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> It's nice that they used examples of problems denied by supporters of more than a single political party. I think we all do that. I disagree, the two example

> It's nice that they used examples of problems denied by supporters of more than a single political party. I think we all do that. I disagree, the two examples (climate change and gun control) aren't that different. Both are issues of personal freedom. I actually wish they would show some blind spots of collectivist liberal anarchists (people like Chomsky), who I feel very close political sympathies to. I am (obviously) not aware of these blind spots. I am not sure I entirely buy the idea of "everybody has blindspots" (EHB). It seems to me that liberal democracy, the idea that everybody is entitled to their moral opinion and should have the same influence over what we consider moral, is pretty much an attempt to get rid of any blindspots. The argument EHB is akin to saying "atheists are also believers".

panic 11y ago
Do you think something like the iPhone could have been produced under a collectivist economic regime?
- asgard1024 11y ago
  Generally, yes! But it really depends on what you mean by "collectivist". Could iPhone be produced by IBM, a huge corporation with top-down command and control? It's about as likely, I would say. I work at medium American corporation and it's not really that different from what was called "socialist" enterprise here in Czech Republic. It is certainly more efficient, but sometimes pathologically - good ideas get killed all the time. And there is not really that much less stupidity to go around. And socialism here (I take it from your question that's what you imagine as "collectivist") certainly wasn't ideal system for liberal left, who would probably prefer some form of worker cooperatives or something like that. Perhaps I should emphasize what I mean by "collectivist" in my previous comment. I actually refer to empathy (or less selfishness) rather than form of ownership. What I mean is understanding that other side can have a different opinion and willingness to compromise (e.g. your personal freedom) with the needs/feelings of others. It doesn't mean you have to entirely ditch the free market, for instance.
  - bobcostas55 11y ago
    I think the parent meant it in a more general sense. Apple doesn't single-handedly produce the iPhone, it takes the coordination of millions of people, most of whom have no contact with Apple whatsoever: those who design oil drilling equipment, those who build it, those who use oil drilling equipment, those who then extract the oil, transport it, refine it, transport it, turn it into plastic bits for the iphone, transport them, put everything together, transport it. And there's a chain like that for every thing in the phone (for some items, such as CPUs the chain is far more complex). There is no top-down command and control, and I doubt it's possible. The only reason coordination on such a massive scale works is because of the price mechanism.
    - nn3 11y ago
      The Soviet Union built some fairly complex machines too, for example buran the Russian space shuttle, nuclear power plants, large airplanes, submarines etc. I don't think these are significantly less complex than an iPhone. Likely more. Now you could argue they did it less frequently or less efficient and not really benefitting the average consumer in many cases. And that would be true. But there is no denying that a top down economy did those things.
      - guard-of-terra 11y ago
        Soviet Union routinely failed to sell its nuclear plants, airliners and less complex stuff. Soviet Union was able to produce something that worked, but it was all below price-quality curve. I.e. you could buy same quality product from Western corporations for less money; or you could buy better quality product for same money. Western corporations also had better selection. So only buyers were in communist bloc, and what USSR end up exporting is oil and gas. And that'll happen nine times out of ten, since socialist economies are not optimal.
        danharaj 11y ago
        I don't know why we're calling the USSR socialist; is it because they said they were socialist? There are plenty of dictatorial regimes that call themselves democratic republics, too. The USSR was structured like one massive corporation: Everything was owned by the government and the government bureaucracy functioned much like a corporate bureaucracy. Libertarian socialists sometimes call states like the USSR state capitalist, because economic activity is still dictated by a top-down hierarchy allocating capital and exploiting workers. Optimal is not the word you want to use, by the way. Not even free markets are optimal, that's why economists talk about 'market failures'.
- jameshart 11y ago
  My iPhone was made in China. Where was yours made?
  - Malician 11y ago
    It was not designed in China, as a unified part. In fact, even the important components were not designed or manufactured in China. Even the CPU was manufactured in Taiwan or Korea depending on the phone version. http://www.smics.com/eng/index.php http://www.smics.com/eng/index.php The state semiconductor corp is still on 40nm, which the Taiwanese TSMC hit seven years ago.
nabla9 11y ago
>I actually wish they would show some blind spots of collectivist liberal anarchists The obvious blind spot is the problem caused by politicization of everyday life. Faceless authority where your value is determined by market forces and laws that come far above you may feel problematic because it's faceless and impersonal. Impersonality is also benefit. When you do your job and go home, you don't have to suck up for the boss in free time and he don't care what your political views are. In small democratic organization you have a face. The good thing is that you have a voice and can participate more. The bad thing is that you have a face. Your political opinions and your personal relationships and personality is part of the game. Your professional life is in the hands of your peers and the cliques that organically form. See also: http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm
- asgard1024 11y ago
  This is an interesting point. However, I am not convinced that life under "market forces" is less political than elsewhere. I would like to see some evidence. I also think the point (and large success) of democracy is that it distributes power equally, so we simply stop wasting time on fighting for it and get the stuff done. Especially in direct democracy. So I think what you are saying only applies to "naive" (maybe even strawman) anarchism, where there are no rules, not the democratic one (that I think Chomsky admires). > you don't have to suck up for the boss in free time and he don't care what your political views are I am actually not sure this is true in small enterprises. I haven't worked for one, but I know one can get easily fired for voicing sympathies with unions, for instance.
_yosefk 11y ago
If a "blind spot" is understood literally then to have no blind spots would require to see, well, everything there is to see at the same time, which is sorta impossible. I think it's pretty obvious that our ability to think - to take facts into account and work out their consequences - is necessarily very much limited by a finite input bandwidth, a finite storage capacity and a finite processing capacity, and so any finite brain will have mental blind spots. To believe otherwise is to be a great believer indeed, IMO...
speccy_geek 11y ago
A common liberal blind spot is the genetic basis of intelligence and other aptitudes, and the extent to which that determines life outcomes.
- asgard1024 11y ago
  I consider myself liberal yet I don't agree with it, though you're right, there are many elitist liberals around. I think they are easily spotted by their opposition to direct democracy. And I actually think we should always assume "nurture". My reasoning is when you assume "nature", that's a dead end. This is a similar argument to whether the world is knowable - assuming it is will get you further.
  - nitrogen 11y ago
    How is that a dead end? I have greater confidence in humanity's ability to find a genetic therapy to boost intelligence than its ability to compensate for bad parenting and culture.
    - asgard1024 11y ago
      Assuming the current level of technology of course - I don't think there is anyone who successfully improved their own intelligence with biotechnology. Once there is such therapy, it simply becomes "nurture". But I am not sure that even matters, people are creative and they will find a way to blame unsuccessful people or nations for systemic failures. Genetic therapy as our future? It's likely you will get choices like "you can have 1 more IQ point, bigger toenails and 10% higher risk of cardiovascular disease after 50". On the other hand, you can do this today, and pick an intelligent partner to have kids with. And people do and we have empirical evidence of growing IQ (but actually it is explained by nurture) - regardless some still talk about how Idiocracy is our future.
ArkyBeagle 11y ago
What Chomsky does is impeccable scholarship, but then he inevitably seems (to me!) to overreach on the conclusions. I don't know if it's blind spots or not. As an example, I do not hold that any colonialist explanation for US involvement in Vietnam is necessary. There's an awful lot of ... circumstantial evidence to suggest that, but I don't know for a fact that anyone in the US explicitly wanted to do it for that reason - it's much more likely that simple anticommunism suffices. After all, weren't the Chinese, in very complex ways, just wanting to "colonize" Vietnam through Ho Chi Minh? But behind that is the message that power corrupts, and on that point, Chomsky is spot on. But I happen to think it's more about the powerful being constrained by circumstance and resources than by them simply being arbitrary. We have ample evidence of this from LBJ's White House tapes. But that is perhaps my bias and blind spot, and maybe he's right. Climate change is different in that cheap energy props up people who struggle economically in the US. So that's why I don't like carbon taxes as well as a solution.

panic 11y ago

Do you think something like the iPhone could have been produced under a collectivist economic regime?

asgard1024 11y ago
Generally, yes! But it really depends on what you mean by "collectivist". Could iPhone be produced by IBM, a huge corporation with top-down command and control? It's about as likely, I would say. I work at medium American corporation and it's not really that different from what was called "socialist" enterprise here in Czech Republic. It is certainly more efficient, but sometimes pathologically - good ideas get killed all the time. And there is not really that much less stupidity to go around. And socialism here (I take it from your question that's what you imagine as "collectivist") certainly wasn't ideal system for liberal left, who would probably prefer some form of worker cooperatives or something like that. Perhaps I should emphasize what I mean by "collectivist" in my previous comment. I actually refer to empathy (or less selfishness) rather than form of ownership. What I mean is understanding that other side can have a different opinion and willingness to compromise (e.g. your personal freedom) with the needs/feelings of others. It doesn't mean you have to entirely ditch the free market, for instance.
- bobcostas55 11y ago
  I think the parent meant it in a more general sense. Apple doesn't single-handedly produce the iPhone, it takes the coordination of millions of people, most of whom have no contact with Apple whatsoever: those who design oil drilling equipment, those who build it, those who use oil drilling equipment, those who then extract the oil, transport it, refine it, transport it, turn it into plastic bits for the iphone, transport them, put everything together, transport it. And there's a chain like that for every thing in the phone (for some items, such as CPUs the chain is far more complex). There is no top-down command and control, and I doubt it's possible. The only reason coordination on such a massive scale works is because of the price mechanism.
  - nn3 11y ago
    The Soviet Union built some fairly complex machines too, for example buran the Russian space shuttle, nuclear power plants, large airplanes, submarines etc. I don't think these are significantly less complex than an iPhone. Likely more. Now you could argue they did it less frequently or less efficient and not really benefitting the average consumer in many cases. And that would be true. But there is no denying that a top down economy did those things.
    - guard-of-terra 11y ago
      Soviet Union routinely failed to sell its nuclear plants, airliners and less complex stuff. Soviet Union was able to produce something that worked, but it was all below price-quality curve. I.e. you could buy same quality product from Western corporations for less money; or you could buy better quality product for same money. Western corporations also had better selection. So only buyers were in communist bloc, and what USSR end up exporting is oil and gas. And that'll happen nine times out of ten, since socialist economies are not optimal.
      - danharaj 11y ago
        I don't know why we're calling the USSR socialist; is it because they said they were socialist? There are plenty of dictatorial regimes that call themselves democratic republics, too. The USSR was structured like one massive corporation: Everything was owned by the government and the government bureaucracy functioned much like a corporate bureaucracy. Libertarian socialists sometimes call states like the USSR state capitalist, because economic activity is still dictated by a top-down hierarchy allocating capital and exploiting workers. Optimal is not the word you want to use, by the way. Not even free markets are optimal, that's why economists talk about 'market failures'.
jameshart 11y ago
My iPhone was made in China. Where was yours made?
- Malician 11y ago
  It was not designed in China, as a unified part. In fact, even the important components were not designed or manufactured in China. Even the CPU was manufactured in Taiwan or Korea depending on the phone version. http://www.smics.com/eng/index.php http://www.smics.com/eng/index.php The state semiconductor corp is still on 40nm, which the Taiwanese TSMC hit seven years ago.

nabla9 11y ago

>I actually wish they would show some blind spots of collectivist liberal anarchists The obvious blind spot is the problem caused by politicization of everyday life. Faceless authority where your value is determined by market forces and laws that come far above you may feel problematic because it's faceless and impersonal. Impersonality is also benefit. When you do your job and go home, you don't have to suck up for the boss in free time and he don't care what your political views are. In small democratic organization you have a face. The good thing is that you have a voice and can participate more. The bad thing is that you have a face. Your political opinions and your personal relationships and personality is part of the game. Your professional life is in the hands of your peers and the cliques that organically form. See also: http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm http://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm

asgard1024 11y ago
This is an interesting point. However, I am not convinced that life under "market forces" is less political than elsewhere. I would like to see some evidence. I also think the point (and large success) of democracy is that it distributes power equally, so we simply stop wasting time on fighting for it and get the stuff done. Especially in direct democracy. So I think what you are saying only applies to "naive" (maybe even strawman) anarchism, where there are no rules, not the democratic one (that I think Chomsky admires). > you don't have to suck up for the boss in free time and he don't care what your political views are I am actually not sure this is true in small enterprises. I haven't worked for one, but I know one can get easily fired for voicing sympathies with unions, for instance.

_yosefk 11y ago

If a "blind spot" is understood literally then to have no blind spots would require to see, well, everything there is to see at the same time, which is sorta impossible. I think it's pretty obvious that our ability to think - to take facts into account and work out their consequences - is necessarily very much limited by a finite input bandwidth, a finite storage capacity and a finite processing capacity, and so any finite brain will have mental blind spots. To believe otherwise is to be a great believer indeed, IMO...

speccy_geek 11y ago

A common liberal blind spot is the genetic basis of intelligence and other aptitudes, and the extent to which that determines life outcomes.

asgard1024 11y ago
I consider myself liberal yet I don't agree with it, though you're right, there are many elitist liberals around. I think they are easily spotted by their opposition to direct democracy. And I actually think we should always assume "nurture". My reasoning is when you assume "nature", that's a dead end. This is a similar argument to whether the world is knowable - assuming it is will get you further.
- nitrogen 11y ago
  How is that a dead end? I have greater confidence in humanity's ability to find a genetic therapy to boost intelligence than its ability to compensate for bad parenting and culture.
  - asgard1024 11y ago
    Assuming the current level of technology of course - I don't think there is anyone who successfully improved their own intelligence with biotechnology. Once there is such therapy, it simply becomes "nurture". But I am not sure that even matters, people are creative and they will find a way to blame unsuccessful people or nations for systemic failures. Genetic therapy as our future? It's likely you will get choices like "you can have 1 more IQ point, bigger toenails and 10% higher risk of cardiovascular disease after 50". On the other hand, you can do this today, and pick an intelligent partner to have kids with. And people do and we have empirical evidence of growing IQ (but actually it is explained by nurture) - regardless some still talk about how Idiocracy is our future.

ArkyBeagle 11y ago

What Chomsky does is impeccable scholarship, but then he inevitably seems (to me!) to overreach on the conclusions. I don't know if it's blind spots or not. As an example, I do not hold that any colonialist explanation for US involvement in Vietnam is necessary. There's an awful lot of ... circumstantial evidence to suggest that, but I don't know for a fact that anyone in the US explicitly wanted to do it for that reason - it's much more likely that simple anticommunism suffices. After all, weren't the Chinese, in very complex ways, just wanting to "colonize" Vietnam through Ho Chi Minh? But behind that is the message that power corrupts, and on that point, Chomsky is spot on. But I happen to think it's more about the powerful being constrained by circumstance and resources than by them simply being arbitrary. We have ample evidence of this from LBJ's White House tapes. But that is perhaps my bias and blind spot, and maybe he's right. Climate change is different in that cheap energy props up people who struggle economically in the US. So that's why I don't like carbon taxes as well as a solution.