Noocracy: The Intelligent as Civil Servants?

constant escape

winter withered, warm
a lot of what you're saying has already happened obviously. the utopian, Californian aspect, the one the rest of us have trouble with, is this idea of optimisation I think.
If I understand this correctly, I think the optimization is centered around the degree to which our world is rendered knowable. More broadly, the degree to which the universe becomes ordered, the degree of informational density in matter that is achieved. That is, how the human brain is (from what little I gather) the of the densest complexity of any known matter. And eventually our circuit-boards/processors will be even denser.

This kind of densification of intelligent matter, as ordered/organized matter, is the evolution of cosmic intelligence.
 

mixed_biscuits

_________________________
I mean, sure, obviously I'm the person best placed to describe what my heart subjectively feels like if I start to present with an arhythmia.

Yeah, that's what I mean...that the individual has something about their situation that only they know and that means they must be at the centre of decisions that have a bearing on their future.

Re. medical expertise, I recently found out that I'm rather sensitive to high-frequency flicker in lighting...my GP had never heard of it (in fact the surgery was decked out in similarly substandard lighting) and the consultant wasn't much help either. I ended up having to deduce the cause of my migraine/dizziness myself.
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
There's that, plus the starting threads with a 5,000 word essay like "this just occurred to me in the shower this morning..."

(Again, not a criticism.)
Don't worry I'm not claiming to be offended, but I think I just missed the message here. Does it seem like I'm... downplaying the difficulty of it? I mean, I can totally see how the tone you describe can be annoying, and I can certainly work on that. I try to exercise, and convey, a sense of self-doubt, in the effort of minimizing self-importance, but maybe its contrived sometimes?

These discussions do really help in elaborating these theories, and prompt considerations that I would have otherwise glossed over. Also just gauging what makes sense and what doesn't seeing how insular things are lately.
 

luka

Well-known member
he'd use the data to determine that. he'd see whos got the most reaction points.
 
Divide that by number of posts in the time period since reactions started to give a true reflection of content quality!!
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
In true noocratic spirit, I'll defer to the machine and let the numbers speak for themselves.

And on that note,

What might a class struggle look like in an economy built upon data instead of labor?
 

luka

Well-known member
i can't imagine an economy based on data or how class divisions would work. too difficult. you do it for me.
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
Well I suppose its already happening, if I understand correctly. Location data, search/browsing history, social connections/friends, all of this stuff that can be extracted by companies without it even seeming like exploitation. An alternative mine for value, instead of labor?

"Well its not like I'm working to generate that data."

That might be the crux. Data generation doesn't seem to require work, at least in the conventional sense. It just happens. All you need to do is be, provided you are accompanied/surveyed by the proper data recording apparatuses.

Yanis Varoufakis suggests the "universal basic dividend" which begins to think in terms of an economy that extracts value from data instead of just labor. This UBD entails Google would have to send out dividends as compensation for the data they use. This is likely to be meager stuff to start, but he seems to have interesting plans about it.

Also, the more data is collected by and incorporated into any algorithmic infrastructure, the better that infrastructure will get at collecting and incorporating data. At least to some extent, confined primarily by power costs/constraints for servers?

In terms of how class divisions would work, it seems like our current orientation will bleed over at least for a while, but I'm not sure if the class system will undergo such a shift as the economic system - really not sure here. That said, some speculation won't hurt.

Perhaps there will emerge ways in which one can generate more data than the next person. Perhaps there will be products that can increase your data capital (such as that monitoring device that sends you money for continuously giving it input/feedback as to what programming you are watching, what your watching schedules are like, etc.). Such things may very well become a trend.

This data economy may become more and more saturated with data that the dividual citizen will become so algorithmically knowable and predictable that they might as well not have a free will, in the conventional sense. This may sound dreadful - but I'm not so sure.

For instance, provided the database is accessible to all, which may be a major crux, this can allow anyone to monitor anyone. How privacy will figure into it, I'm not sure,

Perhaps the class division will be a privacy division, privacy being a luxury that only some can afford, seeing as traditional labor will likely become increasingly precarious and automated, data generation may be something of a dependable income. Not sure how currency as we know it will figure in, but perhaps it won't be too different from now.
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
Here's a thought: if unaccountability is one of the driving enablers of corruption, how can we incentivize the spread of accountability.

So in this noocracy, those with the most power (the noocrats/poindexters that steer the database/machine) will be under the most holistic surveillance, bordering on a cerebral slavery (more power, tighter leash).

If the class divide becomes a privacy divide, how can we prevent those with significant influence from receding into hermitude/privacy, out of reach of the database?

Can we implement a sort of data bounty hunter system? People to essentially go in (rouge? or contracted by the database?) to collect data on powerful people who are attempting to evade the database. A sort of journalism, but a journalism that is filtered through the noocrats (all of whom have a profile tightly monitored by the masses, the media?) and into the database. A properly digital journalism, seeing as the data is collected as a catering-to-the-database.

What kind of data would comprise these profiles? Perhaps some kind of more robust IQ statistics? Unless IQ is already robust enough - I have no idea. The data points can be decided so as to hold the noocrats accountable without being overly invasive. What would this balance look like? I'm not sure.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Don't worry I'm not claiming to be offended, but I think I just missed the message here. Does it seem like I'm... downplaying the difficulty of it? I mean, I can totally see how the tone you describe can be annoying, and I can certainly work on that.
Oh no, not at all! I mean it's great to see someone putting real effort into getting interesting conversations going. I applaud you for it.
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
Some psychologist wrote back to me: “IQ selects for pattern recognition, essential for functioning in modern society”. No. Not seeing patterns except when they are significant is a virtue in real life.

“IQ” is good for @davidgraeber’s “BS jobs”.

The Flynn effect should warn us not just that IQ is somewhat environment dependent, but that it is at least partly

Not statistically savvy enough to contend with most of the data in that article, but from what little I came away with, it seems to make some strong points.

How would intelligence be quantified in a noocratic arrangement? Not sure. Can it be selected for with having to quantize it? Maybe.

It seems like the upper-bound of effective/realistic intelligence would be determined by the role/position of database-driver serving as an attractor. Much like the upper echelons of tech companies selecting for an effective intelligence - whether or not that intelligence is correlated to IQ scores.

Plus, all the ethical baggage that weighs the matter down - I'd say it's a non-starter. One of the major points of Talib's article was that IQ is more effective at identifying/measuring low intelligence, and that score/success correlation variation increases as IQ does.

I'd say it will do, and arguably has done, more harm than good. Especially when wielded by scientism.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Have a go at this on IQ.
This is actually a fascinating article, but - and I'm going to be a total dick, here - if you're writing about intelligence, especially, it's worth having someone proofread it before it gets published. That way you don't end up writing about people with
“vey low IQ”
 
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