[MUD-Dev] The Relationship between pkers andmonster AI?

[Matthew Mihaly]

On Fri, 17 Sep 1999, Ola Fosheim [iso-8859-1] Gr=F8stad wrote:

> J C Lawrence wrote:
> > Groups and societies by their nature as groups, require some sense
> > of agreement as to common purpose or action among their members.
> > Rarely is that agreement documented, explicitly agreed to, or even
> > very well known.  Those agreements are the "social contract".
>=20
> It is my impression that those that participate in a group have their own=
,
> and sometimes conflicting, goals and agendas.  They certainly don't have =
to
> agree upon some common purpose in order to coexist and even cooperate.
>=20
> You need norms in order to be productive, not "social contract", I think?

Defintely true. This also begs the question: What is a group or a society?
I could define the entire world as a group, but you'd  have to try very
hard to find any evidence of a worldwide social contract (though with the
rise of the United States as the single world leader, we come closer to
one, as western morals are spread via commercialism).


> > > The best government is a monarchy. The worst government is also a
> > > monarchy.
> >=20
> > Few can argue with a benign dictator.  As such a principle problem
> > of government is ensuring the inheritors of power continue in the
> > good traits of their predecessors.
>=20
> There are no "benign" dictators, simply because there are no single
> objective perspective on the world.  For a dictator to remain "benign" he
> will have to enforce his perspective on the populace.  That's not very
> "benign", is it?
>=20
> "Good traits"? Who is going to judge that?

Yes, good point. I spoke too quickly. The best government is one in which
I am the monarch.

Even Octavian and Hadrian were bastards to some segments of the population
of their empire, despite being generally far better leaders (in terms of
having a vision that benefited the majority of the population, and which
was carried out and administered well).

Isaiah Berlin wrote a very good essay entitled "The Pursuit of the Ideal"
in which he convincingly destroys the idea of a "best" solution to any
problem in which a multiplicity of views are involved. This fixation on
one, irrefutable solution to any problem is very characteristic of modern
thought, and goes back at least as far as Socrates/Plato. If Anaxagoras
could arrive at the "truth" that the sun is, in fact, many times larger
than the Peloponnese, than certainly, thought Socrates/Plato, the same
methods would yield equal certainty in the field of human behavior - how
to live, what to be, etc.=20

Anyway, this has definite relevance to what we are trying to do on this
list. It's impossible, it seems to me, to discuss any specific solutions,
because each mud is its own culture that will react differently to any
specific solution. As someone said here awhile ago, he hasn't learned much
of value from this list, but uses it instead as entertainment and a place
to bounce his own ideas off of other, similarly-interested people.
--matt




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