This isn’t specifically about free will, but I think people here might find it interesting because it uses a similar systems-thinking framework: looking at the conditions that produce certain outcomes and then using that to understand the dynamics of competition and cooperation. Excited for your feedback.
Title for A: The Biggest Misconception About Competition
Title for B: The Hidden Cost of Competition
For the last 6 months, I've been working on this project, which is heavily inspired by effective altruism principles.
I built a simulation, ran experiments on it, and then spent a bunch of time trying to make sense of the results. They were not at all what I expected.
Here’s the short version: in a competitive environment, even the winners were worse off than they would have been in a cooperative one.
Here’s the full video explaining the simulation and what happened.
Happy to answer any questions or discuss any topics regarding my argument.
This was a six-month project in which I built a simulation, ran experiments on it, and then spent a bunch of time trying to make sense of the results. They were not what I expected.
Here’s the short version: in a competitive environment, even the winners were worse off than they would have been in a cooperative one.
Here’s the full video explaining the simulation and what happened.
I’m very interested in how socialists and capitalists interpret this.
In my experiment, a competitive environment produced winners who were worse off. I built an agent-based simulation to test this.
This video tells the story and shows what happened: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBMrEdEhUTA
Here to answer any questions.
The most surprising result was that the delay hurt the winners of the simulation too.
In the simulation, the “winner” is simply the first agent to reach the next milestone. But as knowledge spread more slowly, even that first-place agent got there later.
So the winner was still winning relative to everyone else, while losing in absolute terms.
Made a full youtube video about it with more context for people that are curious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBMrEdEhUTA
Also standing by to answer any querstions from the community.
I used systems thinking to simulate what I believe makes the difference between a competitive and a cooperative environment. Worked 6 months on this project. Any feedback would be much appreciated.
I think there’s a hidden accounting mistake in some longtermist reasoning.
One side of the calculation gets to unfold into the future. The other side gets frozen in the present.
It's not apples to apples 🍎
Full argument here: https://paulcomans.substack.com/p/longtermism-is-counting-wrong
Would love some feedback and counter arguments.