8 ms·

On one hand, this is a little land with a few building in unattractive location/condition. Not so queer. On the other… We are at a point in time when the wealt

by netcan 11y ago

On one hand, this is a little land with a few building in unattractive location/condition. Not so queer. On the other… We are at a point in time when the wealthy are extremely wealthy. The billionaire club is substantial but even below that, personal wealth in the tens or hundreds of millions exists. What do people want to do with that wealth? It's more than can really be spent on comfort, entertainment, sex and such. Once upon a time money was power, or could be converted to it. Roman Consuls put personal wealth into political enterprises. They were the system of government and the wealth was intertwined with it. But, the main point was they had social, societal and military ambitions. Where are the people today who would like to create a 1,000 person community? Where are the wealthy who would like to try a bold experiment in communalism, anarchism, feminism or whatnot?

empthought 11y ago
"Where are the wealthy who would like to try a bold experiment in communalism, anarchism, feminism or whatnot?" Flippant answer is that the two groups—"the wealthy," and people interested in that sort of thing—have almost no overlap.
- mbil 11y ago
  An example of an exception to that rule of thumb: Robert Owen, a successful industrialist who became one of the founders of utopian socialism. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Owen https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Owen http://www.ushistory.org/us/26b.asp http://www.ushistory.org/us/26b.asp
  - empthought 11y ago
    I don't think someone who died in 1858 is an exception to the modern composition of the wealthy population.
- netcan 11y ago
  It might also mean that the latter group simply doesn't exist, not in the money-where-your-mouth-is way. It's one thing to be interested in these things in a "someone-should-do-something way". But I don't really think either of these are true. Bill Gates has some big "political" goals, societal scale ambitions. Elon Musk too, though he seems to like for profit companies as a vehicle. Some charities get substantial endowments and many in the leaser classes dedicate a lot of their time, attention & money to them.
evanpw 11y ago
There are a few (at least in the "whatnot" category), but they think bigger than 1000-person towns, and it's often unpopular with the public: http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/01/under-new-management/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/01/under-new-management/.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
Kalium 11y ago
I would argue that those experiments fall into three categories: * Experiments that have been tried (like anarchism and some kinds of communalism) and don't need repeating * Obviously terrible ideas (anarchism again, communism, some others) * Beyond the ready scope of purely legal changes (feminism) And this is even before you start addressing the problems of getting 1000 people going in an environment with meaningful infrastructure. Or having it function economically without being a gaping money pit. I suspect smart and wealthy people interested in changing society tend to realize that there are more ways to break society than there are to improve society. Therefore, smaller changes that do not individually break society are preferable to changing everything at once and praying you didn't introduce a killer bug somewhere in your batch of a million changes. As a result, you get more people like George Soros than you do Lenin. For which we may want to consider being thankful.
- ZenoArrow 11y ago
  Can you give me one example of where communism has been attempted and failed? I don't know of any. Note that I'm talking about communism as a way to structure societies, which Wikipedia describes as 'a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state.'.
  - Kalium 11y ago
    Every attempt to enact communism has gone from a putative dictatorship of the proletariat to a plain dictatorship. With a lot of very nasty consequences along the way. Famines in the Ukraine and China come to mind. Now, some kind of Platonic ideal of Communism may work perfectly. It's certainly possible, in the sense that the possibility exists in a realm of pure abstraction. However, history shows that getting there isn't very practical and requires oceans of blood. A perfect system that you cannot get to is useless. Previous work on this avenue of experimentation suggest remarkably strongly that it should not be attempted again.
    - ZenoArrow 11y ago
      > "Famines in the Ukraine and China come to mind." Neither the Soviet Union nor Communist China were/are communist states. They had rulers, communist states cannot have rulers, otherwise they violate the need for absence of social classes. We shouldn't dismiss an idea just because some people misunderstood it. If you can find a society that tried communist principals (and I mean all of the core principals, not half hearted attempts), I'll definitely be interested to know about them.
yolesaber 11y ago
>Once upon a time money was power, or could be converted to it. Roman Consuls put personal wealth into political enterprises. When was wealth never not power? Pretty sure that always and still is the case. Rather than serve in the senate (though some millionaires do of course - the senatorial class in the US is extremely wealthy compared to their constituents), the ultrawealthy just setup and donate to PACs as well as use their money to drive propaganda efforts (e.g. Rupert Murdoch). And then of course you have people like Peter Thiel who want to create an offshore libertarian paradise. Also you would be surprised on how much can truly be spent on sex and entertainment. Multimillionaires go broke all the time due to drugs, partying, and overwhelming decadence.
ZenoArrow 11y ago
> "Where are the people today who would like to create a 1,000 person community? Where are the wealthy who would like to try a bold experiment in communalism, anarchism, feminism or whatnot?" There are similar experiments happening on a smaller scale. I would argue that you wouldn't want to fund these communities through wealthy benefactors, otherwise it creates a sense of deference and obligation, it's far better to have a more egalitarian community IMO.
aaron695 11y ago
Communities like these have been tried 100's of times in most countries. Basically the type of person willing to give up current access to family, friends and job to go there are predominantly weird. The exception is young people chasing jobs and education ie college towns, San Francisco, SoHo Or tax havens.

by netcan 11y ago

empthought 11y ago

"Where are the wealthy who would like to try a bold experiment in communalism, anarchism, feminism or whatnot?" Flippant answer is that the two groups—"the wealthy," and people interested in that sort of thing—have almost no overlap.

mbil 11y ago
An example of an exception to that rule of thumb: Robert Owen, a successful industrialist who became one of the founders of utopian socialism. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Owen https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Owen http://www.ushistory.org/us/26b.asp http://www.ushistory.org/us/26b.asp
- empthought 11y ago
  I don't think someone who died in 1858 is an exception to the modern composition of the wealthy population.
netcan 11y ago
It might also mean that the latter group simply doesn't exist, not in the money-where-your-mouth-is way. It's one thing to be interested in these things in a "someone-should-do-something way". But I don't really think either of these are true. Bill Gates has some big "political" goals, societal scale ambitions. Elon Musk too, though he seems to like for profit companies as a vehicle. Some charities get substantial endowments and many in the leaser classes dedicate a lot of their time, attention & money to them.

evanpw 11y ago

There are a few (at least in the "whatnot" category), but they think bigger than 1000-person towns, and it's often unpopular with the public: http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/01/under-new-management/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/01/under-new-management/.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

Kalium 11y ago

I would argue that those experiments fall into three categories: * Experiments that have been tried (like anarchism and some kinds of communalism) and don't need repeating * Obviously terrible ideas (anarchism again, communism, some others) * Beyond the ready scope of purely legal changes (feminism) And this is even before you start addressing the problems of getting 1000 people going in an environment with meaningful infrastructure. Or having it function economically without being a gaping money pit. I suspect smart and wealthy people interested in changing society tend to realize that there are more ways to break society than there are to improve society. Therefore, smaller changes that do not individually break society are preferable to changing everything at once and praying you didn't introduce a killer bug somewhere in your batch of a million changes. As a result, you get more people like George Soros than you do Lenin. For which we may want to consider being thankful.

ZenoArrow 11y ago
Can you give me one example of where communism has been attempted and failed? I don't know of any. Note that I'm talking about communism as a way to structure societies, which Wikipedia describes as 'a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state.'.
- Kalium 11y ago
  Every attempt to enact communism has gone from a putative dictatorship of the proletariat to a plain dictatorship. With a lot of very nasty consequences along the way. Famines in the Ukraine and China come to mind. Now, some kind of Platonic ideal of Communism may work perfectly. It's certainly possible, in the sense that the possibility exists in a realm of pure abstraction. However, history shows that getting there isn't very practical and requires oceans of blood. A perfect system that you cannot get to is useless. Previous work on this avenue of experimentation suggest remarkably strongly that it should not be attempted again.
  - ZenoArrow 11y ago
    > "Famines in the Ukraine and China come to mind." Neither the Soviet Union nor Communist China were/are communist states. They had rulers, communist states cannot have rulers, otherwise they violate the need for absence of social classes. We shouldn't dismiss an idea just because some people misunderstood it. If you can find a society that tried communist principals (and I mean all of the core principals, not half hearted attempts), I'll definitely be interested to know about them.

yolesaber 11y ago

>Once upon a time money was power, or could be converted to it. Roman Consuls put personal wealth into political enterprises. When was wealth never not power? Pretty sure that always and still is the case. Rather than serve in the senate (though some millionaires do of course - the senatorial class in the US is extremely wealthy compared to their constituents), the ultrawealthy just setup and donate to PACs as well as use their money to drive propaganda efforts (e.g. Rupert Murdoch). And then of course you have people like Peter Thiel who want to create an offshore libertarian paradise. Also you would be surprised on how much can truly be spent on sex and entertainment. Multimillionaires go broke all the time due to drugs, partying, and overwhelming decadence.

ZenoArrow 11y ago

> "Where are the people today who would like to create a 1,000 person community? Where are the wealthy who would like to try a bold experiment in communalism, anarchism, feminism or whatnot?" There are similar experiments happening on a smaller scale. I would argue that you wouldn't want to fund these communities through wealthy benefactors, otherwise it creates a sense of deference and obligation, it's far better to have a more egalitarian community IMO.

aaron695 11y ago

Communities like these have been tried 100's of times in most countries. Basically the type of person willing to give up current access to family, friends and job to go there are predominantly weird. The exception is young people chasing jobs and education ie college towns, San Francisco, SoHo Or tax havens.