[The Immortal Goon]

I'm new, so I appologize if this is a tired issue - just tell me and let the thread die then.

However, I'm curious about what a strict technocrat would say about Trotsky's views in the following essay:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky ... 35-ame.htm

In it, he says:

Here is where the American soviets can produce real miracles. "Technocracy" can come true only under communism, when the dead hands of private property rights and private profits are lifted from your industrial system. The most daring proposals of the Hoover commission on standardization and rationalization will seem childish compared to the new possibilities let loose by American communism.

And it seems to me he is correct - it seems that you would need a radical change in power in order to accomplish these goals. I am a Trotskyist, and I beleive that Technocracy is the final goal that the communist should shoot for.

So my question is more or less, is there a bridge between communism and technocracy. I beleive there is, and I'm curious to see if, in your view, this puts me at odds with the standard technocrat.

Thanks, and sorry again if this is a tires subject. As I said, let this thread die a quick death if it is.

-TIG

[p4lladium]

And it seems to me he is correct - it seems that you would need a radical change in power in order to accomplish these goals. I am a Trotskyist, and I beleive that Technocracy is the final goal that the communist should shoot for.

I agree completely, Communism can be thought of as a proto-Technocracy, as it is not reliant on high technology or organization to work. In regards to Trotsky's words, he's absolutely right in that there is virtually no way capitalist America (and Canada) could possibly become a Technocracy, there would simply be far too much opposition for it to work. For one, like Trotsky said, Americans are very posessive in regards to our property and free enterprise. More importantly (and possible more dangerously), most people that I talk to draw an instant (and false) parallel between Technocracy and Soviet Communism, which is especially sad considering that they don't understand what either is in the least. We need to get off our high horse before making the jump to something better. I do not believe there is a necessary transitional system between Communism and Technocracy, rather that Communism is the transition between Capitalism and Technocracy.

[Mr. Anderson]

Here's something I found.

In question #3 you ask, ``How does the prediction of the collapse of capitalism compare with that of Marx?''

Technocracy never had any philosophical predictions on the inevitable collapse of capitalism. The Marxian political philosophy was a condemnation of the ills of so-called capitalist society and a propaganda political document that all wealth was created by work, labor and toil, a theme which he sums up in his ``Workers of the World Unite.'' Marx, of course, envisaged abolition of one estate and the creation of another, and that the capitalist class should be expropriated and the workers be installed as the new social elite in a socialist world. Technocracy Inc. has never held any brief for the so-called ``capitalist class,'' or for that matter for any proprietary interest or group in our social structure.Marx only wanted to eliminate the so-called exploiting and owning classes. We contend that it is hardly worth undertaking. What Technocracy has always contended is that if sufficient energy consuming devices are installed and the total amount of extraneous energy consumed per capita reaches or exceeds 200,000 kilogram calories per capita per day, toil and workers alike will be eliminated, and, when toil is eliminated, the bourgeoisie will likewise go down the drain of history. Technocracy has always contended that Marxian political philosophy and Marxian economics were never sufficiently radical or revolutionary to handle the problems brought on by the impact of technology in a large size national society of today. It is sufficiently revolutionary to be of some importance and temporary application to under-developed areas of the globe. We have always contended that Marxian communism, so far as this Continent is concerned, is so far to the right that it is bourgeois. It is well here to bear in mind, the technological progression of the next 30 minutes invalidates all the social wisdom of previous history. Technology has no ancestors in the social history of man. It creates its own.

We could give you the energy calculations in many examples, but that takes paper and time. A simple one in agriculture: In order to handle the food production where the costs are lowered and to where the speed is so great that it becomes applicable to large scale production, concepts and design factors go beyond anything that the Russians or Chinese have ever attempted, because they base their concepts on the collaboration of human beings and the values of human toil and hand tools, although they were trying to adapt these concepts to the introduction of mechanical means. Neither Russia nor China has as yet developed the design to handle even the production of wheat in their area, let alone other commodities. The knowledge is here; and it has been done, their design factors have been proven. It requires more energy per minute than has ever been employed in the cultivation of the soil anywhere in the world in history, and even without further development, one unit now in existence plants and fertilizes 70 acres of wheat per hour. You cannot do it with human beings on the land. You have to move the human being off the land to make way for powerful equipment which is not yet in quantity production any place on the globe.

Source: http://www.technocracy.ca/simp/history.htm

6.2 Is not Technocracy very similar to Socialism or Communism?

No, it is not -- mainly because it proceeds from entirely different premises than either socialism or communism. Technocracy originated out of a circumstance of technologically-produced disemployment. Research indicated that increasing technological disemployment would render impossible the distribution of sufficient consuming power in salaries and wages to buy back the products of increasingly efficient machines. The social program of Technocracy therefore, is one specifically designed to distribute an optimum of goods and services to all citizens. (The resulting disemployment by technology mentioned above is on the lips of nearly everyone in North America today.)
Socialism and Communism, by contrast, were out-growths of an environment in which practically all work was done by human muscle-power, and wherein it was never possible to produce sufficient goods and services for all citizens. Karl Marx's theories were formulated to overcome conditions as they existed in Europe in the middle of the 19th Century -- far different conditions from those faced in 20th Century North America.
Only Technocracy applies the necessary measures to cope with 20th century technological problems.

Source: http://www.technocracy.ca/simp/Technocr ... .x.htm#6.2

=====

Maybe communism would be the transition stage, maybe not. There are so many variables to take into account.

Technocracy would probably come up if there is too much automation. Machines displace humans, and so less humans get jobs. The less jobs there are, the less consuming power there is. This situation could be resolved in many ways. Maybe the government will be forced to start to control the economy more, leading to communism. Maybe corporations will collapse, automation will be used less, and humans will be hired again to do manual labor. Maybe a technocracy would be implemented off the bat. It is difficult to predict what might happen.

Communism may be the transitional stage, but it may not be. There are scenarios which use it, and scenarios which do not. We cannot tell at the moment, however.

[The Immortal Goon]

I thank you all very much for your detailed responses to the question I posed.

I have a point, however, that may need to be cleaned up. There have been assertions made that capitalism will be able to birth the rise of technocracy, and the condtion was also made that the power class would try to stop such a rise - this I would agree with.

But I must also point out that the working classes would also oppose such a change, after all - if things are wage based, would technocracy not rob the toiling masses of work?

Thanks again for all of your very detailed responses thus far

-TIG

[Ixa]

Here's something I found.

Amusing. Those reprentations of Marxist thought are almost entirely strawmen. Whoever wrote that is clearly someone who has never read a single Marxist classic, but only second-hand (and mostly erroneous) representations of Marxism.

[Garibaldi]

Technocracy would probably come up if there is too much automation. Machines displace humans, and so less humans get jobs. The less jobs there are, the less consuming power there is.

I find this to be a common misconception of Technocrats. Now, let it be understood that we both agree that there will be an immediate lack of jobs when a new machine is introduced. The reason this machine is introduced is because it will either save the corporation money, or make the corporation more money. That means the corporation will have more money to reinvest, either to create more factories revolving around these machines(which require manual labor to keep them in shape), or for their own luxury. In either case, their is more consuming power than before.

[Garibaldi]

Philosophy and science don't mix well, and especially when they pertain to economics.

I find this another misconception, but more so a common misconception on what "science" is. Science itself is merely a philosophy based around the scientific method, and it's become so succesful that the branches of science are often confused as something else. Merely, Biology is the philosophy of applying the scientific principle to the living world, physics is the philosophy of applying the scientific method to the physical world, ect.

There is also a misconception about philosophy. Philosophy is often interpretted around the idea of Metaphysics, and that all of it's components are baed off metaphysics. This is highly untrue, but does show use where the problem with perceive philosophy and percieved science lay, as science can not be applied to metaphysics since the metaphysical world can not be viewed.

Concerning that, science and philosophy mix together very well, and you would need to take into consideration more than just engineers and technological scientists, you'd need to consult highly with sociologists, psycologists, and political scientists to truly divide a "non-scarcity" in order to benefit, as well as economists and accountants.

[CCJ]

Amusing. Those reprentations of Marxist thought are almost entirely strawmen. Whoever wrote that is clearly someone who has never read a single Marxist classic, but only second-hand (and mostly erroneous) representations of Marxism.

Ix, I don't recall anyone asking for your input. If you wish to make a point, make it, but don't make us read another one of your rants about:

a) how great Marxism is
b) how bad non-Marxists are

ESPECIALLY outside of the Communism forum. Got it?

[Ixa]

Amusing. Those reprentations of Marxist thought are almost entirely strawmen. Whoever wrote that is clearly someone who has never read a single Marxist classic, but only second-hand (and mostly erroneous) representations of Marxism.

If you wish to make a point, make it, but don't make us read another one of your rants about:

a) how great Marxism is
b) how bad non-Marxists are

I just thought it necessary to point out that whoever wrote that did not understand Marxism (for example, I do not see the Marxian political philosophy as a comdemnation of the evils of capitalism). This is relevant because the subject of discussion deals with Marxism and the article on which I was commenting was itself relevant.

I have never written anything about how great Marxism is, nor how bad non-Marxists are, in my life, and I don't how I personally, or what I said or did not say in the past, pertains to the subject of discucssion. But since you brought it up, I protest to the contrary. I like capitalism, and why therefore would I complain about how bad Marxists are?

[Garibaldi]

I find this to be a common misconception of Technocrats. Now, let it be understood that we both agree that there will be an immediate lack of jobs when a new machine is introduced. The reason this machine is introduced is because it will either save the corporation money, or make the corporation more money. That means the corporation will have more money to reinvest, either to create more factories revolving around these machines(which require manual labor to keep them in shape), or for their own luxury. In either case, their is more consuming power than before.

Misconception of the Technocrats? I'm afraid you have this reversed. What you have described is the misconception of economicsts who fail to understand several basic facts about the physical world, i.e. science.

I apologise, but that appears to me as nothing more than propoganda. Economicists are very scientific in their research, they can not afford to be otherwise.

One is that you seem to have the process reversed, and that the introduction of the machines induces an initial rise in employment.

How so? Unless your definition of initial is taken as uber-initial, the people required to build the machine are not equivolent to the number of fired workers who's work is now done by the machine. However, you seem to confuse work with manuel labor.

This is shown in this chart. So while this may work at first, it only works when man-hours per unit is still relatively high (i.e. the machines are not terribly productive). However, as seen in the chart and described briefly in this article (more extensively in this one), once the man-hours per unit produced reaches a certain point, no amount of "investment" is going to be able to allow consumers to reclaim their purchasing power, partly because the disemployment is too high, and partly because, contrary to what optimistic business types may hope, markets do get saturated; there is only so much people can consume.

Interesting, but false; there is no less money in existance, but there are fewer buyers. This installs a higher demand for more luxurious items. To fit the new demand, there must be more of the item in existance. This requires more workers in that feild, whether they be machinists or laborers. This increases the demand for less luxurious items, which employe several more people. They inturn require the initial item which caused the unemployement, which necessitates the production of more, requiring more engineers and machinists, who also have purchasing power. Your chart is based on the misconception of labor being the only form of employement.

The other fallacy of economics that supports this type of thinking is that growth can be unlmited. This of course is absurd, as there are physical limits to everything, and this includes consumption and production. Once these limits are reached, the economy will fail (again), and this time there will be no fixing it.

Not true, most people understand that a population will eventually reach a platue. Wealth can continue to expand, indeed it always will if technology is remembered and not treated as though it were inherently evil.

You also seem to misunderstand the nature of the business cycle and the causes of the great depression; it was the failings of banks and the stock market which incited it, not technology. As for depressions, they're just a normal part of the business cycle.

You may be able to "create" money and debt virtually indefinately, but you cannot create matter and energy. North America is headed for a three-fold econmic disaster, and its time that people took their heads out of the hole in the ground called economics.

Actually, matter and energy are a discussion of debate; matter may become energy, thus "creating energy", as well as vice versa. However, altogether you can not create both simotaneously, no. But you seem to forget the second part: they may not be destroyed. All that's gonna happen is that they'll be recycled and used to form more wealth, in more applicable or luxurious configurations.

I apologize if this sounds a bit harsh, it's not meant to be personal. But this is exactly the sort of thinking that got us into this mess in the first place, and continuing to ignore the facts is only going to make things worse, a LOT worse.

Oh, it doesn't sound harsh, but more of ludicris and devoid of any proof other than that which compells conspiracy theories. Although, if you want to hear a good one I just thought up: Artificially high prices caused by the prohibition of alcohol created the great depression, and drug prohibition is dragging us to the same fate on a vaster scale.

I find this another misconception, but more so a common misconception on what "science" is. Science itself is merely a philosophy based around the scientific method,

I prefer not to get dragged into a debate of semantics with you, but for the clarity of those trying to learn Technocracy here I will elaborate our position. Technocracy defines "science" as "The method of determining the most probable." It is not a search for "truth", or anything like that. You simply observe a given phenomenon many times and discover what the closest approximation of common triats is has. This approximation becomes, for the time being, a "fact". This may change with further observations. With these "facts" we can determine what is the most probable course of events in the future. A simple example is observing that lead melts at a certain temperature, at a certain pressure. Thus we can conclude that lead will most probably behave in the same way given identical circumstances.[/quote]

Yes, as guided by the Scientific Method.

Anyone can "combine" science into philosophy, in order to approach such questions as the "validity" of science in man's life, how to integrate it socially, etc. However, science itself cannot deal with these types of questions, and must be kept separate for that purpose.

How can it not? If, by studying the past and present, find reoccurances of phenomena as pertain to the scientific method, then I would say science very well could verify questions otherwise handled by other forms of philosophy.

In other words, philosophers may speak of science all they like, but someone doing scientific work may not rely on any philosophy if he wishes to successfully determine the most probable in the physical world.

Again, science is philosophy, it just happens to be a very specific and successful type.

And since Technocracy has been described as "determining the most probable in societal operations", it to must rely strictly on science and not philosophical concepts, or anything else that is non-objective such as politics. And since it was Technocracy that was the first to do this, it was the first to discover the "facts" regarding the next most probable state of our society. Given that, they used the same facts to determine what would allow us to continue as a technological society, and thus was born the Technocratic design.

This is the same thing you and every "technocratic" site you sent me too has said. I'm beginning to think technocacy doesn't exist at all, it's just a sham to rile people into mass hysteria.

1)Capitalism is doomed to fail.

2) Science shows us this.

3) Politicians can't be trusted, so science should take over.

It's all more unclear than any of Bushes speaches.

[Mr. Anderson]

If there is one thing technocracy is not, that is unclear. It may be difficult to comprehend, but it is no where near unclear. There are even designs for how the energy credits will look like. There are a plethora of sources describing nearly every aspect of technocracy in great detail. There is the technocracy study guide. There are so many places to get information.

I encourage you to explore and find answers to your questions. Many experts have written, and I'm sure you'll find something.

Websites
Technocracy.ca (Kolzene's site)
Technocracy.org (Technocracy Inc.'s site)

Article Listings
Technocracy.org Articles
Technocracy.ca Articles

Articles
What is Technocracy?: The Beginners Guide to Technocracy
Why Technocracy?
Man-Hours and Distribution
Human Motivation in a Technate: Why People Will Work for Free
Energy Accounting
The Energy Certificate

[Garibaldi]

I've read numerous sites, and they all say the same thing: Technocracy is better because it is based on science. The economy is doomed to fail. I have yet to see else, although I will give those sites consideration.

[Mr. Anderson]

Only those websites I posted are valid sources. The rest are not.

[The Immortal Goon]

Amusing. Those reprentations of Marxist thought are almost entirely strawmen. Whoever wrote that is clearly someone who has never read a single Marxist classic, but only second-hand (and mostly erroneous) representations of Marxism.

I've got a degree in Soviet history. I have a minor certification in Hegalian/Marxist thought.

When I come to a board that's not about communism, however, I usually don't come out guns-a-blazing as I wanted to know some very fundemental foundation oriented stuff about technocracy - I know the ABCs of communism and didn't want to get in to an argument about that as, I implied earlier, my focus for coming here was 90% technocracy, 9% understanding what persuasion the technocrats seem to be, and only 1% marxism.

-TIG

[Garibaldi]

It ignores basic physical laws, the most important of which I've already mentioned, that being a reliance on perpetual growth. They think that in order to get more resources, one only needs more "capital" to be "invested", which is patently absurd, and has led to many problems including our current oil production crisis. There are many others, and Technocracy shows quite extensively and in great detail how this is so. I'm sorry if you somehow missed it.

I agree with you that oil is a bad source of energy; however, oil monopolies and secret contracts with Automobile manufacturers has detered the effort to create improved alternate energy sources, although hybrid cars are a step forward. However, I don't know how this will be any different under a technocracy than under a true free market society. Oil as it is now is a necessity, and anybody who can make an alternative energy source which is better would be highly rewarded by the money they would make either by controlling the new energy source directly or through patents. What persuasion does Technocracy have to improve energy sources?

How so? Unless your definition of initial is taken as uber-initial, the people required to build the machine are not equivolent to the number of fired workers who's work is now done by the machine. However, you seem to confuse work with manuel labor.

It's not a difficult concept. One only needs look at the facts that I've presented. The Three Curve Chart that I've already shown you (and given more than enough explanation of) shows an initial rise in man-hours of employment. This is documented history and it happens for physical reasons in virtually every industry. The reason it doesn't "fire workers" at first is because the machines initially don't have a low man-hours per unit of production ratio, in fact one only equivelent to humans themselves. Thus the installation of the machines requires people to operate them, their primary goal is to increase production, not replace workers. As you can see in the chart, only after machines become very efficient and productive (the middle of the chart) do they begin replacing workers. Now, this is overall in a whole industry we're looking at here. An individual company may come into the picture at any point, and thus have an initial laying off of workers if the man-hours per unit ratio is already quite low. Sometimes this happens, overall it misses the big picture.

I think I understand what you're saying about the loss in workers necesary. However, While these people are no longer necesary, there is just as much money ciculating and at higher worth(more products for the same price). The extra money will not stagnate, people want to spend money. Some newly rich business owner will by more cars, or more luxurious cars, requiring more production. Or he might give his money away to charity. Eitherway, he will put his money back into circulation somehow, requiring more jobs in different feilds. The loss in jobs you stated will only create more demand for Engineering and managemnt jobs, or others of that nature.

Your chart is based on the misconception of labor being the only form of employement.

No, it's not. This technological disemployment happens in service industries as well. For a rude awakening check out how Walmart is replacing cashiers with automated ones. Older examples include automated tellers in banks, or automated switchboards in phone companies. Jeremy Rifkin is a noted economist for having documented this as well, albeit 70 years after Technocracy has.

See previous response.

there is no less money in existance,

Do you know anything about the Great Depression? No less money perhaps, but its value was close to nothing! This means less purchasing power, and hence, less demand. Less demand lowers price, and combined with incredible production of machines, led to the crash.

During the great depression, yes. However, I stated that it was the fault of Prohibition, which I will comment on later.

See, money does not lose worth with increased productivity. It now costs less to gain whatever product is created, per quality. This means that the dollar is worth more. now, suppose that what you say is true and all thje rich people have surplus cash they can't spend while the poor are in the street with no money. How long do you think it will take until a rich person creates a new product that the other rich people would be willing to spend their money on? This needs productivity, which may require machines, but also require people to take care of the machines, as well as managers and people to revise the design for more profit.This will create a higher demand in these feilds, and if there's a deficeit of workers then those going in to college will attempt to get those jobs by majoring in them. You can see in the past ten years the increase in technology-based jobs, especially computers.

But you seem to forget the second part: they may not be destroyed. All that's gonna happen is that they'll be recycled and used to form more wealth, in more applicable or luxurious configurations.

Which only shows how little you know about physics. Have you ever heard of entropy? The second law of Thermodynamics? Energy is never destroyed, no, but it cannot be "recycled" as you put it. It can only be "degraded" into other forms that are useless. Take your car for instance. After it has burned its gasoline, and produced kinetic energy, waste heat, CO2, and H2O, how do you propose to "recycle" that energy? At best you might be able to use nuclear processes to get some fusion energy out of the water, but then the materials "degrade" one again into an even LESS useful form. Energy degradation is not a cyclical process, it is not "recoverable", and is not a renewable resource. I'd suggest taking some basic science classes, or the Technocracy Study Course, which explains this idea very well, as it is essential to understanding the role of machines and energy in our society. There is a good reason that 15 of the 22 lessons in the Technocracy Study Course are on basic science (the rmainder being 5 on economics and 2 on Technocracy's design).

I'm well aware of entropy, but you forget that the energy will be reabsorbed by another source. The only way we could lose energy is if more energy excaped off this rock than came to it.

Oh, it doesn't sound harsh, but more of ludicris and devoid of any proof other than that which compells conspiracy theories.

Oh this is rich. We've already provided you with MASSIVE amounts of "proof" which you've only chosen to ignore. But even funnier is after saying that you say this:

Artificially high prices caused by the prohibition of alcohol created the great depression, and drug prohibition is dragging us to the same fate on a vaster scale.

Based on what? You accuse me of not providing proof? And do you really think that economics is that simplistic?

I stand by both comments, although I should have explained my second comment better.

Any prohibition requires increased taxes to support it. This means less money for reinvestment, or to spend how you want. This lowers demand in all areas. Also, with the increase in corporate and income tax, a company has to make more profit to stay afloat. With higher taxes, corporations in low-profit neiches will go out of business. This creates more unemployement, but doesn't create wealth. Also, those who do drugs or drink alcohol will continue to do so. However, the only posible supplier is Organized Crime. As we can see of Al Capone with Alcohol, La Costa Nostra from 1950 to present day, Russians, Mexicans, Yakuzi and countless other mafia/gangs that exist, certain drugs will either become monopolised or part of a trust made up of crime syndacates. This raises the costs of drugs to an unprecidented high(no pun intended), and leave the money in the hands of the criminal class. This again increases taxes; it also takes money away from the drug-uers who would spend it on cookies, brownies, chocolate milk, or just to go to rehab. The profits of these corporations are then decreased, meaning, again, more unemployment with no increase in productivity.

How can it not? If, by studying the past and present, find reoccurances of phenomena as pertain to the scientific method, then I would say science very well could verify questions otherwise handled by other forms of philosophy.

Like what quesitions? Does man have a "soul"? Are humans basically "good" or "evil"? What is the meaning of life? Is there a God? What does He want from us, if there is? How big is God? How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? I don't know about you, but I can't think of a single way to even obtain the objective data necessary to even begin to answer these questions scientifically!

I've already stated that science can't be applied to metaphysics, but all other philosophical realms are possible. All those questions tend to pertain to metaphysics. Although, under the traditional definition of "good" and "evil", humans most definatly are evil. Without concerning the metaphysical realm, science could possibly define what "good" and "evil" are; I myself am attempting to define them in a scientific manner instead of one based on Hegel or Aristotle, and epecially without the influence of religion.