In addition, there are positions. Works council member. General secretary, whatever. And not just in official life. There is the being the lucky lady on whom monogamous George bestows his affections (I'm listening to Frankie sing "The One I Love Belongs To Somebody Else). Then there is access. I may want to study in a master class with Pavarotti, but his time is limited, and it would be pretty much a waste of it to try to teach me to sing.
I think the desire to stamp out competitionis mysterious. Competitoion is neither good not bad. Some kinds of competition can lead to bad things. Other can lead to good things. Diito with cooperation. You cannot subdue a country and eradicate the natives without cooperation.
I think a lot of this discussion is really a way of talkinga bout whether can eliminate all conflict. That strikes me as insane. Also bad: conflict is not an evil. It is inevitable in a free society. Hegel has a really scary analysis of what happends when you try to impose "the General Will" on society an eliminate all conflict in his Absolute Freedom and Terror section of the Phem. Spirit. Conflict is also good because it sharpens mind and body -- taht's the sports point -- and keeps life interesting. Conflict is great. Conflict is positive. Oppression, exploitation, degradation, humiliation are bad, but conflict is good.
I think the question, Are People Competitive By Nature is so poorly framed on so many levels taht we should drop it. Competitive HOW? What is the bad competition that bothers people? And why is it bad? Then we can discuss whether we can get rid of it.
jks
--- Charles Brown <cbrown at michiganlegal.org> wrote:
>
> From: Brian Siano
>
> As I said: could you please describe an environment
> where competitiveness
> would _not_ occur?
>
> ^^^
> CB: I'll have a go , in the spirit of cooperating
> with you, not competing
> with Miles :>)
>
> How about an environment where there is no scarcity
> , i.e. nothing to
> compete over ?
>
> In terms of a real, historical society of the future
> ( not an abstract
> "environment"), there might persist games of
> competition in "museums" which
> preserved our collective memory of the societies of
> the past, but these
> would not be competition over really important needs
> and wants. Sort of like
> who gets the most runs in a baseball game is not a
> really important, just
> kind of entertaining.
>
> By the way, it wouldn't be an end to all struggle.
> There would still be
> challenges from the non-human environment to be met,
> such as the depletion
> of all oil reserves or the like (Of course, this has
> the danger of turning
> into scarcity and the return of real competition).
>
> It would be a virtual end of dog-eat-dog competition
> between humans. Such
> competition would be rendered extremely rare, an
> anomoly.
>
>
>
> ___________________________________
>
http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search http://shopping.yahoo.com