"pseudo" was a little strong. But if you have any serious familiarity with his "off-topic" rants, youll see he writes about issues glibly and with a severe lack of information. I dont mind "academic journalism", I do it a lot myself: write on difficult topics for a lay audience and maybe sacrifice a little accurasy a long the way. I think pg likes be seen making points more than he wants further understanding/truth/etc.
"The problem here is not wealth, but corruption. So why not go after corruption? We don't need to prevent people from being rich if we can prevent wealth from translating into power."
Umm... how about in a capitalist society money is the vehicle of positive freedom... to increase ones ability to do something on has to have more money. Therefore under capitalism there is always a fundamental tie between money and power.
That's a small off-hand point.
But if you have any serious reading on the last two hundred years of economic, political and sociological critiques of capitalism, wealth and power that whole article will just seem silly.
I'm sure he means well. But it takes a certain kind of "pseudo"-something to think that this kinda hackney "thought-lite" material should be delivered at a major conference (Defcon 2005). If i were asked, on the back of my reputation, to speak on this, I would at least spend a week watching/reading/etc. as much as I can in the area.
>But if you have any serious reading on the last two hundred years of economic, political and sociological critiques of capitalism, wealth and power that whole article will just seem silly.
If you have any "erious reading on the last two hundred years of economic, political and sociological critiques" you'd know that ALL articles and books will just appear silly in isolation. Especially since most of the important critics are vehemently opposed to the ideas of other important critics.
The role of an isolated piece of writing on some topic is not to provide a summary of the ideas ("the last two hundred years of economic, political and sociological critiques") on the topic -- that's just what you do for a bad academic paper.
Its role is to showcase the ideas of the author in a clear light and within his frame of thinking.
>But it takes a certain kind of "pseudo"-something to think that this kinda hackney "thought-lite" material should be delivered at a major conference (Defcon 2005).
Then again, it also takes a certain kind of pseudo-something to value Defcon as a venue for intellectual thought, as opposed to a mostly technical conference and get-together.
Preface: Occasionally, I disagree with pg too. But I respect him since I find most of his essays insightful and I appreciate the effortless precision of his writing style. I.e. too many bloggers beat around the bush and rarely attack the crux of their topic directly, let alone adequately support their thesis.
That said, I'm one of those who "don't see the problem". I reread his essay about inequality. I tried to imagine your thought process. I agree that money, freedom, and power are joined at the hip. I don't see how this contradicts pg's quote.
Here's how I understand things. Corruption implies power by definition. But does power necessarily imply corruption? Lord Acton believed power consistently causes corruption in practice. But it doesn't have to be that way. I think we can agree on this.
Here's where I imagine our disagreement lies (best guess, low confidence). Corruption connotates "immoral behavior". But pg's examples indicate (to me) that he wanted to address not immoral behavior per se, but the double standard society imposes between the privileged and the less fortunate.
This distinction frames the discussion in a more actionable way. Like you said, power enables people to do what they want... which isn't always moral (or fair [1]). It's inevitable. So society won't be able to prevent this consistently, lest reality resemble Minority Report. But one thing society can prevent is punishing offenders according to a double standard. Another thing society can prevent is lack of transparency. I imagine either would decrease corruption while allowing the privileged to enjoy their power (money) in more socially acceptable ways.
Personally, I'm especially upset with the U.S. lobby system. In theory, democracy is supposed to afford one vote per capita. In practice, the lobby system allows the powerful to undermine this principle.
I didn't read the essay in question, but from your quote it sounds like you are deliberately misinterpreting his point. He is talking about political power.
Political power is one form of power; political action are one kind of action. The point I made encompassed them. For example "the ability to be heard" increases with wealth: having your opinion be prominent in a democratic society is politically powerful and the more money you have the more you are able to finance outlets for your views.
One's ability to make money - to have one's skills suit the market; or to be lucky - has nothing to do with the value of your opinions or how frequently/prominently they should be offered to the rest of us.
pg doesn't even begin to engage in anything like this critique of inequality. I dont really think he knows anything about why serious academic researchers and writers have seen inequality as a serious problem for democractic societies. Because he hasnt spent the time to find out.
I do happen to have such serious reading and I don't find the whole article just silly. I may agree with some parts more than others but it isn't idiotic. He's exploring an important issue, wealth distribution and economic growth and outlining some of his ideas on the topic.
btw WTF is a 'vehicle of positive freedom?' This is not a term of art in any serious social science or philosophy that I'm aware of but apparently it is important to your theory of money and power in a capitalist society. A theory, incidentally, which you don't take the trouble to outline. You simply state that 'under capitalism there is...' It is indeed a small off-hand (and unclear) point.
And why the heck shouldn't he be able to give a talk like this at a tech conference? Defcon isn't an academic conference. Unlace your girdle and give yourself a break from your half digested pomposity. :)
I agree with you that reducing inequality is important in order to correct imbalances of political power. But if that is just an off-hand point, then what is your actual point? You said "if you have any serious reading on the last two hundred years of economic, political and sociological critiques of capitalism, wealth and power that whole article will just seem silly." Are you going to give us anything to go on there, or just assume no one will speak up for fear of appearing equally gauche as pg?
