The foundational idea of capitalism is that each person doing their own thing is automatically aligned with the betterment of us all.
This is, strictly speaking, incorrect; but despite the many various examples of it going wrong, it has also been a major part of the overall increase in living standards since 95% of us ploughed fields for the other 5%.
There are fewer people in abject poverty today than there were back then, not just as a percentage but as an absolute number. We live longer, childbearing is less dangerous and we have painkillers for it and other things, etc.
It's not evenly distributed; but even though the system which was founded on even distribution failed harder than capitalism (IMO for the same reason capitalism isn't quite right: nobody really knew about game theory until Nash), we have still eliminated one disease entirely, and are close with some others.
I will add ~1% more cleverness: take capitalism, and make one small change: eliminate one(!) class of hypocrisy: convert our fake concern for the well being of other humans into the real thing: stop war, get a roof of some kind over every person's head, food of some sort into their bellies, and put some genuine effort into ensuring that this is substantively permanent.
"Impossible, because {some meme magic}!" many will say, but I've heard there's a trick that can change this game we find ourselves in: stop speaking untruthfully. I'm a big fan of this challenge, because people (particularly smart people) like to criticize it for how simplistic or stupid it is, but I know something they don't: ~all Humans have some sort of an innate fear of non-untruthfulness, and while they'll confidently talk shit about the idea all day long, they never have the balls to actually try it.
Evidence that it isn't: all of human history dating back well before we had writing.
> I've heard there's a trick that can change this game we find ourselves in: stop speaking untruthfully.
I, too, follow this one weird trick.
Evidence that people who are willing to lie to my face get power by doing so:
* Basically all politicians, but specifically Boris Johnson — people like me even saw and called out the lies at the time, and yet, there he was, being Prime Minister
* Bernie Madoff, until he was finally caught
* Sun Tzu, The Art of War
The second you can argue is capitalism. The first? That's democracy. The third? You may not like warfare (I don't either), but it predates Capitalism and was also a big part of the Soviet world-view — this is the point at which Anarcho-Communists chime in to say "but in a post-Capitalist world there would be no need for guns", which is the same mistake Anarcho-Capitalists make: people with guns don't care that you're saying they don't need guns, and are also now taking as much of your stuff as they want.
I believe that it may be, though the manner in which it would be that would require a long conversation to articulate - metaphysical causal power is the mechanism I would argue....this "is" "woo woo" to most, but this is due to the flawed, scientific materialist fundamentalist training they have received, which has left them with horribly flawed models of reality (which they mistake for reality itself, also due to their training). Humans live in a reality dome of their owm=n making and if you try to break them out of it, numerous (predictable) defences will emerge. Understand LLM's, and you are well on your way to understanding humanity and its follies.
> Evidence that it isn't: all of human history dating back well before we had writing.
Perhaps (if you were incorrect, would you necessarily be able to realize it?)....but watch out for any conclusions that form (or, are formed for you) based on this apparently correct observation.
>> I've heard there's a trick that can change this game we find ourselves in: stop speaking untruthfully.
> I, too, follow this one weird trick.
To some degree, surely. But to what degree? Again, where you are incorrect, would you necessarily be able to realize it? Is there a fundamental problem here, that "should be" obvious? (Think: the benefits of pair programming.)
> Evidence that people who are willing to lie to my face get power by doing so.....
100% agree! Imagine:
a) the size of the list that could be produced if you and I sat down for 8 hours and worked on it
b) the size of the list that could be produced if {all of Hacker News | all of humanity} sat down for 8 hours and worked on it
c) the causal power of such lists (perhaps combined with other things that could be done, but cannot be done, because we live in a reality dome, and do not realize it, because we cannot realize it)
I believe that this is true. Of course, this is susceptible to the same semiotics counterargument I used above, except such an argument would work against the person who used it.
You and I happen to be in a game being run and played by silly amateurs, but the problem is that the nature and rules of this game are such that these silly amateurs run the show almost absolutely....and, they have an extremely well fortified position: they have literally hypnotized ~all players. I don't know about you, but I find this state of affairs terrifying, but also absolutely hilarious. Day after day I can come on here and laugh my ass off at "smart" people "telling us how it is....it is like being back in junior high, except this time I do not have a junior high mind.
Bold, intentionally* provocative claims (aside: is that what this site "is" "for"? Inside joke) like this are almost guaranteed to prompt memetic responses of ~impossibility, /r/iamverysmart, etc, all of which can be easily and skilfully shown to be incorrect, and mocked accordingly (if you are into having fun while playing). Unfortunately: one will always lose, because the judging is rigged, and all the players are hypnotized.
But hey: games that are easy tend to not be fun.
> this is the point at which Anarcho-Communists chime in to say "but in a post-Capitalist world there would be no need for guns", which is the same mistake Anarcho-Capitalists make: people with guns don't care that you're saying they don't need guns, and are also now taking as much of your stuff as they want.
This is but one mistake - an even more important mistake is that they mistake their hallucinations of reality for the real thing.
Also, there is flaw in your criticism:
> people with guns don't care that you're saying
I will note two flaws:
a) Technically, you have no way of knowing this.
b) While they may not currently care, it is "likely" possible to make them care. Even tyrants have numerous well known (but not realized/realizeable), as well as not very well known weak spots. We can choose to exploit these for the benefit of humanity, or we can continue to do what we do today: engage in silliness...as seen in this thread, and all others.
How will it all end!!!???? Stay tuned, perhaps you will find out!! ;)
PS: please disregard any sense of ill will directed at you personally, I tend to take out my extreme hatred of humans in general on individual instances of them, which is plausibly at least somewhat illogical and counter-productive....though not necessarily net counter-productive.
And except for yourself participating in the capitalist system you deride, what's your personal contribution to what you easily propose? I'd wager that you yourself are at least subconsciously speaking as untruthfully as anyone else from a rather shaky place of moral superiority.
Also, the very argument above yours isn't that people show a false concern for the well-being of others, it's that whether they do this or not, their own efforts to improve their own lives even for selfish reasons still more often than not help society in general through market mechanisms. It has worked remarkably so far, even if it's imperfect in many ways, like nearly anything human.
> And except for yourself participating in the capitalist system you deride, what's your personal contribution to what you easily propose?
Some methods.
> I'd wager that you yourself are at least subconsciously speaking as untruthfully as anyone else from a rather shaky place of moral superiority.
State some specifics, let's find out the quality of your heuristics.
>Also, the very argument above yours isn't that people show a false concern for the well-being of others, it's that whether they do this or not, their own efforts to improve their own lives even for selfish reasons still more often than not help society in general through market mechanisms. It has worked remarkably so far, even if it's imperfect in many ways, like nearly anything human.
Can you explain how you measure counterfactual reality, which is an implicit assertion within your claim?
This is, strictly speaking, incorrect; but despite the many various examples of it going wrong, it has also been a major part of the overall increase in living standards since 95% of us ploughed fields for the other 5%.
There are fewer people in abject poverty today than there were back then, not just as a percentage but as an absolute number. We live longer, childbearing is less dangerous and we have painkillers for it and other things, etc.
It's not evenly distributed; but even though the system which was founded on even distribution failed harder than capitalism (IMO for the same reason capitalism isn't quite right: nobody really knew about game theory until Nash), we have still eliminated one disease entirely, and are close with some others.