Optimism matters.
Example: Doomsday scenarios try to inspire cooperation.
But by promoting short-term thinking, they actually prevent cooperation
If we want people to cooperate, we need to play long-term games instead of short-term ones.
We need optimistic long-term thinkers.
Conversation
Great societies think long-term.
An idea I’m considering: Long-term thinking is so important that we should favor leaders and politicians who have kids.
Kids extend our time horizons.
They force us to consider the long term effects of our actions.
Seems important.
Thoughts?
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Replying to
Historically kids so strongly incentivize clannish thinking (modern example, college admissions scandal) that empires have maintained eunuch staffed civil services to foster public-good. Most regressive shit in governance, like regressive school redistributing is “for the kids”
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Having kids makes you willing to do anything, including stomp on other people’s kids’ futures to give yours a leg up. Political decay is in fact tied to neopatrimonialization, a big word for a simple idea: extract public good to favor your kids. Tragedy of commons.
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The Ottomon empire ran on the devshirme system which forbade slave civil service/military from having kids. When that system loosened and they started having kids empire fell apart 😂
Also, “long-term thinking” is code for “right-thinking like me”. A bs authoritarian goal.
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What you want isn’t long-term thinking (Seeing Like a State: everybody sucks at it, human brain can’t actually do it except in special cases), but non-terminal deliberative societies where there’s no such thing as a finished conversation. Only views that are argued for a while.

