Deposing Dictators

David C. Ullrich ullrich at math.okstate.edu
Fri Jul 27 10:00:26 EDT 2001


On Thu, 26 Jul 2001 21:57:30 +0100, Gareth.McCaughan at pobox.com (Gareth
McCaughan) wrote:

>David Ullrich wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 25 Jul 2001 14:05:34 +0000 (UTC),
>> <margg at ux-ma160-18.csv.warwick.ac.uk> wrote:
>...
>> >2) The level of dissent required to change the opinion of the BDFL
>> >perhaps calls into question the 'B'.
>> 
>> Nonsense. Without saying anything about who's right and who's
>> wrong, or about whether the D is B or not: To be "benevolent"
>> towards someone is to act in a way consistent with that
>> person's best interests. This is not the same thing as
>> giving the person what he asks for, not by a long shot.
>
>More: to be benevolent is to *try* to act in a way
>consistent with the person's best interests[1], even
>if in fact you're wrong. So even if Guido is as
>horribly wrong as some people here say he is about
>what their best interests are, that's no reason to
>think he isn't benevolent.

Right. I didn't try to get the definition exactly
right, just right enough to point out the silliness
in judging B-ness by the level of dissent required to
change the D's mind.

Realized later what I should said was just this:
A "benevolent dictatorship" is not a democracy.

>> Why in the world should "level of dissent" have any
>> bearing on anything? Deciding moral issues by taking
>> a vote is one thing - deciding what's best on a 
>> technical issue by taking a vote is silly.
>
>Hear hear.

And thanks for not saying "Here here"...

>[1] I initially typed "integers". Hmm.

Programmers have been typing integers for a long time.

>-- 
>Gareth McCaughan  Gareth.McCaughan at pobox.com
>.sig under construc


David C. Ullrich



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