5 ms·

> It's mostly about making money Those things go hand in hand. Ideally, you can't make money without improving human life in exchange. Sure, any political syst

by cwp 14y ago

> It's mostly about making money Those things go hand in hand. Ideally, you can't make money without improving human life in exchange. Sure, any political system will include a bit of corruption and rent-seeking, but by-and-large, it's exactly the profit motive that has improved the human condition. > billions_ of people continue to do that So it's all pointless? Because we haven't achieved a paradise of endless bliss where no one suffers, we shouldn't bother to try to make things better? As a society we are pursuing both faster smartphones and eradication of diseases. It's really hard to predict which technologies will be the most fruitful. The cell phone, despite being invented to solve first-world problems, has had a huge impact on the third world. It's probably done more to improve the quality of human life than any charitable program ever! [edit] > the idea that production, sales, whatever must continuously expand. Production must expand as long as population continues to expand. The projection is that population will peak around mid-century and begin to come down again. At that point, production might well level off or begin to decline as well.

31reasons 14y ago
What we are missing as a society is Long Term Thinking. Yes businesses do provide value and reduce human suffering as long as its perceived to reduce human suffering from the customer's point of view. For example, cigarettes. It does provide some value but only for the short term without thinking about the long term. If society makes it legal to sell Meth to the public I am sure big pharma will jump on the opportunities to provide you the highest quality.
- dmix 14y ago
  Big pharma is already makes billions of dollars off of amphetamines. It's used responsibly my millions of people. It hasn't stopped people from abusing them even though they are illegal without a prescription. I'm not sure that's the pharma companies responsible if individuals choose to abuse something that has legitimate uses and strong demand. If the government can't stop it, does that mean the pharma companies have a moral obligation to not sell it? This is an important question with drugs, tobacco, guns, finance and lots of other industries. Individual responsibility vs societal control.
  - 31reasons 14y ago
    Individual should be assumed flawed, shortsighted and selfish. As long as the individual makes decisions for herself its all ok, it is considered freedom. The problem is big companies act like the individuals even though their effects are far reaching.
    - dmix 14y ago
      But companies are just made up of individuals. Individuals make the decisions. Therfore they should be held under the same scrutiny. The difference is individuals have tons of direct consequences for their actions, but individuals inside (big) corporations who make bad decisions are masked and protected thanks to the legal system (corporate personhood), government policy and influence of money on both of those. Acting maliciously results in bulk monetary settlements and rarely result in the individuals getting burned. Just look through the yearly pharma settlements, they pay a small percentage of their revenue and things continue on business as usual with zero market effects: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_pharmaceutical_settlements http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_pharmaceutical_...
pretoriusB 14y ago
>Those things go hand in hand. Ideally, you can't make money without improving human life in exchange. That's ideology. Specifically, an Adam Smith style ideology. You can very well make money without improving human life in exchange. Heck, you make tons of money without improving human life. Like being an arms dealer. Or an African warlord. Or a crack dealer. Or a huge money seeking corporation selling sugar water. Or the very same way Belgium made tons of money for a small elite by royally fucking over tens of millions of people in Africa. The reverse is also true: "you can improve the human life without making any money". The same way Ghandi or MLK improved human life without selling anything or being involved in any commercial enterprise.
- nazgulnarsil 14y ago
  You are not the arbiter of other people's values. People drink coke because they enjoy it. Keep your moral outrage reasonable please.
  - TeMPOraL 14y ago
    > Or a huge money seeking corporation selling sugar water. If you remove the word 'sugar' from this sentence, it will still be true and also the problem of value arbitrage will be mostly gone. Bottled water is a worldwide scam.
    - nwienert 14y ago
      Last time I bought bottled water I'm pretty sure I got water inside of a bottle, and that was exactly what I wanted. It's convenience, and that absolutely is beneficial.
- cwp 14y ago
  Well, our best understanding of what generates wealth is that it comes from trade. Trade involves two parties exchanging resources for their mutual benefit. Adam Smith was one of the first to write about this, and yes, he thought that trade and wealth for all was a good thing. > You can very well make money without improving human life in exchange Notice that I said "ideally," and that all the counter-examples you give are illegal. As I said before, a certain amount of corruption (and evil-doing) is inevitable. (The Belgians wouldn't be able to get away with that today. In fact, that's more evidence that we're in a golden age—that kind of behaviour isn't acceptable even from sovereign nations.) I'm not trying to argue the Greed-is-good-Gordon-Gecko philosophy of screwing over everyone in order to enrich yourself. By all means, help your fellow man. But don't be so down on commerce. There's a big, important difference between piracy and trade, though both are driven by the desire to improve one's own lot. Trade is beneficial to both parties, and it's the reason that billions of people live a life of luxury that was unimaginable 10,000 years ago.

by cwp 14y ago

31reasons 14y ago

What we are missing as a society is Long Term Thinking. Yes businesses do provide value and reduce human suffering as long as its perceived to reduce human suffering from the customer's point of view. For example, cigarettes. It does provide some value but only for the short term without thinking about the long term. If society makes it legal to sell Meth to the public I am sure big pharma will jump on the opportunities to provide you the highest quality.

dmix 14y ago
Big pharma is already makes billions of dollars off of amphetamines. It's used responsibly my millions of people. It hasn't stopped people from abusing them even though they are illegal without a prescription. I'm not sure that's the pharma companies responsible if individuals choose to abuse something that has legitimate uses and strong demand. If the government can't stop it, does that mean the pharma companies have a moral obligation to not sell it? This is an important question with drugs, tobacco, guns, finance and lots of other industries. Individual responsibility vs societal control.
- 31reasons 14y ago
  Individual should be assumed flawed, shortsighted and selfish. As long as the individual makes decisions for herself its all ok, it is considered freedom. The problem is big companies act like the individuals even though their effects are far reaching.
  - dmix 14y ago
    But companies are just made up of individuals. Individuals make the decisions. Therfore they should be held under the same scrutiny. The difference is individuals have tons of direct consequences for their actions, but individuals inside (big) corporations who make bad decisions are masked and protected thanks to the legal system (corporate personhood), government policy and influence of money on both of those. Acting maliciously results in bulk monetary settlements and rarely result in the individuals getting burned. Just look through the yearly pharma settlements, they pay a small percentage of their revenue and things continue on business as usual with zero market effects: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_pharmaceutical_settlements http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_pharmaceutical_...

pretoriusB 14y ago

>Those things go hand in hand. Ideally, you can't make money without improving human life in exchange. That's ideology. Specifically, an Adam Smith style ideology. You can very well make money without improving human life in exchange. Heck, you make tons of money without improving human life. Like being an arms dealer. Or an African warlord. Or a crack dealer. Or a huge money seeking corporation selling sugar water. Or the very same way Belgium made tons of money for a small elite by royally fucking over tens of millions of people in Africa. The reverse is also true: "you can improve the human life without making any money". The same way Ghandi or MLK improved human life without selling anything or being involved in any commercial enterprise.

nazgulnarsil 14y ago
You are not the arbiter of other people's values. People drink coke because they enjoy it. Keep your moral outrage reasonable please.
- TeMPOraL 14y ago
  > Or a huge money seeking corporation selling sugar water. If you remove the word 'sugar' from this sentence, it will still be true and also the problem of value arbitrage will be mostly gone. Bottled water is a worldwide scam.
  - nwienert 14y ago
    Last time I bought bottled water I'm pretty sure I got water inside of a bottle, and that was exactly what I wanted. It's convenience, and that absolutely is beneficial.
cwp 14y ago
Well, our best understanding of what generates wealth is that it comes from trade. Trade involves two parties exchanging resources for their mutual benefit. Adam Smith was one of the first to write about this, and yes, he thought that trade and wealth for all was a good thing. > You can very well make money without improving human life in exchange Notice that I said "ideally," and that all the counter-examples you give are illegal. As I said before, a certain amount of corruption (and evil-doing) is inevitable. (The Belgians wouldn't be able to get away with that today. In fact, that's more evidence that we're in a golden age—that kind of behaviour isn't acceptable even from sovereign nations.) I'm not trying to argue the Greed-is-good-Gordon-Gecko philosophy of screwing over everyone in order to enrich yourself. By all means, help your fellow man. But don't be so down on commerce. There's a big, important difference between piracy and trade, though both are driven by the desire to improve one's own lot. Trade is beneficial to both parties, and it's the reason that billions of people live a life of luxury that was unimaginable 10,000 years ago.