I asked this question before in the politics thread and didn't get any answers: what does political instrumental rationality look like? What kind of political actions is it feasible to take, and how do I evaluate which one to take in a given political situation? Most political discussion among LW types seems to be about political epistemic rationality (figuring out what political positions are more or less likely to have something to do with reality) but I see very little discussion of political instrumental rationality, so I have a very poor understanding of what it's possible to do politically, and consequently I try not to spend time thinking about politics because I don't expect those thoughts to ever translate into actions.
So, a meta-project: figure out what political actions are feasible to take, what kind of resources are necessary to take them, what kind of payoff can be expected from taking them, how much good effective political action does relative to effective altruism and x-risk reduction, etc.
Political instrumental rationality would be about figuring out and taking the political actions that would cause particular goals to happen. Most of this turns out to be telling people compelling things that you know that they don't happen to, and convincing different groups that their interests align (or can align in a particular interest) when it's not obvious that they do.
Political actions are based on appeals to identity, group membership, group bounding, group interests, individual interests, and different political ideas in order to get people to shift allegiances and take action toward a particular goal.
For any given individual, the relative importance of these factors will vary. For questions of identity and affiliation, they will weigh those factors based on meaning being reinforced, and memory-related stuff (i.e. clear memories of meaningful experiences count, but so do not-particularly meaningful but happens every day stuff). For actual action, it will be based on various psychological factors, as well as simply options being available and salient while they have the opportunity to act in a way that reinforces their affiliations/meaning/standing with others in the grou...
Those at the far ends of the political spectrum may not agree that improving the efficiency and efficacy of the liberal democracies LWers tend to live in is a good thing. If you want the US government to fall because it is irretrievably co-opted either by the class interests of a wealthy elite or a pseudo-Christian cult of power-mad propagandists run wild then competent technocratic management is probably contrary to your goals. If you're against government you might want them to be bad at it.
Other areas I would suggest: IP reform, tax code simplicity, science curricula and corporate subsidies. Really, there are tons of things progressives, neoliberals, leftists and libertarians can cooperate on. That part isn't hard. I would guess it is the reactionaries you'd have trouble accommodating. I look forward to seeing if they think this is plausible.
The political identity is not just a label you use for yourself; it usually also comes with some model of the world. It's often confused, some people using the same label may use different models, but I think that to some degree the political labels do pay rent in anticipated experiences. (People just don't check those experiences, or filter them heavily.)
For example, if I don't use any label for myself... but from my opinions it is obvious that I expect government to introduce bureaucracy and pervert good ideas, but I expect private companies to come with good ideas if given proper financial incentives... and someone else expects government to act in the interest of powerless opressed masses, and expects rich and powerful individuals to destroy everything for their own profit... then we kind of didn't use labels, but it's not like we can't easily infer them.
Perhaps even this is a step towards sanity. At least we make our models more visible, and are more likely to come with specific predictions, which may be falsifiable. But we can still be in a situation where our models recommend completely different actions, and an experiment to decide would be too expensive (e.g. we would have...
Those are both things I see strong libertarian support for and little support outside the libertarian sphere.
People have this remarkable tendency to believe that they personally have thought through all their political beliefs, but everybody else is just going along with their political identity. I've seen a handful of people for whom this is the case; the vast majority choose their political identity based on their political beliefs.
Personally I think those who think politics are a mindkiller are just guilty of a jilted hubris; it's easier to claim other people can't change their minds than to accept that your arguments aren't as universally compelling as you thought.
ETA: My point in this comment wasn't the mindkiller parts, it was to point out that what somebody is inclined to believe is a "rational" political belief probably isn't nearly so obviously rational as they would like to think - the opposition probably isn't just mindkilled into opposing it, that is. Your "rational" political beliefs probably have decent evidence and arguments, which is why you hold them; don't assume they're slam-dunks without any decent counterarguments.
A better interpretation is "if I identify with a specific political -ism, I have too many political beliefs".
Yes, it is possible for LW community members to have productive discussions about politics. But not online, only in person (or maybe in small-group video chats). In person, it is possible to defend the quality of discussion by modelling the other participants to find common ground, and by excluding anyone who's particularly disruptive. Once an in-person discussion has formed, no one can dominate it just by spending more of their free time. On the internet, many topics will summon angry outsiders through Google Alerts; people with empty lives dominate because they have more time to spend; and and the participants are too many and too invisible to model.
I was thinking about the hazards of bad government, and wondering if there was a way for the LW community to do something to oppose them.
Crime.
Long ago I was talking to a friend about the used booksellers in Portland. I suggested we form a union to help each other out. He said no, a syndicate was better. We help each other out under the table instead of at the negotiation table. Changed my life for the better to hear that.
Nobody's mentioned electoral reform yet? The current incentive structures for the US two-party system are laughably bad right now.
I've been wondering whether it's worthwhile to try and get people in Silicon Valley behind a local electoral reform (alternative vote or proportional representation or whatever, at the municipal level), on the theory that this is the only way to get momentum for larger-scale reform. Plus, there are plenty of things that seriously need reforming on the local level, but are dominated by the cartel of the few folks who currently vo...
To optimize our influence on the government the rationalist community should focus on stuff that almost no one else cares about but we find extremely important, for example legalizing prediction markets on events that won't happen for at least 20 years and don't involve people dying, or helping to get MIRI $1,000,000 a year of federal research funding.
Instead, I believe there are projects which could appeal to rationalists across a wide range of the political spectrum. A couple I can think of are opposing the war on drugs and improving judicial systems. Any other suggestions?
You won't know whether you're "appeal[ing] to rationalists across a wide range of the political spectrum" unless you actually pursue that as a goal. Trying to find some "project(s) that obviously everyone will agree with if they are rational enough" is emphatically not a good way of doing this.
Trying to do aw...
I think the areas least open (though still not immune) to mind-killing are: 1) better, more consistent evidence for policies (good stats rather than govts commissioning policy-based evidence) 2) developing technical systems so they work better: the more techy the better. Making computer systems for processing pensions, tax or whatever that come in on budget and on spec would be a fantastic start. Though I guess even then, a libertarian might feel that giving the state more powerful and effective systems is counter-productive.
Just because we agree that the war on drugs should be abolished doesn't mean that some of us aren't mindkilled when they think about the topic.
What are the interesting questions about the war on drugs?
Does is make sense to push for the kind of hyper burocratic rules that the Netherlands has or is it better to push for medical marijuana?
Can you legalise all drugs without harming evidence based medicine? What's the incentive for biotech companies and big pharma to fund studies that prove clinical effects if they can legally sell the drugs without having to ...
Life extension is one of the possible things to unite different groups. International Longevity party was created to promote it. http://www.facebook.com/groups/longevity.party/
I can certainly think of quite a few political issues that should be changed. However, any attempt I make to change them has an opportunity cost in that I'm not helping, say, preventing malaria. As such, I don't think it would be a good idea to work together to oppose political issues.
Instead, I believe there are projects which could appeal to rationalists across a wide range of the political spectrum. A couple I can think of are opposing the war on drugs and improving judicial systems.
I suspect that while people from across the political spectrum agree that the judicial system could use improvements, they would strongly disagree on what those improvements are. As for ending the war on drugs, I'm not 100% convinced largely because of the issues raised here and here.
I'm confused about what you're trying to accomplish with this discussion: Yes, the areas I suggested for agreement between liberals and libertarians were general and vague. The point was to cover the wide variety of possible issues, not actually identify specific policy options to agree on.
Policy debates should not appear one sided. At the moment at which it seems to you that as issue is completely on sided it's likely that you don't understand the actual issues that are at stake.
I also feel like the model you are using for different political actors is based on random partisans
No, my model of political actors is partly based on people actual political power in Berlin, which is the city I inhabit.
My reason for thinking this is that I live in Washington DC and hang out with a bunch of lawyers and law students who have thought about such issues for more than two seconds and tend to converge.
Basically you discussed law with people who aren't trained to think politically about law but technically about it. Those people might be thoughtful about the technicality but that doesn't mean that they are thoughtful about the politics behind the law.
I think you make a mistake when you assume that the way lawyers think about laws is representative to how thoughtful people in general think about laws.
I think people on LessWrong agree that Robert Hanson is in general a thoughtful person. Look at this post . There he proposes a way to make our tax system even more complicated. If you would ask Robert Hanson whether he wanted an easier tax code he would say yes. On the other hand he still makes proposals for increasing it's complexity. He isn't even a progressive who's big on government intervention in markets.
If someone like Robert Hanson isn't committed to tax code simplicity, why do you expect an average LessWrong reader to be committed to that idea?
If everyone here researched the mortgage interest tax deduction for a month I'm quite sure the progressives would mostly be on board with eliminating it.
If you get rid of the mortgage interest tax deduction, do you also get rid of support for 401k plans? If not, why do the people who buy real estage for their retirement get less support from the government than the people who invest in 401k plans?
If we don't have government incentives that get people to invest for their retirement, what does society do with those old broke people who can still vote?
My point is really simple actually which is why this extended exchange is so confusing. The question was basically: what are things liberals and libertarians can agree on. I just answered empirically. Look up the opinions of prominent American liberal writers, bloggers, think tanks and wonks on the mortgage interest tax deduction. Look up the opinions of their libertarian counterparts. Look at what economists say about it. There is a ton of agreement!
...Basically you discussed law with people who aren't trained to think politically about law but technically
I was thinking about the hazards of bad government, and wondering if there was a way for the LW community to do something to oppose them, and it occurred to me that we might be picking up the problem by the wrong end.
The usual way of thinking about political action is to start with one's political identity (progressive, libertarian, whatever), and that's likely to put one at odds with people who have opposed identities.
Instead, I believe there are projects which could appeal to rationalists across a wide range of the political spectrum. A couple I can think of are opposing the war on drugs and improving judicial systems. Any other suggestions?