On Wed, 9 Aug 2006, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
> One more point. The key reason behind the modern capacity to accumulate
> knowledge is, well, "good old" capitalism, or rather its unprecedented
> capacity to produce and accumulate surplus. The more efficient surplus
> production, the greater the capacity to support people who can devote their
> lives to scientific pursuits, and thus the greater the output of scientific
> research work.
I've agreed with most of Woj's points on this thread, but I've got to contest this one. It is not the social relations of capitalism per se that produce the conditions for creating knowledge; it is the (largely) public infrastructure in industrialized nations. --E.g., the role of the military and public universities in the creation of the internet, the role of basic research in universities in the creation of genetic screening and gene therapies, etc., etc. Sure, after the hard lifting is done, the capitalist entities swoop in and produce products and services that allow them to amass profits; however, the fundamental base for all that innovation is not capitalism. Rather, it is public funded and planned activity in the universities, military, and NGOs. In short, it is the application of socialist economic principles that made possible the vast accumulation of knowledge we have seen in the past few hundred years. Sure, the capitalists have amassed profits from the application of this publicly produced knowledge; that's what they do. However, the tremendous surplus produced by capitalist economic activity is the dependent variable, not the independent variable here.
Miles