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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Maybe in a perfect world it would. |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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| K wrote: | | pietillidie wrote: | | K wrote: | ...
Can you elaborate on what you mean by "untheorised focus"? ... |
What I mean is this:
| K wrote: | | I also don't think homicide is just a "proxy"; surely, it's important in its own right. Homicide, genocide, war... The importance of these things is that they relate to extremes of both human suffering and human evil. Technology has made those of us fortunate enough to benefit from it much more comfortable than in the past. That's really not the heart of the matter. |
Without proper argument, framed as an hypothesis, this is homily. Until I pointed it out, it was locked inside your head; so much so you hadn't considered that you were using proxy variables, and why that matters.
It would be nice if you made your tacit assumptions and theories explicit so we can assess if your proxy variables are valid. Currently, this is a mystery game where only at the end do we discover if we're examining a valid proxy variable.
... |
Homicide seems to be a proxy variable for you, but, as I alluded to above, it is not a proxy variable for me. Apparently, you find homicide of no interest or consequence in its own right. I think differently, as do criminologists (assuming they find their jobs interesting and consequential). Something can be interesting in itself and at the same time potentially inform us about bigger, or more general, or simply different matters. If it does inform us about broader concerns, then one can regard it as doubly interesting, not simply a proxy variable.*
Football could be claimed to teach us about life. Maybe it does. That does not mean football is merely a proxy variable for life. If one is invested in the on-field fortunes of the Collingwood Football Club, that does not mean that one has unwittingly failed to consider that at the end we'll discover that the CFC is just a proxy variable.
No one is forcing you to be interested in any aspect of criminology or warfare for its own sake. But simply dismissing the topics that you don't care about --- or that suggest conclusions you don't believe --- as proxy variables or homily is less helpful than actually providing concrete data and explicit arguments for the topics you do care about.
* For example, by exploring the effect of advances in trauma care on homicide rates, we can find out more about the relation of homicide to violence more generally. We can then hope to find out about the relation of violence to quality of life. You do not need to frame hypotheses in advance to embark on this plan. |
I am interested in it, but only insofar as it is worth considering as part of a broader analysis of questions concerning static and relative assessments of the quality of a society. Indeed, this is why most people are interested in the topic, and why Pinker is of any relevance to the discussion.
Of course, your interest in the homicide rate might be analogous to the way certain train hobbyists are interested in timetables. Or you might be a mathematician/statistician/actuary/computational scientists/similar by trade. Or, you may have an idiosyncratic or emotive interest in murder rates.
If so, I'm not here to interrupt you.
However, if your interest goes further than that, you're passing the buck to the gods or the discipline for your active theoretical prioritisation of one variable in a wider, more complex argument about the relative state of contemporary society.
And this matters because in the topic everyone else here is generally interested in, it is very difficult to know just how much the murder rate reflects the quality of the social epochs being compared. As I've already illustrated using the cases of Costa Rica and South Korea, the murder rate decouples from 'happiness', and happiness is of central concern in assessments of social quality.
So, if the murder rate is your sole concern, fine. If it isn't, and the broader topic of social quality is of interest to you, what data points do you think might be indicative of social quality?
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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| Mugwump wrote: | | pietillidie wrote: | | Mugwump wrote: | | The reasons for the recent falls have been widely theorized (including above) but remain hard to prove. |
But they're no harder to identify than the reasons for the increase.
On the rise, I would be looking at demography, geography and economics first. You have to rule out the major social forces before moving onto more exotic theories. |
“Exotic” theories being the ones you prefer not to believe ?
The hypotheses (for the decline) were discussed above. There are no doubt several. Demographics seems the most plausible (the pros and cons of that explanation were addressed above), economics less so given the discrepancies between nations. |
No, 'exotic theories' being vague speculation beyond the basics.
Hence, demographics are the only solid variable you've fingered so far; I did see your post on that. After that, we can only guess at bits and pieces. You would need a huge model to shake out the various economic and geographic factors, and you'd still probably end up confused.
Your speculation about the decline in authority, if it could be defined and separated from economic liberalisation, hits a brick wall with the decline in violence at the very time society has become 'hyper-liberal' by your usual definitions. So, by your reasoning, liberalisation causes greater violence, but extreme liberalisation reduces it.
On that basis, you ought to be celebrating hyper-liberalisation, not decrying it.
In any case, 'liberalism' spans both 'society' and 'economy'; you can't modify one without modifying the other. This is the reality that Trump is bumping into with his dizzy efforts to control trade and borders, and May is stumbling over as she tries to deliver the fantasies of Brexit. Every effort they make to tighten their grip on either society or the economy results in unforeseen consequences. The far left and far right have long known this, hence their desire not to reform, but to overthrow, nationalise, and assert an iron grip.
I think your feelings about the present are too definite, and you are raging against a machine which not only has many upsides that you understate and filter out, but also has a mind of its own. And definite, anxious interpretations of the world are notorious for driving people to extremes in a bid to regain a sense of control.
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
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^ An exotic theory would be one which does not meet with any intuitive understanding of the mechanisms and behaviour of the object under discussion, "The wearing of synthetic fabrics caused an explosion of very serious violent crime" would be an exotic theory. But if the word helps you maintain your defensive posture and deny any possibility that your ideology may be a factor in much human damage, well, each to their own deflection I guess.
I quite accept above that demographics, increasing new immigration (new immigrants being less likely to commit crime, on average) and incarceration rates of the top 1% malefactors will have a role to play in the rise and fall of crime. I can admit evidence which might contradict my position. You seem unwilling to engage with the fact that countries which have not embarked on your hyper-liberalism have very low rates of seriously injurious crime, and that the age of liberalism coincides with an explosion in it. You seem unwilling to consider that the prevalence of drugs and an adversarial attitude to ordinary authority since the 1960s might be significant. And you seem to be happy with a reduction in crime from stratospheric levels, to levels that are merely tropospheric compared to much of our history.
As a result, most people might feel that your position is the exotic one.
_________________
Two more flags before I die! |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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^I don't have a strong view either way anymore, mostly because I don't think we can get beyond our local emotions to access an objective view on this. It's a hopeless case, which makes me suspect that the data need to be overwhelming either way to override subjective sentiment.
As such, I see the belief that Australia and the UK are getting 'worse' as self-imposed. One could just as easily lean on the mass reduction of pain and suffering, growth in wealth, and the fact that the murder rate of Australia and the UK is still minimal by the standards of the contemporary world, with all of its demographic complexity, to claim the complete opposite of that view.
But what hope do you have telling the loved one of a homicide victim, someone who has lost their job, or someone suffering from perpetual anxiety, or whatever, that the data don't coincide with their feelings? The murder rate could halve tomorrow and it wouldn't matter.
Your fingering of immigration also fails to consider the gains of international exchange over time. The economic liberalisation of Britain and Australia relied heavily on immigration not simply due to the influx of labour, but also because new ideas and motivations were needed to counter structural stagnation and poor productivity, while conceptual difference was needed to break down authoritarian organisations and boys clubs, from dominant religions to political parties and unions.
The resultant liberalisation and restructuring attracted investment, and drove new waves of productivity. People might dislike population growth, but it is plainly a competitive free kick that attracts capital and promotes generational pressure; you can hear this repeated on Bloomberg day and night by institutional investors. Ageing societies shut up shop as the elderly vote selfishly to protect their assets even as infrastructure decays around them.
And what of the mass gains brought to other countries - themselves our own markets which in turn sustain our growth - by econo-cultural exchange, of which immigration plays a major role? Literally billions of lives have been lifted out of extreme poverty by fluid trade and exchange, with expatriate business, worker and student communities being a vital conduit for the flow of ideas and capital, as they have been since colonialism began siphoning assets the other way.
More immediately, those countries also sustain our own economic growth, being new export markets, major exporters of deflation through low-cost products, and suppliers of the highly-skilled labour we struggle to produce in sufficient numbers. When people say the NHS would be crippled without immigrant labour, they're not making things up. The role that motivated immigrants and their families play both locally, and in connection with their countries of origin, can't be underestimated.
It is no coincidence that a host of strong minority groups in the UK hail from invaded and colonised Commonwealth countries. The fact that the largesse of this is now flowing the other way should hardly surprise and certainly shouldn't disappoint. The same applies for those fleeing disastrous interventions such as Iraq and Afghanistan; we cut the path and built the dependencies, and now people are flowing the other way despite and indeed because of the invasion, resource commandeering, and chaos. The complaints over this are among the most hypocritical and irresponsible of our times.
Now, you can go far left or far right in your reaction to the downsides of the liberal socioeconomy, but as Trump and May are finding, you can't have the upsides without taking on the downsides, and you can't waive the downsides without losing the upsides. I'm not saying there are not better approaches and ways of working things to better advantage; there must be, but there are no easy interventions.
Consider, many of us were opposed to Afghanistan and Iraq; many of us want much more intelligent and intensively-supported migrant settlement programs; many of us want the downsides of the liberal economy to be offset by creative programs such as a job guarantee (or similar creative solutions) and international taxation treaties which rein in tax havens across the globe; many of us want more police and more safety and early childhood interventions on the ground; many of us want the grip of old money on housing and urban planning to be loosened; many of us want irrational privatisation handouts to be replaced by quality government services; and on.
But a general grim attitude which clings to the downsides of the liberal socioeconomy like a barnacle on an old pier, and which refuses to present the whole, including the upsides, will do nothing but incite angry and irrational people to do what angry and irrational people do: wreck things.
Edit: You might find a considerable number of changes to the earlier text of this post.
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
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^ there’s a lot in that post that I like, actually, and most of the things in your second last para are things I would support, if implemented intelligently. I am still dismayed that the CBA, which the government used to own, was privatised to become one of our foremost corporate pirates.
I disagree that resistance to the downsides of the liberal socioeconomy encourages Trumpism. I think the evidence from recent history is that the liberal system itself encourages Trumpism. It was not caused by people ringing the alarm about declining standards of civility.
Stepping outside of polemics, it’d be very interesting to see figures corrected for the effects of age demographics and immigration. That should be possible, given there are known rates of transgression by age cohort (younger, male = higher probability) and among new immigrants (typically lower) etc .... but I haven’t seen it done systematically anywhere.
_________________
Two more flags before I die! |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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| pietillidie wrote: | | K wrote: | ...
Homicide seems to be a proxy variable for you, but, as I alluded to above, it is not a proxy variable for me. Apparently, you find homicide of no interest or consequence in its own right. ... |
I am interested in it, but only insofar as it is worth considering as part of a broader analysis of questions concerning static and relative assessments of the quality of a society. ...
Of course, your interest in the homicide rate might be analogous to the way certain train hobbyists are interested in timetables. ... Or, you may have an idiosyncratic or emotive interest in murder rates.
...
And this matters because in the topic everyone else here is generally interested in...
... |
There are many things I find highly questionable in your post quoted in part above, so perhaps I should answer in several posts rather than one.
Your first sentence just confirms that it is a proxy variable for you, so it is something that we can agree on. However, that does not mean that everyone else must regard it as merely a proxy variable. Perhaps if the murder rates went in the direction you liked, you would be a little more interested. Regardless, it would be strange if everyone had exactly the same degree of interest in exactly the same topics.
I also think you should let "everyone else here" speak for themselves, rather than putting words into their mouths. The fact is, there is a thread in this forum not far from this one that is dedicated to just one single instance of homicide. If you think discussing homicide rates is like train hobbyists' behaviour --- and, for the record, I see nothing objectionable about being a train hobbyist --- then presumably you think that people who have posted in that thread are like someone who is fixated on Puffing Billy. I know that you are aware of that thread, because you have posted in it yourself, though in that post you chose not to dismiss everyone there as having an "idiosyncratic or emotive interest".
TBC. |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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^You're going to a lot of effort to take offence given the conjunction 'or' in the paragraph covers many scenarios whereby one might be interested in a single variable, from statistician to hobbyist to whatever reason ('idiosyncratic').
Again, though, you refuse to explain why you're interested in the homicide rate, and therefore sidestep judgement as to whether that interest is fit for purpose, i.e., whether your proxy variable is valid, and to what degree.
Perhaps that's coming in your continuation.
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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| pietillidie wrote: | | ^You're going to a lot of effort to take offence given the conjunction 'or' in the paragraph covers many scenarios ... |
I don't see that all those conjunctions make a real difference. The jobs thrown in the middle seem just a token list, especially since at least half of them must have zero interest in either homicide rates or happiness studies. As I mentioned, there is an entire thread in this forum devoted to a single instance of homicide. Do you think the posters there have an "idiosyncratic or emotive interest" in a proxy variable? (What exactly do you regard as an "emotive interest"?) If so, what is it supposedly a proxy variable for? And what about The Club's related actions last week?
If you want to discuss something else relevant to the thread topic, then simply post something with actual content about it. That is the usual way a thread operates, and this thread is really no exception. Homicide was not even close to the first topic discussed in this thread. It is just where the discussion led. Posters were interested about different aspects of it. If people have more to say about, for example, Robert Solow's work, then they are free to make new posts about it, and new discussion might continue from there. It is also possible to discuss multiple subtopics simultaneously.
Do you wish to discuss studies of happiness? Do you wish to discuss Costa Rica? What makes you think that Costa Rica is so happy? I am not at all convinced about that claim. Maybe Costa Ricans are quite happy. Maybe very happy. But I certainly would not bet at this stage that they are happier than, for example, Australians. Whatever it is we discuss, we should have some sort of respect for truth and not simply repeat wildly speculative claims about the basic facts. |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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^^^ For now, in lieu of further words, a plot:
by way of J. Wolfers
Okay, a few words, but just a few...
Gallup: “All things considered, how satisfied are you with your life as a whole these days? Use a 0 to 10 scale, where 0 is dissatisfied and 10 is satisfied.”
Cantril: “Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you, and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you. On which step of the ladder would you say you personally feel you stand at this time, assuming that the higher the step the better you feel about your life, and the lower the step the worse you feel about it? Which step comes closest to the way you feel?” |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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Oh, maybe just one more pic...
LatinBarometer, via J. Wolfers. |
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David 
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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That a relatively rich country like Chile is so low while a relatively poor country like Guatemala is so high is certainly interesting. Of course, there’s plenty of reason to hesitate before drawing conclusions here – there may be cultural differences in how unhappiness is expressed, for instance – but it also makes one wonder what the point of wealth and technological development is if people’s lives aren’t actually getting better.
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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| Well, David, it seems the three different polls are not giving anything like the same ordering of countries, which immediately throws doubt on what meaning can be ascribed to the questions asked. |
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Bucks5 
Nicky D - Parting the red sea
Joined: 23 Mar 2002
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There would be many variables affecting the results.
The weather at the time, a popular sports team may have won (or lost) an important match the days before, even a Royal wedding can effect the average mood of a country on any given day.
_________________
How would Siri know when to answer "Hey Siri" unless it is listening in to everything you say? |
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K
Joined: 09 Sep 2011
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Don't throw away your (country's) money just yet...
A different question...
Back to life satisfaction...
["New" means 2008. The article this pic accompanies is at https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/business/16leonhardt.html & is entitled
Maybe Money Does Buy Happiness After All.]
A similar but more recent pic...
But is it better to inherit your fortune than to work too hard for it at school?
[Of course, maybe supposed school suffering is justified by the money and ensuing happiness it allegedly brings later in life...] |
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