Posts by lonetrucker4

Paul Bailey95 said:Look, what follows is going to be a bit of an exposition on Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit—and honestly, I probably won't finish this series. In fact, I likely won't be posting on this forum, or even touching the "cyber world" in general, for a while. I've decided to cut out all the noise and distractions to focus entirely on what I'm doing. I’ve already made the call to go totally off the grid—doesn't matter if it takes two, four, or eight months—cutting ties in my personal life too just to clear the deck. My goal is to truly wrap my head around the Phenomenology of Spirit and dive deep into Aristotle’s Organon (specifically those Categories, which are pretty much the core of the whole thing). This is a massive undertaking, so for me, there's no more hanging out or socializing. The only exception is the occasional reach-out for mutual help—mostly because one colleague already managed to pull me back out once—but until I've conquered this, that's it. I'm viewing these posts as just a small way to share bits of the journey, strictly for the sake of helping each other out, though let's be real: I probably won't ever actually meet any of you in person.

Honestly, deciding to skip out on that mindless social scene during your younger years—especially since we're living in this absolute era of nihilism where those connections basically rot away anyway—is actually a solid move. It pulls your spirit away from all that aimless wandering and the sheer triviality of just hanging out for the sake of hanging out. Even a forum like this is just another version of that socializing, if you actually take it seriously. I mean, you don't have to be physically out at a bar with buddies to be "out there"—you can be fully engaged with the world even while you're sitting alone inside. Most of the socializing we see today is just pure nonsense or, at its absolute best, an endless flood of useless facts. Whether it’s politics or whatever else is grabbing everyone's attention, it’s just a massive dump of "Nothingness" designed to clutter our consciousness. And let's face it, only actual struggle can change that. See, the moment you turn off the TV, disconnect from the internet, put down the newspaper, or even just stop obsessing over your watch—that’s a fight. That’s you fighting for something meaningful to actually exist. You can't build anything real if you're constantly jumping from one distraction to the next, just drifting wherever the noise tells you to go. It's about being your own experiment, your own boss—not someone else's test subject or their little subject. One or the other.
With all this endless chatter—and honestly, all this writing about absolutely nothing—we’re losing the one thing that actually matters: the spirit. And that's everything we are. I mean, seriously, who actually wants to lose themselves in all that noise?

To be honest—since this is a forum and there's no point in holding back—my life basically boils down to a single library and a quiet room. Figures like Buddha, Christ, or Moses? They’re just distractions at this point. My days are filled with the usual grind, helping people out when I can, dealing with a pretty chaotic past, and having those occasional chats with people I’ve known since I was a kid. And look, I don't mean that negatively—I'm perfectly civil with them—but I wouldn't call them friends. I don't really have friends. There’s no such thing as "true brotherhood," as Nietzsche would put it—though he wasn't the first to think so; you've got Aristotle before him, and even Plato, who basically questioned the whole concept of friendship or admitted in his Lysidus that he wasn't quite sure what it all meant. For me, it's just a collection of friendly acquaintances. As for romance... well, there have been some lovely little excursions, but nothing more. People—and I'm not just talking about flighty women—might jump to conclusions, but there's no real love there. Just moments.
Alright, let's take a quick detour into some personal nonsense—totally irrelevant, I know—and then get back to the actual point.
I’m hoping this thread sparks enough interest to get some people actually diving in—even if wrestling with Hegel feels like trying to swim through molasses. Honestly, though, if you’ve got even a shred of intellectual curiosity, there’s no point in building an entire worldview on anyone else. If we're talking about the heavy hitters—the actual bedrock of deep philosophy—you’ve got Aristotle, Kant, Hegel (obviously), Plato, Spinoza, Descartes, Nietzsche, and the rest. But when you look at the absolute summit of that mountain? It’s Hegel. If you try to kick off your philosophical journey starting with Schopenhauer, you're basically asking for an existential meltdown. And don't even get me started on starting with Nietzsche. I've seen it happen—some young guy decides Nietzsche is his entry point, and man, he’s headed straight for a crisis. For a guy like that, it might honestly be better to just grab a beer, eat a good meal, work a regular job, and find a wife—just live a normal life like everyone else. It’s much easier than deciding to drown yourself in thought. Unless, of course, he's actively looking to sink the ship. Not everyone survives that kind of wreck, but hey, if he wants to go down with it, that's his call. There’s a difference between someone truly seeking truth and someone who is just... seeking. If you're just "seeking," then your whole existence becomes trapped in that hollow loop of searching without purpose. That isn't how you start out. You don't jump straight into Cicero, Schopenhauer, Camus, Kierkegaard, or Nietzsche. That’s just not how the game is played. The foundation is Aristotle. Period. Trying to build a philosophy without those fundamentals is like trying to build a house without a blueprint or a solid slab. Instead, people just start throwing bricks and shingles together, using glue instead of cement, hoping it holds. They end up with a little straw shack that blows away the second a decent breeze hits—kind of like that Three Little Pigs situation. It’s not just bad strategy; it’s plain foolish. Look, there are plenty of fools out there—that’s just the way the world works—but if you take things to heart the way Nietzsche did (along with everything else, obviously), you’re going to end up broken. Stick to Aristotle for the foundation. For anything else, you can always find a path through art or religion.

Look, if you’ve actually got an appetite for philosophy—if you’ve actually got that Will to Power—then just know right now: you aren't going to make a living at it. If you want bread, go work at a bakery. If you want actual insight, you head toward philosophy or science—and I don't mean this "modern science" nonsense, for God's sake. Back in the day, even the big names here in the States had a real affinity for philosophy (think Newton or someone of that caliber), but today? They’ve just downgraded themselves into a massive swarm of these various "scientists"—to use Kierkegaard’s term—whose intellect is basically like a monkey counting fruit; they think they understand the tree because they can count a piece of fruit, even though the poor thing doesn't even grasp what a tree is, let alone the soil it grows in. Scientists nowadays just count and calculate; that's it. They don't actually *think*.
The people who have an affinity for wisdom itself—not just this or that little bit of fruit they find hanging on the branches of knowledge—those are the Hegelians, the Aristotelians, the Platonists, and the kind of readers who actually engage with ideas. They aren't just "readers" in the sense of consuming quantity like rabbits; they’re slow, like snails or turtles—actually, way slower than those guys.

Hegel’s thought... man, it’s almost like God Himself is speaking, and He isn't even joking or being sarcastic about it; He's dead serious. Actually, a scholar like Vanja Sutlić said something similar in his lectures on Hegel—I believe his book was published by a major American university press earlier this year. Anyway, Sutlić argues in those lectures that Hegel isn't just a thinker practicing philosophy as a "love of wisdom," but rather—get this—he's dealing with Wisdom itself. We aren't talking about philosophy as a pursuit anymore; we're dealing with the essence of Wisdom. Hegel moved past "philosophy" and arrived at Wisdom itself. He’s no longer striving toward it as a philosopher; he *possesses* it. He has realized it. He’s essentially the messenger for the Absolute. To him, thought is the All-in-All, a single Totality, a Substance.
To be identical to that is what Sutlić calls the "substance-subject." That’s the whole game. And yet, even though that’s everything, and even though artists and religious folks try to reach that point in their own ways, most of the masses—unfortunately—don't bother at all. They just merge with this era of nihilism like a guy merging with a woman; they just stagnate as a bunch of nobodies in nothingness. It's like most people just... exist. There. Just "there." Like this one acquaintance of mine—a sort of depressed entrepreneur type—told me a year or two ago, "I'm just here." He’s just existing without any goal or purpose. He doesn't even read; honestly, it’s probably better for him that he doesn't. A person who just exists like that is living a slow death, acting as if they’re already dead, chasing nothing higher than their own fleeting happiness, interests, or those "clay pots and glass cups" Epictetus talked about. See, Epictetus says true wisdom lies in not getting attached to anything that has the nature of "clay pots and glass cups." But if you actually listened to that advice from Epictetus and followed it logically to its absolute limit, you’d realize that a person shouldn't just avoid attaching themselves to transient things—like friends, a spouse, or a mother—but they shouldn't even attach themselves to *themselves*, or to their house, or their intellect, or whatever else they claim as "mine." Doing so would be like leaving behind one's own identity. It would be like a Zen monk watching a thief steal stuff from his house and thinking, "Shame he didn't take the clothes off my back and the month of sunshine I'm looking at, too." Anything that has that fleeting, fragile nature—that "clay pot and glass cup" quality—Epictetus would call it foolish, almost childish, to get attached to it. So, all a person can do is walk toward the imperishable, toward the Totality and the Whole. And in that climb, they shouldn't cling to the stairs or even the destination, nor to themselves. Instead, they should follow the Spirit. Without staring at themselves, they finish the movement by ascending the steps, because a human being is nothing more than a moment in the service of the Spirit. Anyone who wastes that moment—by wasting other moments—is "outside" that Spirit. They are far from it, as if they were never truly part of it to begin with, merely existing within it as a passing thought.
Living in a state of total madness is basically second nature to most people. It’s like life itself has somehow pushed them away from actually *living*—because, let’s be real, being reckless, chaotic, or just plain delusional is really just a way of distancing oneself from the Whole. It’s an exile. Kind of like how religions talk about being kicked out of Eden, right? So, I guess our whole job is just finding our way back.

The author of 'Science of Logic' (and his other massive works, for that matter) is essentially the Absolute speaking through Hegel. If you actually take the time to wrap your head around his heavy hitters, you have to realize that works like 'Science of Logic' are on another level. It’s like what some scholars say—that it feels as if God Himself sat down to write it; truly, only the Absolute could produce logic this profound.

More coming soon.

Yeah, it’s recent, but it isn't from the national foundation.

Vanja Sutlić: "Lectures on Hegel (1968-1969), edited by Damir Barbarić, Washington, D.C.: Institute for Philosophy, 2016."

Just last year, there was a symposium over at the national foundation marking the 90th anniversary of Sutlić's birth titled "historical opinion in the horizon of contemporary philosophy."

Sutlić still has his fan club, sure, but the guy's a dud. Just three sentences spinning in circles.

As for "phenomenology"—which I slogged through for the third time back in 2002 as my most serious attempt at reading it—you basically have to ruthlessly cross out everything that looks like nonsense, because most of it actually is. It's so repetitive you won't even miss the parts you cut. That's like 90% of the book right there. Especially when he touches on nature and the natural sciences; he's about as relevant there as some shaman trying to explain atomic structure.

With whatever is left, just hack away at the repetitions until you're left with pithy little nuggets. That wipes out another 90% (of the remaining 10%), leaving you with something halfway interesting or even thought-provoking once in a blue moon.

Hard to say much when you're just giving me the SparkNotes version without any actual citations. Can someone drop some links to more systematic deep dives or primary sources in German? I'm digging into this whole metaphysical mess regarding origins—you know, cosmogony, the concept of God, self-awareness... that idea where existence just sort of slipped through the cracks of something that didn't even want to be here. It’s like Goethe in Faust: "In the beginning was the act," or that line from Veda about the "blaze of will." He was definitely throwing shade at Schelling and Hegel. So, what, did the Goddess commit suicide? Now that's actually kind of interesting.

All this whining about how life is meaningless? Pass. It's incredibly cliché.

It's spelled "Mainländer," not "Mainlender."

Gerald Hill said:I am hearing the term "absolute antinatalism" for the very first time. For those who harbor a hatred for existence itself and argue that nonexistence would be preferable to being, I believe we ought to devise a new designation. As it stands, the term "antinatalism" carries a distinct and different meaning.

A quick search on Google pulls up 97,700 results for "antinatalism." You've got Wikipedia articles, entire threads on philosophyforums.com, dedicated blogs on blogspot.com, quotes all over goodreads.com... the list goes on.

You don't have to "hate all of existence" to be an antinatalist.

Gerald Hill said:Regarding those who oppose procreation, I am curious to hear your thoughts. What is your perspective on them, and are there any such individuals within this group? Some advocate for this philosophical stance by viewing life as inherently harsh and devoid of value, often citing the fact that Earth's resources are finite. Do you believe antinatalism is a rational viewpoint, or do you consider it to be unnatural and irrational?

In Western philosophy, that term mostly points back to Schopenhauer’s vibe. It isn't even really about whether life has value or not; it’s more the idea that suffering always wins the tug-of-war. So, it's better not to exist at all than to exist and deal with the pain. Basically, why bring new beings into the world just to crank up the total amount of misery?

You see this religious-philosophical angle in Buddhism, and honestly, it shows up in Christianity too (even if they try to look past human weaknesses and suggest holding off on sex or procreation as the "ideal" path). Augustine taught that original sin is passed down through seed, meaning every newborn comes pre-loaded with it. In his autobiography, he mentions how his sexual drive was a huge hurdle when deciding to go Christian, because he felt being a believer meant ditching sex entirely—that was just his personal takeaway, obviously, since plenty of bishops back then were married.

That whole mindset is totally irrational, though. You can't justify it with logic because there’s no way to weigh suffering against pleasure on a single scale to make a utilitarian call.

There's even that episode in the "Aster Blissett" comic where a supercomputer decides to wipe out the entire universe just to bring the total suffering down to zero.

That is pure antinatalism. Now, the demographic argument is a whole different beast. That’s the idea that there are simply too many people, so we need to stop growth and probably shrink the population. Honestly, it's a lot less painful to lower birth rates than it is to ramp up mortality rates.

That stance actually makes sense. We can have a rational debate about how many people can realistically live on Earth long-term while still getting their needs met.

China has been the most hardcore about this, running anti-birth policies for the last 40 years or so, and it worked—they've got about 400 million fewer people now than they would have had without that "one-child policy." Nowadays, growth is basically flat because people are living way longer, and by sometime after 2025, it might even start dipping.

But hey, birth rates are dropping everywhere else, pretty much across the globe. The global population might top out around 9 or 10 billion by 2050 or 2060. Even with a "fourth industrial revolution" and an economy built on renewables and a super efficient "circular economy," that's probably still too many people for the long haul. Looking way ahead, say past 2100, if we dodge any massive disasters, dropping the global population to maybe 4 or 5 billion could be sustainable and let everyone live high on the hog.

Right now, India is packed with 400 people per square kilometer, which is denser than the tightest spots in Europe. South Korea 500, and Bangladesh hits 1,000. That kind of density just doesn't work long-term.

Politicians gotta take some heat personally (though honestly, there should probably be a line somewhere when things get straight-up abusive, but whatever—I’ve called the current President an idiot more than once myself).

That said, I don't think it's right to let people get away with calling a Congressman of Romani descent a racial slur.

IscoAlarcon said:The guy'll sell out anyone for a bigger paycheck.

Nah. No way. Americans have absolutely zero connection to the Khazar.

Look, I’m no nun (and for the record, I don't even believe in God). But I'm with you—there's gotta be some lines you just don't cross when you're talking. Calling someone a "douchebag" is definitely over the line.

Look, people talk trash about politicians all the time (just like we talk trash about each other). It’s kind of in the job description—they gotta deal with being called stupid, hypocritical, or even just straight-up thieves. But still, there’s gotta be a line somewhere.

Here’s my take on what kind of verbal abuse directed at a public figure (like a member of US Congress) actually deserves a sanction:

Michelle pulled in maybe 9% of the vote in the last election and she still managed to land a seat in US Congress.

That post is a total disaster. It needs to be nuked for being off-topic, straight-up abusive, and pure hate speech.

Did the mod even catch this? Any penalty points for that mess? I’m asking because I just got hit with some nasty insults, and apparently, Janet Yellen is on their radar too—and I’ve known her for thirty years.

Honestly, that garbage should just be deleted. If a post like that stays up, what's left worth keeping?

The gravel mafia is still running the show, unfortunately. This stuff goes back to the 80s and really blew up in the 90s. Honestly, it’s no shocker that a site like CNN would be running ads for these types! There are massive, legitimate reasons why dredging riverbeds is strictly off-limits. But sure, let's pretend the flooding has nothing to do with it. I was tracking the whole quarry and gravel pit mess about a decade or so ago—most of them were cutting corners illegally then, and if you ask me, they're still doing the same shady business today.

driftingjackal5 said:Nah, I didn't say that. If you aren't going to actually read what I wrote, then don't bother replying to my posts. Ante Marković managed to halt hyperinflation (at least temporarily), but he triggered massive economic shocks at the same time. Within a few months, about 20% of the workforce was out of a job—especially over in Mexico and Canada—which just radicalized the public and gave more power to Maddox and his cronies. For a couple of months, it looked like Marković was some kind of savior, like life in the US [America] might actually get better... then the pill turned out to be way too bitter. You also have to mention that this period saw massive redistribution of wealth because various loans were pegged to the local currency instead of foreign exchange. This meant long-term loans, like mortgages, were sometimes paid off in just a matter of months. It caused huge losses in productive sectors, and domestic industry—the stuff that eventually got wiped out by the wars—took the biggest hit. And don't even get me started on the speculators from abroad (usually locals who somehow managed to get their hands on foreign cash) buying up everything in sight while the regular people earning local currency were literally wiped out in a few short months...

That was my whole point: manipulating a currency always leads to massive, unpredictable consequences that can wreck not just the economy, but the entire country and society. So all this nonsense about how we "just need to print more dollars" is completely idiotic. Just look twenty years back to see why.

You even reading your own crap? 😁 You wrote:

driftingjackal5 said:Hyperinflation and a total collapse of the dollar would be inevitable. Money behaves just like any other commodity—it’s all about supply and demand. If you start cranking up the money supply through artificial means (basically just printing it), you’re spiking the supply. Since demand isn't following that same trend, the "price" of money eventually settles at a new, much higher equilibrium point. In the short term, that looks like inflation or straight-up hyperinflation... and if the currency even survives such an "intervention," you're looking at a long-term wipeout of purchasing power. Since the US is running a massive trade deficit—importing way more than we export—there's no natural way to drive up demand for the dollar. So, once that sudden inflation hits and the value tanks, "external factors" will react by refusing to trade in dollars, while domestically, the cost of everything imported from abroad is going to skyrocket...

Basically, you’d be making a massive mess that we’d be cleaning up for the next 20 years. Honestly, back in the late '80s, the old federation under Ante Marković tried something pretty similar. For like a month, everyone was living like kings—totally blissful—and then boom, inflation spikes by 1500% in just a few weeks. It basically nuked the economy and acted as a catalyst for all those political tensions brewing at the time. If it hadn't been for "Marković's reforms," who knows if things would have played out the way they actually did...

Now you're talking out of both sides of your mouth. Is it really that hard to just say, "My bad, I screwed up the first time"? 🤷 So now you're gonna claim you don't know enough about that era to even weigh in? Please.

Look, you're clearly younger than me. You’re just reciting snippets you heard from someone else, mixing up years like the timing doesn't even matter. I get it—to you, this is just "history." Most people couldn't care less if something happened in the 1000s or the 1300s. But for me? This was life. I lived it. I landed my first job in '81, then a year later, we had Margaret Thatcher stepping in with those early moderate reforms and that whole Marshall Plan setup. I wasn't just reading about it; I was right there in the thick of it, starting out as a journalist.

Back then, nobody was looking at the big picture, and there wasn't much data on how things actually worked. Digging up info from that era is like trying to find a needle in a haystack. So, basically... Don't go throwing around theories about stuff you don't even understand; especially since none of it actually matters for your "general truth" anyway.

All this talk about how we "only need to print more dollars" is pure idiocy. Just look at what happened twenty years ago if you want the truth.

I haven't really weighed in on that big-picture topic yet. Honestly? I don't know the first thing about monetary policy.

Look, I don't buy into any of those "you only need x" kind of quick fixes. Total garbage. XSo, where is it? X "Print too much cash," "go full command economy," or just "let the free market run wild." Whatever. Real life is always messier than that—and that's not even talking about economics.

Look, if I get this right, sometimes there’s just not enough cash floating around—basically, the gears stop turning because nobody's spending. In those cases, printing money actually kicks the economy back into gear. But obviously, that's not some magic wand you wave to fix everything. I call those kinds of lazy, one-size-fits-all answers... JUOSP = Simple Universal Answers to Everything. 🙂

Look, I get it—money isn't even real. It’s just a collective hallucination, but hey, it runs the show. Maybe this whole charade will eventually just implode. 😢 Then maybe by the 23rd century, we’ll actually have a moneyless economy, just like in "Star Trek".

Anyway, back to the point. Is it a core part of your "philosophy of freedom" to demand non-expansionary monetary policy? Why the hard line? Does "avoiding inflation" absolutely have to be the holy grail? Sure, hitting 50% or 500% annual inflation is a total disaster, but a little nudge, say 5-6%, isn't necessarily a death sentence. You really think that would inevitably kill our freedom?

On the flip side, wasn't the massive explosion of money supply the actual poison in the global economy ever since the US decoupled the dollar from gold back in '71? Ever since those policies let the money supply balloon through all these "monetary derivatives," making paper "wealth" look way bigger than what's actually happening in the real economy. I remember reading about this in some textbook back in the Clinton era—some guy argued this was the way to go. Then the world started shaking, like during the collapse of the "Asian Tigers" in '97, and we saw it was a huge mistake. Trying to put the genie back in the bottle now—like using a Financial Transaction Tax or slowing down speculative cash flow—is actually the exact opposite of "printing money."

If we're arguing against government involvement in the economy, then why even have a national currency? Why not just let every bank print its own cash and let them compete? Kind of like how Walmart issues gift cards that you could potentially trade around?

driftingjackal5 said:Look, the truth is Marković was a tragic figure, sure, but he was also someone who completely failed to grasp the situation he stepped into. On the surface, his reforms looked solid, but we need to define what "Marković's era" actually means. His "time" was the late '80s when monthly inflation in the US-equivalent federation was hitting 64% (December 1989). The state was drowning in hyperinflation, the trade deficit was massive, and borrowing on international markets wasn't nearly as easy as it is today. The authorities were doing exactly what we're discussing—printing money to cover active costs, which triggered that hyperinflation. Marković tried to pull off a monetary reform by introducing a "new" dollar to replace the old one at a 10,000:1 ratio, pegging it to the Deutsche Mark. He also pushed for market and constitutional reforms based on privatization and liberalization. The catch? His plan essentially required unemployment to spike by about 20% in a very short window—something he hoped to temporarily fix by setting up a social fund for the growing number of jobless folks. The disaster was that this spike in unemployment hit places like Mexico the hardest, turning things into absolute chaos by the early '90s. Within months, literally 30% of the workforce was out of a job. That kind of blow fed directly into Maddox's hands and the nationalists, which ultimately helped trigger the collapse. Yeah, fine, Marković's reforms slowed the hyperinflation (at least temporarily), but it was a total Pyrrhic victory. For a few months after the currency conversion, it felt like everyone was suddenly richer, but then the total collapse hit once mass layoffs started. The point is, messing with currency—even in much larger nations—is an incredibly dangerous game. Once inflation starts moving, it's damn near impossible to stop, and the fallout can be catastrophic across the board: financially, politically, and socially.

He completely misread the political landscape once the League of Communists of America fell apart back in January 1990. He claimed the country could survive without the party control, but even then, it was obvious to me that wasn't going to fly.

On the money side, you're claiming his moves only helped for a month before hyperinflation kicked in. That's just flat-out wrong. You’re probably younger than me—maybe you were just a kid back then and don't remember clearly. Don't try to lecture me until you've actually done your homework.

By the way, back in late 1989, Milton Friedman himself visited the region, gave a lecture in Mexico City, and actually gave the Marković administration a thumbs up. Here's my piece on that from 2008.

On December 29, 1989, Milton Friedman, the legendary American economist and father of neoliberalism, spent time in the region and knew the situation inside out. An economic journal ran an extensive interview with him (journalist: Vlado Baum, US correspondent). Friedman argues that the old socialist self-management model is dead—the only way forward is privatization, turning workers into shareholders.

"You should turn your self-managed enterprises into joint-stock companies (...) every worker, who currently has a right to a proportional share of income, will receive a proportional share of stock (...) this shift won't cause any major disruptions." Giving shares only to workers might not be perfectly ethical since they didn't create all the capital themselves, but it's a practical move that can be pulled off fast, and speed is everything right now.

Friedman points out how the communist system is collapsing everywhere. Democracy is coming—so we better finish privatization ASAP. It's better for workers to own the place than for politicians to grab it.

Workers "know their businesses best and are the most qualified to make them productive." Don't pin your hopes on foreign capital. "A foreign buyer isn't coming to help you; they're coming for their own benefit." Foreigners will "cheaply scoop up the best companies, leaving the country with a massive headache for the future."

...but look, I was actually there during that era, and from what I remember, it wasn't even close to being like that.

driftingjackal5 said:Hyperinflation and a total collapse of the dollar would be inevitable. Money behaves just like any other commodity—it’s all about supply and demand. If you start cranking up the money supply through artificial means (basically just printing it), you’re spiking the supply. Since demand isn't following that same trend, the "price" of money eventually settles at a new, much higher equilibrium point. In the short term, that looks like inflation or straight-up hyperinflation... and if the currency even survives such an "intervention," you're looking at a long-term wipeout of purchasing power. Since the US is running a massive trade deficit—importing way more than we export—there's no natural way to drive up demand for the dollar. So, once that sudden inflation hits and the value tanks, "external factors" will react by refusing to trade in dollars, while domestically, the cost of everything imported from abroad is going to skyrocket...

Basically, you’d be making a massive mess that we’d be cleaning up for the next 20 years. Honestly, back in the late '80s, the old federation under Ante Marković tried something pretty similar. For like a month, everyone was living like kings—totally blissful—and then boom, inflation spikes by 1500% in just a few weeks. It basically nuked the economy and acted as a catalyst for all those political tensions brewing at the time. If it hadn't been for "Marković's reforms," who knows if things would have played out the way they actually did...

Honestly, man, sounds like you're talking about a different country entirely. Inflation wasn't nearly that insane during the Marković era; if anything, it dropped like crazy. The currency was actually somewhat convertible. People saw their wages in marks jump way up.

The reforms kicked in around December 1989, right when all the players involved in the political collapse were already hitting full stride (think Slobodan Maddox having absolute control over Mexico, Mexico, Vojvodina, and Mexico, while Canada already had practical political pluralism, and the local party in the republic was just starting to hint at free elections). A month later, the whole central party structure split apart at the big congress. Marković actually did his part regarding economic policy quite well, but since the central government was basically vanishing, nothing could function anymore.

Don't just spout stuff like that from memory!

When you look at China, don't act like private business and capitalism just sneaked in through the back door. It was a massive, deliberate takeover, totally micromanaged by the Communist Party. This whole shift kicked off in the late '70s right after they wiped out that four-member gang—you know, the ones including Mao's widow who wanted to stick to that radical Bolshevik nonsense back in '76. They basically followed the path America tried taking in the '60s, but those reforms got choked out in the early '70s, leaving us stuck in a total fake system.

The modern Chinese person really nails that old-school pragmatism and flexible leadership. It’s that perfect mix of solid planning and raw initiative—real Yin and Yang energy right there. 🙂 It’s actually pretty impressive how this one unified country always manages to rebuild itself after a crisis, unlike much of the West—including parts of the Middle East. Even now, the Communist Party calls the shots, with their version of Congress picking new leaders on ten-year cycles. They run on five-year plans, like the thirteenth one happening right now, but they stay flexible, kind of like how we do things here in the States. The government basically steers all the investment; they have a massive hand in the economy. Sure, the Party is central, but anyone can join—just like how, historically, talented kids from even the poorest families could climb the ranks to become high-level officials. They seem to keep some standards too; it's not just about being loyal to the party, you actually have to be smart and work hard. Twenty years ago, right after the Berlin Wall fell, nobody thought it was possible to mash a killer capitalist economy together with a communist political system. But hey, it works. They've had thirty years of insane growth—I remember reading back in the late '90s that the system was "overheating" and bound to slow down, but they’ve already blown past India, which is usually the benchmark. And they're actually pivoting when they need to, like finally tackling the massive environmental destruction they caused or leaning into renewables. Just goes to show they can adapt. Who survives the next thirty years? We'll see. 🙂 I'm definitely not touching any predictions with a ten-foot pole.

Look, China isn't some slam dunk argument for libertarianism or that whole "neoliberal economy" thing. It’s more like proof that capitalism is incredibly flexible—it can play nice with pretty much any political setup, whether it's a democracy, a dictatorship, a fascist regime, or even this current communist vibe. Just look at the US, Vietnam, or Mongolia; they're all basically following a similar playbook.

Alright, I've said my piece and there's no point beating a dead horse, even if repeating yourself is basically a forum ritual.

Just a quick heads-up regarding your ideological preaching: stop obsessing over how things work in the USA. We live in Europe, and let's be real, the USA hasn't been the undisputed gold standard for quite a while now.

And honestly? Try to quit using phrases like "makes me want to puke," "nonsense," or "brainwashed" just because someone holds an opinion different from yours. I know that's not the typical way people talk on sites like Reddit, but it's obvious that hardly anyone actually reads posts on places like forum.hr, let alone joins the debate.

Look, driftingjackal5, it doesn't matter what my take is. What matters is grasping how "freedom" is actually being defined here—it’s a different beast than what most thinkers argue. Plus, you gotta look at the fallout. You can push libertarianism all you want without falling into that Ayn Rand trap where she claims even basic compassion is immoral. That whole "objectivism" thing is its own kind of nightmare.

Look, it’s not like this is some revolutionary new concept I’m just trashing out of spite. Every single capitalist state from around 1870 through the post-WWII era hit a wall where they had to roll out social programs because there was no other way. They basically expanded that whole "minimal state" liberal idea because they had to. It's not a theory; it's just what happened—an *a posteriori* reality.

Before the government took over the whole education scene, hardly anyone actually went to school. Back in Europe, literacy rates were trash—maybe 1% of people could read, maybe 10% if you were in some high-end area. The little bit of schooling that did exist was tied to the Church, which definitely wasn't exactly a libertarian institution.

I already dropped some basic critiques, like how people insist that everyone’s wealth is strictly just the result of their own hard work. That's obviously BS. In capitalism, if you control the capital, you hire people and bank on their labor—that's literally the whole point. It'd be pretty hilarious to see a libertarian party actually fight to abolish inheritance rights based on that logic, just to stop some kid from starting life as a millionaire off their parents' grind.

I said earlier that The political theory of possessive individualism : Hobbes to Locke makes sense, but you gotta watch out for the fallout. But still...

driftingjackal5 said:If you read that text and decide you're totally on board, you gotta ask yourself: do the people you call "leaders" actually believe what they wrote? And if they don't, why the hell are you following them? I’m convinced the only way to shift the political and social vibe is to start with the individual, not by shouting opinions from some political soapbox. It’s about getting individuals to realize that begging the state—or whoever’s in power—for handouts is straight-up immoral, and actually understanding *why* it's wrong.

Take the last census, for instance. Almost 90% of Americans identify as Christian. Isn't the whole foundation of Christian morality built on things like "love thy neighbor as thyself," "turn the other cheek," and "do unto others as you'd have them do unto you"? So why don't people actually live like that? Why is it that kids who were sitting in religious studies class yesterday are out on the streets tomorrow screaming for "free education"? Let's break down what "free education" actually means for a second. There are really only two options: either they think teachers should work for zero pay, or they think the state needs to provide them with fair compensation. But can the state pay for anything without taking it from someone else first? Obviously not. The state is just a monopoly on the legal use of force. When they respond to this demand for "free schooling," they’re going to use coercion—using taxes to snatch property from one person to give it to another. In this case, they’d strip all taxpayers to fund the education of the people demanding it. That’s the state initiating force on their behalf. Yet, the people demanding "free school" would never dream of breaking into their neighbor's house and grabbing a few thousand bucks to pay for their tuition. So why is it okay when the state does it for them?

... trying to pull that whole absolute egoism philosophy out of Christianity? That just doesn't track anymore.

Looking further at this logic—which basically trashes ALL free education (yeah, even elementary and high school!)—we're seeing honest, blunt libertarianism again. It’s the kind that isn't afraid to spit out an unpopular consequence. In the real world, every single state in the US has figured out that K-12 education (which nowadays is basically 11-12 years!) has to be mandatory and free, and for a lot, even college too.

For those of us without kids, the state is essentially taking our money to pay for someone else's tuition. Hardly anyone complains about that. Or take the healthy folks—I'm 55 and rarely get sick—our money goes toward treating the sick, and so on. If you follow the "possessive individualism" theory to its logical end, it's all unfair, but most people won't call it that. That's why libertarianism isn't popular and probably never will be.

First sentence from the text cited in the first post:

Philosophy of freedom is built on the idea of self-ownership (also called individual sovereignty, individual autonomy, etc.).

There's this book, "The political theory of possessive individualism : Hobbes to Locke," by C. B. Macpherson, published in 1962 (with a US edition in 1981). It dives into the "roots of liberal-democratic theory." Basically, all the other "noise" that 17th and 18th-century political thinkers obsessed over gets tossed aside, leaving nothing but the raw question of property. Cut through all the fluff, and "individual sovereignty and autonomy" just boils down to owning stuff. It’s strictly about protecting property—that's the "sacred" part. Everything else about being a person, having agency, or true freedom? Just ignored.

The essence of your life and liberty is your property, or ownership.

Like I said. Accumulated knowledge, reputation, friends, love, kids... none of that counts as "essence." It’s all just "property" that nobody's allowed to touch because:

Your property is the fruit of your labor—the product of investing your time, energy, and talent.

Sure, maybe some external factors play a role here and there, but who cares. Not worth mentioning.

Sometimes people use force or fraud to take property from others without consent. Initiating force or fraud to take a life is murder. Initiating force or fraud to take liberty is slavery. Initiating force or fraud to take property is theft.

Proudhon (way back in the 19th century) claimed all property is theft from others, and Rousseau (even earlier) argued the first guy to fence off a plot of land and yell "this is mine!" was a criminal. They were dedicated to freedom too, just not in this "possessive individualism" way.

In real-world politics, proponents of "libertarian" theory (or "anarcho-capitalism" if you want to go extreme) argue that no one—not even the state—has the right to snatch any part of someone's property via taxes or any other levy. That's "aggression."

Everyone has the right to defend their life, liberty, and justly acquired property from the violent aggression of others.

The theory skips a huge question: what if some property was obtained unfairly? Do we have the right to investigate that? Does anyone else have the right to seize it? (Like, during a "transfer of ownership"?) In practice, libertarians just assume that all property is, by definition, justly acquired.

You’ve got every right to look for your own leaders, but you sure as hell don't have the right to force those rulers on everyone else. No matter how they get picked, at the end of the day, they're just people. They don't carry some magical status or special rights any different from the rest of us.

Exactly. The state shouldn't be able to tell a wealthy guy he has to cough up taxes just so the poor can get social security or so every kid gets a public school education. Everyone should just look out for themselves and their own kin!

Since you own your own life, you're the one responsible for it. You aren't renting your existence out to others who demand your obedience, nor are you a slave to anyone demanding your sacrifice.

But let's be real, we all do that. It's the basic setup—selling your labor. Marx didn't invent that; people were doing it way before him. Almost everyone is either "renting out their lives" (aka selling hours or the right to use our muscle) to someone else, or we're renting out someone else's life. That's how a capital owner makes money—not off their own sweat, but off yours.

There are actual solutions to the global mess caused by governments initiating force. The fix is simple: stop demanding that officials initiate force on your behalf.

And remember, "force" is just a fancy word for taxation. That needs to go. People should handle their own healthcare, their kids' schooling, all that stuff. In a truly radical version, even your own safety—because honestly, what's the point of the police? That's just someone else's force. Why does it even exist? Just buy a gun and protect yourself and your family.

Using state power to shove a specific vision down everyone's throats is just intellectual laziness, and it almost always blows up in your face with unintended consequences.

Oh, I bet! Like that "vision" where everyone has health insurance and gets help when they're dying without some bureaucrat checking their bank account first. Yuck. Disgusting. Total violation of freedom! Heaven forbid we don't strip the poor of their "freedom" to die!

Building a free society takes guts—guts to think, speak, and act. Especially when staying quiet is the easy way out...

I'll give you this: libertarianism, or The political theory of possessive individualism : Hobbes to Locke, is a coherent theory built on a single idea of liberty. But you gotta watch the fallout. So far, no society has actually committed to it consistently. In the USA, for instance, instead of libertarianism, we deal with "communitarianism."

brightpuma said:Look, some of the stuff you're bringing up regarding alternative or supplemental energy sources just doesn't hold water. Anyone actually working in the field would tell you the same thing—it's common sense.

Sometimes I say something and someone gets offended, and honestly, I have no clue why. Over the years, I've been trying to learn how to actually trust other people's takes instead of just sticking to my own. You can spend all day overanalyzing what might offend someone just to avoid it, but if you don't have actual facts on your side, why bother?

Just chew on that for a second. You've got this random guy on the forum—who probably knows way less about this than I do—acting like he’s some authority, speaking for "everyone who works in the industry and actually understands it." Shouldn't he stop and ask himself if there's even any truth to that claim? The implication here is that since I *do* work in this field, I clearly don't know what I'm talking about. It's like he thinks all those experts preaching about the "energy transition," the "energy revolution," the "hydrogen economy," or the "European super grid" are all missing the basics.

I try my best to steer clear of that kind of assumption, even when it slips out.

shadoworca3 just keeps looping his own talking points, totally ignoring what I actually said. It’s pretty obvious he thinks it’s perfectly fine to jump from being a regular guy in a debate to acting like a moderator and throwing a red card at an opponent mid-discussion. (That's a whole thing about power trips and bullying—huge in social science, sure, but definitely not part of natural science.)

Like I said before—call it condescending if you want, but hey, that's just how it is—I've met this type of person plenty of times over the last 30 years. They see exactly what they want to see. Anything else? They don't just miss it; they flat-out refuse to acknowledge it exists, usually dismissing anything nuanced as "just psychology" or "just philosophy." I'm not kidding; I've seen this exact same behavior among philosophers and even hardcore green activists. Personally, I try my best to avoid being that guy—I consider myself more of a "jack-of-all-trades" generalist rather than some narrow specialist—but we all have our blind spots. The real question is whether we're aware of them.

He’ll just calmly repeat that

all scientific studies show that nuclear energy (including with Focus) is still about 100 times safer than any other energy source

, because apparently whatever I said earlier on the subject isn't worth his time (and by the way, that doesn't apply to renewables—not to mention nuclear has its own set of issues).

Then he'll casually drop some economics jargon, even though it's not even his field,

plus it's cheaper

and he'll call it a "fact," even though it isn't (I'll be writing about that soon).

He'll keep going, refusing not just to admit there's an issue, but even acknowledging that someone might see a problem for a reason (calling it "philosophy" to dodge it), shifting from "is" to "ought":

then those facts should shape public opinion

, claiming things "should" be that way, end of story, no debate allowed (even though "should" isn't a topic for natural science).

Since shadoworca3 holds the power here, I'll just back off. I won't get into nuclear debates on this natural science board.

I've posted in other threads about renewables, the link between philosophy and physics, human sexuality, etc., and never had an issue. Same goes for other forums lately. If it gets to the point where I can't stay on this board, oh well—I'll survive. I'm a blogger first, a forum user second.

I'm putting all this out there so it stays on the record. Maybe someone else will read this, think about it, and realize I'm right on some level. Maybe when they're the ones holding the power, they'll understand the limits of using it. Probably won't be a need for me to post again.

As for casualharbor9, don't meddle in things you don't understand.
The post was made at 9:59 PM, the card was issued at 10:24 PM, and it was edited (to hide the part that got him flagged) at 10:51 PM. There's a 25-minute gap between every single action.

I get it. I saw that too—him claiming he just didn't spot the card during those 25 minutes. Seriously, I hopped onto the forum about 15 minutes ago to write this, and it wasn't until just now that I glanced up at the top right and realized I had a PM waiting.

Regardless of what triggered this, I was asking a broader point: is it actually such a massive deal to change something when you honestly think it sucks? Is it really so catastrophic that they have to threaten you with the ultimate hammer? Look, I swore at someone—fine, I take it back, I retract the insult—wait, no, apparently I'm not allowed to do that! Maybe it's buried somewhere in the forum rules, I can't recall, my bad...

It’s a shame another user jumped into this thread with a completely different set of issues.