[itistoday2]

> So, it is physically impossible to even pay lip service to what you propose in either fourty-six, or fourty-eight of the states in the US.

lol, that is the opposite of my proposal, and your post (thank you for it btw) just further solidifies my point.

When math says it's impossible for your representative to represent you, perhaps at that point we realize that the system has reached the end of its shelf life.

See the rest of my comments in this thread for a clearer understanding of what I'm saying (and my apologies for the comments that HN makes difficult to read due to downvotes ;).

[simoncion]

> When math says it's impossible for your representative to represent you...

That's not at all what I said, and it's a dramatic misinterpretation of my words. There are substantially better mechanisms available to us to figure out what people want and what they need than for a decision maker to ask them, one-on-one.

From what I understand, there's a whole raft of really good, reproducible research on how to tease out what people mean from what they say; people are surprisingly bad at both knowing what they want, and -even if they do happen to know- surprisingly bad at expressing that information coherently. It's trivial to structure queries in such a way to give different answers to what is effectively the same question. [0]

> ...perhaps at that point we realize that the system has reached the end of its shelf life.

This is narrow-minded. Based on this comment, you appear to be proposing that we dramatically increase the number of Federal representatives per citizen. [1] Go pick a country that you think is well run at the highest levels. Go look at their representative to constituent ratios. If they're like 10x or 100x greater than the US's ratios, [4] then you might have a point. If they're only 2x or 5x greater, you probably don't.

[0] A researcher wishes to discover what Presidential candidate a given person intends to vote for. He asks them "What Presidential candidate do you intend to vote for?". Most of the time, the answer to that question does not match what candidate that person actually votes for. The question to ask to get that information -most of the time- is actually "What Presidential candidate do you expect that most people will vote for?". Polling is full of crazy pitfalls like this!

[1] The other possible interpretation is either advocacy of voluntary expatriation of people who disagree with their Congressional representatives [2], or dismantlement of the Federal government. [3]

[2] Okay, sure. You do have the trouble of both finding a country that's governed in a way that you agree with, and will accept you as an immigrant, though.

[3] Ha. See the rest of the paragraph to which footnote #1 is attached.

[4] I'm fairly sure that's in the right direction. Again, I'm sick, sorry if my math is off.

[itistoday2]

> From what I understand, there's a whole raft of really good, reproducible research on how to tease out what people mean from what they say

Having a game of telephone for a government... sounds like it would result in the sort of legislation that can be found in the OP. XD

> Based on this comment, you appear to be proposing that we dramatically increase the number of Federal representatives per citizen.

Not at all. I again invite you to read my other comments.

[simoncion]

I read your other comments. Did you read the footnote attached to the quoted sentence?

[itistoday2]

Apologies, reading your comment was like going down a choose-your-own-adventure maze.

For footnote [3] my reply is that representative democracy is one of a vast variety of possible systems you could use. That ratio of yours becomes much less meaningful in say, a liquid democracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delegative_democracy

These two links should (hopefully) address any further questions: https://fixingtao.com/2016/01/lunatics-terrorists-and-the-th... + this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10899574

[simoncion]

> ...reading your comment was like going down a choose-your-own-adventure maze.

I guess you don't read many academic or technical papers. My ratio of words to footnotes is very, very high. :)

From your linked comment:

> This is not entirely accurate, you can certainly opt-out by leaving Canada.

Right. You're advocating expatriation (whether through emigration or secession). This is exactly as I said in footnote #1, and is a plan that is made substantially more difficult by the issues in footnote #2.

> https://fixingtao.com/2016/01/lunatics-terrorists-and-the-th...

To apply the first bullet point at the end of the essay [0] would necessarily mean the end of the US's Federal Republic. Do you disagree?

In addition to that, let me ask a pointed question, along with two follow-up questions: Is there a national government on Earth that you feel is well-run and adequately represents its citizens? If there is such a government, what is the representative-to-constituent ratio in that nation? If there is not such a government, what are the top five [1] problems with the way the most reasonable national governments of the world govern?

> That ratio of yours becomes much less meaningful in say, a liquid democracy...

You should really read [2]. People are surprisingly incompetent. People are also often easily manipulated into acting dramatically against their own interests.

[0] The relevant pull quote is: "Systems that explicitly allow such secession are called voluntary systems"

[1] Pick any reasonable ranking that you like to determine ordering

[2] http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/07/stupider-than-you-real...

[itistoday2]

> To apply the first bullet point at the end of the essay [0] would necessarily mean the end of the US's Federal Republic. Do you disagree?

It totally depends on whether groups/states decide to remain part of it. To the extent that they do it will continue to be, and to the extent they don't it will cease to be.

> Is there a national government on Earth that you feel is well-run and adequately represents its citizens? If there is such a government, what is the representative-to-constituent ratio in that nation?

Heh, believe it or not that is a project I'd already set for myself.

It's not something I can answer for you in five minutes right now, but I will point out that Switzerland tops many charts and it actually employs direct democracy.

> If there is not such a government, what are the top five [1] problems with the way the most reasonable national governments of the world govern?

Ignoring for the moment the (non)existence of such a government, I'll rattle off a couple:

- Group rules do not represent the interests of group members. Most governments instead represent either the interests of the most wealthy (plutocracy) or the most vicious (dictatorships), and few (if any) provide explicit mechanisms for secession.

- Member votes are not properly weighed based on their understanding and knowledge of the issue they are voting on.

That last issue could be addressed by liquid democracy, or a group currency group fund: http://groupcurrency.org/#GroupFund

[geofft]

Er, one of the specific values of the current system is that the people who (theoretically) represent me and make rules I must abide by also do so for millions of other people. This is genuinely advantageous, even for, perhaps especially for, copyright law. Things are in-copyright or out-of-copyright in a consistent way nationwide, fair use exceptions are defined the same way nationwide, public domain and author's rights exist or don't exist nationwide, etc.

If I have myself and a small number of people represented and ruled by a group of folks, the only way to get this result is for my group of people to form federations with other groups of people, and those federations to form meta-federations, and so forth, and have each group willingly delegate most of its authority upwards. But that's really similar to how I live now.