Oddbean

No, I never said I believed in it. Why is it impossible to point out that people don't understand communism without them thinking you're advocating for it? And no, you don't have that quite right. You could own a printer that could produce things, but you couldn't own a printer that *mass* produces stuff, unless there were so many that allowing it didn't disrupt infrastructure. I hope that wording is clearer.

You just said you don't understand communism enough to explain it to me. Maybe you're the one that's wrong about communism here? OK so you're not advocating for it, I misunderstood. OK so I can produce things, just not mass produce them. Can I sell the things I produce to people? What does that mean, "disrupt infrastructure"?

I understand the core ideas, but different attempts to implement will differ in the finer details. I can approximate the communist response, but there's a wealth of literature and thought on the subject that I haven't explored. I read the Communist Manifesto to understand the basic tenets, and that's it. I think you could produce and sell goods, but some implementations of a communist state may differ. As for disrupting infrastructure, I'll give an example. Let's say we develop nice, fast 3D printers that can print metal in a durable way. Say there's some widget used in future tech that can only be 3D printed and must be made of metal for some reason. Under a communist state, if production capacity wasn't meeting the needs of the people, the government would have the authority to confiscate capable printers and reallocate them to production of those critical goods. It should be noted, however, that most hobbyist printers *today* wouldn't be fast enough to be worth confiscating even if they could work with the right materials, but even if that changes, it won't change the fact that there's often a huge difference between a tool for an end user and a tool for mass production, and communism is primarily concerned with the latter, not the former.

> As for disrupting infrastructure, I'll give an example. Let's say we develop nice, fast 3D printers that can print metal in a durable way. Say there's some widget used in future tech that can only be 3D printed and must be made of metal for some reason. Under a communist state, if production capacity wasn't meeting the needs of the people, the government would have the authority to confiscate capable printers and reallocate them to production of those critical goods. Why not just, pay those people to produce them with their printers?

Kind of, yeah, but I think that'd only be done when they just need a little more, not a huge boost in production. What if they need every machine they can get running 24/7 because it's critical for farming in a drought that could cause a famine, or because it's part of a weapon needed in a defensive war? Modern printers are slow and can take hours to print large objects, so maybe you're willing to wake up every couple hours overnight to start a new piece for a good cause, but what if the printers they need finish a part in only 30 minutes? Are they willing to trust such critical production to run without direct oversight when people might slack off? What if hobbyists can produce enough, but the logistics of shipping them from all over the US (just as a hypothetical, it's big and poses logistical problems) would put excessive strain on postal services or take way more work to properly coordinate? In low stakes scenarios, enticing people to contribute with pay may be sufficient, but when the tool and what it makes is critical, bigger steps may be viewed as necessary and within the authority of the state to take, and they might include confiscating the tools and redistributing them to directly increase production.

But, we do that now with just about everything and stuff gets produced just fine. People don't slack off because they have a personal investment in their work, no threat of Siberia required. If there's a shortage, people are incentivized to produce because prices go up and it's profitable, no central planning required. Wouldn't you rather have a self organizing, distributed system than one with all kinds of administration overhead and central points of failure and misaligned incentives? You say you're not advocating it, just explaining it, but can't you see how it's senseless?

Look, I'm only explaining things because the OP's idea of confiscating nostr keys isn't some gotcha against communism. Everything else has been me with a basic understanding doing my best to field questions from people who apparently know even less than I do. I probably made some mistakes along the way. I'm not saying it's an improvement, just doing my best to explain the ideology as I understand it to people who seem to be asking honest questions. If you understand that I'm not advocating for it, why are you asking me about its sensibility like I'm a believer? We're already straining what I know, so I think it's best I stop speculating and recommend you not take every last word I said as gospel. It's a decent approximation, but I'm sure I could be corrected by an actual communist.

I think his point was to demonstrate lack of internal consistency, and I think he's being facetious to try to demonstrate that the theory around it is a bunch of inconsistent corner case justifications and there's no rhyme or reason to any of it. I am asking honest questions, but I am doing so to try to understand *your* reasoning, not to understand communism, I already thoroughly understand it. And I'm hoping, in having to articulate answers to my questions, you'll understand it more clearly and come to the same conclusion I did, that it is senseless. I don't like to do the usual thing where I shit on people, I like to have sincere discussion and maybe I learn something and maybe other people do. I am always open to the possibility that it isn't senseless and that I am wrong. Explaining it to people while claiming you don't agree with it is like explaining the rationale behind astrology while claiming you don't agree with it; if you don't agree with it it is because it makes no sense to you at all. It's really impossible to explain methodically or rationally something that doesn't make any sense.

I haven't been making judgments, though, so the only insight you've managed to gain into my reasoning is the depth of my understanding of communism. You ask questions, I do my best to guess what a communist would say. The ideology may be flawed, but it's fairly coherent. Having some flawed logic doesn't make it utterly incomprehensible, and even if we don't agree with the conclusions it draws, it sheds light on the grievances people held or hold, and it prepares you to make your own informed judgment. I don't care how anyone feels about communism, I'm just tired of not being able to have nice things like healthcare because people don't understand that politicians and news pundits are lying to them when they call it communism to stop businesses from literally price gouging you to death.

Oh I'm with you, I am very upset about all this stuff going on on society also. We share grievances with the way things work right now. But I think I know what causes them and what the solutions are. The cause isn't capitalism, it's government manipulation of markets, and the solution isn't communism, it's the opposite. Remember when people could afford to go to the doctor? That was when people just paid the doctor for services like any other merchant. Same with education. It is only after governments got involved and these inefficiencies were created and insurance and guaranteed loans and stuff were made inseparable from the industries via regulation that we find ourselves in this situation. You can see the same thing with housing, withinimum square footage requirements and stuff like that, basically any unaffordable thing that people need is unaffordable because of regulations protecting incumbents and preventing new entrants from competing.

well said. mister_monster does not seem to be engaging in good faith. Funny, because that is also something Marx says is necessary to maintain capitalisms hold over the poor - lying and cheating is the fastest way to get rich.

you won't read marx because you don't agree with it? Most wealthy capitalists understand exactly what marx says in Das Capital and agree with him. Those are the capitalists who are very rich BECAUSE they understand t capitalism and the declining rate of profit etc. Marx describes capitalism as it is. Thats useful for communists and capitalists alike.