[elcritch]

It’s sad to me after reading stories like this how much Western societies have generally lost the pursuit of Bildung (wisdom, virtue) that shaped men like Wilhelm von Humboldt's.

I’ve come to firmly believe that a society which looses the pursuit of the noble in the individual in exchange for mere technological excellence will in the long run loose technical ability as well.

It’s not even about a religious ideals, but secular ones as well. Really any belief system that puts the onus on individuals to pursue nobleness, as opposed to the more empty “reforming society” or “fixing society” that universities in particular appear fixated on currently.

Reminds me of CS Lewis’ critiques our modern age in “Abolition of Man” who critiqued it very well.

Of course we see this tension of education of the individual vs mass indoctrination in most western public school systems. TFA was a good read, as I’d always assumed and read that universal education was created as just a tool for mass indoctrination for obedient workers.

[itsamario]

Voting rights was a superficial act of righteousness.

Allowing anyone to vote that can color in lines was when the patients started running the place.

When words lose their meaning, people lose their freedom.

[supertroop]

We went from critical thinking to only some people can participate in society in the blink of an eye. What if you’re one of the people deemed too dumb? Did that ever occur to you?

[SteveGerencser]

I'm fine with a simple, basic test to be able to vote. 5 T/F questions, you only need to get 3 right to vote. Basics. Is the earth flat? Did humans land on the moon? Do brown cows produce chocolate milk? You know, the basics. If I couldn't pass such a test, I should not be allowed to vote.

[sxzygz]

I don’t really want to participate in this discussion, however:

As I stand on the flats of Salt Lake, the Earth is definitely flat. Also, I’m sure there are brown cows that produce milk that’s turned to chocolate milk. And since I didn’t directly observe humans landing on the moon, I can’t be certain of it to say.

Am I being facetious, perhaps. But I want to illustrate that people can be broadly split in to two camps. Those that believe individual agency is necessary for all. And those that believe individual agency can only be preserved for all by restricting it to the chosen.

If you’re happy with affairs however whatever camp you’re in differs from whatever camp your society is in, you will turn a blind eye. However, if you’re unhappy then you’ll feel all your problems must stem from your society’s fundamental misconception.

The world has lost, on my opinion, a mass of level-headed people. We don’t need to agree, but we need to talk. Forums like this depend on people taking their time to be nuanced and clear, however there is little reward in this as the quality of the HN audience slowly decays as the attention span of the general populace from which this audience is derived itself decays.

[econ]

The questions should be about the [current] structure of government.

In round 1 you earn a number of votes for each question. If you score high enough you gain access to the next test of round one with harder questions and earn more votes per question.

Because there are to many candidates the voter gets only two to chose from. They get some time to read the two election programs and round two is a test about the election programs.

If they pass the second round they may simultaneously upvote one and downvote the other candidate with the weight of their voting power earned in the first round reduced by the wrong answers in the second round.

[itsamario]

You're mincing perspectives.

Participation in society and writing the rules are different positions.

How does a human think about cause and effect if they misunderstand the language they reason with?

We found out that less than 20% of the human race is sapient. The other 80% can't even consider other perspectives

[elcritch]

Not really, it was based on the belief of the ability and dignity of the individual.

My mind goes more to the Cultural Revolution in China where millions were killed or starved because a bunch of college students decided that the enemies were the “five black categories” who were enemies of “the people”.