19 April 2020

Liberty is a constraint

If you take the basic system model components -- stocks, flows, feedbacks, and constraints -- liberty is a constraint.  There are these things, and these things must not be done.

One consequence is that the mammonite position -- money is a feedback, so everything can be done with feedback, and no other social organization can be tolerated, never mind accepted as required -- functions to remove constraints.

This is more basic than the slaver desire for free labour; it's a philosophical axiom.

So one consequence is that the concern for erosion of liberties in a time of pandemic is not inappropriate as a concern, but it (like many other problems) reduces to "can't let mammonite axioms into public life".  It's not a question of will or enforcement or intent, really; a world defined by money destroys all constraints, including the "these things must not be done" ones.

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