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contactkarmabank wrote:

The key issue is reaching critical mass, it is quite easy for things that have artifical scarcity today (digital goods) but also at an more tangible level I think the key issue is that the majority of the populace lives in fear of scarcity which propels them to hoard, if such an psychological fear was removed it would free up a ton of resources.

Agreed that a key issue is that people are still thinking in terms of resources being scarce when they aren't or needn't be. This has a psychological effect, as you say and as George Jackson put it in one of his prison letters in Soledad Brother:

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Consider the people's store, after full automation, the implementation of the theory of economic advantage. You dig, no waste makers, nor harnesses on production. There is no intermediary, no money. The store, it stocks everything that the body or home could possibly use. Why won't the people hoard, how is an operation like that possible, how could the storing place keep its stores if its stock (merchandise) is free?Men hoard against want, need, don't they? Aren't they taught that tomorrow holds terror, pile up a surplus against this terror, be greedy and possessive if you want to succeed n this insecure world? Nuts hidden away for tomorrow's Winter.Change the environment, educate the man, he'll change. The people's store will work as long as people know that it will be there, and have in abundance the things they need and want (really want); when they are positive that the common effort has and will always produce an abundance, they won't bother to take home more than they need.Water is free, do people drink more than they need?

He realised that the answer wasn't to fiddle about with real or virtual currencies, but to get rid of money altogether, or, as we would put it, to make money redundant by bringing about the common ownership of resources.

contactkarmabank wrote:

the problem with past socialism was that it was implemented from the top-down rather then the bottom up

I think you are talking about state capitalism, as in the old USSR and under some leftwing governments in the West. That wasn't socialism as it retained classes and class privileges as well as money and production for sale. Real socialism — the common ownership and democratic control of productive resources, production directly for use not profit, and distribution in accordance with the principle "from each their ability, to each their need" — has never been tried yet.

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I wonder if this was the simple (and simplified) point that LBird was trying to make. It's from a lecture on "Some Non-Scientific Observations on the Importance of Darwin"given by Ian Johnston of the Liberal Studies Department of Vancouver Island University in 1998:

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In order to grasp why Darwin's theory was so fundamentally revolutionary, you must understand one intellectual concept: the power and importance of classification systems. As students of biology you are thoroughly familiar with the need for classification, at least within your discipline. But I want you to step back from the discipline for a moment to understand the importance of classification in general.It will be obvious enough to you, as biologists, that you cannot function in this discipline without a comprehensive system of classification. This is especially the case with biology, and has always been a central issue in this part of natural science, simply because in biology, more than in any other science, there is a huge variety of natural phenomena to deal with. But I would argue that systems of classification are essential for all human thought and for the same reasons. Without a classification system of some kind, something which enables us to compartmentalize similar things and to make distinctions between other things, we simply cannot function. Providing us a classification system is the primary function of our education: we learn to classify things in order to make moral distinctions, to establish the hierarchy of goods and goals for our lives, to understand the natural world around us, and in order to function as social beings. How we think is largely determined by how we classify things.The great systems of belief in religion or philosophy or politics are classification systems. Christian belief, for example, encourages me to distinguish between Christians and pagans, between sinners, good people, and saints; a political classification system tells me whom I must or should obey, whom I am responsible for, who owes me allegiance, and who I can ignore. And so on. When I am faced with a problem, I simply cannot begin to analyze it, understand it, and resolve it unless I first have a classification system available for understanding it.The greatest thinkers are not those who come with new answers for old problems. They are the ones who redefine the problem by putting a new classification system on the table. Plato did not solve the problem of how to make people good; but after Plato it was impossible to talk intelligently about good and bad people without bringing knowledge into the discussion. Marx did not solve the social ills of his time; but after Marx it is impossible to discuss social problems without invoking the classification of society into classes based on material wealth. What makes these thinkers revolutionary is that they redirected the discussion and provided a new vocabulary for exploring, understanding, and seeking to resolve human problems.The reason these thinkers focus on classification systems directly is that these systems are never ideologically neutral. The way we organize things into compartments indicates to us an entire network of relationships and hierarchies which are loaded with political and moral value. To take an obvious example. If my moral system requires me to be kind to human beings, then I must attend to what my classification system tells me about who is a human being equal to me. If it indicates, as some have done, that, say, aboriginal people or black people, or the Irish poor are not fully human, then my moral obligations to them are not the same as my obligations to the white middle-class people next door. This may be an extreme example, but it makes the point. And someone who wants me to treat aboriginals, blacks, and the Irish poor as human beings is never going to persuade me until such time as he can overthrow my classification system and replace it with a different one.

The full lecture can be found here,

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http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/aug/29/jim-murphy-scotland-better-together-speaking-tour-suspended-intimidationAre they nasty petty nationalists or petty nasty nationalists?

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Is this what you are on about:http://www.worldkarmaproject.com/about/karma-bank/Or is it something else with a similar name?

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In recent days capitalists in Scotland have been coming out in favour of YES or NO. The split is revealing. It's more or less the same as in the UK over the EU, with smaller capitalist concerns catering for the home market favouring breaking away and bigger concerns producing for export favouring staying. From today's Times:

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Sir Brian Souter, chairman of Stagecoach, Ralph Topping, the former chief executive of William Hill, and Paddy Crerar, the founder of Crerar Hotels, were among those prepared to swing their entrepreneurial weight behind a "yes" vote on September 18.Their push came just a day after 130 influential businessmen, including Douglas Flint, the chairman of HSBC, and Andrew Mackenzie, who runs BHP Billiton, signed a similarly firm No missive to The Scotsman, warning that the case for independence had still not been made.

As someone from Edinburgh University's School of Business explained:

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Professor MacKay said that his research suggested that business attitudes towards independence tended to be dictated by where their customers were primarily located.

So it's buses, hotels and betting shops versus international banks and mining companies. Consumer goods industries v producer goods industries. Big capitalists v smaller capitalists. Marx's Dept I v Dept II. Some choice.Best for workers to abstain and leave the capitalists to settle the matter amongst themselves. 

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Can anyone see why the answer to this clue in Tuesday's Times is Trotsky:

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Solicitor's wrong about island mainly used for political exile.

We appeared to feature in the clues on the previous Thursday:

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Game of Socialist Party completely upset Conservative PM (7)

But why is the answer Balfour? I thought the days of referring to Labour as "the Socialist Party" were long gone.

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undermine cross-border trade union unity

I was thinking that a separate capitalist state in Scotland would make it more likely that a situation would arise as in Ireland after "independence", as described in The Manifesto of the Socialist Party of Ireland (later the World Socialist Party of Ireland) published in 1949:

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Today the Irish Trade Union movement is in a crisis. Two rival Congresses seek to dominate the position. Yet the workers of Ireland are no less solid to-day than they were forty years ago. It is not they  who are divided but the “leaders” ─ men who have allowed personal ambition and private feuds to over-ride all consideration for the working class in general and members of their own Unions in particular.Here is an extract from the Minutes of the Conference of Irish Unions, held at the O'Connell Hall. Dublin, on March 21st, 1945:—"The issue they were there to consider was a simple one; it was whether they would continue to operate under an executive that was dominated by the British Unions. The British Unions would have to go. We know how to talk to one another in Ireland, but we don't know how to talk to British Unions. They are SLIMY."It is not a little difficult to believe that the man who made that statement claims to be a member of the working class. This man forgets (?) that it was the united action of the Irish and British Labour movements which was responsible for the release of the Irish political prisoners on hunger strike in 1920—this man forgets (?) that the Irish workers had the support and backing of British Trade Unionists, as exemplified by the following: A Special Trade Union Congress, held,in London on July 13th, 1920, carried this resolution by a large majority:—"That this Congress protests against the British military domination of Ireland and demands the cessation of the production of munitions destined to be used against Ireland . . . and in case the Government refuses these demands we recommend a general down tools policy, and call on all Trade Unions here represented to carry out this policy, each according to its own constitution by taking a ballot vote of its members or otherwise."In this present clash of personalities and ambitions in the Irish Trade Union movement, however, the Socialist Party of Ireland favours neither side. That is to say, we do not urge the acceptance of either set of Trade Union leaders contending for the dominance of the Trade Union movement. We support and favour all steps taken to unite the workers of Ireland—north and south—in one industrial organisation, in one Trade Union Congress; but that support and favour is not to be understood as support and favour for Trade Union officials who shout loudest for "unity." They may desire unity now—but because their motives are other than the interests of the Irish working class, to-morrow they may commit worse anti-working-class crimes than the one of sundering the Trade Union movement. Unity, yes . . . But unity in the interests of the working class and its struggle against the employing class and capitalism.

In fact, what happened to the working class in Ireland after a separate capitalist state was set up there surely has lessons for workers in Scotland tempted to support setting up one there too.Incidentally, a facsimile of the whole pamphlet can be found here. 

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Yes, the case against voting YES is so overwhelming that I'd almost be tempted to vote NO ! After all, there are some valid reasons for doing so: a YES vote would encourage a nasty petty nationalism, undermine cross-border trade union unity and threaten even more established living standards. It looks as though we are going to have to rely on the common sense of a majority of Scottish workers to avoid this. I'm prepared to stick my neck out and say that I'm confident we can rely on this.

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No, Vin, that's not how it works (or is supposed to work) though I agree that that's probably what many people would do if this system was introduced.If you only plump for one option then you are saying that you couldn't care less and are completely indifferent as to what is chosen if yours is not. If that's is what you really think then that is what you should do. It means leaving the choice to the other voters. If you really hate "World Socialist Party of Great Britain" then you should place it last after expressing all your other dislikes in descending order. Otherwise you are increasing the chances of WSPGB being adopted.It's complicated, I know, with the outcome depending on tactical voting which many voters won't realise but I'm not an afvocate of the system myself.  I'd prefer such multi-option decisions to be left to an elected committee where all the options can be fully discussed — though not, I hasten to add, so controversial an issue as a party's name.

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OK, to enter into the spirit of the thing, I vote:B>C>D>A>E>Fthough actually if we were going to have to make the mistake of changing our full formal name I would vote for World Socialist Party (Britain)

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Before I vote let me see if I have understood the tactics well: if you really don't want something you place them last giving a preference over them to other things you don't want either? In other words, after voting for what you do want you vote for what you don't want in order of least objectionable — even if that's going to mean getting something you don't want?In other words, it's a vote for want you don't want the least? I still can't see how that will not result in the least objectionable option to most people, i.e the most boring or bland one,  or lowest common denominator, getting chosen.

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LBird wrote:

Just good, old fashioned, 'theory and practice produces knowledge'.I simply don't know where to go from here, comrades.

LBird wrote:

Are you seriously saying you don't know the difference between having an unproven 'theory', prior to practice, and 'knowledge' produced by 'theory and practice'?

Is that all you are saying: that when a researcher or an observer ( researches or observes something (A) they are testing "an unproven 'theory'", i.e a hypothesis? And that the outcome of this will be "knowledge" as a confirmed ("true"?) theory? If that's all you are saying then you're not saying anything controversial. But if that is what you are saying I think you need to make the distinction in your formula, eg.Knowledge (C) is produced by a subject ( with a hypothesis (D) observing what happens (A). Or maybe D should be C1 and C C2But isn't this is what is generally accepted (as far as scientific research is concerned, if not epistemology)

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gnome wrote:

A is preferred to B by a majority of voters and B is preferred to C by a majority. However, it is also the case that C is preferred to A by a majority.

This sort of thing seems to be also being discussed on the Philosophy for Communists thread:

LBird wrote:

A+B=C (or, B+A=C)This disagreement needs to be sorted out, or we'll continue to misunderstand what each other is saying.

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Maybe I'm not getting it, but I still say that the person, project or motion getting the most preferences compared with the others will be the one that the least number object to, i.e the lowest common denominator. I haven't done the maths so I'm prepared to be shown that I'm wrong. Better to have "artistic" matters settled by some other method, eg a committee chosen by lot (as in the case of the fascia decision) or by some artists or group of artists on a take it or leave it basis.

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Maybe it would, but I wouldn't want to be on the ballot committee:http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Concordet+methodBut I nominate you.

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