Hi Brad,
Just a couple of points.
1. Like Christians, I basically judged systems not by
their theories but the people of practice them as well
as how much they were left alone in the world at vital
times for their development. i.e. you can't stomp the
corn when it is a bud and blame for tasting bad.
2. The people at IBM years ago referred to thier system
as corporate socialism. I suspect that is what this
current system is since someone IS paying the bill
somewhere.
REH
Brad McCormick, Ed.D. wrote:
> Ray E. Harrell wrote:
> >
> > Just a question. Who pays the salaries for all of these
> > folks doing free things and giving up their ideas for nothing?
> >
> [snip]
> > someone always pays
> > the bill. People do have to eat.
>
> Very good question. Sounds to me like a good
> research project for some sociologists!
>
> >
> > Also the first post that ascribed this to communism
> > seems strange since that involves committees. It
> > seems more accurately to be a Democratic process,
> > not unlike the cultures of many pre-Columbian societies
> > here. [snip]
>
> Two points here:
>
> (1) Ray's definition of "communism" seems to be
> oriented to what came out of the Bolschevik revolution
> and *called* itself "Communist" while *being* more
> fascist, etc. If we're willing to give up the word
> "communism" to the Right-wingers, then how about:
> "anarcho-syndicalism"?
>
> (2) Whatever one wishes to call a *material*
> democratic process in which the workers are
> also the policy makers, I wonder how such a
> process applies to a bunch of *computer
> programmers*, who, in my experience, have
> a vision of human social interaction limited
> by *science fiction*, which, for the most
> part, seems to be very existentially "thin"
> and to have an ideal of a rebirth of feudalism
> in flying fortresses (Star Wars, etc.).
>
> My guess is that many of the "free software"
> programmers have little notion of any social
> process, and that their vision of a "free software
> community" is merely an epiphenomenon of whatever
> *real* social system provides them
> with computers and pizza (yes, even programmers
> have to eat...). The present Global Capitalism probably
> suits many of them just fine (Joseph Weizenbaum
> argued that the computer has been one of the
> most powerful forces for social reaction in
> the 20th Century).
>
> I would like to see technical workers develop a
> richer sense of what it means to be human
> (including what it means to do computer
> programming), and to thematize the
> political nature of what they do (whatever it
> is). For, as Sartre said: To not choose is to
> choose [for what will happen if persons
> don't do anything to change it]. And, to quote
> from imperfect memory, Joseph Weizenbaum:
>
> I hope that, as the discipline of computer
> science matures, its practitioners will mature
> also, and that, whatever thsy do, they will
> think about it, so that those who come after
> them will not wish they had not done it.
>
> \brad mccormick
>
> --
> Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
>
> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 914.238.0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA
> -------------------------------------------------------
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