[FRIAM] gerrymandering algorithm question

[uǝlƃ ☣]

If there's any lesson we can take from the apparent growth of complexity as biology progresses, it's that each sub-population that lands in a niche, exploits that niche until some set of constraints are met.  And if humans are still evolving, then our extended phenotype (including cultural constructs like political reconciliation methods) is still evolving. [†]

And if that's the case, then what is that evolution if NOT manipulation-discovery, exploration-exploitation experimentation?

It seems to me like the numbers people like Steven Pinker and Michael Shermer cite (less poverty, less violence, longer life, etc.) indicate that this *region* of solution space, while not perfect, has been profitable.  The problem isn't that we're now or have recently been flat out wrong.  The problem is that the solutions we've put in place and are using now are not as *dynamic* as they need to be for us to continue the same progress rate.  So, I think a good argument can be made that they should be experiments from which we can learn slightly new methods.  Of course, if you're point is that if others refuse to view them as experiments, then I agree it makes my idealism a bit moot.


[†] Again, perhaps I'm still caught in the cone of inference from McShea and Brandon's "Biology's First Law".  In there, they argue that "Diversity is Easy, Stasis is Hard", wherein they argue that PERHAPS humans are still evolving, but what's being selected for is the same as what *was* selected for.

On 11/13/18 1:28 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> Glen writes:
> 
> < I.e. perhaps there is no such thing as irreconcilable values? ... that any system we put in place, as long as it's fixed for the rest of eternity will lead to (new) irreconcilable values?  If our reconciliation methods were treated as the manipulation-discovery experiments that they are, any given method would be revokable when it failed. >
> 
> Between the civil & world wars, and the swings between fascism & liberalism, one might hope that some learning occurs.  It does not seem to be a manipulation-discovery experiment in any reasonable sense to me.


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