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Scientists Warn the UN of Capitalism's Imminent Demise (vice.com)
Capitalism as we know it is over, an anonymous reader writes. So suggests a new report commissioned by a group of scientists appointed by the UN Secretary-General. From a report: The main reason? We're transitioning rapidly to a radically different global economy, due to our increasingly unsustainable exploitation of the planet's environmental resources. Climate change and species extinctions are accelerating even as societies are experiencing rising inequality, unemployment, slow economic growth, rising debt levels, and impotent governments. Contrary to the way policymakers usually think about these problems, the new report says that these are not really separate crises at all. Rather, these crises are part of the same fundamental transition to a new era characterized by inefficient fossil fuel production and the escalating costs of climate change. Conventional capitalist economic thinking can no longer explain, predict, or solve the workings of the global economy in this new age, the paper says [PDF].
What kind of scientists are experts on social and government construct, and associated economics? Political scientists?
I hope they wore their white lab coats.
Well, let's take a look...
Paavo Järvensivu - Economic cultural researcher
Tero Toivanen - Political Scientist
Tere Vadén - Philosopher
Ville Lähde - Philosopher and Journalist
Antti Majava - Artist
Jussi T. Eronen - Scientist
So... I guess to answer your specific question, yes, at least some of them are likely applying the scientific method to their research. But I would definitely call this a multi-disciplinary group rather than a group of scientists.
This has never been a good answer because under capitalism the capitalists have been in fact, Greedy, Self-Interested, and Power-Hungry.
Nordic capitalism works pretty well. It's called Social Democracy; people today want to run to Democratic Socialism.
I've extended some of the basics to achieve stronger economic stability and growth with lower taxes. The Nordics use huge social welfare systems as an economic support and a household support; I split those two duties between two specifically-designed systems, with the main economic support being a foundation and the rest built on top. We should be able to provide stronger welfare and social insurances at half the tax rate of the Nordic nations.
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From what? Do you really live in the illusion you get to choose? Did you choose where you were born? Who your parents were/ are? The language you speak first?
Did you choose education you were given?
There are only two rationally sustainable world views on freedom:
1) Freedom exists as a gift , granted to us by a transcendent and absolute truth which is also a will or a being and is the cause of the physical forces and the whole universe as well as all ethical and moral principles.
We are free in as much as we are allowed by that being to choose or reject what is good.
OR
2) freedom is an illusion , all human beings are simply the composite of their environment and genetics absolute truth does not exist ( or is unknowable) and personal desires of a human being no more or less important then those of an ape or an elephant. In which case as pavlov (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Pavlov) was prone to say. "The sooner we get over this idea that free will exists and go about governing the human race, the better off we will all be".
HINT: If something inside you tells you that the second option 'just can't be true' you are right, because the cause of the universe within the first option has made every creature in such a way that experience draws them towards truth. Your desire can be your first piece of evidence in a long discovery of what is true and false. Or try to embrace number 2 fully and feel the utter coldness and meaninglessness of that world view, perhaps then you will realize it is incorrect.
âoeTolerance applies only to persons, but never to truth. Intolerance applies only to truth, but never to persons.
So... Capitalism is the problem...
All of those extremists that said Global Warming was a proxy for Socialist Communist totalitarianism... were right ?
5 out of 6 people enjoy Russian Roulette & 6 out of 7 Dwarfs are not Happy
Actually, your headline is about as accurate as the summary's in that calling them chickens is about as accurate as calling them scientists. The lead author, Paavo Järvensivu, is a independent researcher of economic culture which is not science, the next author is a PhD student in the Department of Political and Economic Studies at Helsinki (again not science), and the next two authors appear to be philosophers only the last author claims to be a scientist.
As usual, the Star Trek replicator "post-scarcity" world believers ignore how to get there the most quickly, which is the freedom to innovate with free market economics, aided by university research.
If capitalism dies, it will be because of its own success in a world of freedom and free people have moved on, and not because some power hungry snot in government decides for it on its own behalf.
Properly speaking, capitalism is a corollary of freedom, in the economic world.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Are you telling me that struggles with climate change, scarcity of natural resources and so on will just vanish into thin air by embracing Socialism or perhaps a Fascist dictatorship, or Communist rule? These issues somehow ONLY cause problems for people living in Capitalist systems?
I think what they are suggesting is that unregulated/ill regulated capitalism is a serious problem because it doesn't act in the best interest of the people. However, socialism is intended to be directed to benefit society.
Do note, fascist dictatorships are not mutually exclusive to capitalistic economies and democracies are not mutually exclusive to social economies.
The majority of innovations in technology that will help the whole planet transition to cleaner forms of energy, and possibly even mitigate some of the climate change issues are being developed in Capitalist America.
I agree. However, the reason for this isn't because "capitalism will solve all the problems!" Instead, it's because a tax will eventually get applied to pollution output and thus there will be an economic incentive to pollute less. Until we use regulation to incentivize reducing and removing pollution from the environment, capitalism will continue to plunder the environment.
Regulation and taxation is the solution, not the problem.
If the American Capitalist system fails, it won't be for any of these reasons. It'll simply be due to our leaders constantly increasing the levels of our national debt, in efforts to extend and expand the role of central government into all sorts of areas it was never originally intended to get that involved with.
It would be more accurate to say it will be due to massively regressive taxation and the ever growing military industrial complex.
The nation only generates so much wealth each year, and it's a recipe for disaster to keep spending more than what's sustainable.
Agreed. If you are going to spend more money than you have then you need to raise taxes. The magical thinking that you can cut taxes and spend more is just absurdism.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Sorry but this is not true by any means. I'm living under the so-called social democracy of Sweden. Which is a joke as our social welfare is based on a lie... a big lie!
It is nothing but a Ponzi-scheme on a country scale and as soon as something goes horribly wrong, as it often does, we only raise taxes to cover the huge holes in the budget. The economy is only working if all current costs including pensions etc are paid through the taxes of the workers and they are getting fewer by the minute. That gives us a tax pressure of about 76%... Yes, 76 cents of every dollar you earn is taken by the state in taxes, direct or indirect. More than 50% of the working population is working for the state. So it is fewer than 25% that has to carry the weight of the whole country. Wonderful? It is foul and nasty!
The state also run our lives completely by first take all your money and then give it back as welfare but only if you are nice and a good citizen that votes for the right party.
So if you fancy a country where free speech is based on the decisions of a "benevolent" state, the whole financial system is run by the state, the school system is in shambles and the healthcare is a joke with people dying in the queues to their hopefully life-saving operations...
Well, if that is your view of a "good" society you can have it. We are sick and tired of it and by the 9th of September, after our general election, we will get rid of this GDR-like state.
As usual, the Star Trek replicator "post-scarcity" world believers ignore how to get there the most quickly, which is the freedom to innovate with free market economics, aided by university research.
If capitalism dies, it will be because of its own success in a world of freedom and free people have moved on, and not because some power hungry snot in government decides for it on its own behalf.
Properly speaking, capitalism is a corollary of freedom, in the economic world.
I dont think anyone disagrees. Free-market capitalism is great. It is a bit like natural selection. You get very robust and successful specimens out of the process.
The problem is that just like natural selection, shit can get a bit out of control. The old animals don't simply move over and let the new animals in. The world has to burn a bit. You get malthusian collapses and periods of starvation. Everything eventually settles down and equilibrium is reached(after a few hundred generations), but it isn't a smooth transition.
Also, just like natural selection, stuff gets completely out of control if you pump unlimited resources into an environment. Imagine you had an aquarium, and you started pumping it full of fish food. The fish aren't simply going to eat until they are full and then allow the other animals to thrive. The larger fish will gourge themselves. Some of them will gourge themselves to death if you aren't careful. They will grow huge. They will still attack all of the smaller fish that they can now fit in their mouth. It won't be because of any need for food, rather it will be a basic predatory instinct. They will use their new size to dominate the fish tank. Even with the unlimited food supply, they will still be attacking all of the other organisms in the aquarium. They will pick the aquarium clean, until you have nothing in the tank but a few massive fish. The massive fish wont even be able to swim.
No one is saying that natural selection/free-market is bad. In fact, it is very good. Evolutionary algorithms are some of the best in the world to solve difficult computer problems. The issue is that they are messy. They are incredibly messy. They will require many generations of destruction to reach equilibrium. That is fine if we are talking about bits of data. It can be a bit more dubious if we are talking about human lives. They also frequently come up with solutions which are very counter-intuitive and downright cruel. Once again, not so bad in some realms. Awful when discussing human beings. The solution to the problem is to keep some hand on the system and make sure that the experiment of the free-market doesn't get too crazy. We don't want 5-year-olds working in mines or people being sold as slaves, both of which are free-market solutions.
You can debate how much 'regulation' you want on that experiment, but don't pretend for a second you want a completely unregulated free market. I can promise you that a world without regulation would be very messy and very ugly. After a few thousand years, it might settle down, but in the meantime many millions of people would suffer. So the real debate is only how tightly you want to rein in the experiment.
Now, as far as a post-scarcity world:
You want to get there more quickly? Why?
We have no idea how to handle that transition and the transition will be ugly as fuck. Lets be honest, we are pretty much already to a post-scarcity world.
Right now, the total energy cost to build a solar power plant is less than the output of the solar power plant. What does that mean?
Hypothetically I could build a 1 MW solar plant, and then exclusively energy from that solar plant over the next 30 years to build a 1.2 MW plant. That would include the mining, refining, fabrication, feeding the workers, harvesting their food, etc.
Unfortunately, the gains are pretty minimal and without an energy market it doesn't quite work out right now. However, we are on the precipice of a world where energy is basically just limited to how muc
You're talking about free trade, which is not the same as capitalism.
From Wikipedia, take it for what you will, "Characteristics central to capitalism include private property, capital accumulation, wage labor, voluntary exchange, a price system, and competitive markets."
There may have been very small scale capitalist like economies in the distant past, but nothing like what we have today which emerged maybe 500 years ago.
Too many people are ignoring history and definitions in order to promote their own definitions of capitalism and socialism in order to label one of them as evil. If it's one thing you'd expect from engineers and which is always lacking on slashdot is precision.
2 to write and 1 to make the docs pretty. What's the problem? You do understand that pol science is hard, right? It's essentially statistics. Same with being an Economic cultural researcher. Again, math.
.com boom? The housing bubble? Regular people made money because there was just plain so much of it. But a lot of that money was real and was due to massive increases in productivity. Manufacturing's doubled in 50 years. Farm yields are through the roof. Did you know those farm yields require oil, and not just to run tractors? We use oil by products to replenish soil so we can grow without waiting for the land to recover.
And it's not even hard to imagine why they're saying all this. Capitalism as we practice it today makes people's lives better by growing faster than the ruling class can monopolize the wealth. Remember the
Their point is we can't keep that up. Climate Change won't let us. We can't "grow ourselves out of a recession" anymore. At some point we're going to need social solutions. That means reigning in what we let the ruling class have/do. It means that the scraps the working class has traditionally been left with, which have been mighty tasty scraps of late, are about to go back to what they used to be; scraps. We either fix that with socialism or we go back to feudalism with kings, queens and knights being the crap out of us peasants.
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