Uncanny resemblance.

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NOMAD
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by NOMAD »

Karst45 wrote:
Trantor wrote:Simple Solution, no? :D
That a dangerous path, though we all may have wished that on a really really bad political leader. that kind of thing usually create chaos that "worst" people will use to get more power.
I agree, look at what happen after JFK was killed, President Johnson's tenor wasn't the best, nor was Nixon in the hindsight. ( and poor charter had to take the job after Watergate . . . argh someone had to but really him the nice guy :( ) Granted most might not understand what I'm getting at but the jiff is that one assassination might cause a longer spell of misfortune ( both politically, economically, and internationally) ( in I my own small option).

But in terms of getting rid of a bad leader is a democracy it can be very difficult. My own experiences involve the Canadian Harper government with its constant "delays" in parliament and use of "suspension" of parliament. Now I know my country has had some "Dictatorial" elected leaders in our history but sometime it works ( and with this government) sometime it doesn't and thus your stuck until their voted out of power.
I am a wander, going from place to place without a home I am a NOMAD

discord
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by discord »

okey, let's take the american system for example...you got a two party system, where there is little actual difference between the parties and you are in fact voting for a person that you know little to nothing about whose job is to deceive you into believing you do, and that you trust him.

now who does this guy work for? heck if i know, but if it is 'the people' it will not stay that way for long after he gets into power for the simple reason that the people are self destructive in their wishes, they want so much, and the state can not afford it but for a politician to get voted into office and be popular must provide it, which leads to deficits, and people want that to continue, which leads to greater deficits, which in time leads to banco rupto, or to use the actual latin bancus ruptus, bench broken which was from where the first bankers worked from, and when they went broke they broke the bench, or the more modern term, bankrupt.

then we have democracy that it is also latin, demo=people cracy=rule, and so the people rule....that's good right? problem is that 'people' are stupid, mob mentality, it's a scientific fact, individuals can be intelligent, 'people' can not, democracy assumes that every voting member needs to be sane, understand the issues and care about the issues, the voter needs to have a free press(good information without which it is impossible to form a opinion based on reality) freedom of speech(to have any opinion whatsoever and not be prosecuted for it.) some more things, but the problem is....
that only 'smart' people have enough brains to absorb that amount of information while at the same time be productive members of society, AND that the press is not exactly free due to the fact that speech is not exactly free either, i could bring up the classic nazi argument, but lets not, everyone gets huffy there, so lets take the a couple of questions relevant to modern America, the democratic leaders of the world, gay marriages...oh sorry, same-sex marriages and abortions. both of which can get you killed, or more likely socially shunned if you voice the wrong opinion about it, how many openly homosexual politicians are there in the US of A? having a little problem finding data on it, but i promise you it is usually a political suicide.
so not very free....and that does not even bring up 'care about the issues' since if you are smart enough to understand the issues you will probably figure out that there is little actual difference between the candidates, nor the fact that large groups of people tend to become irrational rather quickly.


summarized
minorities get little to no representation in democracy, which might seem counter intuitive, but it's actually just a extension of herd mentality, if something is different compared to what you are used to, it's bad and must be shunned.

that democracy requires that people be intelligent and care and that 'people' generally do not have these traits.

and finally that to please the 'people' you must give them bread and circus(and other things), which in time will ruin the state treasury.

TrashMan
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by TrashMan »

political parties are just as much a problem of democracy as anything else...favors, below-the-table deals and stuff like that.

Honestly, I'd prefer if it punishement for abusing the office (any high or important political position) is a a public execution, not this "slap on a wrist" BS...
Then the politicians would haev something to think about, the next time they want to f*** the people over.

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bunnyboy
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by bunnyboy »

discord wrote:the people rule....that's good right? problem is that 'people' are stupid, mob mentality, it's a scientific fact, individuals can be intelligent, 'people' can not, democracy assumes that every voting member needs to be sane, understand the issues and care about the issues, the voter needs to have a free press(good information without which it is impossible to form a opinion based on reality) freedom of speech(to have any opinion whatsoever and not be prosecuted for it.) some more things, but the problem is....
that only 'smart' people have enough brains to absorb that amount of information while at the same time be productive members of society,
That is myth. Actually there are some research about how mob intelligence has occassionally beaten experts.
Not in chess or sandbox games, but prediction of football games, survival in catastrophes, production of innovations, for examples.
Also, there is no amount of intelligence to make one immune to stupidities, like prejudices, mistakes and superstitions.
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discord
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by discord »

bunny: production of innovation? i could buy football games, even if there is a very high chance factor involved there, and survival in catastrophe? that is what herd mentality is all about, so sure.....but innovations? how the bloody hell is a mob innovative? unless you are talking about things like wikipedia, but that is a entirely different matter...cause the only way i could think of a innovative mob is perhaps exchanging the torches and pitchforks for flamethrowers and chainsaws...some improvement, but not really intelligent imho.

or you could talk about internet 'cloud' intelligence, aka anonymous...sure, that works for a lot of problem solving....now that i think about it that is what creates the wikipedia...but that is not a herd of people, the internet helps to keep them from becoming a herd and keep them a bunch of individuals, basically distance helps to keep it from becoming emotional, not stop it, just not as much.

to see what i mean all you need to see is...well, football match gets it done, as does a rock concert but the best example i can think of is a religious gathering, if you are in the group you behave like the group, not as a individual and NOT behaving like the group can get you in serious trouble.

trashman: make it simple, create a law against breaking election promises, that would get you quite a bit when it comes to lowering the amount of...not nice things politicians do....but then you would need to assure that the winner has single majority, not much problem in the US, in Sweden it would be, multi party system, lots of smaller parties creating alliances, i think a system of elimination might be best....but then again, you might want a decentralized system too...well, combine it then...whatever.


actually it is kind of funny, democracy and republic are pretty damn OLD ideas, Plato talked about them, and not much has really changed since his time about how it works....and he did not like democracy all that much, and he would have applied it to city states, relatively small communities, where it works better.

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bunnyboy
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by bunnyboy »

Maybe I was little of target when i mentioned innovations. But I meaned that
Experts have great visions, but the trends of progress/fashion/etc comes usually from mass of people.
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GOULimitingFactor
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by GOULimitingFactor »

...Once again proving that citizens of a democratic society have no trouble rooting for aristocracy, as long as they can imagine that they'll get to be the aristocrats.

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Arioch
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Arioch »

I think the notion of an aristocracy theoretically can work... if a sense of duty is instilled in them. The problem here is of course the same problem with that of absolute monarchy, which is that privilege almost always breeds complacency and incompetence, rather than duty and efficacy. For a system to survive, there must be a mechanism in which there is pressure applied on the leaders and the leadership class -- popular pressure on an elected leadership, or cultural and/or traditional pressure on a nobility and/or despot. In most of our Earthly history, the second of the two has more often than not failed, That doesn't necessarily mean it's not possible, but for humans at least I think we can confidently say that given modern technology it's a very inefficient way of trying to run our society.

If you have a leadership caste, you might be able to instill a sense of duty in them as part of their training. This kind of system can work, but is difficult to protect from systemwide corruption.

The Loroi as a culture prefer oligarchy/dictatorship to democracy because it's comfortable to them. The Loroi consider themselves to be a warrior culture, and so some degree of authoritarianism is just assumed to be the norm. They are slow to accept change, and popular sentiment is considered of secondary importance. However, the Emperor's power is not absolute; she owes her position to the Diadem (the Torrai ruling council), and she is under significant pressure both from the "constitutional" rules of the caste hierarchies and also from the possibility of impeachment or civil war to act in a manner best suited for all. Loroi longevity helps a bit in this... a "good" ruler can last a long time (though age is no guard against corruption or disillusion or anarchronism -- one of the most successful Loroi emperors (Eighth Dawn) ultimately failed in the time of greatest need because she could not adapt rapidly enough to changing conditions), while a "bad" ruler can be quickly removed.

discord
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by discord »

bunny: no, most 'innovation' as in ideas for direction usually comes from science fiction writers, jules verne is the classic example another good one would be gibson and sterling for the cyber punk era, there are LOTS of others out there, that came up with a idea for a story and later it turns out to be doable, philosophers....lesse who was the first to come up with the idea that the universe began with a bang? the first to write it nicely was edgar allan poe, there is some indication that erasmus darwin was earlier, but that was pure poetry imho.

arioch: that is why i think it is important to split the system.
nobility, AKA rich people, give them voting power in their own chamber based on taxation value, basically plutocracy.

the people, but instead of national elections, make the system decentralized(vote for who represents your county(or maybe even go down to city? dunno), and the representatives from there elects one of them to represent them in the state and the same for the federal level.), so you get MUCH smaller campaigns that is possible to do without millions in funding, decentralized democracy.

and finally some sort of imperator, probably a hereditary, some kind of monarchy.

and then taxation, 10% of the tax from county goes to state level, 10% of that goes to federal level, and 10% of that goes to the imperator to do whatever the hell he wants to do with it...or something like that, this would give more power to the local government, and therefor make the citizens vote more....noticeable and feel like it makes a actual difference, while at the same time let the wealth be spread about on the state level, and the money on the federal level is mostly just military....the actual numbers here are just a simple placeholder, the actual ratios to be kicked up would of course vary from nation to nation, but CHANGING them would require all three chambers to agree, at which point you can be bloody sure it is needed.

this is all just ideas, i am simply throwing'em out to you and seeing how you react and if you have any opinions/ideas/criticism, and me trying to figure out how to stitch this together to a working system, it SHOULD work pretty well in my not so humble opinion.

Offset
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Offset »

discord wrote: instead of national elections, make the system decentralized(vote for who represents your county(or maybe even go down to city? dunno), and the representatives from there elects one of them to represent them in the state and the same for the federal level.), so you get MUCH smaller campaigns that is possible to do without millions in funding, decentralized democracy.
.
Actually the founding fathers of the US originally had a system very close to this one Discord. They felt that the general population was to ill informed and fickle to have a large control over the federal government. To this end they established that the "Lesser" House of Representatives was the only part they had a control through general elections in. The Senate was chosen by the State Legislature that they represented, and the President was chosen through a group of elites that we call the Electoral College. It is only recently that they have changed it so that the general populace has control over most aspects of the federal government.

discord
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by discord »

those founding fathers seem like smart people, to bad the ones following might not have been.

Offset
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Offset »

They were pretty smart indeed the only mistake I'd say they made was the failure to include term limits in the Constitution cause lord knows it's not gonna happen now.

Nemo
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Nemo »

discord wrote:bunny: no, most 'innovation' as in ideas for direction usually comes from science fiction writers, jules verne is the classic example another good one would be gibson and sterling for the cyber punk era, there are LOTS of others out there, that came up with a idea for a story and later it turns out to be doable, philosophers....lesse who was the first to come up with the idea that the universe began with a bang? the first to write it nicely was edgar allan poe, there is some indication that erasmus darwin was earlier, but that was pure poetry imho.
I wouldn't say that. Verne and the rest didn't give direction to innovation. Much the opposite. Innovation gave them direction, and they advanced it to a logical conclusion. As an example, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Written in 1870, has a submarine with modern characteristics. Cigar tube that can stay underwater for extended periods. But that did not lead to engineers working to make fiction a reality. Rather, engineers had already been advancing down this path with this intent and Verne took it to its end. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_submarine_Plongeur Elongated sub that rams. Swap the powerplant and call it the Nautilus.

I would say philosophy leads science about like a dumped bowl of spaghetti points you north. Standing north you can say, "Hey look! That noodle points north!" but I wouldn't use it for navigation. Neither does science. Its a lot like evolution in that it doesn't build up and select for or towards but tears down and selects against. This noodle doesn't point north. Or that one... or that one... or that one... or that one...


They were pretty smart indeed the only mistake I'd say they made was the failure to include term limits in the Constitution cause lord knows it's not gonna happen now.
Term limits are double edged, not a panacea. They make the politician more dependent on the forces, and monies, that can elect them. You can see a bit of their reasoning in their debate over the lifetime appointment of judges, which was a bit more contested so more was written on it. They opted for a balance between the two in the varying term lengths and election methods of the House and Senate. House looks after the interests of the people and is elected often, making it most dependent. Senate looks after the interests of the state legislatures and is elected infrequently. My solution would be to uncap the number of representatives in the House, keep districts small and the power of the House weak individually, and just too numerous to effectively buy off a majority (as was intended originally). Tie Senatorial election back to the states, which are in turn elected by the people, and possibly consider lengthening terms to 8-10 years. This checks Federal authority against local authority and divests special interests of some of their power.


As to the strengths and follies of the US government, in general I defer to Tocqueville.
A majority taken collectively is only an individual, whose opinions, and frequently whose interests, are opposed to those of another individual, who is styled a minority. If it be admitted that a man possessing absolute power may misuse that power by wronging his adversaries, why should not a majority be liable to the same reproach? Men do not change their characters by uniting with one another; nor does their patience in the presence of obstacles increase with their strength. For my own part, I cannot believe it; the power to do everything, which I should refuse to one of my equals, I will never grant to any number of them.

Lacroix
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Lacroix »

Darth Cloaked Guy wrote:I discovered Outsider only a few days ago, possibly less than a week. What I found was awesome, yet unnerved me to the core.

You see, I've been developing my Cemu setting for some time now, years at this point, as a casual hobby. It was basically my D&D high fantasy setting advanced into outer space. Many of the races were races taken from that setting, evolved, and output into a sci-fi fantasy realm.

The halflings and gnomes together became the Sahrea.
The orcs became the stone-skinned Doluri.
The feline natureborn and catfolk became the Kitai Murrani and Kitai Tokali.

What's unnerving about this?

Well, you see, Elves also reached the stars. Inspired by a picture on Space Empires V, I decided that they were blue-skinned, at least the lower caste.

Okay, blue-skinned space elves with a genetic caste system. That's an odd number of similarities, right?

It gets worse. Much worse.

The plural of the race was Lorikin. -kin being a plural suffix in their language, that leaves one of them being a Lori. One letter away from Loroi.

So mine aren't psychic.

So mine don't control half the galaxy.

Still. Eerie. I would like to request that any misunderstandings be resolved here, so that no legal issues (unlikely, but possible) will occur from this similarity. Please respond if you read this, Arioch.

I can back up my claim somewhat with this blog of mine (which, although old and hasn't been updated in forever, is still younger than the setting itself by some period of time). I never got around to adding information of the species names, but still: http://cemuuniverse.wordpress.com/
I totally agree with you:)
Outsider is awesome!

Paragon
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Paragon »

Arioch wrote:
icekatze wrote:But if the characters are compelling, I think you can get away with an awful lot in storytelling.
I agree absolutely; it's all about the story and characters and whether it works. Crest of the Stars is really about Abriel (the Abh princess), and she's compelling enough to keep you interested. Unfortunately, the human character who is supposed to be the protagonist is not very compelling at all. But that's probably intentional... a lot of anime/manga properties have almost faceless teengage male protagonists, meant to serve as proxies for the teenage male viewers.
It's funny I didn't really consider Jinto to be the protagonist. He's not, Abriel is. Jinto is the viewpoint character, but his role is a supporting one.

My impression of the series seems to have been very different than yours.
"Optical computers, genetic catalogs, nanorepair modules--forget all of that. It's when you see a megaton of steel suspended over your head by a thread the thickness of a human hair that you really find God in technology."

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Arioch
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Re: Uncanny resemblance.

Post by Arioch »

Paragon wrote:It's funny I didn't really consider Jinto to be the protagonist. He's not, Abriel is. Jinto is the viewpoint character, but his role is a supporting one.
I actually just recently watched about the first half of the series again, up to midway through Banner of the Stars (at which point the re-re-rehashing of scenes and pointless dialogue gets really tiring).

It's true that Lafiel is the "main" character in the sense that the action is "about" her, and Jinto is the viewpoint character, but he's also the character with whom the reader is supposed to identify, so in that sense he's the protagonist. He's also the character that makes choices (although that choice is limited to whether to follow Lafiel or not), whereas while Lafiel is very capable, she doesn't really have any meaningful choices, she's just busy doing her duty like a good little Abh. So I guess it depends on your definition of the term.

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