What would happen...-Utopia IMO..

[OmegaPsi]

What would happen to this world if hypothetically a sepratist group of scientists, engineers,High literaries,etc..made a group ,wich required that evreyone who took a test,at a young age, and got the Test score 'X' or above [high] (Oh, and this test is full proof, so there is no question of its validity.) were required to live in a seprate society of other Intelligent people.
and just for kicks..the society was a Technocratic-Democratic-Republic kind of government.

[snoogit]

Play BioShock to find out.

[xhaan]

Play BioShock to find out.

Good one!
Hahaha.

[Sylvanus]

Every book (or movie or video game) about a dystopia, the society was originally intended to be a utopia. Generally they succeed for a short time, until something tips the balance and it cascades into a totalitarian hell-hole. Communism is supposed to lead to a utopian society, except people put their own desires first (not just a small minority, everybody does), and it starts as a hell-hole, and becomes a totalitarian hell-hole.

I would imagine, if we were to start this utopia of intelligent people it would start out well. It would have to be a pure communist government, and could not exceed a few thousand people (communism falters quickly in large populations, the indians are a good example of communism that works, in relatively small tribes). Either everyone would have to share the grunt work, or their would have to be a slave caste of mute eunechs.

There may be other reasons it would falter, many of which could be avoided through careful legislation before it all got started, but I think the children of the next generation will be the tipping point. Many couples will have babies, they will see them grow up for several years. Then when it comes time to test them to see if they are fit to remain in the utopia, some of them don't make the cut. They are removed from society (killed or sent off to another country), and the parents are left behind and pissed. It's all downhill from there.

That may not be the cause, but the most likely one. Anytime that there is a real or percieved inequality in the system, they are one step closer to bringing down the whole system in order to 'right the wrong'. People are emotional and selfish creatures (even INTJ's have emotions, occasionally), utopias have no checks or balances on selfishness and are guaranteed to fail.

[quentin]

The word "utopia" literally means "nowhere" in Latin. When Thomas More wrote the original book, he was fully aware that he was writing about a society that mere humans could not possibly achieve. All attempts to set up a perfect society have failed ignomiously, and always shall fail.

Secondly, there is the mismeasurement of man (to quote Stephen Gould) that are intelligence tests - what kind of intelligence are we measuring? Those tests are notoriously tricky and unreliable. When you consider that Einstein was considered mentally retarded when he was a youngster....

[Tsuru]

I would imagine, if we were to start this utopia of intelligent people it would start out well. It would have to be a pure communist government, and could not exceed a few thousand people (communism falters quickly in large populations, the indians are a good example of communism that works, in relatively small tribes). Either everyone would have to share the grunt work, or their would have to be a slave caste of mute eunechs.


Hmm, what makes you believe that communism is the only way a "smart society" could function? I would think no highly intelligent persons would like to live under compulsion and lack of equal compensation for their efforts (the smartest get the least reward relative to the impact of their contribtions, after all). I'm pretty much in the opposite view, that having a free market would be the only viable long-term solution for stability in a big batch of smart people.


OmegaPsi:

You might want to check out the book Atlas Shrugged. In a lot of ways it has this very premise: the producers and thinkers of the world go "on strike" and withdraw into their own hidden society.

[OmegaPsi]

Secondly, there is the mismeasurement of man (to quote Stephen Gould) that are intelligence tests - what kind of intelligence are we measuring? Those tests are notoriously tricky and unreliable. When you consider that Einstein was considered mentally retarded when he was a youngster....

What would happen to this world if hypothetically a sepratist group of scientists, engineers,High literaries,etc..made a group ,wich required that evreyone who took a test,at a young age, and got the Test score 'X' or above [high] (Oh, and this test is full proof, so there is no question of its validity.) were required to live in a seprate society of other Intelligent people.
and just for kicks..the society was a Technocratic-Democratic-Republic kind of government.

I meant for that to mean the perfect test to test all the diffrent kinds of knowledge and intelligences. =p

[Sylvanus]

Hmm, what makes you believe that communism is the only way a "smart society" could function? I would think no highly intelligent persons would like to live under compulsion and lack of equal compensation for their efforts (the smartest get the least reward relative to the impact of their contribtions, after all). I'm pretty much in the opposite view, that having a free market would be the only viable long-term solution for stability in a big batch of smart people.


Because utopias are always communist...

I for one am all for free markets, but I think a capitalist society and a utopia are mutually exclusive. The means necessary to maintain the utopia would require severe infiringement of individual rights.
If a group of really smart people got together and started a free market society. It would probably work really well. The problem would eventually arise of how to keep the dumb ones out. A free society would probably not put up with the government stealing babies for very long. A free society that allowed it's members to keep their 'dumb' children would cease to be a utopia after two generations. Even smart people have dumb kids sometimes.

[AJ]

Brave New World by Huxley is a great illustration of this sought "Utopian" society. The one thing about B.N.W. was that it was not allowed to have natural birth as it was considered to be something done by savages (avoiding the possible downfall of parents getting mad as Sylvanus mentioned above). Everyone was made through the technology of the day and everyone was classified by their intelligence and capabilities. So the Alpha's and beta's were the superior thinkers while the epsilon minus were the 'morons' who would do the essential jobs that someone with great intelligence would not want to do. I would highly recommend the book, very advanced for the time it was written (1930's).

[OmegaPsi]

Do you guys think this would be an Utoipia?

[Umbrex]

What would happen to this world if hypothetically a sepratist group of scientists, engineers,High literaries,etc..made a group ,wich required that evreyone who took a test,at a young age, and got the Test score 'X' or above [high] (Oh, and this test is full proof, so there is no question of its validity.) were required to live in a seprate society of other Intelligent people.
and just for kicks..the society was a Technocratic-Democratic-Republic kind of government.

the society would collapse due to lack of bus drivers, gas station clerks, nurses, construction workers, caretakers, etc..

the ideal society would be your scenario, where we had access to either robots or slaves. But no worries, the powers that be are already working on the latter. No tests involved though.

[Sylvanus]

the society would collapse due to lack of bus drivers, gas station clerks, nurses, construction workers, caretakers, etc..

the ideal society would be your scenario, where we had access to either robots or slaves. But no worries, the powers that be are already working on the latter. No tests involved though.

Or mute eunuchs

[prometheus]

the society would collapse due to lack of bus drivers, gas station clerks, nurses, construction workers, caretakers, etc..

the ideal society would be your scenario, where we had access to either robots or slaves. But no worries, the powers that be are already working on the latter. No tests involved though.


Or they would all die from an extremely virulent pay phone virus.

+1 on Tsuru's suggestion about Atlas Shrugged.

[Antares]

Utopia reminds me of 1984 and The Giver, although I think the latter matches more. Both are excellent books :) I don't think Utopia will ever really work out. I know I'm taking fictional ideas here, but the world in The Giver is more of a dystopia under the facade of a perfect world.





Camelopardalis added to this post, 2 minutes and 45 seconds later...

What would happen to this world if hypothetically a sepratist group of scientists, engineers,High literaries,etc..made a group ,wich required that evreyone who took a test,at a young age, and got the Test score 'X' or above [high] (Oh, and this test is full proof, so there is no question of its validity.) were required to live in a seprate society of other Intelligent people.
and just for kicks..the society was a Technocratic-Democratic-Republic kind of government.

That's... Segregation...

[OmegaPsi]

Segregation is inherently bad?

[yondyr]

I have a modification for this ideal society based on Umbrex's plaint that there would be no scut workers. Supply and demand should function - the most menial disgusting jobs should pay many multiples of management jobs. Put another way, the more people want the job, the less it pays and vice versa. And, to be topical, politicians much vaunted claim of 'serving' would come true indeed.

[Gonzo]

Brave New World by Huxley is a great illustration of this sought "Utopian" society. The one thing about B.N.W. was that it was not allowed to have natural birth as it was considered to be something done by savages (avoiding the possible downfall of parents getting mad as Sylvanus mentioned above). Everyone was made through the technology of the day and everyone was classified by their intelligence and capabilities. So the Alpha's and beta's were the superior thinkers while the epsilon minus were the 'morons' who would do the essential jobs that someone with great intelligence would not want to do. I would highly recommend the book, very advanced for the time it was written (1930's).

Kinda like that movie "Gattaca". Gave a image of the future that may not be so far fetched. Peoples ability's are improved by manipulating the genes of everyone pre-birth, and their potential (and in turn their value) is settled by a simple blood test. I loved that :). Also recommended!

But like others has stated above, this kind of "utopia" would face countless problems to function. Even if it did work, what kind of society would that be? Should this elite group have more then the rest, or be privileged in some way? It would mean we had to segregate the "lesser" people into a lower class. Just thinking about what this "perfect" society would mean, gives me chills down my spine. Mainly because the nazi's showed us a good picture of the results this kind of thinking has, about 60 years ago. Anyways...

At the end of the day the only thing this utopia would result in is this: 1 really dumb group of people fighting and killing each other, and 1 group of really smart people... well... fighting and killing each other :)

[Antares]

Segregation is inherently bad?

It's not inherently bad, but the group with presumably low intelligence are irrational. Many of them have a pride that says: Why aren't we allowed to live in this area? What's so good about them? They are the majority, apparently, because there are more of 'low IQ's' than intellectuals in the society usually and may cause problems.

This segregation will work well if you rid them of emotions like in The Giver





Camelopardalis added to this post, 3 minutes and 21 seconds later...

Kinda like that movie "Gattaca". Gave a image of the future that may not be so far fetched. Peoples ability's are improved by manipulating the genes of everyone pre-birth, and their potential (and in turn their value) is settled by a simple blood test. I loved that :). Also recommended!

But like others has stated above, this kind of "utopia" would face countless problems to function. Even if it did work, what kind of society would that be? Should this elite group have more then the rest, or be privileged in some way? It would mean we had to segregate the "lesser" people into a lower class. Just thinking about what this "perfect" society gives me chills down my spine. Mainly because the nazi's showed us a good picture of the results this kind of thinking has, about 60 years ago. Anyways...

At the end of the day the only thing this utopia would result in is this: 1 really dumb group of people fighting and killing each other, and 1 group of really smart people... well... fighting and killing each other :)

Oh yesss... I remember that movie. The protagonist is like a second class citizen because he's genetically inferior.

[quentin]

All of a sudden I'm reminded of a scenario where the smart and dumb people were separated - H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, with the Eloi and the Morlocks. It's been years since I read it, so I'm going to quote the Wikipedia entry:

As he explores this landscape, the Time Traveller comments on the factors that have resulted in the Eloi's physical condition and society. He supposes that the lack of intelligence and vitality of the Eloi are the logical result of humankind's past struggle to transform and subjugate nature through technology, politics, art and creativity. With the realisation of this goal, the Eloi had devolved.

With no further need for technology and agriculture and innovations to improve life, they became unimaginative and incurious about the world. With no work to do, they became physically weak and small in stature. Males, generally being breadwinners and workers in former times, have particularly degenerated in physique, explaining the lack of dimorphism between the sexes. The Time Traveller supposes that preventive medicine has been achieved, as he saw no sign of disease amongst his hosts. With no work to do and no hardships to overcome, society became non-hierarchical and non-cooperative, with no defined leaders or social classes.

The fact that there was no hardship or inequalities in societies meant there was no war and crime. Art and sophisticated culture, often driven by problems and aspirations or a catalyst for solutions and new developments, had waned, as no problems existed and there were no conceivable improvements for humanity. He accounted for their relatively small numbers as being due to the implementation of some form of birth control to eliminate the problems of overpopulation. The abandoned structures around him would suggest that prior to these achievements, the population had been larger and more productive, toiling to find the solution that would make the new utopia a reality.

The Utopian existence of the Eloi turns out to be deceptive. The Traveller soon discovers that the class structure of his own time has in fact persisted, and the human race has diverged into two branches. The wealthy, leisure classes appear to have devolved into the ineffectual, not very bright Eloi he has already seen; but the downtrodden working classes have evolved into the bestial Morlocks, cannibal hominids resembling human spiders, who toil underground maintaining the machinery that keep the Eloi — their flocks — docile and plentiful. Both species, having adapted to their routines, are of distinctly sub-human intelligence.