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Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Noam Chomsky at Dec 27, 2004

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Is it a claim, or a thesis that is put forth as a kind of null hypothesis -- something that it is morally right to accept unless there is evidence against it? I think the latter. Thus take a debate about slavery, or women's rights. If Jones claims that some people (say blacks) yearn to be slaves, and that women can only be satisfied when they follow orders and are beaten if they don't, and that we must grant blacks and women what they dearly want, then Jones has the responsibility to provide evidence. A pretty heavy responsibility in fact. If Smith says that no one yearns to be a slave, or to be beaten if they don't follow orders, we don't require that he provide evidence. That's a moral judgment, and I think a correct one. But that's weaker than the claim that humans yearn for freedom. And if someone asks for scientific proof, they simply don't understand the nature of science. You could have found the same in investigating slave societies: slaves who tell you how much more secure they are being ordered and beaten than in having to make their own choices. Or patriarchal societies; the same -- and it's still very much alive in this case. An important step in the struggle for freedom is simply "consciousness raising": helping people -- ourselves and others -- come to understand that they are oppressed, that their subordinate role is not a necessity of life. Nor is it a psychological necessity; rather, an abandonment of one's basic rights, including the right to realize one's full potential. People of course have the right to give up their basic rights, but if we care about them, we have a responsibility to help them understand what they are doing, and why. And it applies to ourselves too. Take, say, women's rights. If you had asked my grandmother whether she is oppressed, she probably wouldn't have understood what you are talking about; that's life. If you'd asked my mother, you'd have found that she resented it, but accepted it, as life. If you'd ask my daughters, they'd tell you to get lost. That reflects hard-won victories for freedom.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Znetblogs, Ethicenter at Mar 01, 2005 09:18 AM
It may be ironic to base social policy on the encouragement of diversity, and yet not to support individuals in their desire to choose a life of slavery (or dictatorship), but it is not inconsistent, because diversity is not served by such a choice. Think how much more ironic it would be to *grant* a person slavery on the basis that they must be allowed their right to choose freely. Both of these apparent paradoxes vanish once we look at the issue from the perspective of society and what is needed to preserve its continued health.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Znetblogs, Ethicenter at Mar 01, 2005 09:17 AM
Therefore, from the standpoint of any non-suicidal social policy, each person has a responsibility to contribute to the diversity of society by expressing that person's own unique identity and perspective. This means that the choice of slavery by an individual is contrary to the interests of society, and should not be tolerated, let alone encouraged or accomodated, by social institutions. Whether or not to tolerate slavery is a question of social policy, and social policy should always be based around the maintenance of a healthy society, rather than on the perceived wants or desires of any particular set of individuals. Some things that individuals may want for themselves are not consistent with a healthy society. Dictatorial power is one of these, and the complementary desire to be a slave is another. The desire to be a slave should be no more acceptable to a healthy society than the desire to be a dictator. (continued in next post)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Znetblogs, Ethicenter at Mar 01, 2005 09:15 AM
Responding directly to Chomsky's post: In the context of my own world-view, the fact that a person might want to be a slave is not sufficient justification for enslaving that person. Just as Being as a whole would become universal Nothingness if there were no diversity, a society (or eco-system, or any entity) would cease to exist if *it* had no diversity. For what defines a society is the principle of cooperation that unites its diverse parts, and without diversity there can be no such principled cooperation. Therefore, to whatever extent a society acts to diminish its own diversity, it is undermining the conditions for its own continued existence. Slavery, like any hierarchical system of control, projects the vision of a few upon the many, and hence results in a radical diminishment of diversity. (continued in next post)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Leask, Bernard at Feb 04, 2005 10:03 AM
I raise this point because discussion of the transformation of objective social structures so often dominates these types of debates. Yet so far as I understand them, both Chomsky and Marx look forward to an anarcho-communistic society that features as a dynamic prerequiste and accompaniment to just social instituions a qualitatively new human being with a more solidaritous and constructive set of desires. Did/do they not both foresee the creation of a new type of human being along with genuinely democratic communism social structures?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Leask, Bernard at Feb 04, 2005 09:49 AM
A quote from Chomsky pertaining to "domination." Note that although the potential for domination may be unavoidable, according to the radical classical liberal perspective illegitimate authority can be minimized in part because of heightened consciousness of illegitimate domination that takes forms such as solidarity, constant care and sympathetic attention: "Any time two people interact in any way, there are "potential infringements on liberty." That's inevitable. The classical liberal position was that we should seek to replace "social fetters" by "social bonds" (Humboldt). That seems to me the right goal. Does it guarantee that there will be no infringement on anyone's rights? Only constant care, attentiveness, sympathy and sometimes struggle can mitigate that -- mitigate, never eliminate, at least not in this world."

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Feb 02, 2005 06:06 AM
Bernardo Before I bother to enter into any sort of rational debate with you, it would be interesting to know whether you have noted the erroneous nature of your syllogism The argument: - Chomsky has no understanding of the American public - the 'sons and daughters', cops or FBI come from America - Therefore 'The American people are homicidal maniacs is just not worthwhile commenting upon. You half raise some questions, but unless you show a passing connection with sanity, I'll not waste the effort. Robert Allen - anything to add??????

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Antiamerican800, Bernardo at Feb 02, 2005 04:50 AM
Chomsky like most left/liberals really has no understanding of the American public, he has an ideal but it bears little resemblance to the reality. Where does he think the "sons & daughters" who committed sexual atrocities in the middle east (and apparently continue to do so) come from? Or the cops? Or the FBI? There might be a "tremendous amount to be hopeful about" in the genteel conversation at the Cambridge Forum, or the polite debate in the studios of "public" television but one does not gain an accurate picture of the American public from such rarefied regions. The American people are homicidal maniacs. But the American left/liberal can't admit that fundamental reality because then they destroy themselves. Also who are these mysterious "elites" that keep cropping up in Chomsky's writings? Does he think the advertising on the Superbowl for example are being sold to "elites"? These are the most expensive commercials being made.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 27, 2005 10:52 AM
Hi, Bruce33 It is indeed an open question. Creating Galt's Gulch on a wider scale might lead to some changes, but it's not a solution. I do find Rand's ideas more a response to those who see all corporations and profit seekers as evil, than a way of changing the system. I feel the danger humanity faces with the systems it creates is that at one time they serve a human purpose, but eventually they all come to serve another: ensuring the purpetuation of their own structure. Even the concept of a conservation economy, one which I have much sympathy with, would eventually fall into this category.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 24, 2005 18:51 PM
"Man is what he believes." - Anton Chekhov

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 24, 2005 08:09 AM
Hey bwong, good to read you again. I can use the word "capitalism" somewhat as a codeword for the private ownership of the means of production for profit, not human needs. I don't much get into the theory because I think that most of it is masturbatory pseudointellectualism. It's pretty clear, to me at least, that we don't need to "extricate ourslves from a system that demands perpetual growth" but rather to extricate a system that is geared to control human creativity, admittedly the most potent force on the planet, from human domination. Think about it: is human creativity creative or powerful enough to liberate itself from human domination? It's an open question that I only speculate about.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 05:22 AM
"Women conscious of their small breasts puff them up with silicon; men conscious about their small peni do something something; Shallow people conscious of their barren minds puff themselves up with hot air and big words. A shallow person who is so unoriginal that he cannot even invent his own big words puff up his ego with hot air and quotes from dead people",--me aka the third stoogie.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:51 AM
Our relationship with "the economy" is very much like the horse and the wagon. The economical system should be nothing but a tool. But the tool has rebelled and now become the master while many of us don't even notice! I agree with mbena this is a structual problem. We need to smomehow extricate ourslves from a system that demands perpetual growth

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:49 AM
The ancient Greeks would have found that a befitting punishment in Hade for the gluttonous. In order to feed the engine of "growth" greed and desires have to be artificially created even if they are absence. A simple example is that governments use fiscal and monetary policies to stimilate the economy when "consummer confidence" us low. When you think about it this is complete madness. If people don't want to consume we should be able to just take a break and say, go out to enjoy the sun.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:46 AM
The situation is like some guy telling you you can either keep on eating or starve to death and than seat you at a buffet table. You have to keep on gorging yourself. If you say, "you are full", you will be locked up in some dungeon where you will not be given any food, ever again.So what do you do to avoid eventual starvation? You keep on eating. When you're too full you go to the bathroom to puke and than return to have some more pancakes.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:44 AM
It is the peculiar nature of capitalism that it either expands or dies. When the economy ceases to "grow" we descend into depressions/recessions which carry massive social toll. This is crazy given that, at least in the developed world(even in many thirtd world countries) we have the material wealth and technological knowhow unthought of any time in history. There is no genuine "scarcity" that compels us go on this mad quest for more(the second axiom of eco101).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:42 AM
Economics101 starts with the axiom that human beings are intrinsically greedy and we always want more, more and more. The economic system is organised to deliver what we desire. The collorary is that the wastefulness of the economical system is a manifestation of "human nature". I think the truth is the other way around. It is not because of consummer appetitide and the "insatiable demand" of greedy individuals(all of us according to economics textbooks) that lead to the massive rape of the enviroment. It is because the economical system cannot survive without massive waste and consumption.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 24, 2005 04:40 AM
A Japanese literary critic in the early 20th centry made the follwoing observation. We usually describe the situation where a horse is yoked to a wagon by saying the horse is pulling the wagon.He said the truth was actually that the wagon was pushing the horse because, without the harness the horse could have none many other things other than slaving away. The current economical system is built on consumptions and waste. But the realationship between "the economy" and us is not quite the way economics textbooks describe.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 24, 2005 01:53 AM
I fully concur with your comments, Bruce33. The problem as I see it is that modern capitalism sees the the world as NC described - an 'infinite resource', not as I do, a fragile and finite ecosystem. I feel strongly the structures produced in the current system do not allow people to make the kinds of decisions regarding our society that we need to be making. Furthermore, the structures that the system does produce require that all decisions are made on the basis of increasing production, or output, relative to invested capital. The capitalist system has become more and more wasteful; always required to produce a greater and greater surplus. And the benefits of the surplus are never enjoyed. Instead they are reinvested and everybody has to work just as hard to produce an even greater surplus, next year.... and so on, and so on. People can post about how the economy needs to find a better balance between profits and people, but it will not make any difference if we do not alter rules of the game - change the design of the machine. That's why I'm in favour of a conservation economy. Your greatest fear, the 'murder-suicide of humanity', is also mine.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 23, 2005 23:55 PM
It's good to see that a thread begun with a discussion of freedom as a moral hypothesis still lives. It's distressing to see 7N still bloviating all over the page. Mbena, I don't know if you know NC's quote about how the people who own and run the world believe it's "an infinite resource and an infinite garbage can." As I mentioned weeks ago before I dispiritedly left this thread, "capitalism" really doesn't exist -- what we have is socialism for corporations and wealthy individuals and families and the struggle for survival for everyone else. The current globalization movement is political-economic domination being installed worldwide in the post-Cold War period. My fear is we'll all have to wait for the Great Depression II and the suicide of this system before we can hope for change (other than around the margins -- which is worth pursuing) because this system is too powerful. My greatest fear is that the next collapse may result in the murder-suicide of humanity.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 23, 2005 22:04 PM
What exactly are you trying to PROVE 7?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 23, 2005 07:42 AM
"Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity." - Nick Diamos "Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege." - Unknown "I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters." - Solomon Short

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 23, 2005 07:29 AM
Now is all you need is to have bwong weigh in and the "Three Stooges" will be live! "Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." - Martin Luther King Jr.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 23, 2005 06:16 AM
You are right, Mbena. I'm going to assume that the readers of this blog with whom I am concered- those who want to end injustice- now realize that 7 is a moron and deal only with intelligent people like you.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 22, 2005 21:44 PM
Robert Allen: Many many posts ago, you raised a syllogistic point about the nature of capitalism: 1.Workers have their time stolen by capitalists. 2. Theft is evil. 3. Thus, capitalist are evildoers. The ensuing debate was interesting. Sadly, it has become sidelined by the postings of one who cannot do other than interject with irrelevant aphorisms that show all and sundry that his miasmal mind is not merely twisted but actually sprained. It would be a pleasant diversion if we could continue the actual line of discussion, and allow 7Natures to intersperse an otherwise rational debate with mindless twaddle if s/he so desires. I agree with your original arguments, and wondered how a system like capitalism that demands ever-increasing production can last in a in a finite ecosystem like our planet? Any economic theory that is based on assuming perpetual expansion - and many are even if they don't recognize it - is surely fundamentally broken. Capitalism can kill and oppress, as everyone knows. Fascism is a capitalist system, for example. I would far rather see a conservation economy.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 22, 2005 21:12 PM
"When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bustling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity." - Dale Carnegie "Wisdom is what's left after we've run out of personal opinions." - Cullen Hightower "My momma always says 'stupid is as stupid does'" Forest Gump

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 22, 2005 20:50 PM
"Fear not those who argue but those who dodge." Marie Ebner von Eschenbach "Don't look for more honor than your learning merits." - Jewish Proverb "There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance." - Socrates "The recipe for perpetual ignorance is: be satisfied with your opinions and content with your knowledge." - Elbert Hubbard

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 22, 2005 20:32 PM
"The less their ability, the more their conceit." - Ahad HaAm "Teachers open the door. You enter by yourself." - Chinese Proverb "Ordinarily he was insane, but he had lucid moments when he was merely stupid." - Heinrich Heine "Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish." - Euripides

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 22, 2005 19:59 PM
"Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please." - Mark Twain "All things may corrupt when minds are prone to evil." - Ovid "The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it." - George Bernard Shaw "There are people who, instead of listening to what is being said to them, are already listening to what they are going to say themselves." - Albert Guinon

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 22, 2005 19:28 PM
"When defeat is inevitable, it is wisest to yield." - Quintilian "An intelligent person who has been defeated realizes as much and learns from his mistakes." - Robert Allen

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 22, 2005 19:24 PM
"Nothing is so good for an ignorant man as silence; and if he was sensible of this he would not be ignorant." - Saadi That's what I and others have been saying about you all along. Just because you quote these things does not mean that they do not apply to you. In fact, anyone who quotes as much as you must be incapable of thinking on his own.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 22, 2005 01:46 AM
" 'Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt." - Abraham Lincoln "Nothing is so good for an ignorant man as silence; and if he was sensible of this he would not be ignorant." - Saadi "Of those who say nothing, few are silent." - Thomas Neill "When defeat is inevitable, it is wisest to yield." - Quintilian

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 22, 2005 01:02 AM
"The character of a man is known from his conversations." Which is why you are inscrutable: nobody can talk to you.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 21, 2005 20:56 PM
"The character of a man is known from his conversations." - Menander

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 21, 2005 20:52 PM
"What a splendid head, yet no brain." - Aesop

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 21, 2005 20:44 PM
"One man that has a mind and knows it can always beat ten men who haven't and don't." George Bernard Shaw

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 21, 2005 07:59 AM
"There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe That's why you are an ASSHOLE, 7natures.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Vacuum, The at Jan 21, 2005 04:54 AM
Take, say, women's rights. If you had asked my grandmother whether she is oppressed, she probably wouldn't have understood what you are talking about; that's life. If you'd asked my mother, you'd have found that she resented it, but accepted it, as life. If you'd ask my daughters, they'd tell you to get lost. That reflects hard-won victories for freedom. Exactly! Owners of San Francisco Hotels are telling hotel workers to pay the health insurance costs: from paying $8 a month, workers will have to pay $250 odd dollars a month. The workers went on strike. Currently there is a "cooling off period", so there are no picket lines outside the hotels, and management and the unions are using this period to negotiate a deal. Hopefully the hotel workers will get a better deal than the grocery workers union did....

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 22:48 PM
"There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 20, 2005 22:47 PM
As I've said before, you are an ASSHOLE, 7Natures.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 22:26 PM
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell "I'm not sure I want popular opinion on my side -- I've noticed those with the most opinions often have the fewest facts." - Bethania McKenstry "Patterning your life around other's opinions is nothing more than slavery." Lawana Blackwell "Stupid is forever, ignorance can be fixed." Don Wood

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 20, 2005 22:05 PM
Mbena and bwong, Thank you for your concern. It's tiresome and I wouldn't call what I'm doing engaging him: he's incapable of reason. But I am concerned that someone we could win over to the side of justice would think that I gave up. Besides, it's not that hard to log on and toss another insult his way.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 21:47 PM
"Thank You Very Much." - Elvis Presley "The public is wonderfully tolerant. It forgives everything except genius." - Oscar Wilde

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 20, 2005 21:06 PM
.....And the winner of the 'Introduce an irrelevant chiasmatic quotation into a thread' award is .......7Natures. ....And the winner of the 'Introduce a spurious quotation by the daughter of an English Earl' award is .....7Natures. Any chance of an original acceptance speech?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 21:01 PM
Ditto !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! "I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it." - Edith Sitwell

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 20, 2005 20:56 PM
7Natures [Quote] I win!!!!!!!!! Win what, my dear - the 'Let's find the most obtuse Nietzche quotation of the day and paste it here' competition??? Fair enough, you can have the prize for that one. But as for the argument - Pleeeze! Mind you - nothing is impossible for someone impervious to reason, so keep on posting sunshine - it's obviously therapeutic for you.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 20:51 PM
"Never be haughty to the humble; never be humble to the haughty." - Jefferson Davis I win again !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 20, 2005 20:40 PM
bwong - One useful purpose is to exercise logotherapy and try to help 7Natures discover what he has so patently lost - a meaning in life. Confronting him may just help him choose values, not spurious aphorisms. Or perhaps not. Nietzche may be his hero, but 7Natures himself is no superman! He is no Prince Hamlet, nor even an attendant lord, yet it can be detected that he is: 'Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— Almost, at times, the Fool' Carry on Robert!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 20:27 PM
"It is nobler to declare oneself wrong than to insist on being right - especially when one is right." Friedrich Nietzsche I win!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 20, 2005 20:22 PM
"The measure of a master is his success in bringing all men around to his opinion twenty years later." - Ralph Waldo Emerson "So why don't you just shut up already? Because I'll tell you what, I'm going to continue calling you stupid- and worse- until you do." - Robert Allen "Now that's some funny shit there Hey!" - Larry the Cable Guy

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 20, 2005 06:24 AM
Hey Robert Allen, Unless you're a shrink I don't know what useful purpose you hope to achieve by trying to engage 7.It's obvious to anyone who reads this blog that the man needs pyschiatric help just like his hero Nietzche.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 20, 2005 06:14 AM
7: Do you really think that you are winning here? Or that anyone reading this blog thinks that you are winning? You are arguing with me, whether you realize it or not. That means that you must show that my claims are false, which you can't do just by quoting.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 23:44 PM
"Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago." - Bernard Berenson

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 23:41 PM
You first

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 19, 2005 23:39 PM
"One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say." - Will Durant So why don't you just shut up already? Because I'll tell you what, I'm going to continue calling you stupid- and worse- until you do.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 23:36 PM
"The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane." - Mark Twain

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 23:35 PM
"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye." - Miss Piggy

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 23:32 PM
"We can learn much from wise words, little from wisecracks, and less from wise guys." -William Arthur Ward

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 19, 2005 23:25 PM
There is a book called "how to impress people in cocktail party,--1000 famous quotes"(something like that).Boring people buy the book, memorize the verses and regurigitate them in social situations in the hope of sounding more profound and interesting. Well I can see at least one scattered brain actualy bought the book. But I doubt that he finally has a social life as a result. poor guy's $20 down the drain. Flush!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 20:36 PM
"One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say." - Will Durant

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 20:32 PM
"Stoop and you'll be stepped on; stand tall and you'll be shot at." - Carlos A. Urbizo

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 20:29 PM
"To be great is to be misunderstood." Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 19, 2005 20:07 PM
The person listing these quotes, who is afraid to reveal his identity, is dense, incredibly dense- to the point of being idiotic.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 19:55 PM
"You can observe a lot just by watching." Yogi Berra "We are alone, absolutely alone on this chance planet: and, amid all the forms of life that surround us, not one, excepting the dog, has made an alliance with us." Maurice Maeterlinck "A paranoid is someone who knows a little of what's going on." William S. Burroughs "There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty." John Adams

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 19, 2005 17:48 PM
You have lost the debate 7Natures; you have 2 intelligent interlocutors telling you the same thing: that you fail to engage the thinking of others, just list quotes. Yet you arrogantly persist in this manner. That is a sign of stupidity. And now you stoop to threatening your critics with bodily harm: "He who thinks by the inch and talks by the yard deserves to be kicked by the foot." That is beneath contempt.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 19, 2005 06:20 AM
"If we value the pursuit of knowledge, we must be free to follow wherever that search may lead us. The free mind is not a barking dog, to be tethered on a ten-foot chain." - Adlai E. Stevenson Jr. "AGITATOR, n. A statesman who shakes the fruit trees of his neighbors -- to dislodge the worms." - Ambrose Bierce "Human kind cannot bear much reality." - T. S. Eliot "He who thinks by the inch and talks by the yard deserves to be kicked by the foot." - Unknown

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 19, 2005 05:15 AM
7Natures, It would appear that you presume that you alone amongst us are capable of exhibiting higher levels of integrative complexity. I find that assumption both amusing and fallacious; at the highest level of integrative complexity, there is recognition of the trade-offs among perspectives and solutions - not the random posting of aphorisms. Even the most basic level involves both thinking and reasoning, skills in which you are so patently lacking. That to which you refer involves the processing of information, problem solving, and decision making. Have you demonstrated any of these capacities? I accept that complexity looks at the structure of one's thoughts, while ignoring the contents, but you ignore the context of the debate! I have been musing upon your cognitive style - and have yet to encounter it. I must concur with the comment made by Robert Allen - and add that you are greatly in need of an enema to rid you of those impacted quotations!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 19, 2005 05:05 AM
Calling an asshole an 'asshole' does not make someone a psychopath: another example of you asserting something with absolutely no proof of it. You can't argue; you just repeat the thoughts of others- and some lousy ones at that.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 17, 2005 19:20 PM
And you are a psychopath!!!!!!!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 17, 2005 19:03 PM
7Natures, Here's something that is not over your head: you are an asshole

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 16, 2005 01:46 AM
I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: 'O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it. Voltaire

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 16, 2005 00:14 AM
While I know this will be way over most of your heads, I nonetheless challange you to try and understand how I know most of you are mentally incapable of rational thought on complex issues. http://www.stanford.edu/group/diversity/coding.htm

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 13, 2005 21:11 PM
Thankyou so much 7Natures 'Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.' You've convinced me of the glaring truth of the latter. Just out of a vague interest, is there a reason for you posting a random assortment of quotations that I am entirely missing? I noticed some way back that one or two had a passing connection to freedom, although the context was sadly missing. Es ist nichts schrecklicher als eine thatige Unwissenheit. And you do seeem to be active!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 13, 2005 20:37 PM
DITTO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 13, 2005 05:14 AM
Mbena, And an "(intellectually) unarmed person" who tries to engage in a battle of wits is a fool.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 13, 2005 04:59 AM
I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed person.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 13, 2005 04:35 AM
Conscience is what separates men from dogs. All sociopaths lack even the juvenile development of a conscience. ADD - ADHD - Opositional Defiance Disorder - you name it. Discourse with sociopath makes as much sense as a stone biting a dog!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 13, 2005 02:33 AM
Mbena, My point exactly, minus the animus. But be wary of Maurice. He's got some charlatan in him as well. See if he can even define 'exist. guilt'. I for one have never felt a smidgen of guilt for just existing and very little for anything else I've done. As Nietzsche said, "pangs of conscience make as much sense as a dog biting a stone."

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 13, 2005 02:33 AM
Digressions, objections, delight in mockery, carefree mistrust are signs of health; everything unconditional belongs in pathology. - Friedrich Nietzsche Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he doesn't become a monster.- Friedrich Nietzsche A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely re-arranging their prejudices. - William James

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 13, 2005 01:00 AM
Wonderful aphorisms, 7natures. How to give the appearance of wisdom without any of that tedious thinking stuff

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 12, 2005 23:54 PM
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Albert Einstein You define the ignorant brute that rules the world!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 12, 2005 23:46 PM
Ok 7Natures, you brought it on yourself: take your Barletts and shove it up your ass. As bwong noted a while back, you are a noting but a regurgitator of other people's thoughts. You couldn't defend one of your quotes if your life depended on it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 12, 2005 22:55 PM
“Life is about survival. Survival is about cash flow.” That is were you are wrong. Cash is a means to an end not the end itself. You can't eat money, and money can be made valueless. Money is simply a contract, a transferable iou, it has no inherent value itself, only the value assigned by the ability to collect on it. There for money is always exchanged for goods through an implicit threat of force. It is the use of force behind the currency that is at the root of inequality with in currency-based systems. It is that force which makes survival possible with in capitalism. That is why the IWW dose not advocates for a “fair days wage for a fair days work,” but rather for the abolition of the wage slave system.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 12, 2005 22:27 PM
Life is about survival. Survival is about cash flow. Cash flow is about having the necessary financial resources to pay others when they need to be paid for things purchased so that we can go on surviving. WEALTH/GREED dictates/rules all Governments which inturn dictates to the ignorant/ non-wealthy who gets what's left and how they wiil spend society's financial resources. The History of the world and its' future can't change because of the corrupting nature of man's greed. If you want world peace then you will need to stop the corrupting nature of wealth/greed - which of course is impossible. Justice is all about money.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Naughtynurse, Mbena at Jan 12, 2005 21:01 PM
Maurice I find your comments on existential guilt interesting, but wonder how much freedom can be accepted if you believe that dasein is the whole of man's existence? Freedom means that we are responsible for our choices but using your philosophy even honest choices won't always be good ones. The chances are you will still feel guilty over failing to fulfill all the possibilities in your life. Look at what happened to Nietszche! It is difficult to look for greater freedoms if you are not free within your own mind, and the angst created within an individual surely means that freedom is a constant struggle; something people may wish to avoid. I find it difficult to adhere to a concept that has so many negative undertones, that emphasizes powerlessness and admits that it is very hard to find meaning and value in our lives.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 12, 2005 20:43 PM
7Natures (all of which are obscure), In the immortal words of Travis Bickle, you talking to me? If you are, that's right, you had better be ready to rumble. How many times do I have to say it, I refuse to treat the conflict between workers and capitalists as an academic matter. If you oppose me AND resort to ad hominen attacks ala realpc and (some people call me) Maurice, then I will fight back with all the rhetorical means at my disposal. But to answer your inane ?, I am the guy "who refuses ...."

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 12, 2005 19:56 PM
Let's Rumble - Plump your feathers - It's a cock fight. Great spirits have always encountered opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly. - Albert Einstein Which are you?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 12, 2005 01:07 AM
Maurice, Listen you asshole, need I remind you that you started it: "it seems to me that the individuals involved in these somewhat useless, mostly unrelated and irrelevant exchanges are making an uncritical, irrational and fairly wasteful use of their freedom and seem strongly commited to relieving their existential anxieties by attacking each other. Is there no better way to utilise one's freedom?" I gave you the chance to debate me- you wimped out. You have nothing of substance to add here with your psychobabble. I have asked you two simple questions; neither of which you have answered. You are simply afraid to debate me because you know that I will KICK YOUR ASS. I'm not here to show off my erudition; but to advance the cause of working people, ala my hero Prof. Chomsky. But while we are on the subject of credentials, who are you? My identity is easily discerned and I am willing to put my reputation on the line here, which is more than one can say for you. So don't threaten me, boy.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 11, 2005 22:10 PM
Maurice, Just what I thought, you are a pseudointellectual moron- you can't answer a simple question without getting into bullshit: existential guilt, if it exists, would not excuse theft. Would you excuse a mugger because of it? I will continue to insult you because I want to make sure impressionable minds don't buy any of your crap.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 11, 2005 04:14 AM
You mention positive freedom as being able to fulfil one's potential. Fair enough. But how can you even define "potential" in a "natural state" without any reference to society and structures? You may have the potential to be a great poet, but that is meaningless if you live in a "natural" cavemen community where everyone just roams around and says "ugh..ugh". I stand corrected if I misunderstood you. But it seems you made the point that the "negative freedom" we enjoy in civilization is purchased by giving up "positive freedom". It could be true in some instances, but more often "negative freedom" is the basis of any positive freedom. The two are not opposite to each other. I don't know what you can "do" with your "freedom" if all you do all day is running around scavanging for food and playing hide and seek with saber tooth tigers. It is true that I deliberately avoided "existential guilt" because to my untrained ear this is jus an instant of philobables(philosphical jargons which sound grand but actually devoid of meaning)It may mean something but you should explain it to the rest of us.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 11, 2005 04:11 AM
Maurice You illustrated the 'natural state" of freedom with the example of primitive humans being able to "roam around the planet" with no rules and restrictions. In case there is any ambiguity you described civilization as a self imposed "strait jacket". I don't think my rat analogy was inappropiate, unless of course, if you didn't mean what you said in the first place. This seems to be the case as your second message seems to contradict the first one by suggesting that it is neither possible nor desirable to be "freed" from all rules. If that is the case what do you really mean by the "natural" state of humans? How is it relevant if you accept the inevitability of civilization?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 10, 2005 23:37 PM
Maurice, Before I label you a pseudointellectual moron, I will give you a chance to answer my basic question. Is it evil for the owner of a business to force his/her workers to create wealth that they do not own? Do capitalists in exploiting their workers commit an injustice that should be outlawed?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 10, 2005 19:33 PM
At birth we all become slaves to our body and minds and souls. That slavery is imposed on us either through evolution or GOD. As a result we have a created or evolved nature which drives all of humanity. How we regulate that nature is driven by nurture and expierience. Freedom is a word used to describe something that is impossible to attain in our current form. Freedom - used historically as an ideal to enslave others to cultural laws and socially accepted beliefs. Freedom has always been increasingly impossible - especially with the burden of the exponential population explotion - half of all people who have ever lived are alive today.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 09, 2005 20:43 PM
I am afraid the notion of "natural freedom" is not a very useful one. The rat is "free" in its natural state. No restrictions, no rules. According to that definition of "freedom", the freest person in our structured society would be the homeless person. I am not sure if that is the kind of freedom one would strive for. Civilization comes with a price tag. While some degree of "natural freedom" is limited, our freedom is enhanced other areas. The primitive humans have little "feedom" from scarcity, harsh weather, diseases, the naural elements and predators(the saber tooth tiger, say), just to name a few "freedom" that we take for granted in an organized society. Mental illness is not less common in rual societies in underdeveloped countries which are "closer to nature". This is a myth, it is just less likely to be detected and people tend to attribute bizzare behaviour to demon possession and something like that(I know people who study this very question).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 07, 2005 23:46 PM
All of us who are concerned for peace and triumph of reason and justice must be keenly aware how small an influence reason and honest good will exert upon events in the political field. - Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 07, 2005 01:39 AM
nohope, I may be on a highhorse from time to time, but mostly I am not. :) I am having enough fun with the that angry little spammer(7 natures), I will be good and ignore him in the future.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 07, 2005 01:12 AM
7Natures : “Your incredible irrational ramblings are indicative of an uneducated H.S. dropout with a below avg.IQ - The common man.” bwong: “Sorry, obviously you have no experience in doing research in technical fields. I don't meant to be patronizing but this is clear.” I think it's time we all get off our high horses before we fall off, myself included.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 07, 2005 00:53 AM
bwrong - You have the right to be here - but Your incredible irrational ramblings are indicative of an uneducated H.S. dropout with a below avg.IQ - The common man. You simply are one of the masses that cannot process advanced rational thought. You will never be able to understand what some of us have learned. Get back in your truck and go make a delivery. You are a huge distraction from meaningful discourse.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 07, 2005 00:14 AM
"The track record and statistics is not good, that we can all agree to without any sterotype." I've had this discussion a lot and I do understand your arguments. I was simply suprised at the ready acceptance of a negative stereotype in the case of gun owners. All the issues you raise are valid, but the idea thatthe average gun owner is a right wing nutjob is not.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 22:34 PM
"A citizen with no ciminal record, history of mentall illness, or history of domestic violence, should be allowed to purchase a gun "nohope "Secondly - in America the #1 murder weapons is....the kitchen knife. A 2+" deep stab wound to the stomach is more likely to kill you than a shot from a small caliber pistol (in the stomach, not the head)." nohope I believe these should have been attributed to r4d20 and not me.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 22:24 PM
“Exactly. But that shouldn't prevent you from speaking out against them on other forums. I don't see why you have to treat the gun issue any differently.” I totally agree. But it seams to me that you are implying that my support of the rights of gun owners comes from some desire to build a relationship with the right instead of my own conclusions that gun control is counter productive and dose not meet the criteria that if an abridgment of liberty cant be defended then it should not be imposed. I find no causal relationship between gun ownership and antisocial activity, only a correlated relationship. r4d20 and I seem to share some similar views regarding Gun Control and America Culture. That dose not mean that r4d20 and I have to share a believe in the goodness of capitalism. Neither dose our disagreement on capitalism mean I must stand for Gun Control and believe American Culture is depraved simply because I have supported your position that capitalism is unjust and tyrannical. I feel no particular desire to conform to any set of ideas other than those that arise from a defense of liberty, fairness and reason.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 22:21 PM
"A citizen with no ciminal record, history of mentall illness, or history of domestic violence, should be allowed to purchase a gun "nohope What if a person becomes mentally ill or abusive AFTER he acquires the gun? Do you confiscate the gun as a result? How do you keep track? Recently, again in Toronto, a mentally ill man turned himself in to the police. He showed the cops a car full of guns. He confessed he was about to go on a shoot spree because "people are stupid"(watch out for 7 natures). He said he changed his mind when he encountered a cute little dog which played with him(apparantly the little dog really existed , not just in his mind) The cops said judging from the size of the arsenel it would have been a major blood bath if it weren't for the little dog. The guns apparantly are legally owned.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 22:04 PM
"Secondly - in America the #1 murder weapons is....the kitchen knife. A 2+" deep stab wound to the stomach is more likely to kill you than a shot from a small caliber pistol (in the stomach, not the head)." nohope Recently in Toronto a man shot his estranged wife in public (a food court to be precise)right in front of the cops. He then held another person hostage before he shot himself. The gun is legally owned. I don't that he would be able to pull that off with a kitchen knife.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:55 PM
"Your image of the "average" gun owner is no more accurate and no less offensive than any other stereotype about any other group. " I may be guilty of exploiting some stereotypes for the dramatic effect, but the argument does not rest on these rhetorical devices. The point is, gun has no place in the cities. If you want to practise in the shooting range, fine. Leave the gun in the club when you're done. We don't live in an ideal world. Fact is, many average, nice people cannot even use their cars or own their pets responsibly. A gun is a lethal weapon and it is insane to put it in the hands of folks who can't even put their rotweilers on a leash until some little kids are mauled. The track record and statistics is not good, that we can all agree to without any sterotype.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 21:54 PM
"Speaking of which a lot of women (in Canada also) are shot by estranged husbands and boyfriends using LEGALLY owned guns(these are not the type who have access to the black market). Surely without a gun he could have used a knife, but chances of succeed is much slimer." These kind of murders tend to be easy to see coming (a history of domestic violence will tend to be there). We could do a lot more to keep this from happening without banning guns. Secondly - in America the #1 murder weapons is....the kitchen knife. A 2+" deep stab wound to the stomach is more likely to kill you than a shot from a small caliber pistol (in the stomach, not the head). Bwong, if there is one thing that law abiding gun owners hate having to refute it's the actions of NON-law abiding gun owners. For every killer stalker in the world there are dozens of law abiding owners. Why should we relinguish our rights because other people can't be responsbile? A citizen with no ciminal record, history of mentall illness, or history of domestic violence, should be allowed to purchase a gun .

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:39 PM
"No absolutely not. But environmental issues don't necessarily need to involve these other issues. Fair trade doesn't necessarily need to involve these issues. The war in Iraq doesn't necessarily need to address these issues. You form partnerships with the right on the issues you have in common." nohope Exactly. But that shouldn't prevent you from speaking out against them on other forums. I don't see why you have to treat the gun issue any differently. Let's face it, on those issues where you share common ground with the right, they need you as much as you need them.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 21:38 PM
bwong, How many gun owners do you know personally? If the answer is anything less than 10 I would suggest admiting that your ideas are heavily influenced by TV and media, that you ARE being lied to, and that the stereotype of the tobacco-chewing, Bible Thumping, right wing NRA nut is a STEREOTYPE that describes the Average gun owner no better than the term "crackhead thief rapist" describes the average black man. Your image of the "average" gun owner is no more accurate and no less offensive than any other stereotype about any other group.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:33 PM
"We could provide state supported marriage and relationship counseling which dose not force partners to stay together in abusive relationships" Speaking of which a lot of women (in Canada also) are shot by estranged husbands and boyfriends using LEGALLY owned guns(these are not the type who have access to the black market). Surely without a gun he could have used a knife, but chances of succeed is much slimer.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 21:31 PM
“Then what do you propose? That the left should be quiet about wife beating, gay bashing and abortion because we shouldn't offend potential allies?” No absolutely not. But environmental issues don't necessarily need to involve these other issues. Fair trade doesn't necessarily need to involve these issues. The war in Iraq doesn't necessarily need to address these issues. You form partnerships with the right on the issues you have in common. This has a practical side in that once we have an issue in common we begin a process of befriending people we might otherwise not associate with. Once you do that you can use this new capital to civilly disagree on other issues of import which you are not directly involved in at present. Perhaps then the left could win some “hearts and minds” of its own.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 21:26 PM
“Accidental firearm discharges and crime of passion (e.g If I have a gun I may shoot 7 natures because I can't stand him anymore) account for the bulk of gun related deaths and injuries in America.” Well Michael Moore suggests in Bowling For Columbine that we could do this by addressing a culture of fear. We could also address inequality by providing Universal Single Payer Healthcare like you have in Canada. We could provide state supported marriage and relationship counseling which dose not force partners to stay together in abusive relationships. I believe the key is in addressing the cause. People will always find a means to kill one another, what needs to be addressed is the underlying reasons that humans make those choices.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:21 PM
"Consider these sites just for a moment and you will find many issues which concern both these “woman hating, gay bashing fundamentalist Christians,” as well as many on the left." nohope Then what do you propose? That the left should be quiet about wife beating, gay bashing and abortion because we shouldn't offend potentual allies?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 21:17 PM
“No? In many U.S cities any nut can just walk into your friend local gun store and load up on guns and amo without even a background check. Is that a fact or a stereotype?” Are you kidding me? A complete stereotype.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 21:15 PM
"Gun advocates of the second amendment variety are mostly right wing nuts." The squeeky wheel gets the grease. The nut jobs are not even close to a majority - they are simply the ones who scream the loudest. You are simply wrong on the facts on this one. Like I said - come down to the range and meet some REAL gun owners instead of basing your opinions on the bullcrap in "Bowling for Columbine".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:14 PM
Nohope you said gun does not kill people but people do. This is of course true but homicidal maniacs kill a lot more people with guns. You proposed to make gun owners responsible for crimes and injuries caused by their guns. But how do you know who the gun owners are when you don't even have a registry? Accidental firearm discharges and crime of passion (e.g If I have a gun I may shoot 7 natures because I can't stand him anymore) account for the bulk of gun related deaths and injuries in America. How would you prevent these by threatening to hold gun owners "responsible"?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 21:14 PM
“NRA types” You're talking about human being here, who confront and want to resolve real issues. Michael Moore is a lifetime member of the NRA dose he deserves to be grouped with Charlton Hesston? Where there is no will there is no way. The pragmatist works with people on issues they have in common. The Seattle anti WTO coalition included Pat Buchanan, environmental groups, Unions, Anarchists, Marxists, and many more. In my hometown it's conservative veterans who held demonstrations opposing the war in Iraq. Consider these sites just for a moment and you will find many issues which concern both these “woman hating, gay bashing fundamental Christians,” as well as many on the left. http://www.peroutka2004.com/ http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/ http://www.amconmag.com/

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 21:12 PM
"Come on Bwong. I talk about the right to own guns & gun owners and you immediately picture a guy with an AK in NYC. That is a charicature and a stereotype - NOT a reality. "r4d20 No? In many U.S cities any nut can just walk into your friend local gun store and load up on guns and amo without even a background check. Is that a fact or a stereotype?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 21:12 PM
"How do you build coalition with NRA types? You may as well trying to find a way to build a coalition with woman hating, gay bashing fundamental Christians." Come on. Not all members of the NRA are the stereotype you envision. Furthermore, not all gun owners are members of the NRA. If you could only see how insulting and misplaced that stereotype is. Come down to the DC area and come to the range with me. You will leave with your mind changed.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 20:59 PM
"While you trotted out the usual suspects which gun control advocates endorse, you failed to address the issue of coalition building with gun rights advocates."nohope How do you build coalition with NRA types? You may as well trying to find a way to build a coalition with woman hating, gay bashing fundamental Christians. Gun advocates of the second amendment variety are mostly right wing nuts. The gun is symbolic but it is not the only issue that prevent coalition with the left.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 19:12 PM
"If you want the right to rebel against oppressive government why not lobby for the right to insurrection? " I don't see how a society can grant the right to insurrection. Every two-bit thug would become a "revolutionary". I don't want a right to insurrection. Revolution is such a terrible thing that I ony want to do it as the last resort - when I am willing to risk death rather than continue to lie down. A "Right to Insurrection" would imply that rebellion is no big deal - that it's something to do if your bored on the weekend or if you don't like the latest vote by Congress.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 06, 2005 19:06 PM
"But what is the excuse for carrying semi automatic rifles in the city? Hunting rats? " Come on Bwong. I talk about the right to own guns & gun owners and you immediately picture a guy with an AK in NYC. That is a charicature and a stereotype - NOT a reality.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 17:49 PM
While you trotted out the usual suspects which gun control advocates endorse, you failed to address the issue of coalition building with gun rights advocates. Neither did you address the disparity between the extremely low number of gun related deaths in Canada which has a higher gun per capita ration than the US. I am not a gun owner myself. But I agree with the view that it's not guns that kill people it's people who do. Rather than limiting gun position that I believe is almost impossible, I would support laws that make gun owners liable for deaths and injuries that involve a gun in their position, along with the individual/s involved in the discharge of the firearm. Such laws would cause the right outcome, i.e. gun owners securing their firearms or if they can't relinquish possession until they are in a position to do so.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 07:51 AM
What the left should do is to make sure the government does not become a fascist dictatorship instead of waiting for a shoot out with "the pigs".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 06, 2005 07:45 AM
"And what dose the left have to gain from gun control other than a government, which even more out guns it's citizens, herding them and arresting them as if they were cattle when they dare to speak out against a government gone mad." With all the guns you guys probably shoot each other long before the government has a chance to herd you away. So far that seems to be what happens. The hunting and fishing(??, shooting fish in a bath tub?) community may need guns. But what is the excuse for carrying semi automatic rifles in the city? Hunting rats? I still don't get it. If you want the right to rebel against oppressive government why not lobby for the right to insurrection? That would be more direct than the right to own guns.If you rebel the punishment for sedition and treasion would likely be much more severe than owning illegal firearms.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 06:50 AM
That is what is at stake for the fishing and hunting community. But if the left doesn't champion their cause of the right to own a gun, then our voice of reason will fall on def ears blocked by the zealots who pray on their deepest fear “the government is going to take my gun away.” And what dose the left have to gain from gun control other than a government, which even more out guns it's citizens, herding them and arresting them as if they were cattle when they dare to speak out against a government gone mad.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 06, 2005 06:49 AM
For the environmental left I find gun control to be a rather stupid and divisive political issue. Are they so idiotic that they don't realize that it is hunters and fishers who are the biggest environmental activists out there? To drive these people into the hands of the environmentally apathetic right is beyond pointless. It's time the left stands up for guns and gun owners in the name of a citizen army and for the cause of environmental protection. Then the left can tell the gun owners what they need to hear, “if you don't save the last virgin forests, if you develop the wetlands, if you drive species into extinction, you may have seen you last spotted owl ever. You may never get a chance to set foot in a thousand year old forest again ever, you may never get to catch a north Atlantic salmon again ever.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 06, 2005 01:31 AM
r4d20 You are right on the money on GUN control. The government is after our guns because it has become increasingly corrupt, and it is just a question of time before the people revolt against the corruption. Corruption brought down the Soviet Union. Corruption will be the demise of the US.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 22:12 PM
"Being a Canadian I really don't get this gun crazy culture in the U.S.A." Don't believe everything you read. The number of gun CRAZY people is very small compared to the number of gun owners. Most of us are kind of sick of being seen as wannabe Rambos. "If you do rebel against the U.S government you don't stand a chance with only handguns and rifles." This is a common misconceptiopn. Obviously a few people pulling a Waco style siege are going to get stomped by the government. However, if the government ever alienates LARGE sectors of the country then the guns WILL be effective in helping to start a guerrilla war. Small arms and IEDs are all that are needed to get bigger arms - a you get heavier weapons by ambushing enemy forces & supply shipments. Sure, our government is fine now, but I can't be sure it will always be so.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 21:10 PM
Revolution is not only a right but a duty. Thomas Jefferson The only way we can stop the effects of greed on our world is to tax all world income from all sources above $250,000 at 100% - world wide. And I call that social justice. The only reason wealth is amassing at historically unheard proportion is because world governments alow it to ocurr. No one man will be able to buy the kind of corruption that rules the world - Bush's -Bin Laden - AIG - Enron - AON - Saudi Royal Family - WorldCom -ad infinitem. Greed will be gone and man will survive.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 20:30 PM
Labor Begets Capital - Abe Lincoln Capitalism steals the capitl of lobor - period. Having been to the US Supreme Court -pro se- I can tell you beyond a shodow of a doubt that you only have the Constitutional Rights that some legal bigots allow you to have. I watched the courts condone the distruction of almost all of mine and now deceased daughter. Rule of Law is one huge fraud perpetrated on the public by Judicial Criminals, who are paid to protect the property of the wealthy -few exceptions exist. If you think slavery does not exist in a capitalistic society because we can vote then you are an economic idiot. The civil war was not about slavery- it was about government preserving its' power.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 05, 2005 18:33 PM
"At the risk of being even more unpopular....this is exactly the reason I'm relatively (<-key word) pro-gun. Knowing that the people had the option of resorting to force would definitely make them think twice, and would assist the people if it ever came to an open power grab." r4d20 Being a Canadian I really don't get this gun crazy culture in the U.S.A. The second amendment right is a crock. If you rebel against your government it is by definition illegal anyway, regardless whether you own your gun legally. If you do rebel against the U.S government you don't stand a chance with only handguns and rifles. Using the NRA logic American citizens should be allowed to own grenades, explosives, anti -tank missles and thermo nuclear weapons. It is funny that with all this fear mongering about imminant terrorist attack, any freak can still walk into a local gun store and arms himself to the teeth.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 05, 2005 08:34 AM
"Go see "Supersize Me" and then tell me fast food businesses aren't partially responsible for the food they construct and sell." But no one tells you to eat at McDonald everyday like the guy in supersize me( especially after you have seen supersize me). I have no problem seeing McDonald's getting a good shake down. But the logic behind this is problematic. McDonald's sells a legal product, presummably adhearing to all regulations. If the argument is that Mcdonald is selling a harmful(poisonous) product then the government, which makes the regulations and permits the product to be sold in the first place, should be sued for negligence. But if the product only becomes harmful with excessive consunmption then I think the consummer should bear primary responsibility. What's next, suing TV manufactueres because your kid becomes an overweight couch potato? We cannot expect the government to be the baby sitter of the nation.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 05, 2005 08:09 AM
What do you mean by property? Should someone be given the right to own acres of rain forest as private property and do whatever he wishes with it? I would say no. on the other hand it would be rather absurd to say that you shouldn't be able to own your own computer or your underwear. I think the point is to exclude "the commons" from private ownership.What should be considered "common" have to be discussed on a case by case basis. I really don't think grand rhetorics like "property is robbery" is very helpful. Actually J.J.Rousseau said "Property is theft" way before Proudhon. Ultimately property is a legal fiction, there is no "intrinsic right" to property. "Right" is a fiction. This does not necessarily carry a negative connoation.Other cherished notions such as human right and freedom are also legal -social fictions. But they do tell a nice story.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 05, 2005 06:48 AM
“I undertake to discuss the vital principle of our government and our institutions, property: I am in my right. I may be mistaken in the conclusion which shall result from my investigations: I am in my right. I think best to place the last thought of my book first: still am I in my right.” “Such an author teaches that property is a civil right, born of occupation and sanctioned by law; another maintains that it is a natural right, originating in labor,--and both of these doctrines, totally opposed as they may seem, are encouraged and applauded. I contend that neither labor, nor occupation, nor law, can create property; that it is an effect without a cause: am I censurable?” http://dhm.best.vwh.net/archives/proudhon-property-is-theft.html

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 05, 2005 06:45 AM
How many here have read Proudhon's “What Is Property? An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government” “If I were asked to answer the following question: WHAT IS SLAVERY? and I should answer in one word, IT IS MURDER, my meaning would be understood at once. No extended argument would be required to show that the power to take from a man his thought, his will, his personality, is a power of life and death; and that to enslave a man is to kill him. Why, then, to this other question: WHAT IS PROPERTY! may I not likewise answer, IT IS ROBBERY, without the certainty of being misunderstood; the second proposition being no other than a transformation of the first?”

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 05:11 AM
r4d20, Go see "Supersize Me" and then tell me fast food businesses aren't partially responsible for the food they construct and sell. But basically, I believe that we should hold each other responsible through democratically-established laws and juries. Please note: these very institutions are under attack by "deregulators", who wish to create absolute and unchallengable freedom (thus domination) for corporations, and "tort reformers", who wish to strip citizen's of access to the courts for redress of grievances. This has happened in Texas. It was unbelievable to watch Texas citizens vote away fundamental constitutional rights under free market brainwashing. Simply stunning.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 05:04 AM
r4d20, If you like the idea of stripping corporations of the rights they've stolen that they now turn against us, then definitely go check out http://www.poclad.org/. They're the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy. They're a great outfit and the literature on this subject is the best I've seen.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 05:02 AM
"...but with full awareness that wealth is subordinate to global democracy and human freedom" That sounds reasonable, but the devil is in the details - and how far you go. If you mean you can't lie about the cancer causing effects of your products for years without paying for some of the damage then I am with you. If you mean that a company that sells fatty burgers and asks if you want to "super-size that" is liable for the fatness of their customers then I'd say you're going to far. What is the line as you see it?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 05:00 AM
r4d20, If you're a pro-gun liberal/progressive/whatever, go read Stan Goff's "Against Empire" on yesterday's ZNet Recent Articles. He suggests dumping the gun issue to stop alienating the middle class. All I want is commensurate gun responsibilities to go with the gun rights.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 04:57 AM
also Capitalist != Corporatist. A lot of people think that we could make the world better simply by repealing the decision to treat corporations as full people, with all the attendent consitutional rights. One can still believe in competition and private property without thinking that a faceless entity composed of hundreds of people (or more) should have the exact same consitutional rights etc. as a real human individual.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 04:54 AM
"....suspend that democracy and we would become a rather straightforward dictatorship?" At the risk of being even more unpopular....this is exactly the reason I'm relatively (<-key word) pro-gun. Knowing that the people had the option of resorting to force would definitely make them think twice, and would assist the people if it ever came to an open power grab.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 04:48 AM
Here's my idea of freedom -- it's the experience of only necessary consraints. "Necessary constraints" is the rub. Have the necessities of life and living is a necessary constraint. Two that I've identified are: indenpendence -- meaning an individual or group is not dominated by others; and autonomy -- meaning an individual or group not dominating others. These seem to be fairly common sensical because if you're dominated by or dominating others, something other than freedom is happening. Domination is the experience of unnecessary constraints.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 04:43 AM
7Natures, have you READ any history of the world lately? Have you noticed that the US doesn't practice chattel slavery anymore? That we have at least written and somewhat enforced civil rights laws? That unions were legalized? That women won the vote? I think you're just a little bit over the top, despair and defeatism-wise. Concensus is a very scary, apparently. I don't know why. Agreement is pretty pivotal to action. We have and can create and improve ways of encouraging and engaging dissent to concensus and agendas. It's good to have feedback loops. Further, it's necessary to be effective, as demonstrated by the Bush concensus, the Wall Street concensus, the RNC concensus, the fundamentalist Christian agenda, ad nauseum.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 04:36 AM
Domination is part of human nature, in particular male sexual competition. This must mean that we're condemned to act like animals, when it's pretty clear to me that we're one extraordinary animal. Guess what, cooperation and collaboration (modes of libertarian contributive justice) are also part of our mutable and potent nature, a stronger part I would argue. Look at what's happening with the tsunami disaster. The Bush Adminstration has been shamed into providing an escalating relief response to the effected nations and victims. Now, I have no faith the Bushites won't divert that money to their cronies somehow, but hey, they've been seriously globally embarrassed and it's forcing them to act.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 04:34 AM
Consensus is not a scary word- that is unless it is by the ignorant masses, which is the history of the world. If 100 wise men were going in the wrong direction would you get in line. The ignorant masses have in the past and will in the future - yet another fact of all of history, and all organized religions. If you want social change then you need to stop wealth from amassing in the institutions of history which have used the wealth to control the hearts and minds of the ignorant masses throughout history. That has never been accomplished and most likely never will. Absent devine intervention man can't change.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 04:21 AM
Here's my proposal for an acceptably moral and ethical capitalism (where I'm using the word capitalism with little structure). If humanity will FIRST do its CHORES (duty, responsibility, you know, all that stuff the right is known for) of taking care of the food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, education needs and provide opportunity for full participation of all of humanity democratically governing our little third rock from the sun, then beyond that the practice of private property accumulation may proceed, but with full awareness that wealth is subordinate to global democracy and human freedom. Wealth must fulfill certain constraints so that it won't begin to dominate society, as it now does. I'll say more about freedom later. Finally, give me a few of those conclusions that I haven't doubted, please.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 04:21 AM
Oops. I must have used a scary word -- concensus. Well then, welcome to Stalinist USA where a pretty solid social concensus exists regarding a whole raft of controversial ideas. E.g. voting (aka democracy) for changing power to some degree, rule of law and equality under the law, etc, the so-called free market... Nobody wants your private property!! I will repeat myself, humanity now exists in a period of post-scarcity. We have the knowledge, experience, resources, technology, ability to take care of all of humanity's NEEDS. Your WANTS are up to you.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 04:12 AM
Property is not freedom. But all know -wealth/ property is as close s it gets. Society/man only values property for that reason. Greed is the foundation of that value system. We are all slaves to our nature. Our nature dominates all that we do. Slaves to a body/mind/soul that grows and dies. True Freedom is not possible. Only in death may freedom potentially come into the realm of possibility, and that is only possible if GOD does in fact exist. Consensus is not freedom either. But mental servitude, an attempt at controlling others- the ideas of other similarly ignorant men. All social order has been about who gets the money period. No society has figured out how to stop the corruption of human greed. The first to do that will be the genius of all times. No man has yet to figure that out and that is because of the seven deadly natures of man. Man's nature is to destroy others and dominate them so that he can have more property/pseudofreedom for himself. Man cannot change his created/evolved nature. History stands as proof. So do all politicians of all of history.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 05, 2005 03:31 AM
Socialist revolutions require consensus, and therefore result in Stalinism. The private property we have worked for represents our freedom. You will have to kill us to get it, as communist revolutionaries have always done. You think just enough to question the unquestioned truths of your culture. But not enough to doubt the conclusions of other questioners.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 02:16 AM
Bruce33 Greed - the strongest most powerful nature of man is the root of all social trama throughout history. All men would sooner die than relinquish their property - unless of course the one taxing/taking/stealing it can kick their ass. Common sense is of no import when greed fules the soul of man. Justice/freedom do not exist for the stupid and the poor. Greed could care less. Greed manipulates the ignorant religious masses of history. The US stands as proof positive to that fact. Indoctrinated educated idiots governing/ teaching/ indoctrinating others to be just like them. The ignorance of one voter in a democracy impairs the security of all. John F. Kennedy The only thing worse than a liar is a hippocrite. All but a very few are both. As a nation we re-elected one of them. We will pay the price of his tax cuts for the wealthy. Life is about money/cash flow. The well of government is running dry.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Jplascyk, Baldrick at Jan 05, 2005 02:14 AM
The corporatists who have been posting in this thread serve a usefull function. We all know the stuff they write is silly crap. However, the ordinary overworked American can be blindsided by their tricks. At least if they come here(would this be in the realm of miracles?) there is hope that new neurons can be grown in the brain(neurological research shows that CNS regeneration does occur). The big question how do we get from point A to point B? Or to put it another way, how do we expand the cage. There are some things that must be taken into account. Let me explain. I wouldn't identify myself as a leftists/progressive. However I do agree with the lefts views on foreign policy and the economy. I beleive that most Americans, if they thought deeply about these two issues would adopt the lefts view on foriegn policy and the economy. On other issues, you can forget it. Therefor, the left should think about tactical coalition building...more later

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 02:09 AM
I'll add one more question: Who believes that, if organized opposition in the US ever got its hands on the democratic levers of power, the owners and managers would immediately suspend that democracy and we would become a rather straightforward dictatorship?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 05, 2005 01:34 AM
I am beginning to be distressed by the posts I'm reading in this thread. People who know about ZNet and who Chomsky is I thought should be able to at least begin to build some concensus on what the problems are that humanity faces and what the possible solutions should look like. With that said, I'd like to pose some questions for everyone's consideration: Who believes that the "private tyrannies" are so powerful domestically and globally that they're going to have to destroy themselves, ala the great depression, before there will be any hope of positive change? Who believes that mutual aid and struggle and agitate/educate/organize can make significant and sustainable change that makes the effort worthwhile? Who believes that Americans/Westerners will acquiesce if not actively participate in the domination and enslavement of the rest of humanity in order to maintain our "security" and standards of living? Who believes that we are all heading for the murder/suicide of our species and a lot of the rest of the planet and that therefore it's hopeless? Who believes that humanity has the capacity to save ourselves and the Earth and that it's not too late to try?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 05, 2005 00:34 AM
Ignorant fools are just that. Engaging an educated fool who is ignorant serves no purpose. Have no friends not equal to yourself. Confucius

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 00:33 AM
If "individualism" means only the right to "be yourself" by wearing your own clothes, listening to your own music, or indugling in other trivial behaviors, then it becomes meaningless. To be meaningful it must mean allowing people to follow their own desires in the bigger areas of life - in their choice of job, hobbies, lifestyle - and it MUST mean letting them make decisions which may upset, or even hurt (within limits), other people. I'm not going to defend the real injustice in the world as an inevitable result of individualism. I think we can eliminate sweatshops and other forms of real oppression while still allowing individuals to be themselves within acceptable limits. However, we can only do so by limiting their freedom by some amount, and the more we push it - the more we try to eliminate smaller and smaller levels of inequality - the more we will have to pay a price in freedom. Besides - don't you feel that if I can talk a guy into buying something he doesn't really need I should be able to? I mean, isn't there a certain level of consumer gullability that you just can't feel sorry for? Isn't it immoral to let a sucker keep his money? :)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 05, 2005 00:02 AM
bruce33, I am well versed in the meanings of 4-20 :).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 04, 2005 23:58 PM
bwong, Individualism means supporting the right of people to make their own decisions about their lives. This means allowing people to make decisions that seem mean or wrong to you. While it is possible to educate people to not made these choices, there is simply no way in reality that you can reach everybody - there WILL be some people who are either naturally "evil" or who learned evil through a f-ed up life and was not reached by your educational program before it was too late. The question society has to ask itself is "how far do we let them act out their bad intentions"? Individualism means giving people a wide latitiude to do what they want, even if what they want to do is be jerks. Obviously there are limits to this (even free socieities will have rules), but the more rules you have forcing people to behave in ANY way they would not voluntarily choose to, the less your society can say to value individualism.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:59 PM
Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty. Simone Weil,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 20:58 PM
Well if spamming and psychobabbles pass for wisdom no doubt 7 nature is the wisest man(woman?)on this blog(and probably in this world) "Regurgitating the words of authority is the hall mark of the unoriginal mind",--me.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:58 PM
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. John F. Kennedy, In a speech at the White House, 1962 If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. John F. Kennedy,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:56 PM
WE hold these truth's to be self evident......... All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. Arthur Schopenhauer

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:54 PM
Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched. Thomas Jefferson,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:53 PM
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers. Thomas Jefferson

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:53 PM
Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. Thomas Jefferson

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:52 PM
The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men. Plato The greatest penalty of evildoing - namely, to grow into the likeness of bad men. Plato,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:50 PM
Ignorance, the root and the stem of every evil. Plato

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:49 PM
He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, senseless brutality, deplorable patriotism, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be part of so base an action! It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder. Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:48 PM
My religion consists of a humble admiration of the unlimitable superior who reveals Himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:47 PM
The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge. Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:46 PM
All of us who are concerned for peace and triumph of reason and justice must be keenly aware how small an influence reason and honest good will exert upon events in the political field. Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:44 PM
Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking. Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:44 PM
I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. Albert Einstein

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:43 PM
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely re-arranging their prejudices. William James

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:42 PM
The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments. Friedrich Nietzsche,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:41 PM
The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. Friedrich Nietzsche,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:38 PM
The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad. Friedrich Nietzsche,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:18 PM
bwrong truly incapable of believing that you are ignorant. don't feel bad you are in good company on this blog. There are few wise people in the world. most are ignorant educated bigots who are so arrogant as to be incapable of understanding exactly how they are controlled by the constant brainwashing and indoctrination we allow others to preform. From our parents, to our rabbi's, to our teachers, to our media, to our bosses and so on all are selling ignorance because the wise know a fool when they see one. Incapable of honest thought - we accept the dogma of others and join ranks for self preservation. Fear rules man and that is learned from the ignorant Dogma of history.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 20:00 PM
Bruce33 "As a thoroughgoing constructionist with a 19-month old daughter, I'm actually watching her build her own mind and grow her own natural human language faculty before my very eyes and ears." There is nothing you will ever do as important as teaching your own. As a father of 3 summa's and phi's it was embarrasing to see them compete with children deprived of wise parenting. Children's brains are super computers. Garbage in garbage out. Watch the programming, she will be limited by your limits. They shine thru. Anyone who works for the government is a Nazi. You have job security - health care - and guaranteed retirement - paid for by the full faith and credit of the Fourth Reich as you watch you fellow citizens go without and have SocSec - Retirement - Health Care stolen from those who are not a NAZI.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Dammit, Dammit at Jan 04, 2005 13:51 PM
What's so bad about being a monkey? Imagine it. Sitting on a tree limb, a breeze passing by under your balls (maybe that's sexist, but monkeys don't care about that sort of thing). That's freedom. Nothing to do, nothing to think, nothing to expect. I'd like to regress and try evolving again. Surely what we've arrived at as a species is not the only possible iteration. This point in the human experience was not inevitable. It can't have been. We derived from chaos, and somewhere along the way someone fucked up and thought of the wrong elephant. Attack and dissect at will. I expect nothing less. We're all in the same cage.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Dammit, Dammit at Jan 04, 2005 13:49 PM
I skipped several pages (well, most of them, actually) to launch my modest brain rocket into this mysterious question of freedom. Personally, I believe the only true freedom is found in the midst of chaos. Not bedlam, mind you...but chaos. Randomness. The complete absence of any predictable element in the course of experience. (I'm not prepared to support this notion further, largely because I can't. I lack the powers of critical logic required to spell it out in coherent form) That's half my story. The other half is my conviction that the development of the abilty to reason, which as far as we know is exclusive to our species, was an evolutionary catastrophe from which we cannot escape. (don't think of an elephant. see what I mean? no escape) No doubt I'll be denounced for my lack of supporting academic theory and accused of suggesting we all return to the horrific primacy of the monkey. Maybe that is what I'm suggesting. Why not?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 10:29 AM
Chomsky himself, who has been invited to speak to the most advanced mathematicians on the planet without admittedly being much of a mathematician, has repeatedly said that all the real learning and discovery goes on in the labs and classrooms where the novices are asking questions that no one has ever thought of before.." How does that prove knowledge is not necessary?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 10:08 AM
"Where did Ramanujan come from? Or Einstein, sitting in the patent clerk's office..." No one knows where Ramanujan come from. That is a mystry, apparantly the goddess whisper something in his ear. There are a few genuis who would flourish no matter where you stick them. But I would not presume that is the general human condition.Chomsky himself would agree with that. If you think everyone is a Ramanujan in the making then the solution is easy. Get rid of all schools altogether. The conservatives who want to cut school budgets for inner cities would find your argument very appealing. Ramanujan is after all, illiterate, had not even grade 6 education, and dirt poor to boot. Yes, let's go to the ghettoes and tell all the kids to imitate Ramanujan. Bush would love your idea.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 09:57 AM
Oh, please, bwong! Do you know on who's blog you're posting? You're basically saying you have to already know it all to be able to learn anything! Where did Ramanujan come from? Or Einstein, sitting in the patent clerk's office. Or Chomsky himself, reinventing linguistics from the ground up from reading 300 year-old texts from Descartes and the Port Royal grammarians. Oh, and btw, Chomsky credits much of his ability from being in an experimental Deweyite school in his youth and didn't even discover that he was "smart" until he went to a conventional high school, which he detested. I'm sorry, but nohope's points are well-made if not well-taken. Chomsky himself, who has been invited to speak to the most advanced mathematicians on the planet without admittedly being much of a mathematician, has repeatedly said that all the real learning and discovery goes on in the labs and classrooms where the novices are asking questions that no one has ever thought of before. Oh, and I have done research (got my name in "Nature"), I have training in physics, electrical engineering, biomedical engineering with a degree in mathematics, so I think I know of whence I speak.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 09:47 AM
"But that's hardly the point. The point is that a desire to learn and the ability to navigate information and ask the right questions is enough. It's enough even if one has no teacher and only books, periodicals, the internet, hard research and access to experts .." Sorry, obviously you have no experience in doing research in technical fields. I don't meant to be patronizing but this is clear. How do you ask the right questions and navigate the maze of information without the knowledge? You may be able to do that for fluffy subjects like philosophy. But definitely not with anything that requires a lot of technical comeptence like mathematics or physics.I speak from experience.Without the knowledge you won't even recognize a questions if it is staring at you, let alone asking the right question. Let's leave it as that because I see no point in continuing on this issue.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 09:45 AM
bwong, Alfie tells that story in "Punished by Rewards" called "The Old Man's Plan". Please note that punishments and rewards are the flip sides of the same coin. First, withholding a punishment is often seen as a reward and withholding a reward is often experienced as a punishment. Further, both require an imbalance of power -- wait, that's right -- DOMINATION. Interestingly enough, these concepts tie deeply into notions of justice. Punishment is the basis of retributive justice. Rewards are the basis of distributive justice. Again, both require domination. I prefer contributive justice, the justice of forgiveness and redemption, which works just fine with people who are equal in value and don't dominate each other. Btw, I love Kohn's description of a reward: "control by seduction". Oooohh, it sends chills down my spine.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 09:38 AM
I find Richard Stallman's writing on external-intrinsic motivation interesting. Here is an example he gave. A man was being taunted by the children in his neighbourhood. Everytime he went out the children would scream at him and called him names. The man then devised a clever scheme to solve the problem. He told the children they would get 25 cents everytime they called him names. The children eagerly agreed.That went on for a couple of weeks and the kids were making quite a bit of money. Then one day the man told them he was broke and the deal was off. Sure enough, seeing that there is no reward, the kids stopped harassing him from then on. The moral is that extrinsic rewards actualy destroy intrinsic motivation. Richard stallman is the founder of the free software foundation.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 09:27 AM
“I said subject competence is essential, necessary for good teaching. But I never said that alone is sufficient.” But that's hardly the point. The point is that a desire to learn and the ability to navigate information and ask the right questions is enough. It's enough even if one has no teacher and only books, periodicals, the internet, hard research and access to experts who have no idea how to teach but who will let you hang out with them and ask questions and maybe help out on their research projects.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 09:27 AM
“I happen to think that specialization is inevitable in a complex society. The idea of cross training everyone to be jack of all trade is, I am sorry, a no brainer.” But that is not what we are talking about. What we are talking about is specialization in a few areas with a concentration in a few at different times. In one interpretation you would be learning all the time and switching your job complexes every five to ten years. A person working in a hospital instead of being a brain surgeon for fifty years might take a stint at nursing, hear surgery, or maybe rotate around as a member of surgical teams so that every one competent enough gets a crack at different jobs. A certain amount of time might be allocated to a job which requires not much extra training but which builds solidarity and good will in the hospital say emptying bedpans as someone had mentioned earlier. The fact is no matter how much we specialize; humans have a need to do more than simply one thing. Balanced work complexes is a rational means of addressing this human reality while at the same time creating a real benefit through addressing the roots of certain forms of inequality.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 09:26 AM
"This is a parody of Albert's position. Sure, be a specialist, specialize all you want, but carry out your own garbage and clean your own toilet." I have no problem with taking out your own trash. But that is not the argument. If you scroll back and read what was actually said, nohope seems to think there should be no specialization so that a mechnaic can do the accountant's job and vice versa(cross training).That is when he brought up parecon, not me. I am not the one who parody Albert. My apologies if I misunderstood nohope. As for the organization of the classroom. Well, learning shouldn't even take place in a classroom if we leave aside feasibility.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 09:23 AM
Just out of curiosity, are any women posting to this thread? Or is just a bunch of nerdy guys? One other question: r4d20, I note the "4" and "20" in your handle. I don't know if you know what "4-20" means in police lingo, but I was just wondering if that was where it came from.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 09:19 AM
nohope, YEE-HAW! Barbecued mouse meat! Another Kohnhead! The two most important and meaningful books of Alfie's that I've read are "No Contest: The Case Against Competition", which makes hamburger meat out of America's sacred cow, and "Punished by Rewards" which expands and generalizes the ideas in "No Contest". I got to meet Alfie in San Antonio two years ago. He's pretty acerbic but a nice guy. The most powerful idea in "Punished by Rewards" is the rigorously reproduced result from social and educational psychology (and I speak as a trenchant critic of our "soft" sciences) that the use of extrinsic motivators like punishments and rewards to motivate human behavior tends to undermine the intrinsic motivation to do that behavior. Mark Lepper called this the "overjustification effect", a horrible moniker. I call it "motivational dissonance", which captures the antagonist relationship between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation pretty well, IMHO. Further, I take the existence of motivational dissonance as evidence of a human instinct for freedom, something Chomsky and other libertarian socialists have been praying for for centuries.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 09:11 AM
bwong, "I happen to think that specialization is inevitable in a complex society. The idea of cross training everyone to be jack of all trade is, I am sorry, a no brainer." This is a parody of Albert's position. Sure, be a specialist, specialize all you want, but carry out your own garbage and clean your own toilet. With regards to have the answers, I think we all know what the answer is: more democracy. I think that some of us just don't really believe that this answer will work, especially given the frail, moribund examples of democracy that we've been exposed to or participated in. And again, the reason I keep returning to domination as a topic of discussion and debate is because it is my diagnosis of THE PROBLEM we've all been talking about. The teacher-centered "sage on the stage" classroom teaches obedience to domination and has the added advantage to the status quo of crushing children's intrinsic motivation to learn, discover and invent. The child and society-centered classroom with the teacher as "the guide on the side" teaches freedom, cooperation and can help create the optimal conditions for a human being intrinsic motivation to flourish.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 09:04 AM
“Btw, Alfie has a new book out in March, "UNCONDITIONAL PARENTING: Moving from Rewards and Punishment to Love and Reason".” I just realized that this book is coming out and I'm totally fucking excited. Not that I have children. I'm not really into procreating. The first book I read a few years ago was The Schools Our Children Deserve and since then I've been going through his older books. I was a manager for a time at Time-Life and I found the environment toxic and irrational, and was so excited by the little I read in The Schools about management studies and the inverse connection between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation etc. It blew my mind….. I wish he would come out with a book on cooperative management and business structures. Maybe that is next after the family book. I hope…. But all of it is important it's so interrelated.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 09:02 AM
Bruce, I don't have the answers. But not knowing the answer doesn't mean that you accpet all "answer" as long as they sound good.I amy not know what is inside a quark, but I still am going to laugh at you if you tell me geni live there. I happen to think that specialization is inevitable in a complex society. The idea of cross training everyone to be jack of all trade is, I am sorry, a no brainer. As for how to avoid being destroyed by predatory capitalism, I don't think anyone has the answer. Perhaps you have a better chance to survive if you do things in small scale, by stealth and don't attract too much attentions. I don't know.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:59 AM
nohope, I was also a black cat in the IWW, at least until I became a piecard in my own union. What I mean by compulsory democracy is what I've been harping on since I started posting on this thread -- it's the only alternative to domination. Ol' Noam himself, in fact, mentioned that in the thirties people used to use the words "democracy" and "socialism" almost interchangeably. This synonomity expressed what people then knew, but what we've forgotten, and that is direct action, revolutionary vision and international solidarity are going to have to address those humans amongst us who'll want to carve out their separate peace (piece?) with the bosses for favoritism. Majority direction, minority protection, but only democracy is allowed to be played. Robert's rules of order is based on two similar principals: No majority should be obstructed by a minority from carrying out the legitimate activities of an organization; and No minority should be obstructed by a majority from struggling to become a majority.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:51 AM
bwong, I apologize for my presumptiousness. I must of missed your post where you offered your own well thoughtout economic alternative with a demonstrated ability to avoid be destroyed by predatory institutions that have wrecked every libertarian socialist effort from the anarchosyndicalist factories in the Spanish Civil War to the Jewish kibbutzes (sic?) in pre-1948 Israel.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 08:51 AM
To be Parecon needs a lot of work. But that's what's exciting about it. Balanced work complexes is simply one of the ideas I think makes total sense. There is a lot about it that I also don't like. One thing is for sure it finally allows us to put Marx to bed. I think to long Marx has been allowed to dominate the discourse of social reform at the expense of competing ideas. Parecon is just one, hopefully of many more to come. I'm a member of the IWW and I definitely have a different view about compulsorily democracy or compulsorily anything for that matter. To me the legalistic and compulsorily aspects of Unions have done Unions a great disservice. I believe Unions must, get back to there roots of direct action, revolutionary vision, international solidarity. I encourage anyone who is not a member of the IWW to join. http://www.iww.org

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:50 AM
"But as I see it there are many people who are vastly knowledgeable and masters of their field who have no idea how to impart that knowledge to another human being. They simply don't know how to connect what they know and their passion for it to the passion of a student who may be totally uninterested in the subject matter." nohope But you are using a strawman argument here. I said subject competence is essential, necessary for good teaching. But I never said that alone is sufficient.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:47 AM
oops, that should be "I'm NOT completely sold on parecon..." nohope, It's great to see you back and to read the beautiful ideas I first encountered from Alfie Kohn but also know from John Dewey, Bertrand Russell, Ted Sizer, Deborah Meier and Chomsky himself. As a thoroughgoing constructionist with a 19-month old daughter, I'm actually watching her build her own mind and grow her own natural human language faculty before my very eyes and ears. The proof is in the child rearing. Btw, Alfie has a new book out in March, "UNCONDITIONAL PARENTING: Moving from Rewards and Punishment to Love and Reason". Just in time for my girl!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:46 AM
bruce, When did I say the current system is working? Are you a bit presumptious? But you have to look at workable alternatives and take small steps. Look, the onus is on Albert to show that his scheme has a chance to succeed. Everyone can dream big. Like I said, he never really answered any question raised by Monbiot(who is in no way an apologist for the current system)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:43 AM
"However, a teacher who can connect the subject matter to the students current interests and can instill an intrinsic interest in the subject matter will not need to do more than steer the way, because instilling a desire for knowledge is all that is really required to educate a person." Only a knowledgible teacher is able to suggest a different angle to look at the same problem or point out connections between apparantly unrelated questions.Moreover with so much information avaliable on any subject you need a knowledigible teacher to narrow the scope. Interest is important, but that's not all. I may be very interested in string theory but I still need guidance if I want to learn more than say, just reading a text book. Studying under a master makes a difference.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:35 AM
bwong, As a realist, are you implying that our current economic system is working? I'm completely sold on parecon but it's a sight better than our current system, which I see as a con game domestically and a protection racket internationally. That really real.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 08:33 AM
However, a teacher who can connect the subject matter to the students current interests and can instill an intrinsic interest in the subject matter will not need to do more than steer the way, because instilling a desire for knowledge is all that is really required to educate a person. That is truer today than ever before because we live in such an information rich society. The most important skill that can be taught today is simply how to navigate and vet this ocean of information. That to me is not a matter of the blind leading the blind, but rather a matter of the skilled researcher leading the novice.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 08:32 AM
nohope I don't how this back up yout thesis that subject competence is irrelevant to good teaching. Encoutaging the students to explore doesn't mean the blind leading the blind.” But I did not say competency is irrelevant, what I said is competency in a given subject matter is irrelevant. However competency in guiding the development of critical thinking skills is highly relevant. I'm not saying that being versed in the subject matter you are teaching can't be helpful. But as I see it there are many people who are vastly knowledgeable and masters of their field who have no idea how to impart that knowledge to another human being. They simply don't know how to connect what they know and their passion for it to the passion of a student who may be totally uninterested in the subject matter.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:31 AM
Silent B, I understand why you don't like paying dues to your union. The reason why you do pay them is so you have a contract and are not an at-will employee. Also, you receive benefits from union activity that you shouldn't receive for free. Unions are democracies and IMO democracy must be compulsory because the alternative is tyranny. Like I said, I'm in Texas. All of my members are at-will employees (meaning they can be fired for any legal reason, or no reason, without notice) because Texas has outlawed collective bargaining for public employees. My union is also crippled by the so-called "right to work" law (an Orwellian term of propaganda if ever there was one). What rtw law does is destroy workplace democracy, or rather make it impossible in the first place. You can't have an "opt-in" democracy. Everybody's in it or it's not a democracy. Anyway, in a rtw state, this means that employees can receive the benefits of union struggle without paying dues, or their "fair share". This may seem like a great thing until you see upclose and personal the outrageous abuses that bosses inflict on employees who have no effective representation to protect them.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:27 AM
Sorry, nohope. I think parecon is pie in the sky. See the debate between Michael Albert and George Monbiot on znet.I don't think Albert addressed any issue raised by Monbiot other repeating the same slogans. I am a realist.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:26 AM
I'm a member and officer of a large local public education union in Texas. We are part of the largest union in the US, the NEA. We're also part of another large union, the AFT, which is affiliated with the AFL-CIO. These in turn are part of EI, Education International, a global organization. We operate democratically from the bottom to the top, with different styles and different degrees of effectiveness. We also catch our own corruption and deal with it before it harms 10s of thousands of people by destroying their jobs, pensions, environment, etc.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 04, 2005 08:24 AM
Silent B is assuming that in an authentic, deep democracy that we'd even have a huge, totalitarian and criminal organization like GE. No kidding, check out the book "Eat the Rich" which has GE's felony rap sheet. It's as long as my arm (and I have long arms). But let's assume we have large, global institutions like GE, but democratic. Would only the whole company borrow money? Or would a local subset make a local decision to borrow democratically? The way things are now is certainly not the way things have to be in a possible better future.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 08:18 AM
“It would be absurd to tell the accountant to fix cars and let the mechanic take careof the book.” I am a tentative supporter of Parecon. One point that can't be over looked is that accountants are tempted to make financial decisions with out a good understanding of their impact on the floor. Similarly workers on the floor are tempted to have little regard for fiscal restraints. This has made me a fan of the idea of balanced work complexes in which a worker would do equal parts of menial and specialized tasks with in their ability. Further more the Parecon model supports the idea that workers would be cross-trained in different disciplines and moved around so that each worker would have a greater understanding of the full scope of a given business. I happen to also think Albret has a point when he asserts that letting all the management tasks fall into the hands of a select few tends to create a bearcatic class who can use the asymmetry of information as a means of consolidating power and privilege. Albert recommends balances work complexes as an antidote to this problem. www.parecon.org

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:17 AM
"Not at all my recipe happens to be the formula for higher education. In our system of education you learn and regurgitate until higher education ... Through this process our society guarantees a spread of workers form menial to professional, but they are not so much picked by virtue of merit as by social connection and economic opportunity." nohope I don't how this back up yout thesis that subject competence is irrelevant to good teaching. Encoutaging the students to explore doesn't mean the blind leading the blind. I do agree with your observation that the education process has been corrupted. To add to that I think exams is a meaningless ritual which is not a very good indicator of excellence or lack thereof(especially standardize tests). Its sole purpose is to weed out people

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 08:00 AM
"Are you saying that all the employees of GE, many of whom may have no education of economics, financing or corporate management, should have a referendum on which bank to go to, how much money to borrow, which sectors to put that money, which assets to put up as collateral.." Let me answer this somewhat differently than nohope. The CEO's decisions are ALREADY subjected to regular refernda by people who probably know squat about the business. Namely, the board of directors and the shareholders. I never say we should get rid of management and professionals. The issue, to me, is to whom these professionals are accountable for? In a worker owned entreprise management is accountable to the workers(including members of management). But that sure doesn't mean everyone doing the same job. It would be absurd to tell the accountant to fix cars and let the mechanic take careof the book.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 07:42 AM
“Are you saying that all the employees of GE, many of whom may have no education of economics, financing or corporate management, should have a referendum on which bank to go to, how much money to borrow, which sectors to put that money, which assets to put up as collateral?” This question of course is absurd, because every individual in the US has or better gain an understanding of economics, financing or corporate management, because these are the exactly same skills that are required to run a family, only if you fuck up running your family your in deep trouble, while if you fuck up your business you may be protected through limited liability.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 07:41 AM
"There are no fixed boundaries between workers, managers, capitalists, etc. We do not have a static class structure"realpc Actually, studies show that the class structure is a lot more static than many people think. Rich people are much more likely to have rich parents and vice versa. As for there is no fixed boundary between managers, CEOs and workers, I sippose you can also say there is no fixed boundary between some grunt killed in Iraq and the 3 star general giving orders. In a broad sense they are both "soldiers".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 07:38 AM
“nohope Perhaps you're right only for very young children. your idea is a recipe for disaster for higher education.I sure don't hope a biology teacher with only a general knowledge thinking creationism is a valid "alternative theory" to evolution just becuase it appears to be more "democratic" to listen to all sides.” Not at all my recipe happens to be the formula for higher education. In our system of education you learn and regurgitate until higher education when you are finally trusted to do your own research, prepare your own theses and be corrected through peer review. Of course you probably thing that under graduate work is higher education. But I would argue that it is little more than an expansion of high school or a trade school today. Students don't earn a BA or BS because they seek to be better educated. They do so out of necessity because our society gives favors to those with the right papers work. Through this process our society guarantees a spread of workers form menial to professional, but they are not so much picked by virtue of merit as by social connection and economic opportunity.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 07:35 AM
In our system CEOs and managers "manage" on behalf of capital. They are the extension of capital(that's why they are so well paid comparing with the people who actually do the job)The workers are tools like any piece of machinery. Silent B said that if a CEO makes the wrong decision many jobs may be loss. Fact is many CEOs get big bonus precisely because they get rid of many jobs/or by shipping them to China(increase "efficiency, cost cutting) Silent B should realize the basic fact that the CEO doesn't manage the firm for the benefit of the workers.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 04, 2005 07:27 AM
There are no fixed boundaries between workers, managers, capitalists, etc. We do not have a static class structure. At the same time, however, our system is complex and therefore is not egalitarian. Individuals specialize and differ in status.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 04, 2005 07:21 AM
Social status may be inherited, resulting in a static class structure. In the 19th c., this was more true than now. People are now categorized as workers because of what they do, not what their parents did. A worker who owns and manages a company should not be called a worker.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 04, 2005 07:21 AM
bwong, All you really need to make the point about the capitalist ripping off the worker is the fact that the worker must turn over to the capitalist the products of her labor. And, if the capitalist were to give the worker as compensation something whose value equalled the value of those products, the former would not PROFIT from the latter's labor. Now, I think that your objections to the idea that the value in ? is time can be handled, but I don't want to press that point here. We just need to consider what is required for the capitalist to profit, which she surely does, from her workers' labor: there must be a significant difference between its value and its compensation.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 07:17 AM
So the CEO must negotiate a signing bonus as it were. They are much like Football players. Aware that they probably will break their knee in a year or so and so they better have put a few hundred million in the bank before anyone notices how worthless they really are. But then since there are some few of these assholes around and since few boards of directors believe in recruiting from within, probably because CEOs fire everyone so there is hardly any internal pool of applicants to recruit from, the CEO's simply go from one company to another running each into the ground ad infinite until the Chinese with their planed economy and cooperative work ethics suddenly own the world.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 07:16 AM
Workers are at the front line human activity. They control the things which effect peoples lives directly. The CEO on the other hand has little direct influence. Their decisions if they are good will be vetted and wade by an entire organization of support workers all the way down to the lowliest who will if the CEO is any good feel free to give honest candid opinions which the CEO if he is any good will not use to make unilateral decisions but will allow as many persons a possible to make in as democratic a way as possible. If that is he is any good. Which most aren't, which brings us to why they make so much money. Most CEOs know they suck. They know in three years they will be fired because in three years it will be apparent that they had no idea how to manage and had little idea how to make a profit other than through firing employees and downsizing the business which only makes it harder to make a profit in the future.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 07:15 AM
“The reason CEOs and executives make so much money is because they have the skills and the knowledge needed to lead a company in the right direction. If an assembly line worker screws up on the job, what's the worst that can happen? A product or two breaks or goes incomplete. However, what if an executive screws up on the job? He could lead an entire company or even an entire industry to collapse, dragging thousands, maybe tens of thousands of people into poverty.” This has to be the product of on over active imagination. But lets just think about this in real terms. If a worker screws up, the car she is building could lead to the operator's death and maybe others on the rode. If a worker screws up, they could well loose a limb or their life. If a worker screws up it could lead to a nuclear power plant melting down.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 04, 2005 07:14 AM
Within a company or government of any complexity, participants have to specialize. In primitive hunting-gathering tribes, or simple agriculture societies, there is little need for specialization, and status differences are minimal. When complexity increases, special skills and leadership are required, and equality decreases.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By B, Silent at Jan 04, 2005 06:33 AM
The reason CEOs and executives make so much money is because they have the skills and the knowledge needed to lead a company in the right direction. If an assembly line worker screws up on the job, what's the worst that can happen? A product or two breaks or goes incomplete. However, what if an executive screws up on the job? He could lead an entire company or even an entire industry to collapse, dragging thousands, maybe tens of thousands of people into poverty. I fail to see how the current system is exploitation. Workers are allowed to organize and make demands, aren't they? They're allowed to unionize. I work for Shaws supermarket, and if anything, my union screws me over more than my employer. I have to pay outragous union dues, I have to strike when the union tells me to while still paying union dues. And being part of the union is mandatory. I'm not sure if all unions work like this, but isn't the point of a union to give more rights to workers?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By B, Silent at Jan 04, 2005 06:29 AM
I've read a lot of replies that repeatedly describe Socialism as workers' democratic control of the workplace, but all of you have completely failed to go into further detail. Lets say that GE wanted to borrow some money. Are you saying that all the employees of GE, many of whom may have no education of economics, financing or corporate management, should have a referendum on which bank to go to, how much money to borrow, which sectors to put that money, which assets to put up as collateral? Lets say they go Bank One. Should all the employees, many of whom, like I said, may have no education in banking or management or so forth, have another referendum on how much money to lend, if it should be lent in increments, how long they should wait to be paid back and so forth?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 04, 2005 04:55 AM
rd240, We don't disagree over values; all of us value material wealth. The disagreement is over how one should pursue it. The decent-minded folks posting here object to exploitation. Creeps like you won't condemn it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 02:29 AM
According to Marx the capitalist rips off the worker by extracting surplus value from the latter's labour(basically Robert's POV). But there is another scenario that Marx did not anticipate. Namely the worker and the capitalist colluding to rip off the public. Pro sport is an example. bTW, I don't think labour alone create value, among other things there is no objective measurement of "labour".If you make a better product using a machine,wih significantly less "labour", does that mean the product is less valuable even if it is of a higher quality? And how do you calculate the non labour input such as machinery, marketing etc? Nor do I believe that value is entirely determined by supply and demand (in that case no one would be ripped off, ever, obviously an absurd conclusion)It is simple and elegant, but likely overly simplistic. Truth is, economists don't have a good definition for value. But economics is on shaky ground anyhow.If you ask 10 economists a question, you are likely to get 11 answers because one guy later changes his mind.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 02:18 AM
Sorry, nature, what are you babbling about? Just wondering.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 04, 2005 02:04 AM
bwong, 'fuck-U-ism'- I love it!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 01:54 AM
If evil exists then GOD does not. If you argue/believe for/in evil then you argue against GOD's existance. If ther is no god then all of history is flat out wrong. Irrational thought does not lead to rational beliefs.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 01:47 AM
"Some people feel equality is more important than allowing people to do what they want with their own lives. Other people think individualism is more important. Neither side is evil - people have different life experience and learn different lessons and values growing up." I think you are making a false dichotomy here. I am sure people who advocate "equality" here envison equality with freedom. Equality without freedom would be like the status of inmates in a concentration camp. I have not seen a convincing argument that equality necessarily lead to the concentration camp scenario. Also, you seem to be confusing indivualism with "fuck-U-ism". I consider myself an individualist, a borg like 'collective" would be my worst nighmare. But I fail to see why that is the only outcome of equality.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 01:38 AM
Many so called 'educators" who come up with all sort of fancy ideas about teaching and learning are people who cannot cut it in any real discipline. they go down to the faculty of ed to do a few hours of show and tell and call themselves "doctors". It is outrageous to suggest subject knowledge doesn't matter in teaching. I am totally with r4d20 on this one.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 04, 2005 01:37 AM
'Not at all. A good teacher could have a general understanding of the subject matter and then send each pupil out to do independent research an the component parts of the subject which interest them most. The teacher could then have the students come back and teach each other. Then said teacher could have the students do per review of the material they just learned. Fact checking and correcting errors." nohope Perhaps you're right only for very young children. your idea is a recipe for disaster for higher education.I sure don't hope a biology teacher with only a general knowledge thinking creationism is a valid "alternative theory" to evolution just becuase it appears to be more "democratic" to listen to all sides. There is still some solid learning in universities (at least in the hard science) because, fortunately, the armchair 'educators' have not yet controlled the system like they do with high schools.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 04, 2005 01:34 AM
r4d20 (you asshole), If you were arguing with a Nazi would you be reluctant to think "that the only reason (the Nazis) don't agree with (me) is because they are stupid or evil"? No, that's just what you would think. Some views, such as yours, are beyond the pale.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 04, 2005 01:28 AM
If you believe that all men are created equal, then you are an truly one of many indoctrinated fools. All men have vastly different abilities. Intellectual capacity to become wise exists in maybe 1 in 100,000. With 6,500,000,000 people maybe you could find 650,000 with any real capacity to develope thought that was based on reason and not the dogma of contemporary "truth"/education. People are animals, most not much smarter than a chimp. Eat - sleep - mate - survive any way they can. Contemporary Education does little to improve what is lacking in most. Lying and cheating and stealing and using others is the foundation of all history and is the human expierience. Freedom does not exist because of the nature of man. We cannot stop supporting the inherited insanity of Judeo - Christian Dogma which is the foundation of all law and of all society. Man is doomed by the false truth of the dogma that has been accepted as truth by sick societies such as our own. Learned lies does not lead to the development of rational thought. Only to evil and ignorance.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 00:40 AM
Chances are we will often be asked to cooperate with people who we consider slow and lazy. We all have a choice in this matter; we can understand why they are “slow and lazy” and act compassionately, facilitating an environment in which they can be their best. Or we can judge and dismiss them, relegating them to slag heap of history from which we have extracted for ourselves all the best things in life. It really has to do with attitude. But we must be aware, those we dismiss today as slow and lazy may be far from slow and lazy exacting retribution for our antisocial attitudes and actions toward them.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 04, 2005 00:39 AM
“The truth is that every student is different and the "best" teaching approach is not going to be the same for different students learning different subjects.” Best for what outcome. Your statement “pace of the class was controlled by slowest and laziest kids,” says more about your personal relationship to your classmates than it dose about the shortcomings of the educational model itself. Learning is not simply about the subject matter being learned; it's also about learning the social skills required to facilitate a compassionate and cooperative interaction with other humans.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 04, 2005 00:19 AM
nohope, The kind of interactive learning you describe has a place, but I don't believe it is always the most efficient. I don't believe in any of the simplistic, "best approach" models to teaching. The truth is that every student is different and the "best" teaching approach is not going to be the same for different students learning different subjects. I changed schools a lot, and I experienced that kind of lesson plan, and I plenty of people besides myself who HATED the education model you describe because it meant that the pace of the class was controled by slowest and laziest kids. OF course, if we had ability tracking that wouldn't have been a problem, but thats another argument...

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 03, 2005 23:28 PM
“I totally disagree - a good teacher has to know BOTH how to teach AND the subject material. In fact, I think this attitude is one reason why US school fall behind the rest of the world.” Not at all. A good teacher could have a general understanding of the subject matter and then send each pupil out to do independent research an the component parts of the subject which interest them most. The teacher could then have the students come back and teach each other. Then said teacher could have the students do per review of the material they just learned. Fact checking and correcting errors. Such an approach would increase the over all retention of material since the pupils would be actively involved in their own education in stead of passive receptors. Check out The Schools Our Children Deserve by alfie kohn www.alfiekohn.org

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 03, 2005 23:13 PM
Most men's irrational arrogance and lack of intellectual capacity shine thru. Most men are incapable of meaningful thought - rational thought. Much like Dubbya and the irrational fools we fail to understand that ignorance is the only true evil and cannot be separated. Only the truly wise ever come to an understanding of ones profound ignorance.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 23:01 PM
It's easy to write off people who disagree as evil, but I feel that most of the idealogical conflicts come from honest disagreements about value systems and the important of various values. Some people feel equality is more important than allowing people to do what they want with their own lives. Other people think individualism is more important. Neither side is evil - people have different life experience and learn different lessons and values growing up. It is the height of arrogance to assume that everyone sees the world the way you do and that the only reason they don't agree with you is because they are stupid or evil. That is the attitude of fanatics.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 22:57 PM
So, when we have a limited resource but cannot get a solid majority to agree on who gets to use it, we can do two things. 1) give a minority the power to make the choice. 2) let people compete for access. If you rule out #2 there is no other choice than to let a minority make decisions where there is no majority opinion. This, however, is the first step in creating a new elite because we now, once again, have a minority making decision for the majority.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 22:55 PM
So, regardless of how much better we share the wealth (and it could be a lot better), we have to think about this problem of allocating limited resources. This problem is intimately linked with our hierarchy of moral values - the list we have in our heads which tells us which morals/principles are more important than others. We all have our own list inside our heads. The degree to which we can make these choices democratically depends on how similar our heirarchy of values are. If we all agree on the relative importants of various principles than we can make these choices in a democratic fashion and count on a solid majority to be present. However, IF (and I think this is true in most countries) we cannot agree enough to form a solid majority on some of the major issue, then we face the choice - let people follow their own moral compass or impose one on them.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 22:47 PM
But, the teacher analogy is getting all warped. My point was simply that a resource (the single teacher) needed to be allocated and could NOT be shared by all. Society must then face the question of who gets to use it. The fact of the matter is no matter WHAT resource we have there will ALWAYS be the talk & debate on how to distribute it. Even if we had a $4 trillon dollar education budget we would STILL have to decide how to spend it. Sure, we'd give every student quite a bit, but the arguments wouldn't go away just because every student had a laptop. There would still be talk like "do we spend the last 10 mill on new, better, laptops for children, or a heated swimming pool"?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 22:41 PM
"The perfect teacher in fact really dose not need to know anything," This has gotten WAY off topic but.. I totally disagree - a good teacher has to know BOTH how to teach AND the subject material. In fact, I think this attitude is one reason why US school fall behind the rest of the world. Almost every other top nation makes teachers be proficient in their subjects. America is one of the few where a person with an Education degree and no background in science can teach High School Physics or chemistry. this is my opinion from evaluating the many teachers I have had. Then again, I find most modern education theory to be so counter to my personal experience that it's frightening.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 03, 2005 22:29 PM
It is a completly false to believe that teachers teach anything. All education is indoctrination, period. Until one is capable of admitting their own educated ignorance and the fact that most of haumanity are indoctrinated fools, which is the history of man, rational change, thought, and behavior are impossible.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 03, 2005 22:00 PM
This fact has lead many to understand an odd paradox in the teacher pupil relationship. Namely that the person who gets the greatest benefit from teaching is not the pupil but the teacher. The act of teaching forces the individual doing the teaching to solidify and understand their subject enough to impart it to another person. Since this is true I would flip this assertion on it's head and state that the problem is not a lack of teachers, but rather a lack of persons who are willing to be pupils. If our education system were organized so that teaching was a means to learning, the over all quality of our students would dramatically increase.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Jan 03, 2005 21:59 PM
“you mention how we distribute a "scarce" good like a teacher when one has a large class to be taught.” I just wanted to ad on to what you are saying here bruce33. The scarce teacher is based on a false assumption that students are empty vestals and that teachers fill them with a possessed quantity called knowledge. But in reality learning is not the passing on of information from those with it to those without. Learning is a process that each individual partakes in on his or her own terms. The teacher who teaches best is not the teacher with the greatest amount of knowledge, but rather the teacher who can train the process of critical thinking and evolution. The teacher in other words who can facilitate a pupil to continue learning well beyond the teacher's expertise. The perfect teacher in fact really dose not need to know anything, but must be capable of imparting how a student can gain and evaluate information.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 03, 2005 21:30 PM
7Natures of man aka 7 Deadly Sins. The nature of man.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 03, 2005 20:52 PM
WOW - The thoughts of others sometimes blows me away. Debate causes all who are trying to control/dominate others to stop thinking. The power of observation would cause change for the better. But man's 7Natures make it almost impossible to observe "natural law". Educated/Indoctrinated fools - The natural order of humanity.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 20:46 PM
What is man's supposed "created nature"?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 03, 2005 20:34 PM
Hope - like justice like freedom - is another one of those words needed by any "society" to cause most men to act against their created nature and be self destructive through out their lives. We are lied to and indoctrinated/educated so that we allow those with wealth/power to steal from us, for their personal happiness/success/wealth. Men acting within their created nature.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 03, 2005 08:29 AM
bwong and r4d20, This is, of course, too strange. I was not only a physics major, I was a Navy nuc and an undergraduate fellow in nonlinear dynamics at UT Austin! Bizarre. I am so tempted to crack that "great minds think alike", but I generally try to eschew the intellectual supremicist ideology I was indoctrinated with in school. Smarter is not necessarily better. But in a way it does make sense -- scientific training is one of the few places where people actually learn critical thinking. There is an old book from 1931 called "Cosmic Religion". It was a book of Einstein's aphorisms. One of them is [paraphrasing] "women have no ability to do physics". Knowing his romantic history tells me much about the man, apart from the scientist. r4d20, you mention how we distribute a "scarce" good like a teacher when one has a large class to be taught. First, teachers are a near limitless potential resource. They are relatively cheaply produced by the process called "education", just like all other participants in various human activities. Educationally developing human potential shouldn't be constrained by scarcity of resources.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 03, 2005 07:52 AM
Todd, "Capitalism has also had enemies - people like you who want to destroy it, and yet it still lives. Why can capitalism surivive despite it's enemies while communism needs a supportive world to live?" Might does not make right, asshole. Besides, the fight is far from over.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 03, 2005 06:49 AM
Todd, You don't read too well. I said that I'm not interested in persuading you and your ilk of anything. I am trying to beat the hell out of you in front of those people whose opinions matter to me.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 06:10 AM
"We ARE called upon to make those choices all the time. Any debate about school funding involves CHOOSING programs to fund, and in turn, choosing who the money gets spent on. Every choice from ciriculum to funding Gifted Programs involves these value judgement"r4d20 Yes, theoretically such a situation can arise. But in many cases the alledged shortage of resources is just the result of misplaced priorities. For example, you are told there is not enough to invest in social infrastructures such as schools, yet your government can afford to spend billions of dollars in Iraq and giving huge tax breaks to the most wealthy Americans at the same time. A tiny fraction of the humogous U.S military buget would be more than enough to build the most extravagent school system in the world. The math just doesn't add up.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 05:51 AM
bwong, We ARE called upon to make those choices all the time. Any debate about school funding involves CHOOSING programs to fund, and in turn, choosing who the money gets spent on. Every choice from ciriculum to funding Gifted Programs involves these value judgements. So, while the 1 teacher example is a stretch, the fact is that there is ALWAYS more desire than resources to satisfy that desire, so we must allocate and pick.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 05:43 AM
"Human institutions and structures have changed all throughout history, as human consciousness and activity has changed" Just because they have changed does not mean that we can modify them at will to suit some rational plan. There are BOUNDARIES within we must work. Change within hthose boundaries is possible, but not outside.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 05:35 AM
Bwong, You're right. The current imbalance of wealth means that sometimes you can make more by helping the rich than by helping the masses. That being said, I think we both agree the solution is not found in radical notions like eliminating money or private property. But allow me to make clear that I do not support or condone true oppression. I do see a difference between the oppression of a sweatshop laborer (Which is real) and the "oppression" of the dropout working at Starbucks :).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By K, Mr at Jan 03, 2005 05:31 AM
yeah there's a new slave class today called wageslaves. these hapless folk serve for minimum wage surviving in the free market on the skin of their teeth. need more luck in capitalism otherwise it's pursuit of happyness aint worth crap. cheapie cheapie neo-cons don't redistribute well do they? revolutions start this way.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 03:05 AM
Yeh, those quantum courses were killers.But now knowing a bit more, it is really fascinating. In those days we were just huge, ugly integratons with no clue what was going on. Still remember this problem where we have to do 20 pages of calculations. In the end it said this was photo electric effect. We kind of went "eh??"

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 03:04 AM
"..if we have to decide who gets access to a limited resource we HAVE to differentiate amongst people basedon their "value" to society.."r4d20 The scenario you created is not very typical. In our society access is often determined by $$$. Moreover, reward is not directly proportional to one's contribution to "society", but "contribution" to the powerful and concentrated capital. Some of highly pay professionals such as corporate lawyers, spin doctors or scientists who work for the "military industrial complex"(sorry, I don't mean to be personal) arguably contribute negatively.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 02:50 AM
I am aware I started using "her" instead of "his/her". I guess I'm also a victim of "gender roles". Sorry :).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 02:47 AM
The Value-Equality of people is interesting to think about. If we say "People like X are more valuable than people like Y" we run the risk of degenerating into a caste-based society. On the other hand, if we have to decide who gets access to a limited resource we HAVE to differentiate amongst people basedon their "value" to society (ie. to us). To use a simplistic example, if there is only one teacher and he/she can only teach 20 students or less, we would be fools NOT to have her teach only the students who stand to learn the most. It would be unjust to have her spend the lion share of her time on one or two slow students and neglect the other children who ALSO have a "right" to learn.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 02:37 AM
bwong, Nice. I always like meeting other physics majors - sort of a small fraternity. I did more work in my "Quantum for Majors" class than I have in any class in 3 years of Grad School in Comp Sci. It sounds like that prof needed to re-examine his prejudices. I've taught before and I can't imagine saying anything like that to a student. I will tell them if THEY, personally, have weaknesses that they need to work on, but never way anything aboyut My only point was that a lot of women don't WANT to be physicists - not that women can't do it. Any who do should be given the same chances as men - but should also compete on the same level. As long as this happens I think it is just regardless of the results.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 02:17 AM
There is no natural law that dictates you should be treated like shit if you're not a fast runner. For the same reason there is no "natural" reason why someone who cannot do math, or cannot handle technology(whatever "skills" that happen to be in demand this week), should be condemned to poverty and marginalization.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 02:16 AM
"However, I assert with all the force I can that individuals MUST BE EQUAL IN VALUE to each other. Value equality (or axioegalitarianism, heh) is the ONLY moral position that I can see for humanity. If we all have the same intrinsic value, then we can morally and ethically diverge and be unequal in other, lesser ways." Nicely put. Chomsky made the point that while it is a natural fact that not all of us are equally talented even with the same access to training(here he is strongly in favour of nature against nurture), how we treat people with different talents, or different degrees of talnets, is a social choice.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 02:08 AM
r4d20, I was also a physics major. How nice! One girl in my first year class went to ask the professor a question. The professor basically told her physics is not for girls. I am not making that up. Also, you have to understand people don't just go to universities to major in physics.They have to go through 12/13 years of schooling first.That is quite a bit of socialization. The fact that girls do not choose physics at university does not necessarily mean that they were "born" not intersted in physics. Also, some of the greatest mathematicans/physicists are/were women: Emmy Noether, Sophie Kowalevskya(sp?) and there are quite a few contemporary ones.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 03, 2005 01:59 AM
I make this point because it's not a matter of differential levels of success in the system. It's a matter of survival or being condemned to die of starvation, disease, violence and pollution. Regarding your belief that some inequality is "natural" and thus unavoidable, I'll stipulate that and go even further -- amongst other things, diversity is going to mean a diversity of skills, talents and abilities and there will be differential compensation accordingly. However, I assert with all the force I can that individuals MUST BE EQUAL IN VALUE to each other. Value equality (or axioegalitarianism, heh) is the ONLY moral position that I can see for humanity. If we all have the same intrinsic value, then we can morally and ethically diverge and be unequal in other, lesser ways. Please note that every form of supremicism that has ever existed posits that same people are just plain more (or less) valuable than others, with the obvious forseeable consequences.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 01:55 AM
a lot of gender roles are socially constucted, but not all. I do NOT support forcing gender roles on anyone, but I also do not support trying to force people to act against gender roles in an attempt to liberate them. I was a physics major as a undegrad. We has 1 girl out of 12 people. We weren't sexist and we didn't keep them out (We WANTED more girls around, if for no other reason than we were heterosexual college students who wanted to meet smart women). There were simply no other women who WANTED to major in Physics . So when academics talk about "insitutional sexism" and put the blame for anything less than 50/50 on the men I have to oppose that - it is simply NOT true. In short, gender roles MAY be social, but we should not assume that they all are or that anything less than 50/50 representation is a sign of sexism. Same with racism, etc.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 03, 2005 01:49 AM
r4d20, me thinks you sound like a libertarian capitalist, or maybe a libertarian individualist. I highly recommend that you read the "Concept of Freedom part II" that I posted a link to earlier. It has a discussion of freedom and capitalism and talks about the "tramp outside of the Ritz" situation, where there is a tramp, who is not oppressed, but is unable to afford to go in the Ritz and dine with the elite. This is put forth as a moral version of negative freedom. I think that in the world today, the situation is more like the "starving family outside of the Ritz", which is clearly immoral and unethical because human misery and poverty are ignored by people with extravagent material surplus. And that is the world today, i.e. post-scarcity. Humanity now possesses the wealth, knowledge, experience, technology, resources and ability to provide for the food, clothing, shelter, health care and education of every individual on the face of this planet, at a fraction of WDP (world domestic product). The fact that humanity doesn't do this for itself is prima facie evidence of domination.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 01:47 AM
"But to respond to your charge, the experiments to which you refer were not conducted without interference, as in physics. To take just current one example, the US will not allow the Venezuelan people to form a socialist economy- it wants the oligarchs back in charge." Capitalism has also had enemies - people like you who want to destroy it, and yet it still lives. Why can capitalism surivive despite it's enemies while communism needs a supportive world to live?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:44 AM
r4d20, Though I think "gender roles" are probably socially constructed. I think domination to some degree is unavoidable in the dating/mating ritual. Nut I would not attribute that to gender, not gender alone anyway.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:39 AM
"A good simplistic way to look at freedom is the right to say "no". The more options you have, the more things you can decline, the more freedom you have. Hence, a person who can choose between many jobs has more freedom than a person who has only a few, or single, option. " How many people have that kind of "freedom"? It seems that most people have fairly limited options, hence freedom, even by yourt own formulation.I don't know how many people have Ph.Ds like you do.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 01:34 AM
bwong, Very reasonable points. We CAN modify insitutions and structures without insisting on a fundamental change in human nature. Your example of remiving institutional gender rules while not insisting on complete negation of gender roles is spot-on. A lot of the socialists and anarchists I meet, however, claim to beleive that ALL violence, aggression, and other "immoral" attributes are products of society and, therefore, that we can structure a society which eliminates these completely. I can't tell you the number of anarchists I meet who respond to criticism of the defensive capabilities of anarchism by saying "well, war and crime are products of capitalism so we don't have to worry about that".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:33 AM
A movement cannot sustain itself on ideology and high minded notions such as abstract freedom alone. Sucessful revolutions have always been motivated by things much more mudane:the right of staying on the land; the right for a livable wages; the right to run one's own affairs etc. "Freedom" is tangible in these instances. Doestrovsky's grand inquisitor told Christ, " the masses want bread yet you offered them freedom, that's why they abandoned you". I won't formulate it quite as cynically. But I would say bread and freedom has to go hand in hand.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 01:24 AM
"Go fuck yourself, you mealy-mouthed fool." Have you ever considered working as a personal trainer. Your ability to motivate people and convince them to see things your way is simply amazing.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 01:23 AM
A good simplistic way to look at freedom is the right to say "no". The more options you have, the more things you can decline, the more freedom you have. Hence, a person who can choose between many jobs has more freedom than a person who has only a few, or single, option. A person who can choose to say something, or NOT say something, is more free than a person is is forced to say, or not say, something.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:22 AM
I think social reforms will only succeed if we recognize its limits. Attempts to create "new human" inevitably lead to tyranny. There is no way to "remake" a perfect human race.Past efforts in such attempts always involve massive coercions(The Jacobin, Mao) The goal of the Nicagragua revolution was much more modest(and hence workable until it was destroyed by the U.S.A). I don't think the Sadinista were even communist. Only the U.S called them such.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:08 AM
Note that in this scenario the domination-submission dynamics is not necessarily gender based. There are many instants the famale partner is more aggressive than her male counterpart(I am excluding homosexual relationships for simplicity) On the other hand, sexist laws and customs are social structures which regidly define sexual roles and officialize gender based discriminations. We can certainly dismantle many of these obviously oppressive structures without ever having to carry out a full blown philosophical discussions on "male-female nature". We already did to a large extent. IMO institutions and structures of dominations should be the focus.That's why I try to keep my focus as narrow and "down to earth" as possible. Among other things, I would be able to avoid getting off some psychiological/philosphical tangent like debating whether "freedom" is just a mindset(as realpc did)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:07 AM
This is a very interesting question(much more than polics imo)but basically irrelevant to the points I want to make here. That's why I said I didn't want to broaden the scope too much. What I want to focus on is social structures of domination. Bruce brought up the example of geneder inequality. I think this is a good example to highlight my point. My speculation about "human nature" is that whenever two person interact in a non trivial way some form of domination will occur. Everyone has some experience with "head games" in the dating/mating ritual.Perhaps at some point in the future that may change, but then may be not. Either way I don't really care.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:06 AM
There is some empirical evidence in antropology and zoology which indicates domination of some form is universal in human as well as primate societies. Antropologists have changed their positions quite drastically. The paradigm used to favour nurture over nature(Mead. e.g) but the pendulum has since swung the other way with more data availiable. Interestingly Chomsky's seminal work in lingustics(repudiation of behavourism)is instrumental in setting the stage for this paradigm shift to refocus on the "human universals".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 03, 2005 01:05 AM
joeblogs56, I like your reading of "Lord of the Flies" vis-a-vis "Heart of Darkness". nohope posted a link to a guy named Alfie Kohn awhile back (http://www.alfiekohn.org/). Kohn has written some fantastic books on competition and human motivation. In his book "No Contest: The Case Against Competition", he recounts a story about how in a native American tribe (Hopi, I believe), children would be scandalized by some of the humiliations that are heaped upon US students in classrooms every day. His example was of a little boy who didn't know the answer to the teacher's question and who had to shamefacedly endure his classmates throwing their hands up to tell the teacher that THEY knew the answer. Native American kids would go and help their classmate discover the answer. Here is an object lesson in the difference between competition (which is both a mode and justification of domination) and cooperation, which is one mode of human freedom.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 03, 2005 01:05 AM
Joe and Bruce, Thank you for your input. I think Joe's interpretation of "Lords of the flies" makes sense. Haven't read the book since I was in high school. I do not have a rigid view about human nature. If I may clarify, I think whether "domination" is intrinsic to human nature is irrelevant in the current discussion, eventhough in a GENERAL, PHILOSOPHICAL sense I think it is.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 03, 2005 00:57 AM
Hello joeblogs56, 7Natures and r4d20, "Nice ideas that can not exist as long as man exists. The nature of man makes freedom and justice impossible." 7Natures, if you believe that there is no hope then you guarantee that there will be no hope. Human beings can (and have) advanced freedom and justice. Though I've seen oppression and injustice, I've also seen liberty and fairness. We can always improve the system, but it takes work and an ability to endure failure and frustration.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 03, 2005 00:55 AM
Todd, Go fuck yourself, you mealy-mouthed fool. You and realpc started it. Moreover, fanaticism in defense of liberty, as Barry Goldwater said, is no vice. I want to DESTROY your ideas, as they lead to misery for workers. I'm not interested in being civil to those who would aid our oppressors. But to respond to your charge, the experiments to which you refer were not conducted without interference, as in physics. To take just current one example, the US will not allow the Venezuelan people to form a socialist economy- it wants the oligarchs back in charge.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 00:14 AM
I'm not here to advance ANY cause. I am here to question EVERY cause. When I go to right-wing blogs I do the same thing to their ideas - and they act the same way that Robert does. Left? Right? Whats he difference when it comes to fanatics?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 00:12 AM
And Robert, the fact that you cannot talk to people who disagree with you without calling them fools and being immature doesn't make anyone MORE likely to agree with you. You are an example of why the Soviet Union became a killing field instead of a communist nation. Despite all your talk about morality and justice you obviously are filled with hatred and malice towards those who do not share you're feelings while, at the same time, you are no different than the people you hate.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 03, 2005 00:07 AM
"So let me just say, suppose your asine statement were true: what would that prove beyond that the revolutionaries in ? were incompetent and/or corupt. It would not show that anything I have said is false, because we are discussing IDEAS, not historical facts." Discounting experimental results in favor of a nice theory is the opposite of the scientific outlook and the exact definition of religious faith. We would not have any modern physics if people had insisted on ignoring experimental results when they contradicted the theory at the time. The fact is that every "communist" government has never achieved true communism and has ALWAYS resulted in a dictatorship by the party elite. True communism might be great, but until I see a SINGLE actual example in the real world....

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Shannon, James at Jan 02, 2005 23:07 PM
Freedom, like justice, is only a word used to describe someting that does not exist - for sure not in the history of this world - but who knows what else may exist elsewhere in our expanding Universe or in other Universes yet to be created. Nice ideas that can not exist as long as man exists. The nature of man makes freedom and justice impossible.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 02, 2005 22:55 PM
However, I do believe, in general, that in a truly just society there would STILL be some inequality that would reflect the natural abilities of people - and that these abilities must not be judged by an "elite" or "central planner" but by other people. Money would be the medium of information flow - being able to make more money would come from having better skills or a better product than the next man, and that this extra money should NOT be taken and given to the other, less qualified, person just to keep them "equal". I believe that such a system would be "unjust" because it would rob the better worker of his due. That being said - I do NOT believe that the current sconomic policies of ANY nation reflects the society I really want.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Jan 02, 2005 22:50 PM
"I always have a good chuckle when I hear a "successful" person lecturing smugly to the not so successful that they should all imitate him and become successful like himself." Come on man, give me SOME credit :). I did not ever mean to imply that EVERYONE could be successful. Obviously some must earn less than average for others to earn more than average. Also, I do NOT believe that being poor is always ones fault because I know that we don't get to pick our parents. So I do not think that the distribution of wealth in this world is always "just" by any means. I know that a lot of those sweatshop workers in other countries could have been a lot more if they had ahd the same chances I did.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 20:24 PM
Oh, and btw, since US-backed cronies have recaptured control in Nicaragua, the country is now the second poorest in the hemisphere (after Haiti, another US success story) and child malnutrition is so bad that it's inducing brain damage in Nicaraguan children. And on another topic, Holly Sklar in this month's Z Magazine has a wonderful statistic that I've been looking for for some time. Namely that between 1947 and 1973, US worker productivity rose 104% and the minimum wage rose with it 101%. But between 1973 and 2003, US worker productivity rose 72% but real hourly wages declined 10.5% and the minimum wage declined 22% [all figures adjusted for inflation]. This is part of the upward transfer of wealth, also known as "theft" in some quarters.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 20:14 PM
realpc, my point is not to support Communist revolution or to denigrate the US. I just want to point out that domination is the common denominator in both cases. Usually in a revolution those holding the guns just change sides -- the domination is a constant. That's another reason why I harp on domination -- humanity has to wake up and wise up that simply having "our side" take over will not advance human freedom. Only eliminating domination from human relations will do that, and eternal vigilence, of course.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 20:13 PM
Good morning realpc and Robert, I would have to reject your assertion about "every" communist revolution. The Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua ended a US-backed slaughterhouse, dramatically improved child mortality, health and literacy, and supported more freedom of the press than the US permitted in other domains like El Salvador. Further, as Chomsky and Ed Herman demonstrated in their masterful "Political Economy of Human Rights", there is a direct correlation between US foreign aid to our client states and those states violations of their own citizens' human rights. When Turkey was the leading recipient of US foreign aid under Clinton (after Israel and Egypt), they were busy committing cultural genocide against the Kurds, in fact, far more vicious attacks then the Yugoslavian gov't ever perpetrated against the Kosovar Albanians. Now Columbia is the number one US aid beneficiary and the gov't's mass murder under the cover of the "drug war" continues to escalate.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 02, 2005 20:10 PM
bruce and bwong, I'm also here to defend Prof. Chomsky against the gratuitous, mean-spirited attacks made by the people like realpc and Todd, exposing them as the pseudointellectuals that they are. (I should add that he himself could mop the floor with them, if he chose to.) But for their twisted claims, I would not even post, just enjoy the comments. The rest of you are capable of advancing the discussion. They, on the other hand, are here to make the good Prof. look bad and I, for one, won't stand for it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 02, 2005 19:48 PM
real, That's a really asinine statement, per usual. I could give you a history lesson, but it would be lost on you or you would find some capitalist way of twisting the facts. So let me just say, suppose your asine statement were true: what would that prove beyond that the revolutionaries in ? were incompetent and/or corupt. It would not show that anything I have said is false, because we are discussing IDEAS, not historical facts.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 02, 2005 19:35 PM
bruce, That's a very good ?. But, really, I have not read too much literature on the subject beyond Marx and Chomsky. I am just trying to develop a view of my own. I want an economy that yields all the goods and services that each worker needs with each worker contributing thereto according to his/her abilities. (If current estimates are correct, that should amount to 3-4 of work each day.) Beyond that, if people want to work further, to exericise their talents and amass greater wealth, so be it. I wish you well in your union work. Your calling is a noble one.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 02, 2005 17:27 PM
Every communist revolution has resulted in an oppressive, evil dictatorship. Is that a coincidence?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 10:20 AM
Hi Robert, I'm a union officer in Texas. I really want to democratize the economy, which is what I see as the real goal of unions. When you write that you want "to advance the cause of Communism - to persuade people that capitalism is evil and should be rejected in favor of worker control of the MOP" are you subscribing to notions like "democratic centralism" or the "dictatorship of the proletariat" or other such ideas? Or do you tend more to the libertarian leftist position like Emma Goldman?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 02, 2005 09:12 AM
bruce 33 and bwong, I'm not here to exchange ideas with self-serving morons such as realpc and Todd. This is a very serious matter for me, not an academic exercise. I'm here to advance the cause of Communism- to persuade people that capitalism is evil and should be rejected in favor of worker control of the MOP. The discussion is going nowhere because the above mentioned fools will not concede that they are wrong. Look at realpc's 1st post in the thread- he's the one who, in his haste to bash Prof. Chomsky, misunderstands his post and, thus, leads us astray. Don't blame me for his thickheadedness.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 09:07 AM
Btw, I am an individualist as well as a socialist. I don't see them as antagonistic though they can be placed into opposition. Most of the "bad" individualism I encounter is actually egoism, which I try to clearly distinguish from individualism itself, which I take as a concept of integrity. I like the word freedom because it captures in the affirmative what anarchism captures in the negative, namely the absence of archism, or domination. FWIW, I actually have a somewhat broader framework than freedom vs. domination that I work within. I like using the concept of freedom with a concept of value and I analogize value as something like mass-energy and freedom as like space-time. Value and freedom are clearly different things. But in the limit as both approach zero, I believe that freedom becomes domination and value becomes "evil", or the absence of value. I have a hypothesis that I've been working on that domination and evil are the same thing, that "domination is evil" -- what I call the DIE hypothesis. A refutation of the DIE hypothesis should include examples of evil that are not simultaneously domination or examples of domination that are not evil.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 09:04 AM
I agree that a dialectical process of human consciousness working on human institutions and vice versa might possibly advance towards a vision of universal human freedom, but human institutions, or structures, are clearly working overtime to mystify, deceive, intimidate and manipulate humanity to forestall that future. Contemporary corporate communications as I see it are designed to eliminate the back-and-forth of a dialectic (as I understand dialectical process from Terry Eagleton). Basically, what I see is this: all of the problems facing humanity at this historical juncture are forms of domination. Racism, sexism, classism, environmental degradation, fundamentalism (both secular and sectarian), jingoism, etc., are either modes of domination itself or instances of supremicist ideologies that pose as justifications for domination.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 09:01 AM
Thanks for the compliment, joeblogs56. Like bwong, I do believe that domination is part of the human condition, especially male domination from sexual selection, which I believe has become infused throughout human culture globally and historically. Dominating and being dominated also have physiological and psychological effects which I do not believe should be discounted. But being a part of human nature doesn't make domination immutable. Rapid human social and cultural evolution and the evidence of human progress itself suggest that domination can be mitigated, though I view freedom itself as inherently unstable, sort of like a pencil balanced on its tip. There is a stability point where the pencil can stand on its tip and not fall over, but it's very vulnerable to perturbations and thus one must always be available to restore freedom's stability should it begin to corrupt into domination. If one desires freedom, then one must accept the concomitant unbounded set of problems of freedom, first and foremost of which is domination.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 08:57 AM
Here's an example of what I'm suggesting: both the public AND private ownership of the means of production can be and have been used to liberate, dominate or both (this could lead one to examine the concept of "ownership" as well as the public-private dichotomy). Both capitalism and socialism have been used as excuses to dominate whole societies and now one is used as justification to subjugate the planet. I've also noticed that most things in life -- power, language, technology, money, labor, human nature itself -- are morally and ethically neutral, they're neither good nor bad in themselves. It's human agency, i.e. what we choose to do with power, language, etc., that adds a moral and ethical dimension to these other concerns. Fundamentally, I see humanity's choice as freedom or domination. All human progress, as far as I can tell, has been the expansion of human freedom and the contraction of human domination, not always at the same time. Again, I recommend at least a complementary discussion of freedom vs. domination to go with the left-right, socialism-capitalism conflict.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 08:52 AM
I appreciate your statement that, "Personally I think domination is a human condition if you want to use the word in its broadest sense(as understood by philosphers). Chances are everytime when you have two people interacting with each other one person would dominate even in the absence of any social structure(to varying degrees depending on the parties involved) A sort of thought experiment is described in William Golding's 'Lord of the flies'." It rather makes my point for me. If this is really your position, that "domination is a human condition", then why try to mitigate the harms inherent in the status quo, regardless of what you call it? You said you find the core of capitalism's immorality its demand that individuals "justify their worth by proving their 'usefulness' for capital". This capital can only do from a position of dominance. Chomsky says that departures from freedom must be justified. I agree. That's why I'm suggesting that we examine this issue from a framework of freedom vs. domination.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 02, 2005 08:47 AM
bwong and joeblogs56, bwong, thank you for the thoughtful reply. I'm not trying to broaden or narrow the scope of the discussion. Rather I'm suggesting that it might be useful to refocus it. Interestingly enough, the concepts of "capitalism" and "socialism" have been batted around without precise specification, especially considering the difference between the pragmatic vs. propaganda meanings. The ownership of the MOP is not well-defined. But I don't believe one needs to proceed with mathematical rigor in order to productively discuss these matters. They're not rocket science or brain surgery and what people can confidently assert seems pretty thin to me so I think it is safe to speculate. I don't think you need any qualifications to talk about freedom, domination, democracy, tyranny, socialism, capitalism, etc. In fact, in a real and substantive democracy these would be topics of manifest importance.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 02, 2005 00:41 AM
Robert Allen, Thanks for the compliment. I am here only to exchange ideas. ActuallyI am not very knowledgible on these stuffs at all. I have some ideas, just want to hear some reactions so I can learn something in the process.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 02, 2005 00:35 AM
In a Capitalist entreprise the workers are only tools for making profit. They have exactly the same status as any machine(hence easily disposable). The dreadful term in MBA speech is "human "resources". Management in such an entreprise is the extension of Capital. Managers coordinate business on behalf of capital(that explains the elevated position of managers relative to workers). In a social entreprise there will still be mangament. But they work for the people who make up the entreprise(including the managers themselves)rather than serving capital. In a social entreprise the workers are human beings rather than just tools for making profit.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 02, 2005 00:35 AM
"If workers own the means of production, they also have to determine what to produce and how much, and find customers. They also have to coordinate their activities and make sure everything fits together..." Realpc I don't quite see your point. The people who are carrying out the coordinating activities now usually are not the capitalists.For any company of moderate size, the market reaserch people, managers ,clerks, receptionists etc are all employees on salary. You seem to be saying in worker control entreprises everyone has to be a jack of all trade. That is certainly not true. A cooperative is not a one man operate small business(which is the model you have in mind).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Jan 02, 2005 00:10 AM
Bruce, I understand what you are saying. But it seems the discussions would be sort of pointless if you try to make the scope too wide. To carry out a discussion on freedom and domination in abstract philosphical terms would require an different framework altogether. For one thing, all your terms would need to be precisely defined before any conversation can proceed. Personally I think domination is a human condition if you want to use the word in its broadest sense(as understood by philosphers). Chances are everytime when you have two people interacting with each other one person would dominate even in the absence of any social structure(to varying degrees depending on the parties involved)A sort of though experiment is described in William Golding's "Lord of the flies". But I am not sure whether this is the kind of abstract discussion we want to get into. Among other things, I am afraid I am not qualified.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 01, 2005 23:49 PM
Further, Chomsky's post talked about whether freedom was a claim or a moral thesis. Chomsky says moral thesis and places the responsibility for justifying domination (slavery, patriarchy) on those who would dominate. Thus, my proposed reframing of this thread's argument would be to replace the capitalism v. socialism fight with a discussion of domination, especially economic, which seems to pass muster with US society, even be encouraged, and seems to be ever more confused with freedom itself. That is, "freedom" in the US seems to be some form of social-political-economic dominance. Anyway, I believe this reframing may be fruitful because I hope it will create a dialogue that can circumvent a useless "left-right" shouting match. FWIW.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 01, 2005 23:49 PM
I raise this observation because my interpretation of this thread's disagreement is over to what extent domination is necessary or reasonable, especially economic or market domination. realpc seems to think that as long as the marketplace isn't coercing or discriminating against one, then one is "free" (negative freedom) and any government intervention will result in "Berlin's paradox, whereby people can be 'forced to be free'". Robert Allen is clearly opposed to any market domination ("oppression, exploitation") whatsoever and proposes basically a democratic socialist intervention into the political economy to ameliorate the effects of capitalism, if not eliminate them altogether, a "positive freedom" project.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 01, 2005 23:48 PM
I would like to take up nohope's earlier despair regarding the meaning of freedom, iirc, and see if the issue of freedom can't be usefully reframed. [First, I would like to recommend Ian Carter's two-part "The Concept of Freedom", an excellent review: http://mason.gmu.edu/~ihs/hsrfall96.html#Freedom and http://mason.gmu.edu/~ihs/hsr/w96hsr.html#freedom] I wasn't very clear on the meaning of freedom until I counterposed what I think is its opposite -- domination. Now, I know what domination is, it's a form of human relationship, something individuals and groups do to and with each other. Importing this observation back into a meaning of freedom, one can reasonably see that freedom is a form of human relationship, in particular one that obeys at least two constraints. Constraint #1: the individual or group is not being dominated by others (independence); and Constraint #2: the individual or group is not dominating others (autonomy). If freedom is a form of relationship and if domination is freedom's opposite, then it seems to follow that these constraints must hold for a self-consistent concept of freedom to be possible.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Poemworld33, Bruce33 at Jan 01, 2005 23:47 PM
hi bwong, realpc, Robert Allen, r4d20, joeblogs56, et alia, I've been following this thread for a few days and it seems to have jelled into a socialists v. capitalists argument, and somewhat far afield of Chomsky's original post. It's also gotten somewhat tired, i.e. both sides' positions aren't moving and no one seems to be persuading the other.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 01, 2005 22:12 PM
(get)realpc, Another thing you don't get is, there is no PROFIT in our society, since profit entails exploitation, which is BANNED. There is economic competition only outside of the system that produces the goods and services that the workers need. So your imaginary carpenter, working outside of that system to supplement what he makes within it, may lose customers, but not his LIVING, because of competition from other carpenters. His living is GUARANTEED in virtue of the labor he contributes (perhaps as a carpenter perhaps as something else) to the above system. Marx's categories work just fine; it's your understanding of them that is flawed.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 01, 2005 20:02 PM
realpc, You just don't get it do you: there are no more CAPITALISTS in our society, there may be marketers, administrators, bookkeepers, supervisors, though. Is that supposed to be an objection to our view? If it was intended as such, then it's what philosophers call a "red herring"- an irrelevant point. The question now is, are you man enough to admit you made a mistake?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 01, 2005 17:38 PM
A self-employed carpenter, for example, has to advertise his business, find customers, determine prices, send out bills, etc. If he becomes a sub-contractor, the company that hires him will mark up the price and "steal" some of the carpenter's profits. If the carpenter hires helpers, he will "steal" some of their time. Obvious Marx's simple categories are no longer adequate, and probably never were.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Jan 01, 2005 17:31 PM
If workers own the means of production, they also have to determine what to produce and how much, and find customers. They also have to coordinate their activities and make sure everything fits together. In other words, workers who own the MOP become much more than workers. They become marketers, administrators. bookkeepers, supervisors.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Jan 01, 2005 04:09 AM
bwong, If I wasn't having so much fun ridiculing realpc and Todd, I would leave the task of refuting them in your eminently qualified hands. You are simply doing a bang up job of exposing the flaws in their position. Believe me, we are winning the ideological war here. What you are saying is so obviously true that the only reason a person would argue with you is that they have a vested interest in preserving the status quo. (Especially cogent is your analysis of the relation between technology and employment opportunities). Their "self-absorption," as you earlier put it, keeps them from seeing the truth.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 22:55 PM
Consider the following example. Before the cow was domesticated each farmer can only work a small plot of land. Then with the help of the cow the farmers realized they can vastly increase food production. Each farmer can now work 5 plots of land instead. You would think that means everyone would work less and live better. But instead one guy somehow managed to own all the cows and land. He then kicked everybody out of his land. In order to survive the farmers had to compet for "jobs" from the land lord. They had to work as many hours as they did before and for little pay. If they complain they would be let go because there are plenty of people desperate for a job. This is capitalism in a nutshell. In my view, the fact that human being have to justify their worth by proving their "usefulness" for capital is the core of capitalism's immorality.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 22:51 PM
The theme of progress was touched on by realpc and rdk20 earlier. I am all for it but it does not follow from any natural law that the advance of technology necessarily must lead to the marginalization of the "technology have nots" As a small boy in the 70's I remember reading futuristic books which predict naively that with labour saving devices there will be a general increase of leisure(hence greater freedom). Instead labour saving devices and machines are used as a weapon against the workforce. People are liberated into the oblivion of unemployemnt. Those who have jobs actually work harder and longer hours. People are forced to compet with technology. There is no natural law which dictates this is the necessary outcome of progress. This is the result of concentrate control of technology by the few.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 22:48 PM
Just to add to Robert Allen's post. Realpc says he is for giving welfare to those who cannot work. But welfare is not the utimate expression of our society's generosity(a mistake often made by wishy washy liberals). Far from it, welfare is necessary primarily because of the fact that workers have no control over the means of production. It is a kind of state sponsored charity that keeps the marginalized sedated so that they won't revolt or rob the rich.It is enough to keep the poor alive but not so much for any real independence. But of course welfare is still better than nothing at all if the basic struture of current system persists.An alternative would be prisons.The U.S is unique in widespread use of prison comparing to other advanced capitalist society

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 21:51 PM
Again, real(whoever you really are)pc, we are not advocating Big Gvt, but worker control of the MOP.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 19:28 PM
realpc Are you for or against theft? Should a person be allowed to confiscate the fruits of another person's labor? If opposing theft is extremism, then call me an extremist.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 17:57 PM
I think that we need welfare for those who can't work. I also think people should be left alone to live their lives, to the extent that this is possible. I think there is no freedom without economic freedom, and the more the central gov controls the economy the less freedom we have. I am not a libertarian, or a conservative. I believe in common sense and balance. I believe in having respect for individuals but I deeply distrust powerful groups.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 17:53 PM
I have never hated the US, but I have never seen it as perfect. I appreciate the ways in which our system has been successful, and I hope it will continue to improve. I feel strongly that no government, however well-intentioned, can be trusted. I recognize that we need a central government, mainly for the functions listed in the US constitution.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 17:50 PM
I never belonged to any extreme group. I have never believed in extreme capitalism or extreme socialism. I have never believed in simple solutions, and I have always thought that revolutions should be avoided if at all possible. I think that fanatical socialists and fanatical capitalists are both well-intentioned, but wrong.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 09:40 AM
It should say 'You are gd right ...' at the beginning of my last post. In an earlier post, it should read 'acquiescing in evil'.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 09:24 AM
Your goddamn right there are pleny of people who SIMPLY can't acquire the job skills needed to succeed in today's job market. But, as usual, you straw man my view. I didn't say such individuals are retarded or that I'm superior to them: in God's eyes, which is what counts, we are all =. (Ask the readers of this thread who comes off as more arrogant: you or me.) But it's a fact- many people simply cannot do complicated technical tasks or even tasks that the capitalists values highly. (Liberal arts teaching is demanding; but it surely does not pay well.) You deny this in order to justify blaming those who are not successful. I'm the one, on the other hand, who maintains that all labor has dignity. Plus, as bwong pointed out, if everyone did acquire a Ph.D. or MA or MBA or JDA, etc. we not only would no longer have auto mechanics, store clerks, and short order cooks, but professionals would no longer be in great demand, driving down their salaries. The individuals I'm concerned with don't need govt. assistance; they need worker control of the MOP. And I do care for them, you asshole.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 09:03 AM
bwong, real(the coward)pc is the master of the straw man. Isn't it fun beating up on pseudointellectuals like him, especially when they espouse pernicious views? Just think of all the sharp minds out there laughing at our portrayal of his stupidity. We are like Socrates with the Athenian youths who followed him around in the Agora as he interrogated the pompous fools of his day.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 07:20 AM
"You're worried about people who can't acquire the job skills to escape poverty. " So what's wrong with the "socialist" idea of free education and training? It is the most effective way to help everyone to acquire skill. But on a more metaphysical point: Even if everybody has the "job skills" you will still need burger flippers and garbage collector. Only difference is you may need a Ph.D to work at walmart if everyone has a Ph.D. No one can be rich without a lot of poor people in the kind of raw capitalist system you champion. "Job skills" have nothing to do with it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 07:06 AM
"People want to be challenged, they want to feel they can contribute to society and be useful. All of us have great potential." Do you consider working for the military industrial complex "useful" and is a way to contribute to society? At least a bum doesn't do any harm. There is very little correlation between "usefulness" and remuneration in the real world. You distribe about "leftists" wanting to treat adults like children by building some kind of nanny state is just a strawman argument. It is the far right who want to encroach on citizens' personal morality and choices. Speaking of the right, isn't it odd that the strongest proponents of social Darwinism are actually dead against Darwinism in biology class where it properly belongs? Joeblog, I was just making a rhetoric points about realpc's swing from one position to the extreme opposite regarding the Western civilization. I don't think the Eastern bloc was ever communist.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 05:33 AM
You want to treat strong healthy adults as if they were retarded children. Even retarded children deserve more respect than that. People want to be challenged, they want to feel they can contribute to society and be useful. All of us have great potential. Yours is the typically leftist idea that some people (especially the leftists) are smart and capable, but the vast majority are too dumb to learn job skills.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 05:27 AM
Robert Allen, You're worried about people who can't acquire the job skills to escape poverty. This betrays your lack of respect for those you supposedly want to fight for. You actually think people are poor because they are somehow intellectually inferior. These inferior individuals need the loving care of a strong parental government.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 04:23 AM
"Years ago I saw mostly the faults of Western civ, until I started becoming interested in science and technology. Now I can see the amazing creativity that's going on, along with the craziness and chaos." realpc Talking about extremism. I have never viewed the "Westrn Civilization" as all good or all bad. It's kind of like the former communists in Eastern Europe suddenly become the most fervent worshipers of the free market. Also, other "non Western" civilizations such as the medieval Arabic civilization also contributed greatly to that amazing creativity.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 04:00 AM
"The creativity you see is part and parcel with horrible injustice, which does not trouble you enough to rage against the system.." I beg to differ. Horrible injustice occurs because of the horrible social order. Even without the scientific know how human beings manage to inflict great cruelty to each other.. It didn't take a lot of advanced technology to carry out genocides in all the great civilizations before us. Mordern scientific knowledge also saves a lot of lives in the form of medicine.The calamity in Southern Asia may have been averted if they have the Tsuinami detecting and warning systems in place. There is also a distinction between science and technology, which is often overlooked. Science in its most innocent form, is the quest of knolwedge, motivated by awe and curiosity.The deployment of technology, on the other hand, is mainly a political decision. The great 19th centry French physcist and mathematician Henri Poncare' wrote that the scientist studied nature not because he wanted to exploit her, but because he was seduced by her beauty and majesty.I think anyone who has studied the natural sciences would agree.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 03:29 AM
realpc, The Nazis designed and built the Autobahn. The creativity you see is part and parcel with horrible injustice, which does not trouble you enough to rage against the system. (And spare me the advice, I have spiritual resources that allow me to fight the good fight instead of acquiecsing with, evil as you do.) We could have the former without the latter, which makes capitalism evil and you wicked.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 03:11 AM
"Do they deserve to live in squalor simply because they cannot acquire the skills needed to be a success in today's job market? Of course not." Another thing these guys(realpc and r4dk20) don't grapse(inspite of their Ph.Ds) is that if everyone has a PH.D they would be paid minimal wage(if they are lucky) in no time. In our kind of system some people manage to stay ahead because there are enough who are left behind. I always have a good chuckle when I hear a "successful" person lecturing smugly to the not so successful that they should all imitate him and become successful like himself. In nature there is conservation of energy, in the capitalist system there is a conservation of losers. It is almost like a zero sum game, at least to first approximation.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 31, 2004 03:02 AM
"r4d20 is not being exploited. He is involved in scientific research, which is a cooperative effort, motivated by natural human curiosity. Scientists must work together and share their results. This is part of the joy of being alive, something I doubt you could understand." This is something that I definitely can relate to because I am in a similar situation. What I find objectionable is his aspiration to work for the "military -industrial complex". I think that is worse than prostitution. At least prostitution doesn't lead to mass murder.Worse still, he makes his choice consciously.(Unlike, say, the scientist in terminatorII who has no clue about the consequence of his work)

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 03:01 AM
real(the coward)pc, Exploitation means being paid less than the value of on's labor. That is what happens to every worker WHETHER HE/SHE ENJOYS HIS/HER WORK OR NOT. Exploitation is not the same thing as hating your job. The fact that you can't grasp this most basic of points shows that your Ph.D does not entail expertise in philosophy, which, in case you didn't realize it, is the subject @ hand.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 02:52 AM
Todd, The other thing you and realpc fail to realize is that it's not all about you. We're all glad that you made a successful career change. But there are millions of people who are not as fortunate as you. Do they deserve to live in squalor simply because they cannot acquire the skills needed to be a success in today's job market? Of course not.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 02:12 AM
And by the way, I did not have special advantages. I worked like mad to get a Ph.D. and learn job skills. I am not a typical American and don't care about buying tons of gadgets. I love learning and I appreciate the chance this society has given me, and millions of others, to get an education without coming from a rich family.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 02:07 AM
Our society does need a lot of work, and each of us probably needs a lot of work as well. But seeing only the faults and constantly getting enraged is a good way to waste your life.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 02:05 AM
Years ago I saw mostly the faults of Western civ, until I started becoming interested in science and technology. Now I can see the amazing creativity that's going on, along with the craziness and chaos.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 31, 2004 02:03 AM
r4d20 is not being exploited. He is involved in scientific research, which is a cooperative effort, motivated by natural human curiosity. Scientists must work together and share their results. This is part of the joy of being alive, something I doubt you could understand. Western civ has many faults, but science and technology are its great accomplishments.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 31, 2004 01:43 AM
Todd, You are a fool. You could be exercising your hard earned skills without being exploited, that is, you could earn the full value of your labor. But you don't seem to mind giving away the fruits of your labor to strangers. That makes you a fool even if you like what you are doing.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 31, 2004 01:02 AM
Robert, Maybe I am a fool. Different people see things differently. I used to spend 10 hours a day doing crap, so I CHOSE to leave my job and go back to school. Now I'm a research assistant who likes his hours and works on stuff I like. After I get my PhD I expect to work for the Military-Industrial complex on other problems that I like to work on. Maybe I'm serving evil oppressors, but I'm doing what I like to do. Call me oppressed. Call me a fool. I'm enjoying myself.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 23:19 PM
Todd, "The oppressors pay me so I get something back." This is an ignorant statement: you work 5-7 hrs each day without compensation: what you make during that time belongs to the oppressors. They have stolen more from you than all the crackheads in the world.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 23:11 PM
realpc, There you go again generalizing from your own employment experiences. You don't take other peoples' points. bwong and I have both pointed out to you that your case is not like the case of millions of other workers, who lack the advantages that you enjoy.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 23:08 PM
Todd, I'm not going to "chill" when I'm the victim of capitalist evildoers along with millions of my fellow human beings. It is not a abstract metaphysical concern but an urgent matter we are considering here and just in case there are youngsters reading this blog I want to make it perfectly clear that you and realpc (who still lacks the guts to identify himself) are FOOLS.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 21:51 PM
“If you subscribe to a one dimensional view of humanity then indeed the logical conclusion would be "nohope".” But we are not talking about how people act. We are talking about what a rational person could reasonable expect from a specific structural paradigm in which people act. That is why it's reasonable to ask how “desirability and necessity of governments” are. After all governments are a system in which human action and inaction become mitigated. If we are talking about freedom, the freedom to be kind to others, or the freedom to exploit; the structure of our social paradigm will effect our decisions as much if not more than any exercise of free will. It becomes hard to even talk about free will and freedom with any real meaning or without sarcasm as long as we live under oppressive social institutions, whether they be patriarchy, racism, capitalism, statism…etc.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 21:19 PM
I just want to add that real people don't function like protitype "Capitalist", "socialist" or "anarchists". This are just caricatures in the dreams of "intelectuals". Real people are more complicated. Consistency is attainable only for robots and computers. That's why discussions and dialogues are not fultile. If you subscribe to a one dimensional view of humanity then indeed the logical consclusion would be "nohope".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 21:10 PM
"This is the problem of intellectuals; they spend their time concerned with dreams that have no bases in reality." nohope I am not sure how it is more realistic to discuss the desirability and necessity of governments. You sound a lot more like an "intellectual" than I am if intellectuials are someone who " spend their time concerned with dreams that have no bases in reality." BTW, I don't consider myself an "intellectual", a "pseudo-intellectual" maybe. I am also not very interested in playing the "I am more radical than you" game. Have a good one.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 21:08 PM
“Obviously I benefit from taking care of other people - but ONLY if those other people also play by the rules.” But the rules of capitalism don't include “taking care of other people” so it is not them who is breaking the rules but rather you who are. “Unfortunatly there ARE people who will do nothing but exploit the kindness and generosity of others.” It's not unfortunate its systemic. It's the principal rule of capitalism. “If I had to work to provide for societies crackheads I would get nothing back for m pain because they would never return my generosity.” But you do work for a societies crack heads if by crack heads you mean you are supporting a class of people who are getting a free ride. That class is called the supper rich.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 20:59 PM
Isn't democratic government an oxymoron? I'm talking about how any government does behave. “democratic government SHOULD behave” according to what laws of nature? This is the problem of intellectuals; they spend their time concerned with dreams that have no bases in reality. The question is not how should government behave. The question is what will it take to get government to behave in accordance to our needs and desires? Is it even desirable or necessary to have a government?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 30, 2004 20:57 PM
bwong, I benefit from fire departments and from clean drinking water, so of course I support them. I benefit from not having starving people willing to kill me for food money - so I support welfare (to a point). Obviously I benefit from taking care of other people - but ONLY if those other people also play by the rules. Unfortunatly there ARE people who will do nothing but exploit the kindness and generosity of others. They will take and take and give nothing back to society. I will oppose any system that ignores this and asks me to work for others regardless of what they do for me. At leasts the oppressors pay me so I get something back. If I had to work to provide for societies crackheads I would get nothing back for m pain because they would never return my generosity.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 20:50 PM
nohope, I am talking about what a democratic government SHOULD behave. I think you missed the point.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 20:43 PM
“Liberaion, like ALL THINGS, is SUBJECTIVE AND RELATIVE. One mans liberation is another mans prison. I object to forcing one's vision of liberation on anyone - because it will be a prison to many of those affected.” But the blog dose not talk about “forcing one's vision of liberation on anyone” it talks about the moral high ground of an argument, not of actions

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 20:38 PM
“I see no reason why shouldn't we expect the government to provide a supportive environment (education, health etc)for the citizens to flourish.” Well there is one big reason, which is that governments don't have a very good track record when they are asked to act on people's expectations. “This is the job of the government!” Not true. Governments have long shown that their job has been to protect the interests of the governing elite. The US government was established to protect and represent propertied, white, males. Any further activities that the US government has assumed it has assumed through coercion, usually via grass roots direct action.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 20:37 PM
“Is it a realistic expectation or infantile whish that the government should take care of safe drinking water and highway safety?” I would say it's a wish since government generally exists not by the will of the governed but by the will of the governors. “Is it a childish fantasy to expect the fire department to come to the rescue when your house is burning down?” That really depends on whether you are an active member of the fire department or community if the fire department is a community service. It's irrational to expect others to help you if you don't help them.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 30, 2004 20:37 PM
"No matter how systemic lack of freedom is, the moral high ground belongs to those who argue for liberation" This misses the point ENTIRELY. Liberaion, like ALL THINGS, is SUBJECTIVE AND RELATIVE. One mans liberation is another mans prison. I object to forcing one's vision of liberation on anyone - because it will be a prison to many of those affected. I don't support every aspect of our current economy - REAL sweatshops suck and REAL exploitation DOES happen and I support measures to stop it. But scrapping he entire system is NOT something I will ever support. So rage on man. Scream and shout and insult me for being "Evil". I laugh at you for even believing in Good and Evil. All is Tao.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 20:24 PM
There is a difference between a "bum" and a "bohemian". If you're unemployed and without any saving to live on you're a bum, a bohemian has money in addition to his free time.The difference is security. The "bum", in my view, is not free. Most Europeans do not think they are in any way less free than Americans. I draw the line when the government interferes with personal choices and morality. But this is almost the exclusive domain of the religious right(who alledgely is for "small government") Speaking of "freedom" and "big governmnet" you should write to Bush about the patriot act other insanities in the name "security.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 20:23 PM
The fact is, there cannot be any "freedom" without certain degree of security. If you have to work 60 hrs a week or you may end up in the street I don't see any "freedom" in that. "Freedom" doesn't just means a lot of free time(as being unemployed), it means plenty of options to use your free time. If you have no security you have no option and hence no freedom.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 20:21 PM
"The desire to have the government take care of us is natural, I guess. As children we get used being provided for. But children have no freedom..." I suppose it all depends on what you mean by "taking care of". Is it a realistic expectation or infantile whish that the government should take care of safe drinking water and highway safety? Is it a childish fantasy to expect the fire department to come to the rescue when your house is burning down? I see no reason why shouldn't we expect the government to provide a supportive enviroment(education, health etc)for the citizens to flourish. This is the job of the government! You talk as if "freedom" and "security" are opposite to each other(no doubt from reading too much Ayn Rant).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 30, 2004 20:21 PM
"How about you r4d20 (another coward who's afraid to reveal his/her identity)?" I always post under r4d20. IT has nothing to do with fear. You need to chill man. -Todd Olsen

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 30, 2004 20:20 PM
Some of you REALLY need to relax. If you can't be civil to someone whom you disagree with you have not learned the FIRST lesson of adulthood.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Xihatemegux, Nohope at Dec 30, 2004 19:57 PM
I have to say I find this entire discussion beside the point. As I read it the question is not how do we become free, clearly ever person has their own idea of freedom and understands the limitations and obstacles differently. The question is what has the moral high ground. Those who argue for greater freedom or those who argue for the status quo. No matter how systemic lack of freedom is, the moral high ground belongs to those who argue for liberation. Whether that liberation is from governments, from social norms, or from the forces of nature themselves. The balancing act it seams to me is in understanding that at times our gain is others loss. Ultimately I believe our individual self interests are best served by cooperation in achieving our goals rather than competition. http://www.alfiekohn.org/

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 19:54 PM
"Health insurance has become unaffordable partly because expensive new medical technologies are constantly developed" But you only see one side of the coin. If medicine is primarily sold as a comdodity there is an incentive to opt for costy procedures and high tech solutions even though cheaper alternatives exists. The U.S is the ONLY developed country in the world that does not have some form of universal health coverage for its citizens. It also happens, --not coincidently,--that the U.S's system is the most expensive in the world.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 19:54 PM
The desire to have the government take care of us is natural, I guess. As children we get used being provided for. But children have no freedom. I do think the government has to be responsible for helping individuals in desperate need. But as the US founders understood, putting too much faith in any government is a great mistake.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 19:50 PM
I have had various jobs and careers in my life, and often lived below what is considered poverty by the American standard. I often wished I could be provided for somehow, rather than constantly having to figure out how to survive in this rather treacherous system. But the treacherous system, like the natural system it is part of, takes care of us if we trust God and accept responsibility.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 19:46 PM
I also have my own business, and I can never predict what the profits will be. If I wanted to be less secure but more free I could quit working for the organization and depend entirely on the unpredictable profits of my business.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 19:44 PM
There are companies, however, where workers do get a share of the profits. But even when they don't, there is some degree of fairness. The high level directors have more responsibility and in general they probably work harder, since they have more to worry about. If you want an equal share of the profits, you should accept an equal amount of responsibility.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 19:42 PM
You have no obligation to work for someone you feel is stealing your time. You can own a business and, instead of hiring workers, share all the profits with them. I happen to work for a non-profit, so by your definition I am not exploited. However, even if there were a profit I would not feel exploited just because I don't share it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 18:13 PM
realpc, Your argument is like saying a mugger isn't stealing from his would be victim becase, after all, the latter can try to flee or fight back.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 18:03 PM
realpc, Workers MUST have their time stolen; otherwise there is no profit. If the values of labor and compensation were =, there would be no profit, which is the difference between the value of labor and its compensation. Force exists here because the worker and his would be oppressors realize that he can quit as many jobs as he likes but he can never make a living anywhere without being paid less than the value of his labor. (And don't give me that bs about being self-employed, to which I have already responded.) Anyone who is exploited is a worker whether he makes 10 dollars/hr or 6 million/year. Some workers, however, such as managers, throw in their lots with the capitalists and oppress their fellow workers. You simply refuse to acknowledge this basic fact to preserve your idealogy.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 16:47 PM
I believe that most of what the medical industry provides is useless or harmful. People have been brainwashed by the medical PR. In fact, they have not made our lives healthier and longer. We all need basic medical coverage, the rest should be optional. The health insurance crisis would probably evaporate if this were recognized.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 16:44 PM
Regarding health insurance: Health insurance has become unaffordable partly because expensive new medical technologies are constantly developed. If a treatment exists, however expensive, everyone feels they have a right to it. Therefore, health insurance prices will continue to rise. I only want catastrophic health insurance for myself, which should be much cheaper, but my employer does not provide that option.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 16:39 PM
Now, workers who get themselves into debt by spending too much and having more children than they can afford often feel trapped and oppressed by their jobs. When the economy is slow and jobs are scarce workers have less freedom. But so do managers and employers -- everyone has more freedom during prosperous times.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 16:36 PM
Even the highest level executives are employees, so we cannot define workers as employees. And there are all those in between categories, all the levels of management, all the self-employed workers, etc. The second problem with your syllogism is that in the US workers, however they are defined, are free to quit their jobs. However tyrannical a company might be, however cruel the boss, workers always remember they are free to leave.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 16:33 PM
Workers in the US do not generally have their time stolen by capitalists. First, there is no clear division between workers and capitalists. Is the manager of a department a worker or a capitalist? Is a self-employed carpenter a worker or a capitalist?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 08:18 AM
"Consider India, for example, which is developing an educated hi-tech middle class" Yes, comparing to the vast majority of the country imporvished by world bank and IMF policies. Even under a slavery there are a few "house slaves" who were better off comparing to the rest.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 08:05 AM
"But most people I know have more gratitude than Robert Allen and others in this blog. The depth of Chomsky's ingratitude is mind-boggling. It's a shame he never appreciated his life" realpc Perhaps Chomsky can see pass his own navel, unlike the crowd you hang with? Incidentally, if you have actually read Chomsky he does acknowledge the good aspects of the U.S. For example, it is relatively free to desent. But isn't it ironic that people like Chomsky are routinely smeared for exercising the very right that their detractors agree to be what sets the democratic West apart from dictatorships? "The goal of the neo-cons is not to impoverish and exploit and terrorize. That may be the result of some of their policies, but the general motivation is probably idealistic" How do you know? Because they say so? Instead of criticizing Chomsky for stupid reasons maybe you should actually read some of his books. The policy makers are actually very candid about their intentions, at least to the right audience. Chomsky did a very good job in documenting these candid moments.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 07:27 AM
For the uninitiated, let me explain how the philosophy game is played, since we are addressing here a philosophical question. I put forth an argument, it went something like this: 1. Workers have their time stolen by capitalists. 2. Theft is evil. 3. Thus, capitalist are evildoers. The argument is obviously valid, you must accept the conclusion if you accept the premises. Thus, it is incumbent upon my opponents to refute one of the premises. 2 is obvious; thus to avoid accepting my conclusion you must refute 1. realpc has failed miserably at this task, if he has even tried to accomplish it, rather than repeat slogans or tell me how HE- the great and mighty professional- does not feel exploited. Are there any other takers out there? How about you r4d20 (another coward who's afraid to reveal his/her identity)? You want to try to refute me so that I can make you look as foolish as I've made realpc look? Foolish, that is, to workers with consciences, the only people whose opinions matter to me.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 06:35 AM
realpc, You presumptuous fool. You probably do not know the 1st thing about Prof. Chomsky attitude toward life. I know for sure that you do not know me. Yet, there you are, maintaining it's all sour grapes on my part, I have no REASON to be ungrateful. But, what should I be grateful for? That I am not exploited as badly as someone working in a 3rd World sweatshop? Gimme a break.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 06:28 AM
realpc, You attack my motives and the motives of Prof. Chomsky because you are incapable of meeting our arguments. Show me that exploitation is not evil or shut up.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 06:24 AM
realpc, You don't even have the guts to post under your real name (no pun intended). I on the other hand, WANT people know I stand for, my peers as well as those workers to come. Because, brother, someday right thinking people are going to look at folks like you the way most people now view the defenders of plantation slavery (the precursor of the form of slavery now practiced in this country). And I want to make darn sure that they don't lump me in with your ilk.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 06:01 AM
realpc, Now you are going to stoop to ad hominen attacks? You are a real a-hole.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 04:47 AM
And some of the most horrific acts of communists were motivated by idealism, as well. What I mean is that exploitation is seldom a conscious goal, although it may often be an unintended effect.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 04:43 AM
The goal of the neo-cons is not to impoverish and exploit and terrorize. That may be the result of some of their policies, but the general motivation is probably idealistic.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 04:41 AM
The neo-cons may be naive and ethno-centric, but their intentions are at least indirectly humanitartian. They want the world to be prosperous and democratic, since prosperous and humane nations are less prone to violence.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 04:34 AM
Consider India, for example, which is developing an educated hi-tech middle class.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 04:33 AM
The third world is another story, where poverty and exploitation are horrendous by any imaginable standards. Whether this can all be blamed on the advanced nations is far from certain. Well-meaning interventions like modern medicine contributed by increasing population. Colonialism has of course been extremely damaging. But what the US is doing now with respect to the third world cannot be simply described as exploitation.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 03:56 AM
But most people I know have more gratitude than Robert Allen and others in this blog. The depth of Chomsky's ingratitude is mind-boggling. It's a shame he never appreciated his life.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 03:54 AM
Human beings are never satisfied, especially if the next person seems better off. Eight-hour days were unheard of 100 years ago, but now it seems like too much. There was no indoor plumbing or heat, no electric lights, etc. etc. The comfort almost all of us have today, even those living below the poverty line, does not always result in contentment.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 03:49 AM
In the advanced countries, most people certainly are not losers. Most of us have much more than we need to survive, even more than we need to survive well. The dissatisfaction results from seeing that someone else has more. The great difference between the richest and the poorest in the US results from extreme heights of wealth, not from extreme depts of poverty.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 02:51 AM
BTW, social Darwinism is social construct, not a law of nature. According to real Darwinism he who leave the most offsprings are the "fittest". If you want to talk about "law of nature" the high income childless yuppie couple is a evolutionary deadend while the stereotypical(and mythical) welfare mom with 100 kids should be your model to emulate

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 02:48 AM
"Why should jobs that could be done by trained monkeys pay well?" Why should the difficulty of the job be the only determining factor for compensation? Most of humanity can live quite well without computer programmers or accountants. But let's see what happen if there is no garbage service for a few weeks. A more basic question, what is the purpose of a society? Does an economy exist just to reward a few based on whatever arbitrary definitions of "talent" , or does it exist to serve the need of the largest number of people? If the rules of the gam somehow result in most people being losers and the grotesque disproportional distribution of income and wealth as we have today , then, to me, it is obvious that the rules need to be changed. No matter what criteria of "merit" you employ,no matter what pseudoscientific doctrine you use to create the rules, the outcome alone is enough to prove that the rules are whack out. To paraphrase Jesus, the economy exists to serve man, not the other way around. .

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 02:22 AM
I did not say a European style social contract is the optimnal solution to the problems you and others raise here. I was just saying this is one school of thought, which may be more attractive to people who don't necessarily see the employment status as inherently "exploitative", but nevertheless agree that system can be made more humane. I did not say this should be our utilmate goal(you obviously have sometyhing way more radical in mind). But this is at least more attainable in the short run than "getting rid of all exploitations"(I don't know how you can even start when many people don't even think they are exploited!) Incidentally, with all the neolibral assaults we will be lucky to keep whatever fragment of a social contract that we have. I am sorry if I have not explained myself very well.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 30, 2004 02:16 AM
"Re. your suggestion, why should workers have to beg the members of the ruling class for justice? Why should the exercise of basic rights be contingent upon the good will of rulers? "Robert Allen That is not my suggestion. If I understand you correctly you're referring to what I said about social contract. Even though the social contract in Western Europe(it is slowly eroding since the 90's)acknowledges the sovereignty of capital, it is not result of the ruler's kindness. It represents a compromise(abeit in the ruler's favour) after intense and protracted struggles. Many aristocratic heads rolled during the French revolution. I certainly would not characterize that as "begging".

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 02:10 AM
If you don't want the capitalists to steal your time you can work for yourself.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 02:02 AM
realpc, You obviously do not have a problem with workers haivng their time stolen, which is a horrible injustice that goes on all around you everyday. Your bs about nature suggests that this state of affairs is inevitable and that I am "infantile" for opposing it. But, again, I have argued that this is not so and you have ignored what I said. We simply do NOT have to work more than 3-4 per day, given modern technology. That is a fact (see "The Overworked American, by Juliet Schor, if you don't believe me). The only reason that we do is so that capitalists can profit from our labor- which is EVIL. I am not being infantile objecting to the theft of my time any more than MLK and his followers were being infantile in demanding their rights. People said the same sort of warped things about the inevitabilty of bigotry to them as you are saying to me re. the plight of working people.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 00:40 AM
There is horrible exploitation and injustice in this world. I have not said anything to suggest that I approve of injustice. Fortunately I live in the US where citizens have legal rights.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 00:38 AM
The world is not going to conform to your desire to work 3 or 4 hours a day. Most of us modify our desires and learn self-discipline. We find a compromise between what we want and what we can possibly attain. Only infants expect all their needs to be instantly filled by others. We gradually learn that life is what it is, that there are certain facts of natural and human ecology that you cannot get around.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 30, 2004 00:34 AM
We are part of the natural world. We do not own it, nor do we govern it. We are fortunate to be here, however difficult it seems at times. The natural world has its laws, and we have no power to change them. Call it wicked social Darwinism if you like, but nature balances both cooperation and competition. If you don't like it, maybe you should try a different universe.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 00:29 AM
r4d20, "Why should jobs that could be done by trained monkeys pay well? The slow antelopes get eaten by the cheetahs, and the skilless laborers get eaten by the system. That is how we have gone from bacteria to humans over 3 billion years. It seems immoral to us only because we are misguided and not in tune with the laws of nature." Your Social Darwinism is simply WICKED. We are not animals, you heartless fool. We are OBLIGED, unlike animals, to treat justly the members of our species. All labor has dignity, as MLK said. You think you are so much better than those doing menial labor. Why don't you try a little humility for a change?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 00:20 AM
ProleUK, I tried to raise realpc's consciousness, but it is impossible. He is much to "self-absorbed," as bwong noted. Thus, all I can do now is make sure that he does not warp the minds of others with his pathetic attempts at defending the indefensible. I am writing for those open-minded young people out there who come to Prof. Chomsky blog seeking to understand why their world is so f-ed up.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 30, 2004 00:13 AM
r4d20, So now I have another obscurantist to contend with? realpc IS thick-headed or as my teachers used to say "he is in the grips of a false theory." He refuses to acknowledge that workers should not have their time stolen. And like realpc, you simply do not care about non-professionals, as bwong pointed out. Not everyone can be a professional and non-professionals deserve to exploited no more than professionals do. Moreover, even professionals are exploited. A slave who can choose his master is still a slave. You also set up straw men. What I want is not "total freedom," but to work 3-4 hours for society each day, which is what it has been estimated each adult must work so that all the goods and services we need are produced. And then to be left alone.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 23:32 PM
So any non-capitalist system must offer me as much as a capitalist one to support it. I certainly have no plans to work solely for the benefit of others without expecting them to help me too when I need it.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 23:31 PM
But, let me say, cooperation has evolved throughout nature too - but only when it benefits individuals as well as "the group". PERFECT altruism is simply not found in nature. Seemingly altruistic behavior is - but closer inspection shows that these behaviors actually benefit the individuals as well, so it is really not altruistic. It is cooperative behavior based on the SELF INTEREST of all parties. I help others not simply because I think it is "right" - but because they will help me too when I need it. That is what a friend is - someone who you help and who will help you. I do NOT help people who refuse to help me. You wanna be selfless - go give a crackhead some money, because when you need it he will certainly NOT give you any. (I know this first hand).

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 23:25 PM
I won't deny that real "exploitation" happens. It does. But simply having to work for someone in exchange for money is NOT, by itself, exploitation. I have skills that few other people have, so I barter these skills to people in return for other things I needs. I am been in situations where I was the one in demand and employers where trying to outbid each other to get me - why should I feel exploited? Poor people are "exploited" when they have no valuable skills - when they have nothing to offer except their bodies to do jobs that anyone can do. Any fool can work an assembly line - so they obviously don't pay much. Why should jobs that could be done by trained monkeys pay well? The slow antelopes get eaten by the cheetahs, and the skilless laborers get eaten by the system. That is how we have gone from bacteria to humans over 3 billion years. It seems immoral to us only because we are misguided and not in tune with the laws of nature. ALL IS TAO.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 23:11 PM
"Why can't you get that through your thick head? My time on this Earth belongs to no one but me. It is a gift from God that I must decide how to spend. I do not want to spend it making strangers wealthy. If you don't mind being exploited, you are stupider than I thought. " 1)realpc hasn't called anyone names - you call him thick-headed. Come on! You can't fix the world and neither can realpc, so there is no need to get angry over this stuff. Discussion and Persuasion, not name calling, is what this place is here for. 2) You ARE free to do what you want with your time - IF you are willing to do without other things. You seem to want it both ways - total freedom to do what you want when you want, but without having to forgo the material goods that it takes money to buy. In the words of the neighbor on "Office Space" : "Shit man. You don't need to be rich to do nothing. My cousin is broke and he don't do sh*t". You can always have freedom to do what you want - what you CAN'T always have is that freedom AND all the material goods you want.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Moxy, Proleuk at Dec 29, 2004 23:07 PM
First off Mr Chomsky thank you, It is heartening to read the final words on women's rights. I look forward with hope that we can one day use the same final paragraph to describe slave/worker/poor rights. I fear we've been taking backward steps in this area for some time and have almost completely undone any earlier hard won victories. Reading the comments here it appears they started a little askew and have ended up a country mile off course with realpc somehow becoming the main topic of conversation here. Could we not instead of attacking and insinuating all sorts against realpc now take and use a little of what Mr Chomsky says in the piece and perhaps help 'raise the conciousness' of realpc? So he might understand that along with the vast majority of the planet's population he is also being oppressed and exploited?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 23:03 PM
"Many people, especially white collar workers in skilled professions, do not see their relationship with their employers as an exploitative one, but rather a kind of symbiotic relationship. " Exactly. I have certain skills that are in demand. I am willing to exchange those skills for compensation. I don't see this as exploitation - even in a non-capitalist society I assume that my skills would be used and I would be compensated, but at least under capitalism I am not forced to work for any particular employer or for any fixed wage. I can make as much as I can haggle out of peoplewho want my skills.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 29, 2004 22:30 PM
realpc, Instead of having to choose "how one is exploited," exploitation should be done away with altogether. (Would slavery be more acceptable to you if some slaves could chose their masters?) There is a huge difference between the demands of Nature ("hav(ing) to work" in this sense) and the demands of a profit seeking employer. Thus, one need not and should not have to spend one's time working to make capitalists wealthier. Why can't you get that through your thick head? My time on this Earth belongs to no one but me. It is a gift from God that I must decide how to spend. I do not want to spend it making strangers wealthy. If you don't mind being exploited, you are stupider than I thought.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 29, 2004 22:16 PM
bwong realpc is an arrogant person who is defending the indefensible: exploitation. He refuses to acknowledge the basic fact that workers have their time stolen from them by their employers. It's just ludicrous to say that "workers exploit their employers." He deserves all the scorn I can muster and then some. Even supposing he is right about professionals, what about about the billions of non-professionals in this world? What about people working in sweatshops? Re. your suggestion, why should workers have to beg the members of the ruling class for justice? Why should the exercise of basic rights be contingent upon the good will of rulers?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 29, 2004 22:15 PM
He strikes me as too self absorbed. Reading realcp conjures up in my mind someone who goes to India, stays in the most glamourous city, lives in an upscale neighbourhood inhabited by yuppies and hangs out at expensive nighclubs. The man then concludes, from his own experience that India is an unparalleled economical success.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 29, 2004 22:03 PM
My main critique of realpc is he seems to think of his relative privilege situation is somehow typical. Well, it is not even in the context of North America.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 29, 2004 21:45 PM
While leftists may not like this positition and what it leads to, but they must acknolwegde this is a legitimate one.If you disagree with it, expose its weaknesses by all means but I don't think you should attempt to browbeat skeptics like realpc to your point of view. There is no need for such hostility and it is not conductive to a meaningful dialogue. PS While I disagree with many things realpc says,I think he is thoughtful and civil in making his points. I would not call him a rightwing nut like some insinuate here. You want to meet some real nuts check out the more "main stream" sites.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 29, 2004 21:43 PM
It would be a social contract which safeguards the economical rights of the workers, while acknowleding the reality of private owenship and the commodification of labour. This is the model of Western Europe countries since WWII. It is ironic that these countries are often mistaken as "socialist. Quite the opposite, a social contract which spells out the obligations of the ruling class is possible only if you acknowledge that such a class exists and accord to it all the privileges which is entitled to. In North America we don't have such a social contract because class consciouness is not as entrenched, in part because in reality North America society does allow greater social mobility(comparing to Europe) and this fact is often exaggerated to the degree that many people are too clueless to even notice there is a ruling class. How else would you explain the widespread perception of Bush as a "common man"- as if stupidity is the sole characteristic of the common man?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 29, 2004 21:42 PM
I think I sort of understand realpc's points here. Many people, especially white collar workers in skilled professions, do not see their relationship with their employers as an exploitative one, but rather a kind of symbiotic relationship. I would even venture to say that perhaps most people would not particularly upset with "waged slavery" as long as there is enough money and residual freedom availiable for private pursuits.To those in this position "exploitation" is a philosophical abstraction. If one subscribes to this perspective the logical goal would not be to eliminate "exploitation" or private control of means of production.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 20:06 PM
And if we spend less than we earn, eventually we might be free to stop working. This is easier in the US than Western Europe, since our income tax is lower.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 20:03 PM
Everyone wants more time to spend doing things they enjoy. Most of us have to work, so we try to choose a career or job we don't hate. Fortunately this society allows everyone to choose how they will be exploited.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 20:00 PM
or would rather do something else, I am free to leave. The deal I have is similar to the arrangements of most Americans with their employers. Yes workers and employers "exploit" each other. The alternative is to be self-employed, and we are free to choose that alternative. But then you have less financial security and a lot more worries.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 19:57 PM
I have a deal with my employer that seems fair enough to me. I do what they tell me 40 hours a week and I get a paycheck. The directors and managers worry about all kinds of things like the financial health of the organization, leaving me free to worry about my limited responsibilities. Any time they feel I am no longer of value they can ask me to leave, and any time I feel I would rather be somewhere else,

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 29, 2004 19:47 PM
realpc, You can't prove a word of your armchair psychologizing. Again, you are just shooting your mouth off, failing to respond to the objections to your earlier false claims. You accused Prof. Chomsky's supporters of believing in a false dichotomy. I asked you to acknowledge this mistake before you went on to make other claims. But did you? No, you arrogantly ignored my legitimate request and proceeded to assert further falsehoods. The fact is, outlawing exploitation would increase, not decrease, our freedom, as we would have more time to spend doing the things we enjoy (not having to spend 5 hours or more each working day profiting our employers). We are not suggesting a return to Stone Age living conditions- again, you put forth a straw man. It is true, though, that we want individuals to no longer be at liberty to exploit other human beings- that is, make them into slaves. If that's the loss of liberty you have in mind, then, yes, we would decrease your freedom. But so do laws against murder.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 18:01 PM
We also must recognize that the self-determination we cherish comes at a price, that increasing freedom means decreasing security.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 17:58 PM
I am not saying the situation is hopeless. But if we don't acknowledge the reality, the reasons for our alienation and dissatisfaction, no improvements can be made. Worse, attempted improvements will lead to increasingly nightmarish results.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 17:56 PM
We cannot re-create a traditional society where members stay emotionally connected throughout life, where rules are unbreakable and knowledge is certain. We live surrounded by strangers who would hardly notice if we suddenly disappeared. Our employers value us for what we can produce, not for our human souls. Our closest relatives live thousands of miles away, and we have only known our closest friends for two years.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 17:51 PM
Members of a traditional society may feel free, subjectively. Their needs for social connectedness are met, as are their spiritual needs and, if nature is kind, their material needs are provided. However they have no flexibility or self-determination. Primitive societies fall apart on contact with Western civilization. This is not always or necessarily the fault of westerners -- the certainty and continuity of traditions is destroyed by contrasting information.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 29, 2004 17:47 PM
As soon as you begin to have division of labor some form of exploitation becomes likely. In the simplest societies men hunted and women gathered, men protected the tribe and women protected their babies. Tribe members lived according to strict rules and traditions, and shared the same myths and supernatural beliefs. People were closely connected and maintained their connections through life. There was little exploitation in these egalitarian and highly cooperative primitive societies. There was also little or no freedom, as we understand freedom today.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 08:52 AM
"capitalism is any political-economy in which one group (ruling-class) of people have the power to employ and exploit the labour of another group (working-class) so as to disproportionately profit by this process, i.e. steal part of the latter's labour-time." This is such a vague and meaningless definition of capitalism. Every society that has ever existed becomes capitalist under this definition.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 08:49 AM
bwong, you misunderstand moral relativism. Here is a perfect example of real moral relativism, from a story on the British East India Company (I saw it a few years ago on PBS). The Brits banned Sati (the ritual in which widows were often thrown on the funeral pyres of their husbands) on pain of death. Those indians that practiced this objected to it's ban and a guru went to negotiate with the local head of the BEIC. The talk went something like this. Guru: You should not ban Sati. It is an ancient tradition and part of our culture. Brit: Well, in my country we also have a culture and we also have ancient traditions. One of our ancient traditions is that when a man burns a woman alive - we hang him. THAT, my friend, is TRUE moral relativism. Their men burn women. We hang the men who do this. EVERYBODY WINS!!!!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 29, 2004 08:20 AM
The term "Islamofacist" is manifestly NOT used to describe muslims in general, but only those muslims who believe in forcing their views, value system, and way of life on others. Since those people ARE both facist and muslims, the term fits. The same is true with the term "Christofacist" can be accuractely used to describe some members of the Christian right. Religious bigotry is found ALL over the world - muslims are NOT immune.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Neptunert, Maninblack at Dec 29, 2004 05:28 AM
I think it has been remarkable how "Freedom" "Liberty" "Democracy" are increasingly becoming mere slogans. I've noticed a vitrolic hatred on the part of right wingers when people on the left are exercising thier rights to free speech and free organization. I've noticed an overuse of "facist" to describe muslims (Islamofacists) and the left(Comparisons to MoveOn.orgs members as brownshirts) while at the same time ignoring private control of resources, an increased militarism, a powerful propoganda system, and a system that treats citzens as mere resources (which where the hallmarks of REAL Facism). I think our grandchildren's definition of Freedom should be greater than ours. All over the world. I like that fate a lot better than a fate of them being mere cogs on a war machine that never ends.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Darjant, Darjan at Dec 28, 2004 13:48 PM
Being opressed and knowing that means being not able to cope with internal rules of a society on a territory that you were born or lets say you lived for the most part of your life. It just might be becouse of the different values and goals that you addopted from some other society living on some other territory. Its about genetics too. Material that you are the carrier to is not just ther lying around in your dnk and your balls. It is actively affecting your daily life. When people DECIDE that they are opressed thay to plenty of stuff to get of that opression of their chest. Some move to some new territory. Some try to deny some differences and start to opress themselves. Some fight that opression. Just looking at the history of people and nations we can see that some stayed and batteled the ground of their current existance and some fleed to other territories. I wouldn pay much attention to women and their rights becouse their existance is proportional to existance of men. The relation between man and women is all genes and nature. All the rights that they are getting are just the changing corellations in a society living on a certain territory.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 28, 2004 09:43 AM
Meme, I think moral relativism is a trap one should avoid. Would you support slavery simply because it was the norm in some culture(and still is, apparantly in places like Sudan)How about female circumcison and "honour killing" in many Islamic countries? Having said that, I am not even sure if "Islam rejects mordernity". Perhaps it is just the kind of "mordenity" they experience. By the same token, a lot of South Americans and citizens of the former Soviet bloc also "reject modrenity"

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Brickshire2000, Memeinstlouis at Dec 28, 2004 09:05 AM
citing historic examples is not proof to what the future will or will not hold. after all, 'the future ain't what it used to be.' realpc, which part of our culture is better than that of the Islamic states? is it our 'freedom' to own as many cars, homes, and acres as we can? or is it our 'freedom' of information that tells us everything we need to hear to feel content with our lifestyle? in short, is it our 'freedom' to live a lifestyle that if everyine on the planet were living we'd need almost 5 planet earths to fulfill all the resource demands? Islam is right to reject modernity. we are wrong to reject that idea solely because a few from that religion did and are doing some stupid things. Who is the real coward? one who straps a bomb to his chest or one who bombs from thousands of feet above the ground? with the help of technology, some of these planes are unmanned, removing all bravery and courage from the act of war, making cowards of all those who make it possible - us: you, I, and all unassuming taxpayers.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 08:57 AM
bwong, I would be careful about agreeing with realpc. He is not "well educated," as he does not know how to argue. He is living proof that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. You know darn well that we are not attempting to create a Utopia, our goal is to do (to use your e.g.) for workers what MLK attempted to do for African Americans- allow them to exercise their God-given rights. That is what democratic control of the MOP amounts to. We are seeking an end to exploitation, that is, workers being forced to spend their TIME creating wealth to be horded by the members of another class- a form of slavery. Workers deciding amongst themselves how to produce goods so as to satisfy their needs- that is what we are after. The fact that one cannot specify exactly what sort of decisions they would make is not an argument against this principle.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Brickshire2000, Memeinstlouis at Dec 28, 2004 08:38 AM
realpc, i applaud you for your engaging comments, but your assumptions (proofs acording to you) tell us a bit about our societal beliefs. First, the US culture as it is right now is not the paramount of individualism as you claim it to be. Capitalism is the aspect of our society that forces the competitve "nature." Second, human nature is not an excuse for anything. Humans have the capacity to do both great good and great bad so how could our "nature" be preventing us from achieving that which has already been attained. Third, evil is a myth. Actually, its a perception. We label something as evil because we either disagree with the way it is done or with what it sets out to accomplish as its end. "Good" and "Evil" are, together, a simple way to classify and (mis)understand the role of our species on this planet.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 28, 2004 08:21 AM
"The choice is not between Tyrannical Capitalism and Tyrannical Big Government. It is between TC and Democratic Control of the MOP." Even though I don't agree with realpc on many things. But I think his skeptism of pie in the sky Utopian visions cannot be dismissed out of hand. I too am skeptical when I hear big statements like putting an end to "capitalism" while there doesn't seem to be any agreement of what capitalism is(some people seem to think any society that has a market is "capitalist" and therefore you can only get rid of "capitalism" in a strictly rationed economy) I think loaded terms like "democratic control" needed to be clarified.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 28, 2004 08:11 AM
In some sense realpc is correct that the "consciousness of being oppressed" is instrumental in revolts. But this consciousness is not just a subjective mindset. African Americans did not agitate for civil right because trouble makers like Martin Luther King or some Marxist put ideas in their heads. They developed this consciousness through their day to day interactions with the real world. For any discontentment that will unfold into a movement this "consciousness" has to be grounded in real oppressive conditions in the material world experienced by a large number of people. realpc may be bellyaching that he doesn't get a promotion because he has high opinion of his ability. But I doubt that this "mindset" will grow into any movement if that is just his INDIVUIDUAL aspirations being frustrated. Social engineers have tried to eliminate the "consciouness of oppressions"(creating the "happy Nigerians" in realpc's example) through means such as organized religions,--the opium of the people,--without changing the objective conditions. But that has not been entirely successful. It may work for a while but at some points things always exploded.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 28, 2004 08:10 AM
Many have pointed out that much of the ugly facets of American Capititalism is hidden from the view of its domestic population. I will add that this is especially true if you live in some middle class enclave. Realpc likes to talk about trade offs. He would get a more realistic picture of the alledged success of the U.S system if he is more careful with the balance sheet.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Gammon101, Bwong at Dec 28, 2004 08:08 AM
I think realpc is talking about "oppression" from a very narrow vintage point of a relatively privileged "worker"(probably in high tech). He is obviously well read and very eloquent, which indicates he is well educated. For someone in that position it is probably true that "oppression" is just a mindset of "feeling oppressed". But I wonder if realpc would consider it "real oppression" if he is forced to work in swear shop conditions. Being beaten(or tortured) for complaining of overwork, or being denied a job or an education because of his race.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 07:05 AM
realpc, Your arguments are so bad because you are trying to defend the indefensible, for which there CANNOT be a good reason.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 02:33 AM
realpc, "Evil can't be conquered," therefore it is foolish to oppose exploitation. By that logic, there should not be laws against murder, theft, extortion, etc. Do you realize how stupid you sound?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 02:29 AM
NO NO NO NO- realpc. You pose an utterly false dilemma. The choice is not between Tyrannical Capitalism and Tyrannical Big Government. It is between TC and Democratic Control of the MOP. Now to continue this discussion in an intelligent manner you must acknowledge making this mistake, which I have pointed out before, and move on. Also, if you would feel oppressed because you yearn to be a capitalist yourself, that's too bad, as I also pointed out. Freedom does not entail having the opportunity to exploit any more than it entails the opportunity to do violence to those against whom you are holding a grudge. Don't just shoot your mouth off; pay attention to what your opponents say!

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 28, 2004 01:26 AM
I think the great truth Chomsky and his defenders can never see is that YOU WILL NOT CONQUER EVIL. Improve one thing, another is thrown off balance. Make one person happy, drive another to despair. This is not to say no one should try to improve anything. Just let go of some of your arrogance, judgementalism and certainty. Evil will always be with us. Try to know yourself, rather than focus all your attention on what others are doing wrong.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 28, 2004 01:21 AM
I would feel far more oppressed as a member of a collectivist society than I do now as a worker in a relatively individualistic society. As it is in the US, capitalists have more freedom to exploit than they would in a centrally-controlled system. But in the centrally-controlled system the government is free to murder and torture, as well as oppress and exploit. We choose between the evil of free enterprise and the (much more pernicious, I think) evil of government control, and try to find a balance.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 00:25 AM
realpc, Do you realize that you are an apologist for evil, that you are trying to defend the indefensible? You refuse to face up to the basic fact that workers, whether they realize it or not, are treated unjustly by capitalists. So what if some workers aspire to join the ranks of the exploiters (and may well do so)- how does that justify exploiting them and their co-workers?

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Allen, Robert at Dec 28, 2004 00:11 AM
realpc, That murderous types are oppressed by laws against homicide is not an argument against such laws. Similarly, the interests of business people who exploit workers simply do not matter if exploitation is evil, which it is. That they would feel "incomplete" in a socialist society is just too f-ing bad. We are not trying to create a society where everyone is satisfied, but one that is JUST.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Organum, Baby at Dec 27, 2004 23:31 PM
Using N.Chomsky ( probably ) as a vessel for what YOU think he represents is meaningless. Example: realpc would probably get the iraquis to fight against saddam and then leave them to their destiny, just like PapaBush did.

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By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 23:07 PM
Chomsky would probably try to convince the happy Nigerians that they are oppressed and should revolt.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Organum, Baby at Dec 27, 2004 23:03 PM
To measure happyness would be difficult at best. Some of the countries with the highest standard of living allso score highest on discontent and suicide. Nigeria with a low S.O.L scored highest on subjective happyness in a recent poll. Material goods are subject to comparisons like: "You have a bigger car than me, shit", overriding "I have a car, yahoo"! Ones freedom will be anothers restriction in a world with limited resources and space.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 22:07 PM
Yes society can be improved. But every improvement has unintended side-effects. Are we happier today than 10,000 years ago? Maybe not. Islam fundamentalists are trying to hold on to a traditional lifestyle that is in some ways much better than our alienating and fragmented culture. Instead of individual freedom they have emotional connectedness and a sense of certainty. I think our way is better, but they are sure theirs is better. Who can judge? Wanting to improve society is ok, but be careful. Chomsky is utterly careless in his certainty that society can be improved. He is utterly arrogant in believing his own ideas of improvement would work for everyone.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 22:00 PM
We are incomplete beings living in time. Mysticism is the attempt to escape temporal incompleteness for a moment. Socialists turn their craving for completeness to the quest for secular social answers. The quest is doomed, it has failed repeatedly. The question is spiritual and therefore the answer cannot be secular.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 21:57 PM
Competition is necessary, in nature and in human society, and always has been. Cooperation is also necessary. Not everyone will become rich and famous but many will attain a quite luxurious life. Many will spend their lives doing something they find rewarding in some way, at least part of the time. There is no chance of a paradise on earth where everyone feels continually fulfilled. Human nature prevents that, since we always strive for something better. We always feel that something is missing (see William James, for ex.). And the society cannot provide us with what we crave. We can't blame the society for our incompleteness, and we can't re-make the society so that it completes us.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 21:18 PM
There is no shortage of cliches for expressing this: you can't please everyone, to each his own, etc. The great strength of the US is that, although it has its own personality profile, it makes some effort not to impose it on all its citizens. The former SU, on the other hand, tried to impose extreme cooperativeness on all. That approach was guaranteed to fail and to carry oppression to new and undreamed of heights.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 21:15 PM
You will never convince a successful American businessman that the US system is oppressing him. And you will have trouble convincing American workers who are striving for success within the system, that they are oppressed. The system is not oppressive for those who are striving and enthusiastically competing. It may well be experienced as oppressive by those who are sensitive, introverted, etc.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 21:11 PM
Each society values certain personality types over others. The US values individualistic, extroverted, competitive types. All others are likely to feel somewhat oppressed.

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Re: Freedom: a moral hypothesis

By Yurallnuts, Realpc at Dec 27, 2004 21:09 PM
Individuals very greatly in what they feel is oppressive and in how much oppression they will tolerate. We are all oppressed and always will be, by the laws of nature if nothing else. Oppression is a matter of degree, and everything involves trade-offs. Many women have been content under patrarchal authoritarian systems, and many have not. The freedom women have today does not come free -- that is, women now are oppressed by having to compete with men, having their children raised by daycare workers, etc. Every possible society must experienced as oppressive by those individuals who for whatever reasons do not fit the society. Non-conformists, for example, would feel oppressed by a socialist system, while those who are naturally cooperative would feel oppressed by a highly competitive system.

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