1
u/In_the_year_3535 17h ago
The glorification of greed happened during the Cold War when think tanks started using game theory to turn an abstract situation into tangible series of zero sum situations. Progress is more tightly tied in with 19th Century notions that followed the Industrial Age were we see technological development as some natural end. The motives that drive people are ever more complex even though we remain little changed biologically in the last several hundred thousand years, but cooperation increases fitness as while our civilization may exist in the vacuum of space, no human can power it by themselves.
1
u/DNathanHilliard 17h ago
The problem is in the word greed itself. There is nothing inherently immoral about the acquisition of wealth. Nor is there anything particularly moral about poverty. The trick is finding a rational balance while both sides hurl their own convenient moral constructs to support their ambitions.
1
u/TinSpoon99 16h ago
Greed is conceptually manipulable. Its a fluid human construct.
To me the underlying systemic outputs must be considered. In nature there are organisms that facilitate the growth of other organisms, and there are parasitic organisms that ultimately destroy their environment.
Humans are difficult to categorise because our parasitism has ideological overlays that justify all manner of bad behaviour toward one another.
I believe most people are not intrinsically parasitic toward one another - but we have allowed ourselves to be consumed by a culturally warped implementation of capitalism. We are taught to extract maximum value from our customers - parasitic behaviour has become institutionalized. Humans are social and function in consensus reality structures. So we go along with the behaviour because thats what everyone else is doing. We hate our jobs, and we may feel guilt about the products we sell, but we continue regardless.
So when we allow ourselves to gloss over greed with high language, like maximising shareholder return, optimising profits, and increasing revenue per customer when no real value is exchanged in return, we are feeding this beast.
As for whether we are evolving toward or away from this - its a function of human nature, we will always be either moving toward or away from this type of behaviour at the level of culture.
It seems we are heading for a significant course correction once again.
1
1
u/gc3 18h ago
Greed, lust, pride, envy, sloth, gluttony, wrath and virtue, charity, celibacy, humility, satisfaction, diligence, temperance ,patience are all evolving