It was reported (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186 ) that China is planning to have the world’s largest Social Credit Systems in the world that aims to rate each citizen’s trustworthiness through the use of a single Social Credit score for every individuals in the country.
This is a very interesting development. The design and implementation of different “Credit Scores” for various purposes is really nothing new, each using different “algorithms” to achieve the desired measured results. This is of course particularly prevalent with financial institutions, such as banks and credit card companies etc.
In Malaysia, the two most often-used and “authoritative” Credit Scores are CCRIS (Central Credit Reference Information Service, run by the Central Bank Malaysia) and CTOS (Credit Tip-Off Service operated by private company as Credit Report Agency). Other countries would have similar measures or scores. Such indices measure what I would call the worldly or “Yang” or “Masculine” status of the person concerned.
There are of course other systems that track non-financial information / data. Such Social Credit systems include many proprietary platforms, such as those that track “reputation”, “influences”, “purchase behavior”, “mental health” and other “invisible” social status. Such indices measure what I would call the ethical-behavioral or “Ying” or “Feminine” status of the person concerned.
It would truly be a gigantic task to integrate these into a single score. The complexity of the algorithm involved would challenge the fastest computer. Even with such a single Social Credit score, how much could we really know about a particular person, in terms of his or her financial, social, psychological , behavioral well-beings or status? In the final analysis, it is the person’s ethical standard or make-up (involving mental and spiritual aspects or “Ying” component) that really determines his or her Social Credit reality or identity.
In other words, the best designed Social Credit System is still not integrative or holistic enough to reflect the individual’s trustworthiness and character. The reality is the person’s true identity is composed of two parts or components: the “Social Credit” (the Worldly or “Yang”) and “Ethical Standard or Make-up” (the Cognitive and Spiritual or “Ying”). It is this integration of Ying and Yang that yields the true picture of the person concerned (integrative and holistic --- Self-Actualization).
All current Social Credit Systems attempt to measure, as accurately as possible, the “Yang” component (or its various versions). Could any Social Credit Systems truly measure the “Ying” component? Or should the “Yang” component be given more weight / emphasis than the “Ying” component? Is it possible to predict not just the trustworthiness but also the potential for Success or Happiness in Life or generally called Self-Actualization? In the end, we would have the following measurements or scores:
1.Social Credit 1.0 = Individual’s Trustworthiness (What is your score now?)
2.Social Credit 2.0 = Individual’s Self-actualization (What is your current score?)
This would naturally lead us to the philosophers’ Great Question: What is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything? Surprisingly or not surprisingly, the answer is also a number: 42 (https://www.quora.com/Why-and-how-is-42-the-answer-to-life-the-universe-and-everything)
And of course, you can watch a video of this on YouTube:
