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the wealth a single man produces is bounded by physical law and physical limits. Even for an artist to make an abstraction such as a painting the artist needs t

the wealth a single man produces is bounded by physical law and physical limits. Even for an artist to make an abstraction such as a painting the artist needs to use material and energy both which are part of a zero sum game. when said artist accumulates 1 billion dollars worth of wealth did that mean he painted 1 billion dollars worth of paintings? Did the billionaires of the modern world single handedly each create a billion dollars worth of wealth? take a 747 airliner. a product worth less than a billion dollars in value. such a product must be built by multitudes of people because projects of such immense complexity require man hours that exceed several life times. If billionaires exist it implies that the billionaire built several products of equivalent value and complexity all by himself. for a single man to hold such extraordinary wealth of absurd proportions means one thing and one thing only. He built his wealth off the backs of others.

WalterBright 11y ago
> the wealth a single man produces is bounded by physical law and physical limits. Not at all. There are no bounds to the value of a painting, for example. None of that is wrapped up in the value of the paints and canvas, which is easily demonstrated by my using those same paints and canvas to paint a picture, and I'd have to pay to dispose of the result.
- meric 11y ago
  That's true. The value of a painting is the painting in and of itself. You can have a piece of a paper with "$1B" written on it, but that's meaningless in world where the painting is the only wealth.
- crimsonalucard 11y ago
  You are talking about a lower bound. I can create a painting with a value equivalent to trash. I can take energy and throw it in the dumpster. This energy is wasted and therefore worthless. This is common sense. But can I create a painting of infinite value? In the history of mankind... has there been an object of such immense value that society has deemed the object worth more than the value of all the lives of humans that have ever existed? No. By virtue of common sense no such product has existed. If no such product has existed then likely there must be a hard physical upper limit to value. However, this example only hints at a fuzzy description of an upper bound to value. It is not clear what this upper bound exactly is... because a human can use his imagination and say that a piece of paper is worth 2 billion dollars. If human thought has no limits and if human thought determines the value of all things, why don't there exist objects that are worth 2 google gabillion dollars? Let us develop a concrete definition for value with our first example: the painting. Also let us examine this painting in the hypothetical context of an island bartering economy of two economic actors: a painter and a potato farmer. The farmer creates products of concrete physical value: food. Food is a product made of energy extracted from the earth and the sun. The painter makes products of abstraction, a painting: an object supposedly worth more than the sum of its parts. Let's throw this economic simulation in motion. What is the maximum value of a painting produced by the artist? Can the potato farmer say that the painting is worth 10 trillion potatoes when his maximum potato production rate is 2 per day? No. This is impossible. No 10 trillion potato-painting transaction can take place in this economy because the amount of potatoes is limited to 20 per day. Thus in an economy of a farmer and artist the value of the painting is bounded by the total potatoes the farmer can produce. Lets look at the absurd example of an economy with two economic actors of two painters. Both painters produce a painting and they both trade each other paintings. Then they starve to death because there are no potatoes to eat in the economy. This absurd example illustrates one thing: All economies cannot be made up of solely abstract products of overblown value. All economies must have concrete physical primitives like food an energy to function correctly otherwise people will starve or nothing can happen. An economy of pure abstraction is an economy made of hopes, dreams and imagination, such an economy cannot exist in reality. So in conclusion what does this mean? It means two things: 1. All economies must have concrete physical products to function. Economies cannot be made up of only abstract paintings, poems and stories. 2. All abstract products within an economy are bounded by how much it can be paid for by the total amount of physical product in an economy. Thus the conclusion is inescapable. THE VALUE OF ALL PRODUCTS PAINTINGS OR ANYTHING are bounded by PHYSICAL LAW and PHYSICAL LIMITS. The notion that value is an ephemeral imaginative thing is an illusion. This makes sense in the context of the universe.

WalterBright 11y ago

> the wealth a single man produces is bounded by physical law and physical limits. Not at all. There are no bounds to the value of a painting, for example. None of that is wrapped up in the value of the paints and canvas, which is easily demonstrated by my using those same paints and canvas to paint a picture, and I'd have to pay to dispose of the result.

meric 11y ago
That's true. The value of a painting is the painting in and of itself. You can have a piece of a paper with "$1B" written on it, but that's meaningless in world where the painting is the only wealth.
crimsonalucard 11y ago
You are talking about a lower bound. I can create a painting with a value equivalent to trash. I can take energy and throw it in the dumpster. This energy is wasted and therefore worthless. This is common sense. But can I create a painting of infinite value? In the history of mankind... has there been an object of such immense value that society has deemed the object worth more than the value of all the lives of humans that have ever existed? No. By virtue of common sense no such product has existed. If no such product has existed then likely there must be a hard physical upper limit to value. However, this example only hints at a fuzzy description of an upper bound to value. It is not clear what this upper bound exactly is... because a human can use his imagination and say that a piece of paper is worth 2 billion dollars. If human thought has no limits and if human thought determines the value of all things, why don't there exist objects that are worth 2 google gabillion dollars? Let us develop a concrete definition for value with our first example: the painting. Also let us examine this painting in the hypothetical context of an island bartering economy of two economic actors: a painter and a potato farmer. The farmer creates products of concrete physical value: food. Food is a product made of energy extracted from the earth and the sun. The painter makes products of abstraction, a painting: an object supposedly worth more than the sum of its parts. Let's throw this economic simulation in motion. What is the maximum value of a painting produced by the artist? Can the potato farmer say that the painting is worth 10 trillion potatoes when his maximum potato production rate is 2 per day? No. This is impossible. No 10 trillion potato-painting transaction can take place in this economy because the amount of potatoes is limited to 20 per day. Thus in an economy of a farmer and artist the value of the painting is bounded by the total potatoes the farmer can produce. Lets look at the absurd example of an economy with two economic actors of two painters. Both painters produce a painting and they both trade each other paintings. Then they starve to death because there are no potatoes to eat in the economy. This absurd example illustrates one thing: All economies cannot be made up of solely abstract products of overblown value. All economies must have concrete physical primitives like food an energy to function correctly otherwise people will starve or nothing can happen. An economy of pure abstraction is an economy made of hopes, dreams and imagination, such an economy cannot exist in reality. So in conclusion what does this mean? It means two things: 1. All economies must have concrete physical products to function. Economies cannot be made up of only abstract paintings, poems and stories. 2. All abstract products within an economy are bounded by how much it can be paid for by the total amount of physical product in an economy. Thus the conclusion is inescapable. THE VALUE OF ALL PRODUCTS PAINTINGS OR ANYTHING are bounded by PHYSICAL LAW and PHYSICAL LIMITS. The notion that value is an ephemeral imaginative thing is an illusion. This makes sense in the context of the universe.