That is all policies and political structures are testable and tested to see their effect on those three (or other suggested) factors. If a policy doesn't reasonably work then it's simply not continually employed. I'm curious to see what factors others think ought to be used.
It seems most political systems now were built without science in mind and utilize it as an afterthought to help develop legitimacy for policies individuals want. Generally politics across countries seems deeply emotionally driven and not fact driven. That is people have a feeling that an idea is a good idea and then they cobble together whatever they can to support that point without any unified measure of good or better. Ideally it ought to be the other way around, fact or evidence informed policy generation.
39 Comments
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 7 pts · 39d
Marxism-Leninism is already heavily based on science, and takes the stance of dialectical materialism as the basis for science and analysis. What's wrong with scientific socialism as it already exists, in your eyes?
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · -3 pts · 39d
Politics then science has the cart before the horse so to speak. It ought to be the other way around. I'll give a small example of what I mean. When someone gets their PhD they're getting a degree in philosophy of something. We could have similarly said their degree is heavily philosophy based but it's another sentiment entirely to say it is a degree in philosophy. Science is the singular most powerful cognitive structure ever created by mankind to determine truth and it ought to be the core of the means through which we govern ourselves. Anything else is just not in the heart of seeking truth, much less the truth on how best to organize and maintain society for the optimized wellbeing of the society's citizens. Science doesn't need a middleman.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 39d
Science is not independent of philosophy. There's idealist science, metaphysical science, etc, all of which are wrong. There is no such thing as science without philosophy, because science is an attempt by humans to understand the world. Humans are all philosophers, as we all have a world outlook. By rejecting study of philosophy as it relates to science, you are ignoring preconcieved biases, rather than acknowledging them and correcting the misconceptions.
This is why Marxism-Leninism is correct, and why all science must be done from a dialectical materialist standpoint.
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · -6 pts · 39d
I mean yeah the scientific method and the tools of science, namely mathematics are indeed branches of philosophy, so is aesthetics but that doesn't mean science is aesthetics even though they both are philosophy. Now if the claim that Marxism-Leninism is "correct" aka is the most optimal form of governance for producing human wellbeing then of course a system dedicated to finding through scientific enquiry the most optimal means of governance will scientifically prove it is through all possible measurements. There's no need to have feelings when we can have proof, quantifiable, measurable, repeatable proof. Once again science and specifically the scientific method doesn't need hand holding, the process will derive the most optimal means of governance regardless of people's seemingly infallible worship of this political system or that political system.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 7 pts · 39d
You're still treating science like it's not a process gone through by humans. Science once posited that race science was correct in order to justify eugenics. We need to be aware of our world outlook and correct it before we begin to use science, otherwise we come to incorrect conclusions and incorrect propositions. That's my point.
Marxism-Leninism is correct not because it is a "form of governance" (it isn't) but because it's a living social science grounded in scientific understanding of the world.
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · -4 pts · 39d
You're correct, the best aspect of science is the self revision built into it unlike other systems. The problem with a lot of political philosophies is they suffer from the same blindness but don't have a system that is ultimately self revising. Once again if what you are saying is true then it will be shown through repeatable measurement, and testing. There's no need to depend on feelings when we can have facts. If Marxism-Leninism is the most optimal form of governance for producing human wellbeing then a system designed to discover the most optimal form of governance will reproduce it. Putting political philosophy before science is putting the cart before the horse, aka Marxism-Leninism is a good hypothesis we can test using a stronger mental construct called the scientific method.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 7 pts · 39d
I already said Marxism-Leninism is not a "form of governance." The fact that you repeat this claim leads me to believe that you aren't actually reading what I'm writing.
Phikosophy, our world outlook, is already before science. The way we see the world and understand it determines how we view science and perform it. This is why vulgar materialists, as opposed to dialectical materialists, tried to prove race theory correct and thus advocate for eugenics. Science is not neutral. The world around us, the material world, does not care how we interpret it beyond how we change it. However, there is no such thing as a perfectly neutral observer, we all have preconceived biases.
Marxism-Leninism is already scientific, the scientific method is a tool employed by it already. You're trying to remove science from the context it exists in.
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 39d
I think we've run afoul of two issues. How do you define Marxism-Leninism? Through which means do you know its correctness?
If you know its correctness through implementation and then measuring the results then that's science testing a hypothesis. For example I know my nose is between my eyes because I can measure through my senses and test that idea repeatedly until I have statistical confidence that's the location of my nose. If for some reason the location of my nose changes then that information can be updated with testing and measurement most likely through my senses.
If you know through some other means like spiritual revelation then it's still the case that the concept will have measurable outcomes we can use to test and compare with other concepts to verify its correctness.
dihutenosa@piefed.social · 6 pts · 40d
If you start tracking performance (of whichever system) via a graph, then people will start pushing the graph up, at the cost of anything else.
Human happiness is multifaceted and not easy to represent in a simple chart.
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 40d
P hacking is nothing new and well understood by an informed group aka it only works on people who don't actually know what they are looking at. Ideally a science based political system is accompanied by a science based culture aka the populace is well versed in the scientific process and how data is collected, the different levels in data confidence aka single case study vs a meta analysis of hundreds of studies.
emergencyfood@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 39d
I don't think they're talking about p hacking. P hacking is when the statistician keeps adjusting the test to get a significant result. What they meant is probably Goodhart's Law.
Devadander@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 40d
Sure. Just get rid of money globally and punish instead of reward those who hoard resources
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 40d
Well if we test this policy and it optimizes people's wellbeing over other policies then yes. The whole Idea is we don't just do things based on the feeling it will have a particular outcome, we test it and that way we have knowledge.
azureskypirate@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 39d
It makes sense. Technology has made workers much more effecient since the 1970s, yet weekly hours worked have not fallen. It might be worth it to have the option to work less, in other words, to increase HDI a lot for a little less GDP.
Zephyr@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 39d
Yeah most countries have been seriously lacking on the HDI and environmental impact aspect of what I consider to be the best optimization for human wellbeing. Production is amazing, more food, better medicine, more efficient energy sources but it has to be for a reason, not just to do it. Of course capitalism tries to quantify this through market demand but unfortunately people and governance are easy to game if one has enough capital aka people can be convinced either directly or through ignorance to support markets that are harmful to their wellbeing and the environment.
emergencyfood@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 39d
This is a variation of a very old philosophy called legalism. They didn't have HDI and GDP in those days, but the idea was that you should judge civil servants and government policies based on objective results rather than morality. It worked when there was a strong and relatively neutral emperor / chancellor to make and enforce those judgements impartially. In the modern day, Singapore might be an example of this. But the problem is that you still need a strong and relatively neutral institution to make and enforce judgements fairly.