|
as Marx saw it, people would always do what was in their best interest. The problem with these kinds of discussions is that capitalists make a false dichotomy between 'work' and 'leisure.' To Marx, if one could enjoys one's 'work' (actually everyday behavior), and live from that, we would have people doing what they do best--each in his or her own capacity.
So while it may be difficult for someone who believes humans are innately lazy and greedy to invision a world wherein people like to drive trains for 6 hours a day, and others who like to chat with their neighbors while collecting the garbage, the reality in my experience is that these people do exist. Such people would happily do what they already do as long as their future livlihood would be guaranteed. Contrary to your commentary, broad swaths of our population are perfectly content to stay in their current economic position. Relatively few people are trying to maximize their utility, as you put it. And even fewer still doing it in a 'greedy' (or socially undesirable) way.
your commentary on the efficiency and utility of 'pooling' resources is historically inaccurate. First of all, the most modern evidence suggests that ancients had a hell of a lot more free time than we do. gatherers worked on average 20 hours per week. pooling resources, as you put it, is not more efficient from an energy perspective. It actually takes a lot of energy to grow something in one state or country, and transport it elsewhere. People formed social groups not because they needed to pool resources, but because they started to run out of space. Now we build vertical.
No, if you were correct, and people were primarily concerned with survival of themselves (we'll leave the greed label off), they would have just killed off the competition. So I think you're committing a few errors when you state we are more advanced in our utilitarian cognition than the ancients. It appears they did much or all of what was correct, for if not, we wouldn't be here according to evolution tenets. But the point remains, we didnt' get here by unbendable commitment to individualism.
__________________
"The theory of a free press is that truth will emerge from free discussion, not that it will be presented perfectly and instantly in any one account." -- Walter Lippmann
"You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists." -- Abbie Hoffman
|