Centralized government or city-states?
02 Feb 2010, 8:06 am
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
iamnotaparakeet
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Joined: 31 Jul 2007
Age: 38
Gender: Male
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02 Feb 2010, 8:19 am
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
But you are correct. Words don't convey the intended meaning though, especially if they are phrased wrongly by the writer or if the reader makes little effort.
02 Feb 2010, 8:38 am
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
But you are correct. Words don't convey the intended meaning though, especially if they are phrased wrongly by the writer or if the reader makes little effort.
I doubt pictures would help in this discussion and otherwise, words are all we've got.
sartresue
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Age: 69
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02 Feb 2010, 10:12 am
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
But you are correct. Words don't convey the intended meaning though, especially if they are phrased wrongly by the writer or if the reader makes little effort.
I doubt pictures would help in this discussion and otherwise, words are all we've got.
Wittgenstein would beg to differ topic
Interpretations of an idea often need illustrations, Words are often not enough.
To return to the central prmise, however, I do not see this as either one or the other. Federal and state(or in the case of my country, provincial/local) should work together to optimize the economy. I for one, think there are too many states in the US, making government co-ordination chaotic.
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02 Feb 2010, 11:22 pm
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
03 Feb 2010, 12:40 am
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
Logically production should respond to demand and capitalism is weirdly schizophrenic in its attitude towards markets. It is frenetically active in stimulating markets for goods that may or may not have real utility. And since the main source of the purchasing power of markets is the ability of the workers who produce the goods to have sufficient income to buy the goods produced, the almost brutal motivation of the producers to minimize wages by destroying worker capability to negotiate for a decent income in the name of cutting production costs undermines the capability of the market purchase the goods produced.is, in the long run, a self defeating action. There is something basically insane in the total system.
03 Feb 2010, 2:43 am
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
Logically production should respond to demand and capitalism is weirdly schizophrenic in its attitude towards markets. It is frenetically active in stimulating markets for goods that may or may not have real utility. And since the main source of the purchasing power of markets is the ability of the workers who produce the goods to have sufficient income to buy the goods produced, the almost brutal motivation of the producers to minimize wages by destroying worker capability to negotiate for a decent income in the name of cutting production costs undermines the capability of the market purchase the goods produced.is, in the long run, a self defeating action. There is something basically insane in the total system.
That's partly what happened in the last 1920's. Those were boom years for agricultural harvests - but mass wages were stagnating so many yields went to waste.
I don't want to call it a fact - but what I expect has happened - is that initially the market was created to serve the people and somewhere along the way that changed and it became all about the people serving the market. We've all heard phrases to that effect of late.
When you place an institution before the people then you make the people slaves to it. I believe in the capitalist system's ability to foster ingenuity. A planned economy is only as ingenuous as those who plan it and typically overtime they tend to serve the planner own self interests and thus creativity stagnates.
However - a system where people profit without creating anything of value, through manipulating others endeavours - is a sick system and needs to be healed. When you promote "everyman for himself and what he can take by flexing the law" - don't expect something noble to arise out of that.
03 Feb 2010, 3:06 am
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
Logically production should respond to demand and capitalism is weirdly schizophrenic in its attitude towards markets. It is frenetically active in stimulating markets for goods that may or may not have real utility. And since the main source of the purchasing power of markets is the ability of the workers who produce the goods to have sufficient income to buy the goods produced, the almost brutal motivation of the producers to minimize wages by destroying worker capability to negotiate for a decent income in the name of cutting production costs undermines the capability of the market purchase the goods produced.is, in the long run, a self defeating action. There is something basically insane in the total system.
That's partly what happened in the last 1920's. Those were boom years for agricultural harvests - but mass wages were stagnating so many yields went to waste.
I don't want to call it a fact - but what I expect has happened - is that initially the market was created to serve the people and somewhere along the way that changed and it became all about the people serving the market. We've all heard phrases to that effect of late.
When you place an institution before the people then you make the people slaves to it. I believe in the capitalist system's ability to foster ingenuity. A planned economy is only as ingenuous as those who plan it and typically overtime they tend to serve the planner own self interests and thus creativity stagnates.
However - a system where people profit without creating anything of value, through manipulating others endeavours - is a sick system and needs to be healed. When you promote "everyman for himself and what he can take by flexing the law" - don't expect something noble to arise out of that.
We seem to agree. So, what's to be done?
03 Feb 2010, 3:39 am
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
Logically production should respond to demand and capitalism is weirdly schizophrenic in its attitude towards markets. It is frenetically active in stimulating markets for goods that may or may not have real utility. And since the main source of the purchasing power of markets is the ability of the workers who produce the goods to have sufficient income to buy the goods produced, the almost brutal motivation of the producers to minimize wages by destroying worker capability to negotiate for a decent income in the name of cutting production costs undermines the capability of the market purchase the goods produced.is, in the long run, a self defeating action. There is something basically insane in the total system.
That's partly what happened in the last 1920's. Those were boom years for agricultural harvests - but mass wages were stagnating so many yields went to waste.
I don't want to call it a fact - but what I expect has happened - is that initially the market was created to serve the people and somewhere along the way that changed and it became all about the people serving the market. We've all heard phrases to that effect of late.
When you place an institution before the people then you make the people slaves to it. I believe in the capitalist system's ability to foster ingenuity. A planned economy is only as ingenuous as those who plan it and typically overtime they tend to serve the planner own self interests and thus creativity stagnates.
However - a system where people profit without creating anything of value, through manipulating others endeavours - is a sick system and needs to be healed. When you promote "everyman for himself and what he can take by flexing the law" - don't expect something noble to arise out of that.
We seem to agree. So, what's to be done?
Well one idea:
Restrict short selling so that if it is being done to manipulate pricing and a stock price devalues significantly, that stock is frozen and all the seller's trading is frozen.
Another:
Whether you believe in global warming or not, emissions tradings schemes work on the principle of there is X amount of gases able to be released in order to set a carbon price in $/Tonnes. Both production capacity and resouce consumption are being considered in the pricing. Why then is it not possible to do this with other resources? The price of copper shouldn't just be indicitive of extraction cost - but of also resources remaining.
Estimates for resources needs to get concluded by an international indepedent authority and taken out of the hands of countries themselves.
03 Feb 2010, 3:44 am
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Sand wrote:
iamnotaparakeet wrote:
Sand wrote:
Thanks for profusely illustrating my comment but what's your point? That there is no intellect involved in agriculture?
Well, my initial point concerned the dependence of service industries upon the use of natural resources to produce goods (an thereby, income). I was trying to agree with mjs82 in regard to the statement that "There's no point of have a financial centre if no one produces anything."
But society cannot exist without production. Things don't last forever and some things are consumed very quickly.
True - but there's a difference between sustainable production and unsustainable production. There are no mechanisms to address sustainability apart from recession.
Logically production should respond to demand and capitalism is weirdly schizophrenic in its attitude towards markets. It is frenetically active in stimulating markets for goods that may or may not have real utility. And since the main source of the purchasing power of markets is the ability of the workers who produce the goods to have sufficient income to buy the goods produced, the almost brutal motivation of the producers to minimize wages by destroying worker capability to negotiate for a decent income in the name of cutting production costs undermines the capability of the market purchase the goods produced.is, in the long run, a self defeating action. There is something basically insane in the total system.
That's partly what happened in the last 1920's. Those were boom years for agricultural harvests - but mass wages were stagnating so many yields went to waste.
I don't want to call it a fact - but what I expect has happened - is that initially the market was created to serve the people and somewhere along the way that changed and it became all about the people serving the market. We've all heard phrases to that effect of late.
When you place an institution before the people then you make the people slaves to it. I believe in the capitalist system's ability to foster ingenuity. A planned economy is only as ingenuous as those who plan it and typically overtime they tend to serve the planner own self interests and thus creativity stagnates.
However - a system where people profit without creating anything of value, through manipulating others endeavours - is a sick system and needs to be healed. When you promote "everyman for himself and what he can take by flexing the law" - don't expect something noble to arise out of that.
We seem to agree. So, what's to be done?
Well one idea:
Restrict short selling so that if it is being done to manipulate pricing and a stock price devalues significantly, that stock is frozen and all the seller's trading is frozen.
Another:
Whether you believe in global warming or not, emissions tradings schemes work on the principle of there is X amount of gases able to be released in order to set a carbon price in $/Tonnes. Both production capacity and resouce consumption are being considered in the pricing. Why then is it not possible to do this with other resources? The price of copper shouldn't just be indicitive of extraction cost - but of also resources remaining.
Estimates for resources needs to get concluded by an international indepedent authority and taken out of the hands of countries themselves.
I'm not sure of the solutions but they seem to require an international authority and that seems very unlikely.
03 Feb 2010, 5:27 am
Well, going back to the original thread... if there was a proper international institution, should it be 1 country = 1 vote (smaller countries can form blocks) or 1 person = 1 vote (large countries can dominate). US wants 1 country, China of course wants the 1 person 1 vote for the UN. Why aren't there any Earth patriots? Both systems are flawed. I'm sure the big countries governments will want to tell their millions who to vote for and smaller countries protect their own minority interests.
What if we scrapped the UN ambassadorship and did it this way? Each country nominates 10 citizens. 200 odd countries x 10 citizens = 2000 nominees. The world votes - countries if they wish can vote for their own as 1 large vote ~ it doesn't matter. Of those 2000 nominees 100 hundreds are chosen - a maximum of 1 per country ~ so it doesn't matter . These people should have nothing to do with their national governments and whilst in office should have no official connections. They act like an international congress, creating and voting on international laws. Two year terms. 1 term maximum.
A true international plebescite.
03 Feb 2010, 7:52 am
mjs82 wrote:
Well, going back to the original thread... if there was a proper international institution, should it be 1 country = 1 vote (smaller countries can form blocks) or 1 person = 1 vote (large countries can dominate). US wants 1 country, China of course wants the 1 person 1 vote for the UN. Why aren't there any Earth patriots? Both systems are flawed. I'm sure the big countries governments will want to tell their millions who to vote for and smaller countries protect their own minority interests.
What if we scrapped the UN ambassadorship and did it this way? Each country nominates 10 citizens. 200 odd countries x 10 citizens = 2000 nominees. The world votes - countries if they wish can vote for their own as 1 large vote ~ it doesn't matter. Of those 2000 nominees 100 hundreds are chosen - a maximum of 1 per country ~ so it doesn't matter . These people should have nothing to do with their national governments and whilst in office should have no official connections. They act like an international congress, creating and voting on international laws. Two year terms. 1 term maximum.
A true international plebescite.
What if we scrapped the UN ambassadorship and did it this way? Each country nominates 10 citizens. 200 odd countries x 10 citizens = 2000 nominees. The world votes - countries if they wish can vote for their own as 1 large vote ~ it doesn't matter. Of those 2000 nominees 100 hundreds are chosen - a maximum of 1 per country ~ so it doesn't matter . These people should have nothing to do with their national governments and whilst in office should have no official connections. They act like an international congress, creating and voting on international laws. Two year terms. 1 term maximum.
A true international plebescite.
As logical as any such system might be the real powers behind the governments are not the people but the elite wealthy and they will not succumb without a lot of blood. Also there are people here on this site who would abhor any international entity, no matter how sensible it might seem.
03 Feb 2010, 7:46 pm
Sand wrote:
mjs82 wrote:
Well, going back to the original thread... if there was a proper international institution, should it be 1 country = 1 vote (smaller countries can form blocks) or 1 person = 1 vote (large countries can dominate). US wants 1 country, China of course wants the 1 person 1 vote for the UN. Why aren't there any Earth patriots? Both systems are flawed. I'm sure the big countries governments will want to tell their millions who to vote for and smaller countries protect their own minority interests.
What if we scrapped the UN ambassadorship and did it this way? Each country nominates 10 citizens. 200 odd countries x 10 citizens = 2000 nominees. The world votes - countries if they wish can vote for their own as 1 large vote ~ it doesn't matter. Of those 2000 nominees 100 hundreds are chosen - a maximum of 1 per country ~ so it doesn't matter . These people should have nothing to do with their national governments and whilst in office should have no official connections. They act like an international congress, creating and voting on international laws. Two year terms. 1 term maximum.
A true international plebescite.
What if we scrapped the UN ambassadorship and did it this way? Each country nominates 10 citizens. 200 odd countries x 10 citizens = 2000 nominees. The world votes - countries if they wish can vote for their own as 1 large vote ~ it doesn't matter. Of those 2000 nominees 100 hundreds are chosen - a maximum of 1 per country ~ so it doesn't matter . These people should have nothing to do with their national governments and whilst in office should have no official connections. They act like an international congress, creating and voting on international laws. Two year terms. 1 term maximum.
A true international plebescite.
As logical as any such system might be the real powers behind the governments are not the people but the elite wealthy and they will not succumb without a lot of blood. Also there are people here on this site who would abhor any international entity, no matter how sensible it might seem.
Live divided, die divided.
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