The Nudge Squad

Off Topic Politics and World Issues
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When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, “This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,” the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything–you can’t conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him.
–Robert Heinlein

Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns; why should we let them have ideas?
– Joseph Stalin

Any nudge by the government is a nudge toward tyranny.
–Varqanir

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580×763 53.8 KB

It starts with Hope…

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…and ends with Change.

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[quote]atypical1 wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

I don’t trust my government, or some random sociologist to tell me what is right for me.

They dont’ live my life, and they, and I know this comes as a shock to them, don’t know what is best for me. I do. [/quote]

I totally get that. From a practical standpoint what do you think this means? I think they are just going to encourage people to act a certain way. [/quote]

Exactly. And that’s exactly the point that we don’t like.

[quote]I take this to mean that they are simply going to start using what behavioral scientists tell us about human behavior and using that to help shape some of their messages.

You’re naive (and I know you’re really not) if you think that “some behavioral sociologist” is not already telling you what is right for you. This happens all the time. Hell, I use some of these same concepts in my work when I’m trying to influence people. I would venture to guess that all of us do.[/quote]

That’s fine. It’s something to watch out for, something all marketing does in one way or other, but it is not something that I want a State Actor doing.

If we didn’t have stuff like the IRS targeting, the NSA spying on us, and all of these other blatant, manifest violations of our Constitutional rights and the founding principles of our government, I would be ok with them doing this. As you said, it’s naive to believe corporations everywhere aren’t doing the same thing, or salespeople. As it is, however, I see no reason to support giving them yet another tool to influence people to believe they’re really benign, benevolent and intelligent when they are corrupt, power hungry, controlling, and borderline incompetent when they do try something.

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[quote]pushharder wrote:
By the way, Snarky, I responded to your last email but didn’t hear back from you. Not that we have to daily pen pals or anything – I just am mentioning this because we had some trouble initially with you receiving my email and wondering if it happened again.[/quote]

Hmm. I’ll look. Try sending it again. The first mail you sent didn’t arrive until after you had sent it a second time.

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[quote]atypical1 wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
I’m blatantly having a hard time separating my practical thinking on this from my wild conspiracy, McCarthyism thinking on this.

IN the beginning, in its infancy, I think it relatively nothing. The people this will have a significant effect on behavior, would have been effected by a fart in church. The independently willed people will likely function on as if there was no program.

Then I start thinking about what this program means for my grandkids and great grandkids, and I’m reading 'Brave New World" so my imagination goes wild and I really start sounding like a loon… (This is why I avoid Alex Jones and Ventura… I’m very susceptible to that kind of thing because I find it hard to believe large swaths of people are really as dumb as it seems…)[/quote]

I typically agree with this sentiment. It’s certainly how I feel about using drones here or about gun control. [/quote]

Me too!

[quote]But I don’t see this in the same league.

Maybe it’s not the government’s place to tell people not to smoke or how to eat. But they are doing it anyway and there’s nothing we’re going to do to stop that. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing. The point that I see of this “nudge squad” would be to use actual science to back up their campaigns which makes sense to me. If they are going to spend the money on it then it might as well work.

Conversely, I can see how this could potentially go bad. If we start “nudging” people to vote a particular way then this would obviously be a bad thing. Maybe I’m being to pollyanna-ish but I just don’t see the government having the ability to do that. I don’t think the government is that organized.

james[/quote]

And to me this is exactly what that eventually boils down to. Or to target political groups they don’t like ala IRS. Or in tandem with the IRS. Or NSA. Or influencing people to give up taking the 2nd amendment so seriously and “clinging to their guns” so much. Win against the NRA lobby.

The question you have to ask yourself is a) how much WORSE could this go if it goes badly vs. how much better could it be if it goes ok? Do a risk analysis. Then factor in the complete inability of the gov’t to stop and leave well enough alone. They’ve never stopped, they’ve never even defunded any temporary agency.

In poker terms, pot odds do NOT justify the bet. Not even close.

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[quote]Varqanir wrote:
When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, “This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,” the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything–you can’t conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him.
–Robert Heinlein
[/quote]

An amazing quote by Heinlein and one of my favorites, though having been so long that I’d forgotten about it.

Incidentally, how do you begin to control a free man? You hoodwink his mind in gradual, plausible, and reasonable pieces. And you encourage complacency.

Again:

[quote]…he brought his fist down and said he didn’t believe a nation where every man had a vote would voluntarily get down in the mud and dirt in any such way; and that to steal from a nation its will and preference must be a crime and the first of all crimes.

Mark Twain, from Connecticut Yankee[/quote]

You see we are going in the opposite direction, James. It is the minority seeking to tell–or gradually influence-- we the People how we should be governed, or behave, or feel about issues of great importance. That is not the direction government should take, it has never been, and it will never be, regardless of which mascot is in the manor at 1600 Pennsylvania. It is also not something they will ever admit to.

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Guess so.

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So they don’t do this already?

Wow well if the majority of people aren’t being “nudged” by our gov’t already, then we are really fucked when they start.

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Couple of quick thoughts. The first is that I don’t believe this is meant to control everyone or tell people exactly how to think or vote.

Hasn’t this country always been about the few telling the majority how to live? Hell, even the founding fathers did that. Not everyone wanted to be independent.

James

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[quote]Phoenix44e wrote:
So they don’t do this already?

Wow well if the majority of people aren’t being “nudged” by our gov’t already, then we are really fucked when they start.[/quote]

Oh sure they do. They’re just very bad at it comparatively speaking. I don’t particularly want them to get better at it either.