"Bob Myers" > wrote in
:
> "alsandor" > wrote in message
> oups.com...
> a écrit :
>
>> The issue here is bio-uniformity for the sake of profits over
>> what nature originally offered us and which we blithely refer to
>> as bio-diversity (which is the natural state of things without
>> man screwing it up).
>
> And you know what? There's really not a damned thing wrong
> with that - "profits" are not inherently a bad thing, especially
> when you realize that there would be NO profit in doing this sort
> of thing IF PEOPLE DIDN'T BUY THE PRODUCT.
So you have effectively argued that only profit controls the
production of food? That's plain silly. On high-end produced goods,
like cookies and canned goods and alcohol, there is no problem with
profits, but what I was arguing was that species or vegetables and
fruit have been eliminated without a thought to future requirements
or the survivability of the species as a whole MERELY for profits.
> The market
> in this case is ruthlessly democratic; as long as the majority of
> people vote with their dollars in favor of low cost over high
> quality, the market continues to deliver it as exactly what they
> want.
Actually, no, it doesn't. The market is nothing but manipulative
humans making decisions, it isn't a separate and distinct entity nor
is it managed by an invisible hand. Some human decide to ship
potatoes without consulting the consumers, but only the ones that can
stay longest on the shelf. They don't ask consumers: "Would you
rather have potatoes that taste better?" They even lie. They say
their potatoes taste best, to influence the purchasing choices.
Consumers (those who are so inclined) vote between McCain's and Ore-
Ida but not between varieties of potatoes because they aren't
informed of that. In fact, the more they know the more it worries
the capitalist because truly informed consumers are dangerous to his
profit margin.
In reality, most people don't vote with their money knowing all the
facts, they vote for a limited slate, knowing only what the leading
producers want them to know. If you haven't figured this out yet, I
suggest you catch up on your reading.
> The "good stuff" is still out there - it's just harder to
> find and more costly as a result of what the free market has
> determined is the optimum product offering.
Sometimes it doesn't even exist anymore and no one was asked to vote
on whether varieties should be called upon to disappear. So this
"democratic market" crap is just a load of really smelly hooey.
--
"Compassion is the chief law of human existence."
Dostoevski, The Idiot