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Comment by ergothus | Hacker News Reader

I used to feel as you do.

Looking at history, though, it seems like most (all?) significant social progress comes about because old people that bitterly cling their views and (most importantly) their power eventually die off, freeing room for the new.

We live in a world that isnt controlled by feudal powers owning a good portion of the population not because of wars, but because younger and less invested people forced those conflicts. The results of those conflicts are accepted because the people for whom the old way was normal die off. The new generations are able to make their own mistakes, get invested in the nest normal, and be replaced in turn.

Now I fear we will make anti-agathics before we develop a means to actually change without people dying.

I still hope. Someday we might live with death as a choice AND without oppression. Pretty sure I wont be around for it.

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>because old people that bitterly cling their views and (most importantly) their power eventually die off, freeing room for the new.

This is just wrong. My 80-year-old mother is far more progressive politically than many 20-35 year old men in this country. Remember the heavily armed Neo-Nazis in Charlottesville protesting the removal of Civil War statues? Those weren't elderly people.

Just because your mom is different doesn't mean anything. It's well known that as people get older they become more conservative and set in their ways.

> It's well known that as people get older they become more conservative and set in their ways.

Is that a "symptom" of the "disease" of aging though?

That's a nice anecdote but what happens when you try to dislodge a ruler with 300 years worth of experience, connections, and wealth? What happens when people have so much time to amass power that at some point you realize you, the younger generation, no longer stand any chance?

Today's model of society isn't adapted for this. Postponing the effects of aging but maintaining the same lifespan within reason is one thing, greatly extending the lifespan* is quite another and we're definitely not ready for this one more than we're ready to become 4m tall from one generation to the next.

*with the multitude of options - the young and old phases are proportional to today's but longer, the young phase is just as long as today and you get to "enjoy" a longer old phase, or the opposite.

>That's a nice anecdote but what happens when you try to dislodge a ruler with 300 years worth of experience, connections, and wealth? What happens when people have so much time to amass power that at some point you realize you, the younger generation, no longer stand any chance?

Wealth doesn't keep people in power; only power does. And power extends from the barrel of a gun. The only reason people with money stay in power is because there's a bunch of people who want to keep him there, and the populace under them either accept this, or aren't willing to take whatever risks are necessary to change this. History is full of revolutions where some ruler with lots of connections and wealth was deposed, violently if necessary. Just look at what happened to rich people during the French Revolution.

> a gun

Is that the kind of gun you buy?

Saying power gives you power is a circular argument. Wealth is like a wildcard, it can be turned into anything. And it's greatly amplified by experience as a guide to turning it into power, and allies by your side.

With wealth you buy the tools needed to stay in power: guns, lobbying, policy making, political campaigning, influencing public opinion or education, etc. No wealth and allies, no tools. Look at corporations making the game without firing one shot.

The entirety of human history showed that wealth has always been able to buy power better than anything else. And a few examples of rebellions or revolutions where people successfully overthrew the rich just show poor management on the side of the rich. Plenty more have died with guns in hand. Guns given to them by someone wealthy.

Later edit: I have edited the comment a bit for clarity, I noticed the reply later.

>Wealth, while not an exclusive means to power, can buy you power in more ways than one.

Wealth only buys you power if people are willing to accept your money, and are also refraining from simply using force to take your money from you.

>Look at corporations making the game without firing one gun.

That's because they have an entire government, with guns, enforcing the rules of the game they're playing. If the government suddenly decides to confiscate all their wealth, there's absolutely nothing they can do about it. This has happened multiple times in history (such as the Cuban Revolution).

>And a few examples of rebellions or revolutions where people have overthrown the rich just show poor management on the side of the rich.

No, it shows that at some point, having money doesn't overrule people willing to use violence against you. Most of the time, this is avoided because people tend to prefer to avoid violence, and because there's enough people willing to defend the status quo (where that money is valued), but sometimes that breaks down, and then no amount of money will save you.

It's very simple: a handful of wealthy people can never be a match for an army of people with guns. The only reason wealthy people have any kind of power is because there's an army behind them backing their claim to power.

> That's because they have an entire government, with guns, enforcing the rules of the game they're playing.

So the guns are just a tool after all. The army isn't leading the rich because it's the rich who built the army. It's the rich who create the wealth and the guns.

> It's very simple: a handful of wealthy people can never be a match for an army of people with guns

It's simplistic. The only example you came up with just showed an error in judgement on the part of the rich due to lack of experience (some things were unfathomable for them), not a failure of wealth to give you that power. Both wealth and guns can "explode" in your face if mishandled.

Insisting the French revolution is the only true evidence that wealth is worthless in gaining power is like insisting the thousands of accidental gun deaths are the only true evidence that people with guns will just accidentally kill each other.

As you can see from today's situation those people with wealth learned from the past. They know where to push and where to pull in order to successfully keep power. They have refined the tools they buy with that wealth. And the civilized world has been managing to keep going this way without using a gun (well, not on home field anyway) for the longest time in history. A library will do a far better job at making my case than I can do in a comment. I strongly encourage it.

You seem to think that "wealth" is a real thing. It is not. That's the whole problem with your reasoning. Guns are a real thing: if you point a gun at someone and pull the trigger, they will be shot and likely die. Wealth, on the other hand, is basically mutual fantasy. The only reason Michael Bloomberg, for instance, is "wealthy" is because a bunch of other people agree to his claim that a bunch of financial instruments he owns (money and stocks) are actually worth something. This only works as long as there's a functioning economy. Periods of hyperinflation in history have shown that this isn't always the case.

What motivation do people with guns have to support people with money? Only the agreement that that money is worth something, and also that that person's claim to the money is something they all agree on.

>As you can see from today's situation those people with wealth learned from the past. They know where to push and where to pull in order to successfully keep power. ... And the civilized world has been managing to keep going this way without using a gun

Have you forgotten WWII? That happened under a century ago, and one thing that happened in the 30s was the Nazis rounded up all the Jews, stuck them in death camps, and seized their money.

Money only gives you power as long as you get enough other people to agree to this. The true power lies with the people who have guns and are willing to use violence.

I have no doubt she is. And certainly being young is no guarantee of progress.

But let's compare the numbers of moms like that to the number of racist uncles. From whom do you think those angry neo-nazis learned their rhetoric?

Well of course, values and prejudices are usually passed down through generations. But my point is: age isn't a very good indicator of progressiveness. Just look at the whole 20th century: back in the 1920s, there was huge social change, and a loosening of social mores. Then it all changed, and by the 40s-50s, things were much more conservative than before. The 60s-70s were the age of the hippies, and then that all went away with the 80s and the Reagan years.

People always seem to have some weird idea that progress will come if we can just get rid of the old people through aging and attrition, but this just isn't the case. New generations can bring progress or setbacks, and it's happened historically over and over.

Speaking of Neo-Nazis, how about the actual Nazis? Were they a bunch of old farts? No, at the time, they were all young people, led by people who weren't old at all (possibly middle-aged). They weren't preceded by generations of people who were even worse than themselves, in fact it was the opposite.

Finally, just look at the current US elections: the most progressive candidate, who others in his party think is too "radical" and "extreme", is one of the oldest.

Ah, I see the misunderstanding.

I'm not (meaning to be) saying old people are conservative. I'm saying people, as a whole, don't change their views. The only way for new views to gain purchase in society is for the people with different views to die off of old age.

Most often those new views ARE more progressive, but not always.

But my core point is that if those in power don't die, they aren't going to change their views, and their power will only concentrate. "in power" doesn't just mean rulers, it also means numbers. Those racist uncles, those people deeply offended by same-sex marriages, etc. Unless the young are automatically more progressive (as you've just argued is not the case), then they won't go away, and won't be marginalized, and they'll keep holding their views.

Exceptions will exist, but numerically, it's an issue.

I think eliminating aging would probably bring more stability to society: people would stop forgetting the past so much, because there'd still be people around reminding them of it, who had personal experience. History tends to work in cycles, and a lot of that is because populations forget what they learned through experience, because the people who went through the experience die off and the younger generations don't learn the lesson properly. Sure, it might mean some change will be slower, but you'll also avoid highly damaging short-term aberrations (like the Nazis).

Also, you seem to believe that people never change their views. I don't think that's really true either; people do evolve over time. My views are very different than what they were when I was a teenager (and not more conservative either). Older people do adapt to changing society. Look at, for instance, the acceptance of various social changes in the US, such as gay marriage. These things did not come slowly; they were breathtakingly fast. There'd be some initial pioneers pushing it for a while, but not getting very far. But eventually, like a dam breaking after a crack, suddenly the whole society would adopt it. Go back in time 20 years and ask some random people if they think gay marriage would be legal nationwide by now and they'd think you're crazy. This didn't happen just because of some old people dying off; it happened because the entire society got comfortable with the idea, though it took many of them a while to accept it.

Finally, eliminating aging doesn't mean eliminating death or childbirth. People will still have children, and people will still die (from accidents, murder, diseases, etc.). Also, the biology of the brain that affects old peoples' thinking will presumably be altered by anti-aging treatments, making them think more like younger adults.

> Look at, for instance, the acceptance of various social changes in the US, such as gay marriage.

We would both use this as an example - you think it is because people changed their views, I think it is because a big group of people bitterly opposed to this died off, opening the door to change.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree. FWIW, I hope you're correct. I'd love to see society avoid repeating mistakes, learning from alternative viewpoints and expanding what they consider. Sadly, the one concrete case I can have of changing viewpoints is my own: In my twenties I felt as you do. In the decades since I've seen people embrace willful ignorance and proudly stand by hypocrisy so long as they didn't have to accept anything that was outside of their "normal". I retain the hope, but I've lost the expectation.

Here's to the hope that my conclusions are wrong.

>you think it is because people changed their views, I think it is because a big group of people bitterly opposed to this died off, opening the door to change.

A group of people bitterly opposing this did not all die off in the space of a mere decade or less. That's the problem with your reasoning.

The same thing happened in the 60s with civil rights legislation.

Here's an article that graphically shows what I'm talking about: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-pace-of-social-chang...

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