[GJM] Zero sum game

[Janos]

Steve, are yusing the expression "zero sum" with your own special meaning?

My understanding of the meaning of "Zero Sum" is that if I have more of some economic goods someone or someones have sthat much less.

As to natural resources versus economic activity, I believe that our ability, at least potentially, to do "more and more with less and less"--the Bucky Fuller thesis--is very significant.

PS and note. You are posting two copies every time  "Discussion Forum for Global Justice" is an alias for discussion at globaljusticemovement.net. Please discard one of them from your address book.
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Steve Consilvio 
  To: discussion at globaljusticemovement.net 
  Sent: Wednesday, January 09, 2008 2:37 AM
  Subject: Re: [GJM] Paula Gloria and Robert Ashford!!


  Zack,


  Can you explain to me why the new high school in my town cost more than the Louisiana purchase?


  The mosquitoes of "a zero sum economy" bite people the same way from generation to generation, but man has an odd habit of putting numbers on things.  Numbers are not a zero-sum economy, they grow, rather wildly.  (aka inflation)  Land, however, does not grow.  The Earth is the same size as it has always been.  If the Earth is physically a zero sum economy, and we are of the Earth, then how can we not have a zero sum economy?


  You may think you created "furniture," but it is still just a tree, with some labor added, and you cannot create the tree, you can only harvest it.  Birds build nests.  So should we say that  birds make "stuff exist" through economic activity?  


  How is it possible that birds can engage in so much "economic activity" without the need for deeds, money or inflation?  If we are smarter than them, then why do we have problems that they do not?  If we are so good at "civilization," then what is the purpose of trying to fix "global justice?"  According to you, nothing is broken.  We live in the best of all possible world, we are "civilized."


  My quote of Ashford is the same as what you said he said.  There is no difference between "capital creates capital," and "acquiring capital with the earnings of capital."  Nor did I say it was wrong, I simply said that the addition of computers was not significant.  You perhaps think computers are the hallmark of civilization.  I think your historical benchmarks are in error, just as his are.  We only need computers because we are so stupid, and have an odd fear and fascination numbers.


  Smell the coffee.  Coffee is the stuff of nature, not civilization.  We need the Earth, the Earth does not need us, nor our numbers.  We don't need the numbers either, but if we are going to use them, 2+2=4.


  peace,
  steve consilvio
  www.behappyandfree.com






  On TuesdayJan 8, 2008, at 3:39 PM, discussion-request at globaljusticemovement.net wrote:


     Steve, you write:




    "Robert Ashford states that 'once you understand that capital creates its

    own capital'..."




    You really are a goosey little fellow, aren't you?  Ashford never said

    the words you attribute to him, not anything even close.  It's just

    something you, not Ashford, dreamed up.  What he talks repeatedly of is

    "the right to acquire capital with the earnings of capital."




    And your continual rants are just laughable.  For example, the ludicrous

    point about the economy being a "zero sum game."




    Just look around you my friend.  Smell the coffee.  Wake up.  See all the

    stuff that exists, the furniture in your room, the streets outside, the

    buildings, factories and farms all around you.  That stuff exists, and

    was created through economic activity.  It is the stuff of civilization.




    A "zero sum" economy is the economy of mosquitoes, not conscious human

    beings who build from generation to generation.




    Zack
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://globaljusticemovement.net/pipermail/discussion_globaljusticemovement.net/attachments/20080109/a1ab8951/attachment.html