Most Nooses weren't built as extraction. They started as Ropes—legitimate coordination mechanisms solving real problems. Then time passed. Context shifted. The original problem disappeared or transformed. But the structure remained, calcifying from useful to vestigial to extractive. The people maintaining it forgot why it existed. New people arrived and assumed it was natural. Someone started … Continue reading Don’t Build Nooses: The Ethics of System Design
Tag: coordination mechanisms
Deferential Realism: Ethics of Constraint-Alignment
I. Foundation: The Honest Life The central ethical question in Deferential Realism is not "What is the good life?" but "What is the honest life in a world of constraints?" Traditional virtue ethics asks what dispositions lead to flourishing. Deferential Realism asks: What dispositions lead to accurate constraint classification and appropriate response? This shifts ethics … Continue reading Deferential Realism: Ethics of Constraint-Alignment
Deferential Realism: Applied Guide
A Practical Manual for Constraint Classification and Energy Conservation Introduction: From Concept to Practice You've read the core concept. You understand that constraints come in four types: Mountains (natural), Ropes (coordination), Nooses (extractive), and Zombie Ropes (institutional inertia). You know the single heuristic: "Does this require enforcement?" Now comes the hard part: using this framework … Continue reading Deferential Realism: Applied Guide
From Axiom Engine to Deferential Realism: How Stories Generate Philosophy
A Bridge Essay I. The Pattern in Ten Stories If you've just read The Axiom Engine, you've experienced something unusual: mathematical theorems as lived constraints. The Oracle tried to predict and failed. The Arbiter tried to satisfy all axioms and collapsed. The Wanderer walked freely and discovered necessity. Each story followed the same arc: Confusion … Continue reading From Axiom Engine to Deferential Realism: How Stories Generate Philosophy
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