Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Einherjar86]

Poverty no; I don't think terrorists are impoverished. I think they're ideologues. And I think they've suffered, although not necessarily in a material sense.

 

[Dak]

Rene Descartes's conception of the subject as the center that perceives has substantiated scientific and philosophical pursuit for almost half a century. Only recently have we begun to move away from this view, and it has had verifiable effects on our society. Even Freud, whose theories aren't pursued in the realm of psychology today (as much), opened the space by which we're able to conceive of mental disease and sexuality differently. Before Freud, Victorian notions of sexuality prevailed; he broke us out of that, even if it took a few decades.

Since when do psychologists fall within a philosophical tradition?

The theories and ideas of philosophers from this tradition aren't always immediately applicable. Sometimes their import lies in the way they gradually influence society. Furthermore, many of these philosophers admit that their ideas are oriented toward the future. There is value to such thought, although it may not be immediately recognizable. Sometimes, philosophy has to resist the lure of immediate practical access in order to say something more profound in the long run.

Like freemarkets?

Free market theorists do nothing but claim that politics must be done away with, and they proceed into polemics against politics and governments. I don't find very much useful in that. Continental philosophers and critical theory has leveled appropriate criticism at governments, but it doesn't go so far as to say that government should cease to exist entirely. That conclusion is an excessive reaction.

Of course anarchocapitalism is not useful immediately. A mojority of people still believe government is a necessary evil at best, and a divine authority at worst. The conclusion is not excessive though, and "offering criticism of particular governments we don't like" sets the Continental School apart from any news pundit how?

No Continential philosopher denies "acting man"; they deny that acting man is the be-all end-all of societal organization. And that is a perfectly legitimate argument. Despite all the "action" that any given human being might do, a single human cannot alter circumstances beyond his or her control. Society should organize itself in order to compensate for such uncertain factors, especially since it's possible.

Well I deny that too, and so do free marketeers. The above paragraph is no different than the charges that free marketeers "don't believe in education" because they don't support public schools, or "don't believe in helping the poor" because they don't support welfare, or "want everyone to die" because they don't support government healthcare, etc.

 

[Einherjar86]

Since when do psychologists fall within a philosophical tradition?

You've read Freud. He's a philosopher of the highest variety.

Like freemarkets?

Cute. But no.

Of course anarchocapitalism is not useful immediately. A mojority of people still believe government is a necessary evil at best, and a divine authority at worst. The conclusion is not excessive though, and "offering criticism of particular governments we don't like" sets the Continental School apart from any news pundit how?

What makes you say that? Sometimes I can't follow your logic or thought process. I'm saying that Continental theory offers criticism of political institutions, which contradicts with your typical rhetoric, which is that they come out in support of political institutions. Of course, they support some; but they aren't blind supporters of political organization.

Well I deny that too, and so do free marketeers. The above paragraph is no different than the charges that free marketeers "don't believe in education" because they don't support public schools, or "don't believe in helping the poor" because they don't support welfare, or "want everyone to die" because they don't support government healthcare, etc.

They say that they support those things. But they don't provide "actionable" policies for implementing successful institutional organizations. Free market theories of education and welfare do nothing but reinforce hierarchy and class entrenchment. They don't enable mobility or provide accessible and efficient resources

 

[SentinelSlain]

Humans are irrational faggots though. It's too easy and too dumb to say, ooh well, there might be a burning wreck where there use to a be a building full of white men and jews, but think of all of the palestinian, think of the crusades, think of how we have suffered.

Balls, people, don't think like that. The only ones who do, most of the time, have specifically been taught to. You could even argue that it's a rational feeling, but that doesn't mean that's why actors behave in the way they do. So balls. basically.

If you actually read my articles, you'd get that the whole thing is saying and evidencing this.

 

[Dak]

You've read Freud. He's a philosopher of the highest variety.

Psychology is considered a social science, and philosophy is not.

Cute. But no.

I don't see the difference here. It has been argued there were never free markets before, and too of course the idealized free individual. This would make free markets future oriented, rather than restorative.

What makes you say that? Sometimes I can't follow your logic or thought process. I'm saying that Continental theory offers criticism of political institutions, which contradicts with your typical rhetoric, which is that they come out in support of political institutions. Of course, they support some; but they aren't blind supporters of political organization.

Is anyone a blind supporter of just any ol' sort of political organization? I doubt it. Any non-anarchist has an ideal form of governance, possibly with 2nd and 3rd best choices. This is my point: Supporting one type of governance or another vs others is pretty normal.

They say that they support those things. But they don't provide "actionable" policies for implementing successful institutional organizations. Free market theories of education and welfare do nothing but reinforce hierarchy and class entrenchment. They don't enable mobility or provide accessible and efficient resources

Sure, because public education and welfare have done such a swell job of deconstructing hierarchy and classes. Free association hinders mobility, and central planning has destroyed the price system as a means of efficient resource allocation.

 

[Einherjar86]

Humans are irrational faggots though. It's too easy and too dumb to say, ooh well, there might be a burning wreck where there use to a be a building full of white men and jews, but think of all of the palestinian, think of the crusades, think of how we have suffered.

Balls, people, don't think like that. The only ones who do, most of the time, have specifically been taught to. You could even argue that it's a rational feeling, but that doesn't mean that's why actors behave in the way they do. So balls. basically.

If you actually read my articles, you'd get that the whole thing is saying and evidencing this.

Christ of all fucking Christ. I read them, as much of them as I need. And I don't need the articles, I'm in a PhD program, I have access.

Here's a quote from the abstract (the fucking abstract) of Barbara Walter's article:

Grievances and opportunity matter, but so does the larger strategic environment in which the government and its ethnic groups operate.

Take away from them more than what your biased mind looks for. She's saying that Third world implications do matter; of course, the success of these "terrorist" actions will depend on other factors that play into their plans. But none of them say that societal conditions don't matter.

Psychology is considered a social science, and philosophy is not.

Read my words: I'm talking about Freud, not psychology. The Freud who wrote Beyond the Pleasure Principle and Civilization and Its Discontents was philosophizing. Once again, you resort to reduction.

I don't see the difference here. It has been argued there were never free markets before, and too of course the idealized free individual. This would make free markets future oriented, rather than restorative.

But the concept of the market itself has been theorized and has been pursued. The notion of the market being "free" or somehow achieving some pure state is absolute fancy, nothing more. So our new task becomes thinking beyond the market. There's never been any pure communism either, so according to your logic communism must also be future-oriented. But this isn't the case either. Notions of purity must be thrown aside and we must try to rethink new ways to combine and interpret older ideas.

This is why calling America "communist" is utterly fucking ridiculous. It isn't communist just as it isn't free market; but just because it has some communistic institutions, you want to label it communist.

Is anyone a blind supporter of just any ol' sort of political organization? I doubt it. Any non-anarchist has an ideal form of governance, possibly with 2nd and 3rd best choices. This is my point: Supporting one type of governance or another vs others is pretty normal.

Fine. I'm not going to argue about what your position or comments in the past might have been.

Sure, because public education and welfare have done such a swell job of deconstructing hierarchy and classes. Free association hinders mobility, and central planning has destroyed the price system as a means of efficient resource allocation.

I'm not saying we have it right, but assuming that free markets would fix everything neglects so many blatantly obvious consequences that it isn't even funny. Free markets are not a solution and they are not the best possible form of organization. Theories that end at this conclusion are facile, juvenile, and just immature.

 

[SentinelSlain]

Christ of all fucking Christ. I read them, as much of them as I need. And I don't need the articles, I'm in a PhD program, I have access.

Here's a quote from the abstract (the fucking abstract) of Barbara Walter's article:



Take away from them more than what your biased mind looks for. She's saying that Third world implications do matter; of course, the success of these "terrorist" actions will depend on other factors that play into their plans. But none of them say that societal conditions don't matter.

I remember the abstract saying that, I hadn't forgotten, however, the articles, overall show that decision making process to be quite detached from any real grievance. It's not like poverty and oppression were invented around the time Al Qaeda came into being. If you look into it and I'm not saying these groups are the same as Al Qaeda, both The Muslim Brotherhood, from its genesis and the Afghan Muhajideen were fighting for causes almost unrelated to poverty.

I just see what you're saying as too simplistic. Actors fight for a lot of reasons, especially if there are things like lootable high value raw resources in a given location, that can be easily taken. People can accept poverty in certain circumstances, as well as gross inequality. Look at the premodern world, for example, people did.

 

[Einherjar86]

Why do you keep using the word "poverty"? I'm saying Third World; there's more to that than poverty.

I'm not reducing Al-Qaeda's actions to impoverishment. In fact, I acknowledge that terrorists often have ample funds for living and carrying out their attacks. Their ideology though, and their fixation within a larger symbolic field - perpetrated in large part by Western political and economic action - establishes them in structural opposition to the West. It has less to do with poverty and more to do with their treatment in a broader socio-symbolic context (i.e. their demonization in Western media, the marginalization of Islam in political discourse, the labeling of Al-Jazeera as the "voice of the enemy," etc.). When I say they're a reaction to global capitalism, I mean the cultural mentality that global capital expresses.

 

[SentinelSlain]

I've spoken to a Bangladeshi guy who basically said something like, oh, there are so many millions of Bangladeshis living on a flood plane of a country, without adequate resources. If the West doesn't solve this problem, then they'll all turn to Salafi Islam. They have to, if they are ignored.

I just see that a shockingly bizarre approach to life. Which Muslim regime cares about its Christians again? Saudi Arabia treats none Muslims like vermin, especially if they're poor immigrants, does that somehow legitimise the suffering of Muslims in some country?

It's just a very dumb approach to life. You are responsible for how you influence your own society, you do not have the right to be an irrational ball of emotion in certain circumstances. He also thought that basically everyone in the poorer parts of the world should move to the West. How about all of those people stop loving their crappy corrupt leaders and get governments that look after them and distribute resources in a more reasonable way, so everyone is at least at an ok level, like in the west. A lot of poor countries plausibly could do that.

 

[Einherjar86]

It's just a very dumb approach to life. You are responsible for how you influence your own society, you do not have the right to be an irrational ball of emotion in certain circumstances. He also thought that basically everyone in the poorer parts of the world should move to the West. How about all of those people stop loving their crappy corrupt leaders and get governments that look after them and distribute resources in a more reasonable way, so everyone is at least at an ok level, like in the west. A lot of poor countries plausibly could do that.

This is where you lose me.

Making the argument that poverty doesn't necessarily lead to violence revolution is fine; but here you're making the claim that the poor and impoverished don't even have the right to revolt. My first instinct is to suggest that the entire notion of "rights" is illusory, so no one has a right to do anything; but my second instinct is to ask: how come?

And why don't they have a right to move to the West? If you're such a flagrant individualist, then how come those non-Westerners have to work together to create a working society? How come they can't act in their own best individual interest and move to the West? Your whole argument "post-poverty" (so to speak) is fraught with contradictions and irrational backlashes.

 

[Dak]

But the concept of the market itself has been theorized and has been pursued. The notion of the market being "free" or somehow achieving some pure state is absolute fancy, nothing more. So our new task becomes thinking beyond the market. There's never been any pure communism either, so according to your logic communism must also be future-oriented. But this isn't the case either. Notions of purity must be thrown aside and we must try to rethink new ways to combine and interpret older ideas.

I won't ever argue that we will see a free market, and of course markets have been pursued to a more or less degree for centuries now. However, so has "thinking beyond the market", and whereever we see "thinking beyond the market", or "thinking against the market", or "thinking outside the market", we see largely consistent trends of debt, poverty, and bi or tri-classism.

"Social" institutions based on violent redistribution are not only non-productive, but antiproductive on the whole. The market, as a the sum of exchanges, is merely that description of the mechanism facilitates productivity, namely exchange, it does not produce it itself, nor facilitate anything.

The market is not a "solution". It is not an institution. It is label on human behavior, or human action. Violence is another label on human behavior, or human action. This is the label we may apply to government institutions. Violence underwrites all their endeavors. Of course that is not to say it is exclusive to government, as government (as an institution) is a product of human action (rather than a behavior).

The work that stands out by the anarchist philosophers is that no matter how we try and evil-proof legal monopolies, it's simply impossible. Now we might turn that critique on humans themselves, which I have no problem with. But, again and again, it is impossible to philosophize the state out of it's inherently circularly reasoned excuse for existence: People are bad so we need a government (which is made by and directed by those same people). It's facile to overlook this.

The argument that "free marketeers" overlook the ugly side of human history is patently false. It is because of this side that exchange is pushed rather than war.

We can live isolated, we can trade, or we can war. The state is war, the market is exchange. Isolation is socially irrelevant for obvious reasons. War not only prevents exchange, it destroys that which could be exchanged.

The constant strain of thought that appears as to "we have enough" is ignorant of the mechanisms by which resources come to be, which is Marxian. This is where tech as some other thing using people is an attempt buttressing the idea that economics and human action may be ignored and manipulated without consequence, because technology will just do it's own thing anyway.

This is why calling America "communist" is utterly fucking ridiculous. It isn't communist just as it isn't free market; but just because it has some communistic institutions, you want to label it communist.

A Continental philosopher was content to label it communist. I just found it interesting.

I'm not saying we have it right, but assuming that free markets would fix everything neglects so many blatantly obvious consequences that it isn't even funny. Free markets are not a solution and they are not the best possible form of organization. Theories that end at this conclusion are facile, juvenile, and just immature.

Not fix everything, and of course it could only be loosely described as "organization". Free association, which includes freedom of exchange, is not a panacea. The organization comes after, not before, and doesn't have to institutionalize. A foundation of institutionalized violence is only going to begat more violence, since it's woven into the DNA/fabric of the society on a cultural level (nevermind human DNA potentially), and violence can only lead to death and poverty/destitution.

I am sure there will be many consequences to free association that would be both obvious and overlooked, but since your previous suggestions are that it would lead to "entrenched hierarchy and classes", I find that quite unobvious, especially in comparison with any state form, which is that very entrenching and perpetuating institution.

To reiterate: free exchange cannot solve all human ills, but the state can only exacerbate on the whole. Whereever it relieves, it absolutely must of necessity increases the ills, and to a greater degree, elsewhere. While there are many arguments to this effect, probably none so succinct as Bastiat.

 

[Einherjar86]

Couple good points:

The work that stands out by the anarchist philosophers is that no matter how we try and evil-proof legal monopolies, it's simply impossible. Now we might turn that critique on humans themselves, which I have no problem with. But, again and again, it is impossible to philosophize the state out of it's inherently circularly reasoned excuse for existence: People are bad so we need a government (which is made by and directed by those same people). It's facile to overlook this.

I don't think anyone would fault you for making this assertion, but I don't think that it's necessarily ignored by those in the Continental school. Most simply wouldn't agree that the answer is therefore to dismantle governmental institutions. No one's trying to vindicate government action, laud it, or idealize it.

The argument that "free marketeers" overlook the ugly side of human history is patently false. It is because of this side that exchange is pushed rather than war.

We can live isolated, we can trade, or we can war. The state is war, the market is exchange. Isolation is socially irrelevant for obvious reasons. War not only prevents exchange, it destroys that which could be exchanged.

"The State" - that abstract thing you use to refer to all central governments and political institutions - isn't "war." Are you saying that the bad side of human nature - or behavior, action, whatever - manifests in the form of a state? The State is certainly a territorializing and re-coding apparatus, and I'm not denying that it operates based on a coercive authority. This is not the same thing as war though. I can appreciate the logic that leads to the distinction between individual behavior and a kind of correlative model in the form of a state - i.e. the state is the warring, violent aspect of humanity, while the market is the cooperative, peaceful side.

But the thrust of my argumentation, and the entire argument of many modern humanist studies, is that those distinctions ultimately break down. You can't separate out the violence, war-like behavior from market behavior. They're inseparable. On paper that distinction might look appealing, but any theory based on that distinction is also un-actionable, primarily because that distinction doesn't actually exist.

A Continental philosopher was content to label it communist. I just found it interesting.

But we've argued over this elsewhere...

As far as the remainder of what you said goes, I feel that much of it rests on the distinction I mentioned above. The state can only exacerbate the problem if that distinction holds true in actuality, and the theory that the market would function more efficiently is only yet a theory; and, if we follow that the distinction you make is an idealization and not an actually existing separation, then I don't see how your proposal would be any better. In fact, I would want a centrally organized body that facilitates the interaction and input of a citizen-body.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

@ my favorite thread ever

 

[Dak]

I don't think anyone would fault you for making this assertion, but I don't think that it's necessarily ignored by those in the Continental school. Most simply wouldn't agree that the answer is therefore to dismantle governmental institutions. No one's trying to vindicate government action, laud it, or idealize it.

"The State" - that abstract thing you use to refer to all central governments and political institutions - isn't "war."

Of course, political theory is not a homogeneous suite in it's particulars, and Continentally based theorists do not advocate uniform policy prescriptions. But they are mostly uniform as promoting the state, or war, as the preferred vehicle to realize the changes they seek . The point of free marketeers is that all of these pro-government theorists (pro government as in they are pro some form) are in fact proving that politics equals war, and since the state is the institutionalization of politics, it's the institutionalization of war. Thusly, the state=war.

The reason, the necessity of the state as a vehicle for change is that is does it coercively. This is war. If such philosophers/theorists were content that their ideas be accepted voluntarily, they wouldn't advocate for a state.

Are you saying that the bad side of human nature - or behavior, action, whatever - manifests in the form of a state? The State is certainly a territorializing and re-coding apparatus, and I'm not denying that it operates based on a coercive authority. This is not the same thing as war though. I can appreciate the logic that leads to the distinction between individual behavior and a kind of correlative model in the form of a state - i.e. the state is the warring, violent aspect of humanity, while the market is the cooperative, peaceful side.

Not only through the state, although it is the current and historical pinnacle of institutionalization of such. It is, in fact, a method of risk management. A structure that allows conflict for power with reduced bloodshed, but conflict non-the-less. Of course, "sore-losers" always have bloodshed as a fallback.

The market however, is by definition a major aspect of the peaceful side, but again not the entirety of it. Isolation is still technically peaceful, and a successful lack of an exchange even without isolation is still peace. To go back to my CD analogy, if we are unable to come to an agreement about a CD sale or trade between us, when you or I decide not to get violent about the lack of trade, this is still peaceful. However, (honest) trading is not only peaceful in itself, but encourages further peace through a building of trust. Obviously if I trade you a purported Suidakra CD, and it turns out to be NSync, this reduces prospects for further trade and peace.

TO compare and contrast, "state diplomacy", both foreign and domestic, is not built on exchange but forever on promises and "robbing peter to pay paul", and full realization of diplomatic promise is never possible, and even limited realization is rare in practice.

But the thrust of my argumentation, and the entire argument of many modern humanist studies, is that those distinctions ultimately break down. You can't separate out the violence, war-like behavior from market behavior. They're inseparable. On paper that distinction might look appealing, but any theory based on that distinction is also un-actionable, primarily because that distinction doesn't actually exist.

Of course we can break down distinctions between anything, even in the physical world. That's not an excuse not to distinguish AND discriminate between objects.

I charge the opposite. While any distinction can be argued as moveable, a distinction and discrimination must be made for any action to occur. In other words, it is indistinction that is unactionable (since action is discrimination), not distinction. That this is so elementary in every facet of life is why Analytics will handwave Continentals even when a good point could be made. That everything is made of the same stuff, and maybe even more similar in a materially phenotypical sense, is no reason not to distinguish and then discriminate between poisonous mushrooms and and edible ones. Continental theorists say either one is edible, Analytics say not only is that contradictory to the suggestion that we cannot distinguish (what's the difference between hungry and not hungry? Eating and not eating? Mushroom and concrete? All these distinctions technically "break down"), but that even upon distinguishing we must still also discriminate.

I'm going to leave alone that if it's all indistinguishable, there is nothing to critique.

As far as the remainder of what you said goes, I feel that much of it rests on the distinction I mentioned above. The state can only exacerbate the problem if that distinction holds true in actuality, and the theory that the market would function more efficiently is only yet a theory; and, if we follow that the distinction you make is an idealization and not an actually existing separation, then I don't see how your proposal would be any better.

The problem of efficiency within arguments is always a problem of "what is efficiency"? I imagine that someone from a Marxian tradition visualizes efficiency as absolutely uniform distribution. I would expect rather to see bell curves. What Corporatism gives us is a positive wealth skew resembling a "severe"/"hockeystick" exponential chart, and ultimately socialism/communism give a relatively uniform distribution of nothing. The difference between the two for the "99%" from a material standpoint is miniscule. The market as a bell curve is the best possible outcome we can expect, and only the market can give us this expected projection.

I'm not sure how familiar you are with statistics, but "uniform distribution", "exponential curve", and "bell curve", are all pretty common stat graph types.

I would want a centrally organized body that facilitates the interaction and input of a citizen-body.

Sounds like Ebay as stated in it's innocuoity. When said in referencing the/a State, it drips venom. "Facilitate", "interaction", and "input" take on scarequotes.

Or we can go in a completely different direction: Craigslist. Only most tenuously "centrally organized", and yet facilitates interaction, at least locally, on a revolutionary level. It needs little input, since it has practically no output. Input and output is direct and personal, voluntary. Craigslist is merely a medium.

 

[Einherjar86]

The point of free marketeers is that all of these pro-government theorists (pro government as in they are pro some form) are in fact proving that politics equals war, and since the state is the institutionalization of politics, it's the institutionalization of war. Thusly, the state=war.

The reason, the necessity of the state as a vehicle for change is that is does it coercively. This is war. If such philosophers/theorists were content that their ideas be accepted voluntarily, they wouldn't advocate for a state.

Your mis-characterizations of these philosophers that you malign seriously subtracts from your argument. Mainly because you confuse advocating the state with simply theorizing the state - its origins, its history, its purposes.

Your equation "state = war" is less empirical and more ideological (which can both be the same thing). War can equal many things: human, business, property, expansion. Every single one of those things can equal war. The aspects of the state that you extend to war aren't isolated to the state. They're aspects of human behavior.

The market however, is by definition a major aspect of the peaceful side, but again not the entirety of it. Isolation is still technically peaceful, and a successful lack of an exchange even without isolation is still peace. To go back to my CD analogy, if we are unable to come to an agreement about a CD sale or trade between us, when you or I decide not to get violent about the lack of trade, this is still peaceful. However, (honest) trading is not only peaceful in itself, but encourages further peace through a building of trust. Obviously if I trade you a purported Suidakra CD, and it turns out to be NSync, this reduces prospects for further trade and peace.

Your analogy is DUMB. It doesn't consider various scenarios and possibilities in which someone might consider deception to be the best possible business maneuver if it guarantees them a big score and they have no need of engaging in transactions again.

You make this analogy over and over again; do you think I'm not getting it? I get it, I just completely disagree with your noble definition of business practice. Business, trade, commerce (i.e. the market) can absolutely be savage and deceptive in nature. Your choice to define it as peaceful betrays a deep cultural conditioning.

I charge the opposite. While any distinction can be argued as moveable, a distinction and discrimination must be made for any action to occur. In other words, it is indistinction that is unactionable (since action is discrimination), not distinction. That this is so elementary in every facet of life is why Analytics will handwave Continentals even when a good point could be made. That everything is made of the same stuff, and maybe even more similar in a materially phenotypical sense, is no reason not to distinguish and then discriminate between poisonous mushrooms and and edible ones. Continental theorists say either one is edible, Analytics say not only is that contradictory to the suggestion that we cannot distinguish (what's the difference between hungry and not hungry? Eating and not eating? Mushroom and concrete? All these distinctions technically "break down"), but that even upon distinguishing we must still also discriminate.

Again, a really bad analogy! I could use the phrase "apples and oranges," but I might as well be clear: "mushrooms and abstract notions of state and market." Continentals won't say that either mushroom is edible; but they will say that abstract concepts only come to seem real to us in retrospect because we reify them. Mushrooms aren't reified; they exist. The state and the market are abstract, but you're treating them as though they're material, and you're defining them specifically as though you can boil them down to some vague, mystical essentials.

Your analogies are poor and misleading. I don't accept them at all.

Sounds like Ebay as stated in it's innocuoity. When said in referencing the/a State, it drips venom. "Facilitate", "interaction", and "input" take on scarequotes.

Or we can go in a completely different direction: Craigslist. Only most tenuously "centrally organized", and yet facilitates interaction, at least locally, on a revolutionary level. It needs little input, since it has practically no output. Input and output is direct and personal, voluntary. Craigslist is merely a medium.

You know what also should take on scare quotes? "Facilitate", "interaction," and "input" when a privately controlled entity is controlling the entire process.

 

[Dak]

Your mis-characterizations of these philosophers that you malign seriously subtracts from your argument. Mainly because you confuse advocating the state with simply theorizing the state - its origins, its history, its purposes.

With generalizations we must necessarily mischaracterize specifics. Advocating and explaining are separate. I don't dispute that.

Your equation "state = war" is less empirical and more ideological (which can both be the same thing). War can equal many things: human, business, property, expansion. Every single one of those things can equal war. The aspects of the state that you extend to war aren't isolated to the state. They're aspects of human behavior.

I just said as much:

Not only through the state, although it is the current and historical pinnacle of institutionalization of such. It is, in fact, a method of risk management. A structure that allows conflict for power with reduced bloodshed, but conflict non-the-less. Of course, "sore-losers" always have bloodshed as a fallback.

To clarify, all state functions are warfare, but not all warfare exists within the state (All X is Y but not all Y is X).

Your analogy is DUMB. It doesn't consider various scenarios and possibilities in which someone might consider deception to be the best possible business maneuver if it guarantees them a big score and they have no need of engaging in transactions again.

This risk is recognized. However, it's absolutely less of a risk than said behavior institutionalized. We already have this sort of risk under the "protective" umbrella of the state. "Fly-by-night" scams, Not-quite-big-enough-not-to-fail investment firms, etc. Life will never be risk free, and current attempts to hide risk under the carpet of the state are merely shifting it, not reducing it. We reduce risk with insurance and education, not offloading.

In lending, this is a function of credit history (formalized into a score) and partially of interest rates. An unknown borrower gets less credit and at a higher rate than a borrower with a positive established history, but more and at a lower rate than one with a bad history. Of course, someone with a positive history can default, but the risk is less (not none), and insurance options exists to cover potentialities.

You make this analogy over and over again; do you think I'm not getting it? I get it, I just completely disagree with your noble definition of business practice. Business, trade, commerce (i.e. the market) can absolutely be savage and deceptive in nature. Your choice to define it as peaceful betrays a deep cultural conditioning.

When Standard Oil (Rockefeller) was offering buyouts "or else" to competition, this might be actions by a business, but the "or else" makes it not commerce. Like "or else" makes sex not lovemaking. I have never suggested, and in fact have repeatedly agreed with the assertion that corporations, or businessmen, etc. are not lilywhite by nature of titles and occupations. BUT, exchange is not automatically the zero sum game imagined by mercantilists, Marx, etc.

Again, a really bad analogy! I could use the phrase "apples and oranges," but I might as well be clear: "mushrooms and abstract notions of state and market." Continentals won't say that either mushroom is edible; but they will say that abstract concepts only come to seem real to us in retrospect because we reify them. Mushrooms aren't reified; they exist. The state and the market are abstract, but you're treating them as though they're material, and you're defining them specifically as though you can boil them down to some vague, mystical essentials.

Your analogies are poor and misleading. I don't accept them at all.

I don't see how we "reify" human action. The state is an institutionalized aggregate. The market is an abstract aggregate. At the root is individual human action, and it is material. I promote one sort of human action over the other.

You know what also should take on scare quotes? "Facilitate", "interaction," and "input" when a privately controlled entity is controlling the entire process.

Of course. But "privately controlled" as a distinction assumes there is a "publicly controlled" entity, and what is more publicly controlled than a business? Certainly not the state. Obviously I don't have 100% control over my affectation by certain businesses, but I do to a greater degree than any state formulation in respective degrees, and encroaching business in a fascist model cannot really be separated to any serious degree from the state.

As comparative examples of public control I offer the US Government and Sears (or Circuit City, JCPenney, etc. Major retailers for decades and decades that are now either dead or dying).

 

[Einherjar86]

Okay, but here's the main problem with making the distinctions you're making: you assume that each time you say "state" or "market" that you're referring to the same entity.

"Mushroom" refers to something very immediate and detectable. "State" and "market" not only refer to questionable entities, they also refer to entities that are always changing. And most importantly, the two aspects that you're identifying (war and peace, state and market) are never cut and dry; they're always conflating, intermingling, and becoming indistinguishable from each other.

Descriptions of credit, risk, etc. don't apply because I'm talking about behavior that doesn't fit into your criteria of market relations. The only difference is that I'm trying to fit the kind of behavior I'm talking about into market relations. The problem is we can't differentiate ("we" being general, not you and I specifically).

 

[Dak]

Okay, but here's the main problem with making the distinctions you're making: you assume that each time you say "state" or "market" that you're referring to the same entity.

"Mushroom" refers to something very immediate and detectable. "State" and "market" not only refer to questionable entities, they also refer to entities that are always changing. And most importantly, the two aspects that you're identifying (war and peace, state and market) are never cut and dry; they're always conflating, intermingling, and becoming indistinguishable from each other.

I'll address the intermingling below, but I want to address the "always changing" point, and my response is that change doesn't automatically mean it becomes something other. The USGov didn't have the DHS 15 years ago. Does that make it any more or less a state? On the other side, we have gone from exchanging eggs for turnips to metal monies to paper monies to digital bits for digital bits (like using bitcoins to buy virtual items in a game). These haven't made voluntary exchanges any less a voluntary exchange (of course where they are voluntary).

Deception, coercion, etc, invalidate the definition. If someone withholds information that they have AIDs to get "voluntary" sex, is this not rape?

Descriptions of credit, risk, etc. don't apply because I'm talking about behavior that doesn't fit into your criteria of market relations. The only difference is that I'm trying to fit the kind of behavior I'm talking about into market relations. The problem is we can't differentiate ("we" being general, not you and I specifically).

Why can't we differentiate? I think you theorize the "market" like an event, say a party, where some people are having a good time getting along mutually, while others are date raping in upstairs bedroom, and others are bullying in a corner, and that since it is "at the party", it's all "partying and indistinguishable", that the party "facilitated the date rape"/"bullying" etc. The dateraper/rapee might be "at a party" geographically, but they are not "partying" nor a part of the party - like a shoplifter is only at the store. Being at a party does not mean you are "partying", any more than being a business or at a business means you are acting in a market fashion.

Distinguishment and discrimination are necessary to function, and the fact that individuals can display a range of actions/behaviors dependent on setting and time doesn't make the actions all the same, anymore than intermingling of institutions of war(state) and exchange (nominally business) blur the actions. The state is an institution, businesses are institutions. The market is not an institution. This might be the crux of the difficulty, in trying to compare an institution with a non-institution. There is no "President" of the market, or a "CEO" of the market.

 

[Einherjar86]

I'll address the intermingling below, but I want to address the "always changing" point, and my response is that change doesn't automatically mean it becomes something other. The USGov didn't have the DHS 15 years ago. Does that make it any more or less a state? On the other side, we have gone from exchanging eggs for turnips to metal monies to paper monies to digital bits for digital bits (like using bitcoins to buy virtual items in a game). These haven't made voluntary exchanges any less a voluntary exchange (of course where they are voluntary).

I mainly mean that concerning war/peace, government/market, the distinction you make simply doesn't hold. When you use the word to refer to coercive government action, it often contains some orientation toward peace. And when you refer to peaceful market transactions, this doesn't occlude the fact that there are violent, undesirable, or coerced transactions that occur.

Deception, coercion, etc, invalidate the definition. If someone withholds information that they have AIDs to get "voluntary" sex, is this not rape?

No, that isn't rape.

It's telling that your examples are getting more complicated and not making your points.

Why can't we differentiate? I think you theorize the "market" like an event, say a party, where some people are having a good time getting along mutually, while others are date raping in upstairs bedroom, and others are bullying in a corner, and that since it is "at the party", it's all "partying and indistinguishable", that the party "facilitated the date rape"/"bullying" etc. The dateraper/rapee might be "at a party" geographically, but they are not "partying" nor a part of the party - like a shoplifter is only at the store. Being at a party does not mean you are "partying", any more than being a business or at a business means you are acting in a market fashion.

Distinguishment and discrimination are necessary to function, and the fact that individuals can display a range of actions/behaviors dependent on setting and time doesn't make the actions all the same, anymore than intermingling of institutions of war(state) and exchange (nominally business) blur the actions. The state is an institution, businesses are institutions. The market is not an institution. This might be the crux of the difficulty, in trying to compare an institution with a non-institution. There is no "President" of the market, or a "CEO" of the market.

Of course we need to distinguish and differentiate to function; but you're arguing that in an absolutely base-level, zero-degree free market, our words would somehow align perfectly with what they mean, and that human beings (or the market) would somehow know when certain actors have crossed the line, or manipulated circumstances to his or her advantage, etc.

I understand why Deleuze and Guattari's notion of uninterrupted flows appeals to you; but you seem to miss the fact that in their theorization of actual material reality, those distinctions do not exist. None of the distinctions we make in our arguments exist. Distinctions are applications of re-coding, reterritorialization. Now, this practice is certainly necessary for us to function, but your whole approach conflates the spheres of thought and action.

You claim that we need to make these distinctions (which is true), but you also believe that these distinctions somehow conform to a broader objectivity, possibly material reality itself. I just find your methodology (as far as theorizing goes) confused and contradictory.

 

[Einherjar86]

Already, a thousand blogs and columns insist the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's new report is a rabid concoction of scare stories whose purpose is to destroy the global economy. But it is, in reality, highly conservative.

Reaching agreement among hundreds of authors and reviewers ensures that only the statements which are hardest to dispute are allowed to pass. Even when the scientists have agreed, the report must be tempered in another forge, as politicians question anything they find disagreeable: the new report received 1,855 comments from 32 governments, and the arguments raged through the night before launch.

In other words, it's perhaps the biggest and most rigorous process of peer review conducted in any scientific field, at any point in human history.

http://www.theguardian.com/environm.../27/ipcc-climate-change-report-global-warming