- Capitalism and Alternatives -

it must be.....'them!'

Posted by: Gee ( si ) on April 16, 1999 at 11:46:57:

In Reply to: If your you I'm me and he's him, who are they? posted by Red Deathy on April 15, 1999 at 17:17:41:

: Precisely, whilst they could liberate society from aristocracy, what can tehy do now, because they are in charge, and they can't give up teh reigns of power...

Except I dont believe 'they' are in charge, in any general sense, of society.

: If that be Stagecoach, I hasten to add that: 1:Theya re the biggest pair of predatory monopolists you could meet, they give out free rides to drive rivals out of business, and then hike prices. 2:They have benefitted magnificently from teh asset stripping of teh British government privatising teh state run bus services.

I dont know if its them, if it is then more fool the goverment for having had state run bus services! If its corect for the state to run buses then why not taxis, your car, your bycicle, your very legs - all modes of transport! crazy.

: And there are enough such millionaires who make a hell of a lot of money, off their better partners hard work. (who?) no one man can earn a million pounds...I find your hero worship and allegence to 'the great man theory of history' disturbing...

I think I'm beginning to see that denigrating the able individual is a strong ingredient in socialist thought. After all if one were to perceive an individual as being the engine of wealth creation then it undrmines 'the collective'. There is no 'worhsip' in me, its strange you perceive such. I do hold that it is a small proportion of individuals who are the engines of wealth creation, without whom people would be worse off. Ive never believed that most feeble excuse 'yeah but someone else would do it'. People are not interchangeable automatons. It isnt necessary to 'worship' the carnegies in order to perceive their role as the creative force without which the various partners would never have been what they became and without which humankind would not have the same wealth as they have.

: Because one day, either the next tech advance will cost too much, or it'll come a year too late to help....

Pure speculation, and also of the sort that does not have sufficient examples in history.

: However, because of government policy, we have very little manufacturing industry left here, and without manufacturing, wealth creation, we're screwed. The reason these firms get propped up is because Govts. know the social consequences of their failure, if Rover had failed twenty years ago, the damage would have been as great. People are strangely reluctant to live by market fulctuations...

First, im glad you recognise the huge role of 'mess about' govts has had in keeping British people back. Govts arent thinking about the social consequences, theyre trying to avoid a short term upset because they dont want to look bad in the eyes of the public. All resource poured into a bad rover should have been left free to find better opportunities. Thats how to 'help the people', keeping them at the end of a thinly disguised dole queue isnt.

: Hurt a lot of people that year, a lot of jobs went because of it...

And by the end of the year things were getting back to normal, ten years later there was a lot more wealth. Its no fun for those people in that year, but its not the 'market crises' many people so desperately want proof of (for some reason!)

: I always thought we knew an indivdual by their body

Nope, their mind I would say as expressed through them by their person. Hence we cannot know the mind, only whats presented.

:- considering your ideas are not your own, considering ypour language is not your own, your meaning is not your own, you are effectively denying that the individual as you concieve it, exists...I may not know your mind, but it is not seperate from mine...

Think about that argument, it would mean that nobodies ideas are their own! no one! Even an inventor would only have invented because other people were around. No one has identity, any thought is everyones and no ones! Its a circular argument, it eats itself.

I think you might be saying that because people interact and exchange ideas that their thinking is heavily influenced. In that case it is, each brain is unique however in how it processes all that info - its that which seperates peope, which individuates them.

: The claim of the community can only be the claim of a number of individuals in that group of
people.

Why not all the individuals?

Because its very unlikely that all individuals in a given community will agree to a given issue in precisely the same way. if they did it wouldnt be a claim on others now would it.


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