Mars as an alternative to War. - Can space exploration replace War?

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-03 18:25:04

Josh;

Since when did subsistence agriculture prevent one from going to Mars?

Yeah, a society of people in grinding poverty, who are perpetually one bad harvest (or at best a few bast harvests) away from going hungery, are going to have plenty of surplus production to support rocket factories.

Is not a self sustaining ecosystem basically ?subsistence agriculture??

???

From Dictionary.com:

"Farming that provides for the basic needs of the farmer without surpluses for marketing."

Words mean things, you know.

What you seem to be suggesting is that the only workable system is one that is constantly expanding, since subsistence agriculture is an inherent equilibrium, and you believe that ?lots of people will end up dead? if they participate in it.

This seems, for some reson, to be basically a left-wing forum, and like most left-wingers, you have fundamental problems with the truth. I'm not necessarily saying it's intentional, but for some reason you're driven to mangle even something as simple as this.

What I said was that if people on Mars adopt the attitude that there's something wrong with selling human necessities, people would end up dead.

Now, mind you, subsistence agriculturalists do end up dead if the crops fail, but that's just a part of the inherent risks of being alive. But your opposition to selling necessities, if acted upon, would result in catastrophic, entirely man-made economic failure, as surely as night follows day.

When I say that necessities are going to be provided for, or not going to be ?sold at a price,? I mean that one section of a colony will allow another section to pipe water and air through, and so on.

And if you pay the people who go out and get the water instead of forcing them, the human necessities are going to be sold at a price.

Really, how am I supposed to get the above from what you said?

Each section could technically live indepdendently from another, but living together gives them more freedom, as resources are distributed better, and the overall social and economic benefits are greater.

You've seen the advantages of specialization of labor.

Now, there are two ways to organize the above. You can let people do it themselves through voluntary exchange, or you can set up a central planning office to tell everyone what to do. Which do you want?

clark;

Becuase either we have a complex economy or we all work the fields.... LOL.

And the other alternatives are?

LOL, this one is great too! I mean, my god, the audacity to make a claim such as this- do you realize that the fallacy in logic you are commiting?! No wait, I'll point it out- by accepting this silly little premise and conclusion, we must also categorize Parenthood, charity, altruism, and any other countless acts of kindness where one bestows "human necessities" upon others who cannot neccessirly help themselves.

And once we decree that human necessities cannot be sold at a price, everyone will work for the benefit of strangers just as parents do for their children, which is why why the Soviet Union had such a better economy than America.

Idiot.

AltToWar · 2002-10-03 21:51:29

This seems, for some reson, to be basically a left-wing forum, and like most left-wingers, you have fundamental problems with the truth. I'm not necessarily saying it's intentional, but for some reason you're driven to mangle even something as simple as this.

Actually, I thought this forum was rather right wing. Those people over in the other discussion are talking about Madating Culture and forcing people to get a lisense to breed and stuff, thats not somthing the left embraces at all!

Now there is a bit of a communist tilt within this forum. I think to use the Soviet Union as the poster child for Communism is like using Enron as an standard of ethical corporate executives.

Communism on the large scale has never been shown to work yet. But there are examples today of successful small communes and Co-ops even here in America.

If I myself had to pick the government structure of mars, I would create a libertarian planet wide government, and promote co-operative based city states.

Now I agree with you that at this moment in time Capitalism is the current apex of our economic exparament. Capitalism does have it's flaws, though. The top of the structure amass hordes of wealth, while the bottom of the structure fights to survive. All too often the increases the top recieves is trivial while the penalty to the bottom is severe.

One of the problems with communism has been it's ineptability to compete with capitalism at producing large amounts of excess. That excess is needed to build up a space program, a massive military, and to influence smaller naitions.

With the Vaccum of space between here and mars, it is possible that new economic systems could be introduced that are not as self serving and advisarial without having to compete with a system built on competition.

Now the Co-op lefties are not the only ones who see mars as a potential utopia, the right wing "state mandated culture" see a chance to finally get a culture who will eat shit and like it. Perhaps there is a some merit in there (though it is difficult to see)

I think that mars does have the potential to be the next step forward in our social-political-economic progress. What I had hoped to get from this forum is a better idea of what that future might be, how it would work, what can practically be done?

We could go to mars with policies and ideas of the past and present, But would they work with such a distant vaccume between Earth and Mars? Would the nature of the communal life prohibit Capitalism from working as well as some other system? Would we be missing an opportunity to take a step forward?

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-03 23:25:49

Okay, I hate ?quote wars,? but it's necessary to disseminate A.J.'s comments.

Yeah, a society of people in grinding poverty, who are perpetually one bad harvest (or at best a few bast harvests) away from going hungery, are going to have plenty of surplus production to support rocket factories.

Well, this is an interesting spin on subsistence agriculture. On Earth, perhaps we have the problem of questionable harvests, but on Mars, with technological advancements, this is hardly even an issue. Of course, subsistence agriculture within a colony, hardly prevents us from expanding a colony. All it says is that the colony is at equilibrium regardless of its size. Expanding is perfectable acceptable, expanding just isn't the motivation for survival, or the central quailty of economics (in this system).

From Dictionary.com:
"Farming that provides for the basic needs of the farmer without surpluses for marketing."
Words mean things, you know.

Yes, subsistence means, ?the minimum necessary to support life.? And agriculture means, ?the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock.?

So subsistence agriculture means, ?the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock at the minimum necessary to support life.?

The m-w.com definition states that subsistence agriculture (farming) is, ?farming or a system of farming that provides all or almost all the goods required by the farm family usually without any significant surplus for sale.?

How is this different from a self sustaining ecosystem? Earth's ecosystem isn't creating any damn ?surpluses? I can tell you. No ecosystem can; it physically defies the Laws of Thermodynamics. Surpluses are inventions of the economist mind.

Note that we're talking about overall resources within an ecosystem. Sure, certain species may consume more or less over a period of time, but the overall ammount of resources in that system approaches zero (with exception to particles that reach escape velocity- though they are arguably replaced at an equal, if not greater, quantity).

This seems, for some reson, to be basically a left-wing forum, and like most left-wingers, you have fundamental problems with the truth. I'm not necessarily saying it's intentional, but for some reason you're driven to mangle even something as simple as this.

Nah, this is actually a moderate forum, I've found. But it should come as no surprise to anyone that science-leaning forums are quite liberal. Most scientists in the US are; and around the world for that matter. Leftism, as an ideology, suits science due to its progressive nature. You know, I found it quite shocking the other day when I went to Space.com's forums, and found the majority voice there to be right-leaning. That kind of thing you don't see very often.

I don't see any reason to make generalizations about ?left wingers,? without at least providing some examples. If left wingers have fundamental problems with the truth, please, feel free to give an example. It would at least put some bit of weight to your statement, and keep you from looking like an asshole who's just trying to stir shit up. (You don't want to sound like Nova, do you?)

And I don't think I'm mangling anything. As there can be no other way to interpret what you meant by putting a negative connotation to subsistence agriculture.

What I said was that if people on Mars adopt the attitude that there's something wrong with selling human necessities, people would end up dead.

If you don't start substantiating your comments, we'll never get anywhere, you know. I don't mind responding when you don't, and I don't mind reading baseless rhetoric. But it would be more constructive if you did at least back yourself up.

And what you said you said (that I didn't say you didn't say), follows what I said you implied, so there's no need to reiterate. (And yes, this made sense.)

But your opposition to selling necessities, if acted upon, would result in catastrophic, entirely man-made economic failure, as surely as night follows day.

Can you at least substantiate this claim? I'll make the opposite claim, and then substantiate it, so that you can see what I'm asking you to do:

Claim: If man continues to sell necessities and force dependency, there would be catastrophic, entirely man-made economic failure, as sure as night follows day.

Substantiation: On Earth, it may be possible to monopolize renewable (solar) energies, preventing populations from ever acquiring the technology to convert their own sunlight into directly useable energies when fossil fuels run out. But in Space, this is increasingly not the case. Current economic trends, like forced dependency, and profit by necessity, cannot work in space due to their inherent breakablity, cost, and overall risk factor.

If I depend on you for food, and can't make ends meet by selling you some absurd resource, like moon dust, I die. If man cannot reconcile this major problem with forced dependency in space, more deaths will occur than you can imagine. Let's talk about slavery, shall we?

I don't even see forced dependency working on Earth, once renewable resources become necessary (when the fossil fuels run out), since to work at current levels, we'd have to distribute technologies throughout the world that use solar energy. Such distribution would require inherent independency from one another (basically decentralization). And individual independency is indistingusable from ?free necessities.?

And if you pay the people who go out and get the water instead of forcing them, the human necessities are going to be sold at a price.

How about; those who need water go out and get it themselves, and no one stops them as long as it doesn't harm the overall health of the colony? Now, one could make a leap and say that belonging to a colony comes at a ?price? (which would be accurate), but so too would not belonging to a colony. In the former the price would arguably be a lot less, since you'd have many more benefits than if you did the latter.

You can let people do it themselves through voluntary exchange, or you can set up a central planning office to tell everyone what to do. Which do you want?

The former, how else? The latter is the only system workable with capitalism, that much is certain. If you were to apply the former to capitalism, or some kind of ?free trade,? you would be left with a mob state. No one voluntarily hands over their time for resources which are inherently less than they would have if that time was used directly for themselves. Unless they're fucking stupid.

AltToWar, BTW, I agree with your statements (especially about trade between colonies), and it should be noted that never have I said that colonies would not be exchanging. Or anything like that, for that matter. I hope you read my resturant analogy, it's really good, I think, to show how we will probably be living on Mars and in space in general.

AltToWar · 2002-10-03 23:54:59

I hope you read my resturant analogy, it's really good, I think, to show how we will probably be living on Mars and in space in general.

Link?

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-04 00:09:48

Me and A.J were talking about this kind of thing in the Terraformation forum, under the thread entitled ?A Question For Greens.? I made the analogy on the second page. I know, I'm a bit long winded, sorry about that.

It basically just says that people who are working together collectively have to be more intelligent than people who work together within a hierarchy. And maybe even implies that the only reason hierarchy works, is because people are stupid. Hehe.

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-06 03:42:20

AltToWar;

Actually, I thought this forum was rather right wing. Those people over in the other discussion are talking about Madating Culture and forcing people to get a lisense to breed and stuff, thats not somthing the left embraces at all!

It's funny you'd use those two examples: those are EXACTLY what the left embraces, and those represent the far edge of leftist opinion here.

Look at China. Heck, look at America. We have (relatively) little mandated culture, but look at who opposes what we do have. Who wants to get rid of the NEA and NPR and PBS? Not the Democrats, not even most of the Republicans, the "right-wing extremists" like me. Or public schools. What's your image of a homeschooler? Probably a Christian conservative, perhaps even a "redneck". Not universally the case, but you get the idea. Speech codes on campus aren't there to protect white males.

And population control. Are you telling me the Catholic Church on on the left and the envirowackies are on the right?

If you'll look at the terms of the debate on the other threads, the arguments for supporting those things are all in leftist terms, while the other side is more moderate if not, as in my case, right-wing.

Now there is a bit of a communist tilt within this forum.

Wait, I thought it was "rather right wing". ???

I think to use the Soviet Union as the poster child for Communism is like using Enron as an standard of ethical corporate executives.

The difference: there are examples of honest executives. There are NO examples of working Communism, even if you define "working" to mean anything except mass death and misery. (Your attempt to find some will be addressed a little later.)

Communism on the large scale has never been shown to work yet.

Yet? You think this is still up in the air?

But there are examples today of successful small communes and Co-ops even here in America.

More like especially in America. Communes and co-ops in America are inherently capitalist entities. Yes, you read that right.

I'll explain. Joining and remaining are voluntary. Uncoerced economic decisions are the definition of capitalism. (Since there are muddle-headed socialists about, I should note that needing to eat to live is biology, not coercion. No human decided to make us that way, it's inherent in the way the world is, and as Mark Twain said, "The world owes you nothing. It was here first.")

Furthermore, small communes in the context of capitalist societies are just that, in the context of capitalist societies. They can rely on the surrounding free markets for information on the relatives value of different products, ect. Basically, by being in a capitalist society, they don't have the calculation problem. That problem, BTW, is why large Communist societies not only have never worked, but can never work, unless they're intended to make everyone suffer. They work great at that.

So when you call Communist societies communist, and then call small communes the same thing, you are, as Aristotle would say, using an equivocal term. It doesn't mean exactly the same thing in both cases, the same way your hand and a hand in a painting are both "hands", but you shouldn't expect a painted hand to write "Cici n'est pas une pipe." Communism, the ideology of Marx and Engels, is not the same thing as commune-ism, living in communes.

Now I agree with you that at this moment in time Capitalism is the current apex of our economic exparament.

Capitalism is what happens in the absence of government intervention. Voluntary exchange will always outcompete involuntary exchange.

Capitalism does have it's flaws, though. The top of the structure amass hordes of wealth, while the bottom of the structure fights to survive.

Yeah, because they've got diabetes, heart disease, or some other problem from being so fat. I'm serious: you're trying to make that argument in a society where the major nutritional problem for poor people is overeating, and their biggest health problem is obesity. That's actually quite an accomplishment, you know. I think capitalism deserves a little credit for it.

With the Vaccum of space between here and mars, it is possible that new economic systems could be introduced that are not as self serving and advisarial without having to compete with a system built on competition.

The notion that capitalism is "self-serving and adversarial" is essentially a socialist propaganda lie. It gets some credibility from the relations between businesses in the same field, but that's not where the heart of capitalism is.

I have more apples than I need. You have more fish than you need. I buy your fish with my apples. Now we're better off than before.

That's it. Everything else is ever more sophisticated elaborations on the above (such as a most-exchangable commodity, aka money) but it all always comes down to this: I have what you want, and you have what I want. We make each other better off by trading.

The alternative is that one or both of us don't get what we want. Someone decides to be "self-sufficient" (i.e., pig-headedly stupid and blind to his own interests), or one of us coerces the other, or a third party coerces both of us.

Now the Co-op lefties are not the only ones who see mars as a potential utopia, the right wing "state mandated culture" see a chance to finally get a culture who will eat shit and like it.

It's not the right wing I see desperate to disarm the common man. It's not the right wing telling us about the multicultural religion-of-peace glories of Islam, not like those violence-prone Christians. (Think of the Crusades! Muslims have never done anything like that, right?) It's not the right wing trying to turn everything over the the collection of kleptocrats and torturers called the UN. (Incedentally, the chief advocate of torture in modern America is noted right-winger Alan Dershowitz.) It's not the right wing trying to ban the internal combustion engine.

If you want "eat shit and like it", try the left. We on the right are a little more discriminating in our tastes.

Josh;

I'll get to your ecomonic and other inanities tomorrow.

AltToWar · 2002-10-06 09:07:08

I reciently cam across a few political theories that expand the 1 Dimentional Liberal-Conservatism split into a 2 dimentional system with a liberal-conservatism axis, and a Libertarian-Athoritarian axis.

Now I define the right as:

Right-conservatives prefer self-government on economic issues, but want official standards in personal matters. They want the government to defend the community from threats to its moral fiber.

I believe Madated Culture and Enforced Burth Control fall within this definition, as acts to mandate the morality and character of the individual.

The left I prefer to define as:

Left-Liberals prefer self-government in personal matters and central decision-making on economics. They want government to serve the disadvantaged in the name of fairness. Leftists tolerate social diversity, but work for economic equality.

Beyond this I believe there are 2 other prominent political ideals that are either mixed in with or totally seperate from the Left-Right axis.

Libertarians:
Libertarians are self-governors in both personal and economic matters. They believe government's only purpose is to protect people from coercion and violence. They value individual responsibility, and tolerate economic and social diversity.

and

Authoritarians:
Authoritarians want government to advance society and individuals through expert central planning. They often doubt whether self-government is practical. Left-authoritarians are also called socialists, while fascists are right-authoritarians.

As you might come to discover, Libertarianism ideals apply to both the right and the left, only on different matters.

As well Athoritarianism crosses over to the left and the right.

If you accept a second axis, then our current arguement becomes rather pointless. Mandated culture and mandated birthcontrol are within the sphere of Athoritarian polotics. It's possible that either the right or the left will accept certian athoritarian ideals. Ideals that move to control the social structure of it's people tend to go to the right, but not nessicarily so.

Blah blah.

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-06 16:50:23

Josh;

Well, this is an interesting spin on subsistence agriculture. On Earth, perhaps we have the problem of questionable harvests, but on Mars, with technological advancements, this is hardly even an issue. Of course, subsistence agriculture within a colony, hardly prevents us from expanding a colony. All it says is that the colony is at equilibrium regardless of its size. Expanding is perfectable acceptable, expanding just isn't the motivation for survival, or the central quailty of economics (in this system).

It's not a "spin", it's the hard reality.

As for Mars, subsistence agriculture means no colony, period. If there's no surplus to feed full-time biologists, ect, why should anyone pay for the initial settlement? And even after that, it's a losing proposition. On Earth, you can pull it off, even though it's precarious, but things you can get free on Earth (like air) will have to be manufactured on Mars. Either you support people to run those things, or you die. And as I'll go into later, trying to do everything yourself is ruinously inefficient.

Yes, subsistence means, ?the minimum necessary to support life.? And agriculture means, ?the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock.?

So subsistence agriculture means, ?the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock at the minimum necessary to support life.?

The m-w.com definition states that subsistence agriculture (farming) is, ?farming or a system of farming that provides all or almost all the goods required by the farm family usually without any significant surplus for sale.?

How is this different from a self sustaining ecosystem?

Oh, I don't know, the farming bit, maybe?

Earth's ecosystem isn't creating any damn ?surpluses? I can tell you. No ecosystem can; it physically defies the Laws of Thermodynamics. Surpluses are inventions of the economist mind.

Back to the "laws of thermodynamics" bit.

I don't know what the economist mind is, but it's obviously wiser than yours. Do you deny that farmers can grow more than they need, in order to sell it?

Leftism, as an ideology, suits science due to its progressive nature.

Progressive like Alzheimer's disease.

I don't see any reason to make generalizations about ?left wingers,? without at least providing some examples. If left wingers have fundamental problems with the truth, please, feel free to give an example.

I would have considered it too obvious to need examples, but here you go. Bill Clinton comes to mind rather easily. Or look at the Hiss case. Hiss himself was simply lying, and the whole left went along. Or, to continue with Communist examples, the fact that the left denied the truth of Stalin's atrocities until the Soviet Union itself admitted them. Is Noam Chomsky still denying the killing fields?

Your own posts show why this is (unintentionally, of course). Leftism is an ideology based on a fantasy world. The leftist is always squirming to get from the real world to his own fake one. The difference between moderate and extreme leftists is that the moderate ones are less given over to fantasy.

This, BTW, is why leftism is inherently totalitarian. Trying to turn the real world into an impossible fantasy world means millions of broken eggs, and not one omlette.

And I don't think I'm mangling anything. As there can be no other way to interpret what you meant by putting a negative connotation to subsistence agriculture.

Except that my comment was about the consequences of ideas, not farming techniques.

Claim: If man continues to sell necessities and force dependency, there would be catastrophic, entirely man-made economic failure, as sure as night follows day.

Substantiation: On Earth, it may be possible to monopolize renewable (solar) energies, preventing populations from ever acquiring the technology to convert their own sunlight into directly useable energies when fossil fuels run out. But in Space, this is increasingly not the case. Current economic trends, like forced dependency, and profit by necessity, cannot work in space due to their inherent breakablity, cost, and overall risk factor.

Another result of living in a fantasy world is making no sense. What the heck are you even talking about?

If I depend on you for food, and can't make ends meet by selling you some absurd resource, like moon dust, I die.

Or maybe you could sell me a non-absurd resource, like books or farming impliments. Or you could even sell something to someone else and then use the money to pay me.

How about; those who need water go out and get it themselves, and no one stops them as long as it doesn't harm the overall health of the colony?

I see. So everyone has to go out and get their own dirt, bake it themselves, and recycle their water themselves, with no economies of scale and no specialized technical knowledge. And while everyone's spending all their time getting water, who the heck is going to grow the food?

Sounds real practical.

My question is, given the choice between wasting all that time and still not having much water and just paying somebody to do it for them, how are you going to make people choose to deprive themselves of the benefits of specialization? Forced dependency? Who needs force? Self-interest and some minimal amount of sanity is all it takes.

Remember, when you force people to live according to economic fantasies instead of economic reality, death and misery result. Every time.

You can let people do it themselves through voluntary exchange, or you can set up a central planning office to tell everyone what to do. Which do you want?

The former, how else? The latter is the only system workable with capitalism, that much is certain. If you were to apply the former to capitalism, or some kind of ?free trade,? you would be left with a mob state.

Here we see a fundamental disconnection with reality, again.

A central planning office is how they do things in SOCIALISM. You're so in over your head in the unreal that you think it's certain that something is it's opposite.

No one voluntarily hands over their time for resources which are inherently less than they would have if that time was used directly for themselves. Unless they're fucking stupid.

Right. They hand over their time for resources inherently more valuable than they'd have if their time were used directly for themselves. You see, if you happen to be employed, your employer gives you something called money. If you give your money to other people, they give you things, like Red Bull. I happen to like Red Bull, and I don't know how to make it myself. But even if I did, I don't know how to make computers, so I wouldn't be here. And even if I did... Do you see the point? It's not just any one thing. It's all of it together. Take your example on another thread of planting trees. Beside the fact that a person's land will only hold so many trees, a fat lot of good it will do you if you quit your tree-planting job to plant trees for yourself when your kid gets sick and you need to pay the doctor.

Go to a Wal-Mart. Anything in the store can be yours without needing to know how to make it, and probably at higher quality than you could manage anyway. That is why people choose specialization of labor: it makes them richer.

AltToWar;

That's from the "world's smallest political quiz". It's wrong. The real cultural division between the left and the right is that those on the right are more traditionalist, while the left is, as they said in the 60s, countercultural. Both have libertarian elements that don't want tro impose their preferences, and both have authoritarian elements that do.

But the left is much worse, for two reasons. First, because traditions are traditional, they require less force to impose than to remove. Second, they're traditional for a reason. People over the generations have found them to work. So here again the left is based primarily on fantasy, which, as I said, leads to totalitarianism.

AltToWar · 2002-10-06 17:16:54

But the left is much worse, for two reasons. First, because traditions are traditional, they require less force to impose than to remove. Second, they're traditional for a reason. People over the generations have found them to work. So here again the left is based primarily on fantasy, which, as I said, leads to totalitarianism.

Your claim that all progress leads to totalitarianism is nuts.

It was 'Traditional' that white men could own slaves.
It was 'Traditional' that women could and should not vote.
it was 'Traditional' that all men and women were vassels of a monarch.

It took couragous people more force to 'impose' thses changes. It did indeed. The end result was not 'Totalitarianism.'

Your painting some rather broad strokes here rosco.

Tradition is nice. Some traditions contain wisdom of our ancestors, refined over ages. Some traditions reflect their ignorance as well.

It is good to hold on to all artifacts of our culture that enlighten us and make is kinder, wiser people. If we come across traditions that are no longer valid or based on faulty logic and reasoning, we should have the courage to stand up and change the way we are.

Todays fantasy is tomorrows reality. Why do you fear to dream of a better future?

Palomar · 2002-10-06 17:22:37

Tradition is nice. Some traditions contain wisdom of our ancestors, refined over ages. Some traditions reflect their ignorance as well.
It is good to hold on to all artifacts of our culture that enlighten us and make is kinder, wiser people. If we come across traditions that are no longer valid or based on faulty logic and reasoning, we should have the courage to stand up and change the way we are.
Todays fantasy is tomorrows reality. Why do you fear to dream of a better future?

*Well said, AltToWar. VERY well said! A great post.

--Cindy

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-06 23:07:08

Wow, A.J. pulled a ?Nova? on us. Instead of actually addressing different arguments, he returns with tons of silly insults. Interestingly, he resorted to the exact same argument as Nova, ?You're living in a fantasy world.? This is my major gripe with idealougs. They cannot, cannot reason.

If there's no surplus to feed full-time biologists, ect, why should anyone pay for the initial settlement?

Um, have you forgotten the story of the Pilgrims? The last bit of your question is irrelevant. We're not talking about scientific expeditions, we're talking about colonization. (Which BTW, you should be calling a ?fantasy,? right about now.)

Also, I never implied we would have ?zero-surpluses.? I said, ?[...] the colony is at equilibrium regardless of its size.? Equilibrium would obviously require a surplus of viable (directly usable) resources. Ecosystems swing from one extreme to another, but without viable surpluses an ecosystem would fail when a necessary viable resource ran out. But total (directly useable or not) resources in an ecosystem remain unchanged. No many how many foxes, rabbits, or clover you have, the total ammount of carbon, nitrogen, etc, in that system is exactly the same, but if you run out of a small surplus of any, the ecosystem fails.

Do you deny that farmers can grow more than they need, in order to sell it?

Not at all. Someone could go to Mars, set up a food, water, and electricity plant, and ?charge? people to use those resources. But the only way they can be ?profitable,? is if they have central control over all these resources. It's absurd to think that people, using high level technology, can profit by making other people, also using high level technology, use their preprocessed resources.

If you go to Mars, are you really going to go under the assumption that once you get there you're going to ?rent? food water and electricity from someone? I highly doubt it. People who colonize will take their own methods of extraction. (Unless they're part of some absurd ?worker colony,? which would be prone to usurpation at any time.)

It doesn't take much more technology to go from ?barely surviving in a vaccume with outside help? to ?surviving in a vaccume independently of the outside.?

I would have considered [the left having fundamental problems with the truth] too obvious to need examples[.]

Oh, I thought you were saying the whole left ideology was completely full of lies, I didn't realize you hated the left because of things that are no more atrocious than things the right has done. Good call.

Leftism is an ideology based on a fantasy world. The leftist is always squirming to get from the real world to his own fake one.

AltToWar could not have said it better. The left only seeks to find equality. Sure, they do some stupid shit along the way, but that is their only goal. I suppose equality is wrong to you, but it's a very noble goal. And the left has strived quite well to achieve it. To call the left a ?fantasy world,? is to be close-minded and bigoted.

Trying to turn the real world into an impossible fantasy world means millions of broken eggs, and not one omlette.

You've hardly substantiated the ?impossiblity? of the left. You've just mouthed off like most right wingers. You said you were going to address the economic part of what I said, well, you haven't. You've just sat there and insulted me like I actually cared.

Except that my comment was about the consequences of ideas, not farming techniques.

I wasn't talking about farming techniques, though. I was just suggesting that ?subsistence agriculture? is a good model for an self sustaining ecosystem where two species exist at equilibrium at an upper population limit. Try reasoning some, won't you?

Another result of living in a fantasy world is making no sense. What the heck are you even talking about?

Um, I'm talking about capitalism being lame with regards to space colonization? What else? I hardly live in a fantasy world. I work pretty damn hard, myself. I just have a more open minded view of the future. And I deserve to have one, since I'm actually out there working on sharing technology openly like a civilized, rational, society would.

Or maybe you could sell me a non-absurd resource, like books or farming impliments. Or you could even sell something to someone else and then use the money to pay me.

Oh man. How am I going to produce those farming implements on Luna? And why would anyone buy from me, given that high level technology would be highly distributed by the time we can colonize Luna?

The reason I used the space dust example, is simple. Moon dust is actually very valuable, as it contains He3. In fact, Luna is the nearest place in the solar system where we can obtain useable quantities of He3. He3 would be a nice commodity to have. But how in the #### is it going to be valuable if anyone could harvest it themselves?

It's absurd to think that only one person can harvest moon dust. Sure, it may be true here on Earth, that only one or a few people can drill for oil, but that's hardly true with regards to moon dust.

Now, it's very possible someone could, say, monopolize moon dust harvestors, and any technology related to the moon, by keeping everything proprietary and secret. But this can only last for so long. The fact that such systems are more prone to breakage, and are highly centralized, makes them highly unsuitable for space.

So everyone has to go out and get their own dirt, bake it themselves, and recycle their water themselves, with no economies of scale and no specialized technical knowledge.

Specialized technical knowledge is way fucking overrated. The only reason we have it, is because capitalism requries that technology be proprietary, otherwise business models don't quite work. I, as a human, can work with anything I have an instruction booklet for. I have rebuilt engines with very little specialization. I have replaced hoses, waterpumps, alternators, you name it, all without attending a mechanics school or some other absurd thing. In some cases, I even borrowed tools (oh no, I live in a fantasy world).

You know, if you actually think we're going to be on Mars in space suits, shoveling frozen regolith to get water, you have got to be kidding me. Martian tools are going to be very different from Terran tools. Specialized labor will be non-existant, we'll have machines doing most, if not all, of the work for us.

And while everyone's spending all their time getting water, who the heck is going to grow the food?

Man, you certainly exaggerate the work involved in growing food, don't you? Hydroponics don't need much attention for food to grow. And food tends to grow by itself, without human intervention. So this really is a non-issue. It's only a matter of hygiene, but hey, you can't understand this since you fail to reason.

[...] how are you going to make people choose to deprive themselves of the benefits of specialization?

What benefits? Like I said, specialization only exists because it makes a good business model. If specs for a vehicle were open, and the protocol to read the computer and so on, mechanics would be out of a job, and competetiors would know your secrets. Do you have any idea how easy technology is to understand once the innards are ripped open and the secrets are out for everyone to see?

I don't think I have to ?make? anyone deprive themselves of ?the benefits? of specialization. They'll get fed up with depending on central authorities after awhile.

Forced dependency? Who needs force? Self-interest and some minimal amount of sanity is all it takes.

Oh yeah. I just gave all the secrets to making moon dust harvestors to people on Earth. Guess what? They've already started building rockets to take their own moon dust harvestors to the moon. This is the same as a new oil field with limitless supplies being found at the bottom of the Pacific ocean, spanning many thousands of miles. Oil prices would plummet, just like the value of He3.

You're totally right. Self-interest and a minimal amount of sanity is all it takes. I'm glad moon dust is no longer monopolized.

Remember, when you force people to live according to economic fantasies instead of economic reality, death and misery result. Every time.

Agreed. Instead of people dying because their He3 reactors ran out, and they couldn't produce enough iron to sell to the National Consortium of Resource Exploitation, there is more than enough He3 for everyone. You're right, economic reality is a lot better! People being free from proprietary knowledge, are economically powerful, no?

A central planning office is how they do things in SOCIALISM. You're so in over your head in the unreal that you think it's certain that something is it's opposite.

No definition of socialism I have read, says that everything is controlled by a central planning office. The problem is that you actually think I advocate Marxism or something. I wish you'd pay more attention to my ideas.

Right. They hand over their time for resources inherently more valuable than they'd have if their time were used directly for themselves.

Ahh, the major capitalist lie. I can assure you, that it would have costed me more to pay someone to rebuild my engine than it would for me to do it myself. When I hand over money to a mechanic to fix my engine, I am handing over my time and resources for something inherently less valuable. I am losing time and resources.

Beside the fact that a person's land will only hold so many trees, a fat lot of good it will do you if you quit your tree-planting job to plant trees for yourself when your kid gets sick and you need to pay the doctor.

Oh, I can plant trees while I still have my tree planting job. The point is, that if I plant a tree I will directly benefit from, I will certainly be spending effort where effort is due, and not wasting it on someone else.

Some things are specialized and need outside training, like health care, but, I don't see why many people in a colony wouldn't want to have as many doctors as possible. Look at Cuba. The best health care in the world, according to the WHO. One highly qualified doctor for every 170 people. Interesting stuff.

[...] people choose specialization of labor [because] it makes them richer.

People choose specialization of labor, because they don't know better. People are inherently stupid and naive.

AltToWar, I couldn't have said it better myself. Leftism is progressive, and progress is good. But you already know this.

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-07 01:16:20

It looks like AltToWar and Josh both missed the point of my comments about the left inhabiting a fantasy world entirely. But I should've expected it: I'm not exactly dealing with mental giants.

Perhaps an example will help. Anyone who thinks we'll be sending any Battlestar Gallactica missions is fantasizing, not thinking. So Zubrin tossed out the fantasy-based plans and came up with Mars Direct, which is firmly based in the real world. I guess he's no different from NovaMarsollia, huh?

"Dreams of a better future" are nice, but they'll produce nothing (at best) without knowing what can be achieved and how to get there. Having some idea what the side-effects will be can't hurt. Remember, you can evade reality, but not the consequences of evading reality.

AltToWar;

Your claim that all progress leads to totalitarianism is nuts.

You're assuming I think "all progress" comes from misunderstandings of how the world works and how it can be improved, and fantasies about what can work and what can't. But, unlike you, I'm not a dolt. Progress forward (rather than progressive degeneration) comes from dealing with reality on its own terms.

If you lived before airplanes and dreamed of a world where people could fly, getting out there and inventing an airplane (which requires dealing with the laws of physics as they are, instead of as you would wish them to be) would be a lot more productive than flapping your arms really fast.

Todays fantasy is tomorrows reality.

Just try that with the laws of physics, bud. Maybe your Darwin Award will include the words "dropped like a rock".

One advantage is that fewer people will end up dead than if you try it with the laws of human nature.

If you reply to this little section of my comments, please tell me how you think the Founding Fathers fit in to all this.

Josh;

Your big fantasy is that the specialization of labor depends on technological monopoly and proprietary knowledge. Like most political fantasizing, it takes something real and distorts the hell out of it until you're looking at some aspect of the world through the bottoms of Coke bottles. I think it may well be too fundamental to your thinking to ever be dislodged, so I'll only make a small effort. To wit, I'll point out how your own statements, when they derive from the real world instead of fantasy, lead away from it.

Specialized technical knowledge is way fucking overrated. The only reason we have it, is because capitalism requries that technology be proprietary, otherwise business models don't quite work. I, as a human, can work with anything I have an instruction booklet for. I have rebuilt engines with very little specialization. I have replaced hoses, waterpumps, alternators, you name it, all without attending a mechanics school or some other absurd thing. In some cases, I even borrowed tools (oh no, I live in a fantasy world).

...

Ahh, the major capitalist lie. I can assure you, that it would have costed me more to pay someone to rebuild my engine than it would for me to do it myself. When I hand over money to a mechanic to fix my engine, I am handing over my time and resources for something inherently less valuable. I am losing time and resources.

If only the technology weren't proprietary, you could do it yourself...

Oh, wait! I was misreading your post as badly as you misread mine, till I snapped out of it. Whoa, that was scary.

So the technology to rebuild cars isn't proprietary? And you can work it with just an instruction book? And yet, contrary to what you predict would happen to any space industry in the same situation, mechanics haven't gone out of business. Typically, for a leftist, you blame the predictive failure of your ideology on other people. Why, they aren't smart enough to do their own car repairs.

Maybe they just don't enjoy mechanical work. Did you think of that? Maybe they could do it if they applied themselves, but such application would be so painful to them that paying the mechanic is worth it to them. Yes, not everyone is like you. Some people even pay to get whipped and spanked. And if they enjoy that sort of thing, it's worth it. Or at least, they think so, otherwise they wouldn't pay for it.

Another real-world example: there are plenty of computer languages that aren't proprietary. Do you see many people coding their own games?

Shaun Barrett · 2002-10-07 01:27:44

I thought AJ left himself wide open for that attack by painting himself into a corner as regards the 'tradition versus change' argument.
On the other hand, as Cindy pointed out, AltToWar's response was delivered masterfully! In battle, they call it a 'coup-de-grace', in golf it's a 'hole-in-one', while on the tennis court, it's a 'passing-shot'!!

That's not to say I don't see generally where AJ is coming from.
I have lived through the actual results of the excesses of socialism in Britain during the sixties and seventies, and here in Australia during the eighties and nineties. I know socialism is based on a theoretically more egalitarian and compassionate premise - essentially the 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his need' philosophy. And it's hard to fault it on paper.
But all my experience tells me that human nature simply doesn't allow it to work in practice.
Sad to say, but the great majority of people will not work hard for very long if it's not for their own advancement, will not give up money if it materially affects their lifestyle, and will milk a state-run social security system for all it's worth if given half a chance.

It's not that there's anything wrong with left-wing philosophy per se, or with left-leaning individuals, who are often well-meaning and good-hearted people. It's simply that the human race is not worthy of such a system.
It can't work and, excluding a major change in the selfish and self-centred nature of the average human being, it never will work! What's tragic is that so many people still think it can.

Having said all that, I also understand that, while capitalism patently does work, uncontrolled capitalism can be one mean ugly beast too!
Ideally , we need enough capitalism to harness the greed in humanity's dark side. Then we need just enough socialist compassion to siphon off some of the resultant wealth to help those who can't help themselves. Sounds simple, doesn't it?!

Incidentally, my view of totalitarianism is that it arises, not out of abstract political philosophy, but purely out of the terrible lust for power and control that exists in certain individuals.
People speak of Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, Stalin's Russia, and Maoist China. Whether you classify these regimes as far-left or far-right is really of little consequence - particularly for the people who lived under them! (And, more importantly, died under them! )
50 million people died in Hitler and Mussolini's push for power, Stalin starved 20 million of his own people to death in the 1920s in the creation of state-run collective farms over which he would have more control, and how many tens of millions died under Mao's monumentally disastrous and self-aggrandising leadership may never be known for sure.

None of this is really politics, it's outright madness!

We need to be calm, reflective, and above all practical, when we talk politics. You will never moderate someone else's opinion by forcibly shoving your own opinion down his/her throat. And it's all too easy to start enjoying the argument for its own sake, to indulge in self-congratulation for scoring imaginary points, rather than using the argument to achieve common ground.
The skill in debating lies as much in the art of the graceful retreat to a position of compromise as it does in aggressively insisting your 'opponent' is just plain wrong.

I don't know how I got into this post!! I'm not even very political by nature.
Please excuse my ramblings ... better yet, ignore them!!
???

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-07 01:52:13

Shaun;

I thought AJ left himself wide open for that attack by painting himself into a corner as regards the 'tradition versus change' argument.
On the other hand, as Cindy pointed out, AltToWar's response was delivered masterfully! In battle, they call it a 'coup-de-grace', in golf it's a 'hole-in-one', while on the tennis court, it's a 'passing-shot'!!

But he was replying to something I didn't say.

An old man said, "Ah seen many changes in mah life, an Ah was agin every one of um!" That person is not me.

My position is that, left to themselves, people will behave more in accord with traditional morals than "progressive" morals. That's why, for example, drug prohibition is stupid. As long as the cultural left is left to its own devices, it'll sort itself out. I don't expect everything to be like a stereotype of the 50s, but the 50s weren't like a stereotype of the 50s. I do expect that people will be behaving well for all the wrong reasons, but it's better than nothing.

It's simply that the human race is not worthy of such a system.

Such a system is unworthy of the human race.

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-07 03:28:13

I really wish I had it in me to insult the shit out of you, but I really can't pull it off with the same kind of finesse you can, A.J., so I guess you're out of luck.

No one is talking about ?Battlestar Gallactica missions,? and everything I've proposed isn't based on some ?unrealizable future.? It's slightly optimistic, but I am actually in the field of technology, so I personally feel my view is accurate.

Your comment about ?misunderstandings of how the world works? shows your bigoted nature. You cannot accept that there are other political orientations that can function just as well in society, some even better due to physical limitations. This is the same person who thinks it's immoral to deprive someone of property for the well being of a larger society, yet finds it well and dandy to allow someone to die of starvation, or suffocate because they cannot or will not subject themselves to pay some central authority for air.

The reality is that everything changes in space. The problem is a failure to acknowledge that high level technology is necessary to live in space. And that high level technology irrevocably releases its masters from hierarchal dependence.

Explain to me, though, if there really was such a thing as human nature, why do feral children develop so differently from normal children? Is it because, maybe, human nature is defined mostly by childhood development? Yes, certainly. So stop invoking ?human nature? in your arguments.

Let's get into the quotes.

Your big fantasy is that the specialization of labor depends on technological monopoly and proprietary knowledge

Well, at least you're actually saying what my ?fantasy? is, instead of wildly generalizing. I think your definition would be summed up much better with, ?capitalistic enterprise.? But whatever.

So the technology to rebuild cars isn't proprietary? And you can work it with just an instruction book? And yet, contrary to what you predict would happen to any space industry in the same situation, mechanics haven't gone out of business.

Actually, it's still quite proprietary, I can't repair most of the computer parts. But that's not the point. I would be screwed if the stuff I did repair was proprietary. I would have no other option but to pay someone licensed to fix it for me, just like I would have no other option but to buy He3 from the National Consortium of Resource Exploitation (are you understanding now?).

One is blessed there's an industry out there making sure people are allowed access to certain resources (it's actually lucrative to give people freedom to access these things). Go to any AutoZone parking lot and wait an hour. I bet at least one person will park, jack up their car, and say, replace their break drums, or give themselves a tuneup. All with borrowed tools, of course. It is, after all, good business practice to be nice to customers.

Mechanics today, and high level technology tomorrow, are totally different things. Cars aren't really designed for a person to work with in their driveway; however, high level space technology would be designed with its environment in mind. A Lunar harvestor should be repairable in a vaccume if necessary, perhaps even remotely, or perhaps there would be no breakage at all! Can you imagine how bad off those mechanics would be with that sort of design in mind?

Capitalistic enterprise doesn't look for long term useablity in mind. It looks to maximize profit by reducing manufacture complexity, so you have cars that have been smashed together in an hour, many not designed to be user friendly in the future from a reconstruction perspective.

This proprietary manufacturing technology prevents people from being able to repair certain things. Those of us who refuse to resort to labor specialization, are forced to become evermore resourceful, since the designers specifically design from a manufacturing perspective, leaving any repair work to specialized labor. Is not specialization in this context, a direct result of proprietary technology? I certainly say so.

Have a look at open technologies, though. IBMs BIOS is a notable example. It's common knowledge that had IBMs BIOS not been circumvented, PCs would not be where they are today, for it was that knowledge that allowed people to develop software for the IBM PC. Some even speculate that Mac's would have taken over the PC industry due to their solid design, if it wasn't for the openeness of the IBM BIOS. The IBM PC wasn't a case of specialization, it was just a case of people having the resources to work with. Think of it as people having free access to a mechanics workshop.

Typically, for a leftist, you blame the predictive failure of your ideology on other people. Why, they aren't smart enough to do their own car repairs.

Um, where is the predictive failure? There are precedents, but there is hardly anything worthy to compare it to. We can't say, ?Hey, we went to Luna, and high level technology didn't work, so we had to resort to that capitalism thing.? But we can say, ?Whoa, GNU has really taken off. And look at other technologies, it seems like all the best stuff was open, and freely exchangable. All these standards, created with many minds involved.?

I'm not ?blaming? anything on anyone. I was making a truthful statement. People who rely on specialization are stupid. This isn't an insult, it's just reality.

Another real-world example: there are plenty of computer languages that aren't proprietary. Do you see many people coding their own games?

That's a great real-world example. The fact of the matter is, there are many many many people coding their own games and modifications for games. There are 241 games that use LibSDL alone. There are countless mods out there from Doom to Quake. Someone recently rewrote Quake to look like the proprietary Doom 3. All of these are examples of being given access to the mechanics shop. Tools and resources, my friend. Open resources, philosophically, derive directly from open source. Do you realize how many people are out there in the open source world? And do you realize how many people would benefit if resources, physical technology, was open in much the same way? This is a no brainer, dude. You're just too bigoted to see it.

And you guys haven't been around long enough to understand what ?human nature? really was.

clark · 2002-10-07 09:19:42

"Dreams of a better future" are nice, but they'll produce nothing (at best) without knowing what can be achieved and how to get there.

This implies that the "dreams" offered by some, most notably the "left=ists" (whatever the hell that is), are not based in what is achievable or possible. In all of your rants AJ, you do a spectacular job of not pointing out these flaws.

Don't worry AJ, I still love ya. Do you still need a hug?

AltToWar · 2002-10-07 11:10:59

It looks like AltToWar and Josh both missed the point of my comments about the left inhabiting a fantasy world entirely. But I should've expected it: I'm not exactly dealing with mental giants.
"Dreams of a better future" are nice, but they'll produce nothing (at best) without knowing what can be achieved and how to get there. Having some idea what the side-effects will be can't hurt. Remember, you can evade reality, but not the consequences of evading reality.
AltToWar;
Your claim that all progress leads to totalitarianism is nuts.
You're assuming I think "all progress" comes from misunderstandings of how the world works and how it can be improved, and fantasies about what can work and what can't. But, unlike you, I'm not a dolt. Progress forward (rather than progressive degeneration) comes from dealing with reality on its own terms.
If you lived before airplanes and dreamed of a world where people could fly, getting out there and inventing an airplane (which requires dealing with the laws of physics as they are, instead of as you would wish them to be) would be a lot more productive than flapping your arms really fast.
Todays fantasy is tomorrows reality.
Just try that with the laws of physics, bud. Maybe your Darwin Award will include the words "dropped like a rock".
One advantage is that fewer people will end up dead than if you try it with the laws of human nature.
If you reply to this little section of my comments, please tell me how you think the Founding Fathers fit in to all this.

Personal insults are always a great way to make one's point, no?

"Dreams of a better future" are nice, but they'll produce nothing (at best) without knowing what can be achieved and how to get there.

Please explain how one can 'Know what can be achived' before achieving it?

Do you think it is rather silly to assume that all that can be done has been done? There is nothing left to learn?

I agree with you that it is nice to dream, but for a dream to become a reality, it must be grounded in modern facts.

If you lived before airplanes and dreamed of a world where people could fly, getting out there and inventing an airplane (which requires dealing with the laws of physics as they are, instead of as you would wish them to be) would be a lot more productive than flapping your arms really fast.

To take your analogy a little (perhaps too) far:

I am a dreamer. I wish to fly.
(I have a dream for a political/economic solution that is not as stratified as capitalism with reguards to the distribution of wealth and resources)

You had a cousin who also wanted to fly, so he jumped off a cliff while flapping his arms. He died.
(Socialism in the Soviet Union and other nations has failed miserably)

Because you saw your cousin jump off a cliff and die, you believe that not only flapping your arms is folish, but any attempt to fly at all is folly.
(because Communism's attempt at social equality was such a flop, any attempt at social equality in the future will flop)

You are convinced the only way to get from Kittyhawk to Atlanta is by train.
(You believe that social and economic equality is just a foolish fantasy. Stick with capitalism, it's the best mode of transportation there will ever be)

If your arguing that social and economic equality are difficult systems to build and if they are to work, you will have to find new routes, as the old ones failed to find their mark, I will agree with you.

If you are arguing that they are impossible, I don't.

A.J.Armitage · 2002-10-07 18:16:59

Josh;

I think my suspicions have been confirmed. You're an open-source guy. If that's the case, your fanatasy world falls into place. You think a model that works for programming can be extended to everything else. You've extrapolated the fact that software companies generally depend on proprietary knowledge to the false idea that all companies depend on proprietary knowledge. You keep speaking of capitalism as if it were the centralized system (ingoring the vasty greater centralization in all other systems ever devised), because your eyes are fixed on the one man who could give any rational person that impression, Bill Gates. Of course, a rational person would look for other examples.

Not every business is programming. That's my point with mechanics, or other examples of people dealing with non-proprietary information. I'll go into it more later, but the biggest difference is this: entrance costs are lower in programming.

No one is talking about ?Battlestar Gallactica missions,?

Yeah, because Robert Zubrin killed the idea.

everything I've proposed isn't based on some ?unrealizable future.?

No, they're based on economic fallacies. Any plans for the future based on them are unworkable.

Your comment about ?misunderstandings of how the world works? shows your bigoted nature. You cannot accept that there are other political orientations that can function just as well in society, some even better due to physical limitations.

The first of the two times you declared, ex cathedra, that I'm "bigoted". I knew bias was passe, but I didn't know it had gotten to the point that bias for the truth rather than falsehoods was considered bigotry. I guess I'll don my white hood and keep telling the truth.

I could accept that other systems could work just as well, if there were one scrap of evidence for it. Instead, I see that everything else ever tried failed, and that your proposal is based on projecting the conditions of a single, rather unusual industry to everything, combined with near-total ignorance of economics, and, bigot that I am, conclude that the only system shown to work will work better than quarter-baked fantasies. Silly me.

BTW, I have to question the mentality of someone who calls me a bigot for thinking my system is more workable... in the middle of a rant about how only HIS ideas are workable.

This is the same person who thinks it's immoral to deprive someone of property for the well being of a larger society, yet finds it well and dandy to allow someone to die of starvation, or suffocate because they cannot or will not subject themselves to pay some central authority for air.

No, the "kill people with a central air authority" guy is clark.

Explain to me, though, if there really was such a thing as human nature, why do feral children develop so differently from normal children?

Feral children? Do you think there are children raised by wolves? Next you'll start telling me about Santa Clause.

Is it because, maybe, human nature is defined mostly by childhood development? Yes, certainly. So stop invoking ?human nature? in your arguments.

And let's not forget what smashing successes the New Societ Man and all the other attempts to reshape human nature were.

Humans are malleable, but not infinitely malleable.

Actually, it's still quite proprietary, I can't repair most of the computer parts.

You mean you didn't build it yourself? Well now, what did you call people who rely on specialization of labor?

Anyway, there are parts that aren't proprietary, and mechanics still get business fixing those parts. There are business models not based on proprietary information.

I would be screwed if the stuff I did repair was proprietary.

Yes, I suppose you would. But it's not, and mechanics still get business repairing that stuff.

Um, where is the predictive failure?

If your model of how business works were true, no one would go to a mechanic for what they could fix themselves. Let's quote a previous post of yours:

Oh yeah. I just gave all the secrets to making moon dust harvestors to people on Earth. Guess what? They've already started building rockets to take their own moon dust harvestors to the moon. This is the same as a new oil field with limitless supplies being found at the bottom of the Pacific ocean, spanning many thousands of miles. Oil prices would plummet, just like the value of He3.

If people don't abandon specialized mechanics to a large enough extent that they go out of business, when it's fairly inexpensive in terms of money and time to do it yourself, just why do you think enough of them will do it themselves when it involves space launches? Rockets aren't cheap; at most you'll get some new competition. (Which you'd have anyway, since creating a "moon dust harvestor" wouldn't be all that hard in the first place, so keeping it proprietary won't do you much good.)

But suppose all these people coming for He3 decided specialization of labor's stupid? No buying rockets. Instead, they have to build them, using tools they made themselves on metal they mined and smelted themselves. They can "simply" do it all themselves.

We can't say, ?Hey, we went to Luna, and high level technology didn't work, so we had to resort to that capitalism thing.?

Yes, you really said high level technology and capitalism are mutually exclusive.

I trust you grew your plants yourself with a growlight you manufactured at home.

That's a great real-world example. The fact of the matter is, there are many many many people coding their own games and modifications for games.

No, it just loooks like "many many many" to someone immersed in the open source culture. Compare the number of people coding their own games to the people who don't, even though they could. In fact, the ONLY segment of the economy where your model can work is programming, and there are still people who'd rather pay someone else to do it for them. Insult them all you want. Maybe it's true that their preferences are irrational. But they're theirs.

Game developement companies make a profit in a world containing the open source movement. Your understanding of economics needs serious improvement.

AltoToWar;

Please explain how one can 'Know what can be achived' before achieving it?

By basing your understanding on the world as it is, not the world as it isn't, and by thinking rationally. Of course, you won't know perfectly, but it's much better than the alternative.

Do you think it is rather silly to assume that all that can be done has been done? There is nothing left to learn?

Well, you obviously have yet to learn reading comprehension.

Not only did I say nothing of the sort to begin with, I corrected you two bumblers when you attributed that sort of thinking to me, and you still don't get it.

I agree with you that it is nice to dream, but for a dream to become a reality, it must be grounded in modern facts.

Really? Wow, I never thought of that...

Blockhead.

If your arguing that social and economic equality are difficult systems to build and if they are to work, you will have to find new routes, as the old ones failed to find their mark, I will agree with you.

You want social and economic equality. Okay then, let's think about it rationally.

Either people left to themselves will tend to become equal, or not. If they do, the thing to do is get rid of interventions stopping the tendency from working itself out. So, for example, you'd get rid of corporate welfare. High corporate taxes, licensing requirements, ect create burdens on business that big businesses can bear, but small ones can't, thereby concentrating businsses unnaturally. Get rid of those, too. Taxes on cigarettes, alcohol, ect hit poor people relatively harder, and so does the existence of state lotteries. Yep, get rid of all that, too. And you know what? If you start pushing all that, I'll be with you, even though I don't really care about equality either way, because it'll make our economy more capitalist.

On the other hand, maybe people left to themselves will tend to become more unequal. Maybe the different levels of intelligence, different temperaments, ect are enough that something else needs to come into place to make people equal. So you create an authority over the economy strong enough to counteract these tendencies. But wait... someone has to run it, right? And that person will be making decisions for everyone else. That's hardly what I'd call equality. In fact, people will be far less equal. So if people, left to themselves, tend to become less equal, capitalism is at least less bad.

But suppose people tend toward neither equality or inequality. Economic planning still makes the planners higher than everyone else, so capitalism is still better.

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-07 22:41:54

You think a model that works for programming can be extended to everything else.

Well, sure, in so far that everything is based on resources. Programming is a finite resource system; there are only so many programmers, only so many programs, and only so many computers in which to exchange those programs. The only difference between current society, and this online culture that freely exchanges things, is that current society doesn't have a physical system in which to exchange resources as fluidly. This is, like I said, a no brainer. And doesn't defny economics.

You've extrapolated the fact that software companies generally depend on proprietary knowledge to the false idea that all companies depend on proprietary knowledge.

Well, it goes further than that. And there are obviously some companies that provide services which have nothing to do with information at all. I never suggested there weren't, mind you. I was just saying, before, that specialization is overrated and largely attributed to proprietary technology, and I think this is true except for some services.

I'm saying that if people had the ablities to do things themselves, these companies would be out of business. If I could fabricate a CPU as easily as I can write a letter, would not the CPU industry be out of business? Sure it would.

You keep speaking of capitalism as if it were the centralized system [...] because your eyes are fixed on the one man who could give any rational person that impression, Bill Gates.

False. I could care less about Bill Gates. But one must reconcile the fact that capitalism is largely centralized. You have workers, bosses, owners. I want a system of just people with different skills who associate freely, and ?own? only their own habitats.

I've come to these conclusions, not by looking at the open source movement and applying it to space (or some version of the future), but rather looking at space and trying to apply it to capitalism. I find that high level techonology is necessary to survive in space, and I find that resource independence isn't far from high level technology. The only thing I can surmise is that, if capitalism extends into space, we're going to have to have a bunch of idiots who build spaceships that aren't capable of independently surviving in space, with some sort of convulted dependence on some central authority. Otherwise capitalism won't work.

Not every business is programming.

I certainly didn't mean to imply that. I only meant to say that resources themselves are not far off.

entrance costs are lower in programming.

Okay, we agree. Now, what's preventing entrance costs from being lower in other resource-based systems? What's preventing me from actually building that CPU fabrication place, and distributing CPUs to people for a small cost? Is there really anything? Some silly economic fallacies, maybe?

Yeah, because Robert Zubrin killed the idea.

Well, Robert Zubrin was one of the first realistic space colonization people. That's totally true. But I doubt he has influcanced my ideas at all. In fact, I think he and I diverge on many issues.

No, they're based on economic fallacies. Any plans for the future based on [your ideas] are unworkable.

The only economic fallicies here, is the ?grow or die? scenario we have with capitalism. Not only does it go against the laws of physics in the long run, it also leads to catastrophic failure. Look at the Tragedy of the Commons; a logical critique and indictment of laissez-faire capitalist economic practices.

I could accept that other systems could work just as well, if there were one scrap of evidence for it.

But wait a second. There certainly is a scrap of evidence for open source. Can't you simply agree that open source is merely a question of resources, as would be high level technology?

I see that [...] your proposal is based on projecting the conditions of a single, rather unusual industry to everything, combined with near-total ignorance of economics, and, bigot that I am, conclude that the only system shown to work will work better than quarter-baked fantasies. Silly me.

Yes, silly you. My projection is based on the same situations. Both are based on how much resources are in a system, and both are based on how those resources are distributed. Your bigoted nature just doesn't allow you to realize the potential here. This isn't fantasy.

What's fantasy, is the absurd belief that one can even have a capitalistic economy in space, especially one that is viable for any significant period of time. I find it absurd that once the technology exists to survive long term in space, people will still be highly interdependent.

I have to question the mentality of someone who calls me a bigot for thinking my system is more workable... in the middle of a rant about how only HIS ideas are workable.

You have said nothing about how your ideas are workable. You have failed with every hypothetical I have given you, to refute my ideas with any examples at all. Intead you resort to pointless ad hominems. Indeed, the very sentence I'm replying to, questions my ?mentality,? as if the things I suggest are far fetched and crazy.

No, the "kill people with a central air authority" guy is clark.

You openly advocate allowing people to die if they can't afford air. In fact, you claim that it is our ?moral duty? to force people to pay for necessities. (Talk about wackos.)

Feral children? Do you think there are children raised by wolves? Next you'll start telling me about Santa Clause.

And I'm the mental one here? I certainly believe there are children which have been raised in the wild. There is more than enough evidence to suggest this. This isn't a case of disillusionment, this is a case of legitimate behavioral analysis.

And let's not forget what smashing successes the New Societ Man and all the other attempts to reshape human nature were.
Humans are malleable, but not infinitely malleable.

Oh well, this is hardly a case of reshaping ?human nature,? as there is no such thing. Consumerism is the shortest lived (but admittedly fasting growing) part of humanities history, and it's only a matter of time before it ends.

You mean you didn't build it yourself? Well now, what did you call people who rely on specialization of labor?

Stupid. I actually enjoy working on older vehicles with no computerized parts a lot more. But I could work on the computerized components if I had the resources.

Anyway, there are parts that aren't proprietary, and mechanics still get business fixing those parts. There are business models not based on proprietary information.

I really didn't mean to imply all businesses are based on proprietary models. I truely thought I was inferring specialized labor. Look at computers. In the early years of computer design, cases had to be unscrewed, these days, cases just snap apart. You can't find a case that screws together anymore. In the old days, people were less prone to fix their own computers. These days, building your own computer is one of the most economical and enlightening experiences you can do. In the old days, specialized labor predominated. These days, individuals are beginning to do these things themselves. Is there still a place for specialized labor here? Sure. But where is the inherent strength in specialized labor? I suspect it actually has more to do with people not having the time or energy, rather than being stupid.

Yes, I suppose you would. But it's not, and mechanics still get business repairing that stuff.

Sure, like I said, there aren't enough resources for the common person to work on it. But this doesn't have to be the case with higher level technology. Something you continue to fail to grasp.

If your model of how business works were true, no one would go to a mechanic for what they could fix themselves.

They would repair their own vehicles, if they had the resources, and it wasn't so damn hard and frustrating. Proprietary technology is just one step of many to create an economy of interdependency. Try this with open, high level technology, though.

[...] suppose all these people coming for He3 decided specialization of labor's stupid? No buying rockets. Instead, they have to build them, using tools they made themselves on metal they mined and smelted themselves. They can "simply" do it all themselves.

It's actually not too hard to imagine a collective doing it themselves, and I don't see why it is for you. It's not like physical resources are scarce. The only thing that we need is a collective of people using physical resources like the open source community uses digital resources. Is this hard for you to imagine?

Compare the number of people coding their own games to the people who don't, even though they could.

How many people can, though? How many people are too busy working their asses off to survive to be able to? The people that can, do. Even some of the people who can't, whose resources are low, who are living at the low end of the bracket, do. And out of those who actually have the time, how many have the tools? You know why mods outnumber individual games? Because games come with tools the user can use to modify a game.

the ONLY segment of the economy where your model can work is programming, and there are still people who'd rather pay someone else to do it for them.

I don't know about that. It's still all about resources, and I still can't see why this can't be applied to physical resources. Hey, set up a little plant on the ocean that extracts necessary resources from the water. A cubic mile of water contains tons of metal, and practicelly every natural element on the periodic table. Everything you could possibly need.

Also, warez is more and more popular every day, which is evidence that people would rather not pay. Especially if it's for something easy to acquire.

Game developement companies make a profit in a world containing the open source movement. Your understanding of economics needs serious improvement.

Um, I never once implied that game development companies don't make profit in a world containing the open source movement. Game development companies make profit in a world where warez is rampant, so there is no reason for me to say or imply this.

I'm just saying that you better think twice if you think capitalism can keep people dependent forever.

clark · 2002-10-08 10:18:05

AJ wrote:

BTW, I have to question the mentality of someone who calls me a bigot for thinking my system is more workable... in the middle of a rant about how only HIS ideas are workable.

Well, I'm at a loss, what system was it that you were proposing as more workable? Could anybody please point out what system this is he is talking about, and where he shows evidence supporting the assertion? I will have to agree with AJ at least, his system is probably more workable than a fantasy, however, I don't believe Josh is proposing any kind of fantasy either. So AJ, now that you have validation, might we expect an explanation?

No, the "kill people with a central air authority" guy is clark.

Hi!
And let's not forget what smashing successes the New Societ Man and all the other attempts to reshape human nature were.

And let's not forget what smashing successes the New Societ Man and all the other attempts to reshape human nature were.

And of course we should meet all failures with abandonment. Obviously the wiser course of action is to just do nothing, and declare it human folly to attempt to intervene within our own behavior. I wish all could see the inherent rationality of not trying to improve the human condition, to strive to be more than we once were... now where is that club, I need to bag me a woman.

Humans are malleable, but not infinitely malleable.

Very very profound. Spread the gospel. Another similar pearl is: People live, but they don't live forever. Wait, I have another one- when the sun sets, it also rises. Damn your good AJ!

So if people, left to themselves, tend to become less equal, capitalism is at least less bad.

Other than that capitalism makes no pretense towards equality, and will only engender social instability and the exploitation of resources and man. The underlying flaw in capitalism is the system used to apply value- your capitalism dosen't take into account environmental degradation, societal value, cultural values, ethics, morality, etc. But wait, that's right, put someone in charge (or several groups of people all watching one another) to oversee the capitalism and correct it's grevious errors and you have a working system.

But capitalism without human overisght? To have absolute faith in a system devised by man as infaliible is irrational and incredibly stupid. But hey, more power to you AJ.

Meanwhile, let's cut the universal phone tax- yeah, we subsidize poor rural folk so they can have a phone. And that damn TVA- let them southerns sit in the dark, bastards. Buh buh medicare and medicaid- who cares about prenatal coverage- oh yeah, who needs to make sure immunization is affordable to all people- let only those who can afford the cost buy, and let everyone else suffer. Enlightened. Progressive.

AJ for Furher... err, I mean President.

Cobra Commander · 2002-10-11 15:25:56

Since I have no desire to get mired in this mess, I'll make this brief. The workability of various economic systems aside, the concept of "equality" keeps popping up and this is what is going to make or break any of these ideas. To those seeking a system with equality of opportunity, I'm with you one hundred percent.
Now, some seem to be after equality of outcome. Bad idea. While saying so is heresy in some circles, PEOPLE ARE NOT EQUAL! All individuals are not the same, all individuals do not have the same abilities. To act otherwise will require imposing punishments on anyone who rises above the mediocrity of the mass, (which destroys any pretext of equality anyway!) A better future is something we should strive for, but chucking reality because it doesn't fit with our vision will not help anyone.

Josh Cryer · 2002-10-12 07:21:31

No one said people were totally and utterly equal. That would be boring.

But everyone does tend to require certain things, like food, and water, and air, etc., in that sense, we are equal.

Deimos · 2002-12-29 12:19:04

This is indeed a very interesting concept of Mars replacing war as a machine to create new technology. However, It needs a boost from private ventures, as the governments of this world have proven they are not capable of going to Mars, atleast not for another century or so they may claim. If private ventures such as the Society were to go to Mars, I believe that would cause a boost in interest by the superpowers in exploration. And in response to what other people have said about the UN, the UN is a large part of what is slowing down our technologial innovations...

soph · 2002-12-29 12:24:02

i think the concept of a stock company for mars would be a good idea for space exploration. the society, or any other organization, could create a mars firm, separate from the organization for business reasons, that provided funding for the exploration of the stars. if enough people were willing to buy the stock, huge amounts of funding could be acquired, and even spread to many space development companies.

Josh Cryer · 2002-12-29 20:16:41

People wouldn't buy the stock unless it showed signs of profitablity. Simply ?going to Mars? doesn't indicate any sort of profitablity at all. ?Going to Mars and mining minerals? would be more plausible, but it's an unrealistic idea, since there are many cheaper ways to mine space based minerals. ?Going to Mars to start up a hotel? might be plausable, but it would easier to do such a thing on Luna.

The only thing that might be somewhat plausible, is some sort of survivial space-based program,wherein contestents go to Mars and everything is televised. But even then, such a thing could be done on Luna, so it also isn't that great of an idea.

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