Illustrated Road to Serfdom

[Nonc Hilaire]

Saw a post with this old pamphlet this A.M.

I'm not sure what troubles me most. Its essential truth in today's government, or the fact that we have lost the ability to communicate this well.



http://mises.org/books/TRTS/

[Endovelico]

Saw a post with this old pamphlet this A.M.

I'm not sure what troubles me most. Its essential truth in today's government, or the fact that we have lost the ability to communicate this well.



http://mises.org/books/TRTS/

Talking about the evils of propaganda...

[Torchwood]

Well, Hayek was right, central planning was not just illiberal, it did not work, because it was uncreative and did not receive feedback to correct its errors, unlike the market. Anyway, it's dead, yesterday's issue (the most openly competitive economy in the world is probably China).

Today's problems are religious fundamentalism, and the rebirth of aggressive nationalism. Extremism is a many headed hydra, you have to keep chopping off heads. A lot of people don't want liberty, they want to be told what to think and believe.

[Mr. Perfect]

A lot of people don't want liberty, they want to be told what to think and believe.

Yeah.

[Nonc Hilaire]

Well, Hayek was right, central planning was not just illiberal, it did not work, because it was uncreative and did not receive feedback to correct its errors, unlike the market. Anyway, it's dead, yesterday's issue (the most openly competitive economy in the world is probably China).

Today's problems are religious fundamentalism, and the rebirth of aggressive nationalism. Extremism is a many headed hydra, you have to keep chopping off heads. A lot of people don't want liberty, they want to be told what to think and believe.

All ideologies have a fundamentalist dip in the cycle because unpredictability leads to a natural drift towards concrete thinking, but all reductional thought inevitably hits a dead end and cycles back. Thought oscillates in waves. It doesn't run in vectors.

[manolo]

All ideologies have a fundamentalist dip in the cycle because unpredictability leads to a natural drift towards concrete thinking, but all reductional thought inevitably hits a dead end and cycles back. Thought oscillates in waves. It doesn't run in vectors.

Nonc,

You sound like my wife.

Alex.

[Nonc Hilaire]

All ideologies have a fundamentalist dip in the cycle because unpredictability leads to a natural drift towards concrete thinking, but all reductional thought inevitably hits a dead end and cycles back. Thought oscillates in waves. It doesn't run in vectors.

Nonc,

You sound like my wife.

Alex.

Just shut up and move that damn motorcycle so I can get my car in the garage and unload these groceries.

[Marcus]

. . Today's problems are religious fundamentalism, . .

One's "religion" is that set of more-or-less systematic propositions in terms of which one makes sense of life and the cosmos.

And "religious" fundamentalists come in many colors. But it's always the other guy who's the fundamentalist, never me. It's always the other guy's religion that's goofy, never mine.

Trust me . . . !

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

Today's problems are the collapse of the Common Vision.......

It came with the Christian triumph over Roman society. Its high point came just before the schism in the 14th c. and it's been on the wane since the Reformation. The common vision is what makes our individual realities a universal one and is the one reason why we can claim our laws, our rights, our common humanity comes from G_d. Even when we deny that, and say that it comes from Nature and is vetted by Reason instead........

Now reality is unique and individual and exists within our heads. Our ties to other humans are relational and affectional, self-affirmative, and tribal...... tribal, tribal tribal. Social and political interests determined by the primitive id and ego. Stuff outside of the tribe is the Other, and is considered the enemy if it even comes up on the radar at all. What's left is a scrabble for the goodies of western civilisation. Some will end up with more and others less - the brokerage of which will be a demoralising mess....'>........

[Simple Minded]

Today's problems are the collapse of the Common Vision.......

It came with the Christian triumph over Roman society. Its high point came just before the schism in the 14th c. and it's been on the wane since the Reformation. The common vision is what makes our individual realities a universal one and is the one reason why we can claim our laws, our rights, our common humanity comes from G_d. Even when we deny that, and say that it comes from Nature and is vetted by Reason instead........

Now reality is unique and individual and exists within our heads. Our ties to other humans are relational and affectional, self-affirmative, and tribal...... tribal, tribal tribal. Social and political interests determined by the primitive id and ego. Stuff outside of the tribe is the Other, and is considered the enemy if it even comes up on the radar at all. What's left is a scrabble for the goodies of western civilisation. Some will end up with more and others less - the brokerage of which will be a demoralising mess....'>........

well said LG.

Remember when Information Technology was going to help us all get along wonderfully, cause we could communicate easily and often...

Instead we use it to criticize those of whom we have no knowledge and whom we will never meet. Not to mention fall in love and get engaged to someone we never met.

I thought progress was supposed to better.

[Simple Minded]

. . Today's problems are religious fundamentalism, . .

One's "religion" is that set of more-or-less systematic propositions in terms of which one makes sense of life and the cosmos.

And "religious" fundamentalists come in many colors. But it's always the other guy who's the fundamentalist, never me. It's always the other guy's religion that's goofy, never mine.

Trust me . . . !

Marcus, that is the "fundamental" difference between mainstreamers and extremists! Everybody knows that!

[Parodite]

And "religious" fundamentalists come in many colors. But it's always the other guy who's the fundamentalist, never me. It's always the other guy's religion that's goofy, never mine.

Religions are always goofy. It can't be denied. Well, you can try... but it never works.

[Marcus]

Today's problems are the collapse of the Common Vision.......

It came with the Christian triumph over Roman society. Its high point came just before the schism in the 14th c. and it's been on the wane since the Reformation. The common vision is what makes our individual realities a universal one and is the one reason why we can claim our laws, our rights, our common humanity comes from G_d. . .

The "great schism" occurred in the 11th century when the bishops of Rome and Constantinople excommunicated each other and thus sundered the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ into two denominations—the Roman Catholic and the Orthodox. Five hundred years later, the Roman Catholic church excommunicated Luther, and here we are.

What "collapsed" at the Reformation was not some imagined "common vision" but rather the tyrannical coercion of common obedience to Specific Authority.

"The story of salvation on earth is the advance of the singular against the plural. Salvation came into a world of many gods, many lands, many peoples. Over against each of these it sets up a singular: one God, one world, one humankind.

"Correspondingly, the story comprises three great epochs. In the first, one God triumphs over the many false gods. This process fills the first millennium of our era, and its outcome is the Christian Church. Therefore church history is the interesting and important aspect of the first thousand years A.D. In the second epoch one earth is won from the plural of unconnected countries and undiscovered lands; no Chinese walls remain effective. This is the point at which we stand today: geographically, technically, statistically, the earth is finally one, and so indeed is the whole world of nature, thanks to modern science which Christendom created. The master institutions of the second millennium are, first the Papacy as a worldly power, then the system of territorial states which grew from under its wings. Therefore world history or political history is the theme of this period.

"Today we are living through the agonies of transition to the third epoch. We have yet to establish Man, the great singular of humanity, in one household, over the plurality of races, classes, and age groups. This will be the center of struggle in the future,... They pose the questions the third millennium will have to answer. ... The State is on the defensive because it is inadequate for the needs of the coming age. The theme of future history will be not territorial or political but social:..."

The Christian Future Or The Modern Mind Outrun, Rosenstock-Huessy, Harper & Row, 1946, pgs. 114-115

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

Today's problems are the collapse of the Common Vision.......

It came with the Christian triumph over Roman society. Its high point came just before the schism in the 14th c. and it's been on the wane since the Reformation. The common vision is what makes our individual realities a universal one and is the one reason why we can claim our laws, our rights, our common humanity comes from G_d. Even when we deny that, and say that it comes from Nature and is vetted by Reason instead........

Now reality is unique and individual and exists within our heads. Our ties to other humans are relational and affectional, self-affirmative, and tribal...... tribal, tribal tribal. Social and political interests determined by the primitive id and ego. Stuff outside of the tribe is the Other, and is considered the enemy if it even comes up on the radar at all. What's left is a scrabble for the goodies of western civilisation. Some will end up with more and others less - the brokerage of which will be a demoralising mess....'>........

well said LG.

Remember when Information Technology was going to help us all get along wonderfully, cause we could communicate easily and often...

Instead we use it to criticize those of whom we have no knowledge and whom we will never meet. Not to mention fall in love and get engaged to someone we never met.

I thought progress was supposed to better.

But we have all these images of cats, and they're so clever with their fractured english and shi†.....'>>...........

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

The "great schism" occurred in the 11th century when the bishops of Rome and Constantinople excommunicated each other and thus sundered the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ into two denominations—the Roman Catholic and the Orthodox. Five hundred years later, the Roman Catholic church excommunicated Luther, and here we are.

What "collapsed" at the Reformation was not some imagined "common vision" but rather the tyrannical coercion of common obedience to Specific Authority.

I wasn't trying to blame the protestant movement or churches, but rather the ecumenical effort of French clerics and German princes to build the modern nation state and to found it on secular ideals of language, culture and race. The first concern of G_d in the Old Testament was that man worshipped Him, and not a graven image, or man himself. Even with the coming of the Messiah in the New, this thing receded only a little bit. All considered, to me, this seems one of those brilliant ideas that sound rather dumb, but with progress looking like a march towards idiocracy through a Cliff notes reading of Freud's Civilisation and Its Discontents, it might be worth revisiting.....'>>.........

and...... the Catholic church certainly looks like the bad guy, but there are heresies and some things are worth fighting for......'>>......

[Simple Minded]

And "religious" fundamentalists come in many colors. But it's always the other guy who's the fundamentalist, never me. It's always the other guy's religion that's goofy, never mine.

Religions are always goofy. It can't be denied. Well, you can try... but it never works.

The dilemma of the "True Believer."

It has always struck me as a significant question, when does the concept of a "strong enough faith" turns into ones' own personal self-delusion? True with all sorts of ideology (little r religions), including politics, not just Religion (big R).

There are all sorts of churches out there, politics, sports, hobbies, hip fads, etc.

So many interpretations of reality to choose from.

[monster_gardener]

Today's problems are the collapse of the Common Vision.......

It came with the Christian triumph over Roman society. Its high point came just before the schism in the 14th c. and it's been on the wane since the Reformation. The common vision is what makes our individual realities a universal one and is the one reason why we can claim our laws, our rights, our common humanity comes from G_d. Even when we deny that, and say that it comes from Nature and is vetted by Reason instead........

Now reality is unique and individual and exists within our heads. Our ties to other humans are relational and affectional, self-affirmative, and tribal...... tribal, tribal tribal. Social and political interests determined by the primitive id and ego. Stuff outside of the tribe is the Other, and is considered the enemy if it even comes up on the radar at all. What's left is a scrabble for the goodies of western civilisation. Some will end up with more and others less - the brokerage of which will be a demoralising mess....'>........

well said LG.

Remember when Information Technology was going to help us all get along wonderfully, cause we could communicate easily and often...

Instead we use it to criticize those of whom we have no knowledge and whom we will never meet. Not to mention fall in love and get engaged to someone we never met.

I thought progress was supposed to better.

Thank You VERY MUCH for your post, Simple Minded.

Remember when Information Technology was going to help us all get along wonderfully, cause we could communicate easily and often...

I remember even more clearly, post 911, when someone whose name I don't remember, discussed that idea and pointed out that the truth appeared to be quite the opposite: that the information exchange on the web, especially images, may have been one of the causes of 911.

Previously vicious Muslim religious fanatics in places like Saudi Arabia might have known that there were infidels in the world doing all sort of immodest things condemned by Allah & Mohammed but now the fact was being rubbed in their face by almost every web search they did given Rule 34 "that if it exists there is porn of it - no exceptions"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_34_%2 ... et_meme%29

I think he may have described it as "They hate US because Britney showed her Belly on MTV"

A bit silly, as I suspect Castro Street in San Francisco is more the problem though I could be wrong

But perhaps generally somewhat true....

As we now know each other and too often find out that we DON'T like each other....

And that it may have been somewhat better when Good Fences/distance made more or less tolerable neighbors as long as each stayed on his or her side of the fence or ocean....

Another factor may be all the wealth displayed engendering greed.....
Maybe not for the Saudis who should have plenty, but maybe for Afghans & similar less wealthy who...

Look at them yoyo infidels
And the way they do it
All that loot on the MTV....
And the way they do it
That ain't workin'
Money for Nothing.....
And chicks for free
Let's take them.....
Or burn it down....


Maybe just the Music itself which is also forbidden......

But offense/control freakism & greed/envy are applicable to other conflicts too......
Not just the Muslim/Infidel one.....

And aggravated by the Web....

Can put US/the World in Dire Straits

lAD6Obi7Cag