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talkpolitics2011-07-23 01:04 am
mintogrubb.livejournal.com) wrote in talkpolitics2011-07-23 01:04 am
Entry tags:
managed catastrophies.
An interesting exchange took place on a recent thread, and it seemed to me to put a lot of things sharply into focus.
M.G.
If we really knew about economics, would we have recessions? If we knew anything about politics , would be have wars?
A New Machine.
Yes to both. How is that even a question? The most rudimentary understandings of either one would show you the inevitability of these situations you decry. From what we know about economics, recessions and the business cycle are not only natural and unavoidable, but good for the system - they clear away the weak companies, and free up resources for more competitive ventures, while providing warnings of what not to do. Like a wildfire - kill the old and weak, feed the new and vital. As for war, different nations have different interests. These conflict. War is one of the many ways in which nations engage in conflict over their interests. Understanding politics just means you understand how and why these interests form, and how and why a people can be led to war.
harry_beast
Theoretically, a perfect understanding of economics would result in the management of the economy such that it would follow an exactly optimal path. Conflicts could be waged with minimum waste and losses, possibly escalating to open war very rarely or not at all.
But ... I know that the complexity of the real world could never be modeled in sufficient detail to achieve such a perfect understand and such an optimal plan.
See I grew up in poverty , but worked my way out of it, with an awful lot of lucky breaks and about an even amount of personal effort. And I think to myself that ~no~ kid should have to grow up in poverty, and have to struggle like I did.
But I have to say that the analogy of the bush fire, clearing the ground, and making room for new growth - I can see that. I hate it that it has to be that way, but I acknowledge the truth of that statement.
I recall reading in National Geographic, I think, that in America , they went through years of preventing any outbreaks of forest fires, but came to realise that this was part of natures cycle of life. Some trees have trees that need the fire to crack them open in order to germinate.So now, forest fires are set up and managed, so as to burn , but not spread disastrously.
Another book I do recall was Peter Hathaway Capstick's tome 'Death in the Long Grass'. A big game hunter in Africa pointing out a few things - like that Elephants get to a point where they starve if Man does not come along and shoot a few. That there were deer in America in a bad way, until the conservationists put a pack of wolves on Vancouver Island, and they kept the balance of nature by hunting and killing the deer, whose numbers dropped and health improved as a result. Oh, Nature is so cruel and heartless, but that is how it is.
But Capstick goes on to say that every week in Africa , some poor women gets attacked and eaten by a crocodile when she goes to get water for washing or cooking , but people shrug. it is like road traffic accidents in the UK. People say it is sad, ut it happens. nobody is gonna ban any cars. And Africans in most countries African cope, as a society, with living dangerous predators.
Perhaps I should just get over it. Life is unfair. And yet I say to myself that the Conservative POV is epitomised by declaring that we have to make a profit, even if people die as a result. It is argued that rotten tomatoes got put into ketchup on a regular basis till Hienz took action and made it illegal, and the suggestion made that compensating a parent for the loss of a child would be quite OK.Me, I am not so sure.In London , there was a massive fire at a tube Station once, and LUL said that it was unavoidable, and was prepared to pay compensation, though.
But the Fenner Report went through the system with a fine tooth comb and made 500 recommendations. We have not had any fires since. It seems that it is not in business interests to sort anything out if the cost is met elsewhere.
The Conservative Argument has been that only middle aged males mattered. Young men could be risked being sent off to war, and women were utterly expendable under any and all circumstances. Women were simply property and were treated as such. No point educating them or paying them equal wages for hourly work. A woman doing a real job was taking that Job from a man who needed it. Giving equal pay would have brought on the demise of Civilisation.
but, we gave women equal pay, and somehow, Civilisation lasted. Like it lasted when we gave women the vote.
like it lasted when we put kids into schools instead of sending them into mills and down the mines.
I get that Conservatives have very limited faith in Earth's carrying capacity. last time I looked, we had 6 billion people on board Spaceship Earth. We also had the resources to feed 12 billion. Double the number in other words. but that was back in the 80s, maybe things have changed a bit. We still have more than enough, though.
We don't just have to focus on the white males, we can take care of white woman as well. We can even allow people of both genders who are black, brown and other ethnicities to have a decent life and a fair share of the things we take for granted, I believe.
We may need to limit the number of kids we have to just one or two, but again , I think that this is possible. We have the technology and the know how to give every child a decent upbringing and every citizen of every land a decent life. It is just that conservatives are sort of people who are bothered enough to see it done.
We, who call ourselves Progressives or Liberals, or whatever ... we need to understand that life has got these limitations and we need to live within those limits - but that the limits are not as narrow as conservatives imagine.
How exactly recessions and wars could be managed like forest fires are, I have no idea. But I feel that we should look into it.
Wars would be easier, being conflicts that can be resolved some other way. Recessions , though, that would be tougher. If we could manage to let such catastrophes happen on a small enough scale to clear the ground, we may be onto something. It seems that we ned them and must manage them effectively.
M.G.
If we really knew about economics, would we have recessions? If we knew anything about politics , would be have wars?
A New Machine.
Yes to both. How is that even a question? The most rudimentary understandings of either one would show you the inevitability of these situations you decry. From what we know about economics, recessions and the business cycle are not only natural and unavoidable, but good for the system - they clear away the weak companies, and free up resources for more competitive ventures, while providing warnings of what not to do. Like a wildfire - kill the old and weak, feed the new and vital. As for war, different nations have different interests. These conflict. War is one of the many ways in which nations engage in conflict over their interests. Understanding politics just means you understand how and why these interests form, and how and why a people can be led to war.
harry_beast
Theoretically, a perfect understanding of economics would result in the management of the economy such that it would follow an exactly optimal path. Conflicts could be waged with minimum waste and losses, possibly escalating to open war very rarely or not at all.
But ... I know that the complexity of the real world could never be modeled in sufficient detail to achieve such a perfect understand and such an optimal plan.
See I grew up in poverty , but worked my way out of it, with an awful lot of lucky breaks and about an even amount of personal effort. And I think to myself that ~no~ kid should have to grow up in poverty, and have to struggle like I did.
But I have to say that the analogy of the bush fire, clearing the ground, and making room for new growth - I can see that. I hate it that it has to be that way, but I acknowledge the truth of that statement.
I recall reading in National Geographic, I think, that in America , they went through years of preventing any outbreaks of forest fires, but came to realise that this was part of natures cycle of life. Some trees have trees that need the fire to crack them open in order to germinate.So now, forest fires are set up and managed, so as to burn , but not spread disastrously.
Another book I do recall was Peter Hathaway Capstick's tome 'Death in the Long Grass'. A big game hunter in Africa pointing out a few things - like that Elephants get to a point where they starve if Man does not come along and shoot a few. That there were deer in America in a bad way, until the conservationists put a pack of wolves on Vancouver Island, and they kept the balance of nature by hunting and killing the deer, whose numbers dropped and health improved as a result. Oh, Nature is so cruel and heartless, but that is how it is.
But Capstick goes on to say that every week in Africa , some poor women gets attacked and eaten by a crocodile when she goes to get water for washing or cooking , but people shrug. it is like road traffic accidents in the UK. People say it is sad, ut it happens. nobody is gonna ban any cars. And Africans in most countries African cope, as a society, with living dangerous predators.
Perhaps I should just get over it. Life is unfair. And yet I say to myself that the Conservative POV is epitomised by declaring that we have to make a profit, even if people die as a result. It is argued that rotten tomatoes got put into ketchup on a regular basis till Hienz took action and made it illegal, and the suggestion made that compensating a parent for the loss of a child would be quite OK.Me, I am not so sure.In London , there was a massive fire at a tube Station once, and LUL said that it was unavoidable, and was prepared to pay compensation, though.
But the Fenner Report went through the system with a fine tooth comb and made 500 recommendations. We have not had any fires since. It seems that it is not in business interests to sort anything out if the cost is met elsewhere.
The Conservative Argument has been that only middle aged males mattered. Young men could be risked being sent off to war, and women were utterly expendable under any and all circumstances. Women were simply property and were treated as such. No point educating them or paying them equal wages for hourly work. A woman doing a real job was taking that Job from a man who needed it. Giving equal pay would have brought on the demise of Civilisation.
but, we gave women equal pay, and somehow, Civilisation lasted. Like it lasted when we gave women the vote.
like it lasted when we put kids into schools instead of sending them into mills and down the mines.
I get that Conservatives have very limited faith in Earth's carrying capacity. last time I looked, we had 6 billion people on board Spaceship Earth. We also had the resources to feed 12 billion. Double the number in other words. but that was back in the 80s, maybe things have changed a bit. We still have more than enough, though.
We don't just have to focus on the white males, we can take care of white woman as well. We can even allow people of both genders who are black, brown and other ethnicities to have a decent life and a fair share of the things we take for granted, I believe.
We may need to limit the number of kids we have to just one or two, but again , I think that this is possible. We have the technology and the know how to give every child a decent upbringing and every citizen of every land a decent life. It is just that conservatives are sort of people who are bothered enough to see it done.
We, who call ourselves Progressives or Liberals, or whatever ... we need to understand that life has got these limitations and we need to live within those limits - but that the limits are not as narrow as conservatives imagine.
How exactly recessions and wars could be managed like forest fires are, I have no idea. But I feel that we should look into it.
Wars would be easier, being conflicts that can be resolved some other way. Recessions , though, that would be tougher. If we could manage to let such catastrophes happen on a small enough scale to clear the ground, we may be onto something. It seems that we ned them and must manage them effectively.
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Do not use any extraneous words or phrases whatsoever. Do not try to anticipate and answer posssible objections to your main point. You can handle those in the comments.
Proof carefully for typos before posting. Then proof it again. Good writing changes the world that reads it.
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This seems a curious conclusion. Belief in global warming, peak oil and the need to restrict reproduction seem to be leftist afflictions, whereas conservatives appear to have more faith in humanity's ability to innovate and overcome various challenges, and of course, more faith in the free market.
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[edit] No, sorry.
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