6 ms·

Humans are great at long term thinking, however capitalism is not

by orf 5y ago

onlyrealcuzzo 5y ago
There's a lot of evidence monarchy, dictatorship, socialism , mercantilism, and fuedalism also aren't great at long-term thinking. What's your solution? Be China during it's golden age of credit expansion? Why not be the US during it's golden age of credit expansion? I don't think there's a governing/economic silver-bullet.
- RedXIII 5y ago
  The solution is to shift away from a system that hijacks our species' selfishness in the name of domination over nature to one where we live in harmony with the environment. Only one of the forms of government you mentioned has threatened human extinction.
  - Tempest1981 5y ago
    Can someone explain why orf and RedXIII are being heavily downvoted without explanations? Aren't their claims generally (or often) true... sure, not 100%. Please explain why you are downvoting to enhance the discussion.
    - objectivetruth 5y ago
      The HN "mob consensus" is that anything even vaguely hinting at socialism or communism is ungood, and anything explicitly condemning capitalism is doubleplus ungood. It's totally safe to ignore the people who respond to this with "there is no 'what HN thinks about X', HN is just a bunch of different people..."
    - loopz 5y ago
      They like many of us now, dare speak up against the official dogma of the day. However, most will argue capitalism has proven to be the most efficient way to allocate resources correctly. So it's quite unclear how to ie. incorporate externalized costs into the system, without breaking it. Accountants make for terrible leadership.
  - seryoiupfurds 5y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea
    - orf 5y ago
      Yes. This is a thing that exists. I’m not sure why it’s relevant to parents comment though.
ericmay 5y ago
Looking around it seems to me these are failures of government and government policy (i.e. failures of the people - I can't even convince people to stop buying plastic bottles of water) . Capitalism and businesses operate within the context of the environment they're in. China has lots of environmental problems and they have an autocracy. Maybe the less capitalistic you country is the less environmentally friendly your country is instead. One has to think that to the extent that resources aren't subjected to the tragedy of the commons, capitalists tend to be concerned with not killing the golden goose. Look around and ask yourself which countries are at least on paper most concerned with the environment and then ask yourself what kind of economies they have. Look at Europe: Norway, Switzerland, Sweden, United Kingdom, France, Denmark, Belgium, etc... -> all highly concerned with the environment and all highly capitalist countries.
- RedXIII 5y ago
  "Maybe doing all this cocaine is actually good for me," he said, blood dripping from his crusted nose. "Maybe it's everyone else who has a problem."
darkerside 5y ago
Many individuals are pretty good at it. Many more are bad at it. Groups typically end up taking action based on the lowest common denominator. This is irrespective of ideology.
- orf 5y ago
  Irrespective of a ideology focused around consumerism, overconsumption and short-term gain by huge corporations who pay no cost for the future damage they are causing? There isn’t any biological or otherwise necessary reason why Coke and Pepsi need to exist, and yet we are generating a huge amount of greenhouse gasses to produce it whilst choking the environment with their plastic refuse after it is consumed. I think it’s disingenuous at best to say “well capitalism has nothing to do with the current state of the captialist-run world”
  - darkerside 5y ago
    An authoritarian communist regime has proven to be just as focused on the short term, even more narrowly scoped to a small group of oligarchs, and without name of the positive byproducts of a capitalist society. Is there an alternative system that you have in mind? Because that's really the way to demonstrate this is a property of capitalism in particular, and not humans in general.
  - exporectomy 5y ago
    Coke and Pepsi give pleasure to people. In a way, that's the most important reason for anything to exist. Do you want a world without any pleasures that have any environmental costs? What would it look like? What else wouldn't exist and what would you keep despite the environmental cost?
missedthecue 5y ago
If capitalism is geared for short term next quarter thinking like everyone says, why do companies like Plug Power, with their negative revenue have $17 billion valuations?

Humans are great at long term thinking, however capitalism is not

by orf 5y ago

Humans are great at long term thinking, however capitalism is not

There's a lot of evidence monarchy, dictatorship, socialism , mercantilism, and fuedalism also aren't great at long-term thinking. What's your solution? Be China during it's golden age of credit expansion? Why not be the US during it's golden age of credit expansion? I don't think there's a governing/economic silver-bullet.

RedXIII 5y ago
The solution is to shift away from a system that hijacks our species' selfishness in the name of domination over nature to one where we live in harmony with the environment. Only one of the forms of government you mentioned has threatened human extinction.
- Tempest1981 5y ago
  Can someone explain why orf and RedXIII are being heavily downvoted without explanations? Aren't their claims generally (or often) true... sure, not 100%. Please explain why you are downvoting to enhance the discussion.
  - objectivetruth 5y ago
    The HN "mob consensus" is that anything even vaguely hinting at socialism or communism is ungood, and anything explicitly condemning capitalism is doubleplus ungood. It's totally safe to ignore the people who respond to this with "there is no 'what HN thinks about X', HN is just a bunch of different people..."
  - loopz 5y ago
    They like many of us now, dare speak up against the official dogma of the day. However, most will argue capitalism has proven to be the most efficient way to allocate resources correctly. So it's quite unclear how to ie. incorporate externalized costs into the system, without breaking it. Accountants make for terrible leadership.
- seryoiupfurds 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea
  - orf 5y ago
    Yes. This is a thing that exists. I’m not sure why it’s relevant to parents comment though.

ericmay 5y ago

Looking around it seems to me these are failures of government and government policy (i.e. failures of the people - I can't even convince people to stop buying plastic bottles of water) . Capitalism and businesses operate within the context of the environment they're in. China has lots of environmental problems and they have an autocracy. Maybe the less capitalistic you country is the less environmentally friendly your country is instead. One has to think that to the extent that resources aren't subjected to the tragedy of the commons, capitalists tend to be concerned with not killing the golden goose. Look around and ask yourself which countries are at least on paper most concerned with the environment and then ask yourself what kind of economies they have. Look at Europe: Norway, Switzerland, Sweden, United Kingdom, France, Denmark, Belgium, etc... -> all highly concerned with the environment and all highly capitalist countries.

RedXIII 5y ago
"Maybe doing all this cocaine is actually good for me," he said, blood dripping from his crusted nose. "Maybe it's everyone else who has a problem."

darkerside 5y ago

Many individuals are pretty good at it. Many more are bad at it. Groups typically end up taking action based on the lowest common denominator. This is irrespective of ideology.

orf 5y ago
Irrespective of a ideology focused around consumerism, overconsumption and short-term gain by huge corporations who pay no cost for the future damage they are causing? There isn’t any biological or otherwise necessary reason why Coke and Pepsi need to exist, and yet we are generating a huge amount of greenhouse gasses to produce it whilst choking the environment with their plastic refuse after it is consumed. I think it’s disingenuous at best to say “well capitalism has nothing to do with the current state of the captialist-run world”
- darkerside 5y ago
  An authoritarian communist regime has proven to be just as focused on the short term, even more narrowly scoped to a small group of oligarchs, and without name of the positive byproducts of a capitalist society. Is there an alternative system that you have in mind? Because that's really the way to demonstrate this is a property of capitalism in particular, and not humans in general.
- exporectomy 5y ago
  Coke and Pepsi give pleasure to people. In a way, that's the most important reason for anything to exist. Do you want a world without any pleasures that have any environmental costs? What would it look like? What else wouldn't exist and what would you keep despite the environmental cost?

missedthecue 5y ago

If capitalism is geared for short term next quarter thinking like everyone says, why do companies like Plug Power, with their negative revenue have $17 billion valuations?