Capitalism and Enlightenment Now

[Anonymous No.15091306]

>Capitalism saved the world, and there is even a heretical theory now, moving up from the level of individuals to countries: countries that trade more and have more open economies are less likely to fight wars and less likely to have genocides.
Is he right? Is capitalism the savior of humanity? What would you say about his comments on capitalism in Enlightenment Now?

Only respond if you've read the book.

[Anonymous No.15091326]

>>15091306
>Pinker was born in Montreal, Quebec, in 1954, to a middle-class Jewish family.

[Anonymous No.15091430]

>>15091326
Jews are good at economics so what?

[Anonymous No.15091443]

[Anonymous No.15091450]

>>15091443
As if he would no what a monster that man was.

[Anonymous No.15091455]

>>15091306
Before world war 1 people also used to say the world economy was too interconnect by trade too allow for wars.
We all know how that happened.
Also the USA has been at war for decades now.
Plus the Australian government helped the Indonesian government commit genocide for access to a few gold and copper mines.

[Anonymous No.15091569]

>>15091306
>tyson
bait

[Anonymous No.15091634]

>>15091569
Tyson envisions a wild, capitalist frontier of interplanetary businesses, astroid mines, and factories on the moon. It may sound like science fiction, but this space-cadet’s dream is only a few decades away from becoming a reality.

“Mining an asteroid is like having access to earth's core. And what do you have? Yes, you have your iron or nickel, but you also have rare earth elements that are common on these asteroids. There's more gold on these asteroids than have ever been mined in the history of the world,” he said.

[Anonymous No.15091811]

>>15091306

I absolutely genuinely think Pinker is an intellectual charlatan.

Consumptive capitalism and it's logic of ever continuing growth is causing such planetary damage that geologists call our era the anthropocene era.

Wealth inequality has never been higher, debt has rarely been higher, culture has rarely been this commodified, essentials like housing and healthcare have never been more expensive, our birth rates are collapsing, terrorism is getting more sophisticated, war and ethnic cleansing is still happening, multicultural societies are at breaking point due to ethnic incompatibility, global warming is becoming an ever increasing existential threat, natural resources are diminishing, the threat of viral pandemics is going through the roof, nuclear annihilation is more likely as rogue states like NK develop the technology and I'm just starting to skim the surface.

[Anonymous No.15091821]

>>15091443

[Anonymous No.15091868]

>>15091811
>nuclear annihilation is more likely as rogue states like NK develop the technology and I'm just starting to skim the surface.
Fuck off either you're a glowie for saying this or just a libtard. NK has nukes for a reason. In the Korean war Korea had their cities demolished, 600k plus bombs dropped by the US, to this day the US has them under heavy sanctions. The DPRK (NK) is unironically the only free nation on earth and I sincerely mean that

[Anonymous No.15091905]

>>15091306
>>Capitalism saved the world, and there is even a heretical theory now, moving up from the level of individuals to countries:
It's heretical because it's awful. Neoliberalism has by every statically measure has only benefited the top 1% yes the third world might have more gadgets, but they're still poor and entire first world is stagnating with the exception of maybe China.
>countries that trade more and have more open economies are less likely to fight wars and less likely to have genocides.
Because the US and it's vassal nations would wreck any nation who opposes them doesn't mean open trade is good, it's only good for transnationals lol

[Anonymous No.15092131]

>>15091306
>less likely to fight wars and less likely to have genocides
don't care

[Anonymous No.15092167]

>>15091443
>scientist Steven pinker
worst part of this image

[Anonymous No.15092198]

>>15091821
What’s the problem?

[Anonymous No.15092284]

[Anonymous No.15092317]

[Anonymous No.15092326]

[Anonymous No.15092337]

[Anonymous No.15092341]

>"At this point in our discourse I would like to take a step back and simply use the word 'Nigger'. I felt the word needed to be somewhere in this book, and so here it is. For too long the pusillanimous editors at Penguin Random House have refused to publish any work containing this word. But do you think I give a shit about what some fruit-fly faggot commies in New York have to say on the matter of science? Because this book is pure science! There is a science in the way I have used Nigger. (And will continue to use Nigger, damn it all!) When will academia allow for the science of Nigger? Shall I be the first to proclaim this new scientific specialization? We must explore Nigger together. What is the first idea that comes to mind when I say Nigger? Obviously, the phallus. But not just any phallus--a black phallus. A towering ebony phallus whose immensity parallels the pyramids of Giza or the Teocalli of pre-Columbian Mexico! Ah, the primordial inseminator! L'éléphant porte son seau! Just as the black sun was the apotheosis of spiritual intensity for Goebbels and the Nazi Schutzstaffel, so too is the black phallus the apotheosis of our own politics and social order. We all worship it one way or another. Notice [fig. 4.5b] that the black phallus does indeed seem to supersede the more flimsy, Asian phallus in both size and function; and as far as I'm concerned this is proof enough that Taoism is pure shit." - Steven Pinker, in Enlightenment Now (2018), pg. 266

[Anonymous No.15092347]

[Anonymous No.15092398]

[Anonymous No.15092442]

>>15092317
>>15092326
>>15092337
those have to be fake

[Anonymous No.15093612]

>>15092442
They're real.

[Anonymous No.15093873]

>>15092398
>>15092347
>>15092337
>>15092326
>>15092317
>>15092284
>>15091821

Macintyre and Taleb should team up and kill this spastic cunt

[Anonymous No.15094082]

>>15091821
>>15092284
>>15092317
>>15092326
>>15092337
>>15092398
These have to be fake.

[Anonymous No.15094087]

>>15091306
>usa in a 24/7 state of war
>dude capitalism like brings peace okay
Does this kind of person even reflect on their beliefs for more than 30 seconds?

[Anonymous No.15094112]

>>15094087
Not major wars and hardly anyone dies. All those shitholes likely have less deaths when America goes to war with them.

[Anonymous No.15094204]

>>15091306
>taking pinker seriously
biggest pseud on the entire planet

[Anonymous No.15095350]

>>15094204
Then refute him.

[Anonymous No.15095481]

>>15095350
what is this bug mindest
the disagreement is not with empirical facts like the state now has monopoly on violence due to modernity but the idea that it is a good thing in the first place

[Anonymous No.15095681]

>>15091821
post irony. fucking cant tell if these are real but i posted them on /pol/ for the lulz

[Anonymous No.15095701]

>>15094204
But Taleb already did

[Anonymous No.15095748]

>>15091821
>>15092284
>>15092317
>>15092326
>>15092337
>>15092347
>>15092398
>>>/pol/253425681

Are you the one that makes these? You have talent, brother. I spread your memes for you. They are very subversive.

[Anonymous No.15095754]

>>15095701
just look at the sheer power of this phoenecian bvll

[Anonymous No.15095758]

>>15095481
It is good. We are wealthier, healthier, and happier then ever. There is hardly any death from violent conflict and industry makes all of this easier for us.

[Anonymous No.15095777]

>>15095758
>healthier
Lmao

[Anonymous No.15095783]

>>15091634
'capitalism' as it actually is is too inefficient and corrupt to take on big projects like that.

[Anonymous No.15095789]

>>15095758
guess what other charts skyrocket with industrial revolution

[Anonymous No.15095790]

>>15095758
we are materially better. the lust for longevity breeds weak dysgenic beings. we must become lovers of struggle and strife as comfort is only the negation of self actualization

[Anonymous No.15095797]

>>15091306
he;s right. the evolution of a global liberal state that hegel predicted is secured through free trade. read smith my lil niggas.

[Anonymous No.15095817]

>>15095790
The world is too small for a bunch of thinkers. You and I will take your advice, but most won't, and they'll get exactly what they've earned.

[Anonymous No.15095831]

>>15095789
Basedness?

[Anonymous No.15095836]

>>15095831
do you look at the average modern dweller and think "man this guy is based"

[Anonymous No.15095847]

>>15095758
>wealthier
being able to buy lots of mass-produced trash that makes you sick and ruins the planet does not make your wealthier.

>healthier
are you joking? you need only look food composition, pollution and obesity.

>happier
not even close. even a slave is happier than most today because he has an assured position and a tightly-bonded family.

[Anonymous No.15095859]

>>15091634
Eugh go back

[Anonymous No.15095879]

>>15091306
Capitalism saved the world... for the first world countries. For anyone else it made hell. I wouldn't go as far as denounce capitalism making the entire 3rd world a shithole, because most of those were probably just as bad as before, but to claim capitalism is a messiah is simply lying. If you were honest you'd say "it made my country rich, I don't give two fucks about chinks and Africans working their lives for the things I buy for cheap, capitalism fuck yeah".

[Anonymous No.15095899]

>>15095758
hurr durr line go up
>life expectancy
yes, and it caused major problems including but not limited to stagnant innovation, binding of ressources because old people may be alive but cant work anymore while costing ressources. also, i wouldnt call sitting in an assisted living facility waiting for death while being pumped full of pharmaceuticals living a life, but thats just me.
>gdp per capita
what is inflation
>percentage not living in extreme poverty
that one is correct, but that doesnt really have anything to do with free trade capitalism per se, the life improvement under state capitalism in china, japan and germany in the 20th century have been above and beyond anything the us, the british or anyone else for that matter every produced. and none of them were trade neolib paradises
>war making capacity
lol why would that be an improvement by pinkers own standards
>% living in a democracy
hurr durr muh "democracy", lets hand over actual control to a bunch of plutocrats controlled by power groups that have no tie to your peoples history, customs or wellbeing but instead to themselves or the corporations that finance them
the main problem is that this guy tries to use spreadsheets, and badly doctored ones most of the times to tell people why they should be happy. but a lot of people in the countries that get to benefit from everything he points out are not exactly happy, there is increasing pessimism, apathy, drug abuse, depression and so forth. people dont live from bread alone, and not from tvs and fridges either. sure, everyone likes having a bigger house, a better dinner and not being killed. that is absolutely correct, noone contests it. but despite all that there is something missing, something essential to the human condition. that doesnt imply that we should go back to living in the woods, but pinker just shoves spreadsheets at everyone and shames them into being happy, like a neurotic mom that screams at sad teenager that he should be happy to have such a nice big house and that they can afford his antidepressants and why he hates his parents so much for not doing exactly as he's told.

[Anonymous No.15095931]

>>15095899
/thread

Anyone defending capitalism is because they want to defend their active businesses.

[Anonymous No.15095938]

>>15095879
All countries are richer because of capitalism.

[Anonymous No.15095960]

>>15095938
You mean, all countries are in debt with international banking system, right?

[Anonymous No.15095976]

>>15094112
please leave and don’t come back until you’re over 18

[Anonymous No.15095980]

>>15095960
when the right and the left put aside their differences(they can hold) to oust every banker in the world we will know true progress

[Anonymous No.15096010]

>>15095976
Prove it wrong.

[Anonymous No.15096013]

>>15095980
And why would the left or the right ever do that? There's only place for a few on the top of the pyramid, and once you get there it's better to stay on the side of the financing system. It's just how it is. You're trash, your effort means nothing and capitalism works on this basis.

[Anonymous No.15096056]

>>15096013
are you jewish?

[Anonymous No.15096085]

>>15096056
Do you need to be Jewish to perceive the truth?

[Anonymous No.15096090]

>>15091306
>capitalism is great because I, a public intellectual who has made my money writing books for dullards, can use my wealth to rape children with the geopolitical elite
Ah, the rigors of right wing political theory.

[Anonymous No.15096125]

>>15096010
>waaaaaah spoonfeed me like mommy does waaaaaaaaaaah

[Anonymous No.15096224]

>>15096125
So you can't.

[Anonymous No.15096247]

>>15095879
No it pretty much made the 3rd world an absolute shithole. Back in the day they at least had a traditional lifestyle. Sure it was hard but they had many ways to cope. Now they wade through piles and piles of shit. Garbage everywhere. Pollution. And they spend all day in some stupid sweat shop making Nikes. At least a subsistence farmer spent his day under the clear blue sky.

[Anonymous No.15096256]

Mass ecological destruction isn't my idea of saving the planet but whatever.

[Anonymous No.15096267]

Pinker is a IYI BS vendor, a fraud and a hack.

[Anonymous No.15096433]

>>15096267
Yet Taleb fundamentally agrees with him.

[Anonymous No.15096450]

>>15091306
Partially true, but it's more due to the American power guaranteeing open trade than open trade itself that prevents wars. There was open trade before WW1 and it didn't do much to prevent the war.

[Anonymous No.15096497]

>>15096247
Those countries are gradually getting better due to capitalism, industrialization is a bit painful for everyone, but compare the US/UK to industrialization under Stalin or Mao.

[Anonymous No.15096503]

>>15096497
And now they're all in debt. Working as intended?

[Anonymous No.15096511]

>>15096503
They'll learn eventually.

[Anonymous No.15096514]

>>15096511
>>15096503
Also, which countries do you have in mind? I suspect a lot of them are in debt after trying to implement excessive gibs programs and going bankrupt.

[Anonymous No.15096519]

>>15096497
>getting better
For what, tourism?

[Anonymous No.15096531]

>>15096519
In wealth. Also, nothing wrong with tourism.

[Anonymous No.15096572]

>>15091306
Pinker claims that any shortcomings of this society are due to its not being capitalist enough, and as the system becomes more efficient these minor difficulties will be resolved.
In my humble opinion, he's definitely right.

[Anonymous No.15096650]

>>15091306
Based.

[Anonymous No.15096706]

>>15096572
>a free market
>a demand market intervention
The only need we have from capitalism is technological progress to transcend our language.

[Anonymous No.15096845]

>>15096514
> I suspect a lot of them are in debt after trying to implement excessive gibs programs and going bankrupt.
There's no jobs. People have to eat somehow. What else do advocate? Let'em eat cake?

[Anonymous No.15096867]

>>15096706
To what?

[Anonymous No.15096885]

>>15096572
And how is that any better than the average Marxist saying Socialism works when it's done correctly?

[Anonymous No.15097059]

>>15096885
It's not socialism.

[Anonymous No.15097123]

>>15097059
It's never socialism.

[Anonymous No.15098696]

>>15097123
Capitalism has all the benefits of other economies without any of the shortcomings.