Politics thread (USA Elections 2016) - Page 130

I mean sure freedom creates an additional incentive, a very strong additional incentive compared to authoritarian regimes, but if you have to point out blatantly obvious things like the fact that ... innovation's birthplace isn't capitalism, nor is it tied to freedom of humans or their rights then you're most likely just wasting your time arguing with a person who's never going to accept your view anyway. I'm pretty sure the USA continued launching satellites using Russia long after the Cold War ended and they were using their bases to send people into Space cause it was cheaper to pay them, than do it via their own means until Space X came to existence, which was like what.... 3 years ago?

Probably reacted too emotional to your posts as I've been directly impacted by the USSR. Context part was about "fantasy and Taleb" books


It's also beyond hypocritical to point capitalism as a driver for innovation. It's the theft of wealth allowing countries like the USA to go from manual labor into labor which requires you to use your brain only, which obviously would enable them to drive innovation. Those factors are usually ignored and statistics only show the positives coming out of capitalism and completely ignoring the bad parts like the constant war-mongering, climate destruction and etc. It's very hard to measure those, so people prefer to simply ignore them.

People aren't free to innovate in capitalism... they are highly restricted. The argument is that the profit motive is the strongest motivational factor human beings have to create things, which is an idea that has been scientifically discredited. In a capitalist system, past a certain amount of money, a fairly modest sum, people are motivated by their creative interests and self-determination is the biggest factor. And of course profit was never at the center of human behaviour throughout most of human history, we lived in gift economies.

Your reaction was definitely emotional. It's like if there was a vegan on this forum who saw that picture and he went into a diatribe about how I'm supporting animal cruelty because I "promoted the fact that they sent a dog to die in space", knowing that I've actually been vegan for years, which makes no sense to me, but whatever. Point being, we're not in disagreement.

Yeah, exactly where I was aiming at, but you replied before I edited

On June 13 2019 21:23 Loco wrote: Show nested quote + On June 13 2019 19:28 RiKD wrote: The whole point was that it is always assumed that capitalism is this great driver of innovation and then here is this fucked up USSR arguably winning the space race. I hope we can move on but I will say it was interesting to see Santafairy make a passionate post that may actually not be a troll. It's debatable whether or not the Moon landing actually happened which would give the USSR a clean sweep and would be perfectly fitting for the USA's MO. Dunno which I find funnier: that you think that Santafairy's outpouring of nationalistic pride was interesting or that you think the Moon landing might be a hoax.

I did find it interesting. I am supposing it might have been the first genuine Santafairy post I've read in a while. I don't think the moon landing was a hoax. Maybe like 14 years ago I got really into that for a while at like 4am and that it was possible but no. I was trolling Santafairy to see how it would feel. It didn't feel very good. It's tough to bat 1.000 in activities. I go from painting a portrait of Rojda Felat to that... Oh well, I gotta get out of here and find some food. Carry on.

On June 13 2019 15:04 Loco wrote: Show nested quote + On June 13 2019 13:07 lebowski wrote: who decides what the finish line of the space race is ? This is the most childish shit ever btw why would anyone care who's best at space programs Oh come on, don't tell me you've never heard this crap that capitalism is an engine of innovation while socialism is the complete opposite. If it was the complete opposite, then it would uniformly be demonstrated to be so. It only takes one example to prove the formula wrong, but there are certainly others. A quick wikipedia search would answer that first question: "A period of détente followed with the April 1972 agreement on a co-operative Apollo–Soyuz Test Project, resulting in the July 1975 rendezvous in Earth orbit of a US astronaut crew with a Soviet cosmonaut crew. The end of the Space Race is harder to pinpoint than its beginning, but it was over by the December 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union, after which spaceflight cooperation between the US and Russia flourished." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Race No one is asking you to care about arguments that you're not involved in.

fair enough

Ok I'll be a decent human being and I wont bait you anymore at least for a few weeks

So I wont keep discussing, I just wanted to point out one last thing

[b]You said that you would oppose a raising authoritarian leftist regime, yet you support Chavez and Maduro.



No need for you to explain how they aren't authoritarians, I'm not baiting you I just wanted to get that shit out of my system.


fwiw I agree that the Soviets won the space race (and obvioiulsy WW2) but I think its obvious that they lagged behind the US in technological advancement even from before the war.

On June 13 2019 21:23 Loco wrote: Show nested quote + On June 13 2019 19:28 RiKD wrote: The whole point was that it is always assumed that capitalism is this great driver of innovation and then here is this fucked up USSR arguably winning the space race. I hope we can move on but I will say it was interesting to see Santafairy make a passionate post that may actually not be a troll. It's debatable whether or not the Moon landing actually happened which would give the USSR a clean sweep and would be perfectly fitting for the USA's MO. Dunno which I find funnier: that you think that Santafairy's outpouring of nationalistic pride was interesting or that you think the Moon landing might be a hoax.

On June 13 2019 21:10 Spitfiree wrote: Show nested quote + On June 13 2019 19:28 RiKD wrote: It's debatable whether or not the Moon landing actually happened . No its not lmao Also its quite obvious capitalism is light years ahead in terms of innovation compared to what the USSR had to offer. Its just that capitalism simply isnt sustainable and cannot work in the long run. No system whose focus is on worthless pieces of paper can work in the long run. I could be a romantic and say that the USSR at least didn't demolish the moral values of people and actually had the high gruond on that, but that would be bullshit as well. People were spying on each other and reporting each other for stuff, which the government found uncool resulting in people being sent to Syberia cause they listened to the Beatles for example....

most of the research and development done in america is through state funding to the military.

The problem with capitalism is that long term technological development is often not really worth the risk and it's not really even something that capitalists want anymore-they want short term profit. The idea of the profit motive as an incentive to innovation is the opposite of the truth-it restricts innovation. The state runs at a loss for a long time on projects that may or may not ending up being profitable many years down the line-like the internet, transistors, ect, computers only really becoming commercial once they could be reduced to the size of personal use. Similar story in Japan for it's investment in vehicles. In fact the only way any country has ever developed technologically to become an industrial society in the last 500 years has been through rejecting free market capitalism. A lot of economic history written on this topic, see douglas dowd's, 'capitalism and its economics'. People will point to their iphones as an example of capitalist development-which is true, but it's actually not an impressive development all things considered in the 20th century, and it's a derivative of state development. And then if you factor in fields of research like mathematics-there is a reason pure mathematicians largely work for the state-their work only usually becomes valuable 50-200 or maybe a thousand years down the line, not something a capitalist is interested in even though mathematics is the basis for all technological development.

I hate the USSR and Nazi germany but they did reasonably well economically especially the ussr considering they were basically a 3rd world peasant society without much industrialization at all in the early 20th century. When russia privitized in the 1990's their economy collapsed in a brutal depression. similariy with South Korea, i hate the dictatorship it had, but their rejection of free market capitalism in combination of development as basically a national religion is what made them so rich from 1960's-1980's.

The space race was a shit show really, an outlier out of all the technological developements because ego and ideology was what motivated it. It was not communism that made russia an economic powerhouse (since russia wasn't communist), rather it was simply it's independence from the west that at least allowed to pursue it's own economic policy and in combination of its totalitarianism. And indeed parts of the system were trying to go capitalist, as lenin was a devotee of the marxist religion, he said the country had to go capitalist before it could go communist; the assembly line is a major source of productivity and that was a factor in their technological development, but on top of that scientists were allowed to work on large projects for long term development. The assembly line is surely a big part of economic growth, but you could control those machines democractically rather than top down like a corporation or a totalitarian state. Russia's totalitarianism did boost it's economic growth but it's supression of free thought also hindered it's growth in other ways; no scientist was allowed to support evolutionary biology for example. That's a big hindrence and it's a complex picture. Even still, their independence from the west made them something to be reckoned with in the world and the elites in America were worried about this.

I don't think Russia would have been a good economic model in the long run, because it's suppression of free thought would have lead to many losses among technological development. But it did actuallly copy a lot of things from the west and their system allowed countries to industrialize within a generation, which would be attractive to some third world nations. The world bank and the IMF and WTO never allowed third world countries to even go so far as industrialize, and kept them in their free market capitalist hell's.

On June 14 2019 08:18 Stroggoz wrote: most of the research and development done in america is through state funding to the military.

whoa whoa whoa... hold your horses cowboy, that is such a big and wrong statement.

Research done through military is the epitome of inefficiency, for example, the development of the F-35 is estimated to cost 1.5 trillion, which is the biggest funding for virtually any research in history, also it flies shorter distances, less height and can carry less weight than its predecsor, the F15 that was built in 1972. The F35 trillion program is supposed to last to 2070... do you see 2070 warfare as manned dog-fighting jets?

Thats how disastrous military development is, and yeah they have come up with some stuff, afterall they only eats like a 3rd of the federal budget for the past 100 years -_-

Elon Musk alone has done more development than the military in the last decade.

Or you can look at "The Entrepreneurial State".

"Many of the revolutionary technologies that make the iPhone and other products and services “smart” were funded by the U.S. government. Take, for instance, the Internet, GPS, touchscreen display, as well as the latest voice-activated personal assistant, Siri. And Apple did not just benefit from government-funded research activities. It also received its early stage finance from the U.S. government’s Small Business Investment Company program. Venture capitalists entered only after government funding had gotten the company to the critical proof of concept.

Other Silicon Valley companies, like Google, have profited in a similarly immense fashion: Google’s algorithm was funded by the National Science Foundation. Many of the “new economy” companies that like to portray themselves as the heart of U.S. “entrepreneurship” have very successfully surfed the wave of U.S. government-funded investments. Hence, one secret to Silicon Valley’s success has been its active and visible hand, in stark contrast to the Ayn Rand/Adam Smith folklore often bandied about."


...

"the venture capital industry is proving itself more risk-averse than U.S. government agencies. The latter are the ones funding the capital-intensive and highest-risk projects. Even development banks in emerging economies, like China and Brazil, are doing more than Silicon Valley-type “entrepreneurs.”

https://hbr.org/2013/03/taxpayers-helped-apple-but-app

Elon Musk has received billions in public subsidies.

https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html

hot take: authoritarianism is when countries with lots of oil don't give it to america

hot meme:



and these made me laugh out loud this morning:

On June 14 2019 22:08 Loco wrote: Or you can look at "The Entrepreneurial State". "Many of the revolutionary technologies that make the iPhone and other products and services “smart” were funded by the U.S. government. Take, for instance, the Internet, GPS, touchscreen display, as well as the latest voice-activated personal assistant, Siri. And Apple did not just benefit from government-funded research activities. It also received its early stage finance from the U.S. government’s Small Business Investment Company program. Venture capitalists entered only after government funding had gotten the company to the critical proof of concept. Other Silicon Valley companies, like Google, have profited in a similarly immense fashion: Google’s algorithm was funded by the National Science Foundation. Many of the “new economy” companies that like to portray themselves as the heart of U.S. “entrepreneurship” have very successfully surfed the wave of U.S. government-funded investments. Hence, one secret to Silicon Valley’s success has been its active and visible hand, in stark contrast to the Ayn Rand/Adam Smith folklore often bandied about." "the venture capital industry is proving itself more risk-averse than U.S. government agencies. The latter are the ones funding the capital-intensive and highest-risk projects. Even development banks in emerging economies, like China and Brazil, are doing more than Silicon Valley-type “entrepreneurs.” https://hbr.org/2013/03/taxpayers-helped-apple-but-app Elon Musk has received billions in public subsidies. https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html

When you are such an anarchist that you go suck the state's cock in an attempt to argue, but you forget the topic was the military research.

On June 14 2019 22:33 Loco wrote: hot take: authoritarianism is when countries with lots of oil don't give it to america

hot take: when you change the constitution to reelect yourself into perpetuity you are obv not an authoritarian



[/QUOTE]


Baal please stop baiting me I'm not going to respond.... but here is the absolutely hillarious meme about anarcho capitalism that I just happen to see today.

military reserch has been strong, the internet, gps, siri voice comes from miltiary research. You pick an specific example of jets like the F-35, however it's pretty obvious that the US military is overwhelming the most technologically advanced and powerful in the world. The picture overall (not just picking examples to suit your worldview), shows that long term innovation comes overwhelming from the state which a good chunk of it is military funded, like DARPA, but also non military funded like the research in the military. If you spent time in STEM departments at universities you just see this on a daily basis.

Ok you say elon musk has done more than the state in the last 10 years, discounting all the classified developments which you dont know about. You can't make this judgement, not to mention nanotechnology/biotech/greentech sector coming from the state which im sure capitalists will be leeching off in the future when it can become commercialized.

And no one even mentions the development of pure mathematics which is literally the basis of all technological development, no exxageration.

On June 14 2019 22:07 Baalim wrote: [ Thats how disastrous military development is, and yeah they have come up with some stuff, afterall they only eats like a 3rd of the federal budget for the past 100 years -_-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was an early packet-switching network and the first network to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical foundation of the Internet. The ARPANET was initially founded by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) of the United States Department of Defense.

Considering how big internet is today, you might want to rethink the term disastrous.

On June 15 2019 01:07 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On June 14 2019 22:08 Loco wrote: Or you can look at "The Entrepreneurial State". "Many of the revolutionary technologies that make the iPhone and other products and services “smart” were funded by the U.S. government. Take, for instance, the Internet, GPS, touchscreen display, as well as the latest voice-activated personal assistant, Siri. And Apple did not just benefit from government-funded research activities. It also received its early stage finance from the U.S. government’s Small Business Investment Company program. Venture capitalists entered only after government funding had gotten the company to the critical proof of concept. Other Silicon Valley companies, like Google, have profited in a similarly immense fashion: Google’s algorithm was funded by the National Science Foundation. Many of the “new economy” companies that like to portray themselves as the heart of U.S. “entrepreneurship” have very successfully surfed the wave of U.S. government-funded investments. Hence, one secret to Silicon Valley’s success has been its active and visible hand, in stark contrast to the Ayn Rand/Adam Smith folklore often bandied about." "the venture capital industry is proving itself more risk-averse than U.S. government agencies. The latter are the ones funding the capital-intensive and highest-risk projects. Even development banks in emerging economies, like China and Brazil, are doing more than Silicon Valley-type “entrepreneurs.” https://hbr.org/2013/03/taxpayers-helped-apple-but-app Elon Musk has received billions in public subsidies. https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html When you are such an anarchist that you go suck the state's cock in an attempt to argue, but you forget the topic was the military research.

many of the examples he presented are military funded and the mountain of evidence is staring you blank in the face.

I know Stroggoz, except how do you disconnect the US military from capitalism exactly? They are funded by a capitalist government and are basically ran as a corporation.... just because the state funds them doesn't change much. They are the main drive of capitalism in the world, its rather confusing to me that you don't see them as part of that system


Baal you're focusing on a single example instead of the global picture here.

On June 15 2019 11:21 Spitfiree wrote: I know Stroggoz, except how do you disconnect the US military from capitalism exactly? They are funded by a capitalist government and are basically ran as a corporation.... just because the state funds them doesn't change much. They are the main drive of capitalism in the world, its rather confusing to me that you don't see them as part of that system Baal you're focusing on a single example instead of the global picture here.

This statement is false, they are not run like corporations as corporations have to make short term profit. The state can take losses and therefore takes more risks and is open to long term investments. The book loco linked shows the difference in more detail.

On June 15 2019 01:07 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On June 14 2019 22:08 Loco wrote: Or you can look at "The Entrepreneurial State". "Many of the revolutionary technologies that make the iPhone and other products and services “smart” were funded by the U.S. government. Take, for instance, the Internet, GPS, touchscreen display, as well as the latest voice-activated personal assistant, Siri. And Apple did not just benefit from government-funded research activities. It also received its early stage finance from the U.S. government’s Small Business Investment Company program. Venture capitalists entered only after government funding had gotten the company to the critical proof of concept. Other Silicon Valley companies, like Google, have profited in a similarly immense fashion: Google’s algorithm was funded by the National Science Foundation. Many of the “new economy” companies that like to portray themselves as the heart of U.S. “entrepreneurship” have very successfully surfed the wave of U.S. government-funded investments. Hence, one secret to Silicon Valley’s success has been its active and visible hand, in stark contrast to the Ayn Rand/Adam Smith folklore often bandied about." "the venture capital industry is proving itself more risk-averse than U.S. government agencies. The latter are the ones funding the capital-intensive and highest-risk projects. Even development banks in emerging economies, like China and Brazil, are doing more than Silicon Valley-type “entrepreneurs.” https://hbr.org/2013/03/taxpayers-helped-apple-but-app Elon Musk has received billions in public subsidies. https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html When you are such an anarchist that you go suck the state's cock in an attempt to argue, but you forget the topic was the military research.

the broader topic of stroggoz's post was the myths related to the dynamicity of private enterprise and the ineptitude of the state. facts don't care about your feelings. also:

On June 15 2019 01:11 Baalim wrote: Baal please stop baiting me I'm not going to respond.... but here is the absolutely hillarious meme about anarcho capitalism that I just happen to see today.

I clearly said I wasn't going to respond to your baiting and I was disengaging for good on the topic of censorship.

On June 15 2019 11:21 Spitfiree wrote: Baal you're focusing on a single example instead of the global picture here.

Look up "parochialism" in a dictionary and Baal's face shows up.