This is not another post about a dishonest city and how it has treated me. It is a just an idea, a thought which struck my mind while I was going back home on the metro system in Delhi. The metro is stuffed with people, and people pour out like water from an overflowing vessel as soon as gates open at a busy interchange station.
Many problems of crowd management could be done away if we removed the constraints in terms of design that are there to ensure that the thieves in the system don’t have their way. Suppose that no one goes out of the system without paying their dues or ticket cost, we won’t need to regulate the exits at the gate, just put in loads of machines in a line (like urinals in a toilet) and keep the gates open everywhere. Everyone pays for their journey in a separate hall made for it, and just exits at another point unregulated, not in queues.
These kinds of systems which would depend on the honesty of the individuals involved could save a lot of time and energy. Extrapolation of this system in the extremes, led me to believe that we won’t even need governments in such a case. Because everyone would be honest, no need for regulation, just some community groups at the local level to handle emergencies.
Shops won’t have to install all those anti-theft measures, you wouldn’t even have to stand at your own shop, and people will take the product and pay for it. I remember an example for such a system, I had read on Quora. While I searched for it again when writing this, I couldn’t find it, but here’s a link to the same from another source.- Shop without shopkeepers
Of course many have already thought of these things, I just wanted to muse this out loudly, so that I could get your views, what do you say? Do we have the time to sit by and trust in the goodness of honest people, when at the same time we want to get filthy rich? Or should we not harden ourselves for this world, remain honest, but fight for our rights ferociously and not concede defeat against misdoings by other people?
Great post! I have some thoughts on honesty, too. Please check out my post, "Love, Lies, and Opposable Thumbs."
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storiform
Thanks a lot, your post really took the need for honesty to a new level. I am sure you even managed to change views of many people who might have thought of it as an issue which could have been ignored had the Darwinian thought been applied. (I could not comment there, have comments been disabled? :))
ReplyDeleteI apologize for turning off the comments. I was so busy replying to comments in my slow, overly careful way that it was literally taking up all my writing time. I'm thinking about turning them back on and maybe just replying to some of them. I really miss the interpersonal communication... except when it comes to certain subjects where people get angry. But that didn't happen very often. I'm probably a little extreme when it comes to honesty, but as best I can tell, my thoughts on the subject are logical and practical for our species.
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