Skeptic Project

RBE, TVP, "Demand The Good Life," what-have-you...these artificial and theoretical schemes for "fixing the world," and a lot of people on this board have been debating them as if they are actually real or have any value out there in the real world.

The problem I have with these schemes is the inherent assumption they make that "changing the world" is extremely simple, and that the only reason the world isn't significantly better than it is is because not enough people have decided that they want to change it.

Like that link GEI posted, bullshit like this:

To implement this program, all we have to do is vote for it.
People think change is difficult. It is not. It may require a lot of hard work. But it is not difficult work. And what makes this work even easier is the position you are currently in.

This is ludicrous. Intellectually this is no different than the John Frum cargo cults on those Pacific islands after World War II, where they built landing crafts and runway equipment out of bamboo and expected tanker planes full of booty to land and solve all their problems.

TVP and RBE are the same. Oh, let's just decide to get rid of money and share goods equally. Then the world will be so much better! Yeah, right. That's like saying, I'd love to walk on the moon. I think I'll go there this weekend.

There are a lot of things in this world that desperately need changing. There are political, economic, social, environmental and numerous other problems that people should be actively working to solve. But solving these problems is extremely, EXTREMELY hard. That's why the people who do make significant progress at solving them are deserving of the recognition they get.

You know someone who changed the world in real life? Gandhi. You know how long it took him? Something like 40 years. Gandhi made a difference in the world. He went out there and worked for it. He didn't spend his time cooking up some ridiculous soup-to-nuts ideology and then tell people, "Believe in it! The world will transform itself!"

You know who else changed the world? Mother Teresa. It took her almost her whole life. She did it by working her ass off in the most horrific and squalid slums on the planet, taking care of one kid at a time. She made a difference in the world. Again, she didn't sit there dreaming up some grand new system for mankind and then put it on a website and called it "changing the world." She made a difference where she could.

Furthermore, not all people who have changed the world have changed it for good. Hitler, for instance, definitely changed the world. So did Napoleon, Karl Marx, Pol Pot and Stalin.

Another thing that bothers me about these push-a-button schemes is that their proponents seem to believe that they are either the first people in human history to happen upon a magical idea that will fix everything, and/or they are the first people in human history whose desire to change the world is strong enough to (they think) translate it into results. Both views are fundamentally arrogant, naive and insulting.

Essentially these people think they will fix the world's problems through an act of will. "I WANT to abolish the money system." "I WANT to live the good life." "I WANT to clean up the environment." Not good enough. Not even close.

History is made, and the world changed, not through acts of will, but through acts of power. Some acts of power serve good and positive ends, like Gandhi's and Mother Teresa's. Some acts of power serve evil ends like Hitler's or Lenin's. But will isn't enough, and changing the world, however you want to change it, is NEVER simple.

demandthegoodlife.com builds on things that already work. It has nothing in common with an RBE.

And your claim that voting can't change the world and make society a better place is also wrong. A concerted effort to create change through the political process has brought an end to slavery, human rights, women's suffrage, civil rights, universal education, access to a hospital even if you can't pay, universal healthcare for seniors, guaranteed income for seniors, stricter regulations that create a cleaner environment, universal police protection, universal fire protection, I could go on.

That same process can deliver a basic income, cheaper credit, universal higher education, easier access to home ownership - some things that I think will improve our existence.

People who enact legislation are voted into power. Government 101, try to keep up.

@Matt "Horse shit, no one elects members of the Supreme Court. They're appointed."

Not only do elected people enact the legislation, they also appoint the supreme court members. But congress writes the law, not the supreme court.

Maybe you need to re-read your Highlights magazine.

And SCOTUS members will likely maintain the same worldview throughout their entire lifetime that got them appointed in the first place. Plus none of the progress we made from the examples I listed above came by way of the SCOTUS striking down an unconstitutional law.

Spend more time on the stories and less time on coloring in the pictures.

"is it just me, or is anyone else reminded of scrotum when they read SCOTUS?"

Of course, because they provide the seeds for the the POTUS.
.

A concerted effort to create change through the political process has brought an end to slavery...

No, it was a concerted effort to change through military processes. In case you don't recall, the end of slavery cost us 600,000 lives.

human rights...

Not legislative in origin. Not even close to being implemented in vast regions of the world.

women's suffrage...

Result of nearly a 100-year campaign of social, political and economic pressure. Not legislative in origin.

civil rights...

Result of a 100+ year campaign of multifaceted action including decades-long legal strategies, religious movements, political agitation, demonstration, open confrontation, passive resistance and economic boycotts. Not legislative in origin.

universal education...

Result of hundreds of years of experimentation with various types of educational systems, including private, religious, and publicly-funded. Not legislative in origin.

access to a hospital even if you can't pay, universal healthcare for seniors...

Not legislative in origin. Mainly the result of economic forces from the 1930s to the 1960s, not to mention changing attitudes of the medical profession and changing attitudes toward entitlements.

guaranteed income for seniors...

Same as above. Not legislative in origin. Mainly the result of economic forces.

stricter regulations that create a cleaner environment...

Not legislative in origin. Result of nearly 100-year campaign for awareness, value shifting and conservation, much of it conducted in the economic sphere.

universal police protection, universal fire protection

Not legislative in origin. Both modern police and fire systems arose as a result of community action on the private level over a period of hundreds of years in European and American history.

Indeed, not a single thing you mentioned came about as a result of legislation. Not a SINGLE thing. The fact that laws were eventually passed to institutionalize what had already happened does not prove your point--in fact, it undermines it.

Next?

No, my point is that laws are entirely reactive--not proactive.

Case in point: did you know that Congress passed a civil rights act in 1864 that provided for much of the same things that we today know as features of civil rights? It was widely ignored, frustrated in practice, never implemented at all in most cases, and very much after the fact was struck down by the Supreme Court in the Slaughterhouse Cases in 1873. After 100 years of social, economic and political agitation for civil rights, Congress passed a second Civil Rights Act in 1964 (the first of many). It took 100 years of social change to get it to stick.

See the difference?

"is it just me, or is anyone else reminded of scrotum when they read SCOTUS? "

Also, angina/vagina

Muertos,

I'm not sure I agree with your premise (if I understand your premise correctly) that these changes require hundreds of years to figure out.

These solutions like a basic income, universal healthcare, universal education, etc. are common sense ideas that should have been implemented from the start. It doesn't take 100 years to figure out that the right thing to do is to treat people who are sick regardless of their ability to pay. It takes someone with half a brain, a few hours of time and a little creativity.

The only reason why it takes hundreds of years to reach common sense progress is because the world is full of a bunch of idiots who believe in conspiracy theories, pseudoscience and fairy tales.

What happens in the world does not affect a country's ability to use taxes to pay a basic income.

-GEI from http://conspiracyscience.com/forums/topic/i-want-freedom-of-information-oh-and-i-also-want-my-privacy/page/3</p>

Because, in a perfect world, the Soviet Union would have been able to maintain their economic system- only problem was that there were many, many more factors that limited, hindered, and crippled their economic control. Nations dont exist in vacuums.

Kaiser

Because, in a perfect world, the Soviet Union would have been able to maintain their economic system- only problem was that there were many, many more factors that limited, hindered, and crippled their economic control. Nations dont exist in vacuums.

NO, the USSR failed because socialism doesn't work. Mixed economies work best.

The USSR has nothing to do with the US's ability to pay social security to people under 65. What does one have to do with the other!?

OH MY GOD! You missed the point ENTIRELY! You cannot possibly expect a government to be able to foresee and control large expenditures over time and not have issues arise surrounding massive, global shifts and events! Countries run deficits, they bottom out, wars are fought and require more money. This shit happens, and its foolish to think such a scheme can be implemented without running a tremendous risk. You can't say the USSR failed because socialism doesnt work because thats a historically ignorant position to take because -heads up- the USSR was not a pure socialist nation! Its a laughably overs simplified statement that literally establishes and explains NOTHING. My point is that your basic income scheme wont work because governments DO NOT have perfect control over economic activity. Furthermore, basic plans like social security sure haven't been impervious to things like a falling base from which to draw funds. Money isn't constant GEI. You cant possibly expect funds to remain static for such a half-baked idea.

See what I mean?

I'm tired of these half-baked theories by armchair pseudo-activists who think that they can analyze, off the cuff, the failures of numerous previous attempts to reform the human condition, and can come up with a coherent plan that's so much more cohesive and workable.

If it was really that easy, don't you think someone else in the previous 10,000 years of human civilization would have thought of doing it that way? I mean, how arrogant can these nimrods get?

At its inception, social security was absolutely nothing like what it is now.

I'm glad to see you are now on board with the idea that these programs have been improving over time and all the website is suggesting is a continuing of that process of improvement.

Welcome aboard. Send me a PM so I can show you the secret handshake.