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by xpe 569 days ago
Sure, we want individuals to act in a way to mitigate collective action problems. But the collective action problem exists (by definition) because individuals are trapped in some variation of a prisoner's dilemma.

So, collective action problems are nearly a statistical certainty across a wide variety of situations. And yet we still "blame" individuals? We should know better.
1 comments
pas 569 days ago
So you're saying Head of AI of Google of Jeff can't choose a better venue?

He's not the first Jeffery with a lot of power who doesn't care.

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xpe 569 days ago
> So you're saying Head of AI of Google of Jeff can't choose a better venue?

Phrasing it this way isn't useful. Talking about choice in the abstract doesn't help with a game-theoretic analysis. You need costs and benefits too.

There are many people who face something like a prisoner's dilemma (on Twitter, for example). We could assess the cost-benefit of a particular person leaving Twitter. We could even judge them according to some standards (ethical, rational, and so on). But why bother?...

...Think about major collective action failures. How often are they the result of just one person's decisions? How does "blaming" or "judging" an individual help make a situation better? This effort on blaming could be better spent elsewhere; such as understanding the system and finding leverage points.

There are cases where blaming/guilt can help, but only in the prospective sense: if a person knows they will be blamed and face consequences for an action, it will make that action more costly. This might be enough to deter than decision. But do you think this applies in the context of the "do I leave Twitter?" decision? I'd say very little, if at all.

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pas 569 days ago
Yes, but the game matrix is not that simple. There's a whole gamut of possible actions between defect and sleep with Elon.

Cross-posting to a Mastodon account is not that hard.

I look at this from two viewpoints. One is that it's good that he spends most of this time and energy doing research/management and not getting bogged down in culture war stuff. The other is that those who have all this power ought to wield it a tiny tiny bit more responsibly. (IMHO social influence of the elites/leaders/cool-kids are also among those leverage points you speak of.)

Also, I'm not blaming him. I don't think it's morally wrong to use X. (I think it's mentally harmful, but X is not unique in this. Though character limit does select for "no u" type messages.) I'm at best cynically musing about the claimed helplessness of Jeff Dean with regards to finding a forum.

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