I don’t understand this. We would be trending towards seeking more power, which would further attract power-seekers. We have already substantially gone down this path. You might have different models of what attracts manipulative people. My model is doing visibly power-seeking and high-status work is one of the most common attractors.
I’m concerned about people seeking power in order to mistreat, mislead, or manipulate others (cult-like stuff), as seems more likely in a social community, and less likely in a group of people who share interests in actually doing things in the world. I’m in favour of people gaining influence, all things equal!
Alas, I think that isn’t actually what tends to attract the most competent manipulative people. Random social communities might attract incompetent or average-competence manipulative people, but those are much less of a risk than the competent ones. In general, professional communities, in particular ones aiming for relatively unconditional power, strike me as having a much higher density of manipulative people than random social communities.
I also think when I go into my models here, the term “manipulative” feels somewhat misleading, but it would take me a while longer to explain alternative phrasings.
TBC, this feels like a bit of a straw man of my actual view, which is that power and communality jointly contribute to risks of cultishness and manipulativeness.
I’m concerned about people seeking power in order to mistreat, mislead, or manipulate others (cult-like stuff), as seems more likely in a social community, and less likely in a group of people who share interests in actually doing things in the world. I’m in favour of people gaining influence, all things equal!
Alas, I think that isn’t actually what tends to attract the most competent manipulative people. Random social communities might attract incompetent or average-competence manipulative people, but those are much less of a risk than the competent ones. In general, professional communities, in particular ones aiming for relatively unconditional power, strike me as having a much higher density of manipulative people than random social communities.
I also think when I go into my models here, the term “manipulative” feels somewhat misleading, but it would take me a while longer to explain alternative phrasings.
TBC, this feels like a bit of a straw man of my actual view, which is that power and communality jointly contribute to risks of cultishness and manipulativeness.
nods My concerns have very little to do with cultishness, so my guess is we are talking about very different concerns here.