Yes. Not all life is politics. So far you’ve shared only the political side and pronounced it’s worth. But as you say, life is not all about poltiics. There is the struggle between government/politics and civil society/free market. Maybe a good discussion on that struggle instead of only one side, ie. politics, would be more informative. I mean a good politican needs to understand it’s enemy, correct?
good. I think that would be more informative and would provide an insight of the ‘bigger picture’.
Sure. I try to learn about both.
The unsustainable part of this equation, as you stated previously, is the politics. It is destructive to itself and that’s why it has to raid the civil society, correct? The larger the government the more it needs to prey upon productive society in order to sustain itself but it can’t last without a ‘big bang’ at the end, wouldn’t you agree?
Yes, government survives by feeding off of the economic part. Sometimes, government gives special protection to pieces of the economic part to make those producers more powerful, sometimes it takes away from certain producers to make them less powerful. Ultimately, the government doesn’t really produce anything material, but it can certainly redistribute the fruits of the producer’s labor.
What’s that old saying “pulling the feathers off the goose while getting the least amount of hissing.”
It’s also worth noting that there are always going to be certain people who think government is a necessary just and proper function and that government keeps the economic side in line. Sometimes they’re probably right, but they’re probably mostly wrong.
An example please.
By the way, I said the unsustainable part is man and so everything man creates is inherently unsustainable. It can be reformed or recreated or whatever, but everything dies eventually. Just because humans as a species can perpetuate its existence doesn’t mean man as an individual can.
Yes. But as you pointed out there is a difference between the unsustainability of government and the producers. The one preys and the other is preyed upon. The government is more chaotic than the producer for the producer can take it on the cheek and keep producing. The government can’t take anything on the cheek so can only maintain itself with brute force whereas the the producer can be robbed and go on to produce again. The unsustainability of the two are categorically different.
I’ve been working on finding a really good example of market failure. Apparently, the crash of 1907 is seen as a classic example. I still haven’t read the book I bought on it yet, so I’m not sure.
My personal bias though, leads me to believe that mankind cannot be entirely trusted to its own devices without some kind of central power to curb wayward impulses.
I’m actually a nice guy. Not because the government told me to be, but because I love to be nice and I enjoy the fruits thereof.
Ok, but they’re two sides of the same coin. This is what Ayn Rand didn’t seem to understand or maybe she wanted to overlook. Parasitic behavior isn’t inhuman, it’s perfectly natural. If I see something that someone else has, I want it. But I cannot take it unless I can make sure that if I take it, nothing bad will happen to me. So I need a means to do that. Hence government.
I’m sure you are. I’m neutral. I am what I feel I need to be. But I try to veer on the side of nice.
It’s not perfectly natural. If it was then it would exist absolutely everywhere at all times. I had large gardens this past year. No parasites invaded them.
But that doesn’t happen all the time. I am the opposite way.
I feel like I would have to do more research on this before I can state it as a fact, but I think I see many competing impulses within humans. One is to be free to act. Another is allowing people to be free to act. Another is to control oneself and others. Another is to be controlled and not have to think or be responsible. These competing impulses get epitomized in different schools of thought and they do battle with one another. Sometimes the freedom school wins, sometimes it’s the controlling others side, sometimes it’s the being controlled side. It seems like a never ending battle.
so you are more nice than bad?
Just because something is natural doesn’t mean it’s got to be universally pervasive. People are different. But human nature seems to be consistent, it just manifests itself in different ways with different people. And that’s a beautiful thing. So people like you and I can both exist. We’re both human and so we both reflect what it means to be human. Different people want different things.
I’d like to think so, yes. [:)]
It is not never-ending, because eventually individuals settle upon one of those differing forms. The impulse to rage against another might arise, but an individual that has the skill to rise above these base-line, animalistic behaviors does just that - they rise above them. I am not in conflict with myself, unless, something external to me tries to invade me, ie. propaganda or physically, and I find a way to turn the experience into wisdom, not the other way around and devolve into my animalistic behaviors. Not all people are trying to stay on the animalistic, libido level of their human nature, others, like myself, are able to dialogue.
Oh. Yes, but think about the propaganda we were talking about before. Humans can be tapped into to believe that brute force is best. Animalistic, libido behaviors are what makes life possible - that can be propagandized. As we covered, the current culture of today is stimulating these aspects of humans more and more. Therefore it becomes increasingly difficult for the individual human to find ways to know (have the knowledge) of higher levels of being. It’s not a suppress of the libido, but rather to feel desire and incorporate that into a more holistic experience by the individual. Some people may only realize ‘this is the way to be human’ but then again with wisdom ‘a more complete way of being human’ can be understood. It’s wisdom that is being suppressed, not the other way around. When people incline upon animalistic experiences they are actually not living their life to the fullest. It is unfortunate.
Alright, you might be right. But if there’s an end to it, I haven’t seen it yet. I have no problem at all with people like you and I enjoy the ability to have these kinds of dialogues. But I do think that you lack the ability to see in others that which you cannot see in yourself (maybe because it simply isn’t there.) It’s almost like a lack of empathy. Maybe that’s part of being on the margins.