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This man[1] didn't work much in his life, he mocked Alexander the Great[2] and it's pretty much famous for his views almost 2500 years after his death. It's qu

by atmosx 13y ago

This man[1] didn't work much in his life, he mocked Alexander the Great[2] and it's pretty much famous for his views almost 2500 years after his death. It's quite an accomplishment given the fact that he chose to live as poor man in a very rich society. Aristotle also has stated that More than 3 hours work per day, equals slavery and I'm pretty sure Socrates would have argued that If you don't want to work you should not be working. Of course all these guys lived in the 4th century B.C.. With today's technology, people should not be working for food and rest. Seriously, the fact that there are people in whatever continent homeless and starving is a shame for our evolved society. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes_of_Sinope http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes_of_Sinope [2] When Alexander the Great took over Athens. He wanted to visit the Wisest man in Athens and the tale (mythology I get) says that the oracle of Delphi (Pythia) had state a couple of years before that The wisest man in Athens is Diogenis of Sinore. Funny, given the fact that Plato was around at the time. So when Alexander went finally found Diogenis in his jar - a jar Diogenis used as a bed/home in the agora - said "Ask for anything and I shall grant it you!" and Diogenis supposedly responded with indifference "*Can you move on the left? You're hiding the sun." ... The answer of course has a deeper meaning, Alexander couldn't give him the sun... And the most famous student of Aristotle (Alexander) was quite impressed as he moved on the left.

pdonis 13y ago
Aristotle also has stated that More than 3 hours work per day, equals slavery Yes, and he was perfectly happy to live comfortably by making use of the products of slaves' work. and I'm pretty sure Socrates would have argued that If you don't want to work you should not be working. I'm pretty sure he wouldn't, since he, like Aristotle, was perfectly happy to live comfortably by making use of the products of slaves' work, and as far as I know, he never asked the slaves how they felt about it.
- mitochondrion 13y ago
  If Zeus himself descends from Mount Olympus and says to you, "I am going to reestablish slavery in society. I will select slaves by lottery, and when it's all over most of the population will be held in the bonds of slavery. No one will remember a time before slavery. It will be as though it has always existed. I will never let slavery be abolished again. I give you, and you alone, the choice to be free or enslaved." Which do you choose?
  - pdonis 13y ago
    What does this have to do with anything? I could answer the question as you ask it (of course I would choose to be free), but I don't see how it's relevant to this discussion, because in the real world, slavery is not dictated by Zeus, it is enforced by some humans on other humans.
    - mitochondrion 13y ago
      Let me rephrase: For much of history, civilizations and other groups of people took conquered peoples as slaves to support the conquerors' lifestyles. The slaves served as the cheap energy that today has been supplanted by fossil fuels. Our Western lifestyle is predicated upon these fossil fuels in much the same way that prior societies' lifestyles were based upon slavery. Slavery has undesirable characteristics that we (being dependent on it no longer) are free to scorn the evils of. Fossil fuels also have undesirable characteristics: they're polluting the atmosphere, polluting the water, and releasing boatloads of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Sea levels are rising, coral are dying, and storms are projected to continue increasing in magnitude. Perhaps you've heard the economics saying, "There's no such thing as a free lunch." You and I are so utterly dependent on this source of energy that our brains can't fully comprehend the consequences of choosing the alternative. And there's absolutely nothing we can do to convince anyone else to stop using fossil fuels. If you're anything like me (and other normal humans), you ignore the costs associated with your actions and continue to use fossil fuels for transport, for food, and for electricity to power your electronic gadgets. To change your lifestyle would require severe unpleasantness. *edit for clarity
      - pdonis 13y ago
        Ok, this makes things a lot clearer. > You and I are so utterly dependent on this source of energy that our brains can't fully comprehend the consequences of choosing the alternative. Depends on the alternative. If the alternative is a much lower standard of living, you're right, there's no way you're going to convince a significant number of people to choose that alternative. (You and I are both providing evidence of that just by having this discussion in this forum.) OTOH, if the alternative is using non-fossil-fuel sources of energy to maintain our standard of living, I'm all for that. I think the chief obstacle in the way of that is people's unwillingness to accept that any source of energy will have some undesirable characteristics. "There's no such thing as a free lunch" applies to any way of achieving a standard of living beyond bare subsistence. So the goal can't be to find an energy source that has no undesirable characteristics; the best we can do is to find sources that have less net undesirability, so to speak, than fossil fuels--just as fossil fuels have less net undesirability (by a very large margin, IMO) than slavery. There are at least two such sources that I can think of that have the potential of supporting a first world standard of living: nuclear, and solar done right.
- cafard 13y ago
  Socrates did work for a living, as I recall--I believe he was a mason. He certainly was not destitute.
  - pdonis 13y ago
    From what I can find out from online sources, Socrates was able to "retire" from working as a stonemason at a fairly young age, and to spend basically all his time talking about philosophy. So yes, he certainly was not destitute. I didn't mean to imply that he was, only that, as a member of the Athenian class of "free persons", his existence was supported largely by the labor of many slaves, and I am not aware that he ever questioned whether the slaves were OK with that.

by atmosx 13y ago

pdonis 13y ago

Aristotle also has stated that More than 3 hours work per day, equals slavery Yes, and he was perfectly happy to live comfortably by making use of the products of slaves' work. and I'm pretty sure Socrates would have argued that If you don't want to work you should not be working. I'm pretty sure he wouldn't, since he, like Aristotle, was perfectly happy to live comfortably by making use of the products of slaves' work, and as far as I know, he never asked the slaves how they felt about it.

mitochondrion 13y ago
If Zeus himself descends from Mount Olympus and says to you, "I am going to reestablish slavery in society. I will select slaves by lottery, and when it's all over most of the population will be held in the bonds of slavery. No one will remember a time before slavery. It will be as though it has always existed. I will never let slavery be abolished again. I give you, and you alone, the choice to be free or enslaved." Which do you choose?
- pdonis 13y ago
  What does this have to do with anything? I could answer the question as you ask it (of course I would choose to be free), but I don't see how it's relevant to this discussion, because in the real world, slavery is not dictated by Zeus, it is enforced by some humans on other humans.
  - mitochondrion 13y ago
    Let me rephrase: For much of history, civilizations and other groups of people took conquered peoples as slaves to support the conquerors' lifestyles. The slaves served as the cheap energy that today has been supplanted by fossil fuels. Our Western lifestyle is predicated upon these fossil fuels in much the same way that prior societies' lifestyles were based upon slavery. Slavery has undesirable characteristics that we (being dependent on it no longer) are free to scorn the evils of. Fossil fuels also have undesirable characteristics: they're polluting the atmosphere, polluting the water, and releasing boatloads of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Sea levels are rising, coral are dying, and storms are projected to continue increasing in magnitude. Perhaps you've heard the economics saying, "There's no such thing as a free lunch." You and I are so utterly dependent on this source of energy that our brains can't fully comprehend the consequences of choosing the alternative. And there's absolutely nothing we can do to convince anyone else to stop using fossil fuels. If you're anything like me (and other normal humans), you ignore the costs associated with your actions and continue to use fossil fuels for transport, for food, and for electricity to power your electronic gadgets. To change your lifestyle would require severe unpleasantness. *edit for clarity
    - pdonis 13y ago
      Ok, this makes things a lot clearer. > You and I are so utterly dependent on this source of energy that our brains can't fully comprehend the consequences of choosing the alternative. Depends on the alternative. If the alternative is a much lower standard of living, you're right, there's no way you're going to convince a significant number of people to choose that alternative. (You and I are both providing evidence of that just by having this discussion in this forum.) OTOH, if the alternative is using non-fossil-fuel sources of energy to maintain our standard of living, I'm all for that. I think the chief obstacle in the way of that is people's unwillingness to accept that any source of energy will have some undesirable characteristics. "There's no such thing as a free lunch" applies to any way of achieving a standard of living beyond bare subsistence. So the goal can't be to find an energy source that has no undesirable characteristics; the best we can do is to find sources that have less net undesirability, so to speak, than fossil fuels--just as fossil fuels have less net undesirability (by a very large margin, IMO) than slavery. There are at least two such sources that I can think of that have the potential of supporting a first world standard of living: nuclear, and solar done right.
cafard 13y ago
Socrates did work for a living, as I recall--I believe he was a mason. He certainly was not destitute.
- pdonis 13y ago
  From what I can find out from online sources, Socrates was able to "retire" from working as a stonemason at a fairly young age, and to spend basically all his time talking about philosophy. So yes, he certainly was not destitute. I didn't mean to imply that he was, only that, as a member of the Athenian class of "free persons", his existence was supported largely by the labor of many slaves, and I am not aware that he ever questioned whether the slaves were OK with that.