Robin Berjon: “I'm sympathetic with where @seanmcarroll is coming from with this, but I think it's the…”

Robin Berjon @robinberjon · 25 Jan 2022

I'm sympathetic with where @seanmcarroll is coming from with this, but I think it's the wrong framing. We have a way to coordinate and solve large-scale, systemic, wickedly complex problems: it's called "society."

Quoting a tweet by @seanmcarroll ↗

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Robin Berjon @robinberjon · 25 Jan 2022

It regularly happens that a given society's complexity, costs, and problems cease to be functional — at which point it collapses. This is common, not Mad Max dramatic, and adaptive: a fast simplification of what it tackles.

Robin Berjon @robinberjon · 4 Nov 2021

Replying to an earlier tweet of mine

"The Collapse of Complex Societies", by Joseph A. Tainter. A very interesting thesis and lots of supporting material, less doomgloomy than you might think. A few notes. First, societies collapse a lot. It's kind of weird not to. Worth keeping in mind.

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Robin Berjon @robinberjon · 25 Jan 2022

Are we headed for collapse? I don't know, but we've *massively* increased the complexity of what we do and how we coordinate without corresponding improvements in governance. And boy does it show! berjon.com/stewardship/

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Robin Berjon @robinberjon · 25 Jan 2022

I'm not picking on Sean here, but "we're not optimised for this" is both common and defeatist. I believe that this is hard yet fixable — but to fix it we have to even know where the solution space is!

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Thread · 4 tweets · 25 Jan 2022