Hey Tyler, thanks very much for engaging, and for working on this very important topic.
I was a little surprised you didn’t spend more time arguing for Citizen’s Assemblies and Sortition in general. While in your comment you mention they have been used a bit, it seems they have been only used for a tiny fraction of all decisions. If they were so advantageous, we might have expected private companies to take advantage of them in decision making, or governments to make widespread use, but as far as I’m aware their use by both is very small. I’m not aware of any major software or engineering projects being designed by sortition, or any military using it to decide strategy and tactics. Presumably this is because a randomly chosen decision making body will be made of up less conscientiousness, less knowledgable and less intelligent people than a body specifically chosen for these traits. Given what we know about the importance of mental acuity in decision making, it seems that we should be wary of any scheme that deliberately neglects any selection on this basis.
I worry that citizens’ assemblies will end up favouring the views whose partisans have the most rhetorical skill and the most fashionable beliefs. In a representative system, disengaged people can rely on highly skilled representatives to defend their position. In an assembly, those with complicated but sound arguments might be at a disadvantage compared to those with higher status or more memetically powerful slogans, even if the latter are false.
You highlight the long remaining life expectancy of the members as a motivation for their to be longtermist, but this seems quite imperfect. In particular, it causes them to be disproportionately motivated by the interests of older people the further out in time you go, with little direct reason they should be concerned about the welfare of future cohorts at all.
In particular, the paper mentions the 2016 Irish assembly as an positive example, but it seems to actually be a counter-example. In the paper you note that future people have high moral value:
These people have the same moral value as us in the present.
This was recognised in the Irish constitution prior to the Assembly:
The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.
However the Assembly recommended removing this right, reducing the protections for future generations, even in cases where no strong countervailing consideration exists. Indeed, it seems they deliberately sought input from affected members of the current generation, even though this introduces a bias, as similar input cannot be sought from future generations.
Hey Tyler, thanks very much for engaging, and for working on this very important topic.
I was a little surprised you didn’t spend more time arguing for Citizen’s Assemblies and Sortition in general. While in your comment you mention they have been used a bit, it seems they have been only used for a tiny fraction of all decisions. If they were so advantageous, we might have expected private companies to take advantage of them in decision making, or governments to make widespread use, but as far as I’m aware their use by both is very small. I’m not aware of any major software or engineering projects being designed by sortition, or any military using it to decide strategy and tactics. Presumably this is because a randomly chosen decision making body will be made of up less conscientiousness, less knowledgable and less intelligent people than a body specifically chosen for these traits. Given what we know about the importance of mental acuity in decision making, it seems that we should be wary of any scheme that deliberately neglects any selection on this basis.
I worry that citizens’ assemblies will end up favouring the views whose partisans have the most rhetorical skill and the most fashionable beliefs. In a representative system, disengaged people can rely on highly skilled representatives to defend their position. In an assembly, those with complicated but sound arguments might be at a disadvantage compared to those with higher status or more memetically powerful slogans, even if the latter are false.
You highlight the long remaining life expectancy of the members as a motivation for their to be longtermist, but this seems quite imperfect. In particular, it causes them to be disproportionately motivated by the interests of older people the further out in time you go, with little direct reason they should be concerned about the welfare of future cohorts at all.
In particular, the paper mentions the 2016 Irish assembly as an positive example, but it seems to actually be a counter-example. In the paper you note that future people have high moral value:
This was recognised in the Irish constitution prior to the Assembly:
However the Assembly recommended removing this right, reducing the protections for future generations, even in cases where no strong countervailing consideration exists. Indeed, it seems they deliberately sought input from affected members of the current generation, even though this introduces a bias, as similar input cannot be sought from future generations.