From: Camp, Christopher (CCamp@omm.com)
Date: Wed Aug 21 2002 - 13:11:26 MDT
Democracy is a critical component to any future. The way we decide to move
forward will help determine what is possible. The political mechanisms now
in place are hindering our ability to move forward. Many citizens are not
trained to be effective participants in this democratic government. For
society to undergo the sorts of changes being discussed on this board in a
secure and safe manner more people in this country and around the world will
have to be involved in the decision making process. Changing the species is
a species level decision - if rogue nations or individuals decide to act
alone and move forward without an effective system of support they invite
rogue actions to derail their efforts of ascension.
When the market is consistently described as an economic realm its power is
decreased. The market should be seen to include the entire world of human
and non-human action. Marketplaces may be seen as fundamentally democratic
in that each action is given a causal vote in determining the future state
of the world.
Political democracy may also be seen as a part of the market - where the
forces of elections, popular opinion, natural disasters, economics,
international relations, education and everything else are in some manner
weighted and used to come to a decision. Economists have long acknowledged
the fact that markets are 'imperfect' due primarily to a lack of perfect
information. An example - A consumer is shopping for a car but is not aware
of all the useful information, namely the relative reliability of each
model, the cost per mile over the lifetime of the car, the resale value, the
complete safety details, the various costs at local dealerships and over the
internet.... obviously gathering this information has a cost (time,
transport, magazines, etc...) and this consumer will end up buying a car in
a state of imperfect knowledge. A voter also has many unanswered questions.
We constantly act in this state of imperfect knowledge (who knows every
aspect of any decision?) and it can be seen to decrease efficiency in any
market it occurs in.
(Of course at some level we may decide to keep certain inefficiencies so
that we may be able to keep a certain level of privacy. The market has a
desire to move toward a state of perfect information and unless all market
participants have access to the information in one another's heads this
condition of perfection will be unfulfilled.)
Collaborative filtering, cell phone internet messaging and American Idol
style voting will all find themselves participants in the political system.
The more quickly they are integrated, the more people are educated (at a
proficiency and college) the higher the probability that transhuman memes
will become widely popularized and implemented. How can we on this board
move forward and make these dreams not only real but happen in a way that
will be morally acceptable? If the ideas here are so powerful and correct
then simply airing them honestly will result in the world choosing this
course - the course that they see as most beneficial. In this sense
democracy is the best route to a transhuman future.
Chris
www.killtherich.com
-----Original Message-----
From: nano-brain [mailto:OooJeffbaureooo@aol.com]
Sent: Wednesday, August 21, 2002 5:18 AM
To: extropians@extropy.org
Subject: extropians, what about democracy ?
The combined knowledges contributing here is a jewel:
artificial intelligence & cognitive sciences, artificial life & complexity
sciences, evolutionary computation, learning systems that deliver expertize
or
artificial assistants for diagnosis & interpretation, etc...
you do believe that science & technology will engineer an improved human ? I
do, in many ways.
But how do you think these trans-humans will organize collectivelly ?
Are you satisfied with a rare, unique, quasi-binary vote to express your
preferences for collective destiny ? i am not.
Don't you think treasures of responsability, goodwill & expertize are merely
ignored by our representative democracies ? I do.
Do you think our political organizations generate enought understanding &
anticipation to cope with the complexity of our world ? I don't.
Do you think our organization and its decisionnal chains are sufficiently
immune from private, corporate or individual interests ? I don't.
Progressive groups often mention direct democracy & the prospects of a
growing
communication sphere. But what about real team-work, collaborative
thinking,
collective intelligence ?
AI decribes how the creation of collective mental maps (or CMMs, superposed
.
to the web) could be spaces for collaborative intelligence. I'm not a
.
specialist, by far, but buzzing over the net, it seemed to me that AI has
.
explored many heuristics that could inspire us to make the most of us, as
.
individuals, sure, but more clearly as a collective
.
These are technological visions: you need a computer & internet access to
.
exist as a citizen, or a cellular phone, and raises many questions
.
Collective intelligence seems to manifest through interactions or the
expression of political preferences & a positive feedback of some sort. Can
you figure out a new way to collect all our political preferences or even
create new ones at need ?
What about a game ?
a huge network advanced *strategy* game, maybe a future version of the
"Civilization" game ? This could be a fun way to implement a CMM.
A successfull network/web game could implement a flexible & learnable
intelligence instructed via the game play (~vote), human conversations, web
ressources, any available quantitative data, news & events,...
It would understand human language, could run remote computer models made
available by reseachers or individuals but would have its own modelling &
computing capabilities.
It could maintain a wide & precise collective mental map and help to build
new political consensusses though preserving conceptual/idological freedom &
creativity.
It would have a trick to detect manifestations of disguised coalition of
interests.
It could foresee futures and their probability of occurrence. It could
anticipate problems or crisis, seeing them as germs or potentialities. It
could also foresee the impact of political measures before real
implementation. A great tool for collective planification, organization, and
problem solving.
We would *vote* at ideas' level by contributing to a game. Not for a whole
political package or a human contender.
Not by playing against each other, but each learning to contribute to our
best
to collective interests, in complex & changing times.
It would be a gentle political wizard, driven by collective preferences &
finding in individuals goodwilling relays in real-world.
Is that a non-sensical dream ?
please share your views.
jeff
---- This message was posted by nano-brain to the Extropians 2002 board on ExI BBS. <http://www.extropy.org/bbs/index.php?board=61;action=display;threadid=52853 >
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