| >We've had capitalism for centuries with no AI production. But it was capitalism that ended up producing AI. And if that's how things have ended up, then that must've been where things had been going all along, no? (Ask the Cheshire Cat for the opposite statement.) That's teleology for you, it's a thing that's usually obvious in hindsight, but, as you demonstrate, even that not always. And if you and your ancestors have never lived under any other social system besides the one that evolved into contemporary capitalism, how would you even be able to make the distinction between the telos of capitalism and the telos of any other global process? What would be your point of reference, experientially speaking? Do you even know any other dreams besides the ones that capitalism dreams throughout your waking hours? Back to Plato's cave with you it seems, and don't, I repeat, please don't think about limited liability corporations, the construct of "personhood" that the legal system ascribes them, and how the only thing that can even attempt to kill a corporation is a government (which is just another kind of "corporation", in the sense of rule-based meta-entity which uses human intelligence as a replaceable building block). And governments have been largely captured (outsmarted) by the corporations. For decades at this point. Qui bono? You Bono? On your way there allow me to guess, you believe that there's least one school of economics which is not "mumbo jumbo" (a term, besides the tastelessness of dismissiveness, also bearing subtle racist connotations), don't you? EDIT: Check this shit out: >Mungo Park's travel journal Travels in the Interior of Africa (1795) describes 'Mumbo Jumbo' as a character, complete with "masquerade habit", whom Mandinka males would dress up as in order to resolve domestic disputes From Wikipedia, emphasis mine. Consider! |
No, it was the scientific method. Back in the mid to late 19th century when scientific research was done in an open-source way without the presence of capital and corporations, science had the fastest progress it had in human history. After the capital took control of science and research through patents and funding, the rate of progress slowed greatly. Thomas Jefferson's views on patents also aligns with this: He said that countries that did not have patents were as productive as those that did have. (he was the first president of the patent office).