Good Americans believe in Darwinism

As good Americans and not neccesarily Americans but as good consumers in a ever growing world with globalization. If we belive in capitalism should we not also believe in darwinism. Darwinism being survival of the fittest. Capitalism is economic survival of the fittest , it requires people to adapt to sell what they can or go out of buisness. As a global society we seem to love capitalism so we should also agree with darwinism. Why are there people who are willing to believe in capitalism but not darwinism ?

reply to post by Kaiser617


Because they have nothing to do with each other? capitalism isn't about survival of the fittest, its about survival of the personally responsible.

"Darwinism" and capitalism are not the same thing. There are many different proponents of both ideologies who hold vastly different views.

Darwin didn't suggest the idea of "the survival of the fittest" being applied to individuals---everybody dies in the end. He was talking about the survival of the fittest "type." The idea is that variation in in the population's gene pool coupled with competition for scarce resources means that more successful types will be those that reproduce and have more viable offspring. Less fit types would not be able to compete effectively for resources, and have relatively fewer young with each successive generation.

Capitalism is not the same as free enterprise, but the basic theory of free enterprise is the "freedom to fail," meaning that those businesses that cannot meet the needs of consumers do not deserve to stay in business. The FE strategy with the most promise is not in fact "competition" for a share of a finite market, but rather increasing the total size of the market.

In other words, the best way to "win" economically is to enlarge the economy, to produce new products instead of making existing products better.

The classic tale is of Fisher Buggy in America. In 1901, they controlled the horse-drawn buggy business in the USA. But they were not interested in making new-fangled horseless carriages. They eventually went bankrupt and were acquired by Buick. Buick used the Fisher plant for a generation to create the chasis of various Buick models, but closed the plant in the 1990's as being hopelessly obsolete.

Is there anything nefarious in the story of Fisher vs. Buick? The socialist model is to have the government step in and guarantee the jobs of Fisher's employees, even though they made a product the public no longer desired.

The differenc between darwinism and capitalism is that darwinism is focused on biology, where capitalism focuses on conscious behavior. Once humans became self-aware, we began warping "natural" selection in new and unforeseen ways, basically escaping the bonds of natural selection.

Capitalism and Free enterprise focus on the freedom of individuals to make choices.

Originally posted by Meatclown
reply to post by Kaiser617

 

Because they have nothing to do with each other? capitalism isn't about survival of the fittest, its about survival of the personally responsible.

Yeah, that.


What he/she said.

.

reply to post by Meatclown


well...survival of the personally responsible within the context of situations. there are some situations where personal responsibility has no meaning at all... both paris hilton and a psychotic homeless person are examples of the two ends of the spectrum of this

reply to post by madnessinmysoul


The instance of psychotic homeless people is one of the arguments for a more comprehensive social welfare policy. Although, truth be told, every nation has these folks in large cities, regardless of their economic system. The homeless of Moscow during the Soviet period were pretty frightening, and an intractible problem, even in a state that readily "disposed" of embarrasing people.

As for Paris Hilton, she's fixing herself, too. If she's wasting money, then her offspring will get the chance to earn their own fortunes. Actually though, Paris isn't all that rich--30 million is the total value of her inheritance when she finally gets it after the appropriate family members (her grandfather?) meet their reward. I suspect that she or her people are a lot more shrewd than we are led to believe. Her "out of prison" party was SOLD to the venue that bid the most for the event. In other words, she or her people are smart enough to market her.

In that case, she's sort of a comedian-by-faux-pas. Sort of like a free-lance clown. If she doesn't market herself well, she will cease to bring in the money.

Originally posted by dr_strangecraft

As for Paris Hilton, she's fixing herself, too. If she's wasting money, then her offspring will get the chance to earn their own fortunes. Actually though, Paris isn't all that rich--30 million is the total value of her inheritance when she finally gets it after the appropriate family members (her grandfather?) meet their reward. I suspect that she or her people are a lot more shrewd than we are led to believe. Her "out of prison" party was SOLD to the venue that bid the most for the event. In other words, she or her people are smart enough to market her.

In that case, she's sort of a comedian-by-faux-pas. Sort of like a free-lance clown. If she doesn't market herself well, she will cease to bring in the money.

Her and Jessica Simpson both love to play the "dumb blonde" role. Are they very intelligent? Probably not. However, they are probably not as dumb as portrayed either.

As far as the Darwinism and Capitalism thing, I can kind of see where the OP is coming from. I don't say that I agree with it, but I can see where one might draw the conclusions that he/she has.

I wonder how much profit Paris Hilton actually might make off of her celebrity. My first thought is, "not all that much." She doesn't endorse a lot of products. Most of her media activity consists of being photographed and published in someone else's magazines.

On the other hand.

- The simple life was a definite moneymaker. The cable networks have run that thing deeper into the ground than where it started. I presume she gets a royalty every showdate.

- She wrote a "book," which I'm sure some collectors needed for their shrines to her. (ew.)

- I think she and her sister hawked some clothing line or other. I always thought her sister was the prettier of the two. Probably that's just because I've seen less of her.

- I think there was a "paris club" in florida, that bought the right to her name, but was wholly owned by other people. Eventually, they changed the name--which makes me suspect that she got the better end of the deal.

- I already mentioned her "cash for bash" deal to hold her out-of-jail party at whichever venue bid the most.

- It was widely remarked that she was paid to show up at various nightclub openings and act lewd to get the places in the celebrity mags.

- Carl's Junior burger ad. Again, she seems to have gotten the better of yet another promoter.

- I have wondered about celebrities colluding with the paparazzi. In other words, agreeing to stage a photo, in exchange for a part of the cash reward from people or us magazine. Didn't some famous couple sell pictures of their new baby to the tabloid press?

- I can imagine fancy hotels and bars paying free-lance clowns like paris and simpson to show up, so that the tourist will go home telling about how they saw her at some vegas hotel; thus causing all their friends from Hoboken to stay at the same hotel/nightclub when in vegas.

Regardless of any beliefs on Darwinism, I have to disagree with your title. I believe good people believe in themselves, not "good Americans do as they're told".