Jay Hanson wrote:
>
> From: Durant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> >It seems obscene to seek out this catastrophic vision
> >and sit back saying this is our fate. You totally ignore
> >the ability to plan and to cooperate.
>
> I am not "seeking out" this vision. I am telling whoever
> will listen that this is what's in store for us.
>
> As far as the ability to "plan and cooperate" for the
> common good, we simply don't do that in America because
> it's considered "un-American". We practice in the Tragedy
> of the Commons social system -- every man for himself.
>
> Obviously, "plan and cooperate" is what we MUST do if
> we are to survive, but FIRST, I say again, FIRST we
> must confront the physical reality of our life on this
> finite planet.
[snip]
The most recent New York Times Sunday Magazine had an article
about how *massive* computer power is employed to fill
as many seats as possible on each flight by a major airline.
Now, it seems clear to me that this is *a* form of
social planning, and it suggests to me that, from a
feasibility standpoint, at least, Soviet Central Planning
was not so much wrong as ahead of its time.
There is something equivocal about this global
capitalist form of social planning: it does not
function for the sake of social good (or even
national interest) but rather
to increase the market share of a "legal fiction"
with no responsibility to anybody's welfare or
wellbeing. That, however, does not seem to
detract from the fact that it offers evidence that,
at last, *central planning* can work, and that
organized social intelligence can accomplish
in fact what it has always promised in
principle: a more intelligent management
of resources than a mindless (or de-cephalated)
process (the "market").
If ever there was a "free play of market forces",
and, for better or worse, there may have been
in the 18th century,
it surely is not how the big airlines are maximizing
seat occupancy numbers, except perhaps in some
highly "derivitive" (isn't that a technical term of
present-day investment banking?) and mathematically
arcane [as opposed to "ordinary language"] sense.
\brad mccormick
--
Mankind is not the master of all the stuff that exists, but
Everyman (woman, child) is a judge of the world.
Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
(914)238-0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA
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