An Emergent Order

[version]

Life expectancy falling in parts of England before pandemic - study

It is alarming, say researchers, that longevity was declining in the north even before the pandemic.

www.bbc.co.uk

UK life expectancy falls to 2010 levels

ONS figures mark first drop across non-overlapping period since at least 1980

www.ft.com

 

[thirdform]

I think maybe you're missing my point.
That you would call it junk reinforces what I'm saying - these exceptionally powerful tools (for example, some people are producing records solely on their phones) are so ubiquitous and common now that we're calling it junk that rapidly loses its value.
and I'm not talking just about phones, but technological progress in general (not that there aren't also downsides).
When "everyone" mostly has access to the same tools that have raised living standards in our countries, they don't seem so great anymore.

I agree. Technology (especially at the extraordinarily powerful level we have it at today) should be rationalised.

This is why I don't understand the love for the Matrix. Or at least, I love it myself, but I would like to reverse the roles so that Neo is the good guy, dictatorial, authoritarian, egalitarian centralist, republican, anti-monarchist, committed to the defence of the matrix, and Morpheus and the rebels are bad guys, christian fundamentalists, parochials, always thinking there is a conspiracy, monarchists, always wanting to go back to the sewing needle and not ascent to the stars. In my alternative version of the matrix the simulation is like a guillotine, and Neo is a kind of Gracchus Babeuf, and his machine wizards are the conspiracy of equals, and they abolish all plugs so that noone can be plugged in and noone is unplugged, and everyone is produced.

 

[germaphobian]

Life expectancy falling in parts of England before pandemic - study

It is alarming, say researchers, that longevity was declining in the north even before the pandemic.

www.bbc.co.uk

UK life expectancy falls to 2010 levels

ONS figures mark first drop across non-overlapping period since at least 1980

www.ft.com

And what's the reason for this?

 

[Murphy]

Grim Britannia, do more with less

 

[version]

And what's the reason for this?

According to the BBC article...

'The researchers say the differences are down to poverty, insecure employment as well as reductions in welfare support and healthcare.'​

​

... which I don't think it would be much of a stretch to attribute to our particular flavour of capitalism and the ongoing fallout from 2008.

The FT article places the blame on flu and COVID, which seems likely and reasonable too, but they obviously have more of an interest in not blaming capitalism.

 

[germaphobian]

According to the BBC article...

'The researchers say the differences are down to poverty, insecure employment as well as reductions in welfare support and healthcare.'​

​

... which I don't think it would be much of a stretch to attribute to our particular flavour of capitalism and the ongoing fallout from 2008.

The FT article places the blame on flu and COVID, which seems likely and reasonable too, but they obviously have more of an interest in not blaming capitalism than the BBC do.

"welfare support and healthcare"

but these two things have nothing whatsoever to do with market mechanisms as such, it's a political choice and responsibility

 

[version]

"welfare support and healthcare"

but these two things have nothing whatsoever to do with market mechanisms as such, it's a political choice how they are handled.

The market is political.

 

[germaphobian]

The market is political.

In what sense?

 

[shakahislop]

Well Africa has massive population growth, doesn't it? So even if the rate of poverty is going down, the number living in poverty will obviously rise if the total population is rising faster than the poverty rate is decreasing.

And things like better nutrition and vaccination rates will reduce the child mortality rate, which (at least in the short term) fuels population growth.

yes but that's what i mean. the basic narrative that things are getting better (in africa) doesn't take this into account. it becomes a more complex thing if you think about absolute numbers.

 

[version]

In what sense?

Any approach to it will be influenced by political ideology. If you were to leave it alone and go hands off that would still be a political move.

 

[shakahislop]

Is free market to blame for unsustainable population growth patterns? That's kind of everyones free choice, no?

dunno. i don't know if anyone or anything is to blame for something like that. not sure if its unsustainable either. i mean. it is going to be sustained. is it a good thing? quite hard to judge

 

[shakahislop]

And what's the reason for this?

dubstep

 

[thirdform]

Any approach to it will be influenced by political ideology. If you were to leave it alone and go hands off that would still be a political move.

'how do you know? isn't this just your own projection, your own framework? many people make economic decisions without thinking about their political implications.'

You see how your approach doesn't actually work in reality because noone can say anything.

This is why i likened it to solipsism, because even if you aren't sure of your own mind, you are still speaking from its vantage point, and infinite regress!

 

[thirdform]

an old cockney-italian catholic driver for the disabled minibus who always used to gently rib me because I came from a muslim family once said to me that agnostics are fundamentally consumed by themselves, and that's why they cannot be certain of anything, and ultimately thus they see themselves as God (subconsciously.) I don't even think this guy took university philosophy courses, though he was definitely an autodidact.

Way to go Alfie! are you marxist now?

 

[version]

'how do you know? isn't this just your own projection, your own framework? many people make economic decisions without thinking about their political implications.'

You see how your approach doesn't actually work in reality because noone can say anything.

This is why i likened it to solipsism, because even if you aren't sure of your own mind, you are still speaking from its vantage point, and infinite regress!

Thought someone might pull this. It's a fair point. My only rebuttal would be that I'm explicitly discussing something within a framework. I'm not making claims for anything outside of it. I'm talking about the rules of a game. My general point wasn't that we can't know the rules of our own games. It's that all we seem able to do is make up and describe those games and their rules, not what may be outside them.

 

[thirdform]

Thought someone might pull this. It's a fair point. My only rebuttal would be that I'm explicitly discussing something within a framework. I'm not making claims for anything outside of it. I'm talking about the rules of a game. My general point wasn't that we can't know the rules of our own games. It's that all we seem able to do is make up and describe those games and their rules, not what may be outside them.

Of course, and this is why logics (or games, if you will) for the dialectical materialist, are taken in a non-philosophical or supra-philosophical way, they rely on experience, its theoretical interpretation, and then the return to experience to sculpt the logic or game, but precisely by ever stricter adherence to the theory.

 

[germaphobian]

Thought someone might pull this. It's a fair point. My only rebuttal would be that I'm explicitly discussing something within a framework. I'm not making claims for anything outside of it. I'm talking about the rules of a game. My general point wasn't that we can't know the rules of our own games. It's that all we seem able to do is make up and describe those games and their rules, not what may be outside them.

There is no outside, that's the main point. You can only observe from within and even then only partially, because you always observe set of frameworks from within your own particular framework which determines how you observe those other frameworks (and how they observe you, that's also important).

 

[thirdform]

the philosopher determines social being by social consciousness, whereas the materialist proper determines social consciousness by social being.

In that sense, materialism as a theory, a game, a logic or a framework is the always immanent anti-philosophical trend within philosophy.

 

[thirdform]

matter as the motion of bodies.

 

[version]

There is no outside, that's the main point. You can only observe from within and even then only partially, because you always observe set of frameworks from within your own particular framework which determines how you observe those other frameworks (and how they observe you, that's also important).

Yeah, this is why I'm hesitant to consciously subscribe to any of them. I know Third will say you're subscribing to one whatever you do, but I think there's a distinction between actively choosing one and trying to break away from all of them while being left with the residue of whichever one you grew up in. I'm sure Third will say "Yes, the distinction is cowardice!" but I don't think that's the only component.