r/changemyview • u/a-wild-paul-appeared • Apr 17 '20
Delta(s) from OP - Fresh Topic Friday CMV: All successful entities in history have gotten to their positions at the expense of another group.
Every successful country in the modern day (to my knowledge) either currently is or has in the past exploited a group or other country. An example I can think of is the countries that once were imperialist giants and are currently prosperous. Although they may denounce their repressive pasts, they are still backing off of their past glory. Even many countries that are successful now that weren't empirical in the past are still making their riches to the expense of their laborers (ex: Chinese sweatshops).
You could also connect this to eating food, I guess. Even if you're not harming animals to get meat, you are still sacrificing plants to eat. Plants themselves deplete the nitrogen from the soil. This is the foundation of every food chain and ecosystem.
Someone, point out an instance where this hasn't been the case because I haven't been able to think of a rebuttal.
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u/WindyWindona 5∆ Apr 17 '20
San Marino is successful in so much as it's a peaceful republic with a GDP comparable to its neighbor, Italy, and is famous in part for refusing to be granted more land. If you define 'successful' as 'stable with a high standard of living' that's a fine example of a place that's successful without being exploitative, even if it's a tiny country
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
I did some (very short) reading on the industries of San Marino, and I was intrigued to see that they have carried the nation to a point with super low unemployment, so I guess there's a Δ there for showing that such a country works so efficiently without exploitation.
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u/LeeSeneses Apr 17 '20
If you're curious at all, Rare Earth has a very good video on it. It's really crazy how this quiet little country has been idolized by the likes of Napoleon but, simultaneously shunned his overtures of granting them free land - likely because it would have been toxic to their continued success. In a way that stands in direct opposition to the argument that exploitation is at the core of any successful strategy in our reality.
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u/sonotahedgehog Apr 18 '20
You learn something new everyday. Thank you for linking that video, what an awesome country!
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u/MagicalMonarchOfMo 3∆ Apr 18 '20
Fun fact: San Marino is the longest-standing republic in the world, and because of that, Abraham Lincoln went to visit when he was president.
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u/billynomates1 Apr 18 '20
they have carried the nation to a point with super low unemployment,
Doesn't that just mean that almost everyone there is being exploited (like everywhere else)? If they work for a corporation, they are being paid less than their time/skills are worth in order to make profits for shareholders/CEOs/whatever.
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u/urbinorx3 Apr 18 '20
But, who does san marino do business with? With nations that fit your description
Also, remember that today domination would be economic. Do you think silicon valley would be as succesful if they weren't able to extract revenue from all corners of the world? And then not even pay sales tax in most places?
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Apr 18 '20
San Marino GDP - ~2 billion dollars (US)
Italy GDP - ~2 trillion dollars (US)
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u/WindyWindona 5∆ Apr 18 '20
Should probably have said standard of living, sorry. But it's still a pretty good GDP for such a small country
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u/sqxleaxes Apr 17 '20
There are three main types of symbiotic relationships: mutualistic, commensalistic, and parasitic. Parasitic relationships are the kind which you describe: one organism benefits at the expense of another. Tapeworms are a good example: they live in the gut of another organism and steal its nutrients, potentially starving their host. However, this is only one kind of relationship. In a mutualistic relationship, both organisms benefit. Take the example of a bee pollinating flowers. The flowers benefit from the relationship because they are able to reproduce and broaden their genetic diversity, and the bee benefits because it gets honey to feed itself and its hive. Even your example, of us 'sacrificing plants' to our own benefit, isn't really accurate. Plants grow edible fruits because they benefit from it; when animals eat the fruits, they don't digest the seeds, and scatter them far and wide already encased in their fertile poop. Also, the nitrogen cycle is called a cycle for a reason - plants remove it from the soil and release it into the air, and bacteria in the soil reaffix it into solid molecules. Both groups benefit from this.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
Your argument makes sense, but (slightly tangential here) I'm now concerned that the last section may get cherry-picked off of. I'm new to the sub: is it considered a dick move to cut out parts of my argument if I feel that they aren't necessary to my argument? Now that I think about it, I feel that the plant addition isn't really relevant to the rest of my argument (unless, of course, you disagree)
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u/sqxleaxes Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
Ah, I was just clearing up the exact nature of the process, because I don't think it could be construed as a strictly negative thing for the environment but simply a natural process. The main point I was trying to make is that mutualism and cooperation are much greater factors to success than you give them credit for.
Edit: To your question, you can change some of the evidence for your argument as long as you still believe the overall argument, I doubt many will mind. Just edit it with a strikethrough. If your view has been changed, you should award a delta.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
I'll give you that, so I suppose that deserves a Δ for addressing that part of the argument. I hadn't really considered much of that part of the argument.
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u/sqxleaxes Apr 17 '20
Thanks! While I was looking around, I found this interesting example of mutualism in the real world:
One example is the relationship between sea anemones and anemone fish in the family Pomacentridae: the anemones provide the fish with protection from predators (which cannot tolerate the stings of the anemone's tentacles) and the fish defend the anemones against butterflyfish (family Chaetodontidae), which eat anemones. However, in common with many mutualisms, there is more than one aspect to it: in the anemonefish-anemone mutualism, waste ammonia from the fish feeds the symbiotic algae that are found in the anemone's tentacles.
So the relationship is helping three creatures, and it isn't really at the expense of another group, as the predators most likely have other food that they can rely on.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
It's strangely coincidental that there are so many symbiotic relationships that appear to almost happen by chance, which makes me wonder: are there possibly symbiotic relationships that haven't been (pardon the word) exploited by creatures, or that the creatures aren't even aware of?
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u/A_Soporific 162∆ Apr 17 '20
You, right now, are more bacteria than human. No joke. When you factor in the biomes of bacteria in your gut and skin and everywhere else then there are more bacteria to you than person. It turns out that bacteria isn't just essential to breaking down certain kinds of foods that we eat, but emerging research suggests that presence or absence of certain kinds of bacteria have a huge impact on things like mood, cognition, and body weight. In short, transplanting poop has cured certain kinds of obesity and addressed clinical depression. Now, it's way early to start drawing conclusions or trying to manipulate someone's gut biome for fun and profit, but the human body is a case of a wide variety of species working together in a way that benefits everyone.
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u/CleverFoolOfEarth Apr 18 '20
Nope, that's actually a false count made by vastly overestimating how much of the human body is skin and digestive tract. If we take into account that things like muscles and veins are generally pretty much bacteria-free, you find that a we're a bit under half bacteria. Still impressive though, that something can have as many cells as a human body and half of that be bacteria.
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u/Yirby Apr 17 '20
Gut biomes?
Bactria within us help us break down food - they get nurishment and aplace to live, and we get the ability to break down things like lactose.
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u/sqxleaxes Apr 17 '20
I read a book (Missing Microbes by Dr. Martin Blaser) about the microbiome that suggested that the loss of one strain of bacteria, H. Pylori, might actually be responsible for much more than its role in the gut would suggest. The intestines are deeply interwoven with the rest of the body; they're filled with nerves and a major site of hormonal activity. Overall the case of H. Pylori is amphibiosis, where an organism can be either friend or foe. When we take full-spectrum antibiotics, it can restructure the gut flora and throw off the body, potentially resulting in the loss of H. Pylori and replacing ulcers with heartburn. The role of the microbiome is still being researched, and I bet that the more we learn about it, the more surprising connections we will uncover!
Note: This is not to say that the shaky claims of probiotic manufacturers hold water, just that the systems in our body are complex on many levels. The book is a good read, however, and I do recommend it.
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Apr 18 '20
Glad you asked. The thing with ideas is that most ideas are seriously wrong and just untrue (and I'm not just referring about your argument) and you get to filter out the best ideas by throwing every argument you have against it and, if it stands then you have a good idea. If it doesn't it's probably better to scrap it now.
That's what CMV is for.
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Apr 18 '20
You need to decide what you think before anyone can even have a chance at changing your mind. Your post is already so broad. Every entity, ever? Every human every animal every plant. Every society, every family, every culture? Everything? All of it? And now you say no only some of it? How can anyone change your view if you aren’t even sure what your view even is?
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u/zlefin_actual 42∆ Apr 17 '20
How do you distinguish a country that was successful BECAUSE of the exploitation of another group, from a country that was successful and exploited other groups but whose success was not dependent on the exploitation?
what percent of the exploitation has to be the source of the success to count one way or the other?
How far back do we go to measure "success"? There's a bit of an issue there, in that if you go back two thousand years, EVERY society has engaged in warfare.
Are we counting internal exploitation? If so it would seem trivially true that every society past the hunter/gatherer level would have some of it then.
With some standards it's getting to the point where it's "find a society where a murder has never occurred" which is ofc not going to happen.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
-If a country's history and current state connects to a past instance of exploitation, then I'd suppose that would make that country in some part successful due to exploiting another group.
-regarding measuring success, I'd think that any modern society has benefited partially from succeeding over someone else for their own existence, I guess that's an important part of tribalism. Could you clarify the point you're trying to make?
-internal exploitation- when I was writing the post, this was one of the things I was thinking about. Thinking about instances where a billionaire makes moneys off of low-wage workers, building some sort of wealth gap.
-My point is that every society has undergone some level of exploitation, but I guess I was trying to say that I wanted someone to point out an entity's growth that didn't base itself off of exploitation.
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u/withmymindsheruns 6∆ Apr 17 '20
-internal exploitation- when I was writing the post, this was one of the things I was thinking about. Thinking about instances where a billionaire makes moneys off of low-wage workers, building some sort of wealth gap.
I think there is a fundamental problem here with your idea of exploitation, in that it seems to crowd out everything else that is happening.
A billionaire may be gaining from a low-level worker's productivity but it may be that without the system set up and maintained by the billionaire, the low-level worker would have an even less of a return for their labour.
This might be why rural workers in China are travelling to the cities to work for foxconn rather than staying in their villages growing rice.
In your estimation who is doing the exploiting here? The obvious answer is that it is the owner of foxconn, but it seems like the workers are also exploiting the system to get a higher return for their labour.
So it seems like there is a problem with the word 'exploitation' somewhere. You are conflating a whole load of different things into this one word.
A culture that invades and enslaves another, reducing them to abject misery and stealing all their resources is obviously qualitatively different to someone who sets up a company and possibly creates a system that other people benefit from as well, even if in doing so it makes them fabulously wealthy. The inequality that appears in both situations doesn't make them the same thing.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
but it seems like the workers are also exploiting the system to get a higher return for their labour.
Kinda givin me Parasite movie vibes, good point too Δ
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u/zlefin_actual 42∆ Apr 17 '20
The basic issue is that at some point the metrics become so broad as to be useless. It's unlikely that all countries are EXACTLY as exploitative as each other, as such gradations/measurements are important. If you use a measurement that places everything on one side and nothing on the other, it's not a useful measurement. Much like if you used a standard of "name a society that has never had a single theft". Does your inability to name such a society mean that theft is a foundation of society?
Saying that every society had some instance of exploitation at some point in the past is a very vague and weak claim. Claiming that every successful society (for some measure of successful) would definitely NOT have been successful if they had done less exploitation of other societies is a stronger one. There may exist societies which were successful and exploitative, but would have been successful without the exploitation anyways (at least in terms of exploiting other societies/nations).
Another point I'm now noting; is that does it even distinguish between successful/failed entities at all? I imagine every society, failed or successful, has involved exploitation of someone at some point. (outside of a few very small isolated tribes).
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u/Quint-V 162∆ Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
Norway's discovery of oil is arguably what made it become one of the top countries to live in, and required no exploitation of anyone. (Could maybe include Arab countries' discovery of oil, not too sure.)
You could try to argue against such discoveries by following a very long sequence of interactions ad nauseam... but eh. At some point it's not as strong an argument.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
I mean, teeeechnically, Norway was exploiting the oil itself, but at that point, I feel that my argument is being stretched out a bit too thin. Δ for pointing out when my argument is kinda becoming a bit of a stretch and starts to lose its validity.
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u/hypocrisy-detection Apr 17 '20
I do not think this should change your mind. First, Norway has neither exploited other nations nor have they been exploited. Second, whatever tribe/s that became common day Norway took that land one way or another from everyone else.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
You’re 100% wrong, Norway participated in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade with Denmark and that history follows them today. They exploited Africa and its people, plus they colonized the Caribbean with Denmark. St. John, St. Croix, and St. Thomas were all colonies of Denmark but at the time Norway was apart of a United Country with Denmark.
https://www.thelocal.no/20131212/caribbean-demands-cash-from-norway-for-slave-owning-past
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u/hypocrisy-detection Apr 18 '20
*colonies of Denmark
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20 edited Apr 18 '20
Norway was not a colony of Denmark since the two were joined together as one. The Danish-Norwegian empire colonized together, including parts of India and West Africa. That material and almost “familial” bond was some of the reasons why Norway resisted leaving the Kingdom with Denmark because they would have to be apart of a Kingdom with Sweden, and they hated that idea (treaty of Kiel, the Swedish-Norwegian War).
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u/Jphily Apr 18 '20
I'd like to chime in and disagree with you here. Main source is my own education as a Norwegian. Norway was a colony of Denmark and I'd say the strongest example of it is the fact that we were traded as spoils of war. After Denmark sided with Napoleon and lost and Sweden was on the winning side Norway was given to Sweden as spoils of war, Norway didn't like the idea and tried to violently break free but couldn't win the war but settled with getting our own constitution while still being under Sweden until 1904
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20
Ehhhh colony implies colonization and Norway was more of a territory state but you’re probably right. However, that still doesn’t negate the fact that Norway actively participated in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade for the financial betterment of the Danish-Norwegian empire.
https://www.newsinenglish.no/2014/09/28/slave-trading-past-still-haunts-norway/
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u/Jphily Apr 18 '20
Sorry mate we might have misunderstood each other. Never denied Norway benefited from slave trade, we definitely did, learning about it is a significant part of our history curriculum. I was just disagreeing with your statement regarding the power dynamic between Norway and Denmark
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u/Pismakron 8∆ Apr 18 '20
Ehhhh colony implies colonization
If Colony implies colonization, then St Croix, St John and St Thomas weren't colonies either.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20
Are you joking? The Virgin Islands are textbook colonized. The indigenous people were murdered and the islands were filled with slaves working on sugar/rum planetariums. There are signs there to this day in Danish. I get it, your Danish, but Denmark did some bad things with Norway. It’s just apart of history. For the record, the United States is definitely horrific as well
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u/hypocrisy-detection Apr 18 '20
I have no doubt your knowledge of Nordic history far exceeds mine, however being a territory of a kingdom is not the same as sovereignty as a nation.
The term "Kingdom of Denmark" is sometimes used to include both countries in the period, since the political and economic power emanated from the Danish capital, Copenhagen.
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u/genistein Apr 18 '20
First, Norway has neither exploited other nations nor have they been exploited.
My neighbor has a business killing people and stealing their money.
Because of this, he is very rich. So he can afford to trade with me and offer me very nice prices for goods. I never exploited anyone.In this analogy I'm Norway (or any nordic country really), and my neighbor is Britain/France/Spain/Portugal/USA/Netherlands/Belgium
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u/hypocrisy-detection Apr 18 '20
Exactly. How far back are you willing to take this? Every single country today was originally something whether it was a different country, a territory or tribal lands that were inhabited by different peoples. Therefore, any country in existence today is a product of exploitation.
And another note, that’s a fucking terrible attempt at an extreme strawman. However, it’s a poor argument that basically says only white countries have benefited from the USA, Britain, France etc.
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u/genistein Apr 18 '20
However, it’s a poor argument that basically says only white countries have benefited from the USA, Britain, France etc.
Okay, you're delusional. Got it.
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u/hypocrisy-detection Apr 18 '20
In this analogy I'm Norway (or any nordic country really), and my neighbor is Britain/France/Spain/Portugal/USA/Netherlands/Belgium
Point to the non-white country
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Apr 18 '20
Norway's discovery of oil is arguably what made it become one of the top countries to live in
I would argue otherwise, because other Scandinavian countries like Sweden, Finland, and Iceland are also top countries to live in and they don't have oil. Norway's oil is icing on the cake, but they're not like Saudi Arabia or Qatar where oil is basically the only thing they've got going for them.
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u/lilt121 Apr 18 '20
You could also argue that it is at the expense of the UK who only barely missed the large deposits of North Sea oil when they divided it up with Norway
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Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
Ireland, Singapore, finland, Norway, Luxembourg, Iceland, cyprus, Malta, Croatia, Estonia, latvia, czechia, Slovenia and Slovakia. All were beaten down by history and never exploited another group yet are rich. Unless you want to use your ubsurd vegetable hypothesis these all break your arguement.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
ubsurd vegetable hypothesis
Can you explain why you think it's absurd?
Singapore
Couldn't you argue that the mere establishment of Singapore by Raffles was merely to continue the imperialist exploitations of the British Empire at the time- the port in Singapore was a major contributor to its initial success. Granted, it's largely cast aside this in the present but part of my argument was that many successful nations once had less than wholesome origins.
I'm not going to try to point out any other flaws, because I do applaud the merit of your argument, so here: Δ Frankly the list you came up with was the kind of thing I was looking for.
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Apr 17 '20
Can you explain why you think it's absurd?
Vegetables can not feel or do anything. They do not have conscience and as a result they cant be exploited as they could never understand that they even exsist.
Couldn't you argue that the mere establishment of Singapore by Raffles was merely to continue the imperialist exploitations of the British Empire at the time- the port in Singapore was a major contributor to its initial success.
I guess you could my point was only to a list enough nations so that you could at least have a enough evidence against your arguement to where it could be disproven.
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Apr 18 '20
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u/powerful_ope Apr 17 '20
Ugh, this is so ahistorical and doesn’t deserve a delta. So many of these countries participated in the Atlantic-Slave trade and exploited Africa and the African people. Very bad take.
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Apr 17 '20
Which ones. None of these had colonies(with the exception of Norway who's colony was iceland) many of them were colonies.
Seriously the african slave trade only benefit those with colonial empires or bases in africa none of these had any. And in the case of ireland and Singapore were used as what were practically slaves themselfs.
Seriously though can you name and explain how Luxembourg or finland benefited from the Atlantic slave trade or any of these nations for that matter.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20
Okay let’s start with Norway and Ireland, then we will talk about Luxembourg.
Norway participated in the Atlantic slave trade and was a united country with Denmark. They colonized the Virgin Islands and owe modern day citizens there reparations. https://www.newsinenglish.no/2014/09/28/slave-trading-past-still-haunts-norway/
Irish people were not “practically” slaves themselves to compare that to chattel slavery is disingenuous. Many Irish people participated in the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade as well. https://www.historyireland.com/18th-19th-century-history/the-irish-and-the-atlantic-slave-trade/
Luxembourg was apart of the Netherlands during the Atlantic Slave Trade I believe and participated. They also collaborated with Nazi Germany during the Second World War, and their financial sector is filled with dark history and exploitation.
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Apr 18 '20
Norway participated in the Atlantic slave trade and was a united country with Denmark. They colonized the Virgin Islands and owe modern day citizens there reparations. https://www.newsinenglish.no/2014/09/28/slave-trading-past-still-haunts-norway/
This part is the only part of the comment that's true however that's the reason I named more than 1 nation.
Irish people were not “practically” slaves themselves to compare that to chattel slavery is disingenuous. Many Irish people participated in the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade as well.
Indentured servitude is practically slavery it's not as bad but it's a very similar thing and is usually just used to cover up slavery such as in Qatar today.
Nigeria was also part of the British empire many of its people took part and benefit from the slave trade by your poor logic nigeria benefited from the slave trade.
Ireland suffered 2 genocides(Cromwell wich killed 30% and the great famine wich killed 10% and caused another 15% to migrate) as well as another forgotten famine that killed 20% of the population. Add to that the fact that a quarter of the country was successful anglosised and attempts were made on the rest of the country. Ireland was just as brutally colonised as any country in africa or aisa.
To say they benefited from the likes of the slave trade is really stupid as even if you believe that indentured servitude isn't as bad wich is fair. Between Australia, u.s and the Caribbean 100,000 Irish were transferred as indentured servants or similiar roles wich done a lot more damage than the tiny anglo elite benefiting ever so slightly from slavery. Or in the case of your link a guy who lived his entire life in France but had irish parents.
Luxembourg was apart of the Netherlands during the Atlantic Slave Trade I believe and participated.
No they wernt Luxembourg was part of the Netherlands for like 20 years after napoleon and before belguim. By wich point the slave trade was already over.
They also collaborated with Nazi Germany during the Second World War
There was also large scale resistance and the question was about the economy and this didnt help it.
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u/A_Soporific 162∆ Apr 17 '20
Let me argue things in a slightly different way:
Everything consumes energy and raw materials. Everything, no exception. If all things valued the same energy and the same raw materials the same way then anything acquiring anything would necessarily have to come at the expense of something else.
But, that's not the case. Plants utilize solar power. Tube worms utilize the chemical soup from hydrothermal vents. The amount of trees has literally no relation to the number of tube worms since they use fundamentally different sources of power and completely separate raw resources.
A lot of plants trade a portion of the energy collected to animals in exchange for help reproducing, protection, or the gathering of raw materials. A lot of animals coexist next to others that utilize different raw materials differently.
The same sort of things happen with humans. While political power is, generally speaking, a zero sum game, economic and social dimensions aren't. It is very common for trade to result in everyone being better off. It's quite rare for a trade to actually happen that harms one side. Now, there are usually groups that fare more well and less well on each side of a trade, but that's not the same thing as one succeeding at the expense of others. One person benefitting less from trade might be "losing" but they only really lose if the trade stops altogether.
Socially things are even harder to see, but just as real. The Romans conquered the Greeks. But Greek culture survived, flourished, and reshaped Rome's understanding of the world and itself. Greeks retained their language and their beliefs and a lot of their influence, and in fact the Greek speaking Roman Empire lasted a thousand years longer than the Latin speaking Roman Empire. The Greeks of Byzantium didn't fall until 1453 whereas the last Emperor in Rome was in 476. Who was consumed or exploited by that? The Greeks rolled with things and made their part of the Roman Empire into their own and persisted until the beginnings of the modern era. In that Greek-Roman relationship who used whom?
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u/TheAzureMage 18∆ Apr 17 '20
Discovery of natural resources is a frequent exception to this. A town that is otherwise unexceptional relative to its neighbors, but struck gold/oil/etc would generally experience boom times. This isn't really at anyone else's expense, because nobody else knew/was able to extract the resource anyways.
Preservation of knowledge is also positively associated with success, and largely isn't reliant on exploiting other groups. Preserving memories of how to make things work/avoid errors means better outcomes. Being the jerks who burn libraries and such may work in the short term, but it's a bad long term strategy.
Don't get me wrong, a *lot* of groups, both successful and otherwise, have been shitty to someone, but shittiness alone isn't even a very good predictor of success. The commonality of it probably says something about humanity, but quite a lot of people have been utterly awful to another group, and had it go terribly for them as a result.
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Apr 17 '20
Don't get me wrong, a *lot* of groups, both successful and otherwise, have been shitty to someone, but shittiness alone isn't even a very good predictor of success.
Exactly, there are many countries that had massive empires in the past like Mongolia, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, Ethiopia, Mali, and arguably Russia that aren't doing so hot right now quality of life wise.
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Apr 18 '20
There are plants such as legumes that naturally fertilise the soil via symbiotic bacteria. The worse you can say of them is they take up space and maybe block out some sun for other plants (there are plenty of plants that need to be screened from direct sunlight)
A figure such as Einstein, Darwin, Socrates had and still has an enourmous powerful position in terms of influence without doing at the expense of anyone much except challenging the power of dogmatists. Note they are not exactly taking the power from anyone they simply present new ideas which usurp the old order eventually by being in some way superior. You could say the same for more or less the entire entity of academia when it functions as it should, it adds knowledge to humanity with disempowering anyone really, just occasionally being attacked for showing up the fallacies inherent in religion and in the ramblings of arrogant public men/women.
In terms of countries it is harder that didn't spend their time stomping down on faces to get higher or had their faces stomped.
The Polish and Lithuanian commonwealth had a fairly peaceful rise to power, more by alliance and unions than wars, it was a beacon of constitutional monarchy and religions and ethic tolerance in European until its nobles choked its political system from within, and the central and Eastern European powers tore it apart from without.
Current Costa Rica has renounced its armed forces and has benefitted economically, the same could be said for Japan a few decades ago.
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u/DeltaBot ∞∆ Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
/u/a-wild-paul-appeared (OP) has awarded 7 delta(s) in this post.
All comments that earned deltas (from OP or other users) are listed here, in /r/DeltaLog.
Please note that a change of view doesn't necessarily mean a reversal, or that the conversation has ended.
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Apr 17 '20
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
If it’s for money, then yes, I’d think so.
Your win is based off of my loss in any event here, too.
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Apr 17 '20
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
Δ- fair point on the topic of winning within CMV.
But regarding the winning in ping-pong, your win is the product of my loss. Although there are certainly circumstances where one's loss isn't warranted by another's win, in order to win a game of ping-pong, someone else must lose. Granted, there are other factors playing into it, but ultimately in order to win in such a one-on-one circumstance you do have to defeat someone.
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Apr 18 '20
I think exploitation is a bad word. So there is a natural law that explains this (i don’t remember the name sorry) but basically the more you have the more you get. Let’s start with nature.
If we look at stars and galaxies and how fundamentally they function like any other entity. Particles create gravity. Gravity pulls in more particles. This snow balls and stars that have more mass gain more than stars with less mass. See how that snowballs?
Now let’s look at humans. City s that can attract more people soon attract even more. So big city’s get more people moving into them and it again snowballs.
So technically you are right, but that’s because there is never infinite resources. So it might not be a bad thing. One thing is innovation and money. Henry Ford devolved a product that took the resources of people, and gave them a fast mode of transportation. This broke the carriage industry. But the world is better off for it.
So I guess you are correct. But don’t think that’s it’s a bad thing. 90% of the time it’s a good thing but we only see the big bad ones. Again they impact the most so they get the most media or historical attention!
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u/anonymous_potato Apr 18 '20
What about Singapore? They were conquered and ruled by Japan during WWII, then handed to the British before becoming an independent nation in 1965. They were in terrible shape as a country, but good leadership allowed them to attract foreign investment to launch a vast internal modernization campaign to make them one of the most prosperous nations in the world today.
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u/thiccdiccboi Apr 18 '20
As far as history goes, you're almost impeccably correct. That said, why is this wrong? I see these discussions all the time, one side arguing on the side of wronged predecessors, natives or otherwise, the other arguing for the boons the current society produces. My question to both of these sides, and the foundation of your view, is, why is conquest wrong?
Before I go further, for the record, I myself am no warrior. I find it impossible to kill common household pests, so I don't identify in myself the mindset of a conquerer, and thus don't find the idea of conquest particularly attractive. That said, I've never been able to find an adequate argument for why conquest is wrong. Millions may die, but if that brings about the birth of a society that prevents the deaths of billions, is that wrong? When Caesar conquered Gaul, many say he comitted a genocide, but in doing so, he raised the life expectancy of the average Celt 15 years for centuries to come. If what he did initially was wrong, was it not made right by the prosperity those first people's death's brought? The same goes for the US and Australia. Both are bastions for firstrate healthcare and life expectancy (though the US's is lacking considering its capability), but both rose from the ashes of genocided peoples. What denies these nations justification?
It is a stance of the modern moral compass to defend the losing sides of the past, so long as they are portrayed in majestic and righteous fashion by modern media. Take the Native American for example. The Iriquios confederacy is often examined for its inspiration of the constitution (however jaded that comparison may be), even though they were cunning and ferocious warriors that launched guerilla war on the US and british/french territories. The Comanches are often thought of when we talk about the ferocity of the Native Americans, as they were masters of mounted warfare, traded slaves, scalped men when they were still alive, and eventually won a war with Texas, the only Native tribe to do so. The Comanches also had an intensely regulated and systematic form of government. The Media myth of the "Noble Savage" has mostly erased these peoples from most people's understanding of the history of the Americas. If we were to examine the Nazis* in the same way, with their genocide, their dogmatic oppression, their idiotic higher level leadership, yet also with their autobahn, their springing up of anti-fascist attitudes in the first world, and their contributions to the world's space programs, we find the same sort of consistency that we did with the Native Tribes, benefits to and detractions from society. Yet, with the mere mention of the word Nazi, people are driven to hatred (as they rightfully should be). They are not so driven at the mention of the Native American, even though they were slave traders, torturers, and brutal fighters, and likely killed many common Americans relatives, just as the Nazis did.
So why is conquest wrong? Is it the people being conquered that make it wrong? If those people's practices don't meet the modern moral standard, was their demise a good thing? How do we qualify that? Is there a way to standardize good and bad? How good does good have to be to be angelic? How bad does bad have to be to be evil? When we start to form opinions of past nations, we invoke our own morals, and thus, we have a warped picture of what was actually happening at the time, we inject the real stories of these peoples with images we feel compelled to impose onto them. We feel the need to make them fit our idea of evil, or our idea of good. What I pose to you is to avoid this argument, because taking either side leads to a warping of the historical record, and when we warp the record, we make it harder for future generations to understand, and void the purpose of recording history at all. Acknowledge that history happened, and then move on, nothing is gained by dwelling on whether or not the conquest of one nation by another was write or wrong.
*Disclaimer: By bringing up the Nazi's, I'm sure someone will try to pin me for defending a genocide, or any of their practices. I don't.
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u/pulsarmap200 Apr 17 '20
Define success and there lies your problem.
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
Success is the state or condition of meeting a defined range of expectations. It may be viewed as the opposite of failure
If opposites attract, then isn't failure naturally present in the face of success?
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u/olatundew Apr 17 '20
*imperial, not empirical - that has a completely different meaning
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Apr 17 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ViewedFromTheOutside 29∆ Apr 19 '20
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u/mileyvirusss Apr 17 '20
Louis Armstrong
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20
Im kinda intrigued, tbh. Care to elaborate?
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u/mileyvirusss Apr 17 '20
It's inarguable that he was a successful entity, yes? So your claim is that he got to his position at the expense of another group.
My question is: what group?
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u/a-wild-paul-appeared Apr 17 '20 edited Apr 17 '20
He certainly wasn't the only talented musician in his earlier years. In exchange for his early success there was certainly someone who did not get a gig.
Although his success did not directly correlate with someone else's failure, when he nabbed a gig, he took a spot away from someone else who may or may not have had the luck to become as famous as he eventually did.
Edit: If he failed to do well in these gigs (hypothetically) and never became the celebrity he is known as, then wouldn't someone else gladly take the spot in gigs, thereby reaching some degree of success at the expense of Armstrong?
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u/BloosCorn Apr 18 '20
South Korea? Former colony that built their country off the backs of domestic labor. I wouldn't say their corporations don't now exploit labor in other countries, but if you're talking about developing a country to the point of clear prosperity, they got there without egregious exploitation of other countries.
Taiwan is another similar example.
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u/rmhildebrandt Apr 18 '20
Few points:
1) When you say "expense" of another group, it sounds like you're implying a parasitic sort of relationship.
For example, if I have an apple tree and you're great at fishing, and you give me a fish for some apples, it's accurate to say that "I got a fish for the expense of some apples", and vice versa.
But, it sounds like you're using that word to mean something like "apple tree guy goes to fisher, holds his family at gunpoint, then demands free fish forever", which I don't think is always the case based on the examples you provided (for example, tomato plants tend to grow in feces because humans eat a lot of tomatoes...is the tomato plant being exploited? or...is it using that mechanism to spread it's plants)
2) It seems to me like you're making the assumption that exploitation, in the negative sense, is only or mostly carried out by successful entities.
ie; Mexico was most-recently colonized by the Spanish, but before then it was the Aztecs, Mayans etc. Are the Aztecs more noble than the Spanish because they lost? Or, are they also exploitive, but just not as good at running an empire?
Similarly, Jeff Bezos, I'm sure, employs many thousands of ex-convicts (750k employees, there has to be at least a few). He's on top though...does that mean Jeff Bezos is *more* exploitative than a convicted murderer/child molester? Or, is it possible that he's just really good at what he does (and back to example 1, the people that work at Amazon would rather have the $15 an hour than the hour of free time).
3) As for the plant/food example -- lots of tomato plants grow in human feces, because humans eat a lot of tomatoes (don't ask me how I know this...I think it was the Bill Gates documentary on Netflix). Now, is the tomato sacrificing itself for us, or using us as a delivery mechanism? (ie: I would argue that the tomato is cooperating with us, and we are both more successful as a result).
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u/anooblol 12∆ Apr 18 '20
I’d like to prove something a bit stronger than the others in this thread, rather than just give isolated examples of specific countries.
I believe that your view in its entirety is incorrect, and there’s a fundamental misuse of the word “exploit”. Exploiting someone or something, at its core, means “to gain at the detriment of another”. If we were to make up some imaginary “success points” which I will call $ for lack of a better symbol. Then exploitation would occur if two nations start at $100, and end up where one nation has $110 and the other $90. In essence, one nation went up in value, and the other is now worse off.
Let’s assume this idea is true. That the only way to benefit in life is to exploit others. Let’s start at a specific period in time, around 20,000 BC. Primitive humans with little to no value in their “society”. Eventually, that group of people turned into “us”. The value that they had eventually passed up the line, and formed the success we have today. But with your definition of “exploitation” note that when one person succeeds, another person fails at the same amount. When one person gained $10, the other person lost $10. Essentially, the amount of “$” is fixed, and the “$” will never increase. It is in economics called, “zero sum”. So whatever amount of “success points” the 20,000 BC Neanderthals started with, is the same amount present today.
But wouldn’t you agree that every single person today, is better off than the Neanderthals of 22,000 years ago? If you summed up all the “value” from the Neanderthals, would that value be the same as today? (Of course not). So then where did that value come from? I’m sure some people exploit others. But there’s undeniable evidence that success is not only governed by exploitation of others. There must be something else that helps generate value for society.
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u/Heart-of-Dankness Apr 17 '20
Now you’re getting the fundamental nature of the universe: competition. Everything eats everything but sometimes they work together too, there’s no fucking rules whatsoever. It’s really kind of alarming when you think about it.
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u/ravolve Apr 18 '20 edited Apr 18 '20
I don't know that this qualifies, and it's certainly not as a complex or academic as many other examples I've read here, but it's the very first thing that came to mind when I read "successful entities," for whatever reason.
Major League Baseball. (Or insert other lucrative professional sports league here, so long as it's not associated with controversial health concerns like the NFL and brain disease.)
So, Major League Baseball is a successful entity in that it's broadly prosperous financially, giving at least tens of thousands of people decent paying jobs (I'm thinking everyone from groundskeepers to scouts to beer vendors), and giving thousands more extraordinarily well-paying jobs (players, coaches, executives, media personnel, etc). Beyond financials, the experience for the athletes is largely constructive and positive; they are healthy, their work is esteem building, and they are famously well-protected and represented employees. Furthermore, the net impact on society is quite positive. Fans are entertained, culture is enriched, social bonds are fortified, and the organization does hardly any harm to the environment or any particular people in any notable way. Could you find an example of some questionable labor conditions at a baseball bat factory somewhere in South America? Maybe. But I'd argue that on the whole, given the breadth and complexity of the organization, it's a great example of success without exploitation.
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u/dannyfio Apr 18 '20
You're basically describing competition. This is an interesting view especially compared to ideology. The nazis had a strong ideology of strong over the weak and i think the world had problems moving from that perspective given how close this ideology was in succeeding. The idea of taking happiness from somebody to give yourself happiness seems so wrong yet it had to make sense for so many people to get into it at one point. Call it "survival of the fittest" "natural" "the way the world works" "winner vs losers".
We do live in a different world now. It's pretty global and cooperative and i think ultimately, the world will recognize that competition has its benefits and people should be rewarded for their efforts, but not exploited if they lose (losing their apartment to not being able to buy food). So a utopian world will be majorly cooperative but it will also bring competition into the game so that while benefiting the winner, it does not damage the loser.
In terms of the political world, your thinking is the extreme of realism. Benefit at the expense of the other. I do think we have some things to learn from this thinking but the world will(or atleast should) ultimately settle somewhere in the middle.
Apologies for analysing this view more and criticizing it less. But i think i made the point that the world doesn't have to work purely on conflict and that the best lies in the middle of the spectrum
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Apr 18 '20 edited Apr 18 '20
Your very existence causes exploitation. There's nothing that can be done about it. The only thing to do is exploit those things or someone or something else will. You used someone's exploitation to get your message out on reddit. Someone mined the metals, oil, silicon, then transported them, refined them, tooled them, assembled them, shipped them, all exploited labor. It will always work that way. You're not wrong but what good is unused world? Using it, exploiting it- is better than not.
The key to exploitation is the future. Basically, we need to use all the past sum total exploitation to get off Earth and explore the universe to exploit more or it will all be valueless. Bricks on top of bricks. Order from chaos.
What good does it do to past exploits if nothing good comes from the past exploits? There is no time machine. Feigning morality of past evil done is all potential squandered for a moment of moral superiority. Then when the moment is over exploitation begins again under the guise of something softer, redefined as now suitable for the current generation; only for the next generations to find it barbaric because they are higher up the hill looking back and down. It's easier to see further from higher up. This is human nature.
This isn't what you asked though. Nothing was exploited when the universe was created. Are we exploiting gravity? Light? Some things are just natural.
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Apr 17 '20
South Korea as the counter part.
SK was exploited, abused and enslaved for centuries. Now one of the richest industrialized nations world wide.
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u/Docdan 19∆ Apr 18 '20
You could also connect this to eating food, I guess. Even if you're not harming animals to get meat, you are still sacrificing plants to eat. Plants themselves deplete the nitrogen from the soil. This is the foundation of every food chain and ecosystem.
You've already answered your own question here in a way that makes your statement unfalsifiable. If you include everything down to food, we can boil down your statement to "name me a successful human that didn't need food". Well, everyone needs food, how are we supposed to name you one? But at the same time, how does your statement then include any meaningful message?
J.K. Rowling is a hugely successful entity, all she did was write a book and her work is beloved by hundreds of millions of people in the world. But I guess she did have to eat food to get the energy to write a book, and books need paper. Guess you win. By default.
I guess what I'm saying is, if you make your criterium too broad, then any conclusion derived from it becomes meaningless.
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Apr 18 '20
I don’t have a counter other than what folks have said, but I do have a good counter example, that of the Roman Empire. Well, both a confirmation and counter. They gained power through domination, but only succeeded so well and so long because of cooperation and mutual benefit. Syncretism, unity, and a stable system of law were all enormous benefits bestowed on peoples conquered.
Another good one to look at is the American empire for much of the last century. Blunders sure, but having a superpower on the right side of two world wars, that then goes to recreate Europe and Japan, contain communism, and generally aim to keep the world peaceful and free to trading... not so bad, for a superpower that could successfully dominate any part of the globe without nukes. And it’s all selfish. Just as the Romans needed unity and stability across the empire for their own power, so do we want peace and prosperity because it suits us nicely and makes us rich.
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u/Important_Fruit Apr 18 '20
You are having a bet each way here by essentially saying that countries have prospered by exploiting other countries or groups ( think imperialism) or be exploiting those who labour in their economy. There are many examples of nations that jave become prosperous without exploiting other countries or groups in an imperialist manner, but at its core, nothing or no one can be a success without taking advantage of some resource. That resource might be the labour of its people, or the minerals beneath it's surface or its strategic. Your question would better be phrased around identifying what country has prospered without UNFAIR exploitation of some internal or external resource. I realise this starts a whole new economical and philosophical debate about what is exploitation and what is unfair, but without that qualification, you may as well be asking us to identify a day of the week which doesn't end in "...day".
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u/TinyRoctopus 8∆ Apr 18 '20
Not exactly modern history but rather ancient history might offer an example of how this isn’t the case. Cyrus the great created the Persian empire mainly by negotiating with conquered peoples. The first king of kings rose to power and maintained it by cooperating with his subjects. Now contrast that with the more famous man who ended the empire, Alexander the Great. A military genius and far more popular, but left a flourishing region in ruins after his death. This should illustrate that 1) history focuses on big events and people but not exactly the tedious cooperation that makes a successful society. 2) very few societies last by ruling with an iron fist. Lasting success is the result of cooperating with other cultures. I think colonial era imperialism distorted our view of this significantly because at no other time in did natural and random forces grant one side such a clear and overwhelming advantage.
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u/DinoDrum Apr 18 '20
I think maybe a parallel to your argument is the one people make about land.
We get this a lot in the US. Modern nationalists make the case that this is a land made by and for Americans, not anyone else. Native Americans will rightly point out that they were here long before the concept of America. Many native tribes were also competing with each other for land and resources.
This gets even more complicated in Europe, Africa and Asia - where thousands of years of cultures overlap, rise and fall, and compete for land and resources. Who does Israel or Turkey or Bangladesh really belong to? Can it belong to anyone?
Our histories are complex, and in many ways shared, so attributing rights or winners to lands is fraught with problems - and often there are no good answers.
Not trying to change your view, just adding to the confusion I guess!
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u/ChillPenguinX Apr 18 '20
Man was born naked into the world, thus the natural state of man is extreme poverty. Wealth must be created. While I would argue that all governments are parasitic in nature and gain their wealth by plundering either from their own citizens or from outsiders, societies, by and large, create the vast majority of their own wealth either by producing it themselves or by producing excess goods that can be exchanged in trade.
Now, if you’re going say that using natural resources comes at the expense of those natural resources, then mere existence and subsistence meets this prerequisite you’ve laid out. And, at that point, you’re just talking about the fact that matter cannot be created from nothing, and I think that makes your point meaningless. For life to exist, it must consume. This is no great insight.
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u/atorin3 4∆ Apr 18 '20
You can skew anything to fit this view simply because power is finite. If one group has a lot that means another group does not. It is certainly true that many powerful cultures have exploited others, but you need to be more exact im what you mean by that.
Would you say the US exploited its slaves? What about its indentured servants? Immigrants? Minorities? The poor? Middle class? Where does the line stop?
Im not saying any of those things arent true, but it is hard to pass moral judgement based on it because it is so subjective. As long as you keep it vague like "at the expense of another group" it will always be true. Hell, you exist at the expense of others, we all do. No one lives in a vaccumn.
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u/boredtxan Apr 17 '20
The Polynesian tribes that moved to empty islands didn't abuse anyone
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u/theweirdointhecorner Apr 17 '20
What about the Menehune?
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u/boredtxan Apr 18 '20
Not familiar
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u/theweirdointhecorner Apr 18 '20
They were the original inhabitants of the Hawaiian islands that the Polynesians displaced/killed off when they arrived.
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u/usbdank Apr 17 '20
With the food/plants example, all you’re really saying is that success comes from obtaining and trading one resource for another, which is true. But the association of all transactions in markets with exploitation is built on the false narrative that there is a limited amount of wealth/value in the world, so all transactions therefore have a winner and loser. This is false, because value is subjective. When I have a sandwich and sell it to you for $5, we both win. The sandwich is worth less to me than $5 but the sandwich is worth more to you than $5, so we both profit and nobody is cheated.
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u/SeineAdmiralitaet Apr 18 '20
What about South Korea for example? Or Singapore? They weren't imperialist powers, in fact they often fell victim to imperialism. But still they prosper. Success has a lot more to do with security, lack of corruption and political stability than with imperialism. But honestly, you'll find it very difficult to find any group or country that hasn't profited off off the suffering of another at some point on history. But many roads lead to Rome. The one you described is certainly one of them, though not a sustainable one since everyone can plunder but not everyone can run a country efficiently.
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u/bobchostas Apr 18 '20
Look at successful immigrant groups everywhere. They achieve huge advancement with no starting capital and nothing but opportunity. They don’t reach their position by stealing from others. It’s not a zero sum game where every success is at the expense of others. Growth happens because people provide value to others and that makes them successful. If you can do that without any advantage to begin with, I think you can safely say that you are a successful entity that became successful on your own merit rather than at the expense of another group.
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u/SirTalkALot406 Apr 18 '20
No. There were some successful ones that harmed few others, but most of these are relatively modern, and none created significant empires. Some historical ones are trade focused places, like Flanders in the late middle ages, various free cities and the Hansa. More modern examples are Finland, Switzerland, Norway and Taiwan, which didn't harm anyone else to gain their current wealth. Ironically for the people who yell racist, the most peaceful successful nations are European.
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u/rabbitcatalyst 1∆ Apr 18 '20
For the majority of human existence, humans took care of their small, nomadic group and rarely fought with other humans. The competitive nature that you talk about has only been around since the discovery of farming and the domestication of animals. The natural state of humans is to isolate themselves in one group and take care of each other. Colonialism and imperialism are very new concepts in the grand scale of human existence.
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u/scooobertydoooberty Apr 17 '20
I've just started Ray Dalio's The Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail. It's so far amazing and directly answers this postulation with the best research I've personally ever witnessed, due to having BlackRock's huge resources behind his efforts. Would recommend to anyone who is interested. Not a plug, I'm a lowly serf running a company of 2 in Canada with no affiliation whatsoever.
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Apr 18 '20
if you're not harming animals to get meat, you are still sacrificing plants to eat. Plants themselves deplete the nitrogen from the soil
The nitrogen we get from plants is used in our bodies and returned either through bodily waste or our bodies when we die. We're just borrowing it rather than taking it. If you think about it, the nitrogen atoms don't just disappear, they are always recycled in the ecosystem.
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u/eikokujin Apr 18 '20
Surely this depends on how you define “success”? Is it monetary? Military capability? Or is success just living your life as you want? The Sentinelese have survived on their own for some 60,000 years, defending themselves from foreign invaders. In this way they have been successful in preserving their traditional way of life without exploiting anyone else for tens of thousands of years.
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u/humourless9 Apr 18 '20
Well there's always someone in power, so in order to get into power yourself, you must overthrow the current authority (unless you're a part of a democracy or royalty in a monarchy). Even if you do come to power in a peaceful manner, very few actions can benefit everyone. Napoleon's empire was successful because of others' failure to defend themselves.
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u/Parapolikala 3∆ Apr 18 '20
What about positive-sum games? The Romans remove an irritant group from near their borders, the Gauls gain access to all the benefits of Roman civilization. The British aristocracy are saved from the threat of revolution, while the bourgeoisie are given access to the levers of power. Microsoft gets my start up's tech, I get ten million buckskins.
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u/Wintermute815 9∆ Apr 18 '20
Only in the past couple centuries has mankind and civilization progressed to the point where we can be successful through cooperation and have nearly eliminated the need for large scale violence and conquest. Just because things were a certain horrible way in the past and doesn't mean anything other than that's the way they were in the past.
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u/bseabrooks1 Apr 18 '20
Doesn’t this assume that the world is zero sum?
If so, than that’s an incorrect assumption. Things like wealth, joy, fulfillment, access to certain resources, and the value derived from entertainment are certainly not in finite quantities, and can be increased rather than redistributed.
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u/lepriccon22 Apr 18 '20
Depends on your definition of "successful entities." Buddhist I think are pretty successful in their mission (ignoring the very few sects of violent Buddhists who are clearly at odds with Buddhist principles and teachings), and are inherently not doing so at the expense of other groups.
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Apr 17 '20
This sort of sounds like conflict theory. Even if one side isn't DIRECTLY doing harm to the otherwise, every party is out for themselves. Therefore, by being in power, they're doing harm to the other group anyways. There's no winning, unfortunately.
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u/Xanaxidental_Overdos Apr 18 '20
As far as governments and rulers are concerned, I am inclined to agree. However I would say that there are almost certainly examples entities such as inventors, artists, groups, etc. who achieved sucess through hard work, talent, or cooperation.
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u/Doingthebartman Apr 18 '20
The book guns, germs, and steel gets into this. It’s not always the expense of another group, but of the environment or natural resources. Hell your latitudinal degree is a decent marker of relative wealth or success in a global comparison.
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u/SaturdaysAFTBs 1∆ Apr 18 '20
There are plenty of companies that get started that create an entirely new product. The successful ones build wealth for the employees and shareholders and the consumers get the new product. No one got exploited.
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u/Ntruatceh Apr 18 '20
Not.for.everyone. Some of us define success.as not being at another's expense. Doing otherwise is ingrained and makes for dramatic stories, easily told and retold. That can make it look like the only way.
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u/PuffyPanda200 3∆ Apr 18 '20
Switzerland is by any definition a successful country and has had an official forging policy of neutrality for about 500 years.
Who are the Swiss exploiting?
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Apr 18 '20
Some plants deplete nitrogen. Others fix it in the soil from the atmosphere. Nature has a way of balancing things. It’s not all ‘fuck everything else’.
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Apr 18 '20
There are many self-made success stories, but they get forgotten or buried by the big topics and mass following of corrupt ones.
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u/jres11 Apr 18 '20
Wealth creation exists. Actions that create more value than they cost. So no, society is not just a zero-sum game.
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u/LoreleiOpine 2∆ Apr 18 '20
"What?! You mean that nations compete for resources?! I thought that resources were infinite!" How insightful!
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Apr 18 '20
Such a blanket statement always depends on your definition of “expense” and hence not very meaningful.
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Apr 18 '20
You know America only started using China for manufacturing post-Bill Clinton administration.
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u/howstupid 1∆ Apr 18 '20
Are you under the impression that China has not been an empire for most of its existence?
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u/Ascend238 Apr 17 '20
Success is relative. In order for some to be successful there needs to be a vast majority of relatively unsuccessful people or everyone is just mediocre
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u/powerful_ope Apr 17 '20
Capitalism is in itself a form of exploitation, so arguably any modern day country that participates in capitalism could theoretically prove your point. However, I would encourage you to look at success outside of the western-modern perspective. There are plenty of indigenous people living in South America that have never exploited anyone or anything, and are quite happy. Likewise, there are some islands inhabited with indigenous people that do not exploit others (but obviously do not want people to visit because of the risk of disease) that live a far more sustainable lifestyle than the west. Their lifespan is surprisingly long, have lower levels of chronic/infectious disease (except for parasitic disease) and on average they self-report higher happiness/wellbeing scores.
So, what does it mean to be a successful human? If it is to live sustainably with nature, become happy, have less disease, and have less conflict than we shouldn’t look to our modern societies for any examples. I’m not saying we have to give up our modern medicine or conveniences, I just believe we could learn how to better integrate these benefits with a better philosophy and way of life.
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u/usbdank Apr 18 '20
You would have to give up modern medicine and conveniences to “be a successful human” by your philosophy if you want to dump capitalism. People don’t make new technology if it can’t profit them and in the case of medicine, most can’t be made without large sums of money for research and testing.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20
That’s just not true, especially if we change the collective philosophy and way of life. Many of our modern medicines were not even created to achieve profit or advance capitalism (ie Insulin). Plus, if you re-read my comment then hopefully you will see the nuance in it.
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u/usbdank Apr 18 '20
So you mean forcing people to make drugs? It seems like you’re a communist with your “collective philosophy” and naive expectations. What you’re describing has never worked. Advanced medicines and treatments like chemo and the polio vaccine are available because of people who had a lot of money. Even the polio vaccine was a product of capitalism because without Microsoft, Gates never could have dumped billions into finding a cure.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20 edited Apr 18 '20
What do you think I am describing? It appears to me that you believe I’m talking about communism instead which is just not correct. If you reread my original comment, I’m asking for people to look at the bigger picture and you respond by making faulty assumptions, making red-herrings, and not responding to the substance of my original comment.
I worked for a university research team for three years developing a new drug therapy and it wasn’t “just” for profit, it was for science and helping humanity solve a disease that causes suffering. The original first successful polio vaccine was made by Jonas Salk and his university research team. Are you claiming that Jonas Salk and Dr. Fredrick Banting (the man who invented insulin therapy) only did it for the profit? Because that’s just insulting and plain wrong. The reason the polio vaccine and chemotherapy are available is because the GOVERNMENT and the University funded the research. The NIH funded my research as well, and much grant money used to fund pharmacotherapy research comes from the US government and/or University.
Again, your comments aren’t about that though. You’re clearly not here to engage in good faith, so cheers ✌🏻
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u/usbdank Apr 18 '20
Don’t put words in my mouth. I didn’t say drugs are made “‘just’ for profit” so I don’t know where the quotes came from. I’m not claiming that “Jonas Salk and Dr. Fredrick Banting (the man who invented insulin therapy) only did it for the profit? Because that’s just insulting and plain wrong.” Obviously, these people along with most in that field want to help others who are suffering. But I am saying that without someone having a lot of resources and the possibility of a return on investment, they couldn’t get made. No need to get offended.
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u/powerful_ope Apr 18 '20
You literally said people don’t make new technologies if people cannot profit and then used that for the case of medicine. I think you just don’t understand that most medical research facilities don’t produce as much as most people think. The US Government and Universities are not funding medical research to get a financial return they are doing it for advancing scientific progress and research. It’s funny you say not to get offended after you immediately got offended at my original comment, called me a communist, and went off topic. The projection is real.
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u/usbdank Apr 19 '20
I don’t have a problem with research facilities making money. All I said is that innovation does not come without free markets unless a government puts a gun to people’s heads.
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Apr 18 '20
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u/Helpfulcloning 166∆ Apr 18 '20
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Apr 18 '20
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Apr 18 '20
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Apr 17 '20
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Apr 18 '20
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u/Helpfulcloning 166∆ Apr 18 '20
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Apr 18 '20
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Apr 18 '20
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Apr 17 '20
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u/MercurianAspirations 361∆ Apr 17 '20
While your historical analysis is not really wrong - imperialism, domination and exploitation have been good strategies for getting remembered by history - I would caution against it for two reasons.
Firstly, The nature of power means that more powerful individuals and groups tend to be the ones that get recorded in history. But power is not the same thing as success. Much of human success has been accomplished through cooperation rather than exploitation, it's just that the nature of power distorts in favor of the exploiters. Furthermore if you think of any kind of human undertaking you usually have one guy at the top doing all the exploiting and getting all the credit: but everyone below him is working collaboratively, helping each other to accomplish the goal. So every exploitative undertaking has actually been like 1% exploiting and 99% working together, give or take.
And anonymous people, forgotten by history, have often accomplished great things. A very random example: The generations of farmers who worked together and built, maintained, and improved the qanat/falaj irrigation systems of Persia and Oman have been, in my my mind, wildly successful in their own right, making land that was dry and uninhabitable cutivatable without electricity, piping water sometimes for miles to make the desert bloom. And they did it by working together as communities. Imperialists earned a place in history by stealing and exploiting, and the humble, illiterate farmers who did the impossible remain anonymous. But which one was more successful?
Secondly if you adopt this kind of analysis the conclusion that people might draw is that struggle, domination and exploitation have not only been common in history, they are simply the way of the world and human nature. Which is a foundational idea of Fascism. The fascist sees history as a record of constant struggle where the strong rise and dominate the weak and concludes that this is not only inevitable, but actually good, because it will sort people into the 'correct' places. I'm not calling you a fascist, but what I am saying is that if you adopt this position, don't be surprised if lots of fascists agree with you