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Thread: The problem of polemics

  1. #1
    Laetus
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    Discourse is important. It affects everything we do. I don't know how many of you have read orson Scott Card's "Ender's" series but for those of you that have, you must realize that the power of discourse shapes th world. Therefore it is detrimental that we discuss the current state of the world and what to do about it. But First we must consider what I call...the problem of polemics....


    We have a serious problem. A very serious problem and I have no idea what to do. We recognize the system is bad. We recognize that the system must normalize its participants to perpetuate itself. We know all this. But the people who know all this are either authors who have already been normalized by the state and perpetuate capitalism (which is an apparatus of disciplinary power) by selling their books, students that do very well in school which is the main institution of normalization, or crazy people that no one takes seriously because they are outside of the realist system. This is incredibly serious. How can we fight the oppression of the state when the people that are aware of it are deeply enmeshed in its framework already. It seems impossible. But there might be a way. Slavoj Zizek, unlike many authors who write on critical theory, believes that we can work inside the state. He believes that we can overthrow the realist system by working inside the realist system. We can do this by sticking the letter to the law and creating metaphoric condensations around policy options. That's all fine and good. But he also says that we have to sacrifice something for closing this gap for otherization. We must sacrifice the safety of ourselves. We must throw ourselves in the open, vulnerable to the super power as everyone else outside the superpower is vulnerable to it. Only by removing ourselves from this master (American exceptionalism as the one power) will we then realize that the master is superfluous. A lot of people ask me what kind of society we will have at that point but is it really so hard to imagine a world where one power does not control and oppress everything. Will this world be perfect? No, it can't be. We have to give up our dreams of perfection. There are too many local acts of power relations. At the end of the day we have to ask ourselves if we would risk our safety for the possibility of a better world. Whatever that world may be.

    The ones who are not beaten down on must beat themselves hardest and it is hardest for them to beat themselves for so long they had been the one with the closed fist.

    Now where does this fit in polemics? Well....if we don't take action, what is criticism but polemics?
    "A wise man's question contains half the answer" Samuel Ibn Gabriel

  2. #2

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    Next time, try it minus the jargon.

    All you're doing is rejecting the social contract. Well guess what? I disagree with rejecting capitalism out of hand as an "apparatus of disciplinary power" and I happen to like the social contract. We get a certain amount of safety in return for a certain amount of freedoms. I'll take a little bit of security and a lot of freedom over complete freedom and no security any day of the week. So take your Bakunin and stick it where the sun don't shine.

    Also, this is honestly anything but a "realist" state. Polemics are far less of a problem than the form they often take, sophistry. Our culture is smoke and mirrors, all rhetoric with a lot of emotional charge but very little substance. We barely even practice realpolitik anymore.

    However, the problem of the appeal of fascism and rhetoric are not a governmental problem, they're a human problem. This is not a new condition at all, and changing the government won't magically change the people that the government supposedly represents. Utopianism went out with the 19th century. Get with the program.
    "Jamf was only a fiction, to help him explain what he felt so terribly, so immediately in his genitals for those rockets each time exploding in the sky... to help him deny what the could not possibly admit: that he might be in love, in sexual love, with his, and his race's, death." - Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

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  3. #3
    Laetus
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    The problem with your reply is that you do not understand the way in which power relations can be fought. My goal is very far from utopian, and it is in fact this comment that perpetuates the state of loss we are currently in. All power relations are localized. We can fight them one of two ways. The foucauldian, which you can see I favor (check out the icon), which is total criticism of the state and the role of a specific intellectual to bring it down. And there is the zizekian, working through the state to create a metaphoric condensation around a particular crisis (i.e. we could stick the law to the latter with the crisis in Guatanomo bay thus naming America as the terrorist and bringing the war on terror to a logical conclusion, in effect destroying the main apparatus of bio power today.) I'll put Foucault and Zizek against your social contract any day. Also you fail to realize that the social contract relies on a benign state, not a state that has duped us into thinking its benign. We must start to reject the state as it is to overcome it's oppressive nature. You say this is utopian but what you fail to realize is that the state is simply the state of common conception that a collective body holds. By individually rejecting forms of abusive power we can change the collective conscious.

    As for the sacrificing of ourselves and hence polemics

    That is a simple question of deontology and consequentialism/ utiliatarianism. I simply can't believe in a world of docile bodies in which a humyns life has no value. Therefore throwing ourselves in the open is the only way to bring us down to the level of the other (also a Zizekian virtue)

    I respect your arguments and recognize you as an intelligent person, therefore I respectively disagree but thank you for commenting.
    "A wise man's question contains half the answer" Samuel Ibn Gabriel

  4. #4
    smack's Avatar Complaints Department
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    Read less. Live more. Post examples. This pure political philosophy obfuscates any sagacity you wish to impart, friend.

    Potentially interesting topic. Nice reply Rububula.

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  5. #5
    Laetus
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    Lol thanks for the advice but I'm good. As for pure philosophy obfuscating my sagacity, i stick with my notion of discourse as the most influential power we as individuals have.

    You want some examples? Sure....

    Lets talk about Metaphoric condensation

    In 1988 Slavoj Zizek participated on a committee to defend four journalists who were being tried at the time by the Yugoslav army. At first the committee was just supposed to make sure that the journalists humyn rights were upheld, but as the Afghanistan war acted as a proxy for two powers to debate, the committee became a major oppositional political force, challenging the entire legitimacy of the socialist regime. Their slogan “Justice for the four accused” became a demand to overthrow the oppressive state. This demand acted as a metaphoric condensation or a representation of a universal theme which could be “condensed” into a specific situation. While the communists tried to deprive the slogan of its universal connotation and reduce it to its literal meaning, this failed. The state could not attack the slogan in this manner because it would have to shed its guise of a benign power. This is effective. Either the state shows its true colors and we can realize its bio political strategies of control, which then allows us to modify its hold, or it fails to deprive our metaphor of its connotation, which then brings down the oppressive regime, the same thing that happened in Slovenia.

    There have been other examples of other applications of political action working in conjunction with critical theory. Anyone interested might want to check out some works by an author named Rorty.
    "A wise man's question contains half the answer" Samuel Ibn Gabriel

  6. #6

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    In 1988 you weren't even born yet. Quit with the pretentious vocabulary, no one's impressed. It's more than an issue of pretention, though. It's very easy to hide behind jargon. Sure "discourse" is a great power, but discourse doesn't mean using big words, it means socratic debate (sort of). If you can't carry an argument without the bull, you honestly can't argue it at all. It's easy to read something and parrot it on a forum, what's hard is composing your own arguments. If you don't believe that philosophy can be written naturalistically, just take a look a Kierkegaard.

    Your goal is far from utopian? You don't have a goal. You already said that you have a problem, but not a solution. You have a revolution (in a coffeehouse intellectual sense), but no program. Without a program you're doomed.

    See the big problem is that you reject the state out of hand, and classify anyone who disagrees with you as being "duped" by the system. Rejecting capitalism is also a mistake. I agree that it should be controlled to a degree to protect the greater good, but capitalism is a sytem very in tune with human (note the correct spelling... aren't you a precious little leftist :erm ) nature. Competition. Selfishness. These are values that are bred into us by millions of years of evolution. Capitalism comes naturally because self-interest is built in all the way back to the instinctive lizard brain at our core. Disagree all you want, but just look how communism turned out.

    Ultimately though, these are all minor issues. More importantly, I'm going to reject your model (rather, Foucault's model) of societies entirely. The state is much more than a common conception. You can't shrug off the state like you can an idea. We are members of society on a very fundamental level. We operate, often uncosciously, as constituent parts of a societal animal, much like cells in a complex organism.

    This is not to say we're necessarily tied umbilically to the government. We are members of societies, large and small, which compete in an evolutionary way. Out of this behavior arises the state. States themselves compete in this manner. You may advocate the overthrow of the state, but that doesn't negate the role you play in its functioning. Discourse itself is an evolutionary process. After all, if you want to get really platonic, there is no truth, only debate. Ideas compete and struggle with each other, and adapt to gain the upper hand. Note that the most flexible systems of politics and thought are ultimately the most successful.

    Of course, the idea of the state is itself out of date. Now it's systems of thought that compete, not states. Communism vs capitalism, during the cold war. Now we have east asian investment economy vs. american consumption economy. And the age old fundamentalism vs secular humanism.

    And what we have here in this country is a very flexible system. Our government changes every few years. It represents the interest of groups large and small, from states to congressional districts. Ideally it adapts to changing times by following the rule of the majority. As the country changes, so does the government.

    Practically, of course, the system is not perfect. The incumbency rate is far too high. The parties are useless. The judicial branch has too much power. We have cultural issues too, especially with the media. We need tighter monopoly law to protect the radio from clear channel and Rupert Murdoch. But honestly what we have here is a society that allows you to do pretty much whatever you want, and that's a thing worth preserving, no matter how much jargon you fling around.

    And finally, the most serious flaw in your argument is that you're posting on a computer game message board. This, combined with information from your profile, allows a few assumptions. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I doubt you'll need to.
    1)You are a teenager. A young one too, probably a sophomore. In other words, you know nothing. Teenagers are idiots, especially the ones who think they know things.
    2)You have read foucault, and you live in florida. You are very likely white.
    3)You're probably writing this on a home computer, and again you've read foucault. You are probably middle or upper middle class.

    So here's you: an upper middle class honkie sitting in front of the computer his parents paid for, spelling "human" with a y. You've never known a day of government oppression in your life. Anything you have to say about the oppressive regime is an abstraction borrowed from the writing of others. You only think the government is oppressive because that's what you've been told in books, but you don't actually have any life experience to back it up.

    Obviously this is all an assumption, and there's a small chance that I'm grossly mistaken. You could be a cambodian orphan with no legs, for all I know. But odds are you're a middle class white boy like most of the rest of us, and anything you have to say about oppression is a lot of bourgeois hot air.
    "Jamf was only a fiction, to help him explain what he felt so terribly, so immediately in his genitals for those rockets each time exploding in the sky... to help him deny what the could not possibly admit: that he might be in love, in sexual love, with his, and his race's, death." - Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

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  7. #7
    Big War Bird's Avatar Vicarius Provinciae
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    Hmm, looks like some one got hold of a philosophy textbook *wink*
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    Oh my rububula, you certainly told him. I love it.

    Don't worry rainman, in a couple years, you can get into these sorts of discussions with like minded people at whatever lib arts college you choose to attend. I'm sure you will be loved by all the professors.

  9. #9
    Laetus
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    Bravo
    Why even pretend that I’m not impressed by your post. I think you have a lot of good points which I may have to reconsider. After all, what is this discourse I’m blabbing about if I can’t use a vocabulary which most people can connect to. I apologize if I seemed on an ivory tower but you must understand that it isn’t intentional, however hard that may be to believe. When you read as much as I do, especially critical texts, certain words tend to creep into your vocabulary. Once again I hope I didn’t sound like to much of an arrogant prick.

    With saying that I would also like to express my extreme disappointment in some of the arguments you chose to pursue. Especially attacking my age, my class status, and my use of language. As for you assumptions, most of the things you said were listed on my profile. As for me being a suburban wealthy white boy, you are absolutely right. Something I have had to fight against all my life to be taken seriously. It is true that I am wealthier than most and it is true that I read critical texts. And yet you seem to think that I simply recite them without making new arguments. That I am simply a elitist idiot, who himself is engaging in polemics for some sort of intellectual cheap high. I want to assure you that that is not the case. Yes I am in high school and I participate as a debater. I debate around the nations many people who have said what you have written. Some cruder and many more respectively. The message was the same though.

    You have made my job easier to explain myself on this post. I am not privileged in that I am privileged. Discourse is my only means to speak out. Unfortunately I can not fight the good fight because of where I am right now. So I debate in a Socratic way if you wish, and try and figure out how I can be prepared as a possible future policy maker. I don’t know your age but you have probably passed the age in which this was a possibility for you. I, however, must discuss with people like you, how best to deal with the systems of our world. That is my purpose.

    As to my argument (which you have hinted is simply a summary of Foucault), I have a very well conceived program or idea. It is true that I have read Foucault but I have also read the authors that disagree with him. My arguments are my own. Whether or not they have been thought before is irrelevant. Whether I have studied them is irrelevant. I have chose them to represent my ideals.

    First. You talk about capitalism and how the idea of capitalism is an archetype (sorry big word there again, I just don’t know any other word) that is essentially beneficial to mankind. You back this up saying that the bad stuff of capitalism is a product of society and look how communism turned out. To answer that, it is impossible to imagine the capitalism free from these evils (selfishness and competition) because it doesn’t exist. You aren’t really advocating capitalism but rather the idea of a free society of meritocracy. It is kind of like Ayn Rand in her books. If we could just have capitalism without all of the evils of man, relying only on competence. This is exactly what I would like. I am only rejecting the evils of capitalism, and since there has never been a form of capitalism without these evils using the term as a whole is acceptable.

    You then talk about how you see the state as an organic entity, a direct product of people’s behaviors. You talk about how my rejection of the state is actually key to its functioning. You are right to a certain degree. Resistance has always been key to the stability as states (following the well known proverb, you can have your cake and eat it too) but this resistance never stepped over a certain line. There were always parts of the state we liked and therefore accepted. It is the most likable parts of the state one must reject the most. A total rejection of the state can lead to real change. You say that policies must be flexible and I agree with you. That is why I am not disregarding the entire idea off the state but simply stating that a more total “program” must be implemented for the proper checks and balances. We don’t have that right now as you point out. You mention there are problems to be fixed ( monopolies, the judicial branch) but these problems can not be fixed by the same political form that put them in place. While you advocate letting the age old process straighten itself out I say we as individuals need to take a more active role.

    Then you get to your wonderful monologue on my personal flaws. I really enjoyed this. Hell I laughed when I saw it. You were right, I’m privileged and I have never personally suffered direct oppression but that does not mean I am not aware. As I said, this whole topic was founded in the idea that I’m just a snot nosed punk. I can’t really do anything. I can at least discuss what should be done.

    Once again, though you continue your rudeness and frankness, I respect you as a thinking individual. I respect your right to argue and critique. In fact I implore you to continue doing it because it is the only way I can grow. And I do apologize if once again I used too much jargon. If your interested in original thoughts I have pertaining specifically of a program to lead to real social change you can mention it on your next post. I have a very large document in which I have compiled and written my ideas on what to do.

    I may be fifteen but I know what I am talking about and I would appreciate it if you would refrain from personal indicts and stick to the arguments. That is the only aspect I can mature through these posts.
    "A wise man's question contains half the answer" Samuel Ibn Gabriel

  10. #10
    Marshal Qin's Avatar Bow to ME!!!
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    So I debate in a Socratic way if you wish, and try and figure out how I can be prepared as a possible future policy maker. I don’t know your age but you have probably passed the age in which this was a possibility for you. I, however, must discuss with people like you, how best to deal with the systems of our world. That is my purpose.

    A total rejection of the state can lead to real change

    you intend to go into politics? and yet reject the state that the political system works in.

    I think we all have a plan for how we could run the world (there's even a thread here somewhere), but the only way you're going to get the chance is by working from within the system. Totally rejecting the system makes you a radical, and radicals just end up getting shot. The age of revolutions is over, unless you wish to completely destroy a country and put it back half a century. Social development must not include the complete destruction of whatever sytem was in place beforehand or you risk hurting those very people you wished to help far more than the evils of the current system are hurting them.

    If you say you (your parents) are not short on cash, then start travelling. Being idealistic is all well and good, but it sounds like you need a reality check.
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  11. #11
    Nihil's Avatar Annihilationist
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    Whew, welcome to TWC rainman. I think perhaps the phrasing of your posts might be what gets you shot to pieces. Try to sound a bit more humble and less like you think you have all the answers, and people might feel less obliged to take you down a peg. I'm a reasonably well-prerserved thirty years old and I come here knowing that I know a certain amount about x and y but nothing about z, whereas some other member might know everything about x but nothing about y, and a third member might know some completely different things about x and y than I do. The great thing about this place is that through the meeting of the minds you can sythesize your ideas with fresh input from others and you can often learn something new or encounter an argument you had never heard before. So post with an open mind if you don't want to be savaged.

    As for the content of your post, I'm all for destroying the state. If you need any help just let me know. And never mind that rububula, he's just a bit cranky.
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  12. #12

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    Anarcho-utopian ideals are common in all teenagers, it's part of one's development of self-identity and the release of the paternal/maternal bonds. No, i'm not attacking your age neither your social status
    What I believe is that no matter how people try to label capitalism in any way and shape as a proto-fascist structure it's plainly wrong. Capitalism expresses the will of the majority, hence being a pro-democracy ideology. Utopian ideals arise in every society which limits it's citizens to a set standard of behaviour. The problem is that the idea of morals/ethics and state is intertwined and wrongly so, but has been such because mankind itself has given states the power to dictate the moral standards by which one lives.
    Oh well, i'll let the heavyweights take the discussion forward...
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  13. #13
    Nihil's Avatar Annihilationist
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    Capitalism expresses the will of the majority, hence being a pro-democracy ideology.
    Does capitalism express the will of the majority? Or does it sap the will of the majority and leave them stupid and jaded? Hey, I'm just asking. I suppose we'll see how good capitalism is if/when the oil eventually runs out. Can a system that is founded on waste and overindulgence keep the populace tranquilized indefinitely? I'm not exactly a lefty and I'm not saying capitalism is doomed, but in it's present state it seems to me to be about supplying enough distraction to the masses to keep just enough of them docile. That way the ones who can't afford docility and have something to lose by trying to change things are in the minority. I am an idealist rather than a realist I admit it, but a system that is founded on having as much injustice as it can afford makes me reach for my molotov cocktail.

    Of course Rububula's argument that society is an evolving system is a convincing one. Looked at this way, necessity does indeed dictate that the people must suffer exactly as much as the dynamic equilibrium of the system demands, and no more, because of the very definition of dynamic equilibrium*. He's right I suppose but any chemical process can be affected by lighting a fire under it. The question is - do we have a bunsen burner?

    * I realise I'm mixing my biological and chemical metaphors here, but fu*k it.
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    Laetus
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    First off Nihil I want to thank you for the vote of confidence. As for me being humble, your probably right. I'll admit that I don't know everything. In fact it is one of the reasons I started to post on here (juan siblz told me about this place.) So I just want to make it known that I read and consider everything that is said and hope it is obvious in the maturing process that my posts serve as.

    Now...

    Marshall. I get what your saying. Total rejection in action is a risky business. That is why in my original posts I only advocated total rejection through discourse. As for action, I think your right. That is where my metaphoric condensation comes in. What is great about it is you get to change the system within by sticking the law to the letter. Once again check my previous post for historical examples. As for traveing the world, yeah I am going to the dominican republic to build houses this summer (or at least im trying to.) I mean it isn't much but it's something. But you have to understand, all this power that I say the state has effects us too, less directly but more dangerously in my opinion.

    Now to the capitalism debate

    I said it before so i don't want to be totally redundant. I think that Nihil presents the problem well. You have to understand that capitalism is not the will of the majorities. (Ok I am going to use a little bit of jargon but stick with me, I'll explain it.) It goes bacck to my first post. Capitalism is a set way in which we live, and because of gloabalization, how most of the world lives. It is even more dangerous today with global governance groups like the UN. Nihil iss right though. Capitalism normalizes (confines them to set practices) through certain institutions. This is why it has continued for so many years. Everyone who is recelling has already been normalized through the institutions (i.e. schools, hospitals, etc.)

    As for Nihil'ss chemistry lesson *tongue* I get what he is saying. He is right, we need a bunsen burner to equate the wolrd. That is what I was talking aabout in the beginning. We need some kind of theoretical beating to bring us down to the level of the people we beat on. That is, in a way, exactly what the terrorists of Al qaeda tried to do.

    Once again i appreciate the in put and the support and look forward to hearing our thoughts
    "A wise man's question contains half the answer" Samuel Ibn Gabriel

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    Nihil's Avatar Annihilationist
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    On further reflection, I must add something to what I said in my post above about "oil running out". Of course I think we can assume that such an end to prosperity is more likely to lead to a "new dark age" rather than any kind of age of enlightenment. The point I was trying to make was only that prosperity is a kind of illusion granted only to very few in a world where maintaining those few in the prosperity to which they are accustomed seems to be the only prerequisite to guarantee obedience.

    I would prefer if people were harder to satisfy and demanded more, but that's human nature. The harsh realities of life also dictate that if this prosperity which a small portion of the world enjoy was to end, all that would happen would be a return to cudgels and firing squads as instruments of authority, rather than sitcoms and designer luxuries. In other words, the parts of the world that live in privilege now would become just like everywhere else. But somebody would still be the boss.

    Bummer.
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  16. #16

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    Talking about oil running out...

    Dear Reader,

    Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon. This is not the wacky proclamation of a doomsday cult, apocalypse bible prophecy sect, or conspiracy theory society. Rather, it is the scientific conclusion of the best paid, most widely-respected geologists, physicists, and investment bankers in the world. These are rational, professional, conservative individuals who are absolutely terrified by a phenomenon known as global “Peak Oil.”

    "Are We 'Running Out'? I Thought
    There Was 40 Years of the Stuff Left"
    Oil will not just "run out" because all oil production follows a bell curve. This is true whether we're talking about an individual field, a country, or on the planet as a whole.

    Oil is increasingly plentiful on the upslope of the bell curve, increasingly scarce and expensive on the down slope. The peak of the curve coincides with the point at which the endowment of oil has been 50 percent depleted. Once the peak is passed, oil production begins to go down while cost begins to go up.

    In practical and considerably oversimplified terms, this means that if 2000 was the year of global Peak Oil, worldwide oil production in the year 2020 will be the same as it was in 1980. However, the world’s population in 2020 will be both much larger (approximately twice) and much more industrialized (oil-dependent) than it was in 1980. Consequently, worldwide demand for oil will outpace worldwide production of oil by a significant margin. As a result, the price will skyrocket, oil-dependant economies will crumble, and resource wars will explode.

    To continue reading, click here.


    It's a very interesting read...
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    Nihil's Avatar Annihilationist
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    There was an interesting thing about this in National Geographic a few months ago. There was a photo of a family sitting on their lawn surrounded by numerous ubiquitous articles which depend on oil. There was a lot of stuff.

    Of course now we are wondering off topic, into uncharted realms of unimagined possibilities...Moderator, save us!
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  18. #18

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    I don't know how many of you have read orson Scott Card's "Ender's" series
    Ohhh, you spoke the word "Ender" in my presence. You will wish you had never been born! For you will never stop hearing of it, views on the book and things within, my worship of the book and the series, my utter and complete obsession. . . oh, I pity you. Poor, innocent fool. :w00t

    I think I can probably claim #1 OSC Fanatic title on this board. Probably. Would someone care to challenge me? :grin Launchies! I own you in the standings!

    Sorry to go off topic there. :>< As to the topic, I agree there are problems with the system, but I&#39;m quite happy continuing to live in a capitalist society, for lack of a different system which is guaranteed to be better. So, call me selfish, but there it is.

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  19. #19
    Laetus
    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Florida
    Posts
    17

    Default

    Sorry Justinian
    In no way was I claiming to be the ultimate OSC fan. He&#39;s a great writer and I think perfect to supplement my point. As for the topic, we are kind of skewing from it. As for calling you selfish, its not necessary. I think you figured that bit for yourself.
    &quot;A wise man&#39;s question contains half the answer&quot; Samuel Ibn Gabriel

  20. #20

    Default

    Sorry about the personal attack. As Nihil pointed out, I can be pretty cranky. It&#39;s just that if there&#39;s one thing that gets under my skin it&#39;s ivory-tower leftists. It&#39;s the very idea of discourse, this empty platonic debate that goes nowhere. It&#39;s so tepid. Pure intellectual exercise. Middle and upper class impotence at its worst. So again, sorry about the personal attack.

    I&#39;ll also open myself up a little by adding that I&#39;m only a few years older than you. When I say "teenagers are idiots" I include myself. I&#39;ll be the first to admit I know absolutely nothing about the real world. We (us middle class honkies) spend our first 18 years living with our parents, going to school and waiting for real life to start. The shame is that 18 years is farted away waiting for what&#39;s coming next. When you&#39;re in middle school, they say you have to do well to get into a good high school. When you&#39;re in high school, you have to work hard to get into a good college. Everything is looking forward, nothing looks to the present. You blink your eyes and find that you&#39;re all grown up and you still know absolutely nothing.

    Now for the actual debate.

    You characterize selfishness and compeition as flaws that need to be worked out of humanity. I&#39;ll say pretty much the opposite. Self-interest and competition are integral parts of who we are. They help make us human. The thing is that self-interest is the foundation of competition, and competition is the force driving of change. Without competition we would never have come down out of the trees in the first place.

    Why do you think farming took such an immediate hold and changed the face of humanity thousands of years ago? It&#39;s because societies that embraced agriculture could build permanent settlements and have greater populations than the old nomadic societies, who couldn&#39;t keep up. Nomad culture has only survived in terrain that is either very friendly to that lifestyle (the asian steppes, for example) or very hostile to agriculture (the Arabian peninsula). And in the last century nomadic life ended in Arabia as oil drilling fills the function of farming. The problem is that when the oil runs out they&#39;ll be right back where they started. Keep an eye out for a complete collapse of government and modernization in the middle east, especially the Arabian peninsula.

    Capitalism, being competition in possibly its purest form, is very in tune with our natural self-interest. If there&#39;s anything that capitalism supports, it&#39;s change. Look at the difference in the rate of advance in culture, technology and ideas between the mercantilist middle ages and the modern age of capitalism. Once capitalism comes on the scene in the 18th century the whole world changes. Everything speeds up, and change becomes a thing which happens by the decade, not the century.

    You could point out the USSR as the prime example of a command economy adapting and competing effectively with a capitalist world. However, the USSR was forced to change through competition and interaction with the outside world. The drive was not internal. If left to their own devices, the USSR would remain the same indefinitely. The USA, however, is forced to change through the action of internal competition of ideas and structures and will evolve and adapt regardless of outside stimulus.

    Basically, without competition all you have is stagnation.

    That said, I&#39;m not arguing for a total free market. True capitalism has no concern for human welfare, only competitive success. In a civilized society this cannot be allowed to run rampant. Therefore I&#39;m very in favor of federal social programs, protection of the poor, a high rate of tax, market and industry regulation, anti-trust law, etc. Capitalism, if properly controlled, can be a very good thing for society.

    I have more to say, but I gotta get out of here, I&#39;m alreasy late for something. I&#39;ll just point out that if you want a fantastic attack on intellectual utopianism, read Notes from Underground by Dostoevsky. I&#39;m sure you&#39;ve read it, but if you haven&#39;t you should go pick it up now.
    "Jamf was only a fiction, to help him explain what he felt so terribly, so immediately in his genitals for those rockets each time exploding in the sky... to help him deny what the could not possibly admit: that he might be in love, in sexual love, with his, and his race's, death." - Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow

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