The alignment chart that has its origins in Dungeons and Dragons has a fascinating choice of just two dimensions that comprehensively shape a characters' behavior. theatlantic.com/technology/arc…
'A “good” moral alignment means a character will lean toward altruism and personal sacrifice. Evil means harming and oppressing. A neutral person is one who wouldn’t kill somebody for no reason, but wouldn’t protect anybody for no reason either.'
'lawfulness,“implies honor, trustworthiness, obedience to authority, and reliability. On the downside, lawfulness can include closed-mindedness, reactionary adherence to tradition, judgmentalness, and a lack of adaptability.'
'Chaos implies freedom, adaptability, and flexibility. On the downside, chaos can include recklessness, resentment toward legitimate authority, arbitrary actions, and irresponsibility.”
It's interesting to me that the labels themselves have a bias. Good is preferred over evil and lawfully is preferred over chaos. I feel the need for more neutral labels.
Good places higher priority for the well-being of the collective. The opposite prioritizes the individual. Therefore many libertarians would object to the label 'evil'.
Lawful prioritizes established prescriptions. Chaos prioritizes principles over rigid rules. Anarchists would argue that their chaotic methods are a good thing.
The two axes can be relabeled as "Collective vs Individual" and "Convention vs Creativity". These are two axes are surprisingly captured by Peirce's predicaments.
The D&D moral alignment chart captures all 3 universal tensions. The lawful-chaos axis conflates a 3rd tension (order-chaos) with (convention-creativity). It should be no surprise why we see the chart applicable to so many domains.

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More from @IntuitMachine

Feb 19
Americans are a very odd lot. You have a deadly weapon, that is purportedly manufactured by a known enemy, yet many have become a catalyst for the spread of this deadly weapon. In political jargon, they call these 'useful idiots'. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_id…
I could be talking about the covid19 virus or anti-democratic Russian tactics, which would apply to the same set of Americans. There is something odd here where so many find it to be their duty to work against their own interests.
It's also interesting that the pandemic is still at its peak in Russia. So perhaps to understand a useful idiot, we have to understand how people in Russia tick. Why is it that Russia is so backward as a nation?
Read 11 tweets
Feb 19
It's difficult to understand how the Russian army can occupy Ukraine which is the size of Texas. It's next to impossible to do if the population (44m) isn't on your side. One would need to enlist a sizeable number of accomplices within the population.
Certainly, if the permafrost is hard enough, the tanks can move unimpeded, but logistics win wars. The problem with good logistics is that it doesn't come for free, it's expensive.
Anyway, none of this makes sense. I don't see the Russians moving tanks into Ukraine when the temperature is around 40F. That's a muddy quagmire! Also, tanks aren't as effective inside urban places.
Read 7 tweets
Feb 19
Did anyone notice that sustained nuclear fusion is a good analogy to achieve unlimited human potential? To tame the unlimited energy of a nuclear fusion one needs a magnetic bottle that is adaptive enough to constrain the reactor from destroying itself.
Doesn't this remind you of dystopian movies like "Fahrenheit 451", "The Giver", "Equilibrium" and "V for Vendetta" where art and emotion are removed from society so that humans avoid their own destructive fate?
In each of these movies, the antagonist are institutions that are so rigid in their micromanagement of lives that we've what it means to be human. Do we not also see it in ourselves when we are rigid in our own thinking that we've lost our emotions and thus our humanity?
Read 12 tweets
Feb 18
The business model of NFTs is to conjure up the impression of exclusivity. That's not unlike many other business models:
Let's not forget that FaceBook began by pandering to exclusivity (i.e. owning an email address in a prestigious university). All economics requires scarcity, exclusivity is a kind of scarcity that exists in a world of abundance.
Many don't recognize the two sides of decentralized ledger technology (i.e. blockchain). On one side is the idea that exclusive control of the network is prevented. On the flip side, the network makes possible human notions of scarcity in a virtual world of abundance.
Read 8 tweets
Feb 17
It is a common belief that human civilization evolution is predominantly influenced by the religious and philosophical ideas of the past. I don't think this is true, civilization is influenced by technology. Let me explain.
Technology influences the direction of civilization because we are 'forced' to adopt it. We adopt technology because it is useful. We adopt it regardless of our religious or philosophical biases.
The Amish, as part of their religion. deliberately avoid modern technologies. With the exception, however, if it is used for work. So it is not uncommon to see them with smartphones and credit card readers to facilitate their commerce.
Read 20 tweets
Feb 17
It's already been two years since John Vervaeke completed his 50 episodes 'Awakening from the Meaning Crisis'. I revisited one lecture and realized that it's much better than when I originally watched it!
My original motivation for watching his lectures was to see if I can gain more insight on human cognition in the hopes of understanding general intelligence. So I skipped most of his lectures until episode 26.
The previous episodes are a historical account of how humans evolved their thinking of how they would navigate this world. I tend to not care for historical accounts because they spend time on dead ends.
Read 10 tweets

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