Re: TURMEL: Einstein on monopoly capitalism

From: Duncan Patton a Campbell is Dhu (campbell_at_babayaga.neotext.ca)
Date: 08/16/04 

Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 07:41:54 GMT

You're getting carried away with tricky words, there.

At the risk of upsetting Pauline Christianity, I got a
story t' tell you 'bout why the Scotch eat Haggis.

The stuff tastes like ***. More precisely, sheep ***,
oatmeal and muttonfat. That's 'cause there really is
*** in it. And it's to remind us of how stone-sucking
poor we really were once upon a time.

And we all know damn well not money nor the love it
is the root of evil. There's nothin' wrong with
loving money so long as you love people more.

Man does not live by bread alone, but by *every* word
of God. So don't be tellin' me that the love of anything
is evil, except by makin' it stand alone.

Dhu

In article <cfp10o$b66$1@freenet9.carleton.ca>,
        bc726@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (John Turmel) writes:
>
> JCT: I've often said that my "Miracle Equation" (I/(P+I)
> which predicts how many people will fail so the others can
> pay their interest to survive the death-gamble was more
> important than Einstein's equation which predicts how much
> energy can be obtained from mass. What's more important to
> the state of the Earth, the algebraic equation linking
> energy and mass or the right algebraic equation linking
> Unemployment and Inflation with Interest rates? That's
> becaue I think the solution to Unemployment and Inflation is
> far more important to the survival of the planet than the
> solution to how much energy you get out of matter.
>
>>Article #1089506 (1090730 is last):
>>From: dogna <dgordon@ak.net>
>>Newsgroups: alt.freemasonry,alt.conspiracy,
>>alt.politics.religion,alt.politics.economics,
>>alt.security.terrorism,alt.military,alt.society.sustainable
>>Subject: einstein on capitalism
>>Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 01:10:09 -0800
>
> The solution is sitting right in front of us...waiting.
>
> The problem is the love of money, the root being evil, foul,
> and corrupted from the start. Solve for problem. Learn to
> share. How? Talk about solutions instead of problems.
>
> JCT: Interest makes us love money. Interest is the root of
> the evil. Abolishing interest by using a service charge
> solves for the problem and permits sharing. Sharing can't be
> optimal in a death-gamble where "looking out for number one"
> is the optimal strategy.
>
> Change the monied collective perpsective by selling freedom
> to consume in-common free goods/services for free for all.
> Simpler still, why not simply sell freedom FROM the power of
> money? How?
>
> JCT: Yes, how? how?
>
> By talking about simple solutions to complex problems.
>
> JCT: Sure, most people have said that poker chips and barter
> aren't complex enough to be a solution to the complex
> economic problems we face. They don't have to be.
>
> Simple solutions I've found, ALWAYS solve complex problems.
> Love of money is the root for all evil manifested by greed
> for the love of money... crafted religiously, as a culture
> and way of life for many. The entire system/matrix/monied-
> CONstruct/process is corrupted to ITs core and needs
> wholesale change from the bottom up WHILE retaining the
> construct'ion of the matrix.
>
> JCT: Actually, the LETSers are solving the problem from the
> bottom up but that can't be as helpful as getting to
> everyone in the world overnight by solving it from the top
> down. That's The Engineer's goal even if I have to get
> elected Prime Minister of the planet to do it.
>
> The matrix is a computer-based, digital-machine come to life
> preying on ITs creator, US. There is no denial...we are each
> guilty, some more than others, of feeding the digital beast.
>
> JCT: Bull. The slaves aren't guilty of anything other than
> succumbing to the feeling of helplessness though the
> situation is not hopeless.
>
> However, through awareness and re/de-programming, create a
> logistical-based economy where government becomes a
> goods/services clearinghouse database designed to
> efficiently move, fill, and create desire, all for free, in
> service to the consumer needs of the consumers.
>
> JCT: Okay, that sounds right.
>
> Simpler put, pull the plug on the machine. Stop consuming
> monied lies, learn to share.
>
> JCT: Good talk. No action. To learn to share fairly, you
> need an accounting mechanism, you need a system to permit
> you to trade your employment locally, or globally. A Local
> or Global Employment-Trading System.
>
> Bankrupt the matrix.
> Sell the benefits of sharing the matrix for free.
> Learn how to share talents freely and build a better world.
> Prosper and grow...all at the same time.
> or
> Flood the free market with free money for all. Consume to
> ones heart content. If a desired good/service cannot be
> acquired, fill the desire by creating an outlet for what is
> desired. Build your dream for free with unlimited cash.
>
> http://www.abolishmoney.com
>
> JCT: We need an accounting mechanism to abolishing money is
> wrong when abolishing the interest on the money is all it
> takes to fix it.
>
> http://www.ubarter.com
>
> JCT: Okay, now this guys' on the right track.
>
> http://www.reformation.org/moneychangers.html
> http://www.reinventingmoney.com
> http://www.dorewilliamson.com/plan.html
> ===
>
> Why Socialism?
> by Albert Einstein
> http://www.monthlyreview.org/598einst.htm
>
> This essay was originally published in the first issue of
> Monthly Review (May1949).
>
> AE: Is it advisable for one who is not an expert on economic
> and social issues to express views on the subject of
> socialism? I believe for a number of reasons that it is.
>
> JCT: And even moreso when you consider that studying
> economics is just getting brain-washed even more about how
> it doesn't work. Nothing helps them get it wrong more than
> studying Economics so of course, the thoughts of non
> economists has to home in on the truth more than the
> thoughts of those who have been professionally misled.
>
> AE: Let us first consider the question from the point of
> view of scientific knowledge. It might appear that there are
> no essential methodological differences between astronomy
> and economics: scientists in both fields attempt to discover
> laws of general acceptability for a circumscribed group of
> phenomena in order to make the interconnection of these
> phenomena as clearly understandable as possible. But in
> reality such methodological differences do exist.
>
> The discovery of general laws in the field of economics is
> made difficult by the circumstance that observed economic
> phenomena are often affected by many factors which are very
> hard to evaluate separately. In addition, the experience
> which has accumulated since the beginning of the so-called
> civilized period of human history has, as is well known,
> been largely influenced and limited by causes which are by
> no means exclusively economic in nature.
>
> JCT: He missed the fact that astronomers use a stable
> measuring stick, light years, while economists use a
> variable measuring stick, dollars. Rubber rulers.
>
> AE: For example, most of the major states of history owed
> their existence to conquest.
>
> JCT: What Albert missed was that they owed their existence
> to conquest FOR GOLD. How many, other than those of us who
> read David Astle's Babylonian Woe, know that the great
> conqueror, Alexander the Great, was made to wait in the
> lobby of his financier, before getting the loan that
> permitted him to conquer the world? Har har har har. Who was
> the real ruler of the world, Alex the borrower, or his
> loanshark creditor?
>
> AE: The conquering peoples established themselves, legally
> and economically, as the privileged class of the conquered
> country. They seized for themselves a monopoly of the land
> ownership and appointed a priesthood from among their own
> ranks. The priests, in control of education, made the class
> division of society into a permanent institution and created
> a system of values by which the people were thenceforth, to
> a large extent unconsciously, guided in their social
> behavior.
>
> But historic tradition is, so to speak, of yesterday;
> nowhere have we really overcome what Thorstein Veblen called
> "the predatory phase" of human development.
>
> JCT: So they call being forced to "kill or be killed" in the
> musical chairs death-gamble with money being "predatory."
> Men are predatory, not because it's a fight to death where
> someone must die, but just that they like fighting to the
> death. Not.
>
> AE: The observable economic facts belong to that phase
>
> JCT: Sure it looks like men slaughter themselves because
> it's natural thing to do but I say it's the root economic
> fight that is at the cause. After all, add an extra chair to
> the game so everyone can survive and the predatory instinct
> is eliminated. Of course, as John Von Neumann said
> "important economic question arise in a more elementary
> fashion in the theory of gamesk," and if you don't
> understand how the mort-gage death-gamble works, then you
> can't understand how foreclosure causes Shift B inflation
> and all the financial woes that have plagued humankind since
> interest was first invented.
>
> AE: and even such laws as we can derive from them are not
> applicable to other phases. Since the real purpose of
> socialism is precisely to overcome and advance beyond the
> predatory phase of human development, economic science in
> its present state can throw little light on the socialist
> society of the future.
>
> JCT: And considering it's designed to mislead it's students,
> whatever weight it does throw is designed to throw us off
> the solution.
>
> AE: Second, socialism is directed towards a social-ethical
> end. Science, however, cannot create ends and, even less,
> instill them in human beings; science, at most, can supply
> the means by which to attain certain ends. But the ends
> themselves are conceived by personalities with lofty ethical
> ideals and, if these ends are not stillborn, but vital and
> vigorous are adopted and carried forward by those many human
> beings who, half unconsciously, determine the slow evolution
> of society.
>
> For these reasons, we should be on our guard not to
> overestimate science and scientific methods when it is a
> question of human problems; and we should not assume that
> experts are the only ones who have a right to express
> themselves on questions affecting the organization of
> society.
>
> Innumerable voices have been asserting for some time now
> that human society is passing through a crisis, that its
> stability has been gravely shattered. It is characteristic
> of such a situation that individuals feel indifferent or
> even hostile toward the group, small or large, to which they
> belong. In order to illustrate my meaning, let me record
> here a personal experience. I recently discussed with an
> intelligent and well-disposed man the threat of another war,
> which in my opinion would seriously endanger the existence
> of mankind, and I remarked that only a supra-national
> organization would offer protection from that danger.
> Thereupon my visitor, very calmly and coolly, said to me:
> "Why are you so deeply opposed to the disappearance of the
> human race?"
>
> I am sure that as little as a century ago no one would have
> so lightly made a statement of this kind. It is the
> statement of a man who has striven in vain to attain an
> equilibrium within himself and has more or less lost hope of
> succeeding. It is the expression of a painful solitude and
> isolation from which so many people are suffering in these
> days. What is the cause? Is there a way out?
>
> JCT: If you don't know the cause of the bad vibrations, how
> can you find a way out?
>
> AE: It is easy to raise such questions, but difficult to
> answer them with any degree of assurance. I must try,
> however, as best I can, although I am very conscious of the
> fact that our feelings and strivings are often contradictory
> and obscure and that they cannot be expressed in easy and
> simple formulas.
>
> JCT: Actually, Problem = I/(P+I) isn't such a hard formula.
>
> AE: Man is, at one and the same time, a solitary being and a
> social being. As a solitary being, he attempts to protect
> his own existence and that of those who are closest to him,
> to satisfy his personal desires, and to develop his innate
> abilities. As a social being, he seeks to gain the
> recognition and affection of his fellow human beings, to
> share in their pleasures, to comfort them in their sorrows,
> and to improve their conditions of life. Only the existence
> of these varied, frequently conflicting, strivings accounts
> for the special character of a man, and their specific
> combination determines the extent to which an individual can
> achieve an inner equilibrium and can contribute to the well-
> being of society. It is quite possible that the relative
> strength of these two drives is, in the main, fixed by
> inheritance. But the personality that finally emerges is
> largely formed by the environment in which a man happens to
> find himself during his development, by the structure of the
> society in which he grows up, by the tradition of that
> society, and by its appraisal of particular types of
> behavior. The abstract concept "society" means to the
> individual human being the sum total of his direct and
> indirect relations to his contemporaries and to all the
> people of earlier generations. The individual is able to
> think, feel, strive, and work by himself; but he depends so
> much upon society in his physical, intellectual, and
> emotional existence that it is impossible to think of him,
> or to understand him, outside the framework of society. It
> is "society" which provides man with food, clothing, a home,
> the tools of work, language, the forms of thought, and most
> of the content of thought; his life is made possible through
> the labor and the accomplishments of the many millions past
> and present who are all hidden behind the small word
> "society."
>
> It is evident, therefore, that the dependence of the
> individual upon society is a fact of nature which cannot be
> abolished; just as in the case of ants and bees. However,
> while the whole life process of ants and bees is fixed down
> to the smallest detail by rigid, hereditary instincts, the
> social pattern and interrelationships of human beings are
> very variable and susceptible to change. Memory, the
> capacity to make new combinations, the gift of oral
> communication have made possible developments among human
> being which are not dictated by biological necessities. Such
> developments manifest themselves in traditions,
> institutions, and organizations; in literature; in
> scientific and engineering accomplishments; in works of art.
> This explains how it happens that, in a certain sense, man
> can influence his life through his own conduct, and that in
> this process conscious thinking and wanting can play a part.
>
> Man acquires at birth, through heredity, a biological
> constitution which we must consider fixed and unalterable,
> including the natural urges which are characteristic of the
> human species. In addition, during his lifetime, he acquires
> a cultural constitution which he adopts from society through
> communication and through many other types of influences. It
> is this cultural constitution which, with the passage of
> time, is subject to change and which determines to a very
> large extent the relationship between the individual and
> society. Modern anthropology has taught us, through
> comparative investigation of so-called primitive cultures,
> that the social behavior of human beings may differ greatly,
> depending upon prevailing cultural patterns and the types of
> organization which predominate in society. It is on this
> that those who are striving to improve the lot of man may
> ground their hopes: human beings are not condemned, because
> of their biological constitution, to annihilate each other
> or to be at the mercy of a cruel, self-inflicted fate.
>
> If we ask ourselves how the structure of society and the
> cultural attitude of man should be changed in order to make
> human life as satisfying as possible, we should constantly
> be conscious of the fact that there are certain conditions
> which we are unable to modify. As mentioned before, the
> biological nature of man is, for all practical purposes, not
> subject to change. Furthermore, technological and
> demographic developments of the last few centuries have
> created conditions which are here to stay. In relatively
> densely settled populations with the goods which are
> indispensable to their continued existence, an extreme
> division of labor and a highly-centralized productive
> apparatus are absolutely necessary. The time which, looking
> back, seems so idyllic, is gone forever when individuals or
> relatively small groups could be completely self-sufficient.
> It is only a slight exaggeration to say that mankind
> constitutes even now a planetary community of production and
> consumption.
>
> JCT: Which is why the global version of LETS is the only
> model to handle the problem.
>
> I have now reached the point where I may indicate briefly what to me
> constitutes the essence of the crisis of our time. It concerns the
> relationship of the individual to society. The individual has become
> more conscious than ever of his dependence upon society. But he does not
> experience this dependence as a positive asset, as an organic tie, as a
> protective force, but rather a a threat to his natural rights, or even
> to his economic existence. Moreover, his position in society is such
> that the egotistical drives of his make-up are constantly being
> accentuated, while his social drives, which are by nature weaker,
> progressively deteriorate. All human beings, whatever their position in
> society, are suffering from this process of deterioration. Unknowingly
> prisoners of their own egotism, they feel insecure, lonely, and deprived
> of the naive, simple, and unsophisticated enjoyment of life. Man can
> find meaning in life, short and perilous as it is, only through devoting
> himself to society.
>
> The economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my
> opinion, the real source of the evil.
>
> JCT: And interest creates the economic anarchy putting
> everyone at each others' throats. Musical chairs with money
> creates that economic anarchy.
>
> AE: We see before us a huge community of producers the
> members of which are unceasingly striving to deprive each
> other of the fruits of their collective labor; not by force,
> but on the whole in faithful compliance with legally
> established rules.
>
> JCT: Striving to get the other guy's tokens to one may pay
> one's own interest payments.
>
> AE: In this respect, it is important to realize that the
> means of production; that is to say, the entire productive
> capacity that is needed for producing consumer goods as well
> as additional capital goods may legally be, and for the most
> part are, the private property of individuals.
>
> For the sake of simplicity, in the discussion that follows I
> shall call "workers" all those who do not share in the
> ownership of the means of production, although this does not
> quite correspond to the customary use of the term. The owner
> of the means of production is in a position to purchase the
> labor power of the worker. By using the means of production,
> the worker produces new goods which become the property of
> the capitalist. The essential point about this process is
> the relation between what the worker produces and what he is
> paid, both measured in terms of real value. Insofar as the
> labor contract is "free," what the worker receives is
> determined not by the real value of the goods he produces,
> but by his minimum needs and by the capitalists'
> requirements for labor power in relation to the number of
> workers competing for jobs. It is important to understand
> that even in theory the payment of the worker is not
> determined by the value of his product.
>
> Private capital tends to become concentrated in few hands,
> partly because of competition among the capitalists, and
> partly because technological development and the increasing
> division of labor encourage the formation of larger units of
> production at the expense of smaller ones.
>
> JCT: Concentration due to partly.., partly.., partly.., but
> mostly due to interest which takes from those who don't have
> enough to give to those who already have too much.
>
> AE: The result of these developments is an oligarchy of
> private capital the enormous power of which cannot be
> effectively checked even by a democratically organized
> political society.
>
> JCT: It can.
>
> AE: This is true since the members of legislative bodies are
> selected by political parties, largely financed or otherwise
> influenced by private capitalists who, for all practical
> purposes, separate the electorate from the legislature.
>
> JCT: Sure the game is fixed and our representatives are
> really working for our oppressors but it doesn't mean we
> can't win our freedom.
>
> AE: The consequence is that the representatives of the
> people do not in fact sufficiently protect the interests of
> the underprivileged sections of the population. Moreover,
> under existing conditions, private capitalists inevitably
> control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of
> information (press, radio, education). It is thus extremely
> difficult, and indeed in most cases quite impossible, for
> the individual citizen to come to objective conclusions and
> to make intelligent use of his political rights.
>
> The situation prevailing in an economy based on the private
> ownership of capital is thus characterized by two main
> principles: first, means of production (capital) are
> privately owned and the owners dispose of them as they see
> fit; second, the labor contract is free. Of course, there is
> no such thing as a pure capitalist society in this sense. In
> particular, it should be noted that the workers, through
> long and bitter political struggles, have succeeded in
> securing a somewhat improved form of the "free labor
> contract" for certain categories of workers. But taken as a
> whole, the present day economy does not differ much from
> "pure" capitalism.
>
> Production is carried on for profit, not for use.
>
> JCT: This is a real valid observation.
>
> AE: There is no provision that all those able and willing to
> work will always be in a position to find employment; an
> "army of unemployed" almost always exists. The worker is
> constantly in fear of losing his job. Since unemployed and
> poorly paid workers do not provide a profitable market, the
> production of consumers' goods is restricted, and great
> hardship is the consequence.
>
> JCT: Poverty is this hardship's true name.
>
> AE: Technological progress frequently results in more
> unemployment rather than in an easing of the burden of work
> for all. The profit motive, in conjunction with competition
> among capitalists, is responsible for an instability in the
> accumulation and utilization of capital which leads to
> increasingly severe depressions. Unlimited competition leads
> to a huge waste of labor, and to that crippling of the
> social consciousness of individuals which I mentioned
> before.
>
> JCT: Not the profit motive. The survival motive. There's
> nothing wrong with a fair profit motive but there is
> something wrong with killing or enslaving those who don't
> succeed at it.
>
> AE: This crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil
> of capitalism.
>
> JCT: Monopoly capitalism. Social, communal, christian,
> capitalism where all may compete and all may survive is
> different.
>
> AE: Our whole educational system suffers from this evil. An
> exaggerated competitive attitude is inculcated into the
> student, who is trained to worship acquisitive success as a
> preparation for his future career.
>
> JCT: They call the effect inculcated by playing musical
> chairs to the death with money an "exaggerated competitive
> attitude."
>
> AE: I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these
> grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist
> economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be
> oriented toward social goals.
>
> JCT: I'd bet that there's no positive feedback in his social
> economy but it's obvious that Albert never saw usury as the
> instability in the system.
>
> AE: In such an economy, the means of production are owned by
> society itself and are utilized in a planned fashion.
>
> JCT: The means don't need to be owned by society. Nothing
> wrong with private ownership as long as there's no positive
> feedback.
>
> AE: A planned economy, which adjusts production to the needs
> of the community, would distribute the work to be done among
> all those able to work and would guarantee a livelihood to
> every man, woman, and child.
>
> JCT: And would arise naturally once the function takes from
> the starving to give to the fat is eliminated.
>
> AE: The education of the individual, in addition to
> promoting his own innate abilities, would attempt to develop
> in him a sense of responsibility for his fellow men in place
> of the glorification of power and success in our present
> society.
>
> JCT: This is natural once the death-gamble is no longer
> operative.
>
> AE: Nevertheless, it is necessary to remember that a planned
> economy is not yet socialism. A planned economy as such may
> be accompanied by the complete enslavement of the
> individual. The achievement of socialism requires the
> solution of some extremely difficult socio-political
> problems: how is it possible, in view of the far-reaching
> centralization of political and economic power, to prevent
> bureaucracy from becoming all-powerful and overweening? How
> can the rights of the individual be protected and therewith
> a democratic counterweight to the power of bureaucracy be
> assured?
>
> JCT: The rights of the individual are not threatened by a
> properly operating non-slavery system.
>
> AE: Clarity about the aims and problems of socialism is of
> greatest significance in our age of transition. Since, under
> present circumstances, free and unhindered discussion of
> these problems has come under a powerful taboo, I consider
> the foundation of this magazine to be an important public
> service. All material )copyright 2002 by Monthly Review
>
> JCT: Discussing interest rate abolition is still subject to
> a powerful taboo as well as a citizenry conditioned to
> disbelieve an interest-free system is even possible.
>
> So, one of the world's greatest thinkers was also stumped at
> identifying the instability in the money system. Sure makes
> John The Engineer's claim to have derived the equation of
> social system he described (1/s LETS) and the problem
> (I/(P+I) that much more spectacular.
>
>
> --
> Abolitionist Slave Leader John C."The Banking Systems Engineer" Turmel
> for UNILETS interest-free time-based currency in U.N. resolution C6
> to Governments in the http://www.un.org/millennium/declaration.htm
> http://www.cyberclass.net/turmel 519-753-0645 USENET: can.politics 

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