This site is blocked by openDNS for malware distribution :-/
Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
21–30 of 273 posts
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
It looks like we both independently came to the same conclusion, though I have a “solution” to the finite knowledge problem :)
Is it alzheimer’s?
No, although that is an interesting thought: selectively forgetting things so you can relearn them later.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#23Judging by the list of "Ignorance, war, poverty, dirt, disease, frustration, hunger, fear, overwork, superstition all vanished." it seems many of us are living in a utopia yet we still aren't satisfied.
> Ignorance
Ever present, if you look around.
> war
Always on somewhere on this planet, and always a threat when the relations between yours and other nations become tense.
> dirt, disease, frustration
All ever present, and experienced by everyone to great extent.
> hunger
In the western "utopia", it's usually a job mishap or a big medical bill away.
> fear, overwork
Ever present and experienced by most of us.
> superstition
Displayed by half of the population, if not more.
Even if we happen to live without experiencing most of these for a while, it's only the most ignorant that don't realize how fragile such situation is.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#24I never liked the formulation that utopia is not worth it because people lack the creativity to imagine what could be done for fun in it. It's like we've never tried but hey here's an explanation as to why you shouldn't want it! It should really not be a surprise that imagination is lacking here because for a lot of people, happiness is just defined as having things other people don't have, because that's simply how we came out to be wired and because we continue to live in a world that follows those principles.
Until those principles have been modified, you have no idea what a utopia is and would look like. This has never, ever, been the case, not in any society you can think of. You might think you live in some super nice societies but you have never escaped those principles.
Utopia isn't about making people not have toothaches or whatever anymore. That's not the point. Utopia is about letting people live in a manner that they would want, not in the manner, currently, prescribed by the law of the powerful and the powerless.
But if you really think that if suddenly your problems being solved, you'd find nothing to do, you are not thinking hard enough, and you are already too wrapped up in the thinking of having things other people don't have. It's a mindset problem of people born into a world working on that principle and it's a hard one to rewrite.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#25Judging by the list of "Ignorance, war, poverty, dirt, disease, frustration, hunger, fear, overwork, superstition all vanished." it seems many of us are living in a utopia yet we still aren't satisfied.
Are you? Do you have no worries in the world?
If we take each of those issues:
Ignorance - developed countries have never sent so many people to university.
War - Is less common in recent history and the wars we do get involved have fewer casualties. I know people will raise Iraq but you only need to go back as far as Vietnam to find a conflict that was an order of magnitude worse.
Poverty - Absolute poverty is very low in the developed world and decreasing elsewhere.
Dirt - Soap is cheap.
Disease - Smallpox, Malaria, Measles, Rubella, Syphilis, Rabies are all eradicated or falling heavily. Cancer is only so common because we live so long.
Frustration - Liberal values have given freedom to a lot of people that had been oppressed.
Hunger - Food has never been so cheap.
Fear - I live in the UK, there is nowhere in my country that I feel is out of bounds for me.
Overwork - Jonathan Sachs has a really good presentation on this, our hours have been falling for decades. Also technology has freed us from much backbreaking work.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#26This article focuses on a utopia of worldy pleasures, and goes on to explain why such a place would be a pretty boring place to live. But that’s just human nature: we’re never permently satisfied with what we have. The only way that we feel happiness from these things is if we get more of whatever it is, and that’s kind of impossible in a utopia. However, I still think there’s a way to get satisfaction out of a world…
Unless we radically alter the way the human brain works, there's no chance to "learn everything." We already know much more than any individual could learn in a lifetime.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#27Is anyone else intrigued that this is hosted on a Russian domain? I’m thinking ideological honeypot, lol.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#28Judging by the list of "Ignorance, war, poverty, dirt, disease, frustration, hunger, fear, overwork, superstition all vanished." it seems many of us are living in a utopia yet we still aren't satisfied.
Are you? Do you have no worries in the world?
Many do not. There is a theory of something called the Power Process, which states that for people to be happy, they need goals which require effort, and need to achieve at least some of those goals. The lack of meaningful goals which require effort in the first world may be responsible for much of the depression, suicide, and other issues that plague us today.
I found this Medium post which quotes the relevant parts: https://medium.com/chris-messina/surrogate-activities-the-po...
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#29There's a fundamental conflict between conceptual Utopia/Heaven and the law of supply and demand. All literary conceptions of a utopia rely on abundance of some good that is scarce in the author's time. Usually ignoring that its ubiquity makes it tend toward zero value. Here's my stab at Utopia, but it requires a belief that Knowledge is infinite: Utopia is a state of unhindered, continual learning at your own chosen…
The U.S. founding fathers had another definition which is life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is very individualized. Suggests it is relevant to the one as opposed to relevant to the masses. Very anti-elitist on its own merit.
Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you? Do you have no worries in the world?
If we take each of those issues: Ignorance - developed countries have never sent so many people to university. War - Is less common in recent history and the wars we do get involved have fewer casualties. I know people will raise Iraq but you only need to go back as far as Vietnam to find a conflict that was an order of magnitude worse. Poverty - Absolute poverty is very low in the developed world and decreasing else…
I don’t disagree that it’s getting better, but it’s disingenuous to suggest that there aren’t still problems in the world that should be solved.