Comments on: Walmart: A sufficiently advanced capitalism is indistinguishable from socialism

By: Joshua

Joshua — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 02:00:39 +0000

It is, in many ways, a facetious or playful argument, starting with the title’s reference to the claim that “a sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” It’s not a serious claim, because the most serious distinction is in accountability, which I think I make clear in my post.

That said, there are similarities worth considering, and Marx himself sometimes suggested that capitalism must first accumulate ownership in the hands of a monopoly before the workers appropriate the means of production, so I don’t think I’m that far off in proposing that’s there’s something quasi-socialist in Wal-mart’s growth. Socialist states have struggled with transportation and distributional problems precisely because of their emphasis on production and consumption, so I don’t think I’m off in suggesting that supply-chain mastery and superior logistics in a necessary step in the development of our hoped-for utopia.

By: LostInDaJungle

LostInDaJungle — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 17:53:26 +0000

Because Person A does something that Socialist B does does not make Person A a socialist.

There are no examples of pure socialism and/or pure capitalism, and you have used terrible examples to try and make some facetious link.

The USA, a capitalist country pays out farm subsidies and has public education. China pays out farm subsidies and has public education, is China therefore capitalist?

You teach philosophy and aren’t aware of the logical fallacy you present here? This is called “Affirming the consequent”.

By: Toni

Toni — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 04:48:56 +0000

Prof. V. was making a similar point in the research I was doing for him…big companies like this are taking on a role through private contracting regarding environmental matters that states are unwilling or unable to take on: http://www.law.virginia.edu/pdf/workshops/0607/vandenbergh.pdf