Yes, elections produce stupid results. Is there an alternative?
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johnh865's recent activity
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Comment on Batman: Caped Crusader gender-flipped The Penguin as Batman had "a lack of good villains" in ~tv
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What do congressmen actually do? The work life of US Congress.
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Comment on A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentWhat exactly are you comparing to? We have about three choices. We can trust ignorant voters to make the hiring decisions through elections. We can trust a benevolent dictator or hierarchy. Or we...What exactly are you comparing to? We have about three choices. We can trust ignorant voters to make the hiring decisions through elections. We can trust a benevolent dictator or hierarchy. Or we can trust a deliberative assembly.
If you think democracy is a good thing, IMO a deliberative Citizens assembly is a far superior hiring procedure than an election. Do you disagree? Do you think elections competently hire the best personnel?
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Comment on A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentIn the Irish context, Citizens' Assemblies were explicitly used to solve the abortion and gay marriage issue. The Citizens' Assembly overwhelmingly voted to support abortion and gay marriage...? Like, someone tried it and it has SOLVED climate change?
In the Irish context, Citizens' Assemblies were explicitly used to solve the abortion and gay marriage issue. The Citizens' Assembly overwhelmingly voted to support abortion and gay marriage whilst the politicians were too scared to legislate on it. This ultimately led to a referendum and Constitutional Amendment where normal citizens had to drive through the change.
In the Irish context, the citizens have also been far more aggressive in tackling climate change compared to their elected counterparts. Of course because Citizens' Assemblies only have power to render recommendations, these recommendations were safely ignored by their legislature. The legislature instead settled on government mandated carbon targets rather than explicit policies such as carbon and meat taxes as recommended by citizens.
This is sort of important, because Ireland has one of the most advanced democracies in the world. Ireland uses a sophisticated ranked choice voting algorithm called "Single Transferable Vote" to elect their politicians. Even with the best technology, politicians turn out to be unrepresentative in terms of core issues such as abortion and climate change.
democracy has been hijacked by unlimited money to influence media and narrative.
I'll go ahead and claim that elections are intrinsically hijacked by money and media. Elections and money go hand-in-hand since the dawn of democracy 2000 years ago. Elected regimes by their nature select the most popular of us. The most popular can only be created through mass media. Because we live in jurisdictions of millions, it is impossible for us to personally know the popular. We rely on mass media to tell us who is popular. Popularity can only be achieved by putting in time, effort, and money into becoming popular. Normal, regular citizens will never be popular.
Imagine we banned all campaign donations tomorrow. The only people who have a shot in running in this world are the already popular or already have the wealth to run a campaign. Rich and famous celebrities who can pivot their fame and wealth into office.
Imagine the world where election campaigns are funded solely by the government proportionate to previous year's results. Now we have a world that empowers the status quo politicians against any upstarts. Political connections and insider trading are what get you power.
if you want electoral reforms you just first create a utopia. If normal people had time, money, resources and expertise, we wouldn't need government at all whatsoever.
The point of sortition is to facilitates this. Sortition gives ordinary people power - time, money, and resources - through lottery. In sortition, you pay people to participate for long periods of time. This is logistically feasible because we don't have to pay the entire public, we just need to pay a small sample.
Sortition is therefore a far, far more practical way to achieve an informed deliberative body compared to the typical liberal progressive belief that we need more, more, more education to solve our election woes.
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Comment on A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentI'm not opposed to meritocracy, but I think any meritocracy must be constructed from below rather than above. In my opinion the best device to construct a meritocracy is a Citizens' Assembly....I'm not opposed to meritocracy, but I think any meritocracy must be constructed from below rather than above.
In my opinion the best device to construct a meritocracy is a Citizens' Assembly.
- Select citizens by lot to form a Citizens' Assembly
- Give these citizens the task of hiring bureaucrats, advisors, and executive officers.
- Give these citizens the time and compensation and full powers of a deliberative body.
With the powers of a full deliberative body, citizens can now interview dozens, hundreds of applicants. Citizens can solicit and read resumes. Citizens can go through a full, typical job candidate interview process. Citizens can hire staff to aid in hiring more staff. Then after hiring, citizens can go through a full job performance review.
In sortition, the meritocracy is therefore reconstructed through a deliberative interviewing and job search process instead of an election process. No more campaign circus and need for mass marketing. The cacophony of the political campaign is replaced with a typical resumes, interviews, and job performance review. In my opinion that's a superior way to form a meritocracy.
Hiring and firing staff is one of the core jobs of any legislature or Parliament. That is why constructing a bureaucracy and therefore meritocracy is one of the jobs that any sortition-based legislature would also carry out.
In the process you propose, some entity still needs to go through the difficult job of establishing "pre-qualification". With my principle that meritocracy should be established from below than above, I'll claim that a Citizens' Assembly is the best kind of organization to do this job.
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Comment on A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentIf you wish to break a paywall there is something called scihub.If you wish to break a paywall there is something called scihub.
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Comment on A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentSure, corruption is a problem with both sortition and election. With both, assembly participants can take bribes either during or after service. Sortition unfortunately doesn't fix this particular...There is already corruption in my country from the fact that after someone leaves offfice in the senate they know they can land a cushy consultant or talking head job if they "play ball", so to speak.
Sure, corruption is a problem with both sortition and election. With both, assembly participants can take bribes either during or after service. Sortition unfortunately doesn't fix this particular problem. So if you're going to be comparing systems of government, neither sortition nor election has a clear advantage here.
There are some smaller advantages though. Businesses typically seek politicians as employees for their lobbying prowess and political competence. Politicians form intimate relationships with bureaucrats and other elected officers, as these officers may serve for many years or decades at a time. Politicians therefore make excellent lobbyists.
However in sortition, everyone serves finite terms of at most 0-4 years. That means the relationships formed will never be as solid as in an elected regime. You'll never be able to call up your legislative buddies 5 years from your service. You might have relationships with bureaucrats but they'll also never be as solid as ones formed by elected politicians.
Sortition-selected jurors are inferior employees with inferior lobbying skills and inferior connections compared to an elite elected politician. Elected politicians by the nature of the job must become very good at making social connections and marketing and sales. Therefore companies get much less bang-for-buck for hiring jurors compared to politicians.
In sortition this job offer is therefore a much less compelling bribe. You can still be fired at any time, moreover if a juror has already voted in your company's favor, you have no obligation to return the favor. A secret ballot at the final decision might also make verification of quid-pro-quo difficult for the business.
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A new way to self govern - the selection of representatives by lottery
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Comment on Tildes fundraiser June 2023: Encourage an app developer (me) to work on a Tildes app faster, by donating to Tildes (not me)! in ~tildes
johnh865 Link@deimos, why don't you consider a for profit consumer cooperative model? The difference here is that you eventually transition the site towards community ownership. Yet, with a profit motive...@deimos, why don't you consider a for profit consumer cooperative model? The difference here is that you eventually transition the site towards community ownership. Yet, with a profit motive hopefully there are incentives for community expansion.
I think a small problem with contemporary coops is lack of participation from most owner members. I think problems with participation can be mitigated using a sortition, lottocratic style of governance where small samples of owner members are drafted and compensated for participation in governance.
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Comment on The case for abolishing elections in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentJuries are chaotic because they are idiotically designed. Juries operate oftentimes via unanimous rule, meaning a single juror could throw the trial into disarray. Juries use a terrible sample...Juries are chaotic because they are idiotically designed. Juries operate oftentimes via unanimous rule, meaning a single juror could throw the trial into disarray. Juries use a terrible sample size that guarantees high variation from one sample to another.
A randomly selected legislature uses a scientific sample 1 to 2 orders magnitude greater in size - 100 to 1000 jurors. Moroever legislatures typically operate via majority rule, which tends towards the median preference of the sample. These sample sizes will produce a far more stable political preference distribution.
Random sampling is the ideal way to achieve proportional representation. The sample will nearly perfectly match the distribution of American in terms of political party affiliation. It will also better match gender, class, race, ethnic, and every conceivable category you can imagine.
In other words the median political preference from one sample to another is going to be roughly invariant, especially when statisticians can optimize the sample size to minimize deviation.
It's chaos to rely on a single coin toss. It's not chaotic when you flip that coin 1000 times and find the results to be about 50/50 heads/tails.
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Comment on The case for abolishing elections in ~misc
johnh865 Link ParentI think sortition has the opposite problem that you describe. A legislative sortition body has the financial powers of the state - including the ability to compensate themselves. The worry isn't...I think sortition has the opposite problem that you describe. A legislative sortition body has the financial powers of the state - including the ability to compensate themselves. The worry isn't that those in service would be financially harmed. It's the opposite. The worry is that those in service would exploit the system to financially benefit themselves. Which is why a sortition system would need a system of checks and balances to keep jurors in check.
I'd also prefer to keep service voluntary with high compensation as the carrot. Therefore the wealthy have incentive not to serve except for the greater good whilst the lower class have every incentive to serve.
So for things such as loss of employment, that can be easily remedied by legislation. Generous unemployment benefits and severance package. The law could even be used to force/incentivize employers to rehire jurors.
The sortition body would assuredly be motivated to provide such benefits.
Moreover I don't think sortition is well suited to small municipal governments where there may be less than a dozen elected officials. Sortition depends on the large of law numbers to draw large numbers of people and thereby benefit from the diversity and wisdom of crowds. A small government cannot afford such a large sampling.
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The case for abolishing elections
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Can ‘the people’ solve climate change? France decided to find out.
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Comment on Why Jeff Bezos must be stopped before it’s too late in ~finance
johnh865 Link ParentThere is a consensus among Egyptologists that the Great Pyramids were not built by slaves. Rather, it was farmers who built the pyramids during flooding, when they could not work in their lands.
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Comment on Trump mounts campaign for more debates against Biden in ~news
johnh865 Link ParentDismissing minor parties is probably the smartest thing to do in a "First Past The Post" plurality voting system. Minor parties will always spoil your second favorite candidate; that's how the...Dismissing minor parties is probably the smartest thing to do in a "First Past The Post" plurality voting system. Minor parties will always spoil your second favorite candidate; that's how the mathematics of voting works out.
This isn't just a "meme" but a cold hard reality of how our voting system works. Indeed our system does create an inbred duopoly of two bad choices. But if you want to change that, you need to change the voting system.
Therefore it's in mine and society's best interest to criticize and de-legitimize third parties. The appropriate way for extremist candidates to compete is to compete within the Democratic and Republican primary system. That for example is exactly what people like Ron Paul, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Occasio Cortez, etc etc have successfully done. These Libertarians and Socialists have obtained substantially more power within the primary system than the Green or Libertarian candidate ever has. That for example is exactly what the typical strategy the Democratic Socialists of America do to get their people elected into office - challenging Democrats in the Democratic primaries.
It's in my strategic interest therefore to make fun of third parties, to emphasize their gaffs, and to ensure that you don't vote third party, and convert you to a straight-party Democrat or Republican. The appropriate avenue for you to challenge the party is with primary challenges.
Indeed our system has idiotic foibles. One important component of plurality elections is that these elections are extremely manipulable to political strategy. For example, the typical layman might not understand viable voting strategies and indeed may waste their vote. If you don't like the way things are, what you need to advocate for is fundamental electoral reform into:
- Newer voting systems such as ranked choice voting, scored voting, Condorcet voting, and a plethora of methods.
- Proportional voting systems such as party list, Single-Transferable-Vote (STV), Mixed-Member-Proportional (MMP), etc.
- Direct democracy methods such as Citizens Assemblies and sortition methods. Citizens Assemblies are in my opinion the ultimate version of scalable direct democracy with near perfect proportional representation.
But until the necessary reforms are put into place, a vote for a third party will always spoil your second favorite, causing your most hated option to win. That's how the math will work out. Plurality systems do not work correctly when voters do not behave strategically but rather vote for their "honest favorite". Indeed you can observe this phenomenon in plurality and alternative voting system simulations: http://electionscience.github.io/vse-sim/VSE/
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Comment on Wood heaters too dirty to sell are clean enough to be donated to Native American tribes and Appalachian communities for a tax deduction, says EPA in ~enviro
johnh865 Link ParentI believe the ideal use of wood in a green economy is as construction material, where the wood can sequester the carbon for many decades.I believe the ideal use of wood in a green economy is as construction material, where the wood can sequester the carbon for many decades.
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Comment on Wood heaters too dirty to sell are clean enough to be donated to Native American tribes and Appalachian communities for a tax deduction, says EPA in ~enviro
johnh865 Link ParentWood burning for home use is supposed to be very bad for your health. Clean wood burning, if it exists, would be better for your health because people wouldn't be breathing in the particles. We'd...Wood burning for home use is supposed to be very bad for your health. Clean wood burning, if it exists, would be better for your health because people wouldn't be breathing in the particles. We'd rather have the byproducts contained rather than released into the air.
Not all combustion processes emit the same byproducts. I'm by no means an expert but there's a reason why diesel engines for example are considered more dirty - their combustion happens at higher temperatures which tend to create more nitrogen oxide "NOX" emissions. Wood by its nature is not a "clean" fuel in that wood has not been refined to be more chemically pure than typical oil & gas products. Therefore wood emits a lot more "bad chemicals" than a cleaner fuel. This is a concern when you're burning this wood right in your home.
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Comment on Tower of God - Final in ~anime
johnh865 LinkI used to follow the manga but then it got copy-right noticed, and then the official English translation was terrible. Stopped at I think the "pain train" arc. I guess I'm interested what...I used to follow the manga but then it got copy-right noticed, and then the official English translation was terrible. Stopped at I think the "pain train" arc. I guess I'm interested what ultimately happens, is it worth it to find out?
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Comment on What 'classic' bands or artists do you think are overrated? And can you suggest any alternatives? in ~music
johnh865 Link ParentRadiohead is really fucking good live. Other bands are not so great live. So yeah Bonaroo 2012. Radiohead is the first major act for Day 1. I'm there with no expectations; I've listened to and...Radiohead is really fucking good live. Other bands are not so great live.
So yeah Bonaroo 2012. Radiohead is the first major act for Day 1. I'm there with no expectations; I've listened to and enjoyed their music but wasn't a fanatic. Radiohead starts singing their siren's song and everyone, enchanted by their music, move towards the stage in unison for a closer listen. The set is amazing and every song has been rearranged for a new fresh listen. Radiohead was so fucking good the next big set, Red Hot Chili Peppers, started their set with "damn that Radiohead show was amazing". Anyways Radiohead blew away every other act in the rest of the music festival.
So yeah, one live show and a timely smoked joint cemented for me their status as one of the greatest bands.
Nobody cared when Spiderman gender flipped doc Octavius. Actually the new character was even cooler than the old one.