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[SalmonGod]

I don't believe in human nature.  I think there are specific psychological quirks that are very consistent as a consequence of limitations in cognition + perspective.  I'm talking about things like the way people relate to authority, the bystander effect, etc.  It's the "human beings are _____" or "human beings all want _____" that I don't agree with.  Every example you can come up with to back up one of those statements can be met with just as many solid counter-examples.

As for human beings having a need to feel better than one another, I can see what you are saying, but I don't interpret it the same way you do.  I think human beings have an innate sense of fairness, and this has actually been observed in a large variety of species.  You also have to take into account that our society functions on competitive premises, and thus it would be absurd not to expect competitive behavior.  You cannot take behavior from within a specific context and claim that it is innate and universal.

[kaijyuu]

I believe in correlations, but no hard rules concerning human behavior. So "human nature" is bogus in most respects... it's bogus as an excuse for actions, bogus as a reason for making assumptions about people, and altogether bogus for anything other than weak inductive arguments about large groups. We're talking about large groups, so it could apply, but well... what SalmonGod said.



Another thing about education: it has far more value than just getting people jobs. An educated populace is a much better populace to live in, to have voting, etc. It enriches people's lives and that, alone, gives it lots of value. We're going to school until our mid 20s, but haven't really solved any income disparity, you say? Still an improvement over only having high school diplomas.

[Glowcat]

This is a dumb tangent. It would be better if we could concentrate on the over-arcing concepts rather than doing this dance. You can't deny human nature. Women want the most successful 20% of men, not the least successful 20%. Are you really going to argue otherwise? I'm here to describe human nature, not pass value judgments on it. Women selecting the best men is one of the social pressures that empowers evolution.

Yup, sexist. Typical insertion of evolutionary psychology to boot.

If we're talking about recurring aspects of Conservatism this sort of blanket assertion about human nature would rank amongst its common features. Especially with regard to why Capitalism "works" and why the government cannot be trusted. At least that's what I remember from my Libertarian days. Like this ridiculous assertion of all women wanting rich men, there's typically no substance behind the presumptions, presumptions which unfortunately lead to all manner of wrong-headed conclusions.

[kaijyuu]

There are worse sexist arguments. It's true that people (not just women) will try to select the best partner, and that will include things like finances. His problem is pointing out women specifically when men do exactly the same thing.


Anyway, to solve economic disparity, we need to either bring up those on the bottom or cut down those on the top. We're trying to bring the bottom up, but I personally wouldn't be opposed to another New Deal esque culling up the upper class. The monopolies of yesteryear aren't any worse than the mega corps of today; having other mega corps to compete with only inconveniences them from throwing their weight around, especially in politics.

[Trollheiming]

It's the "human beings are _____" or "human beings all want _____" that I don't agree with.  Every example you can come up with to back up one of those statements can be met with just as many solid counter-examples.

I guarantee you can't bring as many counter-examples. That's an empty claim.

Let's see, though. Human beings all want food and water. Almost all humans engage in sexual activity of some sort, with others or with themselves. Humans have a self-preservation instinct. Humans have an instinct to seek safety in numbers and form societies. Exceptions? Yes. But that a few outliers can exist in any set of data doesn't fascinate me much. You can also reject identifying humans as creatures with two arms, two legs, and one head and call Leonardo da Vinci an utter fraud for having drawn his famous Vitruvian Man. Yet I prefer to speak of the average limbs a human has, and the normative behaviors that you observe in societies all over the world.

I think human beings have an innate sense of fairness, and this has actually been observed in a large variety of species.  You also have to take into account that our society functions on competitive premises, and thus it would be absurd not to expect competitive behavior.  You cannot take behavior from within a specific context and claim that it is innate and universal.

You can take it from the ex-USSR, too, where politburo members had countyside dachas, and where black markets in contraband thrived. If you create a system to make everyone equal, being better means controlling the system itself, or breaking the system in order to wear foreign jeans instead of domestic jeans.

There's no longer a clean slate where you can pretend all this wasn't put through various vastly different permutations of societal pressures. Human nature persisted through it all, and it screwed everything up that didn't try to work within its practical boundaries.

[Trollheiming]

Typical insertion of evolutionary psychology to boot.

I respect your right to deny evolution. Creationism is a religious belief, and I have no desire to change your deeply-held belief in creationism.

Also, see the post above for why I am not playing the "ALL HUMANS" and "ALL WOMEN" game. Outliers always exist, yes. It's not as fascinating a fact as you seem to think, though. Many women don't want extremely successful men, but enough exist to create a pressure in that direction.

His problem is pointing out women specifically when men do exactly the same thing.

Women are better suited for that task. We're using keyboards here, which means we're writing. And there's an old saying about writing: "Write what you know."

[Glowcat]

I respect your right to deny evolution. Creationism is a religious belief, and I have no desire to change your deeply-held belief in creationism.

Amusing Mr. Troll, but try not to conflate bunk pseudo-science with something as well supported as actual evolution.

[SalmonGod]

Let's see, though. Human beings all want food and water. Almost all humans engage in sexual activity of some sort, with others or with themselves. Humans have a self-preservation instinct. Humans have an instinct to seek safety in numbers and form societies.

Human needs (including sexuality) and physical qualities are not what people generally mean by "human nature" and that's not the kind of thing you have been describing in this thread, either.

I would actually agree that the need for social interaction could qualify as an element of "human nature"... but any specific claim about that interaction is subject to too much variation to qualify, and I'm not talking about outliers...

I think human beings have an innate sense of fairness, and this has actually been observed in a large variety of species.  You also have to take into account that our society functions on competitive premises, and thus it would be absurd not to expect competitive behavior.  You cannot take behavior from within a specific context and claim that it is innate and universal.

You can take it from the ex-USSR, too, where politburo members had countyside dachas, and where black markets in contraband thrived. If you create a system to make everyone equal, being better means controlling the system itself, or breaking the system in order to wear foreign jeans instead of domestic jeans.

There's no longer a clean slate where you can pretend all this wasn't put through various vastly different permutations of societal pressures. Human nature persisted through it all, and it screwed everything up that didn't try to work within its practical boundaries.

Actually, I think any system that involves centralization of control over resources is going to have and encourage competition.  Whether it takes the form of politics or markets makes little difference.  I see late-game capitalism and statist communism as being practically identical.  I am an anarchist.

[kaijyuu]

Outlier:

An outlying observation, or outlier, is one that appears to deviate markedly from other members of the sample in which it occurs.

Key word: "markedly."


Ya'll are talking past each other here.
- They're not pointing out "outliers." They're pointing out significant exceptions to your rules, that in fact are intended to prove that the "outliers" are NOT abnormal, but rather quite standard deviations.
- You're claiming their examples are unusual, and (very notable!) markedly so.


With some proper statistics, which no one has yet provided, it'd be much easier to determine for certain what's an outlier and what's a common variation.

[Criptfeind]

I see late-game capitalism and statist communism as being practically identical.  I am an anarchist.

Capitalism and Communism are exactly the same thing at their extremes. Anarchy.

(Well a argument could be made against Communism going that way. But I was upset at someone who said they don't like capitalism saying they are a anarchist so I just wrote that out.)

[kaijyuu]

 

In their extremes they're totalitarian, ie the opposite of anarchy.

[Heron TSG]

I think the 'sexism' part came in when someone equated 'successful' and/or 'best' with 'richest'.

You can take it from the ex-USSR, too, where politburo members had countyside dachas, and where black markets in contraband thrived. If you create a system to make everyone equal, being better means controlling the system itself, or breaking the system in order to wear foreign jeans instead of domestic jeans.

At the moment, in our system, there is a very slight difference between people who don't control the system. Say, $40 or $50 thousand dollars per year. That's not a large gap, but most people fit within the $15,000-$60,000 section. And then you get to the richest 5% or so, and there's a sudden titanic upward leap in income. These people control the system. Corporate executives, politicians, silver spooners, and mixes of the three. One might say that with money comes power. Perhaps money is power. Voting is another sort of power - everyone gets one. But with money, you can make people vote.

Democracy and communism will both have people who abuse the system.

[Truean]

In their extremes they're totalitarian, ie the opposite of anarchy.

Totalitarianism is anarchy for all but the totalitarian him or herself until and unless the totalitarian decides to get involved. For everyone else, it's a bitch to deal with one anther, because there are no rules beyond the totalitarian's rule and no one wants to invoke that.... The surest way to lose your holdings is to plead for them in a totalitarian court....

[Glowcat]

I see late-game capitalism and statist communism as being practically identical.  I am an anarchist.

Capitalism and Communism are exactly the same thing at their extremes. Anarchy.

Even if you were to clarify Capitalism to be Anarcho-Capitalism, there's still differences in the economic anarchy each accomplishes. Communism's anarchy is one in which there is bottom-up control whereas Anarcho-Capitalism seeks to perpetuate privately owned property and thus places the resources of control into the hands of a few.

[Criptfeind]

In their extremes they're totalitarian, ie the opposite of anarchy.

You know. I have written and deleted a few paragraphs of responses. But I think the best way I can sum this up is as such:

Power needs to be somewhere.

Capitalism and Communism are exactly the same thing at their extremes. Anarchy.

Even if you were to clarify Capitalism to be Anarcho-Capitalism, there's still differences in the economic anarchy each accomplishes. Communism's anarchy is one in which there is bottom-up control whereas Anarcho-Capitalism seeks to perpetuate privately owned property and thus places the resources of control into the hands of a few.

I don't need to clarify anything. Capitalism does not need any letters or words added before, after, or inside of itself to be scary.

And on Communism. The argument could be made for that. Sure. I don't really care since the point I was making was about capitalism and anarchy.

But that said, power collects upwards. I don't think anyone here disputes that. Which is one reason communism seems to love to fail. There is no difference between comrade leader and McRich other then what moral justifications they get to use.

Edit: Not to be hating on communism. I think with the right social shift and the right technology it seems like the longest lasting way of happiness.