[ExI] Atlas Shrugged

[Darin Sunley]

Marxism isn't a political or economic philosophy, it's an apocalyptic
religion. And not a very well-thought-out one either.

Could you build a political and economic philosophy on Marxism? Sure. Many
have tried.

But Marx wasn't one of them.

On Sat, Apr 30, 2022 at 1:38 PM Darin Sunley <dsunley at gmail.com> wrote:

> Scott Alexander on Singer on Marx:
> https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/13/book-review-singer-on-marx/
>
> "But in fact Marx was philosophically opposed, as a matter of principle,
> to any planning about the structure of communist governments or economies.
> He would come out and say it was irresponsible to talk about how communist
> governments and economies will work. He believed it was a scientific law,
> analogous to the laws of physics, that once capitalism was removed, a
> perfect communist government would form of its own accord. There might be
> some very light planning, a couple of discussions, but these would just be
> epiphenomena of the governing historical laws working themselves out. Just
> as, a dam having been removed, a river will eventually reach the sea
> somehow, so capitalism having been removed society will eventually reach a
> perfect state of freedom and cooperation."
>
> "Singer blames Hegel. Hegel viewed all human history as the World-Spirit
> trying to recognize and incarnate itself. As it overcomes its various
> confusions and false dichotomies, it advances into forms that more
> completely incarnate the World-Spirit and then moves onto the next problem.
> Finally, it ends with the World-Spirit completely incarnated – possibly in
> the form of early 19th century Prussia – and everything is great forever."
>
> "Marx famously exports Hegel’s mysticism into a materialistic version
> where the World-Spirit operates upon class relations rather than the
> interconnectedness of all things, and where you don’t come out and *call* it
> the World-Spirit – but he basically keeps the system intact. So once the
> World-Spirit resolves the dichotomy between Capitalist and Proletariat,
> then it can more completely incarnate itself and move on to the next
> problem. Except that this is the final problem (the proof of this is
> trivial and is left as exercise for the reader) so the World-Spirit becomes
> fully incarnate and everything is great forever. And you want to *plan* for
> how that should happen? Are you saying you know better than the
> World-Spirit, Comrade?"
> " I am starting to think I was previously a little too charitable toward
> Marx. My objections were of the sort “You didn’t really consider the idea
> of welfare capitalism with a social safety net” or “communist society is
> very difficult to implement in principle,” whereas they should have looked
> more like “You are basically just telling us to destroy all of the
> institutions that sustain human civilization and trust that what is
> *basically* a giant planet-sized ghost will make sure everything works
> out.”
>
>
>
> On Sat, Apr 30, 2022 at 6:36 AM spike jones via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> *On Behalf
>> Of *Dan TheBookMan via extropy-chat
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> >…By the way, I would distinguish between Marxism and communism. This
>> doesn’t mean communism as such is workable…
>>
>>
>>
>> Ja.  I put the blame for communism on the communists rather than the
>> starry-eyed writers.  Like any philosophy, communism picks and chooses
>> carefully among the stuff Marx and Engels wrote.  I can mine their writings
>> and find plenty of stuff in there that resembles actual sanity.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> >…Also, I personally would more want to see a society based on Nozick’s
>> slogan: from each as they choose, to each as they are chosen.  Regards, Dan
>>
>>
>>
>> Cool I like it.  We have a system based on that idea, even if it never
>> heard of Nozick: the Boy Scouts of America.  The adult leaders are all
>> volunteers, the boy scout looking for training or advancement goes and
>> finds the people who can help her make it happen, ordinary citizens help
>> fund the organization with donations, lawyers smell the money and
>> voluntarily come after them relentlessly, everything is voluntary, the
>> neediest get what they need, the worthiest help the others and are rewarded
>> with veneration.  Excellent.
>>
>>
>>
>> spike
>> _______________________________________________
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>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
>>
>
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