Feo3: THEE 'Physicsist'
Posted by Feo Amante on Feb 03, 2004 at 22:36
(24.130.231.153)Re: Feo2: THEE 'Physicsist' (Kathleen Eykamp)
I get the feeling from this latest post that you're drifting from your original assertions, Kathleen.
But if I may take a stab at one point you make that seems to be a key point to your whole post:
>We don't live in an ideal society but an opportunistic one, often throwing all ethical decisions to the wind for the ALMIGHTY DOLLAR, in a lose-lose fashion.<
Honestly speaking, I don't see that in the U.S. and I didn't see that in Australia when I was there.
I can't speak for the whole world, of course.
But it's my opinion the being opportunistic is a pretty good survival mechanism. Whereas an ideal society is an impossibility, an opportunistic one can care for the greatest number of it's people.
Being opportunistic - and I don't equate it with being greedy - means having the adaptability to accept change both for better and worse and use it to your greatest advantage.
Let's say you are looking for a job. You learn, teach yourself, or get training in a specific area you feel you can do well in. Then you go out and try to find a match for your talents. Nothing comes along but you've learned enough with general studies in grade school to get by. You keep plugging away, looking for your moment. One day a friend or aquaintance knows of somebody who could use your talent. In a given pool of need, there are hundreds or thousands of desires/wants. Out of those many, thee are a few who want your specific talent and you use the opportunity.
I use an Urban example but it works just as well on a primitive level with a human faced with an environmental potential. Like the humans in Egypt who not only adapted to the annual flooding of their river banks, but used the opportunity to thrive in harmony with it. They didn't think they were being harmoneous with nature. Hell, they built vast stone monuments and buildings that used up great resources. Still, they thrived and grew within their environment by being opportunistic, taking what came their way and adapting, changing, and ultimately thriving.
Building an ideal society takes a lot longer and isn't necessary to survival.
In the U.S., for example, we have been trying for hundreds of years to build an ideal society. It takes time overcoming the primal survival instincts. We'll make it. There is an unsteady imbalance of optimists and pessimists and good people doing good and bad things and bad people doing bad and good things - all in order to get a bigger reward for themselves and/or their family.
But it works, and in all the various historical economies, nothing works better than the work and reward system of Capitalism. Nothing checks capitalism better than a free Democracy of voting public. And that in turn works best within the framework of a Republic.
The almighty dollar isn't the goal. Lots of gold wasn't the point of the Gold rush: no one planned to stay in the golden hills once they made their fortune. I'm not working because I enjoy going to work and collecting a paycheck at regular intervals. I work because I trade my effort for a measure of freedom. that as long as I can take care of myself, I'm not wholly subject to someone else's rules.
Many of us aren't chasing the almight dollar, but merely grabbing it as we run past GO.
If there is a God, I don't need him. I'd rather live and die by my own devices, in a world indifferent to me, than be subject to a God's (biblically speaking) capricious whim and judgement.