LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 (edited) Over the last 6 months or so I've been reading a lot of futurist theory and political theory and moral philosophy and the more I thought about things the more one particular issue started to eat away at me CEO who raised price of old pill more than $700 calls journalist a moron for asking why https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2015/09/21/ceo-of-company-that-raised-the-price-of-old-pill-hundreds-of-dollars-overnight-calls-journalist-a-moron-for-asking-why/ A few months ago I was reading about the Hepatitus C cure(Yes, it's literally a cure) And how it costs about $150,000usd And I started to think about what might happen When we stumble upon radical life-extension therapies Now, I've always been more or less a 'socialist' (At least in the colloquial sense) So all this didn't really change my position much But rather I realized just how high the stakes really were Now, the solution is very simple (theory-wise, not logistics-wise of course): we all 'socialize' the cost of R&D for such pharmaceuticals And then we all share in the fruits For the last few years Uber-right 'libertarianism' (aka 'anarcho-capitalism') Has been a growing phenomenon here in the states Especially among tech-minded, Silicon Valley types Like Peter Theil Who once said "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible" And who openly advocates monopolies (i.e. companies that can charge $700usd/pill) Now, radical life-extension is merely an engineering challenge And as I've said previously As its realization grows closer and closer And the stakes grow higher and higher There will be a reckoning of sorts: People will truly have to decide if they're a dirty socialist Or a freedom-loving sociopath In 20 years Fountainhead Paul will be telling us that it's a testament to our freedom That poor people only live 25% as long as rich people And that the most sacred freedom on earth Is the freedom for corporations to price their products as they choose Regardless of the social impact Anyway, just something I've been thinking about lately Edited September 22, 2015 by LimpyLoo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goDel Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 wait, was that a poem? in what verse? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Author Share Posted September 22, 2015 wait, was that a poem? in what verse? See last three pages of FWP thread for (bizarrely long) discussion of my writing style Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
may be rude Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 (edited) bernie is saying he's a socialist. wondering if that will doom him and give trump the apocalypse wheel. i see your point, hard to disagree with. the republicans have been using socialist as a slur against obama, not sure how bernie plans to win a general election proudly claiming to be a socialist. Edited September 22, 2015 by very honest Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azatoth Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 Anything that is beneficial for the collective should be socialized, everything extra can be done by the market. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goDel Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 wait, was that a poem? in what verse? See last three pages of FWP thread for (bizarrely long) discussion of my writing style Would read if I would have a clue where to find this mystical FWP thread. Favorite Wine Porn? Funny Word Protocols? bwu.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadameChaos Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 Anything that is beneficial for the collective should be socialized, everything extra can be done by the market. agreed, but even this should be carefully regulated to prevent people being ripped off. this is an interesting article about the current state of affairs with the UK utilities market. http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/jul/10/uk-energy-system-in-thrall-to-giant-utilities-customers-budget-renewables as is often the case, the market rips off those who can least afford it. the elderly. renewables are the way forward, especially the local co-operatives idea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eugene Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 everyone just wants to be rich Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Author Share Posted September 22, 2015 everyone just wants to be rich i don't I just want enough to be able to persue my projects studies rather consistently show That beyond helping to avoid the Maslowian unhappiness of poverty wealth doesn't affect happiness Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eugene Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 (edited) your imagination is limited by your lack of resources, you're psychologically inclined to imagine projects that you more or less can afford. your very belonging to a certain class does that. it's kinda similar to when i was choosing new speakers not long ago, i avoided demoing speakers that were more than 1k$ that i could spend on that. Edited September 22, 2015 by eugene Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psn Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 Clean diesel about to blow up like a mofo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Author Share Posted September 22, 2015 your imagination is limited by your lack of resources, you're psychologically inclined to imagine projects that you more or less can afford. your very belonging to a certain class does that. it's kinda similar to when i was choosing new speakers not long ago, i avoided demoing speakers that were more than 1k$ that i could spend on that. if I somehow found myself 'needing' more than a few thousand dollars to do my projects I hope I would realize that I had gone astray somewhere along the way Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Psychotronic Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 http://www.basicincome.org/news/2015/06/finland-basic-income-government-schizophrenia/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hugh Mughnus Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 your imagination is limited by your lack of resources, you're psychologically inclined to imagine projects that you more or less can afford. your very belonging to a certain class does that. it's kinda similar to when i was choosing new speakers not long ago, i avoided demoing speakers that were more than 1k$ that i could spend on that. if I somehow found myself 'needing' more than a few thousand dollars to do my projects I hope I would realize that I had gone astray somewhere along the way I would love to go to space. But I can't afford it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest boo Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 everyone just wants to be rich Everyone.. where? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest boo Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 https://youtu.be/c5nfracXAt4?t=6m58s blegh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Author Share Posted September 22, 2015 https://youtu.be/c5nfracXAt4?t=6m58s blegh That is indeed a knockdown argument.......for state 'socialism' https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FyyvzrMzJFg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LimpyLoo Posted September 22, 2015 Author Share Posted September 22, 2015 Edit: against state socialism, that is But to the extent that the state controls production It's not socialism Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eugene Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 everyone just wants to be richEveryone.. where? everywhere. come on, who doesn't have an aspect of their life that could be improved with more money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caze Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 But to the extent that the state controls production It's not socialism that's not correct. one true Scotsman alert. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chenGOD Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 "Socialism" is such a vacuous term. It's been abused by all sides as to become essentially meaningless. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psn Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 The planet should be afraid: http://www.theguardian.com/business/commentisfree/2015/sep/22/the-guardian-view-on-the-vw-crisis-the-planet-should-be-afraid Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caze Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 (edited) State control of prices/production (when there is a scarcity of resources/energy at any rate) is provably wrong. No matter how complicated a computer model we could possibly come up with, it'll simply never work. Mixed socialist models, like modern social democracy, don't suffer from this problem. But that's not their only problem. Libertarian socialist models are as ludicrous as extreme/naive individualist Libertarian models, the former is an oxymoron, the latter is impossible to protect from balkanised fascism. The main problem with socialism in general is that it tends to increase overall inefficiency and corruption, even if the motives are in the right place, it fails to take account of innate human shittiness, and so the assholes tend to rise to the top of everything and bugger everything up for the rest of us. Our current global system isn't much better than this though, of course it's not a free market system either (and free doesn't mean 'no regulation' btw, it just means 'free from bad regulation'), so maybe we should have a proper go at that any see if it does any better. That doesn't mean we have to throw out all socialist concepts (welfare systems, progressive taxation, free education, etc.), but they need to be empirically validated. Edited September 22, 2015 by caze Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caze Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 Actually, that douchey pharma CEO is a great example of bad-regulation, it's not a good example of the evils of free market capitalism. He can only get away with that shit because it's too costly for anyone else to enter the market for that pill - despite the fact that the patent has expired. This isn't a problem in the EU, where a generic version of the drug could be fast tracked for little up-front investment, and the price would come down to a reasonable level pretty quickly. But the US has onerous FDA regulation, even for new generic versions of already approved drugs, and so it's just not economical for anyone else to enter the market. This would be true for all R&D if it weren't for the patent system, which protects the profits for a certain time allowing them to pay off the massive R&D investments they put in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chenGOD Posted September 22, 2015 Share Posted September 22, 2015 State control of prices/production (when there is a scarcity of resources/energy at any rate) is provably wrong. No matter how complicated a computer model we could possibly come up with, it'll simply never work. Japanese and South Korean growth in the 1960s through 1980s would beg to differ. Both of these nations utilized significant state intervention in their economic growth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now