by Pepe Escobar – posted with permission.
How Heraclitus, the Riddler, may teach us to fight Covid-19
He was known as “the Riddler.” Even “the Dark.” Heraclitus of Ephesus was one of a kind.
In his heart of hearts a contemptuous aristocrat, this master of paradox despised all so-called wise men and the mobs that adored them. Heraclitus was the definitive precursor of social distancing.
We, unfortunately, owe the “pre-Socratic” reductionist label to 19th century historians, who sold to modernity the notion that these thinkers were not so preeminent because they lived before Socrates (469-399 B.C.) throughout the 6th and 5th century B.C., in assorted latitudes found in today’s Greece, Italy and Turkey.
Yet Nietzsche nailed it: the pre-Socratics invented all the archetypes of all the history of philosophy. And if that was not enough, they invented science as well. Their Grandmaster Flash was, unequivocally, Heraclitus.
Only around 130 fragments of Heraclitus’s thinking managed to survive – prefiguring Walter Benjamin’s intuition that the beauty of knowledge is encapsulated by the fragment.
Let’s start with “Nature loves to hide.” Heraclitus established that nature and the world are ambiguous par excellence, in a never-ending film noir. As nature is a nest of riddles, he could only use riddles to examine it.
It’s tempting to imagine Heraclitus as a doppelganger of the famous Delphic oracle, which “neither declares nor conceals, but gives a sign.” He’s certainly a precursor of Twin Peaks (the owls are not what they seem). Legend has it that the only copy of his book was consigned to a temple in Ephesus in the early 5th century B.C., shortly after the death of Pythagoras, so the mobs wouldn’t have access to it. Heraclitus, a member of the Ephesus royal family, would not have settled for less.
So we, as a race, are essentially a misguided bunch. “Men are deceived in the recognition of what is obvious, like Homer who was wisest of all the Greeks,” Heraclitus wrote. “For he was deceived by boys killing lice who said: ‘What we see and catch we leave behind; what we neither see nor catch we carry away.’”
Heraclitus compared our lot to beasts, winos, deep sleepers and even children – as in, “Our opinions are like toys.” We are incapable of grasping the true logos.
History, with rare exceptions, seems to have vindicated him.
There are two key Heraclitus mantras.
1) “All things come to pass according to conflict.” So the basis of everything is turmoil. Everything is in flux. Life is a battleground. (Sun Tzu would approve.)
2) “All things are one.” This means opposites attract. This is what Heraclitus found when he went tripping inside his soul – with no help of lysergic substances. No wonder he faced a Sisyphean task trying to explain this to us, mere children.
And that brings us to the river metaphor. Everything in nature depends on underlying change. Thus, for Heraclitus, “as they step into the same rivers, other and still other waters flow upon them.” So each river is composed of ever-changing waters.
If you step into the Ganges or the Amazon one day, that would be something completely different compared with stepping in on another day.
Thus the notorious mantra Panta rhei, “Everything flows”. Flux and stability, unity and diversity, are like night and day.
One river may consist of many waters, and even if there are many waters, it’s still one river. That’s how Heraclitus reconciled conflict and unity into harmony – quite an Eastern philosophy concept.
No fragment tells it explicitly. But what’s fascinating is that flux in unity and unity in flux do look like moving parts of the logos, the guiding principle of the world, which no one before him had managed to understand.
Next to your fire
Everything flows. And that brings us to war – and once again Heraclitus meets Sun Tzu: “War is father of all and king of all.”
That also brings us to fire. The world is “fire ever living” and “fire for all things, as goods for gold and gold for goods.” Here Heraclitus seems to be equating gold, as a vehicle of economic exchange, to fire as a vehicle of physical change. He would have despised fiat money; Heraclitus was definitely in favor of the gold standard.
No wonder Heraclitus fascinated Nietzsche because he was essentially proposing a cyclical theory of the universe – Nietzsche’s eternal recurrence – with everything turning into fire in serial cosmic bust-ups.
Heraclitus was a Taoist and a Buddhist. If opposites are ultimately the same, this implies the unity of all things.
Heraclitus even foresaw the reaction we should have towards Covid-19: “It is disease that makes health sweet and good; hunger, satiety; weariness, rest.” Lao Tzu would approve. In the Heraclitus framework of serial cosmic recycling, disease gives health its full significance.
This collective attitude could go a long way to explain the relative success of Eastern societies in the fight against Covid-19 compared with the West.
And once again, all this Heraclitean interconnectivity could not be more Eastern – from Tao to Buddhism. No wonder the grandmasters of Western civilization, Plato and Aristotle, didn’t get it.
Plato distorted Heraclitus like there was no tomorrow. Plato based his analysis on Cratylus, a philosopher who misunderstood Heraclitus in the first place. Because Plato and Aristotle basically regurgitated Cratylus’s reductionist interpretation everyone afterward followed them, not the original Riddler.
For Plato and Aristotle, it was impossible to understand Heraclitus because they seemed to have taken “You cannot step into the same river twice” literally.
Heraclitus in fact discovered, for all humanity to see, that rivers and everything else in nature change constantly. They’re all about flux, even when they seem still. Call that a definition of history.
At least Plato’s misguided interpretation raised a key question we are still debating 2,500 years later: How is it possible to have certain knowledge of an ever-changing world? Or as Nietzsche famously put it: There are no facts, only interpretations.
So because of Plato’s misunderstanding, Heraclitus the genuine article became a sideshow in the history of thought. The Riddler would not have given a damn. It’s up to us to do him justice in these anguished times.
The technology of man goes back billions of years and is still evolving today, those were hard times to live in, today we have it easy, so we ought to take it easy, don’t let the sound of your own wheels, drive you crazy.
“relative success of Eastern societies in the fight against Covid-19 compared with the West.”
This is repeat ad nauseum. Where is the proof the Western elites mishandled anything?
Counting deaths that would had happened anyways as corona-deaths only gives the Western elites the opportunity to keep their grip on power and not change a thing. They will introduce automation in a big way. The elites will be fine. The masses not so. The masses are obsolete. Like the flip phone.
Italy screwed up by not copying S. Korea’s pattern.
Spain screwed up by not copying S. Korea’s pattern.
The US was pathetically unprepared, failed at its first test, rolled out testing so slowly, even though the Germans had done massive testing.
Wrong again, RATM. The Elites mishandled time(the head start China gave to everyone), testing, social distancing, and masks.
From the elite’s POV nothing was mishandled.
From the masses’ POV, some would have died anyways. So nothing was mishandled in regard to corona (different if we talk about economics!)
The elites want the West to appear unprepared, in order to stoke the hysteria. And funnel money to big-pharma (overpaying for respirators that will be used once or never).
Maybe it’s time to think outside the box instead the usual stale thought patterns.
Just think of all the equipment we’ll have the next time a bug strikes. Oh yeah, everything now a days is obsolete in 4 years.
From the elite’s POV nothing was mishandled.
That is absolutely untrue. The US’s chaotic bungling of its internal Covid epidemic is proving to the other countries that it is incompetent, unfit to lead the world. The fumbling will have serious consequences that even the American elites will regret.
“unfit to lead the world”
Untrue. Again, from the bankers/elites’ POV this response to the corona ‘pandemic’ makes it possible for them to raid any state savings/reserves and/or print money as much as they want. So elites worldwide who r dishonest and thieving will welcome the Western lead. And some despots, like Orban and Vucic, use it additionally to dispose of their political enemies.
From the POV of the ordinary folks, well they already are occupied with basic survival. Noone asks them anything.
“unfit to lead the world”
I will try to make my point more clear:
Elites worldwide will follow any ‘development/event’ that gives them the opportunity to profit and/or strengthen their (political) power. This ‘development/event’ can be initiated by any other country – this is why we get countries sign up to BRI, but also the same countries going along with the corona hysteria. The elites from those countries expect to profit from both ‘developments/events’.
So, the notion that noone will again follow the US lead is plain wrong.
Those that follow the US are “chained” to it. Europe is in throes because it is vassalage, not a group of free operators. Even the great German economy can’t pull the chains off. The US military occupation and command over NATO assures obedience to what the US orders. There are no sovereign nations in Europe.
Example: the Sanctions against Russia cost Europe billions in lost trade. They cost the US nothing. Yet, the Europeans cannot disobey the US or they will suffer the same sanctions impact.
No one follows the lead of the US willingly. When goals align, like with UK in the Middle East, it looks like the US is being followed. The two work the same mission. That’s not US leadership.
What you seem to think is your insight into “elites” is mistaken.
You certainly don’t know much about the BRI and how projects are funded.
As for profiting from the corona virus, that will take some time to determine. The world is going deep into recession, might even enter a depression. Explain the “profit” from that.
Even the magic vaccine that will be the inoculation against the virus is going to be one of many. So no one company will benefit.
“Explain the “profit” from that.”
Buying up everything ‘pennies on the dollar’ . With printed money no less.
Being given free money to ‘save the economy’ then proceed to automate everything. Robots and AI. Sure the economy will be saved (and those who own it), while the ordinary folks are f****d. They won’t be part of the new economy.
“The Elites mishandled time(the head start China gave to everyone), testing, social distancing, and masks.”
To me the big question is whether this screw-up was an honest screw-up.
Or, are they crazy like foxes? I am speaking of the USA. I can’t comment on the situ in Italy.
The NSC document on detailing exact actions to respond to a pandemic suggests that at least some portions of our govt. and health hierarchs wilfully ignored what they knew was coming and buried the document that could have provided clear guidance. And failed in their duty to inform the president of the need for early coordinated action and clear communications to the nation.
Why?
I don’t know.
We need a whistleblower to reveal what was going on behind the scenes in the Swamp in December, January, and February.
Katherine
” these graphs don’t present the ‘absolute’ numbers, but the ‘z-scores’, which are the deviations from what is normal for this country.)
France is up a bit, but everywhere else (apart from England, which we’ll talk about in a minute) is flat, or even down. That includes Wales, Scotland, NI, Germany, and most importantly … Sweden. Yes, Sweden is stubbornly showing no signs of impending doom despite their refusal to have a lockdown.”
snippet from
-Latest Euromomo stats: Covid-19 visible in some countries, but no disaster, Sweden fine. by Hector Drummond-
Screwed up/mishandled what exactly?
Everything is within normal parameters so far statistics say to my surprise.
In Norway kindergartens will start to open again 20 April, my guess is it might be bc Swedish sidewalks and hospitals is not littered with dead people even tho they did nothing.
(I hope this is not breaking your rules Saker, it is just the average death numbers from euromomo i want people to notice bc they are interesting, specially if you compare 2019-20 with the last 2-5yrs. Let through this once. Any further to MFC please. Mod.
Pepe! Philosophy in a Time of Virus.
What a beautiful seminar. Thoughts for a rainy afternoon . . .
Reconnecting us with a treasure of wisdom, the foundation of Western civilization at its purest form, the elegance of mankind connected to Nature.
Thanks, Pepe.
Philosophy as a Virus in Time.
How this particular virus finds sustenance in peoples’ minds was described by Kant in the Critique of [Pure Theoretical] Reason, in the section Antinomies of Reason. To ignore that is to revert to the age old deceptions and self-deceptions of neo-Platonism. A virus that has existed in one form or another for 5000 years, and crosses cultures with ease. Masquerades as wisdom, mysticism, profundity. Look hard and you will always find The One.
Isn’t it interesting that the “actual Infection Rate has not yet been determined because no actual specific and scientific testing has yet commenced ?. How can one make claims about percentages of infected people when nobody has accurately measured anything ?. Isn’t it really revelatory that the “true” Mortality Rate of the Corona Virus has also not actually been determined ?.Has anyone separated causes of Death from other factors ?. Where are the specific figures about the causes of death from the Standard FLU. Old Age? Complications from others medical conditions , etc. ? Other than gunshot wounds and car accidents ; this new Pandemic gets credit for killing the world and scaring the pants off people. It seems that every death we are being told about has been attributed to this NEW CORONA VIRUS. Doe anyone think that Bankers will benefit because they can now claim that the Economic Collapse was caused by a Virus…instead of their past games ?.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3096&v=1BiM1YYIPCo&feature=emb_logo
As Dr Shiva states in this excellent video: we have science by consensus
Not rigorous scientific method
I say, “Well said” to both Babuska and frank reps.
Sadly, it appears from repetitive fearful comments that some commentators here – and these are people who have contributed very significantly and positively to previous discussions on previous topics here – that they have bought into this concoction of misrepresentation and omission of critical facts and data. Honestly, I am stunned at witnessing how fear and misinformation has crippled the reasoning of otherwise very informed and altruistic people – in general.
The brainwashing perpetrated by the combination of the liars in MSM and Pharma has achieved outstanding success. However, I hear all around from many, many sources that there is now an ever-growing groundswell of public resistance to this entire fiasco.
i pray that it rises to be a tsunami – and that the people I have mentioned above lose their fears and come to their senses.
It is time to contemplate , deeper in time that has been , and still IS.
Thanks Pepe .
Heraclitus The Obscure that give us a light .
Fragment 54 : An unapparent connection is stronger then one which is obvious !
Fire ! Fire ever living !
Enemy of the fire is The Flood.
Flood of misleading half truths that are more poisonous then naked lies .
Flood of banalities .
Amazing nonsense on stilts, is it not? When you don’t/can’t believe in facts because you are a victim of postmodernism and believe in the equality of interpretations and narratives, then what else is there left? Embrace contradictions; pretend you can believe them. Like a theology without a logos.
Motto: it is happening again !
Fire ever living !…I hope the fires we gonna get pretty soon are not ever living !
Life is God’s uncreated energy.
The current global economic, social, cultural, politicalo paradigm is based solidly on the judae/Christian/Muslim template.
It has gone as far as it can go.
Time for rethink.
And reconnect with the inner neanderthal, perhaps? A rethink is certainly necessary, but IMO we need to unwind only 200 years at most: postmodernism, the logical positivist ideologists of science, Wittgenstein [Tractatus vintage] and its entailed meaningless of ethics and aesthetics and religion – all these the issue of extremist Empiricism – and also the procreations of extremist 19th century Rationalism (here’s looking at you Hegel pal).
We wouldn’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, would we? That would God’s job I think.
‘Keystroke’.
Wikileaks Vault 7 stuff.
Manufacturer (on site) level imbedded spyware, all comm devices.
Western intel, cia/mi6/affiliated crown services…
Just sayin’.
Watch what happens to Boris Johnson in a matter of a few short days.
If he is cured by the malaria drug chloroquine ….. to the massive protests of all the usual suspects in the globalist “health” (the well being of their power and control…….the lack of society’s….is their “health” goal) cartel and all their political slaves from Hitlery to Maxine Waters to Adam Schiff……this may be Their Last Stand…….which falls flat.
On the other hand …if Boris dies…or is killed (he better have excellent protection….but does he?) the NWO still has a fighting chance to force obedience on all their intended slaves.
I don’t think this is about China Good…..OR China Bad. It is more complex than that. There is good and bad [DS] everywhere.
And this is not about Elites caring about health and screwing it up in comparison to China….due to lack of Chinese model public health competence. They care less about the health of the entirety of humanity than they did about those 3000 persons in WTC I and II on the last day that those buildings stood.
This mess and incompetence (they intend to stick Trump with) is just cover for decades of financial system swindles and rot and immorality that their private central banking power structure imposed.
This should be quite interesting…and very, very soon.
Best sign to look for near term beyond a cured BOJO?
A FIRED Fauci.
a sweet read as usual from Mr Escobar. I always gravitated towards Heraclitus the little I know of the Greeks as base of euro civilization.. but I am not european so my subjectivity followed my need south.
the african predated Heraclitus and the Greeks..and ealier, fooling around with metaphors..this time mainly the night in particular, and all it is been used as substitue for that we knew of I wondered what I could have done all along the way to glean mataphor out of african life in the middle of euro reality… living in a euro reality with metaphor seemingly entirely euro which may not be true at all.
it occured to me that there is likely a continuity there..from currently for that matter all the way back to Hericlitus and his time and past, into african origins.
living in a euro reality with metaphor seemingly entirely euro which may not be true at all.
maybe the whole human story can be traced back way back..in the process of establishing an accurate human chronology, dating it and establishing the human story in whole..and the mataphors we use would go back too..and we can trace them all, establishing their evolution..
anyhow I also wanted to say I am attracted to RATM’s reasoning to an extent but isnt there a virus there..one that certainly make us ill..and in the right conditons for the virus kill us as well?
But RATM isnt saying there isnt a virus I dont think..but that its handling in the west has left the population exposed… is deliberate
there is a lot of experience of the western elites that makes all such notions well worth consideration. the American elite are highly capable of such behavior..they have been known, when it was in their perceived interest..
So before Heraclitus people did not know that rivers flow and that one cannot dip in the same water twice. Neither did Plato and Aristotle, poor misguided sods. Fortunately we had Nietzsche to set the record strait (in the strait jacket).
As for ‘social distancing’ one should take the example of Diogenes, but not in public.
Glad to see Pepe dipping into philosophical grounds, and I agree with him that Heraclitus is wonderful.
But to say Plato and Aristotle are misguided attempts to understand Heraclitus is like saying Confucius is a misguided attempt to understand Lao Tzu. I would rather say all these great thinkers are in dialogue and all important for the different aspects of being they attempt to answer to.
Certainly very close and careful readings of Plato and Aristotle yield amazing fruit, and many of the 19th and 20th century interpretations that one receives become very inadequate. The big honker is that Plato in Republic was laying out a blueprint for a perfect state. Closely read, the Republic is more like a tragicomedy showing how all attempts to design a perfect state fail, but at least a lover of wisdom has the happiness to “contemplate it in heaven.”
Sounds like Pepe is advancing the Political Science view of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle rather than an actual close reading of the texts, preferably in ancient Greek. But very happy he is abolishing the absurd “pre-socratic” division.
Thinking is thinking, and all the ages of it are open to us in friendship.
He is an admirer of Nietzsche and of the French ‘philosopher’ Michel Onfrey. Michel Onfrey is an ‘Epicurean’. Epicurus was against Plato and Aristotle. QED.
@Seeker good comment, perhaps worthy of a mutual subjective exchange of opinions ?. For me Heraclitus obliterates the East/West divide by his discussion on “non-duality , which Pepe call his mantra 2
“You cannot step into the same river twice” (Heraclitus).
There are many ways of ‘looking’ at these words and all of them are correct. I really don’t know what Heraclitus wished to convey. However, this is a normal subject / object statement where the former had some “experiencing” (stepping) of/with the latter.’ The question is can this experiencing be repeated ? my view is yes and no.
Physically, both the subject and object are in a state of constant change/oscillation, so it’s a ‘no’ from this point. By default every impression that hits our mind , is computed by referencing an associated entry in memory, which in this instance happens to be the river (object), so psychologically it’s a yes. Repeated experiencing is a purely mental construct, it explains things like habit &/or pleasure.
Thinking is thinking
Bill Gates tells us why the West does such a bad job fighting epidemies:
«First, we’ve got population. The world today has 6.8 billion people. That’s headed up to about nine billion. Now, if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by, perhaps, 10 or 15 percent.» (Bill Gates, Feb 2010)
Wait a minute. …lower that? You mean… A great job… on new vaccines… we can LOWER the population??
Short version: https://youtu.be/WUJMR3BUm2s
The whole thing, transscript and all, you find on ted.com, Bill Gates: Innovating to zero! | TED Talk, in case the links do not work:
https://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates_innovating_to_zero/transcript#t-11971
https://youtu.be/WUJMR3BUm2s
I am somehow sorry that I had to post that one. To bring it more in line with Pepe Escobar, we can say that as the East (China and friends) is going for light, the West is going for darkness. Godfree Roberts said «as America pursues an increasingly dystopian future…»
As we lose what is left of our freedoms, we will finally know what freedom was.
One of the targets of the coronavirus may be testicles. There is no study yet, but the potential seems to be there.
https://www.zerohedge.com/health/covid-19-may-attack-testicles-reduce-testosterone-study
If it turns out to be so, population will be reduced.
Much fun on ZH, Larch. But if a vaccine is intended to lower the population, it is no vaccine, it is only labeled vaccine. I would not post it, if it didn’t come out of the mouth of Mr. Gates, who is host of the show right now.
Before 9/11, you can bet all that thermite that was placed in those towers were not labeled thermite, rather fire insulation. This is not the art of medicine but the art of compartmentslization. The foot soldiers don’t need to know what the ammo contains.
Heraclitus is indeed one of a handful of ‘Western’ philosophers who reaches the lofty peaks of Eastern wisdom teachers, but not for the petty reasons Pepe is putting forward here.
‘Everything flows’ primarily means that the ego/mind, we 100% identity with, is in constant flu, and therefore only the witnessing consciousness is godly, unchanging, eternal, Atman, Brahman, the Soul.
Remains the question: What should this have to do with a Mafia orchestrated global virus hoax? The answer, of course is, nothing at all.
Agreed.
There is time for philosophical discussions, and there is time for action.
Now it’s time for action. As soon as the elites realize that the masses have had enough, and that the guillotines r ready, they will back down and wind down the hysteria. If the masses continue to be sheep, the elites will carry on.
Even the saker said, this is 95% information war, and 5% kinetic. Well, even Putin took action in Georgia and in Syria at one point. Time for the masses to take action now. Or suffer more. Their choice.
my argument all along: the people out in the streets without the benefit of any vanguard party, not threatening to take action but carrying out a popular revolution, eliminating the capitalist state and capitalists, creating in the process social organization that addresses the collective need now, immediately
ts is possible after generations or worker struggle and general deelopment of the populr conscious, in the open Covid attack in cover of ultimate capitalis failure that is to drive the people into agreement with their own enslavement..to create a massve change n the social quality from the top down…BNW
the people have no choice at this point but to move in establishing the popular option. there is no alternative option to the popular option that leads anywhere but to slavery for the people which includes me and mine
Well, I don’t agree with you 100%.
It should be a hybrid system, a synergy of socialism from the top and capitalism from the bottom. The state should macro manage things, but let the people enough freedom to micromanage their own fate.
But all these save-the-economy bailouts are masquerading as help for the ppl (socialism) but in reality are thievery on a monumental scale.
Are You Serious?
You agree with this or that or dont agree..of what relatitivity, point, accuracy is that?
so we ourselves made or make the reality we are a part of.. or is an evolution of, all it has been, and its current derived reality and future potential…?
I thought nature is he driving creative formative factor in all of it..and what IS… is the truth.. not personal preferences?
what you prefer means little. there is no content for that in the universal social potential as far as I have seen.
at this stage we have a criminal elite that has arrived by the most comprehensive and vicious crime ridden system of social domination we know. it is not only their passage from the social power that is crucial, but how?
can society in transition ignore the crimes perpetrated against it..by such as the Jews and the white elites etc..indeed all elites associated all over up to now, and alive and well at the point of transition
for them it would be arrest, charges, trial and sentencing, confiscation of their wealth etc..and that is the ‘good’ potential relative to their crimes against humanity. if things break down and the social organization collapses there could be pogroms a-plenty likely with the elites as focal points, because they lose their social power..which they must lose if we ordinary people are to survive. elitist power and the maintaining of ordinary lives do not mix in the technological age.
and their power can be maintained only by more exploitation and crime against humanity. how else can they maintain? why dont you tell us….?
and if they are maintained what happens to the rest of us…to you for example?
dont you think they will get to you at some point..no matter where you think you stand relative to them?
they dont care..only for their own survival. how do yo fit into their considerations of their own survival? how do they deal with you in the brutal reality they have been the vanguard of for centuries?.
this makes me think of all the security guards, popping up like flies all over the place now having their Nirvana day, terrorizing their ordinary bretherin on Covid lockdown.
you should see them in their glee putting it on the people now that ‘they have power’
dont you think the elites have and are saving a particularly sweet and ironic and proper denouncement for them at some point? like you.. in principle you/the guards.. are the enemies of the elites. if the use you now what tells you there is any long term security for you in their plans because of that?
and in serving them you betray your own: how does that endear you to them? it does not. it gives them an excuse to kill you right off when they are ready..no compunctions
I would be worried if I were you
the ways this stage can be resolved are only 2:
elitist victory over the people and Brave New world..which totally ensures you own elimination
or popular revolutionary change by the people for the people…in which system the people set up a process that does not produce hierarchical social relations by the cooperative ownership of society by the people, and democratic forms of running society that gives everyone a say..created by the people in revolutionary surge, guided at all points by popular need.
that is the major challenge for the people: how to produce such a democracy that must be produced for the development of democracy that does not degenrate into chaos and back into hierarchical organizatin and general exploitative relations?
the best hope for that lies in the very technological advance humanity has achieved..that in the hands of the people can make a material security for all..everywhere, in their various nations
in anyway..which ars the forms that produces the terrible exploitative realty we now live. you cannot have society in which some work and others control..a minority who control the pie that the workers create. you know the story. that is parisitism.
with the original parisitic opportunity the parasites develop and establishes a full systematic social control over those who work and bleed them to death literally..perpetually. they cant stop..that is how they have come to live period.
all the social evils we live is as a result of, and flow from such systematic exploitative social organization. such society goes along until the system itself catches its own tail as in financial usury finally exhausting capitalism.
and in addition there is the process of technological advance which brings society into extreme automotive facility, which makes the working classes redundant, useless from the angle and social interest of parasitic classes. such technological advance also helps the system to fail irrevocably..as it has as we speak
and at that point..where we are at now.. we have the choice of which direction and what is involved, the totality of the stage, all its dangers etc…the full potential of this day.
that is what the day, our day contains..the potential of the day–revolutionary democracy or some form of Brave New World..not what you list as your preferences. that is the stuff of dreams not reality.
oh..I almost forgot! human extinction while it is not an option as in deliberate human choice to die, to kill all life on planet earth..war to produce such a global effect is also part of the potential of this day
It is obvious that you never experienced socialism. Your knowledge is only theoretical.
Btw, even N. Korea and Cuba have ‘controllers’ , i.e. presidents/leaders who decide without consulting with the ‘society’, e.g. some poor janitor slob.
sorry for my typos above
people must make the conditions of survival the best they can, the most secure way they can..would it be safe to call that the wealth of society..the production of the means of survival?
and that is always the case in all socities and nations..the daily, routine production of the means of survival
that being the case what are the various social relations in the process..who does the work and who benefits more from it. those who benefit most turns out to be those who do the least work in the routine….
but you know all of that.. and if you know then it follows that as long as there are groups in the routine who benefit more that others and do less to to no work they pose a danger to society of their role coming to be embeded and exploitative.
how does society avoid that..how does society work, what is it, where is it going etc all figures in the answer to that question?
it turns out that the answer to that questions is in the interest of the people who do all the work when fully examined. they are the ones exploited, or can be exploited, or can be increasingly exploited by the classes who do less work or no work at all. and that being the case society will ever be safe and free from all the problems of expoitation..unless those who do the work actually run society
so thos who do the work must themslves take over and create ways of running society hands on and inclusive..andwith that go on to create comprehensivesocial well being by the full eployment of the mens available. and obviously that will be an increasingly, expandingly sophisticated process as it develops
whatever organization the Cubans andother such efforst use as equal to their on-going needs, especially under USA pressure calculated to disrupt their movement to socialism, making sure their are such differences embedded that would not allow full socialism to succeed
but at the time could the Cubans have achieved full socilism immediately? no one I know thinks so but they set themslves on the way. there will be evolutionary pains along the way
even in capitalism the west has been further along the way..so that if rght now the people got up, refuse ledership by the political parties go out take over andby need create a state in a form that meets theirneeds they are fully capable of making a socialism more advanced than the Cubans did relatively.
andbyrejecting the pliticalparties they reject parasitic interest that do not workin thr production of the means of survivaof the society so that what they would establish inleadership is bound to be a way to pay them for leadership which would be hierarchical and exploitative and the source of major social trouble continuing.
the revolution is about eliminating that very exploitation and all social division and hierarchy that the political parties represent..all of them. you do not intentionallycarry out a revolution to create the obvious conditions for a further one of the same quality down the road. society may alwasys revolutionary change but what sense does it make fighting the same oneover and over
which is where you come in: you want a society that is unequal from the start, seemingly unaware of where that inequality would lead. the point is that inequality is the problme produced by society that alows those who do not contribute much or nothing at all to the production of the meansof survival..parasitism
so if you know all of this..that this is indeed the way of things, what are you concerned about.. that is the way life is. if you allow differences in the social power based on parastism then you will always have society for as long as it survives the way it is currently.
the answer lies in the interst of the only social group representative of the major socialinterst in society..those who produce the means of survival. therefor that interest must become sociallydominant for there to be social peace prosperity and human survival as well as allround human development.. indefinitely
if you can prove that that is not true be my guest. you would advance all of us if you can and do do that
I am saying that that is indeed the way society is..tha the struggle is between those who by capitalism and fnancia lusury have exhausted capitalism, and we are a juncture when the society must evolve organizationally..from quantity to quality relative to social change.
so at this point we have..what I call the popular interest as conflated in the interes of those who work..and those who have not worked in production of the means of survival but stolen the production of the working classes all along the way. and by that they havebuilt social power by corruption they must now evolved into ways of social control that are not capitalism but which nevertheless keeps their minority social power intact
and an examination of those possible ways the minority elite can continue to control
society in perpetuity allmeans terrible merciless abusive social control for all ordinary people. the masses of humanity will not survive such treatment
so you have the opposed sides then..the elites versus the masses of ordinary led by the working classe. and in the working classes you have those who produces the means, have the needs..and their existential need is to make a democracy that secures for all them their individual needs..FROM THE VERY WORK THEY DO… PRODUCING THE MEANS OF SURVIVAL FOR EVERYONE..FOR THE WHOLE SOCIETY.
(Mod- please abstain from caps…… considered screaming…. if you want to emphasise a point use bold…..)
there you have it then.. the potential of society at this moment in time by the two sides in the equation squared off… who are the product of all social experience to this point. there-in then is the potentail for social democacy if the ordinary people led by the working classes prevail..or a Brave New World if the current elites have their way.
that is all the elites can build – BNW! …a way to ‘fix’ the people in perpetuity so they can never revolutionize society, challenge the elites for the social power..to be fixed into acceptance of irrelevant life, depopulated without fight back, starved out, enslaved, abused..to live in abuse
if the elites win out there would be no need for anything like you suggested…there would be need for them and their automation organized to shut the people down..the the rump of engineered humanity the elites allow to live for their pleasure. they dont need no middle..and if they do.. making sure sucha middle class are no challenge to them.. what will they do to them..chip them vaccinate them, monitor them 24/7..feed them in ways that ensures their perpetual compliance? why bother?
andif the people led by th working classes win out creat their domocracy putting the all the means of society at the disposal of the people using technolog not to control but to advance the colective interest all the people become elites..able to live lives as full as the day makes possible. that is why I argued that there is no social potential for what you proposed!
and to accept minute irrelevant, starved, slaved places in existence
Our choice. We are all part of the masses.
Some possible answer to the ultimate question: Schrödinger’s equation and quantic physics……
The big thinkers are hard for some of us to comprehend. The statement, disease makes health sweat and good is such a statement. Not many of us want to live on the north or south pole. Life is much easier closer to the equator. Diseases is a terrible thing. Focusing all or attention on disease is destructive. Good health is a great thing. Focusing all or attention on good health is counter productive. Balance in the middle leaves humans in their healthiest and most productive spot. Your statement means disease makes you appreciate good health. Find your balance, focusing on the extremes does not produce happiness.
we are all fools,cause these false scenarios have been played again and again by the perfumed narrative makers from world war 1 to assad is a barrel bomber,but we the majority keep falling for it unendelessly .
drink up the manufactured ”we vs them” koolaide to the full and open your hearts for fear and hatred or open your eyes and see what is actual.
we are all one anything else is just illusions .,aggressor or victims it does not matter in the end there is always death,the great equaliser,live in love not in hate and fear is the only life lived fruitfully .
“Heraclitus in fact discovered, for all humanity to see, that rivers and everything else in nature change constantly. They’re all about flux, even when they seem still. Call that a definition of history.”
Indeed. It is all about dialectics.
perhaps he sought help from psilocybin laden mushrooms instead of lysergic substances when he tripped around his soul😁
Nietzche actually converted to Islam in his later years.
Oh my, yes. I enjoyed that. Jolly good!