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>higher entropy of ownership distribution leads to the higher degree of socialism That characterization doesn't fit at all. Capitalist/Market-based societies a

>higher entropy of ownership distribution leads to the higher degree of socialism That characterization doesn't fit at all. Capitalist/Market-based societies are far more decentralized, with a higher entropy ownership distribution, than Communist/Socialist ones. In Market-based systems hundreds of thousands of small, medium and large companies and millions (or hundreds of millions) of individuals do day-to-day business with each other without direct oversight or control of a central body. >where nominally all the people collectively own everything. Except that's not how collective ownership works. A society of millions of citizens can't collectively manage anything - they need to create representative institutions to do that on their behalf. The bigger the collective, the less entropy the representative institution displays. So collective ownership in practice is a very very low entropy position.

trhway 9y ago
man, you have completely mixed up ownership power with executive/management power. When everybody owns everything that is maximum possible entropy of ownership power distribution, and that results in practically minimum entropy of executive/management power distribution - the heavily centralized planning&control. By contrast, in capitalist society every piece of property, except for government owned, is owned by a set of people smaller than the whole society and their stakes aren't necessarily equal - thus such distribution has lesser entropy that the socialist one of everybody everything. Where is management and control in the capitalist society and economy being less centralized has thus higher entropy distribution than the socialist centralized.
- macspoofing 9y ago
  >man, you have completely mixed up ownership power with executive/management power. I did not. You have a view of socialism that is not at all grounded in reality. That's where you got confused. >When everybody owns everything that is maximum possible entropy of ownership power distribution But that isn't true in practice at all. In every socialist/marxist society collectively ownership is a meaningless idea. It is more of a theoretical concept rather than a practical one. You have no rights as a collective owner to actually influence and decide on how specific resources are managed by some institution charged with exploiting them. The reality is that some central governing body, which under Marxist regimes is usually the communist party, is the one that actually manages all institutions. Usually that body is not even accountable to any democratic action. Worse for you, all power tends to be concentrated in an individual and even the party can be completely inconsequential and used more to rubber-stamp the decrees of the leader. So I stand by my assertion that in practice, Marxist/Socialist societies actually have a very low-entropy "entropy of ownership power distribution". The central government is the defacto owner and manager of all institutions. That's as low entropy as you're going to get. >By contrast, in capitalist society every piece of property, except for government owned, is owned by a set of people smaller than the whole society Sure. But the set of sets of people who own something is itself huge, in theory and in practice, so market-based economies will have a low-entropy 'ownership power distribution' regardless. Even when comparing real market-based societies to your non-existent Utopian socialist societies I'm not sure you can simply assert the latter is more decentralized than the former because in capitalist societies there are more things to own that are in fact owned by more sets of people. Under Marxism, there may be one car manufacturer, and one car model being manufactured. In market-based/capitalist societies, there may be 10 car manufacturers making 10 car models that are then owned by far greater number of people. Each manufacturer can be also be owned by thousands or millions of individuals. Hell, you can take a thermodynamic view if it helps to illustrate the concept. Historically market-based societies have been far better at increasing universal entropy than Marxist ones.

trhway 9y ago

man, you have completely mixed up ownership power with executive/management power. When everybody owns everything that is maximum possible entropy of ownership power distribution, and that results in practically minimum entropy of executive/management power distribution - the heavily centralized planning&control. By contrast, in capitalist society every piece of property, except for government owned, is owned by a set of people smaller than the whole society and their stakes aren't necessarily equal - thus such distribution has lesser entropy that the socialist one of everybody everything. Where is management and control in the capitalist society and economy being less centralized has thus higher entropy distribution than the socialist centralized.

macspoofing 9y ago
>man, you have completely mixed up ownership power with executive/management power. I did not. You have a view of socialism that is not at all grounded in reality. That's where you got confused. >When everybody owns everything that is maximum possible entropy of ownership power distribution But that isn't true in practice at all. In every socialist/marxist society collectively ownership is a meaningless idea. It is more of a theoretical concept rather than a practical one. You have no rights as a collective owner to actually influence and decide on how specific resources are managed by some institution charged with exploiting them. The reality is that some central governing body, which under Marxist regimes is usually the communist party, is the one that actually manages all institutions. Usually that body is not even accountable to any democratic action. Worse for you, all power tends to be concentrated in an individual and even the party can be completely inconsequential and used more to rubber-stamp the decrees of the leader. So I stand by my assertion that in practice, Marxist/Socialist societies actually have a very low-entropy "entropy of ownership power distribution". The central government is the defacto owner and manager of all institutions. That's as low entropy as you're going to get. >By contrast, in capitalist society every piece of property, except for government owned, is owned by a set of people smaller than the whole society Sure. But the set of sets of people who own something is itself huge, in theory and in practice, so market-based economies will have a low-entropy 'ownership power distribution' regardless. Even when comparing real market-based societies to your non-existent Utopian socialist societies I'm not sure you can simply assert the latter is more decentralized than the former because in capitalist societies there are more things to own that are in fact owned by more sets of people. Under Marxism, there may be one car manufacturer, and one car model being manufactured. In market-based/capitalist societies, there may be 10 car manufacturers making 10 car models that are then owned by far greater number of people. Each manufacturer can be also be owned by thousands or millions of individuals. Hell, you can take a thermodynamic view if it helps to illustrate the concept. Historically market-based societies have been far better at increasing universal entropy than Marxist ones.