• 0 Posts
  • 305 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: July 3rd, 2023

help-circle
  • The same threat that democracy faces, it’s vulnerable to charismatic people who become entrenched and draconian. I’m not convinced it can ever work without some competing force that resists the consolidation of power, such as highly educated and politically involved populace.

    Communism probably works at smaller scales but for larger populations it would only be feasible when the leadership is benevolent. A robot administrator would be an interesting experiment.


  • The situation where a candidate is rejected because they don’t have relevant experience is often decided by people who don’t have that experience either. The last thing I want is a job where I immediately know how to do it. That’s often the reason to leave - it’s boring and not a challenge any more.

    The market is probably flat right now and that’s the reason there’s no jobs. You have to hang in there for a bit and wait for an upturn.











  • The democratic party per se isn’t the problem.

    First past the post democracies always result in what we have now. The democratic party will completely disappear under proportional representation. In it’s place you will see a proliferation of the power that is being grimly clasped by the corporate kleptocracy and their minions. Instead of 1% deciding how we manage our society, everyone gets a say.



  • I don’t think it’s necessary to have a formal education in any subject, it’s more of a shortcut in the best case. An open curiosity and some logic for mitigating the biases from our reasoning is probably sufficient.

    Superficially that is the appeal of Harris, he is articulate and strong on logic but it will only carry an idea so far. His stance on atheism is a good example of limitations of a purely rational approach to living in the world. I agree with his point that we probably would be better off without religion but we still need some of the spiritual elements. I suppose he would argue that he obtains this from an introspective practice which make his blind spots all the more surprising, given his obvious expertise in the area of self awareness e.g. Waking Up app and book. There’s some interesting insight on this point by the producers of Decoding the Gurus podcast where they recently mused the rise of fascism. One other podcast on the fringe of philosophy that I’ve found entertaining and informative is The Very Bad Wizards, it’s run by scholars for fun but I first became aware of many of the basic philosophical tenets there.

    Thanks for the links, appreciate it.