Dave5 comments on Contaminated by Optimism - Less Wrong

10 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 06 August 2008 12:26AM

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Comment author: Dave5 06 August 2008 12:40:12AM 0 points [-]

In my darker moments, I think that every human political tendency is just an instance of this very problem. Terry Pratchett (our most underrated explicator and critic of both Traditional Rationality and Bourgeois Morality) described it most pithily as "Wouldn't It Be Nice, If Everyone Was Nice". It's most obvious on the left, but can be seen on the right and libertarian tendencies as well.