I wonder if the RIF Hooligans read aloud to one another? One of my most literate friends recently wished he had a schedule that would let him try an experiment in reading the way folks did when good light after sundown was a serious luxury and a full day left only an hour or so to indulge in a novel.

The closest I ever got to that was when a housemate and I read Bruce Sterling's Heavy Weather aloud to each other. We were both in grad school, so it took us quite a while to find enough time to finish the book. Originally, I thought what made the experience so different was the voicing, but this thread has reminded me of my other friend's thing about slow reading and made me wonder if taking more time might indeed tend to give you a stronger reading experience.

taking more time might indeed tend to give you a stronger reading experience

I find that this is the case, and on top of that it also allows better retention of said material.

Addressing the issues in reverse order (easier for my addled brain).

taking more time might indeed tend to give you a stronger reading experience

Most certainly! When I read business or technical periodicals, I must force myself to move faster, because, quite frankly, these are not worth the effort to digest any deeper than the surface ink spilled on the page. A novel requires more thought to appreciate, if appreciating the novel is the desired goal of the endeavor.    Obviously I agree with this sentiment:

The Bible is not a book to be skimmed through or read without preparing your mind to embrace what is being told. To speed through the passages doesn't seem right since I don't believe that a person can begin the thought process to grasp what is being told by reading this way

Couldn't have said it better myself!

While some are worried, others have embraced this brave new world of abbreviated language. One Australian with a lot of time on his hands translated the entire Bible into SMS-speak in only four weeks, turning well-known passages like Psalm 23 into, "U, Lord, r my shepherd. I will neva be in need. U let me rest in fields of green grass. U lead me 2 streams of peaceful water." Somewhere in the outer rings of heaven, King James is weeping.

I was wondering if we could get this thread back to the original topic without a lot of pain and gnashing of teeth.   If this is where the translations are going, just hold out for the flip-book… The bible in 30 seconds… Both volumes!  

We as Humans (most) want to accomplish something in our life time that has never been done. Second, most of us want to be remembered for something we have done in our life times, and third... The "want it now" generation seems try to make everything faster.

Now we get to the heart of it... But I would argue that there is still a heavy undercurrent of materialist thought even in these seemingly “neutral” dictums. Accomplishing something is obvious enough: We desire meaning in our lives, a purpose. Why do we necessarily seek uniqueness in this, however? I am certainly not the first person to raise a family of six and struggle with all of the tensions of the modern world. I am not all that successful at it, by anyone’s criteria, but I am happy and content with my role. I would argue that happiness needs to be factored into anyone’s criteria for “success”, or the term becomes meaningless.
Said otherwise:

Because I own a humble home, an older car, have decent food on my table, have a dog, a job that pays well enough to have these things, a wife and kids that love me, and morals, I classify myself as being successful, where others may not.

If we define our success only along a material axis, completely absent of the spiritual or emotional components of our life, we risk creating a hollow shell existence, without any “life”.

To be successful you do not need to acquire wealth, fame, fortune, and power, but those 4 things, whether by themselves or together, do tend to, more times than not, generate greater success.

This is a tautology. Money = Success; so we are successful (and happiness is implied here) when we aquire more money. This completely misses the “human” dimension to this world. Sadly, a dimension that the educational system (regardless of political philosophy) tends to miss.

Were you recently watching the Passion of the Christ? Same line, same tone...

LOL - Saw that when it came out. The line itself is as old as the hills, though. That doesn't diminish its wisdom and appropriateness for today. Funny how it came back to that, huh?

it seems then that you would believe in reincarnation, correct?

Not my own by my own merits and certainly not in some futile cycle of eternity leading to nothingness    My apologies to any Buddhists reading this. I am a repentant Christian! My apologies also to GW   

I'm also an unrepentant Marx-Engels fan

I have grave qualms in this regard.
I think I’ll finish this reflection by pondering the feeling held by one in this forum that they possess…

the thoughts and knowledge of someone who should be "higher" on the ladder in life

I definitely do not understand this mode of thinking... Since when does our socio-economic status determine our thoughts and beliefs? Am I a mental slave to my bank account? That would be gloomy indeed!
Cheers!
PS: Needless to say, I reviewed and reflected on this reply.

This is a tautology. Money = Success

Although I appreciate QuietlyObserving's reply overall, I must note that his or her statement here is an example of nasty rhetorical language. The quote that QO critiques includes

To be successful you do not need to acquire wealth, fame, fortune, and power, but those 4 things, whether by themselves or together, do tend to...

IMO, QuietlyObserving is wrong b/c the purported tautology is in conditional language but the complaint is in absolute terms. This might appear to be a web-slap to some readers, but I'm actually very interested in seeing QO start some fresh threads. That's partly b/c I like to see anyone using the word "tautology" and partly b/c I think this forum might gain from dicsussions about "success," AKA "victory" AKA "winning."

This is quite the erudite forum! Hats off to one and all for making it so. GW is correct in that "tautology" was used in a rhetorical sense, but the intent was anything but nasty. "Money = Success" is so often blindly accepted by one and all as a truism, that I wanted to shake this assumption to its very foundation and challenge people to think of other metrics for measuring success.

I'm actually very interested in seeing QO start some fresh threads.

  I will endeavor not to disappoint. I have seldom been accused of not sharing my opinions with others!

Regarding "winning" in general and GC2 specifically: I rarely ever "win" a solo game by the classic criteria (X points by Y turns). I'm far more interested in letting the "history" of the game milieu take over, and in "living" the (fantasy) moments as they come. I'll battle mightily to alter its course, but I will resist the urge to stab an ally in the back simply because "the time is ripe" and he is particularly vulnerable, even if this means I will forfeit any hope of technically "winning" the game. This is the joy I find in the game; I know it drives my son crazy, but to each his own.  

Are there others here who share this tendency for immersion in the game? Playing becomes a method of "acting" almost (lest we forget, it IS just a game  ). I found this true in MOO3 and Civ4 and I especially like GC2 because the AI reacts in a more "realistic" fashion to my moves. Brad Wardell has quite a winner on his hands in this respect (and others).

I'm also an unrepentant Marx-Engels fan I have grave qualms in this regard.

Let us then heat up this contemplative,,low-keyed exchange of thoughts by tossing the tourch of revolution upon the smoldering pile of resentment.
My current thesis is that the slaves have not been liberated at all,,only the schackles are now cleverly disguided.

When a man can work for fourteen hours a day without ever having a day off whether it's Sunday,,Christmas or sickness and still not be able to provide even the bare essentials,,something is wrong.
Perhaps a lazy man,,not pulling his weight you may say.
Yet this man will probably will worn out from work alone way before his fourtieth birthday.
With bare essentials it's to be understood such things as nutritious food (not neccessarily tasty as long as it keeps starvation and sailor's gums away),,housing and clothing just enough hold rain,,cold and sun at bay,,perhaps some basic health care like getting your broken bone straightened and fixed or some antibiotics when the pneumonia sets in.

The other occurance making me belive Marx were on to something are companies buying our laws to suit them.
Take a look on what measures RIAA has taken the last 50 years,,all while claiming to protect the authors and artists who make the music we listen to.
Heck,,even the idea of a company being a legal person by itself ia a sign of the system removing personal accountability,,rejecting the grand mass of human life into little more than compliant consumers at the bottom of the food chain if they are lucky,,being regarded as waste if not.

Q.O, while I do agree with most of your posted "review", there are a couple areas I feel compelled to respond.

Because I own a humble home, an older car, have decent food on my table, have a dog, a job that pays well enough to have these things, a wife and kids that love me, and morals, I classify myself as being successful, where others may not.

I Consider myself a success, and am happy with my position in life. My family loves me and it should be a given, I love them in return. Both Happiness and love are examples of emotion. Having Morals can be directly related to ones beliefs spiritually. I personally refuse to discuss my political or spiritual views any further than I already have on these forums. I am not sure how you arrived at the following, using my previous statement as the conduit, unless you were simply trying to generalize.

If we define our success only along a material axis, completely absent of the spiritual or emotional components of our life, we risk creating a hollow shell existence, without any “life”.

This is of course, your opinion, but a good one nonetheless.

Again, success is how we, as individuals, define it for ourselves.

If we do not achieve a minimum amount of "material success", whether it be earned, given, or dare I say, stolen, relying on the spiritual or emotional components is pointless in todays society. Without the very basic material necessities, how in the world can you "live", let alone be happy?

To be successful you do not need to acquire wealth, fame, fortune, and power, but those 4 things, whether by themselves or together, do tend to, more times than not, generate greater success.

This is a tautology. Money = Success; so we are successful (and happiness is implied here) when we acquire more money.

Money = Success = Happiness.

This is where so many problems lie within our society today.

I could have used a bit more detail when writing my opinion on success. I was just trying to get across that you do not need those things, that there are other ways to be, and or feel, successful. You summed them up very nicely in the rest of your post.

Quixen, I was only attempting to generalize and clarify the discussion, drawing together the elements alluded to by the various previous posts. I was not presuming to be you

Without the very basic material necessities, how in the world can you "live", let alone be happy?

Indeed! However, the arguments are apt to heat up as we attempt to define what constitutes "necessities". I am an American, so be it. I deduce that most (if not all) of our fellow posters are, at a minimum, from what is euphemistically called "the developed world" (versus "the developing world"). Our minimum standards of living would be considered obscene by Third World sensibilities (not that I think we should average down to the lowest common denominator). Think for a minute how on Earth "happiness" can exist in Calcutta or Burundi by these standards. Yet it does exist. If you are happy and content, is it forbidden to also be successful? By this I mean to define "success" by the combination of happiness and contentment each of us possesses. This makes "success" a relative term, useless in statistical analysis, I agree, but who likes statistics, anyway?

My current thesis is that the slaves have not been liberated at all,only the shackles are now cleverly disguised.

When a man can work for fourteen hours a day without ever having a day off whether it's Sunday,Christmas or sickness and still not be able to provide even the bare essentials, something is wrong

Agreed. But putting the class rhetoric aside for just a moment and speaking about real people and not some straw-man class stereotypes better left in a dusty college tome, there are laborers (all of us who provide some form of "work" for a living) and there are wages for this labor paid by somebody, who expects to get something for it. In this example, the laborer trolling for 14 hours a day is in what country? Under what set of Labor Laws was he/she/it employed? Before we go attacking a fictional "free market system", we must understand that this too is a straw-man that doesn't exist. There are impediments to freewill in every system on Earth, whether by government (laws) or culture (mores). Mortal man can seldom foresee all of the consequences of his actions, so care should be exercised when force is applied to others to alter their freewill. Textbook "Capitalism" (von Mises, Smith, Hayek, et. al.) is merely a resource allocation methodology that seeks to achieve some "optimum" outcome. It is a tool, like a hammer. Without considering the human dimension (call it ethics/morality for lack of a better word), this tool can do great harm, just like a hammer in the hands of a murderer. When constrained by the proper intangible elements (the human dimension), this tool will allow the most bountiful harvests, far more so than any command economy can hope to achieve. At the heart of it is an innate trust in the balancing effects of myriads of different players' interests (good and bad) in "averaging" out each other. When excessive force is brought to bear by any one player (government for instance), it distorts the exchange: Freewill is abrogated. I would rather live in a "benevolent dictatorship" if such a creature actually existed than a completely amoral, purely capitalistic true democracy. I do not value Hedonism highly, obviously!

How are we allowed to barter for our wages in exchange for our labor? Some structure (society) with rules (laws) will be necessary. But when writing these rules, what principles are followed?

As regards RIAA and their "defense" of copyright laws: Do you oppose copyrights in principle or just organizations of players which concentrates forces in ways you consider undesirable? Prior to the internet, there weren't avenues for large scale abuse that could really threaten the "value" of the copyrighted property that didn't involve such scale and organization that the costs were prohibitive to any but "corporate" entities (government included). China does not enforce copyrights for a simple reason: They currently do not produce anything of value to copyright. It is in their interests as a nation to allow such collective "thievery". The internet is a very powerful tool. The barriers to entry are effectively zero and the distribution costs are effectively zero for an infinite audience (in the sense that anyone who gets wired to the net is a potential customer). Gone are the days of physical transport of goods (remember, we are talking about "copy" rights). This was an introduction of force/power on the side of the individual consumer that grossly unbalanced the system vis a vis the individual producer. Now there were no limits to "copy" and distribution, effectively making all value derived from scarcity meaningless in the internet age. Either a new model is needed or we shall get the quality of output worth every penny we paid... zero! Go down to a poorly managed "arts" festival sometime to get an idea of what rubbish is produced when demand is removed from the equation. Technically, in this example, talented supply would be removed, but why quibble over a good analogy, eh?

Ahem...
Next?
Cheers!

Not to encourage an endlessly digressive thread, but...

If we do not achieve a minimum amount of "material success", whether it be earned, given, or dare I say, stolen, relying on the spiritual or emotional components is pointless

Marx & Engels would doubtless agree here--one of the reasons I threw out their names, aside from a tendency to like cage-rattling, is that I believe that in many ways they understand capitalist economics better than anyone currently acting as a free market high priest.

@QO: I must admit that you've somewhat caught me about using the sacred free market cow as a bit of a straw man. I beg off in the name of rhetoric but defensively offer up a claim that there's not yet been any real "communism," in Marx-Engels terms at least, b/c there's never been a global proletariat, so I was at least half playing fair.

To try dragging this at least slightly back twoards galactic 4X game talk, I surely hope that GCIII might include AI players that have some fundamentally different assumptions, whether those follow from radical differences of biology or ideology. I rather hope that we could see some AIs that could trade only goods like volatiles, metals, or complex organics while others did the money thing.

Moving back into the realm of GC3. AI actions /decisions would need to take into account the civ's "drive to win" as well as tangible/material calculations (like relative valuations for trading).

Interactions with the AI tend to fall into two broad categories: Bartering and Conflict (Active and Passive).

These interactions may or may not involve open communications (covert and overt diplomacy being two equally useful options), but every interaction has a goal: Influencing the Galaxy around us, preferrably in our favor.

I would love to be able to gather more detailed information on such "behind the scenes" actions/reactions of my foes through espionage. For instance, I might be trying to establish the Drath Legion as a buffer state between me and a rapidly expanding and aggressive Drengin Empire. I do this by trading on very favorable terms with the Drath (even gifting tech/money/ships when necessary). My goal is to have the Drengin spend more blood and treasure pushing through the Drath territory before getting to me. How far I take this will depend on how much I value "winning at all costs". I have already said that my playing style tends to minimize the pure Machiavellian ploys and takes a more long term view, with Alliance /Political victories being my goal. If you are willing to share the spoils of the galaxy, there is a lot more negotiating room with other, like-minded civs. The AI will need to assign a value to this "willingness to share". Part of our job as players should be to determine which AI civs are more willing to share and cement any alliances with them as soon as possible. Racial modifiers would need to play into this as well (Yor and Iconians have a history, as do Torians and Drengin).

Trade generally occurs when both sides believe they have something to gain. In order to make this calculation of gain, "valuations" of various elements (both material and strategic/political) need to be assigned. I agree that it would be nice to have some radically different assumptions come into play besides the standard fare of "good guys are nice while evil guys are nasty". I see alignment affecting things like trustworthiness in my relations with other civs. It would be interesting if GC3 could model some more complicated relationships. Perhaps it already does, in which case more indicators of this during play would add to the experience as a whole.

I recently perused the Metaverse and saw that most victories were "Military", which is a more "selfish" mentality than, say, "Political" victories, which, by definition involve more "collectivist" urges. I wonder how much the AI races follow "pre-ordained" paths along these two axes. Will the Drengin ever pursue a Political victory? Who would trust them? It is the risk of my opponent taking a (credible) non-military path to victory that adds so much to my enjoyment of this game. Military victory is rather simple to engineer (and counter): build better ships and more of them. Overwhelm enemy defenses and win. The other choices are more difficult to engineer, which makes them far more exciting for me.

What do I do when I have managed to forge an alliance (or at least a very close working relationship) with two civs who ultimately start to engage in a Cultural War against each other? Are they smart enough to determine my motives when I interact with either of them? If one of them valued sharing more than the other, perhaps they would change their tactics and bury the hatchet in the hopes of manipulating their way into a Grand Alliance engineered by me... The possibilities are endless. That's what makes this game and its focus on "thinking" AIs so much more enjoyable than the run-of-the-mill 4X games available.

Before I go, I can't resist asking you, GW, what precisely would a "global proletariat" look like?  

Cheers!

At the risk of getting flamed, I would like to say that the proper terminology for the whole 14 hours of work thing is Wage Slavery, which is very much alive and well in all 'developed' nations as well as 'developing' ones, and especially here in the good old US of A. People need to look at one major point in all of this and that is production.
To me, health care sucks up way too much of our money, and pays out way too much to doctors, dentists, etc. for their work. They technically produce nothing, and I have yet to meet a doctor personally whom I would think is even worth their salt. All they do anymore is throw pharma's at us and say "take some of these and you will be good". Rarely is the problem solved and to what end? The doc gets a nice chunk of change for pretty much nothing, the insurance, if you are fortunate enough to have it, gets a chunk, and usually so does the pharmacist and pharmaceutical company. In that whole trail of money, the only thing that was actually produced was the prescription medication, and even at that, the dollar amount charged pales in comparison to the actual price to manufacture.
Now the feds are thinking of upping the minimum wage to what, 7.25 an hour? For what? Those wages still suck on an average forty hour work week, even more so if you have a family. What, is the increase supposed to cover the cost of putting your kid in daycare because both parents have to go out and work just to pay the bills (not even beginning to touch on college for the kids, Christmas, back to school, etc.)?
I think that is where our country has fallen from grace, our working families. A mother should be able to stay at home and raise her kids, not ship them off to be watched by some 6.00 an hour flunkie who really doesn't give a damn about my kid because they are getting paid crap while they know full well the daycare they work for is raking in the cash. Same as that 5.00 an hour kid making my burger. Do I really trust that nothing has been done to my food especially considering that this kid could be very pissed off that instead of using that 'worthless' college degree to make some real money he finds himself stuck in a dead end job because he is unwilling to move to India or China or whatever?
As you can tell, this whole topic really pisses me off.

what precisely would a "global proletariat" look like?

I can't at all say "precisely," but as a baby Marx-Engels student I'd say at the very least we'd need to have a world economic system that enabled labor to move as freely as capital does now.

That seems a necessary prerequisite for the notion that folks who work for a living would see that as their most important identity trait, trumping their geographical and cultural identity traits. Mind you, I'm a pretty fierce regionalist for "green" reaons and ironically proud to be an old son of the new South. I'm happy to play theory, but in Marxist terms, my praxis, she's not so strong.

At the risk of getting flamed, I would like to say that the proper terminology for the whole 14 hours of work thing is Wage Slavery

What's the opposite of "flamed?" If I follow Evil rightly, he's just taken a good moment to put some details behind a bumper sticker near and dear to my heart: Work to Live, Don't Live to Work.

On the meds rant, we really should start another thread if you want to go on there. That's one of my "policy areas" when I put on my tatty scholar's cap, and I'm also the son of a retired VA nurse who specialized in oncology (cancer, if any of you are lucky enough not to know the fancy word yet).

Wage Slavery

Very large topic here and a divisive one at that. But anyone that couldn't stop working tomorrow and not work another day in their life is little more than a wage slave. To say nothing about someone working a minimum wage job, my $60 an hour makes me only a slightly higher paid wage slave.

Bringing up the medical issues is an aside but an important one. I consider doctors to be glorified car mechanics (actually my opinion of nurses is much higher). The real cost that my employer pays for my medical insurance (which of course he considers part of the cost of hiring me versus someone in Pakistan) is about $18,000 per year. Looking at the country today versus when I was young, I have to conclude that the country is going to hell in a hand basket.

In the mid 60's my mother was earning $8,000 a year as a secretary and paying less than $500 a year in taxes (6% of total income). As a single mom with only a high school education she was able to buy a brand new 3 bedroom brick home in a good neighborhood for $12,000 (1.5 times her yearly salary). She was also able to put me through 7 years of college culminating in a PhD in EE from MIT.

So compared to my mother, the comparable house in the Boston suburbs is closer to ten times my income and my total tax burden is closer to 40% of my income. Believe me, the $8,000 a year my mom earned in 1965 far exceeds the $120,000 per year I earn today.

One of the biggest fallacies promulgated by the Republicans is that folks like me are "rich". It couldn't be further from the truth. Anyone in a similar situation to me is deluding themselves if they think they're anything but a peasant. I have far more in common with the minimum wage worker that the truly wealthy. If more people like me realized this truth it would be the immediate end to the Republican party. The problem is that the Republicans treat the people that most folks aspire to be extremely well.

I've tried very hard not to expose my political feelings on the basis that you'll never change the opinion of someone that disagrees with you and you're just preaching to the choir to those that do agree with you, but I guess sooner or later it was bound to come out.

Yeah. Wage Slave.

I have far more in common with the minimum wage worker that the truly wealthy.

Well,,that is a matter of point of view really.

From the low,,you certainly have much more in common with the wealthy as you most likely don't have to worry too much about putting food on the table,,paying the rent and buying decent clothing.
You also have less worries about you being replaced at a whim of the employer,,and if you are,,your chances to find another job is far better than for one working in the fast food business for instance.

From up high,,you are locked in place by not being selfsustaining.
You are reliant of an employer to make a living and thus cannot make totally independent decisions.


The healthcare system is certainly something that concerns most people regardless of nationality.
However,,I belive a much more adequate question from the Marx/Engels perspectice would be the follwing:
Take a company,,GM for instance,,and remove the entire board along with the CEO.
Will the company still be able to produce cars for the market?
Now remove the man on the floor instead,,is the same still true?
During my time ass a pencilpusher,,I quickly realised that most of the people in the top are just as interchangable as the men on the floor,,if not even more so.
Yet the company leaders have many times higher income than the people actually getting the job done.