Re: Marx, Keynes and Ancestors second of II
Thomas: I will be cruel. Without experience there is not understanding. Without feeling there is no wisdom. Western man objectivies everything and very little touchs him. People study religion, they do not practise religion. People study anthropology, they do not sit in the woods and feel the world. People argue about abstractions, they do not test their arguments in reality. To know about nudity, you have to take your clothes off. To know about hunger you have to experience not eating. To know about spiritual experience you have to have some. To know about trade, you have to trade. In the west, we do not trade, we buy and sell. The difference is we objectify every value into the mathematics of money. The "trader" arguing with the native over the value of a beaver pelt imposed objectivity on the trade - discounting the experience of traveling through the woods, setting traps, removing the life of an animal, scraping the skin, feeling the texture and beauty of nature expressed in the fur. Discounting the stories of the beaver and their relationship with the native and the exchange of learning that each had from the spirit of the other. Trade is about the exchange of values. Western man imposes values based not on use or creation, but on potential profit. The capitalist defines the rules. The question is, "why should we play their game?" We play the game because the capitalist holds something we might value or aspire to own and he sets the terms of it's price. In most cases, the capitalist did not make the knive or the gun but was able to buy that labour and craftsmanship because they held the power of food and shelter. They did this through political systems that have the ultimate power of physical force behind them. Capitalism, as we in West know it, did not develop among indigeous people because the food supply was always free. Any native could set a snare, start a fire and harden a stick to make a spear, pick a berry or dig a root or catch a fish. Any native could sleep in a leanto, make a tent or brush shelter, build an igloo, drink water from the lake or stream. Yes, that food or shelter may not have met the standards of comfort we expect today but it allowed them that rarest of values - true freedom. Therefore, trade was about exchanges inherent in the object being traded - not objectified into an arbritrary monetary number enforced by force. As I watch Ray, twist and turn, trying to use references, scholarship and comments on his experiences to try and penetrate the objectivity of the Western mind, I feel his spirit contracting like a wild animal forced to come to terms with a cage. A the same time I sense the nobility of the spirit that tries to communicate values, relationships, experiences and histories that come from his experiences - from his families experiences, from his tribes experiences, from his race's experiences. We, temporarily, are the conquerers. That does not invalidate other truths, it just means that in the long wheel of history, at this moment our thought, our rules, our perspective is dominate. Like most conquerer's we have the arrogance of rightness - after all, science, rationalism, logic, capitalism, military prowess, legal traditions are the proof of our rightness - right? What don't we have? We don't have spirit - we study the cosmos, we don't experience the cosmos. We talk of freedom and rights - but we don't have freedom and rights except in the narrowest of definitions. You do not have the right to take food from the Earth or to use a portion of the Earth for shelter - except within the rules. Our government makes decisions for us, creates regulations that define our behavior, create mazes we must go through to recieve benefits, be they education or welfare. The native in the Council could listen and speak and then decide for himself whether to particpate. We do not have a standard of honesty, of respect for the truth. Our truth, is the truth of self service. We conceal what embarrases us, we distort what prevents our success - how many resumes do you think are truthful? I am going to close this posting with a Graffis posting that perfectly expresses the values of the West, that exemplifies the distortions we have created because we have moved out of balance with the Earth and because it points so succinctly towards the seeds of our civilizations downfall. Respectfully, Thomas Lunde From: Mark Graffis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> New market for old farts ?? Free trade or protection? Observer (London) Sunday July 25, 1999 Q: What causes as much air pollution as power station chimneys? A: Pig farms ROBIN MCKIE on how scientists have found nitrogen produced by manure on animal farms is as damaging to trees as the smoke and steam from industrial sites They are as bad for the atmosphere as belching chimney stacks and emissions from power stations. Scientists have discovered a startling new source of air pollution: pig and chicken farms.
Re: Marx, Keynes and Ancestors second of II
This is a long document. If you are not up for it, then accept my apologies and skip it. REH Well Ed and Keith, if I don't answer these things then people believe they are true. And there is a lot of just plain old economic paternalism in your post. Consider how there is very little systematic consistency in economic thought. When systems are consistent within themselves that is the beginning of their usefulness. Of course too much consistency makes "stale" also. But an inner coherency is the beginning of knowing whether a system will be coherent with reality. The wars of the 20th century have been between competing economic systems. I believe when "conversion" is the only solution, (sort of a philosophical monopoly as the only answer), then the system is immature. There is an inner insecurity and inconsistencies within the system itself. Capitalism's biggest nightmare was when the "simplicity of Communism as the only competitor" gave way to "terrorist" complexity. Once again we are in the merchant wars of the 18th century with the same language being used as was justification for defeating the Chinese Emperor and making opium addicts of millions of Chinese. Keith, what I hear you saying, applied to the Chinese situation, would be that destroying China's sovereignty in order to open their market to opium was all right in the ultimate scheme of things. Is that correct? I would say when systems are so immature that they must convert other systems, to the monopoly of their idea, they have a very low probability of non-destructive, holistically wise action. (after reading Ed's most recent post) Yes Ed, the Aztecs worshipped those same destructive Gods also. And their Pochtecas (export businessmen) didn't function all that differantly from ours, while Huitchilopoctli and Tlaloc were the gods paralleling both Darwin and agriculture. They did abuse their neighbors, as you pointed out, in their immaturity and their neighbors did march against them but it is a mistake to say that was what turned the tide against them. It is also a mistake to believe that the brutality of the Aztecs appalled the Spanish Christians. You can't put tongues in cheeks on paper. The "night of tears" proved the Spanish and their allies could not win the war by military means. It was what William McNeill pointed out about the 98% number for smallpox that swung the balance in the direction of the Spanish.When the warriors met for healing in public ceremony, unarmed, the four hundred Spaniards slaughtered them as they had done earlier with the Cholulans. Because they were sick they couldn't fight back. They were not as weak normally as the priests of Cholula but the illness destroyed the entire infra- structure of the city. One should never forget that You are speaking of people who would run to the coast for fresh fish, would fast for nine days without food or water (I know its hard to believe but again it is well documented). A people whose soldiers, (not the ones who fasted), could run anyplace in the entire empire in a couple of days. So there has been a lot more research done since your sources put the pen to paper. For example, much has been made, in the past of their failure to use wheels and their lack of an animal to pull a cart if they did. That this held the Aztecs back technologically. They knew of both the Llama and a cousin that could have served. The people of Mexico refused to use the Llama because it had hooves that tore up the soil. They didn't use wheels for anything but toys for the same reason. The soil was and is sandy and very thin top-soil but when the Spanish arrived they saw a virtual paradise. It is only since the horse and wheel became a part of that environment and the church banned the Aztec farming methods with plants like Amaranth that the system collapsed and much of it is desert today. I would also say that in the "stories" about the farming methods of the forest dwellers (called "slash and burn") they also have been ignorantly maligned. You never read about the way that the fields are returned to the forest over a fifteen year period with deliberate plantings of forest healing plants that will feed and heal the hunters at a later time. Villages are moved every fifteen years. No one talks about the farming methods of the peoples of highland Peru either where the Science Times of the NYTimes pointed out several years ago that their canal method of raised fields enriched by fisheries in the canals had the greatest yield per acre and per worker of any fields in the world . But it is hard to do and does not fit well with Western cultural beliefs. The same reason commercial wild rice is so awful. They insist on cutting the stalks when they harvest it and so it never matures. The French "raised fields" use some of the same methods. Since the Iroquois have traditionally used the same I would be interested in knowing whether the French learned it from them or may
