More current update:

1. Jeff Bezos: $183bn (£137bn)
The former hedge fund manager turned online book seller started Amazon in his garage in 1994. Bezos has invested heavily in space technology and also owns The Washington Post newspaper.

2. Elon Musk: $136bn (£101.8bn)
Musk is the founder and CEO of SpaceX and also the CEO of Tesla.

3. Bill Gates: $129bn (£96.6bn)
A permanent fixture at the top end of rich list for the past 20 years, the Microsoft founder has sold or given away much of his stake in the company – he owns just 1% of Microsoft – and now focuses predominantly on his philanthropic work.

4. Mark Zuckerberg: $105bn (£78.6bn)
Zuckerberg famously started Facebook in 2004 at the age of 19 and now is among the top five richest men in the world.

5. Bernard Arnault & family: $105bn (£78.6bn)
Arnault is the wealthiest European on the list. The Frenchman oversees an empire of more than 60 brands including Louis Vuitton and Sephora.

6. Warren Buffett: $88.4bn (£66.2bn)
Now in his ninth decade, the Berkshire Hathaway chief executive, known as the “Oracle of Omagh” is one of the most successful investors of all time. Like Gates he has pledged to give away more than 99% of his fortune to charity.

7. Larry Page: $82.7bn (£61.9bn)
Internet entrepreneur Page is one of the co-founders of Google. He stepped down as CEO of Google’s parent company Alphabet Inc. in December 2019 but remains a board member.

8. Sergey Brin: $80.1bn (£60bn)
Along with Larry Page, Brin was a co-founder of Google. Until December 2019 he was president of Alphabet Inc.

9. Steve Ballmer: $77.4bn (£57.9bn)
The American was the former CEO of Microsoft from 2000 to 2014. He is the current owner of the Los Angeles Clippers NBA franchise.

10. Mukesh Ambani: $74.9bn (£56.1bn)
Indian Ambani has a 42% controlling stake in Reliance Industries, which is the owner of the world’s largest oil refining complex. He is also the owner of property worth more than $400m.

What do you mean?

Oh and also, having to pay rent instead of just living in my family’s second or third home for free, or getting help with a big enough down payment that interest on a mortgage wouldn’t exceed rent, etc. — Pfhorrest

Ludicrous.

From the Internet

Bill Gates $76 USA
2 Carlos Slim Helu $72 Mexico
3 Amancio Ortega $64 Spain
4 Warren Buffett $58 USA
5 Larry Ellison $48 USA
6 Charles Koch $40 USA
7 David Koch $40 USA
8 Sheldon Adelson $38 USA
9 Christy Walton $37 USA
10 Jim Walton $35 USA
11 Liliane Bettencourt $35 France
12 Stefan Persson $34 Sweden
13 Alice Walton

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/meet-the-80-people-who-are-as-rich-as-half-the-world/

The general trend is the 1% aren't self-made but inherit their wealth and social advantage. So personal qualities or broader outlooks are pretty irrelevant. Better off considering the accidents of their birth. — apokrisis

The OP is “Who are they?”

Just to begin with it would be interesting to know if this is true or not.

I decided to go back to to read your first post.

So, what I am asking is whether there is a human nature? In this sense, I am also asking about whether there is a fixed nature or whether it can be altered. But firstly I am asking is the idea of human nature still a fundamental part of philosophy or has it been superseded by a more important agenda?[/quote

First of all I would agree with this comment.
— Jack Cummins

I do not believe in any one simplistic definition of human nature — Jack Cummins

I don’t know whether that was ever possible. Maybe it was when we were still learning about ourselves and our understanding was very basic. What I’m not sure of is whether it was a limited understanding of our “nature” or that our “nature” was actually that simple then and that very quickly we’ve become very complex. I suspect the latter. So complex in fact that the idea of a human nature is redundant.

We are obviously very adaptable creatures, we can make decisions about the best way to go forward, how to change the environment to suit our purposes, how to produce food according to our needs and not the dictates of environment, how to preserve life and so on; all material gains. But we can obviously be adaptable in how we think about thing and how we respond. Because of that we can sometimes go careering down the wrong path, sometimes we agree to follow someone down that path, we can convince ourselves of the truth of it. Fortunately we can also override that thinking and correct the direction we’re going in.

One of reasons for my posts is the interest I have in where we’re going and what it will be like. I try to do that by looking at who we are, which means I have to try and find out what brought us here, what is “human nature” and how that affects our decisions. Which is what I as looking at in my Kant OP. Are we moving away from our decision making on a moral basis towards a more ideological position?

If there is no such thing as ”human nature” then we are free to do whatever we want, but without any sense of morality. So we toss aside the idea that we are ethical creatures and now go with ideology, which is culture to me, but not a natural, organic culture that evolved over time. Instead it’s culture rapidly constructed along ideological claims and reinforced by the media and political response, and as I’ve said, there are cultures within cultures within cultures.

So I don’t think human nature is a fundamental part of philosophy. But something has replaced it which is the idea of who we can be, who we should be and what purpose we serve, and each culture has its own idea of that. If I’m correct then where does that take us?

I would say that the whole way we live is part of way of defining human beings. There are underlying issues, especially the nature and nurture one. However, the possible adaptations we make in the face of our circumstances and possible freedoms are also one way of seeing human nature. — Jack Cummins

Taking into account your comments on community and family, and posts from others about psychotic CEO’s or environmental destruction or politics or poverty, do you think that necessarily defines us and therefore our nature?

Okay I think I get where you’re coming from. For life to be about survival every aspect of our life, instinctive or chosen, would need to be based on survival.

I'm not really sure what you mean by this. — Mijin

Does it help if I’m talking about time and the evolution of man, not what happened last year.

What I am saying to you is that a single counter-example is a big problem for the philosophical idea that life is competition. — Mijin

Sure.

what if he just kills himself, or spends the rest of his life trying to get his space hopper back? That would be an example of an organism not competing, no?
— Mijin

If he kills himself then he has found his situation to be more than he can bear. Yes that is an example of an organism not competing. However it’s also an aberration, it’s the actions of an organism that cannot cope any longer with the way life has turned out. You might say that he has lost the will to live any longer. — Brett

My point here is of an organism not competing and that the action of not competing was an aberration.

This is a thread about what life is "all about".
You have phrased it as "life is competition" — Mijin

The OP was not about what life is "all about". It was “Is life all about competition?”.

This is my first post: “ Yes, life is about survival. Competition is a strategy.”

Me, typing this comment, does nothing to aid my survival. We could say it is a side effect of so-and-so instinct that was for survival, but that would concede the point that right now my action is neither motivated by survival nor does it aid my survival. — Mijin

That’s very true. But I’m not trying to assert that all actions are about survival, but these actions we engage in come about because we have survived.

How could anything we do or know be passed on to us if the originators of that knowledge had not looked after our survival long enough for us to comprehend it then act on it?

I’m now going to throw in Schopenhauer’s World as Will.

Any comments @schopenhauer1?

You don’t think that ideas can be proven in an environment that is insecure or unhealthy? Victor Frankl, for instance? — Possibility

If you read my posts with a little less bias you’ll see that that is not what I mean.

Perhaps I am splitting hairs, but only to challenge assumptions you seem to have about how the world is supposed to work. You can’t just dismiss anomalies and then claim to understand reality as a whole - your understanding must be able to explain those anomalies as well. — Possibility

I’m not saying how the world is”supposed to work”. Where did you get that from?

s a parent, I know there would be circumstances where I would not hesitate to choose otherwise. — Possibility

Yes, you want your child to survive.

I’ve watched a national level sporting team lose more than they won and fail to make more than the first game of finals for years under the same coach. Despite intense pressure from their supporters and critics, the players and the club continued to back that coach season after season, well beyond reason. It was apparent that their focus was not to win, but something else. — Possibility

Does the exception prove the rule?

An imprisoned or threatened being would be ‘insecure’ as such. — Possibility

This is where, intentionally or unintentionally, I think you play games. Or maybe it’s just splitting hairs.

Anyone can have an idea. I have them all the time. But ideas must be proven in the world. The ideas that we have on families, love, sharing and collaboration evolved, developed in a healthy, secure environment. These are the ideas that have made us what we are and from that we develop further.

I’m not saying that at some point I won’t make the choice to compete for survival if it comes to that, but I’m under no illusions that it’s my only choice under any circumstance. — Possibility

I’m not saying that either. I’m saying that you want to survive.

Or do they use the game to focus on developing their resources, capacity and value for future interactions? There is no right answer here - suffice to say, it is not all about winning. — Possibility

If they don’t win, for instance, they don’t go into the next round. What’s the point of developing resources, etc, if it’s not to win?

That’s just silly. True, players on a team may communicate and collaborate with each other, but in an effort to win.
— Brett

Are you certain of this? — Possibility

Why do you think they’re there?

The criteria by which you define ‘survival’ is limited to the transmission of genetic code. — Possibility

I don’t think I’ve tried to define survive. The definition of survive I imagine is to continue to live. But anyway, even if that were true I haven’t restricted it to the transmission of a genetic code, but knowledge as well as collaboration and communication and all the other things we are known for.

I dispute that only a healthy, secure being can develop intellectual faculties to play with ideas. There are countless examples through history of chronically ill, crippled, disabled, imprisoned and threatened human beings who have written or dictated evidence of highly developed intellectual faculties and ideas. — Possibility

Of course, but I think you’re now playing games.

So in time that allowed other aspects of our nature to develop and our intellectual faculties to play with ideas. Only a healthy, secure being can indulge in this. — Brett

You neglected to include a “secure being”.

I’m not going to argue about luck. Yes it plays a part but if you think you can live day to day based on luck then good luck to you.

It is within the capacity of any football player or team to focus more on building communication or collaborative capacity and value than on competition. — Possibility

That’s just silly. True, players on a team may communicate and collaborate with each other, but in an effort to win.

But, suppose a small collective live together in a small village. Circumstance destroy their usual supply of food. What do they do? Do nothing and die and with it the potential of their genes and all the knowledge they have, or do something.

So it occurs to me that I might be talking about “Will”.

If you want to attribute survival as the ultimate quality of life, — Possibility

I’m not sure if I actually said that but I’ll think about it anyway.

Edit: yes it would be the ultimate quality of life. How could it not be? How can knowledge be passed on?

You’re basing your reasoning upon an assumption that life is all about survival. — Possibility

Not necessarily. It’s because we have learned to survive so well that we have managed to survive the brutality of evolution. So in time that allowed other aspects of our nature to develop and our intellectual faculties to play with ideas. Only a healthy, secure being can indulge in this. Of course there are other things of value in life, otherwise we would not be chatting. But we have to be here to act.

Sport is competition. Even a mountain climber on his own competes with the mountain. My point was that I don’t think competition only occurs in times of scarcity. It may be part of our nature to compete.

We cooperate with each other because it is mutually beneficial to do so. — 8livesleft

Isn’t it possible that the mutual benefit is to survive? Isn’t it possible being part of a collective contributes to security, quality and quantity of good, successful child birth rates, general health and well being, which is about survival.

Obviously other aspects of human behaviour develop in that environment, but only in a healthy environment. No one wants to play when they’re starving.

Competition only occurs in times of scarcity, — 8livesleft

So what do you think is going on in a game of football?

Edit: And why do you think people cooperate?

Why is it that psychopaths disproportionately hold high level CEO positions. — Benj96

Presumably you regard competition as a psychotic activity, a human aberration. That the sickest rise to the top. I don’t know if it’s a fact that they disproportionally hold high level CEO positions.

We are born into a world where we are expected to strive for success : which to most is to have the best of everything; the best wealth, the best recognition, the best popularity and influence. — Benj96

Where would you put people who compete in sport, who strive to train and push themselves to win or beat a world record?

Life as we know it is turning upside down but it may involve relearning the basics and essence of human nature, for worse, or preferably, for better. — Jack Cummins

So we’re back to the beginning; is there such a thing as human nature and what is it?

However, in general when we have a set of things that share some property, we don't feel the need to expand the definition to include that property. — Mijin

I presume that what you mean by this is that we don’t need to define something by one of its many properties.

And in the case of life competing, it's not merely the case that we have no reason to include it in our definition, — Mijin

and that there’s no reason to exclude it as a property. So one of the properties/features, among others, of humanity is that it’s competitive.

what if he just kills himself, or spends the rest of his life trying to get his space hopper back? That would be an example of an organism not competing, no? — Mijin

If he kills himself then he has found his situation to be more than he can bear. Yes that is an example of an organism not competing. However it’s also an aberration, it’s the actions of an organism that cannot cope any longer with the way life has turned out. You might say that he has lost the will to live any longer.

If he spends the rest of his life trying to get the damned hopper back then it’s a sort of quest.

They did not have any desire or ability to compete as such, but the environment favored certain mutations.
Now, if we count even that as competition, then we can apply this notion of competition to everything... — Mijin

I’d agree with that. But life did not remain that way. We obviously cannot regard the favouring of certain mutations as a definition of competition and then apply it to everything. Somewhere, somehow, life, once born into existence, had no intention of giving up. I think, though I can’t be sure, that all life fights to the death (Which is why suicide appears so confusing or confronting).

g. we can say that stars compete, since the environment favors certain stars to live longer and be more numerous than others. — Mijin

Yes we could say that if we go by the favoured mutation theory, but we won’t.

When did we decide that it was a "Be the most numerous type of star" competition? Why not "Be the biggest" or "Be the brightest" or "Most metal rich" or "Most active" whatever?
It takes a subjective judgement to decide that, say, red dwarfs will one day have the highest population, therefore they're the bestest. — Mijin

Well it’s true that in that context it’s a subjective judgement. However “we” did not decide that we will fight to the death to survive. The measure of why we “decided” what was best was our survival, whatever it takes. We now have advanced (cautiously used, please don’t jump on me) ways of surviving. We are no longer totally dependent on the cycles of nature or controlled by the brutality of life. Even our ability to collaborate or form tribes contributes to our survival. It may be that we collaborate because we are caring creatures, but whatever the reason it has contributed to our survival.

Just to reiterate my point; life may not be about competition but it is about survival.

My point being that competition is only an arbitrary perspective of interaction, not ‘what life is all about’. — Possibility

Yes, I agree, but only in the context you put it.

Yes competition is not “what life is all about”, yes it’s an arbitrary perspective.
The way you put it is that there’s a lot more to life than competition, that “Human achievement is not an individual effort - everything we do is contingent upon the collaborative efforts of others, from the moment we are born. The more awareness, connection and collaboration, the greater our success.”

That’s true. It’s how we have evolved as social creatures creating communities. My position is that life is not about competition but about survival. Presumably that’s why we carry out collaborative efforts, because we’ve learned that survival depends on collaboration, awareness and connection. Because we are reasoning creatures we can create better futures.

Life might have some greater purpose, but that’s an end, and as you said a perpetual revolution, so there is no end. So then life is about being, but that’s synonymous with survival, you can’t have one without the other.

Edit: but competition is how we survived, it’s the nature of life at ground level. That doesn’t mean it’s necessarily violent, but it’s about holding onto something or gaining something that another has the same desire for. That seems to be the history of life whether we like it or not. You and I are here because those that carried our genes survived the competition.

therefore all resources, capacity and value we perceive beyond our own potential for awareness, connection and collaboration, we are motivated to either absorb/possess/consume or ignore/isolate/exclude. — Possibility

Right, that’s competition is in whatever language you want to put it.

Though it’s my feeling that features of organisms don’t evolve because they served some particular function. That would be intentionality. It’s complete chance that the evolving feature benefits the organism in the future.

Yes, I do recall a previous OP about your perspective on evolution.

Is life all about competition?

It is now.

“ Competition is just a matter of quantitative perspective - it’s an arbitrary choice that we continually make ... to compete... “
— Possibility[/quote]

So what is compete?

Competition creates meaning in a meaningless world.

So these are things people will say to spin competition as good. — schopenhauer1

To convince you to play the game? The carrot on the stick. But my question then is how long has this been going on? And competition obviously exists before it’s used as a tool to manipulate the population, as in a consumer world,

True. But why tolerable?
— Brett

What do you mean by the question? — schopenhauer1

This was related to the meaningless of life.

If we observe life in its many forms is there anything consistent in them? The guy on the space hopper, his actions tell us very little about him. But what if someone came and took the hopper off him by force?

You do have a point which I’m thinking about.

First of all, it's worth saying that life does not need to be "about" anything. — Mijin

Sure, but what if you leave out “about”? “Life is competition”.

Edit: just out of interest, would you say life is about survival or not. Or do you mean it’s an accident of circumstances without meaning?

I just went back to one of your posts.

A lot of the day is just dealing with, dealing with, dealing with. — schopenhauer1

True. But why tolerable?

Do you mean what if life is meaningless?