Name: 烏托邦一定是荒誕的嗎？烏托邦是可能的嗎？ (Is Utopia Always Dystopia? Is Utopia Possible?)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T07:57:03.000Z
Duration: 11 min 21 s
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In every second, of every day, you have to
decide between action and inaction.

We're all tangled up in a web of cause and
effect and so every choice you make has gravity

情態副詞

and pulls us towards one of two futures: one
that is more heavenly or one that is more

hellish; one that is more utopian versus one
that is more dystopian.

It's human nature to dream about utopia: a
place better than here.

We dream about what our lives could be, and
some of us dream bigger, about what the world

One thing's certain, there's always a place
that exists outside of space and time, it's

better than here, and it's where we want to
go.

But all things come with a price tag, and
you have to decide whether you're willing

In some sense, your life is defined by the
costs you're willing to pay.

A better world exists, and it demands payment;
so, what are you willing to sacrifice?

In his story *The Monkey's Paw,* William Jacobs
writes about a man who acquires a magical

monkey paw that will grant him three wishes.

Much to his dismay, the man finds out that
each wish comes with an unintended side effect.

When the man wishes for 200 pounds, he receives
it — as compensation for the death of his

When he wishes for his son to come back to
life, he does — as an undead being.

Fate demands a price and if the man would
not voluntarily choose his sacrifice, it would

The residents of Aldous Huxley's *Brave
New World* live in a technologically advanced

utopia: they're happy, healthy, and youthful.

Class hierarchies exist but everyone has been
psychologically conditioned to love their

Residents of this utopia have no attachments
to one another.

In the words of one character, “everyone
belongs to everyone”.

Everyone has multiple sexual partners, and
orgies are commonplace.

If at any point in time a resident feels down,
they can take a drug called Soma to uplift

Soma brings on feelings of euphoria — *with
no downsides*.

In order to maintain the utopia's ideals
of “community, identity, and stability",

residents have to make a heavy sacrifice.

They give up their individuality, art, religion,
love, and, ultimately, their freedom of choice.

Utopian thinking isn't just confined to
literature.

The 20th century saw the rise of many charismatic
leaders claiming to know the way to Eden but,

wherever they were leading us, the cost was
too high.

In some ways, we were like the man with the
monkey paw: we wanted the benefits of utopia,

without the responsibility of bearing the
costs.

But fate demands a price, and when we gave
up our responsibility, we gave up our individuality

Despite these negative examples, I do believe
utopia is possible.

In his recent book *Enlightenment Now*, Steven
Pinker documents all of the positive changes

the world has undergone since the Enlightenment.

For example, average life expectancy has increased
from 30 years of age, in the 1750s, to 70

Deaths due to malaria have declined by 60%
from 2000 to 2015 [3].

Worldwide rates of extreme poverty have been
declining since the 1800s [3].

All of these are what I would call positive-sum
games: win-win situations for humanity as

I think the important questions to ask are
how many of these positive-sum games could

we play, how much better could the world ultimately
get, and how do we continue down this path?

At the same time, how do we avoid traveling
down some of the paths we already went down

You can think about the world at different
levels of analysis.

The highest level might be something like
universal.

The levels that follow that — in descending
order — are the planet, the country, the

community, the family, and, lastly, the individual.

The lower levels are all nested within the
higher levels which means that all levels

The individual affects the family, which affects
the community, and so on.

The problem with conceptualizing utopia is
that it gets created at the higher levels

By starting at the higher levels, we force
all the lower levels to mesh with it.

Anything, *or anyone*, that fails to harmonize
with the highest level is seen as unfit for

This type of utopia always devolves into a
totalitarian dystopia.

In design, we call this a *top-down approach*:
the highest ideal is generated and all of

the lower levels are adjusted to meet that
ideal.

A top-down approach will always succumb to
evolutionary pressures because a static and

constant ideal can't survive in a dynamic
and evolving world.

The opposite of a top-down approach is a *bottom-up
approach*.

Instead of starting at the highest, you start
at the lowest level of analysis possible.

In our case, this would be the individual.

You start by creating a simple set of rules
that govern the individual and allow the system

From individuals — communities, cities,
and nations emerge.

Bottom-up systems harmonize well with nature
because they can evolve and adapt.

In fact, evolution is a bottom-up system:
it's governed by rules of survival and reproduction

YouTube is also a bottom-up system: it analyzes
our behavior and evolves based on how we interact

The algorithms of today are more than mere
technology: they're alive and YouTube is an

Bottom-up systems are partly unpredictable;
we don't know what the YouTube homepage

will look like in a year from now, let alone
life on Earth in 1000 years.

*It's impossible to predict what an emergent
utopia would look like.*

Of course, I'm oversimplifying a bit here.

Many systems are a mix of top-down and bottom-up
elements.

With that said, are there a minimum number
of rules that, if an individual were to enact

them, would allow a better world to emerge?

The philosopher David Hume famously pointed
out that it's difficult to determine the

way the world *should* be based on the way
the world *is:* this is known as the *Is-Ought

Science gives us a description of how the
world is and philosophy gives us a prescription