Posted by
Robert J. Cordingley on
Sep 02, 2007; 11:32pm
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/politics-and-cliques-tp524626p524636.html
Glen,
It seems the world has had for a long time, and still has, oppression,
poverty and poor education of segments of its population. Perhaps we
can say that the developed world has managed to lower their own deprived
segment size while the un(der)developed hasn't made so much progress.
(Do you remember the TADtalk visualization on poverty?) It is
considered by many, including you and me, that having deprived segments
of the world's population is unethical because of the ethical standards
we hold, have learned (and have been indoctrinated in, if you will).
It remains ethical to work towards the reduction and elimination of
these deprived segments - it's a big job. The argument is over how. I
don't believe complexity science or studies and simulations of Complex
Adaptive Systems (CAS) are yet sufficiently mature to help very far in
this endeavor, but I'm not an expert in the field. It just seems that
way from the perspective of an observer.
That complexity studies indicate emergent behavior that is otherwise
hard to predict and matches small systems (ie < 10^6 agents) behavior is
*very* interesting and justifies further work. I don't think it
separates cause and effect which is the primary reason for not using
such studies for predictive purposes. And there is no evidence yet of
successful studies or simulations that model social change, e.g. the
French or Russian Revolutions. (Please correct me if this is wrong).
So it seems that the problems of society (including trying to figure out
what is the 'best' form of government) are not yet subject to relief
from CAS studies. Many would not want one small class of experts to be
responsible for this task anyway.
Going back to your original ethical dilemma, if one agrees with what is
ethical and one's political position doesn't then one will
change/adjust/modify one's political position to maintain one's internal
integrity. Labels and technicalities in definitions may be part of the
problem:
I am a democrat because I believe everyone should have a say in government,
I am an environmentalist because we should take care of our biosphere so
it remains habitable for us,
I am a monarchist because I don't want to disband the Royal Family,
I am libertarian because I don't want a Big Brother government,
I am conservative because I think we shouldn't waste our resources,
I am a republican in the sense I don't want to dismantle the US federal
system and its three branches of government,
I am a capitalist because I believe in free-markets,
I am socialist because I believe everyone deserves basic health care,
education, justice,
I am a moderate because I believe we deserve a system of justice that
can reign in man's excesses.
etc
If complexity science turns out to be a powerful technology it may take
it's place along side fire, nuclear power and genetic engineering. All
are amoral. It's how we use them for our benefit that will exercise our
morals (ethics).
Robert C
Glen E. P. Ropella wrote:
> The sides being a) the ethical consideration of
> things like abject poverty, epidemic diseases, starvation, etc. and b)
> the objective necessity that, with a population-based search method,
> some individuals are destined for extrema, often very unpleasant
> extrema. And it is especially difficult to simultaneously consider both
> sides when the members of the population who are destined for horrible
> extrema like AIDS or starvation are innocents who didn't have any chance
> to _choose_ their extreme destiny.
>
> - --
> glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846,
http://tempusdictum.com> Power never takes a back step - only in the face of more power. -- Malcolm X
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
http://www.friam.org>
>
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