Corporatism = hedonism?: Philosophy Forums

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Corporatism = hedonism?

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Corporatism = hedonism?

ManiacJack
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Posted 08/18/08 - 09:44 AM: Subject: corporatism = hedonism ???	#1
Wiki: "Hedonism is the philosophy that pleasure is of ultimate importance, the most important pursuit." Well, in a capitalist society, money is what goes around. We are bombarded with the notion that money equates happiness [my generalized assertion for the day] in pop-culture, media outlets, school, and probably even within our own family. But the worth of the dollar is not intrinsic, but in what you can purchase with it. Severe inflation shows this to be the case [I do wonder what is absolute in the market]. Legal Tender might be a choice word. That this notion that money = happiness is hedonistic, ala superficial and based on emotional satisfaction [fill that void in life through consumption], and the same rings true for corporations. Money, to the corp, is happiness. Nothing else matter. I've worked some crap jobs; they all seem to like the corporate ethic; Texas has a 'right to work' law which means you can be dropped at any time for any reason [though, none of those discriminatory reasons are applicable]. From within, it seems that people value their paycheck more than each other- and in fact it is encouraged with rules of the business that enforce dislike between employees. There is the common rules of the environment that subjects of the business should not talk about money, politics, or religion- which means conversation is relatively meaningless. So, everyone talks about what they just bought with their money. "I've found momentary happiness!" they exclaim. "I've located modern Hedonism," I reply. ----------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------- My question: Is this an accurate analogy? What of the negative/positive associations of hedonism and corporatism?
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wholeminutia
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Posted 07/21/09 - 10:36 AM:	#2
Money is not everything but it's close.
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MarchHare
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Posted 07/21/09 - 01:29 PM:	#3
Corporatism does not mean what you are using it to mean in this thread. Look it up. "ManiacJack" wrote: I do wonder what is absolute in the market. If by absolute you mean "not determined by values", then not much really, except from non-economic facts eg. iron is heavier than copper, a sports car is more energy-efficient than a SUV etc. Market economics is all about personal preferences and decisions, hence its attraction. "ManiacJack" wrote: That this notion that money = happiness is hedonistic, ala superficial and based on emotional satisfaction [fill that void in life through consumption], 1. No-one seriously claims that money is worth anything more than what one can (at some point) exchange it for. If you have evidence to the contrary, post it. 2. Hedonism tends to be used to refer to either (a) ethical hedonism, that the only valuable thing is pleasure, or (b) psychological hedonism, that the only thing people pursue is pleasure. It has nothing directly to do with economics. 3. Superficial is a horrificly abused word. If you mean superfical in the standard sense of "having nothing to it beyond what is apparent", then I don't see how ethical hedonism is necessarily superficial. 4. Anything use of "happiness" that didn't refer to some form of emotional satisfaction would be a very idiosyncratic use. "ManiacJack" wrote: So, everyone talks about what they just bought with their money. "I've found momentary happiness!" they exclaim. "I've located modern Hedonism," I reply. Presumably this conversation has never actually taken place, so you're talking about subtext. If so, isn't it a better idea to actually ask people what they mean rather than read subtexts into what they say? One tends to get a better idea of what people actually think that way. Furthermore, doesn't the fact that people say "I just bought X!" in a manner that suggests they approve of this purchase suggest that they are in fact desiring things rather than pleasure? Call that materialism or whatever you like, but it's distinct from the standard philosophical use of the word "hedonism", since hedonism refers to a love of pleasure rather than a love of things.
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thefranzkafkafront
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Posted 07/21/09 - 02:17 PM:	#4
Uh corporatism is a quite a diffrent concept to capitalism. It's primarily about running an interacting society throught popularist interventionist means. It's sort of analogous to the old fascist symbol of the axe made of bound sticks. So unsuprisingly it was quite big with early fascism and still arguably is one of the few identifiable points of fascist theory. If anything it's directly opposed most of the time to the private ownership of the means of production (capitalism). Not to mention corprations themselves are a goverment sponsored public form of ownership and thus technically aren't capitalism, which is an economic ideological diapole thats never fully been reached. Anyway with my pedantic caveats aside, I think you've still made a good point; the level of economic freedom which we largely experience now in the west not only gives the average person a large disposible income but also gives him access to a large range of goods that commonly cause a lot of pleasure. Now whether or not hedonism is humanity's main driving force, it's certainly a driving force. So combine the two aforementioned characteristics with the latter, put it in place in human society (more governed by chaos theory than anything else) and you'll see overconsumption occur whereever that's possible. Perhaps we're only just noticing it now in the modern day, because it's the first time we've actually had large sections of our population with large amounts of disposible income. But to say it's confined to any one society let alone your standard western 'freeish' market economy. Well it's like saying they didn't drink a shit load of vodka in centrally planned Soviet Russia. Take any economic system you like you'll see people accumulate goods they value. Edited by unenlightened on 07/21/09 - 04:51 PM. Reason: spelling, punctuation.

MarchHare
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Posted 07/22/09 - 02:40 AM:	#5
I'm not familair with any serious scientific evidence that people are hedonistic in the purely philosophical sense, ie. driven to pursue pleasure as such. There are numerous studies telling us what people generally pursue, but none (as far as I know) have revealed that "the sensation of pleasure" is something that people go for; particular sensations that are pleasurable, sure, but one would have a hard time explaining all the various preferences of humankind with psychological hedonism of even a limited kind. As for the standard use of the word hedonism: since the word is used occasionally and the meaning of the word comes from its use, it is obviously correct to say that human beings are occasionally hedonistic.
Doubt requires a reason to doubt. Nothing is immune from potential doubt. The correct response to a question isn't always to try to give the question's answer.

unrealist42
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Posted 07/23/09 - 06:49 PM:	#6
This being a philosophy forum I would expect that people would parse the definitions of the words and argue interminably over the disparity of their definitions but I can perceive no arguable difference in the activities of capitalists and hedonists except perhaps some of the venues where they apply themselves.

PontificatingChauncy
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Posted 07/24/09 - 12:50 PM:	#7
Well, as Adam Smith states (paraphrased, obviously): People work so as to aquire what they need to survive, plus comfort and amusement. When you ask someone to do something, you need to motivate him using something he needs, or by offering to increse his comfort/amusement. Seeing as how (outside of physical survival needs) persons are stated to seek comfort and amusement exclusively, I guess you could define capitalism as fancy hedonism. But is there anything wrong with that? Epicureans and David Hume wouldn't seem to think so.
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keda
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Posted 07/24/09 - 02:41 PM:	#8
Capitalism has really nothing to do with hedonism. A hedonist wouldn't be worried about by what means his ends are obtained, but in capitalism, one ought to put certain rules before ones self interest e.g. not to steal, cheat, murder and lie. Corporatism btw, has nothing to do with capitalism either. It is a form of government, much like that of aristocracy or oligarchy, controlled by a small group of people, who happens to rich, not so coincidentally, but still because they also treat their fellow human beings as slaves. There are really only two types of government, and all other so called forms are just diversionary tactics to understand how simple it is, namely a republic, which is the rule of law, indiscriminatory and fair, or a tyranny, discriminatory and thus unfair. Legal tender is of course nothing but government interference in the market, a loophole in the law, which allows an exempt elite to control the people. Money does not have to be legal tender. It can be anything that becomes an accepted means of exchange, but the government again, imposes on us a very poor means of such, as it devalues over time and causes all sorts of malinvestments and bubbles and financial crises.
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unrealist42
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Posted 07/30/09 - 04:07 PM:	#9
Steal, cheat, lie, are these not the bedrock tenets of capitalism? Is it not lying to withhold information that gives you advantage in a transaction? Is it not cheating and stealing to go through with such a transaction? The hedonist has no need to resort to such subterfuge so the only difference seems to be that capitalists are just lying cheating and stealing hedonists, a subclass of distinction.

Vulcan23
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Posted 07/30/09 - 04:30 PM:	#10
Money is very close to oxygen on the " Need to have list".

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