This is a cross post also posted in Freedom Matters.
4 months ago
I haven't delved into any of the speakers yet, but sounds like a pretty conservative bunch.
4 months ago
Is that a disqualification for rational debate?
4 months ago
No, it is not. I am waiting for you - or any one with an opinion not rooted in rhetoric - to engage us with a debate. All you ever do is post a link that gives us the ideas of others. Perhaps you would care to pick one topic from the lectures and debate the ideas behind it using your own thoughts to support the validity, or lack thereof, of your stance on the issue at hand.
4 months ago
I do not know about you guys some of the lectures seemed real interesting What haht Athens have to do with wal street"
anyideas whathis might be about? the only thing I can think of is the huge building boom that occured the triggereed or coincided with the golden period or was it the tribut tax athens was demanding from the member states of the delian league? or how just before pericles athens was on the edge of a huge internal melt down due to the uneveness of wealth between the noble and others? there were no 401K's back then
you mean non of these interst anyone?
anyideas whathis might be about? the only thing I can think of is the huge building boom that occured the triggereed or coincided with the golden period or was it the tribut tax athens was demanding from the member states of the delian league? or how just before pericles athens was on the edge of a huge internal melt down due to the uneveness of wealth between the noble and others? there were no 401K's back then
you mean non of these interst anyone?
4 months ago
Yichel….I am glad you asked, my friend. After listening several times to the lecture, frequently rewinding it to take notes, I can tell you that Mr. Thornton could have shortened his lecture to about fifteen minutes and that would have sufficed to explain how an open market in Greece expanded into the open market economy we have now.
Basically, the Greeks were unlike any other people and the rulers encouraged expansion of new ideas that could be manufactured by anyone and sold to everyone with no interference from the rulers. This gave the people the power to create personal wealth if a person could invent or create – and successfully market - something others would buy a lot of. That is the epitome of an open market economy.
The rest of the lecture goes in several directions and has everything to do with Western Civilization and little to do with an open market economy. I am glad I never had Mr. Thornton for a professor because he is, while an interesting man, a rather disorganized orator guided by personal beliefs more than the history he teaches. A Professor of Classics and Humanities should never give a lecture on an economic crisis with an eye on any certain outcome of that crisis, I think.
Mr. Thornton dislikes our government exerting control over the open market and predicts that our country will collapse because our government is doing so. What Mr. Thornton fails to accept is that governments always control open markets in one way or another. Mr. Thornton actually says this but then later in his talk contradicts himself. The amount of control exerted by one government should be based, I believe, on the amount of control needed to stabilize the open market as control shifts constantly - on a global level - from one country to another. I want my government to have – at least - as much control over the world market as all other governments have. On the other hand I want our government to not stop people in America from having the chance to create, invent, manufacture and market their goods and ideas so that regular people with dreams and hard work can create personal wealth. I see our government doing both of these things and I am satisfied.
Real wealth is actually a tangible thing, though.
In order to have real wealth, to be prosperous, one needs to own gold or silver or land. Mr. Thornton tells us that creative destruction costs jobs but he is wrong. Mr. Thornton uses an analogy of the steamboat industry that was replaced by the railroads, he believes, and doesn’t realize or admit that the people who lost their jobs making and running steamboats got new jobs – that paid better – when motors were put on tug and tow boats that are doing more now than any steamboat ever could. This tells me that Mr. Thornton does not have a knowledgeable idea as to what ‘creative destruction’ really is. The owners of the steamboats simply replaced them with better boats and make more money now because of it.
Mr. Thornton also says that the Greeks created tragedy….having a tragic view of life. This, of course, is silly. I am certain that many people before the Greeks had a tragic view of life. The Greeks did, however, identify with the syndrome more than earlier cultures. The reason Mr. Thornton gives for mentioning tragedy is that he believes, as I do, that in the end we all lose because we die. He expounds on this a little by saying the risk of loss is what ennobles us and yet the limits of what we will achieve are limited by chance, nature, and death. He says, “It’s the risk of loss that gives us meaning.” If he believes this then he should be supportive of the bailouts rather than not supportive, shouldn’t he, should what he says be true? He tries to tie tragedy into an open market economy but Mr. Thornton misses the boat and seems to be rambling. Mr. Thornton says, and I agree, that our currant outlook on life is not as tragic as the Greeks once envisioned but our outlook on life is not based on any reality. I loved his T ball analogy. Adult Americans, he says, want life to be, for them, like it is for the little kids playing T ball. Everyone is both a player and a winner. This T ball mentality deletes the need for most adult Americans to face the fact that most adult Americans will never achieve any tangible wealth (gold, silver or land) and that their wealth will never be anything more than an accumulation of material objects – mostly bought on credit that sinks them into debt - that depreciate in value as time goes by and can’t be of any use to them once they are dead. In other words, the race for material wealth by Americans is a dumb idea that ultimately leads folks down a dead end road. Although Mr. Thornton equates these silly Americans with people needing government assistance he only hints at this thought but it is obvious Mr. Thornton thinks social programs are going to bankrupt our country. I believe that redesigning social programs so that they work to get people to the point they don’t need them is a better idea. Education is the key to making people more productive wage earners.
In my opinion Mr. Thornton is doing what most people do when thinking about an open market economy and what our government is doing right now, Yichel. There are two open markets to consider but Mr. Thornton, and others like him, only see one. There is the open market economy of America and then there is the open market economy of the world. These are two separate and distinct entities that require two separate and distinct forms of government attention. It really is much more complicated than that because there are also the open market economies of other nations our government must compete with but since two is hard for Mr. Thornton to see it would be fruitless to point this fact out to him and others like him.
Mr. Thornton also discusses epilepsy. I left this for last because like so many things he said it has nothing to do with an open market economy. Mr. Thornton needs to stop lecturing on economic issues and stick to Greek Mythology.
I realize this is a long response but a discussion about any lecture, especially one with so many unrelated subjects being discussed as Mr. Thornton provides, must be. I hope this helps you see things you failed to see while watching the 47 minute lecture.
Bill
Basically, the Greeks were unlike any other people and the rulers encouraged expansion of new ideas that could be manufactured by anyone and sold to everyone with no interference from the rulers. This gave the people the power to create personal wealth if a person could invent or create – and successfully market - something others would buy a lot of. That is the epitome of an open market economy.
The rest of the lecture goes in several directions and has everything to do with Western Civilization and little to do with an open market economy. I am glad I never had Mr. Thornton for a professor because he is, while an interesting man, a rather disorganized orator guided by personal beliefs more than the history he teaches. A Professor of Classics and Humanities should never give a lecture on an economic crisis with an eye on any certain outcome of that crisis, I think.
Mr. Thornton dislikes our government exerting control over the open market and predicts that our country will collapse because our government is doing so. What Mr. Thornton fails to accept is that governments always control open markets in one way or another. Mr. Thornton actually says this but then later in his talk contradicts himself. The amount of control exerted by one government should be based, I believe, on the amount of control needed to stabilize the open market as control shifts constantly - on a global level - from one country to another. I want my government to have – at least - as much control over the world market as all other governments have. On the other hand I want our government to not stop people in America from having the chance to create, invent, manufacture and market their goods and ideas so that regular people with dreams and hard work can create personal wealth. I see our government doing both of these things and I am satisfied.
Real wealth is actually a tangible thing, though.
In order to have real wealth, to be prosperous, one needs to own gold or silver or land. Mr. Thornton tells us that creative destruction costs jobs but he is wrong. Mr. Thornton uses an analogy of the steamboat industry that was replaced by the railroads, he believes, and doesn’t realize or admit that the people who lost their jobs making and running steamboats got new jobs – that paid better – when motors were put on tug and tow boats that are doing more now than any steamboat ever could. This tells me that Mr. Thornton does not have a knowledgeable idea as to what ‘creative destruction’ really is. The owners of the steamboats simply replaced them with better boats and make more money now because of it.
Mr. Thornton also says that the Greeks created tragedy….having a tragic view of life. This, of course, is silly. I am certain that many people before the Greeks had a tragic view of life. The Greeks did, however, identify with the syndrome more than earlier cultures. The reason Mr. Thornton gives for mentioning tragedy is that he believes, as I do, that in the end we all lose because we die. He expounds on this a little by saying the risk of loss is what ennobles us and yet the limits of what we will achieve are limited by chance, nature, and death. He says, “It’s the risk of loss that gives us meaning.” If he believes this then he should be supportive of the bailouts rather than not supportive, shouldn’t he, should what he says be true? He tries to tie tragedy into an open market economy but Mr. Thornton misses the boat and seems to be rambling. Mr. Thornton says, and I agree, that our currant outlook on life is not as tragic as the Greeks once envisioned but our outlook on life is not based on any reality. I loved his T ball analogy. Adult Americans, he says, want life to be, for them, like it is for the little kids playing T ball. Everyone is both a player and a winner. This T ball mentality deletes the need for most adult Americans to face the fact that most adult Americans will never achieve any tangible wealth (gold, silver or land) and that their wealth will never be anything more than an accumulation of material objects – mostly bought on credit that sinks them into debt - that depreciate in value as time goes by and can’t be of any use to them once they are dead. In other words, the race for material wealth by Americans is a dumb idea that ultimately leads folks down a dead end road. Although Mr. Thornton equates these silly Americans with people needing government assistance he only hints at this thought but it is obvious Mr. Thornton thinks social programs are going to bankrupt our country. I believe that redesigning social programs so that they work to get people to the point they don’t need them is a better idea. Education is the key to making people more productive wage earners.
In my opinion Mr. Thornton is doing what most people do when thinking about an open market economy and what our government is doing right now, Yichel. There are two open markets to consider but Mr. Thornton, and others like him, only see one. There is the open market economy of America and then there is the open market economy of the world. These are two separate and distinct entities that require two separate and distinct forms of government attention. It really is much more complicated than that because there are also the open market economies of other nations our government must compete with but since two is hard for Mr. Thornton to see it would be fruitless to point this fact out to him and others like him.
Mr. Thornton also discusses epilepsy. I left this for last because like so many things he said it has nothing to do with an open market economy. Mr. Thornton needs to stop lecturing on economic issues and stick to Greek Mythology.
I realize this is a long response but a discussion about any lecture, especially one with so many unrelated subjects being discussed as Mr. Thornton provides, must be. I hope this helps you see things you failed to see while watching the 47 minute lecture.
Bill
4 months ago
I do not know if greeks invented tragedy but having a tradic view of life does make some sense imagine being one of many small cuty states living outside a huge empire (prersia) each ciy state having a long history of warefare with each other the land is mountainous which is both isolating and takes up ariable land. It took a while befire the freej states Athen, & Sparta finally got it together then they attack each it other Athens locked behindi ts walls dying of desease then fighting with sparta then ther Persans attack I would say they iknew tragedy and lived a culture of death being very near through somw sort of violence.
4 months ago
