Socialism

What Hacker News says

1. trod123Oct 2024
   Socialism by Ludwig von Mises (1930s)

   As a Systems Engineer, I've always been fascinated by systems both for computation and involving people. Concepts in business process design/implementation have quite the overlap with automation, and this book provides one of the best discussions I've seen, where its first properly defining the problem, and then moving on to failure modes via a priori reasoning (which is fairly conservative) in relation to centralized hierarchical systems, or bureaucracies.

   The title aside, the structural analysis is quite impressive and in the process also explains the basis for many failures within bureaucracies involving people, including corruption, and trends concentrating staff production value towards a least common denominator (negative production value), through social coercion, within the institutions.

   This book arguably is a very dense read though, and requires an old dictionary (from around the same time). Many of the words have changed meanings since the writing (towards more ambiguity and more contradiction).

   It comes from a time where hyper-rationalism and its principles were followed and respected, and falsehoods and liars ignored or rejected outright; something we can use more of today.

   The book also is useful in describing why Socialism, and its various forms is a failed system, and indirectly but inevitably fails in ways that allow no accountability through deceit, and how those supporting and promoting such systems are both supporting their own destruction as well as others (incl family, friends etc).

   The systems discussed are safety-critical systems, and its not hard to reason that when you support a system that will inevitably fail (causing death/harm), where you can't transition off the system or know beforehand, then you promote and support the given outcome. Indirect, but still rational and principled.

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2. freedombenApr 2018
   If you want a more gentle introduction, I recommend (in no particular order):

     1.  This website:  https://www.philosophybasics.com/
   
     2.  The "Philosophize This" podcast (start at the beginning)
   
     3.  The "Philosophers in 90 minutes" series (I recommend going in chronological order since most philosophers build on the work of previous philosophers)
   
     4.  "The Philosophy Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained": https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/0756668611/
   

   For a very thorough and newcomer friendly introduction:

     1.  The HoPWaG (History of Philosophy Without any Gaps) podcast:  https://historyofphilosophy.net/
   

   When you're ready for more deep dive, or if you like to start out sprinting:

     1.  Introduction to Greek Philosophy (yes it's an "intro" course but it's amazing and pretty deep.  Highly recommended even if you are mostly interested in modern philosophy): 
    https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/introduction-to-greek-philosophy.html
   
     2.  The Modern Intellectual Tradition - Descartes to Derrida:  https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/modern-intellectual-tradition-from-descartes-to-derrida.html
   
     3.  The Modern Political Tradition - Hobbes to Habermas:  https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/the-modern-political-tradition-hobbes-to-habermas.html
   
     4.  A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell:  https://smile.amazon.com/History-Western-Philosophy-Bertrand-Russell/dp/0671201581
   
     5.  European Thought & Culture in the {19,20}th Century:  https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/european-thought-and-culture-in-the-19th-century.html  and  https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/european-thought-and-culture-in-the-20th-century.html
   
     6.  Great Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition (honestly not my favorite, but it covers a lot of ground):  https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/great-minds-of-the-western-intellectual-tradition-3rd-edition.html
   
     7.  Original Sources!  Especially:
   
       A.  John Locke's Second Treatise of Government
   
       B.  Descartes First Meditation (this will blow your mind)
   
       C.  Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason
   
       D.  Kant's Metaphysics of Morals
   
       E.  If you are into politics and/or economics (if you really try to understand these books, you may come away having no idea what your political leanings are): 
   
         1.  Karl Marx - Communist Manifesto, and Das Kapital
   
         2.  Ludwig von Mises - Socialism, and Human Action
   
         3.  Hayek - Road to Serfdom
   

   Those are some of my favorites. There is a giant queue I have left to read, and I've also left off some good ones.

   There are quite a few additional books and Great Courses that I can also recommend if you're interested.

   NOTE: Don't pay full price for a Great Courses course. They go on sale a couple times a year, so just keep an eye on them until they are 70-90% off. Also if you buy through their website they are DRM free.

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3. mkempeSep 2016
   For a thorough understanding of free-markets and the laws of economics, Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics by George Reisman. Economic Sophisms by Frédéric Bastiat. Socialism by Ludwig von Mises.
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4. sageikosaJul 2013
   Yeah, it's not like they used "Socialist" in the full name of the republic or something...</deadpan>

   For anyone interested who doesn't understand the spectrum of socialist organization, read almost any book by Ludwig von Mises (start with "Socialism", where he catalogs the socialist orers of the early 1920s) and work your way forward.

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5. trod1234Apr 2025
   That is not a solution because it blindly solves one problem in isolation while creating a whole host of other problems that are equally if not more destructive.

   It is improper to say this is a solution when you swap out the problems for something worse as a surrogate at the same time.

   When you are tied to one physical ID, you give disproportionate power to the game manufacturer, which enables them to monopolize, and engage in coercive, and corrupt behavior more readily.

   Say they decide after the fact that they don't like your objective review of a game you bought because shocker it was "unfinished". They decide to ban you, that ban alerts all other manufacturers, and they block you as well. Or someone who can issue those bans decides to blackmail or extort you.

   If you don't comply, in the process, they revoke access to all your licensed purchases. It is tied to a real ID, so there's no way around it. You've just been cancelled from games/entertainment as a whole.

   If this touches on physical aspects like interfering with your ability to get food, hold a job, etc, you've just been forced into the dregs of society with no due process outside a rule of law. "There are plenty of people that haven't had this scarlet letter attached, ... we'll just choose anyone but them", is how it will go.

   This is not a new concept, in fact it is one of the common elements found in Maoism and collectivism in general.

   So the solution you propose is communism by another name. Any educated person knows Communism fails in common ways intractably, and as a result this cannot be a solution.

   A good rule of thumb is, if it involves a centralized hierarchy structure; its more likely than not going to be some form of communism/socialism (fabian/globalist/its gradual neighbor)/or collectivism, and one must consider slippery slopes where once you adopt one thing, you slip all the way down to another.

   Ludwig von Mises wrote a book back in the 1930s-1950s covering all of the intractable failures, under the title "Socialism". The detailed problems he describes are intractable, and naturally occur in such systems.

   Communism and its derivatives are all about obscuring its origins deceitfully to trick you into thinking and agreeing its a solution. They don't give you the whole picture and they strive to mislead towards pipe dreams which never happen in practice, towards control you can't take back.

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