Desmond Morris On the Future of America

[metis]

Desmond Morris was a world-renown anthropologist, author of numerous books, including"The Naked Ape", and he was an inspiration to me enough so as to be a factor of why I went into that field.

Around 1970, he was interviewed on American t.v., and one question that was asked of him was what he thought of America's future? He seemed uncomfortable with the question but did give a fairly brief answer that I can paraphrase because his response shocked me.

He said that we probably would be OK for a while because of our vast resources but that we likely would gradually slip after a while because Americans can't seeming stop competing with each other, and that any nation majorly divided would eventually collapse under its own weight, especially if resource levels decline, thus leaving more and more people becoming disenfranchised. He gave no timetable but it seemed that he was talking about quite a few decades down the line.

He said that competition to a point is natural and good, but societies that don't limit it tend to collapse over time due to internal division that causes societies to fragment.

There's more, and from a different source.

[continued]

 

[metis]

Jane Goodall I do believe is quite familiar to most of you at least, and she ran an experiment with chimps that I found quite telling.

She brought in a large batch of bananas, far more so than what she normally had used, to see what would happen. What did happen was so shocking that she almost immediately stopped the experiment.

Individuals began to hoard as many bananas as possible with the dominant males doing most of that, especially the alpha-male. It was far more with them that they could possibly eat. So, why all this hoarding, including stealing bananas from females and even children?

The answer was for "power". If I'm the alpha-male, and a less dominant male gets more bananas, that threatens me because it makes me look relatively weaker, thus jeopardizing my position in the society.

Now, in a capitalist human society, apply that basic principle and one can see what is likely to result. If I'm a billionaire, my status more relates to other billionaires than with those in the middle or lower class or even just millionaires. I don't compare myself to them as they're not my peers. The fact that I could easily live on a fraction of what I have is irrelevant.

Anyhow, I gotta go-- da wife calls-- who says slavery ended.

Your thoughts, fellow naked apes?

 

[BSM1]

Jane Goodall I do believe is quite familiar to most of you at least, and she ran an experiment with chimps that I found quite telling.

She brought in a large batch of bananas, far more so than what she normally had used, to see what would happen. What did happen was so shocking that she almost immediately stopped the experiment.

Individuals began to hoard as many bananas as possible with the dominant males doing most of that, especially the alpha-male. It was far more with them that they could possibly eat. So, why all this hoarding, including stealing bananas from females and even children?

The answer was for "power". If I'm the alpha-male, and a less dominant male gets more bananas, that threatens me because it makes me look relatively weaker, thus jeopardizing my position in the society.

Now, in a capitalist human society, apply that basic principle and one can see what is likely to result. If I'm a billionaire, my status more relates to other billionaires than with those in the middle or lower class or even just millionaires. I don't compare myself to them as they're not my peers. The fact that I could easily live on a fraction of what I have is irrelevant.

Anyhow, I gotta go-- da wife calls-- who says slavery ended.

Your thoughts, fellow naked apes?

Except for one salient (and overlooked) fact; in a capitalist society there is the opportunity for the other monkeys to grow their own bananas.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Your thoughts, fellow naked apes?

People get old and die, and we do limit monopolies in the USA. From time to time they get out of hand which then leads to cries to break them apart, and then hopefully somebody starts trust busting to reset the markets. Its a dynamic environment.

 

[PruePhillip]

Jane Goodall I do believe is quite familiar to most of you at least, and she ran an experiment with chimps that I found quite telling.

She brought in a large batch of bananas, far more so than what she normally had used, to see what would happen. What did happen was so shocking that she almost immediately stopped the experiment.

Individuals began to hoard as many bananas as possible with the dominant males doing most of that, especially the alpha-male. It was far more with them that they could possibly eat. So, why all this hoarding, including stealing bananas from females and even children?

The answer was for "power". If I'm the alpha-male, and a less dominant male gets more bananas, that threatens me because it makes me look relatively weaker, thus jeopardizing my position in the society.

Now, in a capitalist human society, apply that basic principle and one can see what is likely to result. If I'm a billionaire, my status more relates to other billionaires than with those in the middle or lower class or even just millionaires. I don't compare myself to them as they're not my peers. The fact that I could easily live on a fraction of what I have is irrelevant.

Anyhow, I gotta go-- da wife calls-- who says slavery ended.

Your thoughts, fellow naked apes?

This naked ape thinks this is a classic Marxist trope.
Humans competing is not humans fighting.
You can stop competition only by being the Stalinist/Maoist who won the competition for top job.
Competition is what gives us this remarkable society we live in.

 

[metis]

People get old and die, and we do limit monopolies in the USA. From time to time they get out of hand which then leads to cries to break them apart, and then hopefully somebody starts trust busting to reset the markets. Its a dynamic environment.

And I'm not sure about this, but if my memory is correct (a dubious claim, I know), I think he may also have said that America tends to be quite flexible, and that might well be our saving grace in the long run. But even with that it still could be a quite difficult pill to swallow because we still do have our "habits", and they tend to get ingrained. After all, many Romans, way back when, thought the Roman Empire would go on forever, and we know how that turned out.

And today when I see all the domestic "tribalism" and hostilities, Morris' words tend to come back into mind.

 

[metis]

This naked ape thinks this is a classic Marxist trope.

He was not a Marxist.

Competition is what gives us this remarkable society we live in.

So, how about "cooperation"? You don't think that has made a difference as well? And how about the fact that America was blessed with national resources that other nations only could wish that they could have? Overly simplistic answers usually miss the mark.

IOW, there are many facets that have contributed to our relative success, but sitting back and only relying on them while not dealing with the reality of a changing world that we should try to adjust to can all too often lead to an arrogant lethargy that could very much hurt us in the long run. All of the great empires came and went, so our success is not guaranteed just because we did some things right.

 

[PruePhillip]

He was not a Marxist.

So, how about "cooperation"? You don't think that has made a difference as well? And how about the fact that America was blessed with national resources that other nations only could wish that they could have? Overly simplistic answers usually miss the mark.

IOW, there are many facets that have contributed to our relative success, but sitting back and only relying on them while not dealing with the reality of a changing world that we should try to adjust to can all too often lead to an arrogant lethargy that could very much hurt us in the long run. All of the great empires came and went, so our success is not guaranteed just because we did some things right.

You can hold Marxist views without being a Marxist.
There's no competition in a Marxist society.
I worked in the car industry - we had other car manufacturers breathing
down our necks. We had to up the quality and reduce the cost on a year
by year basis. I can't imagine companies co-operating to build a car -
that car would cost you a fortune and have few of the features we expect
a modern car to have.
In fact, cars competed against horses at the turn of the last Century -
should that have been stopped, too?

 

[sun rise]

Except for one salient (and overlooked) fact; in a capitalist society there is the opportunity for the other monkeys to grow their own bananas.

The chances of that are very slim although it still happens. But typically the alpha male "monkeys" rig the system to make it very very difficult.

 

[metis]

You can hold Marxist views without being a Marxist.
There's no competition in a Marxist society.

Morris was not anti-competition, nor am I. It's a matter of degrees, and he was concerned that, in excess, there can be problems.

I worked in the car industry

I worked for Ford for two summers, Chrysler for one summer, G.M. for one summer, and a small machine shop that supplied parts for the Big Three for another summer.

America's economic system is called a "mixed economy" within economic circles because it contains elements of both capitalism and socialism, and that mixture has served us quite well.

 

[sun rise]

Overly simplistic answers usually miss the mark.

As does false dichotomies.

 

[BSM1]

The chances of that are very slim although it still happens. But typically the alpha male "monkeys" rig the system to make it very very difficult.

No, they don't...

 

[joe1776]

I think Desmond Morris was wrong about America. For some reason, people are generally pessimistic about the future of our species. In a 2015 survey, 78% saw humanity in a moral decline although the opposite is true.

Evidence of humanity's moral progress is extensive. Here's a partial list:

• The hateful way the world's religions sometimes treat each other is still a problem today but the problem has diminished considerably since the time of the Crusades;

• The sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity and Islam condone slavery and treat women as subservient to men in addition to giving other very bad moral advice. This is evidence that the men who wrote those texts two thousand years ago lived in societies that were morally immature by today's best standards;

• Racial and national prejudices have been weakening; among the nations, many once-traditional enemies are now trade partners;

• Imperialism is waning as powerful nations are much less likely today to want to dominate the weaker nations to extend their empire;

• Children of the poor are still used as cheap labor in a few cultures, but compared to the past, much progress has been made with Child Labor laws;

• In morally advanced cultures, men are learning to treat women as equals and they are not getting away with abusing women as they once did;

• Caste systems, like India's, which have resulted in unfairness for many over centuries, are gradually crumbling;

• Not very long ago, violent strikes were common during Management and Labor negotiations; it happens far less often today;

• Employers have learned that it is profitable to give both employees and consumers more respect and better treatment than they once did;

• Government corruption and oppression are still a problem but much progress has been made since governments for the people have been replacing governments for the privileged;

• During past wars in human history, civilian populations were ravaged; today, attempts are being made to limit the targeting to combatants;

• Because of the Geneva Convention and other similar efforts, prisoners of war are treated better now than at any time in our history;

• We still hear about prisoners being tortured but, in the Middle Ages, torture was a thriving industry. Clever devices were designed and made to maximize pain;

• NFL Football provides mild violence as entertainment, but it is nothing compared to the spectacle of slaughter seen in Rome's Colosseum;

• The nations of the world have abolished slavery; it's still a problem but not nearly to the extent that it was just a few centuries back.

• Oxford sociologist Manuel Eisner's study persuasively demonstrated a long-term pattern of declining homicide rates across Europe over 800 years.

• Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker makes a well-documented case for moral progress in his book History and the Decline of Human Violence. A brief summary of his argument can also be heard on his TED Talks video: The Surprising Decline of Violence.

Capitalism has been useful because the free market is a means of limiting the power of corrupt and incompetent government. We humans have yet to invent a government decision-making process that wasn't corrupt, incompetent or both. But that doesn't mean that we'll never do it.

In better government, the Scandanavian countries will likely lead the way and the USA will drag along behind but Americans will make progress because we're human and we humans are making progress.

In time, cooperation will defeat competition.

 

[Stevicus]

Desmond Morris was a world-renown anthropologist, author of numerous books, including"The Naked Ape", and he was an inspiration to me enough so as to be a factor of why I went into that field.

Around 1970, he was interviewed on American t.v., and one question that was asked of him was what he thought of America's future? He seemed uncomfortable with the question but did give a fairly brief answer that I can paraphrase because his response shocked me.

He said that we probably would be OK for a while because of our vast resources but that we likely would gradually slip after a while because Americans can't seeming stop competing with each other, and that any nation majorly divided would eventually collapse under its own weight, especially if resource levels decline, thus leaving more and more people becoming disenfranchised. He gave no timetable but it seemed that he was talking about quite a few decades down the line.

He said that competition to a point is natural and good, but societies that don't limit it tend to collapse over time due to internal division that causes societies to fragment.

There's more, and from a different source.

[continued]

I think he was correct in his prediction about America becoming majorly divided and more people becoming disenfranchised. Whether it's due to competition or a combination of other factors, that's difficult to say.

We've also had different types of competition. The Cold War was a type of competition which some people claim we won. All wars are a competition. Then there is global competition among nations on an economic basis, as well as internal competition within America between corporations and other businesses. There's even competition among neighbors and family members - struggling to "keep up with the Joneses." We also have competition among different street gangs and criminal organizations.

There's also athletic competition, academic competition. Our legal system and political system are designed to be adversarial in nature.

But we also have a cooperative side. It could be reasonably argued that athletic competition (as an example) can build character and a sense of teamwork, which are vital in promoting cooperation. Even competitors have to sit down and cooperate once in a while.

I think that the trap that America has fallen into is that, ever since WW2 and all during the Cold War and up until today, our government has depended upon and needed strong unity among the body politic to be patriotic and supportive of American ideals in whatever endeavor we may have embarked upon. Even despite open challenges and confrontations during the 60s and 70s, we still managed to hold things together and keep most of the people content enough to maintain ourselves.

So, we may find ourselves at cross-purposes. We want everyone to be relatively content and "sustained" to some degree, and we also want a united, patriotic nation in support of American ideals and interventionism. But we also favor a system of cutthroat competition which has gotten ugly and which can leave a lot of people out in the cold.

We want a laissez-faire capitalist republic...and we want an empire spanning the globe. We wanted both, and we'll probably end up with neither.

 

[Valjean]

Except for one salient (and overlooked) fact; in a capitalist society there is the opportunity for the other monkeys to grow their own bananas.

And that social mobility has been steadily decreasing as America became more capitalist. We used to be the land of opportunity, when we were a Rooseveltian (?) social democracy. After Reagan switched our economy from Keynesian to Neo-liberal "trickle down," wages have been largely stagnant, while the cost-of-living has risen steadily, along with the costs of healthcare and education.
America today has more income inequality and less social mobility than it's had since the '20s; less than many European economies.

 

[Valjean]

People get old and die, and we do limit monopolies in the USA. From time to time they get out of hand which then leads to cries to break them apart, and then hopefully somebody starts trust busting to reset the markets. Its a dynamic environment.

Roosevelt could trust bust 'cause he had government and popular backing.
Today monopolies are largely unchecked. They have the government in their pockets, and the people have been led to believe government is the enemy, while corporations are their saviors.
The oligarchy is pretty well entrenched.

This naked ape thinks this is a classic Marxist trope.
Humans competing is not humans fighting.
You can stop competition only by being the Stalinist/Maoist who won the competition for top job.
Competition is what gives us this remarkable society we live in.

With competition comes repression and exploitation, if not held in check. The behavior of corporations and the .01% mirrors that of the chimps.

 

[PruePhillip]

Roosevelt could trust bust 'cause he had government and popular backing.
Today monopolies are largely unchecked. They have the government in their pockets, and the people have been led to believe government is the enemy, while corporations are their saviors.
The oligarchy is pretty well entrenched.
With competition comes repression and exploitation, if not held in check. The behavior of corporations and the .01% mirrors that of the chimps.

"Held in check" is the problem. Yes, we will eventually hold Facebook
and Google in check. Under Marxism these corporations wouldn't exist.
Marxism tolerates no power but its own - the ultimate Corporation that
even has the power to kill you.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

This naked ape thinks this is a classic Marxist trope.
Humans competing is not humans fighting.
You can stop competition only by being the Stalinist/Maoist who won the competition for top job.
Competition is what gives us this remarkable society we live in.

Any society with competition but without cooperation is ridiculous. And in no way would such a thing result in 'this remarkable society in which we live in.'

 

[Valjean]

Morris was not anti-competition, nor am I. It's a matter of degrees, and he was concerned that, in excess, there can be problems.

I worked for Ford for two summers, Chrysler for one summer, G.M. for one summer, and a small machine shop that supplied parts for the Big Three for another summer.

America's economic system is called a "mixed economy" within economic circles because it contains elements of both capitalism and socialism, and that mixture has served us quite well.

All societies contain socialist elements, else they wouldn't be social, but without checks and balances ("regulation") the aristocracy becomes parasitic, just like the alpha chimps.

No, they don't...

[rig the system to block social mobility]
In the case of the American oligarchs, they have. There is little social mobility. Few can afford to loose their income and health insurance to change jobs or start a business. Few can even afford further education. There are serious barriers to social mobility.

 

[Valjean]

I think Desmond Morris was wrong about America. For some reason, people are generally pessimistic about the future of our species. In a 2015 survey, 78% saw humanity in a moral decline although the opposite is true.

It's not moral decline that's the problem. The problem is Neo-Liberalism, imperialism and oligarchy. The alpha males are hoarding all the bananas and repressing the other chimps.
Freedom and democracy is decreasing in the world; authoritarianism increasing. The uncertain future of democracy[/QUOTE]