New Mars Forums

Well, I think there is good evidence to suggest that the most pressing problem right now with how the space agency is organized is that Congress, and hence the NASA administration that it selects, is beholden to huge buisness interests which see little value in long term exploration and which are exploiting the space agency for their own private profit, in the form of huge pork barrel extravaganzas which do very little in the way of real science or exploration for their cost. So for example, why haven't we developed something to replace the ridiculously expensive space shuttle? Why are we developing an ISS which does almost nothing for, as conservative estimates put it, some $60 billion? Why aren't we spending more on projects which are really going to do something, like robotic planetary exploration and precursors to human missions? I think all of this is good evidence for the conclusion that right now the central purpose of NASA is not to explore or do science, but rather to funnel cash into the pockets of huge corporations, the front runners Boeing and Lockheed Martin. This idea is also backed up by the realities of election spending: buisness, as a bloc, funds almost three quarters of election money in the United States. I would expect big buisness to be a large proportion of that, with results which are not very suprising.

In any case, the "free market" is not something which has long term space exploration as a goal ; they're interested in profit, that's essentially the alpha and the omega for them, because the relevant guys are big corporations and if it wasn't they wouldn't be big, or mabye even exist. So these corporations have, basically, one goal: they're going to bilk the system for whatever they can get, and they're going to do it at a minimum cost to themselves. If you want to make them do space exploration, then you have to provide them some incentive to do it. They're not going to do it on their own, because the incentive just isn't there, there is no short term profitability, we know that. Let's be honest: there's no money in interplanetary space exploration right now. There might be decades down the line, but there isn't any right now. So Zubrin is right when he says that without some kind of government initiative, it isn't going to happen.

So what is our role? We just have to keep pushing them, I guess. Keep demanding they open a serious initiative, keep demanding more funds for useful projects like robotic interplanetary probes, a cheap new launch vehicle, etc. Scale down use of the space shuttle to an absolute minimum, cancelling it and replacing it with cheaper alternatives asap. As for the ISS, I suspect the only sensible way to deal with this is just to scrap it. At present it's a total waste, as I understand it. Expanding it will take years, and tens of billions, and even then, it's liable to be mostly a waste. So I think we should scrap it, and do it as soon as possible, and divert the excess funds into projects which are actually useful.

I think I'll post a copy of this at "Human Missions", too, so the more technical people can see it.

Here, let's examine this statement at the end of the post: Socialism -> War
Free (Unregulated & Untaxed) Markets -> Peace
Taxation is the fuel of War
The "Assault Weapons" Ban Must Die

A few ideas. First, capitalism is by its very nature regulated by the federal government. If it were not regulated by the federal government, then it would simply be warlordism, because I could go over to my competitor, and, in a magnificent display of free market ingenuity, shoot him in the head. The "free market" would soon degrade into a system where powerful people, in admiriable displays of individual initiative, coerced everyone else into terrible suffering. Of couse, that's essentially what happens in more regulated versions of capitalism as well, but in a somewhat less brutal manner.

"Free markets" is a system where the most brutal forms of oppression at the hands of the greedy and powerful are barred by other forces (which must have roots in some level of popular support, I think), but otherwise, oppression is free to proceed underhindered, as the masters exploit everyone else in remarkable displays of "individual initiative", subjugating people for "the profit motive", alongside such admirable people as Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler, who had similar goals, although more potent means for achieving them. In our society, this is done by establishing control of the main institutions ; once such control is established, there is little for everyone else to do but bow down and be waiters.

Taxation is not the fuel of war ; greed is the fuel of war. You want something that you cannot have, so you make war to take it. If taxation is something which is done by a few to increase their own power, then yes I would say this fuels war. But if taxation is a process in which wealth and power is taken away from the few and given to the many, then this is something entirely different. Then you would be promoting individualism, if the word is to retain any meaning.

Well, first of all, the idea that we ought to have a system where competition drives innovation, as opposed to one where people decide that innovation is good and do it voluntarily, is in my opinion a very strange idea. I do not see any reasons that could justify this idea when applied to a human society.

Second I think we should recognize that capitalism by its very nature is regulated: you can't, for example, go over to the house of your competitor and kill him, at least not in the theory (if you are rich, the reality is that you might be able to--killing strikers used to be routine). So that's regulation. Even if you accept the premise that competition has to drive innovation, it should be obvious that it has to regulated, because unregulated competition is just warlordism. So it's not a question of whether you want regulation or no regulation ; it's a question of whether you want more or less, or whether you want to just throw out the whole system itself, that being another option.

In our society, the vast majority of the population has no real control over society's institutions. We should remember that 1% of the population owns 50% of the stock market, and 40% of the total wealth. By definition, the people who don't own that aren't supposed to have control over it. Now, they have very indirect control which is dictated by the desire of the masters to secure their dominance, but it's not really relevant. Even people under Stalinism had some level of indirect control.

I don't think that we should have a system where "human ingenuity" is required by people who want to evade horrible consequences which are  set up deliberately by other people (those who control the wealth). Rather, what people are doing should be decided by themselves in a really meaningful way, not with horrible consequences (ie homelessness) hanging over their head. "Human ingenuity" should be used to pursue goals that the person in question believes are important in themselves, not those which are dictated by an artificial social system where an elite ultimately tells everyone what to do.

Generally, people work for their own self-interest...we do things on both an individual and collective level that brings about maximum possible benefit, i.e., I develop whatever skills, use the tools at hand,my time and effort, etc, to get the things I want and need

I'm not really sure what you mean by "self interest", but if I am understanding you correctly in percieving this as gaining control of various materials, then I'd say that's very much false. I think this is because people are smart enough to understand that their own comfort is often irrelevant compared to this vast world and universe we have layed out before us. There was this one study I was reading recently which bears this out in some ways ; it turns that when the economy goes down, people are actually more willing to help other people at their own expense than when the economy goes up. I mean, I don't think many of us would be here if all--or even most of--we were concerned about is our own interest. I don't see the Mars Society bylaws as a get rich quick scheme, anyway.

As for redistribution of wealth, I think what we really need to understand is that wealth is not typically just some money floating around in a bank. In our society it typically takes the form of corporate stock for the really rich people. So what you have there is essentially a tyrannical arrangement--you've got some people, an elite, who have vast control over the most important institutions in society, and the rest of the people have very minimal control. I guess it's most important in the media, if you want to pick a single industry, because that's the industry that suggests what we think about. Media is a buisness in our system ; truth has only as much value as the owners can make a buck from. It goes for other industries too ; the auto industry affects practically everyone, but the people who ultimately control it are a tiny elite. And so on and so forth. It's a very monstrous system, really.

So what to do about it? Well, we need to democratize the system, certainly. One idea for doing that is to just take the stock of company and hand it out to the workers, but personally I doubt it would prove very workable. A better idea, I think, is to just get rid of the idea of a company altogether and form some other kind of arrangement, where people do not compete, but rather collaborate for a goal which all think is valuable in itself. Production and action would be taken up, not because you have to compete with some other guy for the right to have a house, but rather because you believe what you are doing is valuable in itself.

I think this deserves a serious reply on some matters. Many of you seem to be very indoctrinated with Zubrin's aversion to enviornmental protection. In the real world, enviornmental protection fits in well with space exploration--you can't explore space if everyone is dying at home from cancer, because the ozone layer just dissapeared.

Of course, we're always going to need to exploit the Earth in some ways: even animals do that. If spaceware is being used to help exploit it in a potentially problematic way, there's a simple solution: don't.

In some cases I think space vehicles and their launch sites may be enviornmentally damaging ; there are two options. If the damage is not so great, then we may just tolerate it. If it is, then we can design new vehicles.

This is like saying that having more than one person in the world is a bad idea because it promotes the idea that if someone dies it is not important.

Well, they shouldn't be: space exploration should be controlled by those affected by it, which is, to some degree, all humanity, and, to some degree, the people who are working on it. How to compromise with elites in the framework of the current situation is another matter, however.

On the contrary, capitalist imperialism and its variants will probably lead to the destruction of civilization and technology in the long run, and hence space exploration, if unchecked.

A lot of this IS ridiculous, and so I suspect is was written by someone who was trolling.

The current Western social structure places some value on liberty and mutual aid, it's not a Stalinism, but there are still many major elements in society which are controlled by tiny elites, and that should not be.

Let us examine this claim that in a capitalistic society, resources are controlled by those who are most productive with them. How do you get to control resources in capitalism? Well, you get money. How do you get money? Well, you provide some service to those who have money, so that they'll give you some of thier money: that's how every capitalist has amassed his fortune and how every wage laborer survives. Now, in the case of capitalists, they are in a position of power, they have a lot of freedom. Wage laborers, by contrast, in general will either do what the capitalists tell them or they will not survive. The capitalists begin by selling themselves to others, and then, if they are successful enough, they may become masters themselves. The wage laborers sell themselves to others continually. It is a system which is based on servitude, not individualism.

Thus, those who are most "productive" and "efficient" with resources are those who satisfy best the desires of the powerful, an interesting definition of productivity.

For decent people, it should be understood that nobody has the right to tell someone else that they should be doing something else because they are "not being productive" ; the underlying ideas are similiar to those used to justify totalitarianism. Everyone should be allowed to decide for themselves what is productive and not productive, free from coercion.

In a previous message I remarked that it is a point not generally understood among people who want to spread civilization among the stars that you cannot do this if civilization is first annihalated here at home. As technological progress strides foward, humankind can only assume more and more awesome societal responsibilities--and similiarly growing consequences for failing in them.

The fundamental problem, I think, is this. Humankind stands enough of a chance as it is running into some fatal problem without any help from other human beings--releasing, say, uncontrollable mutating nanites ("grey goo") which destroys the biosphere, or several other possibilities. Unless we switch to social structures which place value on liberty and mutual aid, rather than the intentional destruction and subjugation of other humans, the likelihood of a fatal disaster is far increased over what it would be in a situation where humanity collaborates to achieve things agreed to be great.

The most obvious threat, I think, right now of such a civilization destroying event is nuclear war. As systems of domination extend their grip further over world affairs, the result can only be a situation of increased tensity, suffering, and hatred. The potential for a civilization destroying nuclear war--several basic scanerios can be envisioned--becomes progressively greater. Vast human suffering and waste is also possible in the event of tactical nuclear first strikes by the US, something which has been outlined recently in "defense" reports.

Another threat is that of ecological destruction. There are several avenues whereby this could cause a massive disaster. First, if the ozone layer becomes too depleted, it is a sure bet that the incidence of cancer among populations worldwide will rise, with unknown consequnces depending on the level of the increase. Second, it is also possible that global warming could initiate a massive melting of some of the more unstable parts of Antarctica, resulting in the submergion of most of the major centers of industrial civilization.

In the future, new threats may arise. Consider the possibility of someone guiding an fair sized asteroid into an impact with the Earth. The consequences need not be stated here. Genetic engineering, once developed extensively, will doubtless pose grave dangers to the enviornment if handled irresponsibly by despotic governments or greedy corporations. This goes moreso for the possibility of real self reproducing nanites, although from what I can gather, this is probably not a very near term possibility.

What is the solution? Should we all go crazy and try to institute a totalitarian government to make sure these threats to civilization do not get out of hand? No. These technologies, in the hands of a totalitarian government, would be even more dangerous than they are in the present situation, where the most powerful nation is merely imperialist. The only viable course is to make do as best we can and try to create societies which are based on independent thought, rationality, and mutual compassion. Working together for what is agreed to be worthwhile can only maximize our chances of survival and progression into a real Type II civilization.

Actually, I don't think this is so necessary as one might think. I think that "pure capitalism", unchecked by democracy, will lead inevitably to forms of despotism. I think socialism is not a self consistent concept unless it is essentially equivilant to anarchism, and that authoritarian socialist ideas are self contradictory. But it is not necessary that everyone use the words like this. All that matters is that we know what we are talking about.

Russia and China were not socialistic in any consistent sense ; the brands of "socialism" they subscribe to are self contradictory. You cannot have a classless society in the midst of tyranny, that's a contradiction in terms. Nor did these societies ever attempt classlessness ; the Bolsheviks were very straightfoward with their intention to institute what they thought of as socialism on everyone else by force, as were the Maoists. In none of these countries was there any serious mass based attempt at a classless society, rather there were factions who let themselves be led by "great leaders" who promised "socialism" once they were made rulers.

Any self consistent definition of socialism must be essentially equivilant to anarchism. A classless society where people can plan their lives without fear of reprisal by others who judge what they are doing to be worthy of punishment. See my messages above.

Well, the people who control society, the people who own it, the wealthy, they didn't just get there by chance, they got there because they were good at getting money. Now, how do you get money in a capitalist system? Well, you offer something to people who already have money that they can give you. In otherwords, you please them, and rent yourself to them in exchange for money.

At the other extreme, we have people who just refuse to listen to anybody: they don't what they're told by powerful individuals, they don't obey. What happens to them in a capitalist system? Well, it depends on what kind of a system we're dealing with, but one of two things: they either go homeless and beg, or, in less charitable (or, equivilantly, more brutal) societies, they die. Now some people say, if they aren't willing to listen to powerful individuals, and do what powerful individuals say, then they aren't contributing to society, and if people don't contribute to society then they don't deserve to get anything back. That's perverse logic, because powerful individuals have no right to determine whether what a person is doing is important or not important. Only the person in question should have that right. If you don't believe that, then as far as I can see, you have no legitimate claim to being a libertarian, and are simply an open advocator of power elitism.

Well, there are a couple of things I'd like to say about anarchism and liberty.

First of all, capitalism is not a libertarian system--in fact, it is a very unlibertarian system, and one which, unchecked by popular control, will lead to fascist type systems. In capitalism, what you are supposed to be concerned with is bringing resources under your control. You are not supposed to be concerned with anyone else ; if you are, you'll go out of buisness. Now, normally, it is assumed that to be capitalistic there should be certain restraints on the profit motive: you should not, for example, be allowed to kill someone if they do not work for you. However, this constitutes a restraint on the profit motive. Are we then to conclude that pure capitalism actually has regulation built in? Some would say this, and in a sense they are right--it depends on the language we use. But in a more consistent sense, "pure capitalism"--that is, a system where the profit motive drives all, is simply warlordism and utter tyranny. This is not difficult to see.

Some have claimed that capitalism is individualistic. Well, what is individualism? There are two different conceptions of individualism that I know about, one of which is essentially doublespeak. The first is "rugged individualism", that is, the idea that anyone can make it as long as they're willing to be tough and work hard. What this basically means, in the context of reality, is that as long as you submit to (wage)slavery, that is, rent yourself to someone else for a while, you'll be able to be a master later on. Essentially, it means that in order to be successful or have a decent life, you need to please other people. That's "individualism". There is another conception of individualism, however. This is that people ought to be able to act out thier lives in ways which are not coerced or planned by others. Now clearly capitalism is a major violation of this idea: workers do not plan thier actions, thier actions are dictated by the boss.

What kind of a sytem is really individualistic? Well, it's one which material resources are not handed out on the basis of the whim of some individual, and individual who, by consequence, is more powerful than everyone else. If that individual disagrees with what you're doing in life, he can just say, I'm not giving you anything until you conform to my demands. Returning to the original question, the solution has to be to create a system where resources are not distributed according to individual whim, but rather by need. Then there is no coercion: people can plan thier lives and do what they feel is important, without having the judgement of someone else hanging over thier head. Now they may have reality hanging over thier head, but it isn't passed through the prism of somebody else's judgement about it. This is why I disagree with Josh's statement that:

I think it could happen with basically any amount of resources. The traditional idea of what happens in a need based system is that everyone deliberately does nothing and uses up all the resources and basically just cause society to go down in flames. Well, I think that's ridiculous: I think that human beings are smart enough to not do that, and I think there's actually a lot of evidence for that, if you're willing to cut through all the propaganda (like the idea, say, that the fall of the USSR "proves" that a need based system can't work, as if the USSR was ever even intended to be a need based system, rather than generally its opposite).

It should be noted, too, that during NASA's peak productivity it had the most direct control over what corporations were doing, oversight was largest. Corporations began to become more autonomous following the Apollo era. That would also seem to contribute to the corporate welfare hypothesis.

Which is what I am doing.

It should be noted that the corporate welfare hypothesis and the "government bureaucracy hypothesis" which has been circulating some time now don't conflict, they work together. It's just a matter of assigning relative importance.

Well, the shuttle orbiter isn't. The launch stack might be useful for something.

I think people ought to be somewhat interested in the welfare hypothesis, because, even if you don't agree with it, it is something which is different from the traditional viewpoint, which assigns the sole blame to government, mysteriously leaving out corporations, even though in many cases they are essentially a single entity, as Zubrin himself attests. Also, the welfare hypothesis allows for the possibility that "free market economics", that is, without government subsidy, would impact innovation in space quite badly, something which is obviously the case, looking backward.