Re: Evolution in action (was: Re Kidney-nappers)

Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
11 Sep 1997 10:03:31 +0200


Eric Watt Forste <arkuat@pigdog.org> writes:

> Anders Sandberg writes:
> > True. This is the major reason I don't think market solutions
> > always produce the best results as perceived by human individuals;
> > markets can organise to produce good results for other entities
> > than humans, such as corporations.
>
> Yes, this is true, but the only alternative usually presented
> to market solutions is political solutions, which have the
> exact same failings: political systems can organise to produce
> good results for other entities than humans, such as
> governments.

Good point. I have been looking at the Swedish political arena
for some time, and it is very clear that it is not intended for
the benefits of humans, just a group of organizations. After all,
we do not elect individual politicians, just their parties,
and through memetic selection organizations which make the
fitness lansdcape nicer for organizations will prosper. There
are some interesting cases of co-evolution and symbiosis
(I suppose one could call it conspiracy, but I prefer a biological
formalism) which leads to the formation of stable structures
with very little interest in individual humans. Of course,
many humans adapt to this to get maximal benefit from the present
structures, creating career politicians, bureaucrats and wellfare-
addicts.

All in all, it seems that our problem is that we have metaorganisms
around that doesn't help, and often hinder, transhuman progress.
The big question is how to deal with this, and what kinds of interactions
(and ethics) we should develop between individuals and metaorganisms.

-- 
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Anders Sandberg                                      Towards Ascension!
asa@nada.kth.se                            http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/
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