This is junk. Possibly even a case study exemplar of spurious correlations. Take a small set of units (high false positive rate, inter alia). Take some vaguely relevant sounding metrics (entry point for p-hacking). Does a bunch of regressions.
Here's the next paper from the group:
Distance from equator is predictive of authoritarianism. The more constant daily cycle causes a yearning for rigid routines, predisposing populations to authoritarian rule.
If you think I'm merely taking the piss, is it more or less plausible than the proposed causal mechanism here:
"Because many disease-causing parasites are invisible, and their actions mysterious, disease control has historically depended substantially on adherence to ritualized behavioral practices that reduced infection risk [9]."
Or maybe it's because we've already seen the data our whole lives, know which countries are authoritarian and can select any variable which separates democracies from authoritarian countries and bang, you've got p < 0.05.
Yup, or maybe it's the same "Global North" vs "Global South" thing where the rich countries of the world are predominantly in the temperate north. There's just not that much land in the temperate south.
In the middle you have the Caribbean/Northern Latin America, Central Africa and then like Indonesia out in Asia. A lot of warm, wet places with lots of history of malaria, other parasites, and terrible economic development.
What's interesting and cuts the other way right now is the small evidence that warmer and wetter makes COVID less infectious/effective. Have yet to see a good reason 'why' that's the case here, but it would be the first time you kinda want to be near the equator in order to avoid an infectious disease.
> What's interesting and cuts the other way right now is the small evidence that warmer and wetter makes COVID less infectious/effective. Have yet to see a good reason 'why' that's the case here
My understanding is that coronaviruses such as the SARS-CoV family or influenza die more quickly in warmer, more humid conditions. Some sources:
Looks like the measures for authoritarianism are taken from various indices for present-day countries. I wonder how this would hold up if we ask historians to rank historical civilizations by "authoritarianism" and then see how this holds up when extrapolated there.
This study gets absolutely demolished by the fact that all the major old world democracies were trade/citizen empires in the tropics and sub-tropics; Athens, Rome, Carthage, the Malaccan states, Phoenician states, Swahili city states, etc. While Northern Europe and China were the kinds of totalitarian states that the DPRK would envy.
Whatever the specific case here, I think we're hitting some sort of epistemological point with after-the-fact data analysis. Pseudoscience, basically. I realise that the term is inflammatory but ultimately it comes down to some fundamentals.
There's a reason why science as a philosophy places so much value on experimentation that makes predictions and tests them. Testability is a fundamental. Untestable theories are not just wrong, they're nonsensical to science. Take Ostrom's "Simulation hypothesis." Is it pseudoscientific? Depends. Is it testable? Is a simulated universe different in a testable way? A theoretically testable simulation hypothesis makes predictions. One that isn't, doesn't. A simulation which is 100% unknowable cannot be a scientific theory. This doesn't strictly mean that it isn't true, it just means we can't gain scientific knowledge of it. If it's masquerading as a scientific theory, then it is pseudoscience.
On the "softer" level, there's a reason why science as a cultural, intellectual institution places so much value on eliminating observer effects. Scientists own bias has always been a major detriment to science. Often in the history of science, generations have had to die off before bias can be shed and science advanced in some area.
Basically and practically, the "double blind" designs of experiments are the heart of this. People's objectivity is not to be trusted, not even scientists, not even a little.
Economics, sociology and such have shifted from one flavour of pseudoscience to another. Back in Popper's day, they would create big untestable "theories" that explained everything and nothing. Today, they make micro-theories after they analyze the data.
I think this may be peaking though. The way machines do "data analysis" is starting to shift the way we think on the margins. Machines make predictions, but not theories. They don't care which way causality runs.
"There's a reason why science as a philosophy places so much value on experimentation that makes predictions and tests them."
Exactly.
There's something that's always bothered me about the "evolution by natural selection is science and everyone who doesn't immediately buy into every aspect of it is an idiot".
I personally believe in evolution. It probably makes quite a few good predictions. And I'm sure some experiments have rigor.
But a lot of it seems pretty untestable. Add a stress to a population, and it will either die off or evolve to improve fitness. If it dies off, does that contradict the theory because no evolution happened? If it evolves, how much will it evolve? Will the population reach a smaller equilibrium, larger, or the same? Does any change count as "evolution" or is someone quantifying which ones actually improve fitness? What about changes that don't seem obviously connected to fitness, like ridiculous peacock feathers, would those be predicted? Are we coming up with falsifiable predictions before the tests, or just explanations afterward?
I'm sure someone with more knowledge of the field has answers to all of these questions. But my guess is that they are more nuanced than the "evolution is science and if you question any aspect you are an idiot".
Darwinism is is a scientific theory par excellence. A lot of that "testable predictions" philosophy of science was inspired by darwinism.
First, a scientific theory doesn't need to make only testable predictions. It just needs to make a testable prediction. Testing it doesn't "prove" the theory, it just subjects the theory to falsification.
Second, "testable/falsifiable" doesn't strictly mean "testable in practice." Even if it's not practical to test a prediction. EG, new species of bat will emerge in the future. We don't live long enough to test this in practice, but theoretically, it is a testable prediction. That doesn't make it unfalsifiable.
"Origin of Species" itself is full of predictions, some tested by Darwin himself and after is death. At this point, evolution has made so many predictions, that it is very very unlikely to be true. Unlikely, but nothing in science is proven beyond doubt ever.
Newtonian physics was "disproven" by Einstein. To do that though, Einsten's theory had to predict Netwonian physics.
I agree. I comfortably assert that evolution is fact, and evolution is science. This is independent of various social / cultural phenomena surrounding the discussion.
As a skeptic and contrarian I've encountered the "evolution is science and if you question any aspect you are an idiot" people, and worse. Many ignorant people believe in evolution without understanding it, without understanding the evidentiary basis for it. They have chosen the correct cultural 'team' to side with, but usually for the wrong reasons.
>Does any change count as "evolution" or is someone quantifying which ones actually improve fitness?
I think it's helpful to get distance from the idea of "fitness" in discussion with laypeople, as it is often loaded with presumptions. Evolution selects for what it selects for. It's true that surviving to maturity and producing offspring is vital for evolution (for the forms of life that work this way), but that's far from the whole story and our intuition about 'fitness' is often wrong.
I'm no biologist, if you want high quality answers you'll have to go find one to ask. But I'm pretty sure you have some wrong ideas about how evolutionary biology works as a field. They observe reality and form theories that fit what they've perceived thusfar. They make predictions based on those theories. Subsequent discoveries can confirm their predictions, or confirmation may remain elusive. It works basically the same way as astrophysics.
Biology is traditionally considered a "hard science" by people who subscribe to a 'hard/soft science' worldview.
I've learned through personal experience that it's not sufficient to discuss this with a professional biologist. I've found several biology PhDs ill prepared for this topic. I discovered that even at the PhD level some biologists take evolution on faith without having a decent understanding. I think it's much better to read books or view lectures created by specialists in the field specifically for the purpose of confronting evolution skepticism.
I respect your skepticism, but I agree with catalogia in that I get the impression that you "have some wrong ideas about how evolutionary biology works"
Evolution is a fact, but many people's individual mental models of evolution are flawed. It's easy to remain unconvinced if you have a series of conversations with such people and successfully ferret out those flaws.
If you have the time for it, maybe now (covid stay at home) would be a good time to get on Amazon and take a deep dive into evolution and evolution denial?
I believe it's not just parasites -- it's also things like diseases and famine as well.
The reason it's called "parasite-stress theory" is not because parasites are so important for the selection of government, but because it's a reference to parasite-stress theory in biology.
It makes sense. If you don't even have basic healthcare or security, a strongman willing to swoop in and take decisive action does sound appealing. Unfortunately, though, they usually just make things worse.
It would seem to me that if you are sick or your health is suffering, several things can result:
1) you dont have the time or energy to consider what the (authoritarian) leader is doing as carefully (cognitive)
2) you may just be too tired/sick to do anything about it (physical)
You're lower on the hierarchy of needs. If you're afraid you're going to get killed or starve you don't care about abstract things like freedom of artistic expression.
I would agree... Because in my opinion it is the same as religious belief. People in first world countries are getting more and more secular because they have more time, more willpower to decide about life on their own. If you are poor or sick you spend all mental energy on caring about here and now and you let "higher power" to lead everything else.
"a strongman willing to swoop in and take decisive action does sound appealing"
Or maybe a group of people facing existential calamity actually do need fairly strong leadership?
Taiwan and especially Singapore might be characterized as much less 'liberal democratic' than the US, and they have already tamed coronavirus while the US flails and a lot of people are dying. Maybe that's not a perfect example, but it surely illustrates the point.
That's true. I'm normally very anti-authoritarian but these days I applaud when police come by and shut down public gatherings due to COVID-19. I think everyone is more comfortable with authoritarianism during this crisis. To be fair, there is a place for decisive action during emergency, as long as those emergency powers don't last forever.
However, long term, authoritarian leadership makes things worse due to lack of transparency and accountability to the people. They can clean things up short term, but then they hold onto power and rot society.
I guess there could be a place for temporary authoritarian governments to swoop in, sweep up the mess, and then hand over things to liberal democracies, but they don't hand over power easily.
A book I read on Vietnam (A Bright Shining Lie) floated the idea that communism never delivered on its promise to make society more equitable, but communist revolutions have played a role in eliminating backwards feudal governments and clearing the way for liberal democracies to take over. Kind of like a shock treatment, but with a very high price in terms of human suffering.
Anyway, we should all be very suspicious and ready to oppose authoritarian creep, because we're all susceptible to it right now, and it could stick around even after this virus passes.
I'm not sure that police shutting down parties is always authoritarianism. In the present case we have public health authorities issuing very sound and science based banning on large gatherings, done under temporary emergency authority during a declared emergency, all in compliance with established law and long known medical knowledge of epidemic management. These orders are then enforced by police. Is this really then an authoritarian government that operates this way?
It seems to me the authoritarian way would be that the strong man issues an edict which may or may not be legally allowed or based on reason, and then his stooges, which may be the police or military, enforce it in a draconian manner, without regard to what the written law may permit.
I find it curious that in our current political climate / party system, liberals seem to be more okay with mandatory lockdown procedures, whereas conservatives are pushing back. The latter may be partially due to prior ideological commitments [0], but it's also somewhat counter-intuitive considering the known correlation between authoritarianism and germaphobia.
It may be that our two-party dynamic, being focused primarily around left vs. right, largely ignores the authoritarian/libertarian axis of the political compass [1], meaning both parties have authoritarian wings internally. In times of stress/shock, real and/or perceived, it seems that each political tribe is willing to cede power to its authoritarians, based on its values: currently, the left does so for health and the environment, and the right for border security and violence from the "other". And of course, these values can shift based on political winds and alliances of convenience; I'm watching HBO's "The Plot Against America", and from a modern perspective, it's strange to see the FDR economic progressives be the hawks, while the (original) America First-ers are the doves.
(While I lean libertarian on the political compass, I'm not a-priori judging all authoritarianism to be evil; there are arguably times such as a pandemic or a world war where some amount may be necessary.)
I agree with your post, and I've marveled at various perceived hypocrisies on both sides. I acknowledge that in some cases there is no actual hypocrisy, just nuanced views that don't fit a simple mold.
But I also believe that partisanship for the sake of partisanship is more important to many people on both sides than any kind of deeper ideological consistency or integrity.
Merely exercising state powers is not authoritarianism. There are other necessary aspects that must exist. If a popularly-elected government orders a curfew that is not necessarily authoritarianism.
It's a semantic argument, but I generally agree. I'd say authoritarianism is an extremist endpoint on a spectrum. It's become a dirty word for obvious reasons, but I'm using the term in a relatively value-neutral / non-pejorative sense.
restating a prior sentiment: such dichotomies--left/right, authoritarian/libertarian--and their cross-products are cognitive traps. they inhibit understanding and obscure solution pathways.
so don't worry about the axis affiliations and critique the ideas themselves (as you imply you already do by not judging a priori).
fear-driven decision environments (as with the current pandemic) are ripe for power seizures (even if just incrementally). we should remain vigilant against that.
afaict, most US residents are following governmental requests (like physical distancing, washing hands, and self-quarantining when sick) because it's a reasonable and prudent response to a virus that's still relatively unknown but has the potential to be bad, not because we're coerced by said government. those admonitions provide (sometimes sparse) evidence, information, and rationale for doing so, rather than mainly relying on force.
that force is held back by governmental units because of the threat of backlash by residents. this keeps their power in check. don't give that up.
>that force is held back by governmental units because of the threat of backlash by residents. this keeps their power in check. don't give that up.
You seem to be implying that, absent such a threat, the government would be employing force against citizens regardless of their compliance, simply because they could get away with it. If so, is it not more likely that restraint is due to the purpose of the state's monopoly on force being to coerce compliance, and as such is simply not necessary when the public is already compliant?
In other words, that the government is holding itself in check far more than the public is?
for sure, it's the dynamic that matters to keep coercion in check, which is broader than any one constituency. but that constituency is important to the dynamic too.
> left/right, authoritarian/libertarian--and their cross-products are cognitive traps
No dispute. It's a classic leaky-abstraction problem; some models can be helpful in reasoning, but they're always imperfect at describing messy complex reality. (While it too is imperfect, I'm rather fond of the 8-axis political compass! [0])
A lot of our weird tribal coalitions are byproducts of a First-Past-The-Post voting system, which necessarily results in two parties, game-theoretically. IMO there is no more urgent policy issue than electoral reform, to something like Ranked Choice or Approval, so that our representatives are more reflective of our preferences.
> fear-driven decision environments (as with the current pandemic) is ripe for power seizures
This is true; I'm a big fan of Chomsky's admonition that "the burden of proof is on state power to justify itself". While I'm grateful for how many people are doing the right thing voluntarily (I'm genuinely surprised at the trust of citizens in science, at least in my neck of the woods), I do think a pandemic is a situation where judicious use of state power can be justified (forbidding gatherings over N people, for instance). It's a balancing act, and we must be very vigilant to see that "emergency" powers do not persist indefinitely, as they so often do (Patriot Act, etc).
totally, models/stereotypes are useful shortcuts and aids. i was mainly advising against soley/overly relying on them. (and online quizzes are always fun!)
yes to election reform! especially curtailing/leveling money's influence, and de-gerrymandering, as both are unnecessary consolidations of power.
as for temporary/emergency powers, skepticism and resistance should correlate with the size of the governing body (somewhat ok with my mayor but not keen on my president exerting power domestically).
While this is all very interesting, there's a pretty deeply embedded bias on display here.
"authoritarian governance is defined by highly concentrated power structures that repress dissent and emphasize submission to authority, social conformity, and hostility towards outgroups"
... is a very problematic way of articulating this - to the point of promoting ignorance, because it's frankly how someone with a Liberal Democratic mindset would describe the system, but not others. I would argue that it's not objective because it may not capture the essence of such systems, rather, it just highlights the 'downsides' as seen from the other side.
Others might describe systems as possibly more collective or communitarian wherein legitimate central authorities have considerably better ability to manage affairs, particularly wherein such controls can have a material effect, i.e. 'pandemic', 'war' and maybe even things like infrastructure or other national challenges.
What people in 'liberal democracy' might see as 'individual choice', others might see as 'selfish, self-interested' possibly 'greedy' behaviour, actions that show little regard for others, only the self. The natural result of such behaviours might be 'inability to respond in a coherent manner to collective problems'.
Of course, where there is centralised power, there's an opportunity for it to be corrupt wherein you might have arbitrary and bad acting here and there, but I don't think to describe a system by its downsides is right.
This is especially important because the correlation may not be with authoritarianism as described, but possibly with group unity, collectivism or something else.
Edit: I should add, systems with strong 'central control' that some might describe as 'authoritarian' like Singapore, South Korea etc., have tamed and controlled Coronavirus and have exemplary responses. Their economies are not collapsing, they are in school, they are not dying en masse.
Meanwhile, 'Liberal Democracies' economies are collapsing, facing massive casualties, dying in hordes.
Imagine how stupid we must look to them? They literally showed us 'how to do it' but we're either too self-focused or possibly 'don't understand' how they are organized.
I think it's beyond reasonable dispute that freedom and democracy work better than authoritarianism on pretty much every dimension. If there's one thing that both right and left agree on, it's this.
South Korea is an extremely democratic country. They have one of the highest voting rates of any country and have a very strong culture of protesting against injustice. The reason they are doing OK is because they rose up to remove their former president, who was the daughter of the former dictator and who was abusing her power, and replaced her with a much less corrupt leader. The entire country is working together from the bottom up instead of being forced to do things from the top down. Koreans feel allegiance to their country, rather than their leader (although their president is fairly popular among most people), so when they are asked to wear masks and such they do so willingly. I guess I don't see how caring about your neighbors is authoritarian.
The US actually has a problem because our government is a bit too centralized. The state governors are often afraid to take initiative because Trump may withhold resources if they don't go along with his narrative. We also put too much faith in the CDC and FDA to develop tests quickly.
Strong leadership is different from authoritarianism. Non-authoritarian leaders produce results by inspiring their communities to help willingly. Authoritarian leaders have to micro-manage everything, which can sometimes work, but fails miserably if they are not competent. We are paying the price for electing an authoritarian who values obedience and loyalty over everything else.
This is interesting - but I think you are misunderstanding the nature of both 'western liberal democracy' (especially regarding institutions and culture) and of 'authoritarianism'.
It's not just 'political structure'.
In fact, I think your points help to illustrate the general misunderstanding happening here.
>>> "Korea votes, and the protest against injustice"
Really? No abortion? No gay marriage?
Where are the protests?
Now - I'm not taking a position pro/against those issues - what I'm saying is that those are subject to interpretation.
'Protesting injustice' is not 'liberal democracy'.
In fact, popular protests against perceived injustice could actually be a sign of authoritarian populism i.e. 'Law and Order' regimes.
Koreans are strongly ethnocentric (in-group vs. out-group), they have a very strong, nationalist sentimentality. They have compulsory military service and no problem filling the ranks. They are very traditional, they absolutely support Korean culture as 'normative', they support traditional marriage, traditional family hierarchy. I think it's fair to say that Korea is essential 'patriarchial' both in culture and business but also politics.
Korea values strongly 'national industrial champions' like Samsung ('Chaebols') [1] etc.. The economy is considerably more centralized under the power of this small elite of ruling families than elsewhere. Employees are often actually loyal to these 'families' as they work their entire lives, and 'play their part' in building a 'greater Korea'.
Here is one description of 'Chaebol': "A chaebol often consists of many diversified affiliates, controlled by an owner whose power over the group often exceeds legal authority." (from [1]). This is a pretty powerful statement of authoritarianism.
Of course, from 1955 until only about 20 years ago, Korea was point-blank a 'centrally planned economy' and such systems don't change overnight.
Social behaviours are codified, and deviation will come with 'social shaming'. Actually - this very term 'social shaming' really helps differentiate between US and Korea: 'social shaming' would be seen as mostly a negative artifact in a liberal society, whereas I believe most Koreans would support the kinds of subtle shaming that can be pervasive (my evidence being the fact that such shaming is commonplace). This is an example of systematic authoritarianism, and a specific artifact called right out in the paper as 'social conformity'.
'Getting mad at a strong man' is not an example of 'anti-authoritarianism' - because usually, the strong man is replaced by another one they like ... until they get mad at him as well.
Even though 'they vote a lot' as you say, for the most part, most would argue that Korea is not a 'Western Liberal Democracy' in the broader sense of the term.
And yes, by the way, I agree they're probably not interested in 'individual strong men' quite as much as Russians for example, but systematically, it's still authoritarian.
Korea, Japan, Singapore - similar.
>>>>> The US actually has a problem because our government is a bit too centralized.
I'm sorry but this is just not true, the US is a highly decentralized nation.
In Korea (as in France, Sweden for example) - political, industrial, military, and even cultural centres like the elite Universities, Media, Publications - all have a much tighter relationship with one another and are centralized.
The US doesn't even have a state broadcaster, they have no direct means to communicate with the people.
US Pres. has very limited powers to direct certain activities in normal times. Yes - he can declare 'emergency' powers to do 'some things' - but even then, he does not have the apparatus in place as an instrument of control. He can make 'orders' but where are the agencies to effectuate such orders? He has the military, the IRS. There is no national healthcare system. The pandemic response is hugely fragmented.
Look at how America is responding to the crises: Fed programs, indirect payout programs - these are all 'bigger versions' of things they would do in normal times.
Whereas Trump materially and specifically interjected? He stopped some air travel - but has he coordinated policy? Purchasing? Testing? Not really. He has 'invited' market participants!
You can see America trying to react to this situation on America's strengths (indirect intervention, capitalism, market solutions, distributed authority), which is failing them.
>>>>>>>>>> Strong leadership is different from authoritarianism.
Yes - your point is taken - if we were talking about a CEO, then it would be especially relevant. But in this context, it's not so important.
'Bill Clinton' is an inspiring, the great moral leader in many ways, you could say 'strong leader' but he's the last person we want in charge right now.
A true 'strong leader' with 'authoritarian tendencies' but who very thankfully understood the risk of it - would be Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Eisenhower was not so very 'inspiring' (not like Obama), and he was not a great communicator. But he was absolutely a competent, effective operator, and ruthless if he needed to be. He was Supreme Nato Allied Commander: simple, austere, efficient, down-to-earth but politically nimble, brilliant, 'non-populist', humble, dispassionate manager of mass violence.
But he's totally unlike Trump - who I think is the 'bad kind of strong man' (i.e. aggressive, crude, arrogant, but actually incompetent). The key to understanding his popularity is that many people actually do believe him when he says 'I'm a genius'.
So if Trump was, like Eisenhower: patriotic, loyal, dedicated, organized, competent, then 'authoritarianism' would be good in times like this.
Example: the states are all in a bidding war over PPE, ventilators, there's a lack of coordination, too much will be paid, deliveries won't be optimized etc.
A benevolent central power like Eisenhower would have acted long ago, set temporary price controls on items, set production levels, required isolation by law and had the apparatus to effectuate it (i.e. 'workers' to go to homes, check on health, make sure nobody is cheating). Testing would have been mandatory and prevalent, and he would have demanded that you give up your movement history, which citizens would have accepted due to the nature of the situation.
During WW2 and shortly afterwards - Eisenhower was a 'strong leader' a 'great example', but he was also definitely an authoritarian and a little bit of a strong man as well, by definition, as a military general.
FYI that's why Eisenhower type leaders aren't elected long after wars!
Summary:
+ Korea is institutionally and culturally much more authoritarian than the West.
+ Authoritarianism is generally misunderstood, miscommunicated
+ People living in 'Western Liberal Democracies' sometimes have difficulty with this one, having little exposure to anything else.
+ All of the modern nations that 'tend centrally planned' have actually responded well to coronavirus, all of the 'liberal democracies' are in general disarray - and this is precisely due to the operational competence of some of the 'more authoritarian systems'.
+ This is not evidence of superiority, nor is it evidence that certain kinds of authoritarianism won't fail: Russia, I believe, if it is 'hit hard' by coronavirus, will be devastated, as will obviously very poor, totally corrupt nations around the world with zero operational competence but who have 'strong man' leaders.
Please leave the racism at the door. China didn't develop or intentionally spread anything and this whole "chinese virus" meme just needs to die already. Even Fox seems to have abandoned it.
China's regime has everything to do with the outbreak, mainly due to failing to crack down on those dirty ad hoc markets that trade in unsafe meat.
That deliberate inaction is directly linked to authoritarianism. The regime avoids taking action in order to appear to be lenient, which gives it leverage in taking other important freedoms away.
That creates a situation in which you can't speak critically of the government, but are able to sell a sick bird that starts a global pandemic.
We can readily identify this with the situation of the "proles" in George Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty Four.
The proles are a class who enjoys significant personal freedoms. Activities that would in fact be crimes if perpetrated by members of non-prole classes are permitted to the proles. Proles have access to pornography, and can practice religion, if they want. The regime plants moles among the proles who disseminate misinformation.
>China's 'authoritarianism' has nothing to do with the origin of the outbreak.
China's authoritarianism has normalized silencing of dissent, independent thought, open communication with murder or threat of murder. This cost the world valuable time.
Because it isn't a fact and is downright false. China isn't great for a number of reasons and their suppression of information may have made this worse but blaming them wholesale for this outbreak is just silly.
Thank you. We can't solve a problem if we cannot discuss it accurately. The Chinese regime is invested in controlling the narrative, and is taking advantage of our deep concerns about racism to convince people to assist them in that control.
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