What are you currently reading?

[karlhenning]

Will Cuppy, How to Become Extinct

[Florestan]

Corporations, overall, have responded vigourously to this competion thereby serving consumers and investors very well -- but people not so well.

But... the consumers are the people, aren't they? How can one and the same person be served very well as consumer and not so well as people? What am I missing here?

[Fëanor]

But... the consumers are the people, aren't they? How can one and the same person be served very well as consumer and not so well as people? What am I missing here?

Yes, I believe you're missing quite a bit.

From an economist's perspective a consumer is a person who purchases goods & services.  So if you haven't any money, you aren't a consumer but presumably you are are still a person.  Or, again, you don't pay to breath so you aren't a consumer of air in the economic sense; neverthless you need to breath -- as a person.

[karlhenning]

Even when they act as corporations so that they are not personally liable ; )

[Fëanor]

And what you, and I presume Reich, are missing is that Capitalists, e.g. businessmen, are human beings and citizens, too.

And you are determined to miss the point, apparently. Check my response to Florestan.

You would do well to read the book.

[ibanezmonster]

The Shinra Corporation is evil, though.

[Philoctetes]

The Shinra Corporation is evil, though.

HA!

To get this back on track:

William Reno's Warlord Politics

[Scarpia]

Corporations are a type of business entity.  They are not intrisically anything, good, bad, moral, immoral, they are neutral.  Some corporations are very big, most are small - again, they are a type of business entity that is set up according to certain laws of operation and how they are governed.  Some are public, most are private. 

I find it amusing that so many people brand "corporations" as evil, yet, it is because of the enterprising energy, resources and creativity of businessmen and capitalists who form corporations that a good portion of the goods and services everyone needs or benefits from enter the marketplace.

And lest we forget, there is such a thing as a non-profit corporation.

Corporations are not evil, but they have no incentive to promote the public good.  Their only incentive is to improve the economic situation of their owner or owners.   Governments must put constraints on corporations so that they have incentives to promote the public good.  Such constraints include making them pay taxes, making them subject to fines and penalties if they damage the environment, regulating how they can treat employees, giving them tax breaks for taking actions that benefit the community as a whole, making them subject to law suits when individuals are harmed by their actions, etc.

Corporations are like the locomotive that pulls the train (the train being the well-being of the population as a whole).  Some people think that the locomotive will go faster if you unhook it from the train, but that defeats the purpose.

[Fëanor]

Corporations are not evil, but they have no incentive to promote the public good.  Their only incentive is to improve the economic situation of their owner or owners.   Governments must put constraints on corporations so that they have incentives to promote the public good.  Such constraints include making them pay taxes, making them subject to fines and penalties if they damage the environment, regulating how they can treat employees, giving them tax breaks for taking actions that benefit the community as a whole, making them subject to law suits when individuals are harmed by their actions, etc.
...

Well put, Scarpia.

To expand on Robert Reich as I read him, he doesn't see (for-profit) corporations as good or evil; he sees them as profit making machines.  Reich argues that it isn't their role to "do good" beyond obeying the laws.  Thus for-profit corporations are inherently disinterested in, for example, the environment.  They must be constrained by laws & regulations to protect the environment.

Per Reich, the hyper-competitive environment today causes companies to compete with each other vigorously, and one way they do that is by lobbying politicians and sponsoring their campaigns.  Given the money that business can bring to bear is far more than labor, environment, education, anti-poverty advocates, etc., can muster, he argues that popular concerns are "crowded out" of the arena of political influence.

By the way, Reich deplores that corporations can be, (as they are especially in the US), deemed "people" in the sense that they are entitled to freedom of speech for example, or that they can be found guilty of malfeasance while they directors face no personal consequences.

...
Corporations are like the locomotive that pulls the train (the train being the well-being of the population as a whole). Some people think that the locomotive will go faster if you unhook it from the train, but that defeats the purpose.

From the myoptic economic perspective the purpose of corporations is to make money by satisfying their paying customers.  But in the big picture business -- and the rich -- exist to serve humanity.

[Antoine Marchand]

This one:



But the Spanish translation on Anagrama:



This is a fascinating book (series) which is not usually the case with philosophy books these days. A furious attack against Plato, the Christian thought and idealism in general. A vindication of all sensualisms and materialisms and their thinkers. 

[Florestan]

A furious attack against Plato, the Christian thought and idealism in general.

Is there anything new to be said in this respect after Nietzsche? 

[abidoful]

THE GENESIS FLOOD
The Biblical Record And Its Scientific Implications
John C. Whitcomb
     And
Henry M.Morris

Fascinating!

[Daverz]

THE GENESIS FLOOD
The Biblical Record And Its Scientific Implications
John C. Whitcomb
     And
Henry M.Morris

Fascinating!

I assume fascinating in an anthropological sense.

[abidoful]

I assume fascinating in an anthropological sense.

No no no !!! (why do people assume that?!?)
In a geological sense naturally---I'm a Creatonist myself

[Fëanor]

THE GENESIS FLOOD
The Biblical Record And Its Scientific Implications
John C. Whitcomb
     And
Henry M.Morris

Fascinating!

What is the POINT of reading the book? Scientifically it is nonsense, but is there perhaps some other reason to read it?

[Bogey]

What is the POINT of reading the book? Scientifically it is nonsense, but is there perhaps some other reason to read it?

Possibly, (I do not want to speak for him), he adheres to 1 Corinthians 3:18. 

as well as (taken from the web):

...., religious language, though it may be the deepest and most true, is not the only way to talk about the wonders of creation. Clearly, science is another. It has its own methods and procedures, and, as science, does not and cannot deal with issues of ultimate concern. One can be both a devout and committed Christian and an evolutionary scientist.

Bill, might you address the above.  No debate or argument intended here.  Just want your take (and others).  A PM would be fine.  The rest of the article is here:

http://www.americancatholic.org/Newsletters/CU/ac1007.asp

Thanks!

[Fëanor]

Possibly, (I do not want to speak for him), he adheres to 1 Corinthians 3:18. 

as well as (taken from the web):

...., religious language, though it may be the deepest and most true, is not the only way to talk about the wonders of creation. Clearly, science is another. It has its own methods and procedures, and, as science, does not and cannot deal with issues of ultimate concern. One can be both a devout and committed Christian and an evolutionary scientist.
....

Thanks for you response, Bogey.

I was raised by a devout Christian mother who alway propounded that evolution was a fact but was guided by God.  Devout as she was all her life, (she passes away last year at 91), she never took seriously that the world was created in ~4000 BC.  She never felt that Genesis had to be take literally, but rather as a metaphor.

18 Do not deceive yourselves. If any of you think you are wise by the standards of this age, you should become "fools" so that you may become wise.

Any good scientist will tell you that science isn't a body of knowledge but rather a process.  Science, the process, insists that there is no absolute, unchallengable knowledge -- this makes it different from religion.

[abidoful]

What is the POINT of reading the book? Scientifically it is nonsense, but is there perhaps some other reason to read it?

I'm reading it becouse i'm fascinated about the history of this planet and us
The Geological data actually fits better of Biblical account of things than evolutional does---it's more how do you interpret the data. And there is no point interpreting  Genesis in a "symbolical way" ; it's a symbol of what??
Fascinating stuff; dinosaurs living the same time as men; records from different parts of the world  of a big universal flood that destroyed all humanity except for few people etc... Thruth is more interesting sometimes than fiction!!!

[Opus106]

Fascinating stuff; dinosaurs living the same time as men; records from different parts of the world  of a big universal flood that destroyed all humanity except for few people etc... Thruth is more interesting sometimes than fiction!!!

Uh... "The Flintstones" is fictitious.



Thread duty: The Trouble with Physics, Lee Smolin

[karlhenning]

Wilma, a fiction?!