My Political Philosophy

@hue-man,

hue-man wrote:

I think that people in the know should determine what works best. What I mean is that there should be an inter-governmental system of educators, engineers, medical professionals, geologists, astronomers, sociologists, economists, psychologists and the like that work together to maintain the functions of our civilization.

Okay I've been doing some thinking over this and I can raise this objection. If we created a system resembling the one you propose above, it will simply transfer the elite status from the politicians to the intellectual "elite." The technicians and intellectual elite will thereby equip their knowledge towards their own ends, and the masses lose again. There is no avoiding this state of events with this proposition. What is necessary is to take the knowledge and technical know-how from being hoarded by an elite caste of society and dangled over the heads of the people like a carrot; and diffuse this knowledge into the masses so that their lives are based on a logical, materalistic understanding of reality and not an idealistic one--and an idealistic understanding of reality is what does and would necessarily trickle down into the proletariat, should a class of elite 'experts' be privy to, and by extension be responsible for handing down, all the knowledge to the proletariat. What gets added into the translation is dogma. Ideals are the tools of slavery... knowledge is the tool of liberty.

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@GoshisDead,

GoshisDead wrote:

If you are not planning for a Utopia, my apologies. That being put aside, two large problems among others remain. 1) Technical/Practical system of government and or politics is in and of itself an ideology. It carries with it its own moral code, its own relative potential for law and the execution thereof, it will attract certain like minded particpants willingly and repel others. It will have the same shortcomings as any current political ideology. 2) Any system of government is a system it is necessarily ideological and symbolic of the people who hold the power to manipulate the system. Only by compeletely removing the people from the system and enforcing the system onto its subjects will one 'remove the ideological'. This is why I asked if we were going to be ruled by robots in your introductory post.

When I use the term ideological I am speaking of people who value the idea more than they value the outcome of the idea. I am speaking of impracticality.

I do see artificial intelligence, automation and robotics eventually playing a central role in the future of our civilization, but they wont control what people do.

As far as such a system having the same shortcomings as the current political system of government, can you please give me some examples?

---------- Post added at 05:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:04 PM ----------

rhinogrey wrote:

Okay I've been doing some thinking over this and I can raise this objection. If we created a system resembling the one you propose above, it will simply transfer the elite status from the politicians to the intellectual "elite." The technicians and intellectual elite will thereby equip their knowledge towards their own ends, and the masses lose again. There is no avoiding this state of events with this proposition. What is necessary is to take the knowledge and technical know-how from being hoarded by an elite caste of society and dangled over the heads of the people like a carrot; and diffuse this knowledge into the masses so that their lives are based on a logical, materalistic understanding of reality and not an idealistic one--and an idealistic understanding of reality is what does and would necessarily trickle down into the proletariat, should a class of elite 'experts' be privy to, and by extension be responsible for handing down, all the knowledge to the proletariat. What gets added into the translation is dogma. Ideals are the tools of slavery... knowledge is the tool of liberty.

Maybe there will always be an intellectual elite, but that social status will not be based on economics (there will be no economic classes). The intellectual social status would be open to anyone who was, well, intellectual. There would be no limited access to education (professional or self-education). The education of the community will be a core value in the society that I'm proposing. Knowledge is indeed the tool of liberty.

Also, the professionals who maintain the functions of society will not control people. They will simply maintain the technical functions of society.

---------- Post added at 05:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:04 PM ----------

Also guys, the inherent failures of our current socio-economic-political system may just destroy our civilization before we can ever get to this level of sophistication. Man, that would suck.

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@hue-man,

hue-man wrote:

No problem, I'll look out for the thread. I assume that you're in college, correct? What is your major (like I need to ask, but what the hell)? Are you going for an undergrad degree or a grad degree? I'm thinking of going to college to major in philosophy myself. I'd be starting off late (I'm in my early twenties), but I didn't realize the interest that I have in this field.

Yes, I'm an undergraduate working on a (you guessed it) philosophy degree.

I absolutely love it. You should go for it if you can swing it financially.

---------- Post added at 06:09 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 PM ----------

hue-man wrote:

Also, the professionals who maintain the functions of society will not control people. They will simply maintain the technical functions of society.

What system is in place to ensure this? I don't want to be pedantic, but remember that power corrupts, whether that power has an element of exclusivity to it or not.

[quote]Also guys, the inherent failures of our current socio-economic-political system may just destroy our civilization before we can ever get to this level of sophistication. Man, that would suck.[/quote]

This is my greatest worry.

1 Reply

@rhinogrey,

rhinogrey wrote:

Yes, I'm an undergraduate working on a (you guessed it) philosophy degree.

I absolutely love it. You should go for it if you can swing it financially.

---------- Post added at 06:09 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 PM ----------

What system is in place to ensure this? I don't want to be pedantic, but remember that power corrupts, whether that power has an element of exclusivity to it or not.

This is my greatest worry.

The same thing that ensures our current system will ensure the more technical system I've proposed. A social contract, constitution, rights, etc. etc. People want to dominate others and have power over others in order to secure their class status. This type of society will not have any economic classes, and goods and services will be distributed equally by the community and for the community, so the motivation for domination would be meaningless.

As I said, I haven't fully formulated my theory yet. What I am almost sure of is that the current trends in technological innovation are going to necessitate the fall of capitalism. As advances are being made in computer science, automation, and artificial intelligence the economy will become more automated and the cycle of consumption and employment will drop dramatically. This is why people are already leaning towards more leftist, socialist like policies in the developed world. If it wasn't for liberalism's balancing act, capitalism would have collapsed in on itself a long time ago. Eventually, these policies will ultimately fail in sustaining our socio-economic system. Once that happens a complete reform of society will be needed.

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@hue-man,

Well put, well put.

How do you envision the reform? Is a sudden mass paradigm shift possible, or will it be a gradual re-structuring? The latter may be the better way to come up with organic solutions.

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@rhinogrey,

rhinogrey wrote:

Well put, well put.

How do you envision the reform? Is a sudden mass paradigm shift possible, or will it be a gradual re-structuring? The latter may be the better way to come up with organic solutions.

I think that the latter would be the better way, but I'm not so sure if that's how it will happen. All of this seems to reflect the prediction that Karl Marx made about emerging technologies and the capitalist system. It may be a combination of violent revolutions and/or democratic demands for reform.

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@rhinogrey,

rhinogrey wrote:

Well put, well put.

How do you envision the reform? Is a sudden mass paradigm shift possible, or will it be a gradual re-structuring? The latter may be the better way to come up with organic solutions.

Every form is a paradigm, and you cannot expect those who have made their way to the top of one form to ever imagine living without it... So change from the top is impossible...And Jefferson was right in the Declaration of Independence...People grow accustomed to their form, and their natural conservatism resists any change...It is only when people can no longer avoid change, when the force for progress becomes irresistable that old forms are swept away, with haste and violence... But those people resisting change are violent too, and they usually have the army and the heavy weapons...If we were to change America tomorow, and out of necessity became socialist, is it possible to believe the right would not nuke us???I think the ideological purests on the other side of change are more dangerous than a loaded gun...I won't do everything to have change because I think it inevitable... But those people hanging onto the past will do anything, and one only has to look at what they have already done to know this is true.

---------- Post added at 07:29 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:16 AM ----------

hue-man wrote:

I think that the latter would be the better way, but I'm not so sure if that's how it will happen. All of this seems to reflect the prediction that Karl Marx made about emerging technologies and the capitalist system. It may be a combination of violent revolutions and/or democratic demands for reform.

The violence has long past started...Reactionary violence is real old in this country; but in this latest and let us hope, last failure of form, the poor are shooting first, and fighting the cops to the death...If the government tries to rein in guns they will find they are making enemies of a lot of people on the right who absolutely refuse to be made vicitims, even while, by the time a gun would have any use it is already too late... But, if people fight back rather than going to jail or being thrown into the street, then you know society is ready for change...Certainly, if people are willing to kill their own children they are distressed.... Too many are distressed, and the government and economy as forms cannot address their basic needs... And it cannot fix itself... But the change we need does not demand violence, but a simple understanding... People change their forms all the time, and history, and even the whole story of mankind is the story of changing form... We only have to give up on these forms of ours, remove our trust with out which no form can survive, and begin working on new forms, that will work for us, and in which we can invest our trust...It does not have to be violent; but reactions always are...

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@hue-man,

I do not know much about political values. But I seem to remember a saying I heard years ago. "The needs of many are greater than the needs of a few". Maybe if this simple philosophy was instilled in the minds of the powers that be, and in the minds of those who elect them, things could get better.

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@hue-man,

Well da... the many are greater in number so their needs will be greater.... The fact is that no law, and not even the constitution can contradict our true founding document which says all men are created equal...Stripped of its metaphysics, it is a statement of law, that the many are the law, and with the many are the right...This is our land, and even if this land is put in private hands it must still support the population... There is not, and there never has been an absolute right to property... Every economy has to support the government and the people...If our economy says we must throw increasing numbers of people over board so the rest can enjoy ever less of rights and wealth; then that form of economy is wrong, and failed...

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@hue-man,

Not everything has to be logical, logic is the downfall of many. Isn't an unrestricted society also 'tribal?' Personally, I don't see a reason to do anything without rules and regulations. The problem in this society is that laws become unjust by being too logical, or using the wrong criteria to convict someone, i.e age, gender, race, temperament. Such as a 40-something year old who was a good neighbor cleaning someone's clothing (evidence) for them, after the people whose clothes those were had just committed murder. The result? This good, honest man is convicted of tampering with evidence and faces 35 years, while one of the murderers walks after 4 years and the other only gets 8, for 2nd degree murder, for godsake! It was even in cold blood! Sometimes the law wrongs people who are innocent, but we still need it. The jury system may need some modification, like add people who are indifferent about the culprit's characteristics and only focus on the crime they committed.

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@hue-man,

hue-man;56274 wrote:

Political parties engage in petty us versus them tribalism, when they should really be focusing on what works best and what doesn't. Issues like energy, conservation, crime, resources consumption, etc, are technical issues that get politicized by these ideologues. For me, politics is about choosing the lesser of two evils, and in this case that lesser evil is liberalism.

So-called pragamtists seem to always forget that some action or policy or plan has no value in itself. It neither works nor doesn't work in itself. Policy x cannot be said to be effective or ineffective in itself, no more than one could say that an apple falling from a tree is effective or ineffective. The question, which political philosophies answer in varying ways, is 'To what end?' Policy x is effective for what? Useful in achieving what goal? by what criteria do we determine if it 'works' or not?

If you find liberalism to be the lesser of two evils, I presume you answer the question 'to what end' with 'the greatest good.' I for one do not find that purpose of government and the state is to do the most good for the most people. Rather, I value individual liberty, so I might find that many of the liberal policies you espouse do not 'work.'

1 Reply

@BrightNoon,

BrightNoon;95326 wrote:

So-called pragamtists seem to always forget that some action or policy or plan has no value in itself. It neither works nor doesn't work in itself. Policy x cannot be said to be effective or ineffective in itself, no more than one could say that an apple falling from a tree is effective or ineffective. The question, which political philosophies answer in varying ways, is 'To what end?' Policy x is effective for what? Useful in achieving what goal? by what criteria do we determine if it 'works' or not?

If you find liberalism to be the lesser of two evils, I presume you answer the question 'to what end' with 'the greatest good.' I for one do not find that purpose of government and the state is to do the most good for the most people. Rather, I value individual liberty, so I might find that many of the liberal policies you espouse do not 'work.'

The Object of our government is clearly spelled out: Justice, Liberty, Defense, Tranquility, Welfare, Unity...Sounds like the greatest good for the greatest number to me...In addition, Aristotle says good is the object of government because it is the object of all that humanity does...If you think that can be achieved by granting the greatest freedom to the individual you are wrong... Excess must be governed, and there is no way for government to achieve the good for which it was constituted unless it actively pursues those goals with a purpose... Not a fraction of the people are ever in a posititon to seek justice on their own, or welfare, or defense... These common goals must be pursued cooperatively as they have always been pursued by democracies... If we have not reach our goals, or reached for our goals it is because the whole aim of our governemnt has been perverted to serve only a few...The influence of the rich on the course of government is obvious, and that influence should be paid for with taxes, as it was in the beginning...

---------- Post added 10-05-2009 at 09:49 PM ----------

Elmud;57017 wrote:

I do not know much about political values. But I seem to remember a saying I heard years ago. "The needs of many are greater than the needs of a few". Maybe if this simple philosophy was instilled in the minds of the powers that be, and in the minds of those who elect them, things could get better.

You know; power to the people might be more to the point...The whole point of our government seems to be to avoid democracy... So what good is the good government does for you if you do not have the power to always demand good government from them...If the people got to pass on every law, then certainly mistakes would be made... I mean, consensus is the only true defense a minority has in a democracy... People need a veto...And sure, if they had the power they would have to educate themselves, or suffer their own ignorant actions...Today, we are so badly governed that in spite of the fact that each person's ability to produce for their needs has been multiplied many time, we are still working long hours for chicken feed wages... Our lack of government, which we could use to defend ourselves from mindless exploitation, instead keeps us over occupied, or unemployed, spending all our time worrying, or hating people as powerless as ourselves...The government is serving the master and running the slaves into an early grave...

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