What is the point of society?

[taxigirl]

What about them? How about this?

You want me to believe Noam Chomsky saying that anarchists are looking to "commonly decide..." is valid? OK. I like Noam.

I still say that "society" is based on a commonality, not a rule. "Society" came from the Latin word societas, which in turn was derived from the noun socius (comrade, friend, ally).

May I suggest that this Chaos theory statement in your signature is pure BS? :2razz:

someone else in this thread mentioned that socialists are bad at math....

Chaos Theory is based in mathematics, it has uses in physics, engineering, economics, biology, and philosophy, politics, psychology, etc...

To sum it up concisely: the deterministic nature of events does not make them predictable -- future behavior is determined by initial conditions and small differences, even tiny tiny ones, can have the most drastic effects on future behavior. Hence, the "Butterfly Effect".

 

[imagep]

Society sounds like torture from this. We're brainwashed for the point of expanding freedom (without necessarily having something to be free with)?

A while back on another forum, an English professor told me one of the advantages of American education is we DON'T groom people for careers.

Especially in today's economy, I don't see how ignoring job placement is a good thing. The smart become enslaved to the stupid whether working in hi-skilled or low-skilled jobs.

A while back on another thread where we were discussing shortening the length of the workweek someone said "I would rather work for minimum wage 70 hours a week than to give up my freedom" (refering to giving up his freedom as being told that he could only work 20 hours a week at a full time living wage). I pointed out that most of us thought that having to work 70 hours a week for a low wage IS giving up our freedom. I don't think he has posted since.

It's weird sometimes what people percieve as being "freedom".

 

[Zyphlin]

The point of society the formation of a common undestanding amongst a group of individuals regarding what compromises they will make for each other in exchange for what benefits they'll gain from each other.

 

[Gardener]

Society is what we form because we are soft bodied, without fangs or claws, lacking body armor and do not run particularly fast.

 

[taxigirl]

The point of society the formation of a common undestanding amongst a group of individuals regarding what compromises they will make for each other in exchange for what benefits they'll gain from each other.

Common, compromise, benefits. That sounds like a more left leaning idea. And a starpk contrast to what others are sating; defense, security etc...

 

[Zyphlin]

Common, compromise, benefits. That sounds like a more left leaning idea. And a starpk contrast to what others are sating; defense, security etc...

"Society" can be left wing.

"Society" can be right wing.

"Society" is broad. Trying to claim that it must be right or left is a bit ridiculous and just kind of unrealistic.

For example...using my definition...

A society could be formed by a group of people coming to a common understanding, expressed through a founding document, in which they give up (Compromise) their natural ability to violate the rights of others and give up some of their rights to self determination (in terms of giving up some of their money to society, giving up some of their privacy to society) in exchange for the benefit that their rights won't be infringed upon by others and that society would provide protection of those rights.

In that example...you have essentially what you stated, a society based around providing security. However, you can not create a society that will provide security without compromising some what on what your natural rights are.

However a society could absolutely be made with a more left leaning understanding...

A group of people could come together to form a society based on the common understanding held amongst them all that all land that the people of the society claims belongs to all the people of that society, that all wealth gained belongs to all of that society, and one can't act on any natural right that the majority of the people feel hurts the society. In exchange for this those in the society are given a place to live, food to eat, medical treatment, and protection from physical harm.

Society, government, is not inherently left or right. It can be crafted using either ideological basis, but inherently it is neutral in terms of ideology.

 

[Aunt Spiker]

So, what is the point of society? To provide for mutual defense? That's pretty common knowledge so we can skip that. Is there more to society though? Could there be more? Should there be more?

Not all societies (present or past) have had mutual defense to worry about. That tends to go along with larger socieities as they must find new land / means of sustaining theirselves - and must expand by command and conquer (and so on).

Society in itself is a means of being able to survive as people - food, emotional support, child rearing, living . . . and so on.

culture changes dependent on these different 'needs' that people have - but society is the physical form in which a group of people eek out their existence.

 

[Medusa]

we are social beings and this is why we need a society,it must be the point which is based on our evolution period.we learned that we needed each other in a society when we were evolving.

 

[Canell]

I still say that "society" is based on a commonality, not a rule.

But there is no society with no rules, written or unwritten. Even "savages" have them. Otherwise there is the danger that everyone can twist the situation to his benefit.
A group of people with no rules is just a group of people. Ideology contains rules in the form of certain moral (acceptable behaviour) too.

Hence, the "Butterfly Effect".

Copy that, I'm just saying it's BS.