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The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
31–40 of 131 posts
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
> First off, I'd suggest buying "Seven Habits of Highly Successful People", and NOT read it. Burn it, it's a great symbolic gesture. -- Linus Torvalds Myself... I'm not that extreme, but the good ideas from so many business books could be summed up in a few paragraphs.
> the good ideas from so many business books could be summed up in a few paragraphs Sure. You can also forgo reading most fiction by simply reading the Wikipedia plot summary.
Given limited time, I’d rather read War and Peace in its entirety, and a blog post on 7 Habits.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
> First off, I'd suggest buying "Seven Habits of Highly Successful People", and NOT read it. Burn it, it's a great symbolic gesture. -- Linus Torvalds Myself... I'm not that extreme, but the good ideas from so many business books could be summed up in a few paragraphs.
> the good ideas from so many business books could be summed up in a few paragraphs Sure. You can also forgo reading most fiction by simply reading the Wikipedia plot summary.
Most non-fiction has little literary value (which consists of more than plot) though.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#34I'd like an extended version of the story where the businessman realizes he's wrong, invites all his friends to give up their lives in the business-world and revert to subsistence living that provides freedom. Then society collapses because if everyone is doing the bare minimum, there isn't anything left over for basic government services.
Nobody said that the fisherman is engaged in subsistence living. I'd also like a citation on the claim that "basic government services" require profit-making (and presumably taxation to go with it) that is substantively different than the fisherman's approach to life.
Government services obviously require a resource surplus (and some mechanism to direct that surplus to paying for these services, of which taxation is the most common one). If everybody are chill fishermen, there's no surplus - there's no reason for the fisherman to create one.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#35Hasn't that happened in Somalia? There were happy fishermen until their fishing grounds were depleted by businessmen and their big boats which led to the pirate industry? On land, it's hunter gatherers and farming or logging.
The closest parallel might be how native americans lived for thousands of years subsisting on the land. The level of sustainable living they maintained was extraordinary. Everything from 3 sisters farming, to fish stocking in lakes, to controlled burns to prevent wildfires... they found a harmony with their environment to just live enough, and no more.
> How cruel the whites are: their lips are thin, their noses sharp, their faces furrowed and distorted by holes. Their eyes have a staring expression. They are always seeking something. What are they seeking? The whites always want something, they are always uneasy and restless. We do not know what they want, we do not understand them, we think that they are mad.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#36Anybody want to take a crack at tracing the origin of this one?
Probably some ancient Indian tale - because most of the wandering tales we're using today come from ancient Indian stories (by way of Persians, Arabs, Greeks, etc. - as the trade goes, do the stories). If that's the case, the origin is probably impossible to determine.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#37A few years later, the fisherman gets an expensive, debilitating disease and dies penniless and destitute and alone. But at least he had fun before that.
Well, apparently the story was conceived by a German, in which case the social system would catch him, provide the health care he needs, and when recovered he'd be back on that beach...
But who pays for these social services to pay the doctors that heal him?
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#38Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#39Hasn't that happened in Somalia? There were happy fishermen until their fishing grounds were depleted by businessmen and their big boats which led to the pirate industry? On land, it's hunter gatherers and farming or logging.
The closest parallel might be how native americans lived for thousands of years subsisting on the land. The level of sustainable living they maintained was extraordinary. Everything from 3 sisters farming, to fish stocking in lakes, to controlled burns to prevent wildfires... they found a harmony with their environment to just live enough, and no more. > How cruel the whites are: their lips are thin, their noses shar…
Don’t forget the raping and pillaging of other tribes when times got tough.
Very few of the tribes in the more barren west lived on land bountiful enough for this utopian fantasy.
Re: The businessman and the fisherman (1963)
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nobody said that the fisherman is engaged in subsistence living. I'd also like a citation on the claim that "basic government services" require profit-making (and presumably taxation to go with it) that is substantively different than the fisherman's approach to life.
Government services obviously require a resource surplus (and some mechanism to direct that surplus to paying for these services, of which taxation is the most common one). If everybody are chill fishermen, there's no surplus - there's no reason for the fisherman to create one.
Surplus can come in the form of a small number of large surpluses, or a large number of small ones. The fisherman is quite capable of being part of the latter example.