Slashdot Mirror
Defining Globalism
Sometimes things are easier to grasp by defining what they're not. The e-mail and posts last week were about equally divided (apart from the usual flaming yahoos) over whether globalism marks corporate evil or global modernization. Most were agreed that globalization isn't about buying computers and TV set. It's about what sociologists like Anthony Giddens of the London School of Economics call living in a "runaway world," a period of enormous transformation, affecting almost every aspect of life from technology to how government functions to employment to personal values. Globalization is spreading all over the world, yet nobody is in charge of it, and there isn't even much consensus about what it is, an economic system or an ideology.
Generally speaking, globalization today is a Western idea (although other, earlier cultures took some shots at it), fueled most recently by technology's forging of a global economy. It's a powerful offshoot of capitalism and popular culture, yet it's being debated in almost every country, and it's become almost impossible to hear a major political speech that doesn't mention it.
The subject arouses strong emotions. Directly or not, globalism is at the root of the terrorist attacks on September 11, and the resulting conflict between the United States and Islamic fundamentalists, who are articulate and open about their hatred of the changes sweeping their cultures. Every business is obsessed with it.
It's getting hard to find academics and other members of the intelligentsia who don't mistrust it, equating it, somewhat justifiably, with corporatism and the rise of the multinationals. Surely, there are more reasons to mistrust the multinational corporations who advance globalization than I could possibly list here.
But globalization is an elusive notion. Skeptics argue that it's a highly exploitive western force and profit center that represents business as usual for corporatists exploiting new worker pools and marketing possibilities, and for despoiling the rest of the environment.
Some economists argue that globalization is an old idea, similar to the way world economies operated centures ago, from the Romans to the Venetians. Those civilizations didn't have an e-economy and the Net, of course, and couldn't transfer cash all over the planet in seconds.
And there are clear differences. Globalization seems to erode the longtime primacy of the nation-state, already undercut by networked computing, which changes the potency of boundaries and enables people, businesses and banks to talk directly to one another rather than through surrogates. It also undermines dogmas, both political and religious, some of which greatly fear environments that permit the free flow of ideas. It's hard to preach a monotheistic view of the world if all sorts of ideas are available to your kids online and via TV, music and film. And the new global electronic economy -- involving fund managers, banks, corporations and millions of individual investors -- can transfer vast sums of capital from one part of the world to another in seconds, quickly stabilizing or de-stabilizing economies, as has happened recently in Asia.
Electronic information has also fueled globalism and its consequences. The World Trade Center attacks were a global, not a local event. When Nelson Mandela was released from a South African jail, he was watched by the entire world. So is the American bombing campaign against the Taliban. This kind of internationally-transmitted imagery doesn't just provide external information, but affects the internal politics and reality of our lives -- our family and religious values, our perceptions about the world. When hundreds of teenagers stormed the Berlin Wall and began to tear it down, the first thing many of them did was run to music stores and buy the videos they'd been secretly -- and illegally -- watching on MTV. And "Baywatch" remains the most popular show in Iran, to the despair of the religious leaders running the country.
Primitive cultures like the one running Afghanistan don't accept the inevitability of globalism. Most other governments do, perhaps the primary reason the Arab world isn't actively resisting the much-resented United States in its new war. Countries that don't want to join in may end up like Afghanistan, beset by tribal conflicts, cut off from capital development and economic opportunity. Would investment from multi-nationals help or harm a country like Afghanistan, where one kid after another says in TV interviews that the only available job opportunities involve shooting people?
Whether it's a good witch or not, globalism is much too big and pervasive an idea to go away. For all the media hysteria about bio-terrorism and other dangers, it seems probable that the United States will ultimately destroy the Taliban government, and the first such conflict of the 21st century will be over. What isn't as clear is whether this will mark the beginning of a war or the end. Or whether anybody will ever come up with a widely-accepted definition of what globalization really is.
At least thats what it means to me when I hear it. We are basically talking about US-centric ideology and economy. It means that things like this invasion of Afghanistan should be accepted by the rest of the world, because sooner or later it may happen to them. Forget that nations have their own sovereign right to determine their own internal affairs. They only have that right insofar as the US does not feel the need to interfere. And this does not apply equally across the board. Would we allow France to bomb our cities because we are harboring a political fugitive they are seeking? Would we allow Russia to arm and finance groups in America that advocate overthrowing the US government? Yet that seems perfectly acceptable for the US to do in other countries. Of course when the US does it, its not called "state sponsored terrorism".
Globalization can be classified as a polarizing issue. Often seen in politics, it is simply an issue that one can use to easily separate people into two groups; those for, and those against.
Somewhere in the middle exists a rational argument, but either sides probably aren't interested in hearing it.
The thing that really scares me about globalization is the homogenization that follows. Don't get me wrong, I'm not some extremist or religious nut. But every nation being different is what makes it so interesting. Once there are McDonalds on every corner, and the whole world shops at The Gap, this place will be so boring it will drive me mad. On the other hand, if you go too far protecting your national identity, you end up like the french, with their laws preventing social dilution at the expense of personal freedom, or like the Taliban, so scared that people will see western ways and abandon their twisted interpretation of religion that allows them to keep control. It really is a fine line.
Where's my lobbyist? Right here.
Globalism is, among other things, the only way for local markets to keep expanding. Since there is nothing left beyond the world for now, I guess this is the last phase until the end of the old world and probably the beginning of a new middle age.
Don't get me wrong. Globalism in itself is the negation of any kind of territorialism being used as forms of abuse -- the fall of barriers. But those barriers still want to survive on their own ; if they're going to disappear, they may try not to go down alone and take a part of the world with them.
Therefore, any side-effect of globalism should not be attributed to itself. It is rather an opportunity to get rid of systems that do not have any use anymore, that will crash anyway on their own, and that can blow us with them if we do nothing. If we're going to globalize anyway, let's not do it half-assed.
--Martin
Globalization is one of the finest things that can happen to human race, if it's done the right way. It means a world without barriers, but since human stupidity makes ppl try to push their own ideas down other ppl throats, that's what is going to happen. Furthermore, it's interesting how globalization is always shown connected with world economy, instead of being defined as a massive cultural exchange. Of course... the greedy capitalists out there have a focus on this matter just a 'little diferent' than we do :)
Rio de Janeiro's dwellers are stupid. No, really.
Call me a cynic if you like but to me globalisation means whatever the man with most money and the best lawyers want it to mean at the time.
Globalism is never a problem for anyone -- it allows competition to level the paying field for even the poorest nations as long as they have the people who want to work for it.
Where globalism, capitalism, and "Big Business" get ugly is when the government (any government) intervenes in any way: whether its a subsidy, a tariff, an embargo, even a bailout (a la airlines). The minute a government steals from the citizens in order to help a business, the system falls apart. Those who worked hard to make their business profitable get hurt for their smarts (Look at the airline industry, there are numerous airlines HIRING right now, and some of which who are still profitable). Instead, our government takes the biggest ones, with the worst track record of profitability, and bail them out, hurting the little guy who was making it work.
Big Business will always fail with no government intervention, eventually. 10 smaller companies in a co-op situation will always do better in the long run if they have the competitive edge and no sanctions to hurt them or subsidies to help the Big Business competition.
It's evident that totally free trade can "save the world." It's more evident that our country will never allow it. Sanctions against Iraq destroyed that country (NOT Saddam Hussein as the media and government portrays as the culprit). Sanctions and subsidies destroyed the wheat crop in Columbia, then destroyed the coffee crop. What was left? Coca. Now our government intervenes to destroy that crop.
In order to have a peaceful society, we need to get government ENTIRELY out of free trade. Let businesses and people deal with whomever they want, bar none. I can understand if government may want to limit arms sales, but other than that, I can see no reason to ever limit or subsidies trade or business of any kind. In a totally free economy, there will always be winners and losers. Unfortunately, government intervention makes losers into smaller losers, and the winners into big losers. Tell them to stay out, and you'll see happy people all over the world, able to buy and sell their wares at prices that they deem proper.
We believe that without the government, prices would skyrocket (they wouldn't, supply and demand and competition prevent that), or we'd have shortages (again, suppy and demand and competition would help), or we'd see our economy fail because other countries do it cheaper (they do, and better, sometimes its even our unions that make our businesses unprofitable, not necessarily our business tactics).
The first problem (the one with the theory) is an attempt to homogenize culture. Face it, most people like their culture, no matter what it is. Culture is usually not prescribed by the government, but is certainly influenced by it. On the other hand, cultural homogenization may be inevitable--more influenced by cheap transportation and communication than any political actions.
The second problem has to do with the way globalization is being done. I am a US citizen, and consider having a say in my government to be a divine right. Current globalization efforts include, IMHO, the UN, the WTO, and the EU. These agencies, these super-governments (for lack of a better term) don't answer to people, they answer to governments. This removes the person further from the government imposing laws on him or her. I don't swear allegiance to the UN, I am not permitted to help elect its members, why should I answer to it? Why should my country's business laws be prescribed by the WTO, when I have no opportunity to vote the bums out?
This looks like a pure power steal. Global agencies are not directly accountable to people. If they were, if I could protest their policies peacefully at the ballot box rather than violently at protests (the only option we now have), I would have more patience with them.
--The basis of all love is respect
Globalism is:
1. Putting all your eggs in one basket.
2. Trying for harmony when everyone sings the same tune.
3. Letting everyone make the same mistakes, all at once.
4. Making sure the free market never decides anything.
5. Saying "Businesses have been a discriminated minority for too long."
6. Trying to disprove the myth that humanity doesn't scale.
"Look at me, I invented the stove!" -- Ben Franklin
It is the consolidation of global power into fewer and fewer hands.
If there is any one lesson that mankind should have learned from its history, it is that power corrupts.
More power == more corruption.
Too often people (governments, coporations, etc) attempt to employ the drive towards globalisation as a means to achieving particular ends, rather that accepting that stable globalisation only comes about as a consequence of other factors.
Whilst the dimmishment of the powers of centralised national governments, in favour of more decentralised power structures, may be a positive factor in the continuing development of advanced liberal democracies, for weaker and less prosperous nations it can be disasterous and is too easily perceived as an attack on their sovereignty. Similarly, the enforced acceleration of the economic development of weaker nations, without regard for the resources and equity of those nations can have terrible consequences on their lon term ability to survive independently of the international community (ie - for poorer nations the journey to a globalised community is one way).
You only have to consider the different manners in which Russia and China have responded to the West-driven globalism to see (relatively) how much better (stable, prosperous) China will be in the near future than Russia; Russia dove headfirst into westernised democracy without the social and economic infrastructure to support such liberalised globalism, China however, though it's record in many areas is wretched, has been focusing more on developing it's social and economic infrastructure, so that as it progresses a culture that can support liberal globalism will arrise naturally.
I've been writing about it for years, and got more than 2,000 responses and e-mails about it from some columns here last week, but you know what? I still couldn't tell you exactly what it is.
Translation:
I don't know what I'm talking about.
"Enough of this wretched, whining monkey life." -- Marcus Aurelius, _Meditations_, Book 9, 37
. . . to any meaningful debate on the subject. Those who are in favor of globalization seem to define it in very different terms than those who support it. This is an issue that those who have protested at recent WTO meetings have failed to adequately address. They have successfully conveyed their message that "globalization is bad," but without further clarification, this will strike different audiences as either self-evident or as an absurdity, since "globalization" means entirely different things to different groups of people. If you take it to mean the exploitation of indigenous peoples by large multinational corporations, then of course it's bad. But if you take it to mean greater mutual understanding among people of different nations, it is long overdue. The problem is, globalization can, but does not necessarily, encompass all these things, and a lot more.
Globalization may well be inevitable, as Katz correctly points out, but what form it will take is yet to be determined. Therefore, rather than getting into a shouting match over whether globalization is Good or Bad, it would be much more productive to discuss how to take advantage of the opportunities that globalization presents us while avoiding the the dangers it presents. This is the challenge for our age.
Namely peace and prosperity. Commerce and communication have essentially brought us these. People who aren't hungry and have jobs tend not to fight each other. Knowing the facts and understanding what's going on around you makes you less able to be manipulated by leaders with their own agenda. It may sound stupid but TV has actually brought around world peace. It's reduced ignorance and brought new points of view to poeple who might not be exposed to them, and along with that understanding.
/bin/laden calling for death to the infidels, but how can you fault the benefits? I shake my head when I see people protesting against globalism. Largely they are healthy, middle class youths. Wearing Nike sneakers, Levi jeans and driving to the protest in Fords, etc. If they are serious, why aren't they living in caves, growing their own vegetables?
Globalism is merely more of the same. More commerce and more communication. It means that countries left behind by the prosperity that has benefited the west are more likely to share in it, even if the west gets fatter in the process.
There is of course the dark side of globalism. MacDonald's and any other given multinational,
Globalism is here. We should stop talking about wether it's good or bad and start asking how we can reduce its bad aspects and increase it's benefits.
Reliable, Great Value Hosting: $7.95/mo 2.4G/120G
Trade-based globalization will result in the shifting of power from cultural states (i.e. countries), to economic "states" (i.e. multinational corporations), transcending national law, and a lot of the social reasons governments are formed, and law is written in the first place. We need then to fill this vacuum with strong international law and cooperation of the peoples of many nations. Otherwise we are just going to end up with a cabal of extremely wealthy and exploitive corporations with no allegiance to any particular peoples, exploiting and oppressing for profit.
It's probably too late to reverse globalization(understatement of the century), both economic and cultural/social, but we can at least try to keep it on track and make sure it looks out for the many instead of just the few entrenched players.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
This ensures that no region will be rich and other poor. Because people can migrate.
/. message board about how a global government should fix the problem, then I have issues.
There will ALWAYS be rich and there will ALWAYS be poor. The trick is to do our best to make sure the middle class holds the deciding vote between them.
(ObHistory: The entire history of western civilization, up to and including "globalization" can be summarized in one phrase: "The Rise of the Bourgeosie.")
I have a real issue with folks who have Internet connections and the ability to speak freely saying we should be transferring more of global wealth to the "poor." If that's the case, please, set an example, sell your computer and donate the $$ from your college tuition to Food For the Poor. But if your contribution to the fight against global poverty and dispair is to bitch on a
Face it folks. WE are that global government. WE are the ones who can make a difference. Set an Earnings Tax on yourself. Vote in favor of stockholder resolutions that require companies in which we hold stock to act in socially conscious ways.
Funny thing about the open, competitive system that has yielded this globalization trend. It evolves from within, through debate and action. We don't need a global government. We don't need a world revolt against "corporations." Those corporations are us folks. We hold their stock, buy their products and take their money. (And if you don't think so, please cash out your 401(k), or if you're a student, please, only go to a school that refuses corporate help.) The "system" responds to the incentives we give it every day. Change the incentives, change the system. Change our individual choices, by an act of will not coercion, change the world.
Development is never balanced. It's not driven by structure or conditions. It's driven by individual people deciding to build a better life for their children. That's it. Why is Singapore rich and peaceful, but unfree, while Uruguay, which arguably has better natural conditions for development, is slipping backwards every day? Because of individual decisions about greed and power.
Build a world your children in which your children have a better opportunity, by making small changes to the way you live your life.
Don't burn down a McDonalds for 15 minutes of fame. Because that, my friends, is hypocrisy.
Whoah, bit of a rant here.
IMHO.
- Japan, although it has a suffering economy, represents a very strong concentration of economic power for such a relatively small country.
- Japan's old culture has certainly not been destroyed. Many anti-globalization voices argue globalization destroys cultures. Not exactly. Japan's old culture, old values, have been mixed and integrated with western ones. Anything American sells well in Japan, while Japanise cartoons sell well in America. The key issue being, both were altered in the process of being exported to another culture.
Japan has become modern, industrial, and an ECONOMIC superpower. Japan is the face of globalization. Thanks to billions of dollars in aid and reconstruction from the US, it has mostly avoided the negative backlash to globaization some developing countries see.You might note that few would say American industry has exploited Japan and its workers, infact American industry has been damaged by competition. The idea that globalization has anything to do with exploitation should take note of this.
-- Ken Kinder ken@_nospam_kenkinder.com http://kenkinder.com/
Slashdot, the way I see it, is a site for nerds to talk about science, technology, games, and toys (like legos). Politics are only discussed when something drastic happens (9/11, and war, for example). Jon Katz, a journalist with no technology background, has proven time and time again that he can't hang with the "technology" crowd, so he starts to write about topics he knows (like politics). This has no place in slashdot (nor does most of his writings). As proof, I present this article on kuro5hin about OSDN getting rid of kuro5hin.
In this article, Roblimo states : Kuro5hin's emphasis has changed since we first started working together. It is no longer as focused on Linux, Open Source, and Internet tools as it was a year ago. Kuro5hin is still great, but it is no longer a good "fit" with other OSDN Web sites. I ask this, How does Jon Katz fit with Linux, Open Source, and Internet tools?
Moderators, please consider what I said before modding me into oblivion.
Thanks.
No. It's not the natural way for things to progress in a vacuum, it's the PRODUCT of a very specific politico-economic situation. It's the product of the laws that have been put into place in the dominant western culture. Certain people have chosen, over the course of a few hundred years, to produce this situation. It's artificial, human-made.
Historically, it's been an abandonment of governmental responsibility. It started with the monarchs of Western Europe choosing to get out of the way and let their merchants have free reign, eventually giving way to democracies. Now we've ended up at the point where the democracies are giving way to transnational corporations. It's based on what makes the most money for those in power.
If it's a natural progression, it's simply the progression of what used to be capitalism, and has now reached a new form based on investment and globalism. Capitalism required finding new markets for expansion, and that's the only thing that hasn't changed much.
No, that's wrong. First of all, many businesses are started by other corporations or by entrepreneurs with enough backing to start out big.Besides, the common theme is for businesses to get bought out by a big corporation before they reach maturity--that's how companies like MS stay on top. So the idea of hard-working mom-and-pop operations turning into transnational corporations is a complete fantasy. If you honestly think that companies succeed by offering the best products, then you have probably read too much economics and too little marketing theory. Much of economics rides on models of rational actors that are completely blown away by modern industrial psych and marketing.
Coca Cola is a perfect example of a company that is ALL marketing. What do they sell? Syrup, which other companies bottle and turn into something that's awful for you.
Ah, but you say it must taste better than the competition, which is why people buy it? Nope. In taste-test trials other soft drinks beat the crap out of Coke. Why do people buy Coke? It's exclusively because of effective marketing. Coke has become about as American as apple pie, and it's all through marketing.
byroniverse
If you look as corporations as an individual person - then the act of turning to a coporation for "governmental sevices" is pretty much equivalent to paying Vito and his buddies a monthly fee to not 'bust up your place'. It's anarchy.
The first duty of a government, ANY government, is to protect it's people. Whether it's from a gang-operated protection racket, or whether it's from profit-driven exploitive multinational corporations.
The difference between a GOVERNMENT and a GANG, is that the GOVERNMENT (at least in a democratic society) is accountable to it's people. The money this government extorts is supposed to go to provide the goods and services it's people need, and the information about that money is mostly publicly availalbe. Accountability. If you pay Vito $100 per month not to hassle you, (or if you pay SecureCorp $500 a month to provide "security services" to your home, in absence of a governmnet -funded police force) - you have no idea where that money's going. Is Vito's $100 going to pay for a couple of young punks to stand outside your restaurant to make sure nobody from any rival gang comes along? Or is it going into Vito's pocket for his next snort of coke? Is SecureCorp's $500 going to pay for well trained well armed security patrols in your neighborhood? Or is it going to pay for the CEO's teenage daughter's Lexus?
At least when I pay my taxes, I know where most of it gets spent, even if I disagree with some of it, I have a right to VOTE.
In an unrestricted market economy - SecureCorp might even become a monopoly. "Vote with your dollars" doesn't work. Basically, without the government regulation to prevent monopolies or their abuses, what your "free market" is, is anarchy.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
The problem isn't globalization. What's wrong with people from different countries trading, communicating, and working together? Nah. The problem is that "globalization" is being carried out by unelected bodies of government appointees and corporations.
It's like saying leftists are against the idea of cities just because we think mayors should be elected by the people that live in them instead of appointed by General Electric and Microsoft.
And then, of course, there are the results of corporations determining the course of globalization -- "free trade" means corporations are free to go whereever they want and do nearly whatever they want, but the people who work for them get stopped at borders and are forced to endure corrupt, despotic governments that limit their actions. Corporations can shop around for the country with the lowest wages and oppressive anti-worker laws, but the workers in those countries are forced at gunpoint to remain.
And anyone that knows anything about how a "free market" works can see that this is anything but a free market. Given that corporations have the right to move into any country regardless of human rights, and given that all other countries are forced to accept the products, you have a situation where corporations are always seeking more and more oppressive and corrupt governments, and have a financial incentive to make them worse. Government leaders, on the other hand, have a financial incentive to cooperate. And when a worker in one of those countries tries to improve their situation, by moving to a better country, by organizing a union, by trying to change their government, etc. they are met with soldiers with guns keeping them back.
Final result -- lower wages, longer hours, and less rights for everyone around the world, higher profits for corporations.
Now what would happen if globalization was controlled democratically by the people whose lives it will affect? Short of revolution, we won't know.
"Globalization" means that capital can move where it wants, but labour (ie, you and me) are constrained in where we can emigrate to in order to follow the money flow. Borders restrain and impede people searching for better standards of living while being deliberately porous for capitalists.
What exactly is "globalization" all about? The IMF/World Bank/WTO knowingly bribe local officials to sell off national assets cheaply, deliberately push people into the poverty trap to inflame "social unrest" so that Western companies can buy assets cheaply during the ensuing panic, and "condemns people to death".
But it's not just me saying that. Or those rather smelly anarcho-crusties swinging their dreads forlornly. It's all in the words of Joseph Stiglitz, current Economics Nobel winner and former chief economist boffin at the World Bank. He seems to have done a Vadar and come back from the Dark Side.
Just how badly has globalized moneterism failed to achieve universal prosperity for all?
In the United States, the median real wage is about the same today as it was 28 years ago.This means that the majority of the labor force has failed to share in the gains from economic growth over the last 28 years. That is drastically different from the previous 27 years, during which the typical wage increased by about 80% in real terms. Trade has doubled as a percentage of our economy since the early 1970s, and there is no doubt that globalization has played a significant role in the worsening distribution of income here.
Now, international trade per se is obviously not the issue here, it's international trade under the deliberately poverty-inducing stategies of the IMF-led cartel. International trade could be defined and regulated in such a way as to promote prosperity of ordinary people within economic areas:
Globalization is no more natural or inevitable than the construction of skyscrapers. The globalization we have seen in recent decades has been driven by a laborious process of rule making. It is the establishment and enforcement of these rules that allows Timberland shoes, for example, to make their product in China at wages of 22 cents an hour, and then sell it at the local suburban mall. Advances in transportation and communications did not determine this result. Our leaders have rewritten the rules of the game in a way that has driven down wages for the vast majority of American employees. One may agree or disagree with this policy, but it should be understood as a conscious political choice.
...
The same thing could have been done to the salaries of doctors, for example. With much less effort and expense than it has taken to negotiate investment and trade agreements like NAFTA and the WTO, we could license and regulate the training of doctors in foreign medical schools. By allowing these doctors to practice medicine in the United States, we could lower the salaries of doctors and greatly reduce health care costs, without any loss of quality. Interestingly, the savings to consumers from reducing American doctors' salaries to even those of Europe would be enormous: about $70 billion a year.
This is about a hundred times more than the gains from tariff reduction in our most comprehensive trade liberalization agreements, such as the one that established the WTO five years ago. Huge savings could also be achieved by introducing international competition to the practice of accountants, lawyers, economists, and other professionals. But it is unlikely to happen, because these professionals -- unlike the majority of the US labor force -- have enough political clout to protect themselves from international competition.
This Economist article is well-reasoned. But it ignores the underlying fact that globalization means the increasing freedom of movement of capital without complementing freedom of movement of labour, has led to a massive democratic imbalance in the world.
This is because Corporations have lobbyists and expense accounts whereas poor people can only throw rocks.
Corporations prosper while working people are denied freedome of migration and emigration and suffer and end up rotting in huge unemployed pockets of poverty. This is not right and leads to the kind of tensions that I see expressed as fundamentalism in Muslim countries and riots by rich Western kids in Genoa.
Apparently, "unbridled laissez-faire" has got us into this predicament. Maybe it's time to restructure international trade to prevent plunging so many countries into IMF misery?
This is not unprecedented. Before World War One the global economy was very tightly knited together. Unfortunately, this imperial, colonialist and racist system massively benefitted certain countries at the expense of others. What we call today's "laissez-faire" is in fact nothing of the kind but a complex regulatory system designed to perpetuate Western Hegemony.
I benefit greatly from this, getting to eat candies when I want and buy cheap shoes at Payless. But if I had to settle for less candies and knew this was in some way reducing the risk of a suicidal airliner dropping on my head then I'm all for it.
Maybe it's time for a Tobin Tax? Make all those currency speculators produce something worthwhile from their mindless machinations. Donate the proceeds to developing world educational programs....
Da Blog
"I suggest finding yourself a pair of nuts and logging in the next time you want to flame someone. "
I'd prefer to make my points on content or in the case of the first post... the lack thereof. Your reply is not half bad, just a little sophomoric.
"I'd also suggest that you explain your curious notion that ideas in science fiction books should automatically be discounted in conversations about future trends in society. What do you think science fiction is all about? "
Its about entertainment. If you use it as the source of you scientific, economic, philosophical or political education, you are either a child or you need to read more. When I was a mere lad, I read Asimov, and thought he was +5 Insightful when he wrote about NP-Completeness, Cognitive Sceince, and turned the rise and fall of the Roman empire into a nice serialization.
When you grow up, it makes more sense to get your education from the scientific source rather than from a plot device in a fictional novel.
"I wonder if you ever read Snow Crash. If you had, you'd know it's exactly on target. The book is entirely about the consequences of globalization and it presents an interesting alternative vision. "
Actually I have read Snow Crash, as well as Zodiak, The Diamond Age, and Cryptonomicom. Snow Crash is mildly amusing, but not that great. Zodiak could be a decent TV movie. The Diamond Age is mostly good, although it ends horribly, and Crytonomicon was the biggest waste of time I've seen. 900+ pages for intertwined plots, only one of which was marginally interesting. (I'm sure you probably think that Stephenson invented the concept of Cryptography, and Alan Turing was a great character like Hiro Protaganist.) All in all, I didn't find any of them to be particularly insightful.
"In Snow Crash, there were a common set of low level protocols for all states to do business with each other, but it differed from our current reality in two major ways."
So I guess you really believe that Stephenson invented these concepts. Economists were writing about the viability of the City-State model decades before this occurred. In fact, I believe this how the Greeks created the first vestigates of civilazation. of course, I could be wrong.
Gibson was the social commentator that introduced us to Cypherpunks. Stephenson smashed all these together into a "plot device." The book was decent, and entertaining, but that is all. Go outside the little high school rah-rah circuit, and see if you find anyone that thinks this contributed to the social sciences or useful arts.
"That's what I think Stephenson was saying, and for you to just dismiss his entire book as being as relevant to the conversation as "The Matrix" only shows your own ignorance and lack of comprehension. "
Actually, my comprehension has been more than adequate in most objective measures. What I do comprehend is that there is this generation of kids that blindly follow the disciples according to Torvalds/Reeves/Stephenson. That's dangerous because not one of them have contributed anything novel to our society. The latter two are entertainers, and do a decent job of entertaining. The former created a monolithic software company, bankrupted a hardware company, and has a dangerously large ego.
So yes, someone comparing an economic issue to a Stephenson novel has all the intellectual insight of high school girls saying, "this is exactly what Brittany was talking about in her new video."