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Keith:
Oh dear! I am disappointed. What you're saying above is that you
are giving up in trying to understand the world. The fact is that our genes,
instincts and predispositions are exactly the same as 100/200,000 years ago. (In
my opinion we are probably a little less intelligent, but's by the way.) Also,
most of the main events and features -- migration, warfare, savagery, trade,
oppressive government, etc -- are also exactly the same. The original
processes of living have just been placed in different contexts (1.the natural
world, 2.the agricultural world, 3. the industrial world) each with its own
basic energy technology, and each embellished with its own unique weapons of war
and other innovations.
Ed:
No, Keith, I'm not giving up trying to understand the
world. All I'm saying is that I understand it as a series of dynamic
interweaving and interacting processes, some of which are understood and
many of which are not. Who could have predicted 9/11 and its
fallout? Who can tell us where we will be a year from now? All we
can do is, like a surfer, try to stay upright in it, but that doesn't always
work, and the sharks may be waiting below.
But, being at least partly rational creatures, we are
forever trying to get a fix on things. Bring back the gold standard (Hey,
real value!), that'll fix it! Git rid of Saddam, that'll fix it!
Legislate corporate governance, that'll fix it! But nothing ever really
seems to work more than momentarily. My gargantuan baker just keeps
weaving the dough in and out, in and out, and never puts it in the oven.
It never bakes.
And I would take issue with you that we are now the
same as we were 100/200,000 years ago. Stephen Mithen of the
University of Reading, as one example, argues that until about 70K to 80K years
ago, our brains were relatively compartmentalized; that is, we were a lot like
cats who think about mating and nothing else when mating, hunting and nothing
else when hunting, socializing and nothing else when socializing, etc. At
the time, our rather limited thoughts and actions were highly genetically
determined. Then something happened. The wiring that controlled all
that began to fall away and we became, as Mithen puts it, "cognitively fluid";
that is, we could think across all of those little compartments and use them all
at the same time. The result was an explosion in creativity and also an
explosion in our capacity for mischief. Not everybody agrees with
Mithen. Some argue that a "creativity gene" arose some 50K to 100K years
ago. Whatever happened, appears to have happened to all of us alive at
that time in just a few generations, and it would seem that there weren't very
many of us. As is suggested by the unique similarity of human DNA
among primate species, there may only have been some 2,000 of us, the survivors
of some natural disaster barely managing to stay alive somewhere in
Africa.
I'm also inclined to disagree with your argument that
"most of the main events and features -- migration, warfare, savagery, trade,
oppressive government, etc -- are also exactly the same. The original
processes of living have just been placed in different contexts (1.the natural
world, 2.the agricultural world, 3. the industrial world) each with its own
basic energy technology, and each embellished with its own unique weapons of war
and other innovations." It places a fixity on things which IMHO was never
really there. Since we walked out of Africa some 50K years ago and various
groups of us went this way and that, our experiences as a species have been
hugely varied. Some of us never left the bush, others became pastoralists,
still others built cities along rivers and trade routes. In some cases,
there was a progression from one type of activity to others; in other cases,
people continued to do what they had done for millennia. I will never
forget the shock I experienced when I first saw northern Athapaskan Indians
wearing hard hats working in a mine. For some 20K to 30K years they had
not known anything about hard hats or mining, and here they were, going
underground as though it was perfectly natural to do that!
But getting back to my dynamic view of the world, I
would suggest that the more we have left the natural world behind, the more
we have put ourselves in the hands of my gargantuan baker weaving
dough. There is a determinism and year to year predictability in
the lives of hunters, gatherers and pastoralists that people who live in
densely populated industrial economies simply do not have. We've tried to
build in a predictability by creating institutions of governance and by
pretending to be able to measure everything with aggregative statistics, but
then a few chits in Florida can say it's Bush, not Gore, and a few hijacked
aircraft can blow the roof off.
Ed
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, November 23, 2003 2:17
AM
Subject: Re: Slightly extended (was Re:
[Futurework] David Ricardo, Caveman Trade vs. Modern Trade
Ed,
At 16:58 22/11/2003 -0500, you
wrote:
Ray,
brilliant! Not sure of how to respond, so maybe I'll just back into
the shadows and say nothing. You're right about how I see the
world. It's a thing of interveaving flow processes, as though it were
dough in the hands of some gargantuan baker who never puts it in the oven,
but just keeps twisting it this way and that. There's nothing that
ever stays the same for more than an instant or two. There's nothing
that we can ever be sure of. There are no fixes that really
work.
Oh dear! I am disappointed. What you're
saying above is that you are giving up in trying to understand the world. The
fact is that our genes, instincts and predispositions are exactly the same as
100/200,000 years ago. (In my opinion we are probably a little less
intelligent, but's by the way.) Also, most of the main events and features --
migration, warfare, savagery, trade, oppressive government, etc -- are
also exactly the same. The original processes of living have just been placed
in different contexts (1.the natural world, 2.the agricultural world, 3. the
industrial world) each with its own basic energy technology, and each
embellished with its own unique weapons of war and other innovations.
Keith
Ed
- ----- Original Message -----
- From: Ray Evans Harrell
- To: Keith Hudson ; Ed Weick
- Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
- Sent: Saturday, November 22, 2003 12:51 PM
- Subject: Re: Slightly extended (was Re: [Futurework] David
Ricardo, Caveman Trade vs. Modern Trade
- It seems to me that you all are arguing the
superiority of your own particular system as nature. Keith
claims nature for trade and demands a rock bottom (gold) while Ed talks
relativity and processes (flow model) on the other hand Keith gives
Ricardo a sort of environmentalist bent where everything will take care of
itself if you just remove all the dams from the river. Except
modern nation states that deal with civil authority as a balance to
diversity and that accords strength to civil contracts based upon equality
rather than authority pleads the case for dams to remove floods and make
cities and housing possible. Chris claims that Ricardo was
misunderstood. Then we get a fight over
interpretations. It is all so biblical.
- I suspect Ricardo, Smith, George and others
who talked about invisible hands were speaking as Egyptians who had a
natural ebb and flow in the Nile that served them well for the longest
single state in the history of the world. But that does
little for the complexity of the present. We live in a world
where wealth is accruing in the hands of the elite and where they are also
struggling to gather the finest of everything to themselves and giving to
the church the egalitarian purpose of serving the cultural and welfare
needs of the poor. "If you want music, go to church!" as
was said by a policeman in a recent comedy. We might
remember that it was Alfred North Whitehead that said that it was the
"Ultimate Abstractions that taught us the meanings of things" and music as
well as math are one of those "ultimate abstractions."
- The Scandinavian states are more secular or
perhaps just less diverse so their overall secular instrument serves the
needs of the whole population better. The same is true of
their cultural institutions which were marveled at not long ago when their
state sponsored orchestras visited New York. All of the
complaints about the decay of the state as advanced by both Keith and
Harry does not seem to be the case in a smaller population and a less
diverse one. Remember where Harry is in California is a
ferment of diversity, cultural and economic change. Hence
"give us a hero."
- I think the real point here is that Canada and
the US are special cases nothing like England or elsewhere except maybe in
the beginning throes of the European Union which is beginning to resemble
pre-Bismarck Germany. We forget that Germany was a series of
small states at war with each other and that they didn't want to join any
more than Norway wants to join Europe today. The issue here is
more complicated than Ricardo or any of the economists have thus far dealt
with. Canada and America is extremely irresponsible to
its citizens preferring to replace them with immigrants who show them what
"shits" they are for complaining about such things as healthcare and
education. Immigrants who were trained in the schools of
America's old enemies and who carry the cultural bug of that system in
their training. Not logical at all but myths are hard to
shake.
- I suspect that they are reacting to their
cultural myths out of fear. It seems that most of them suffer
from a Judeo Christian inability to think logically about big systems
while making peace with the everyday life. Christianity has
the same problem when they confess their sins, lay them off on God, get
forgiveness and continue to be irresponsible. They then state
the ideal as the goal while ignoring it in their lives and getting
forgiveness for ignoring it. So nothing is ever
seriously tested, especially the ideals. No one ever deals
with the possibility of an ignorant, angry God who has lost control of his
creation. Or how illogical that is in the contemplation of
eternal realities and transcendent omniscience. Their
description is not of an omniscient, benevolent being by any
means. Petulant might be a better description.
- Abortion is a perfect example. The ideal
of life. So perfect that even masturbation is killing. Birth
control is out of the question. Of course abstinence is the key for
everyone but the poor male who was given the hormones (by God) not
to be. Well then discipline. But the best
disciplined is also the most likely to have his life shortened by a
clogged prostate. Is it any wonder that we have among men a
plague of prostate cancer today in civilized society? Why
would it be any less logical that mastery of any part of the body would
include cleansing any more than digestion? But we are not
doing so well with food and digestion either. We give up
Mastery and skill preferring ignorance and faith.
- Sex is another. Christian
attitudes towards sex are dysfunctional and mired in the middle
class. The Roman church's answer was the hierarchy which made
children of the masses and celibate (sexually ignorant) fathers who would
progressively interpret the texts.
- With massive literacy Catholics are now
reading the bible and starting the history of the church all over again
with the abuses of the early church. Might I say that it is
the "abuse" of the child in the act of growing up.
Protestants stressed reading, like the Jews and outran the Catholics until
the present. Only wealth and power balanced their not being
overrun by the world. Mike Hollinshead blamed this on
nonconformist theology. I suspect it simply had to do with
literacy in the masses. When Islam stressed literacy they too
excelled in math and science but they had an elitist reaction from the
wealthy and once more made the poor illiterate. How
interesting the that Taliban, those demons, were again stressing literacy
for the poor while the approved war lord today have once again put the
people safely "in their place." If we were to look at
the history of the first seventy years of America we too could find
Taliban like abuses in the treatments of groups. The
communists in China used to put the heads of drug addicts along the road
to break the addiction to opium brought by the West in exchange for
tea. There are no heroes here but plenty of demons.
- Today we have a great turmoil in the world as
protestants envy Catholic's certainty and create their own little world
with mega churches, a semi hierarchy and their own schools.
The answer, I believe is not a pendulum but a historical evolution more
akin to Democratic decline into despotism. Meanwhile the
elite wealthy have collaborated by absorbing the complex secular culture
as their turf and making it economically unavailable. That has
driven the masses to religion for culture, welfare and
community. A Baptist is a Baptist no matter where in the
world. All they need to do is move their letter from one
church to another and they have full voting rights in the
congregation. All they need to do to be a member is swear
allegiance to the sovereign of the Baptist church. Its free
and they make a big deal about that and the forgiveness before the big
Kahuna because the payment was made for his anger. But
does the system work? Well, it is certainly less murderous
than the coliseum and is more sensitive than "let them eat
cake." But is it a really intelligent
system?
- Keith, you are seeing some anti-intellectual
elements appear in England. That is not surprising as the
breakdown of Empire caused immigration into England and diversity
appeared. The answer to diversity in the Western
tradition is the liberal secular state that guarantees equal rights,
availability of education, community development, healthcare and the
right to work for the best potential of your
talent. That is the balance to religion and what
keeps religion from turning cancerous. It is also the balance to
unfettered trade and greed. Everything is about balance and
not about nature. Humanity decides balances and bases the
answers on the current situation both in the human and natural
worlds.
- Today we are a planet alive with a coming
change in the magnetic poles that severely effects the environment and yet
we can't even decide how to take care of our poor in an environmental
situation of our making. Nature is beyond our
imagination. That is a problem with the current
myths. We can't seem to consider all humans as potential
rather then considering them as things to be economically
exploited. Personally, I think modern "classical" economics is
as cancerous in its needs as is runaway religion. I also
believe that assigning nature to human activities is always a very
dangerous proposition. That is not our gifts as animals
compared to the rest of the animals. The silliest thing
of all is the concept of property. The only property is
Intellectual property that you arrive and leave with.
Everything else belongs here. Everything else is about
negotiation, wisdom and the courage to be who you are to the best of your
potential and to find your peace with your fellow humans.
- REH
- ----- Original Message -----
- From: Keith Hudson
- To: Ed Weick
- Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
- Sent: Saturday, November 22, 2003 8:46 AM
- Subject: Slightly extended (was Re: [Futurework] David Ricardo,
Caveman Trade vs. Modern Trade
- Ed,
- I'm a bit non-plussed by your answer, I'm afraid. Let me try again --
see below. (This is slightly extended from the one I sent you and forgot
to copy to FW.)
- At 07:13 22/11/2003 -0500, you wrote:
- Keith:
- > Today, currency has no value, except as much as the confidence
that people have in
- > their respective governments to maintain printing to sensible
quantities.
- > Exchange rates and trade balances are thus now complicated by
all sorts of
- > political factors besides trade. Hence we have currency
speculators (rather
- > than the more benign currency arbitragers.)
- I know we've been over this again and again and again, but I guess
we need one more round. How can you say currency has no value when
it very clearly has value against other currencies, which is why we have
speculators, and against all goods and services, which is why my local
grocer will give me something for it? Like everything else, its
value changes, but value is there. Your real complaint may be that
value has become much too fluid, that you can't count on something
having the same value tomorrow as it has today, and that this buggers up
all kinds of transactions. This can be worked on (and central
banks do work on it) without reverting to something as archaic and
inherently unworkable as the gold standard.
- If people have confidence in government (as they generally did at the
turn of the last century) then they'll accept their government's word that
the un-backed pound is the same pound as it was a fortnight previously
when it was backed by gold. And once by far the greatest economic power in
the world (as the UK was at that time) had done so, then foreign investors
and traders would also have confidence and other governments followed
suit. And that's what's happened ever since -- unless one individual
government or another plays hanky-panky with its economy (e.g. Argentina,
the fourth most prosperous country in the world 100 years ago), and its
currency takes a nose dive in comparison with others.
- We've also had this out before. Yes, gold was patently insufficient as
a practical money-in-your-pocket currency by around 1870 'cos there wasn't
enough of it physically. In its place, a paper currency is perfectly
practicable for day-to-day transactions -- so long as it was transferable
into real value (e.g. gold) if necessary. When it's not transferable into
value then it's at the mercy of governmental policies.
- Despite the ups and downs of finding new resources such as gold or
platinum which had effects on the valoue of currency, money has never
inflated as much as paper-only currencies have in the last half century.
Even when the Spanish brought heaps of South American gold into Europe in
the 17th century money only inflated about two-fold -- in the 1970s, when
all our paper currencies inflated 24-fold! (This is ignoring bouts
of hyper-inflation which individual countries can bring on
themselves.)
- I think we're probably gradually proceeding towards a world-wide
currency -- namely the US$. The quicker we get there the better because
there'll be no currency fluctuations and if there's inflation or deflation
then the currencies of all countries go up and down in step. In effect,
we'll be in a similar siutation to when we had a gold-backed currency.
(This is not to say that inflation or deflation won't still remain
important -- they still will be -- but one major factor of international
stress will be eliminated.)
- Keith
- Keith Hudson, Bath, England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>
Keith Hudson, Bath, England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>
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