this post was submitted on 28 Apr 2024
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If I make a system to move people around, but this also sometimes leads to the death of people, that does not mean that the purpose is to kill people. It is still moving people around. And instead of ignoring this issue, we make the system better at avoiding accidents and increase safety aspects.
If a system moves people around and some of them die, that’s the purpose of the system.
You can say “we don’t want any of them to die” and that’s true, but the system doesn’t reflect that.
You can say “fewer people will die because more people can get to hospitals, but some will die as a result of people moving around” and the system will demonstrate that.
Is that a “we don’t want anyone to die” system or is it a “we are going to accept some people dying as a result of the system so that more people can be saved” system?
Okay, take the medical system. People die. But far less than without. Is the purpose of the system to kill people...?
I'm not sure why you got down-voted for this as I think you illustrate the intent of the above-mentioned heuristic quite well. The intent of the heuristic isn't to objectively define what the purpose of a system is(because, well... lol), but to change the framing of it in order to better understand it's function and how well it serves it's "purpose". People who design and implement these systems tend to become married to the idea of that system just needing a tweak here and there to finally serve it's purpose 100%, usually without considering that the system may already be working optimally.
The reason I think your example of the Healthcare System(in America to be specific) is a great example is that those who are served by said system see it's flaws first-hand versus those who design and maintain it. To the individual(s) on the receiving end, the purpose of the system is effectively something completely different than the original purpose given. To then apply the framing that the purpose of the Healthcare system is to add stress, bankrupt the sick, skyrocket costs, make people die from neglect, etc, we then see the system not as a flawed one that just needs a few tweaks, but as fundamentally missing the mark before it's epistemological foundation is even laid. We're able to get the engineers see what the maintenance crew sees, so to speak.
What the heuristic doesn't do is objectively establish the purpose of a system. That's silly, as purpose is necessarily subjective. I think our boy was trying to find a way of not only better analyzing a system, but to also help the designers of those systems see it from the perspective of those on the receiving end. What better way than to think of a system as working exactly as intended?
As for me, I think we tend to subconsciously project our intent into the world, effectively turning our framing of things we do/create as objectively inheriting the purpose we had in mind, regardless of the outcome. This can really muddy the waters with what we mean when we discuss something like purpose, which I suspect is the source of apparent confusion within this particular thread. Purpose being subjective, it will change from person to person, and purpose being subjective, it's a poor indicator of how a system functions.
A thought exercise was all well and good, but my impression from the absolute tone of his comments was that he believes a system which does x but due to flaws in the system also does y, is intended to do both x and y, period. Which is absurd and paranoid.
Exactly. It's absurd to say the designers of any system absolutely intended any and all outcomes of said system, in the same way It's absurd to attribute someone's intent as whatever you deem to be the outcome. To kind of bring it all around, it's absurd to say the designers of our overall system legitimately intended all the flaws that came with it. In fact, with things like the [American] Healthcare system, it wasn't really "designed" so much as it kinda happened. The heuristic to think of the system as working as intended is a great way to analyze it and all, but it's still important to keep in mind that the illuminati wasn't up there wringing their hands and cackling about how much suffering the barbaric American Healthcare System would cause.
I’d say the purpose of the medical system involves taking measured, educated risks.
Tge system moves people around at the cost of some dying. That may not be your intention, but it's what the system does.
Not shutting down the system as soon as you realize it operates on blood means you're ok with the amount of blood it's consuming.
Sometimes it's better than the alternative. Magical perfect systems don't exist. You get the best one you can and then improve on it.
No, not at the cost of some dying. That just randomly happens. The same way anything happens while doing anything. Babies are born in airplanes. That does not mean that they are delivery rooms.
Maybe you'll understand it clearer like this: There are no side effects, their are only effects.
Whatever something does is whatever it does, we have intentions with things but our intentions don't determine reality. If a system has effects we do not like our only recourse is to change the system, we cannot convince it to be other than what it is.
So then everythings purpose is to do everything. No matter how seldom sometime happens in connection with something, that is it's purpose. What a useful definition.
you understand that there's a difference between causality and coincidence right?
Chairs cause weakening of core muscles which can lead to injury, chairs are frequently found in buildings that catch fire however they are unrelated to the fires.
The whole point of the previous examples was to verify this is the logic. Why are your examples now specially not affected? Why is the purpose of the chair not to weak for muscles?
The chair is to enable comfort at the cost of weakness, but not house fires.
you have appalling reading comprehension.
Not according to your definition. My childhood house burned down because of an electrical fire. So according to your logic, the purpose of electricity is to burn down homes. It's absurd.
Yes, the system of electrifying houses is to enable widespread use of electrical devices at the cost of a few electrocutions and fires.
So why do we have the National Electric Code?
I don't know who we is here, by the blithe arrogance I'll assume usa.
Presumably because people decided there were too many electrocutions and fires and so modified electrification of houses to reduce that? What do you think you're point is? It's not that people are gleefully throwing children into fires for their TVs, it's just that stuff does what it does.
Sweet. So the point of electrification is to power homes, with a side effect of burning some down. But we can try to improve electrification, so fewer homes burn down. And over time, as we've improved the system, fewer homes have burned down.
The purpose of the system is not to burn homes down. The purpose of the system is to power homes. Some homes burn down, but that doesn't mean that by using electricity we're okay with that. And it doesn't mean we should abandon the idea of electricity. It means we should take the system and try to improve it.
Now we can bring that back to our current democratic capitalist social system. Democracy and capitalism are systems that sometimes produces death and misery. Death and misery is not the intent of the systems. We can still use the system without accepting that death and misery are a natural part. Instead, we try to improve the system. Not tear it down, improve it. And it has been improving. Not steadily, it jumps forward and then falls back at times, but over time there's been a general upward trend in happiness and quality of life. People in the 2020s have a better quality of life than people in the 1920s, who had a better quality of life than those in the 1820s. We're making things better. We don't need to tear it down.
You're being stupid and trying to wiggle out from something so obvious as to be tautological https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does
That's a cool thought experiment, and can be useful in cases where people are lying about the intent of a system (ie poll tax - - > voter suppression), but it's just a thought experiment, not a tautology. It's a way to look at a system from a different viewpoint to gain insights. It's not descriptive of reality.
Again, the point of electrification is not to burn down houses. If you agree with this statement, then your premise is wrong.