The key missing metric is "Happiness/Contentment." While its definition may be somewhat subjective, asking people how satisfied they are with their lives could be a good start.
However, it'd be less surprising if that metric might not have the same trajectory as the overall trend of the other graphs.
Happiness being subjective is exactly why it is an important metric. We are conscious beings with subjective experiences. I don't care how many studies say that I'm objectively happy I read, if I'm not happy, the metrics are meaningless and perhaps even harmful to me.
That being said, optimizing for some of these collective benchmarks does create some baseline stability from which people can pursue and build their own rich, meaningful and happy lives.
They optimize for system health, not health of each node. However, a healthy system is great, though if all the nodes kill themselves, or tear the system apart, maybe it isn't so healthy?
I'm referring to slow suicide through "lifestyle choices", and war, both physical and cultural.
So work should be done on all levels of abstraction, from the system level down to the compute node, and even lower, to the energy, and maintenance of compute subsystems.
Hard to measure that. Even GDP/capita is too rough a measure. People who do subsistence farming may not be starving or dirt poor, but GDP/capita completely fails to capture their production and consumption. But at least GDP/capita is a decent enough measure because as a nation gets wealthier there is more specialization of labor and subsistence farming becomes a thing of the past (and along the way food security improves dramatically). But let's just say that food security enables happiness/contentment -- that the rest is up to each individual, because how else could it be?
That seems pretty flattering for the GDP-growth dogma, then, if organizations trying to measure happiness and human development feel that GDP statistics are an important input.
GNI is about inequality, which again many of us in this thread argue is not a good measure. Bringing it back in through the backdoor doesn't help. Argue the points.
Would such a metric even honestly exist on the historical time-frames covered? I would guess late industrial-early modernity at best as the beginning of such data systematically.
The social "sciences" and their consequences have been a disaster for the human race. We'd be better off if we just stopped applying labels like "metric" or "data" to subjective concepts altogether.
Interesting to learn about that Iron Law. Though what I find missing in the mini blog post is an explanation why the second group ("the pure institution for institution sake" mindset) tends to take over the organisation.
Is it because they are more invested in the organisational/administrative tasks versus the first group's actual goal archiving mindset ?
As these goals of the first group lie outside the organisation, the simple distance of goals within vs without might be one significant part. E.g. easier to achieve something within then outside, hence more power over time.
> why the second group ("the pure institution for institution sake" mindset) tends to take over the organisation.
Because they can focus 100% of their time and effort on controlling the organization, whereas the first group can only focus the time and effort on that that they can spare from getting the actual work done that they are in the organization to do.
Makes sense. I'm wondering now how a "safeguard" from this behaviour could look like. E.g. make a person's promotion within an organisation depending on achieving also "first-order" goals of the organisation.
The problem is that the institutionalists define "first-order" safeguards. They also often control key relationships like access to the board of directors
I would say that it’s because their job description and their KPIs are tied to it. HR is measured for doing HR things. HR’s sole purpose is to do HR things. The department becomes a sort of paperclip maximiser that is not concerned with things like the company’s goals.
I'm wondering whether there's also going to be a large-scale operation a few months ahead of the games of deporting homeless people from the city as we have seen in Paris. (also, I heard they have already quite rolled back on that "car-free" goal. Don't have the source available, but google is your friend.)
> I'm wondering whether there's also going to be a large-scale operation a few months ahead of the games of deporting homeless people
Yes. Already beginning in cities all across the US since the Supreme Court decision in Grants Pass v Johnson.
Prior to this decision, a locality without sufficient shelter beds could not just sweep through an encampment arresting/fining/evicting the residents while seizing and destroying their possessions like sleeping bags, blankets and tents, or fine/arrest and impound vehicles of people sleeping in vehicles (yes, all the above happened in spite of the law, but it did result in some restraint on the part of the authorities). Now, homeless hate can be unleashed without restraint.
Hate it is. In one memorable letter to the editor of a local paper, a woman wrote, "Homeless are like cockroaches and I wish I had a giant can of Raid." (for non Americans, Raid is a brand of insecticide-- maybe obvious from context).
People who were in foster care as children make up 50% of the homeless population in the US [1]. Homeless demographics have changed recently, people becoming homeless for the first time after the age of 50 is now the second largest single group in California at 41% [2]. The US is a brutal society that is failing its most vulnerable.
I have an 2012 MBP (upgraded 500 SSD, 4GB RAM) which runs great on Linux Mint (lightweight) or even Fedora. The battery is only about 2.5 hours, but I guess when replaced it would also last much longer.
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