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Could we make a political party that uses DebateIsland to decide what to do?

Debate Information

I believe we can make evidence-based e-democracy political parties that use pro/con forums to select policy.

I believe Wikipedia is a great example of amateurs doing very complex things, with very little structure. I believe with even a very little bit of structure we could make it much easier to reward good behavior, and punish bad behavior better than Wikipedia.

I believe we can make it relatively easy to make electronic democracy immune to manipulation by special interest. We can simply link the strength of each conclusion to the strength of the argument, and make it so it punishes your side if you make an illogical argument that is not supported by the facts. With a little bit of structure, this can be very easy.

Simple algorithms can change the course of history. Google's algorithm counted links, as a way to determine which websites were the "best". The websites that get linked to the most, were assumed to be the best. If we create the right structure, we can count reasons the same way google counts links. Conclusions with the most evidence to support them, and the lowest evidence to weaken them will be assumed to be the best, until someone can weaken the evidence. If we just link Conclusion Strength (CS) to the Argument Strength (of reasons to agree or disagree), and also track Linkage Strength (LS) between arguments and Conclusions, and Unique Strengths as a result of people tagging arguments as saying essentially the same thing as other arguments given to support or weaken the conclusion, we can generate very good Conclusion Scores. But I'm just getting started! You can also strategically use upvotes and downvotes, similar to other websites. I would also brainstorm likely motivation of those who agree and disagree. This is because those in conflict resolution and mediation teach us to focus on interest, not positions. This allows for elegant ways of meeting the interest of both sides.

Again, I'm not even getting started. We should have cost and benefits listed for each proposal, and use the arguments to determine the likelihood of each cost or benefit. I've been thinking about this for 20 years, and I have about a hundred other ways of promoting quality. It will be so easy. We just have to get started. I believe there are many ways to we can promote quality, and have a good, online, cost/benefit analysis for each party.

I believe we can make evidence-based e-democracy political parties that use pro/con forums to select policy. We can promote candidates that promise to use open systems to make their decisions. This is how e-democracy is born. It's about time.

It would be easy to create a political party platform with DebateIsland. It would just be the 20 things with the highest scores, the most benefits, and the lowest cost. DebateIsland will use some of the billions of dollars that get poured into political parties each year, in order to make their algorithms transparent, and continually improve them. They will show the math. They will add all the scores of the reasons to agree, and subtract all the scores of reasons to disagree. They will multiply argument scores, by linkage percentages to determine if each reason (if assumed to be true) can be said to support the conclusion. By definition a good political party platform is policy that stands up to scrutiny. If we build the right scoring algorithms, we can build the best political party platform.

We should require our politicians to use transparent decision making processes in which they clearly outline the reasons they support or oppose each bill. There are many ways we could expose the decision making to the light of transparency. We could require candidates at least up-vote the arguments that they consider to be valid. We could alter the recommended course of action for each user, so that the website will recommend different policies based on which policies they consider to be valid. Obviously, this is a step in the right direction and not ideal. However we could reward politicians for at least clicking on or evaluating more arguments. The website could give each politician a score based on how often they agree with arguments from the other side. Currently we don't even require politicians to pretend that they are acting in our interest by having a formal procedure that they account and explain their actions. Politicians should have to point out what they believe to be the greatest weaknesses of at least the top 5 or 10 reasons to disagree with their actions. Having to explain yourselves works in engineering classes, where students are not only required to get the right answer, but are required to show their work, indicating to the professor how they came to their conclusion. We should do the same thing in public policy. We should focus much less on what people believe, and much more on the data and arguments they use to support their beliefs. This process works will for the US Supreme court that has to give a majority and minority opinion after each vote. Each member has to explain themselves. All elected officials should have to explain themselves, and at least explain why a few of the major criticisms of their side are invalid.

If we use DebateIsland to run our political party, we will be able to get a lot of people to support us. People are looking for tools that get people out of their silos and trenches acknowledging there are two sides to every story. Technology Billionaires like Bill Gates often talk about the problem of politics in the Modern Age. Facebook is looking to clean their image after acknowledging they were used by Russia to spread fake news and heated debate. Someone will build a rational system for making decisions in the electronic age. It might as well be us. Echo chambers are boring, dysfunctional, and won’t be able to compete with us if we do a good job of promoting good arguments. There are technological solutions to confirmation bias, blind partisanship, and fake news. We can create structures that make people aware of confirmation bias, and encourage people to judge conclusions directly by the merit of the arguments, without giving more weight to arguments from their side. If they see that the math adds up, and they see how the other side has logical data, and good arguments, and they see how the algorithm supports them some of the time, they will embrace the algorithm.

Many people wisely see partisanship, narrow-mindedness, and dogmatism as the problem not the solution. They don’t see these things in themselves, and will gladly inter into forums that promise to root out bad logic. When they see that some of their arguments don’t hold up to scrutiny, they will quickly abandon them and focus more love and attention on their arguments that are kicking as and doing well. The National Review, the leading Conservative periodical in the USA, regularly has articles about the problems with “Blind Partisanship”. George Washington, the “father” of the United States, warned of the problems with “factions” (think political parties).

People hate the existing political parties in the United States. The democratic party seems dedicated to tribalism and identity politics and seems unwilling to care about appealing to the working class. The republican party no longer cares in balancing the budget, family values, or human decency. They no longer seem to care about creating a meritocracy but seem committed to protecting those who already have all the power. Existing political parties are weak. “None” is the fastest growing political party. The existing political parties are losing commitment to ideas and values and are lost in swamps of hero worship, identity politics, us-vs-them, the revenge cycle, and tribalism. Websites that focus on ideas can quickly renew the best parts of Western and Eastern political thinking.

People will see that parties that make their decisions by measuring the relative strength of pros and cons for each decision as the only viable path forward. We can help reason (and worship at the feet of Athena the Goddess of Wisdom. LOL.) by crowd-sourcing the scientific method of policy evaluation. We have waited too long to apply the scientific method to our policy proposals. We are running out time. We are being left in the past, embracing the symbolism of past success but spurning the reason, logic, and thinking that caused our past glory. If we do a very good job of creating systems that promote reason we can be pretty sure reason will eventually win. We can help reason win by creating systems that give more points to data that has been more thoroughly verified, and casual relationships that have been more thoroughly supported.

Blind dogmatism will get us all killed, and political parties that start with a better process for finding better policy is the only antidote to blindly dogmatic political parties that "know" they already have the truth. The inability to reason, communicate, or understand the other has almost started nuclear war in the past and could in the future. We need to know what assumptions our enemies and friends are assuming, so we can react appropriately. The only way for this to work is for everyone to outline their reasons for doing what they do. Otherwise everyone is making countless assumptions. Dogmatism is "the tendency to lay down principles as incontrovertibly true, without consideration of evidence or the opinions of others." The inability to see or hear, has gotten many people killed in the past. Let us make sure we do not blindly destroy the gifts that have been given to us by proceeding generations. Instead let us create the bridge to the future by organizing their structure of reason, with solid linkages between our conclusions and their assumptions.

People will see how easy it was for the Russians to manipulate social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), and how hard it is to get them to change their minds in data poor environments, and they will see the need of open, transparent, pro con environments like DebateIsland. To keep doing the same thing, and expecting different results in insanity.

People will give us money if we create a political party based on DebateIsland. Their is a lot of money in politics for those who present a compelling vision of the future.

People will join our party and vote for our candidates (if we create a political party based on DebateIsland). People will be more likely to participate in pro/con forums if they feel their contribution will affect the policies that a political party will support. If we build better political parties that show why the policy we support is built on valid arguments, and why the other party's policy is not valid, people will join (WE CAN SHOW WHY WE ARE BETTER IN A WAY THAT PEOPLE WILL SEE)

agsraarongkmelkevolution17
  1. Live Poll

    Can we make evidence-based e-democracy political parties that use pro/con forums to select policy?

    2 votes
    1. Unlike Wikipedia, public policy is too complex to be ran by amateurs
      50.00%
    2. There is no way to create electronic democracy that isn't prone to manipulation by special interest
        0.00%
    3. There is no way to use algorithms and website design to sufficiently promote quality
        0.00%
    4. There is no way to do a good open online cost/benefit analysis.
      50.00%
  2. Live Poll

    Would it be easy to create a political party with DebateIsland?

    2 votes
    1. It would be hard to get the owners to support the idea of a political party made from DebateIsland.
      100.00%
    2. It would be hard to get political candidates to promise to use DebateIsland to make their decisions.
        0.00%
    3. It would be better to create a political party with Kialo, Wikipedia, Facebook, or Google.
        0.00%
  3. Live Poll

    Would people give money to candidates who use debate island to make their decisions

    2 votes
    1. People assume they are right & support those who agree with them, not who follow logic.
      50.00%
    2. People are ready to dump the republican and democrat party in favor of balanced forums.
      50.00%



Debra AI Prediction

For
Predicted To Win
100%
Likely
0%
Unlikely

Details +


For:

0% (0 Points)


Against:

0% (0 Points)



Votes: 0


Voting Format: Formal Voting

Rounds: 3

Time Per Round: 48 Hours Per Round


Voting Period: 7 Days


Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

Voting



Post Argument Now Debate Details +



    Arguments


  • Round 1 | Position: For
    MyKlobMyKlob 15 Pts   -  
    I believe Wikipedia is a great example of amateurs doing very complex things, with very little structure. I believe with even a very little bit of structure we could make it much easier to reward good behavior, and punish bad behavior better than Wikipedia.
  • Round 1 | Position: For
    agsragsr 881 Pts   -  
    I think it's an interesting idea.  Many issues such as hacking and media manipulation would still need to be addressed though.
    Live Long and Prosper
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