Placeholder Image

字幕表 動画を再生する

  • Our next speaker, I know

  • not a lot of you are probably going to know too much about this guy.

  • He is the filmmaker and director of

  • the Zeitgeist film series ...

  • [Applause]

  • and he has flown in to come and give you guys a talk.

  • Here you go, Peter Joseph.

  • [Applause]

  • I have given a great number of talks the past

  • 15 or 16 months. I'm getting really tired of hearing myself speak,

  • and with that comes a kind of a general frustration because

  • what I've been doing over the course of the past few years

  • is taking the same information, more or less and

  • moving it around and trying to communicate it in different ways,

  • different angles to appeal to different values

  • and different levels of education.

  • Those that are familiar with the talks that I've given,

  • there will be some overlap. [With] all the wonderful presenters we had earlier,

  • naturally there is going to be some repetition,

  • so please bear with that.

  • Overall, to be a little honest,

  • I'm a little tired of talking about this stuff,

  • but it is all within good reason and

  • formulating new ways to make this

  • more creative and expansive, as I move forward.

  • In the words of the late great comedian Bill Hicks

  • "Pardon me as I plow through this shit one more time."

  • [Hoots and applause]

  • The title of this presentation is 'Origins and Adaptations.'

  • Part 1 of 2, I'm afraid. Due to the time restraints here

  • and the train of thought that I ended up working with

  • to create this in the form that I wanted,

  • I had to break it up into two sections, so

  • there will be, at a later date, probably at the Los Angeles Town Hall

  • where I live, (we do these monthly town halls)

  • I will do the second section of this.

  • It's unfortunate I couldn't condense it enough,

  • but I ran out of time to make it the way I wanted to.

  • It will work best I think, in the long run, as two sections.

  • As a whole, both sections (the 2nd section that you're not going to see today)

  • this talk will deal with the root origins of our economic system

  • along with the outgrowth of problems that have emerged.

  • The focus of Part 1: to present a different angle of understanding

  • with respect to the problems we see.

  • The second part will discuss adaptation, change and transition,

  • the way we interact, a hybrid economy.

  • But again, that is for the 2nd section. We'll focus on this for now.

  • The first section of this work is entitled 'Structural Psychology'

  • which will walk through the evolution of our current economic social order

  • and work to show how where we are today is not some unexpected anomaly

  • or some unfortunate detour from a high-integrity economic practice.

  • It is rather a natural consequence of the basic underlying assumptions

  • that define the kind of economic model we endure today.

  • I will also work to show that the value system disorder we have at hand,

  • as rampant as it is, how the free market economy itself,

  • as it's politically pitched and defended

  • is nothing more than an imposed structural framework

  • that reinforces these distortions and guarantees

  • not only the reduction of social, environmental efficiency, on many levels,

  • but also the reduction of human liberty

  • and the ongoing empowerment of a very small subculture

  • as a natural consequence.

  • In the second section, 'Market Versus Technical Efficiency,'

  • some of the core contradictions between the monetary market economy

  • and the provable natural order of our physical reality will be assessed.

  • The argument will be made that the economic system we have today

  • is really a grand corruption in form

  • and completely incompatible with the natural order of our physical reality.

  • Part 1: Structural Psychology

  • As noted earlier,

  • a great deal of attention has being paid in the public media

  • and in activist groups

  • about the problems that we are facing as a world society

  • because of the economic system we have.

  • Issues, many years ago that we started

  • to discuss, as I've mentioned in the introduction of this event,

  • have been picked up quite rapidly, in ways that really blow my mind,

  • which goes to show that the seeds have been planting

  • and you never know where they're going to take root.

  • From the wilderness we have been talking about these things, but

  • it has started to come into the general Zeitgeist

  • which is kind of the whole point, no pun intended.

  • Yet, as recognized,

  • as some of these problems now appear to the general public,

  • there is still a truncated frame of reference

  • when it comes to the important root causes of the psychology,

  • the structural logic that's imposed by this system

  • and the trends that, when you follow them,

  • paint a picture that, really, is quite dire

  • that unfortunately many aren't actually seeing.

  • It is one thing to comment on

  • the injustice of having 1 billion people starving

  • or 1 percent owning the vast majority of the planets wealth,

  • and it's another to really understand 'why',

  • and how this is even possible. How has this happened,

  • and what does the trend actually foreshadow?

  • The fallback, as we all know, has been the blaming of the infamous 'they'.

  • Everyone wants to blame somebody; it's the easy way out.

  • The right blames the left, the economists blame the state,

  • the poor blame the rich, and so on and so forth.

  • The psychological and structural pressures

  • that comprise human motivations are typically ignored.

  • For example, when we think about the ruling class

  • and what has now been globally branded 'the 1%',

  • the most critical question is not what to do

  • about the injustice of the circumstance; it is too ahead.

  • The real question is "How is such a reality even possible?"

  • What mechanisms have set this pattern in motion to enable the condition?

  • Are the 1% a manifestation of the current system or an anomaly?

  • Why is it that those in our legislative bodies

  • seem to always come from the same pool of people?

  • Is it really any surprise that our elected officials

  • continue to hold up policies that support

  • the very class they have been groomed or bred into?

  • Is it any surprise that in a system based on social warfare,

  • where the market is driven solely by the intent of personal or group gain

  • at the advantage and exploitation of others,

  • that those who are most rewarded by this system ethic

  • often show characteristics of indifference and elitism?

  • In a recent study by the University of Michigan

  • entitled 'Higher Social Class Predicts Increased Unethical Behavior',

  • it was found that the upper class individuals often behave more unethically

  • than lower class individuals. It appears that the more privileged

  • people are in this system, the greater the tendency to lie,

  • to cheat, to take things meant for others,

  • to cut others off when driving,

  • not to stop for pedestrians at crossings,

  • and to endorse unethical behavior,

  • than people that are in the lower classes. Hmm!

  • I would contrast this point

  • that many years ago in the US, a big study was done

  • that found that the lower and middle classes

  • would donate their time and money to poverty and charitable organizations

  • exponentially more than those that are very wealthy.

  • More money (percentage of income) was donated

  • and more time was donated,

  • yet the wealthy have more money and they generally have more time.

  • Interesting.

  • John Lennon once said

  • "Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives.

  • I think we are being run by maniacs for maniacal ends,

  • and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that."

  • I would obviously have to agree in gesture, but the reality is that

  • those in positions of power today only appear insane

  • when their restrictive belief systems

  • are compared to a more viable benchmark.

  • Within the frame of reference they understand,

  • they most certainly are not insane.

  • Rather, they are a manifestation

  • of an outdated societal reward and reinforcement system

  • that continues to uphold and protect the structural insanity

  • we unfortunately still call normality.

  • So with that in mind,

  • let's now quickly consider how our economic-political system

  • and its defining values essentially emerged.

  • It's safe to say that the Neolithic Revolution

  • was likely the most profound social shift in human practice on record.

  • It is in many ways the dawn of applying scientific causality

  • for human utility, enabling us to better control our environment,

  • not to mention understand it.

  • We went from a natural balance

  • with the regeneration of planetary resources,

  • to one where we could cultivate and create almost at will.

  • Consequently, this allowed for the stockpiling of food and tools,

  • and eventually set the stage for what we know as trade,

  • as one producer who has corn

  • might find a balance of demand with another producer of wheat

  • and then barter would commence.

  • Then, once our nomadic ancestors slowly began to settle in fertile regions,

  • establishing city and state systems,

  • hence emerging the introduction of land rights,

  • law, property and all the underlying social logic we clearly see today.

  • Then with respect to trade, cumbersome barter

  • was replaced by product values being represented by precious metals

  • and rare materials. It then moved to paper certificates,

  • then eventually to the introduction of banks, the digital revolution,

  • where now essentially these abstract,

  • empty structures house only digits on screens

  • and pieces of paper that don't mean anything, in reality.

  • Basically [it's] a religious belief imposed by culture

  • that gives value to these symbols.

  • The first thing to point out, one of my biggest frustrations

  • when I talk to people that deal with traditional economics:

  • The introduction of money was not just the introduction of

  • a 'medium of exchange'.

  • How many people have heard that "Oh, money is just a medium of exchange!"

  • What does that mean? How is that possible?

  • The introduction of money was the introduction of a new form of abstract property

  • which had an inherent characteristic,

  • excuse me, it had inherent characteristics,

  • that were never fully realized, many many centuries ago.

  • Adam Smith and John Locke, those notable economic philosophers,

  • who essentially formalized the current system as we know it,

  • likely never imagined

  • that the most profitable and influential industry on the planet

  • would eventually be in the realm of stock trading and investment,

  • where money moves not for the sake of creativity or direct production

  • but for the purpose of systematic extraction of simply more money.

  • Likewise, we went from

  • a producer class, trading the fruits of their labor with other producers,

  • which actually did enable the unique form of human freedom and abstraction,

  • to a system where those with high wealth concentrations (money)

  • are able to detach from the producer role entirely,

  • and instead buy human labor as a commodity.

  • Under the metaphysical notion of capital investment,

  • are able to exploit those who actually invent and produce

  • for their own narrow, personal gain and power,

  • even though they produce absolutely nothing.

  • In other words, we went from a system based on a producer-to-producer merit

  • empowering the individual and minimalistic simplicity,

  • to the emergence of what I call,

  • the ownership investment governance class

  • (which I'll expand upon later) we see in the world today:

  • those 'insane maniacs' that John Lennon poetically described.

  • Sociologist Thorstein Veblen, notable figure,

  • writing from 1917, made this very acute observation:

  • "The standard theories of economic science

  • have assumed the rights of property and contract as axiomatic premises

  • and ultimate terms of analysis.

  • And their theories are commonly drawn in such a form

  • as would fit the circumstances of the handicraft industry and petty trade."

  • In other words, simple systems of exchange.

  • "These theories," he continues, "appear tenable on the whole

  • when taken to apply to the economic situation of that earlier time.

  • It is when these standard theories

  • are sought to be applied to the later situation,

  • which has outgrown the conditions of handicraft,

  • that they appear nugatory and meretricious.

  • The competitive system which these standard theories assume

  • as a necessary condition of their own validity,

  • and about which they are designed to form a defensive hedge,

  • would, under those earlier conditions

  • of small scale enterprise and personal contact,

  • appear to have been both a passively valid assumption as a premise

  • and a passively expedient scheme of economic relations and traffic."

  • He continues:

  • "Under that order of handicraft and petty trade

  • that led to the standardization of these rights of ownership

  • in the ... accentuated form

  • which belonged to them in modern law and custom,

  • the common man had a practicable chance of free initiative and self-direction

  • in his choice, in pursuit of an occupation and a livelihood;

  • insofar as rights of the ownership bore in his case.

  • However, this complexion of things

  • as touches the effectual bearing of the institution of property,

  • and the ancient customary rights of ownership,

  • has changed substantially.

  • The competitive system has in great measure

  • ceased to operate as a routine of natural liberty, in fact,

  • particularly insofar as touches the fortunes of the common man.

  • And, as would be expected, the change in popular conceptions

  • has not kept pace with the changing circumstances.

  • On the transition to machine technology

  • the plant became the unit of operation

  • and control has clearly come to be not the individual or even isolated plant,

  • but rather an articulated group of such plants working together,

  • under a collective business management, and coincidentally

  • the individual workman has been falling into the position of an auxiliary factor,

  • nearly into that of an article of supply,

  • to be charged up as an item of operating expense,

  • so that at this point, the right of ownership has ceased to be, in fact

  • a guarantee of personal liberty to the common man

  • and has come to be, or is coming to be, a guarantee of dependence."

  • He wrote that in 1917.

  • This assessment by Veblen is really critical to understand, as it underscores

  • what is the growth of an abstract economic premise of ownership

  • with a shift of power from the general worker producer class

  • to the investment and ownership business class,

  • which are in effect a perversion of the producer concept.

  • As these roles literally, again, contribute nothing to the technical,

  • artistic or scientific basis of industry.

  • The introduction of money as a commodity is the source of this perversion.

  • So, remember that when someone says "Money's just a medium of exchange!"

  • As would be expected,

  • due to the power now yielded by this ownership investment class,

  • we now have a governance entity

  • which not only operates as a manifestation of values of competition and ownership

  • but naturally pulls the vast majority of its governance constituents

  • from the very same wealth, business and ownership pool,

  • not to mention operate with a broad collusion

  • between the state and the corporate institution,

  • in effect merging the state and the corporate structure into one,

  • as we clearly see across the world today.

  • On this issue of the ownership class

  • and hence its inevitable morphing into the governance class,

  • Veblen states:

  • "The responsible officials and their chief administrative officers,

  • as so much as may at all reasonably be called 'government' or 'administration',

  • (I love early English bourgeois smart ass)

  • are invariably and characteristically drawn from these beneficiary classes,

  • nobles, gentlemen or businessmen,

  • which all come to the same thing for the purpose in hand:

  • the point of it all being that the common man

  • does not come within these precincts and does not share in these councils

  • that are assumed to guide the destiny of the nations."

  • He adds with respect to the legislative legal orientation

  • to which these beneficiary classes, defined by the ownership/investment values,

  • are in control of:

  • "There is a strong and stubborn material interest

  • bound up with the maintenance of pecuniary faith (that means money)

  • [and] the class in whom this material interest vests

  • are also, in effect, invested with the coercive powers of the law."

  • Which means, you're basically double-screwed.

  • Where are we now?

  • Today, I am sorry to say, we have little more than a covert system of slavery,

  • which not only motivates people and groups to directly exploit

  • for their preservation and expansion,

  • [but] the very construct of social operation, government and law

  • has evolved to preserve the integrity

  • of the established elitist power structure and values as well.

  • I call this 'structural classism'

  • which is derived from an old phrase used in the 1960s

  • by an activist named Stokely Carmichael called 'Institutional Racism'.

  • Structural classism really is a racist institution,

  • as I'll describe.

  • Only this time the oppression is based on monetary social status,

  • not the color of your skin.

  • Some quick examples of this are debt and interest, capital gains,

  • pay scales and credit rankings.

  • Really quickly, the debt and interest system is

  • the most powerful driver of structural classism,

  • for money is made out of debt and interest is charged as a fee,

  • ... excuse me, and that interest doesn't exist in the money supply outright.

  • Since the low and middle classes are the ones

  • who need to take interest-bearing loans to afford cars, homes and education,

  • the vast majority of people are put into positions of imposed scarcity,

  • with the pressures of debt constantly reaffirming

  • their class status and lack of social mobility,

  • not to mention that the interest charged for those loans

  • are then often paid to the upper class,

  • who might invest their free cash into CDs

  • or the like, in a financial institution,

  • making money off the interest while the poor pay it.

  • You don't get much more structurally biased than that.

  • Capital gains,

  • which is the profit generated from investment in the stock market

  • is likely a key source of income disparity in the West,

  • hence class permanence.

  • The top 1/10,

  • 0.1 percent, 1/10 of a percent

  • earns 50% of all capital gains today. And according to Forbes,

  • capital gains make up to 60% of the income made by those in the Forbes 400.

  • That's enormous!

  • The top 400 richest people in America make 60% of their money

  • through the capital gains that they get from the stock market.

  • That's ridiculous! In other words,

  • the art of turning money into more money, in the stock market,

  • this rich man's game that has been invented by them for their own purposes,

  • really is the most massive driver of inequity and class division,

  • and it is built into the design. The stock market

  • should have been shut down a long time ago

  • [Applause]

  • and pay scales.

  • Pay scales via the corporate pyramid are also astounding and irrational.

  • Top CEOs in the financial service sector

  • now take home hundreds of millions of dollars a year still.

  • If you were to compare the shift in pay scales as you examine the corporate ladder,

  • the multiplier is truly astounding and baseless as far as merit.

  • A study done by the Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives

  • found that Canada's top CEOs

  • make an average worker's yearly salary in 3 hours!!

  • It's even worse in America, naturally.

  • [chuckles from audience]

  • A final issue I'll address on this, regarding structural classism,

  • has to do with the credit system which is pretty much universal.

  • Those in the lower and middle classes are always under the benchmark,

  • for the cost of survival in terms of their available cash.

  • In homes, education, cars, no one has the type of money

  • to pay outright for this in those lower classes, so credit must be used;

  • and once any error of judgment emerges,

  • or money is not available for a bill that is due,

  • the possibility of affecting one's credit negatively becomes more and more probable

  • (very common with hospital bills for example,

  • which is a leading cause for bankruptcy in America)

  • and once it's tarnished it becomes a self-feeding feedback loop.

  • I've seen this with numerous friends of mine, once they get a little bit inhibited,

  • they can't get above water and it's one big massive spiral

  • and they end up at the bottom of their credit with very little options

  • in the way they conduct their financial life. It's structurally classed.

  • I can provide many more examples of this, but I think you get the point:

  • The structure of this system benefits the ownership/investment governance class,

  • continually securing the financial well-being of the wealthy elite,

  • while systematically inhibiting the well-being of the lower and middle classes

  • to keep them in their place.

  • Back to my main point: What did you all expect?

  • The structurally-induced psychology inherent to a system based on competition,

  • where some win and some loose, logically leads to levels of protection

  • that transcend the market itself

  • and move into affecting the regulation or governance of society,

  • as a whole, as a form of market strategy

  • and preservation. Why not? After all it's the free market, right?

  • Who says lines have to be drawn?

  • If I believe in competition and a philosophy that some will win,

  • some will loose, I seek my own best interest; that's the game.

  • Then, I would have personally no problem working to alter the very structure of society

  • to support and reinforce my security, as the way I choose to operate.

  • It's a natural progression, so the things we see as far as government collusion,

  • we shouldn't be surprised whatsoever.

  • In conclusion of this section, as an aside,

  • I would like to add that if I was indeed a wealthy elitist,

  • groomed into a value system that I must be better than everyone else in the world

  • to justify the fruits of what I've been given, for whatever reason,

  • the great wealth and privilege that you see,

  • I would like nothing more than the impecunious masses to think

  • that the Free Market was the only way for their liberty and freedom.

  • It's a perfect structural scam,

  • for the entire economic system, by its very core philosophy,

  • inherently supports the higher classes and condemns the lower.

  • [Applause]

  • Thank you.

  • Section 2: Market vs. Technical Efficiency

  • In the prior section we quickly glossed over

  • how the market economy has undergone a natural evolution

  • where the benefits it used to have in a more simple period of human history

  • are deeply overshadowed by the misaligned philosophy

  • that was inherent to its root premise.

  • It was just a matter of time, through technological means, other developments,

  • that the result would be a covert, structured oppression

  • that can only continue the division of society with more social imbalance

  • and unfortunately, destabilization.

  • Now I would like to take a look at the foundational practice

  • of the market economy in a more physical science context

  • and consider how those attributes that are inherent to it

  • are environmentally disconnected, decoupled from the natural world

  • as it actually exists, as science has taught us.

  • The context is 'efficiency', and there are two opposing systems at work.

  • The first one we will call 'market efficiency' which has to do with

  • the fluid operation of the monetary market system and abstraction,

  • while the second is 'technical efficiency' which has to do with the

  • physical natural laws and how we best align with the environment

  • for our own sustainability.

  • I'd like to first remind ourselves what an economy is supposed to be

  • by definition in early Greek. It means the management of a household,

  • and being efficient with that management, hence reducing waste.

  • Keep that in mind.

  • For the sake of the comparison I'm about to make,

  • I want to define my terms for clarity,

  • and I'm mixing this up a little bit:

  • We often use the term Resource-Based Economy, which is perfectly applicable.

  • [but] Resource-Based Economy (RBE) can sometimes be semantically construed

  • for people to use it in very weird contexts because they think, for example

  • "Monetary economy is resource-based because you use resources,"

  • or they think that a RBE would be a gold standard economy or something like that,

  • so I prefer the term, at least at this point in time, 'the Natural Law Economy'

  • because it is referencing scientific natural law.

  • This would be essentially defined as follows

  • if it was actually in practice:

  • "Decisions are directly based upon scientific understandings

  • as they relate to optimized habitat management and human health.

  • Production and distribution is regulated by the most technically efficient

  • and sustainable approaches known. " Very simple.

  • Market Economy, as it is practiced today, would be defined as follows,

  • in operation: "Decisions are based on independent human actions,

  • through the vehicle of monetary exchange

  • regulated by the pressures of supply and demand.

  • Production and distribution is enabled by the buying and selling of labor

  • and material provisions, with the motivations of the personal group

  • (competitive self-interest) as the defining attribute of unfolding and initiation.

  • Here are 7 economic attributes

  • that each economic [system] shares in a certain contextual comparison,

  • all of which I'm going to address one by one.

  • I will add that the asterisks at the bottom

  • have to do with issues that relate to the advancement in science and technology

  • and social science also, which

  • is naturally a part of a scientifically-oriented system

  • where you're paying attention to what we understand about human health

  • and you adapt the system accordingly to maintain good public health

  • or advanced technology (you get the idea),

  • and this will become more clear as we proceed.

  • Point 1: Consumption

  • Market economy is driven by consumption. That is the fuel.

  • That's what keeps you employed. That's what keeps you fed.

  • That's what keeps the lights on, basically.

  • It's not that people are consuming to support that, per se.

  • It is the other way around at this stage:

  • They're consuming to keep it going, if that makes any sense,

  • to maintain purchasing power and the stability,

  • the stability we see that's in jeopardy right now.

  • If consumption was to stop or significantly slow, as it's doing,

  • all life-supporting processes are stifled.

  • The world economy is based on one thing and one thing only:

  • turnover through sales.

  • How does this compare to the demands of the natural world?

  • It is obviously the opposite: preservation, efficiency.

  • The Earth is a virtually finite system,

  • and the reduction of waste and hence true economic efficiency is demanded.

  • The example I use: If you had a small island, a small group of people

  • with natural regeneration of certain food-producing produce, etc.,

  • you would respect those actual boundaries, the dynamic equilibrium.

  • Why would you design an economy for your society where everyone

  • has the initiative to want to consume as fast as possible?

  • The Earth is indeed a small island in a vast cosmic ocean,

  • and it's a lot smaller than we think.

  • Point 2: Obsolescence, something people don't think about enough.

  • The market economy maintains two forms of obsolescence:

  • Intrinsic and Planned.

  • Intrinsic Obsolescence has to do with cost-cutting necessities of companies,

  • in order to remain affordable and competitive.

  • It's called cost-efficiency in traditional economics.

  • The result is immediately inferior products the moment they are made.

  • Immediately!

  • Planned Obsolescence: much worse.

  • During the Great Depression, the need for turnover to boost the economy

  • brought about the idea of deliberately reducing good quality

  • for the sake of more turnover.

  • Huge economic praise was given to these people that pitched this stuff.

  • You can go back and look at the historical record. It's amazing! Awards were given.

  • [People were] held in high esteem, to create an economy

  • that's going to waste more and more.

  • That was apparently efficient, and it is!

  • That is market-economically efficient,

  • while the antithesis of what a Natural Law Economy would be.

  • Part 3: Property

  • A foundational premise of the market economy is singular ownership:

  • a metaphysical notion, clear and simple,

  • as all ideas and physical goods are transient

  • and serially developed through the group mind,

  • and there is no way to make a permanent association to ownership

  • over the long term.

  • Nature [economy]: What does our developing scientific reality say

  • about how we use the world around us?

  • Universal property is obviously inefficient.

  • Strategic access is more environmentally responsible as a model

  • and more socially efficient, clearly.

  • The best example is a car; you only use it for a small percentage of time.

  • Why not not even own that and share that vehicle

  • with a number of other people that would use it as well,

  • and there would be an incentive to maintain the well-being of that car

  • so it doesn't break down because of the need to keep it going.

  • That's for another conversation, as I would address

  • in the second part of this talk, when I talk about a hybrid system

  • and certain processes that can be used

  • to demand the corporations actually support truly efficient products,

  • but that's my tangent for the evening.

  • I have tons of film equipment piled into my closets.

  • I don't want to own it; it takes a great deal of space,

  • but it's too monetary economically inefficient,

  • for me to rent this every time I need it because

  • it is more expensive to do that, given how often I use it.

  • So, I'm forced to have all this stuff that I very rarely use.

  • I would be so happy to have a storage facility

  • where I could go, get these things, return them. It would be amazing,

  • and obviously more environmentally responsible and socially responsible

  • because more would have access to it than they do today.

  • Part 4: Growth

  • The market economy not only needs consumption in general as mentioned,

  • it actually requires growth of consumption.

  • and increasing rates of it, I am sorry to say.

  • This is always the topic of conversation with government today,

  • who is talking about economic stimulus:

  • "We need more growth" they say.

  • That's just wholly ridiculous under the ecological level.

  • What does the natural world has to say about infinite growth? Obviously,

  • it demands a balanced-load economy:

  • an economy that demands dynamic equilibrium be recognized!

  • Otherwise, it's simply a matter of time

  • before the incompatibility of these two systems come together, which is

  • what you're seeing now to a certain degree when it comes to certain resources,

  • and massive scarcity emerges and problems emerge.

  • Point 5: Competition

  • The market economy's operational premise is competition

  • to the pursuit of self-interest as drilled in before.

  • The sociological, scientific reality

  • is that human collaboration is at the core of all invention in reality

  • and psychological studies now show long term distortions

  • in inapplicable qualities of the competitive view

  • as Matt mentioned earlier with the research of Alfie Kohn.

  • As denoted in the first section of this talk,

  • competition itself as a foundational structured philosophy

  • is at the core of an enormous number of atrocities and inhumanity,

  • and it just simply isn't necessary as a method,

  • despite people's claims of human nature and the like.

  • It's obvious that we can collaborate.

  • People argue "War, we want to compete. " People go to war; why do they do that?

  • They're in great collaboration in the army of themselves.

  • They have a common enemy they work against because of the manipulation factors.

  • I'm sure there was great camaraderie in the 10-million strong Nazi army.

  • I'm sure they were very good friends, but once they turned their intention

  • toward someone else, through the competitive neuroses,

  • you see the distortion that emerged. It's a very dangerous,

  • dangerous identification, and I could go on other tangents on patriotism

  • and a lot of other stuff with respect to this

  • underlying psychological flaw of the competitive training.

  • Point 6: Labor for Income

  • The market economy is based on labor for income, as we know.

  • Human survival is contingent upon one's ability to

  • obtain employment and enable sales,

  • foundational, considered time memorial as we all know.

  • As Federico pointed out very clearly, mechanization is taking its toll.

  • The scientific development, the evolution of our ability to create,

  • is producing tools that far exceed our ability,

  • that are more reliant than we are; they don't have the fallibility that we do.

  • The advent of automation is making human employment more scarce

  • at a minimum and possibly obsolete on the foundational level.

  • It's more productive and efficient, as well, than human labor.

  • It's more safe, which makes it socially irresponsible

  • for us not to mechanize at this point, and take the fruits of its abundance

  • and safety and everything else.

  • Last point, Point 7: Scarcity and Imbalance

  • Money moves based only on inefficiency, imbalance, scarcity.

  • That's the driver of it, and when you realize that,

  • when you realize the anti-steady state nature of this,

  • when you realize that the dynamic is fueled by scarcity

  • and Marshal Salant's quote that Matt mentioned earlier, it's

  • "The driving mechanism is deprivation. " How could we ever expect

  • there could be balance in the world?

  • Abundance and equality just simply can't emerge in this system.

  • It's impossible! So,

  • on the human health realm, the public health level,

  • is that good for us? Obviously not. We need to meet human needs.

  • The vast majority of crimes are related to money. They can't get their basic needs met.

  • They're related to all sorts of other complex layers

  • of conditions that happen from scarcity, from familial developments

  • that create the spiral, as I'll mention in a second, the spiral of distortion

  • for human behavior and malintent and mental neuroses.

  • So, meeting human needs is critical!

  • Why would you want a society, scientifically, that can't do that?

  • Equality, as well, is the ultimate positive for public health.

  • Equality, if you compare for example the US

  • (extremely stratified, a very deeply imbalanced society,

  • the excessive murder rates)

  • to Canada, which has some stratification but nothing compared to the US.

  • Why is it that the US has these enormous murder rates

  • and Canada, right across a little river, has just a fraction of them?

  • What does that mean? There's all sorts of public health issues

  • that coincide with imbalance in society; it's called psychosocial stress,

  • and I suggest you look into it. It's literally unhealthy for us to live

  • in a stratified society, and the worse it gets the worst we behave.

  • I call this whole kind of concept the 'Spectrum of Social Disorder,'

  • whether it's debt collapse, pollution, mental disorders,

  • resource depletion, general destabilization, overall public sickness,

  • war, waste, poverty, scarcity, drug addiction,

  • unemployment obviously, crime in general.

  • Life support systems that fuel good public health

  • are basically in decline as a whole because of the evolution of this system,

  • and I can go on a very long tangent describing certain experiences I've had in my life

  • with respect to friends that came from super deprived environments;

  • and I've been able to watch them, in sort of this forbidden experiment,

  • manifest themselves in these very neurotic distorted ways,

  • all because of this lack of understanding in our culture of what causality does.

  • I strongly suggest the work of Gabor Mat

  • if you're interested in how society as a whole and its condition

  • affects us at very young ages and distorts us systematically from those points on,

  • building into it.

  • On the left side here, that you can't really read,

  • are a series of points that are kind of general societal problems:

  • abject poverty, relative poverty, inequality, unemployment,

  • destabilization conflict, the debt collapse, pollution, waste,

  • energy scarcity, water and resource scarcity as well,

  • public health disorders in general.

  • When you take the broad view of what's possible

  • and our understanding of public health, that can be statistically evaluated,

  • all of these issues are technically obsolete. They don't have to exist.

  • This is our potential; we have an enormous potential!

  • Removing the environmental and sociological inefficiency inherent to the market

  • and simply applying modern scientific understandings

  • resolves or greatly reduces these issues.

  • That's our potential, but since we don't maximize it,

  • and we let this system go, we're faced with what I consider to be

  • well-defined as collapse, and there's 3 nails in the coffin

  • as far as I'm concerned [1] Unemployment:

  • Again as Federico pointed out, you are not going to see

  • the percentage employment levels for the human population

  • that we've had in the past ever again.

  • Unless, unless,

  • there is a decision by governments to literally stop technological development,

  • which they actually attempted to do during the Great Depression

  • when they were blaming all the unemployment on mechanization back then.

  • They literally had legislation come through that said

  • "We want to stop all technological invention and application."

  • The unions wanted this, which is kind of mind blowing when we think of this.

  • It's really fascinating that it had even go through their minds.

  • How one-sided their values really are!

  • So, that's something that is almost insurmountable

  • unless huge obnoxious and socially inefficient decisions

  • are made on the part of government to stifle such issues.

  • [2] Energy costs: We live in a hydrocarbon economy

  • and very, very little real work

  • is being done to bring a green revolution, if you will.

  • It's too slow, and the energy scarcity that's predicted at this point

  • with the rising gas prices that you are seeing now,

  • there's going to be a peak point. Excuse me,

  • there's going to be an acceleration point, whether it's panic driven or not.

  • You're going to see unions eventually stop working because they can't afford to do it.

  • What happens when 3 or 4 major unions that go up the west coast

  • decide they can't afford to make their shipments any more

  • because gas prices are too high?

  • There's an easy way to see a systemic crisis emerge with the hydrocarbon economy,

  • I can't emphasize it enough; but I don't want to spend too much time on it.

  • There is no real government or corporate initiative being made

  • because there is far too much money being made

  • (back of their mind and their profit incentive) with the scarcity that's emerging.

  • That's an unfortunate conundrum of values.

  • Then we have [3] Debt Failure.

  • Debt failure is a pure comedy to me, because it doesn't exist!

  • You have all these horrible austerity measures in Greece,

  • Italy, Spain. The dominoes just keep falling throughout Europe.

  • The US will go bankrupt; the only reason it hasn't gone bankrupt is because

  • it happens to still be the de facto empire and holding great reserves

  • currency-wise and its oil control, and of course military hegemony,

  • but that's about the only thing that keeps it at bay.

  • The debt thing is not going stop. It needs to be shut down immediately

  • and a transitional type of concept: There needs to be a massive campaign

  • to have a complete debt jubilee across the board (personal, corporate, state),

  • and then we can have some breathing room to figure out what's going on.

  • Well, I know what's going on, but...

  • [Applause]

  • do you see any of that rhetoric

  • happening in your governmental talks about this issue?

  • No, they pretend it's real, like it's a physical natural law.

  • Out of all these issues, that's the one that insults me the most, frankly.

  • I am sorry to say, due to time restraints,

  • I wish I had more time to reflect on... Really,

  • my original focus was a proactive kind of thing, to not only harp on the problems

  • but to talk about change.

  • We are faced with a critical social imperative

  • where each of us has a responsibility to ourselves and each other.

  • In the next part of this talk, I'm going to do my best to talk about

  • a hybrid system of economics with one foot in the market system

  • and one in a 'natural law' Resource-Based Economy system

  • and how these things can be connected and pooled,

  • and how a new level of activism, a new level of initiative can be made by us,

  • and creative thinkers and activists, to

  • really start to push this in a step-by-step basis before it's too late.

  • It's one of the greater criticisms that any of the organizations that

  • talk about new social systems face: How do you get there?

  • I'll do my best and I've done a great deal of work on it,

  • and I hope to have that presented within 2 months or so,

  • and you can see it at thezeitgeistmovement.com

  • and so on and so forth but

  • until then, I thank you for your patience and thank you for coming today.

  • [Applause]

  • Please stay for the Q and A. Oh, thanks!

  • [Continuing applause]

  • Thank you very much!

  • [Continuing applause]

  • Thank you!

  • [Continuing applause]

Our next speaker, I know

字幕と単語

ワンタップで英和辞典検索 単語をクリックすると、意味が表示されます

B1 中級

ZDay 2012 - バンクーバー - ピーター・ジョセフ - 「起源と適応」パート1 (ZDay 2012 - Vancouver - Peter Joseph - 'Origins and Adaptations' Part 1)

  • 10 0
    王惟惟 に公開 2021 年 01 月 14 日
動画の中の単語