For the CCP to declare themselves as “Communist” means they are likely to disregard much granularity that good policy must have
The fact that North Korea someone publically declares themselves to be democratic in the name of their country. That tells you little about how it’s actually governed.
In the last decades the CCP seems to have had an enough people who understand the free market well enough to allow it to operate in a way that produces growth for China.
To the extend that Xi consolidates power I don’t think that the word Communism helps you a lot to understand what’s happening.
The fact that North Korea someone publically declares themselves to be democratic in the name of their country. That tells you little about how it’s actually governed.
Actually, it tells you a lot. Countries with “democratic” in the name are probably far less democratic than nations without it. The point I was making was that calling yourself something conveys information, depending on what you call yourself. Calling oneself communist has a positive correlation with other countries who called themselves communists. Whether they behave according to the ill-conceived utopian ideology doesn’t really matter, what matters is that we can increase our credences that they will behave in certain ways. Clearly, this is dependent on subject: Calling oneself a good driver probably conveys very little information. So, you can’t dismiss it based off counterexamples in different areas. Otherwise, you could say that since people who claim to always tell the truth sometimes don’t tell the truth, someone who claims to sometimes lie might be lying about lying (which is a ridiculous conclusion).
To say that calling oneself communist contains no information at all seems extremely unlikely to me, just based on all the other countries that have done so, even if I didn’t know of the recent changes in China. I’ve become more confident in this view from listening to people who can read and speak fluent Chinese and who have lived there for over a decade, and who saw first-hand the rolling back of free market rules.
To change my mind about communism not providing any info, you’d have to show how you built your reference class to reach that conclusion.
This would make sense if China was a black box of which we only knew the official name.
ETA: The point being that we have tons and tons of much more relevant evidence on their behavior than what they chose to call themselves 100 years ago.
When you have a government that identifies as Communist, that’s a threat that needs to be taken seriously. The evidence I’ve looked at this threat to evaluate this threat is anecdotal…
It’s a perfectly reasonable jumping off point to get into the specifics. I agree that if you have a more specific reference class, you should use it (I’ve made that point myself before, “holding your IQ test results in your hand and refusing to read it because ‘The average is 100, so I probably got 100’”).
I don’t think the problem with China’s COVID policy is disregard for granularity. Zero COVID used to be a good strategy but now it doesn’t. The problem isn’t that the zero-COVID strategy lacks granularity but that a strategic change would be necessary given the higher transmissibility of the Omicron variant.
That strategic change doesn’t happen because of the sunk cost bias and because powerful people have their careers invested in the strategy. I don’t think the strategic change doesn’t happen because China’s leadership believes that changing the strategy would go against communist ideals.
Again, as I mentioned in my earlier response, ideals don’t have anything to do with the claim. The claim is that countries that call themselves communist make large policy errors more frequently due to heavy-handed policies. The thing you label yourself with provides some information. That information might be contrary to what you want to portray (as in the case of countries with “democratic” in their name), but it’s valid Bayesian information nevertheless.
Changing policy based on different circumstances is certainly part of granularity. It’s granularity with respect to time and circumstance.
Ah well, hoped to bring you over, but I’ll agree to disagree.
I see only one big policy error. If you argue that China frequently made policy errors in the last year, what errors do you see besides COVID-19 policy?
The fact that North Korea someone publically declares themselves to be democratic in the name of their country. That tells you little about how it’s actually governed.
In the last decades the CCP seems to have had an enough people who understand the free market well enough to allow it to operate in a way that produces growth for China.
To the extend that Xi consolidates power I don’t think that the word Communism helps you a lot to understand what’s happening.
Actually, it tells you a lot. Countries with “democratic” in the name are probably far less democratic than nations without it. The point I was making was that calling yourself something conveys information, depending on what you call yourself. Calling oneself communist has a positive correlation with other countries who called themselves communists. Whether they behave according to the ill-conceived utopian ideology doesn’t really matter, what matters is that we can increase our credences that they will behave in certain ways. Clearly, this is dependent on subject: Calling oneself a good driver probably conveys very little information. So, you can’t dismiss it based off counterexamples in different areas. Otherwise, you could say that since people who claim to always tell the truth sometimes don’t tell the truth, someone who claims to sometimes lie might be lying about lying (which is a ridiculous conclusion).
To say that calling oneself communist contains no information at all seems extremely unlikely to me, just based on all the other countries that have done so, even if I didn’t know of the recent changes in China. I’ve become more confident in this view from listening to people who can read and speak fluent Chinese and who have lived there for over a decade, and who saw first-hand the rolling back of free market rules.
To change my mind about communism not providing any info, you’d have to show how you built your reference class to reach that conclusion.
This would make sense if China was a black box of which we only knew the official name.
ETA: The point being that we have tons and tons of much more relevant evidence on their behavior than what they chose to call themselves 100 years ago.
Exactly, which is why I looked further into it:
It’s a perfectly reasonable jumping off point to get into the specifics. I agree that if you have a more specific reference class, you should use it (I’ve made that point myself before, “holding your IQ test results in your hand and refusing to read it because ‘The average is 100, so I probably got 100’”).
I think this claim has aged pretty well. Do you still disagree with this statement?
I don’t think the problem with China’s COVID policy is disregard for granularity. Zero COVID used to be a good strategy but now it doesn’t. The problem isn’t that the zero-COVID strategy lacks granularity but that a strategic change would be necessary given the higher transmissibility of the Omicron variant.
That strategic change doesn’t happen because of the sunk cost bias and because powerful people have their careers invested in the strategy. I don’t think the strategic change doesn’t happen because China’s leadership believes that changing the strategy would go against communist ideals.
Again, as I mentioned in my earlier response, ideals don’t have anything to do with the claim. The claim is that countries that call themselves communist make large policy errors more frequently due to heavy-handed policies. The thing you label yourself with provides some information. That information might be contrary to what you want to portray (as in the case of countries with “democratic” in their name), but it’s valid Bayesian information nevertheless.
Changing policy based on different circumstances is certainly part of granularity. It’s granularity with respect to time and circumstance.
Ah well, hoped to bring you over, but I’ll agree to disagree.
I see only one big policy error. If you argue that China frequently made policy errors in the last year, what errors do you see besides COVID-19 policy?