How about shared hallucinations?

Ah, the earth has way too much humanity, adding more is like dropping bombs, because each one will add to the already too great consumption of earth resources. However, I believe having families is also very important, so the compromise is having no more than one child to replace each of us. Preferably only highly responsible and committed people reproduce themselves, because to raise a child who is a benefit to humanity and not a problem, requires a lot of effort and a loving desire to make that effort. Humans are not just naturally intelligent and good citizens. They must be nurtured to be of value to the rest of humanity.

As for blame, that is perhaps a silly notion, but a moral is a matter of cause and effect and carelessly reproducing, no matter what the circumstances, will lead to problems. We seriously need to get in touch with reality. There is no God who created humans next to the angels. We are of the animal kingdom and need to learn how to live in balance and harmony with the rest of nature. If we don't we are no blessing to this planet. Whatever is out of balance will be destructive.

Democracy is about citizens ruling themselves rather than being dependent on authority about them. That is why education is so important.

Do we have agreement that we can not maintain our way of life?

Do we agree that global warming will become increasingly costly in the way of extreme weather, flooding and fires, ice and excessive heat causing deaths of plants, animals, and humans, and the rising seas destroying land and agriculture?

What can we do?

We can spread information and check with the schools. Write letters to editors and post online to spread information. Perhaps read books or take college classes so we are better informed ourselves. Buy butcher paper and buy meat where it can be wrapped in butcher paper instead of put in plastic trays. When possible go to the store with containers can that can be refilled and buy bulk instead of prepackaged food. Always carry your own bags, and do not use straws when stopping for liquid refreshment.

Dospossible baby diapers and sanitary pads are huge environmental enemies. It is not just that can contaminate groundwater and take forever to degrade, but they consume resources and increase the cost of gas because they are an oil product as well as require trees. https://www.smallfootprintfamily.com/dangers-of-disposable-diapers

We can use cloth diapers and pads. That is not convenient or pleasant but future generations deserve our care.

What else can we do? I am not saying these actions will save the world, but they buy us time.

Just for fun, here is Bob Hope and Jane Russell


but this is a better version of Buttons and Bows.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1ggNUKQL2Y


How about the Lawrence Welk Show

Another source of confusion can be attempting to solve a problem and not finding the solution. Sometimes the problem is ill-formulated and we don’t realize it and so we attempt to pursue something that cannot be found. Or the problem has a solution but because we don’t see/understand everything we have a hard time finding it.
— leo — fullofnull

Boy oh boy, is that true! I do workshops on healthy living designed by Standard, and they are so academic they don't relate well to the real human beings that participate in the workshops. It is the facilitator's job to humanize the information so it resonates with them and also give them some skills for thinking more logically, Such as a method of decision making. This is not just about language but also how we organize our thoughts.

I have been a domestic woman most of my life, and thinking domestically is very different from thinking academically, and if someone is in a subculture such as a street gang, the thinking will not be domestic nor academic. While the average Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu, Republican, Democrat will each have a different frame of mind for understanding the world. When the frame of mind is different, there will be a huge communication problem because so much of our communication depends on others sharing the information we have.

I am not necessarily saying this is inevitable, nor am I saying that it is the end of humanity. I'm just trying to think ahead in order to plan for possible outcomes based on public information. I don't see how it is a waste of effort unless the entire thing is a lie, in which case I will be thoroughly impressed with the organizational skills required to do so. — Lif3r

I think possibly the best book ever written for common people and understanding how our world works, is Youngquist book "Geodestinies". I knew him and I am quite sure he is dead now. He was a geologist and worked around the world. Then he became a geology professor. He wrote two books that I know of "Mineral Resources and the Destiny of Nations" and "Geodestinies". "Geodestinies" got special awards and finally, our local paper accepted the importance of his book after I got on them about that. I am saying really important information is not getting to the people, so we can not have faith in the masses. However, if you want to be well informed you can access the book here and give a copy to your local library and possibly highs schools. This is something real and meaningful we can do.

Geodestinies: The Inevitable Control of Earth Resources over ...
https://www.amazon.com › Geodestinies-Inevitable-Control-Resources-Indi...
There are many good books on peak oil, but none fly as high as Youngquist's "Geodestinies", giving you an eagle-eye view of how the world works from a ... — amazon

Well, the last few generations of Elders, having left us up Shit Creek without a paddle, seem to me to deserve about as much respect as some Chinese geese we once had to keep the lawn down - we lost track of them in the grass! I think that we need to distinguish very clearly between the material of history and the other subjects and those who have control of education. When I was a kid in the Rhondda, after what had been done to our people, about the only person we respected was Paul Robeson, and when I was in Cambridge about the only person I respected was Leavis, the great critic, who didn't much respect anyone else. It was a place full of rich snobs from public (your private?) schools, many on closed scholarships, and I was in perhaps the worst of all the colleges in that respect, so my reactions were just boredom and contempt. Isn't the stuff you are talking about available on the internet? An amazing amount of material does seem to be. I'm not unsympathetic with your views, but I feel that each generation is now adapted to the technology it is supposed it will be living with, and it cuts down on generational contacts, because capitalism will see to it that technology goes on developing fast. Wouldn't designing humanoid robots and bowing out with dignity be a preferable approach? — iolo

If I understand you correctly, your argument is that robots are better than humans? This is such a wonderful subject it deserves its own thread. Why would a robot care about anything?


It would be great if we could all watch the Britsh tv show "Humans" together and then share our impressions and concerns. This link provides ways to access the show
https://www.google.com/search?q=online+British+tv+show+%22Humans%22&rlz=1C1CHKZ_enUS481US483&oq=online+British+tv+show+%22Humans%22&aqs=chrome..69i57j33.34768j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Then I saw large amounts of money entering the picture, generalisations made about percentages, averages, of heating over long periods and historical figures on temperatures being altered. So many of the predictions made never happened and the horror stories that began to appear became standard forecasts, even though they were based on a worst-case scenario and unlikely to happen.
— Brett — Brett

So many of the predictions are happening, the language of scientist is has gotten stronger and the warning now says the changes are happening faster than expected. Where on the earth do you think wildlife is safe from the devastation of human activity?

Humans increased species extinction rate by 1,000 times, new study says. Plant and animal extinctions are occurring at a rate of at least 1,000 times faster than the time before humans, a new study says. ... On a pre-human earth, the death rate was 0.1, but that number spiked to between 100 to 1,000.May 29, 2014
Humans increased species extinction rate by 1,000 times, new ...
https://www.pbs.org › newshour › science › animal-extinctions — PBS

Walter Youngquist is a geologist who explains what we have done to the planet and the threats to natural habits and humans in his book GeoDestinies. How well do you understand the minerals essential to agriculture and where did you get your information?

How about the rain forest. If you want us to believe you are well informed, tell us why the forest are important and what is happening to them. What happened to trees in the US and why did it happen? How about what happened to the trees on Easter Island and the impact that had on the island. Tell us you know and instead of attacking us for believing we have some very serious problems. Give us reason to agree with you.

I don’t know if you failed to read this carefully or purposely misconstrued it.

It’s not faith in “the pharaoh” I mentioned but faith in ourselves, in who we are. What else could there be, who else should we have faith in? I don’t see how my faith in people is evidence of taking no interest in facts. Then you go on to blame me for something you made up. — Brett

I believe there is a good reason to have faith in humans, but that is conditional and we have met those conditions. That means our faith in humans is no better than past faiths, because the faith does not go with the necessary conditions for that faith. Do you want to argue unconditionally we should have faith in humans? How about why should we have faith in humans?

In a 1920's newspaper an article warned... "Given our know oil supply and rate of consumption, we are head for economic disaster and possibly war." All industrial economies collapsed and the world went to war. Following that, we dramatically increased our consumption of oil, and today people argue we have all the oil we need. I think the people who make that argument are poorly informed. Now convince me of why I should have faith in them.

Probably the archetype behind that film was EST. I did something similar in my twenties. — Wayfarer

I did EST and I chose to break contact with those people.

I am starting to read Plato from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy and I'm enjoying it so far :). I want to read more about Aristotle, Socrates, and more. I know a bit of Marx, Hegel, Kant, and a few others but I have only read surface level content from all of them. If you have great resources that you like I would love them but only if you would like to send them. I would appreciate anything. Thank you again! — fullofnull

If you are interested in Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, know that Plato wrote the lessons of Socrates and taught Aristotle. Know that everything Socrates said was influenced by Sparta winning the war with Athens and controlling Athens, and that Aristotle favored Spartan control and authority and the Roman Christianity Church picked that authoritarianism. The more you study this stuff the more exciting it will be as it reveals what lies hidden in the western civilization subconscious. And know for everything we might admire about Sparta, in the end, it was self-destructive because they could not reproduce enough to keep Sparta strong.

This might be the best use of your time and money...

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If you go that site look for the course titled "Great Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition".

I am glad you realized a more constructive way to think of your "disorder". Your "disorder" can be a gift but perhaps one difficult to live with because it means seeing things differently from others, so the gift comes with a challenge of getting others to see things differently. Others may think your thoughts are way out in left field or disorganized as right brian thinking is very creative and reorganizes thoughts in new ways. Developing good communication skills and your own confidence can bridge those problems and reveal your gift.

Well, I assume we write into the basic programme the ability to change in response to changing conditions. It is, after all, how our own evolution worked, and well within current possibilities, surely? — iolo

I think that is a wrong assumption. Only if we value a study of history do we keep ourselves as informed as we need to be. Unfortunately, with education for technology came disrespect of the elders because today we so much smarter than older people. Like every generation, our young think they are smarter only unlike previous generations we have turned the young against their elders in favor of faith in technology.

Unfortunately, I have a college education and burn with resentment towards some of my professors. Had I been young I would not have known better than to sit in awe of them. As an older student, I was often horrified by what they said. Not only do some of them insist information for papers be from the abstracts, but it must also be less than 10 years old. With this mentality, our university government document library emptied its shelves of the books recording government documents. Today no one can find information without knowing exactly what to look for and depending on a librarian to retrieve that information that is electronically stored. No more sitting with the old books and discovering what is in them. This is like blinding the whole population! I am horrified by what has been done. Information today is as controlled as when the Church had power. It is just a different set of people controlling it.

May all those who remember when things different raise their hand.

The fact that you suggest particular books to read that would “change” my mind means you’ve already put me in a particular camp, where I approve of mindless destruction in the name of capitalism. — Brett

Heavens no, I wasn't thinking that. I just know when we (all of us) have different opinions it is usually because we have read different things. :lol: I am one of those obnoxious people who is so sure of what I believe to be true, that I am sure if others were working with the same information they would agree with me. :grin:

It’s true that nature does work to keep things in balance, but it’s a dynamic planet so you can’t be sure of what exactly that balance is. My negative interpretation of your concern is that we can’t go back to your pagan way of life. The “hostile negativity’ is an effort to stop what I regard as a movement that will not help us or the planet, a movement incapable of dealing in reality and in the adaptability and extraordinary development of the species we are. — Brett

:lol: Your assumptions fill me with the joy of laughter. I will point out the Christians thought the Greeks were pagans and it is the Greeks who gave us philosophy and put us the path to science. They began with nature-based gods and goddesses. I think that was important to the development of their thought. The Greeks were not as materialistic as the Romans and unfortunately, although the Greeks gave the more barbaric Romans the bases of civilization, it was the materialistic (a belief in matter) Romans and then the Christians who became dominant. I see nothing incompatible with Greek paganism and science. And yes, I feel strongly about a consciousness that is in harmony with nature rather than a strongly materialistic consciousness.

Of course we are capable of damaging the environment, just by our sheer numbers alone, and there has been a lot of work done to mitigate this damage. There’s little doubt that people are generally healthier than they’ve ever been. True, some people are still struggling, but not in the same way they have in the past. — Brett

No people are not healthier than they were. 30 years ago that was true, but recently the health of younger people has gone to hell. Our government with its new focus on profits is not protecting us as it did when it first created controls of our food supply. The problem with diabetes has rapidly increased and we have spread it to third countries with products such as sodas. I am so ashamed of us. Restaurant meals are commonly not that healthy and commonly the servings are way too much. At Least Shari's, a northwest restaurant chain, gives people information of the calories in a meal.

Increasing Mortality and Declining Health Status in the USA ...
www.hhpronline.org › articles › 2018/10 › increasing-mortality-and-decli...
by S Bezruchka - ‎Related articles
Oct 11, 2018 - The National Center for Health Statistics reports that life expectancy is declining, and infant mortality is increasing 1. The reported life ... — S Bezruchka

What I find myself resisting is the doomsday mentality, not as extreme in your post, but still there by association. — Brett

As I said, you haven't read what I have read. If you did you would not be arguing.

It’s a lack of faith in who we are that I object to and belief that it’s all over I find the need to resist. I don’t see it as helpful to pass this on to the next generation. Of course help them to understand the importance of our relationship to the environment, but don’t crush their hope or educate them through fear. — Brett

When you are interested in knowing facts let us know. Only when people such as yourself are working with the facts, can we resolve serious problems. Going on "faith" in the pharaoh, or any other ruler who is supposed to have the power of keeping things in balance and pleasing the gods, or faith in technology and our new leaders is no better than past faiths.

We the people must take the responsibility of being well informed, and if you were, you would not speak of having faith, instead of facts. When a young child runs into the street screaming about the dangers of running into the street will do absolutely no good unless the child is old enough to know the meaning of all those angry words. Today our adults need to stop trusting and working on faith, and accept responsibility for learning and then acting on informed decisions. Unfortunately, education for technology has not prepared the young for growing up and taking responsibility. Education has become just bull shit about our superiority and how technology can resolve every problem, and prepared the young to be dependent on authority, on the "experts", instead of preparing them to be their own authority. I am stating this as a national, politically driven problem and culture change that is not good for us or the world.

Well. flesh-and-blood humans aren't, I think, likely to survive the capitalist climate Gotterdammerung, so if we want something to survive, robots seem the best bet, if we create them such that they evolve. — iolo

I am excited about reading your explanation of that statement.

I just realized this thread spins of pervious threads about language games. Here is a quote form a link about language games.

"Wittgenstein was intent on bringing out how ‘the “speaking” of language is part of an activity, or form of life’."

When we are teenagers effectively who we are (a dependent child) dies to become a yet unknown adult, sort of like the worm metamorphs into a butterfly. How are we to understand this without contemplating the meaning of life and death? Tempting fate may seem foolish but our knowledge of life comes through experience. Words do not have meaning without experience. To get close to death may stimulate our will to live?

To respond to the question "And what is confusion and how is it easily induced with language?" Without language can there be confusion? Without language what can we know? I think without language we can be aware of our feelings. We can judge how safe it is to take the fruit when sitting too near the alpha male or judge how safe it is to take other chances with our life. But confusion? No, I don't think we can be confused without language.

Oh my goodness it is so nice to read something written by a well-informed person.

The future of India looks very bad! https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/coastal-concerns-rising-sea-levels-will-inundate-coastal-areas-sooner-than-projected-/articleshow/71985765.cms

The satellite radar used by NASA paints a worse picture of our future than expected.

I am alarmed by someone flagging this thread for not being philosophical. I am not sure how moderators here handle such conflicts of interest, between those who want to remain blind to reality and keep everything pleasant, and those who want to raise awareness of problems with the hope we will use knowledge to resolve problems. Science comes out of philosophy, let us hope those who love philosophy do not turn their backs on science. Doesn't philosophy mean a love of knowledge? Should we shut down threads that are knowledge of things we don't want to think about?

Directly to your explanation of why cities are better than survivalist isolation, we need education for democracy for those cities to function well. It will be as we create it and without an understanding of democracy, we could have short sited ideas of survival and look more like the feudal period of our history than an evolved democracy.

Well. flesh-and-blood humans aren't, I think, likely to survive the capitalist climate Gotterdammerung, so if we want something to survive, robots seem the best bet, if we create them such that they evolve. — iolo

Excuse me but I must disagree with you. Not only do I find little value in life without humans, but robots also demand finite resources. A problem with electric cars is the finite resources required for their batteries. But what if we are God's consciousness? Can that be transferred to a robot? I don't think so.
And our planet sure does not need robots to preserve life. But many ancient cultures thought it was man's purpose to help nature. Too bad we don't live with that belief today.


God is asleep in rocks and minerals, waking in plants and animals, to know self in man. The teaching of Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

What a bunch of pathetic, self indulgent losers. I don’t believe any of you really believe what you write. You insult everyone that’s come before you to forge a life out of nothing. — Brett

My goodness, that is a strong criticism. I am not exactly sure which statements you find so bad. But I think there are books that would change your mind. Such as this book ... by Izolda Trakhtenberg

Life Elements: Transform Your Life With Earth, Air, Fire and Water

Izolda worked at both the National Geographic Society and then NASA where she worked for the GLOBE Program. Envisioned by Vice President Al Gore in his book, Earth In The Balance, the GLOBE Program is a unique international partnership among students, teachers, and scientists where students study the earth and care for the environment. Izolda honed her teaching and training skills in workshops as she developed the training methodology for the Soil protocols and then traveled the world as a Master Trainer in the Atmosphere, Land Cover, Hydrology, and Soil protocols. This knowledge, these skills and her interest in ancient symbolism and methodologies further developed her insight into human interactions and tendencies. She saw the patterns and relationships among self-directed change, self-confidence, and ancient Elemental/environmental symbolism and synthesized them into the Life Elements System. — amazon

Nature works to keep things in balance and humans have greatly disrupted that balance. How could anyone not think this is a very important subject, or see as anything but concern for future generations and our planet? I happen to be a pagan who thinks caring for our planet is very important, and excuse me but humans have become a problem. Something is really wrong when people have such a negative interpretation of our concern. Why all the hostile negativity directed towards those of us who sincerely care about future generations and the planet?

What if we're brains in vats? How do you know your not a brain in a vat, or hallucinating when you say "It is raining."? — Harry Hindu

If we were brains in a vat, what could we know and how could we know it? We experience life with our bodies and without them, we might record and regurgitate facts, but we would know not the meaning of them. Without a body what does time or rain mean?

Now you just need knowledge of this state-of-affairs called truth in order to make an accurate claim that knowledge entails truth. But you can't because it would require a level or perception that we can never attain - like being the thing you are making a claim about. — Harry Hindu

So what can know about string theory and how can we know that? :naughty:

Unless your hope is that this poor person is not sincerely trying to merely distract himself from death rather than bravely staring it in the face. — Pfhorrest

Oh, I thought you were going to say, "rather than bravely engaging in life". I think contemplation of death occurs, and reoccurs, at different periods of our lives, but it seems for most of my life I have been too busy resolving the challenges of life to give much time to thinking about death. Long ago my contemplation of death lead to learning everything I can before I die, just in case we live after death, or in another dimension, we remain conscious.

My biggest fear was meeting the important people of history at that big dining table in the sky. It would be so :yikes: embarrassing to be dining with them and totally ignorant of what they know.

All true to experience ... BUT it all depends on certain assumptions based on language I think. What is this individuality based on except the noise 'I'? Once accepted, the concept suggests all sorts of pain. — iolo

Are you speaking from the teachings of Buddha? Happiness is conditional on security and learning to be happy. After doing workshops on healthy living, it has been obvious being happy does not come naturally but is learned. Like I had to experience many people to conclude I was not the only one who had to learn how to be happy, and it is not just my family that needs to learn who to be happy. In general, humans struggle to be happy because they don't know how to be happy unless that came from their family.

What is really important other than a reality that meets the conditions of happiness, is our internal language, our self-talk. Our self-talk depends on our personal experience and also our culture and position in society. That is, if we are born into wealth, we are treated very differently than if we are born into poverty. And education promotes culture. We are now in cultural crisis because education is no longer focused the social goals. Hum, how do I say? Our humanness is about our relationships, not just our ego or individuality.

If you can watch the movie "Passengers" for a perspective on the importance of living with humans and not just robots. Or the British TV series Humans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sm23e0a5_w

:lol: Robots just don't fit into my fantasy of what is valuable. I am old and as far as I am concerned if humans do not thrive, nothing matters. I care as much about robots outsurviving humans as I care about my shoe existing a hundred years from now. :roll:

I will go with what Punshhh says about the importance of transmitting our knowledge to the young. I believe democracy is best for humanity and it is not defended unless it is defended in the classroom. We have not defended democracy in the classroom since 1958 when we replaced liberal education with education for the Military-Industrial Complex that makes people dependent on technology and authority instead of preparing us for liberty and the responsibility of democracy. Now we have humans who are happy to give up their liberty to live under the control of robots because they believe robots can be superior to humans. That is frightening! A machine can never be human. There are no fairies that can turn Pinocchio into a real boy.

Isn't death only a problem for those who accept the heavy promptings of language to believe intermittent and shifting consciousness 'is' 'an individual'? — iolo

Good grief, I associate death with loss. I suffered the loss of my mother when she died, and I don't even want to think of the loss of a son or daughter or one of their children. I am sure my life is of no value to people in this forum, but I think it has an important value to those I am close to. Growing up without a mother or father can be very painful. Losing a sibling can throw the whole family into grief and radically change the trajectory of one's life. Death is about being human and our relationships, and that is a little more just our individuality.

I have an attention disorder that lets my mind easily transition from subject to subject in thought when I'm thinking about something, whether it's an idea or object of objective existence. It's hard to explain but, in short, my mind can get confused in the middle of thinking of a productive statement (which I define as something that adds to the conversation in value to both peoples/peoples involved in an obvious manner.) I've always been fascinated with how plastic a mind can be, especially mine. The idea of confusion as I understand it is a simple one although I cannot find anything much on how to initiate confusion in different ways, or to initiate it easily. I'm not a very creative person and I have trouble coming up with my own ideas on things unless I get a tiny bit of inspiration from other places. — fullofnull

I am surprised you said you are not creative. Perhaps that is because you think you have an attention disorder, instead of thinking of this as a positive, in which case you should be very creative. :lol: We might say nature has an attention disorder because all new things are new combinations of what is.

You might enjoy learning Latin and Greek because our thinking begins in the past, and much of it was lost to us when Rome fell, however, the Renaissance was the resurrection of that consciousness and kick-started the scientific thinking of what we call the modern age.

You can get a feel of this by knowing the word "concept" is a relatively modern word, unknown to Christian Europe before there was literacy in Greek and Latin. Imagine talking about what we think without the word "concept". Everything we know of thinking today would not be possible without the vocabulary invented to talk about thinking. The word "concept' originated in 1550.

concept (n.)
"a general notion, the immediate object of a thought," 1550s, from Medieval Latin conceptum "draft, abstract," in classical Latin "(a thing) conceived," from concep-, past-participle stem of concipere "to take in and hold; become pregnant," from con-, here probably an intensive prefix (see con-), + combining form of capere "to take," from PIE root *kap- "to grasp." In some 16c. cases a refashioning of conceit (perhaps to avoid negative connotations that had begun to cling to that word).
https://www.etymonline.com/word/concept

I have to wonder if the negative connotations had something to do with the story of Adam and Eve and the forbidden fruit of knowledge and fear of Satan's lies in a society that was rapidly changing and therefore fearful because of literacy in Latin spreading and changing what, and how, people think. :lol: I suppose my difficulty with staying on topic could be called an attention disorder but I see it as an ability to see what others don't see. More of a big picture view than a narrow view.

Historically good times become bad times and bad times become good times. Civilizations fall because humans do not live sustainably, and eventually, their populations require more than their environments can sustain. Increasing our success by consuming from around the world, means we pull the whole world down, not just our own civilization. Even if the changing weather patterns did not lead to our doom, our refusal to live with the limits of our environments and the limits of the planet, will take us down. Just as every civilization before us fell, including the fall of Rome and South American civilizations. However, if a plague wipes out 1/3 or more of the population, those who survive, get to enjoy the good life.

And do you know how to keep a nuclear power plant from melting down? You may live so far from a nuclear power plant this is not an issue for you, but nuclear power plants must be properly maintained and this requires a constant water supply to prevent them from melting down and no amount of money will protect humans from this, because keeping a power plant operating and providing needs requires knowledge and labor. Who will keep the mines open and turn the ores into cars, batteries, cell phones, etc.? The richest people are dependent on the laborers to provide their needs. How are they going to protect their labor force and get essential resources from around the world?

I think you are correct to believe human behavior will not be congenial when the shit hits the fan. We can through studies of humans that mothers allowing passively allow their children to die when and abandon them when they can not feed them. We know of cases of humans eating humans when they are dealing with starvation. What makes us nice humans is full bellies and security. Take that away, some of them will give up and die, some of them become brutal to survive, the most capable and intelligent will work together for their mutual survival and protection of resources but such groups will necessarily be small when the environment can only support a small group of people, and we are no longer shipping meats, vegetables, and fruits to supermarkets year-round.

OMG Pfhorrest, I don't think I could feel more ignorant than I do at the moment! Like perhaps seriously brai

Pfhorrest
714
I don't know if I will understand what you said better in the morning? I have an idiot math IQ and as important as I think math is for defining truth, I am not good at it. However, because math is essential to defining truth, I want to develop my ability to think with math and communicate with it. I get from what you said, not only must our figures agree but so must our terms agree. At this point in time, we (all of us) do not have the communication system we need to understand anything about our economic reality and homelessness.
— Athena

I wouldn't quite say that, but the communication we need is nuanced and sometimes difficult to understand. There are a lot of similar but importantly different things we could be talking about, and keeping them properly differentiated is hard. Some of those things are:

What defines an economic class? Is it:
-Being in a certain percentile of incomes?
-...of wealth?
-Having sufficient income to meet certain goals?
...or sufficient wealth?
-etc

If relevant, what is an "average"?
- Mean? (Add together all the figures and divide them up evenly)
- Median? (Line all the figures up in order and pick the one halfway down the line)
- Mode? (Group all the figures into similar classes and then pick the biggest class)

And if we're averaging, what are we averaging?
- Household income?
- Personal income?
- Household wealth?
- Personal wealth?

What you usually hear people talk about is median household income. But even then, it's not consistent whether economic class is being defined by being in a certain percentile of household income (like the poverty line is usually defined), or by having sufficient household income to meet certain goals.

On top of that, I think that personal figures are more useful because household size can vary so those household figures might be divided over one person or six (on average it's about two, so household figures are usually about twice personal figures).

And I think mean and mode figures are just as important to be aware of as the median, if (as is the case) the mean is way above the median, and the mode is way below it, which means that wealth is really concentrated at the top, so the mode or "typical" person (one who falls into the biggest group) makes way less than the median, while the mean or "average" person (one who has an even-sized slice of the pie) makes way more than the median. In our case, the "typical" American makes about 30% of what the "average" American makes. That fact is lost when all we talk about is what the median two-person household makes.

And on top of all of that, I think it's way more useful to talk about wealth than income. That mode ("typical") income is about what I spent to live a quite comfortable life, and it's about what a full-time minimum-wage job would pay. But because I lack wealth (such as a home of my own) and so have to borrow (rent) it from others while also saving to buy my own so I can stop doing that some day, I'm working my ass off to bring in that mean ("average") income that's more than three times what I need to fund my comfortable level of consumption. Someone who inherited a house could be living a lifestyle better than mine on less than a third of my income, but if all we look at is income figures, I look fantastically rich compared to them, while they have already realized my lifelong goal that I'm not sure I will ever manage to realize.

What does your community look like?
— Athena

Rent Per Month
Apartment (1 bedroom) in City Centre 2,200.00 $
Apartment (1 bedroom) Outside of Centre 2,000.00 $
Apartment (3 bedrooms) in City Centre 3,500.00 $
Apartment (3 bedrooms) Outside of Centre 2,800.00 $

Numbeo doesn't have figures for my town's income, but for the closest other one:
Average Monthly Net Salary (After Tax) 3,933.33 $

Preschool (or Kindergarten), Full Day, Private, Monthly for 1 Child 900.00 $

How can I copy a picture in my email and paste it here? Or send it from cell phone to the forum?
— Athena

Only subscribers can upload photos to the site directly, but if you upload the picture somewhere else (like http://www.imgur.com/ or such), you can put the URL to the picture inside of img tags, like this but without the spaces:

[ img ]https://i.imgur.com/ms2mozp.jpg[ /img ]

and it will show up like this:


7 hours ago
123
8 — Pfhorrest

n damaged. :lol: That is a little humbling considering I normally think of myself as a pretty well-informed person, but I can not wrap my head around what you said. This youtube is fun and helpful but it will take a while to sink into my thick skull https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=explaining+average%2C+meidum%2C+mode&page=&utm_source=opensearch If I had a magic wand I would make it possible for us all to think like this, because this is the first step to understanding our social problems and possible solutions. The way we are talking about "those homeless people, just isn't helpful. I think you are a real blessing to all of us because of what you know.

The stats for your community could give me a heart attack. My monthly income is $783. That is what people with Social Security and SSI get. :lol: That might give you an idea of what my rent problem is and why it is my intention to use my new cell phone to post on-line and hopefully inform people of our reality and what will be their reality if they work for low wages and can never afford the wealth of which you speak, or if they become disabled before making it to retirement. If they make it all the way to retirement on low wages, their reality won't be much better than mine. They might be able to afford nicer restaurants while they haul everything around in a shopping cart. :rofl: If you can help me talk math to make the point, that would be a real blessing! :heart: It is a terrible wrong to do city planning with those kinds of stat's I am sure that results in decisions that do not include all the low income and our economy depends on them. Wealth is made by paying the laborer the least wage possible and charging the renter the most the market will bear. We are creating a terrible problem and seem to blind to that fact while we pat ourselves on the back for being so wealthy. :joke: We are not getting- things do not add up right. Rows of homeless people camped on our streets is what happened in India, not the US.

I am trying to establish an account with http://www.imgur.com/ but that isn't going so well. I will keep trying.

How can I copy a picture in my email and paste it here? Or send it from cell phone to the forum?

Definitions of economic class vary and some are more useful than others. By some sources the poverty line is defined at the bottom quintile, so by definition 20% of people are always below it no matter what, which obviously isn’t very informative about social wealth distribution. I don’t know where your other figures, 50% middle class and 1-2% upper class, are from, so I can’t comment on them. I do know from memory that about 75% of people presently make an income below the national mean personal property income (i.e. GDP per capita, what you’d get if you added up all incomes and divided by population). The median personal income, which 50% of people are below by definition, is about half of that mean income: around $25k/yr as opposed to around $50k. The mode income, the group with the most people in it, is barely over half of that, at around $15k/yr.

As I would define them, lower class is anyone whose rent and interest expenses are higher than their income from the same, middle class is anyone where they’re equal (so their only expenses are their own consumption and all their income is earned), and the upper class is anyone whose income from rent and interest is higher than their expenses on same. By those definitions, almost everybody is lower class, and almost nobody is middle class, because it’s way easier to move from middle to upper class than it is from lower to middle. — Pfhorrest

I don't know if I will understand what you said better in the morning? I have an idiot math IQ and as important as I think math is for defining truth, I am not good at it. However, because math is essential to defining truth, I want to develop my ability to think with math and communicate with it. I get from what you said, not only must our figures agree but so must our terms agree. At this point in time, we (all of us) do not have the communication system we need to understand anything about our economic reality and homelessness.

How might we begin creating a dialog about homelessness that makes sense? In "Poverty and Riches" Scott Nearing, Ph.D. states the cost of living and then speaks of wages.

I am using information for my area from this site https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/

Rent Per Month

Apartment (1 bedroom) in City Centre 972.73 $ 800.00-1,150.00
Apartment (1 bedroom) Outside of Centre 821.78 $ 700.00-1,000.00
Apartment (3 bedrooms) in City Centre 1,700.00 $ 1,600.00-1,800.00
Apartment (3 bedrooms) Outside of Centre 1,421.88 $ 1,200.00-1,600.00


Average Monthly Net Salary (After Tax) 2,574.85 $

The minimum wage is 11.25 so that is $1,800.00 for 40 hours work.

Childcare
Preschool (or Kindergarten), Full Day, Private, Monthly for 1 Child 936.00 $

So if a single parent pays the $972.73 for rent and $936.00 for child care, that leaves the parent $108.71 for everything else, if I did the math right. There is no problem with that is there? Unless the car breaks down.

What does your community look like?

↪Athena I’m not contesting that humans are having a negative impact on nature or advocating that we just destroy nature to build hones willy-nilly. I love my hometown because it’s so close to nature. I’m just pointing out the human-caused problems that are independent of that. There are lots of empty homes up for sale in my town, but you have to be rich to be allowed to live in them, and the homeless or underhoused locals are obviously not rich. And nationally, there are more unoccupied houses than homeless people. Without doing any further development, we could house (and feed etc) everyone. But we don’t. So there being too many people isn’t the cause of poverty. We could fix poverty just with what we have built already. — Pfhorrest

Are you referring to our banking system creating an artificial economy? I think that is something we could look at. Oh wow, I just got a cell phone and if I could learn how to take pictures and put them on the internet I could post some very powerful pictures that are in a 1916 book "Poverty and Riches". This book speaks of $768 a year of earned wages, providing a decent living for a family of six. He uses numerals to make a point that 7/10 of the workers earn less than $750 and that these people do not have a decent wage. Today, not even a single person could live decently on $750 a month. Our rents are higher than that. Why in a little over 100 years has our money been so devalued?

However, 7/10 of people below the poverty level is 70% and that is huge compared to today with the states with the highest poverty percentage just below 20%. In the past, only 20% of the people were middle class, and 10% were wealthy. About 50% of our population is middle class. Another site says our upper class is 1% to 2%. That does not work. If 20% are below the poverty level, and 50% are Middle class and only 2 % are upper class we are missing 28%. Help can anyone explain that?

I think that says we are doing something right because those living below the poverty rate has decreased the middle class has increased. However- the relative deprivation is greater. To just function in today's society requires a substantial amount of money and that was not exactly so in the past. Check this graph below to see the growth in the cost of property, and consider people homesteaded in the west for free. Not only did they get large parcels of land free, and build homes with free trees, but they could live off the land in many places. Now they can't even find a free place to put a bedroll, they can not hunt year-round, and they can't even pee without being fined. Until the west was filled, people could escape the poverty of industrial cities and the plantation economy of the south. Now they have no place to go and if we are intelligent we will do something about this.

100-Year Housing Price Index Graph

100-year history of U.S. real estate/housing prices
U.S. Housing Price Index (1900 - 2012) — Observations

In short, I think what you said is that we must examine everything philosophically. Then it follows what is required for the philosophical examination of life?

I kind of want to get this thread back on the topic of the breakdown of social justice. While going through my books I found one explaining the mass migration from Europe to the US and how disruptive this is to people's lives. They are born in one culture and one position in an economic structure and must come to understand the needs of a different economy and what is required of them, and the new culture and what it demands of everyone. This is not really different from a civilization taking over a region that is occupied by indigenous people and forcing them into housing and a way of a life foreign to them. This is devastating to their identity and social ties and often leads to alcoholism. I am not sure that the huge problem we have with drug addiction is not the result of the same uprooting, only people haven 't moved but our culture and economy has changed so much they might as well have moved. I am very sure that for most homeless people there is no family to help them. Most of humanity has been ordered by family order and that is no longer true.

Hum, I am having trouble focusing, so participating in the forum is difficult. I am having trouble sleeping knowing I have to empty out my apartment. I am having trouble emptying out my apartment because I get so little done before the pain is so bad I have to sit down. I am trying to thin out my library and I am making some progress but I think I am trying to save too many books. Now to what you said.

I think the Bible has many great analogies and metaphors and if we all saw the analogies and metaphors for what they are, the Bible wouldn't be so bad. Thinking of a militarized government like a beast that devours resources is a great metaphor. Thinking a God literate made us from mud in the Garden of Eden is a terrible mistake. Going on your concern of division, dividing things between good and evil can be problematic, and thinking a God controls what is happening instead of natural forces and human choices is problematic.

This is a thinking problem. I think with proper education everyone would interpret the Bible abstractly instead of concretely. They would see the analogies and metaphors for what they are, instead of being superstitious. Holding that man can know the will of God, is a terrible, terrible thing that we must not tolerate because this belief can lead to evil.

We agree holding false beliefs can be a serious problem. How do you suggest we correct the problem without causing division?

↪Athena I’m not contesting that humans are having a negative impact on nature or advocating that we just destroy nature to build hones willy-nilly. I love my hometown because it’s so close to nature. I’m just pointing out the human-caused problems that are independent of that. There are lots of empty homes up for sale in my town, but you have to be rich to be allowed to live in them, and the homeless or underhoused locals are obviously not rich. And nationally, there are more unoccupied houses than homeless people. Without doing any further development, we could house (and feed etc) everyone. But we don’t. So there being too many people isn’t the cause of poverty. We could fix poverty just with what we have built already. — Pfhorrest

:heart: I like the forums best when we have agreement and can move forward from there. Now let's see if we can do some problem-solving.

Empty homes are not free. Someone invested in the home and that home can not be taken from that person without compensating the owner. If you sank 5 hundred thousand dollars into a home how would you turn it into a place for people who need housing? Or how could we turn that private land into public land? Who is going to pay and who is going to pay for maintaining the home? And by the way, where I live there is not a surplus of housing. Rentals are off the market a day after they are put on the market and $500,000 housing is gone in a couple of months. I do not see the land for new housing, and the city is pressured to build up, but as you said, people with private homes do not want apartments built next to them. They don't want the extra traffic and more children in the schools, all things that decrease their standard of living and increase their cost of living as growth demands more services and more taxes. I am afraid I am not saying this well, but we need to think about this mathematically. Let us stop agreeing over human values and simply make all this a mathematically understandable problem.

I have a bone to pick to with all cities. We know the price of real estate goes up and up and room to grow does not. We know, or should know, our economy depends on cheap labor. Nothing is affordable without cheap labor or robotic machines that don't pay taxes and who wants a robot waitress or waiter instead of a real human? So let us think of reality good for humans and the reality of needing cheap human labor (how many and amount of wages) and the fact that these human beings need affordable housing (where and how much can they pay). How sane is it to not set aside land for the future needs of low-income people? Some countries such as Mexico have set aside land for the indigenous people. In the US we have reservations for indigenous people. I have read Germany is doing a good job of providing affordable housing and keeping everyone employed. What in hell is wrong with the US? We need to wake up to our reality. We no longer have a wilderness to fill up with our growing population. What should do get people to wake to our changed reality and think mathematically about the problem?

Ouch, :broken: can you show me mathematically how the problem is not too many people and not enough resources?

Well, my sister is on her way. She has been on the warpath since I told her about my situation. She has been to our state capital every day since, arguing that something needs to be done. She is coming to get proof that the woman who denied me housing violated the HUD rules. It is a two-hour drive for her to get here and I better be ready when she arrives. When my sister is upset she is like an armed nuclear bomb. and I don't want to trigger an explosion by not being ready or by arguing with her about details. The two of us have independently fought these battles before and we win but we have avoided each other most of our lives. She is a little too intense for me, and I am a little too passive for her. I hope we get through this without killing each other. :lol: Had I know she would react as she is reacting, I would have never told her.

You might not have much choice in the matter. It might have to be either Heaven or Hell.

But as we achieve Godlike powers it is obvious that our ideas about God creating a Heaven and Hell to reward or punish us is very primitive concept cooked up by stone age people. — ovdtogt

Zeus feared once we learned the technology of fire we would learn all other technologies and rival the gods. He created the first woman and gave her to the first man, and he gave them a wedding gift. The man and woman were warned by another god, not to open the gift but when the woman was left alone curiosity got the best of her and she opened the gift. Out flew the miseries that Zeus gave them to slow down their progress for as long as possible. However, today we are technologically smart and without reverence for the gods, we lack the wisdom to use this technology wisely. :wink:

1.

Because there are more unoccupied homes than there are homeless people, and still tons and tons of undeveloped land. I live in a place with mixed suburbs, rural orchards and ranches, national forests and other nature preserves, and so on, and it's still ridiculously expensive to live out here on the edge of nowhere... and there's always lots of fabulous houses for sale, and lots of people living in trailers and sharing run-down slums because nobody from here (like me) can afford the real houses, it's just rich people from elsewhere who want to live close to nature and so jack up the prices and stall any further affordable development to keep their property values high. — Pfhorrest

:heart: My grandson was here yesterday to help me with the move. He made the same argument you made. I assume that is the popular story on the web.

How many people lived there a hundred years ago? I am quite sure you can find the history of your area and get an idea of the size of the population and the value of the property a hundred years ago.

Are you aware of Buckminster's books? I suspect you are too young to remember him?

Richard Buckminster Fuller (/ˈfʊlər/; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983)[1] was an American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, and futurist. Fuller published more than 30 books, coining or popularizing terms such as "Spaceship Earth".... — wikipedia

He, among others, warned us of overpopulation and it is devastating to know those educated since 1958 tend to be clueless of the overpopulation problem and seem to be living a fantasy about what technology can do for us and that we do not have respect limits. Here is a list of authors

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_expressed_views_relating_to_overpopulation_as_a_problem

Now to take another look at all the unused land. Do you think humanity can survive if we destroy nature? Do you have any concerns about protecting nature or about global warming? Do you like oxygen in your air? Do you think people are psychologically the same if they live in the inner city or rural area? Do you think you would like to live with the crowding of India or China?

2.

It's not a matter of there not being enough resources to support this many people, it's a matter of the resources being artificially restricted by systemic factors so that the people who control them gain more wealth and power, at the expense of a whole lot of other people that they couldn't care less about.

Ah, yes, I addressed that belief in the paragraph above. With technology we are limitless. :grimace: You don't know much about history and the rise and fall of civilizations do you? Again and again, overpopulation has destroyed civilizations. We can discuss this more if you like.

3.

Mind you, I do think that overpopulation exacerbates the problem, and in places where nobody wants to live (which are subsequently sparsely populated) you don't see these problems because there is so much unwanted excess. And there certainly is some point where the world can't support any more people. But we're not there yet.

:grin: There is hope we can come to agreements. At this point, I am think our disagreement is narrowed down to when we are at that point. And this is a good time for me to say our system of allocating who gets what could be improved. However, as I look at the new housing with almost no front or back yard, and see the teeny tiny apartments for low-income people and student housing used for family housing, I think we passed that crucial point 20 years ago. In California, it was more than 20 years ago. Do you know what California's demand for water is doing to the environment and the very real limits on the supply of water? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_in_California Californians are like the frog that doesn't jump out of the pot on the stove. They are in much more serious trouble than they realize.

I am reminded of the story of Easter Island. Easter Island was a paradise with plenty of everything people needed, like Oregon was a 100 years ago. Each new generation saw the island as it was when they came of age, not as the generation before them saw the island. They did not see what was happening to the island, and they did not see the day coming when the island was deforested and their food supply was gone, and those who survived were reduced to cannibalism. Not only are we overpopulated already but all these people are going to have babies and overnight all that available land can be gone, the tick of the clock between we are not at our limit yet and we are over our limit, is the final tick of the clock. We needed to take overpopulation seriously when Buckminster was writing, the forces that prevented this and exasperated the problem with consumerism could cause our civilization to fall as those before us fell.

I am confused because you appear to be making the same arguments I make, only you seem to think the problem is non-Christians and I think the problem is Christianity. Excuse me if I am wrong about thinking about you are Christian who is saying non-Christians are the problem.

1.

The idea that microscopic germs exist and cause diseases used to be seen as a supernatural power, because we couldn’t see them and the idea seemed far-fetched at the time. Or the idea that continents drift. Or the idea that rogue waves exist. And many other examples. What we call supernatural is usually that which we believe does not exist, then when we come to believe it exists we stop calling it supernatural, when we come to see it or come to understand how it acts on what we see we stop calling it supernatural and start seeing it as natural, as really existing. Something we call supernatural now may not be seen as supernatural in the future. — leo

Are you arguing that there is a God? I have no problem with that. However, if you are arguing the Bible is anything but mythology, and that it is the word of God, then we have a disagreement.

2.

Now when I talk of evil I’m not asking anyone to believe that there are forces we can’t see and can’t explain that are responsible for all the conflicts and the suffering in the world, we can focus on what we do see. For instance we do see that there are some desires and beliefs that contribute to unite people, to protect life and spread happiness, whereas there are some other desires and beliefs that contribute to divide people, to destroy life and spread suffering. We can see these latter desires and beliefs as natural forces, and we can call them evil forces.

Then you are not asking us to believe in Satan and demons and power of curses and reason for why we are not living in Paradise and why we need to be saved?

3.

Now where do desires and beliefs come from? People who believe in materialism say that they are the results of chemical reactions in the brain, of particles moving according to laws of physics. Whereas people who believe differently say that desires and beliefs do not come from particles, that they may be influenced by physics but that they are also influenced by other things which we do not see with the eyes. The idea that desires and beliefs solely come from laws of physics is a supernatural explanation itself, because we don’t have evidence of that, that’s a pure belief. But regardless of what we believe on the matter, regardless of where desires and beliefs come from, when we talk of evil we can simply focus on some desires and beliefs without necessarily assuming that there are unseen entities who work to make us have these desires and beliefs.

I really can not think of feelings, thoughts, consciousness as matter. It can even be hard to believe in matter because everything is energy. However, I think you have argued yourself out of accepting the Bible as the word of God because without believing the story of Adam and Eve and the snake/Satan and the forbidden fruit, the whole Christian notion of being made different from all other animals and needing to be saved falls about.

4.

And I wouldn’t say that believing there are things we don’t see or don’t understand promotes ignorance, on the contrary it prevents us from believing we already know everything, it keeps us open-minded and keeps us thinking and looking. There are some people who like to remain ignorant by looking to explain nothing, and there are people who like to remain ignorant by believing we already see everything. But the idea that we don’t see or don’t understand some things in itself doesn’t promote ignorance.

"ignorance" means to ignore something. People who believe the story of Adam and Eve, have cause to fear Satan, and false information from a supernatural source, and forbidden knowledge. They tend to ignore science and the scientific method of judging truth. What you said is true and it is a good argument and to me, it explains what is wrong with Muslims and Christians. They can be holding a false belief and kill people believing it is God's will they kill the pagans and infidels or those Christians who have a different understanding of the Bible. Those who believe they can know the will of God, can be pretty dangerous people.

5.

And so I don’t see what’s wrong with identifying forces that contribute to divide people, destroy life and spread suffering, and what’s wrong with calling them evil. Some of these forces are some desires and beliefs. There are other evil forces we can identify, and there can be other such forces we are yet to identify and understand. If you don’t like the word ‘evil’ you could use another word for it, maybe you have suggestions. But the reason I call evil the elephant in the room is that if we keep ignoring these forces, we can’t explain why social systems always seem to break down no matter what we try.

Wants wrong with calling them evil? They are Christians and Muslims who think they are doing the will of God. Are you wanting to call these religious people evil? Do we want to think of disease as evil spirits and watch for demons to come out of evil people? Do we want to eat without washing our hands but with faith that Jesus is protecting us and if we are saved we are protected? Do we want to believe Bush jr., Obama and Trump are made good presidents because of God and our prayers? Do we want to believe we are better people because we know the word of God and those who do not agree with us do not have the right understanding of God's word so it is okay to use million-dollar bombs and destroy their most important cities? Killing people with weapons of mass destruction because their leader may be developing a weapon of mass destruction. We can do this but they can not?

Oh yes, we can explain why social systems break down. Civilizations are born and die and we know a lot about the cause and effect. And the best reason for opposing Christianity is these people hold false beliefs and do not look for the truth outside of their belief, just as you explained in paragraph 4.

I've been the starving guy who can't find a job and can barely afford to eat, and while that was awful, I at least had a free roof over my head at the time (barely... a tool shed, but it was something), and it doesn't hold a candle to the abject horror of the prospect of not even being able to sit and starve in peace one I lost that and had to constantly pay a huge chunk of my income just for the right to be somewhere. I've spent my entire life since then trying desperately to get back to a point where I don't have to be afraid of going temporarily broke, a point where there is some kind of rock bottom to hit and rest upon as I try to pick myself up again, and not just an infinite gaping void below me waiting to swallow me up if I slip up for a moment. That terror is what has made me chained to jobs and working myself to death (and avoiding every possible risk, and consequently opportunity, that could jeopardize that fragile stability) my whole life since, way worse than just having to skimp on food made me do. And the realization that it's probably going to take me my entire life just to get back to that point, and I'm doing better than 75% of Americans according to the statistics, is what made me turn to socialism from my more libertarian roots. — Pfhorrest

I've been the starving guy who can't find a job and can barely afford to eat, and while that was awful, I at least had a free roof over my head at the time (barely... a tool shed, but it was something), and it doesn't hold a candle to the abject horror of the prospect of not even being able to sit and starve in peace one I lost that and had to constantly pay a huge chunk of my income just for the right to be somewhere. I've spent my entire life since then trying desperately to get back to a point where I don't have to be afraid of going temporarily broke, a point where there is some kind of rock bottom to hit and rest upon as I try to pick myself up again, and not just an infinite gaping void below me waiting to swallow me up if I slip up for a moment. That terror is what has made me chained to jobs and working myself to death (and avoiding every possible risk, and consequently opportunity, that could jeopardize that fragile stability) my whole life since, way worse than just having to skimp on food made me do. And the realization that it's probably going to take me my entire life just to get back to that point, and I'm doing better than 75% of Americans according to the statistics, is what made me turn to socialism from my more libertarian roots. — Pfhorrest

Welcome to Nazi Germany. I think we are back to the OP. It dawned on me when I was denied HUD housing by a woman who resented the "special favors" it get such as special accommodation for a medical condition and not have to claim the $2.65 I earn as a Senior Companion as income because it is stipend, that what you wrote of is how Germany spun out of control. People who struggle as you did can become compassionate or resentful. The woman I had to do deal with was resentful and hell will freeze over before she is unfair by giving someone more than what everyone else gets. Because she had zero compassion, she saw me as a terrible person taking advantage of the system and she was not about to let that happen. Others are shocked that I was denied because I spoke up to get what I am allowed. A person without pain such as the pain I live with has less need of a bathtub to manage pain. I don't think doing my best to get an apartment with a bathtub is being unfair. When she responded in an ugly way, it became even harder for me to smile and kiss her ass as though she were a king who can rule on a whim. But the reality is, what she did is against the policy but she can get away with it because there are so many people on the waiting list who would kiss her feet to the get the apartment. Legal Aid may help me, but too late for me to avoid being homeless.

There is more to this, She has her job instead of a compassionate person because the private owners who own the HUD housing are concerned only with the money. She was not chosen to be compassionate but to enforce the policy and defend the monetary interest of the property owner. Now some people I deal with like the Section 8 caseworker are very compassionate! The social service providers are often there because they really care about the people, and their organizations are about helping people, not monetary interest. Occasionally the social service workers are not compassionate at all, depending on the culture in the community, but hopefully, the culture is compassionate and about caring for people, instead of a focus on money and power. However, when more and more of the people in positions of power are resentful and willing to do anything to keep the security of the their job, we have the condition of Nazi Germany and the number of needy is growing rapidly.

If a person managing storage sheds is compassionate this person will do the best s/he can to help someone get their stuff out before the storage shed is locked and everything in it is sold off. This person will feel really bad if s/he must follow the rules and take action which means the person who can't pay the bill can't even get personal photographs out of the storage shed. If this person is afraid of losing the job or displeasing the employer, like the Nazi victimizing Jews, s/he will coldly do the unpleasant and each time it will become easier and easier to do the unpleasant.

We all like to think of ourselves as nice people, but the conditions we find ourselves in can make us less nice than we would like to be. If most people are desperate, who is going to do the "right thing" instead of following orders? We can do the wrong thing more easily when we believe it is the right thing, and the victims are at fault for everything. We all know those homeless people made bad choices and brought the problem on themselves, obeying authority is the way to avoid their fate. Hail Hitler who makes us proud and strong and is finally doing something about "those people" who cause us a problem.

the poor tend to be more concerned about acquiring status items/symbols or material possessions or possibly being able to present as wealthy or at least owning X possession. I can't say I blame them given their background/upbringing. — BitconnectCarlos

I think you are wrong about the poor doing more status spending. We are just like the rest of the animals when it comes to status and survival. :lol: I assure you I will do my very, very best to not look like or act like a homeless person if I end up on the streets. I do not want to get thrown out of places because of having the status of a homeless person. This is as true for us as it is true for all social animals. If you look like and act like an important member of the group, you will be treated like an important member of the group. If you look like and act like the one who is at the bottom of the pecking order, you will be treated as one at the bottom of the pecking order. All social animals push the losers to perimeters where they are most likely to be dinner for the preditors. Survival is best for those in the inner circle and no one can stay in the inner circle without appearing as a member of the inner circle. That overpriced handbag and shoes a woman must have are her pass into the inner circle.

Yesterday a friend told a story of knowing she gave money to the wrong person because she later saw that woman in a fine restaurant enjoying a special coffee and pastry. Wrong ! You can bet your bippy if I do end up on the street I am going to treat myself very, very well because I know that will be essential to feeling like a decent human being. If I get consumed by the cold, pain and fear, and become as a frightened animal, my chance of survival is very poor. I must remember who I am, and I must treat myself very well if I going to get through this trial. A nice thing about not paying rent is having money to treat myself in a high-class hotel by the river. That will be more important to remembering who I am than it is now, when I can comfort myself in my own soft bed, in the safety of my home.

I don't know if I am explaining things well or not. What I am about to do will only be destructive if people are not agreeable to what I say.