Getting a Handle on Wealth

[RE]

Word anarchy!

Like general anarchy, it might seem nice in theory, in practice it doesn't work too good.  You just spawn confusion and everyone is talking past each other because they aren't using the same definitions for the words they are using.

RE

I would have to agree that in your own case my own case falls quite flat.   We shall see if it falls so very flat in the case of others.

It's an interesting discussion.

in my own case, I am terrifically grounded in practical matters of survival.  So my perspective comes from this.  I remain interested in how others view these issues though.

RE

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[Palloy2]

Since "wealth" is the number one obsession with the world, it would be an exercise in futility to try to change its meaning.  Gross National Happiness already has a head start on you.  http://www.grossnationalhappiness.com/

This thread is going nowhere.

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[RE]

This thread is going nowhere.

That's the second time in recent history you went with the "thread going nowhere" idea.

It's going SOMEWHERE, just maybe not in the direction you like.

You and me are both on the same side of this one, so I hope you keep contributing to the thread, long as it lasts.

To me, this is a basic CFS issue.  In our current society, "Wealth" is measured by how much money you have access to.  It buys everything else you need to survive as a Homo Sap in the modern world.

Monetary system collapse it is a totally different story line.  But so far, that level of collapse has not hit.  Hit it will though, I GUARANTEE it.  So discussing some alternatives for the post collapse environment has value.

RE

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[JRM]

I remain interested in how others view these issues though.

So you say.   But saying is not doing.  You've had ample opportunity to actually be interested in what I say, but I've not seen it happen much. If I point this out, as I have done, you accuse me of accusing you of being "stupid". I said I don't think you're stupid.  But I'm not so stupid as to think that you care what I have to say.  I'm not sure what you really care about, what gets you out of bed in the morning -- apart from your personal survival, as you say.

It may be that we're just too different in terms of what gets us out of bed in the morning to understand one another.   Twenty plus years ago I faced a life-or-death, existential issue. I was not sure I would live any longer, or much longer... a few months... a couple of years. During this time I really went deep into "What really matters?" kinds of questions, for me. It was a personal journey deep into that question.   Since then, though I've preferred to go on living, my life hasn't been about what's in it for me. It's been this:  "How can I accept the gifts that have been given me down through the generations?" ... from the generations of humans who came before me?  How can I do that?  I decided that the only way I could accept these amazing, extraordinary gifts is to give my own best gift.  This became more crucial, more central, more basic in my life than my own mortality, my own life, my own preferences.  It was the only foreground, central, crucial question left in my life.  "How can I accept these gifts?"  And my answer could only be, "By giving my best..., and by passing these gifts on."  (I didn't know this at the time. I had to get older to realize that this is so.)

Standing on the shoulders of giants ... leaves me cold. 

Gandhi, flawed as he was. MLK. Flawed as he was. Jefferson, flawed as he was. Rosa Parks... The kids who sat on the lunch counters. The ones who stood up for unions..., the authors who bled ink into the night for us...  Emerson, Thoreau, ...   flawed, imperfect.... Those with and without name recognition... those who passed the torch over How Many Generations?  I needn't name them all. You have your heroes, differing, the same....  Innumerable names... stretching back and back... folks who sacrificed or lived deeply, always with an eye to the inheritance. Us. Recipients of their immeasurable gifts!

And not just the gifts of our fellow humans. The gift of moonlight.  Of salmon. Of running surface water... of stars...  All of the unnamable gifts that come our way!  How can we receive these? How can I?  It's a bit of a sweet, sour, bitter burden.  Sweet most of all.  Such gratitude and what can we do with it other than to extend it back in all directions?

I'm not going to survive this life.

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[JRM]

This thread is going nowhere.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWtCittJyr0

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[Palloy2]

RE: That's the second time in recent history you went with the "thread going nowhere" idea.

It's going SOMEWHERE, just maybe not in the direction you like.

I can recognise when a thread is going round in circles.
Cue video of some people vibrating the air.

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[JRM]

I can recognise when a thread is going round in circles.
Cue video of some people vibrating the air.

Round in circles? That's what you think we're doing here?

Is what I'm saying really that arcane that it seems to be going in circles?  Perhaps it is so.  How sad. 

Maybe I'll find another lunch counter.

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[RE]

It may be that we're just too different in terms of what gets us out of bed in the morning to understand one another.

That seems quite likely.

I'm not going to survive this life.

Nobody does.  It's a one way trip to the Great Beyond.

JRM, you're posting up to the Diner.  I will always challenge your perspectives, because for the most part I do not agree with them, at least on the spiritual/exisential end.  Politically, we are fairly similar. It is up to you to defend you POV if I challenge it.  Do not call me stupid, even in couched terminology.  I sniff this out like a Hound Dog.  I am doing this sort of thing for decades now.  You want to argue a POV, feel free, but do not expect me to agree with you, and when we conflict, STICK TO THE TOPIC.  DO not CALL ME STUPID!  In any way, shape or form.

re

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[JRM]

I never did call you stupid. That's your thing, not mine. It's your stuff.

Everyone has their stuff.  It prevents seeing things as they really are -- people, anything....  You clearly worry that folks will find you to be stupid. See? That's yours.  It has nothing much to do with me.

There are some great folks who pop in here from time to time.  I hope you will appreciate them for what they are worth.  But I'll not keep my fingers crossed.

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[RE]

I never did call you stupid. That's your thing, not mine. It's your stuff.

Everyone has their stuff.  It prevents seeing things as they really are -- people, anything....  You clearly worry that folks will find you to be stupid. See? That's yours.  It has nothing much to do with me.

There are some great folks who pop in here from time to time.  I hope you will appreciate them for what they are worth.  But I'll not keep my fingers crossed.

Most recently, you said I needed to keep reading the thread to understand what was going on.  That is a backhand way of calling me stupid.

It's very possible to do this sort of thing in many ways, I do it myself periodically with the "Read for Comprehension" comment.  I am trying to wean myself off of this because I know where it goes, which is to escalate into a Napalm Contest.  Which I am plenty good at doing, but plenty tired of also.

So my latest strategy here is to point out when others are going into Ad Hom, even in disgusied and backhand ways.  That's what all those Violation of the CoC posts are about.

Keep your arguments strictly to topic.

RE

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[luciddreams]

Currently I'm reading one of JMG's latest books Dark Age America.  He talks about wealth and money, and he points out that money is not the norm in terms of our species time on Earth.  However, the arrangement without money, from a western POV, seems to be feudalism. 

Another idea that seems to work against money, I don't know too much about, and that is anarchy as a political movement.  I've never read any books on the subject, but I suppose I will soon because I have been growing interested in it lately.  Yet, it seems to me like just another idealistic movement that won't work simply because of it's composition of idealism.  I've learned that too much idealism just equals delusions.  There is maybe room for a smattering of idealism in daily life, but beyond that and you are setting yourself up for agitation, friction, and needless strife.  I'm well qualified as I have spent my entire life wallowing in idealism.  Even now, having identified this problem of mine, I still find it hard to ascend up out of the pit of idealism.  Idealism works in the realm of spirituality, and that is it's proper place it seems to me. 

JRM, this idea of yours is one of idealism.  On the one hand we have the empires practice of Newspeek to deal with.  They take over words all of the time and change their meanings, and they typically change them to their opposite meaning...which is what Newspeek is.  Not just words, but ideas and institutions."  "The Ministry of Health" being the place one would go to get tortured.  "Freedom is Slavery" and the like.  On the other hand, the idea of wealth is central to a corporeal existence, and it's defined as stuff and how much stuff you have, and what that stuff is. 

Yet there is the usage of wealth such as "he has a wealth of knowledge."  That means he has a lot of knowledge and knowledge is not a physical good.  It just means there is a lot of knowledge in his possession.  There is also spiritual wealth.  There are different types of wealth.  The common wealth, however, is money and and the things that money can buy. 

In this case, you cannot claim Newspeek because everybody uses the term "wealth" to mean material abundance.  The definition of the word has not been changed, you, JRM, are trying to change it, and so I agree with RE that you should just use another word.  This is similar to the debate we had about the word "cult."  Here on the Diner I believe the dictionary is judge and jury in these cases.  We rely solely on words to communicate via this forum.  The dictionary's purpose is to define words, and so we must acquiesce to those definitions.  The meaning and usage of words is a very nuanced thing, but in this case it is even less so than with the word "cult." 

There is a world of difference between the ideas of "wealth" and "value."   "Quality" is another word that comes to mind. 

You can't force spiritual ideas onto people.  It just doesn't work that way.  That's why the great spiritual practitioners simply point in the direction that leads to enlightenment.  You have to go their yourself or it doesn't work.  I'm of the opinion that real wealth comes from a spiritual place because in the end we all die and we can't take our "wealth" with us.  Doesn't stop us from trying.  The real wealth we are here for is an intangible wealth that is made of experience and knowledge.  I believe when we die we can take that with us, if only to help navigate our way back to source.   

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[JRM]

I never did call you stupid. That's your thing, not mine. It's your stuff.

Everyone has their stuff.  It prevents seeing things as they really are -- people, anything....  You clearly worry that folks will find you to be stupid. See? That's yours.  It has nothing much to do with me.

There are some great folks who pop in here from time to time.  I hope you will appreciate them for what they are worth.  But I'll not keep my fingers crossed.

RE -

Most recently, you said I needed to keep reading the thread to understand what was going on.  That is a backhand way of calling me stupid.

It's very possible to do this sort of thing in many ways, I do it myself periodically with the "Read for Comprehension" comment.  I am trying to wean myself off of this because I know where it goes, which is to escalate into a Napalm Contest.  Which I am plenty good at doing, but plenty tired of also.

So my latest strategy here is to point out when others are going into Ad Hom, even in disgusied and backhand ways.  That's what all those Violation of the CoC posts are about.

Keep your arguments strictly to topic.

RE

RE -

One of two things are going to happen here. Either I leave the forum for good or pretty much don't respond to anything you say.  I was trying to keep the channels open with you, but I honestly don't want to keep going around and around this "calling me stupid" bullshit any more with you. I've never called you stupid.  Period. Not even in a backhanded way.  And I'm simply tired of your CoC nonsense around that.  I'm also tired of trying to communicate with you.  We speak two very different languages, though we both use English to do it in.  I doubt that you'll ever be able to make sense of what I am talking about, and I'm tired of having to explain what was already said and explained.

Maybe we should just leave one another alone?  I can not respond to your posts.  And you can not respond to my posts.  And I can still talk with Eddie, JDW, Surly, Roamer, Luciddreams, Palloy... and the others who I enjoy talking with in here.

As far as this respect thing, as per your DoD, neither of us feel that we're respected by the other.  I certainly don't feel that you're respecting me.  And I don't want to continue butting heads in an unhealthy, unproductive way.  It's getting old.

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[JRM]

The dictionary's purpose is to define words, and so we must acquiesce to those definitions. 

Good, comprehensive dictionaries include the usage of the word wealth as I'm using it here.  And words are always changing.  They change when people use them differently.  And there's no reason why a person cannot call for, suggest, a change in usage. 

My purpose here, in part, has been to reveal how the popular use of the word wealth in economics terms is flawed and should be altered.

If what I'm saying here is "idealism," that's fine.  I have often been called an idealist. It's not a word I prefer to use to describe myself, actually.  I see myself as an intelligent person who despises falsity and ignorance being employed in "official" places as part of a system of deception, foolishness, destruction and oppression.   I will not stop sharing my thoughts about such things because it's supposed to be "idealism" which is supposed somehow to be ridiculous, silly or irrelevant.  Of course, if no one here is interested in some part of what I have to say, they can just ignore that part -- this thread, for example.  It's not everyone's cup of tea, obviously.  But it matters to me.

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[RE]

I never did call you stupid. That's your thing, not mine. It's your stuff.

Everyone has their stuff.  It prevents seeing things as they really are -- people, anything....  You clearly worry that folks will find you to be stupid. See? That's yours.  It has nothing much to do with me.

There are some great folks who pop in here from time to time.  I hope you will appreciate them for what they are worth.  But I'll not keep my fingers crossed.

RE -

Most recently, you said I needed to keep reading the thread to understand what was going on.  That is a backhand way of calling me stupid.

It's very possible to do this sort of thing in many ways, I do it myself periodically with the "Read for Comprehension" comment.  I am trying to wean myself off of this because I know where it goes, which is to escalate into a Napalm Contest.  Which I am plenty good at doing, but plenty tired of also.

So my latest strategy here is to point out when others are going into Ad Hom, even in disgusied and backhand ways.  That's what all those Violation of the CoC posts are about.

Keep your arguments strictly to topic.

RE

RE -

One of two things are going to happen here. Either I leave the forum for good or pretty much don't respond to anything you say.  I was trying to keep the channels open with you, but I honestly don't want to keep going around and around this "calling me stupid" bullshit any more with you. I've never called you stupid.  Period. Not even in a backhanded way.  And I'm simply tired of your CoC nonsense around that.  I'm also tired of trying to communicate with you.  We speak two very different languages, though we both use English to do it in.  I doubt that you'll ever be able to make sense of what I am talking about, and I'm tired of having to explain what was already said and explained.

Maybe we should just leave one another alone?  I can not respond to your posts.  And you can not respond to my posts.  And I can still talk with Eddie, JDW, Surly, Roamer, Luciddreams, Palloy... and the others who I enjoy talking with in here.

As far as this respect thing, as per your DoD, neither of us feel that we're respected by the other.  I certainly don't feel that you're respecting me.  And I don't want to continue butting heads in an unhealthy, unproductive way.  It's getting old.

It's quite hard NOT to respond when someone writes something you seriously disagree with.  If you are all in the same room having a conversation and somebody says something you disagree with, your choices are to either argue with this person or to leave the room. I am obviously not going to leave this room, since I pay for it. lol.

I would regret it if you left the room here because I find your perspectives interesting, even when I disagree with them.  So I hope your choice is to argue with me instead.

I piss off lots of people JRM, even close friends.  It's my nature, like the Scorpion and the Frog.

A scorpion asks a frog to carry it across a river. The frog hesitates, afraid of being stung, but the scorpion argues that if it did so, they would both drown. Considering this, the frog agrees, but midway across the river the scorpion does indeed sting the frog, dooming them both. When the frog asks the scorpion why, the scorpion replies that it was in its nature to do so.

RE

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[luciddreams]

The dictionary's purpose is to define words, and so we must acquiesce to those definitions. 

Good, comprehensive dictionaries include the usage of the word wealth as I'm using it here.  And words are always changing.  They change when people use them differently.  And there's no reason why a person cannot call for, suggest, a change in usage. 

My purpose here, in part, has been to reveal how the popular use of the word wealth in economics terms is flawed and should be altered.

If what I'm saying here is "idealism," that's fine.  I have often been called an idealist. It's not a word I prefer to use to describe myself, actually.  I see myself as an intelligent person who despises falsity and ignorance being employed in "official" places as part of a system of deception, foolishness, destruction and oppression.   I will not stop sharing my thoughts about such things because it's supposed to be "idealism" which is supposed somehow to be ridiculous, silly or irrelevant.  Of course, if no one here is interested in some part of what I have to say, they can just ignore that part -- this thread, for example.  It's not everyone's cup of tea, obviously.  But it matters to me.

From one idealist to another, I understand your frustration. 

It's not that your ideas are ridiculous, silly, or irrelevant, it's just that they are ideal.  Economics is a "science" that can never be ideal.  It's made of statistics (lies), propaganda, lies, theories, and finally the reality that results from the combination of all of those things.  The truth is that economics is a lie.  It's just the science by which the men at the top stay at the top.  They are at the top because they want all of the wealth for themselves and they are vile enough to do whatever it takes to ensure it stays that way.  They are perfectly happy with their wealth, and they want the rest of the world to see things exactly the same way that they do.  They want us in competition with one another for wealth. 

No matter how you slice it, corporeal wealth is made up of materials.  Wealth is just having a lot of something desirable. 

I don't know...kinda feels like I'm pissin' in the wind here. 

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