Live debate tonight 7PM GMT - Gavin Andresen will be there

[grondilu]

That's why there is  "Direct democracy" everbody should really demand and work for.

A and B are not necessarily a person or a government.  They can be a decision.  You were talking about drone strikes.  There is nothing in democracy, even in a direct democracy, preventing a drone strike to be voted by the majority.

You can regret the outcome of a vote, but if you say it results from people being not independent or free, you basically say that they are stupid, ignorant and that you know better.  Which you seem prone to do, btw.  And anyway it does not change anything to the fact that the vote was democratic.

It's not because a democratic process results in decisions you disapprove that it's not a democratic process anymore.


Again, you wrote:

How can it be a democracy if peoples minds aren't independent and free.

Democracy has nothing to do with whether or not people minds are independent and free.   Democracy is about giving an equal power of decision via vote to everyone.  It is not incompatible with people being dependent and not free.

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[justusranvier]

Democracy as a political system is just a way of making totalitarianism superficially appear less evil.

If it's evil for a single individual to point a gun at someone and order him around, it's also evil when two people do it, when three people do it, and so on. There's no tipping point where you add one extra person to the group and all of a sudden "a mob" magically transforms into "society".

If you still have trouble seeing why majority rule is not a valid ethical justification remember that gang rape is applied democracy.

[grondilu]

Ok so your argument is because the way they vote is not the problem ( which i have shown is not right ) and i can't know what is in peoples minds ( why they vote a particular way. Which i have shown is, not; correct, again.) Results in it not being important wether it's democratic.

I don 't know if anybody can follow this inane logic.  Let me know.

The logic is very simple.  You wrote:

« How can it be a democracy if peoples minds aren't independent and free. »

The two points of my argument are straightforward:

1.  their vote is not the problem.  It's A problem if the vote induces poor decisions, but it is not THE problem of deciding whether the process was democratic, which was the problem suggested by your question ("How can it be a democracy").

2.  You don't know what's in peoples mind.   You talk about people minds being independent and free but that's an external judgement and you can't know for sure.  And no, if someone enters a supermarket, it's not necessarily because he's hungry.  He can have many other motives (like he works for someone and does his shopping).   Anyway fortunately, you don't have to analyse the motives of a vote to consider it valid.

[Rob E]

That's why there is  "Direct democracy" everbody should really demand and work for.

A and B are not necessarily a person or a government.  They can be a decision. Well you're just shifting the goal posts. We started of talking by me arguing that no reall democracy can exist without free and independent minds.

When millions of the masses are fed fascistic government propoganda information and projects, and people " believe" or "accept"  these "propaganda" Then no reall democracy is achieved because they havn't inspected that data themselves if it is true or not, in other words thir decision making is delt by the government, their minds their will, not their own.

You were talking about drone strikes.  There is nothing in democracy, even in a direct democracy, preventing a drone strike to be voted by the majority. How so?

You can regret the outcome of a vote, but if you say it results from people being not independent or free, you basically say that they are stupid, ignorant and that you know better.  No i'm saying that they are in a state of unknowingness, or willfull unknowingness, is that stupidity , yes, is it ignorant, well if you're unwilling to look or accept opposite data, i'd  say yes. Which you seem prone to do thank you .btw.  And anyway it does not change anything to the fact that the vote was democratic. I think you don't understand.

It's not because a democratic process results in decisions you disapprove that it's not a democratic process anymore. Good point. But if there was a reall democracy why with hold people being able to vote on major issues. Like they do allow to do for example in Switzerland. Switzerland is a great example of Direct democracy.

Again, you wrote:

How can it be a democracy if peoples minds aren't independent and free.

Democracy has nothing to do with whether or not people minds are independent and free.   Democracy is about giving an equal power of decision via vote to everyone.   What good is that if their minds or feelings are not completely their own, but dictated or ruled by their media or government. I'n political decisions that they make. That's what i mean when true democracy cannot exist without free and independent minds.


 It is not incompatible with people being dependent and not free.
I have no clue what you ment there.
 

[grondilu]

What good is that if their minds or feelings are not completely their own, but dictated or ruled by their media or government.

Hoping for a society where people are smart, educated and have independent minds sure is a noble and fine social goal, but it has nothing to do with democracy.   You're just using this word to describe something that is not related.

What good is that if their minds or feelings are not completely their own, but dictated or ruled by their media or government. I'n political decisions that they make.

See, that's why we disagree.  You now asks "What good is that if...", when I was arguing with your initial question "How can it be a democracy...".  I wasn't trying to discuss whether democracy is a good or a bad thing, I was talking about whether or not people not having independent minds changes anything to the nature of a democratic process.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Depends on the point of view. From my point of view, in the world of open source, the mainline client/fork is the elected official, and users are the voters.
Every user or group of users can become/create an elected official by creating a fork of his/their own, and other people can vote for the official by using forked version of software.

Saying that using or not using is equivalent to a vote is far fetched.   It is not a vote.

If you are using it, then you are supporting it. You are trusting it. You are placing your trust and your life in the hands of the software you are using, the same as you do with elected officials.
And there are different choices: Litecoin is one of them. NFTF fork is also a choice (however differences between mainline fork and NFTF are practically negligible).

Sounds like a vote to me.

[grondilu]

Depends on the point of view. From my point of view, in the world of open source, the mainline client/fork is the elected official, and users are the voters.
Every user or group of users can become/create an elected official by creating a fork of his/their own, and other people can vote for the official by using forked version of software.

Saying that using or not using is equivalent to a vote is far fetched.   It is not a vote.

If you are using it, then you are supporting it. You are trusting it. You are placing your trust and your life in the hands of the software you are using, the same as you do with elected officials.
And there are different choices: Litecoin is one of them. NFTF fork is also a choice (however differences between mainline fork and NFTF are practically negligible).

Sounds like a vote to me.

It is not a vote because the result of a vote is supposed to induce a decision that will concern all participants.   It might sound trivial to remind this, but when Obama was elected, people who voted for Mitt Romney did not gather in a part of the USA to make a separate state.

Also, a vote is basically a question that is asked to you, and your answer is taken into account with the answers of others.  When you download a software, or when you just use it, you don't have to tell anybody.   People might care about you using it, and your choice might in the end support the developers in some way, but there is no accurate accounting of the number of users and it does not directly affect the decisions of developers.   Really, it has very little to do with what a vote actually is.   It might look like it, but it's more of a metaphor than anything else.
 

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Depends on the point of view. From my point of view, in the world of open source, the mainline client/fork is the elected official, and users are the voters.
Every user or group of users can become/create an elected official by creating a fork of his/their own, and other people can vote for the official by using forked version of software.

Saying that using or not using is equivalent to a vote is far fetched.   It is not a vote.

If you are using it, then you are supporting it. You are trusting it. You are placing your trust and your life in the hands of the software you are using, the same as you do with elected officials.
And there are different choices: Litecoin is one of them. NFTF fork is also a choice (however differences between mainline fork and NFTF are practically negligible).

Sounds like a vote to me.

It is not a vote because the result of a vote is supposed to induce a decision that will concern all participants.   It might sound trivial to remind this, but when Obama was elected, people who voted for Mitt Romney did not gather in a part of the USA to make a separate state.

Also, a vote is basically a question that is asked to you, and your answer is taken into account with the answers of others.  When you download a software, or when you just use it, you don't have to tell anybody.   People might care about you using it, and your choice might in the end support the developers in some way, but there is no accurate accounting of the number of users and it does not directly affect the decisions of developers.   Really, it has very little to do with what a vote actually is.   It might look like it, but it's more of a metaphor than anything else.
 

Sure, there are some differences, but it still is good enough for me.
Despite that, it may work even better than standard democracy.