Things I’d like to know about:
I was thinking yesterday about subjects I’d like to learn about it. My thought process was if I was given a grant to study anything I wanted, what would I like to immerse myself in? And, what peculiar questions would it be cool to have answers to? These are some of the topics I came up with. If anyone has any reading on the topic, or wisdom to add, please do.
[*] The Philosopher’s Burden.
[*] It’s pretty easy to see how today the media blows things out of proportion and tends to overestimate the importance or significance of events or movements. Is history different? What are we missing? Who because they were media or social darlings got overvalued and what true mover has been ignored?
[*] The Psychology of Tattoos: What makes people get them? What separates the people who get one or two and the people who coat their body in them?
[*] Is there a fallacy about betting on people who have already been successful, even though probability would state that since success is rare, the likelihood of doing it twice is even more rare? [Sort of like the conjunction fallacy, I guess]
[*] Entrenched Player Dilemma. I know a little bit about this, but I’ve yet to find a really good write-up.
[*] From Dawkins: Was it possible to be an atheist in an informed way before 1859? Or was it just as speculative or without evidence as religion?
[*] Paternalism has disastrous results socially, economically and politically. The record of communist societies is objectively unsuccessful. What evolutionary tendency drives us to that time and time again? Why does the issue seem so clear to some people but intellectuals continue to insist optimistically that it will work?
[*] In The Gift of Fear, Gavin De Becker talks about how we subconsciously perceive threats to our safety and that if we were more in-tune with those feelings we could prevent it. What if that perspective is just the hindsight bias that we use instead of admitting how vulnerable we really are? I suspect that a lot of it is just a coping mechanism.
What would you like to learn about?
The communist issue is really interesting. In one of my classes, we learned about two neighboring communities in Israel: the Kvutza and the Moshav. The first was like our society, and the second was very communistic. Both were stable, but the Moshav had some issues. It had high level of intolerance for individuality, and at the same time was vulnerable to those who were different. Anyway, I think the only appealing aspect about the Moshov is that it forcibly eliminates isolation and inequality.
There was a great article on Becker-Posner about the Kibbutz movement on Israel and why it failed. I don’t know what you learned, but a kvutza is just a group of people who live together, usually who grew up on a kibbutz, and are loosely affiliated. I spent my summers at a camp modeled after a kibbutz (I hate socialism with a passion but it was great for teaching us responsibility and how to get along with others), so I have a decent understanding of these movements compared to others.
As for why people are still drawn to communism(in the case of the kibbutz and other collective movements in Israel – and quite honestly many Jews) is twofold.
The first is that the Jews who lived in Israel since time immemorial (they are small in number but they exist) as well as the settlers from Europe all lived Hobbesian lives previously; short, nasty, brutish, always looking over their shoulder for the next pogrom. Communism was coming into vogue, and they figured that since they share the same values, background etc they could band together to create a utopian socialist society in their historical homeland. This was also after an Enlightenment occured within the Jewish community, and many young people rejected Orthodox Judaism in favor of more liberal streams or rejected it outright and became Zionists(indeed, most Israelis are secular, and identify as Jewish culturally.
The second factor is the Jewish notion of “Tikun Olam”, which directly translates into healing the world. This principle states that Jews should strive to make the world a better place, and while many Jews have made their positive mark on the world, the unfortunate fact is that while we can proudly hold up Milton Friedman as a credit, we also have Karl Marx, Jacques Derrida etc.
If you look at the world today with our modern technology and intelligence level you find that if society were re-designed today we would do things much differently. I’d hire the top industry designers, engineers, scientists to re-think our approach to everything from housing, transportation, energy, clothing, farming, public education, etc.
Hiring a brain trust to come up with a new society isn’t hard; getting the people to change is the tricky part.
With large groups of people, it is infinitely easier to just add onto the old – like a coral reef – than to wipe clean the slate and start anew. Even though the redesign is more efficient, the old ways will still be used as long as things still get done. Look at computer programming.