From: Steve Peterson (speterson@fast.net)
Date: Fri Jan 03 2003 - 22:06:54 GMT
Matt,
> Matt said:
> Oh, Lord. This is just completely wrong-headed. You can disagree with the
> assertion that economics is the primary motor of history, but to say that
> if it is, the world is _obviously_ getting better is to ignore, at the
> least, this century of American history. You say, "People are more wealthy
> now than ever." Which people? Wealthy people? Why yes, wealthy people
> are becoming more and more wealthy. The growth of the poor people's pie
> isn't quite looking as good, however.
The economic pie of wealth has gotten larger and larger throughout history.
The pie analogy is misleading. Wealth is created. Bill Gates, for example,
isn't hogging up a huge piece of a fixed pool of wealth as many liberals
imagine. The wealth that that he wields didn't exist before he was born.
He and those like him have made the pie much bigger so that we can all enjoy
larger slices.
Even though the gap between rich and poor has widened. Throughout history
poor continue to get richer. We have some of the richest poor people right
now in this country that the world has ever known.
Let me emphasize again that I'm not saying there is no problem. The
ever-increasing gap between rich and poor is a huge problem. But it is a
different sort of problem than you seem to think it is.
While our poor people (with the exception of a very small percentage) enjoy
shelter, enough food (our poor are disproportionately overweight in fact),
electricity, heating systems, indoor plumbing, and television, they tend to
have a far less dignified existence than people a hundred years ago who
never heard of Starbucks coffee, a VCR, or J Lo.
Economic justice and dignity cannot be achieved merely with more money.
>Matt said: There have been gains by some of the
> underpriveleged, but there are sill many living in complete and hopeless
> poverty. When I say that economics is the motor of history, I'm following
> Marx, the great defender of the underclass. He lived during the Industrial
> Revolution when people were becoming richer than they had ever been and
> faster than anybody thought possible.
Steve:
Have things gotten worse or better since Marx' time?
>Matt: What Marx meant by making economics
> the motor of history was that, until people have their material necessities
> taken care of, they won't have time to take care of their spiritual
> necessities. They won't have time to love thy neighbor. They'll be too
> busy scrapping for a meager existence.
> Now, I'm sure my statements will touch off another
> economics/political/statistical debate, one that I have no real interest in
> participating.
>The only point I need is my reading of Marx and the fact
> that a lot of poor people still exist in the "rich" North Atlantic nations
> and the world and a lot of suffering still exists.
Steve:
My point is that with the exception of a relatively small group of people in
the US, people's material necessities are taken care of.
I don't think you can argue that time is the issue. Like obesity, time
spent watching TV is negatively correlated with wealth. It would be
especially absurd to think that the unemployed don't have time for Quality.
I also don't think anyone needs a degree in philosophy or a great deal of
time for studying metaphysics to put what ZAMM teaches into practice.
E.g.:
I could take the highway instead of the country road and get there 5 minutes
faster. Will it make my day more enjoyable?
I could get a second job and make more money. But would I be any happier?
I could dump my wife for someone younger. Would my life be any better?
These and countless others are the sorts of questions that people need to
ask themselves. They are really questions that question our culture.
Contrary to what modern culture teaches us, richer, faster, bigger, younger,
more convenient etc. are not synonyms for better.
> Steve:
> Everyone is spiritual whether they know it or not if the universe is based
> on value not material.
>
> Matt:
> Nice for you to say, but if you make this paradigm switch, then the problem
> we are dealing with changes clothes, rather than goes away.
Steve:
Exactly. And this "change of clothes" is what will help us solve the
problem. I never meant to say that there is no problem. I'm just trying
to correctly diagnose the problem. (Once again, I am not talking about the
problems of the very small percentage of people who really do lack
biological necessities but of the rest of us.) To me, the misdiagnosis is a
huge part of the problem. It is a spiritual problem misdiagnosed as
"materialism."
We are convinced that we want things--that we are greedy. As if like Alice
being told by the Queen to shut her eyes and try real hard to believe
something impossible, we could concentrate hard enough to make ourselves
content with our lives as they are. There is nothing wrong with desire if
we can reason our way to desiring what will actually make us happy in life.
Our culture has us convinced that acquiring and consuming will make our
lives better. The problem is misplaced value. We don't actually want
things so much as what our culture has us convinced that those things
represent. But no matter how many packs of Double-mint gum we buy, we never
get to date the twins.
It is not only liberals, but conservatives as well who see the world as
going to hell. They each blame the other for the state of things and
propose contrasting solutions for how to make the world better. Isn't it
possible that they are both wrong about the causes and the solutions (and
maybe even about whether the world actually is getting worse)?
Both the the liberal and conservative points of view are based on the
assumption that more wealth is what will make our lives better. You seem to
agree when you say that what we need is "more money." I disagree (and in
doing so I have apparently offended your liberal sensibilities with your
"oh, Lord" and your choking back of anger, disbelief, and sorrow.)
I respect the compassion that liberals express, and I am repulsed by the
lack of compassion of many conservatives, but I can't always agree with the
liberal's proposed solutions to all of society's ills.
Winston Churchill said, (I don't know the exact quote that I believe he
paraphrased someone else) "Whoever is not a liberal before the age of thirty
is heartless, and whoever is not a conservative by the age of 60 is
brainless."
I sure hope there is another way. I don't want to be heartless or
brainless.
Steve
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