[Timo]

Just be careful cause your cellphones are wiretapped or bugged so they know who voted to oust the Programmers and they know much more about you. Well does not Facebook already know much about its members.

I don't do the Facebook deed for that very reason, so i guess i'm outside the Commie App box.

I like the idea, though.

To a great degree, however, various food producers are already doing this, taking votes via FB to decide what flavors of pig skins taste best to people. I assume that's mostly a marketing ploy to get people to try all of the possible flavors, thus increasing that company's profits.

Applied in a political direction, though, that would be a very interesting experiment!! The experiment could be a tightly controlled, yet non-binding series of votes to decide, at the base level, what people really want and expect from their government. Conversely, what they truly hate and despise about their government. Participating in such an excercise could even convince me to do the FB.

Occupy Facebook!

[onlooker]

Yea, Timo but I was referring to the more nefarious aspects of cellphones or for that matter all connected electronic devices. Was that not one interesting aspect of the Bin laden story the fact that he understood how all electronic and Internet connected devices could be traced and therefore he chose to stay in caves and not use anything like that. Maybe it is my doomer and conspiracy oriented nature that is getting the better of me. Careful Big Brother is watching you.

[Pops]

In a true democracy there is no "they" — EVERYTHING is decided by direct vote.

In the commie app society there is no one in a position of power to take advantage because there is no difference between government and private, it is all just one thing.

[radon1]

I would really appreciate it if someone would show how typical impulsive, unthinking, instinctive behaviors are to be directed in a way consistent with the post-capitalist plan.

There is a practical example in place (fortunately?). Development of science/defense in the Soviet Union.

[Quinny]

Market mechanisms can be used in a communist society.

Representative democracy doesn't work because money buys votes, and with capitalism likewise one dollar = one vote. With modern technology, participative democracy and communism could work fine without a strict central planning policy. Libraries have been working like that for years!

[Pops]

Market mechanisms can be used in a communist society.

how?

[Pops]

Representative democracy doesn't work

Ah crap, I'm living in a failed state?

This must be another of those deluded sheep things because it seems to be working OK, a little messy maybe...
and: T'rump

Have you seen a flotilla of US boat people or something?

LoL

[Pops]

There is the syndicalist idea, kind of a co-op of workers, that one I really like. Prolly useless. It comes from Ricardo ( the scarcity guy) I think, and so Ricardian socialists think all value comes from labor and so workers should get all the profit. Kind of old hat.

then the state run business like Aramco or Petrobras or Pemex...

The problem seems to me to be the oligarchs. The Iron Law says they sprout up in any organization, your model doesn't need to start out totalitarian to wind up that way just through "natural selection" of bureaucrats. In the end there is no profit because each individual along the line takes just as much as he can so the state run business (unless it is oil) is never profitable.

[ralfy]

A market economy involving profits and returns on investment requires increasing energy and material resources, which is at some point not sustainable given peak oil and physical limits. Environmental damage and global warming make matters worse.

[Quinny]

well Pops if you're happy with system where politicians are elected by a minority and spending millions and the press is dominated by the right and accountability is once every few years then fair enough. Many are not

The problem with the market is its one dollar one vote. For years libraries have decided on book purchasing policy dependant on demand - you could implement similar systems for other goods and services. Lack of accounting for externalities also often skews the market price of some goods so the market isn't all it's cracked up to be anyway

[Cid_Yama]

...socialists think all value comes from labor and so workers should get all the profit.

That is the nonsense Capitalists spout to obfuscate the issue. One, it isn't necessarily a socialist issue, but clearly a labor one, two, the issue is wanting to be paid the value of their labor, not that all value comes from labor.

Unforunately, the way the system works is that labor is paid as little as possible, and profit becomes mostly derived from the excess unpaid value of that labor. That's called exploitation of labor by not paying them the true value of that labor and harvesting the rest.

There is also the way the entire system is designed to ensure that labor has no choice but to sell their labor for less that it's value or starve and become homeless, but that's another issue.

[SeaGypsy]

So how does the commie justice app deal webmaster Pops? Do lynchings only happen at local level by popular local vote or is it proper global commie democratic rule? Borders/ history right? Do we need a proper aristocratic blood fest or do we let em off if contrite & plough ready?

[Tanada]

A market economy involving profits and returns on investment requires increasing energy and material resources, which is at some point not sustainable given peak oil and physical limits. Environmental damage and global warming make matters worse.

That is not correct. People have traded goods and services with one another for as long as we have been human with the 'profit' and 'return on investment' being a strong sense of community and success at surviving. Very successful traveling merchants were the ones who took enormous personal risk to travel from market to market with goods that were common in one place and rare in another. The survival rate was something like 20 percent for travel from Europe to the Far East and back. The energy required was all wind or muscle power, both of which have natural limits.

These are the reasons for the whole buy local not global movement, you don't need fresh strawberries in December in NYC, you can eat fresh all summer and eat preserves in the off season. Modern people are horribly spoiled, but it does not have to be that way.

[Ibon]

Mennonite (and Amish) communities hum along so well because they have a shared belief in an immutable source (the Bible).

Understood. Ibon, tell us how to get there without the Bible! How do we all share a universal belief in an immutable source( the planet)?

Not only did the Anabaptist communities share the belief in an immutable Bible they also do this in sharp contrast to what they see as decadent modernity around them as they practice their agrarian style of christianity. Their belief system is therefore framed and reinforced by modern society at their borders.

I think Timo that the only way to get there without the Bible is in a similar way of standing your ground in contrast to imbalances around you. In the case of the Anabaptists it was decadent modern society. In the age of human overshoot it will be the degraded biosphere that is the imbalance and the healing of the planet will be the "glue" or the universal consensus that will draw us together under a modified economic system. That's were consequences come in. You cannot create a universal consensus without them. For I believe it is really only consequences that will force modern human society to turn back toward holding our mother earth sacred. Whatever way we frame this.

I don't know if I mentioned it here but my father grew up on a farm in Lancaster Co Pa. and he was a member of the Church of the Brethren, the least known of the Anabaptist sects that includes the Mennonites and Amish. I spent my childhood with all my cousins and uncles and aunts still practicing this agrarian lifestyle and it certainly influenced me. Probably contributes to some of my luddite tendencies.

We go round and round a bit in circles here. AD believes that rational logic is enough to eventually bring a higher consciousness into modern human life that will guide capitalism away from destructive consumption culture toward higher communal values toward humanity and our fellow creatures. If we get there without an immutable source that is religious that would be fine. I just don't think it is realistic.

I also don't see a contradiction between logic and a type of "faith" or religion that holds our planet sacred.

Pops mentioned those oligarchs that eventually emerge in any system. I don't think logic and reason alone can control the corrupting influence of power. But either can religions since some of the best examples of a controlling oligarchy can be seen in institutional religions. By the way, the Anabaptists kind of addressed this as well as they did not have a central church or full time priesthood. Sunday worship was rotated in different private homes and the size of the congregation was limited to the physical local area of where their farms are a typically each congregation being less than a 100 people.

I don't have an answer to Timo's question.

[Pops]

...socialists think all value comes from labor and so workers should get all the profit.

That is the nonsense Capitalists spout to obfuscate the issue.

Ricardian Socialism
Ricardian Socialism is an economic philosophy inspired by David Ricardo, and suggests that socialism, rather than profits is the natural progression of the free market. The central pillar to Ricardian Socialism is that labor is the source of all value, and that laborers are entitled to production outputs.

http://www.economistviews.com/ricardian-socialism/

[Pops]

So how does the commie justice app deal webmaster Pops? Do lynchings only happen at local level by popular local vote or is it proper global commie democratic rule? Borders/ history right? Do we need a proper aristocratic blood fest or do we let em off if contrite & plough ready?

Actually I was only thinking about how markets might work, the app replaces the market and the bureaucrat with a poll, maybe.
Pick one:
10 hrs/day of electricity
1,000 cal of gruel
underwear

[americandream]

Ibon

Problem with religion is that it is anthropocentric with notions of stewardship which infers management with all that implies in the incomplete mind. We are not stewards of this planet but occupants. The distinction is a subtle one but dangerous enough in an incomplete consciousness with the result that we see all sorts of madcap geo engineering ideas floating around.

Frankly I think we are not yet ready for any management, not until we get our consciousness sufficiently functioning that we tool our environment on a needs basis. Religion is not capable of doing that as it actively prolongs dysfunctional consciousness with the result that it degrades after a period...into a whole salad bowl of crazy mutatuions. As I have said, evolution contemplates fully functioning consciousness and we will either get there or get the boot.

[Pops]

More on Ricardo. From the little I've read, Adam Smith was the guy who thought unlimited growth is possible, Ricardo on the other hand though that economies eventually are limited because of scarcity of resources. He predated Marx and gave old Karl a bunch of stuff to work with but in his day, landlords were the industrialists and land was the factory. Ricardo thought rent came from the difference in productivity in one piece of land and another, bottomland being inherently more valuable and a rocky hillside for example.

As the population grows, he thought that more and more marginal land would be forced into production and the rent on better land would increase to the point profit to the renter would fall to zero.

If that doesn't sound familiar it should. Comparative advantage (better land) is the basis for globalization and falling profits on increasingly marginal resources sounds an awful lot like falling eroei, limits to growth, etc.

[Pops]

I also think that the 2 threads in this thread; religion & economic is interesting. Adam Smith, the guy who wrote the book on modern capitalism and economic theory was better known in the 18t century as the guy who got the ball rolling on the whole Romantic period. Basically by saying that the mind is not simply a rationality engine but also possesses emotions and empathy that affect moral decisions.

[Ibon]

Ibon

Problem with religion is that it is anthropocentric with notions of stewardship which infers management

Once we initiated agriculture 10k years ago this became unavoidable.

We are not stewards of this planet but occupants. The distinction is a subtle one but dangerous enough in an incomplete consciousness with the result that we see all sorts of madcap geo engineering ideas floating around.

I understand the subtle distinction and it goes deeper. We are not any longer participants in local ecosystems since the day we abandoned our HG ancestry and started agriculture and civilization. We are occupants of the planet living in our own self made human ecosystem. This necessitates stewardship of the commons. These madcap geo engineering ideas are flawed because they are insane attempts at maintaining humans at current consumption and population levels where we are already in overshoot. It is hubris and lacks humility.

Frankly I think we are not yet ready for any management, not until we get our consciousness sufficiently functioning that we tool our environment on a needs basis. Religion is not capable of doing that as it actively prolongs dysfunctional consciousness with the result that it degrades after a period...into a whole salad bowl of crazy mutatuions. As I have said, evolution contemplates fully functioning consciousness and we will either get there or get the boot.

Every once in a while I have to remind folks here that I am an atheist and am not a member of any religious faith. I am educated as an ecologist and have spent countless hours in the field. I can look at a micro orchid growing on the trunk of a tree and place it in its correct taxonomy at the same time as I can hold it sacred. I don't know why this seems so hard for folks to understand. I have known many academic ecologists who have dedicated their lives to the organisms they study and have seen again and again their despair at the destruction of the ecosystems they study. This despair is existential and I would say almost spiritual in nature. And these are scientists.

I do not discount that religions may evolve a sense of ecological stewardship going forward. In fact, it is most likely once consequences happen that religions will go down this path since the imbalances of human overshoot will appear quite "biblical" and it will be very tempting for religious institutions to frame this as the wrath of god for having trashed mother earth.

The workings of logic and reason merged with a sense of the sacred is not a contradiction. I have personally learned this as a scientist. And I have seen this with other ecologists. We are holding our breath and watching the unfolding of the next great wave of extinctions. You can not look at this dispassionately and without a sense of the existential crisis that this represents.

I am not in disagreement with the fact that reason and logic applied to our consciousness is the pathway out of this mess. I see reason and logic as the temple. The sense of the sacred is the singing and praise of our mother earth that echoes inside.