Was there anyone operating under the illusion that it was bulletproof? Every constitution has loopholes in the same way that all code has bugs: they’re written with implicit assumptions about the universe they’ll operate in, the rules of interpretation and the people using them. I’d like to see one constitution that doesn’t have an “emergency powers” escape hatch.
Expanding the scope of explicit prohibitions and protections only adds more points of failure and contradiction. You can’t “solve” a human society any more than you can predict the future.
We’ve been baggaged with the enlightenment era’s struggle for perfect rationality for hundreds of years now. Every political conversation has an implicit (and absurd) backdrop that ideals need to be indelible for all time and policy needs to constantly drive toward perfection. That’s the least rational perspective when we now know for an empirical fact that we’re ephemeral electrochemical meat sacks floating through a mostly lifeless universe of entropy.
The earth’s magnetic poles will flip, super volcanos will decimate agriculture, the moon will drift away, the sun will explode and humanity doesn’t have the resources or evolved inclination to escape to terraformed utopias for eternity. These are simple facts. No revolutionary or reactionary political action can change them and no constitutional commandments set down today will be useful to our Nth-great grandchildren in those scenarios.
I’m waiting for a politician to acknowledge that and let us grow past paternalistic feudalism and arrogant 19th century doctrine. Let’s treat our future generations as capable equals instead of children; gift them what knowledge we have and preserve the resources they’ll need instead of dictating instructions.
Was there anyone operating under the illusion that it was bulletproof?
Like, a lot of people? They treat their Constitution like a sacred text instead of something that should have been scrapped and rewritten after the Civil War.
Was there anyone operating under the illusion that it was bulletproof? Every constitution has loopholes in the same way that all code has bugs: they’re written with implicit assumptions about the universe they’ll operate in, the rules of interpretation and the people using them. I’d like to see one constitution that doesn’t have an “emergency powers” escape hatch.
Expanding the scope of explicit prohibitions and protections only adds more points of failure and contradiction. You can’t “solve” a human society any more than you can predict the future.
We’ve been baggaged with the enlightenment era’s struggle for perfect rationality for hundreds of years now. Every political conversation has an implicit (and absurd) backdrop that ideals need to be indelible for all time and policy needs to constantly drive toward perfection. That’s the least rational perspective when we now know for an empirical fact that we’re ephemeral electrochemical meat sacks floating through a mostly lifeless universe of entropy.
The earth’s magnetic poles will flip, super volcanos will decimate agriculture, the moon will drift away, the sun will explode and humanity doesn’t have the resources or evolved inclination to escape to terraformed utopias for eternity. These are simple facts. No revolutionary or reactionary political action can change them and no constitutional commandments set down today will be useful to our Nth-great grandchildren in those scenarios.
I’m waiting for a politician to acknowledge that and let us grow past paternalistic feudalism and arrogant 19th century doctrine. Let’s treat our future generations as capable equals instead of children; gift them what knowledge we have and preserve the resources they’ll need instead of dictating instructions.
Like, a lot of people? They treat their Constitution like a sacred text instead of something that should have been scrapped and rewritten after the Civil War.