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If you took away...

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by Mathloom, Apr 2, 2009.

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  1. JuanValdez

    JuanValdez Member

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    I don't know if you call this a technicality, but eliminating money and property will collapse the world economy and most of this country and the world would be starving in no time. At which point, it is more important than ever to build weapons and erect borders. Maybe humanity is capable of sharing, but you can't support 6 billion people like that.
     
  2. Rocketman95

    Rocketman95 Hangout Boy

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    nevermind it's just a dumb conservative stereotype.
     
  3. Mathloom

    Mathloom Shameless Optimist

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    Really?

    I don't think so. Why would we be starving in no time?

    I think you're touching on what I'm interested in..

    Are you suggesting that not only will humans not work for money, but they will not work unless they can secure defeat of other humans (secure a better living)?

    Won't the artists still paint/sing/dance? Won't the scientists still be curious?

    Also, if the world economy collapses, I don't think it matters.

    Are we such a stupid race that even with all the lessons leanred we will do the same thing? and if so, then why the hell do we nag so much about how things should be?
     
  4. rimrocker

    rimrocker Member

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  5. JuanValdez

    JuanValdez Member

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    Most people don't like their jobs. Maybe the artists and the scientists have an intrinsic motivation that will be unaffected by these abolitions. But, what about the assembly line workers, the Starbucks cashiers, the merchant marines, the accountants (who wouldn't have anything to count anyway), etc.? They produce value in their occupations, but work for extrinsic motivations. If they receive these things whether they work or not, they won't work. If they don't work, not enough food will be grown or shipped, electricity won't be generated, etc. If they must work in order to receive these things, you've reinvented barter and you're just a half-step from monetization, capital, property, and then on to borders and guns.
     
  6. bingsha10

    bingsha10 Member

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    Most of our problems are caused by scarcity and lazy people who'd rather steal from others than work.

    But hell, even if we all lived in the garden of eden there would still be the D-bags who wanted to boss everyone else around.
     
  7. Invisible Fan

    Invisible Fan Member

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    This can serve as example to highlight the faith we have in our system(s) and how it's ingrained culturally to the point where Americans take it for granted.

    Ask an Iraqi or Afghani what freedom and liberty means to them and you'll get completely different answers. And the effects in those answers reflect in governance, enforcing the rule of law, obeying the rule of law, and how people react to each other. As for us, we know that liberty is an absolute trait. It's enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, therefore it must be true! It wouldn't be called Universal if it wasn't!

    For one thing, Americans are pretty damn lucky that our transitions of power are bloodless and without incidence. Where does this come from? Bush was the most polarizing president since Nixon, yet there wasn't any rioting. Why do we, for the most part, demand that law enforcement not accept bribes for our security. And what does security mean to us compared to other people?

    Since we know and assume what security is, would it still last in utopia-like conditions? Well sure, we take the best of what we have and trash the worst. That's worked wonders in our occupied lands. The people have totally bought the system, and we would buy the utopia too should it ever happen...
     
  8. BigBenito

    BigBenito Member

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    This thread reminded me of the movie Blindness. I won't go into details to spoil the film, but that is what I expect from people if everything fails.

    (I hated Julianne Moore's character in that film, more than anyone else.)
     
  9. B-Bob

    B-Bob "94-year-old self-described dreamer"
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    Yeah, good call, on the comparison (not Julianne Moore. :mad: )

    Eliminating money and guns would result in a world where everything is like that site where you can chat with a random internetz person. Yikes.
     
  10. justtxyank

    justtxyank Member

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    I repped.

    To answer the op question, I agree with the general sentiment. If you took all of the stuff we fight over today away from us, you'd just put us back into the state of existence that led to the creation of those things in the first place. Men would start fighting over land again. You'd see strongmen return en masse who would couple groups together to try and reconstitute borders, etc.
     
  11. justtxyank

    justtxyank Member

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    Because our world is so dependent on the economic system we've instituted. Read the thread about what would happen if that sunflare catastrophe happened and knocked out our technology.
     
  12. thumbs

    thumbs Member

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    I have to jump in here because we finally agree on something. ;) :D

    On the OP's original thought, without money of some form, we would have to constantly trade -- my pig for your wheat for rhad's millwork etc. etc. That works fine when there's a few hundred of us, but now there are millions of us ... not at all workable.
     
  13. DaDakota

    DaDakota Balance wins
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    Taking away religion would be a great start.

    DD
     
  14. justtxyank

    justtxyank Member

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    You're so foolish on this matter. The people who have used religion to raise their armies would just use something else. Men waged war on this planet long before people started caring about religion.
     
  15. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    Taking away all those things is not enough
    what would need to happen is a fundamental rethinking of the means of survival

    Men would have to come to understand
    they can get more through cooperation that conflict
    ALSO
    Men would have to gain a fundamental need to DO THEIR PART for the greater good.

    People would have to learn to be better than their survival instincts

    Rocket River
     
  16. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    Taking away Capitalism would be a better start

    Rocket River
     
  17. Tb-Cain

    Tb-Cain Member

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    he shoots

    he scores
     
  18. Mathloom

    Mathloom Shameless Optimist

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    On the barter thing, I don't think I made my point clear.

    You don't own anything specific to trade nor does anyone else own anything specific to trade. We all just own everything. Sicne we require the same amount of food, clothing, housing , etc, why would there be an imbalance in trade?

    So for example, all the wheat in the world and everything that comes from it is divided by the population of earth. That's ownership. IMO no one should have to work for food.

    You're going to ask, who's going to process the food? Everyone will do their own if they have to.
     
  19. weslinder

    weslinder Member

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    God thought so, too, but the Israelites got tired of manna.
     
  20. justtxyank

    justtxyank Member

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    This world cannot work. It's idealistic hogwash. Sooner or later somebody is going to say "Man, I spend all day processing my food, I sure wish I had a machine that did it faster." He'll figure out a way to speed up his processing and start using it for profit. Or something else will happen. The nonsense of a world where we all own everything and just share everything is just that; nonsense.

    On top of everything else, even if that world functioned, we would never advance in anything because we'd all be too busy processing our food and doing construction work on our homes.
     

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