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The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

ucl.ac.uk

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Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#41

Post by mlatu »

SuoDuanDao wrote: post #28
fifticon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the wealth piled up with people like elon musk and jeff bezos indicate this is not what is being solved or handled here. The 188b$ of Bezos and 264b$ of Musk are clearly not dedicated to providing me with hamburgers and sleeping quarters. If I divided those 452b$ amongst 334m americans, I'd get around 1300$ per head. Though net worth is not the same as yearly income, I note that Musk's 264b$ represent 5.600 times the…

>Currently we organise our Lords through capitalism. And that's how I want it. I may have a low chance of winning but nobody argues against my right to throw my hat in the ring if I want to rise above my station. Nobody but the anticapitalists that is.

That's what they want you to believe, but your hat needs to be at least THIS big in order to not just evaporate when it lands in the ring.

Good luck playing against the house. I'd much rather demolish this casino and put up a soupkitchen instead.

I'd rather have everyone fed, clothed, housed and medically taken care of than having a low chance of "winning". What do you win anyways? Can you hug your profits? Can they thank you for your efforts?

I'm not convinced that capitalism is the best way to run this planet, but certainly one of the better ways to ruin it, this way at least those already well off, will have it nice until the end, hordes of immigrants fleeing from droughts and >50°C around the equator? who cares, they'll drown in the mediteranean sea or otherwise be hindered from reaching the "good" parts in europe..

The world is fucked, if you dont see it already as such: capitalism is barbarism. You don't really need to involve immigrants even, just look at industrial livestock farming. There was an article recently, that at least 65 different species of animals can laugh. I used to laugh at vegans not eating meat, I mean, it's just animals..., but now? What makes US so special? Why is the laughter of our children worth more than that of some cows or chicken?

How can I enjoy a steak without thinking about whether or not this animal had a good life? It died so i may eat it, but why did it live in the first place? Just to be eaten?

A horrible thought.

And then, why do i live? Just so I can feed my landlord? Are we just here to produce abundance for those who have all the money/power/assets/rights?

I want to see the (capitalist) world burn and I want you to want that too, so we can build a better world together

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#42

Post by jokoon »

neilwilson wrote: post #8
jokoon wrote: post #5

I was again, arguing about work on reddit. Someone said that even animals "work" to survive. I found that the comparison was not really good. Food and shelter are abundant. Technology improved the human condition, but it made humans be much much less social, which is the main cause of inequalities. The individual car/kitchen/living room/bathroom generate exclusion. I'm an introvert, I want to have my safe space, but…

"Food and shelter are abundant." Only because somebody made them by working Monday to Friday. That somebody could make less by working Monday to Tuesday. Food and shelter would be less abundant and the person currently working a full week to produce the surplus would instead have the rest of the week to themselves. The productivity, and the free time, would accrue to those expending the effort of production - as mora…

Few people work to provide food and shelter, that's what I meant. We do have a magic porridge pot surplus. Just look around you.

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#43

Post by joshgrib »

neilwilson wrote: post #8
jokoon wrote: post #5

I was again, arguing about work on reddit. Someone said that even animals "work" to survive. I found that the comparison was not really good. Food and shelter are abundant. Technology improved the human condition, but it made humans be much much less social, which is the main cause of inequalities. The individual car/kitchen/living room/bathroom generate exclusion. I'm an introvert, I want to have my safe space, but…

"Food and shelter are abundant." Only because somebody made them by working Monday to Friday. That somebody could make less by working Monday to Tuesday. Food and shelter would be less abundant and the person currently working a full week to produce the surplus would instead have the rest of the week to themselves. The productivity, and the free time, would accrue to those expending the effort of production - as mora…

I think you're sneaking in some assumptions here that people just develop these skills within themselves and have the same opportunity to do so as anyone else. If you start the clock with them already having those skills and other people not then it makes sense, but they ultimately owe all of that back to the society that gave them those skills.

However you end up is a combination of genes and environment - neither of which you have any control over. I don't see why someone should have full rights over whatever their output is when they have no control over the input. If someone has a great idea that can double food production - they owe all the money and food to the society because they would not have had the idea or been able to implement it otherwise. The public could then decide they should get a larger share for some reason(we generally do this with tax policy), but I don't see how they could have any moral claim to it

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#44

Post by Infernal »

mlatu wrote: post #41
SuoDuanDao wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Currently we organise our Lords through capitalism. And that's how I want it. I may have a low chance of winning but nobody argues against my right to throw my hat in the ring if I want to rise above my station. Nobody but the anticapitalists that is.

That's what they want you to believe, but your hat needs to be at least THIS big in order to not just evaporate when it lands in the ring. Good luck playing against the house. I'd much rather demolish this casino and put up a soupkitchen instead. I'd rather have everyone fed, clothed, housed and medically taken care of than having a low chance of "winning". What do you win anyways? Can you hug your profits? Can they…

> I'd rather have everyone fed, clothed, housed and medically taken care of than having a low chance of "winning"

Where do you believe the food, clothing, housing, and medical care/technology will come from in this hypothetical?

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#45

Post by Kalium »

jokoon wrote: post #42
neilwilson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Food and shelter are abundant." Only because somebody made them by working Monday to Friday. That somebody could make less by working Monday to Tuesday. Food and shelter would be less abundant and the person currently working a full week to produce the surplus would instead have the rest of the week to themselves. The productivity, and the free time, would accrue to those expending the effort of production - as mora…

Few people work to provide food and shelter, that's what I meant. We do have a magic porridge pot surplus. Just look around you.

You are absolutely correct. This is true. There are comparatively few people who work to provide food and shelter.

That said, when I look around me I see massive complexity to accomplish the seeming of a magic porridge pot surplus. I think it may be possible to understate what goes in to producing these things. The food production system requires a whole series of industrialized inputs to work at this level of labor efficiency, so we need to keep those and supporting systems. Food production systems also need food distribution systems, which means ways to harvest, process, package, store, and transport food. This requires its own logistical chains and their supporting systems.

Now we're up to including a bunch of heavy industry, some mining, steelmaking, a cross-continental rail system, international shipping, and last mile logistics. We haven't even gone into how much of this is specialized labor requiring significant training - a lot of it - and what it would take to adjust the amount of work per person involved or spread it over more people.

We haven't looked at housing, its supply chain(s), the educational systems required to train specialists, health care, or administrative systems.

I am in awe of the complexity that goes into making the magic porridge pot work.

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#46

Post by joshgrib »

burntoutfire wrote: post #22
justalanm wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abolish "mandatory" work. Now you can keep working if you want to. It was easy.

Work already is not mandatory. Anyone is free to figure out other ways to get food and shelter.

I think this is overlooking the main argument - having someone waste time by getting their own food/shelter isn't really any better than having them waste time doing a job to get money for food/shelter. We would likely be better off not wasting people's time and just giving them food/shelter so they are free to figure out how to best use that time

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#47

Post by jokoon »

Kalium wrote: post #45
jokoon wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Few people work to provide food and shelter, that's what I meant. We do have a magic porridge pot surplus. Just look around you.

You are absolutely correct. This is true. There are comparatively few people who work to provide food and shelter. That said, when I look around me I see massive complexity to accomplish the seeming of a magic porridge pot surplus. I think it may be possible to understate what goes in to producing these things. The food production system requires a whole series of industrialized inputs to work at this level of labor…

We just disagree

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#48

Post by sleepysysadmin »

jokoon wrote: post #5

I was again, arguing about work on reddit. Someone said that even animals "work" to survive. I found that the comparison was not really good. Food and shelter are abundant. Technology improved the human condition, but it made humans be much much less social, which is the main cause of inequalities. The individual car/kitchen/living room/bathroom generate exclusion. I'm an introvert, I want to have my safe space, but…

>I was again, arguing about work on reddit. Someone said that even animals "work" to survive. I found that the comparison was not really good.

Seems like a good comparison to me. Society is not post-scarcity. People in society must produce a surplus and contribute that surplus. Economics is how we measure how much contribution happened.

>Food and shelter are abundant.

Food prices are climbing and housing is in bubble territory. Abundance is complicated.

>I guess that's what people criticize about current capitalism.

Marx has many valid arguments against capitalism. It's very obvious today that socialism is dead. It officially died in 1989. Though that doesnt solve the problems with capitalism.

>In earlier times, in hunter gatherer societies, food was scarce and work was important. But today, you cannot tell people that working in fast food or in customer support is mandatory to eat and have a roof on your head.

Nobody is saying they must work the mcjob. Many many other jobs out there. Entrepreneurship is important to capitalism.

However we absolutely are saying you must contribute something to society in order to eat and have a roof over their head. If you don't, that's your decision, you deal with the consequences. Our society is not at the point where work is optional. Perhaps getting people out of the mcjobs and building a fully automated factory where food just comes out at no cost. Where housing can be 3d printed in a weekend anywhere in the world. We get to the point where maslow heirarchy of needs is solved and you can decide to not-work as much as you like.

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#49

Post by CraigJPerry »

jonsen wrote: post #18
antoniotorrez wrote: post #9

"Because people typically spend eight hours or more of each weekday at work and another eight or so hours sleeping, it is where they spend about a third of their waking hours." Actually, half of their waking hours

A week has 7*24 = 168 hours. 40/168 ~= 1/4 Hours awake 7*16 = 112 40/112 ~= 1/3

>> A week has 7*24 = 168 hours.

Ahh, grandparent said weekday, you've added in weekend to your calc

Re: The Philosophy of Work [pdf]

#50

Post by WHA8m »

jonsen wrote: post #18
antoniotorrez wrote: post #9

"Because people typically spend eight hours or more of each weekday at work and another eight or so hours sleeping, it is where they spend about a third of their waking hours." Actually, half of their waking hours

A week has 7*24 = 168 hours. 40/168 ~= 1/4 Hours awake 7*16 = 112 40/112 ~= 1/3

One of you is talking about weekdays only and the other about a hole week. From the cited sentence, you can interpret it both ways, I guess.
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