ismu: I think that the thing you wrote about the golden mountain is very smart... are we raised to desire more and more or is this something we were born with? I dont know about others but I can say that I personally don't have this need for richnes... Im happy as I am, as long as I have nature and someone to talk to... but If someone gives me a computer and a big screen tv, I wont hesitate to use them...
Originally posted by Tyler *Unlike you I do not see every baby as being born into the world deserving of the same as everyone else. I believe in this world, things are earned. Things are earned through hard work and perceveerance.* Yes, in this civilization. In this world, this society! I didn't mean to be rude to you. It's just that this society has grown in what it is now-a-days. I think it's sad. Maybe it's better to go off the thread. Religion and Money, and I are allergic to eachother. (necessarry evil, you need to use Money) I believe in an equal society/civilization or whatever you want to call it. In which everybody gets the same chance. Oh I get a headache from it. I quit. My apologies to you Tyler...
No apologies needed, simply explinations. I believe that you earn things. I believe that one who works harder than another, deserves more than the other. I believe that if you work for 100 hours in a week and I work 10 hours in the week, you deserve more than I. Perhaps this doesn't lead to a more 'sharing' society, but it leads to competition, which I both enjoy and desire. And I believe cometitive natures are what cause the greatest advancements in our society. If you eliminate competitive nature, what need have we to advance? I personally would get very, very bored with a society where I could do nothing all day and still get the same as if I worked hard all day. Why is it sad banshee? Why is it sad that I believe in a society based on eash getting what he EARNS not the same as everyone else? Personally, I would rather kill myself than live in your society. There is no greatness to reach for if you make everyone equal. If you believe in everyone getting an equal chance, that's great. But that in no way means you have to leave everyone to be equal for their entire lives. What do you mean by everyone having the same chance? If everyone ALWAYS gets the same commodities throughout their entire lives, what is there to aim for? More importantly I can't get my head around your whole idea of my just society being 'sad'. Tyler - If you work 100 hours you deserve more than someone who works 1 hour. Banshee - If you work 10000000 hours you deserve the same as someone who works 0 hours. I like my logic.
If you could eliminate competitive nature! I doubt that you could. Think about the way we evolved. Look at the great apes. They fight over territory and domination of thier groups. Throughout history, humans have fought each other to gain territory and to dominate nations....I can think of no society in which conflict does not exist at some level. It would be wonderfull if all people got the same start, but, as Tyler points out, life without competition would be boring. What is there to fight for? What is there to want? What is the point?
Yes. Not all of people searching for wealth for main target. But lot's of people do. Take a random sample about 20 people around you neighborhood. You'll find out that some of them will always looking for higher standard of living. Always higher than currently they got now. 5 out of 20 will be enough to keep trade to be continuous. Basically all of us want to be comfort. And richness is the most common way to buy things to make us feel comfort. Money can be almost anything. Money can make peace or evil. Depend on the man behind the gun.
I havent read everything everyone said, but this made the think of something : 2. The society has reached a level of technology that makes every citizen's living standard high enough for them to survive without working. I think it will be a very great day when robots make enough food for everyone to live happily and noone has to work and everyone can just chill... o baby Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! damn, that WOULD be cool...
The simple reason why we use money is because eventually bartering becomes inconvenient. Money (especially money in a fiat currency economy like the US-and I imagine most countries use) is simply a voucher that we have all sort of decided is equivalent to something. So, I trade in one of my little $1 vouchers and I get 2 liters of pop. I trade in $1000 vouchers and I get a computer. I trade in $16,000 vouchers and I get a car. Imagine how many apples you'd have to bring into a dealership to buy a car? Depending on the type of apple, 16,000 to 32,000! Or 320 head of cattle (depending on the going rate at the time). Deep down there is simply no difference between bartering for goods and trading slips of paper for goods, except that the slips of paper in a fiat currency system have no inherent value beyond what the governmnt says their worth, and are only as good as the industrial and military might of the country in question. While I do hate a fiat system, I am down with capitalism. I also don't really see the problem with money. Lets face it, really, once you've made a certain amount of money, you don't play for that anymore. I sincerely doubt that the people who are the CEO's and the rest of the rich of the rich do what they do for power, not for more cash. I sincerely doubt that Bill Gates keeps MS plowing ahead because he likes making his millions a second, (yes, an exaggeration) I find it more likely that he likes the idea of having an underling call up the DOJ and tell them that if this lawsuit keeps going on they're going to pull every copy of Windows from every shelf in America. Deep down the struggle has been over this Hobbesian clusterf*ck for sovreign power, hell, let's all face it, it's good to be the king. I admit, I like things, but the reason why I work and try to gather money is so that I can eat and sleep and watch tv and take trips to Boston and attract potential mates with shiney objects and the reason why I'm not out growing my own food and slaughtering my own cows is that I prefer being a chemist and an aspiring philosopher and there are people who prefer to grow things and kill them for food and as long as I work hard to get him the medicine he needs for the price of my labor, then i feel entitled to be able to get the food that I need for the price of his. How is that wrong?
Just to get back to the original question, “do we need money?” I think the answer is yes, at least for the moment. Jez you asked how it worked in star trek. Well saying they don’t use money isn’t absolutely true. They do trade, and to trade is just another form of “money”. What they believe in is the advancement of there selves “same as borg”. They aim to better themselves and not what they have. I think if we could all try to use the same ideas would be best, but I can see that will never happen in my life time, for this I am deeply sad. But I hope that in my life I can help towards the goal, for this I can see a few changes are needed. 1.the advancement of emotional intelligence. e.g. knowing that doing something bad is wrong 2. realize that were are not alone In this universe and to fight ourselves is not just pointless but stupid. 3. every person in a human being, and are our family I do not mean everybody should go around singing songs and saying “I love u man” but the greed should be stopped. Does anyone else feel the same?
Not until I'm dead. Personally, money motivates me. I realize this is a bad thing, but I'm 16 so whatever, I'm sure I'll eventually grow out of it. For now, however, I want cash, and a lot of it.
Why the fuck is that a bad thing, Tyler? Money can buy you anything. Including love. What's wrong with wanting the good things in life?
Some people will say money shouldn't be what motivates you. That happiness should be. Hapiness and understanding. These peopel are often to dense to accept the fact that some of us like finer (therefore, more expensive things) to make us happy. Also, Xev motivates me.
Tyler: Thank you! If finding the mass of the Higgs boson makes me happy, I need money to fund my experiments. Need money to eat sushi instead of beans and rice. Need money to drink brandy instead of cheap gin. Etc. Thank you.
hmmmm Well, someone asked how you determine the value of something. Well, if you took a economics class you would know that it is based on supply and demand. It gets a little more complicated when you get into manufactured items, because then you have to think about cost of supplies, cost of production, cost of shipment, and so on. But, even those things can be reduced to supply and demand at a certain level to determine their worth.
the motivation for objects shouldent be what makes us happy. this is what i think is whats wrong with the word. what if u lived in a word that money did not exsits, u could do all the experments you want. money is not needed on earth, soon as people relise that then sooner we will be better off.
Economics is the control and distribution of resources. Oggie: how do you decide who gets the research equipment? who makes the research equipment in the first place? Who supplies the materials to create the research equipment? Who supplies the food that the scientist has to eat while the scientist works on studying things? How do we decide who gets anything or who makes anything? part of the problems that people have with economic study lately is that it doesn't focus enough on production of supplies, but rather, profit margins. Tyler: Economy is simple. You have something that people need (specifically your labor) and they have something that you need (specifically money for wants and needs). You trade your labor at fair market value for their money, and then you buy the clothes. or, if you are an apple farmer, you harvest apples and can either process them into more valuable materials (apple sauce, apple cider, apple juice, apple butter/jelly, apple pies, apple preserves) or you can keep the raw material and trade to someone who owns lots of sheep who weave wool to make cloth to make clothes. finally, can we seriously ONCE have an economic discussion in which "Star Trek" doesn't come up?
Uh.....Rio.......I do know what economy is. I was asking him so that he can show me how a society would work without trade/money.
