Screw you, Ayn Rand: Study finds evidence that selfish behaviour is not evolutionarily sustainable - Polidicks

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41678827]so if i worked on a farm and the farm was getting attacked by wolves sporadically, i could put up a fence(thereby investing time and capital into the land), and now i am legally entitled to a share of the profits?[/QUOTE] He'd probably promote you in some way.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41678853] If you negotiated it with the landowner first, sure. If not it's up to his discretion.[/QUOTE] you imply that a land owner is entitled to profit because they are the ones who invest in the land. if i invest into the land, shouldn't i be entitled to profit whether the land owner agrees or not? hell, this is a better system than pure capitalism because it encourages everyone, no matter how poor they are, to invest something into the lands they live/work in so they can reap a profit.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41678930]you imply that a land owner is entitled to profit because they are the ones who invest in the land. if i invest into the land, shouldn't i be entitled to profit whether the land owner agrees or not? hell, this is a better system than pure capitalism because it encourages everyone, no matter how poor they are, to invest something into the lands they live/work in so they can reap a profit.[/QUOTE] It isn't your land though; you just work there.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41678827]so if i worked on a farm and the farm was getting attacked by wolves sporadically, i could put up a fence(thereby investing time and capital into the land), and now i am legally entitled to a share of the profits?[/QUOTE] A good manager would pay you a little extra, both rewarding you for your initiative and encouraging you and other employees to do the same in the future. A bad manager would fire you for not sucking up to him first.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41678930]you imply that a land owner is entitled to profit because they are the ones who invest in the land. if i invest into the land, shouldn't i be entitled to profit whether the land owner agrees or not? hell, this is a better system than pure capitalism because it encourages everyone, no matter how poor they are, to invest something into the lands they live/work in so they can reap a profit.[/QUOTE] Because it's a first come first serve basis. Land ownership does not only extend to investment in the land, it is basically a form of micro-jurisdiction. The reason we don't have a free-for-all like that is because it would be trivially easy to game the system. I wouldn't want Johnny Dickweed fucking around doing who-knows-what on my land no matter how much he claims he's "investing" in it.

I absolutely hate rich selfish people, won't even spare 10$ from their 10 million sacks.

Selfishness may have been the way to go at a certain stage of evolution, hell I'm sure of it. But that was when it was up to every lone individual to keep themself alive. These days it's no longer about the survival of individuals, it is the survival of society and civilization - it is the new body of evolution, it's replaced the individual creature. It's all part of the evolution; from individual to family, but then, to society and that is where evolution stops being biological and becomes more complex. It is a pattern. In tens of million years, if we haven't been wiped out and evolution hasn't reset, what will make the body of evolution then? What is there that is far more complex than society and civilization?

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41678971]Because it's a first come first serve basis. Land ownership does not only extend to investment in the land, it is basically a form of micro-jurisdiction. The reason we don't have a free-for-all like that is because it would be trivially easy to game the system. I wouldn't want Johnny Dickweed fucking around doing who-knows-what on my land no matter how much he claims he's "investing" in it.[/QUOTE] it's trivially easy to game the system already if you are born rich.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41678996]it's trivially easy to game the system already if you are born rich.[/QUOTE] Not really. It's way easier to lose money than gain it. Remember regression to the mean - Daddy might have had the wits and drive to build the multinational empire from scratch but the kids will probably not get as much luck in the genetic lottery. They'll either fritter it away or recognize their own incompetence and put their money in low-risk bonds or something, with anemic future prospects.

[QUOTE=MrJazzy;41678990]What is there that is far more complex than society and civilization?[/QUOTE] If you believe James Lovelock, it will be possible to [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis"]abstract the behaviour of Earth's population as that of the components of an organism[/URL]. Civilization itself becomes a bacterium in the ecology of the planet. Of course, for this to actually go anywhere, we'd need other inhabited plants within practical distances.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679025]Not really. It's way easier to lose money than gain it. Remember regression to the mean - Daddy might have had the wits and drive to build the multinational empire from scratch but the kids will probably not get as much luck in the genetic lottery. They'll either fritter it away or recognize their own incompetence and put their money in low-risk bonds or something, with anemic future prospects.[/QUOTE] you can literally pay other people to make money for you when you are rich.

Aside from economics, altruism being fundamentally important from an evolutionary standpoint is also pretty devastating to the argument that morality and compassion must come from gods/religion.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41679051]you can literally pay other people to make money for you when you are rich.[/QUOTE] So? That money isn't "taken out" of the economy you know. It funds the growth of new things. Do you know how investment works?

[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;41679035]If you believe James Lovelock, it will be possible to [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis"]abstract the behaviour of Earth's population as that of the components of an organism[/URL]. Civilization itself becomes a bacterium in the ecology of the planet. Of course, for this to actually go anywhere, we'd need other inhabited plants within practical distances.[/QUOTE] I can definitely imagine something like this, we being much like the cells in our bodies, part of something much bigger. That we all have roles to play in an unimaginably big machinery that plays another role in an even "larger" (I use larger with quotation marks as at this point we may not even be talking about something on a 3D plane as we know it) machinery.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679070]So? That money isn't "taken out" of the economy you know. It funds the growth of new things. Do you know how investment works?[/QUOTE] i'm saying you can game the system to keep yourself rich or make money easily in this system, why is it any different if everyone owned the land collectively and invested into it collectively for profit?

[QUOTE=MrJazzy;41679088]I can definitely imagine something like this, we being much like the cells in our bodies, part of something much bigger. That we all have roles to play in an unimaginably big machinery that plays another role in an even "larger" (I use larger with quotation marks as at this point we may not even be talking about something on a 3D plane as we know it) machinery.[/QUOTE] The universe does seem to like replication of hierarchy across scales. We see it in fractals at almost every level of existence (above the molecular level, at least). This is deviating increasingly off-topic, but I'll just leave this here in case you haven't read it before: [URL="http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html"][I]The Last Question[/I] by Isaac Asimov[/URL]

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41679163]i'm saying you can game the system to keep yourself rich or make money easily in this system, why is it any different if everyone owned the land collectively and invested into it collectively for profit?[/QUOTE] Because it would crash and burn into a pit of mediocrity

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679185]Because it would crash and burn into a pit of mediocrity[/QUOTE] much like this system has for about 80-90% of the population?

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679185]Because it would crash and burn into a pit of mediocrity[/QUOTE] i don't think the timescale for what you're describing as the "right" method is going to last too much longer either though.

[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;41679165]The universe does seem to like replication of hierarchy across scales. We see it in fractals at almost every level of existence (above the molecular level, at least). This is deviating increasingly off-topic, but I'll just leave this here in case you haven't read it before: [URL="http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html"][I]The Last Question[/I] by Isaac Asimov[/URL][/QUOTE] It's so interesting though, I just started watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos series a few days ago and I find this fascinating - not the actual science we know - but what we [B]don't know[/B] and can only speculate on using the science we have. I'll make sure to read that later, my eyes are really tired and it's 02:30 in the morning so I should really head for bed soon. It's amazing when you realise that evolution is something much more and immensly bigger than just the "Animals change their bodies to adapt to enviroments"-stuff you read in biology class. It's basically the God of science, the driving force in the universe.

[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;41679035]If you believe James Lovelock, it will be possible to [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis"]abstract the behaviour of Earth's population as that of the components of an organism[/URL]. Civilization itself becomes a bacterium in the ecology of the planet. Of course, for this to actually go anywhere, we'd need other inhabited plants within practical distances.[/QUOTE] Gaia hypothesis is bollocks. No legitimate scientist actually supports it.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;41679194]much like this system has for about 80-90% of the population?[/QUOTE] I'm sorry I can't hear you over the sound of 3 orders of magnitude worth of improvement in living standards since 1850 [editline]2nd August 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=MrJazzy;41679201]It's amazing when you realise that evolution is something much more and immensly bigger than just the "Animals change their bodies to adapt to enviroments"-stuff you read in biology class. It's basically the God of science, the driving force in the universe.[/QUOTE] evolution as in the natural selection darwinian thing has interesting implications outside of biology but none outside of earth unless you want to get into the zany anthropics shit if you're talking about things like stellar evolution they only share a name, nothing else

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679237]evolution as in the natural selection darwinian thing has interesting implications outside of biology but none outside of earth unless you want to get into the zany anthropics shit if you're talking about things like stellar evolution they only share a name, nothing else[/QUOTE] I'm talking about how eventually if we continue to successfully evolve, evolution may very well begin to affect the space outside of our planet right? :v:

[QUOTE=MrJazzy;41679201]It's so interesting though, I just started watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos series a few days ago and I find this fascinating - not the actual science we know - but what we [B]don't know[/B] and can only speculate on using the science we have. I'll make sure to read that later, my eyes are really tired and it's 02:30 in the morning so I should really head for bed soon. It's amazing when you realise that evolution is something much more and immensly bigger than just the "Animals change their bodies to adapt to enviroments"-stuff you read in biology class. It's basically the God of science, the driving force in the universe.[/QUOTE] What I like about this sort of thing is that it's all emergent - it's not like something set it down and said it must be this way like a god - it all arises automatically out of the way simple things interact with each other. Kind of like [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langton%27s_ant"]Langton's Ant[/URL], simple rules end up creating a structure that no one could have predicted.

[QUOTE=Tweevle;41679479]What I like about this sort of thing is that it's all emergent - it's not like something set it down and said it must be this way like a god - it all arises automatically out of the way simple things interact with each other. Kind of like [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langton%27s_ant"]Langton's Ant[/URL], simple rules end up creating a structure that no one could have predicted.[/QUOTE] In theory if you knew all these rules then you could predict it's structure and future, unless there is truly randomness but that seems incredibly odd that there would be, right?

[QUOTE=MrJazzy;41679510]In theory if you knew all these rules then you could predict it's structure and future, unless there is truly randomness but that seems incredibly odd that there would be, right?[/QUOTE] Unfortunately that's where Chaos Theory comes in - even without any randomness you can't predict things like that very well long term since tiny changes in the starting conditions lead to massively different outcomes, and you can't know all the starting conditions because of the Quantum Mechanics.

[QUOTE=MrJazzy;41679510]In theory if you knew all these rules then you could predict it's structure and future, unless there is truly randomness but that seems incredibly odd that there would be, right?[/QUOTE] If you have not yet learned anything about quantum mechanics and the practical implications it has on the universe, I would simply like to tell you that, actually, the universe does seem to have deep, pervasive random elements to it. However, the randomness in the universe is so fine-grained that it develops emergent properties of order, in a way. I'm no expert on quantum mechanics myself, and I cannot hope to properly explain it to you in a concise or accurate manner in a forum post. Suffice to say, in the last century, we've discovered that our universe is far more weird and complex than the Greeks or the Renaissance thinkers or even Einstein ever imagined. TL;DR entropy is a giant bitch if you like to predict the future.

I'll take your words for it, I barely know physics at all - I've never been good at the science classes in school, in fact I failed one of them, I just find these things so fascinating :v:

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;41679237]I'm sorry I can't hear you over the sound of 3 orders of magnitude worth of improvement in living standards since 1850[/QUOTE] due to the rise of the middle class which is now dying because of people who think like you do