[AussieWog93]

There have been massive ecological disasters in command economies too, the most famous being the locust plagues that resulted from Mao's Four Pests Campaign.

Hell, before civilisation even existed you had humans wiping out megafauna right across the world.

Regardless of what economic system we have, a technologically advanced culture that values hamburgers and Doritos over biodiversity will trample on nature to get what they want.

(I'm not making the cynical argument that humans don't inherently care about the environment - in many Australian Aboriginal cultures, for example, environmental damage was considered as great a sin as murder - just that you can't blame capitalism for wider humanity's lack of care or respect for the environment.)

[moosey]

A "command economy", or even "China", are still abstractions. Arguably, your points further prove mine.

[AussieWog93]

Really?

The whole point of a command economy is to have a central planning authority that oversees production of x tons of potatoes, y tons of steel and z T-34 tanks. They explicitly ignore abstract financial metrics like GDP and stock prices. They still ruined the environment.

Unless you're arguing that the mere existence of abstract concepts somehow degrades the environment, I don't see how this proves your point.

[moosey]

My point is, what does it serve to build tanks? If the goal is to protect "our nation", then we are serving the abstractions.

If you take a "command economy" and tell it to feed the people of the world, restore natural areas, shelter people... Then the abstractions serves real things.

[AussieWog93]

If you tried to build a society that invested $0 into the military, you would be pummeled into the ground by an external aggressor.

Those tanks are serving the abstraction of survival.