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Konkvistador comments on Rationality Quotes May 2012 - Less Wrong
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There's a threshold where violence, disease and hunger stop being disastrous in our opinion (compare e.g. post-Soviet Eastern Europe to Africa), and that threshold, as we can see, doesn't require brutal authoritarianism to maintain, or even to achieve. Poland has transitioned to a liberal democracy directly after the USSR fell, although its economy was in shambles (and it had little experience of liberalism and democracy before WW2), Turkey's leadership became softer after Ataturk achieved his primary goals of modernization, etc, etc. There's a difference between a country being a horrible hellhole and merely lagging behind in material characteristics; the latter is an acceptable cost for attempting liberal policies to me. I accept that the former might require harsh measures to overcome, but I'd rather see those measures taken by an internally liberal colonial power (like the British Empire) than a local regime.
The actual real people living there, suppose you could ask them, which do you think they would chose? And don't forget those are mere stated preferences, not revealed ones.
If you planted Singapore on their borders wouldn't they try to move there?
Sure, Singapore is much better than Africa; I never said otherwise! However, if given choice, the more intelligent Africans would probably be more attracted to a Western country, where their less tangible needs (like the need for warm fuzzies) would also be fulfilled. Not many Singaporeans probably would, but that's because the Singaporean society does at least as much brainwashing as the Western one!
I don't understand why you think "warm fuzzies" are in greater supply in London than in Singapore. They are both nice places to live, or can be, even in their intangibles. London-brainwashing is one way to inoculate yourself against Singapore-brainwashing, but perhaps there is another way?
Have you been to Singapore for any amount of time? I haven't (my dad had, for a day or so, when he worked on a Soviet science vessel), but I trust Gibson and can sympathize with his viewpoint. At the very least I observe that it does NOT export culture or spread memes. These are not the signs of a vibrant and sophisticated community!
What could you mean by this that isn't trivially false?
I haven't read the Gibson article (but I will). I know that "disneyland" and "the death penalty" are both institutions that are despised by a certain cohort, but they are not universally despised and their admirers are not all warmfuzzophobic psychos. Artist-and-writer types don't flock to Singapore, but they don't flock to Peoria Illinois either do they?
Downvoted without hesitation.
If you have the unvoiced belief that cultural products (especially high-quality ones) and memes are created by some specific breed of "artist-and-writer types" (wearing scarves and being smug all the time, no doubt!), then I'd recommend purging it, seeing as it suggests a really narrow view of the world. A country can have a thriving culture not because artistic people "flock" there, but because they are born there, given an appropriate education and allowed to interact with their own roots and community!
By your logic, "artist-and-writer types" shouldn't just not flock to, but actively flee the USSR/post-Soviet Russia. And indeed many artists did, but enough remained that most people on LW who are into literature or film can probably name a Russian author or Russian movie released in the last half-century. Same goes for India, Japan, even China and many other poor and/or un-Westernized places!
Notice how this more or less refutes the argument you tried to make in the grandparent.
I'm not making the argument that liberal democracy directly correlates to increasing the cultural value produced. Why else would I defend Iran in that particular regard? No, no, the object of my scorn is technocracy (at least, human technocracy) and I'm even willing to tolerate some barbarism rather than have it spread over the world.
What definition of technocracy are you using that excludes the USSR and India before its economic liberalization?
You seem to have read some hostility towards artists and writers into my comment, probably because of "types" and "flock"? These are just writing tics, I intended nothing pejorative.
I hold no such belief, and I'm glad you don't either. I only want to emphasize my opinion that Singapore does have a thriving culture, even if it does not have a thriving literary or film industry. But since you admit you don't know a lot about it I'm curious why you have so much scorn for the place? A city can have something to recommend itself even if it hasn't produced a good author or a good movie.
In short, well, yeah, I hold more "formal" and "portable" culture such as literature, music or video to have relatively more value than the other types of "culture", such as local customs and crafting practices and such - which I assume you meant by "thriving culture" here. All are necessary for harmonious development, but I'd say that e.g. a colorful basket-weaving tradition in one neighborhood which is experienced/participated in by the locals is not quite as important and good to have as an insightful and entertaining story, or a beautiful melody - the latter can still have relevance continents or centuries apart.
Some African tribe can also have a thriving culture like that, but others can't experience it without being born there, it can be unsustainable in the face of technical progress, it can interfere with other things important for overall quality of life (trusting a shaman about medicine can be bad for your health), etc. Overall, you probably get what I'm talking about.
Sure, that's biased and un-PC in a way, but that's the way that I see the world.
(I don't have any scorn for Singapore as a nation and a culture, I just don't care much for a model of society imposed upon it by the national elites in the 20th century that, unlike broadly similar societies in e.g. Japan or even China, doesn't seem to produce those things I value. Even if its GDP per capita is now 50% or so higher than somewhere else. Heck, even Iran - a theocracy that's not well-off and behaves rather irrationally - has been producing acclaimed literature and films, despite censorship.)
It seems to me that if you are talking about artistic achievements that have stood the test of centuries, then you are talking almost exclusively about the west, which I agree is utterly dominant in cultural exports. What I have in mind when I say "Singapore culture is thriving" is that it's a city filled with lovely people going about their business. You could appreciate Singapore culture because you find muslim businessmen or guest worker IT types agreeable -- maybe you like their jokes. You could hate Singapore culture if you instead found muslim businessmen to be vacant and awful. But couldn't we allow that the intelligent african that kicked the discussion off might have either taste? Then we should find out what his tastes are before recommending that he choose London over Singapore.
I read "Disneyland with the death penalty." Gibson's not a very good travel-writer, there's hardly any indication in the article that he spoke to anyone while he was there.
You're not being fair. Singaporeans would have surely produced something to your tastes, if there were a billion of them and their country were two thousand years old.
Konkvistador's point is that third world countries attempting to imitate western countries haven't had much success.
When Turkey was modernizing it sure as heck was looking towards Europe for examples, it just didn't implement democratic mechanisms straight away and restricted religious freedom. And if you look at Taiwan, Japan, Ghana, etc... sure, they might be ruled by oligarchic clans in practice, but other than that [1] they have much more similarities than differences with today's Western countries! Of course a straight-up copy-paste of institutions and such is bound to fail, but a transition with those institutions, etc in mind as the preferred end state seems to work.
[1] Of course, Western countries are ruled by what began as oligarchic clans too, but they got advanced enough that there's a difference. And, for good or ill, they are meritocratic.
I'm not familiar with Ghana, but both Japan and Taiwan had effectively one-party systems while modernizing.
I don't care all that much about political democracy; what I meant is that Japan, India or, looking at the relative national conditions, even Turkey did NOT require some particular ruthlessness to modernize.
edit: derp
Could you explain the meaning of this sentence please. I'm not sure I have grasped it correctly. To me it sounds like that you are saying that there was no ruthlessness involved in Atatürk's modernizing reforms. I assume that's not the case, right?
Compared to China or Industrial Revolution-age Britain? Hell no, Ataturk pretty much had silk gloves on. At least, that's what Wikipedia tells me. He didn't purge political opponents except for one incident where they were about to assassinate him, he maintained a Western facade over his political maneuvering (taking pages from European liberal nationalism of the previous century), etc, etc.
To extent that this is a discussion of quality of life and attractiveness of a country, as opposed to what is strictly speaking necessary for development, it's worth remembering the Armenian genocide.
Really Ataturk was less harsh than Industrial Revolution-age Britain? I find this highly unlikely (unless your taking about their colonial practices in which case the Armenian genocide is relevant). I think the reason you're overestimating the relative harshness of Britain is that Britain had more freedom of speech than other industrializing nations and thus its harshness (such as it was) is better documented.
Taboo 'ruthlessness'. For example Japan was certainly ruthless while modernizing by any reasonable definition.
It didn't fully come into the "Universalist" sphere, ideologically and culturally, until its defeat in WW2, and the most aggressive and violent of its actions were committed in a struggle for expansion against Western dominiance.
Konkvistador's argument would be that it wouldn't of been able to modernize nearly as effectively if it had come into the "Universalist" sphere before industrializing.