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Date:      Wed, 28 Aug 2002 01:39:04 -0700
From:      Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com>
To:        Dave Hayes <dave@jetcafe.org>
Cc:        Lawrence Sica <lomifeh@earthlink.net>, Giorgos Keramidas <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr>, Ceri Davies <setantae@submonkey.net>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Why did evolution fail?
Message-ID:  <3D6C8C28.E64C085B@mindspring.com>
References:  <200208280603.g7S63h198402@hokkshideh2.jetcafe.org>

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Dave Hayes wrote:
> Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> writes:
> > It's the consensus that a consensus defines correctness.  8-).
> 
> Unfortunately, adherence to this consensus prevents you from
> seeing anything else that might be there.

IYHO.  8-).


> For example, it was
> one time known by consensus that the correct viewpoint was that
> the world was flat...

And it was, for all intents and purposes.  As a working hypothesis,
it's as good an approximation as, say, Newtonian mechanics.


> The real question is how useful the definition is to explain something
> that people might not be seeing.

Never having seen an example of a working civilization of any type
that didn't have it as an axiom, I wouldn't know.  Examples welcome,
of course... 8-).


> > I disagree.  There are no counter-pressures, unless you make
> > it evolutionarily disadvantageous to be a troll, by removing
> > trolls from the gene pool before they have an opportunity to
> > breed.
> 
> The stagnation that would occur in that instance will leave us
> genetically weak as a race and unable to adapt.

Again, IYHO.  Arguably it *is* an adaptation, to an increased
population density, with decreased communications delays.


> >> > Rosseau's Theory of the Social Contract permits the state
> >> > to take such actions as it deems necessary for the common
> >> > good.
> >>
> >> Just why is this Theory more correct than others?
> >
> > It's axiomatic in any society that accepts it.
> 
> That doesn't make it globally correct, or even useful.

It's useful in that it's predictive.  That's makes it one up on
uncontrolled anarchy.


> >> You look at this as a forced action. I look at this as the test for
> >> the next evolutionary level of community. If the community can
> >> withstand even the toughest troll and yet refrain from implementing
> >> such draconian and fascist measures, that community is on a higher
> >> evolutionary level than it's counterparts.
> >
> > And if not, we'll throw them up against the wall and remove
> > the genes that permit such dissent to arise in the first
> > place.
> 
> I didn't say that. You did. The real solution is for individuals
> to make trolls irrelavent. Until we can do that as a group, we
> aren't there yet.

Make them irrelevent by removing them from the gene pool?  By
removing their mail accounts?  By denying them DNS services?  By
blocking packets from them at our routers and firewalls?  I
didn't expect you to advocate the Spanish Inquisition... but
then I guess no one expects that.  ;^).


> > In the limit, though, no one in the majority minds a fasciest
> > state. So deleting the minority is topologically equivalent to
> > tolerating them,
> 
> I don't accept that. Deleting them means there are no more tests to
> tolerance, which means tolerance becomes weak. If another problem were
> to surface which required strong tolerance, the problem would not be
> solv-ed.

So, for example, if you don't constantly pound on your skull with
a brick, in six months time, the first loose brick you see will,
without a doubt, be fatal to you from six yards away?

What you are describing is an overly simplistic version of a
mutual security game.  Your model is flawed, actually.  I suggest
you read up on "globocop".  The arms race equivalent to your
argument is that unless we are constant at a state of DefCon 4,
if we ever "slip" to DefCon 1, then our ability to defend
ourselves is compromised.


> > If you like anarchy, you can always go hang out where anarchy
> > is welcome, instead of where it is not...
> 
> This was true before you asserted it, and remains true after your
> attempt to make it a straw man. ;)

The "instead" is the important part.


> >> Trolls are a necessary consequence to a community of individuals which
> >> provide evolutionary pressure that benefits everyone in the long
> >> run. They are not glorified, they should not also be villified.  They
> >> simply exist. Why waste energy seeing them any other way?
> >
> > Why punch the guy with the ghetto blaster on the public subway
> > in the face, and smash the ghetto blaster to bits?
> 
> Because you haven't learned tolerance?

Because it's not societys job to accomodate the every whim of
the sociopathic individual?


> > Some people are members of communities not by choice, but by
> > necessity, e.g. "The only way from point A to point B is to
> > go through the middle".
> 
> There is always a choice. There may not be choices we prefer over
> others, and some choices may have starkly different returns on
> investment, but there are always choices.
> 
> You can also choose to be tolerant.

There may not be choices we prefer over others.  I prefer to choose
not to tolerate sociopaths.

> >> I assert the following. You take any large random group of people,
> >> some subset of them have common interests. This group forms a
> >> community. The anti-group is also formed (by implication if you
> >> must). That's how it works. Members of the anti-group are
> >> not-in-contact, and trickle into the group as trolls and kooks.
> >
> > And the sherrif throws them in jail, and they leave, or the
> > sherrif throws them in jail, and they learn their lesson, or
> > the sherrif throws them in jail, and the townfolk show up
> > that evening, carrying torches, and hang them from the tree
> > just outside of town as a warning to the next one.
> 
> Since the genes are till out there, another one shows up and another
> and another...they keep getting thrown in jail, they get stronger
> while people on the outside get weaker. A meteor hits the planet,
> suddenly all the weak "societal" folk die and the people who've been
> in prison for years have the toughness to survive the coming ice age.

Cool.  Then we wait until they get bored diddling themselves,
since even if the genetic tendency towards civilization is
recessive, it's there, and then their great great grandchildren
build their own jails.


> > The recent spate of trolls on the FreeBSD mailing lists also
> > belies your theory: if your theory were correct, they would
> > have been there all along, and not be a relatively recent
> > phenomenon.  How do you explain that away?
> 
> Just because they don't post doesn't mean they aren't there.

Er, interesting theory... ever heard of Occam's Razor?


> Perhaps they were biding their time?

I guess we will all die of Ebola next Thursday at 17:05 Zulu,
since we are all infected, the virus has merely been "biding
its time".  Sneaky bastard, that Ebola... 8-) 8-O.


> >> > There's a cost for everything, isn't there?  The trick is to
> >> > choose actions which result in outcomes with the highest total
> >> > sum, even if that leaves you with a lower individual sum in the
> >> > short term.
> >>
> >> In short, "he who dies with the most toys wins"? That I don't buy.
> >
> > That's an incorrect paraphrasing of my statement.  The highest
> > total sum is the *net* sum for all members of the society.
> > An individual is expected to conform to social norms.
> 
> That is the entire problem with our planet to date. This is not the
> original purpose of the individual, nor does this game of maximizing
> sum have any meaning outside of the society it is in.

Well, I think I speak for everyone when I say that you're always
free to find another planet, where you declare what (IYHO) you
believe the purpose of the individual to be, and then deport
anyone who doesn't agree with you....

As far as sum maximization: no it doesn't: but it was you who
were claiming that trolls were definitionally part and parcel
with the society they oppose, rather than outside provocateurs.


> Society expects individuals to conform to a standard that may or may
> not be appropriate for any particular individual to conform to. This
> tries to limit the genetic search space of the planet. It's
> counterproductive to the global algorithm. It also backfires
> constantly.

Socially approapriate?  Appropriate in what context?  You are
starting to sound like Archimedes Plutonium...


> >> The real "better", if it exists, exists for everyone.
> > The avowed racist and the cannibal?
> 
> Them too.

No, not them too.  The benefits of society do not accrue to those
who would destroy it.


> > That's like the PETA representative, who, when forced to
> > address the issue of tigers eating other animals, said "Can't
> > we just teach them to eat grass?".
> 
> This flys in the face of:
> 
> > An individual is expected to conform to social norms.
> 
> Some individuals aren't here to do what society wants them to. I feel
> it's dishonorable to expect them to conform.

What about locking them up, and having no expectations of
them, other than that they not escape, and that they will
eventually die of natural causes?

Are you arguing that it is *never* right to segregate people
from the larger society?

> >> Still, Microsoft (damn them) has the highest market share...even tho
> >> they leave much to be desired as a computer software company...people
> >> -still- buy their products when better free ones exist. We computer
> >> experts don't understand this, but it illustrates quite nicely that
> >> there are more dimensions of optima to "better" than we can quantify.
> >
> > Normatively better free ones *do not* exist.  Techincally
> > better, yes; normatively better, no.
> 
> In effect you are saying if everyone uses FooOS, there's nothing
> normatively better. Is that really useful?

Yes, in terms of reduction in duplication of effort.  There are
at least 80 million people in the U.S. (my numbers are old; this
is likely more today) who interact with Microsoft Windows in one
way or another on a daily basis.  The training costs for a single
application run to US$2,500 per seat.  That's $200 billion dollars
of training, alone, totally ignoring data.

Whatever wanted to displace it would have to have a normative value
in excess of $200 billion *above* the equal base value of the OS
itself.


> > I never met a transhumanist I didn't like... ;^).
> 
> A who?

No, Cindy Lou wasn't a transhumanist, she wasn't even human...


> > On a similar note, we have ~1.6 million people in prison, and
> > another 4.4 million on probation in this country (~2.5% of the
> > total population).  I have no problem with them being forcibly
> > removed from society for their failure to obey norms of human
> > behaviour, either.
> 
> I do. Those are our survival as a race should a real mega-disaster
> happen. Without them, we don't survive (unless a mega-disaster
> never happens).

You must see some redeeming traits in the Jeffrey Dahlmer's of
the world that I don't.


> > People who can only contribute destruction should be removed
> > from the gene pool.
> 
> Nonsense. Creation and destruction are a dance. Both need to exist
> for either to exist. How would you destroy an old building or find
> out that a piece of software has security holes without those kind
> of people?

That's a joke, right?  You're not seriously advocating that
script kiddies serve a social good which is not already served
by the people who originally discovered the problems, or that
those who discover the problems, but exploit rather than
disclosing them are somehow beneficial to society?

-- Terry

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