Rethinking our collective decision making PDF
Preview Rethinking our collective decision making
Rethinking our collective decision making Let's use visual tools to avoid more disasters Target audience: everyone interested, Author: Edgar Hartel no special knowledge necessary Date: published January 2019 Reading time: 15-25 minutes Terms: free for non-commercial use (license details below), Page layout: allows easy reading commercial use requires separate agreement without scrolling, $ even on C C Creative Commons 3.0 Unported License very small screens B Y N C S A Attribution - NonCommercial - SharedAlike We humans are masters at using tools to overcome our limitations. 2 We couldn't fight mammoths with We can't move very fast, We're not very strong, bare hands, so we used weapons. so we use vehicles. so we use machines that are. In complex situations, we can't make quick and well-founded decisions, We can't do difficult calculations, so we use ... uh ... we just don't do it We can't fly, so we use aircraft. so we use machines for this. (and ignore the issue). 3 Note: I don't think it's smart to “ignore the issue”. When I say “well-founded decisions”, I refer to decisions that are made That's what this document after all relevant options and criteria is about. have been evaluated. 4 Progress Intro done Why our current situation is dangerous up next How to improve our current situation Outlook Summary Other thoughts References 5 Where it is obvious that life or money is at stake, the need for quick and well-founded decisions becomes obvious, too. In some of these cases we have started to use tools to overcome our Flight computers Car safety systems mental limitations. And it works. assist aircraft pilots. assist drivers. Algorithms Medical knowledge systems assist stock traders. assist doctors. 6 Flight computers Car safety systems assist aircraft pilots. assist drivers. But mostly, and especially in politics, using special tools for (quick and well-founded) decision making appears to be an ignored concept. Algorithms Medical knowledge systems assist stock traders. assist doctors. 7 This is a dangerous situation. Many people have suffered For you, too. or even died. Others do so while you read this. Just ask yourself, Political decisions affect all of us. your parents or your grandparents. There have been And this happens again and - wars again and again. - famines - environmental disasters Because if we use the same - economic crises methods as always, the results - (...) will be as always. because of poor political decision making. 8 What methods That's because the leaders' views are we talking about? are usually dominated by ideology and ego. The leaders also tend In the case of tyranny, to lose contact with reality. there is a single person, or a small group, that makes political Methods used in tyranny: decisions. This certainly allows personal reasoning, gut feeling, for quick decisions, but not for advisor/expert consultations well-founded ones. 9 In the case of democracy, Democracy allows, in theory, there are dozens of persons in for well-founded and also quick government, and hundreds or decision making (within thousands in parliament(s), that government and parliament), make political decisions directly but this is currently far from reality. and on a daily basis. Methods used in democracy: The part of the population personal reasoning, gut feeling, that has the right to vote advisor/expert consultations, makes political decisions discussion/debate, other hearings, indirectly and seldom. and voting 10
The list of books you might like
