Banking/Monetary Reform

[Birch]

departures from capitalism can't be used as an indictment of capitalism, just doesnt work. that's as bad as using a word to define itself.

This part made my ears prick up. Are there examples of capitalism where there have been no departures? I'm not arguing any specific direction, it's more out of curiosity as to whether it's acceptable for a term to refer to a set of conditions that never actually happen.

[joeblast]

there's always departures. how bad are they, what will they be? hey, just like "departures from" marxism, communism, socialism, have killed however many tens of millions because of its departures...that's why rule of law is stressed because it limits the departures. when the rule of law is usurped, watch out. what if the usurper declares itself the law, what then? grind down and kill those who disagree? the bad perversions of any of these wind up doing that.

Edited April 2, 2013 by joeblast

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

wow.... this world is REALLY sick... departure damage is the domestic equivalent of wartime collateral damage... No excuse.

[joeblast]

I think people accept that there are certain players, having a certain market share, would like to increase that by doing whatever they may to tilt the board in their direction.

 

The politician should have integrity, for he can prevent the perversion - or, he can line his pockets and enable a distortion of the local market.

 

We cant police integrity here. Wrt corps, individuals can vote with their wallet to whatever limited extent, and wrt politicians they can organize and vote the bums out.

 

Often the damage is done though and bad legislation sticks around. But, when its just regulatory stuff, that can more easily be changed because a lot of that is arbitrarily invented and enforced by the government anyway.

 

There's a ton of ways any of these systems can go wrong, and they all start with power bloodlust, loss of integrity, the usage of public places of influence to boost one's own personal wealth or standing. Following the rule of law is almost always the best path forward, although that area gets gray when a government goes Wild and starts thinking its coded books of law are merely suggestions that can be modified to suit whatever direction the government finds itself wanting to go.

[joeblast]

By Ron Paul

The Great Cyprus Bank Robbery

 

The dramatic recent events in Cyprus have highlighted the fundamental weakness in the European banking system and the extreme fragility of fractional reserve banking. Cypriot banks invested heavily in Greek sovereign debt, and last summer's Greek debt restructuring resulted in losses equivalent to more than 25 percent of Cyprus' GDP. These banks then took their bad investments to the government, demanding a bailout from an already beleaguered Cypriot treasury. The government of Cyprus then turned to the European Union (EU) for a bailout.

 

The terms insisted upon by the troika (European Commission, European Central Bank, International Monetary Fund) before funding the bailout were nothing short of highway robbery. While bank depositors have traditionally been protected in the event of bankruptcy or liquidation, the troika insisted that all bank depositors pay a tax of between 6.75 and 10 percent of their total deposits to help fund the bailout.

 

While one can sympathize with EU taxpayers not wanting to fund yet another bailout of a poorly-managed banking system, forcing the Cypriot people to pay for the foolish risks taken by their government and bankers is also criminal. In their desire to punish a “tax haven” catering supposedly to Russian oligarchs, the EU elites ensured that ordinary citizens would suffer just as much as foreign depositors. Imagine the reaction if in September 2008, the US government had financed its $700 billion bank bailout by directly looting American taxpayers' bank accounts!

 

While the Cypriot parliament rejected that first proposal, they will have no say in the final proposal delivered by the EU and IMF: deposits over 100,000 euros are likely to see losses of at least 40 percent and possibly as much as 80 percent. “Temporary” capital controls that were supposed to last for days will now last at least a month and might remain in effect for years.

 

Especially affected have been the elderly, who were unable to use ATMs or to transfer money electronically. Despite the fact that ATMs severely limited the size of withdrawals during the two week-long bank closure, reports indicated that account holders who had access to Cypriot bank branches in London and Athens were able to withdraw most of their funds, leading to speculation that there would be no money available when banks finally opened up again. In other words, the supposed Russian oligarch money may well be already gone.

 

Remember that under a fractional reserve banking system only a small percentage of deposits is kept on hand for dispersal to depositors. The rest of the money is loaned out. Not only are many of the loans made by these banks going bad, but the reserve requirement in Euro-system countries is only one percent! If just one euro out of every hundred is withdrawn from banks, the bank reserves would be completely exhausted and the whole system would collapse. Is it any wonder, then, that the EU fears a major bank run and has shipped billions of euros to Cyprus?

 

The elites in the EU and IMF failed to learn their lesson from the popular backlash to these tax proposals, and have openly talked about using Cyprus as a template for future bank bailouts. This raises the prospect of raids on bank accounts, pension funds, and any investments the government can get its hands on. In other words, no one's money is safe in any financial institution in Europe. Bank runs are now a certainty in future crises, as the people realize that they do not really own the money in their accounts. How long before bureaucrat and banker try that here?

 

Unfortunately, all of this is the predictable result of a fiat paper money system combined with fractional reserve banking. When governments and banks collude to monopolize the monetary system so that they can create money out of thin air, the result is a business cycle that wreaks havoc on the economy. Pyramiding more and more loans on top of a tiny base of money will create an economic house of cards just waiting to collapse. The situation in Cyprus should be both a lesson and a warning to the United States. We need to end the Federal Reserve, stay away from propping up the euro, and return to a sound monetary system.

[Birch]

I think people accept that there are certain players, having a certain market share, would like to increase that by doing whatever they may to tilt the board in their direction.

 

The politician should have integrity, for he can prevent the perversion - or, he can line his pockets and enable a distortion of the local market.

 

We cant police integrity here. Wrt corps, individuals can vote with their wallet to whatever limited extent, and wrt politicians they can organize and vote the bums out.

 

Often the damage is done though and bad legislation sticks around. But, when its just regulatory stuff, that can more easily be changed because a lot of that is arbitrarily invented and enforced by the government anyway.

 

There's a ton of ways any of these systems can go wrong, and they all start with power bloodlust, loss of integrity, the usage of public places of influence to boost one's own personal wealth or standing. Following the rule of law is almost always the best path forward, although that area gets gray when a government goes Wild and starts thinking its coded books of law are merely suggestions that can be modified to suit whatever direction the government finds itself wanting to go.

 

I dunno that it's as clearly articulated as all that JB. I really wanted to be in favour of 'the market' as a self-organizing principle and at one point I imbued it with much more wisdom than now seems warranted but I can't at this point. I'd like a discussion on the time at which 'pure' capitalism was actually in effect.

[JustARandomPanda]

Thought I'd toss in some resources for consideration.

 

The problems outlined in this thread are not going to be fixed imo. The biggest roadblock is not just the corporations but that the average Westerner (and increasingly Easterner) doesn't want to give up his/her way of life.

 

Here are some resources for folks to check out whether one ends up agreeing or disagreeing.

 

Cheers!

 

 

Review of The Principles of Representative Democracy (very good - *not* what you think it's gonna be).

 

 

 

The following are critiques of the current "Right" coming from...the "old" Right!

 

Oakeshott vs America

 

The New Jacobism: America as a Revolutionary State

 

Conservatism in America: Making Sense of the American Right

 

Conservatism Revised: The Revolt Against Ideology

 

 

 

some other stuff:

 

 

Debt: the First 5000 Years - be sure to read Hans D. Despain's review and replies to the ensuing commentary

 

The Great Rebalancing - be sure to read the reviews of Lemas Mitchell and David Merkel

 

Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea - (again...not what you think it might be..this guy really dislikes TBTF banks)

 

The Wealth of Nature: Economics as if Survival Mattered - really like JMG...he is a severe critic of the U.S Supreme Court and it continually permitting the central government over the 20-21st century to usurp the power of the people and local governments. For that matter he also distrusts state governments quite a bit too ...probably because they're miniature versions of the federal government with the same centralizing-of-power mentality. His book covers angles in economics none of the other resources I've listed here do.

 

 

How Social Darwinism Made Modern China: a Thousand Years of Meritocracy Shaped the Middle Kingdom

 

The Rule of the Clan: What an Ancient Social Organization Reveals about the Future of Freedom

 

And a book I want to read asap:

 

Subversive Virtue: Ascetism and Authority in the 2nd-Century Pagan World

 

Saw a thread discussing this book and knew I had to get it. Basically..when a people decide to focus on Self-Refinement of the Senses instead of Self-Gratification of the Senses..there is almost no way for any Elites (whether government, financial or corporate) to control them. That's why Imperial Rome had a bad habit of exiling it's philosophers...they couldn't be controlled and bought-off politically with cheap entertainments and stuff to buy since their entire lifestyle revolved around slowly minimizing the desire for self-gratification and sharing the possibility of inner fulfillment instead with others. If a majority of the U.S. populace adopted this philosophy (which is not unlike Taoism)...the government and corporations would have a hard time maintaining the leviathan control they now have.

 

*****Some Vids*****

 

by Yanis Varoufakis Prof of Economic Theory - University of Athens (4 short vids)

 

 

- He titled his talk "The Death of the Asian Development Model" - fast forward to 12:12 - he gives a good reason for why China may not be the "savior" of the world economic system a lot of people hope for.

 

Documentary - China: The Biggest Domino

 

Michael Harris on

 

Yra Harris on

 

Anarchist-leaning (and critic of modern anthropology) David Graeber on

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

Unfortunately, all of this is the predictable result of a fiat paper money system combined with fractional reserve banking. When governments and banks collude to monopolize the monetary system so that they can create money out of thin air, the result is a business cycle that wreaks havoc on the economy. Pyramiding more and more loans on top of a tiny base of money will create an economic house of cards just waiting to collapse. The situation in Cyprus should be both a lesson and a warning to the United States. We need to end the Federal Reserve, stay away from propping up the euro, and return to a sound monetary system.

 

 

The only way this is feasible is "in person" and in act. talking about it wont do jack squat. the only way we can actualize this topic is to segregate ourselves from the monetary system entirely and live "off the grid" so to speak.

 

I dont see any of us pulling that off successfully without disappearing from the internet entirely and thereby severing any connection the rest of us might have at sharing this same off-grid-lifeway achievement.

[voidisyinyang]

 

 

The only way this is feasible is "in person" and in act. talking about it wont do jack squat. the only way we can actualize this topic is to segregate ourselves from the monetary system entirely and live "off the grid" so to speak.

 

I dont see any of us pulling that off successfully without disappearing from the internet entirely and thereby severing any connection the rest of us might have at sharing this same off-grid-lifeway achievement.

 

I visited the most traditional Berber village in Morocco - so cool -- houses made out of adobe and stacked on top of each other -- with stairs all different sizes to slow down invaders. Composted all their humanure to transform the mountain desert into vegetable and wheat farms. Stone line irrigation ditches from mountain water. Home made clothing from wild sheep that are herded. The Berbers had tatoos on their chins from when the Arabs stole the females - so the arabs would tattoo the female on the chin when she was "used up." So the Berber females just pre-emptively tattooed themselves to keep the Arabs away.

 

So then one truck drove by and all the females raised their fists in the air and yelled at it. The government had just put in a gravel road and so the village had no tolerance for noise and pollution. there was some electricity but just one light bulb for a couple hours a night and that was a brand new thing. They still had "stink bomb" pails hanging from their houses to scare off evil spirits.

 

Trance music galore and fresh food - the young females were not allowed to talk to the males but when they started eyeing each other then the adults would notice and hook them up to get married. haha.

[JustARandomPanda]

Wanted to share one other resource for everyone.

 

Check out this book

 

The Endless Crisis: How Monopoly-Finance Capitalism Produces Stagnation and Upheaval from the U.S.A. to China

 

Be sure to check out Hans Despain's review as it gives a very good summary.

 

 

corresponding YouTube vid by one of the authors

 

 

 

 

*****

Edit:

 

 

 

BTW - Dr. Graeber gives only a partial reason for why corporations began capturing a larger portion of productivity gains than employees. To get another equally important reason of why that began you'd need to read JMG's book The Wealth of Nature. In fact...he is the ONLY resource I've discovered to outline this economic reason of why it began when it did and not sooner.

 

He is also the only person I've seen explain why corporations end up technologizing/A.I.-izing and Outsourcing and it ISN'T because they're greedy thieves (although of course there is plenty of that too). Also...he explains why it's going to INCREASE despite the political and social attempts of the West to stop it. The West's outsourcing and economic decline is a result of the "wealth pump" flows of capital worldwide. It can not help but be so and he shows how the mechanism works and why it makes it very difficult for companies to increase employment and manufacturing when this "wealth pump" system is going on even if they genuinely want to!

 

In short...lots of handwaving and agitprop but nothing will actually get done because the average Developed-World Citizen is into Self-Gratification of the Senses and Ego instead of Self-Refinement...Notice that this Preference for Self-Gratification is just as true of most all of von Hayek/Rothbard-loving Libertarians as it is of most all Leftist Progressives.

 

 

 

p.p.s. To JMG's assessment above I'd add the average Citizen in Developed Countries (and Very-Fast Developing Countries too) the preference for Convenience. That's why petroleum is the Ur-Commodity of all modern economies. It is the commodity that sets the limits upon all others since it is the one that separates what a 'modern' , 'developed' production economy is compared to all prior economy types in history.

 

Are you beginning to see why the U.S. Jacobist-loving Republicans and Democrats and their Capitalist-Corporate Cronies loved the idea of "Nation-Building" in the Middle East? If you've got developed economies where the average citizen's "bread and circuses"-lovin tendencies are getting more crimped by the decade it starts to make political sense to put a claim on the Ur-Resource that can more easily quell potential domestic dissent and anger at the elites in control of the leviathan.

Edited April 2, 2013 by SereneBlue
typos and additional JMG info

[voidisyinyang]

Wanted to share one other resource for everyone.

 

Check out this book

 

The Endless Crisis: How Monopoly-Finance Capitalism Produces Stagnation and Upheaval from the U.S.A. to China

 

Be sure to check out Hans Despain's review as it gives a very good summary.

 

 

corresponding YouTube vid by one of the authors

 

 

 

 

*****

Edit:

 

 

 

BTW - Dr. Graeber gives only a partial reason for why corporations began capturing a larger portion of productivity gains than employees. To get another equally important reason of why that began you'd need to read JMG's book The Wealth of Nature. In fact...he is the ONLY resource I've discovered to outline this economic reason of why it began when it did and not sooner.

 

He is also the only person I've seen explain why corporations end up technologizing/A.I.-izing and Outsourcing and it ISN'T because they're greedy thieves (although of course there is plenty of that too). Also...he explains why it's going to INCREASE despite the political and social attempts of the West to stop it. The West's outsourcing and economic decline is a result of the "wealth pump" flows of capital worldwide. It can not help but be so and he shows how the mechanism works and why it makes it very difficult for companies to increase employment and manufacturing when this "wealth pump" system is going on even if they genuinely want to!

 

In short...lots of handwaving and agitprop but nothing will actually get done because the average Developed-World Citizen is into Self-Gratification of the Senses and Ego instead of Self-Refinement...Notice that this Preference for Self-Gratification is just as true of most all of von Hayek/Rothbard-loving Libertarians as it is of most all Leftist Progressives.

 

 

 

p.p.s. To JMG's assessment above I'd add the average Citizen in Developed Countries (and Very-Fast Developing Countries too) the preference for Convenience. That's why petroleum is the Ur-Commodity of all modern economies. It is the commodity that sets the limits upon all others since it is the one that separates what a 'modern' , 'developed' production economy is compared to all prior economy types in history.

 

Are you beginning to see why the U.S. Jacobist-loving Republicans and Democrats and their Capitalist-Corporate Cronies loved the idea of "Nation-Building" in the Middle East? If you've got developed economies where the average citizen's "bread and circuses"-lovin tendencies are getting more crimped by the decade it starts to make political sense to put a claim on the Ur-Resource that can more easily quell potential domestic dissent and anger at the elites in control of the leviathan.

 

 

Yeah but JMG is not some original thinker on these matters. haha. It's good he's getting his message out but he's still too Western in his thinking.

 

My question is this - can JMG sit in full lotus? haha. Check out Daily Censored -- so I watched a Netflix documentary on the new president of Ecuador being an environmentalist but now it turns out he's a fake environmentalist because he's a socialist-humanist. He still doesn't get it.

 

http://www.dailycensored.com/to-get-the-gold-they-will-have-to-kill-everyone-of-us-ecuador-gives-gold-and-copper-concession-to-china/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Dailycensored+%28Daily+Censored%29

Edited April 3, 2013 by pythagoreanfulllotus

[JustARandomPanda]

Yeah but JMG is not some original thinker on these matters. haha. It's good he's getting his message out but he's still too Western in his thinking.

 

My question is this - can JMG sit in full lotus? haha. Check out Daily Censored -- so I watched a Netflix documentary on the new president of Ecuador being an environmentalist but now it turns out he's a fake environmentalist because he's a socialist-humanist. He still doesn't get it.

 

http://www.dailycensored.com/to-get-the-gold-they-will-have-to-kill-everyone-of-us-ecuador-gives-gold-and-copper-concession-to-china/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Dailycensored+%28Daily+Censored%29

 

Well to respond:

 

1. Sitting in full-lotus (which not everyone can do - I can't even do half-lotus but that doesn't stop me from meditating anyway and I've still managed to see some good results!) - pardon for the digress. Anyway...sitting in full-lotus is part of that whole 'self-refinement' vs self-gratification thing I mentioned earlier. Very few people do it. And most don't see why they'd need to or want to anyway.

 

It's asking the typical Secularist-Spiritual-but-not-Religious-Science-luving citizen to take on faith that there IS such a thing as self-refinement and thus higher states of being a human than what they already know and experience in their everyday lives. In short - to them it sounds suspiciously like propaganda to pacify the growing anger the average middle class technical/creative class strata feels justified in feeling. They don't yet see how their living style and high-paying job is a crucial part of the leviathan that greases the whole system...lose this class and the elites will finally have to reveal their hand...aka brute force "peace keeping"..aka overturning posse comitatas...aka regular media-talking heads denouncing the increasing radicalization and polarization going on in society by [insert bogeyman-of-the-month here].

 

2. It's not required to see things less Western in order to see "Reality Isn't What it Used to Be". I'd say that's actually a diversion although possibly interesting if it gives new ideas and options. All that's required is for people to realize they're finally going to have to give up a lot of things they STILL (even now) see as sacred cows in their very own lives. Everybody is trying to get some other guy/gal to be the one to take the hit and point the finger at instead of realizing they already have power to re-write the rules of the game without 'pre-authorization' from any elites. They always ever did. That's why new methods of social interaction begin whenever calamity hits. People finally wake up from the dream and realize that since the old order is gone even in the midst of suffering there are new ways to begin solving problems in their lives directly.

[voidisyinyang]

Well to respond:

 

1. Sitting in full-lotus (which not everyone can do - I can't even do half-lotus but that doesn't stop me from meditating anyway and I've still managed to see some good results!) - pardon for the digress. Anyway...sitting in full-lotus is part of that whole 'self-refinement' vs self-gratification thing I mentioned earlier. Very few people do it. And most don't see why they'd need to or want to anyway.

 

It's asking the typical Secularist-Spiritual-but-not-Religious-Science-luving citizen to take on faith that there IS such a thing as self-refinement and thus higher states of being a human than what they already know and experience in their everyday lives. In short - to them it sounds suspiciously like propaganda to pacify the growing anger the average middle class technical/creative class strata feels justified in feeling (they don't yet see how their living style and high-paying job is a crucial part of the leviathan that greases the whole system...lose this class and the elites will finally have to reveal their hand...aka brute force "peace keeping"..aka overturning posse comitatas...aka regular media-talking heads denouncing the increasing radicalization and polarization going on in society by [insert bogeyman-of-the-month here]).

 

2. It's not required to see things less Western in order to see "Reality Isn't What it Used to Be". I'd say that's actually a diversion although possibly interesting if it gives new ideas and options. All that's required is for people to realize they're finally going to have to give up a lot of things they STILL (even now) see as sacred cows in their very own lives. Everybody is trying to get some other guy/gal to be the one to take the hit and point the finger at instead of realizing they already have power to re-write the rules of the game without 'pre-authorization' from any elites. They always ever did. That's why new methods of social interaction begin whenever calamity hits. People finally wake up from the dream and realize that since the old order is gone even in the midst of suffering there are new ways to begin solving problems in their lives directly.

 

haha. Sitting in full lotus is not a prescription for someone to do to solve a problem but rather it is an ontological truth.

 

The truth is the yin yang resonance into the Emptiness. So yeah there's other techniques that rely on the yin-yang dynamics into the Emptiness but for those out there claiming to preach the truth -- then they need to demonstrate the direct approach to the yin-yang dynamics to the Emptiness.

 

So there's no point in trying to convince anyone of anything -- be it the middle class or the elite, etc.

 

Zero population growth will happen - no matter what. We can say -- ah but if we consciously try to plan things right then we can lessen the suffering, blah blah.

 

Each individual will do what it wants so what we can do is give them information - share information - but realize that they will reject it -- get mad -- and do probably the opposite of the information. So that reaction has to be taken into account.

 

Basically my goal in life is to stay out of prison and not get butt raped.

 

I know -- I dream big. haha.

 

So on a practical level that means I'm going to have to build up my muscles, get in better shape, learn fighting, etc.

 

But you see that is only the very practical level - it's not the foundation of reality! So that goal is not at the top of my list.

 

The foundation of reality is the Emptiness - so that should be the top of the list. Deep dreamless sleep therefore is my top priority.

 

haha. If I can be consciously aware of my deep dreamless sleep then all the better!

 

People define reality in terms of people and that's the problem -- so John Michael Greer is still trying to "save the planet."

 

Umm - even George Carlin got it better -- and I know you say - no JMG understands how humans need to save themselves and the planet can take care of itself.

 

But this whole "transition to an oil-free world" -- or whatever -- I mean Sweden plans to be oil free by 2020 -- so there you go -- JMG writ large.

 

But face it - 2 billion people already live in an apocalyptic culture that is the outcome of the supposed middle class that gets to decide how best to deal with running out of oil.

 

So no matter how radical JMG thinks he is - it's still a bourgeois humanistic mentality that is Western and dependent on genocidal imperialism.

 

As the middle class disappears -- already everyone is dependent on going to McDonalds because it's the "cheapest" way to get the most calories -- but of course it's not cheap - it's just adjusting the cost to high taxes and the tax money is then given to big Ag which as private corporations then take the tax money to destroy the planet and sell crap food at "cheap" prices.

 

haha. Yeah it's a big scam -- but the whole civilized Mall culture -- drive thrus, etc. -- flying on airplanes. Like my sister actually badgered me when I dropped her at the airport - she wanted to know why I wasn't flying. I said - you know that TSA is really invasive and its against civil liberties - and she says - but that's not going to stop me from flying! As if flying is someone's personal right -- but for me I would want to fly the least possible because of the environmental cost. haha.

 

Humans are not some special animal that can rationally control their future - rational planning is a total joke. The truth of reality is rape and pillage - and "civilization" is a smoke screen.

 

So this whole - "intelligent" planning to a post-oil future - it's a joke because ecology by definition is beyond rational planning. A person needs to take DMT and just merge into Nature and just let go and then they can come back and go - wow I'm just glad to be alive just in the here and now -- because the here and now is really all that exists.

 

I appreciate JMG saying how alternative energy can not replace oil -- that is important to point out. But the idea that there is some rational solution is a joke.

 

Sure there can be some crazy survivalist tribal solution -- like the Berber culture I visited that has existed like that for thousands of years.

 

I know the whole primativist technology thing is cool. For me - I dumpster dived - not as just some individual solution thing but I did it to make it less painful for people to do in the future. I mean - my goal was to make it more socially acceptable because I knew that more and more people would have to rely on dumpster diving. I did dumpster diving to make it a new norm for society.

 

Sure enough that's what happened - I biked out of the city and the crisis got worse and homelessness got worse. My coworker got fired and I saw him on the street and he said he had founded "Homeless Against Homelessness" and they got a new law passed to provide free bus passes to the homeless - available through shelters. So he got fired from some bourgeois middle class "activist" nonprofit which was really dependent on Wall St. Rockefeller environmental.

[JustARandomPanda]

Here's an interesting Op-Ed by JMG that I enjoyed. Certainly gave me things to think about. His book The Wealth of Nature expands upon this essay and much more.

 

 

Lies and Statistics

 

 

Plenty of difficulties stand in the way of making sense of the economic realities we face at the end of the age of cheap abundant energy. Some of those difficulties are inevitable, to be sure. Our methods of producing goods and services are orders of magnitude more complex than those of previous civilizations, for example, and our economy relies on treating borrowing as wealth to an extent no other society has been harebrained enough to try before; these and other differences make the task of tracing the economic dimensions of the long road of decline and fall ahead of us unavoidably more difficult than they otherwise would be.

Still, there are other sources of difficulty that are entirely voluntary, and I want to talk about some of those self-inflicted blind spots just now. An economy is a system for exchanging goods and services, with all the irreducible variability that this involves. How many potatoes are equal in value to one haircut, for example, depends a good deal on the fact that no two potatoes and no two haircuts are exactly the same, and no two people can be counted on to place quite the same value on either one. Economics, however, is mostly about numbers that measure, in abstract terms, the exchange of potatoes and haircuts (and everything else, of course).

Economists rely implicitly on the claim that those numbers have some meaningful relationship with what’s actually going on when potato farmers get their hair cut and hairdressers order potato salad for lunch. As with any abstraction, a lot gets lost in the process, and sometimes what gets left out proves to be important enough to render the abstraction hopelessly misleading. That risk is hardwired into any process of mathematical modeling, of course, but there are at least two factors that can make it much worse.

The first, of course, is that the numbers can be deliberately juggled to support some agenda that has nothing to do with accurate portrayal of the underlying reality. The second, subtler and even more misleading, is that the presuppositions underlying the model can shape the choice of what’s measured in ways that suppress what’s actually going on in the underlying reality. Combine these two and what you get might best be described as speculative fiction mislabeled as useful data – and the combination of these two is exactly what has happened to the statistics on which too many contemporary economic and political decisions are based.

I suspect most people are aware by now that there’s something seriously askew with the economic statistics cited by government officials and media pundits. Recent rhetoric about “green shoots of recovery” is a case in point. In recent months, I’ve checked in with friends across the US, and nobody seems to be seeing even the slightest suggestion of an upturn in their own businesses or regions. Quite the contrary; all the anecdotal evidence suggests that the Great Recession is tightening its grip on the country as autumn closes in.

There’s a reason for the gap between these reports and the statistics. For decades now, the US government has systematically tinkered with economic figures to make unemployment look lower, inflation milder, and the country more prosperous. The tinkerings in question are perhaps the most enthusiastically bipartisan program in recent memory, encouraged by administrations and congresspeople from both sides of the aisle, and for good reason; life is easier for politicians of every stripe if they can claim to have made the economy work better. As Bernard Gross predicted back in the 1970s, economic indicators have been turned into “economic vindicators” that subordinate information content to public relations gimmickry. These manipulations haven’t been particularly secret, either;visit www.shadowstats.com and you can get the details, along with a nice set of statistics calculated the way the same numbers were done before massaging the figures turned into cosmetic surgery on a scale that would have made the late Michael Jackson gulp in disbelief.

These dubious habits have been duly pilloried in the blogosphere. Still, I'm not at all sure they are as misleading as the second set of distortions I want to discuss. When unemployment figures hold steady or sink modestly, but you and everyone you know are out of a job, it's at least obvious that something has gone haywire. Far more subtle, because less noticeable, are the biases that creep in because people are watching the wrong set of numbers entirely.

Consider the fuss made in economic circles about productivity. When productivity goes up, politicians and executives preen themselves; when it goes down, or even when it doesn't increase as fast as current theory says it ought, the cry goes up for more government largesse to get it rising again. Everyone wants the economy to be more productive, right? The devil, though, has his usual residence among the details, because the statistic used to measure productivity doesn't actually measure how productive the economy is.

Check out A Concise Guide to Macroeconomics by Harvard Business School professor David A. Moss: "The word [productivity] is commonly used as a shorthand for labor productivity, defined as output per worker hour (or, in some cases, as output per worker)." Output, here as always, is measured in dollars – usually, though not always, corrected for inflation – so what "productivity" means in practice is dollars of income per worker hour. Are there ways for a business to cut down on the employee hours per dollar of income without actually becoming more productive in any more meaningful sense? Of course, and most of them have been aggressively pursued in the hope of parading the magic number of a productivity increase before stockholders and the public.

Perhaps the simplest way to increase productivity along these lines is to change over from products that require high inputs of labor per dollar of value to those that require less. As a very rough generalization, manufacturing goods requires more labor input overall than providing services, and the biggest payoff per worker hour of all is in financial services – how much labor does it take, for example, to produce a credit swap with a theoretical value of ten million dollars? An economy that produces more credit swaps and fewer potatoes is in almost any real sense less productive, since the only value credit swaps have is that they can, under certain arbitrary conditions, be converted into funds that can buy concrete goods and services, such as potatoes; by the standards of productivity universal in the industrial world these days, however, replacing potato farmers with whatever you call the people who manufacture credit swaps (other than "bunco artists," that is) counts as an increase in productivity. I suspect this is one reason why the US auto industry got so heavily into finance in the run-up to the recent crash; GMAC's soaring productivity, measured in terms of criminally negligent loans per broker hour, probably did a lot to mask the anemic productivity gains available from the old-fashioned business of making cars.

As important as the misinformation generated by such arbitrary statistical constructs is the void that results because other, arguably more important figures are not being collected at all. In an age that will increasingly be constrained by energy limits, for example, a more useful measure of productivity might be energy productivity – that is, output per barrel of oil equivalent (BOE) of energy consumed. An economy that produces more value with less energy input is arguably an economy better suited to the downslope of Hubbert's peak, and the relative position of different nations, to say nothing of the trendline of their energy productivity over time, would provide useful information to governments, investors, and the general public alike. For all I know, somebody already calculates this figure, but I'm still waiting to see a politician or an executive crowing over the fact that the country now produces 2% more output per unit of energy.

Now it's true that a simplistic measurement of energy productivity would still make the production of credit swaps look like a better deal. This is one of the many places where the distinction already made in these essays between primary, secondary, and tertiary economies becomes crucial. To recap, the primary economy is nature itself, or specifically the natural processes that provide the human economy with about 3/4 of its total value; the secondary economy is the application of human labor to the production of goods and services; and the tertiary economy is the exchange of abstract units of value, such as money and credit, which serve to regulate the distribution of the goods and services produced by the secondary economy.

The economic statistics used today ignore the primary economy completely, measure the secondary economy purely in terms of the tertiary – calculating production in dollars, say, rather than potatoes and haircuts – and focus obsessively on the tertiary. This fixation means that if an economic policy boosts the tertiary economy, it looks like a good thing, even if that policy does actual harm to the secondary or the primary economies, as it very often does these days. Thus the choice of statistics to track isn't a neutral factor, or a simple one; if it echoes inaccurate presuppositions – for example, the fantasy that the human economy is independent of nature – it can feed those presuppositions right back in as a distorting factor into every economic decision we make.

How might this be corrected? One useful option, it seems to me, is to divide up several of the most important economic statistics into primary, secondary, and tertiary factors. (Of course the first step is to get honest numbers in the first place; governments aren't going to do this any time soon, for obvious reasons, but there's no reason why people and organizations outside of government can't make a start.) Consider, as a good example, what might be done with the gross domestic product.

To start with, it's probably a good idea to consider going back to the gross national product; this was quietly dropped in favor of the current measure some years back, because it puts a politically uncomfortable spotlight on America's economic dependence on the rest of the world. Whichever way that decision goes, the statisticians of some imaginary Bureau of Honest Figures might sort things out something like this:

The gross primary product or GPP might be the value of all unprocessed natural products at the moment they enter the economy – oil as it reaches the wellhead, coal as it leaves the mine, grain as it tumbles into the silo, and so on – minus all the costs incurred in drilling, mining, growing, and so on. (Those belong to the secondary economy.)

The gross secondary product or GSP might be the value of all goods and services in the economy, except for raw materials from nature and financial goods and services.

The gross tertiary product or GTP might be the value of all financial goods and services, and all money or money equivalents, produced by the economy.

The value of having these three separate numbers, instead of one gross domestic (or national) product, is that they can be compared to one another, and their shifts relative to one another can be tracked. If the GTP balloons and the other two products stay flat or decline, for example, that doesn't mean the country is getting wealthier; it means that the tertiary economy is inflating, and needs to have some air let out of it before it pops. If the GSP increases while the GPP stays flat, and the cost of extracting natural resources isn't soaring out of sight, then the economy is becoming more efficient at using natural resources, in which case the politicians and executives have good reason to preen themselves in public. Other relative shifts have other messages.

The point that has to be grasped, in this as in so many other contexts, is that the three economies, and the three kinds of wealth they produce, are not interchangeable. Trillions of dollars in credit swaps and derivatives will not keep people from starving in the streets if there's no food being grown and no housing being built, or maintained, or offered for sale or rent. The primary economy is fundamental to survival; the secondary economy is the source of real wealth; the tertiary economy is simply a way of measuring wealth and managing its distribution; and treating these three very different things as though they are one and the same makes rank economic folly almost impossible to avoid.

Now it deserves to be said that the chance that any such statistical scheme will be adopted in the United States under current political and social arrangements is effectively nonexistent. Far too many sacred cows would have to be put out to pasture or rounded up for slaughter first. Still, current political and social arrangements may turn out to be a good deal less permanent than they sometimes seem. What might replace them, here and elsewhere, is a topic I plan on exploring in a future essay here.

[JustARandomPanda]

So there's no point in trying to convince anyone of anything -- be it the middle class or the elite, etc.

 

 

If you really believe that PFL then why were you an activist and why are you in this thread posting anti-corporate/anti-finance messages at all?

[JustARandomPanda]

thought I'd post this guy's review of The Principles of Representative Government

 

 

It is a telling sign of the ignorance across the USA and elsewhere that there is no other review of this book, a book that was brought to my attention recently when I made it known that I was beginning to question the US Constitution's sanctity, having already concluded that the USA is as Matt Taibbi puts it so well in Griftopia: A Story of Bankers, Politicians, and the Most Audacious Power Grab in American History, a merger between criminal corrupt complicit government and criminal corrupt financial gangs whose crimes are either legalized or ignored ("control fraud").

I find it very sad that I had to reach the age of 60 and have several years of unemployment on top of my life experience and multiple graduate degrees before I could ingest the reality that the USA is a democracy but that this does not mean popular self-rule, nor did the Founding Fathers every intend for it to be a direct democracy. The USA is a republic of, by, and for the wealthy, and I consider it quite timely and helpful that this book may be making a comeback in the consciousness of the avant guarde that always sets the stage for a revolution--and I do believe a revolution is coming in the USA.

The author makes it clear from page one that democracy as conceived by the Founding Fathers is an ALTERNATIVE to popular self rule, what one author calls Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems. He writes in a very measured academic manner, but I cannot help equating democracy with a shell game -- the Founding Fathers persuaded the public that the "consent of the governed" conveyed authority and legitimacy to what was in essence a government, of, by, and for the wealthy.

The book ends as it begins, outlining how "democracy" today comes in three flavors, parliamentarianism, party democracy, and audience democracy. On the latter two I cannot help but think of Grand Illusion: The Myth of Voter Choice in a Two-Party Tyranny and Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq.

Early on the author cites Rousseau's distinction between a free people makings its own laws, and a people electing representatives to make laws for it. Later in the book the author points out that once an elite is elected to make laws, they will never overturn laws that favor them. Witness the nine times a bill has been submitted to the US two-party Congress to put all accredited national parties on all state ballots and all debates (for federal elections). Nine times the two-party tyranny has refused to do the right thing and the public has not noticed.

QUOTE (8): Representative government gives no institutional role to the assembled people. That is what distinguishes it from the democracy of the ancient city-states.

He draws on and cites with admirmation the work of M. H. Hansen, The Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes: Structure, Principles, and Ideology and this is the start of a very lengthy and fascinating section on how important "lots" were, with the caveat that citizens first had to volunteer to be among the chosen, and then the lots would be dsrawn.

Early on he points out that the core principle for maintaining INTEGRITY is ROTATION -- regular rotation of average citizens, with a constant deep distrust of "political professionalism."

Where Athens was the role model for direct democracy, Rome is the role model for indirect democracy, with a mixed government, multiple classes of citizens and voters.

As someone who has read and reviewed many books on collective intelligence, wisdom of the crowds, etcetera, I am interested to learn that Rousseau specifically had no confidence in the average citizen, and also did not conceptualize the potential of the aggregate being wiser than any expert--David Weinberger makes this point nicely in his most recent book, Too Big to Know: Rethinking Knowledge Now That the Facts Aren't the Facts, Experts Are Everywhere, and the Smartest Person in the Room Is the Room.

The middle portion of the book reviews elections and the philosophy of elections across history and the author's conclusion is clear: elections are a means of creating an aristocracy, NOT of meeting the needs of the public for an efficient form of self-governance.

The author returns to the lot in a discussion of how important it is that the rulers and the ruled be "like" one another. A very fine discussion of US sources makes it clear that the Founding Fathers, including the anti-Federalists, were committed to creating a government process that was of, by, and for the wealthy, going no lower that the middle professionals in the right to vote.

The anti-Federalists made two signal contributions: first, in objecting to the small size of the House of Representatives, and insisting that districts had to be smaller to provide for a better ratio of elected and electors; and second, that any process that created distance between the elected and the electors, that resulted in electing individual who are not "like" their constituents, was flawed.

The author suggests that insufficient attention has been paid to the anti-Federalists, and this indicates to me there is at least one great PhD thesis topic waiting to be developed.

QUOTE (129): From the very beginning, it was clear that in America representative government would not be based on resemblance and proximity between representatives and represented.

As the book draws to a conclusion, the author examines the role of wealth in winning elections, and observes that when wealth confers an advantage toward selection or election, then wealth confers power in and of itself.

The conclusion includes a discussion of the First Amendment, and the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. Occupy blew it in my view, they had a chance to flip the entire Congress by demanding the Electoral Reform Act of 2012 (disclosure: I was accepted by the Reform Party as a candidate, and ran briefly to explore the possibilities).

The author distinguishes at the end as at the beginning between parliamentarianism, party democracy (as in two-party tyranny), and audience democracy (as in sheeple).

I turned 60 this year. I never in my lifetime to this date thought I would ever question the sanctity and validity of the US Constitution, but this book puts me in that place. Of course I will continue to defend the Constitution against all enemies domestic and foreign (including bureaucrats who confuse loyalty to the chain of command with integrity in serving the public interest) but it is now clear to me that the US Constitution does NOT meet the needs of the public because we have created a political class that is so corrupt as to be an enemy of the public interest.

Among the ideas that I brought together from others for my brief presidential campaign were these: Electoral Reform Act of 2012; end to all income taxes, substituting the Automated Payment Transaction Tax on everything including stock and currency trades (explodes the pie, reduces to nothing the burden on the individual and small business); a coalition cabinet announced in advance; a balanced budget announced in advance; and a national jobs act that would assure every veteran and then every unemployed person of a 21st Century job with one year of paid training.

Other books that support this book include:
Empowering Public Wisdom: A Practical Vision of Citizen-Led Politics (Manifesto Series)
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
Escaping the Matrix: How We the People can change the world
Voice of the People: The Transpartisan Imperative in American Life

 

 

Also wanted to mention that there actually was some truth imo to the charge during the 2nd Bush Administration of it being influenced by Straussian ideas on regime-building [bush's "lets make the world safe for democracy" for example] and foreign policy (Strauss and his disciples are big believers in regime-change and regime-building). I've been looking into that too.

 

The most interesting thing being that Leo Strauss didn't realize that the kind of elite-philosopher types he kept saying modern societies need to return to for grounding their morals (instead of relativism, materialism and nihilism) was not the kind of 'philosopher king' Plato was talking about. That is - Leo's "philosopher king" was not the same "philosopher king" Plato was talking about. I guess he wasn't aware of Sanskrit, Pali and Ancient Chinese and so didn't realize that Plato's philosophy of Forms was very similar to what is taught in Eastern Spiritual traditions.

 

You have to be able to have attained Samadhi to get to the level Plato is talking about.

 

In short - Plato's philosophy of Forms corresponds to the first 4 jhanas (the next 5 corresponding to the formless jhanas). So Plato recommending that the ideal society being governed by 'philosopher kings' would mean being governed by people who had all attained the virtue and realizations of the Buddha or Lao Tzu. These are the only kind of people genuinely qualified to be fit to rule according to Plato. Something Leo Strauss (and his most famous disciple Alan Bloom) never knew about. Buddhism also talks about the idea of Forms for example (it also goes on to talk about the formless too which is even higher).

 

Plato was a mystic advocating the best rulers (and Corporate Executives in this day and age) are people on the same level as Lao Tzu, the Buddha and Jesus Christ. If only...

[voidisyinyang]

 

If you really believe that PFL then why were you an activist and why are you in this thread posting anti-corporate/anti-finance messages at all?

 

haha! You fell into my trap! haha. The reason I devoted my life to environmental activist was because I had no choice! Mother Earth is in charge. It doesn't matter if no one does nothing! Mother Nature will take revenge. I told that to one of my bosses at the environmental nonprofit I worked at. haha. So I try to be an environmentalist - compost my urine, etc. -- because I have no choice about it -- it's not based on some ideology but because of the law of physics. I told my niece that -- when she could have composted some food -- I said -- ah it doesn't matter because we will all be recycled anyway by Mother Nature. haha.

 

So yeah -- like I've posted before we can't change people's political views with words -- because political views are hard-wired by the time of puberty.

 

And so these issues are structural -- we look at the thrust of western civilization -- and also at the history of ecology - humans are no different than any other dominant species on earth except that we are catastrophic to the homoestasis of ecology. Even the concept of a steady-state system is considered debunked by "sophisticated" scientists using chaos supercomputers -- but as Strogatz says the computers are in control - it is not rational math. But guess what? It never was rational math! haha. It's just that now that is more obvious that it is not rational.

[JustARandomPanda]

Not sure I agree with you completely PFL although I see where you are coming from. But it still comes across to me as a position of 'what-the-hell-ever' and someone else can and will do differently. Actually most will. Your niece's answer was right in light of your own professed truth-'realization'.

 

Master Nan Huai-Chin was talking about one of the Buddha's suttas on this. The Buddha said some Karma is like a big fiery wheel (the karma of nations is often like this) and to stand against it or try to do anything about it merely feeds the fiery wheel to make it bigger and it will eventually mow you down.

 

But as Master Nan pointed out the end result of people buying into such a 'trap' as yours (which is the same as the Buddha's - you just use the word Mother Nature where the Buddha used the word Karma) is that people will stand on the sidelines with their hands in their pockets doing nothing all the while they're bemoaning the fate of all living things.

 

I (and Master Nan too) like the Confucian teaching better - history is in the hands of humans.

[voidisyinyang]

thought I'd post this guy's review of The Principles of Representative Government

 

 

 

 

Also wanted to mention that there actually was some truth imo to the charge during the 2nd Bush Administration of it being influenced by Straussian ideas on regime-building [bush's "lets make the world safe for democracy" for example] and foreign policy (Strauss and his disciples are big believers in regime-change and regime-building.). I've been looking into that too.

 

The most interesting thing being that Leo Strauss didn't realize that the kind of elite-philosopher types he kept saying modern societies need to return to for grounding their morals (instead of relativism, materialism and nihilism) was not the kind of 'philosopher king' Plato was talking about. That is - Leo's "philosopher king" was not the same "philosopher king" Plato was talking about. I guess he wasn't aware of Sanskrit, Pali and Ancient Chinese and so didn't realize that Plato's philosophy of Forms was very similar to what is taught in Eastern Spiritual traditions.

 

You have to be able to have attained Samadhi to get to the level Plato is talking about.

 

In short - Plato's philosophy of Forms corresponds to the first 4 jhanas (the next 5 corresponding to the formless jhanas). So Plato recommending that the ideal society being governed by 'philosopher kings' would mean being governed by people who had all attained the virtue and realizations of the Buddha or Lao Tzu. These are the only kind of people genuinely qualified to be fit to rule according to Plato. Something Leo Strauss (and his most famous disciple Alan Bloom) never knew about. Buddhism also talks about the idea of Forms for example (it also goes on to talk about the formless too which is even higher).

 

Plato was a mystic advocating the best rulers (and Corporate Executives in this day and age) are people on the same level as Lao Tzu, the Buddha and Jesus Christ. If only...

 

 

That sounds like Bodri's take on Plato - I read Bodri's book on Socrates Enlightenment which I thought was good - but Plato himself was promoting fake democracy -- and not based on real enlightenment philosophy.

 

This is because what this whole Political economy debate neglects is something very simple and yet very radical - the logarithmic mathematics was the key foundation to justifying the exponential differential of wealth distribution.

 

I already quoted the Michael Hudson expose of this -- and this is just too radical for even John Michael Greer to acknowledge!

 

The primitivist cultures are not some "add-on" to Western high -tech goodies but the primativist cultures are before Western logarithmic-based geometry used to mass produce the continued imperialist logarithmic extraction process. So Plato says - and I document this in my book, Plato says each citizen must be "compromised for the good of the state." So much for your claim about Plato pushing some meditation philosophers. haha. The "compromise" is defined by number ratios - each citizen is valued at 9/8 which is the major tone music interval and it must be compromised to create a logarithmic-based scale of justice -- and this is the foundation for logarithmic geometry.

 

So the bourgeois environmental scene is not thinking deep enough! It is not radical enough.

 

Democracy - even populist democracy of "equal" vote ignores the truth of male-female complementary opposite dynamics which should define human culture as is the case for the Bushmen culture or the traditional Mayan village culture - or any matrifocal culture.

 

So anyway -- I have documented all this but I am not out there trying to promote it -- trying to "sell" a book -- because again this is just physical truth of reality -- it is ontological. As Dr. Albert Bartlett says - zero growth population will happen.

 

So sure I respect the JMG followers to try to break out of the system but unless they understand that even some equal vote democracy system is still tied to a logarithmic exponential wealth system -- due to the mathematics of the production of technology! So if that is not accepted and understood - I called it the "surplus value of consciousness" -- because it spreads through repressed sexual energy that then projects consciousness as an externality of oppressive relations -- even though real consciousness is Emptiness that is not based on any ideology of evolution. The destruction of ecology and social justice spreads through the "tantric trajectory of technology."

 

As Ramana Maharshi said - there is no evolution. Real reality is outside of spacetime.

[voidisyinyang]

Oh yeah and the WEstern music is then mass mind control since it's based on these logarithmic ratios that underlie the repressed sexual energy that limits trance healing -- and promotes the patriarchial ejaculation addiction that is behind the Oedipal Complex creating the Edifice Complex.....

 

So that each citizen is "compromised" for the good of the state starts with the Western music brain washing and is formalized by 10th grade mathematics.

[JustARandomPanda]

I didn't get that from Bill Bodhri. Had no idea he even talked about it.

 

I got that from myself and from beginning to study what Plato actually said and how he was influenced by Pythagorus and others. I still say Plato was a mystic and his conception of 'the good of the state' was influenced by meditation-derived realizations of the necessity of virtue. According to Plato if that meant a lot people were denied the right to vote so be it (and judging from the low voter turnout in most Western Democracies most people wouldn't actually miss it in actual practice).

 

Plato wasn't promoting democracy at all. He was showing why democracy is inherently unstable and non-virtuous because it replaces people who have awareness of Prajna wisdom and Bodhicitta with the idea of number being the determinant of what's in the best interests of the state or people. High Virtuous Wisdom doesn't rule-the-day but rather just what's popular at that particular moment with that particular crowd which almost always involves some kind of self-gratification (hence all the special interest groups crowding around the taxpayer trough demanding their share of the pork).

 

And JMG is not always going on about being pro ' increases in production'. He actually thinks that's madness as there's no such thing in nature as "sustainable growth' and has written extensively about it. It's a total oxymoron and he outlines why that's so and why that also translates inevitably into economic instabilities over the long haul.

[voidisyinyang]

I didn't get that from Bill Bodhri. Had no idea he even talked about it.

 

I got that from myself and from beginning to study what Plato actually said and how he was influenced by Pythagorus and others. I still say Plato was a mystic and his conception of 'the good of the state' was influenced by meditation-derived realizations of the necessity of virtue. According to Plato if that meant a lot people were denied the right to vote so be it (and judging from the low voter turnout in most Western Democracies most people wouldn't actually miss it in actual practice).

 

Plato wasn't promoting democracy at all. He was showing why democracy is inherently unstable and non-virtuous because it replaces people who have awareness of Prajna wisdom and Bodhicitta with the idea of number being the determinant of what's in the best interests of the state or people. High Virtuous Wisdom doesn't rule-the-day but rather just what's popular at that particular moment with that particular crowd which almost always involves some kind of self-gratification (hence all the special interest groups crowding around the taxpayer trough demanding their share of the pork).

 

And JMG is not always going on about being pro ' increases in production'. He actually thinks that's madness as there's no such thing in nature as "sustainable growth' and has written extensively about it. It's a total oxymoron and he outlines why that's so and why that also translates inevitably into economic instabilities over the long haul.

 

 

yeah - the people who were promoting democracy was fake -- so democracy is defined in the context of Plato -- who was also promoting eugenics also - which comes out of number ratios too. I'll pull the quotes for you.

 

 

“Since 9 actually reduces to a wholetone of 9/8, its cube will reduce to (9/8)³ = 729/512, a Pythagorean approximation to the square root

of two, a problem which fascinated Socrates in the marriage allegory.”

 

Ernest McClain, The Pythagorean Plato: Prelude to the Song Itself (Nicholas-Hays, 1978), p. 36 Dr. Sherry

Ortner also makes the argument about how men essentially became property of the City-State in early civilization

through monogamous marriage. Sexual Meanings: the cultural construction of gender and sexuality (Cambridge U

Press, 1981).

 

 

The necessity of tempering pure intervals, defined by the ratio of integers, is one of the great themes of Plato’s Republic. In his allegorical form, “citizens” modeled on the tones of the scale must not demand “exactly what they are owed” but must keep in mind “what is best for the city.”

 

Ernest McClain, The Myth of Invariance: The origins of the Gods, Mathematics and Music, from the

Rg Veda to Plato (Nicholas-Hays, 1976), p. 11. Professor Michael Hudson concurs: “The worst problem

in tuning occurs in the interval of three whole tones, e.g., between C and F#/Gb in the “natural”

untempered methods of tuning. If the ratio of the octave is 2:1, then the ratio of C to F# represents the

square root of two — an irrational number. (Burkert [1972:441] notes that the harmonic mean discovered in

the context of Pythagorean music theory has a major use precisely in approximating the square root.)”

Michael Hudson’s essay, “Music as an Analogy for Economic Order in Classical Antiquity” in Jürgen

Backhaus (ed.), Karl Bücher. Theory, History, Anthropology, Non-Market Economies (Marburg:Metropolis

Verlag, 2000): pp. 113-35 citing Burkert, Walter (1972), Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism

(Harvard University Press, 1972).

 

Not just the content but the form of Plato’s writings were also secretly Pythagorean: “The twelve-part structure

of the dialogues detected above together with the prominence of the number twelve in Greek music theory suggests

that the stichometric structure of the dialogue is a musical scale. Plato used this musical scale as an outline, pegging

key concepts and turns in the argument to steps in the scale.” John B. Kennedy, “Plato’s Forms, Pythagorean

Mathematics, and Stichometry,” Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science, 2010, p. 17.

 

 

Pythagoras became the patron saint of the most anti-democratic clubs. They used the principles of musical harmony as a patina of pseudo-science to give intellectual legitimacy to a movement whose worldly consequences were anything but harmonious. The Pythagorean clubs became a network of civic cults rising above the local sphere to which most clubs related. There seems to have been some connection with the Delphi temple (the name Pythagoras means “voice of Pythia,” the snake-goddess of Delphi and its oracle). They have been likened to

the Free Masons, in that they served as a kind of Council of Foreign Relations or New World Order…. Archytas developed the musical scale into a political metaphor for the scales of justice. What gave music this imagery of social balance and just proportion was the ability of its mathematics of harmonic (“geometric”) proportions to serve as an analogy for how inequities of wealth and status rendered truly superior men equal in proportion to their virtue — which tended to reflect their wealth. By this circular logic the wealthy were enabled to rationalize

their hereditary dominance over the rest of the population.

 

Professor Michael Hudson’s essay, “Music as an Analogy for Economic Order in Classical

Antiquity” in Jürgen Backhaus (ed.), Karl Bücher. Theory, History, Anthropology, Non-Market Economies

(Marburg:Metropolis Verlag, 2000): pp. 113-35

Edited April 3, 2013 by pythagoreanfulllotus

[voidisyinyang]

Plato promoted compromising the citizens by squaring ratios as proper eugenic breeding of the population – the so-called “nuptial numbers.”

 

By applying this new Greek Miracle of sacred irrational geometry to the population, Plato combined the law, technology, and religion as economics, which was then applied by Archtyas, the quasi-Pythagorean military-engineer collaborator with Plato. Although Plato recommending the combination of music and gymnastics to harmonize the soul with the body
and mind, ultimately the musical training was rejected for the realm of colder reason:

 

 

Having discarded music and gymnastics, Socrates proposes considering the science of “number and calculation” (522C6-7)…. The link between the correct use of mathematics and the capacity of this discipline to lead to an extrasensible dimension recalls the link between the correct use of the science of harmony (of music in general) and the potential of this art to establish a contact with the soul and supersensible harmony.

Francesco Pelosi, Plato on Music, Soul and Body (Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 118

 

This new focus on music as a justification for cold calculating reason and empire is also the point of Professor Michael Hudson’s essay, “Music as an Analogy for Economic Order in Classical Antiquity” in Jürgen Backhaus (ed.), Karl Bücher. Theory, History, Anthropology, Non-Market Economies (Marburg:Metropolis Verlag, 2000): pp. 113-35:

 

 

A contemporary preoccupation with Plato’s Timaeus has brought to the fore a logic of production that is bound to the discussion in the dialogue of ‘chora.’ That production can be reformulated in terms of what could be described as the specific logic of ‘chora’....The logic of chora means that the nature of the distinction between production and what is produced must be more than opposites. And yet, while complicated, what is at work here is the necessary impossibility of the inscription — in whatever form — of the founding moment
within that which it founds.

 

Politics, Metaphysics, and Death: essays on Giorgio Agemben’s Homo Sacer (Duke University Press, 2005) The essay in question is “Spacing as the Shared: Heraclitus, Pindar and Agamben.”

 

The necessity of tempering the pure intervals, defined by the ratios of integers, is one of the great themes of Plato's Republic. In his allegorical form, “citizens” modelled on the tones of the scale must not demand “exactly what they are owed,” but must keep in mind “what is best for the city.”

 

Ernest McClain, The Myth of Invariance: The Origins of the Gods, Mathematics and Music from the Rig Veda
to Plato (Nicolas-Hays, Inc., 1976), p. 11.

 

...irreconcilable systems, be they of suns and planets, of even octaves (powers of 2), and odd fifths (powers of 3), or of divergent members of a res publica – must be coordinated as an alternative to chaos. What the demiourgos has shown to be
possible in the heavens, what the musicians have shown to be possible with tones, the philosopher should learn to make possible in the life political. Limitation, preferable self-limitation, is one of Plato's foremost concerns.

 

Ernest McClain, The Pythagorean Plato: Prelude to the Song Itself (Nicolas-Hays, Inc., 1978), p. 14.

 

Along with “alogon” or the irrational of Archytas came the concept of “negative infinity” (apeiron) with his collaborator Plato – Aristotle was against the origin of this infinity, as zero, in pure number.248 This was first discussed in Chapter Two as the objection raised by Schelling against Hegelian dialectics being the same as Platonism which combined abstract idealism with
extreme materialism. Pure number as material reality – the illogical conflation of arithmetic distance with material geometric length to “contain” infinity.

 

As Lawrence Gage goes on to explain, infinity tied to matter was considered negative infinity while infinity tied to pure Platonic mathematical form was considered positive infinity as God. Professor Lawrence Gage, “Comprehending the Infinite,” Real Physics, 2007.

 

For Kepler, the method of exhaustion, derived from “Plato’s Theory of Numbers,” (for the square root of two, the ratio of the triangle diagonal to the side as an infinite fraction series converging on the irrational, by alternately greater and less ratios)
exposes the inherent Pythagorean complementary opposites of evolution – the male and female principles. (“Plato's Theory of Number,” by Ivor Bulmer-Thomas, The Classical Quarterly, 1983).

 

So Kepler could not accept the logarithmic equation, whereas Ficino, the great NeoPlatonic inspiration for the Renaissance, argued in favor for the concept of logarithms.

 

Yet when Archimedes argued for an equality of infinite multitudes with an equality of infinite irrational magnitudes he was building on the earlier discovery of the alogon by Archytas.

 

The World Brain was inspired by the Neo-Platonic concept of the Matrix outlined by Professor John Ruskin, a favorite source of inspiration for the Royal Institute of International Affairs.

 

Plato and Archytas were worshipers of Dionysus, the horned god of the underworld and chaos.

 

As Kingsley puts it,

 

“By the time of Plato and Aristotle, the doors of understanding were closed...argument is more
important than appreciation, reinterpretation an easy substitute for understanding...[the denigration] destroyed the mythical dialectic.”

 

Peter Kingsley, Ancient Philosophy, Mystery, and Magic: Empedocles and Pythagorean Tradition (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 108-110.

 

The key point here is that a “fractal” is generated by a computer as a Platonic mathematical ideal – it is not real Nature or ecology, as quantum chaos math professor Steve Strogatz emphasizes.

 

Bucky Fuller is a neo-Platonist relying on sacred geometry and his philosophy is based on the transmutation of elements from the implosion power of “tensegrity.” The heart of the P.C. revolution was the concept of the “augmented” human—the Actual Matrix Plan—which is also based on Platonic Mathematics—the Tetrad of Pythagoras. The secret of “The Nine” is how
2:3:4 is infinite consciousness as complementary opposites must be “contained” through Freemasonry. While the elements are transmuted the only thing that doesn’t change is the nonlocal consciousness beyond spacetime.

 

A couple key update books on the Actual Matrix Plan and quantum chaos are Dr. John Casti’s The One True Platonic Heaven (2003) and George Johnson’s Fire in the Mind: Science, Faith and the Search for Order (1996).

 

Moret traces the origin of this eugenics agenda back to Bertrand Russell and an elite Platonic scientific dictatorship.

 

This teaching “lying for the better good of the general public” – Plato’s version of Metis – is justified through the mathematics, the geometry of iron technology (the sword), based in the ancient Solar Dynasty city-state empires.

 

Camille Paglia makes this point about the older Greek statutes having small penises and big muscles (“Even brawny Hercules was shown with a boy's genitals.” (p. 114, Sexual personae)504 – it's actually because they were shamanically sublimating their jing sexual energy. So these statutes represent a vanishing mediator back to the Pre-Socratic Pythagorean
shamanic culture whereas the Platonic Greeks actually sucked off the jing energy as sperm – the older males would literally suck off the younger males so that the older males could increase the energy. “[The Greek boy] occupied a presexual or or suprasexual dimension, the Greek aesthetic ideal.” (p. 115) This homoerotic materialist technospiritual culture also relied on misoygny of women so that the females had to be kept in the houses.

 

For example see the Hercules statue made in the third century A.D. By Glykon, which copied an original of Lysippos.

 

Steven Shankman, “These Three Come Forth Together But are Differently Named: Laozi, Zhuangzi, Plato,” in
Early China/ancient Greece: thinking through comparisons by Steven Shankman, Stephen W. Durrant (SUNY
Press, 2002).

 

Anyway so the one book John Lamb Lash does refer to is a new one to me – The Plato Prehistorian. This is a fascinating argument but it's full of holes and worse – still based on the “natural law” ritual priest racism that John Lamb Lash contends he's against. For example from John Lamb Lash citing The Plato Prehistorian there is the claim that the Lascaux paintings – the “lines of the horses’ heads represent harnesses, not natural contours or anatomical details.” The cave art is dated to 30,000 BCE not 12,000 BCE. Sure some of it is later but still c’mon. Cave Painters. I search the book for harnesses and nothing. This claim that the painted horses have harnesses is bunk. If you look at the paintings it's clear there's no
harnesses. If you google Lascaux and harnesses or reins nothing comes up about horses.

 

John Lamb Lash quotes The Plato Prehistorian on Anatolia as an ancient source for mysticism but Anatolia is also known for being the main source of the pot-smoking religion. So this is all great -- focusing on the religion of the Neolithic age but it's not deep enough.

 

Plato was inspired by Pythagorean philosophy but as I’ve demonstrated he relied on the written down, falsified version given by Philolaus and then Archytas. “What Plato is careful to point out is that such intending is always accompanied
by the experience of poverty and need and emptiness, which is figured as the feminine in this passage, as are many equivalent experiences in Laozi.” Shankelman neglects to point out that Plato twisted the meaning of the female infinite void – the Cosmic Mother – into a negative infinity as a lie – a “containment” -- through the use of alogon (the irrational number geometry). Professor Bruce Lincoln documents that Plato lied about the meaning of metis, which, as Professor Steve Toulmin points out in his last book, The Return of Reason, actually means, “being finely skilled beyond expression in words.” Plato argued that metis meant “female cunning” and females lie with words and that metis was a necessary tool in politics! This evil
side of Plato is also discussed in detail by University of Cambridge Ph.D. Peter Kingsley and Professor Bruno Latour and its relevancy comes to light in regard to the recent expose of the Straussians running the U.S. Capitol!

 

Raphals goes on to describe how just as with Plato, the meaning of metis was changed in Chinese culture from Taoism to Confucianism:

 

 

Here the individual of zhi frequently appears as a sage-general, whose mastery of the art of deception allows him to prevail over an opponent of stronger physical force, a mode of operation of those strongly reminiscent of that associated with the individual possessing mētis. Taoist texts, on the other hand, deride “small knowledge” (Zhuangzi), or even all knowledge (Laozi)…. Since the Han dynasty, the rationalist and moralistic world view of Confucianism has dominated the Chinese intellectual, social and political tradition in much the same way
Platonism came to represent the Greek world view. And Confucianism, like Platonism, carries its own metaphysical assumptions about wisdom and knowledge.

 

Lisa Ann Raphals, Knowing words: wisdom and cunning in the classical traditions of China and
Greece (Cornell University Press, 1992), p. 18. Ibid, p. 20. This pre-Han Taoist philosophy versus post-Han Confucian is also paralleled by Taoist being associated with the southern Tang Ren Chinese and Buddhist more associated with the northern Han Ren Chinese. There was tension between the Buddhist and the Taoist since the Buddhist monks relied on
imperial tax revenue while traditionally the Taoists relied on self-sufficiency, albeit the Taoist lineage was
very selective in who it chose to train to be energy masters.

 

The book The Tao and the Logos : literary hermeneutics, East and West by Chang, Lung-hsi (1992)
documents that it was Dong Zongshu who was the most important philosopher to make patriarchal Confucionism the dominant ideology of China.

 

O.K. so just as with Plato changing the meaning of Pythagorean philosophy, we see the same solar-patriarchal transformation in China through the philosopher Dong Zongshu in the 2nd Century B.C. Philosophy professor David L. Hall documents that Zongshu changed the meaning of yin-yang from being a fluid process of resonance with equal but complementary gender
relations to being a static hierarchical axiom based on left-brained patriarchal logic.

[joeblast]

heh, care to tie that into banking and monetary reform, drew? while your historical diatribes are interesting, they tend to wind on so long that it start getting to be tough to figure out what your point is outside of math having historically been stripped of its higher resonances in order to limit people's spiritual growth, and of course mother nature will come kill us all once she feels ready

 

how the frig do we break the grip of the aristocracy? that's why I included that bitcoin vid before. you want to hurt a modern day entity, punch 'em in the pocket as hard as you can - cant think of a better way with these fools than to take away their capacity to steal incremental percentages of our money at every step of the process.

[eye_of_the_storm]

Stop globalisation... (eggs in 1 basket)

Give each nation back it's sovereignty / collapse the UN + EU

Nationalize the banks. Commonwealth of the People.

^ Autarky

Make usury illegal.

??

How do you change a criminal organisation from within?

that is the question?

Generally, lawful people raid the criminal organisation, arrest and jail everyone involved and sieze all assets.

Edited April 3, 2013 by White Wolf Running On Air