tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post3068512396860152885..comments2024-02-18T18:59:06.164+00:00Comments on Econosophy and other musings: A Brief Story of MoneyTobyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-40605869680203811772010-05-13T15:58:00.514+00:002010-05-13T15:58:00.514+00:00Toby, I think we ALMOST agree here.
I am an ardent...Toby, I think we ALMOST agree here.<br />I am an ardent defender of our being ANIMALS.<br />And I am aware of what you are talking about with the dolphins, and the chimpanzees.<br />But I am making a difference between us and other animals on the EFFECTS that our symbolic systems and the consciousness that goes with them, generate in our civilization.<br />I agree with you that we are much more animal than we even like to think that we are.<br />In the end I will defend, with you, the idea that we are animals.<br />I feel that it is deeply unfortunate at this time that the REALIZATION that we are animals has... DEPRESSED us so much... Got us so... MELANCHOLY.<br />The "higher" mammals, like dolphins, chimps, and elephants definitely behave very much like we do, that's for sure. Or... WE behave very much like them ??Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-22678275586693027022010-05-13T13:25:13.675+00:002010-05-13T13:25:13.675+00:00Debra, perhaps you think I mean 'healthy' ...Debra, perhaps you think I mean 'healthy' when I say natural. I don't, I just mean natural. The point I'm making, by being close to redundant with a definition of 'natural' that includes everything, is not to render the word pointless, but to get over the cultural sense humans have developed of being above nature, that machines are somehow 'unnatural'. They're just tools, like the computer and the plough. What is unhealthy is the way we have organized ourselves socially in pursuit of monetary profit. Our sense of being above nature still pervades the way we think and express ourselves: <br /><br />"I don't think that this is visible in the animal world."<br /><br />We <i>are</i> one of the animals in the animal world, and depression is indeed evident in other species. I watched on a documentary some years ago a young, recently orphaned chimpanzee in the wild fade away and die, so badly did it miss its mother. Dolphins live max 5 years in captivity, but about 25 to 30 in the wild. A dolphin trainer who worked with dolphins for decades claimed one committed suicide in his arms (I wish I could find that article). One of my daughter's friends has a pet bird which is right now very listless because its owner is away for a week. We are animals just like all the others. <br /><br />However, we are capable of many things the other animals are not. But we do not become less animal the more complex our behaviours become. Can other animals be 'unnatural' in what they do?<br /><br />Otherwise, I agree with most of what you say, just this (to me very) important semantic point lies between us. You are describing a healthy relationship with environment as 'natural' and an unhealthy one as 'unnatural.' I prefer healthy and unhealthy, and try to leave 'unnatural' from my lexicon.<br /><br />Rupert, you know I agree with all that, but I feel also that the way through the ego and beyond requires the ego as a guide for that journey. It's all there in the grail legends. I also believe that consciousness is the ground of all being, and that what we experience as 'the real world' is itself part of consciousness, part of the story that we are weaving together, but that is a <i>whole</i> other story!<br /><br />Thai, no harm done, and thank you for the apology!Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-42893891770362274342010-05-13T12:12:14.303+00:002010-05-13T12:12:14.303+00:00Toby, I agree with Rupert on this one.
I think tha...Toby, I agree with Rupert on this one.<br />I think that the "consciousness" experiment has introduced new... variables into nature that are not visible everywhere.<br />During and after WW1, Freud was EXTREMELY depressed to discover that his pleasure principle theory COULD NOT account for the fact that soldiers coming back from the front had repetitive nightmares where they went back to traumatic experiences over and over again. (Anglo Saxon vocab calls it PTSD, i don't call it that....)<br />How do you explain that human beings go BACK to trauma over and over again if it... hurts them and even puts them in danger ?<br />I think that only the phenomenon of consciousness accounts for this. The.. FACT that it can be more important for humans to be... RIGHT than it is for them to be alive... That our language and symbolic systems ARE more important to us than... eating, for example...<br />I don't think that this is visible in the animal world.<br />I am arguing that this state of affairs does NOT give us any hierarchical superiority.<br />If anything... it gives us MORE RESPONSIBILITY.<br />That's what aristocracy is all about.. more "riches" means more responsibility. <br />And consciousness goes hand in hand with.. MELANCHOLY.<br />The ability to bring THE WHOLE THING DOWN because we HATE ourselves.<br />This is what I see going on around us in our civilization right now Toby.<br />Now... is it.. NATURAL ?<br />I won't go that far. I WILL say that it is HUMAN, that's for sure.<br />But in my book, we have been cultivating ALIENATION for a long time, and I am not happy with saying that alienation is... natural, just because it's.. there. <br />I think that at some point we have a responsibility to MAKE CHOICES (in our daily lives...).<br />Not just to.. theorize about the world from whatever perspective we choose to look at it.<br />We are... NOT GOD, after all...We can't take his (symbolic) place.Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-86565003819234012002010-05-13T11:48:59.677+00:002010-05-13T11:48:59.677+00:00Toby, my sincerest apology (honest). I have simply...Toby, my sincerest apology (honest). I have simply had this same conversation with Deb so many times<br /><br />Deb, please check your email frenchydotrousseauatgmaildotcom<br /><br />"dot" means . <br /><br />"at" means @Thaihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00700253024420397221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-11786026100924649812010-05-13T08:27:42.431+00:002010-05-13T08:27:42.431+00:00Allow me to expand on what may well be obvious to ...Allow me to expand on what may well be obvious to you but I will explain my thinking none the less. The sentient elements of nature I see as those that have developed their instincts in conjunction with their language. There by greatly accelerating their abilities to adapt to their changing environment. As you travel down the layers of 'intelligence' our ability to manipulate our environment changes, for good or bad. Toby, I know our understanding of what choices we make is influenced by an incomplete list of variables, my point is that we have 'tools' at our disposal that no other animal has access to. The concept that we have to de-ego and reconnect with our nature is the battle to which I refer. We've learned a new dance but the band are playing the same tune, instruments may have changed shape but the tempo and key have stayed the same. Stop. Listen and try to pick up the beat again.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13850588586412355359noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-64154139498110749862010-05-13T06:37:38.205+00:002010-05-13T06:37:38.205+00:00Things that are wildly different can come under th...Things that are wildly different can come under the same set on a larger perspective. I am not trying to argue that trees and skyscrapers are the same, only that they are both natural products. At this level of definition -- everything is nature -- what I am NOT doing is removing difference from the equation, I am pointing out that Descartes was wrong to insist on a split between mind and body, and that all other dichotomies along those lines are wrong too. <br /><br />Also, you can be a primitivist and believe that everything is nature, I don't see the two positions as mutually exclusive. I might call primitivism very conservative and romantic, but I think it sees humans as part of nature, don't you, Debra? What I think all humans have to recognise is that we are not 'above' nature looking down on it, harming it or protecting it. We are a part of it, made by it, embedded in it and cannot escape it. Nothing we can do is unnatural.<br /><br />Thai, this has been my position since I was very young, so don't try and paint me as Thai II, I find that offensive. I even drove my parents to distraction with such arguments. Neither you nor I are original thinkers Thai, and, as with everyone else, we agree on some things, and disagree on others. It's natural ;-)Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-19425717258778678752010-05-12T23:34:56.671+00:002010-05-12T23:34:56.671+00:00LOL!
Deb, you seem to have found my... clone? ;-)...LOL!<br /><br />Deb, you seem to have found my... clone? ;-)<br /><br />... Well, not the issue of abundance for even if we are 18 billion agreeable on this planet, those people all have to agree not to eat all the fish, etc...<br /><br />Still, this blog chat must have the ring of "I've read this before"?<br /><br />... If Toby starts saying "it's all very fractal" (and he is getting <i><b>awfully</b></i> close), the transformation will be complete.<br /><br />Anyway, I just came over to say "hi" since you never responded to my earlier emails.<br /><br />Be wellThaihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00700253024420397221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-53696736521350939192010-05-12T18:57:23.530+00:002010-05-12T18:57:23.530+00:00I don't think we're going to agree on this...I don't think we're going to agree on this one, Toby...<br />The key word is "ultimately".<br />I'm not a zero sum person.<br />It got me into trouble a while ago...<br />I think that we need to establish differences in order to be able to think, and that saying that EVERYTHING is natural is eliminating difference.<br />I am not willing to eliminate that difference.<br />To a certain extent I feel that that difference is a fundamental one to even... DEFINING what civilization is. By opposition to... something DIFFERENT.<br />It's true that there is destruction everywhere, and believe it or not... I eat my meat with gusto, unlike my bro who has been vegetarian for years.<br />As a former psychoanalyst, I am aware of what sadism is, probably more so than many others.<br />But... there are DIFFERENT kinds of destruction, and it is not because something is destroyed and I can handle destruction that the MANNER in which it is destroyed is indifferent to me. Not at all. <br />I understand Ecclesiastes, and "There is a time for".<br />I follow that.<br />But... skyscrapers and trees are in a different ballpark for me. Sorry.<br />At heart I am Rousseauian. And a primitivist. At this time, at least.Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-68009198150183928942010-05-12T17:23:13.324+00:002010-05-12T17:23:13.324+00:00Well, we kill animals when we want to, as do other...Well, we kill animals when we want to, as do other animals that eat animals, or hunt them. Our cat, for example, kills birds for fun. Then nature has in its lexicon viruses that kill their hosts. Death and destruction are part of life. <br /><br />We repair machines when they are repairable and it makes sense to do so, and we heal animals when we can and believe to makes sense to do so. Or we throw them away. We are animals produced by nature, and interact with nature as it interacts with us. <br /><br />The differences you describe are of course there. There are differences everywhere; hearts are different from bones, and yet they are both part of the human body. Computers are different from worms but both are parts of nature, both are natural. As termite mounds with air conditioning are acts of nature, so are skyscrapers with air conditioning. Some things are made by animals, others are made less purposefully by other systemic processes (animals are also systemic processes, but are very visible and easy to identify as individual units so to speak). Something is making something, it's just a matter of defining "making" and the processes involved.<br /><br />As to what we can tolerate and not tolerate, that is different from person to person. But change is always happening. Speaking very crudely, once there were no plants at all, and all sorts of life forms were probably obliterated when plants took over. Then animals came along and obliterated many plant forms. Now we have homo sapiens sapiens as yet another form of nature having its effects on its surroundings, and so it goes on. Everything is natural. Even destruction. Even sorrow and depression. Even sickness. What we value and prefer is personal to us, and dependent on a very complex set of influences, both cultural and biological. But ultimately it's all nature.Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-28036055072876767792010-05-12T15:17:13.832+00:002010-05-12T15:17:13.832+00:00I don't feel that there is a clash between sen...I don't feel that there is a clash between sentient and non sentient nature, if I'm understanding you correctly, Rupert.<br />But... I DO think that there is a BIG difference between a computer and a worm.<br />Men can MAKE computers.<br />They CANNOT... make worms.<br />Nor can they... ressuscitate worms once they have killed them. They can... repair machines. <br />That is a BIG difference in my book.<br />The fact that there are carbon atoms in the worm and in the computer do not dull the distinction in my mind that the worm is alive and the computer is NOT.<br />Descartes also happened to think, as per his time that the animals were machines... because they lacked (self) consciousness. <br />No go, for me on that one.<br />I do NOT follow him there. <br />And... I think he was wrong.<br />I authorize myself to pass judgment here.<br />Because... look what we do to the machines when we finish USING them... They go on the junk heap. They are blithely destroyed, with NO conscious regret. No conscience. <br />Do we really want to continue on this course, and do this with... animals, and men ?<br />Not me. I don't want to be any part of that. <br />Certainly that is an emotional reaction, if you like.<br />But... our emotions also serve to LIMIT our conscious actions in certain cases.<br />And that can have VERY positive effects. <br />Why do you think that the Nazi command expended a great deal of energy trying to find ingenious ways to gas the Jewish people that would NOT elicit emotions in the people participating ? (Not sadism. Dispassionate killing.) <br />Because they KNEW that emotions also induce identification which limits our actions. <br />We can justify ANY course of action on the grounds of REASON ALONE..Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-18347971429760164672010-05-12T10:25:59.368+00:002010-05-12T10:25:59.368+00:00I don't know what progress is, except trying t...I don't know what progress is, except trying to change things for the better. If we feel it to be good then it is, if we feel it to be bad, then it's bad. Typically, it seems people who live in poverty and have to struggle to stay alive in a hand-to-mouth way, most often prefer to live the Western way, surrounded by the trappings of what we call progress. That progress is thorny, patchy and troubled is a given.<br /><br />But I have to insist that everything is nature, even perception itself. I see computers and trees differently because they are different, just as bird nests and ant hills are different. They are all though, as is everything else, products of nature. There is <i>only</i> nature. To believe otherwise is to be entangled in the unfortunate Cartesian split that has so bedevilled modern thought, even though Decartes was merely making clear what was already quite visible in Christianity and other overly paternalistic religions. But we must be careful not to hate the sky god while re-embracing mother earth. Both are parts of nature, and parts of our projections.<br /><br />Rupert hit the nail on the head, though with a dyslexic hammer ;-) Sentience and non-sentience are quasi-remnants of the Cartesian mind-body split, a false dichotomy if ever there were one. It may be that this is our joker in the pack, culturally speaking, because it is even more key than money. If we can nail this sucker down, look at this openly and bravely, other things might fall better into place. <br /><br />There is The One which gives rise to infinite diversity. It is the blind watchmaker, or God, or whatever you want to call it. But it is The One.Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-51164739257100909302010-05-12T09:25:19.542+00:002010-05-12T09:25:19.542+00:00Everything MAY be nature, and then again may NOT b...Everything MAY be nature, and then again may NOT be.<br />I don't think that we look at... a computer or a tree with the same perspective, the same eyes.<br />In a certain way, I feel that saying that things are zero sum is unfortunately a way of saying that in the long run there is NO DIFFERENCE.<br />But... to me these are lies that we are telling ourselves.<br />Because deep down we FEEL that there are differences, and we BEHAVE as though there ARE differences.<br />When we tell ourselves lies, alienation is the result.<br />There is currently great alienation between us and the world of the trees, the birds, the animals, to define nature THAT WAY, precisely. <br />But there is probably greater alienation WITHIN our minds...<br />Does water gain economic value because it becomes scarce or because we start looking at it a different way, we start SEEING IT with new eyes ?<br />Is water REALLY scarce now ? I don't think so. <br />Did some of the Indian cultures NOT see economic value to water because they didn't make it enter a system of numeric, monetary exchange ? <br />To me.. industial agriculture is an abomination.<br />And it is definitely... NOT rational.<br />What is rational about.. not composting our material waste to return it to the ground in order to fertilize it (without having to go through Montsanto, thank you.. or buying seeds from Montsanto every year instead of keeping part of your crop to reseed) ?<br />Is this progress ?<br />WHAT is progress, and why are we so convinced that it is a GOOD thing for us ?<br />That it is an advantage that has NO disadvantages...<br />If I talk so much about the Ancien Regime, it is because for very good ideological reasons we have tons of prejudice about who we were, as human beings, under it.<br />Too bad. But... we will be returning to some of its ideas. We already are. Human beings ALWAYS return to the past for models in times of crisis.<br />A way of ensuring continuity for the society.Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-23640423763063328532010-05-12T09:07:46.789+00:002010-05-12T09:07:46.789+00:00I can't prove that no energy is ever created o...I can't prove that no energy is ever created or destroyed, that is WAY beyond my ability, but the idea at least represents a new phase of our understanding which differs from the prior understanding. What becomes of what we 'know' is anybody's guess, my point is that change is the only constant. And while we must try never to throw the baby out with the bath water, it is sometimes unhelpful to point to the past and say, ah, then it was good, then we really knew what it's all about. There has never been and never will be such a time, and besides, change is the only constant.<br /><br />What is also inescapable is that some feel happy in their time, while others don't, with all the shades in between. What the human animal, embedded in nature (there is only nature) can achieve, and how this incredible animal copes with the fallout of its own accomplishments, is also uncertain, particularly if we think forwards in millennia. Nevertheless I think it valid to look at, as best we can, what is changing, and which of our old received wisdoms are possibly in the way of smoother and wiser coping strategies for the changes we bring down upon our own heads.<br /><br />Money is a variable which itself changes as it effects and changes those systems and variables it impacts, while those systems which impact it bring pressure to bear to change it further. I believe that ultimately (I don't know how long) there will be no further need for money in human society, but in the meantime, due to quickly changing conditions, we need to tune how money works, so that it functions in a healthier manner. An example: I just heard that "fresh" as in "fresh apples" in the supermarkets means not older than 2 years! They are plucked very green, and ripened slowly in special storage conditions. There is much controversy over whether this is healthy. It is certainly done for monetary reasons, not for health.<br /><br />Air has no economic value, and water becomes more economically valuable the scarcer it becomes. This is a simple part of business. Economic activity though is not zero sum in total. Economic activity is wedded to technological developments, which do improve living standards generally. Everthing is interconnected -- technology, money, economics, politics, art... Everything is nature. To talk of unnatural things is to talks of impossibilities. Humans are as natural as ants, industry is as natural as agriculture. Before agriculture there was hunter gathering. Hunter gatherers were uniformly egalitarian. As humans settled social structures became hierarchical. This is neither good nor bad, it just is. I happen to think we are about to choose, culturally and globally, between deeper, more rigid hierarchy, or a move towards greater egalitarianism.<br /><br />Time will tell which way this cookie crumbles, but the battle to shape money is a key battle ground, and the war is well underway.Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-58983136618975167592010-05-12T08:58:21.495+00:002010-05-12T08:58:21.495+00:00As the sphere of my existence bounds and rebounds ...As the sphere of my existence bounds and rebounds against many others my ego has developed a list of needs whose priorities change on a daily basis. The clash between sencient and non-sencient nature continues to baffle me. I have witnessed, and engaged in, a variety of philosophical debates and, I don't know if it is beyond the depth of my perception, the conclusions that I fumble into being have sated me. I continue to fine tune my understandings as my relationship with the world blossoms and my happiness grows.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13850588586412355359noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-14166976996024353922010-05-12T06:27:50.109+00:002010-05-12T06:27:50.109+00:00How do we KNOW that energy is never created or des...How do we KNOW that energy is never created or destroyed ? Do we know it, or do we believe it ?<br />And as a rather heated discussion on SD showed, it depends on your perspective, the conclusion that energy is never created or destroyed. <br />I am not a physics person, so I will not comment more than this. I am not competent to comment on this. But I am definitely not functioning on ANY postulat that I don't believe in, EVEN IF THE PHYSICISTS TELL ME THAT THIS IS TRUTH. There has always been somebody, and there will always BE somebody to TELL us what the "truth" is. But, a lot of the time, this gets in the way of OUR thinking.<br />As we have moved (not evolved...) from a society based on agriculture to an industrial society, our paradigm has shifted, as you point out.<br />But as I said a long time ago, our social body is NOT homogenous. The ideas of the Ancien Regime (like clemency in the U.S., for example...) are still present in our society. They are present in our society alongside of more recent ideas founded in industrial ideology. (Hey... I never thought of it before, lots of people out there are reasoning within industrial ideology, and NOT agricultural. I will say that I DO NOT LIKE industrial society, Toby, and that I am doing all in my power to limit MY actions within it, and ITS actions on me. A futile enterprise certainly, a lost battle, but one that allows me to get up in the morning with a sense of purpose (not JUST negative, that purpose too...)<br />I believe that Ancien Regime ideology ROOTED us in nature, whereas... industrial ideology UNROOTS us, and seems to make US, our bodies too, like the capital that goes from one place to the next, BELONGING nowhere.<br />And I'm pretty experienced at being a rootless person. It is very demanding, rootlessness. It CAN be managed, but with great effort, great intellectualization, on an individual level, and that is a choice that not everybody is willing to make. And I believe that everybody should not HAVE to make that choice because of societal imperatives, either...<br />What you say about abundance being anathema to modern money makes me think that its ideology is based on... exclusion.<br />Something is WORTHLESS is EVERYBODY has access to it. (Look at how this is playing out with respect to water...)<br />How true IS this ?<br />When we talk about.. democracy in the Western world, aren't we in converting mode on it ?<br />Aren't we saying that democracy is such a good thing that EVERYBODY has to "have" it ?<br />So... how is scarcity applicable there ? <br />But our ideas of value being a fixed pool that supposes that if somebody has something, it is BECAUSE somebody else was... DEPRIVED of it, those IDEAS will certainly NOT help us to move beyond the ideology, the prejudice of scarcity.<br />In the last post, I said that I think that modern scarcity theory is derived in part from the Protestant attitude towards grace. Some people "had" it, and others just didn't.<br />And most, if not all of our ideas we THINK are original are more or less old ones that have been repackaged with new vocabulary to allow us to feel more.. modern than our ancestors. <br />Gotta feel more... "modern" than our ancestors.. What are all those cars good for if we aren't ?Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-66658810691368127062010-05-12T05:16:27.617+00:002010-05-12T05:16:27.617+00:00In "Web of Debt" Ellen Brown talks about...In "Web of Debt" Ellen Brown talks about interest as being rooted in paying with livestock, which of course does grow organically. And yes, the roots of money growth are in an ancient understanding of organic growth, but we know more now, namely that energy is never created or destroyed, it is only exchanged, moved from place to place, has its many patternings altered and so on. We also know that non-stop growth is cancerous.<br /><br />Language is an example of an abundant medium of exchange, and we have a rich language that works and everyone can use. Media of exchange do not have to be scarce.<br /><br />My long struggles with money are not based on hatred or fear, but on trying to understand the functional consequences of it, and how it is changing over time. That's it. The way we use money technically has indeed changed over time, and will change again, not perhaps in its pure essence as a medium of exchange, but certainly in terms of speed and complexity, and certainly its effects on culture and politics, especially when you include changes in our technical abilities and the amounts we can now produce and consume.<br /><br />Also important is the notion of scarcity, which to my mind is an inspirer of greed and fear. When you use livestock as your medium of exchange, you can have scarcity, but you can have abundance too, so perhaps we could call this more natural than the current situation of a medium of exchange logically bound to scarcity and <i>only</i> scarcity. Indeed, abundance is anethema to modern money. This is a problem.<br /><br />Another reason I'm looking at money this way is to get under the skin of the myth about The Market and The State. My idea is that The Market differs from The State because it circulates money more effectively, at least in theory! However, things like education and health, which are so important to societal cohesion, should not be money circulators, and this is also a problem. Right now the measure of success is profit. So, if States are in deficit they're doing something wrong. With money-profit as ultimate denoter of success there is less and less room for grace.<br /><br />Then comes technological unemployment, unkown in Shakespeare's day, and a functional problem for the necessary circulation of money. It's not hateful or emotional, it just is so. Change is always happening...Tobyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16258136994278139356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7378568575885387942.post-8680818479813491562010-05-11T21:01:35.288+00:002010-05-11T21:01:35.288+00:00Toby, I am going to comment in detail on your post...Toby, I am going to comment in detail on your post here, and I intend my comments to further OUR dialogue here.<br />When you say that money does not grow like organic matter does, I am going to say that... our understanding of what growth means is based on organic growth, and that we must take this into account in our paradigms, and our analysis of our world.<br />Shakespeare, "The Merchant of Venice", Act 1, scene iii, PLEASE READ THIS SCENE IN DETAIL as it is very important towards understanding money, and I will say that I myself do not understand all the implications of what is said here. <br />The whole play is about the economy...<br />"Shylock : When Jacob grazed his uncle Laban's sheep --<br />This Jacob from our holy Abram was...<br />Antonion : And what of him ? Did he take interest ?<br />Shylock : No, not take interest--<br />Not as you would say directly interest. Mark what Jacob did : When Laban and himself were compromised that all the eanlings (lambs) which were streaked and pied should fall as Jacob's hire (belong to him), the ewes being rank (in estrus) in end of autumn turned to the rams ;<br />And when the work of generation was between these woolly breeders in the act....<br />This was a way to thrive, and he (Jacob) was blest ;<br />And thrift is blessing if men steal it not.<br />Antonion : This was a venture sir, that Jacob served for, a thing not in his power to bring to pass, but swayed and fashioned by the hand of heaven.<br />WAS THIS INSERTED TO MAKE INTEREST GOOD ?<br />OR IS YOUR GOLD AND SILVER EWES AND RAMS ?<br />Shylock : I CANNOT TELL ; I MAKE IT BREED AS FAST."<br />So.... what do we do with the realization that our MODEL for growth is necessarily an organic one ?<br />Our ideas come from somewhere, and many of our ideas come from... observing the way nature works.<br />And by basing our ideas on the way nature works WE MAINTAIN CONNECTION WITH NATURE in our minds, and in our society.<br />This connection in our own minds is even more important than money, Toby.<br />I think that our ideas drive our world. And our ideas are... words, of course. <br />Money is one symbolic system, and it is a symbolic system which is subservient to language as a symbolic system EVEN THOUGH WE ARE GETTING ALL EXCITED ABOUT IT, AND THINKING THAT IT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT SYMBOLIC SYSTEM FOR US.<br />While money changes hands, and moves around... WORDS change mouths, and move around too.<br />In my last post, I talked about grace as the lubricant that kept things going in our society.<br />I believe that while we are avidly looking towards the OBVIOUS agent of money, we have NOT BEEN LOOKING at what REALLY drives the system, or at least drives it AS MUCH as money does : gratuity. What is the DIFFERENCE between all those words that make up the circulation in the economy ?<br />buy<br />sell<br />lend<br />borrow<br />give<br />receive<br />earn<br />win<br />owe<br />ALL of those words are activities of the economy, and are about.. EXCHANGE, in one form or another.<br />And I have probably forgotten some in that list.<br />I'll return later.<br />Critical reading is hard work...Debrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01510189619803992336noreply@blogger.com