Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
The past provides the data from which scenarios of probable futures are created. Science is the best process we have to calculate those probabilities. I posted a long bibliography of hierarchies in ecology. You are a scientist/technologist if I recall. An idealized social structure that has never existed in the natural world doesn't fit the scenario building criteria; it is speculative, creative writing. I cannot see the relevance, we are a qualitatively different species even from our nearest biological relatives. Our level of consciousness gives us the capacity to make our hierarchies different. We were able to grow wings and live in space (and yes, blow each other up) etc. without biological prediction of such feats. Biological sience is not the discipline that should calculate social probabilities. Social evolution is not like biological evolution, even if we happen to be biological beings (at the moment). The sum of the individuals can turn into something different, quantitative change into qualitative change - that is a universal character of matter. Human society is such a biologically not describable entity. For an ET from a distance our cities would look like an ant or termite- nest, but that doesn't mean that the hierarchy has to be the same, especially if it doesn't satisfy the majority of the people. We are not born to be "workers", "queen" etc, our intelligence and a decent upbringing can make all of us fit to all social roles, even if we happen to be all individually very different indeed. and we have the capacity to change our social structures inside of a few hundred years rather then waiting for biological evolution taking it's course through thousands of years. Whatever life forms do - by definition - is part of biological evolution. BTW, some scenarios give us less than 100 years to a significant population crash. Better speed up! social evolution is not part of biological evolution. Biological evolution is an unconscious process, social evolution can and at a given point of it should become a conscious one. If we don't want to crash like the biological ones. Just because chimps live in a particular way, doesn't mean same is best for humans. "Best" is a subjective judgement based on selected value criteria. Then free will and effective implementation have to be assumed, neither of which are unchallenged by social scientists, psychologists philosophers. "Best" is obviously the one that allows to survive the biggest number of the species in your biological sence, and the important addition of the human sense of providing all the surviving individuals as much physical and intellectual/emotional satisfaction as possible. Fairly objective criteria in my opinion... I agree, there is no such thing as free will, but there is a definite progress towards it, and when the economical and physiological constraints are minimised we will be a good way towards it. Capitalism is not able to provide the environment for it as it restricts most of mankind with the economical thus social restraint. After all - taking your argument - our "unnatural" ways made us the more successful species in your preferred biological sense. Well, you lost me here, Eva. You keep telling me, that we can only exist on the so far described biological ways. I meant to point out - and I did further above - that we are doing biologically unpredictable things, and in the process we became most successful mammals. (except for rats - but I venture to declare that they are not aware of their prosperity). Eva Steve [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
What you ignore is, that we are able to evaluate which social structures can be more beneficial for us in the future, and we have the capacity to change our social structures inside of a few hundred years rather then waiting for biological evolution taking it's course through thousands of years. Just because chimps live in a particular way, doesn't mean same is best for humans. After all - taking your argument - our "unnatural" ways made us the more successful species in your preferred biological sense. Eva Of course, any and all relations can LOOK hierarchical IF you are prepared or intending to see them that way. The question is: are they REALLY hierarchical, and THAT requires more than looking. Isn't it rather silly to expect me to prove what is demonstrated to you every day is true? Your personal incredulity is not a valid scientific argument. Why don't you point some society -- or some social primate -- that doesn't have hierarchy? It seems the burden to disprove our everyday experiences -- and the findings of the scientific community -- is on you. Jay [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Durant wrote: (responding to Jay) What you ignore is, that we are able to evaluate which social structures can be more beneficial for us in the future, The past provides the data from which scenarios of probable futures are created. Science is the best process we have to calculate those probabilities. I posted a long bibliography of hierarchies in ecology. You are a scientist/technologist if I recall. An idealized social structure that has never existed in the natural world doesn't fit the scenario building criteria; it is speculative, creative writing. and we have the capacity to change our social structures inside of a few hundred years rather then waiting for biological evolution taking it's course through thousands of years. Whatever life forms do - by definition - is part of biological evolution. BTW, some scenarios give us less than 100 years to a significant population crash. Better speed up! Just because chimps live in a particular way, doesn't mean same is best for humans. "Best" is a subjective judgement based on selected value criteria. Then free will and effective implementation have to be assumed, neither of which are unchallenged by social scientists, psychologists philosophers. After all - taking your argument - our "unnatural" ways made us the more successful species in your preferred biological sense. Well, you lost me here, Eva. Steve Of course, any and all relations can LOOK hierarchical IF you are prepared or intending to see them that way. The question is: are they REALLY hierarchical, and THAT requires more than looking. Isn't it rather silly to expect me to prove what is demonstrated to you every day is true? Your personal incredulity is not a valid scientific argument. Why don't you point some society -- or some social primate -- that doesn't have hierarchy? It seems the burden to disprove our everyday experiences -- and the findings of the scientific community -- is on you. Jay [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Jay Hanson wrote (in response to Eva): We are not ** common herd animals with some higher evolved race of scientists, Jay, wake up from this irrational nightmare of yours. To deny human hierarchy, is to deny what is before your eyes everywhere. Hierarchy is part of every human society, from the shaman, to the Native American "Chief", to the football quarterback, to priests, to opera singers, to astronauts, to CEOs, to Joseph Stalin. Hierarchy is part of ALL primate societies -- from chimps, to baboons, to Americans. You must deny what is so utterly obvious because it is incompatible with your God of Communism. Hey, Jay! What is "before my eyes everywhere" is a resting earth with lots of geography. Galileo says (somewhat rhetorically, in the _Dialogue_) that he admires Copernicus for declaring that the earth is actually moving *despite* what his senses most definitely tell him. It requires THEORETICAL UNDERSTANDING to get it moving. It is hardly something you just SEE, even through a telescope. Of course, any and all relations can LOOK hierarchical IF you are prepared or intending to see them that way. The question is: are they REALLY hierarchical, and THAT requires more than looking. What may look like hierarchy to you may look to me like cooperative ( equal) social action wherein the cooperators have designated (somewhat arbitrarily somewhat according to skill) one or more *coordinators*. Plato's _Republic_ may look hierarchical to YOU, but *in theory* it is an arrangement of EQUALS in which people having un-identical abilities are treated EQUALLY according to their innate abilities. Not a hierarchy at all. (This is, of course, according to Plato's THEORY of innate human capacities, a theory which is surely overly simple and spectacularly false; if you are sure it's false, then _The Republic_ looks alot like *ideology*, a conceptual excuse for domination.) Thus, a group with a "chief" may not REALLY be a social hierarchy at all: it just looks that way to people who think that they see a "superior" lording it over "inferiors" and who may see things this way because they are sure that such arrangements are "natural" or "in our genes". Your fruitless struggle to defend your God against science reminds one of Bellarmino defending his God against science: To quote an official pronouncement of an officer of the Church as having ANY bearing on this discussion is intellectually irresponsible. It contributes little to understanding. It's rather like quoting the US House Bills of Impeachment (or whatever they're officially called) as sufficient to explain what's been going on in Washington DC for the last year (or 6). The passage you quote from Bellarmine is a notification of the official findings of a Commission of Inquiry (so to speak), which Commission officially ordered Bellarmine to inform Galileo personally of its findings. The Inquiry itself had been provoked by Galileo's repeated insistence, in the absence of proof, that the Copernican hypothesis is TRUE. From 1543 -- the publication of Copernicus's book, which book, by the way, was dedicated to the Pope and opened with a Letter to Cardinal Schoenberg in Rome saying, essentially, here's the book you asked about -- until 1616 the Church had said NOTHING officially about Copernicanism. I think it's fair to say that had Galileo not provoked an official response, the Church might well have remained silent. (Whether Galileo is heroic or injudicious is an interesting question.) I can quote you Bellarmine *in writing* (at exactly the same time, 16 years before the "trial") telling Galileo (and others) that IF he, Galileo, can produce a "demonstration" that the earth is moving, THEN he, Bellarmine, will be required to conclude that the Church has misinterpreted Scripture. Galileo has no such demonstration and offers none, then or later. He has a good case for *plausibility* but that isn't the issue. As of 1633, the Astronomy Dept. at the Collegio Romano (the Jesuit astronomers who brought us our Gregorian Calendar) have adopted Tycho Brahe's system largely because, in their view, the failure to observe any stellar parallax -- Galileo can't find any either with his telescope -- looks like a decisive falsification of the Copernican hypothesis. Tycho -- the best damn observer ever to date -- doesn't think the earth moves either. "Of all hatreds, there is none greater than that of ignorance against knowledge." -- Galileo Galilei, June 30, 1616 INCLUDING, most definitely, ignorance of the actual history of the sciences, knowledge of which does tend to diminish both "hatreds" and an unfounded certainty about matters which are uncertain. -- Stephen Straker [EMAIL PROTECTED] Vancouver, B.C.
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
- Original Message - From: Stephen Straker [EMAIL PROTECTED] Of course, any and all relations can LOOK hierarchical IF you are prepared or intending to see them that way. The question is: are they REALLY hierarchical, and THAT requires more than looking. Isn't it rather silly to expect me to prove what is demonstrated to you every day is true? Your personal incredulity is not a valid scientific argument. Why don't you point some society -- or some social primate -- that doesn't have hierarchy? It seems the burden to disprove our everyday experiences -- and the findings of the scientific community -- is on you. Jay
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
- Original Message - From: Durant [EMAIL PROTECTED] Social structure is not the same as hierarchy. You are not anti-communist, you are anti-democratic, you are a supremacist madman, who sees humanity with contempt, who sees humanity as chattel to be herded who sees humanity with less dignity than herd-animals, because herd animals do not choose their ways. I am a realist, someone who recognizes the overwhelmingly obvious fact that humanity is hierarchical -- that some people are better at some things than others. I would -- like all other people who are not insane -- go to a doctor for surgery. I suppose a true believer like yourself might opt for surgery from the grocer, but it doesn't make sense to me. G Jay
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
- Original Message - From: Stephen Straker [EMAIL PROTECTED] share the same idea. What do you mean by "hierarchy"? I can only guess at what you take "hierarchy" to be. Hierarchy is the natural ordering among primates and many (all?) other social animals. It's the dominant male character, or the "alpha" animal in mamals. If you have two cats, one is the boss. Anthropologists have described "egalitarian" societies, but that does not mean that the people in them do not tend to hierarchy. It means that their particular social system works to keep the dominant animals in check -- to supress the geneitc bias fort dominance. These "egalitarian" societies work because they are small. Community members must be able to "recognize" other community memebers. That limits them to 300 or 400 individuals. It not a question wheither or not human will have rulers, the only question is who shall rule. We are presently ruled by the rich. I would like to see different criteria. It's a fact of life that democracy (no matter how one defines it) is on the way out. To find out more about aimals in politics, see: DARWINISM, DOMINANCE, AND DEMOCRACY: The Biological Bases of Authoritarianism, by Albert Somit and Steven A. Peterson http://info.greenwood.com/books/0275958/0275958175.html http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0275958175 Jay -- www.dieoff.com
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Guess what, science was also done by h u m a n s and at least as long ago as god. The human brain evolved to make patterns, to generalise, to abstract, to imagine, etc, as planning/picturing for the future proved to be an asset. When there was not enough data, god and superstition filled the gaps. When science, education and openness retreat, when there is uncertainty and insecurity, not to mention unexplicable-seeming poverty, god again returns in the guise of new-agism and fundamentalism to fill the reoccuring gaps of ignorance. In the US a large percent of scientists claim to be religious. Scientists are exactly like other humans, reflecting their physical and social environment, and given the right conditions, doing the human- defining act TOGETHER: changing both for the better, using the communication, cooperation and imagination that also evolved exactly for the execution of this very task. We are not ** common heard animals with some higher evolved race of scientists, Jay, wake up from this irrational nightmare of yours. Yes there are lots of horror instances when we behave like animals, when - by definition - wel o s e our humanity. It is not a normal state! And if you build a future environment that expect people to behave like animals - they will. I - and I hope most futureworkers - want a future fit for humans. And yes, we need a picture of this future for our mental well-being, that doesn't mean it is an illusion, it means a rational and practical plan to work towards a yes, ideal and optimal human existence (and most of us have a nonsurprisingly similar picture) - even when we know, that we can only do an approximation - but that is far more preferable than an insane, unplanned and inhuman present that leads nowhere.. Eva "... s mint rajta a rak, egy szorny-allam iszonyata rag." Jozsef, Attila .. No matter what the issue -- from democracy to nuclear power -- it works great when abstracted from the real world. People evolved to believe in illusions -- not to discover real world: "The human mind evolved to believe in gods... Acceptance of the supernatural conveyed a great advantage throughout prehistory, when the brain was evolving. Thus it is in sharp contrast to [science] which was developed as a product of the modern age and is not underwritten by genetic algorithms." The Biological Basis of Morality, E.O. Wilson http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/98apr/bio2.htm The idea that the common herd animal can solve problems in complex systems, is the biggest illusion of all. Jay -- www.dieoff.com [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Eva: I very much agree with what you've written. In any generation, knowledge can only extend so far. Beyond that there is uncertainty and speculation and, yes, the invention of gods. Religion is a way of organizing uncertainty, and it can vary from the loony to the profound. Keep up the good fight. Ed Weick Eva Durant: Guess what, science was also done by h u m a n s and at least as long ago as god. The human brain evolved to make patterns, to generalise, to abstract, to imagine, etc, as planning/picturing for the future proved to be an asset. When there was not enough data, god and superstition filled the gaps. When science, education and openness retreat, when there is uncertainty and insecurity, not to mention unexplicable-seeming poverty, god again returns in the guise of new-agism and fundamentalism to fill the reoccuring gaps of ignorance. In the US a large percent of scientists claim to be religious. Scientists are exactly like other humans, reflecting their physical and social environment, and given the right conditions, doing the human- defining act TOGETHER: changing both for the better, using the communication, cooperation and imagination that also evolved exactly for the execution of this very task. We are not ** common heard animals with some higher evolved race of scientists, Jay, wake up from this irrational nightmare of yours. Yes there are lots of horror instances when we behave like animals, when - by definition - wel o s e our humanity. It is not a normal state! And if you build a future environment that expect people to behave like animals - they will. I - and I hope most futureworkers - want a future fit for humans. And yes, we need a picture of this future for our mental well-being, that doesn't mean it is an illusion, it means a rational and practical plan to work towards a yes, ideal and optimal human existence (and most of us have a nonsurprisingly similar picture) - even when we know, that we can only do an approximation - but that is far more preferable than an insane, unplanned and inhuman present that leads nowhere.. Eva "... s mint rajta a rak, egy szorny-allam iszonyata rag." Jozsef, Attila .. No matter what the issue -- from democracy to nuclear power -- it works great when abstracted from the real world. People evolved to believe in illusions -- not to discover real world: "The human mind evolved to believe in gods... Acceptance of the supernatural conveyed a great advantage throughout prehistory, when the brain was evolving. Thus it is in sharp contrast to [science] which was developed as a product of the modern age and is not underwritten by genetic algorithms." The Biological Basis of Morality, E.O. Wilson http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/98apr/bio2.htm The idea that the common herd animal can solve problems in complex systems, is the biggest illusion of all. Jay -- www.dieoff.com [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Durant wrote: REH Never having lived in Marxist Communism I am sure that is true however: Here we go again... Ray, nobody yet lived in Marxist Communism, what's more, not one of the pseudo-socialist countries/ex-leaders claimed that their countries were Marxist Communist. Not even Castro or Baby Kim. (snip) Eva, Thanks for all of the work. You were very articulate and I enjoyed the read. If your premise is correct then the rest of that post is unnecessary. There are those in every movement who state that the original premise has been betrayed.I think the Free Marketeers would say the same about their ideas. They certainly would argue with you about genuine Capitalism ever being tried in the world. I am aware of the specifics of what you were speaking but it was not the subject of my questions. I would contend that the teacher (apart from a school which is a kind of "education of scale") IS responsible for the success of their product. They are also responsible for the failure. If they do not wish to be known as such, then they should not accept the job of teaching that particular student. Or should forgo writing the book. I certainly do hold the founders of the various schools of religious, political and economic thought responsible for the chaos expressed in their names. I contend that without the original seed, the genetics stop there.Responsibility is, in my culture, one of the primal ideas. That is why we burn anything that has not been sold or given away by the dead. If you wish to go the route of Marx as founding the idea that "economics is the bottom of all human life and interactions" then I would have another, actually harsher set of questions since I consider it a statement not grounded in all of the facts of human civilization. In short, it is 19th century "romantic idealized thought." Thought from a time that had no idea of the foolishness implications inherent in their arguments. As I pointed out with the Hammerklavier fugue, even in the system of 18th and 19th century harmonic theory, there is the issue of time. When the system has been achieved it is replaced by another with different rules. In the 19th century they believed in A system, A morality, A religion, A universal theory of economics (their own), A Universal Art based upon European principles. The absurdity of this should be apparent to anyone who has studied the various languages of the world.But from Johnson's Dictionary up through Marx's era it was the common belief that Latin grammar was the basis of all advanced languages. This lasted until modern psycho-linguists had to admit that it didn't fit English all that well either.Like the Sioux skull to the Phrenologists. But you can't keep claiming that the theory is OK when it keeps coming up with failed applications based upon excuses. I find idealism a useful tool but only a tool. It has to be balanced with truthfulness. What do you know? Truth and Beauty.Why don't we try that for awhile? When you think about truthful practice plus an evolving, humane, respectful idealism, most civilizations work. I would suggest, as I have to libertarian members of this list and others, that the best way to prove your point is to form a community of like minded people willing to work within the discipline of your principles. Show with your intelligence, humanity, culture and prosperity the value of your principles and their implications. Otherwise I would place all of these writings that we have discussed along with the "Republic" and Frank Lloyd Wright's "Usonia" as fantasy writing. Although they have been tried, adjusting them to the real human condition has been a failure. Even the beautiful houses of Frank Lloyd Wright became a dull landscape in Usonia.Personally I would prefer New York's urban clutter to any of the ugly inhumanity that I have seen in Greenbelt or Columbia Maryland or in the attempts to create the worker's paradise. Year's ago I read the Bible and worked in Churches for awhile (13 years) building artistic music programs.After a while I had to admit that the book was being betrayed by the people. Were the people wrong? No, I found later in Synagogues, the context for the book and the people that it came from. That taught me that religion, like art, is time/space specific. It springs from a context and meets the needs of a group. Often the context changes within a few years and the book, although filled with beauty and wisdom, is no longer applicable to the new situation. My people were both Democratic and Communitarian. They succeeded because they were family, but the outside world tore them apart. Life tore us apart.I've heard the same said about Bologna. Italy is beautiful and Bologna is unique.But the Libertarian can always find someone in Little Italy in New York who escaped the "terrible lack of freedom" in Bologna while others are freed
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Eva, Thanks for all of the work. You were very articulate and I enjoyed the read. If your premise is correct then the rest of that post is unnecessary. There are those in every movement who state that the original premise has been betrayed.I think the Free Marketeers would say the same about their ideas. They certainly would argue with you about genuine Capitalism ever being tried in the world. Complementing me won't hide the fact that you did not bother to read my my post, as you are not responding to the points I made; I had given reasons for my arguments, I hadn't just re-stated them like you do here. (patiently and optimistically:) The original premise has not been betrayed, well demonstrated conditions created a well demonstrated pattern. Different conditions would have made a different outcome. Every theory have to be defined over a given and limited domain to work; Marx was good enough to define it for us, but if he didn't we would had to do the work of making it more universal. Just like relativity being more inclusive than newtons laws, not negating but making it more understandable as a special case of a more general framework. I haven't seen a systematic analysis of capitalism by free-marketeers or by capitalists as a development from past systems and as a pointer to a next phase. Free markets lead to child-labour etc, super-exploitation of humans and the environment, I yet to see an analysis why it didn't work in the pre-welfare past. Also, the free-marketists usually embrace social Darwinism that is ready to dispence with the "loser" majority of human kind which is totally against the trend of human development so far. I am aware of the specifics of what you were speaking but it was not the subject of my questions. I would contend that the teacher (apart from a school which is a kind of "education of scale") IS responsible for the success of their product. They are also responsible for the failure. If they do not wish to be known as such, then they should not accept the job of teaching that particular student. Or should forgo writing the book.I certainly do hold the founders of the various schools of religious, political and economic thought responsible for the chaos expressed in their names. I contend that without the original seed, the genetics stop there.Responsibility is, in my culture, one of the primal ideas. That is why we burn anything that has not been sold or given away by the dead. If the student is hungry and hasn't got the book which even if he had he cannot read, would you still blame the author of the book for any outcome? Uptil now history just happened TO people, so you cannot blame them - any of them - for it, it was like an outside, wild law of nature. Only now we have first time the option to act responsibly with both the information and the economic/technological conditions satisfactory for actively form our future. If you wish to go the route of Marx as founding the idea that "economics is the bottom of all human life and interactions" then I would have another, actually harsher set of questions since I consider it a statement not grounded in all of the facts of human civilization. In short, it is 19th century "romantic idealized thought." Thought from a time that had no idea of the foolishness implications inherent in their arguments. As I pointed out with the Hammerklavier fugue, even in the system of 18th and 19th century harmonic theory, there is the issue of time. When the system has been achieved it is replaced by another with different rules. In the 19th century they believed in A system, A morality, A religion, A universal theory of economics (their own), A Universal Art based upon European principles. Economics is the base of society, the efficiency and distribution of the human necessities make the rest go round - surely this is somewhat evident. In what way can you see marxism to be linked to morality and religion of the 19 hundreds? It has a totally different look at the family, art and culture than his contemporaries - the problem is, he's even too new for you... The absurdity of this should be apparent to anyone who has studied the various languages of the world.But from Johnson's Dictionary up through Marx's era it was the common belief that Latin grammar was the basis of all advanced languages. This lasted until modern psycho-linguists had to admit that it didn't fit English all that well either. Like the Sioux skull to the Phrenologists. I don't know if Marx signed up for this idea, he happened to have opinions on most sciences he was aware of, but even if he did a bit of liguistics, I can't see the significance. Galileo was wrong about heliocentriity because his contemporaries had a few wierd beliefs? If someone managed to nail a piece of reality, it just doesn't matter when and why it happened. You should know this,
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
...
No, I don't think that 19th century Socialism and Communism with its base in out
of date "scientific" theories is any better. These may as well base their
theories on Phrenology for all of the sense they make. They were all trying to
find their individuality by killing their Fathers. ("I'm sure I can write a
better Bible than that!)
...
If this is what you think, you did not understand what
marxism is all about.
That is the reason that I do my own work and am my own boss.I miss the
"safety" and am considered irresponsible by some for not having more of an
inheritance for my offspring, but it seems you can't have both in this
society. Sometimes it's better just to stay out of the way of those "economies
of scale."
not an available option for 99% of the people.
Eva
REH
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
I think the problem is the "we" and "them" situation, and I'm afraid you were perceived as "them". Why should they do something boring, when they could play? The low level computer skills that are on offer on these courses are not getting you a job. (I've been there, done it, got the tshirt...) Why should they attempt to get a crappy job that hardly pays more than the assistance? Why should they take all the lecturing and the usual smug contempt of "helpers" with any other attitude? For decent jobs with decent wage there are too many applicants, and if you were out of work or never worked your chance is zilch. You never heard anything else in school, but that you are stupid and the experience was humiliating and boring. Why would they volunteer for what they think is more of the same? If there was a basic income type of thing and free choice of free education with interested, not overworked and harrassed teachers, the confidence would come back with the change from exclusion to inclusion. Eva Yeah, we creative types really dream of the end of 'wage slavery' ! I could spend years and years only with creative hobbies, NGO volunteering and the Net, but alas, the 'job' work gets in the way most of the time. However, in a part of the NGO work I got to know a different kind of persons: When I created a social programme for unemployed people, I naively thought they could be put to a (low-level, low-intensity) task and simply do the work all day, or even find own ideas to work something useful. Wrong. 90% of them did nothing (except reading the newspaper, chatting/arguing, and other nonsense), unless someone advised them "every move" all the time. I offered them a variety of opportunities, even a computer system to work with, and individual courses on it. But they ended up with playing computer games. They didn't ask me for new projects, but for new games after they got bored of the old ones. You may say: "See, you're not a social worker..". But the 'managers' of other similar programmes confirmed the attitude of the participants. Note: The official purpose of those programmes is to give the unemployed a structure to increase their chances to get back into the working mill err process. Now, I don't put the blame on those individuals. Rather, I think it was "the system" that made them like that. Actually, at least in 'lower' positions, corporations don't seem to want employees with "own brains", but they want "wage slaves". It will take huge educational and psycho-social efforts to prepare these people for the Basic Income society, or they will end up in even more boredom, despair and drugs. Greetings, Chris [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: an empirical observation Re: the end of 'wage slavery'
Christoph Reuss wrote:
Yeah, we creative types really dream of the end of 'wage slavery' !
I could spend years and years only with creative hobbies, NGO volunteering
and the Net, but alas, the 'job' work gets in the way most of the time.
However, in a part of the NGO work I got to know a different kind of
persons: When I created a social programme for unemployed people, I naively
thought they could be put to a (low-level, low-intensity) task and simply do
the work all day, or even find own ideas to work something useful. Wrong.
90% of them did nothing (except reading the newspaper, chatting/arguing,
and other nonsense), unless someone advised them "every move" all the time.
I offered them a variety of opportunities, even a computer system to work
with, and individual courses on it. But they ended up with playing computer
games. They didn't ask me for new projects, but for new games after they
got bored of the old ones. You may say: "See, you're not a social worker..".
But the 'managers' of other similar programmes confirmed the attitude of
the participants. Note: The official purpose of those programmes is to
give the unemployed a structure to increase their chances to get back into
the working mill err process.
Now, I don't put the blame on those individuals. Rather, I think it was
"the system" that made them like that. Actually, at least in 'lower'
positions, corporations don't seem to want employees with "own brains", but
they want "wage slaves". It will take huge educational and psycho-social
efforts to prepare these people for the Basic Income society, or they will
end up in even more boredom, despair and drugs.
Chris,
I spent an entire year shooting pool and watching the TV in the Army because they
had lost my papers. Had I pointed this out I might have been dead in Vietnam.
But I didn't "do drugs" and wasn't bored, (I read a lot.) I also read that
both Veblen and Keynes wrote their first masterpieces when they were "loafing"
(Heilbroner's word, not mine) on the job.
I have experienced on all levels the hostility of those above to people
"improvising" with their jobs at lower levels. They only want to know that you
are there when they ask. Sort of like Butlers. (the Blue Team)
That is one of the reasons that I find Capitalism and the Market to be so
incredibly poor at efficiency with too much redundancy. On the other hand when
the Master Capitalists took over in the Gingrich Revolution they cut their staffs
to the bone and then couldn't deal with the business of the offices.
No, I don't think that 19th century Socialism and Communism with its base in out
of date "scientific" theories is any better. These may as well base their
theories on Phrenology for all of the sense they make. They were all trying to
find their individuality by killing their Fathers. ("I'm sure I can write a
better Bible than that!)
Remember, what "did the Phrenologists in" was not science but racism. They found
the Lakota had the most ideal, large skulls, bigger and better brains, and their
theories never recovered. Of course along the way they operated a huge trade in
human skeletons ($600 per, they said the stench of boiling human flesh around the
Army posts was unbelievable,) that made the Lakota more valuable dead than alive.
That is the reason that I do my own work and am my own boss.I miss the
"safety" and am considered irresponsible by some for not having more of an
inheritance for my offspring, but it seems you can't have both in this
society. Sometimes it's better just to stay out of the way of those "economies
of scale."
REH
