I have a different explanation for the phenomenon. Strong Opinions Loosely held. If you ask most humans except for a fewexceptions peoples stated preference is concave. Arms races are a revealed convex preference, because they favor a single winner. People observe this and imagine this convex entity they need to outcompete. Hence “What about china”, “permanent underclass” and similar memes. Hence humanities revealed preference right now is convex. People are not good enough at applying math to real life to see the equilibrium for convex entities is bankruptcy over timescales longer than that convex entity can predict well. Anyone familiar with kelly betting is aware that overestimating your edge leads to bankruptcy faster than underestimating it. But with power someone is over and someone is underestimating. People see a rational chance of being crushed and want to rebalance early before things escalate. I can’t explain to my mom what a revealed convex preference is. My mom is not reflective enough to steer against the collective equilibrium of bad faith and for a good faith one. Humanity as a whole is not reflective enough. The egregore in the driver seat can’t is a preschooler who doesn’t know it shouldn’t step on the gas pedal and is going to crash unless it grows up fast. This is only an evo-psych explanation insofar as most humans did not evolve to learn to grow the fuck up in the face of a technological singularity and fighting for cooperation itself. You could also say evolutions revealed preference is to disempower humans unless we steer against that.
I have a different explanation for the phenomenon. Strong Opinions Loosely held. If you ask most humans except for a few exceptions peoples stated preference is concave. Arms races are a revealed convex preference, because they favor a single winner. People observe this and imagine this convex entity they need to outcompete. Hence “What about china”, “permanent underclass” and similar memes. Hence humanities revealed preference right now is convex. People are not good enough at applying math to real life to see the equilibrium for convex entities is bankruptcy over timescales longer than that convex entity can predict well. Anyone familiar with kelly betting is aware that overestimating your edge leads to bankruptcy faster than underestimating it. But with power someone is over and someone is underestimating. People see a rational chance of being crushed and want to rebalance early before things escalate. I can’t explain to my mom what a revealed convex preference is. My mom is not reflective enough to steer against the collective equilibrium of bad faith and for a good faith one. Humanity as a whole is not reflective enough. The egregore in the driver seat can’t is a preschooler who doesn’t know it shouldn’t step on the gas pedal and is going to crash unless it grows up fast. This is only an evo-psych explanation insofar as most humans did not evolve to learn to grow the fuck up in the face of a technological singularity and fighting for cooperation itself. You could also say evolutions revealed preference is to disempower humans unless we steer against that.