Does Light Lag Guarantee that Communism can Never Happen? - Page 3 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14987701
RhetoricThug wrote::roll: You cherry picked my last post and skipped over my original post. I told you, the logistics behind traveling beyond low earth orbit is a point of curiosity, not my main message.

I didn't read your first post. I did not cherry pick your last post I scan read it for anything coherent and interesting which was only the factually incorrect regarding van allen belts.

RhetoricThug wrote:Additionally, I noted Once we exit Earth and enter a man-made environment, our survival depends on the technological support systems we've created for space travel. These new conditions create a totalitarian environment, because there will be little room for erroneous behavior. In a way, It will resemble military life, and most activities will be influenced by the group or team you're living with. When I think more about it, I think a technocratic-totalitarian society would have many of the notable attributes of Communism, because production and survival would become one thing for a space colony. @B0ycey not sure why SolarCross hasn't addressed the body of my main message. He's a really angry dude, I guess. :?:

You have not shown why technology "creates a totalitarian environment" you have merely made the claim without backing it up with any reasoning. It is even less worth engaging than your errors regarding van allen belts and apollo.
#14987702
SolarCross wrote:I didn't read your first post. Most of your posts are garbage so I don't usually bother anymore. I did not cherry pick your last post I scan read it for anything coherent and interesting which was only the factually incorrect crankery regarding van allen belts.
Dude, why do you resort to name calling on an internet forum? :eh: It's unpleasant.

Anyway, I explained how intelligent systems affect causality (cybernetic systems), and how technological determinism can affect human behavior.

Example- Life aboard the ISS: First and foremost I need to point out that our days, all of them, are planned by a huge, world-wide group of people on the ground.

How does this relate to a typical day? Well we have a scheduling program on board that has in it all of the details that we need to know in order to do the day's work. It tells us when we should go to sleep, when we should get up, when we should exercise, when to eat our meals, when and what information we need to do our tasks. This program is our main way of communicating and coordinating our day with the ground. It sounds constraining, doesn’t it? There is some flexibility for us to manage parts of our day—most tasks do not have to be done at the time listed on the schedule. If something has to be done at a certain time, say because ground controlling is required, or there exists some constraint that we need to know about it, we have a color code scheme that alerts us to do that particular task definitely at the time shown on the schedule. It is a rather comfortable system; from the ground’s viewpoint they have a way to document everything that they need to have finished that day and from a crew viewpoint you have the flexibility to control your time and use it in the most efficient manner.


https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stat ... nus_5.html


You have not shown why technology "creates a totalitarian environment" you have merely made the claim without backing it up with any reasoning. It is even less worth engaging than your errors regarding van allen belts and apollo.
Well, I've given you a glimpse of life aboard the ISS. Here on earth, you could visit a hospital. There you'll see how technological/scientific environments regulate human behavior. If and when we send humans to colonize space, survival and production may merge, and there would be little room for human error.
#14987705
SolarCross wrote:Organisation is not equal to totalitarianism. Plus the ISS is a government research facility, not a civilian, residential or commercial facility.
Totalitarianism is a form of organization. Furthermore, it depends upon your personal definition of freedom. Note the international nature of the ISS, it's far more socialistic than capitalistic. Lastly, I'd like to point out why this thread is silly. Light lag affects communication and all forms of organization (including capitalism).

@B0ycey summed it up: Whether Communism is or is not possible will not be dependent on interstellar travel.
#14987709
RhetoricThug wrote:Depends upon your personal definition of freedom. Note the international nature of the ISS, it's far more socialistic than capitalistic. Lastly, I'd like to point out why this thread is silly. Light lag affects all forms of organization (including capitalism).

Yeah capitalism is more international than "socialism" because national governments are generally more warlike than private commercial entities. Trade encourages xenophilia, war encourages xenophobia. So you are wrong there too.

And I would like to point out that light lag does not impede capitalism in the same way because capitalism tolerates autonomy and decentralisation. If you don't have a master then you don't have to wait thousands of years to hear his voice before acting. You can act for yourself instantly.
RhetoricThug wrote:@B0ycey summed it up: Whether Communism is or is not possible will not dependent on interstellar travel.

Communism doesn't work for other reasons but the proposition in the OP remains also true allowing that the marxist claim that communism must completely replace capitalism in order to work. @Pants-of-dog has a different idea about that and he may be right but if he is it still remains that all of humanity cannot be unified under a single totalitarian state once we move beyond earth.
#14987722
SolarCross wrote:Yeah capitalism is more international than "socialism" because national governments are generally more warlike than private commercial entities. Trade encourages xenophilia, war encourages xenophobia.
All of which revolves around scarcity. Technocracy is about eliminating or managing scarcity, but it requires a form authoritarianism. Unless send robots (to mine resources), space colonization will not resemble early capitalism or colonialism :lol:, because resources will be managed by intelligent systems and cybernetic feedback loops.

And I would like to point out that light lag does not impede capitalism in the same way because capitalism tolerates autonomy and decentralisation. If you don't have a master then you don't have to wait thousands of years to hear his voice before acting. You can act for yourself instantly.
Space travel requires centralization and collaboration. Cybernetic or intelligent systems limit autonomy. In a space colony, capitalistic behavior could be seen as irrational behavior, because capitalism values the individual over the group.

Communism doesn't work for other reasons but the proposition in the OP remains also true allowing that the marxist claim that communism must completely replace capitalism in order to work. @Pants-of-dog has a different idea about that and he may be right but if he is it still remains that all of humanity cannot be unified under a single totalitarian state once we move beyond earth.
I told you, Socialism and communism missed the boat, humanity is rapidly entering a stage of civilization that has given up collective sovereignty to data/information processors. Advances in technology inevitably lead to more control and less personal autonomy. This can be summed up by the adage- “you can't manage what you can't measure.” The very nature of scientific development is to quantify physical systems so we can better manage phenomena. You missed the boat, because didn't read my original post in this thread.
#14987734
:roll: That is very arrogant of you, SolarCross. I didn't imagine any of it, and I'm sure the reader will be able to follow my logic. Consider sociocybernetics, if technological environments (complex adaptive systems) influence personal autonomy then ask yourself- How does living in space affect the following:

All living systems go through six levels of interrelations (social contracts) of its subsystems:

A. Aggression: survive or die

B. Bureaucracy: follow the norms and rules

C. Competition: my gain is your loss

D. Decision: disclosing individual feelings, intentions

E. Empathy: cooperation in one unified interest

F. Free will: The ability for any species, regardless of type, race, sex, creed, belief, genetics, make, model, or sentience to govern their own existence and not be controlled. "To be free to choose how to live life without discrimination or interference."

Going through these six phases of relationship theoretically gives the framework for the sociocybernetic study of any evolutionary system.




Also, why would a spacefaring society favor capitalism? Wouldn't they be busy managing their technological environments?

Life Support systems are an integral part of a deep space habitation capability, which is one of the main focus areas of AES. Habitation systems will provide a safe place for humans as we travel deeper into space, and life support is key to survival inside a deep space habitat. Simplified Life Support Systems Schematic. The Simplified Life Support Systems Schematic shows all of the elements of a life support system, including various processors for waste, air, and water.

NASA’s Life Support Systems (LSS) activities develop the capabilities to sustain humans who are living and working in space - away from Earth’s protective atmosphere and resources like water, air, and food. This includes monitoring atmospheric pressure, oxygen levels, waste management, and water supply, as well as fire detection and suppression.

After forty years of development, LSS technologies have advanced a great deal but remain heavily dependent on Earth. Sending life-sustaining supplies 250 miles to the International Space Station (ISS) requires careful planning, and a robust international supply chain for delivery in one or two days after launch.

Existing life support systems on the ISS provide oxygen, absorb carbon dioxide, and manage vaporous emissions from the astronauts themselves. Analysis of these systems allows NASA to identify areas where additional technology development is needed. Addressing any gaps will make life support systems more reliable and effective, which will lead to integrated testing on Earth and ISS in preparation for future human spaceflight missions deeper into the solar system. In the 2020s, humans will conduct proving ground missions in cislunar space, which lies between Earth and the Moon or its orbit. Demonstrating key capabilities like these advanced life support systems will enable future deep space missions.

SYSTEMS ARCHITECTURE

With so many complex systems comprising life support in space, it is important to understand the overall system requirements to ensure that all the components integrate well together and that ground testing is as representative of destination environments as possible.

Specifically in this area, we:

Define life support system architectures for different space mission classes.
Assess life support system technologies.
Perform life support systems integration.
Define and monitor life support system testing.
Develop an integrated life support system model that will be used to understand life support system dynamics and the potential impacts of new technology infusion.
Study reliability, maintenance, and crew time requirements of the state-of-the-art subsystems to understand which subsystems require technology development to meet exploration requirements.

ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING

Spacecraft are enclosed spaces that usually contain complex machines in operation as well as science experiments and technology demonstrations. A problem with any one of these things can compromise the enclosed environment, causing it to become unsafe. While current environmental monitors aboard ISS will alert crew members and mission control when an emergency occurs, long-duration environmental health monitoring cannot take place on board the space station.

Right now, NASA sends archived environmental samples back to Earth as part of the long-term monitoring process. In order to alleviate the need to return these air and water samples from space for analysis, NASA is developing onboard LSS analysis capabilities. The overall approach to LSS systems architecture and engineering is a major step toward this goal. Future monitoring needs are being addressed by embracing modular integration of multiple sensing modalities, employing a combination of simple and rugged technologies, and using highly capable complex approaches where needed. Efforts in this area include:

Developing and demonstrating onboard analysis capabilities that will replace the need to return air and water samples to Earth for ground analysis. Incorporating Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS) technologies to enable significant miniaturization over current systems, and selects elements offering both low resources and high reliability operation for affordability. Developing, demonstrating, and/or testing leading process technology candidates and systems architectures that will fill capability gaps or significantly improve efficiency, safety, and reliability. Demonstrating test articles (at various technology readiness levels) in a ground test facility under relevant flight conditions.

ATMOSPHERE MANAGEMENT

Maintaining the atmosphere within a habitat is the highest priority of any life support system, which is why atmosphere management is a critical function for all human exploration missions. Life support systems must not only supply oxygen and remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but also prevent gases like ammonia and acetone, which humans emit in small quantities, from accumulating. Vaporous chemicals from science experiments are a potential hazard, too, if they combine in unforeseen ways with other elements in the air supply. Air revitalization includes oxygen generation and recovery, removal of carbon dioxide and control of trace contaminates and particulates.

Oxygen Generation and Recovery

The oxygen generation and recovery technology development area includes several approaches to supply oxygen to the crew, to recover oxygen from exhaled carbon dioxide, and to recycle the recovered oxygen back into the atmosphere. Current oxygen generation systems aboard the space station can generate or recover approximately 40 percent of required oxygen; for exploration missions this percentage must increase significantly. Specific tasks include:

Advancing technologies for an oxygen delivery and supply system.
Developing technologies to increase oxygen recovery.
Advancing technologies for high-pressure, high-purity oxygen generation for exploration vehicles.

Carbon Dioxide Removal

A majority of the breathing air for astronauts is recycled within the spacecraft or habitat, and a key part of this process is the removal of exhaled carbon dioxide.

Carbon dioxide removal and associated air-drying development efforts are focused on improving the current technology on the space station as well as assessing and examining the viability of other emerging or alternate technologies.

Specific tasks include:

Performing test scenarios to optimize performance.
Screening alternative sorbents (materials used to absorb or liquids or gases) to determine the best candidate for a deep space carbon dioxide removal system.
Testing new sorbents as replacements for those currently used.
Ground testing of alternative carbon dioxide removal and compression systems.
Ground testing various solid/liquid/thermal ammonia derivatives as an alternative to current systems.

Trace Contaminant and Particulate Control

In collaboration with the National Research Council's Committee on Toxicology, NASA has established guidelines for safe and acceptable levels of individual contaminants in spacecraft air and drinking water. A spacecraft cabin trace contaminant and particulate control system keeps the environment below the spacecraft’s maximum allowable concentration for chemicals and particulates. Particulates are small particles of matter like dust and aerosols.

Both passive (filters) and active (scrubbers) methods contribute to the overall trace contaminant and particulate control system design. Work to advance technology and capability in this area under is focused on making improvements to current space station systems to improve performance and reduce consumables. Specific tasks include:

Developing new technologies to control trace contamination.
Testing technologies to monitor aerosols in spacecraft.
Developing filtration technologies for particulate control to meet exploration requirements and reduce crew maintenance requirements.

WATER MANAGEMENT

A major goal of life support systems is the development of water recovery systems to support long duration human exploration in deep space. Wastewater management systems have been designed to recycle crew­ member urine, wastewater, and humidity for reuse as clean water. By doing so, the system reduces the amount of water and consumables that would need to be launched from Earth

Current ISS systems recover water at a rate of approximately 74 percent. For longer, further missions into deep space, this rate must be increased so that astronauts can journey for months without resupply missions from Earth.

To achieve this, the LSS work is underway to:

Develop technologies to achieve 98 percent water loop closure.
Increase reliability and robustness over current technologies.
Reduce mass, power and volume as compared to current technologies.


https://www.nasa.gov/content/life-support-systems

The key to space travel is intelligent collaboration and information integration for complex systems. In other words, the enforcement or advocacy of strict obedience to authority (complex systems) at the expense of personal freedom.

Technocracy: Technocracy, government by technicians who are guided solely by the imperatives of their technology.

Alas, you'll be governed by technocrats, if by chance you get an opportunity to help colonize space.



:)
#14987741
RhetoricThug wrote::roll: That is very arrogant of you, SolarCross. I didn't imagine any of it, and I'm sure the reader will be able to follow my logic. Consider , if technological environments (complex adaptive systems) influence personal autonomy then ask yourself- How does living in space affect the following:

All living systems go through six levels of interrelations (social contracts) of its subsystems:

A. Aggression: survive or die

B. Bureaucracy: follow the norms and rules

C. Competition: my gain is your loss

D. Decision: disclosing individual feelings, intentions

E. Empathy: cooperation in one unified interest

F. Free will: The ability for any species, regardless of type, race, sex, creed, belief, genetics, make, model, or sentience to govern their own existence and not be controlled. "To be free to choose how to live life without discrimination or interference."

Going through these six phases of relationship theoretically gives the framework for the sociocybernetic study of any evolutionary system.


This little snippet you plucked from a wiki article is cringingly obvious pseudo-science. It genuinely looks like it was written by a cretin. Of course that is often the case in the social "sciences". It's a step up from gender studies but no less useless posturing.

RhetoricThug wrote:Also, why would a spacefaring society favor capitalism? Wouldn't they be busy managing their technological environments?

The potential is there for there to be quadrillions of independent societies spread across millions of cubic lightyears. No one is saying they will all "favour" capitalism* but clearly a single totalitarian society is impossible. On another point, generally people prefer freedom and autonomy over slavery and the more power they have the more able they will be to make manifest that preference. Technology is nothing but the power to achieve one's goals. Consequently technology will tend to increase freedom not the opposite.

RhetoricThug wrote:Technocracy: Technocracy, government by technicians who are guided solely by the imperatives of their technology.

Alas, you'll be governed by technocrats, if by chance you get an opportunity to help colonize space.

:)

When the little man who mends my car installs himself as dictator for life and plants a 50 ft tall statue of himself in my back garden I'll make sure you are the first to know. :lol:

*"Capitalism" , you don't know what the word capitalism means. You should look it up before using it but then it would be the only word you used which you actually knew what it meant.
#14987771
It is difficult to predict the future @SolarCross by the fact it has not happened. But one thing that isn't deniable is the more dependent you are on something the more control that something has on you. For example someone who has a family and a mortgage is less likely to quit their job on a whim than someone who lives in their parents house. So if you are in space and your survival depends on technology, the owner of that technology has power over you. You cannot escape from it and become an outlaw like you can on Earth. So if the only option is death or giving your labor to the ship owner you have to ask why do they have to pay you anything? You are in essence a slave and whether you get paid or not is out of your hands if the ship owner understand their ultimate power. And that is RT's point. By the very nature you depend on technology in space travel means the overall outcome is more likely Totalitarianism rather than Capitalism as the bourgeois has all the power and the proletariat has absolutely none to negotiate a fair wage to gain from their Labor whilst living in a climate outside of Earth.

The only other option in space is cooperation. That is that everyone owns the means of production and as such nobody has power over anyone else. You work for your personal survival and that of the crew. There is no profit involved and as such no loss can to be made. And guess what economic system that is?
#14987811
SolarCross wrote:This little snippet you plucked from a wiki article is cringingly obvious pseudo-science. It genuinely looks like it was written by a cretin. Of course that is often the case in the social "sciences". It's a step up from gender studies but no less useless posturing.
:hmm: So are you a parody of partisan politics now? I don' get it, I feel like I'm talking to a social media parrot. Are you letting network algorithms and partisan echo-chambers mold your opinions?

BTW, economics is a social science.


Social systems have regulatory properties, SolarCross.

I suggest reading: Sociocybernetics: Complexity, Autopoiesis, and Observation of Social Systems

In an effort to shed light on recent developments in sociocybernetic research, this volume represents recent and advanced thinking in this rapidly developing field. The authors address the core problems in social science caused by increasing societal complexity and analyze the inadequacy of many of the methodological tools still used for grappling with nonlinear, self-organizing systems. Together, the 18 contributors propose elements of a new methodology based on sociocybernetic principles aimed at describing and explaining the growth of societal complexity, the contribution of autopoiesis of societal subunits to more societal complexity, and the new simulation-based methodology needed to observe complex social systems. This unique volume contributes to a greater understanding of sociocybernetics and its uses as a method for researching modern problems of increasing complexity and interdependence.

The first part of the book deals with increasing societal complexity and contains chapters on its overall development, the complexity of brain-environment interaction loops, organizational change, the development of human values, and the increasing interpenetration of societal subsystems. The second part concentrates on a current issue in sociocybernetics: autopoiesis, or self-production. The chapters included in Part II concentrate on embodied cognition, on the applicability of autopoiesis to business firms, on its roots in Aristotelian philosophy, and on the possibility of societal control and steering in democratic societies. Part III, more focused on methodology, discusses the difficulties inherent in observing complex social systems. The chapters deal with the problems of cross-cultural comparative research, simulation of the evolution of social systems, longitudinal simulation of education systems, and the methodological difficulties associated with analyzing the unexpected complexities of mutually interacting nonlinear systems.


Felix Geyer and Hans van der Zouwen contribute to Kybernetes (Kybernetes is a peer-reviewed scientific journal of information and knowledge management exploring the complex relationships between information systems and management theory and practice to determine how humans develop meaningful and satisfying roles in professional and organisational contexts.)

The content is very pertinent, given my explanation for why technological systems produce authoritarian behavior.


The potential is there for there to be quadrillions of independent societies spread across millions of cubic lightyears. No one is saying they will all "favour" capitalism* but clearly a single totalitarian society is impossible. On another point, generally people prefer freedom and autonomy over slavery and the more power they have the more able they will be to make manifest that preference. Technology is nothing but the power to achieve one's goals. Consequently technology will tend to increase freedom not the opposite.
In the future, there could be pockets or islands of communism. You originally said: Given that the conditions for colonisation beyond earth is almost complete but a project to impose a single globe spanning totalitarian state is not even 1% complete it is virtually guaranteed that the former will happen before the latter and once the former happens the latter can never happen. I disagree, in reality, we're closer to a Technocratic state on Earth. Moreover, I've thoroughly explained in other threads how and why technologies reshape societal dynamics. Thank you for noting how technology can facilitate power. Technology does enhance our ability to manage physical systems and engineer behavioral patterns. Technology is an extension of our nervous system. In a cybernetic feed-back loop, automation diminishes autonomy, because it consolidates or harmonizes energy transfer between animal and machine via intelligent systems engineering. If you're not familiar with cybernetics, I recommend: The Human Use of Human Beings, by Norbert Wiener.

Technological societies must be driven by information, feedback, control, and communication systems. To be effective, a technological society must manage all components (social, biological, mechanical, etc) of any system (and subsystem). We already live in a world developed by the science of controlling machines and humans.


*"Capitalism"
AI will continue to augment and take over capitalistic operations here on earth, and it will incrementally eliminate human decision making. Like today, technical experts will modify and code intelligent systems (until self-repairing sentient systems go online), and average citizens will become information channels or data points living inside a technocratic society. Such conditions may give rise to major changes in production. Self-correcting and adaptive information loops can potentially reshape the global market economy. Private decisions become group decisions and investments become survival strategies for civilization. Ecologically, free market capitalism can produce a schizoid race to the bottom. Remember, the U.S. is a mixed economy, with socialistic tendencies. Over time, It had to adopt socialistic policies to stabilize itself and protect itself from market volatility. Likewise, 1st world countries will adopt technocratic policies to manage the fragility and volatility of human systems.

:)
#14987975
B0ycey wrote:It is difficult to predict the future @SolarCross by the fact it has not happened. But one thing that isn't deniable is the more dependent you are on something the more control that something has on you. For example someone who has a family and a mortgage is less likely to quit their job on a whim than someone who lives in their parents house. So if you are in space and your survival depends on technology, the owner of that technology has power over you. You cannot escape from it and become an outlaw like you can on Earth. So if the only option is death or giving your labor to the ship owner you have to ask why do they have to pay you anything? You are in essence a slave and whether you get paid or not is out of your hands if the ship owner understand their ultimate power. And that is RT's point. By the very nature you depend on technology in space travel means the overall outcome is more likely Totalitarianism rather than Capitalism as the bourgeois has all the power and the proletariat has absolutely none to negotiate a fair wage to gain from their Labor whilst living in a climate outside of Earth.

The only other option in space is cooperation. That is that everyone owns the means of production and as such nobody has power over anyone else. You work for your personal survival and that of the crew. There is no profit involved and as such no loss can to be made. And guess what economic system that is?

You can't predict the future because you don't understand the present or the past and you don't know how anything works and the same goes for @RhetoricThug who thinks pretending to be clever is the same as being clever.

So you say dependency causes totalitarianism. Funny I am dependent on thousands of different trades already and yet no baker, builder or candlestick maker has ever tried to enslave me. The reason for that is that dependency is mutual. Not only am I am dependent on the car mechanic and the doctor but they are dependent on me, that is what a trade network is, a mutual dependence network and it is in all our interests to make each other happy rather than sad, angry and depressed. This is why the totalitarianism is actually rather rare and dysfunctional and will probably get rarer and more dysfunctional in the future.

I genuinely wonder how you can imagine that the USSR or DPRK in space will be magically less of a wonky shitshow where nothing works. Totalitarianism in space will be chernobyl every day, airlocks left open, hydroponic feed tubes left to gum up with toxins, structural welds left half done, cracked blast shields unreplaced, periodic brownouts as the solar panels drift out of alignment, backflowing sanitary facilities just left to spew shit everywhere, pharmaceuticals with the wrong labels on....

Never mind light lag crushing large scale totalitarianism, depression will kill it on the small scale too just as it does on earth.
#14988134
Forum image SolarCross continues to ignore the implications of technological change. :roll:
SolarCross wrote: So you say dependency causes totalitarianism. Funny I am dependent on thousands of different trades already and yet no baker, builder or candlestick maker has ever tried to enslave me.
Yes, because they're busy being enslaved by financial institutions that manipulate interest rates and create money out of thin air. Are you familiar with dependency theory?

Dependency theory
international relations


According to dependency theory, underdevelopment is mainly caused by the peripheral position of affected countries in the world economy. Typically, underdeveloped countries offer cheap labour and raw materials on the world market. These resources are sold to advanced economies, which have the means to transform them into finished goods. Underdeveloped countries end up purchasing the finished products at high prices, depleting the capital they might otherwise devote to upgrading their own productive capacity. The result is a vicious cycle that perpetuates the division of the world economy between a rich core and a poor periphery. While moderate dependency theorists, such as the Brazilian sociologist Fernando Henrique Cardoso (who served as the president of Brazil in 1995–2003), considered some level of development to be possible within this system, more-radical scholars, such as the German American economic historian Andre Gunder Frank, argued that the only way out of dependency was the creation of a noncapitalist (socialist) national economy.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/dependency-theory

Exploitation: the action or fact of treating someone unfairly in order to benefit from their work.

The reason for that is that dependency is mutual. Not only am I am dependent on the car mechanic and the doctor but they are dependent on me, that is what a trade network is, a mutual dependence network and it is in all our interests to make each other happy rather than sad, angry and depressed.
Right, and these networks become intelligent systems in the information age. Trade networks become energy formulas in a technocratic society. Progress and efficiency harness personal innovation and autonomy. This may be tangential but I must promote the following notion: Alienation accelerates when trade accelerates and when trade accelerates wealth inequality increases.

The subsystem you live in is merely an aspect of a super-system and individuals in the subsystem are subject to a super-system that favors growth and profit over human welfare. Self-propagating systems, guided by unlimited growth will hit a ceiling or wall, so to speak. The ceiling or wall is the ecological network or environment upon which trade networks develop. A simple formula emerges, namely logistic growth. When we reach carrying capacity, socioeconomic organization patterns will change. Couple such an extrapolation with environmental degradation, what do you get?

Comprehensive wealth will be limited by finite resources. Poor peoples will suffer first, followed by a stagnate middle class. When the time comes, technologists will offer provocative solutions (as they do today, to combat climate change) and resource management will lead to the centralization of trade networks. The centralization of trade networks will be facilitated by technology, and technology will be governed by technical experts (or sentient AI). Scientifically endorsed regulations will impact how you exchange goods and services. Again, if Earth reaches a post-harvest (After the Gold Rush, thanks Neil) period, survival and production will merge.

Sustainability, capitalism and evolution
Nature conservation is not a matter of maintaining human development and welfare in a healthy environment


In conclusion, any proposals aiming to achieve sustainability, owing to their intrinsic anthropocentric nature, can help to promote intra- and inter-generational social justice, but they are not sufficient to achieve real nature conservation. This goal would require even more profound societal change than is acknowledged. Replacing capitalism with a new economic system is necessary for sustainability, but real nature conservation also requires a less anthropocentric attitude and the adoption of an evolutionary perspective. Scientists would have a key role in triggering and guiding these changes, provided that they are able to analyse and communicate the appropriate knowledge and maintain their independence from political and economic influences. Scientists must also leave their laboratories and begin to interact with society on a larger scale (Johns, 2009). One relevant lesson is that natural systems have their dynamics, guided by evolution, so there is no single ‘natural' state as a preferred conservation target. Naturalness, on the contrary, is constant change.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3049435/







Side note: Clinical psychologists are well-aware of: Anxious? Depressed? You might be suffering from capitalism: Contradictory class locations and the prevalence of depression and anxiety in the United States

Our study used a large, nationally representative sample and diagnostic measures of depression and anxiety to identify and explore an apparent contradiction in the dominant “social determinants of health” discourse; i.e., a nonlinear relationship between social class and certain mental illnesses. We documented how the political-economic arrangements that give rise to SES may affect depression and anxiety via relational class mechanisms in a nonlinear, non-gradational fashion. This was seen in supervisors’ and managers’ high prevalence and odds of depression and anxiety relative to workers and owners. Our findings suggest that class processes such as domination and exploitation warrant explicit attention in social and psychiatric epidemiology.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4609238/

This is why the totalitarianism is actually rather rare and dysfunctional and will probably get rarer and more dysfunctional in the future.


Wrightwood. Cal.

21 October, 1949

Dear Mr. Orwell,

It was very kind of you to tell your publishers to send me a copy of your book. It arrived as I was in the midst of a piece of work that required much reading and consulting of references; and since poor sight makes it necessary for me to ration my reading, I had to wait a long time before being able to embark on Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Agreeing with all that the critics have written of it, I need not tell you, yet once more, how fine and how profoundly important the book is. May I speak instead of the thing with which the book deals — the ultimate revolution? The first hints of a philosophy of the ultimate revolution — the revolution which lies beyond politics and economics, and which aims at total subversion of the individual's psychology and physiology — are to be found in the Marquis de Sade, who regarded himself as the continuator, the consummator, of Robespierre and Babeuf. The philosophy of the ruling minority in Nineteen Eighty-Four is a sadism which has been carried to its logical conclusion by going beyond sex and denying it. Whether in actual fact the policy of the boot-on-the-face can go on indefinitely seems doubtful. My own belief is that the ruling oligarchy will find less arduous and wasteful ways of governing and of satisfying its lust for power, and these ways will resemble those which I described in Brave New World. I have had occasion recently to look into the history of animal magnetism and hypnotism, and have been greatly struck by the way in which, for a hundred and fifty years, the world has refused to take serious cognizance of the discoveries of Mesmer, Braid, Esdaile, and the rest.

Partly because of the prevailing materialism and partly because of prevailing respectability, nineteenth-century philosophers and men of science were not willing to investigate the odder facts of psychology for practical men, such as politicians, soldiers and policemen, to apply in the field of government. Thanks to the voluntary ignorance of our fathers, the advent of the ultimate revolution was delayed for five or six generations. Another lucky accident was Freud's inability to hypnotize successfully and his consequent disparagement of hypnotism. This delayed the general application of hypnotism to psychiatry for at least forty years. But now psycho-analysis is being combined with hypnosis; and hypnosis has been made easy and indefinitely extensible through the use of barbiturates, which induce a hypnoid and suggestible state in even the most recalcitrant subjects.

Within the next generation I believe that the world's rulers will discover that infant conditioning and narco-hypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of government, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging and kicking them into obedience. In other words, I feel that the nightmare of Nineteen Eighty-Four is destined to modulate into the nightmare of a world having more resemblance to that which I imagined in Brave New World. The change will be brought about as a result of a felt need for increased efficiency. Meanwhile, of course, there may be a large scale biological and atomic war — in which case we shall have nightmares of other and scarcely imaginable kinds.

Thank you once again for the book.

Yours sincerely,

Aldous Huxley


I genuinely wonder how you can imagine that the USSR or DPRK in space will be magically less of a wonky shitshow where nothing works. Totalitarianism in space will be chernobyl every day, airlocks left open, hydroponic feed tubes left to gum up with toxins, structural welds left half done, cracked blast shields unreplaced, periodic brownouts as the solar panels drift out of alignment, backflowing sanitary facilities just left to spew shit everywhere, pharmaceuticals with the wrong labels on....
Yes I agree, there will be no time for stupidity/error if you find yourself living in a technocratic space colony.

Never mind light lag crushing large scale totalitarianism capitalism, depression will kill it on the small scale too just as it does on earth.
I agree, light lag affects all forms of human organization.


I'm not promoting scientific totalitarianism, but I think capitalism will eventually sleepwalk into technocracy.







Be seeing you,



-RT
#14988709
“I'm convinced that before the year 2000 is over, the first child will have been born on the moon.”
― Wernher Von Braun

Nice to see space capitalists are trying to monopolize space tourism (and build the foundation for a space passport system). Nazi war criminal, Wernher von Braun, is an excellent poster boy for scientific totalitarianism.



The V-2 assembly plant at the Mittelwerk, near the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, used slave labor, as did a number of other production sites. Von Braun was a member of the Nazi Party and an SS officer, yet was also arrested by the Gestapo in 1944 for careless remarks he made about the war and the rocket. His responsibility for the crimes connected to rocket production is controversial.
https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/h ... n/bio.html

In attempting to justify his involvement in the development of the German V-2 rocket, Braun stated that patriotic motives had outweighed whatever qualms he had had about the moral implications of his nation’s policies under Hitler. He also emphasized the innate impartiality of scientific research, which in itself, he said, has no moral dimensions until its products are put to use by the larger society. During his later career Braun received numerous high awards from U.S. government agencies and from professional societies in the United States and other countries.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Wernher-von-Braun


But while his actions during the Second World War were monstrous, he wasn't motivated by some inherent evil or personal belief in Nazi ideology. Von Braun was motivated by his childhood obsession with spaceflight, a somewhat uncritical patriotism, and a naive grasp of the ramifications of his actions in creating one of the War's deadliest weapons. How can we treat someone who brought technological triumph to two nations, in one case as a purveyor of death and destruction and in the other a bringer of wonder and inspiration?
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opini ... 74374.html

"Research is what I’m doing when I don’t know what I’m doing." -Von Braun




What is the Gateway

You could call it a destination hotel, a LEO cruise ship, or a city in space with a spaceport. But the best way to understand this complex piece of infrastructure is to look to its namesake: The Gateway.

Humankind will explore and colonize our solar system and then reach for the stars. But every time terrestrial travelers will venture outside Earths atmosphere to worlds and destinations afar, we will stop at The Gateway and change from our earth shuttle to a true spaceship, and the same for people visiting Earth, they will stop at The Gateway and board a shuttle to Earth. This space station will be our Gateway to the stars and for those born on our Moon, Mars, and beyond, it will be The Gateway to Earth.

Humankind will return to the Moon. We will colonize Mars and mine the asteroid belt. We will walk on Europa, Io, and later Titan, but before we do any of that – we will build The Gateway.

It’s the first important step to colonizing space and other worlds – The Gateway Foundation will connect people from all over the world so we can make this first step together.


https://gatewayspaceport.com/the-gateway/what-is/

Technical Overview

Perigee: 400km
Apogee: 400km
Orbital: Inclination 28.5 deg
Atmospheric: Pressure 1 atm, 1013 hectopascals, 29.92 inHg
Width: 488m
Depth: 76m
Pressurized: Volume 11,906,250m3
Crew: 150
Max Guests: 1250
Solar Power Generation: 56.1Mw




Memorable quotes from the video above: "There's my favorite, the villa. Similar to how Boeing will customize an airliner frame to create a VIP private jet, so too will we have modules fitted for wealthy customers. VIP jets can be very plush, but this station will have far lower noise levels, consistent pressurization, no turbulence or vibration. It'll be more like a billionaire's yacht."

"There is also the person who wants to visit space for a few days, but doesn't have enough money to buy their own villa. For every billionaire that wants to visit space, there are millions of well-off people who'll buy a ticket to the orbital Hilton, for a three day off-world excursion."

"My favorite is the middle class person who wants to go too, but can't afford to blow their retirement getting there. For that person we've created the gateway foundation crew membership. Each year we will choose one of these people from the first 1K members and one from the first 10k to visit the station at our expense. We created the crew membership for lots of different reasons, but the biggest one has to do with the powerful force of innovation stemming from human curiosity. When everyday people get involved, things start to move fast."

"We will need workers from many walks of life just to run this station."









@starman2003
Here's another wonder that'll knock your socks off!



Fantasy Becomes Reality.

Chart a course for adventure and wonder, where elegance and sophistication mingle with storytelling and whimsy. Sister ship to the Disney Dream, the Disney Fantasy is a masterpiece of design and engineering boasting Art Nouveau allure alongside modern technological advancements. Set sail for exotic destinations aboard this 130,000-ton marvel while enjoying Disney magic at sea!

Featuring 14 towering decks, a ship length of 1,115 feet and a maximum width of 125 feet, the 130,000-ton vessel includes 1,250 staterooms and has the capacity to comfortably accommodate 4,000 passengers—along with the over 1450 Cast and Crew Members who tend to the needs of every cruise Guest each and every day.


https://disneycruise.disney.go.com/ships/fantasy/

:eek:
#14988712
Don't worry RT the video is designed as a promotional video for a vision and potential funds going to waste instead of being a reality that will ever materialise. Such a project is a white elephant for the capitalist playboy, most of whom will not wager on the dead horse. Whatever the estimates of such a project you can times the figure by at least ten - and as such no billionaire is going to finance their hub until significant progress has been made getting the thing started to begin with. And without backing the project is dead before it takes off.

If the ISS declined the Von Braun station design due to cost and engineering challenges then whoever thinks they can make a profit from it might as well either give their money to charity or declare themselves bankrupt now. :lol:

Capitalism might advance progress but it has its limits. Only national vanity and a cold war mentality could perhaps make this station a reality. And that is Socialism territory.

#irony
#14988737
B0ycey wrote:Don't worry RT the video is designed as a promotional video for a vision and potential funds going to waste instead of being a reality that will ever materialise. Such a project is a white elephant for the capitalist playboy, most of whom will not wager on the dead horse. Whatever the estimates of such a project you can times the figure by at least ten - and as such no billionaire is going to finance their hub until significant progress has been made getting the thing started to begin with. And without backing the project is dead before it takes off.

If the ISS declined the Von Braun station design due to cost and engineering challenges then whoever thinks they can make a profit from it might as well either give their money to charity or declare themselves bankrupt now. :lol:

Capitalism might advance progress but it has its limits. Only national vanity and a cold war mentality could perhaps make this station a reality. And that is Socialism territory.

#irony

That is just your wishful thinking.
#14988743
SolarCross wrote:That is just your wishful thinking.


Well that is what I thought of your "space odyssey" when you published a video of a crowd funded project to build a space station in space. Its mere existence is to extort money from the likes of you. :lol:

Have you joined up to the Gateway Foundation yet? Remember membership gives you the chance to be one of two lucky people to be the first to visit the space station when it's build (so never).
#14988744
@B0ycey



lol, you have no clue what you are talking about.

Following its first test launch, Falcon Heavy is now the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two. With the ability to lift into orbit nearly 64 metric tons (141,000 lb)---a mass greater than a 737 jetliner loaded with passengers, crew, luggage and fuel--Falcon Heavy can lift more than twice the payload of the next closest operational vehicle, the Delta IV Heavy, at one-third the cost. Falcon Heavy draws upon the proven heritage and reliability of Falcon 9. Its first stage is composed of three Falcon 9 nine-engine cores whose 27 Merlin engines together generate more than 5 million pounds of thrust at liftoff, equal to approximately eighteen 747 aircraft. Only the Saturn V moon rocket, last flown in 1973, delivered more payload to orbit. Falcon Heavy was designed from the outset to carry humans into space and restores the possibility of flying missions with crew to the Moon or Mars.
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