4 ms·

You are missing what i mean by being a violence based economy. Of course, you can't have property without violence. I'm not even saying that the dark ages wer

by lsc 9y ago

You are missing what i mean by being a violence based economy. Of course, you can't have property without violence. I'm not even saying that the dark ages were more violent than other ages. (I think they might have been, but it's largely irrelevant to the point I'm making about a 'violence based economy') My point is just that in the dark ages, you accumulated wealth through you yourself or through people who directly worked for you committing acts of violence. Not by simply operating within the rules of society (which are, of course, enforced with violence) as you would do today. Today? Directly being a, uh, violence technician as it were, or even being higher up in the chain of command in the organizations that handle violence in our society just isn't that remunerative. You've gotta be way up the officer ladder before you make as much money as I did out of high school as a UNIX technician. I mean, I know I messed up some connotations there; I certainly have nothing against the 'violence technicians' as I put it; I recognize that they are important. I just prefer to live in a world where Truman fires MacArther and not the other way around, if you know what I mean.

jstewartmobile 9y ago
I think your take on the early middle ages has been abstracted through the lenses of modernity, drama, and materialism. There were so many different arrangements, cultures, and value systems in play at that time, and obviously some of those elements came into conflict with each other, but to extrapolate that into a summary of the entire age is a mistake.
- lsc 9y ago
  I suppose it would be... difficult for me to see anything except through the lens of materialism. But I think that's true of most people; the number of people who don't see the world in a fundamentally physicalist way is... shrinking. (This is controversial; the religious in my country have been flexing their muscles, and there is open debate as to if this indicates a resurgence of belief, or just the religious seeing the majority slip from their hands thrashing to turn back the clock while they still have the strength. I personally believe the latter, but I don't have evidence that is any more solid than anyone else.) I do think I would be a better person if I was better able to understand how the religious people saw the world... but it's just not something I've been able to do. It's very difficult, really, for someone who doesn't believe faith is good in and of itself to understand people who do. I read on the subject; the most sympathetic and relatable portrayal I've found so far is Jeung's "Answer to Job" But... while it's fair to criticize me for not really understanding spirituality, If you are arguing that the dark ages were not dark for, uh, metaphysical reasons, I think our values are so different that we can't really have a meaningful debate.
  - jstewartmobile 9y ago
    There is some ambiguity to what the complement of materialism actually is, but I'm fairly sure religion isn't it. I think we can all come up with examples of people who accepted reduced material circumstances in service of a higher goal, and many of those people were not believers in anything other than their own personal value systems. The hazy impression I get of that era is a breakdown of the Roman imperium's refined monoculture into a multitude of unrefined variations. On many levels, I like that. By ceaselessly optimizing, refining, and centralizing without regard to intrinsic human needs, we're really just charging head first into entropy. Think the Italian "slow life" vs NYC...
    - lsc 9y ago
      Materialism is well-defined and means something in philosophy[1] - if you are using it in the sense of "greed" well, that's a different sort of thing entirely. My own experiences and assumptions all point to 'diminishing marginal value' when it comes to all physical goods - I'll do a lot if it means that me and mine don't starve. I'll do a lot less to move up from a Toyota to a Lexus. (don't get me wrong, If I've gotta drive, I'll take the Lexus... but not if it means I have less reading time.) Extrapolating backwards from that, my assumption is that everyone in the pre-modern era; everyone from a time where more people suffered from eating not enough than eating too much would be a lot more concerned with obtaining goods (well, food, shelter and the tools to obtain those things in the future) than I am now. So from that point of view, I'd have a distorted view of the dark ages (and, for that matter, Rome and the whole world before the 'green revolution' in the late '60s) simply because I've never experienced anything like real hunger or want. I mean, sure, I've wanted things, but every time you ask me to do something for money? My question is this: Would I rather do that thing you want me to do for the money you are offering? Or would I prefer to stay at home and read classic works from project gutenberg? For me, a lot of how I've looked at work and the how much time to trade for it has been that view that I really don't have to save that much money to live a pretty comfortable life without working. (Now, I've made some massive mistakes in how to go about doing that, but that's a different discussion. the idea that money in the bank is years I don't have to work to be comfortable is a constant) What I'm saying is that as modern people, I don't think we can comprehend the privation that pre-modern folks had. The amount of time and effort they needed to put in to gain even the most basic and essential of material goods. Also, my guess is that when you are in such a tenuous situation, people are going to work a lot harder than your "New York" example. (I like your example because New York is a place I'm considering moving... in part as a way to de-stress my life. Remove transit issues. Live within walking distance of my life.) [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism

by lsc 9y ago

jstewartmobile 9y ago

I think your take on the early middle ages has been abstracted through the lenses of modernity, drama, and materialism. There were so many different arrangements, cultures, and value systems in play at that time, and obviously some of those elements came into conflict with each other, but to extrapolate that into a summary of the entire age is a mistake.

lsc 9y ago
I suppose it would be... difficult for me to see anything except through the lens of materialism. But I think that's true of most people; the number of people who don't see the world in a fundamentally physicalist way is... shrinking. (This is controversial; the religious in my country have been flexing their muscles, and there is open debate as to if this indicates a resurgence of belief, or just the religious seeing the majority slip from their hands thrashing to turn back the clock while they still have the strength. I personally believe the latter, but I don't have evidence that is any more solid than anyone else.) I do think I would be a better person if I was better able to understand how the religious people saw the world... but it's just not something I've been able to do. It's very difficult, really, for someone who doesn't believe faith is good in and of itself to understand people who do. I read on the subject; the most sympathetic and relatable portrayal I've found so far is Jeung's "Answer to Job" But... while it's fair to criticize me for not really understanding spirituality, If you are arguing that the dark ages were not dark for, uh, metaphysical reasons, I think our values are so different that we can't really have a meaningful debate.
- jstewartmobile 9y ago
  There is some ambiguity to what the complement of materialism actually is, but I'm fairly sure religion isn't it. I think we can all come up with examples of people who accepted reduced material circumstances in service of a higher goal, and many of those people were not believers in anything other than their own personal value systems. The hazy impression I get of that era is a breakdown of the Roman imperium's refined monoculture into a multitude of unrefined variations. On many levels, I like that. By ceaselessly optimizing, refining, and centralizing without regard to intrinsic human needs, we're really just charging head first into entropy. Think the Italian "slow life" vs NYC...
  - lsc 9y ago
    Materialism is well-defined and means something in philosophy[1] - if you are using it in the sense of "greed" well, that's a different sort of thing entirely. My own experiences and assumptions all point to 'diminishing marginal value' when it comes to all physical goods - I'll do a lot if it means that me and mine don't starve. I'll do a lot less to move up from a Toyota to a Lexus. (don't get me wrong, If I've gotta drive, I'll take the Lexus... but not if it means I have less reading time.) Extrapolating backwards from that, my assumption is that everyone in the pre-modern era; everyone from a time where more people suffered from eating not enough than eating too much would be a lot more concerned with obtaining goods (well, food, shelter and the tools to obtain those things in the future) than I am now. So from that point of view, I'd have a distorted view of the dark ages (and, for that matter, Rome and the whole world before the 'green revolution' in the late '60s) simply because I've never experienced anything like real hunger or want. I mean, sure, I've wanted things, but every time you ask me to do something for money? My question is this: Would I rather do that thing you want me to do for the money you are offering? Or would I prefer to stay at home and read classic works from project gutenberg? For me, a lot of how I've looked at work and the how much time to trade for it has been that view that I really don't have to save that much money to live a pretty comfortable life without working. (Now, I've made some massive mistakes in how to go about doing that, but that's a different discussion. the idea that money in the bank is years I don't have to work to be comfortable is a constant) What I'm saying is that as modern people, I don't think we can comprehend the privation that pre-modern folks had. The amount of time and effort they needed to put in to gain even the most basic and essential of material goods. Also, my guess is that when you are in such a tenuous situation, people are going to work a lot harder than your "New York" example. (I like your example because New York is a place I'm considering moving... in part as a way to de-stress my life. Remove transit issues. Live within walking distance of my life.) [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism