[MD] Socialism

[Christoffer Ivarsson]

[mel]
 The intellectual level isn't 'victimized' by the market, it's
 part of the aggregate of the market in some partial
 'ven diagram' way.

 [chris]
I disagree. Since I view the intellectual level as being The Quest for
 Knowledge, I identify it as being very immoral for this Quest to be
 restricted by what's profitable.

[mel:]
Ah, I was speaking from the consumer/buyer's
point of view. The Quest-for-Knowledge, just like
the search-to-purchase, is not about what is
profitable; it is about what is preferrable.
(What is preferrable underlies this forum.)

[Chris]

Hmm, the clash between the levels still doesn't go away. The same problem 
remains:

The market controls what can be done how in terms of furthering 
intellectual-level-valued understanding (in terms of funding etc) and the 
market as such isn't primarily concerned with intellectual level values, but 
with social. Thus the social level rules over the intellectual. Which is 
immoral.


[mel:]
Just to repeat, regulations that remove restraint-of-trade
by low quality behavior and avoid creating regulation
based restraint-of-trade (potentially even more damaging)
are potentially in the service of DQ.

 [chris]
 It is my belief that no static/stable pattern of value can be "in service"
 of DQ. And I also believe that going down that road, as to justify things 
by
referring to a mystical entity called DQ that likes some things and
 dislikes other things will rightly place us in the "New Age" box.

[mel:]
This is a sort of 'negative proof'. A static pattern
can be said to be "in the service of DQ" to the extent
that it does not prevent the experience of DQ.


[Chris]
Maybe. If we are talking about humans here, which we are, this doesn't say 
much about the issue at hand though (the market that is). We can't know 
anything about DQ as such, and when we are to judge things in this world, we 
have to do so from the static patterns of Good we can see. That's why I 
talked about an "intellectually guided economy" as preferable to one where 
social values rule over intellectual ones.

[mel:]
An 'intellectually guided economy', however, is another thing.
Nothing is more democratic than the choice of where to spend
money, time, and attention. It is the ULTIMATE democracy to
the point of anarchism.

 [chris]
Democracy? I don't know what democracy has to do with that really. But 
nonetheless, it doesn't really have much to do with an intellectually guided 
economy either.

[Mel]
The value of human life is rather clearly shown when an
issue of People magazine or a tabloid journal is sold and
a coin is deposited in a Darfur Relief box by the same store's
cash register. We value the starving children, just not as
much as Brittany (sp), or Brad-Angelina/Jennifer/the Royals/
Beckham/All Blacks/Bollywood...at the end of the day when the
relief box and register sales are tallied.

[Chris]
THIS IS MY POINT! The reason it is this way is because the social level is 
supreme. We value social-level junk over other things, because that's the 
way the system works. Where we spend our money is controlled by social level 
values more than intellectual level values.