Bitcoin Forum

Yeah, do you want a free lunch with a free beer, you too ?

Seriously, this is so silly that it is scary:

http://worldwidestrike2012.blogspot.com/2010/10/world-wide-strike-2012.html

But before facepalming this, please talk to those guys and try to make them realize how silly they are.  Try to be as polite and respectful as possible.

I whish I could answer to those guys myself but they use facebook and other privacy-hazardous networks.  If you have accounts on these networks, tell them that you can not have free stuff unless someone is willing to work for you for free.  Who's pretty enough to convince someone to get up in the morning and work in exchange of nothing but a smile and a "thank you"?

Is anyone really surprised that a janitor makes less money than a brain surgeon?

Well, those people seem to think that everyone should earn 0$, whatever their job is.

Amazing, isn't it?

Then what's the incentive to do anything unpleasant? The world needs ditch diggers too.

Sorry, but I stopped reading here:

"Economic and spiritual revolution "

Yeah, great idea, than I can spend my days playing Playstation, travelling and pick up some nice free cars like an Audi R8 or Lamborghini Murcielago and have lots of fun with them.

I totally support these guys, the only small little thingy, where to find suckers who make me my games, bring my ass to whatever place I want to go and build me those exotic sportcars. ???

How silly? Why are they silly? Oh wait, you lot are capitalists. Never mind, carry on. (Personally, I think the silliest thing is that they seem to want to keep the government. The getting rid of money isn't so silly. I'm supporting Bitcoin because it's a tool against government, not because I like money.)

Which is more important for society? If all the janitors suddenly disappeared, what would happen? If all the brain surgeons suddenly disappeared, what would happen? I suggested that in the first case, perhaps the brain surgeons would "led full, rich and happy lives until they [are] all suddenly wiped out by a virulent disease contracted from a dirty telephone", or something.

For a further discussion on  the differences between doctors and janitors, check out this thread on Reveft (http://www.revleft.com/vb/doctor-argument-against-t147012/index.html).
Particularly the fifth post, which I will quote part of here:

I really can't be bothered arguing the point, because I don't enjoy banging my head on walls.

Which is more important for human survival, bread or diamonds? Hmm, then I wonder why diamonds cost a lot more than bread. It might have something to do with economics. It is true that bread is more important in general than diamonds but we have plenty of bread and fewer diamonds so any individual loaf of bread isn't important.

Almost anyone can pick up a broom and sweep. A lot fewer people can slice open a human skull without puking into it or making the person worse off than before. Therefore, even though janitors are important in general, no individual janitor is important because they are so plentiful.

Yes you do! you just don't feel it anymore because you've hit the wall a bit too hard last time, and your reasoning, or lack thereof proves my point. Don't worry that you can't understand what I mean, or you feel that I'm just making fun of you... right now it's all you can achieve.

Ironically, brain surgery might have got you back to normal (though I'm not sure I want to know what that means for you) but all the surgeons are busy cleaning the phones, those that survived infections, that is.

Here is the alternative to money:

http://www.smithworksforge.com/leatherItems/images/1bullWhip.jpg

With this stuff, when I want someone to bring me a beer or to make me a pizza, I don't need to pay him.  All I need is to whip him very hard in the back and shout very loud.

Who needs money really?

Ahh, utopian societies  :) I often think about it and would like to believe that it is possible, but the current state of affairs is the best indication how fucked up we are. Whoever wrote that blog had good intentions at heart, so don't be too hard on them.

What gives me a warm feeling however, is that people are finally realizing that something is wrong.

That's the biggest brain fart of an argument I've seen so far. Yes, the doctor wouldn't be able to perform adequate surgery without the janitor but that doesn't mean he owes his life to him. It is all service based on NEED and the amount of NEED is determined by what people are willing to pay. I'm sorry you don't like the idea of people working to sustain themselves.

don't you understand? A Dog, Human and a Tree are all worth the same!

Everyone is a slave to everyone else.  Whatever we decided happens to you, you will do.

Something is always wrong.

Free does not always equal good.

While I agree with your sentiments, diamonds are actually almost worthless. They are only worth something to some people because of clever marketing. Go buy a diamond, then try to re-sell it. Worth almost nothing.

Man those guys are awesome. Under their own logic, hot women should be made readily available to the masses as a social service. Finally i can score some poon for free!

Yeah I was reluctant to say it, but indeed in a moneyless world, to get what they want, men would have to beg or to use force, and women would have to beg or to spread their legs.

So money can replace begging, sweet ;)

Begging is the less efficient way to get money I know.

You're just repeating what you've been told and haven't actually done any research. You won't get anywhere near the retail price you paid but they are certainly not almost worthless.

In other words, you don't give a damn about people's preferences and the only acceptable set of values is your own. If people die from brain surgeries done by janitors in your world then so be it. This is the future under your system, and this guy is your hero:
http://propertyistheft.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/stalin_gulag.jpg
He believed in the same things that you do... for everyone else except himself, of course.

You are a moron if you think that. One, I'm against all government. Two the USSR was not in anyway communist, though it may have started out as an attempt to bring about an end result of communism. Why wasn't it communist? Because communism is classless and stateless, two things which existed in all the "communist" countries. At most the USSR claimed to be moving towards communism.

Also, preferences can be expressed in a myriad of ways. "Free markets" (which any capitalist system will inevitably stop being) are merely one way.

Personally, I think that few of you have ever bothered to engage beyond name calling with people who have radically different opinions to you. That's why some people are making ignorant statements about the use of force to get what you want in a moneyless society. Hint, look up gift economy.

----

Edit: I also just want to say that the basis for my political (and life) philosophy is an attachment to freedom, and to a lesser extent, equality. Using that as the basis, I can say that, for example, capitalism conflicts with both freedom and equality. The first because it inevitably forms either monopolies or governments or other structures that restrict freedom. The second for obvious reasons.

If you have a different starting point for your political philosophy, we aren't going to agree. If you don't have a starting point, maybe you should re-examine everything you ever thought you knew and get a starting point.

Oh, the irony. By the way, care to respond to my post?

http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5884.msg86538#msg86538

I'm sorry if we gave this impression.

Just answer this question please:  how do I convince someone to do something for me in a moneyless society?

Say I want to go in a foreign country but I don't own a plane nor I can pilot one.  Should I just find someone who do, and ask him to take me there?  What if this person doesn't want to go there, for instance because he thinks he has more interesting things to do?

How do I convince people to work so that I can eat something everyday?  If I can't use money, does that mean that in order to have the right to receive some food, I would be required to work too?  Does that mean that my economic activities would be planified by some central bureaucracy?   Of course I have no problem with working to get some food, but I don't like the idea of people telling me what work exactly I must do and when.

In a same way that you think that with capitalism free market eventually ends, I think that communism eventually ends up with forced labour.

Notice the very important word in what you quoted, "if". The person basically said I had the same ideas as Stalin. Which is a really stupid thing to say, 'cause, like, I had already said I disliked government. Moreover, I had said nothing of the sort. Moreover, I've engaged in much more than just name-calling with people who have different ideas.

Because the diamond miners keep the price so high? Considering that artificial diamonds are just as good....

Your argument seems to be that scarcity+demand means that something should cost more. I disagree. We are approaching this from completely different perspectives.

It's not everyone, just many.


Gift economy.
I would suggest that it would be perfectly possible that there would be regular flights between major destinations 'cause that's what some people like doing to contribute to society.

So you don't work for a company then? You work on your own? In a true communist society, I doubt there would be a central bureaucracy, because such things would inevitably produce inequality.
Perhaps what would happen is that people building widgets would notice their stock of gadgets is running low. They might ring up the gadget makers and ask them to send a pile over. The gadget makers say, no worries! Or, perhaps there is an automated system, whereby gadgets get set to the widget makers every month. The widgets then get sent to the distribution center, where they are given out to the people who want them. Personally, I don't like the widgets made by the Daiichi Widget Factory, so I get my widgets from Daini Widget Factory. But most people like the number one widgets, and so only a few people work at the number two factory.

I'm a computer person, so I help out both widget factories with their computers as, and when needed. At other times I go and look after kids at the crèche, or perhaps paint a picture or two. Not many people like my paintings, but enough do that it does contribute. Other people paint just because they like painting, but they consider it a hobby, rather than "work".

I think that capitalism = forced labor. I think that true, proper, communism (no government, no state, no classes, gift economy), would end up with people sharing because they want to. People work because they would otherwise be bored.

We already produce more than sufficient food to feed everyone. We are post-scarcity. Even if everyone worked only half as much (or less) we would still have enough. Partly, this is because in the current system so much energy is going into unproductive labor (finance, including debt-collection and management, government, misc other bureaucracies).

----

What I've written above is one possible way a society might run, there are many many possibilities. The main point being, that as an anarchist, I would reject any society that wasn't free. And so central bureaucracies and similar are a big no no. But to quote Malatesta, "t is not right for us, to say the least, to fall into strife over mere hypotheses".


----

Anyway, this will be my last post on the matter (in this thread at least). I direct people who are interested in discussing anarchism (the left sort, not the fake sort), communism, or other stuff, to RevLeft. I don't post there, but they have other knowledgeable people who are more interested in banging their heads than me.

It's not a matter of how things should be. I have no opinion on that. It's a matter of how economics works which is a natural outcome of rational human nature. You're not going to overcome that through voluntary means, only by aggression. Humans have importance scales of goals and each loaf of bread we want to get occupies a place on that scale. If we limit the scope to talking about only loaves of bread and diamonds, my scale might look like this:

get 1st loaf of bread
get 2nd loaf of bread
get 3rd loaf of bread
get 4th loaf of bread
get 5th loaf of bread
get 1st diamond
get 6th loaf of bread
get 2nd diamond
get 7th loaf of bread
...

This scale represents how I rank each of these goals in importance from highest to lowest. The next goal I wish to achieve depends on how many of these goals I have already achieved. If I have 0 loaves of bread and I am offered the choice between a loaf of bread or a diamond then I will choose the loaf of bread. If I have 4 loaves of bread and offered the choice, I will still choose the bread. However, what happens when I have 5 loaves of bread? Well, according to my scale, the next most important goal I would like to achieve is to have a 1st diamond rather than a 6th loaf of bread. Therefore, I will choose the diamond. This is just basic rational human nature.

Now, let's say I have accomplished all these goals and I am forced to give up a loaf of bread or a diamond, which will I choose? Obviously, I'm going to give up the least important goal on this list, which is a 7th loaf of bread. Let's say I am forced to give up 2 of these things, this time I'll give up a 7th loaf of bread and a 2nd diamond. Again, this is just how basic rational human nature works, albeit extremely simplified, but it's still qualitatively the same.

If you can find a way to short circuit these value scales that we all have (without sticking a gun in their face or threatening to imprison them) then you can make people rather give up a doctor than a janitor. Rather than doing that, it's easier to just allow people to fulfill as many goals as they can and eventually we will start concerning ourselves with the least important goals, like caring about janitors.

I actually also think that at some point in the future, we will be in a post-scarcity society, where everyone will work on a pure volontary basis (work based on desire, not need), and where everything will basically be free.


But I also think such a society will be reached smoothly, not via some kind of communist revolution.



Basically free market will gradually price things for their true value, which will slowly tend to zero.  We won't go from a money-based society to a moneyless society in a discontinuous manner.  It will be a slow process regulated by market forces.  Prices will gradually fall as things get more and more easy to obtain.


You think we are currently already in this post-scarcity society.  I don't.   But I think it's not up to me or you to decide.  Only free market can tell.


In other words, I changed my mind and I think a moneyless society IS possible.  But we are so far from it that first we have to try a sound money, and then eventually price of stuffs will decrease if that is what economic reality wants.   Because with a sound money, what you call a moneyless society is a society where prices of all goods and services are zero.  There's no reason for going to non-zero to zero discontinuously.

It will be reached by fulfilling all of our goals until we are so far down on our lists that "being a good neighbor" or "running around the Star Trek Enterprise in a unitard" is near the top of the list. Right now most people's lists are occupied with survival and basic pleasures.

Grondilou, except for raw materials and energy.  But yes, i suspect that a free (NO IP) market, over long enought time, will reduce costs of everything else to zero.

If everything costs $0 it doesn't matter if everyone earns $0.

Those people have a good point, they are just a few decades (centuries?) early.

Until the post scarcity economy arrives money will remain a necessary evil.

Everyone on the planet moves to Australia and is given a 1/4 acre block. Then we still have Queensland and the rest of the world left vacant. We are living in a pre scarcity world and we somehow manage to produce scarcity by our very nature. "Post scarcity" is a utopian pipe dream

Utopias are nice, as long as noone tries too hard to make them come true.

I don't see how you guys ever expect to abolish scarcity. Even if it can be achieved with commodities (and I don't think it can), there is still scarcity in labor; i.e. it doesn't matter that I am getting this floor for free, i'm certainly not going to cook bread for you with nothing in return.

also


That just made my day. It's hilarious how hardcore socialist will deny that the actual and past communist states aren't communist. Seriously? How in the world are you going to enforce socialism without a state... goddamn kids

Robot slaves.

shit, gotta get me one of those

Sexy Robot Slaves.  8)

Yeah, baby!

Lol

I'd like to read a SF story where the world is full of commercial robot wives, and where 'real' women have many difficulties for finding husbands, so they fundamentally go through a tough social crisis, while men are just doing well.

As usual it's Japan to the rescue  ;D
http://imghaven.com/images/11697

Oh yeah I know about this anime.  I had watched the two first episodes I think.  I will go back to it and watch the full series someday.

Chobits is horrid. Try Eve no Jikan, at least it's got some thinking into it.

I watched Eve no Jikan already.   Good stuff, but it's not quite the story I was describing above.

I have to say from all the animes i've watched I haven't come across a robot harem setup yet oO

could you possibly be more wrong?
take a look at flat prices expressed as "hours you need to work to purchase square meter" in last 100 years

take a look at 1930  household and compare it to 2011 one
look around and think how much stuff do you poses even if it is virtually useless to you

i don't want to sound like aluminium foil hat wearing person but - most of the people in civilized countries (i.e. countries that you don't need to worry about sudden death) 
are effectively owned by banks, corporations etc. having and wanting to have more and more of unnecessary things

everyone have mobile phone, so you have to have one - otherwise you will miss a lot both in personal and professional life
when just 15 years ago nobody had one... and that costs couple hundred bucks every two years plus 20-30 monthly
sure, some people are making money with them, when for general public landline could be completely acceptable, but...

everyone need to have car (or perhaps two, three per household) in fact number of vehicles per capita in usa doubled from 1960, who is going to produce them for free and why not take one for every day of week?

now, tell me who will do all those simple and dull jobs when one won't have to?
who will be mining everyday for 30 years or staying month after month on oil platforms if they can do nothing or anything?
not everyone can be brain surgeon cowboy astronaut race driver, someone need to swept the floors and without motivation nobody is going to do that

and reason why diamonds cost that much is simple - there is less supply than demand and that is a thing that is making people pay a lot for them to actually get one

there is no way for all that to work without currency of some kind

we can satisfy all basic needs like water, bread, clothes and a piece of roof above ones head, but we cant and wont be able to give everyone Lamborghini because there is not enough of them - why? because it is taking a lot of time to make one, so instead of waiting 60 years before yours will be made for free you can get one for money now

unless there is FREE way for everyone to create stuff i.e. some nanobots putting together anything from fork to spaceship, that 'no money' dream simply won't work because people have tendency to get more than they need (and more than they can produce for others during their lives)

Yes I could.  For instance I would be more wrong if I was assuming that we can reach a moneyless society NOW, with just a political decision and authoritative measures (making money illegal, in a nutshell).

On the contrary, I say that maybe technical progress could, in future, make price of things decrease significantly, so that life is easier and stuffs appear to be essentially free.


Prices is not something that is purely proportionnal.   One thing might be cheap when you want only a small amount, but very expensive if you want a lot of it.  This happens when you request more than what production can offer.


One word:  machines.


Diamonds are a bad example as they currently can be manufactured.

Gold will probably never ever be free.  However, one gram of gold will probably get more and more purchasing power, just because stuffs will be easier and easier to produce with time.


You missed the point when I was saying that prices would GRADUALLY decrease.  Basically I'm saying we could reach a moneyless society in an asymptotic manner.  Money will still exist, but prices of stuffs will gradually get closer to zero, even if they never actually reach zero.

i know that if i want to buy all copper in word, near the end of my search it would be rarer than gold and cost more, but that is not exactly relevant is it?


well, we nowhere near that, are we?

besides - i really don't think that developing machines (self sustainable, completely universal - that would require proper AI) and letting everyone to do what they WANT to do and nothing else is such a great idea

and more, nowadays one can do whatever he wants, yet we still have plenty of some rebellious bullshit, why future supposed to be so much better?


gram of gold was $5 in 1975 it is $45 now

first - almost half of price difference is inflation (whatever cost $5 in 1975 would cost $20 now)

so it is partially true, but consider one thing - products are more complex every day, they live shorter and are replaced by 'better' and dearer ones every single day
and what is more important, number of things on household is growing every day

you can get tons and tons of things you would use once or never, so even if today fridge is half the price when you add all 'necessary' things like displaying of current temp, automatically making ice cubes, auto defrosting, deep freezing, etc. etc. you end up spending same or more money for product that won't last 5 years while back then it would last 10-15 years without problems

family story: my grand grand mother bought light bulb back in 1935 (europe, gremany) and it last for 67 years - someone broke it during cleaning in 2002, today you are lucky when you get 67 days of light... producer will sell it 50 times cheaper today but it last 200 times shorter, even if they can make it last hundred years for few extra cents they won't...

we could get more better things over the time, but that is not going to happen... not only producers and marketing fault - people wants it because all those adverts, other people etc.

i used my first watch back in 1980's for more than 10 years, now i'm changing a sophisticated mobile, pc almost every couple years... partially because of new features, partially because it cost less to get new laptop than fix mobo in 5 years old...

i could get 5 or maybe 10 better watches for the money my dad paid back 1980, but who uses a watch this days? an cell phone (which costs the same) is todays watch :P

There is no place, like Utopia.

God damn it, have I written otherwise?

Again:  I am not saying that I am sure that in the future we will live in a money less society.   I say that to me it is possible that free market forces, along with technological developpement, slowly reduces prices so that society looks more and more like a moneyless society.

I won't write anymore here, as this thread is pissing me off.