ObjectivityIncarnate

you just get loans against your static wealth at incredibly favorable interest rates.

It’s more than that, because the wealth of those who utilize loans this way typically isn’t static. It’s not about just getting a good rate, it’s that the assets they use as collateral appreciate in value at a rate higher than inflation and the interest rate combined, so in practice, the interest rate is literally negative. The price of having access to these loans is that their net worth just grows a bit more slowly as a result.

Of course, this only works as long as said assets continue to appreciate at that rate.

This would be funnier if it wasn’t so aggravatingly accurate, lol.

Am I the only one who always subconsciously mentally replaces “baby” in song titles/lyrics with “infant” to see how funny the result is?

power wasting lights.

To be fair, it’s all LEDs now, which consume very little power.

Yeah, that’s not definitely not on YouTube, the final ‘star score’ was effectively indicative only of the ratio of the 5-stars to the 1-stars. The infinitesimal minority that would actually thoughtfully rate 2, 3, or 4 stars made no difference at all.

Yeah, no way an omnipotent God could do anything about the lack of Y chromosomes. He can create a new life in the womb of a virgin woman, but put a Y in the kid? Nope, His hands are tied, apparently.

Come on, lol.

It’s not “capitalism alone”, but it’s clear that capitalism was a massive catalyst in accelerating that success, hence my emphasis on “how far we came in such a short period of time”.

In 1820, 94% of the world’s population was living in extreme poverty. By 1910, this figure had fallen to 82%, and by 1950 the rate had dropped yet further, to 72%. However, the largest and fastest decline occurred between 1981 (44.3%) and 2015 (9.6%).

Greed isn’t just wanting good for yourself, it’s wanting more than what is reasonable.

“What is reasonable” is the furthest thing from an objective measure, no matter how much you believe your definition of it is the definition of it.

You’re the one believing a myth—world history already contains plenty of information to back up what I just wrote. Check global poverty rates a century ago, compared to today, for one. It’s almost miraculous just how far we came in such a short period of time! And no, it wasn’t just because of China.

1. Corruption makes it possible for greed to be rewarded in any system.
2. Greed is not necessarily a net negative—one’s personal avarice can be ‘addressed’ by creating and selling a product that the public is happy to pay (an amount that creates profit for them) for. That sort of ambition should be encouraged, because the result is a better outcome for everyone.

I think we can do better than that

Maybe we can. But of everything that’s been tried so far, capitalism has by far worked the best.

So if there is a better way, it’s got to be a brand-new idea.

There is no other system immune to the potential negatives within capitalism, while no other system has shown to have as many positives as capitalism has had, over its history.

Don’t be surprised if those negatives magically persist within a different system. The grass is always greener—you’re better off addressing the negatives directly (e.g. sensible legal regulations within the system), instead of naively assuming that changing the system will magically eliminate or even lessen them.