Econo-crisis

[Humodour]

I don't think that we should be at all surprised by attacks on Wall Street. If the dog craps on the carpet, you reach for the rolled up newspaper! However, I don't see this spasm translating into an effective change in the political landscape of voting America.

 

So long as the people vote for the guy with the best PR, they are going to be voting for the guy who sells himself best to big business. And that means no shift in the relationship between Congress and business.

 

I don't see that as a failing of the system, so much as a failing of the people.

 

I agree, but I'm not sure how we can fix it.

 

A start would be to improve the slightly abstract skill of critical reasoning in the voting populace. I say that because I think it's just possible one could foster that skill without getting directly political. It's a life skill so the benefits would be felt all over the damn place. However, I do sometimes wonder (in the twilight hours) whether it's just too easy for politicians to keep people dumb. I'm not saying they plan it. I'm just saying it's far far too easy to say it's far too difficult to do anything about.

 

I had this discussion with a mate of mine doing his honours in International Relations, and we came to roughly the same conclusion. Some sort of compulsory combination of ethics/abstract thinking/philosophy classes taught from an early age right through to the end of high school. Then wait a few decades for it to filter through to the populace.

 

Another good way to "keep the bastards honest" is a three party system where none of the parties have strict allegiance with each other and the support of two parties is required to form government (minority government), so that sensible bills from any party get through and bad bills from any party don't. It's harder for corporations, businesses, and lobbyists to buy out all 3 parties, especially since one of the parties that develops in a 3 party system tends to be staunchly economically centrist or centre-left. The best form of third party in this regard is an environmental party, because they are suspicious of business not due to some high-minded socialist agenda but an evidenced-based approach to environmental and social damage caused by corporate excess (and they tend to want to work within capitalism rather than replace it). Moreover the politicians of such a party, regardless of whether you agree with them, tend to be in the game for less corruptible, more altruistic reasons.

 

Thankfully, this situation exists in many Western democracies now (New Zealand, Australia, Britain, lots of European democracies).

 

It is very difficult for this situation to develop in America and Canada because of their shockingly bad electoral systems (although to the credit of the Americans, they do at least have a decent house of review in their senate), and I can't see it continuing into the next term in Britain either for the same reasons (although the fact that it managed to happen in Britain at all surprised me).

[213374U]

I had this discussion with a mate of mine doing his honours in International Relations, and we came to roughly the same conclusion. Some sort of compulsory combination of ethics/abstract thinking/philosophy classes taught from an early age right through to the end of high school. Then wait a few decades for it to filter through to the populace.

And what if people failed? You'd withhold their voting license? I doubt this would work. People would just cheat their way through, requirements would be reduced to the lowest common denominator... etc. It's happening with grades inflation and the general decrease in the actual worth of degrees. You cannot just shoehorn critical thinking into people, much like you cannot enforce physical fitness.

 

When the day-to-day worth of a skill is lost, the prevalence of the skill itself is diluted. You don't need independent, self-formed criteria to purchase and operate an iPhone, get through college with decent grades, land an okay job and a moderately nice house and get along with most people. Now go ahead and tell me that's not what occupies most people's thoughts.

 

What itt is called "critical thinking" is the extension and development of the natural mechanisms for systematization based on the coordination of memory and observation, present in the brain. Those obviously evolved to better guarantee the survival of the species. Today, that kind of thing simply no longer provides a survival or reproductive edge, and so, they have atrophied.

 

So, in short, I guess that, despite all the gloom and doom talk, we still live really good and easy lives.

 

 

Another good way to "keep the bastards honest" is a three party system where none of the parties have strict allegiance with each other and the support of two parties is required to form government (minority government), so that sensible bills from any party get through and bad bills from any party don't. It's harder for corporations, businesses, and lobbyists to buy out all 3 parties, especially since one of the parties that develops in a 3 party system tends to be staunchly economically centrist or centre-left. The best form of third party in this regard is an environmental party, because they are suspicious of business not due to some high-minded socialist agenda but an evidenced-based approach to environmental and social damage caused by corporate excess (and they tend to want to work within capitalism rather than replace it). Moreover the politicians of such a party, regardless of whether you agree with them, tend to be in the game for less corruptible, more altruistic reasons.

I think you have a rather romantic (and manichaean) view of politicians, with "true" left-wingers as incorruptible, and right-wingers as inherently vulnerable to corporate kickbacks. And I'm sorry, but all the self-styled "greens" I've met were both scientifically unfit -despite some being scientists themselves (!)- and extremely intolerant of any ideas or viewpoints outside their accepted theses. I tend to mistrust people who view themselves as wise enough to educate on right and wrong so lightly. I don't question their supposed altruism, but the path to hell is paved with good intentions.

 

Also, your proposed system tends to give undue weight to the minority party, which gets to call the shots where otherwise they wouldn't, so one of the two big ones gets their way against the wishes of the other. Trust me, I've seen it happen with regionalist groups. It's one of my country's worst problems.

[Walsingham]

I have to agree with Numbers. You've recently adopted a somewhat mesianic fervour about green policies which I just don't see justified by all the (many) green politicals I've met. As archbishop Desmond Tutu would say: they're bonkers in a big way. We're talking human culls, compulsory closure of factories, eugenics. It's pure dreaming outside of a dictatorship, and I'd rather be picking dessicated penguin out of my teeth in the Birmingham desert than live under a dictatorship.

 

Also as Numbers points out you can't impose an academic test as a means of delivering voting rights. It's far too easy to abuse. But what you CAN do is to make it a part of the curriculum, and at least get keen people thinking logically. It's not beyond schoolchildren. I know a couple of public boarding schools who teach it as young as 14!

[Humodour]

I had this discussion with a mate of mine doing his honours in International Relations, and we came to roughly the same conclusion. Some sort of compulsory combination of ethics/abstract thinking/philosophy classes taught from an early age right through to the end of high school. Then wait a few decades for it to filter through to the populace.

And what if people failed? You'd withhold their voting license?

 

People fail subjects in school all the time. They still take something out of it. A person's performance in a critical thinking class is not relevant to their right to vote, but would in many cases hopefully inform it.

 

And I'm sorry, but all the self-styled "greens" I've met

 

Meet more then? There are quite a few centre-right greens parties (and greenies) out there. Plenty of them here in Aus. Although unfortunately some of the economically far-left element has hopped on the green bandwagon, too, since hardcore socialist parties continually fail to gain representation, but this fringe element is unable to dominate because their ideas are unpalatable to sensible people. I say unfortunately because these are the type of people that still go around calling for the overthrow of capitalism. It's stupid, and damages the core messages of the green movement. But hey, the economic liberals have a similar problem with idiot social conservatives hijacking their movement. Nitwits like the Tea Party movement, etc. Yet in no way does their existence cheapen the concept of economic liberalisation.

 

I have to agree with Numbers. You've recently adopted a somewhat mesianic fervour about green policies which I just don't see justified by all the (many) green politicals I've met. As archbishop Desmond Tutu would say: they're bonkers in a big way. We're talking human culls, compulsory closure of factories, eugenics. It's pure dreaming outside of a dictatorship, and I'd rather be picking dessicated penguin out of my teeth in the Birmingham desert than live under a dictatorship.

 

No, we are not. I'm sick of dealing with people like you who portray us that way. Stop jumping to conclusions. The first and fundamental principle of green parties (the political movement, not necessarily environmental groups), is adherence to human rights in all government policy. That's a far cry from eugenics and forced euthanasia bull****.

 

Also as Numbers points out you can't impose an academic test as a means of delivering voting rights. It's far too easy to abuse. But what you CAN do is to make it a part of the curriculum, and at least get keen people thinking logically. It's not beyond schoolchildren. I know a couple of public boarding schools who teach it as young as 14!

 

I didn't. I proposed compulsory ethics and abstract thinking classes in school (alongside maths and English) so that when the future generations do go to vote they hopefully approach the ballot box with more insight than the generations before them. There was nothing in this proposal which tied their performance in these classes to their right to vote - don't jump to conclusions!

[Orogun01]

I personally think that giving classes in ethics to teenagers and children is a waste of money. Teenagers will see them as either an outlet for them to stand out from the crowd (trying to pull a Will Hunting) or completely irrelevant to their lives, in both cases they are not taking much from the experience. With kids you run 2 risks, they often don't think in relative terms and they can grow out of it.

[Walsingham]

I personally think that giving classes in ethics to teenagers and children is a waste of money. Teenagers will see them as either an outlet for them to stand out from the crowd (trying to pull a Will Hunting) or completely irrelevant to their lives, in both cases they are not taking much from the experience. With kids you run 2 risks, they often don't think in relative terms and they can grow out of it.

 

Surely ANY enterprise has associated risks. I didn't say teaching the subject would be easy. You're right kids don't handle abstarcts well. But teenagers (IMO) always respond t ooffers to put power in their hands. YOu offer them a way to think more clearly, avoid being exploited, buy cheaper, spot dangers... I think they would respond.

[Asol]

I personally think that giving classes in ethics to teenagers and children is a waste of money. Teenagers will see them as either an outlet for them to stand out from the crowd (trying to pull a Will Hunting) or completely irrelevant to their lives, in both cases they are not taking much from the experience. With kids you run 2 risks, they often don't think in relative terms and they can grow out of it.

 

Surely ANY enterprise has associated risks. I didn't say teaching the subject would be easy. You're right kids don't handle abstarcts well. But teenagers (IMO) always respond t ooffers to put power in their hands. YOu offer them a way to think more clearly, avoid being exploited, buy cheaper, spot dangers... I think they would respond.

 

 

Idealistically down the road individual ethics and social responsibility have to rebound in major way. Permaculture has to be a central principle, with not even minute robberies and borrowings from oncoming generations being acceptable. I would say ethics are presently difficult to instill because the youth encounter nothing but wide spread consumerism and flagrant degeneracy. They would rightly consider various ethical points a handy cap in practice no matter how idealistic they felt. The phases of life and living generations in those phases need to be reintegrated instead of having broad institutionalized education, employment and retirement schemes. The present scheme enables a kind of inter-generational prisoners dilemma, everyone is concerned with their own personal 'get overs' while the institutions just enable it but don't actually bear the weight. People need to be trained to respect their biological base and have their needs met though as local means and schemes as can be made possible with as much personal contribution as they are able.

 

Essentially permaculture principles need to be integrated in all aspects of social design otherwise we can sit and pray that scientists and politicians can find a new finger for every new crack in the damn... What people are valuing as their freedom now are ultimately destructive principles, people manage misery and apathy event though they live in the height of comfort and wealth compared to history, clearly we need people on board with a new value system in line with permaculture ethics.

[213374U]

People fail subjects in school all the time. They still take something out of it.

Do they? Even disregarding the fact that keeping a fit brain is a lifelong commitment, you are simply ignoring how many adults can't seem to remember some basic facts they supposedly learned in school like say, the date of the storming of the Bastille, what the flaming crap is a cosine, or that Albania is not only a country, but it's also in friggin' Europe.

 

So forgive me if I don't buy into your idea that a compulsory 3-hour per week class would make a dent on the ongoing stupidification of developed societies. And let's also not forget, while we're at it, how an "ethics" class oriented towards "fostering critical thinking" is open to abuse, when in fact the ultimate goal is to make "citizens". Yes, I also know of this for a fact, because it's been one of our waste-of-skin's president brilliant ideas. I've read the books.

 

Also: there are few disciplines more abstract in nature than math. Math is already compulsory. It's not helping any.

 

 

Meet more then?

You got it the other way around. It doesn't matter that there are a few sensible greens -fabled creatures such as they are- The problem is that most greens are seriously disconnected from reality -historical, scientific and economic- and fanatically proud of it. It sure goes without saying that it's not the moderates who get to establish party programs.

[Tigranes]

There was an interesting French documentary last year where a researcher/teacher went in and taught philosophy to a group of kindergarten children - I think from age 3 to 5, or 5 to 7, or something like that. Obviously they didn't emerge with some kind of systematic framework out of it, or even an understanding of the widely accepted definition of philosophy, but more importantly it was amazing how going from year to year they developed certain ways of looking at things and thinking in the abstract (they were able to handle the abstractness of, say, a concept like death), even if they couldn't articulate what they were doing. The necessary margin for sensationalisation as a documentary aside, I absolutely think that the growing momentum for an educational overhaul (esp. in the US but elsewhere) needs to be harnessed for a revival of ethics/philosophy/etc from primary right through to tertiary education.

 

The problem is that the social sciences still has not been able to reassert itself and really declare its legitimacy in the world at large - they took some big uppercuts and have been reeling for decades since, if we look at how they fare against the natural sciences in those kind of decisions (hence the major cuts to humanities in universities post 2008 - they weren't able to articulate why what they study is useful to the world / university as well). There's possibilities here but there needs to be a concerted effort from political science, philosophy, psychology et al to show that it really is important to know these things as a society and from a young age, and not just for the vague result of "better human beings".

 

Of course, this would work best if coupled together, as I say, with an overhaul of education whose principal mal du siecle is apathy and disengagement of its students - there is no longer a sense of everything being in its right place anymore in the classroom. Numbers' critique works in the sense that if you just threw in a random philosophy class that made no effort to properly mediate the contemporary field of philosophy, well, you'll see most clearly that a lot of humanities has its arses up in the clouds (and I say that as someone inside). Ethics and philosophy isn't about learning a corpus of facts, building up a knowledge bank - that is arguably the worst possible way to try and introduce it as an institutionalised subject. A properly taught philosophy has to be, through and through, about the way you see things and make your decisions, and has to be connected at every possible juncture to real tasks of organisation, mediation, deliberation, PR, politics, and activism. I don't think it's a lost cause - but it might require too much of our current systems to do it right.