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From: Jim Kalb
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Subject: Re: Socialism and Abortion
Comments: To: bit-listserv-catholic@uunet.uu.net
Alexander R Pruss writes:
>: The usual conception of "social justice" is that everyone has the same
>: rights and obligations, and no-one is required to make a contribution
>: not equally laid on others
>
>the principle should say (3) "no-one is required to make a contribution
>NOT EQUALLY LAID ON THOSE OTHERS WHO ARE IN LIKE CIRCUMSTANCES AND
>CONDITIONS."
As restated the principle is an immediate consequence of the view that
obligations are governed by rules. It is purely logical and therefore
empty. "Social justice" is however a fighting faith. Therefore your
restatement may say something valid but what it sets forth is not the
principle of social justice as understood by someone who thinks of
social justice as one of his basic political commitments.
People who think "social justice" is important don't mean simply that
like cases should be treated alike (for example, that ALL noblemen
should be exempt from certain taxes). They also mean that social
institutions, expectations, habits, standards of value and conduct,
etc. should be reconstructed to reduce the frequency and importance of
situations in which differing circumstances justify differing
treatment. They therefore look for ways in which social treatment of
sex, gender and related matters could be changed to establish equality
of the sexes in as literal and complete a fashion as possible. Since
denial of the right to have an abortion is radically adverse to that
end it is very difficult for them to accept it.
>By your original "social justice" principle, it is wrong to require
>those who have incurred the debt to pay it back, unless the paying back
>is spread among all people in the population.
Quite true. Debtor's relief legislation has commonly been justified on
grounds of social justice. Communists and socialists are uneasy with
private property (the whole institution of borrowing money and paying it
back depends on private property) and especially don't like banks.
To avoid misunderstanding: the foregoing relates to the conception of
social justice held by the secular left, which I do not share. My
intention is to answer the original question, why it is that socialist
and communist parties typically favor abortion rights so strongly. I
myself oppose abortion rights.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Depardieu, go razz a rogue I draped.
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Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 13:18:34 -0500
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From: Jim Kalb
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Subject: Re: Socialism and Abortion
Comments: To: bit-listserv-catholic@uunet.uu.net
In <5hr9os$hfj@usenet.srv.cis.pitt.edu> Alexander R Pruss
writes:
>See Nagel's book _The Possibility of Altruism_, most of which is
>designed precisely to argue for this point.
Thanks for the reference.
>It is necessary at the least to distinguish between circumstances
>which can be reasonably reconstructed and those that cannot reasonably
>be restructured.
The Left tends to be reluctant to do so. They are suspicious of
theories of unchangeable human nature and strongly inclined to explain
things as socially constructed. They are adverse to putting limits on
the ultimate possibilities of what they understand as progress.
>They may have _government_ lending offices. The communists (at least
>in Poland) _did_ have a state run bank, and it did lend in some cases.
The notion of borrowing though is that the borrowed money is
temporarily treated as one's own. There seems something uncommunistic
about it. One difficulty of talking about all this is that the Left
does not view any existing social arrangements or system of morality as
final -- they're all evolving in the direction of increasing human
emancipation with no limits that can now be assigned.
>But once a person enters into a different normative situation, her
>situation does change, and her duties do change--- for some
>considerations, she can no longer be compared with other persons in
>general, but only with those in her situation.
The usual test of social justice on the Left, though, is the equality
of the actual distribution of benefits and burdens rather than whether
the distribution can be justified by reference to what happened in the
past.
>I did not know the reasoning you stated was the reasoning they had
>applied. It's good to know, because should it happen that I am
>debating a communist on the issue, now I will know that the thing to
>do is to center on the principle of "social justice".
Another problem is that what I am doing is reconstructing as a concrete
line of reasoning a set of tendencies among people with whom I
disagree. I believe the reconstruction is broadly accurate, though.
Liberal-to-leftish lawyers in America, for example, continually come
back to the goal of establishing the practical equality of the sexes as
the decisive reason for viewing abortion as a woman's right.
>I know that I would have been badly hurt had someone misattributed
>such a view to me. Please forgive me, brother.
One posting led two people neither of them fools to attribute beliefs
to me that I don't hold. The problem I suspect was with the posting.
If I thought there was anything to forgive I would of course say "I
forgive you".
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Depardieu, go razz a rogue I draped.
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From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Defining Fundamentalism (was: Jehovah's Witnesses Attack Fu
Date: 1 Apr 1997 22:39:51 -0500
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jrghgb@worldaccess.nl (J.R.Grit) writes:
>God is not a thing and no person (at least not in the ordinary sense of
>these words) - this is fundamental. So I don't mean to set the standard
>for knowledge of God higher - rather, it is the "object" that defies
>our knowledge. Tell me, what positive natural knowledge do we have of
>God? Can you give me some examples? Do these exceed mere conjecture?
All our knowledge has a conjectural element, and relates to things we
cannot fully grasp. Descartes might lead you to except first-person-
singular present-tense conscious experience, but without the aid of
memory we can't attain determinate knowledge even of that, so
uncertainty infects it as well at least if we want to say anything
definite.
As to God -- it seems to me we can have natural knowledge of good and
evil, and of rational order in the world. We recognize both as
independent of us and our beliefs, intentions etc., but neither it
seems to me makes sense except by reference to some mind and will for
which they are unchangingly good, evil, rational. Therefore it seems
to me we have natural knowledge of a righteous and omniscient God.
Romans 1:18 ff. The Buddhists perhaps don't agree with me, but very
likely there are those who disagree with you about what you consider
your natural knowledge of chairs, trees and electrons.
>The problem is that God not like any other concrete object or subject
>but nevertheless regarded "real" by believers. What kind of knowledge
>are we talking about here?
The feeling that there is something very very odd about God and
knowledge of him follows I think from the feeling that we fully
understand other things or at least have them well under control. If
you think that the world of our experience involves just one kind of
real thing -- the kind physicists talk about maybe -- and we can know
things of that kind completely then God is indeed a problem.
That's an illusion, though. There are lots of kinds of real things
that enter into our world and we can't think or act without reference
to them. There are the things physical theories describe, there are
mathematical objects, there are universals, there are subjective
experiences, there is good and evil, there are _Dinge an sich_, there
is the Whole, etc. All of those things are mysterious to a greater or
lesser degree, but nonetheless we are able to an extent to know them
and speak truly of them.
>Knowing worldly items, things and persons can be described as a matter
>of synthetic judgement: we unite the particular (originating in
>perception) with the universal (our "ideas"). Would you say that this
>is what happens when we recognize God in Jesus Christ? This is not
>something I would say so quickly. This would imply that we have the
>perfect idea of God in our heads with which we are able to identify God
>in this particular human being.
No, only that we have an idea of God that is in fact an idea of God.
Recognizing you as a person is not the same as uniting my perception of
varying light and shade on my computer screen with an idea in my head
which is somehow perfect. For one thing to recognize you as a person is
to recognize that you are independent of my knowledge and might be very
different from what I think.
>That's why I keep stressing the Ceasarea-Philippi story. I take Jesus'
>words in Matthew 16:17 to mean that we are not able to recognize the
>"object" Jesus as the Christ the Son of the living God unless God makes
>us inwardly able to see what we can recognize in this person Jesus.
It's difficult to sort the issues out. It seems to me that were it not
for sin we would be able to recognize Jesus as the Christ without
special illumination.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Depardieu, go razz a rogue I draped.
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From: Jim Kalb
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Subject: Re: Socialism and Abortion
Comments: To: bit-listserv-catholic@uunet.uu.net
Alexander R Pruss writes:
>we're always going to have more and less intelligent people, more and
>less strong people, more and less altruistic people, people more prone
>to cancer and people less prone to cancer, people better at painting
>and people better at poetry, people better at mathematics and people
>better at chemistry, people better at cooking and people better at
>sewing.
What then is an egalitarian to do? Some possibilities:
1. Special training to make people more equal. If girls tend to be
less aggressive than boys give them special assertiveness training.
2. Reconstructing social arrangements so differences matter less. If
a telephone lineman's job requires too much upper body strength for most
women redesign the job.
3. Reconstruct social patterns of evaluation so differences are judged
to matter less. If competition creates losers as well as winners get
rid of competition and give every child a prize for being the special
person he is. If application of usual standards (of scholarly
achievement or whatever) interfere with diversity then change the
standards. If the view that the bond between mother and child, before
or after birth, is special and involves special obligations not shared
equally by father and ultimately society at large makes it more
difficult for women to advance themselves in the market and bureaucracy,
then change that view.
>I would suspect that most people who identify themselves as socialists
>hold to a moral system which to a large extent agrees with ours (one
>should keep promises, one can have at least some private property, one
>should not break contracts, etc.), though they supplement this with
>socialist ideas, and maybe they add the "social justice" principle
>without realizing how extreme this principle is---that it destroys
>essentially ALL common sense morality.
Social justice is a perpetual task, and common sense a summary of
existing social practice. The latter is presumptively invalid when it
conflicts with the former. That's why an expression like "deeply rooted
social stereotype" is derogatory. How to transform what seems to be
common sense in accordance with the present demands of social justice
can be viewed as the basic issue of progressive politics. While instant
utopia is not a possibility our present common-sense moral
understandings are only provisional. They will evolve in the future as
they have in the past. Such I think is the view.
Analogously, one might say that the Gospel sets us a perpetual task and
calls us to transform our lives into something very much at odds with
the common everyday sense of how things usually are, what works
practically, what we're used to, what people expect, etc. In the
course of that transformation all our present understandings will be
transformed; we now see through a glass, darkly. I Corinthians 13:12.
The basic issue I think is whether it makes more sense to have as one's
ultimate goal the knowledge and love of God, or man's self-legislation
with every man a full and equal participant. Once the goal has been
chosen there are certain similarities in process between Christianity
and the Left.
>Has it occured to them that one way to establish ultimate equality of
>the sexes vis-a-vis pregnancy is simply to sterilize the whole
>population, so that nobody will bear children, and hence no woman will
>have the "unfair burden" of bearing a child, a burden not shared by men?
One could approximate such a situation locally by having a very low
birth rate, easily available abortion and plenty of publicly funded day
care etc. in one's own political society and maintaining the population
by immigration.
The contemporary Left are not of course the first to notice that the
particularity and peremptory arbitrary demands of the flesh make it
hard to live straightforwardly in accordance with the spirit, whether
of God or equality. People who are ambitious for perfection don't
marry, and people who are ambition for a society to be perfect (Plato,
founders of monastic orders, serious egalitarians) get rid of marriage
as an institution.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Depardieu, go razz a rogue I draped.
From neocon-request@abdn.ac.uk Thu Apr 3 08:38:50 1997
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From: Jim Kalb
Message-Id: <199704031103.GAA24088@panix.com>
Subject: Re: Keyes on the First Things Flap
To: BillR54619@AOL.COM
Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 06:03:54 -0500 (EST)
Cc: neocon@abdn.ac.uk
In-Reply-To: <970402113438_-1805131014@emout14.mail.aol.com> from "BillR54619@aol.com" at Apr 2, 97 11:35:05 am
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Bill comments:
> Perhaps it was that you managed to attack Keyes from the libertarian
> flank after all, while at the same time preserving your Ibn Kaldun
> theory of national disintegration.
The two lines of thought go together. The IK theory is that the public
moral culture has too little content to support the self-government of
society as a whole. The government of society as a whole must
therefore be based on the will of a small group. Under such
circumstances the claim that the only legitimate government is based on
consent is really a claim that to feel at odds in a morally fundamental
way with the ruling group is to be at war with the social order. On
such a theory the _First Things_ symposiasts become just like people
who bomb government buildings. Podhoretz said as much in so many
words. The theory is thus an instrument of spiritual tyranny.
> If all cultures are social;ly constructed, how do I distinguish
> between the bogus and illegitimate forms of culture (i.e. Soviet
> society, since we don't have any Soviets around to defend themselves)
> and the natural, legitimate cultures that Edmund Burke would find
> worthy of protection against the tyrannies of the system?
The question seems to be how to distinguish tyranny and constitutional
government. One criterion is distribution of power and authority
outside a small group and the need for cooperation of independent
powers in getting things done. Another is whether the ruling group
defines its own powers or depends for its power and authority on a
pre-established political order. Another is whether all significant
social institutions are regarded as political -- subject to government
administration and if need be reconstruction.
> Have I made myself clear enough ?
You'll have to judge from my answers.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Depardieu, go razz a rogue I draped.
From jk@panix.com Sun Apr 6 06:19:17 1997
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From: Jim Kalb
Message-Id: <199704061012.GAA18671@panix.com>
Subject: Re: Christian Morality/Ethics versus Nudity in Art
To: jonw@beresford.co.uk (Jonathan Webster)
Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 06:12:27 -0400 (EDT)
Cc: Anglican@du.edu
In-Reply-To: from "Jonathan Webster" at Apr 5, 97 11:52:58 pm
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> > Do you believe it is always sinful to portray nudity in art? First
> > of all one must I suppose define what art is (I leave that part
> > open to the loosest interpretation).
>
> No, of course not, where do you dredge up the notion that nudity
> portrayed is sinful?
There's an issue here, though. I don't know if there's such a thing as
a theology of clothing, but there are proverbs like "clothes make the
man."
Our need to wear clothing has something to do with our construction of
social identity, and social identity has to do with the way we agree to
view each other as persons rather than objects (for example of lust).
The nakedness of Christ when he was crucified was not the same as that
of Adam and Eve before the Fall. After the Fall A. and E. felt the
need of clothing to recreate enough of the dignity they had lost to
make ordinary life possible. Christ's nakedness was therefore part of
his suffering.
So it seems that nudity in art or in "art" depersonalizes. Stripping
of personality can be part of idealization or abstract representation,
as in the nudity of gods, Michael Angelo's David or the representative
men in his Last Judgement. It can also be a violation.
> > Secondly do you believe it is wrong to look upon such a portait?
>
> No, of course not, unless of course you consider the naked body to be
> dirty.
You seem to suggest that the two possible ways of viewing the human
body are "dirty" and "natural object in space" or something like that.
Our attitudes toward the body and nakedness are *far* more complicated.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
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From: Jim Kalb
Message-Id: <199704061306.JAA05022@panix.com>
Subject: Re: Keyes on the First Things Flap
To: BillR54619@AOL.COM
Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 09:06:22 -0400 (EDT)
Cc: neocon@abdn.ac.uk
In-Reply-To: <970405224605_922257273@emout09.mail.aol.com> from "BillR54619@aol.com" at Apr 5, 97 10:46:05 pm
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Bill Riggs says:
>> The I[bn] K[haldun] theory is that the public moral culture has too
>> little content to support the self-government of society as a whole.
>> The government of society as a whole must therefore be based on the
>> will of a small group.
>
>Gaddis goes on to stress that it was the political dialectic between
>the US and Soviet hegemony (almost a Manichaen power system, one might
>say) that legitimized America's role.
The suggestion seems to be that even if the public moral culture has
very little content there is likely nonetheless to be enough there for
people to accept as legitimate the rule of what I call a small group and
you call a hegemon. For example, there might be a widespread desire to
manage in peace the things that concern one most. I think that's right.
If so, legitimacy will depend among other things on the hegemon
restricting his rule to a narrow range of issues. That is something
governments today find it very difficult to do. My theory of course
predicts that the despotisms of the future will do very little apart
from maintaining crude public order and extracting what taxes they can.
>I'm trying to square this thought by hypothesizing an American
>hegemony in world politics that is somehow illegitimate.
It would be illegitimate if its acceptance as legitimate were by
governments that were themselves illegitimate, for example if everyone
everywhere felt about their national governments the way American right-
wingers feel about theirs, and the American hegemony were a NWO
supported by those national governments and designed to prop them up.
(For those who aren't into right-wing speak, "NWO" = New World Order.)
>And I'm still puzzling over the notion that [Keyes] views amount to a
>justification of tyranny.
It's more that the presuppositions of his view (which Neuhaus and other
_First Things_ syposiasts share!) make it hard to avoid justifying
tyranny under present circumstances. If the alternative is either to
give moral consent to our rulers' principles or promote the war of all
against all, then "bellyfeel Engsoc" does seem a moral imperative for
whatever the local equivalent of Engsoc is. The view that government
need not be based on consent delivers us from that alternative.
>I think that this brings our government, any government somewhat in
>conflict with elements of society, with culture cultures, and
>subcultures. Keyes denies this, and strongly equates the political
>culture with the underlying social culture and milieu.
Contemporary (liberal) political thought doesn't like the idea of
coercion. Keyes and the _First Things_ symposiasts agree with
contemporary liberalism on that. My point is that denying the
necessity of coercion and claiming that consent is the only legitimate
basis of government has the practical effect of requiring a more
profound system of coercion whose existence is denied. The notion
becomes that those who reject the fundamental moral principles of the
regime are inhuman monsters who reject social order as such. That is
why Anthony Lewis believes that the essence of the right-to-life
movement is murder. Since it rejects the established moral order it
must as it appears to him stand for the mere supremacy of its own will
over all other wills.
>But suppose I just flat out rejected that such a dualism can exist,
>that a man cannot serve two masters, and must love the one and abuse
>the other ? Would I not therefore be required to determine which
>culture has authority over me, can make legitimate demands on my
>freedom, and which culture I shall selectively support, at best, and
>actively undermine, at worst.
If morality is a social construction there can be no distinction
between God and Caesar. To fail to join with those who create the
God/Caesar through the coherence of their wills is then to destroy all
morality.
That is not of course to say that God and Caesar can not come in
conflict even if recognized as different authorities both of which are
valid.
>> One criterion is distribution of power and authority outside a small
>> group and the need for cooperation of independent powers in getting
>> things done.
>
>I wonder how this differentiates from "mere pluralism" in a
>consitutional democracy.
For a society to be tolerable there has to be some sort of accommodation
between unity and diversity, freedom and authority, etc. If the need
for authority is denied we'll get some combination of force and fraud as
a substitute. Talk of "pluralism" often sounds like one-sided
sloganeering to me, as if unity and authority were not necessary.
>Are you espousing a form a pluralism in which there is a sort of
>central "power elite" independent of the interest group heirarchies, or
>what one would call the "opinion leaders", the leadership of the
>competing interest groups ? And how much do the elites within these
>interest groups have in common with the "power elite" ?
No. The view you present treats political society as a construction
from power relations. I treat it as moral unity in diversity. The
existence of that unity is validated if power relations are not
sufficient for the practical functioning of society -- that is, if
voluntary cooperation is needed. That cooperation must be brought
about through agreement on the public good; common interests are not
sufficient.
Sufficient agreement and cooperation may not always be present. That
is another way of saying that secession, civil war or despotism is
sometimes inevitable.
>> Another is whether the ruling group defines its own powers or
>> depends for its power and authority on a pre-established political
>> order.
>
>Could this be a little of both ?
For sure. No government can be either perfectly constitutional or
perfectly tyrannical.
>But being a bit of a statist, I do tend to take comfort in those social
>institutions sponsored by the state, for the enrichment and wellbeing
>of the citizens. I can even listen to free concerts at the National
>Gallery of Art without guilt.
I have no objection in principle to them. If they attempt to play too
comprehensive a role there are problems though. Free concerts at the
National Gallery are one thing; a general system of goverment
sponsorship of art and art education another.
>I still have this feeling that something is missing here, and it is
>causing me to ramble.
I also have the feeling that issue has not been joined.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Mon Apr 7 09:01:33 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
~From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
~Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
~Subject: Re: Sooooo, Now We Know Why There Is So Much Child Abuse
~Date: 7 Apr 1997 08:41:48 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
~Lines: 15
Message-ID: <5iaq2c$ae1@panix.com>
~References: <5i8jro$3md@basement.replay.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <5i8jro$3md@basement.replay.com> nobody@REPLAY.COM (Anonymous) writes:
>Equality for women has turned women into nothing short of HORROR
>BITCHES on wheels, and men are turning on children as an outlet.
>Excuse me for being blunt about it, but the only natural, functional
>order to things is to have women on the bottom.
It does seem that the notion that the relations between the sexes are
to be based solely on contract and individual preference leads to
brutality and perversion. Still, this language strikes me as more a
manifestation than an analysis of the situation.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Mon Apr 7 16:46:18 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: AI and economics
Date: 7 Apr 1997 08:47:42 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 59
Message-ID: <5iaqde$b55@panix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
I thought I'd post the following from a private email exchange to see
if anyone had comments:
>Whats your solution to the problem with labor surplus depending on that
>mashines can take over more and more of production.
A great deal depends on whether artificial intelligence is possible --
that is, whether it will be possible for a computer to pass the Turing
test and so on. (It seems to me by the way that this is the fundamental
issue determining our political, social etc. future.)
My guess is that it won't be possible, so human beings -- every normal
human being -- will always be able to do things a machine can't and so
(speaking from an economist's point of view) will always be a valuable
economic resource. The freer and more technologically advanced markets
get the more they will be able to do with that resource, so I expect
incomes to continue to rise overall and for the majority while the
current worldwide trend toward economic liberalism continues.
Naturally there will be problems. As markets become better at using
whatever economic capabilities people have differences in income will
widen without limit. Also, better markets and technology mean that all
human capabilities will become more and more readily convertible into
money. The social and cultural problems caused by huge economic
inequalities and immediate convertibility of everything into money are
obvious and I think will end in the radical division of society on
ethnic/sectarian lines. That however is a different problem from that
of labor surplus.
>I can se several ways attractive for the establishment in the future,
>when the problems are growing over there heads.
>
>1) A communist system
A communist system run by a big computer would I suppose be possible if
artificial intelligence is possible.
>2) Forbide the low IQ:s to breed, or regulate their breeding.
Wouldn't do any good if artificial intelligence is possible. If a
machine can do anything someone with an 80 IQ can do then 10 years later
it will be able to do anything someone with a 100 IQ can do and so on.
We could all be replaced -- the difference in principle between someone
with an 80 IQ and you or me is not so great.
>A market economy depends on wage-earners who can by the products they
>produce. No wage-earners, no products sold... In this case would some
>system for distribution be the logical end of market economy.
I don't think this is a problem. There will always be someone who owns
the output and whoever that is will think of something to do something
with it. There won't be products lying around unused.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From owner-newman@LISTSERV.VT.EDU Mon Apr 7 17:21:20 1997
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Sender: newman Discussion List
From: Jim Kalb
Subject: Re: The non-gendered Army
To: NEWMAN@LISTSERV.VT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <199704051635.LAA17004@swva.net> from "Seth Williamson" at Apr 5,
97 10:32:56 am
Status: RO
> A paid adviser to Army Secretary Togo West on sexual harassment
> recommends that the military eliminate its "masculinist" tendencies
> and adopt an "ungendered vision" in which units look to Alcoholics
> Anonymous, religious orders and other groups as models. . . . .
I of course agree. The army of the future will abandon aggression,
reaching out to "enemies" on a personal level and finding common ground
in recognition of the loneliness and vulnerability they share but don't
dare face. They will leave the trenches and stage impromptu
psychodramas, reliving and exorcizing the experiences that inculcated
masculinist stereotypes of "the nation," "the warrior," and "victory."
Female soldiers will help males to get in touch with their inner crone,
the spirit of womyn's wisdom suppressed in males and womyn alike by
5000 years of masculinist culture.
It'll be great! I hear the Citadel is revising its program already!
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From owner-newman@LISTSERV.VT.EDU Mon Apr 7 17:24:23 1997
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Reply-To: newman Discussion List
Sender: newman Discussion List
From: Jim Kalb
Subject: Re: Bruce Bawer on American religion
To: NEWMAN@LISTSERV.VT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970406104638.006a16bc@swva.net> from "Seth
Williamson" at Apr 6, 97 10:46:38 am
Status: RO
> As a result, American Protestantism is in the midst of a major shift.
> It is being split into two nearly antithetical religions, both
> calling themselves Christianity.
> The Church of Love is generally loath to deny the name of Christian
> to anyone who claims it
These two statements seem oddly inconsistent from a member of the C. of
Love.
> The Church of Love views the Bible as an inspired but human document
> that must be read with a critical understanding of its historical and
> cultural contexts.
It does seem to me the C. of Law (to use Mr. Bawer's terms) should make
more use of the argument "even the Bible is read freely, in accordance
with today's experience and the needs of the time, the answers are the
same." Certainly such a _Summa contra Gentiles_ could be presented very
strongly as to sexual morality, which seems to be the issue now
arousing the most controversy.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From neocon-request@abdn.ac.uk Mon Apr 7 20:18:57 1997
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From: Jim Kalb
Message-Id: <199704080021.UAA03185@panix.com>
Subject: Government based on consent and spiritual tyranny
To: neocon@abdn.ac.uk (neocon)
Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 20:21:12 -0400 (EDT)
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Status: O
On another list I noted a quote from Tocquevelle that dealt with the
effect on spiritual freedom of treating the will of the people as the
sole basis of legitimate authority:
> "I know of no country in which there is so little independence of
> mind and real freedom of discussion as in America. In any
> constitutional state in Europe every sort of religious and political
> theory may be freely preached and disseminated; for there is no
> country in Europe so subdued by any single authority as not to
> protect the man who raises his voice in the cause of truth from the
> consequences of his hardihood. If he is unfortunate enough to live
> under an absolute government, the people are often on his side; if he
> inhabits a free country, he can, if necessary find a shelter behind
> the throne, The arstocratic part of society supports him in some
> countries, and the democracy in others. But in a nation where
> democratic institutions exist, organized like those of the United
> States, there is but one authority, one element of strength and
> success, with nothing beyond it." (Dem. in America, I: 273-274)
The example of the "people's democracies" shows that things only get
worse if power is held by some small ruling elite that must nonetheless
pass off its rule as that of the people. Social order then depends on
public acceptance of a lie easily recognizable as such, and it becomes
very important to make sure everyone says only the things they are
supposed to say.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From owner-newman@LISTSERV.VT.EDU Tue Apr 8 15:26:45 1997
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Reply-To: newman Discussion List
Sender: newman Discussion List
From: Jim Kalb
Subject: Re: the former surgeon general
To: NEWMAN@LISTSERV.VT.EDU
In-Reply-To: from
"Neill Callis" at Apr 8, 97 09:09:51 am
Status: RO
> forthrightness and straightforwardness on so many issues.
Forthrightness and straightforwardness are far better than the reverse.
Still, they may show someone doesn't belong in a position. Her
comments on sex (e.g., masturbation education for schoolchildren) were
outrageous even though so far as I can tell they reflected the views of
"health educators" generally. So it was right for people to complain
about her and right in itself (although maybe not right for Clinton) to
get rid of her.
> -we spend more on Defense Research in 30 months than we have in 100
> YEARS on Biomedical Research.
Why didn't she say 1000 or 1,000,000 years? Big-time biomedical
research is a new development, and inflation blows up recent numbers,
so what she says shows very little about the current relationship
between the two kinds of research.
In any event, it's a silly comparison. We benefit from the biomedical
research Germany, China or Japan do, but if other countries spend a lot
on military research that *increases* our needs. Also, most biomedical
research is done by private drug companies.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 8 15:52:01 EDT 1997
Article: 9367 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Republicans & counterculture
Date: 8 Apr 1997 10:29:39 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 47
Message-ID: <5idkoj$nld@panix.com>
References: <19970407133401732428@deepblue42.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <19970407133401732428@deepblue42.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>Perhaps the Press will notice. Probably not. Its members identify with
>the Court Party and actively defend it. A dissenter is "out of the
>mainstream" and probably a mad bomber.
I don't think "identify with and actively defend" is strong enough.
"Part of" would be more accurate. The Press is an essential
constituent of the ruling class. How could things be otherwise in a
centralized mass democracy in the age of television? Those who control
the Forum and how issues are presented and discussed can control
everything.
>A Conservative Party might be a waste of time. "In their hearts they
>know they're wrong" and they always fold when the Press or their
>opponents smear them. They believe the smear.
A problem is that organizing a new political party requires extensive
public discussion, and public discussion can't be carried on in America
apart from the Press. The fate of an effort to organize a third party
in serious opposition to the Court Party would be like that of the
Buchanan campaign, only more so.
A special problem is that as you suggest conservatives as such believe
in the established institutions of their own country, and the
established institutions of America in 1997 are all committed to
anti-traditionalism.
>But most such people also have serious respect for the law and it
>would take a lot to get them to break it.
>Given that, suppose dissenters calculated their taxes according to the
>law, but then wrote checks to local schools, churches and charities?
I don't think it will be necessary to seek out lawbreaking, the law
will eventually seek out those who simply try to live in accordance
with their principles, rendering unto Caesar only those things due
Caesar. We are moving I think toward a zero tolerance policy for hate
and bigotry. Rejecting in principle the current regime involves
recognition of an authoritative principle other than egalitarian
hedonism, and therefore hate and bigotry as those things are now
understood. So at some point those who unbellyfeel Engsoc or whatever
it's called and act at all on their principles will find themselves in
trouble with the law.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 8 15:52:03 EDT 1997
Article: 9369 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: AI and economics
Date: 8 Apr 1997 15:51:41 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 32
Message-ID: <5ie7kd$sdi@panix.com>
References: <5iaqde$b55@panix.com> <199704071546411211180@deepblue19.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <199704071546411211180@deepblue19.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>Jim Kalb wrote:
>> A great deal depends on whether artificial intelligence is possible --
>> that is, whether it will be possible for a computer to pass the Turing
>> test and so on. (It seems to me by the way that this is the fundamental
>> issue determining our political, social etc. future.)
>By AI, do you mean machine behavior or machine consciousness?
Behavior. Can a machine do whatever a man can do?
>I am uncertain regarding economic consequences. Wouldn't cheap robot
>slaves produce a material abundance? Who would need wages?
The question was whether technology means unemployment. My answer was
no, because I don't expect AI to be successful, so a man will always be
able to do things machines can't, and better and more technologically
advanced markets will be better at converting those things into cash.
There will indeed be fundamental problems, but not technological
unemployment.
You are right I think that if AI *is* possible the result won't be that
smart people get jobs and all the money and everyone else goes on the
dole. In the post I said I thought that if AI is possible at all it
will soon become smarter than any of us, so we'd *all* be out of a job
in the sense of economically productive labor, and that in that event a
communist system would probably work.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 10 06:42:31 EDT 1997
Article: 9373 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: AI and economics
Date: 9 Apr 1997 10:18:02 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 36
Message-ID: <5ig8eq$hgd@panix.com>
References: <5iaqde$b55@panix.com> <199704071546411211180@deepblue19.salamander.com> <5ie7kd$sdi@panix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
rafael cardenas writes:
> > Naturally there will be problems. As markets become better at
> > using whatever economic capabilities people have differences in
> > income will widen without limit
>
> > it will be able to do anything someone with a 100 IQ can do and so
> > on. We could all be replaced -- the difference in principle between
> > someone with an 80 IQ and you or me is not so great.
>
> Seems to me that the two claims above are contradictory.
The thought was that if AI is possible the human mind would soon be
outclassed and underpriced. Who would hire you or me at any price if
he could get an android with an IQ of 1000 for $1.50?
If there are two and only two computers in the world, an 8086 with 128K
and a 80286 with 1 Meg, both will be very valuable in an efficient
market but the latter much more so than the former. If someone then
figures how to make Pentiums with 16 Megs cheaply and plentifully our
two original computers will become economically valueless.
> Itis only in spectator sport that the best man is -really_ worth
> very much more than the second best.
It's common enough though in almost anything for the best to be worth
far more than the average let alone the somewhat sub par. My point is
that the difference of degree among human beings is dwarfed by the
difference in kind between man and machine. That difference is to our
advantage if AI is impossible but otherwise the reverse. So my
prediction is that in the future either AI will be possible and we'll
all be economically redundant or it will be impossible and none of us
will be.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 10 06:42:32 EDT 1997
Article: 9374 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: AI and economics
Date: 9 Apr 1997 10:18:41 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 23
Message-ID: <5ig8g1$his@panix.com>
References: <5iaqde$b55@panix.com> <199704071546411211180@deepblue19.salamander.com> <5ie7kd$sdi@panix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
cla04@cc.keele.ac.uk (Andy Fear) writes:
> : Can a machine do whatever a man can do?
>
> Doesn't consciousness come into this as well. The Chinese room test
> would produce a perfect translator who had no understanding of either
> language he was dealing with. That seems to be rather different from
> a translator as we understand the term. I have a general feeling that
> hard AI proponents are a lot less optimistic than they used to be.
> Are things different in the US?
They're less optimistic than they used to be. The issue I was
considering had to do with economic productivity and so didn't relate
to machine consciousness as such, just to what machines could do and
whether they would eventually make human intellectual labor
economically worthless. So behavior was the only direct concern.
In fact, I think it will turn out that you can't get the behavior
without the consciousness, and computers won't be capable of either.
That seemed a different point, though.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 11 13:21:59 EDT 1997
Article: 9389 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Sheep to left, Terrorists to right...
Date: 11 Apr 1997 08:21:39 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 28
Message-ID: <5ilacj$cur@panix.com>
References: <334DCDAF.3591@teleport.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <334DCDAF.3591@teleport.com> "H. Michael Sweeney" writes:
>Please remain calm, Citizen. We are here to help you. Take a number
>and wait your turn for execution.
Good opening that captures something of the spirit of the modern state.
>You may access these files and others by directly visiting the Light vs.
>Shadow home page:
>
Does anyone have a page on the anti-terrorism act and similar
legislation that says that if the government is worried about bad
people everyone hates it can do whatever it wants? It would be a
worthwhile resource if it were pared down to specific legal provisions
and news reports.
It could be supplemented by a page on technical advances in controlling
people (e.g., there have been recent news reports about expanded use of
surveillance cameras and electronic devices that detect concealed
weapons in public places).
I'm too lazy to do it, and it's not the side of things I spend most of
my time worrying about, but if someone did a good job it would be
useful and get lots of hits.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From neocon-request@abdn.ac.uk Sat Apr 12 11:41:25 1997
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From: Jim Kalb
Message-Id: <199704121314.JAA07370@panix.com>
Subject: Re: Multiculturalism: The Neocon Position ?
To: BillR54619@AOL.COM
Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:14:10 -0400 (EDT)
Cc: neocon@abdn.ac.uk
In-Reply-To: <970412002259_-932932330@emout19.mail.aol.com> from "BillR54619@AOL.COM" at Apr 12, 97 00:23:00 am
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Bill writes:
>> What is the content of assimilation? Economic enterprise and hard
>> work to build up a business?
>
>That is a good question, and, I suppose, a good answer. At least as
>good an answer as any.
If so, I don't like it. Money, even money honestly earned, doesn't
work well as the ultimate social standard. For a discussion see 550c
ff. of Plato's _Republic_. Basically, he says that if you make money
the standard then in short order you get the multicultural democratic
consumer society and after that tyranny.
Putting Plato aside, a difficulty is that sacrifice becomes simply
irrational if money is the standard, and no society can endure without
sacrifice.
On the neoconservative view, however, the goodness lies in the struggle
for economic success rather than money itself. That view does not make
a lot of sense -- it's another example of the neocon tendency to
recommend faith (in this case, faith in The American Dream) as the
opiate of the masses.
A difficulty with the view is that it makes immigrants the only real
Americans, since no one else takes the struggle for economic success
with the necessary seriousness. Those who have been here longer have
either failed or succeeded. Those who have failed must be assumed not
to have taken the struggle seriously, or the system becomes unjust, and
those who have succeeded no longer need to do so.
It is imaginable that continual technological change and social
transformations caused by technology, mass immigration and world empire
could provide the neocons an out, since the world would always be
changing into something new so in effect we would all be eternal
immigrants. More likely the whole system would collapse, since what
immigrants are struggling for is to establish themselves, and in such a
situation no one could ever be established and the pointlessness of the
struggle would become all too visible.
>I suspect, however, that the truth lies beyond mere merger of economic
>imperatives. When Ms. Fields writes romantically of azure-eyed Irish
>quarterbacks pairing off of dark-eyed Jewesses, well, how can that
>romance be anything other than Shakespearean drama ? In this way, the
>clash of ethnic mores becomes bound into one story line. Is this not
>human ?
As the Divine Marquis has noted, transgression is boring unless what is
transgressed matters. Miss Fields' pairing is of romantic interest if
Irishry and Jewry are continuing realities that inspire deep loyalty
because they organize and give point to the lives of their members.
The sort of society in which that is the case is not however the same as
the Conservative Opportunity Society.
>You won't find esprit like that in the Federal Republic of Germany. It
>is not at all hard to make young Americans into single-minded
>chauvinists. All one must do is try.
The militia movement and the state of the military reveal I think a
contradiction at the heart of American chauvinism. John Locke and
traditional values are not really consistent; our solution to the
problem has always been to avoid thinking. Since no other non-radical
solution is apparent the neocons want to keep applying the old one. I
don't think it will work.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 13 05:35:52 EDT 1997
Article: 9398 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Guilt and authority
Date: 12 Apr 1997 07:52:28 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 23
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References: <19970411071000406446@deepblue3.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <19970411071000406446@deepblue3.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>A suspicious person might wonder if this arrangement serves the
>purpose of any specific faction. Who benefits from a neurotic majority
>and permanently disabled minority? New management displacing the old.
I think that's right. People associated with the old management think
about themselves from the standpoint of the ideology of the new
management. One cause is that the fora in which public thought is
carried on (TV, the prestige press) have become radically centralized,
and the new management includes those who dominate the fora. Another
is that the new management has a technological attitude toward all
things, which is presumed correct.
>What about other countries? Are majority Britons supposed to feel
>shame regarding the colonial past? I suppose France and other European
>countries can share in that also. Is it an effective strategy?
When I was in Britain last summer I noted that the TV networks had
discovered the wonders of multiculturalism.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 13 05:35:53 EDT 1997
Article: 9403 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: NR "utopia" article
Date: 13 Apr 1997 05:12:46 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 12
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The latest issue of NR has a long article, "A PRINCIPALITY IN UTOPIA,"
by Editor John O'Sullivan dealing with the current state of
conservatism. Not so good, he says. "Seeing its old answers rejected,
the Left has nimbly shifted ground, seeking Utopia by other means.
Where are the conservatives who should be resisting?" He proceeds to
give a quite intelligent discussion of the culture war, the New Class,
multiculturalism, immigration, etc. The article is online at:
http://www.nationalreview.com/nationalreview/feature/feature.html
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 13 21:16:17 EDT 1997
Article: 9415 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 13 Apr 1997 19:40:04 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 26
Message-ID: <5irqsk$bba@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> James Hedman writes:
>ultimately, he really doesn't stray too far from the politically
>correct reservation himself.
Sure, but the structure and direction of discussion is everything.
>it does have the merit of conceding that tariffs would protect not
>American jobs but American levels of regulation."
His only comment on free trade. It's an interesting point, by the way
-- just what is protectionism protecting? If what's it's protecting is
the welfare state, it seems to me that protectionism is at least as
damaging to national culture and political life as free trade.
>National Review is always the first to denounce any "conservative"
>attempt to give voice to the concerns of O'Sullivan's disenfranchised
>Republican voter.
O'Sullivan's lengthy and carefully written article therefore seems
significant. Its stated purpose is to reorient official conservatism.
It's worth noting that it comes out squarely against the Kristols and
Podhoretzes in the _First Things_ dispute.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 13 21:16:19 EDT 1997
Article: 9416 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 13 Apr 1997 21:11:05 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5is079$61q@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <01bc45e7$e8136b80$11f8aecc@mycroft> <334fe818.2054358@news.demon.co.uk> <20097793wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <20097793wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>The evidence in this country at least is that the cost of medical care
>goes up with more technology, so there are fewer jobs for everyone
>from doctors to porters
Don't understand. Usually if people spend more money on something
there are more jobs in that thing and fewer in other things. What's
special about medical care that makes the reduction outweigh the
increase?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 13 21:16:20 EDT 1997
Article: 9417 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 13 Apr 1997 21:14:11 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 11
Message-ID: <5is0d3$6ps@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <33504737.61B0@mach3ww.com> <800743085wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <800743085wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>They are right to deny that corporate elitism has its problems: its
>only problem (sing.) is the existence of too many other people.
As usual, I don't understand. For corporate elitism "other people"
constitute a resource and a market. What's wrong with resources and
markets from their point of view?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Mon Apr 14 19:45:14 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 14 Apr 1997 09:19:22 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 16
Message-ID: <5itasq$f23@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> <5irqsk$bba@panix.com> <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com>
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In <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com> James Hedman writes:
>> It's an interesting point, by the way -- just what is protectionism
>> protecting?
>What it always has protected: indigenous industry and the jobs such
>industry creates. NOT ONE industrial nation was developed without high
>tariffs, certainly not the United States.
It increases the power of the centralized national state. Before 1861
for example protectionism was one of the major issues between North and
South. So what one thinks of the Federal government in 1997 has to be
a consideration in thinking about protectionism today.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!panix!news.eecs.umich.edu!news.radio.cz!newsbastard.radio.cz!news.radio.cz!CESspool!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!insync!uunet!in2.uu.net!128.6.21.17!dziuxsolim.rutgers.edu!igor.rutgers.edu!christian Mon Apr 14 19:45:24 EDT 1997
Article: 94833 of soc.religion.christian
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From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Defining Fundamentalism (was: Jehovah's Witnesses Attack Fu
Date: 14 Apr 1997 00:07:41 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 57
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jrghgb@worldaccess.nl (J.R.Grit) writes:
>That is a paradoxical situation (neccessarily): our picture includes
>the notion that God cannot be pictured - so to speak. You can probably
>find this in every modern philosophical notion of God.
Actually it seems to me that all realities other than first-person-
singular present-tense experience have aspects that cannot be pictured,
and even the latter can't be spoken of without reference to things that
exceed our comprehension. That is one reason Kant seems to be on to
something when he speaks of "noumena."
>This is an important element in our notion of God because it implies
>that our images can be proven wrong by experience. But it can only do
>so if we have an openness for God who shows Godself as other than our-
>thought-god.
All our knowledge except maybe immediate experience and certain
mathematical and logical knowledge can be proven wrong by experience.
And unless experience can give us reliable knowledge of God it can prove
nothing wrong about any of our beliefs about him.
>[BTW, I don't find Hegel's argument that we can all think this up on
>our own - without a real life of this man Jesus - very convincing.
>Noone could have imagined God like this - and Paul first had to be hit
>in the face on that road to Damascus before really seeing that God was
>present in this carpenter from Nazareth.]
As an aside -- my perhaps idiosyncratic definition of "paganism" is that
it is creating a god for oneself out of one's personal or social desires
or practices. The alternative is acceptance of revelation.
>In short: my point is only that experienced reality must constantly be
>able to override our ideas. This fundamental openness, this attitude of
>not-knowing, is a basic element in religious life.
To what extent would you permit people to benefit from the experience of
others? Sometimes for example religious tradition (tradition is the
carrier of accumulated experience) says one thing and our own ideas
another. Since our interpretation of our experience depends on the
ideas we happen to have we may even say that tradition conflicts with
our experience. What then?
>Or, when we try to find a goal to fight for in an absolute sense it is
>very important to know what we are fighting for. Then it is all-
>important to stress a qualitative difference between our conceptions of
>the absolute and the absolute itself. What I previously referred to as
>"fundamentalism" is marked precisely by confusing "my opinion of the
>absolute / God" with God as Godself is.
Someone has humbly accepted God's revelation of himself and his will,
and so knows what he is fighting for. How can he be distinguished from
a fundamentalist fighting for his opinion?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 08:47:36 EDT 1997
Article: 9435 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 15 Apr 1997 18:02:11 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 25
Message-ID: <5j0tt3$2bs@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> <5irqsk$bba@panix.com> <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com> <5itasq$f23@panix.com> <33528fc8.6127049@svr1.pdx.gstis.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <33528fc8.6127049@svr1.pdx.gstis.net> hedman@mindspring.com (James hedman) writes:
>The industrial revolution requires strong government to develop.
>Tarrifs, pollution regs, local monopolies for rail, telecom, etc...
>and many other government functions are made neccessary by
>industrialism.
This account makes it odd that the industrial revolution brought on
laissez-faire liberalism.
>You want nuclear power or microelectronics you must have a strong
>government.
I'm not sure why. Perhaps as to nuclear power the argument is that it
creates dangers that require government regulation, but why
microelectronics?
>Our open borders and lack of industrial policy are ruining our white
>civilization.
I agree open borders are a problem, but why is industrial policy so
necessary?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 08:47:38 EDT 1997
Article: 9442 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 16 Apr 1997 07:56:02 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 45
Message-ID: <5j2eoi$h9b@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> <5irqsk$bba@panix.com> <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com> <5itasq$f23@panix.com> <33528fc8.6127049@svr1.pdx.gstis.net> <5j0tt3$2bs@panix.com> <33544823.5BD9@mindspring.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <33544823.5BD9@mindspring.com> James Hedman writes:
>an unfettered "satanic mill" does bring (rightly) government
>regulation of the proscriptive type (pollution & child labor laws).
The legal system had ways of dealing with nuisance (tanneries or what
have you) long before the industrial revolution, and child labor has
always been common enough on farms. As to microelectronics, there
seems to be lots of successful activity that doesn't have much to do
with industrial policy. I don't know enough about economic or
regulatory history to discuss this effectively, though.
I'm not sure where the discussion is going. Perhaps the idea is that
the modern economy is part of modern life generally, which breaks life
up into separate social functions and personal persuits. Production,
consumption, moneymaking, domesticity, sex, family, friendship,
religion, politics, etc., etc., which way back when were part of a
single tribal order based on informal custom and tradition, become
mutually independent and can be ordered only through formal market and
bureaucratic mechanisms.
On that line of thought the distinction among those who accept "modern
life" would be among liberals who think the guiding principle of the
market/bureaucratic system should be maximizing the satisfaction of
individual desire, national socialists who think it should be
maximizing the well-being and power of the ethnic people, and theocrats
who think it should be realization on earth of some divine principle.
For my part all those possibilities seem intolerable. If someone tells
me it's inevitable my response is that catastrophe is then inevitable
because none of them can last. The task from my point of view is
therefore to find out how to avoid the catastrophe, or to mitigate its
effects and prepare for reconstruction afterwards.
All of which is grand theorizing that you may find uninteresting or
aside the point. On more down-to-earth issues, it seems to me
immigration control is one thing, tariffs another, and industrial
policy something else again. Not all are equally related to whether
your grandchildren will be Chinese, and the last it seems to me
contributes to the movement toward establishment of an imperial
despotism in America that would be more oppressive than the one that
has distinguished China from Europe.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 08:47:39 EDT 1997
Article: 9443 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 16 Apr 1997 07:56:54 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 11
Message-ID: <5j2eq6$hed@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <5j21sr$7fj$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <5j21sr$7fj$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> cla04@cc.keele.ac.uk (Andy Fear) writes:
>Is this magazine still on line?
Yes. If you can't find it the article is also at:
http://freenet.buffalo.edu/~cd431/utopia.html
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From owner-newman@LISTSERV.VT.EDU Tue Apr 15 18:25:10 1997
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Reply-To: newman Discussion List
Sender: newman Discussion List
From: Jim Kalb
Subject: Re: Gender-inclusive language
To: NEWMAN@LISTSERV.VT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <199704151947.PAA09334@gabriel.cc.emory.edu> from "Martha Bishop"
at Apr 15, 97 03:47:56 pm
Status: RO
> The introduction talks about English constantly changing, and how the
> original texts were written in a "male-oriented culture," etc. In
> this version St. Paul's _adelphoi_ comes out as "friends" or
> "brothers and sisters", for example. This doesn't seem unreasonable
> at first blush,
Language changes, but not usually as a result of the efforts of
pressure groups and functionaries deciding what things can and can not
be said.
Quite possibly we have much saner, healthier and more moral attitudes
toward sex and gender than St. Paul and the contemporaries to whom he
was writing. I know of no reason to suppose that's so, but I'm no
expert and as always the experts must decide. Still, does the status
of a text have any effect on whether our translation should reflect our
own attitudes rather than those of the writer?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 20:43:47 EDT 1997
Article: 9453 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Third way ?
Date: 16 Apr 1997 19:39:45 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5j3o01$kun@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In Hawk writes:
>This being A.R.C, I was wondering if anyone had heard about a group
>called "The International Third Way" and might be able to explain
>their ideals and methods.
There is Third Way and there is the International Third Position, and
they don't think much of each other. Each has a web site. For links
go to http://www.panix.com/~jk/trad.html and look for the section on
ENR and related.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 20:43:48 EDT 1997
Article: 9454 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 16 Apr 1997 20:31:10 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 102
Message-ID: <5j3r0e$smd@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> <5irqsk$bba@panix.com> <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com> <5itasq$f23@panix.com> <33528fc8.6127049@svr1.pdx.gstis.net> <5j0tt3$2bs@panix.com> <33544823.5BD9@mindspring.com> <5j2eoi$h9b@panix.com> <3354D647.4488@mindspring.com>
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In <3354D647.4488@mindspring.com> James Hedman writes:
>a modern industrial economy can only exist through formal market and
>bureaucratic mechanisms.
And I have no objection to either in their place. The issues as I
understand them are (i) what limitations on the market would be
beneficial if made the responsibility of government, and (ii) how to
avoid bureaucratic domination of all significant social relations. The
standard old-line conservative view, with which I have a lot of
sympathy, is that some specific limitations are a good thing -- e.g.,
immigration controls, suppression of businesses such as pornography or
dope peddling that undermine the traditional moral order, sometimes
protective tariffs. There are other specific items that could be
discussed. Not all these things should however be the responsibility
of the Federal government.
The problem with industrial policy and social policy generally is that
it makes it harder to deal with point (ii) above because it gives the
Federal government open-ended responsibility for the direction in which
economic life and therefore (since we live in a world driven by
economic concerns) political and social life develop. Industrial
policy is likely to include for example education policy, demographic
policy, the degree to which federalism, private property or family life
is tolerated when those get in the way of what the planners have
decided, etc.
As to the conditions for the existence of a modern industrial economy
it seems that industrial policy isn't one of them unless "industrial
policy" exists by definition whenever industry does.
>The current reductionist anarcho-libertarian line espoused by
>"conservative" idealogues attacks ALL regulation in a corrosive and
>way. This is just propaganda for capital.
I'm not sure why big capital wouldn't prefer regulation that furthers
its interests. If it's so powerful it should be able to secure it.
Why be satisfied with the power of money when you can get the police on
your side too?
>As for domesticity, sex, family, friendship, etc... those are still
>somewhat free of formal market and bureacratic mechanisms. Our residual
>white European customs and traditions are, however, under relentless
>attack by leftist multicultural idealogues who very much favor the
>destruction of the white race. We need to restore some of our
>traditions from the Old America such as laws against miscegenation and
>our right of free association stripped away by the "civil rights" laws
>of the last 40 years.
I agree that the "civil rights" laws have been destructive. One
concern I have is that industrial policy tends to break down family,
particularism, tradition etc. because everything becomes grist for the
national economic mill. The modern state is soulless -- all it cares
about is extension of its power. Working women and Federal control of
education presumably would be an aspect of industrial policy, for
example. Ditto integration of all workers, black, white or whatever
into a single national industrial army, as is done in the army army.
You seem to want to make the centralized state an instrument of the
interests of white people. I don't see why the centralized state
should put up with outside control in anyone's interests but its own.
That's especially true if the state adopts social policy -- that is, if
it is in the business of deciding what the country shall be. If that's
what it's doing, then as O'Sullivan observes when the people lose its
confidence it will dissolve the people and form a new one.
>> On that line of thought the distinction among those who accept
>> "modern life" would be among liberals who think the guiding
>> principle of the market/bureaucratic system should be maximizing the
>> satisfaction of individual desire, national socialists who think it
>> should be maximizing the well-being and power of the ethnic people,
>> and theocrats who think it should be realization on earth of some
>> divine principle.
>>
>> For my part all those possibilities seem intolerable.
>Why is the well being and power of the people intolerable?
It's not, any more than it's intolerable for people to get what they
want or for God's will to be done. The problem is the role of
government in bringing about those fine things. Is the Good something
that can be operationally defined and achieved by administrative means?
Theocracies do not in fact establish the Kingdom, liberal welfare
states end by making people unhappy, and not all national socialist
regimes have done great things for their ethnic peoples.
>The catastrophe is occuring RIGHT NOW!
By catastrophe I meant what happens when a system no longer works on
its own terms.
>We have rampant and state sponsored sexual degeneracy which in
>combination with unfettered capital driving down real wages and
>forcing mothers with young children to work, has resulted in worldwide
>birthrates for whites to be below replacement level.
Whites are still richer than nonwhites, and the nonwhites (Japanese and
Singaporeans) who are not multiplying are the rich nonwhites. Our
problem is not lack of money.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 20:43:50 EDT 1997
Article: 9455 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 16 Apr 1997 20:35:14 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 12
Message-ID: <5j3r82$5b@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>One has the impression that the Libertarians are the battering-ram
>that the new elite, not the Left, is using to destroy all culture and
>establish anarchy.
The question is what they batter better, culture or culture's enemy the
modern state. Their specific proposal is not "let's do away with
violins and good manners" but "let's do away with laws."
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 16 20:43:53 EDT 1997
Article: 9456 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 16 Apr 1997 20:41:24 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5j3rjk$17l@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> Hans Lebeck writes:
>The NR-article is based on the view that conservatism today has became
>a reductionst movement.
It's a problem with conservatism that it's based on existing conditions
and established practices and if those things are based on 200 years of
reductionist thinking it will end up being reductionist itself.
Still, I think the Left is in even worse shape.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 06:55:21 EDT 1997
Article: 9467 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 17 Apr 1997 06:41:33 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 18
Message-ID: <5j4uot$6t5@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <01bc45e7$e8136b80$11f8aecc@mycroft> <334fe818.2054358@news.demon.co.uk> <20097793wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is079$61q@panix.com> <276151818wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <276151818wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>> >there are fewer jobs for everyone from doctors to porters
>No doubt there are more jobs for small numbers of well-paid designers of
>expensive medical gadgets.
Who spend their high pay on something, which creates more jobs.
It does seems that advancing technology and world markets mean greater
differences in pay. I just don't see why it should mean fewer jobs.
If only well-paid jobs with lots of benefits and guaranteed security
are legal -- that is, there's lots of worker protective legislation --
then it may mean fewer of those and so result in unemployment. That's
a problem, but it isn't the same problem you mentioned.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 06:55:24 EDT 1997
Article: 9468 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 17 Apr 1997 06:47:27 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 23
Message-ID: <5j4v3v$8aa@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <33504737.61B0@mach3ww.com> <800743085wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is0d3$6ps@panix.com> <602991164wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <602991164wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>> >They are right to deny that corporate elitism has its problems: its
>> >only problem (sing.) is the existence of too many other people.
>>
>> For corporate elitism "other people" constitute a resource and a
>> market.
>Perhaps they need less of either than they used to. I read recently that
>U.S. exports had increased in 'value' twentyfold this century, but in 'bulk' not
>at all.
The mark of advanced technology and markets is that they can turn
anything whatever into money, just as slaughterhouses are able to use
every part of the hog except the squeal. If corporate elitism can't
use as many workers today how come all the mothers of young children
are in the paid labor force?
The modern world has lots of problems, but inability to turn things
into saleable commodities isn't one of them.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 06:55:26 EDT 1997
Article: 9469 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 17 Apr 1997 06:50:07 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 11
Message-ID: <5j4v8v$901@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <33512DD7.689A@mindspring.com> <5irqsk$bba@panix.com> <335197DB.38C3@mindspring.com> <5itasq$f23@panix.com> <33528fc8.6127049@svr1.pdx.gstis.net> <5j0tt3$2bs@panix.com> <343190467wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <343190467wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>> This account makes it odd that the industrial revolution brought on
>> laissez-faire liberalism.
>But surely that only applied to some people and not others.
Which which?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 06:55:28 EDT 1997
Article: 9470 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Clinton
Date: 17 Apr 1997 06:53:26 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 11
Message-ID: <5j4vf6$9qo@panix.com>
References: <5j46q5$5j7@sjx-ixn5.ix.netcom.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <5j46q5$5j7@sjx-ixn5.ix.netcom.com> Daniel Benson writes:
>Perhaps the powers that be have gotten all the mileage they can out of
>Slick Willie and, that being the case, he has become a major
>embarassment to them so they've decided to give him the deep six.
They don't like him but he's not a Republican. The election's over, so
it's no more Mr. Nice Guy.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 21:10:41 EDT 1997
Article: 9485 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 17 Apr 1997 20:28:40 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 21
Message-ID: <5j6f7o$qj1@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j3r82$5b@panix.com> <19970417075309519737@deepblue9.salamander.com>
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In <19970417075309519737@deepblue9.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>I recently saw a note by R.W. Bradford, editor of _Liberty_, where he
>said something like: "What is wrong with a higher level of government
>striking down a local tyranny, as long as total liberty is advanced?"
There are of course libertarians and libertarians. You could also have
somebody calling himself a libertarian saying that the government
should illegalize social customs that have the effect of restricting
individual liberty because that would advance total liberty. After
that someone could announce that the welfare state or socialism
advances total liberty because it liberates us from the tyranny of the
common-law rules of property.
What praise I am willing to give to the libertarians depends on their
opposition to the centralized state that manages society as a whole.
The effect of Bradford's comments is opposite to that. I don't think
much of the libertarians' theory of the good.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 21:10:42 EDT 1997
Article: 9486 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 17 Apr 1997 20:58:57 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 32
Message-ID: <5j6h0h$2uf@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j3r82$5b@panix.com> <141934187wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <141934187wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>But they'll do away with violins if the 'market' doesn't want them;
>and they are quite happy if corporate advertisers persuade the
>'market' to buy its junk-music products rather than violins, provided
>the propaganda doesn't come from the State.
In cultural matters I don't see the modern state as any sort of
opposing influence to the mass market. The two are spiritually similar
except the state has more means of getting its way.
The question to my mind is how ways of life that feature violins rather
than junk music can maintain themselves. It seems to me that it will
be easier for them to defend themselves against the market alone than
the market combined with the state. The market lets you play the
violin with your friends if you feel like it and can figure out some
way to keep out the racket, which should in fact be possible because
the market lets you own private property. The market doesn't really
care, because it doesn't have a conscious cultural policy or education
policy backed by force the way the state does. It's just a bunch of
particular actors trying to make a buck mostly by persuasion, which is
less of a threat than a single actor consciously trying to remold the
social order by force.
Modern communications and transportation mean that any high or refined
culture is going to have to be far more resistant to outside influences
than in the past. Dealing with the effects of the market and
advertising is a problem of the same type as others that will have to
be solved. Dealing with the state will be more difficult.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Thu Apr 17 21:10:44 EDT 1997
Article: 9487 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 17 Apr 1997 21:08:15 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 24
Message-ID: <5j6hhv$54d@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> Hans Lebeck writes:
>Jim Kalb wrote in his answer that conservatism is a reductionist
>movement, it was founded as a protest of the reductionism of the
>french revolution.
What I meant to say is that conservatism characteristically bases
itself on existing social and political traditions. Unfortunately at
least in America today the dominant traditions are permeated by
reductionism so what is called conservatism becomes so as well. Things
were different at the time of the French Revolution.
>The conservative movement doesn=B4t reduce th= e human being to either
>a religious or a political or economical man, only. In the
>anti-reductionist sense is the conservatism anti-modern.
My point then is that today at least in America the "conservatism" that
is based on the existing social order is not conservative in this
sense, and vice versa. It's an odd situation, but we really do have
people (Newt Gingrich for example) who are thought conservative but are
utopian thinkers.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 18 08:14:51 EDT 1997
Article: 9492 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 18 Apr 1997 05:48:33 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 31
Message-ID: <5j7g1h$pmc@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <01bc45e7$e8136b80$11f8aecc@mycroft> <334fe818.2054358@news.demon.co.uk> <20097793wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is079$61q@panix.com> <276151818wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j4uot$6t5@panix.com> <328639001wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <328639001wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>On average, rich people save more than poor people; if the savings are
>invested abroad; they don't give employment to poor people at home;
>and if they are spent, then they are more likely to be spent on
>imported goods and services that the spending of the poor is.
I don't see what's so special about foreign goods and services. In
general it's easier to get people close by to do what you want them to
do -- easier to hire and know what you're hiring, easier to communicate
and supervise, fewer misunderstandings, greater similarities of taste,
less expense for travel and shipping. If the Cocoa Islanders are all
busy working in resort hotels they'll need to hire people to take care
of other things, like making clothes and TV sets for them, so they'll
buy abroad too, and from their standpoint you and I are abroad. It all
goes around in a circle. If the Goscote nobs like strange new
sensations so they buy weird chutneys from Bangalore the Bangaloreans
or someone they buy from will want something from Liverpool.
>The conomist's solution to the problem would no doubt be global
>movement of labour, but that's not something that cultural
>conservatives can approve.
It seems to me the economists should be satisfied by acceptance of
whatever disparities in pay are needed to clear the market. That might
cause lots of problems, but my point is that they're not the same
problems as the ones caused by an absolute lack of employment or by
global movement of labor.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 18 08:14:53 EDT 1997
Article: 9495 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 18 Apr 1997 07:44:57 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 30
Message-ID: <5j7mrp$7v4@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j3r82$5b@panix.com> <19970417075309519737@deepblue9.salamander.com> <5j6f7o$qj1@panix.com> <3357037A.328D@mindspring.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <3357037A.328D@mindspring.com> James Hedman writes:
>> What praise I am willing to give to the libertarians depends on their
>> opposition to the centralized state that manages society as a whole.
>Why, pray tell, do you share their opposition to centralized state
>management of appropriate functions?
I don't. The question is what the appropriate functions of the state
are. They do not I believe include general social management. Among
other problems, assigning that function to the state makes it
impossible for government to be responsible to anyone other than
itself.
>Centralized control has stood the white race in good stead when it
>comes to the matter of say, slaughtering Semites, whether that be at
>Tours in 732 or Kuwait in 1991.
I'm no fan of the Kuwait massacre or of revolting and criminal
slaughter generally. Besides, the centralized state has murdered far
more Aryans than Semites if that's the key. (I'm assuming Slavs count
as Aryans and whites; if not I'd have to include deaths in the world
wars.)
As to Charles Martel, he was not the head of a centralized state. I
agree that in wartime unity of command is normally important but not
that social life should be understood on the analogy of an army at war.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 18 08:14:55 EDT 1997
Article: 9496 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
Date: 18 Apr 1997 08:12:40 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 50
Message-ID: <5j7ofo$blv@panix.com>
References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <33504737.61B0@mach3ww.com> <800743085wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is0d3$6ps@panix.com> <602991164wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j4v3v$8aa@panix.com> <351033461wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <351033461wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>> The mark of advanced technology and markets is that they can turn
>> anything whatever into money
>Advanced technology makes money out of non-things rather than out of
>things; sell the squeal, throw the hog away, and sack the
>slaughterman.
Technology is simply an array of methods of using things to achieve
purposes. Why throw anything away? Why give up any advantage? You
can use *anything* if your methods are sufficiently varied and your
purposes sufficiently complex. Have meat-packing plants in fact
started to throw more things away, or have they and other industries
found more uses for waste products? The latter, I think.
If A lays workers off B can make money if he can figure out something
to do with them that will pay. Why despair of B's success when he has
a whole world of productive processes to work the laid-off men into and
a huge number of technical means of doing so? Why have there been so
many new jobs in the US in the past 20 years if you're right?
>It's cheaper to pay the mothers to work half-time, and put the men on
>the dole.
If it's cheaper to put the men on the dole why not pay them 50 cents
more and get some labor out of them? Here in the States work weeks are
lengthening, people have less leisure time, more are working second
jobs, AND the women are all working. Not an ideal situation, but the
problem isn't that the economic system has become unable to use people.
>> The modern world has lots of problems, but inability to turn things
>> into saleable commodities isn't one of them.
>But what commodities? Saleable to whom?
Labor power is to the economist a commodity, saleable to anyone who can
use it in a productive process. Better technology and markets mean
more ways to package it and a much larger array of situations in which
it can be used.
Ultimately of course there must be demand or there will be no
production. I don't see why that should be a problem -- the economic
value of the product is divided up among those who own the business,
those who provide labor or raw materials, those who lend money, etc.
Why not think that whoever it is who gets the value -- profits, wages,
rents, interest, whatever -- will spend it?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
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Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 07:12:09 -0400 (EDT)
To: orthangl@voicenet.com
From: jk@panix.com
Subject: Re: Schism
> the new church, in communion with Canterbury, would be a home for
> those of us who feel scripture and tradition are equal in weight to
> reason.
A tangent -- don't concede that the revisionists have reason on their
side. If scripture and tradition are at odds with what people think is
reason then chances are the "reason" isn't so reasonable. On a
social-science, this-worldly analysis, for example, the revisionist
attitudes toward sex and gender have made people miserable rather than
happy. Their God tells them nothing they don't put in his mouth and so
is useless. And so on.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Sat Apr 19 07:07:18 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
~From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
~Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
~Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
~Date: 19 Apr 1997 06:19:02 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
~Lines: 42
Message-ID: <5ja66m$a1k@panix.com>
~References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <01bc45e7$e8136b80$11f8aecc@mycroft> <334fe818.2054358@news.demon.co.uk> <20097793wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is079$61q@panix.com> <276151818wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j4uot$6t5@panix.com> <328639001wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j7g1h$pmc@panix.com> <189085168wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <189085168wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>there would have been no chronic underemployment in third-world
>countries whose elites buy the goods and services they want in the
>rich world and invest their savings (or stealings) there too.
The latter part arises from insecurity of property -- either the money
was stolen and might be repossessed or it wasn't stolen and might be
taken anyway. Free economies don't work well when property is insecure
especially when "working well" requires long-term investments.
Apart from insecurity of property, third world underemployment can
arise from population growth in traditional rural economies (my claim
is only that technological advance helps the free-market economy eat
everything) and mass movement to the cities, combined with official
inefficiency, petty tyranny and extortion, insecurity of property (as
suggested), and economic policies that make it difficult for new
enterprises to establish themselves.
>My point is that the disparities may be such that the minimum wage is
>not sufficient for survival.
Theoretically conceivable. Nothing at all like this has happened in
the U.S. where in spite of the flood of women and immigrants into the
labor markets long-term large scale unemployment has not been the
problem it has in Europe and shows no special sign of becoming so. The
long-term question I think is whether human labor adds something to the
productive process not easily replaced. If it does, and if birthrates
keep declining so that availability of labor becomes more a limiting
factor on production, this will remain a non-problem. If it doesn't
then as I've already discussed all bets are off.
>In practice the 'labour market' has _never_ cleared in recorded
>history. Does one prefer theory to evidence?
Nothing works perfectly. The issue I thought was whether labor markets
fall so short of clearing (you can put whichever terms in scare quotes
you want) that long-term unemployment becomes a major and increasing
social problem. It has not been such at all times and places.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Sat Apr 19 07:07:19 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
~From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
~Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
~Subject: Re: Technology & Greed
~Date: 19 Apr 1997 06:22:18 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
~Lines: 10
Message-ID: <5ja6cq$amd@panix.com>
~References: <01bc457a$35bbfb90$a28418cb@nt1> <33504737.61B0@mach3ww.com> <800743085wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5is0d3$6ps@panix.com> <602991164wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j4v3v$8aa@panix.com> <351033461wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j7ofo$blv@panix.com> <580826247wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <580826247wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>the 'hegemonic' ability of the US to run deficits which are not
>permitted to smaller countries for such long periods
Last I looked U.S. deficits were not outstandingly large by European
standards.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From alt.revolution.counter Sat Apr 19 07:07:19 1997
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
~From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
~Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
~Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
~Date: 19 Apr 1997 07:02:18 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
~Lines: 73
Message-ID: <5ja8nq$d9d@panix.com>
~References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j3r82$5b@panix.com> <141934187wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j6h0h$2uf@panix.com> <344830155wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <344830155wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>In Europe there is still a certain amount of State subsidy to high
>culture, although it tends to be for things the rich like (such as
>opera) rather than which more modest people might like (such as string
>quartets).
We have State subsidies as well, although not on the scale they do in
Europe. They don't seem to have done a lot for high culture. Some of
them go to quilting societies and the like, on the democratic theory of
the greatest goodies for the greatest number, the electioneering theory
of getting something for your district, and the academic theory that
concepts of "high" and "low" are instruments of oppression. Others go
to painters etc. where they seem to have bred a neo-academicism -- the
stuff that gets the support is stuff that can be discussed most easily
by a bureaucracy. Nobody likes it or cares deeply about it. There's
also a certain amount of cliquishness and cronyism in grants. Then
too, no one much cares about the arts as such. So theater companies
get grants by casting blacks as Norwegian theology students when they
do Ibsen revivals and orchestras get them by doing "outreach," which so
far doesn't seem to have set anyone on fire with love of orchestral
music. To save themselves from boredom the bureaucrats have also taken
to funding art that is "difficult" and "confrontational" -- basically,
art that is grossly offensive to traditional standards of behavior. It
makes them feel heroic while at the same time promoting the interests
of the managerial class to which they belong.
>The constant refrain in our present election campaign, from both
>sides, is how little the state can actually do. The official reason is
>that people won't pay the taxes needed for it to do anything, which is
>only partly true (they would pay hypothecated taxes for purposes of
>which they approve); the real reason is fear of the money markets.
Odd. I thought the state in most European countries took 40-50% of
national output.
>I don't see that that follows: in my experience the market does not sell
>soundproofing at an affordable price (I have had occasion to investigate it).
Doesn't matter. People who like violins more than rap can live in
apartment buildings, housing developments or what have you that allow
one but not the other. That's the kind of thing that leads to ethnic
neighborhoods and to almost all new residential construction in the
American South and West taking the form of communities with charters
and governing boards determining how people can and can't use their
property. Walled and gated housing developments are a growing trend as
well.
>And while their view of what should be remoulded in the social order
>is more limited than that of politicians, that doesn't mean they're
>not trying to remould it; or that they won't try to use the State to
>remould it in their own interests when it suits them
>In the absence of an effective state, and the presence of large
>transnational corporations, the corporations eventually create their
>own despotic state, as in 18th-century India.
Maintaining order and decorum in a shopping mall does seem more limited
that what the state does for example through the educational system.
One thing to remember is that there are a lot of different business
corporations -- what you're dealing with is far less unified than the
state. Another is that so far as I can tell the tendency of modern
communications is disaggregation of large enterprises -- people get
things done less through a chain of command and more through agreements
arrived at over a communications network (that is, through a market).
All the foregoing is not to suggest that there are not big problems,
only that the problems are not fundamentally caused by the size and
power of particular business corporations, and that government is not
fundamentally what will save us.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 20 06:44:20 EDT 1997
Article: 9516 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Global Gray
Date: 19 Apr 1997 18:37:19 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 90
Message-ID: <5jbhev$s6i@panix.com>
References: <127502722wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <127502722wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>Has there been any comment here on John Gray's article in _New Times_
>on 'Big Idea 1 -- Globalisation'?
Took a look at it, and found it an interesting statement of where some
people's thoughts were going. Some comments:
>The goal of this project is a condition of unregulated global free
>trade and mobility of capital, in which barriers to competition have
>been broken down worldwide.
I don't see the interest in free trade as such, without imposition of
transnational regulatory schemes. The EU for example is not a free
trade area. If the point of NAFTA were to establish free trade the
treaty could be much shorter than it is. It's interesting to speculate
on the future balance between the demand for internationalization of
markets and the demand for regulation of economic activity and for that
matter of social and political life. There's been a boom in
international "human rights" treaties and such as well. Even the
American "most favored nation" treatment requires the toeing of certain
political lines. It doesn't seem to me at all a simple issue.
>the power of the global bond markets has caused the collapse of the
>fiscal foundations of post-war full employment policy in deficit
>financing.
The cost of the post-war welfare state was increasing, apparently
without limit. That seems inevitable to me. As I recall, in Sweden
government expeditures reached something like 60% and government
borrowing something like 8% of national output. Is the point that the
trend could have continued if only the bond markets had been different?
>At an early policy meeting, a group of people around Clinton got
>together to decide how much would need to be spent on US education to
>retard the growth of economic inequality that has been a feature of the
>US at least since 1980. The answer was trillions of dollars, on any
>plausible assumptions.
I'm suspicious of a commentator who takes such analyses and estimates
seriously. Very large past increases in educational expenditures in
the U.S. combined with greater centralization of control and therefore
greater participation by experts have given us a system that works
worse than in the past. Professor Gray however believes that social
engineering is possible. It goes with his evident attachment to the
welfare state. His early Thacherism was perhaps of the same type,
although he was using different blueprints at the time. Just decide on
what you want, draw up your plan, line up your inputs, and bingo!
>This fundamentalist idea of community is a complete dead end, a huge
>policy error. But the human experience of insecurity on which it feeds
>is real and needs to be addressed. How? How does thought about
>community, which accepts the cultural pluralism that globalisation
>fosters and deepens, generate anything akin to a policy agenda?
Some great ideas here! People need community -- that is, they need to
hold goods in common that precede all the ordinary decisions of
individual and collective life and so are worth living and dying for --
and that means there has to be a policy agenda to deliver it to them!
>The way I see communitarian thought, it is really concerned with the
>problems involved in crafting common institutions, whereby different
>cultural traditions, social groups and communities, can co-exist
>productively and harmoniously.
That is indeed what "communitarian thought" amounts to. Sounds
clueless. Who is going to "craft" and run the institutions that manage
all those different things? Martians? Professor Gray and his
associates? Is there a distinction?
>American market capitalism will also be transformed by historically
>unprecedented levels of economic inequality; of incarceration (now
>rivalling only post-communist Russia with, for example, more than one
>per cent of the population in California behind bars); by the very
>rapid growth of the gated community ... This summer, the signing of the
>Welfare Reform Act represented this symbolic and practical
>disintegration of the Rooseveltian settlement.
I'm puzzled by the apparent view (do I mistake him?) that the welfare
state promotes social integration and public spirit. It obviously does
the opposite. One thing for Professor Gray to consider would be the
very large increases in crime and other indicia of social disorder in
Europe beginning as early as the 50s.
It may be true that the end of the welfare state would be a sign of
social disintegration and loss of public spirit. He seems to believe
more than that, though.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 20 06:44:21 EDT 1997
Article: 9521 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopism
Date: 20 Apr 1997 06:34:49 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 37
Message-ID: <5jcrg9$bbo@panix.com>
References: <33593346.21C8@mailbox.swipnet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <33593346.21C8@mailbox.swipnet.se> Hans Lebeck writes:
>The state can also build a culture, UK and France is good examples of
>that. The civility is a part of how the state can be defined. But the
>state is also a part of the civil societys ground.
I wonder about the modern state in this connection. It seems that the
state has helped form culture by creating a framework for living
limited in space and unlimited in time within which the institutions
etc. that constitute culture can grow up. Better communications means
that the state has less to do now with defining the scope in space of
the relationships by which men live. Also, the institutions of the
state seem to have less of an air of permanence than they once did.
In addition, modern states are determined to be "secular," which seems
to mean that on principle they claim to be indifferent to questions of
ultimate good and evil, man's fate, the purpose of life, and so on.
The logical result is the multicultural state which claims to be
indifferent to particular cultures as well.
It may nonetheless be true that the state necessarily forms culture,
because it claims life-and-death authority and such authority can only
come from a central cultural position. If so, we have a very odd
situation in which the state sets itself against the thing (the
authority of particular culture) by which men live and by which it
exists itself.
One resolution to the problem would be for the state to abandon its
claim to authority and rely simply on force. The ruling group would
then have its own culture, so its members would recognize the authority
of their leader. The subject populations would live by their various
particular cultures, and the unifying principle would not be a common
culture but an army consisting of mercenaries and members of the ruling
group as officers.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sun Apr 20 06:44:22 EDT 1997
Article: 9522 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: NR "utopia" article
Date: 20 Apr 1997 06:43:45 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 14
Message-ID: <5jcs11$c14@panix.com>
References: <5iq82e$5m@panix.com> <19970413105029771179@deepblue0.salamander.com> <425383276wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5j3r82$5b@panix.com> <335880F8.727F@bellsouth.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <335880F8.727F@bellsouth.net> John Fiegel writes:
>> Their specific proposal is not "let's do away with
>> violins and good manners" but "let's do away with laws."
>The difference in practice being.....?
Not much, if "laws" means "all principles of orderly conduct." On the
other hand, music and good manners are themselves principles of orderly
conduct that do not come from the state, so if the state attempts to
form everything by law then music and good manners will disappear.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 21 07:59:43 EDT 1997
Article: 9536 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Global Gray
Date: 21 Apr 1997 07:59:37 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 22
Message-ID: <5jfkr9$ef8@panix.com>
References: <127502722wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jbhev$s6i@panix.com> <771594017wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
rafael cardenas writes:
>to Americans ... 'The Welfare' means doles. In Europe the welfare state
>is more associated with social insurance (going back to Bismarck), and
>with the idea of a contract between citizen and society mediated by the
>state, a la Beveridge. Full employment was considered essential to prop
>that up.
Association of ideas doesn't matter. A comprehensive system of social
insurance in the end means loss of social integration and public spirit.
Its effect is to make us as independent as possible of each other and
dependent only on the state. The family etc. lose serious functions and
social solidarity becomes a matter between each of us individually and
the state. It's hard to imagine though how social solidarity could be
made to work based solely on our relationship to something as distant,
as impersonal and as spiritually vacant as the modern state. Society
must be based on something that touches us closely and the whole
tendency of the welfare state is to keep things from touching us
closely.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 21 08:02:38 EDT 1997
Article: 9537 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 21 Apr 1997 08:02:25 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 37
Message-ID: <5jfl0h$er2@panix.com>
References: <33593346.21C8@mailbox.swipnet.se> <5jcrg9$bbo@panix.com> <863724195wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
rafael cardenas writes:
>The marketist ideology would be a crucial element of legitimation for
>some new global empire or its constituent sub-states. 'Losers' would
>'justly' have lost, the actions of the 'invisible hand' replacing a
>divine system of rewards and punishments.
In a socially incoherent universal empire that must be ruled
tyrannically if at all, modern multicultural welfare-state liberalism
seems a better source of legitimation than the classical form. In
classical liberalism the upper classes are simply those who have done
better playing the same game as others. That's not sufficient to
justify despotism, because all classes are part of the same moral world.
In contrast, modern multicultural welfare-state liberalism creates a
huge gulf between rulers and ruled that is the same as the gulf between
master and slave -- the people must be utterly inert politically,
because if their political views and efforts had any effect whatever
that would constitute the rule of some over others contrary to modern
liberal principle. Particular cultures and ways of life, the powers
opposing the world ruling class, are kept on the defensive because they
stand for hate, discrimination, xenophobia, whatever. Modern liberalism
also gives the ruling class a more active sense of mission to dominate
and remake the world in accordance with never-satisfied standards of
justice and tolerance.
It's no accident that in national societies classical liberalism has
been replaced by modern liberalism. Why not expect a similar trend in
the New World Order? The latter makes the ruling class far more
independent and self-contained -- why isn't that something the ruling
class would strive toward? Modern liberalism will be resisted, of
course, but that doesn't mean the ruling elite won't view the struggle
for justice and against hate, as well as promotion of prosperity and
stability, as part of its mission.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 21 08:04:09 EDT 1997
Article: 9538 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Global Gray
Date: 21 Apr 1997 08:04:00 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 15
Message-ID: <5jfl3g$f0s@panix.com>
References: <5jbhev$s6i@panix.com> <771594017wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <335AB036.71F3@nwu.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
"Christopher P. Reicher" writes:
>"Multiculturalism" is now indeed only accepted within the community of
>people who have no real practical thoughts or applications thereof,
>i.e. a number of harebrained college professors and the teachers'
>soviets.
I don't think this is so. "Cultural diversity" is a big thing in
business for example. No doubt that's mostly because the civil rights
laws as a practical matter require all business leaders to swear and
make demonstrations of profound devotion to such things, but civil
rights laws are hardly a fringe affair.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From soc.religion.christian Mon Apr 21 14:34:50 1997
Path: news.panix.com!panix!news.eecs.umich.edu!news.radio.cz!newsbastard.radio.cz!news.radio.cz!CESspool!europa.clark.net!newsfeed.nacamar.de!news.apfel.de!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!sprint!uunet!in2.uu.net!128.6.21.17!dziuxsolim.rutgers.edu!igor.rutgers.edu!christian
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Alabama judges and religious freedom
Date: 21 Apr 1997 01:31:21 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 30
Sender: hedrick@geneva.rutgers.edu
Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu
Message-ID: <5jeu39$qp9@geneva.rutgers.edu>
References: <5iv2mn$ets@geneva.rutgers.edu> <5j1i8t$h4r@geneva.rutgers.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: geneva.rutgers.edu
In <5j1i8t$h4r@geneva.rutgers.edu> Warren Steel writes:
>The first amendment does not limit the religious expression of
>individuals. It prohibits the government from taking sides for or
>against any religion, or for or against religion in general.
"Congress shall make no law with respect to an establishment of
religion" meant among other things that the Federal government would
leave state religious establishments alone. The First Amendment
therefore illegalizes most of what the Federal courts do in its name.
In any event it doesn't forbid anything a state or state official might
do.
In addition, a religion is a fundamental understanding of what the
world is and what life is for. I have no idea how a government,
especially a modern government with pervasive involvement in day-to-day
life, could avoid taking sides for or against some such understandings.
>The judge in Alabama is pandering to the lowest instincts of the mob
>(intolerance and bigotry)
Many comments on the judge pander to the intolerance and bigotry of
those who believe the contemporary secular liberal understanding of the
world is simply and unmistakeably correct, and that other
understandings are symptoms of low social class and accompanying moral,
psychological or intellectual deficiency.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From soc.religion.christian Mon Apr 21 14:34:50 1997
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From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Alabama judges and religious freedom
Date: 21 Apr 1997 01:31:16 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
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In <5j1i96$h4u@geneva.rutgers.edu> James MacMillan writes:
>I suppose the concern is the appearance of fairness. Suppose you were
>to go to court against a fundamentalist Islamic accuser. The judge is
>fundamentalist Islamic. He starts the day with a prayer, in which your
>opponent participates. You stand there, not having a clue what to say
>or do.
>Now we start the trial. You think you have a very strong case. Your
>opponent refers to the Quran several times (purely by way of
>illustration) during the trial. You lose. You think the judge was
>wrong.
The possiblities can be multiplied endlessly. Suppose you're a
fundamentalist redneck who goes to court against a secular humanist who
drives a Volvo, reads and believes the _New York Times, doesn't wear
synthetic fibers, etc. The judge is a liberal Democrat who gets awards
from the ACLU and praise in the prestige press when his views on what
the world is like and should be seep into his rulings. The judge and
your opponent visibly recognize each other as soulmates. You lose, you
think wrongly. How do you feel?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From soc.religion.christian Mon Apr 21 14:34:50 1997
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From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Defining Fundamentalism (was: Jehovah's Witnesses Attack Fu
Date: 21 Apr 1997 01:31:12 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
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It appears that our esteemed moderator's computer ate my reply, so here
goes again:
In <5iv2im$esb@geneva.rutgers.edu> jrghgb@worldaccess.nl (J.R.Grit) writes:
>"The Kingdom of heaven does not exist at all except as what is shown
>through that to which, in the biblical parables, it is being likened."
Don't agree. There is valid natural religion that hints at the Kingdom
of Heaven. Otherwise we couldn't even begin to understand the
parables.
>I don't know if I am able to explain in yet other words what I've been
>trying to say all along.
I think you've explained your views very well, so that I understand
them as well as I am likely to at present. They can serve for me as
one pole of the world of possible understandings of Christianity and
revelation.
>> As an aside -- my perhaps idiosyncratic definition of "paganism" is that
>> it is creating a god for oneself out of one's personal or social desires
>> or practices. The alternative is acceptance of revelation.
>this definition is almost identical to the meaning the word "religion"
>has in Barthian and post-Barthian theology in Continental Europe ...
>In Continental neo-orthodox/dialectical theology "religion" is also
>used in opposition to "revelation".
I however consider paganism a necessary preparation and religion a
necessary setting for the Christian revelation. What we want and do
has not fallen away totally from implicit love of God. It seems that
in your view revelation would relate to things so transcendent and so
separate from anything we know about otherwise that in attributing to
it any usable significance we would be engaging in paganism in a strong
sense, merely making an idol of our own impulses.
>Because all people are equal in the face of / over against God my
>interpretations (that is all they are) have the same right as any
>other.
Why should my interpretations have the same right as the
interpretations of someone who has given his life to God much more than
I have? If there were a community of such people -- a communion of
such saints -- and a settled interpretation had grown up in that
community why wouldn't that be better yet? It might of course be that
I am right and everyone else wrong, but why should that be the guiding
presumption when what I want is truth? All men are equal in the face
of / over against truth and wisdom generally, but I usually trust those
who seem to know better than I.
>And - I must add - what is right and what is wrong must be correlated
>to the specific time and space in which I live.
So how is paganism to be avoided? We have the desires and prejudices
of the moment. If revelation tells us nothing concrete and the
accumulated experience of the Christian community (tradition) isn't
very useful because it consists of yesterday's answers to yesterday's
problems most likely we will construct something out of our desires and
prejudices and let that be our source of guidance.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 21 20:30:51 EDT 1997
Article: 9542 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Global Gray
Date: 21 Apr 1997 20:29:10 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 83
Message-ID: <5jh0om$18j@panix.com>
References: <127502722wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jbhev$s6i@panix.com> <771594017wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jfkr9$ef8@panix.com> <50382776wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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In <50382776wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> rafael cardenas writes:
>> A comprehensive system of social insurance in the end means loss of
>> social integration and public spirit.
>it depends how the social insurance is constructed. Widows' pensions,
>for example, to which the entitlement depends on husbands'
>contributions, tend to prevent divorce in so far as financial
>incentives can do so. Medical insurance systems where the parent pays
>the bill for his child and then reclaims can have similar effecst. It
>is not clear that a private system of insurance causes any less
>reduction of responsibility for those who are insured.
The first example appears to be something very like private savings
used to buy life insurance payable as an annuity. The way the second
works is somewhat obscure, so I won't comment. My claim had to do with
the effects of a comprehensive system rather than particular pieces
with features like those of private contracts which is what you seem to
have in mind here.
A distinguishing feature of a comprehensive system of social insurance
is that in guaranteeing a materially decent way of life to everyone it
necessarily insures against moral risks no private carrier would be
willing to take. For example, no private carrier would be willing to
offer anti-destitution or anti-unwed motherhood insurance at an
affordable premium to all comers.
>Arguably _private_ insurance in certain circumstances encourages
>social breakdown: house insurance, for example, may make people
>careless of trying to prevent crime other than by purely mechanical
>means, and the police careless of investigating it -- 'never mind,
>they're insured'.
Sure. The problem's self-limiting though, more so if insurance
regulators do not insist on nondiscrimination, assigned risk pools and
so on. If losses rise companies withdraw from certain markets or put
more emphasis on loss prevention, stricter underwriting criteria,
exclusions or severe limitations for situations like disappearing cash
where moral risk is especially severe, and so on. Companies that don't
do that go out of business.
In the case of a comprehensive system of social insurance when losses
rise the emphasis has to be on maintaining the social safety net for
those who are worst off, which means mere desire to avoid losses is not
a sufficient reason for exclusions, limitations or refusals to
underwrite. There is a particular social end that must be achieved,
whatever the cost, which is not the case with regard to private
insurance.
>But would it work any better based solely on our relationship to
>something as distant, as impersonal, and as spiritually vacant as the
>Universal Insurance Company?
Social solidarity can not be based on that, no. No one claims it can
-- that's why the UIC is entitled to refuse to cover some fellow
citizens for some of the risks of life, and can do no more than claim
payment of money from its customers on pain of cancellation and can not
demand they risk or sacrifice their lives.
>> Society must be based on something that touches us closely and the
>> whole tendency of the welfare state is to keep things from touching
>> us closely.
>So is the whole tendency of big business.
Sure. I'm not sure why that should be the tendency of a society that
permits big business though. After all, we all know we can't rely on
big business, even in societies in which it exists, to see us through
all the difficulties of life. Big business only deals with the part of
life it thinks it can make a profit from and therefore can in no case
be the basis of society. It just doesn't arise as an issue.
>Yet some large-scale institutions might actually increase social
>interaction in ways that improve the standards of behaviour.
Sure. They have a place and also limitations. The welfare state
ignores the limitations on what can be achieved through overall social
organization. That doesn't mean e.g. the state is all bad or even that
it could not in some ways and under some circumstances contribute to
culture.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 22 07:36:50 EDT 1997
Article: 9547 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 22 Apr 1997 07:32:40 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 30
Message-ID: <5ji7ko$i0g@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <5j6hhv$54d@panix.com> <335CCEDA.1D1F@mailbox.swipnet.se>
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In <335CCEDA.1D1F@mailbox.swipnet.se> Hans Lebeck writes:
>I mean that the anti-reductionism of conservatism is not a consequence
>of the society that the political conservatism works in. The American
>society with its reductionism is not a conservative phenomena.
But since conservatism is not reductionistic it can not be constructed.
It must be rooted in existing political culture. Is it your view then
that conservatism is impossible in America? How about Sweden?
Political society can not in fact be constructed either. It may be
therefore that no political culture that actually exists can be
reductionist except in confused aspiration, in rhetoric, and in
self-destructive tendency. On that view conservatism would always be
possible, although it would not necessarily appear conservative because
of the conflict with the utopian public rhetoric that has become
traditional.
>The main part of the american society is utopistic, we can se that in
>the american history from Thomas Jefferson and other. I mean that the
>american state has built on the idea of its mission in the history.
America has been based on a utopian but limited state and on moral
traditionalism that had to remain mostly inarticulate because public
symbols tended to be utopian. Modern conditions have caused the state
to become unlimited and public aspirations to eat up traditional
morals. Therefore our current problems.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 22 09:27:07 EDT 1997
Article: 9551 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Whence naziism?
Date: 22 Apr 1997 09:20:23 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 45
Message-ID: <5jidun$4lk@panix.com>
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An email correspondent asked me:
> why is there such a neonazi/fascist component to the right? ... the
> Hitler stuff is rather disquieting...
I threw out the following, which I post here for further comment:
Interesting question. One possibility is that naziism is
philosophically close to liberalism. That's why the liberals are
obsessed by it. So if you want to stop being a liberal it's a short
and sure way of doing it.
Specifically, both are relativist and reductionist in morals. To say
something is good is to say it's a pragmatically realizable thing that
has actually been chosen. The good is thus identical with the
satisfaction of preferences a.k.a. the triumph of the will. The
liberals take the collection of all wills as the standard, which seems
unwieldy, the Nazis the single will of a unified people embodied in the
leader, which seems more pragmatically determinable and therefore more
scientific. Both liberals and nazis reject an objective _summum bonum_
but accept an objective _summum malum_ (_infimum malum_?), death and
suffering. The liberals try to minimize the _summum malum_, which is
an unwieldy task and worse is in effect an attempt to eliminate the
only objectively real feature of the moral universe. The Nazis have
the more ingenious idea of inflicting the _summum malum_ on other
peoples, thereby making it an objectively valid fact that they have
achieved a good (the status of an enslaving and exterminating master
race) that is not only what they have chosen, and therefore
subjectively valid, but also demonstrably better than what others have
achieved and therefore as close as one can come to an objectively valid
_summum bonum_.
All of which is I admit very speculative. Maybe a simpler answer is
that people don't want liberalism and don't know what they want so they
choose something as strongly non-liberal as they can that at least
recognizes some non-liberal features of our condition, like our social
nature, which however gets flattened out to extreme nationalism.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 22 09:27:09 EDT 1997
Article: 9552 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Gated communities
Date: 22 Apr 1997 09:26:43 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 29
Message-ID: <5jieaj$5ph@panix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
Another correspondent responded to comments on gated or planned
communities by pointing out how boring they all are. For example, he's
a ham radio operator and it turns out they all forbid or severely
restrict antennas. My response, again posted for comment:
Planned communities are a bit of a puzzle. Right now the sole
intention seems to be maximizing property values, which apparently
means constructing and maintaining each unit and the environment in a
way that makes the development look at all times like a display of
neatly packaged consumer goods in a supermarket. That's the proven way
of relating to a mass market, and why argue with success when you're a
developer trying to turn a sure profit?
An issue to my mind is whether in the future they can become a vehicle
of cultural particularism. At the moment they are that to some extent,
since one of their purposes is to insulate the flattened-out
middle-class way of life from the cruddy criminally destructive ghetto
way of life. Anti-discrimination rules are perhaps somewhat a barrier
to doing anything more than that. Or maybe it's just a function that
can't be served until people really want it. Even today in New York
and New Jersey there are incorporated villages inhabited solely or
almost solely by Hasidic Jews. At some point maybe others will get
into the act as the way of life offered by the "general culture"
becomes increasingly intolerable. It could be a reaction like the
curdling of milk that rather quickly transforms the way people live.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 09:46:24 EDT 1997
Article: 9563 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: abortion and abolitionism
Date: 23 Apr 1997 09:46:18 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
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X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
Daniel Benson writes:
>There are many well-intentioned anti-abortion and pro-life groups and
>individuals across the nation. Unfortunately, many of them have not
>done their homework.
>
>They erroneously try to tie the pro-life movement of today to the
>abolitionist movement of the 19th century--a grave error.
More generally, they try to hitch their movement to the general demand
for radical egalitarianism centrally enforced. There have also been
appeals to the 60's antiwar movement, to left-wing historical
revisionism, to national liberation movements, etc. The unborn child
is just like a slave, or an Indian, or a Vietnamese peasant, and so the
universal order to be constructed to suppress racism, sexism, European
imperialism or what have you should also suppress abortion.
I don't think it's going to work. For one thing the basic principle of
radical egalitarianism is the equality of all wills. While a pregnant
woman has a will her unborn child does not because an unborn child has
no choices to make. So if Mom's will conflicts with child's life on
the radical egalitarian view Mom's will wins every time.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 09:49:11 EDT 1997
Article: 9564 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Whence naziism?
Date: 23 Apr 1997 09:49:06 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 44
Message-ID: <5jl40i$cde@panix.com>
References: <5jidun$4lk@panix.com> <512997419wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
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X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
rafael cardenas writes:
>I enjoyed this post more than anything I've read about Nazism since
>Borges's _Deutsches Requiem_.
Why are we such lovebirds all of a sudden?
One issue with the post is that it presents how naziism appears to a
liberal. As such it's an outlook with a peculiar power rather like a
black mass or the Dark Side of the Force. My theory makes it
understandable that naziism should appear in the most philosophical of
nations as liberalism approached its triumph as a sort of last-ditch
resistance to that triumph. So maybe there's something to it. Still,
to ask in a liberal age how something appears to a liberal is not
necessarily to find out what it really is.
When I say "liberalism" by the way I basically mean egalitarian hedonism
guiding social reconstruction. What naziism does is get rid of the
"egalitarian", which makes sense since it's the part of the mix that has
the poorest pragmatic and scientific base. What you're left with then
is hedonism -- the principle of getting what you want just because you
want it -- and the total subjection of the world to that hedonism
through whatever means are most effective pragmatically, which naturally
takes the form of militarization and limitless aggression on the part of
those with whom the actor identifies.
You might be inclined to say that classical liberalism and neoliberalism
get rid of the "egalitarian" as well, and also pay better and are more
secure and so more hedonic. Formal equality of rights means significant
egalitarianism though. Also more money is different only in degree from
less money and so provides a less ontologically solid triumph than the
triumph of master/torturer/killer over slave/victim.
>> The good is thus identical with the satisfaction of preferences
>> a.k.a. the triumph of the will.
>
>Modification (or possible modification): The human will.
That's what I meant. To identify the good with the triumph of God's
will is neither relativist nor reductionist. It might of course become
the latter if someone thought he was in full possession of God's will.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 09:50:48 EDT 1997
Article: 9565 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 23 Apr 1997 09:50:42 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 43
Message-ID: <5jl43i$crg@panix.com>
References: <335CCEDA.1D1F@mailbox.swipnet.se> <5ji7ko$i0g@panix.com> <335E4C46.67FB@mailbox.swipnet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
Hans Lebeck writes:
>Conservatism in its European mood can not be existing in America
>because one part of the conservative idea is based on culture. The NR
>article is a good example on the utopistic and materialistic view of
>the american conservatism.
>Of course can political cultures not be constructed, they must grow up
>under long times and can not be a part of a non-traditional ground. The
>moral traditionalism in the American society is one part of what
>american conservatism could build on.
These two paragraphs seem somewhat opposed to each other. The
"conservatism" mentioned in the first appears to be that of Mr.
Gingrich, while that mentioned in the second seems closer to
conservatism in its European mood.
>I mean that conservatism can not be rooted in a political culture which
>is based on utopistic ideas, which America is.
American political culture has had two parts, an explicit utopian part
and an inarticulate traditionalist part. It could not have existed
without the latter because utopia can't exist. Limitations on the
activity of the state kept the utopian part within bounds and so enabled
the American polity and political culture to survive. Americans dealt
with the conflict, and with the importance to their national existence
of both utopian symbols proclaimed to be universally valid and
particularist traditions, by avoiding thought.
The limits on the state have now disappeared, utopianism is everywhere,
the American polity is in decline, and it seems that the task of
conservatives is to make the traditionalist part of our political
heritage explicit. "American traditionalist conservatism" is therefore
not an oxymoron.
>One of mr Lindboms best books is "Demokratin =E4r en myt" (Demockacy is
>a Myth. I don=B4t know if its translated to English).
It's been translated, I believe as "The Myth of Democracy." I haven't
read it unfortunately.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 09:51:44 EDT 1997
Article: 9566 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: BBC Election bias
Date: 23 Apr 1997 09:51:38 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 14
Message-ID: <5jl45a$d4q@panix.com>
References: <261618483wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jin2v$k8i$2@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> <789099562wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
X-Newsposter: trn 4.0-test55 (26 Feb 97)
rafael cardenas writes:
>In article: <5jin2v$k8i$2@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> cla04@cc.keele.ac.uk
>(Andy Fear) writes:
>> True enough, however when the media denies a new product entry to
>> the market which is what is effectively done with the minor parties
>> by giving them only one braodcast and not even at peak viewing times
I take it the point of all this is that parties get broadcasts by
having them granted by the media rather than by buying them?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 20:34:39 EDT 1997
Article: 9570 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Whence naziism?
Date: 23 Apr 1997 20:18:49 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5jm8t9$oq4@panix.com>
References: <5jidun$4lk@panix.com> <512997419wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jl40i$cde@panix.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In "James C. Langcuster" writes:
>Could it be that liberalism has created such a heterogeneous -- not to
>mention, hedonistic -- world that measures of master/slave,
>superior/inferior no longer can be objectively defined?
"Master/slave" or better "torturer/victim" can certainly be objectively
defined. That's why both liberalism and naziism (as I'm construing
naziism) define their highest good by reference to pain, slavery and
death.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 23 20:34:40 EDT 1997
Article: 9571 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Whence naziism?
Date: 23 Apr 1997 20:29:53 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 26
Message-ID: <5jm9i1$qq3@panix.com>
References: <5jidun$4lk@panix.com> <512997419wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> <5jl40i$cde@panix.com> <358164758wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <358164758wnr@bloxwich.demon.co.uk> raf379@bloxwich.demon.co.uk (rafael cardenas) writes:
>Surely the essence of slavery is _ownership_ of the slave by the
>victim, a property relation?
It's inconsistent with the formal equality of property rights required
by classical liberalism and so is not part of the c.l. conception of
property.
>And would those in 15th-century Florence whose freedom had been
>subverted by the Medici Bank agreen that that family's triumph was not
>ontologically solid?
Triumph by conquest has always been considered more noble than triumph
by application of cash. The point of money is to make everything
convertible into everything else. It therefore destroys ontological
distinctions.
>The 14th century emphasis on God's potestas absoluta, in contrast to
>his potestas ordinata, has sometimes been thought of as relativistic,
>and is surely reductionist.
And also to my mind unsatisfactory as a way of understanding God.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 25 03:10:59 EDT 1997
Article: 9585 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Un-Natural Justice?
Date: 25 Apr 1997 03:00:48 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 22
Message-ID: <5jpkr0$gob@panix.com>
References:
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In Chris Stamper writes:
>Before positivism took hold, giving judges the ability to engineer
>what they thought to be socially desirable, the power of the courts
>was limited by adherence to the older idea that there are natural
>rights, such as liberty and property, that limit the advancement of
>what might be considered the common good at the expense of
>individuals.
The older idea was I think more that there is something called the
"law" (of England or Massachusetts, say) that was consistent with
natural right but far more concrete and particular and far more closely
linked with the actual institutions of the country. One of the current
functions of abstract rights theory is to increase the power of the
courts at the expense of other social institutions. It gives judges
the right and obligation to revolutionize society whenever social
practices don't measure up to what the judges think to be the correct
theory of individual rights, subject maybe to prudence (that is,
whether they'll get away with it).
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 25 03:11:00 EDT 1997
Article: 9586 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 25 Apr 1997 03:08:29 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 15
Message-ID: <5jpl9d$hmt@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3358861B.492C@bellsouth.net> <335AAE44.7C61@nwu.edu> <19970424101958977849@deepblue3.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <19970424101958977849@deepblue3.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>How can a community be economically strong without damaging the other
>aspects? "Strong" might once have meant local industries and small
>farms; now it means owning shares in global corporations.
Is this so? Small business is still alive. The prosperity of Northern
Italy and Taiwan I'm told is based on family businesses. There are
small independent states like Singapore and Iceland and smaller
separatist communities like Hasidic Jews that seem to be doing OK
economically. So is the underground economy in most places, and global
corporations don't fit underground.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Fri Apr 25 10:15:17 EDT 1997
Article: 9591 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Initial thoughts:
Date: 25 Apr 1997 10:12:44 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 64
Message-ID: <5jqe4s$cs5@panix.com>
References: <5jokpf$st9@mahler.rev.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <5jokpf$st9@mahler.rev.net> sdrain@rev.net (Todd) writes:
>I would have to say that even though the majority of major
>conservative writers in the US are Catholic, the right in the is
>driven by baptist and evangelican protestantism. Though classically
>Baptism has resisted church involvment in the state, it, and most
>especially evangelicalism, now wish to impose their moral code on
>society.
The problem I think is that America has been based on a combination of
liberal and even utopian public symbols with inarticulate moral
traditionalism, reconciled through social conformity and refusal to
think. With the expansion of government utopia has eaten up moral
tradition. The only response Americans can think of is to turn moral
traditionalism into a utopian public symbol, because such symbols have
been the basis of the only serious public life they have known, and
thus in an era of big government into a set of Federal programs that
impose moral dogma.
>I am hoping that the Catholic Alliance will develop a sufficiently
>separate identity to draw Catholics in the US out of their liberal
>lethargy.
Is there any sign that it will? American Catholics seem more American
than Catholic.
>Democracy is the most unstainable form of government, unless it is in
>a religiously homogeneous society. The reason is that a climate of
>equivocation and radical egalitarianism, so symptomatic of the liberal
>mind, undermines a society's ability to exist with contradictory
>opinions. A WILL makes belief act, and no such individual, group or
>government has the conservative will to impose itself, especially in
>the United States.
The answer has been contemporary liberalism, which eliminates democracy
in the sense of popular rule in the name of radical egalitarianism.
The variety of opinions in society then doesn't matter because opinion
other than elite opinion doesn't matter.
>People's natural tendency is away from morality, at the same time they
>wish to draw closer to morality.
So why not make a morality of abolishing morality?
>The sum of human thought has been explored for all intents and
>purposes, and now humanity vies for imposition of its brand of
>thought. We just happen to repackage and reassert known thought in
>new manners. I may be in error on this...any thoughts?
The "end of history" theory, but with history ending in chaos instead
of establishment of a final universal and rationally satisfactory form
of society.
One problem with the theory is that it can't be known to be true. If
tomorrow there's going to be a fundamental innovation in human thought
we can't predict it today; otherwise it wouldn't be a fundamental
innovation. Another is that the theory can be held only from a
nonexistent point of view that abstracts from all actual points of
view. From the standpoint of any particular brand of thought there is
no war of all against all; the truth is known, and the problem is to
vindicate it and make it effectual.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sat Apr 26 04:38:38 EDT 1997
Article: 9598 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 26 Apr 1997 04:36:35 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 23
Message-ID: <5jseqj$3pp@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3358861B.492C@bellsouth.net> <335AAE44.7C61@nwu.edu> <335F94EE.6418@bellsouth.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <335F94EE.6418@bellsouth.net> John Fiegel writes:
>Unfortunately, today the mainstream political movements have confused
>and conflated self government and national government through the
>mythical creation of a national community, two words whose
>oppositional character should be apparent to anyone.
It's fun to read the rhetorical devices that make use of the myth. I
think it was Michael Walzer who originated "nobody here but us
Americans" -- by definition, anything done by a government composed of
American citizens turns out to be an instance of American
self-government!
Then too, there is the view of constitutional law professors that we
govern ourselves at the most profound level by engaging in a
"constitutional dialogue" on fundamental principles of political
morality. Self-rule therefore means rule with regard to the most
important things by judges, lawyers and constitutional law professors.
Ronald Dworkin calls that process "exhilarating," and for him I'm sure
it is.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Sat Apr 26 13:47:34 EDT 1997
Article: 9606 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 26 Apr 1997 13:46:04 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 31
Message-ID: <5jtf0s$nne@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3358861B.492C@bellsouth.net> <335AAE44.7C61@nwu.edu> <19970424101958977849@deepblue3.salamander.com> <5jpl9d$hmt@panix.com> <19970425085141694651@deepblue6.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <19970425085141694651@deepblue6.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>All doomed, don't you think? Won't they have to make way for shopping
>malls and casinos? We have Amish and Hasidic colonies near here, but
>most people shop at Wal-Mart.
Why doomed? Extremes of both particularism and deracination are
consistent with a world economy linked by fiber optics or whatever and
computers. What can't exist is moderately distinctive societies that
rely on physical distance to maintain cultural differentiation. So the
issue (speaking Darwinistically) becomes the relative survival
advantages of the shopping mall way of life and the Hasidic etc. way of
life.
Initially of course world markets mean deracination since it destroys
the moderate distinctions that people had found satisfactory until now.
I expect the long-term effects to be quite different.
>I do not have statistics, but I believe most Americans work for, buy
>from and invest in firms which are not their neighbors.
In recent years there's been a shift in employment toward small
business. Better communications and more efficient markets favor
disaggregation since it becomes cheaper to pay e.g. a parts supplier
for supplying you with just those parts you need when you need them
than to set up your own internal parts department and pay them whether
you need their output or not. It's the same as the advantage of
part-time and temporary employees over full-timers.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 28 09:16:00 EDT 1997
Article: 9615 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 28 Apr 1997 05:58:12 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 68
Message-ID: <5k1sbk$fkt@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3358861B.492C@bellsouth.net> <335AAE44.7C61@nwu.edu> <335F94EE.6418@bellsouth.net> <5jseqj$3pp@panix.com> <3363BB79.4834@mailbox.swipnet.se>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <3363BB79.4834@mailbox.swipnet.se> Hans Lebeck writes:
>> Then too, there is the view of constitutional law professors that we
>> govern ourselves at the most profound level by engaging in a
>> "constitutional dialogue" on fundamental principles of political
>> morality. Self-rule therefore means rule with regard to the most
>> important things by judges, lawyers and constitutional law
>> professors. Ronald Dworkin calls that process "exhilarating," and
>> for him I'm sure it is.
>I think mr Dworkin is right when he discusses the constitutional
>dialogue. The constitutional process of exhilirating is a part of the
>history. The self-goverment is built on the common moral and the
>common views of the political.
Depends on who carries on the constitutional dialogue. The United
States is not a Greek _polis_, and very few of its citizens have
inclination or opportunity to engage in serious constitutional
discussion that has any chance whatever of influencing public life.
The polity can therefore be constitutional only if its principles are
very stable. Otherwise it will be run not by settled laws and a
settled distribution of authority recognized by all as legitimate, but
in accordance with changing principles devised by the few and imposed
on the many without their consent and therefore, since the regime is
ostensibly democratic, by some combination of force and fraud with the
emphasis on the latter.
What Professor Dworkin describes as "exhilarating" is of course that
process whereby an elite of which he is a very influential member
remakes the American polity in accordance with its own views of what is
proper, and through its domination of the media and educational system
convinces the people that what has been done is good and in any case
resistence is socially dangerous and ultimately hopeless. Professor
Dworkin explicitly recognizes that in America judges are now in the
habit of making revolutionary changes in the polity by decree. That
may be even more wonderful a thing than he believes, but it is
certainly not self-government.
>A thing which is interstesting in the modern state is that the
>powerful state is a part of the ideal of the citizenship. The little
>state can only exist if the civil society doesn=B4t have any political
>implications because if the democracy should exist in the form of a
>constitutional dialogue the egalitarism is a need if the democracy
>should exist. The common society of a people is problematic if the
>state not has a corporativ role in balancing the civil society of
>egalitarism and the market economy. The state monopol of violence is
>the base of the civil society, but if the state is too bug it can also
>destroy the civil society by individualising the citizenship too much.
The attempt in large modern states to have self-rule of the society as
a whole extending to all aspects of social life is I think hopeless.
Therefore the ideal of citizenship must today be a limited one. There
simply can not be a constitutional dialogue of millions and millions of
equals.
Self-rule has to be based on federalism and private property, which
break society up into much smaller pieces within which self-rule
becomes possible, and on stability and tradition, which keeps
government tied to popular attitudes and understandings and enables the
experience of the people at large slowly to become reflected in the
institutions of government. It therefore requires limited government,
which restricts the range of political issues and therefore increases
the number of people who can participate in productive discussions. To
say that government is limited is to restrict the constitutional
dialogue, though.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Mon Apr 28 09:16:01 EDT 1997
Article: 9617 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Initial thoughts:
Date: 28 Apr 1997 09:13:50 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 31
Message-ID: <5k27qe$abi@panix.com>
References: <5jokpf$st9@mahler.rev.net> <5jqe4s$cs5@panix.com> <5k1tfd$v2$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <5k1tfd$v2$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> cla04@cc.keele.ac.uk (Andy Fear) writes:
>Isn't another problem the growth of an ideology which now denies that
>that tradition exists.
I think that's so. Talk of "our" tradition is now taken to be a screen
for the will of the powerful. Tradition like everything else is to be
deconstructed. That procedure is thought to justify a new system of
power that professes to be the appropriation of power by the powerless
but is plainly nothing of the kind.
>The problem is that now it is that modern liberals have decided to saw
>off the moral traditionalist branch they have been content to sit on.
>It is difficult to see that changing, especially as the world seems to
>have moved to a world where things can only be justified through
>rationalising ideology. That in essence means the end of the US in the
>medium term and the end of my own country in the longer term, or I
>suppose the shorter term if we become part of the fourth reich.
That conclusion is certainly the most easily defensible as an
intellectual matter. Still, it's not over till it's over.
Will the European countries really be more durable than the U.S.? I
suppose smaller size is an advantage in an age of disintegration.
Still, looser organization is an advantage as well. It seems to me
your social and economic problems are more intractable than ours
because the demand for comprehensive social organization -- e.g., the
welfare state -- is greater.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 29 08:07:35 EDT 1997
Article: 9623 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Initial thoughts:
Date: 29 Apr 1997 08:05:21 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 72
Message-ID: <5k4o61$otl@panix.com>
References: <5jokpf$st9@mahler.rev.net> <5jqe4s$cs5@panix.com> <5k1tfd$v2$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> <5k27qe$abi@panix.com> <33655EE2.2F9E@mindspring.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
James Hedman writes:
>> It seems to me your social and economic problems are more
>> intractable than ours because the demand for comprehensive social
>> organization -- e.g., the welfare state -- is greater.
>
>And what is necessarily wrong with providing a welfare state to the
>people?
The quoted language raises the issue of adaptability -- if government
administers society in too extensive and detailed a manner, and the
things administered relate directly to people's well-being, it will be
hard to make necessary changes.
Another problem is that "welfare state" means it is the government that
is responsible for seeing that each of us has the means for a
materially decent way of life. There can't be many conditions on that
obligation, because government is in no position to know whether most
of the conditions that matter are satisfied. Is the person really
trying to find a job or going through the motions? Is his problem bad
luck or innate incompetence, or is he working the system?
As a social institution, most of morality depends on common recognition
of concrete responsibilities. In a welfare state men no longer have
responsibilities they need take seriously for themselves, their
families, and others to whom they are connected. After all, everyone
automatically has the means to live an OK life, and what he does with
those means is his own business, so why should anyone bother anyone
else about it? Morality therefore disappears in a couple of
generations except as a private hobby and except for things like murder
and theft from individuals.
The disappearance of most of morality -- a common structure for life
involving serious obligations to those immediately around us -- means
the end of family life, friendship, personal loyalty, and many other
good things. There's a cascade of horribles. It means a world no
reasonable person would want to live in.
>If it gets too generous the government can cut it back to more
>reasonable levels as has had to be done in Sweden.
Society is basically a set of moral understandings, not incentives the
government can fine-tune for the sake of balancing the budget. It
takes decades for the moral effects of the welfare state to appear and
they can't easily be reversed.
As I understand the matter, Sweden has accepted the principle of the
welfare state as the moral basis of its political order. After that,
do cuts in welfare for the sake of saving money -- balancing the budget
on the backs of the poor to make the rich richer -- mean proportional
drops in crime, bastardy, long-term unemployment and other consequences
of the welfare state? Do they restore social cohesion? Or do they
just make life more sordid and people more miserable and nastier to
each other?
>With a homogenous folk a 30 hour work week is an attainable goal as
>long as society is governed with enough backbone to effectively
>administer it.
A folk or people is more a cultural than a biological unity. Its
cultural unity depends on the small-scale and local connections among
its members. So the issue as I see it is the effect of the welfare
state on those connections.
The obvious way to maintain unity consistent with the welfare state is
to militarize society and plunge it into constant struggle with
outsiders. While several gifted leaders have taken that route it has
never worked for their people in the long run and it is hard to see how
it could.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 29 21:47:26 EDT 1997
Article: 9626 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: conservatism and utopistic thinking.
Date: 29 Apr 1997 21:37:05 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5k67o1$4df@panix.com>
References: <33557970.15F6@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3356B6D4.3B44@mailbox.swipnet.se> <3358861B.492C@bellsouth.net> <335AAE44.7C61@nwu.edu> <19970424101958977849@deepblue3.salamander.com> <5jpl9d$hmt@panix.com> <19970425085141694651@deepblue6.salamander.com> <3365CD40.29C3@bellsouth.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <3365CD40.29C3@bellsouth.net> John Fiegel writes:
>Suburbs didn't just happen, they were planned and encouraged by
>interests who benifitted from the destruction of morally and
>economically coherent communities.
How so? The developers I know of mostly think about making a buck out
of particular developments rather than long-term schemes of social
engineering. Who is it who's heavily involved in the process who
particularly benefits from destruction of coherent communities as such?
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Dog, as a devil deified, lived as a god.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Tue Apr 29 21:47:28 EDT 1997
Article: 9627 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Income inequality and the Global Hand
Date: 29 Apr 1997 21:46:29 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 13
Message-ID: <5k689l$65d@panix.com>
References: <199704291003021092740@deepblue2.salamander.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
In <199704291003021092740@deepblue2.salamander.com> wmcclain@salamander.com (Bill McClain) writes:
>Although the authors object to all national barriers to the flow of
>goods, capital and labor
Do they say why cross-border flow of labor is so important? The usual
market-of-the-future theory is that better communication and
transportation and the dematerialization of economic activity mean that
it's less important that the work be done in one place rather than
another.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Dog, as a devil deified, lived as a god.
From news.panix.com!not-for-mail Wed Apr 30 06:13:44 EDT 1997
Article: 9630 of alt.revolution.counter
Path: news.panix.com!not-for-mail
From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: alt.revolution.counter
Subject: Re: Initial thoughts:
Date: 30 Apr 1997 06:07:49 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
Lines: 50
Message-ID: <5k75ll$ndt@panix.com>
References: <5jokpf$st9@mahler.rev.net> <5jqe4s$cs5@panix.com> <5k1tfd$v2$1@gerry.cc.keele.ac.uk> <5k27qe$abi@panix.com> <33655EE2.2F9E@mindspring.com> <5k4o61$otl@panix.com> <3366CD46.3AC0@cajun.net>
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
skred@cajun.net (Alfredo) writes:
> Given the above view, would you say that Nazi Germany was a welfare
> state, which in turn (if I interpret your entire message correctly)
> would make it a left-wing regime?
"National Socialist" strikes me as a reasonable description. The Nazis
believed in the absolute unity of the German people. They didn't like
class divisions, bankers, capitalists, etc. If you look at _Mein
Kampf_ Hitler really was concerned with the material well-being of the
German worker, which he thought should be seen to by the government
rather directly. One of the main themes of _Seig des Willens_ (Leni
Riefestahl's film about the 1934 Nurnberg rally) was the dignity of
labor.
In talking about militarization as a possible source of unity for a
welfare state I also had in mind the communist countries, which were
also heavily militarized and given to emphasizing external threats.
Even Mongolia, which was located between two large communist countries
against either of which defense would have been hopeless in any case,
had a very large military establishment.
> "extremes always meet." This is simply nonsense.
Talking about a spectrum that has extremes can be useful up to a point
but taking the metaphor too seriously is not illuminating.
> The unfortunate thing is that most of the Republicans currently being
> railed against thusly are simply slow motion socialists who differ in
> degree but not substance from those who are calling them names.
One problem is that politicians don't do thinking on their own, and the
people who do the thinking and publicize it in America today
(academics, journalists and the like) believe in big centralized
government. It's natural they should, because if you can attribute
everything to big centralized government it simplifies thought and
explanation, and also makes experts and propagandists more important.
Most people prefer important easy jobs to difficult unimportant ones.
> P.S. Cool palindromes, Jim. Especially the Dog one.
Thanks!
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Dog, as a devil deified, lived as a god.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Dog, as a devil deified, lived as a god.
From soc.religion.christian Thu May 1 05:03:43 1997
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From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: The New NIV: Better, or Simply More Liberal?
Date: 28 Apr 1997 01:14:33 -0400
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences
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In <5jpc47$40g@geneva.rutgers.edu> Helmut.Richter@lrz-muenchen.de (Helmut Richter) writes:
>It is, however, questionable how much social change can be brought
>about by change of language, and it is more questionable whether this
>should be attempted. (Your 1984 newspeak was only fiction, our
>Reichspropagandaminister was reality.)
It does seem unusual for "lingistic evolution" to proceed through the
work of committees on nonsexist language issuing binding guidelines on
what can and can not be said.
As I understand the matter, the Fascists in Italy didn't like the
customary use of "Lei" (which means "her") as the polite form for
"you," and insisted the second-person plural "voi" be used instead.
More gender-accurate, I suppose people could have argued. The effect
was to force Italians to give a linguistic Fascist salute every time
they addressed someone. Today things have gotten better so we have to
give feminist salutes instead. It may of course be a boon to our
understanding of the Bible and a splendid way of honoring the sacred
text.
--
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com and http://www.panix.com/~jk)
Palindrome of the week: Do not start at rats to nod.
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