(SPOILERS) Dialydd's report

PeterZ wrote:
Dilandu,

I am not comparing the relative moral values of capitalism with communism. I am speaking to states usurping the moral agency from the individual. That is something that the series we are reading addresses.

And so? The capitalistic states could very easly usurp the moral agency from the individuals.

My point was simply that control over goods means the responsibility for how they are used resides with he/she/they who exercise that control. If a state deploys its goods to feed the hungry across the world, does the citizen who does nothing but pay taxes accrue credit for that moral good? If that same state uses its goods to spread chaos, do the citizens of that nation accrue the moral evil?

And so? If the capitalistic state decided to make a humanitarian goverment effort - does the citizen who does nothing but pay taxes accrue credit for that moral good? Or if the capitalistic state decided to invade the another nation, do the citizens accrue the moral evil?

The only real difference, that in capitalist system there is a SMALL number of wealthy peoples, who - theoretically - could do some good or evil without the help of state. With all respect, it's completely unsignificant.

My point was that good or evil accrue to he/she/they that decide to do good or evil. Nations or governments, like the CoGA and real world dictatorships, that restrict the choices of its citizens too greatly also take away the moral agency from its citizens. That is the ability to choose to be moral.

And how do the - theoretical - communist state restrict you more than the capitalist one? You are pretty able to start the politic career in communist state, be elected in goverment - and because there is no tradeable money, there is no significant corruption (in theory), so your election would be only the result of your own competence - and use the power of the state to make good. Or you could organise the nonstate humanitarian campaing. Or simply donate some part of the good and services you earned to the humanitarian.

So? The only thing that you really could not do in theoretical communist state, is to become extremely wealthy. But if someone wouldn't able to do right moral choises without the extreme wealth, so he possibly wouldn't able to do them at all.

Dilandu, Was it Khrushchev or Brezhnev who said

"Under Capitalism, Man exploits Man. Under Communism it is vice versa"

I suspect that this is more true than he meant.

chrisd wrote:Dilandu, Was it Khrushchev or Brezhnev who said

"Under Capitalism, Man exploits Man. Under Communism it is vice versa"

I suspect that this is more true than he meant.

As i recall, i said - theoretically. Actually, the basic problem of building the communist society is the non-money based "universal evaluation system", that could evaluate the citizen's work by quality and quantity. This system proved to be impossible to create on pre-digital society, and that doomed the Soviet Union's attempt.

Hi Dilandu,

The "universal evaluation system" communists and socialists seek is called "money", which only goes to show how rationally off base socialists and Communists are to start with.

You really believe the communists were democratically elected to power in communist countries"?

Seriously?

Who else had a chance?

The party apparatchiks I met in the 70's and 80's were real communists; NOT!

Back in the 70's when it was obvious neither the soviets or Chinese were truly communist or socialist, the desperate western socialists [mainly french] looked elsewhere for the example they needed.

Where did they find it?

Albania.

Seriously.

Back in the Brezhnev era [1970's], they used to tell the following joke in the Soviet Union:

The spirits of Lenin, Stalin, and Khrushchev visit Brezhnev on a train, suddenly the train stops.

Stalin tells the others he'll handle this and tells the engineer if the train isn't moving in ten minutes he'll have his family shot.

The train doesn't move.

After fifteen minutes, Khrushchev tells the others this is how they do things better now, and tells the engineer he'll get a nice new apartment with a dacha in the country and double food allotments if the train moves in a half an hour.

The train doesn't move.

After an hour, Brezhnev explains this is how we do things now, goes to the window and closes it, then announces "now the train is moving".

Cuba is such an example to America on how life should be, we're all desperate to go live there and survive on pitiful government handouts.

Right.

Please show me any communist or socialist country that wasn't corrupt from the get go, regardless of how non-trade-able its currency was, because the leaders were already corrupt and greedy.

The idea Stalin or any communist leader who grabbed power wasn't in it for the power [which corrupts absolutely] and the personal advantages boggles the mind.

According to Communism and Socialism, there shouldn't be any nationalism separating the communist or socialist nations, but when and where did that ever happen between the USSR and the PRC?

The USSR and the Warsaw Pact?

If anything their record demonstrates their inept understanding of economics among many other things despite their claims of mastery, while given their attitude to humanity being simply one more unthinking animal resource to be expended as they saw fit shows the very lack of humanity that they [and you] kept claiming they were ultimately serving.

The claim that only the ends justify the means was the same philosophy for both the Nazi's [who were very socialist] and the Soviets, as well as those identifying themselves as other kinds of communists and socialists; for some reason a separate moral code is too much for any of them to bear.

PeterZ is quite right that giving the individual the ability to chose right or wrong is the best if not main purpose of government, by such means that provides the greatest opportunity for more of its people to achieve all they want to, being the measure of which is the best.

That generally means getting out of their way as much as possible, though that's not PC these days.

L

Dilandu wrote:

chrisd wrote:Dilandu, Was it Khrushchev or Brezhnev who said

"Under Capitalism, Man exploits Man. Under Communism it is vice versa"

I suspect that this is more true than he meant.

As i recall, i said - theoretically. Actually, the basic problem of building the communist society is the non-money based "universal evaluation system", that could evaluate the citizen's work by quality and quantity. This system proved to be impossible to create on pre-digital society, and that doomed the Soviet Union's attempt.

You really believe the communists were democratically elected to power in communist countries"?

Of course not.

As i said before: there was NO real communist countries on Earth, simply because it appeared to be impossible to build communism on the avaliable tecnological level.

I'm talking about communist theory, not the realisation. Any theory always look better than the realisation: the capitalism and american-type democraty also

Back in the 70's when it was obvious neither the soviets or Chinese were truly communist or socialist, the desperate western socialists [mainly french] looked elsewhere for the example they needed.

Of course; because, as i previously say - the theory proved to be unrealistic on the avaliable technological level.

Neither USSR, nor China was able to deal with a immense problem of creation the non-money based universal evaluation system. It proved to be simply impossible on the avaliable technological level. It MAY BE POSSIBLE on the higher level, however.

Please, understand the difference between theory and practice. The communism is a theory - a theoretical way of how to build a perfect (for the some points of view) cociety. The socialism was the attempt to put the theory in practice.

If your are claiming that "if the theory have problems with realisation, that it was a bad theory", so what about the Christianity, for example?

---------------

My opinion, that the communism is really the logical next step (but definitely not the final, despite the Marx tried to persuade!) in humanity global sotial evolution. But it would be the EVOLUTION, not the REVOLUTION, and it would be supported by the much higher technologial progress.

In the late '40's the Commissar visited his local collective farm and met one of the peasants whose land had been "collectivised".

"How is the potato harvest this year, Comrade?"

"Magnificent! Commissar, Magnificent! If we should pile them all together the pile would reach the feet of God"
"You ignorant fool!" responded the Commissar, "You know that we have seen through that old superstition. We have abolished God. It is official policy. There is no God!"

"There aren't any potatoes, either, Commissar".

chrisd wrote:In the late '40's the Commissar visited his local collective farm and met one of the peasants whose land had been "collectivised".

"How is the potato harvest this year, Comrade?"

"Magnificent! Commissar, Magnificent! If we should pile them all together the pile would reach the feet of God"
"You ignorant fool!" responded the Commissar, "You know that we have seen through that old superstition. We have abolished God. It is official policy. There is no God!"

"There aren't any potatoes, either, Commissar".

Well, a lot of americans could say just that about their food supply in early 1930th... And they was dealing only with the economical problems, not with the country, ravaged with civil war and isolated economicaly.


Still, ehat was the other choise? You forgot, that the Imperiall Russia didn't have any significant number of farmers in classic definitions. There was only peasants with a really small chunk of land, and without any resources for some modernization simply because they haven't be able to make a lot of money on their land. The hunger in the Russian Empire was constant; simply too many wheat and rye were sold in attemt to obtain a cash, and the peasants liberation of 1862 was completely screwed.

There are a VERY SMALL number of anything like wealthy peasants in the Russian Empire before the 1917. The only thing that was somewhat near was the "Kulak"'s - and the therm "Kulak" (the fist) didn't actually mean a farmer or wealthy peasants, but the moneylender, illegal alcohol trader (there was a state monopoly in Russian Empire) and swindler , that "squeezed his neighbors in a fist".

The big problem was, that this system couldn't simply transform in some more effective, even with the state support. The peasants was largely illiterate, usually completely in debt for their local "Kulak"'s, and simply can not make enpugh money on their small private lands to afford some modern equipment or machinery.

The collective farms was the attempt to solve the problem by concentrating the resources in large, goverment-supported enterprises. largely, they was sucsessfull, because before them the situation was simply worse. The main problem was, that they were created by the peoples, "politically loyal", but largely incompetent in agricultural. They simply didn't understand, how the things work, and they was eager to demonstrate success at any cost.

The hunger on Soviet Ukrania in early 1930 was the result of incompetence, not the inefficiency. Actually, the collective farms, when they were controlled by the competent peoples worked good. Not that good as the large western farms, but much better than before them.

(Please, recall that i'm the geneticist with agronomy speciality, so i knew the point pretty good )

Er, and isn't it the even greater off-topic?

Duckk wrote:People, take it elsewhere.

Gentlemen if you do not move this fascinating debate to politics http://forums.davidweber.net/viewforum.php?f=16 where it belongs the Duckk will snip this thread. The subject matter would make an excellent topic thread in Politics.

Poker

pokermind wrote:

Duckk wrote:People, take it elsewhere.

Gentlemen if you do not move this fascinating debate to politics http://forums.davidweber.net/viewforum.php?f=16 where it belongs the Duckk will snip this thread. The subject matter would make an excellent topic thread in Politics.

Poker

I am surprised he hasn't already. Certainly I stopped posting about it as soon as I saw the "take it elsewhere"