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SquaredError comments on Stupid Questions September 2015 - Less Wrong
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Is a major advantage of capitalism that it gives people who are naturally born sociopaths (but highly functioning such that they'll gain considerable influence over people) something do in a game that has at least some rules.
Capitalism sets up rules based on practicality and repeated interactions between people, which means that they actually make sense to follow even if you are purely selfish. In a system where the rules are based on empathy or ideology, the psychopath will have ZERO desire to follow the rules if they won't get caught, but because interacting peacefully in trade with people actually pays off they get incentivized not to just do whatever they might impulsively want.
Another advantage of capitalism is that it limits some of the local power of sociopaths who are heads of families and landowners and such. Money is less entangled in systems of obligation than a more personal set-up.
And, going with Viliam's comment, market power is less threatening than political power, which includes criminal justice and the military. Channel your sociopaths towards dollars, not guns.
Yes, it's Adam Smith's invisible hand at work creating incentives for highly self-interested people to take actions which better society.
Can't tell whether this is sarcasm.
No sarcasm intended.
Why would they feel bound by the rules of capitalism but not by rules of other types of societies?
Because choosing to bind yourself by the rules of capitalism is profitable to them. Just like a psychopath can decide to cooperate in an iterated prisoner's dilemma purely out of self-interest, they can decide to lawfully run a business.
So why can't they decide to lawfully run a barony under feudalism? Or be a lawful satrap/pasha/governor/whatever?
Because you don't generally get to DECIDE to be a baron? You can inherit one, in which case a psychopath can to a large extent do what he wants with it without suffering repercussions, you can be granted one by the king (which is at least SOME sort of incentive system), or you can get a bunch of random guys together, start and army, and take one. At which point you can usually do whatever you want with it.
Of course rich guys can do a lot with the power they have once they have it, but the path to getting it is far more likely to involve helping a lot of people if it needs you to convince a bunch of different people to give you money for your services.
The original question was why would sociopaths bind themselves by the rules of capitalism, but not by rules of other socioeconomic systems. That's a different question than whether sociopaths' climb to the top can be made useful for others.
Because capitalism rewards such compliance, whereas other socioeconomic systems at the least incentivize breaking the rules, and at the worst punish compliance.
You don't rise to barony by following the rules in feudalism.
I don't think so. What you would actually prefer to do is to blow up your competitors and establish a monopoly -- not much different from, say, poisoning your political enemies and acquiring the loyalty of some capable troops in pre-capitalist societies.
In all systems you can ploddingly follow the rules and expect some modest success; or you can break the rules and go for a lot of power/wealth -- at the risk of death/disgrace.
And yet people don't go around blowing up their competitors - except perhaps in the black market, where such behavior, while not exactly routine, also isn't entirely unheard of. There's an incentive structure to deal with that, too, you see, and the risk/reward payoff strongly favors following the rules. Especially if you're the sort of person who -could- take over an entire country in the first place.
It's a bit like democracy and civil war; if you can win the civil war, you'd be better off just winning the election.
I don't know -- do you think the rate of blowing up your competitors in, say, XIX century USA was much different from the rate of poisoning your enemies in e.g. XVII century Persia?
Yep, and there were incentive structures to deal with that in the pre-capitalist societies as well. Polities where everyone is free to poison anyone don't last long...
Indeed. If you can become Tony Soprano and intimidate potential competition into not going into business against you, then you make more money than you would otherwise...
I'd say it's not so much following rules as being productive. The value of capitalism is that embezzlement, bribery and the like are less often the most personally profitable course than they are under other systems.
Every game has rules and every rule can be gamed. What makes you think that sociopaths are rendered less threatening when living in a capitalist society? If anything, it seems like capitalism would be a highly advantageous environment for a sociopath compared to a society where all important economic entities are mired in government oversight.
In a society where government controls everything important, all ambitious sociopaths will aim for government functions.