Theos-Talk Archives (November 2002 Message tt00484)

--- In theos-talk@y..., Mic Forster <micforster@y...> wrote:
> I can
> influence my family directly but this will only amount
> to 30 people at the most. On the other hand I can
> influence my Theos-Talk "family" which has about 170
> members and can get my message across to more people.

The problem with that is, it ignores the geometric expansion. If 
each of the thirty people in your family know thirty people and each 
of those know thirty people, you are only a few removes from everyone 
in Australia. It only fails if everyone you know is a loner. So the 
question is the quality of the ideas you are putting out. If te pond 
you need to throw a stone into is Theosophical, then theos-talk is a 
more appropriate pond than your immediate family. But if people 
resonate to what you are saying, it doesn't make any difference how 
small your initial audience is.

> Would you
> agree that the modern media is supporting the
> intrenched capitalist system? By this I mean that the
> media, by and large, is generally in support of a
> capitalist system that at the end of the day promotes
> selfishness over altruism.

Question: what economic theory promotes altruism over selfishness? I 
used to work in the altruism field and got out when I was repeatedly 
appalled at how self-serving and un-altruistic everyone in it was. I 
am reminded of Diogenes looking for an honest man and Bertrand 
Russell looking for a rational man. I spent some years looking for 
an altruistic man, then decided life is short, art is long, and I 
have better things to do. Call me a cynic but I believe everyone is 
out for himself and that there must be some cosmic reason for it, 
which means it is OK for it to be that way. According to game theory 
(a school of mathematics), though, rational selfishness eventually 
leads to the outcome which most benefits everyone in the system. 
That is how societies were formed in prehistoric times. Everyone in 
the society was striclty out for Number One, but ended up working 
together for the common good because that was the best way to 
cynically serve their own self interest. Of course that assumes the 
members of society are RATIONALLY self-interested. Those who are not 
rationally serving themselves by the time they reach a certain age 
tend to be excluded from society. We call it incarceration and death.