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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Is Christianity the same as socialism
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
The Unity of Opposites is part of Hegelian Dialectics (although I don't think he referred to it as such), and Marx and Engell's based their theories of Dialectic Materialism on it. Along with changing quantity into quality and the negation of the negation it forms the philosophical underpinnings of classical Marxism.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
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A Feminine Force
Ship's Onager
# 7812
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Posted
I see. Is there a point to this observation? I mean, are you saying that Marxism necessarily proceeeds out of this particular POV?
LAFF
[ 11. May 2007, 12:05: Message edited by: A Feminine Force ]
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C2C - The Cure for What Ails Ya?
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
No. I simply made the point that what you have observed is part of marxist philosophy. Of course many things are found in opposition in the universe, but it was Marx and Engells, following on from the work of Hegel, who used that opposition to create the structure of Marxism.
It was for your interest that's all, to highlight that the phenomina you noticed had been noticed before and had found its way into a political system that is related to this debate.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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A Feminine Force
Ship's Onager
# 7812
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Posted
Thanks for this. I hardly think my observation is new. As I said earlier, I think that something that looks like Marxism might proceed out of an internal revolution in the hearts and minds of a group of people who surrender to the Law of Love and the Great Commandment. But I hardly think such a revolution can be imposed from without by implementation of economic theory through the commercial laws of a nation(as has been proven in recent history).
Which is why I don't think that socialism and Christianity are the same thing. Christianity is a personal, intimate, and very private revolution. Its first fruits are esoteric before the exoteric evidence is visible in the Christian's "way of being in the world".
LAFF
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C2C - The Cure for What Ails Ya?
Posts: 2115 | From: Kingdom of Heaven | Registered: Jul 2004
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Littlelady
Shipmate
# 9616
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mad Geo:
I can say this Papio. Go ahead and tax the rich at 70%. They will flee your country and then we will simply show you what's its like to watch your country die. Because if you could actually pull that off (which it won't) that is what would happen eventually.
We had that situation in the UK during the 1970s. It was a desperate time here. Very bleak. At that time, the higher rate earnings tax was more like 80% (it might have gone even higher, not sure). No-one wanted to come here. Thatcher had a helluva job on her hands to reverse it all, but she did. She certainly began the process of recovery anyway.
However, 10 years of Labour, albeit in its 'new' guise, has seen taxation increasing alarmingly, though this time by stealth rather than the crush-the-rich approach of old style Labour.
Papio's comment reminds me of why I never, EVER, want to see leftwingers running our country again. Please God, spare us that!
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'When ideas fail, words come in very handy' ~ Goethe
Posts: 3737 | From: home of the best Rugby League team in the universe | Registered: Jun 2005
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Papio
Ship's baboon
# 4201
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Posted
I never ever want to see your part in power again, so I won't take that personally. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
In the 70s there was rubbish on the streets, I agree. In the 80s, it was human beings, which for some reason Tories think was better.
The Tories economic record:
Record unemployment
Record homelessness
Record child poverty
Low Wages
Monetarianism
Black Wednesday
Boom and Bust.
No thanks.
[ 11. May 2007, 16:36: Message edited by: Papio ]
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Posts: 12176 | From: a zoo in England. | Registered: Mar 2003
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Littlelady
Shipmate
# 9616
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Papio:
The Tories economic record:
Was such that your party, when it came to power, publically stated it would maintain Tory fiscal policy for the first two years of its first term.
Mmmm. Must have been bad then!
Without what the Tories did, Brown would not have had all that money to spend (and then, when he had spent it all, he started raising taxes so he could spend some more ... hmmm ... where have come across that approach before I wonder ...)
(PS: Glad you're not taking it personally. It was only your comment and not you that reminded me. ![[Biased]](wink.gif) )
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'When ideas fail, words come in very handy' ~ Goethe
Posts: 3737 | From: home of the best Rugby League team in the universe | Registered: Jun 2005
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Papio
Ship's baboon
# 4201
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Posted
Tax and spend was always better then monetarism. Still is. And Brown is still a better chancellor than anyone the Tories have ever had in their entire history.
Labour wasted their first term, though, by not realising that most people didn't like the Tories. Or not daring to believe it.
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Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
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Posted
But I thought you thought Brown and Blair were just Thatcherites in disguise?
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Papio
Ship's baboon
# 4201
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
But I thought you thought Brown and Blair were just Thatcherites in disguise?
I do, more or less and part from the minimum wage, but they are still better than anyone in the Tory party.
Why do people think the Tories are ready for goverment? They have no policies whatsoever, all their policy announcements to date have been farcical, Cameron is so insincere and wet0behind the ears that he reeks of both, and he is desperately falling over himself to ape a man who has been an electoral liability to his own party for years!
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Posts: 12176 | From: a zoo in England. | Registered: Mar 2003
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
I do, more or less and part from the minimum wage, but they are still better than anyone in the Tory party.
Well it's good to that objectivity is alive and well on the left!
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Papio
Ship's baboon
# 4201
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by deano:
quote:
I do, more or less and part from the minimum wage, but they are still better than anyone in the Tory party.
Well it's good to that objectivity is alive and well on the left!
It's completely objective. They are better because they are to a certain extent constrained by actual labour.
I don't believe that the Tories have anything to offer this country or that they are in any way ready for government. Nor do I believe that they stand a chance of winning the next election, quite honestly.
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
Nor do I believe that they stand a chance of winning the next election, quite honestly.
Well there we agree! I think it will be a hung Parliament with Labour having the Largest party and looking to the Liberal Democrats to support it. I think it will last until the LibDems realise that they will not be given PR and the Government will fail. The Conservatives WILL win that election.
I fully expect to have to vote in two general elections within 18 months to 2 years.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
Ah, another popular tactic of the left. When their flawed policies and failures are pointed out they immediately launch into a "well your side were bad too" tirade in order to deflect attention away.
I suspect this is because they have no decent answers, but other reasons are possible.
Hence how we appear to have gone from discussing high tax rates for the über-rich (and the inevitable loss to the country of most of the higher paid people, leaving it worse off by far) to a straightforward party political slagfest.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Papio
Ship's baboon
# 4201
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Ah, another popular tactic of the left. When their flawed policies and failures are pointed out they immediately launch into a "well your side were bad too" tirade in order to deflect attention away.
Your side wasn't "bad too". Your side was far, far, far worse in literally every fucking way. Thatcher was the worst PM this country has ever had. Ever.
Pointing that out isn't a "tactic". It is an attempt to get the right of their high horse that they have no right to be on because no matter how many times they can score points against labour, we must never forget that their team was worse and will always be worse.
[ 11. May 2007, 23:37: Message edited by: Papio ]
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Ah, another popular tactic of the left. When their flawed policies and failures are pointed out they immediately launch into a "well your side were bad too" tirade in order to deflect attention away.
I suspect this is because they have no decent answers, but other reasons are possible.
But that is a decent answer. Electoral politics is a pragmtic thing. If there are two parties and one is less harmful thatn the other, you ought ot vote for the less harmful.
As I said on the Frog thread, if there was an election with Hitler standing against Mussolini it woud be a sin not to vote for Mussolini.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
the inevitable loss to the country of most of the higher paid people, leaving it worse off by far
In my estimation that would be the same kind of 'loss' which is involved in the removal of a diseased appendix. Just so long as they don't even think about taking their loot with them.
But, if you want to believe that your betters are such wonderful, innovative, entrepenurial people that the rest of us would just wander around saying 'ug' without them, go ahead. 's a free country.
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Sir Pellinore
Quester Emeritus
# 12163
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Posted
No. Christianity is not opposed to social progress but realises no society - even the Church - can be made "perfect". It also sees the alieviation of poverty, oppression et sim as just a step on the way. Because of the tragic Jekyll/Hyde dichotomy of human nature ("Original Sin" to purists) human society is not perfectable.
Life is paradoxical. I think we have to try and find what we call "Heaven" amidst the rubble of boring everyday life. Heaven is eternal i.e. outside our normal concepts of time and space. We can, I believe, only have occasional glimpses.
"Humankind cannot stand very much reality" T S Eliot.
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Well...
Posts: 5108 | From: The Deep North, Oz | Registered: Dec 2006
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
We had Old Labour and the unions. We had the fucking Tories. The Tories were worse. You lose.
Except between 1979 and 1997 (18 years) we didn't lose. Old Labour and the Unions did consistently, and the only reason Labour is in office now and has remained so is because it is "new" not "old".
Don't you think the electorate have made it clear that they don't want old-fashioned socialists within a country mile of Government?
I'm afraid your ideology and values are defunct except at the margins of politics. There can't be any going back. Nobody is voting for it and nor will they.
Still, I admire your pluck their Papio. You keep hanging in there, against all the odds and such commitment has to be welcomed in this day and age.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
the inevitable loss to the country of most of the higher paid people, leaving it worse off by far
In my estimation that would be the same kind of 'loss' which is involved in the removal of a diseased appendix. Just so long as they don't even think about taking their loot with them.
But, if you want to believe that your betters are such wonderful, innovative, entrepenurial people that the rest of us would just wander around saying 'ug' without them, go ahead. 's a free country.
Hold on a second.
Unless you are arguing that the very presence of rich people causes others to be poor, then this argument becomes absurd. You tax rich people, and instead of paying they leave. How does this help anyone exactly?
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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CrookedCucumber
Shipmate
# 10792
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
the inevitable loss to the country of most of the higher paid people, leaving it worse off by far
In my estimation that would be the same kind of 'loss' which is involved in the removal of a diseased appendix. Just so long as they don't even think about taking their loot with them.
But, if you want to believe that your betters are such wonderful, innovative, entrepenurial people that the rest of us would just wander around saying 'ug' without them, go ahead. 's a free country.
Hold on a second.
Unless you are arguing that the very presence of rich people causes others to be poor, then this argument becomes absurd. You tax rich people, and instead of paying they leave. How does this help anyone exactly?
If X has more, then Y must have less, unless X's surplus contributes to Y more than it takes away from Y.
This is just basic arithmetic, isn't it? For every extra (say) £1000 that X gets, he must increase the total wealth in society by more than £1000, or somebody else has less.
Proponents of capitalism often argue that this does, in fact, happen. `A rising tide lifts all boats' and all that. It's not clear that economics really works this way, particularly if a society is resource-constrained. And even if it does, it's difficult to ensure that the surplus generated by all the rich Xs doesn't just go to other rich Xs.
Posts: 2718 | From: East Dogpatch | Registered: Dec 2005
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
Hold on a second.
Unless you are arguing that the very presence of rich people causes others to be poor, then this argument becomes absurd.
On the contrary, I think that the presence of poor people helps others to be rich.
That is not, however, what I see as being damaging in the 'don't do anything nasty, or the rich will leave our shores' argument. What is pernicious about that argument is the suggestion that the overwhelming mass of humanity are so lacking in initiative that society would fail miserably, were it not for the improving effect of a few visionary, entrepenurial, spirits (who happen to be filthy rich.)
Incidentally, Richard Branson and Paul Daniels both threatened to leave Britain if Labour won in 1997. I, for one, am still waiting.
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Littlelady
Shipmate
# 9616
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
Incidentally, Richard Branson and Paul Daniels both threatened to leave Britain if Labour won in 1997. I, for one, am still waiting.
Well, it probably helped that New Labour maintained Tory fiscal policy for the first two years of its first term and subsequently hasn't raised the higher rate of tax to the levels reached in the 1970s, which is possibly what the likes of Branson was worried about with the return of a government claiming to be Labour.
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'When ideas fail, words come in very handy' ~ Goethe
Posts: 3737 | From: home of the best Rugby League team in the universe | Registered: Jun 2005
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Telepath
Ship's Steamer Trunk
# 3534
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Posted
quote:
This is just basic arithmetic, isn't it? For every extra (say) £1000 that X gets, he must increase the total wealth in society by more than £1000, or somebody else has less.
Definitions of wealth vary, and they often vary within the same text.
Henry George laid particular emphasis on the distribution of wealth, and the definition of terms. According to his definition, to qualify as wealth, an item must be a material object, produced by human labour for the satisfaction of human desires, and have an exchange value.
Which is why money isn't wealth: it doesn't directly satisfy human desires. It's only a paper claim on wealth, acting as a medium of exchange and a marker of value. As you point out, one person cannot gain £1000 without someone else's losing £1000. Promissory notes detailing the amount that some of the country's inhabitants owe to some other country's inhabitants have been shuffled around.
If all the money in the economy disappeared overnight, there would still be the same amount of wealth in the country, although the purchasing power of the individual buyer would have disappeared.
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Take emptiness and lying speech far from me, and do not give me poverty or wealth. Give me a living sufficient for me.
Posts: 3509 | From: East Anglia | Registered: Nov 2002
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
Henry George's view tends to go down well with the granola classes. On the other hand, if one - in a money-based economy - is hungry or in want of shelter, it doesn't help much to convince oneself that 'money isn't the same as wealth'. 'Let them eat cake'.
Money is not a physical product of labour, true. Money oughtn't to be the stuff of wealth, undoubtedly. But it is. In fact. Really. Such is capitalist society. And therein lies the difference between liberals and radicals. The former think that the world is basically OK, it simply requires that we look at it the right way (and perhaps do some tinkering around the edges). Us radicals, meanwhile, think that it requires serious change in order to be the kind of world where the liberals would be right.
The difference mirrors pretty exactly that between Pelagians and orthodox Christians.
[ 13. May 2007, 12:20: Message edited by: Divine Outlaw Dwarf ]
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Telepath
Ship's Steamer Trunk
# 3534
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Posted
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Henry George's view tends to go down well with the granola classes.
That doesn't make it untrue.
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
On the other hand, if one - in a money-based economy - is hungry or in want of shelter, it doesn't help much to convince oneself that 'money isn't the same as wealth'. 'Let them eat cake'.
Indeed, clear definitions of what wealth is and is not, will not solve the problem of my lacking it. But then neither will money, which is only valuable insofar as it can be exchanged for wealth (in the form of cake, granola, or shelter).
Obfuscating definitions of wealth also doesn't help to solve the problem of anybody's poverty. All it does is lead to confusion. If I assume that, because every time I gain £1000 someone else loses £1000, it therefore follows that every bite of cake (or granola) I eat correspondingly deprives someone else of a bite of cake, I might attempt to reduce world poverty by reducing my personal cake consumption, and urging others to do likewise. Or, preferably, feeling guilty about my cake consumption and urging others to do likewise. Patissiers may go out of business, but that's not my problem and anyway they deserve to.
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Take emptiness and lying speech far from me, and do not give me poverty or wealth. Give me a living sufficient for me.
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by CrookedCucumber:
If X has more, then Y must have less, unless X's surplus contributes to Y more than it takes away from Y.
But this is false
To illustrate with a simple economy
In one day, I make 5 wicker baskets, and you make 50
You become wealthy, I less so
You leave because of high taxes
I still have five baskets a day
How am I helped by your absence?
quote:
This is just basic arithmetic, isn't it? For every extra (say) £1000 that X gets, he must increase the total wealth in society by more than £1000, or somebody else has less.
Yes..but in trade that is the case
If I build a car and sell it I may be up several thousand dollars, but somebody else now has a car and there is now an extra car; I have added as much as I have taken. How does the removal of people who have sold a lot of cars help anyone?
quote:
Proponents of capitalism often argue that this does, in fact, happen. `A rising tide lifts all boats' and all that. It's not clear that economics really works this way, particularly if a society is resource-constrained. And even if it does, it's difficult to ensure that the surplus generated by all the rich Xs doesn't just go to other rich Xs.
The reference to resources is interesting
If I take a natural resource a sell access, then I’m selling something I am not making; so I’m not adding anything to the community, but I am getting wealthier. In other words, the wealth in that trade is moving in one direction only, rather than both directions as in the making and selling of cars
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
Well I don't know. Ideally, I would like socialist revolution to usher in a society where are relationships are not mediated by the money-form. In the meantime, however, money helps. It really does. In many situations it can make all the difference.
I'm reminded of Gordon Brown's rather odd comment that 'poverty cannot be solved by throwing money at it'. A statement most likely to appeal to those who are not themselves poor.
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
In one day, I make 5 wicker baskets, and you make 50
You become wealthy, I less so
You leave because of high taxes
I still have five baskets a day
How am I helped by your absence?
Thus bourgeois ideology's account of production. Here are some alternatives.
Liberal scenario*:
I make 5 wicker baskets using tools you give me, in conditions determined by you.
At the end of each day you give me the money-value of half a wicker basket and either re-invest or pocket the rest.
You leave because of high taxes.
I don't give a flying toss.
Someone else takes over your role. Same shit. Difference boss. Slightly better welfare state.
Socialist scenario:
We make wicker baskets etc.
We take the wicker basket factory away from you.
*Seen through Marxian eyes.
[ 13. May 2007, 12:53: Message edited by: Divine Outlaw Dwarf ]
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
Hold on a second.
Unless you are arguing that the very presence of rich people causes others to be poor, then this argument becomes absurd.
On the contrary, I think that the presence of poor people helps others to be rich.
Using this model the removing the rich is still of no use whatsoever to the poor.
quote:
That is not, however, what I see as being damaging in the 'don't do anything nasty, or the rich will leave our shores' argument. What is pernicious about that argument is the suggestion that the overwhelming mass of humanity are so lacking in initiative that society would fail miserably, were it not for the improving effect of a few visionary, entrepenurial, spirits (who happen to be filthy rich.)
I’m not even sure that’s of any interest. If you can’t show how effectively removing rich people helps the poor, then there is no reason to do it, is there?.
You tax the rich, the rich leave; who is helped by this?
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
Thus bourgeois ideology's account of production. Here are some alternatives.
Liberal scenario*:
I make 5 wicker baskets using tools you give me, in conditions determined by you.
At the end of each day you give me the money-value of half a wicker basket and either re-invest or pocket the rest.
That seems like a rough deal, what stops you from making the tools and cutting me out?
quote:
You leave because of high taxes.
I don't give a flying toss.
Someone else takes over your role. Same shit. Difference boss. Slightly better welfare state.
Somebody else makes the tools?
quote:
Socialist scenario:
We make wicker baskets etc.
We take the wicker basket factory away from you.
*Seen through Marxian eyes.
So the important difference here is that people don’t get paid for making factories?
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
Henry George's view tends to go down well with the granola classes. On the other hand, if one - in a money-based economy - is hungry or in want of shelter, it doesn't help much to convince oneself that 'money isn't the same as wealth'. 'Let them eat cake'.
Money is not a physical product of labour, true. Money oughtn't to be the stuff of wealth, undoubtedly. But it is. In fact. Really. Such is capitalist society. And therein lies the difference between liberals and radicals. The former think that the world is basically OK, it simply requires that we look at it the right way (and perhaps do some tinkering around the edges). Us radicals, meanwhile, think that it requires serious change in order to be the kind of world where the liberals would be right.
The difference mirrors pretty exactly that between Pelagians and orthodox Christians.
You can't abolish money, just as you can't abolish numbers. People count and money is counting
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
You can't abolish money, just as you can't abolish numbers. People count and money is counting
Spot the fallacious reasoning:
P1: Counting cannot be abolished.
P2: People count money.
C: Money cannot be abolished.
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
By Divine Outlaw Dwarf
either re-invest or POCKET the rest.
(my emphasis added)
No, he doesn't pocket it. He puts it in a bank to be used for loans or he spends it thus passing the money onto other companies and other people.
You aren't thinking further than the one factory and one factory owner. You need to think beyond that. Money doesn't stop moving ever. The only way it does is when somebody keeps it in a shoebox under the bed, which just doesn't happen anymore.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by deano:
Money doesn't stop moving ever.
Possibly not. That, incidentally, might be an argument against money. Money, as the circuit of capital goes on, however, does seem to move increasingly in the interests of some people rather than others. Some tend to eat caviar whilst others eat Asda Economy.
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
Well if the there was no money per se, and I had enough guns to protect the sturgeon fishing grounds I was on, I would want a lot of Asda Economy food to barter for a little of my caviar!
But that's not the point. The point is as long as the money is circulating it means that many others can accumulate it and bank or spend it and whilst they may not live on caviar, they should be able to afford a decent ciabatta from Waitrose.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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CrookedCucumber
Shipmate
# 10792
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
In one day, I make 5 wicker baskets, and you make 50
You become wealthy, I less so
I don't become wealthy. I merely become the owner of 50 wicker baskets. Moreover, I've probably had to pay somebody for the raw materials to make the wicker baskets, and the tools to make them with. So at this stage I'm actually running at a loss.
My wicker baskets only become wealth if I can exchange my wicker baskets for something that has value as a medium of exchange -- money, salt, bread, Levis, whatever it happens to be at the time.
But I'm a basket-maker, not an advertiser, or a distributor, or an accountant. Unless people are beating a path to my door to purchase my superior wicker baskets, I probably don't have any way to turn my wicker baskets into wealth.
In any event, the economic practices of a modern industrial society cannot be reduced to a comparison with trading wicker baskets.
Posts: 2718 | From: East Dogpatch | Registered: Dec 2005
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
You can't abolish money, just as you can't abolish numbers. People count and money is counting
Spot the fallacious reasoning:
P1: Counting cannot be abolished.
P2: People count money.
C: Money cannot be abolished.
You missed this bit
I wrote: "Money is counting"
I didn't conclude, particularily; i asserted that money is an example of counting and abolishing it would be like trying to abolish scores in sport.
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by CrookedCucumber:
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
In one day, I make 5 wicker baskets, and you make 50
You become wealthy, I less so
I don't become wealthy. I merely become the owner of 50 wicker baskets. Moreover, I've probably had to pay somebody for the raw materials to make the wicker baskets, and the tools to make them with. So at this stage I'm actually running at a loss.
No, you now have five baskets, where before you had zero. If you had to pay more than five baskets to get to that stage then you haven't been paying enough attention to your interests
quote:
My wicker baskets only become wealth if I can exchange my wicker baskets for something that has value as a medium of exchange -- money, salt, bread, Levis, whatever it happens to be at the time.
The baskets are wealth if you or someone else wants them. Considering you just built them, can we take for granted that you wanted them?
quote:
But I'm a basket-maker, not an advertiser, or a distributor, or an accountant. Unless people are beating a path to my door to purchase my superior wicker baskets, I probably don't have any way to turn my wicker baskets into wealth.
You don’t have to turn them into wealth, they are wealth, but you may wish to exchange them for other wealth and people may be able to make this more efficient for you and so they will, of course, want to be paid to do so. You could even decide to purchase the use of tools from people who make and / or sell the use of tools. You could purchase the use of a van to deliver them and a megaphone to tell people about them, and then you could hire people to make the tools or actually buy the tools or buy the van
Oh my good god! You are a CAPITALIST and all you ever did was make wicker baskets
In any event, the economic practices of a modern industrial society cannot be reduced to a comparison with trading wicker baskets. [/QB][/QUOTE]
Actually they can, because in essence all production is very simple -
Humans labour upon nature to arrange circumstances to fit human desires
You can start off with the simplest example –
A human labours upon nature to satisfy his own desires; I chop down a tree to make firewood
Then go up on step in sophistication (in terms of exchange) -
A human labours on nature to satisfy the desires of another who agrees to labour to satisfy his desires as an exchange; I make some firewood which I then exchange with another for potatoes
Then up one more level (in terms of exchange)-
I make firewood which I exchange with another for a medium of exchange which is then exchangeable easily for anything else I may want from anyone. This, of course, opens up possibility of systemising and simplifying the exchanges; rather than buying firewood off you, I can hire you to chop firewood on a continuous basis because I can give you money which you can then exchange for what you want. Employment, as such, must have been a little inconvenient under barter
It’s all the same; nothing essentially changes here, although techniques and exchanges become more efficient. Humans labour upon nature to fulfil desires
There is he issue of access to nature, though
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
I wrote: "Money is counting"
I didn't conclude, particularily; i asserted that money is an example of counting and abolishing it would be like trying to abolish scores in sport.
I'm not clear what you're suggesting. If you are claiming that 'money is counting' is a statement of identity (so that, for all x, if x is 'counting' then x is 'money', and x is money if and only if x is 'counting') then that's self-evidently wrong. If you are saying that money is an instance of counting, then that's undoubtedly correct, but to argue from this basis that money cannot be abolished without counting thereby being abolished is to commit precisely the fallacy I noted above.
The analogy with sport is interesting. As I see it the problem is that you see 'sport' as analogous to 'human social existence', whereas it may just be analogous to 'certain historically contingent forms of society'.
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insert amusing sig. here
Posts: 8705 | Registered: Jan 2002
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by deano:
they should be able to afford a decent ciabatta from Waitrose.
Dear God, you move in limited social circles. Then again, you appear to like Ayn Rand, Satan's favourite nihilist.
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insert amusing sig. here
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CrookedCucumber
Shipmate
# 10792
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Stars:
You don’t have to turn them into wealth, they are wealth, but you may wish to exchange them for other wealth and people may be able to make this more efficient for you and so they will, of course, want to be paid to do so.
If you define wealth as `stuff that is made' then of course there is an almost unlimited supply of wealth in the world. I can make sandcastles all day for the rest of my life and not run out of sand.
But, as you correctly point out, the baskets only become wealth if I am able to exchange them for something which has a greater value to me than the cost of materials and production.
But there is very rarely an unlimited supply of the raw materials needed to construct things of value. If I have the raw materials to make baskets, someone else has less. Even if I grow my own raw materials, I will be using land that then becomes unavailable to other people.
Your argument only holds for things that have high value once constructed, and are made from raw materials of which there is an unlimited supply. I doubt this is even true of baskets, and it's certainly not true of most of what people produce these days.
Posts: 2718 | From: East Dogpatch | Registered: Dec 2005
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
the inevitable loss to the country of most of the higher paid people, leaving it worse off by far
In my estimation that would be the same kind of 'loss' which is involved in the removal of a diseased appendix. Just so long as they don't even think about taking their loot with them.
It's not just their money that they'd take with them (and oh, yes, that would go with them. It's theirs, see). It's all the jobs they've created for the rest of us.
Richard Branson is a good case in point. OK, he's made himself very very rich, but on the way he's set up dozens of Virgin companies employing thousands of people. Those jobs simply wouldn't be there without him.
quote:
But, if you want to believe that your betters are such wonderful, innovative, entrepenurial people that the rest of us would just wander around saying 'ug' without them, go ahead. 's a free country.
I think there are plenty of people in this country that would be doing the 21st Century version of wandering round going "ug" if it weren't for the efforts of the few in providing them with jobs, and the Treasury with funds. You seem to have a far higher (and, I would say, naive) impression of the common man/woman. Good luck with that.
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
The analogy with sport is interesting. As I see it the problem is that you see 'sport' as analogous to 'human social existence', whereas it may just be analogous to 'certain historically contingent forms of society'.
My God, are you saying you actually want a society that's analagous to a sporting match where one doesn't keep score? But what then is the fucking point of playing in the first place???
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
Marvin - I don't see life as being a competition. I wouldn't see sport as an analogy for life at all. Besides anything else, no-one can agree on the scoring mechanism.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Stars
Shipmate
# 10804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
I'm not clear what you're suggesting. If you are claiming that 'money is counting' is a statement of identity (so that, for all x, if x is 'counting' then x is 'money', and x is money if and only if x is 'counting') then that's self-evidently wrong.
I cover this ambiguity in the last post; I wrote “that money is an example of counting”
Surely, my meaning is clear now, though there was admittedly a technical ambiguity at first
“Money is an example of counting” is pretty clear
quote:
If you are saying that money is an instance of counting, then that's undoubtedly correct,
but to argue from this basis that money cannot be abolished without counting thereby being abolished is to commit precisely the fallacy I noted above.
But I don’t argue that, I argue that because money is an example of counting it can no more be abolished than any other form of counting. Perhaps it would aid your understanding, of my point, if you attempted to provide other forms of counting that you think could be effectively abolished.
quote:
The analogy with sport is interesting. As I see it the problem is that you see 'sport' as analogous to 'human social existence', whereas it may just be analogous to 'certain historically contingent forms of society'.
In my opinion, this is not the problem and no I don’t see the entirety of human social existence as analogous to sport. I used the example of sport counting to illustrate to you how difficult and pointless it is to try to abolish a particular type of counting. People count and you can’t stop it happening, is my point.
Posts: 357 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2005
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by CrookedCucumber:
But there is very rarely an unlimited supply of the raw materials needed to construct things of value. If I have the raw materials to make baskets, someone else has less. Even if I grow my own raw materials, I will be using land that then becomes unavailable to other people.
Well then, clearly nobody should ever produce anything - even food - because by doing so they deprive others of the raw materials used.
Hell, maybe we should all stop breathing. After all, by doing so we're depriving others of access to the oxygen we just used...
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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CrookedCucumber
Shipmate
# 10792
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by CrookedCucumber:
But there is very rarely an unlimited supply of the raw materials needed to construct things of value. If I have the raw materials to make baskets, someone else has less. Even if I grow my own raw materials, I will be using land that then becomes unavailable to other people.
Well then, clearly nobody should ever produce anything - even food - because by doing so they deprive others of the raw materials used.
Hell, maybe we should all stop breathing. After all, by doing so we're depriving others of access to the oxygen we just used...
I never said we should not produce anything. I was responding to an assertion that `wealth' is something that can be produced without anyone else being deprived of anything. My contention is that there is a limited supply of `wealth' (if sensibly defined) and that, once that supply is used up, one person can only get more by depriving someone else.
If you raise an income from the production of food, then it seems self-evident to me that you are depriving somebody else of the opportunity to make that same income. There is only a limited amount of land to grow food, and only a limited demand for food. So the wealth-creating potential of food is limited.
I didn't think this was in any way controversial. In itself it isn't an argument for, or against, any policitical system. But if your political system relies on the existence of unlimited wealth-creating opportunities, it will fail, because there are not, in fact, unlimited wealth-creating opportunities.
Posts: 2718 | From: East Dogpatch | Registered: Dec 2005
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