Skeptic Project

As I want to stay neutral at first I'll say something within the post my opinion about this. Just interested to see what you CS would say about this.

I dont see money as evil I just see the way people may use money as evil. Its not the tools that are to blame rather the way the tools are used, just as nuclear power is not evil, but can be used for evil.

I am using the term evil here as place holder for an action that is counter productive.

So in fact the monetary system is not inherently evil, rather the way people use it makes it counterproductive, but it is not necessarily this way. All that is happening is a trade of an intermediary for an object. The monetary value of the object is literally the price of the hours of labour a person puts into it, its quality and potential use plus its aesthetic and rarity value.

In a Resource based economy these inherent properties of objects will not go away, IE rarity/aesthetic beauty will not simply dissapear because no computer is going to knock out a million renoirs or rembrandts or be able to mimic the nuances of a live philharmonic orchestra performance. These things will be rare commodities irrespective of imitation knock offs, so to say everyone will have everything they want is not correct because I can not have all the renoirs I would love because there are only one of each.

Here's something else would would think Peter would be in a good position to understand.

What if you want to make a movie? Today you can make crap movies and people will help you make it if you pay them enough, but what incentive do we have to help people make movies we don't have any artistic belief in?

Fresco as I understand doesn't really "get" art even though he can draw, so might say that machines could be built to help. While a machine can probably replace crew that are mainly practical such as lighting grips, what about the artistic roles? Your special effects experts, stunt co-ordinators, CGI artists, make up designers, director of photography, writers, directors, sound designer, foley artist, composers, musicians, actors and so on.

So that person that wants to make a movie would want other film enthusiasts to help him, but since he has a crappy idea no one has any interest in he will want to offer some incentive such as bartering with them in some way.

Once you feel the need to do that in Fresco's world, its all over.

And Im someone who agrees with the majority of what Fresco says about human behaviour, I believe social conditioning is the main reason we are the way we are but he ignores basic things about humanity that really is natural.

But the fact is even if humans really are a blank slate as his vision requires, we as a society are not a blank slate and so there can be no transition. It would require all humanity forgets everything that came before his society. Because otherwise you have parents being "conditioned" but they werent from birth so they aren't 100% conditioned and so still teach their kids things they were taught and you can never get out of that because simple problems will fuck everything up as these simple examples show.

Add to the fact that Fresco's society requires hypothetical technology that doesn't exist yet, but as I said even then there would be problems.

The more I learn about money and banking and economics, the less evil it seems. It's a tool. It's the way people view it that might be problematic. That is a cultural thing and money mechanics itself doesn't seem to have much to do with it that I can see.

As for human nature, we have to realize they are two sides of the same coin. Yes, we are largely a product of our environment, but the way our environment affects us is determined by our genetics. And some of our behavior (like a baby crying) has nothing to do with the environment. I heard the split is about 50-50 genetics-environment that determines human behavior, but I'm not sure how they measured that [1].

What is funny is that ZGM are the ones saying money doesn't really mean anything and is just based on debt when the fact is if you removed money you would still have people wanting to barter with something else. Its not money that is the problem its the human nature issue of the want to barter. Money is just a way to do that, in countries where money is scarce you can barter with products you make, in places where money doesn't exist (like obscure little villages in some jungle somewhere) they barter in other ways.

They have a word for it "scarcity" but they do not explain how to remove all scarcity from life that you will never feel you will ever want to barter ever again. All their ideas about education are great and would I feel result in a much better society but they will never be able to engineer this aspect out of humans, yet this would destroy their entire concept their society is BASED on. For their society to work all bartering has to go.

I would like it if the Venus Project actually forgot this whole new society bullshit and just tried to get better education in schools, pointed out other absurdities in society and maybe tried to get real change happening.

The whole "new society" nonsense is just a total waste of everything they could be doing, so now they do nothing but evangelise about this amazing new society that will never happen.

if I want to maximize my power as an author, I need to sell as many books as I can, instead of only selling them to those who actually want one w/o me being obnoxious about it.

Or you could write a book that everyone wants to read, like Harry Potter. I think this problem exists, but mostly in cases of intense competition and high stakes, because at some point the stakes are so high that they outweigh the concern for society at large. This is a problem with capitalism, IMO, but I have no idea what can be done about it.

Also, I should sell only stuff that can be replaced after a while - which is why advertising will always prefer to sell products on continuity basis, instead of selling a one-time-fix.

Sounds like you're talking about planned obsolescence, but this only works in a monopoly situation. Once you start having competition, planned obsolescence becomes a losing strategy. Consumers will just switch to your competitors.

Instead of giving out all technology or quality I have, I only release 1% more than my competitor.

This is true, but if you made higher quality products they would use more resources and have to be priced higher. It just depends on what market you're trying to hit.

The last thing, if people can't afford what I have to sell, I just damage my goods (like Intel its processors) to sell them something w/o lowering the price of my high quality product. That this is stupid on a non-financial level should be obvious.

I haven't heard of that. Why not just make a lower quality product for cheaper and sell it for less? That would make more business sense.

But I have heard of coupons fulfilling this purpose - allowing a product to keep its "price point" while offering a discount to those who wouldn't be able to afford it otherwise.

That Pinker video was interesting, thanks.

I watch storyofstuff and home...

I'm not sure I would trust that video. I've heard lots of criticisms about its statistical evidence being wrong. I think it deserves to be looked into more deeply. Here's a review that looks promising: http://www.andybrain.com/qna/2007/12/07/annie-leonards-the-story-of-stuff-review-and-analysis/</p>

and just think that we shouldn't motivate people to buy things they wouldn't need otherwise.

I agree. I think government should raise the fines for false advertising so that it actually offsets the profits made via the false advertising, and I think they should lower the bar for what constitutes false advertising. I think they don't do this because better regulation costs more money, which we don't exactly have right now. But I don't think we can or should ban advertising outright because that would infringe on freedom of speech, which is more important to uphold than getting rid of advertising.

Nobody selling a "Do this and your face will clear up forever" product can compete with that, the entry cost is just too high.

If they had such a product, and they could sell it for a reasonable price, don't you think the demand would be super high? The entry cost might be high, but I think initial investors will see it would be worth it, and thus you would be able to secure the necessary funding.

Is it possible that they believe in some nature but that it's mostly nurture? I can't imagine them actually thinking it's all nurture.

Here's a review that looks promising: http://www.andybrain.com/qna/2007/12/07/annie-leonards-the-story-of-stuff-review-and-analysis/</p>

Thanks, I'll look into it.

But I don't think we can or should ban advertising outright because that would infringe on freedom of speech, which is more important to uphold than getting rid of advertising.

Yup, I'm not for any bans either. I've thought about nationalizing industry and rewarding "businesses" for measurable qualities and results, instead of letting them compete for profits - I still see the latter one only leading into plutonomies and corruption. I tend to agree with PJ on this, the more problems you create, the more money can be made solving them.

If they had such a product, and they could sell it for a reasonable price, don't you think the demand would be super high? The entry cost might be high, but I think initial investors will see it would be worth it, and thus you would be able to secure the necessary funding.

Well, I think they go 600k negative per show, 60 bucks per sale over 9 months makes $540 - you'd have to sell for that to be able to compete.

You'd have to charge more than $540 to make a profit, I don't think it's possible to pull that off on a mass scale, selling to non-super affluent customers.

Yup, I'm not for any bans either. I've thought about nationalizing industry and rewarding "businesses" for measurable qualities and results, instead of letting them compete for profits - I still see the latter one only leading into plutonomies and corruption. I tend to agree with PJ on this, the more problems you create, the more money can be made solving them.

I agree that could be a problem, vaguely, although we're getting into conspiracy waters here. Nonetheless, I think increased transparency can and will help. The information age is helping with this. Consumer review sites and ubiquity of access to those reviews (i.e. broadband access, smartphones) is helping and only getting better with time. Consumers can make their own decisions about which businesses get their dollar, and some of those decisions will be based on their assessment of the businesses' ethical practices, which is becoming more and more informed. I'm not sure anything beyond that needs to be done.

You'd have to charge more than $540 to make a profit, I don't think it's possible to pull that off on a mass scale, selling to non-super affluent customers.

Sometimes only the rich can afford the quality shit. This can be viewed as a problem, but that is a very hairy issue. After all, that money they paid for your product goes to you, and you might have been poor, lol.

Peter was initially going to call his new movie z3 tabula rasa from early forum posts, and he was going to do a big section on it, but he recently stated that he has had to do less about it. Now I know you all know about tabula rasa, so yes they do have a love for the idea.

But prisons do solve problems, they remove the offender from society.