Marvel Universe

Systemic Causation v. Greed

"While causation can sometimes be explained by intentional actions and sometimes by systemic interactions, too often the results of systemic interactions are falsely explained by individual intentions. Just as primitive peoples tended to attribute such things as the swaying of trees in the wind to some intentional action by an invisible spirit, rather than to such systemic causes as variations in atmospheric pressure, so there is a tendency toward intentional explanations of systemic events in the economy, when people are unaware of basic economic principles. For example, while rising prices are likely to reflect changes in supply and demand, people ignorant of economics may attribute the rises to 'greed'...To say that prices are due to greed is to imply that sellers can set prices by an act of will. If so, no company would ever go bankrupt, since it could simply raise its prices to cover whatever its costs happened to be. But the systemic interactions of the marketplace through supply and demand force the high-cost company to keep its prices down to where their competitors' prices are, thereby leading to losses and bankruptcy. Charging higher prices would simply mean more losses of sales and faster bankruptcy."

emphasis mine, Thomas Sowell.

Something obviously went wrong. Prices were raised, companies did go bankrupt, greed is part of the explanation of the financial crisis. Yet, I am of the opinion that the general thrust of the free-market system is effective. The free-market system failed, not because the principles of economics are unsound, but because it left out the law. Regulation is needed to ensure people do not 'cheat' when they are greedy.

New York Times backs Obama

"After two years of a gruelling campaign, senator Barack Obama has proven that he is the right choice for president. Mr Obama has met challenge after challenge, growing as a leader and putting real flesh on his promises of hope and change. He has shown a cool head and sound judgment. We believe he has the will and the ability to forge the broad political consensus needed to solve this nation's problems. At the same time, senator John McCain has retreated even farther to the fringe of politics, running a campaign on partisan division, class warfare and even hints of racism. His policies and worldview are mired in the past. His choice of a running mate so clearly unfit for office was a final act of opportunism and bad judgment that eclipsed his 26 years in congress."

Pork and Beans

"Im'ma do the things that I wanna do
I ain't got a thing to prove to you
I'll eat my candy with the pork and beans
Excuse my manners if I make a scene
I ain't gonna wear the clothes that you like
I'm fine and dandy with the me inside
One look in the mirror and i'm tickled pink
I don't give a hoot about what you think."

Weezer

Why markets are left to run on their own

"While markets coordinated by price movements – “capitalism” as it is called – may seem like a simple thing, markets are misunderstood more often than some other things that are considered more complex. Although a free market economic system is sometimes called a profit system, it is in reality a profit-and-loss system – and the losses are equally important for the efficiency of the economy, because losses tell producers what to stop producing. Without really knowing why consumers like one set of features rather than another, producers automatically produce more of what earns a profit and less of what is losing money. That amounts to producing what the consumers want and stopping the production of what they don’t want. Although the producers are only looking out for themselves and their companies’ bottom line, nevertheless from the standpoint of the economy as a whole the society is using its scarce resources more efficiently because decisions are guided by prices."

Thomas Sowell

Choice is Tiresome

"Most of the work that most people have to do is not in itself interesting, but even such work has certain great advantages. To begin with, it fills a good many hours of the day without the need of deciding what one shall do. Most people, when they are left free to fill their own time according to their own choice are at a loss to think of anything sufficiently pleasant to be worth doing. And whatever they decide on, they are troubled by the feeling that something else would have been pleasanter. To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilisation, and at present very few people have reached this level."

Bertrand Russell

The part that never made it to print

A hasty definition of class, by citing Marx, Weber, or prominent class theorists, give an impression of ipse dixit, which in Latin means ‘he himself said it’. It can be argued that this is a logical fallacy because the truth-value of an assertion stems from an appeal to authority. It is, however, not in the interest of this researcher to make such an argument. I want to highlight the fact that the infallibility of theoretical authority cannot be taken-for-granted for and ‘class’ should, in the element of sociology, be problematized and contextualized.

Class is usually understood vis-à-vis stratification. Social stratification is an institutionalized system of social relationships that determines who gets what and why (Kerbo 2006:10). Class is often defined as a grouping of individuals with similar positions and economic interests within the stratification system. Definitions of class focus on the characteristics of a group of individuals. Yet, class is not merely a category, class is a term that carries with it the philosophical baggage of inequality whether intended or not. In essence, when one uses the term class, it implies there is inequality - there is a group of individuals that have more or less access to resources, services and positions. The question of ‘what is class’ is tacitly and necessarily informed by the question of ‘what causes class’. To answer ‘what is class’ without answering the ‘what causes class’ is to assume class is axiomatic; and consequently imply that inequality exists ipso facto. Yet, we cannot know ‘what causes class’ unless we first know ‘what is class’. Any class-based study has to have a working conception of class before knowing what can cause it. This as much is inevitable. Therefore, to understand class, it is important to answer both questions.

The Ant, the Spider and the Bee

"Those who have handled sciences have been either men of experiment or men of dogmas. The men of experiment are like the ant, they only collect and use; the reasoners resemble spiders, who make cobwebs out of their own substance. But the bee takes a middle course: it gathers its material from the flowers of the garden and of the field, but transforms and digests it by a power of its own. Not unlike this is the true business of philosophy; for it neither relies solely or chiefly on the powers of the mind, nor does it take the matter which it gathers from natural history and mechanical experiments and lay it up in the memory whole, as it finds it, but lays it up in the understanding altered and digested. Therefore from a closer and purer league between the two faculties, the experimental and the rational, much may be hoped."

Francis Bacon

Plato versus Thrasymachus

'Plato thinks he can prove that his ideal Republic is good; a democrat who accepts the objectivity of ethics may think that he can prove the Republic bad; but any one who agrees with Thrasymachus [that justice is nothing else than the interest of the stronger] will say: "There is no question of proving or disproving; the only question is whether you like the kind of State that Plato desires. If you do, it is good for you; if you do not, it is bad for you. If many do and many do not, the decision cannot be made by reason, but only by force, actual or concealed."'

Bertrand Russell

Insouciance

"A dog will bark more loudly and bite more readily when people are afraid of him than when they treat him with contempt, and the human herd has something of this same characteristic."

Bertrand Russell

Escape I

"Our doings are not so important as we naturally suppose; our successes and failures do not after all matter very much. Even great sorrows can be survived; troubles which seem as if they must put an end to happiness for life fade with the lapse of time until it becomes almost impossible to remember their poignancy. But over and above these self-centred considerations is the fact that one's ego is no very large part of the world. The man who can centre his thoughts and hopes upon something transcending self can find a certain peace in the ordinary troubles of life which is impossible to the pure egoist."

Bertrand Russell

If rivers were wise, they'd stay still

"The habit of looking to the future and thinking that the whole meaning of the present lies in what it will bring forth is a pernicious one. There can be no value in the whole unless there is value in the parts. Life is not to be conceived on the analogy of a melodrama in which the hero and heroine go through incredible misfortunes for which they are compensated by a happy ending."

Bertrand Russell

Hyper-imagination

What's worse than having the difficulty to sleep is the torture of having to be conscious.