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Phlebas comments on Should LessWrong be Interested in the Occupy Movements? - Less Wrong Discussion

-7 Post author: DBreneman 25 November 2011 06:06AM

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Tags: occupywallstreet economics politics societalchange

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Comment author: [deleted] 25 November 2011 11:54:59AM *  11 points [-]

Since early October, I've been closely following Occupy Wall Street [...] As it's grown though, I've been thinking that there might be a couple of things happening in the movements that might be of interest to rationalist communities.

I want to co-opt an explicitly non-political community to join in my favoured political movement.

I've not seen much discussion of Occupy and its tactics on LessWrong, and I think that if nothing else, they're at least interesting, so I thought I'd open it up here.

They’re at least interesting, but that isn’t why I thought I’d open it up here.

Each Occupy movement is a hotbed of community experimentation. Things like General Assemblies (horizontally democratic voting discussions to make policy decisions) and ad-hoc sanitation, fire, and security committees of all shapes and sizes are popping up all over. What's more, as the events grow in size, and as police pressure on the events rises, these constructs are going to be tested more and more. We have a wildly varied gene pool, strong environmental constraints, and a fast mutation rate. It's a big evolutionary experiment in community formation. And I think if we look closely, we can find a whole lot of useful hacks to make stronger communities.

We are very, very strong monkey tribe. Join us, can’t you taste the power?

And I'm not exactly strong in the ways of rationality yet, still reading and re-reading the Sequences

Re-read this post.

Comment author: RichardKennaway 25 November 2011 01:59:40PM 4 points [-]

I think this post is even more required reading. "A big evolutionary experiment in community formation" may just as easily produce monsters as any desirable sort of "stronger communities". In fact, maybe it's doing that already. (Thanks to Eugine_Nier for that link, and see more from that writer on the subject here.)

Comment author: [deleted] 25 November 2011 02:27:02PM *  5 points [-]

Or perhaps no evolutions for corporations or nanodevices. "Evolutionary" metaphors should be strictly secondary to substantive arguments regarding the direction of some community.

Comment author: fortyeridania 25 November 2011 03:42:58PM 8 points [-]

I voted this down because I disapprove of the sarcastic "translations" of OP. Such rhetoric antagonizes (me, anyway), which makes taking sides easier than it otherwise would be. There's some irony there.

Bravo for recommending a specific post for the author to read, though.

Comment author: RobertLumley 25 November 2011 05:08:55PM 4 points [-]

Upvoted for having been downvoted for explaining a downvote. I don't think anyone should be downvoted for explaining a vote - that discourages their explanation, which isn't good.

Comment author: [deleted] 25 November 2011 04:05:55PM 4 points [-]

Disingenuity deserves skewering. The attempt to dress up political recruitment as "interesting to rationalists", whilst claiming naivety, is disingenuous.

Incidentally I would say the same thing if someone asked if LWers should be interested in putting their weight behind the Tea Party movement (of whom it could also be said that their "goal is lasting societal change, and they have a good deal of momentum already") or any other political group.

Comment author: DBreneman 25 November 2011 06:23:52PM 4 points [-]

That wasn't my core intent, and I'm sorry I angered you by making it look like it was. Honestly I'm a bit of a pop-politics junkie. I also followed the tea party closely, as well as the campaigns of minor candidates like ron paul, because I found it interesting to see how well non-core-party rhetoric would work.

I guess I wanted LW to have a discussion page about it or something because we are a big powerful monkey tribe, and because the stupid ancestral part of my brain respects that, and wants to see what the tribe thinks of my interests. Putting in that little bit about potentially getting involved in the party was going too far, and I'm sorry about that.

Comment author: [deleted] 25 November 2011 11:19:01PM *  5 points [-]

Actually, a quick google search of your username leads me to believe you. I apologise for being harsh. Your post came across very badly because of that "little bit", which seemed like its focal point, though. Perhaps you were unaware of the strong taboo against overtly political discussion here.

I would suggest you sate your interest in politics and community organisation by reading books instead. Implying no necessary endorsement of any of these thinkers, here are some that you might find interesting: The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli is the original article; Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals should be relevant to understanding OWS; (selections from) Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks outlines progressive bureaucratic incrementalism; Mencius Moldbug's political writings offer a reactionary perspective; The Machiavellians by James Burnham is a lesser known classic of political science from the mid-20th century; and Public Opinion by Walter Lippmann discusses the interaction of journalism and democracy.

Comment author: Vladimir_M 26 November 2011 03:17:51AM *  5 points [-]

The Machiavellians by Robert Burnham is a lesser known classic of political science from the mid-20th century;

That would be James Burnham. The book certainly can't be recommended highly enough, though! The opening essay clicks particularly strongly with some of the central OB/LW themes about signaling.

Comment author: [deleted] 26 November 2011 10:51:23AM 0 points [-]

Thanks, fixed. Duh.

Comment author: DBreneman 26 November 2011 04:16:04AM 3 points [-]

Thanks for that, it looks like a great selection. The only one of those I've read before is The Prince, and that was a long, long time ago. I definitely need to track all of those down and give my brain a nice warm bath.

I'd read about politics being the mind killer and all that, and that makes my mistakes even more silly in retrospect. I think I wanted my main focus to be on looking at what's useful/worth discussing about the movements, and whether or not they're something that knowledge could be gained from. I thought that would be apolitical enough, but then I went and injected politics into it anyway.

Comment author: lessdazed 25 November 2011 06:31:41PM *  2 points [-]

We are very, very strong monkey tribe. Join us, can’t you taste the power?

I interpreted that paragraph about being more, "Come. We show tree with young of third tribe. We show how raid third tribe for meat. Gift to you! No obligation join our tribe in fight," after reading:

And at the risk of sounding like a James Bond villain, there are some serious options for us to take over the world here. In the sense at least that the Occupy movements' goal is lasting societal change, and they have a good deal of momentum already. If members of the rationalist community moved to help them, they might have a fair deal more. And if we introduce them to rational ways of thinking, if we inject those memes into the discussion, there's some serious opportunity here to help stop the world being so insane.

That last quote is the "We strong, join" one.

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