I Have A Question About The Dialectic of History According to Marxists

2.0 is not apocalyptic, mind. It's the Business as Usual scenario that's a runaway risk. 2.0 has distributed damages that will (in aggregate) not be visible next to growth. In fact, it's possible to over-spend while trying to avoid 2.0, quite easily even. But the BAU scenario means that refusing to spend is underspending.

2.0 is filling a tooth cavity. BAU is waiting for the abscess.

i think 2.0 melts greenland and if so half of Copenhagen's gone

EDIT: Now pointer, I'm using apocalyptic relatively loosely here, it's not like we're all gonna die, but we sure as hell are gonna suffer. I should probably not use that kind of language, but people generally do not understand the points climate scientists are trying to get across. I have no idea what to do. :(
 
i think 2.0 melts greenland and if so half of Copenhagen's gone

EDIT: Now pointer, I'm using apocalyptic relatively loosely here, it's not like we're all gonna die, but we sure as hell are gonna suffer. I should probably not use that kind of language, but people generally do not understand the points climate scientists are trying to get across. I have no idea what to do. :(

Keep in mind that I'm regularly asking for more help on CFC for AGW, to which the answer is often 'no'. 2 degrees of warming will cause a lot of inequitable harm, but it's harder to avoid 2 degrees without causing inappropriate costs as well. It's mostly a non-discussion in practical terms, since avoiding 2 degrees might be fundamentally impossible.

The inequitable harms aside, the future could be better with 2 degrees warming than it is now. It's the worse scenarios that we're barreling into.
 
Communism has little to no real world history beyond the failed attempts of "not really communisms".

Yes, I also only give things to my family members if they're able to pay the market price
 
EDIT: Now pointer, I'm using apocalyptic relatively loosely here, it's not like we're all gonna die, but we sure as hell are gonna suffer.
IIRC real apocalyptic scenarios are unlikely, but possible. In some runaway scenarios the Earth may turn into Venus-like hell, which literally destroys all life on planet, not just half of Copenhagen.
 
:lol: Fair market price. I like that one. That seems to work fine in families, yup! It's the "you are communists with me now" that seems to create the problems, and for not totally unrelated reasons that it's a problem when you inform people that they're in your family now, "Congratulations, wife. From each according to thier ability."

It's not the idea of equity, it's the grouping. No?
 
They are saying "our theoretical world would be much better than your real world, but you have to just trust us."

As Upton Sinclair observed, it is difficult to get a person to understand something when their salary depends on their not understanding it. Those who are comfortable under the current system are not inclined to see its problems.

Are you saying that there was no underbelly of poverty and unrest prior to some point in time when capitalism became dominant? When do you see the approximate start of capitalism? 17th c? earlier? later? Did it originate in Northwestern Europe?

This is quite a misunderstanding of the points at play here. The Marxist critique of capitalism is precisely that it operates the same way as these precapitalist formations where the connection between the wealth of elites and the poverty of common people was obvious. The critique has force exactly because pro-capitalist ideologues imagine that capitalism is somehow different from (and clearly morally superior to) precapitalist social formations.

The other problem of course, which isn't so much a contradiction of capitalism, is the concept of discounting the future. tl;dr Angst is exactly right that, at least as incentives exist under capitalism, you always take $1000 now from torching the planet over $1000 you get later because you spent $1000 now on preserving the planet.

Not really Communism was articulated in the 19th century mostly as a result of the conditions of the IR when Marx came up with it.

The redistribution of land and cancellation of debts was the demand of almost every single peasant uprising in the Old World for something like 4500 years before Marx was born.

Capitalism has a huge incentive to tackle rising seas and global warming.

No, it has incentive to ignore both of these issues because the costs are largely externalized from the actors who have the decision-making power. Which is exactly the problem, and with climate change we can now add the most bitter contradiction of all, one that @Angst notes accurately Marx did not foresee, which is that climate change and other environmental problems means that there is a very real sense in which no capitalist economic activity is actually possible without externalizing the costs. If the true costs of emitting CO2 were properly borne by the emitters, we would be living in a pre-industrial world because no one would ever have invested in a coal-powered engine in the first place.

2.0 is filling a tooth cavity. BAU is waiting for the abscess.

We hope 2.0 is filling a tooth cavity, anyway. We're not really sure.
 
:lol: Fair market price. I like that one. That seems to work fine in families, yup! It's the "you are communists with me now" that seems to create the problems, and for not totally unrelated reasons that it's a problem when you inform people that they're in your family now, "Congratulations, wife. From each according to thier ability."

It's not the idea of equity, it's the grouping. No?

"well son, if you want this breast milk you're going to have to perform labor for me that's equal to its marginal value!"

The idea that communism "has no history" is too absurd for words. Everyday communism is the default condition of the human species. Commerce is an unnatural adaptation to living in close proximity with strangers.
 
"well son, if you want this breast milk you're going to have to perform labor for me that's equal to its marginal value!"

The idea that communism "has no history" is too absurd for words. Everyday communism is the default condition of the human species. Commerce is an unnatural adaptation to living in close proximity with strangers.

There is plenty of history. And yes, typically the son is expected to help as they become able, the breast milk functions both as gift and investment. Wastrel sons can be ruinous to families, indeed.

The problems come with the enforced grouping, as they always do. Not limited to communism, no.
 
IIRC real apocalyptic scenarios are unlikely, but possible. In some runaway scenarios the Earth may turn into Venus-like hell, which literally destroys all life on planet, not just half of Copenhagen.

Yea I only brought up that point about Copenhagen to note what we're currently expecting with 2 degrees... It's definitely looking grim.
 
Not really. Implicitly, most of us are hoping we'll be fine even if we blow past 2 degrees.

Well, yeah, but I'm referring to the actual facts of the matter, not the perception. If you're talking perceptions, then many many people (to put it no more specifically) believe they will be fine under business-as-usual.
 
The idea that communism "has no history" is too absurd for words. Everyday communism is the default condition of the human species. Commerce is an unnatural adaptation to living in close proximity with strangers.
This comes down to definitions:
  • Everyday communism: As opposed to what? Theoretical communism?
  • default condition of the human species: What is that? When is that?
  • Commerce: Trade? Exchange of goods? Money?
  • unnatural adaptation: :lol:
Lots of good words in your post but they cry out for clarification. :)
 
Those who are comfortable under the current system are not inclined to see its problems
If this is true, would the following also be true:
"Those who are uncomfortable under the current system are not inclined to see its benefits."

Cute slogans and phrases usually fail under scrutiny especially when they are written as divisive statements. But I think they are a natural adaptation of language in a society. ;)
 
This comes down to definitions:
  • Everyday communism: As opposed to what? Theoretical communism?
  • default condition of the human species: What is that? When is that?
  • Commerce: Trade? Exchange of goods? Money?
  • unnatural adaptation: :lol:
Lots of good words in your post but they cry out for clarification. :)

Unnatural adapation is kind of what it is. Anthropologists have largely seen that pre-agriculture populations largely use a favor based debt "economy" answering needs. This is not the same as Marx speculated, though, even if there's overlap.

However, many things are unnatural that are good. The favors system breaks down with populations that are too large.
 
Unnatural adapation is kind of what it is. Anthropologists have largely seen that pre-agriculture populations largely use a favor based debt "economy" answering needs. This is not the same as Marx speculated, though, even if there's overlap.

However, many things are unnatural that are good. The favors system breaks down with populations that are too large.
Are knapping and using stone tools an unnatural adaptation? Is trading shells for fur an unnatural adaptation? Is using Ochre to paint the walls of a cave a natural or unnatural adaptation?
 
Are knapping and using stone tools an unnatural adaptation? Is trading shells for fur an unnatural adaptation? Is using Ochre to paint the walls of a cave a natural or unnatural adaptation?

Two terminologies of natural here.

First mine. The internet is a natural adaptation. The internet is human nature. So yes.

Second, Marx. The unnaturalness here is largely discussed in regards to economic systems that are contradictory and have to be enforced through power. Tools and fashion don't generally contradict this in themselves. So... yes.
 
Two terminologies of natural here.

First mine. The internet is a natural adaptation. The internet is human nature. So yes.

Second, Marx. The unnaturalness here is largely discussed in regards to economic systems that are contradictory and have to be enforced through power. Tools and fashion don't generally contradict this in themselves. So... yes.
So if a big strong guy takes extra food from a weaker guy while deconstructing a mammoth, is it natural or unnatural?

How does adaptation fit into all this?
 
I’d like to suggest that the household is the practice of everyday capitalism, with households effectively structured as a corporation. :mischief:

A household has assets, liabilities, supplies, budgets, a division of labor, and effectively a system of personnel and board of directors.

When I’m at work, do I need to pay for a pen and piece of paper? No, I take it from the supply closet. It’s uneconomic to price out every single item when it’s arguably of such a trivial nature, rather the aggregate is taken into consideration by the management. A household operates on the same principle, maintaining a supply of goods to be used by its members but is still accounted for in total.

:)
 
So if a big strong guy takes extra food from a weaker guy while deconstructing a mammoth, is it natural or unnatural?

You have to be more particular as to what's actually going on here. Those tribes tend to die out (ie damaging your own tribe during hunter-gatherer times with no agricultural food surplus = tribe's in trouble). If so, by Marx, unnatural.

How does adaptation fit into all this?

?
 
Because if all the medium size guys can count, maybe they can all agree up front that the big ******* isn't getting away with it this time, and he just might learn to know it up front? But isn't that how everything is supposed to work, sort of? We're all so terribly smart, and so terribly capable of cruelty in the face of large enough wants. Especially when we're young.

If it stops working, it stops working. But something is going to need to work.
 
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