The proper human purpose is a relation to God, — Leontiskos

Only for those who believe in a god.

If you get married and have kids you will tend to find purpose, — Leontiskos

From day to day and year to year until the kids are grown. Had I considered procreation my purpose in life - as some (mostly female) people do (and fall to pieces if they fail to achieve it), I would have tried to procreate, instead of taking care to prevent it. Though they gave me cause to make plans and set goals that centered solely on them, the children I did raise were not the purpose of life, any more than taking care of stray cats is. These are responsibilities I assume freely, of choice, and that choice then entails purposeful actions directed toward its fulfillment.

Well, yes, but you had already more or less said or implied the possibility that if the universe had a mind it was more likely to be "cold, mean and indifferent" — Janus

That wasn't my intention. It's simply a matter of scale. If the universe is sentient, whether we would judge it from our perspective benevolent, hostile or indifferent, it's so much bigger than us that our perspective could not possibly take in the scope of its intelligence or intent. From its perspective on that scale, even supposing it was aware of our existence, I surmise that it would be unlikely to differentiate between humans and bats or any other sentient species in any of the trillion or so galaxies it surveys.

I just assumed it was a species of Earth termite that I had not heard of before — Janus

Probably because I misspelled it the first time.

And the atheists think the theists are being unreasonable, — Metaphysician Undercover

And some theists think their faith makes them clairvoyant.

Linguistically 'purpose' does not imply something that is human-intention-derived. The purpose of a knife is to cut because humans made knives, and they made them to cut. It doesn't follow that the purpose of a human life "has worth only in terms of [human] intentions and actions." — Leontiskos

If it's not human intentions, then a supernatural will is required to give humans purpose. A god has to make them his tools.
I reject the idea of being someone's tool, no matter how powerful they are. I'd rather be a wild thing with no ultimate significance. If the gods hunt me down and eat me, so be it, but I will not have accepted "food-source" as my purpose in life.

If purpose could be made then it would make sense to ask for the recipe. — Leontiskos

Then you're still asking someone else to determine your purpose. You're asking to be the means to an end: a tool - or a meal.

If the universe has a mind of its own, might that mind not be vaster, more capacious, more compassionate than our own. — Janus

Or cold, mean and indifferent. It doesn't matter which, unless and until the universe reveals its preference and purpose in action - and we probably wouldn't recognize its intent even then.

As to us valuing or caring about termites, it would seem that it is not outside the realm of human possibility. — Janus

We might care about the Earth ones. I did say Centaurian termites: we don't know whether there is any such thing.

I think we're at cross purposes due to having different ideas of "purpose." — tim wood

Oxford's idea is: 1. "the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists."
2. "have as one's intention or objective."
3. a person's sense of resolve or determination.
I usually just go by the dictionary meaning; otherwise, it's a guessing-game.

If not yourself, likely you can imagine someone wondering what the meaning and purpose of his or her life is, or life in general. — tim wood

Lots of people do that. I suppose they're hoping to be significant, important, and they want an outside authority (God, Fate, Destiny, The Great River...) to imbue them with that significance. It's a whole lot easier than finding your own.

To the degree they ask, they're asking for something, and when they stop asking, a reasonable conjecture is that they stopped because they no longer had a need to ask. — tim wood

That's a reasonable conjecture, assuming you know that they've stopped asking. It's possible that they found their purpose. Another reasonably conjecture is that, having received no answer, they gave up. Or became convinced that there isn't one. Or invented a purpose for themselves. Or somebody with a stronger will imposed one on them.
Very few questions of psychology have only two possible answers.

As to the existence of trees, I claim there is no such thing as a tree, — tim wood

Nevertheless, I suggest you don't stand under the figment of one during the figment of a thunderstorm.
It's a collective term by which we refer to not specifically named members of a category of things. Language is fun to bend and twist for poetry, not so much for intelligible communication.

Are you suggesting that perhaps the Universe absent any and all percipients might not be blind and might be intelligent? In that case would that not qualify it as being somehow mindful? — Janus

Probably. I don't claim that the universe has a mind of its own; I just don't know that it doesn't.
If it does, it's as unlikely to care - crave or miss - our poetry and cruelty, as we are unlikely to crave or miss the cultural touchstones of Centurian termites.

Well, it exists, not as a thing but as an idea. Consider your experience/understanding/use/description of a tree. And what is that to the universe? All this is being just the point/problem of Kant's thing-in-itself-as-it-is-in-itself. — tim wood

Huh? My understanding of a tree has no influence on the universe or the existence of trees. Does thing-in-itself-as-it-is-in-itself mean anything?

Does it? It may require will to act on it, to actualize it. Unless purpose and action are indistinguishable - but that seems untenable. — tim wood

You need a body to actualize the purpose of the will.

Let's suppose you have neighbors that offend you. Why don't you shoot them? — tim wood

How does that come into it? If I have neighbours who offend me, there is a huge range of possible reactions that don't involve shooting. How doe this relate to a purpose?

But how would that answer reconcile with "purpose?" — tim wood

Whatever my feeling was about the neighbours, I would then have to formulate an appropriate response. I'd have to decide what I want (will), then devise a plan of action to achieve what I want (purpose).

If purpose implies choice, — tim wood

It doesn't imply. It is simply the aim or goal to get or accomplish something desired. Purpose, aim, goal, intent, plan all precede action. A purpose may also be conferred upon implements made or co-opted to achieve a goal, aim, plan or intent.

Purpose then, the imperative to do the right thing, as best I can figure and do. — tim wood

Whatever the "right thing" is in any situation is a reasonable purpose to have. I'm also reasonably sure it is not a universal imperative.

That is one way to think about it. The other is that absent minds the Universe is 'blind'—there is nothing that can experience anything—there is no beauty, no poetry, no compassion, no love and also no ugliness, no doggerel, no cruelty, no hatred. In a way the mindless universe would be as good, or bad, as non-existence. — Janus

Well, yes. No mind is insignificant to itself, bot neither is any mind in a position to affect the universe much. The universe is whatever it is. I don't know that it's blind and stupid, but I know that we alone care about the things we care about. If our minds didn't exist, who would miss the poetry etc?

Also, we humans, who think so very highly of the mind don't seem particularly concerned with preserving or supporting even the minds of our own species, let alone all the other kinds.

Should I understand from your reply that you hold that there is no "ultimate underlying meaning and significance"? — tim wood

Correct. Purpose requires will - either that of the living entity with internal goals, or an external entity that has power to exert its will over that of the subject. Inanimate objects have no desires, no will or aims, but they can be purposed to the aims of life-form that can exert its will upon them.
A pebble has no purpose of its own, but a crow can use it as a tool. Life-forms can also be used by an external will with the power to override their own. The purpose of a pig is to keep living and produce offspring. Man re-purposes pigs for his food.

I happen to think there is, but only as a product of mind, — tim wood

If there were gods, they could find uses both for animate and inanimate objects; if the gods were powerful, they could override the will of intelligent life-forms. If they were powerful enough and wished to, they could find uses for the universe.

By "reverse" I do not know if you mean: "If world then maybe mind," which would be trivial, or, "If world then mind," which would not be trivial, but that I might ask you to support, somehow. — tim wood

Simply: No world, no mind(s).
But then, I'm no longer sure that you refer to "the world" not as the universe, but as some image or model that doesn't exist.
I mean that minds are minuscule ephemeral sparks in a vast cosmos of billions of suns. Minds are dependent on the bodies that contain them and those bodies are dependent on their ecosystems which are dependent on their planet, which are dependent on their sun. Minds are trivial.

The questions here are, then, what is purpose (in itself), where does it come from, what is its ground? Or, what exactly gives it all meaning, makes it all worthwhile? — tim wood

Purpose is a property of life and becomes a concept when intelligent minds recognize it.
Every snail crawling up a wall has a purpose: to find algea that may be clinging there, to find shelter from the drying sun, or dampness a hiding place from birds. The underlying purpose of all these short-term goals is to prolong and improve its life.
However complicated the mind and the life-form to which it belongs, it has short term goals to serve an underlying purpose: to prolong and improve its life.
But only humans have the audacity to project the need for a purpose on the world, even the universe.
Ultimate underlying meaning and significance is something only humans demand of anything.
They seek it in vain, so they make something up.

No mind no world. — tim wood

Exactly the reverse.

Just stop getting in their way. — NOS4A2

Who are they, how am I in their way, and what have they got to do with how you relate to your community?

That's great. Then nothing needs to be implemented but the freedom to do it. — NOS4A2

Nobody can 'implement' freedom. In societies where the law does not prevent association among people, freedom to change a community need only be exercised. How a community functions is up to the people who live in it.

Why don’t we just organize, find some like minded people, and implement our philosophy by living it and doing it? — NOS4A2

A lot of people are. You just need vision, courage and the ability to communicate.
Of course, whether you find like-minded people to co-operate depends partly on your goal.

Is a fact about the universe now, still a fact if we are not part of the universe and have no interaction with it from somewhere external to it? — Barkon

Yes. But the only way you can confirm that is by going outside the universe and then establishing communications with someone inside.

Can there be facts without observation? — Barkon

Yes.

And thus, do facts exist in the mental realm, — Barkon

Facts are the verbal description of things and relationships that exist in reality. What you put in your mental realm are memories of factual descriptions.

moreover the physical realm as per se one's collection of facts(in mind) as opposed to the states of things in a locale? — Barkon

This does not scan.

What I'm saying is that technology is the root of the food-supply problem, not meat-eating. — Gnomon

And technology can provide a reasonable answer (not shipping people off-planet) in the form of cultured meat. Like any new technology, it needs a time to develop improved product and to become affordable. ATM, it's less than ideal: though not as energy-wasteful and polluting as industrial sized live meat production. The biggest obstacle, as usual, is the consumers' entrenched prejudice, fuelled by the present meat industry, which has a lot to lose.
One huge advantage, when cultured meat becomes commonplace, is that a meat factory can be set up in every town, and several in each city, saving all the transportation costs and fallout. Vegetable and food growing can also be local and urban, liberating vast tracts of land to grow oxygenating, carbon-capturing vegetation and wildlife habitat.

I ask again. Why should a pipefitter pay off someone else's student loans? — fishfry

Because two of the students are his own children, but he doesn't earn enough to pay for their higher education all alone. And because, even if he doesn't have children, he's helping to train up the well taxed caregivers and inventors of helpful products for his old age. And because he's making the world safer and better to live in for himself and his family. And because the industry that employs him depends on other industries and technologies that all need competent people to run them; he may find himself redundant, in need of training in a new skill; a public education fund can bail him out. And those underwater baskets may one day save his life by fishing out the plastic he'll otherwise choke on.

Buy fewer missiles and smoke granades, give the mega-rich fewer tax breaks and allocate the saved resources to family planning, local clinics, wholesome school lunches, good daycare centers and community gardens*.
*Essential to healthy child-rearing: they develop a taste for fresh vegetables, learn where food comes from and how to produce it, and the communal atmosphere is a socializing influence.

If an evil person is someone who acts immorally and wickedly, they need to act immorally and wickedly, and thinking just doesn’t rise to that level as an activity or behavior. — NOS4A2

Thought is the necessary precursor of deliberate activity and behaviour. The thoughts are evil before the person decides to do evil and thereby becomes evil.
As for their "need to", I very much doubt it. I think, rather, they want something, which can be acquired or achieved by mean of evil deeds.

If you were to observe someone having evil thoughts versus someone having good thoughts, it would be impossible to determine which — NOS4A2

Correct. Before action is taken, only the thinker knows. If those intentions were visible, most crimes could not take place.

What combination of words and letters could force you to push the button? — NOS4A2

The ones that spell out your oath to serve. (And the subtext of punishments for refusing a direct order.) Some people have strong enough convictions to refuse anyway, and some are incapable of carrying out certain actions, regardless of the consequences. But since there is evil in every human mind, the words only need to release the repressed evil waiting for expression in those who are willing to act.

Words are wholly innocent — NOS4A2

Individual words are innocent. Some combinations express thoughts, ideas and desires that are evil. Words are mere symbols; have no character or moral value. They can be, and are used to convey all kinds of messages.

The blame lies solely on those who act on them. — NOS4A2

The blame is shared by all participants in a conspiracy to commit evil.

Ideas can be written in words, musical notation or numbers; if visual, they can be represented by a sketch or diagram. The only kind of thought that might resist language is fleeting impression or flash of psychological insight - but I'm not sure they can be classified as ideas.

The idea of infinity can't be properly expressed using language, but then again, infinity is a word. — Scarecow

The word exists because the concept was not only imagined but communicated.

I say this because thinking is one of the least consequential and impactful activities human can engage in. — NOS4A2

We have three kinds of action: automatic (motions of body that do not require us to be conscious or aware) instinctive (emotional response to stimuli, over which we don't always have control, or have imperfect control) and deliberate ones that proceed from conscious thought. Most evil thoughts are not translated into action, but no evil act is performed without forethought.

If they were to store the kinetic energy produced by any of amount brain activity and release it on the world I wager it wouldn't move a feather, let alone produce any evil. — NOS4A2

Once it's trapped in a battery, no evil produced. While operating human bodies, all the evil in the world.

Even when thoughts are reified into a phrase or book, one could observe the words for 10 lifetimes and see nothing come of it. — NOS4A2

Or precipitate a world war in one lifetime. Or nuke 180,000 people in an hour.

They are completely innocent. — NOS4A2

Words are not even innocent when read by impressionable youth; they're guilty as sin when written as commands and read by obedient drones.

Of course you can have evil thoughts. Everyone does and we all - non psychopaths - know they are evil when we have them. Having them doesn't make a person evil; it simply reminds him that we all have in us the capacity for evil. That's why we invented the term. Externalizing it as an imaginary person or force doesn't change the fact.
But we usually don't act on them; the moral person resists that temptation.
Fantasy, especially deliberate indulgence in fantasizing, is a step toward evil. The next step is wishing, and after that, intention, followed by planning and execution. The healthy response to evil fantasies is not to suppress them, but to analyze and thereby disarm them.

The obvious questions are when the pendulum will start to move the other way and how much damage will be done before that finally happens — Ludwig V

Maybe it already has, and a lot of damage is already done. Trouble is, you're right: it's not so much a pendulum as a long spiral staircase upward and a steep slide down. Things take more time and effort to build than to destroy.
Other trouble is, we're running out of time.

What's it to do with logic?
Reasons aside, you either believe something or you don't.
Sometimes it's rational to refrain from identifying as an atheist. If you don't believe, but fear persecution for your disbelief, it's logical to pretend that you believe.
Whatever rewards there might be in Heaven for believing, you don't get them: I've heard you can't con God. If he exists, it would be illogical to lie about you unbelief. Anyway, if you die and discover that he exists after all, you'll believe, so you won't need to lie about it.

What if somebody is in their last moments of life. — Scarecow

What would they have left to deny?

Capitalism has been in crisis practically ever since it was invented. — Ludwig V

You'd think somebody would've twigged that it's not the best possible system?

The obvious alternative is Socialism, which is as polymorphous as capitalism. — Ludwig V

That's not an alternative; it's a modification, an attempt to cushion the impact of a profit-driven economy.
All monetized systems - all shades of capitalism - are subject to the same internal and external dangers, but the Socialist versions are more sustainable, just because they eliminate the lower extreme where most of the casualties occur. In fact, if democracy is allowed to operate unhampered, all monetized societies tend toward Socialism, because the beneficiaries - i.e. the majority - vote to keep their benefits.
As for Communism, in a monetized economy, that's an oxymoron; a chimera at best. Money is infinitely corruptible and it tends to infect people who control too much of it.

We seem to be working out how to blend the two, and that seems to me to be the right way to go — Ludwig V

We were on the right track - UK, Australia, NZ, Canada, most of Europe and even the US - for a large portion of the 20th century. (Chastened by the depression, governments curbed big capital and invested in the population at large) Then, starting about 1980, the political pendulum was pushed hard to the right. Now, the far left is where the moderate right (remember them?) was in 1976. Now, we're heading toward fascism at a fair clip.




Side-bar, Your Honour
interesting bulletin from New York City

Continued declines across most major crime categories prevailed during January
2024, compared to the first month of last year, and included substantial drops in murder, rape, burglary, and felony assault. And for the second month in a row, the number of vehicles stolen in New York City was reduced by at least 3.8% (1,178 vs. 1,224).

It seems the upticks are in transit crime and hate crime - sign of the political climate, I imagine. That, of course, is what FUX news reports, without mentioning the overall decline.
You'd almost think New York was doing something right.

In a news release, the NYPD said “uniformed presence in the subway system was expanded in hot-spot areas and will be supported further over the coming weeks using a combination of Transit Bureau personnel and officers usually assigned to administrative duties department-wide.”

I haven't found any mention of the crimes that do occur being committed by miscreants who had received civil summonses due to Criminal Justice Reform of 2016 https://council.nyc.gov/legislation/criminal-justice-reform/ but then, public urinators were never dangerous. The big issue seems to be

The City Bar supports enactment of the Communities Not Cages suite of bills[/url]. These three sentencing reform bills are a long overdue overhaul of the most pernicious aspects of New York’s sentencing laws.Eliminate Mandatory Minimums Act - Judges would be able to consider sentences that would be most effective in addressing the individual’s behavior and the unique circumstances of the offense;
The Second Look Act (A.531 AM Walker / S.321 Sen. Salazar) would enable those currently incarcerated with long sentences to petition judges for reduced sentences.
The Earned Time Act (A.1128 AM Kelles / S.774 Sen. Cooney) would enable those serving long sentences to earn credit to reduce their sentences by complying with prison rules and by participating in treatment, education, vocational training, and work programs. — https://www.nycbar.org/blogs/criminal-justice-reform-new-york-2024-nys-legislative-agenda/

And here it comes:

A number of proposed laws that advocates say would make the criminal justice system more fair for people charged with crimes face an uncertain future in Albany this year, as the Democrat-led state house grapples with backlash from critics who say reform measures have made New Yorkers less safe.

Reform is an uphill battle.

Do you think that denial can be helpful? — Scarecow

For a while, maybe. Depends what you're denying.
"Mom's not dead, she just went to visit Grandpa in heaven" is good for a few days.
"No, that's not smoke, probably just my sneakers I'm smelling" Not more than a minute.
Most things you don't want to acknowledge have to be dealt-with sooner or later.

Can people choose to change their beliefs, or do beliefs choose people — Scarecow

No, but they can learn new things and question the things they believe. If enough information comes in to convince them, they will change their belief. Bonus: if a person has gone through that process once, they're more likely to keep questioning and learning.

For example, let's say that I received a cancer diagnosis. If denial helps me process, then, is it still irrational for me to go into denial — Scarecow

No. That will kill you.

Money represents resources. — Ludwig V

Therein lies the rub. When dealing with symbols, you're dealing with abstracts: the interpretation is more important than the thing being represented. If a loaf of bread has a price tag, that figure doesn't necessarily reflect the amount of wheat, yeast and water it contains, nor the amount of time someone spent on preparing and then assembling the ingredients plus the energy it took to bake the bread. It represents, instead, an arbitrary value placed upon it by an arbiter - usually not the baker nor the consumer. Monetary values are assigned to things according to desirability or rarity or branding of some kind. The price can be at great variance to the resource-content of the item.
When it comes to remuneration for work, the time/effort component is the least consideration: it's valued according to a wholly arbitrary standard - stockbroker starting salaries (before bonuses and perks) are approximately double that of a teacher or construction worker (no bonuses or perks) You judge their relative contributions to the society. Or, you could always go back to the 400/1 ratio between the assembly line worker who actually makes the profitable product and the CEO who attends meetings and makes decisions. Not figuring in the people who do nothing but lend/invest money at interest.
Then factor in the cost of money itself: printing, storing, guarding, counting, shipping, tracking, exchanging, accounting, taxing and redistributing, litigation over it, stealing it and punishing the thieves... All those costs to society are added on to the price of commodities.

Add to this, the portability and morphology of money. A wagon load of turnips, you can readily calculate its nutritional value and the labour, time and land it took to produce. You can't disguise it as something else, can't spirit it out of the country, hide it in a vault or turn it into a gold coin and pocket it. When money exists mainly in electronic form, any kind of magic tricks can move it, transfer it or disappear it. A painting of two hazy orange squares by John Smith is worthless. A painting of two hazy orange squares by Mark Rothko is worth $45,000,000 - same canvas, same paint, same aesthetic. Not a resource-base valuation!

The practicality is not yet upon us. I don't think reform is feasible.
House-of-cards economies like the one we're living in periodically collapse. The last depression adversely affected much of the world and was followed by a crazy big war. This time the global interconnections are even less extricable. When one economy defaults on its debt, all the still viable ones have to rally round with loans and service-reducing, tax-hiking regimens - they have to, because the whole edifice is in danger. Debt is accumulating everywhere at a rate that bodes imminent collapse. Add the damage of climate events and the pressure of human migration.... Does the current system implode or explode?
There will be casualties. Lots of them. Maybe whoever's left standing can start over with a different model. I hope they get it right, but won't be here to see it.

describes the present socio-political situation; I am not making a moral judgement. — Ludwig V

Where? In Australia? I don't know who the 'sides' are there. It would take me a while to catch up. In Canada, I think the sides do understand the problem but are uninclined to work together, since one side wants to eliminate the problem, while the other wants to reinforce it. Most of the political spectrum fall somewhere in the middle, groping their way from crisis to crisis, dispensing duct tape on the Titanic.

The fallacy I'm asking you to avoid is the fallacy of stereotyping groups of people. Deal? — Ludwig V

I didn't think I was. I meant to describe political positions. I'm quite aware of the magnanimous billionnaires who use their money for culture and charity, as well as larcenous beggars.

Do you know what the right distribution of wealth across our society should be? — Ludwig V

No. I have trouble dealing with the concept of wealth in any distribution. I'd rather think in terms of resource allocation and sharing.

I believe everyone should have enough food, shelter, security and leisure, a chance to contribute to their community and be recognized for their effort, access to education and the freedom to fulfill their potential. I believe nobody should have more of anything than they can use and enjoy in one lifetime.
I believe no child should start life materially better off than others of its cohort, and those who start life with a handicap should be offered all available support by the community, as should any adult who falls ill, is injured or grows feeble.
I believe we should not take from the Earth more than we collectively need, and dispose of our waste in a productive manner.
I realize it's a pipe-dream.

But neither side seems willing to acknowledge that and work with it, so I'm not optimistic. — Ludwig V

Oh, please don't fall into the 'both are as bad as each other' fallacy. They're not. The billionnaires want to keep taking more and more; the wretched just want a little of it back. Some of the advocates of the wretched are bellicose, a few are even violently angry, but their violence is mere fleabites compared to the might of property-defending police and mercenaries. Not to mention all the upper middle class who benefit from enabling and stroking the super-rich, the portion of the middle class that fears being worse off if there is any change and - especially - the persuadable lower middle class buys into the system, in hopes of betterment, in fear of a potent underdog, in misdirected resentment of the very authority that tries to regulate their exploiters, in moral outrage over the reputed erosion of their cherished values, in defense of the little advantage they have over some other group.
At the present level of disparity compromise is impossible; the "sides" far too unequal to negotiate.

But if the difference was implemented, most of those problems would go away. — Ludwig V

Not without major reconstruction of the justice system. But that's doable - would save a lot of resources, too. This is the bit the right wingers don't get: it's cheaper for society to assure everyone a reasonable life than to protect the wealth of a few. Money is a very, very expensive commodity.

It is interesting to think about the way in which ideas of religion may hinder ideas of morality and ethics — Jack Cummins

It doesn't - at least not in its own time-frame and place. The religious ideas of antiquity or the middle ages nay not seem ethical to us, but made sense to the people who practiced them. Religions are made to fit the circumstances of the people who adhere to them. While the skeletal structure of a belief system may last 200 years, its practical beliefs and practices change and adapt over time to the needs of changing societies.

and make it ever harder for small businesses to compete with the larger ones. — Janus

Oh. So, the regulations are designed to protect customers and workers from exploitation. My guess is that the bulk of the abuses to which the government is responding was perpetrated by large corporations - not because they're worse people, but because of the machinery of profit - and the small ones who have no intention of short-changing their customers or abusing their workers get caught up in it.
OTOH, I'm aware of some pretty awful scams in the building trades that are perpetrated by small contractors, so I can imagine how regulation and oversight would be reassuring to customers. OTTH, a under-the-table deals are made all the time by small contractors and complicit customers to cheat the government and circumvent regulations.
It's not so easy, governing a monetized society!

It seems it's just virtue signaling designed to net votes—our governments certainly appear to be bought by the plutocracy.. — Janus

In a monetized society, where political campaigns run on money, officials can't afford to cross the people who finance their election. And of course, financial interests and entrenched privilege have their staunch supporters, not only in the press and broadcast media (which they own, and which control the reputation of officials) but also among the voting and tax-paying public. A whole lot of the victims of mega-capital are willing to attack anyone who moves against the status quo.

The critical factor is the extent to which the organization has consent, and has enough flexibility to give space to minority and unpopular interests. — Ludwig V

To a very large extent, this is a question of economic disparity. Where the gap between richest and poorest is minimal, all the people have common interests and points of agreement.
https://ssir.org/books/reviews/entry/spirit_level_greater_equality_societies_stronger_richard_wilkinson_kate_pic
Where the gap between the richest and poorest is an immense chasm, many are disenfranchised, marginalized and driven to despair. Not only because subsistence is hard won at the bottom, but because the bulk of the resources are concentrated in the numerically small upper tiers and there is not enough left for the much bigger lowest tiers. This means everyone in the second, third and fourth economic bracket is in constant fear of being displaced by someone from the tier below.
The advocates of capital depict an open field of competition, where anyone who "works hard" can achieve their goals and climb the social ladder. In fact, there is very little competition at the top, and a good deal of collusion. If the haves can keep the have-nots fighting over scraps, nobody will come for their loot.

As for the difference between police and armies - don't count on in it. Police forces in many countries are increasingly militarized, insulated and alienated from the community they're meant to protect; in many communities, the citizenry and the police are locked in a cold war that occasionally erupts in gunfire.

Australia, from all I've heard, is a more democratic nation than the US. Maybe not every administration, but by and large, the governance has been more nearly equitable. Canada is similar in its cushioning of the blunt instrument of capital.
Why does government red tape make things difficult for small entrepreneurs but not for big ones? I hear the same complaint in Canada. I find it hard to believe that either government is deliberately trying to harm small businesses. What red tape is designed to hamper small business?
Is it, perhaps, that legislators try to make regulations for all businesses, and the big corporations can get around the regulations, while the small ones get caught?
(I don't know - I've only been involved in a tiny business and had no trouble with red tape.)

The trick is, to find something that is objective, or at least rational, or at least acceptable to those who are rejected. — Ludwig V

In a society that cared about its members, there would be no people rejected. You don't need a whole lot of objectivity to figure out what people need. What people are able to contribute, they do, if they're given the chance. Nobody wants to be left out; nobody likes being useless. A badly organized society creates many malcontents and disrupters; a well organized one tends to give rise to very little crime and abuse.

Under a capitalist system, apart from whatever welfare state is in play, people end up getting whatever their capacities enable them to. — Janus

In whose movie? How can you know what the capacities are of a child who doesn't get healthy food or adequate care? What good are capacities where honest work doesn't earn a living wage? What are people supposed to do with their capacities when a company closes its operations and moves to China, leaving entire towns up Shit Creek? Some turn their intelligence and agility to crime. Every economic and political system produces the kind and amount of crime that showcases the capacities of its neglected members. (Except for the mass shootings - that's about internal conflict. Eventually, it becomes civil war.)

Who decides what the needs of each are? Perhaps the same question could be asked of abilities. — Janus

But isn't that the same question asked now, when allocating resources and remunerations under capitalist organization? Somebody always seems willing to decide who is worthy of what.

Yes, them too, by and by. But first, the opposition.

Soon enough they will be recanting their views. I wonder what they will do if (when?) we go totalitarian. — Lionino

Die by the thousands, as usual. Evil always wins; it's not hindered by scruples, compassion or shame.

I should have seen that.

But I'm not sure it is money that is the problem. — Ludwig V

You're right. Money is just the thing that's being misused. The problem is a society founded on the concept of portable, cumulative wealth, that puts a monetary value on every thing, every place, every man, every idea.

It isn't possible to set up or compete in sport without any resources. — Ludwig V

A field. A road. A frozen pond. A set of hurdles made of trestled logs. People used to compete before arenas and giant monitors. Kids still do, if we let them.

It would be better to say that the tendency to measure the value of everything by reference to money that sucks the joy out of everything, — Ludwig V

I did say that. Everything but money - because joy also has a dollar value. Just watch the ads if you don't believe me.

The complication is that the acclaim and reputation tends to result in financial opportunities. — Ludwig V

In a society that monetizes everything, and sucks the joy out of everything but money, yes.

That was certainly true in ancient Greece and I would be suprised if it wasn't true of modern Olympics as well. — Ludwig V

It's not. Modern Olympic games are business. Huge government contracts to build new arenas, huge financial losses for the public sector - but, hey, some jillionnaire will buy the arena cheap, plaster his name all over it and charge exorbitant ticket prices to the people who paid for the building of it. As for the athletes, if they survive with body and mind intact, their best hope is to sell their name to a corporation.