I simply have principles, and I hew to the apparently radical idea that a better world is possible. — StreetlightX

Well, in a thread on "overpopulation", the point is simply to focus the problem on the right issues, rather than the wrong ones. In any case, you don't believe in solutions at all. That there are populations at all seems to be an issue for you. This is as dumb as the ecofascists, albeit more benign and thankfully self-eliminating. — StreetlightX

Amazing. You extrapolated a whole line of reasoning from literally nothing I said and then, having made up a fantasy, said that this fantasy - that you made up from scratch - is not fit for reality and so I must be a standard liberal. Very cool. Why bother chatting with me when you can just chat with yourself and then argue against yourself? — StreetlightX

Why do you think so? The removal of a capitalist class who owns the means of production does not entail any technical change in how those means function - apart of course, from what we now decide to do with them. — StreetlightX

Why would anyone want to 'unravel' these things? What is being called for is a change in the regime of property. It's an issue of control, not technical ... whatever it is you are imagining.

As for this 'no-win' business - I have no tuck with it. I have nothing to say about that because it's useless and dumb and not philosophy. — StreetlightX

As for this 'no-win' business - I have no tuck with it. I have nothing to say about that because it's useless and dumb and not philosophy. — StreetlightX

So your point is that we can't change the system because we can't change the system. This is glib but are you really saying anything more than that? — StreetlightX

Also, for what it's worth, I don't hate your posts. I just think they focus on all the wrong things; or at least, things I find philosophically uninteresting. There are posts I hate. Yours are generally not among them. — StreetlightX

It's rude. — StreetlightX

Also, it is in general, a really silly point. Do you think the revoltionaries who did away with feudalism sat on their hands because they were stupefied by the scale of the issue? No. The objection is ahistorical and frankly isn't one. — StreetlightX

Eh, this doesn't address anything I said at all. And in any case sounds like what one says when one is comfortable, which billions of people are not. — StreetlightX

Eh, this doesn't address anything I said at all. And in any case sounds like what one says when one is comfortable, which billions of people are not. — StreetlightX

Therefore? — StreetlightX

But this is simply not true. Literally anyone who works for a wage employs those means every time they go to work. The 'seperation' is a legal and conventional one. It has nothing to do with "remarkableness". — StreetlightX

This is one of those memes that gets rolled out every now and then in defense of capitalism, but it could not be more wrong. In fact that this is so completely wrong is probably, for me, the major reason we need to get rid of capitalism. Can you even imagine the number of people around the world who have had to give up on their dreams, or who have abandoned projects because they were not considered profitable? The fact that capitalism selects for profit means that massive swathes of planetary potential is simply wasted, swept into the garbage bin of society, because it doesn't meet the artificial and extrinsic standard of profitability - no matter how useful, interesting, or even life improving those things might be. — StreetlightX

Small businesses are in most cases even more exploitative of labour than big business. They are more likely to engage in off-the-books employment, while ignoring safety or health considerations. They are in general less subject to scrutiny and accountability, and are all the worse for it. — StreetlightX

The alternative of course is to liquidate the capitalist class and place the means of production back into the hands of the working class, who make up the vast majority of this Earth. This latter would be a true democracy, one in which the economy would be placed back into the hands of the people, unlike the pseudo-democracies we have today in which impersonal market mechanisms that systematically favour capital over workers continue to immeserate billions of people across the planet. — StreetlightX

I'm not sure of this, but don't you have the idea of the categorical imperative backwards? Isn't it the positive behavior that is universalized as an obligation? I think that makes a difference, doesn't it? — T Clark

Because the CI only makes statements about positive actions (only do anything if everyone also did it would not make the world worse), but it does not make statements on the lack of action (don't do anything that would harm the world if everyone did it.) Because EVERYONE doing it would harm the world, but SOME doing it would not harm the world. — god must be atheist

So hard work... yes, you can work hard, and it would not harm anyone if everyone would work hard, but what if some people worked hard and some did not? You say that violates the law of fairness (do not cheat others in a way you would not want to be cheated), but there is a hitch here: some people do not mind working harder than others. And some others enjoy freeloading. This now enters the realm of personal taste and personal view, subjective judgment: do I mind working harder than others, or do I mind if others work harder than I? The answer to these two questions are not universal by everyone. And basically here you cited universality. — god must be atheist

Should the unexamined life consist of an examination of ultimate concerns, such as those found in existentialism?

What are your thoughts? — Shawn

What question/s do you think is of most value to ask leaders of countries/organisation? — I like sushi

I can't quite tell whether you are caricaturing the ruling class, or giving them your obeisance on bended knees. If you are on your knees, get the fuck up this instant! — Bitter Crank

The economy of a successful country requires the efforts of almost everyone. The queen of a beehive, ant hill, or termite mound is but one role of many essential workers. Does the hive die if the queen dies? No. The workers have the ability to create new queens.

In the same way, the rich "kings and queens" of a country can drop dead without the economy screeching to a halt, because the economy has so many essential operators. 128 million workers -- including everyone keep the train on the track and it's wheels turning. — Bitter Crank

No I'll admit there's a thousand things wrong with the current capitalist system, most of which have at least some form or remedy or at least attention to but, this premise of greater effort =/= greater gain is kinda.. I dunno man without getting into too grizzly detail, simply put it didn't sit well with folks. — Outlander

Like it or not the person who can at least plant a crop they have to eat to live, gets to stay compared to someone who just eats it and tries to convince they're of equal value to the other guy. — Outlander

Why not step your game and remove workers from the system? Why go through attrition by not making more workers (antinatalism) when one could simple remove (murder) already existing workers? Would that not in truth save these poor unfortunates from further toil and suffering. even more so because they have been deluded into believing they are happy with their toil, those poor unfortunate bastards! Poison the water as rebellion! — Book273

It just goes on and on. Eventually you reach a piper that has to be paid, even after swindling, dodging, or doing worse to those before. — Outlander

The bourgeoisie have all sorts of justifications to cover their operations. They will keep repeating their self-justifications until the world is an unlivable hothouse and we are all dead. — Bitter Crank

First, creativity, invention, and innovation depend on the creative, intellectual, and physical labor of many predecessors without which there would be nothing new. The Macintosh Computer rested on a century's worth of technological development. Science and industry are inherently social activities which gradually accumulate potential for new technology. — Bitter Crank

Second, if there is to be a fortune made from new technology (like personal computers) the inventor depends on the socially accumulated wealth of bankers and investors who are willing to gamble on making a product a reality, and perhaps a success, in exchange for a payoff. Without financial investors, there would be no iPhones, no music streaming, no Teslas, no airplanes, no televisions, no LED lights, no railroads, no nothing. — Bitter Crank

Everything that is made today depends on social accumulation of knowledge and wealth. Specific individuals (like Steve Jobs or Elon Musk) capitalize on what others have built previously--and 99% of the accumulation was produced by working people. — Bitter Crank

They would say that. They might also say (but will not) that their fortune depends on all the jobs "the little people" did -- "sell, train, support, install, account for the money of, transport, warehouse, market, website maintain, develop further product development]". Without all the workers' efforts, there would be no fortune, no reward. — Bitter Crank

But if you ask, "Is this a good system?" I am emotionally and rationally compelled to answer, "Absolutely not!" and argue for a system which distributes reward for both fizzy creativity and mud-slogging work fairly. A fair and equitable distribution of rewards for work is possible, and it doesn't look like our capitalist system. — Bitter Crank

What is it that I said that you find so threatening here? I honestly don't know why you just snapped at one word and assumed I was stating some kind of "law"? — I like sushi

Rhetoric only hurts if the audience takes the bait. Work is necessary to survive. But the assumption is that this is good in the first place. You immediately end the conversation to question this necessity of life or life itself by saying it’s juvenile. Bypass all thinking and just tar and feather. — schopenhauer1

I'm reading the novel Jurassic Park by the late Michael Crichton. In it the gigantic T. Rex is a problem no doubt but its the much smaller Velociraptors that are the real killers; heck, even the Procompsognathids manage to put a child in hospital. — TheMadFool

Rhetoric — I like sushi

Juvenile as opposed to mature — I like sushi

It is a very juvenile way of viewing the world. — I like sushi

I believe it was Twain who said something about work and play being essentially the same thing. That is a healthier view I think. — I like sushi

Seizing the wealth and power of the Plutonic-kleptocrats will be extraordinarily difficult, so in the meantime, I recommend people who can do so, reduce their needs and wants so that they can keep themselves afloat on less the 40 hours per week, maybe 30, maybe 25. This is no easy thing, especially after 40 years of inflation and stagnant wages. It's like unto impossible in high-cost areas, like San Francisco, NYC, LA, Washington D.C., Boston, etc. — Bitter Crank

Is doing a job for 3 hrs worth the same as doing a job for 5 hrs if paid hourly? Should jobs be paid equally or not - how/why? — I like sushi

Antinatalism comes in handy for young people trying to do this. Raising a family pretty much forces one to work however much one can, and that still might not be enough, — Bitter Crank