Paleo Epistemology and Sociology; Harvard School of Law

Comments

1. John Tropea August 25, 2015 at 09:07

   Hi Richard,

   This video resonated with me and inspired me to collect bits of my older posts into a new post along with your insights.

   When the personal social network grows too big, it relies on representative decision makers whom naturally can’t have empathy for each individual due to proximity, and at the same time they are loyal to their own personal network…

   “with scale the self-interest motivation of the decider remains constant but the focus and intensity of the altruistic drive does not necessarily expand to match the larger group.”

   “What may have begun as needed specialization by an even accidental decision-making group, with even the best of intentions (e.g. Plato’s philosopher kings), will tend to become self-reinforcing and isolated with it’s own internal loyalties and identifications related to the natural drives linked to their own personal associations and Dunbar’s Number.

   Hence oligarchies are over time an unfortunately inevitable problem when society scales beyond natural human community size.”

   Thx for your video, here’s my post
   johntropea.tumblr.com/post/127562933811

   Reply