A
Amaris
Guest
I couldn't agree more. Both your post and Sci's sums up my thoughts on the matter. Which is good, because now I have more time for Bridge Commander.
Starfleet at Quarks
- Thread starter gunner_thomas
- Start date
I couldn't agree more. Both your post and Sci's sums up my thoughts on the matter. Which is good, because now I have more time for Bridge Commander.
Let us assume then;
1. On fed worlds, clothes and food are most likely free. Money as we know it is obsolete.
2. There will always be some kind of barter/favour arrangement in place - "If I can eat in your resturant tonight Mr Sisko, I will get my son who works in Starfleet engineering to look at your faulty cooker."
3. The Fed probably does have large currency supplies from trading etc with other races.
4. Starfleet staff can probably requisition expenses in latinum or local currency from starfleet, provided they explain themselves/get receipts.
5. Starfleet officers (Riker and Dax for example) gamble (Sometimes badly) and occasionally get a lot of latinum which they are allowed to keep or do with as they will. They invest it in a bank and let it mature. Or give it as gifts to friends as it's practically worthless to them.
6. People would get jobs because after the first few months sleeping your way through the females of the galaxy on the holodeck and saving the federation from monsters (again, on the holodeck) you would want to do it IRL.
1. On fed worlds, clothes and food are most likely free. Money as we know it is obsolete.
2. There will always be some kind of barter/favour arrangement in place - "If I can eat in your resturant tonight Mr Sisko, I will get my son who works in Starfleet engineering to look at your faulty cooker."
3. The Fed probably does have large currency supplies from trading etc with other races.
4. Starfleet staff can probably requisition expenses in latinum or local currency from starfleet, provided they explain themselves/get receipts.
5. Starfleet officers (Riker and Dax for example) gamble (Sometimes badly) and occasionally get a lot of latinum which they are allowed to keep or do with as they will. They invest it in a bank and let it mature. Or give it as gifts to friends as it's practically worthless to them.
6. People would get jobs because after the first few months sleeping your way through the females of the galaxy on the holodeck and saving the federation from monsters (again, on the holodeck) you would want to do it IRL.
Finally, some reasonable discussion going on here, instead of slogans that don't address the issue at all!
Money is not the same thing as greed. You don't have to be greedy just because money exists, and you most certainly don't need money to be greedy - you could as well try to get a lot of land, or buildings, or other property, or even people; it all comes down to the same thing - power and possession. Money is also not synonymous with capitalism, or with corporativism. It existed/exists in feudalism, in socialism, in every evolved society - for the simple reason that it makes TRADE much simpler, easier and fairer.
If you abolish every sort of currency, you have to go back to the barter trade - which is clumsy and impractical, and this is exactly the reason why money was invented in the first place. There is nothing "evolved" about abolishing money and going back to the barter economy - and it makes no sense that an evolved society would want to do that. That would be devolution, not evolution.
If there is no currency, the only other alternative to the barter economy is... that everything is given for free? Am I right that this is what some people here are implying? Goods are free, and people provide services for free? OK, let's see how that would work.. You talk so much about trying to IMAGINE what the Federation society would look like. Well, let's do that.
Say, you live on 24th century Earth and you have a beautiful family vineyard, and produce very fine wines. There are quite a few people who would love to get your wine, the "real thing" instead of that replicated thing that doesn't get anywhere near the real taste or scent. But, much as you'd like to oblige, being a nice evolved Federation citizen, there just isn't enough to give to all the people who are interested. You have to ask them to give you something in return. But since there is no money, you ask them to give you some goods of their own... One person is a great carpenter, and offers to give you one of those wonderful, unique tables they make. Another one is a painter, and paints wonderful pictures, and offers to give you a picture. But, you really would love one of those tables, but you have absolutely no interest in arts, so you pick the carpenter. Poor painter has no hope that he would change your mind, so he has to trade his paintings with someone else for something else you find interesting... otherwise, he can never hope to get your wine. You're putting the carpenter at an unfair advantage. But how do you value a painting relative to a table, relative to wine? It all gets very complicated and clumsy - but it would all work so much easier, if there was some kind of common determiner of value... say, some sort of currency... uh, money?
Or else - if there is no trade on Earth in the 24th century and people just give things and services for free... how do you choose who do you give them to, when there is not enough for everyone? It's most likely you'll give them to your friends, or neighbors, or people who have done you a service in the past or given you something. It's not unheard of, but to use that reasoning all the time... means that society is ruled by favoritism and nepotism, and people are locked into their little cliques that exchange goods and services with each other, closed to outsiders.
In either case, you'll end up with a clumsy economy and a society that breeds inequality to an even greater degree than a society with money does. At least in the monetary economy a person can hope that their work can produce the amount that would allow them to buy something that they want.
It is perfectly conceivable that poverty has pretty much been eradicated thanks to the invention of the replicator, and that pretty much everyone can get some sort of food and drink, some sort of clothes, and medicine they need, and that the society is taking care that everyone gets some sort of place to stay and sleep at, and that everyone has free medical care - with the priorities being based on how urgent and dangerous the condition is. This is what I believe that every state/society is obligated to ensure to every person. Now, doctors aren't replicable so there would still be an issue of availability of proper medical care, but advances in medicine, the use of dermal regenerator, and the existence of holographic doctors might also help alleviate the situation.
However, what you're talking about is just the most necessary means for survival. Do you really believe that these are the only things people wish for? I am not talking about greed, wanting lots and lots of money in order to gain power. I am talking about people wanting things like, say, a better place to live, their own home, food that tastes better, nicer clothes of their own choosing, ability to travel, or to go to the theatre or attend a sports game or a concert, and so on... all those things that make up a higher standard of living.
You can only replicate some things such as food, drink and clothes. And even with those, people - even in Trek - tend to prefer real food - characters tend to mention that this replicated drink tastes almost like the real thing, but if they weren't on a starship and if they had a choice, they most likely would prefer the real thing. Look at our reality - agricultural industry has found the means to mass produce food and drink, but has that made the "natural" products disappear? Not at all, many people still prefer the "natural" food and believe it to be healthier and tastier. And in Trek universe, we see that there still are restaurants and vineyards; and tailors - so obviously there are people who prefer not to have their clothes produced by a replicator.
As long as those "natural" products exist, they are likely to be valued more than the dime a dozen replicated products.
And then, there are things that simple CANNOT be replicated at all.
What about LAND?
If anything, this is the one commodity whose value is only likely to go up in the Trek 22nd, 23rd and 24th century. With the advances in medicine and the problems of hunger and poverty solved, no intra-planetary conflicts and wars, and a presumed decrease in crime, the population is definitely going to grow and grow and grow, and not even all the good contraceptives are going to slow it down. Available land is going to be extremely valuable in the 24 the century Trek world, a lot more so than in the 20th century.
The obvious solution to the over-population problem is something we see it in Trek: off-planet colonies.
But, this begs the question: how many people would actually want to leave their home planet, or even their home region, if they had a choice? Sure, some people are adventurers and explorers... but there are always many more people who just want to stay in the same place that they were born and grew up; many people even care about staying where their ancestors lived... And we know that, in the real world, people rarely become emigrants out of a desire to explore and find new worlds; most people emigrate because they are looking for a better life - because of lack of money, land, jobs, because they didn't have a good life where they came from.
It is obvious that, no matter how nice the society on Earth might have become by the 24th century, there is not going to be place for everyone. So... who and what decides who is to stay, and who is to go? If only people who go to the off-world colonies were those who did it out of a desire for exploration or because they want change... that would leave a very over-populated Earth.
Or, let's say the Federation has tried to do away with the private property - which we know is not true (Picard vineyards, Sisko's restuarant) etc. But if they did... and if all the land only belonged to the state/society, as in a communist ideal - who decides who gets to live in which place? The state? The authorities? That only breeds inequality, and gives the state far too much power over the individual. And it would invite favoritism and nepotism... It's been tried already in some countries in the 20th century - and it worked very, very badly.
(And we have seen in Trek that people of 24th century don't like being moved around and forced to leave their homes any more than the 20th century people did - this was, after all, a basis for the entire Maquis storyline.)
What about other real estate - especially old houses, old buildings etc.? Aren't they going to be things of high value?
The only way one could ensure that no house is valued more than some other would be if they were all identical. So, they would have to either tear down every old house or make them all museums or properties of state (first throwing people out of their homes and making it property of the state, then deciding who is to move there... ugh, that sounds familiar - as I said, it's been tried, and it's still remembered as a nightmare)... then what would you do, forbid architects to show any originality, make it illegal for people to build any houses that would be different from the norm, build only rows and rows of identical houses?
What about TRAVEL? Even with all the advances in technology, I don't think that it is likely that an unlimited number of people would be able to travel everywhere, whenever they decide. What if too many people want to travel from San Francisco to Paris today... or to the Moon... or to Vulcan... with no such thing as a paid ticket, how do you decide who you are going to keep off the plane, or shuttle, or whatever? Are you going to tell people to make a run for it - first come, first served - which would put some of them at an unfair advantage (like those who live near by, or those who are faster and stronger, etc.) and is most likely to create havoc? Or you are going to make authority figures decide who has the right to travel, and who does not? The former case seems like anarchy, the latter sounds very totalitarian. Again, people having to get state permits to travel was something that was attempted in some of the real-socialist countries, and people weren't very happy with it...
But, bad as real-socialist/communist countries were, none of them were that crazy to try to abolish money. Marx or Engels never suggested that... probably because, unlike Roddenberry, they actually had a clue about economy.
What about CULTURE and ENTERTAINMENT?
Sure, there are going to be mass products, like padds with books and holoprograms, that you can get for free. Just like we get music and video files and whatnot from the Internet, for free - well, sort of. But what about originals of paintings or sculptures, what about antique? People tend to value originals more than copies.
More importantly - what about the things that cannot be copied or replicated at all - such as live performances? You may broadcast or record a concert or play or a sports game, so that everyone can enjoy it in some way or another... But the thing is, many people will still want to attend a concert, a play, or a sports game in person. Just like they do today. And it's just physically not possible to have an unlimited number or people present and able to actually see or hear what they want to see or hear.
So, if everything is FREE in the Federation - or at least Earth - society... and a HUGE number of people want to see this particular artist perform, how do you decide who gets to see the concert, and who will have to wait for some other time, or be content with a recording?
Either you'd have a complete mess on your hands, or you'd need a totalitarian state that decides who, where and when is allowed to travel, who is allowed to attend a concert and who isn't, who is allowed to live where...
Do you really think that everyone in the world would be happy with just eating food made by a machine (with nobody growing any real vegetable or fruit anymore), living in an apartment identical to millions and millions of other identical apartments, not travelling anywhere unless the state allows them to? Is that an ideal, utopian society you have in mind?
Gene Roddenberry had some good ideas, and some bad ones. This one was, frankly, a very stupid one. It just sounds nice, i"We don't need money, because our society is ideal!" but it makes no sense. It seems that he just didn't think it through. And it's not surprising that we NEVER actually SAW on the SCREEN how this money-less society works.
Which is why, as I already said, it is absurd to argue that moneyless economy is a "PREMISE" that one has to accept to be able to enjoy Star Trek. Space travel, warp speed, transporters, replicators, universal translator, humanoid aliens, inter-species mating and reproduction, united Earth as a leader of a Federation of Planets - these are the basic premises of Trek. (And still, some of those were questioned in this forum.) The idea about money-less society is not a premise of anything, it never produced a single storyline in Star Trek. In fact, if it weren't for a couple of speeches given by Starfleet captains, we wouldn't even know about it. Alien spores that make people happy are far more a premise of Trek - they were a premise of a (very good) episode. Transporters splitting people into a civilized and animalistic dopperganger are a more important premise, they produced another good episode. All-powerful godlike aliens are a far more important premise, they figure in a number of episodes and movies. Time travel, a very prominent premise. Heck, people devolving into lizards and other lower life forms is more of a premise, it was the basis for at least 3 (bad) Trek episodes.
Money is not the same thing as greed. You don't have to be greedy just because money exists, and you most certainly don't need money to be greedy - you could as well try to get a lot of land, or buildings, or other property, or even people; it all comes down to the same thing - power and possession. Money is also not synonymous with capitalism, or with corporativism. It existed/exists in feudalism, in socialism, in every evolved society - for the simple reason that it makes TRADE much simpler, easier and fairer.
If you abolish every sort of currency, you have to go back to the barter trade - which is clumsy and impractical, and this is exactly the reason why money was invented in the first place. There is nothing "evolved" about abolishing money and going back to the barter economy - and it makes no sense that an evolved society would want to do that. That would be devolution, not evolution.
If there is no currency, the only other alternative to the barter economy is... that everything is given for free? Am I right that this is what some people here are implying? Goods are free, and people provide services for free? OK, let's see how that would work.. You talk so much about trying to IMAGINE what the Federation society would look like. Well, let's do that.
Say, you live on 24th century Earth and you have a beautiful family vineyard, and produce very fine wines. There are quite a few people who would love to get your wine, the "real thing" instead of that replicated thing that doesn't get anywhere near the real taste or scent. But, much as you'd like to oblige, being a nice evolved Federation citizen, there just isn't enough to give to all the people who are interested. You have to ask them to give you something in return. But since there is no money, you ask them to give you some goods of their own... One person is a great carpenter, and offers to give you one of those wonderful, unique tables they make. Another one is a painter, and paints wonderful pictures, and offers to give you a picture. But, you really would love one of those tables, but you have absolutely no interest in arts, so you pick the carpenter. Poor painter has no hope that he would change your mind, so he has to trade his paintings with someone else for something else you find interesting... otherwise, he can never hope to get your wine. You're putting the carpenter at an unfair advantage. But how do you value a painting relative to a table, relative to wine? It all gets very complicated and clumsy - but it would all work so much easier, if there was some kind of common determiner of value... say, some sort of currency... uh, money?
Or else - if there is no trade on Earth in the 24th century and people just give things and services for free... how do you choose who do you give them to, when there is not enough for everyone? It's most likely you'll give them to your friends, or neighbors, or people who have done you a service in the past or given you something. It's not unheard of, but to use that reasoning all the time... means that society is ruled by favoritism and nepotism, and people are locked into their little cliques that exchange goods and services with each other, closed to outsiders.
In either case, you'll end up with a clumsy economy and a society that breeds inequality to an even greater degree than a society with money does. At least in the monetary economy a person can hope that their work can produce the amount that would allow them to buy something that they want.
That is simply not true. People have needs and wants beyond the basic needs. Do you really think that everyone in the world is completely content with having nothing more than a daily ration of water and some kind of food, some sort of clothes and some sort of place to stay, and medical care if they get ill?
It is perfectly conceivable that poverty has pretty much been eradicated thanks to the invention of the replicator, and that pretty much everyone can get some sort of food and drink, some sort of clothes, and medicine they need, and that the society is taking care that everyone gets some sort of place to stay and sleep at, and that everyone has free medical care - with the priorities being based on how urgent and dangerous the condition is. This is what I believe that every state/society is obligated to ensure to every person. Now, doctors aren't replicable so there would still be an issue of availability of proper medical care, but advances in medicine, the use of dermal regenerator, and the existence of holographic doctors might also help alleviate the situation.
However, what you're talking about is just the most necessary means for survival. Do you really believe that these are the only things people wish for? I am not talking about greed, wanting lots and lots of money in order to gain power. I am talking about people wanting things like, say, a better place to live, their own home, food that tastes better, nicer clothes of their own choosing, ability to travel, or to go to the theatre or attend a sports game or a concert, and so on... all those things that make up a higher standard of living.
For a very simple reason: YOU CAN'T.
You can only replicate some things such as food, drink and clothes. And even with those, people - even in Trek - tend to prefer real food - characters tend to mention that this replicated drink tastes almost like the real thing, but if they weren't on a starship and if they had a choice, they most likely would prefer the real thing. Look at our reality - agricultural industry has found the means to mass produce food and drink, but has that made the "natural" products disappear? Not at all, many people still prefer the "natural" food and believe it to be healthier and tastier. And in Trek universe, we see that there still are restaurants and vineyards; and tailors - so obviously there are people who prefer not to have their clothes produced by a replicator.
As long as those "natural" products exist, they are likely to be valued more than the dime a dozen replicated products.
And then, there are things that simple CANNOT be replicated at all.
What about LAND?
If anything, this is the one commodity whose value is only likely to go up in the Trek 22nd, 23rd and 24th century. With the advances in medicine and the problems of hunger and poverty solved, no intra-planetary conflicts and wars, and a presumed decrease in crime, the population is definitely going to grow and grow and grow, and not even all the good contraceptives are going to slow it down. Available land is going to be extremely valuable in the 24 the century Trek world, a lot more so than in the 20th century.
The obvious solution to the over-population problem is something we see it in Trek: off-planet colonies.
But, this begs the question: how many people would actually want to leave their home planet, or even their home region, if they had a choice? Sure, some people are adventurers and explorers... but there are always many more people who just want to stay in the same place that they were born and grew up; many people even care about staying where their ancestors lived... And we know that, in the real world, people rarely become emigrants out of a desire to explore and find new worlds; most people emigrate because they are looking for a better life - because of lack of money, land, jobs, because they didn't have a good life where they came from.
It is obvious that, no matter how nice the society on Earth might have become by the 24th century, there is not going to be place for everyone. So... who and what decides who is to stay, and who is to go? If only people who go to the off-world colonies were those who did it out of a desire for exploration or because they want change... that would leave a very over-populated Earth.
Or, let's say the Federation has tried to do away with the private property - which we know is not true (Picard vineyards, Sisko's restuarant) etc. But if they did... and if all the land only belonged to the state/society, as in a communist ideal - who decides who gets to live in which place? The state? The authorities? That only breeds inequality, and gives the state far too much power over the individual. And it would invite favoritism and nepotism... It's been tried already in some countries in the 20th century - and it worked very, very badly.
(And we have seen in Trek that people of 24th century don't like being moved around and forced to leave their homes any more than the 20th century people did - this was, after all, a basis for the entire Maquis storyline.)
What about other real estate - especially old houses, old buildings etc.? Aren't they going to be things of high value?
The only way one could ensure that no house is valued more than some other would be if they were all identical. So, they would have to either tear down every old house or make them all museums or properties of state (first throwing people out of their homes and making it property of the state, then deciding who is to move there... ugh, that sounds familiar - as I said, it's been tried, and it's still remembered as a nightmare)... then what would you do, forbid architects to show any originality, make it illegal for people to build any houses that would be different from the norm, build only rows and rows of identical houses?
What about TRAVEL? Even with all the advances in technology, I don't think that it is likely that an unlimited number of people would be able to travel everywhere, whenever they decide. What if too many people want to travel from San Francisco to Paris today... or to the Moon... or to Vulcan... with no such thing as a paid ticket, how do you decide who you are going to keep off the plane, or shuttle, or whatever? Are you going to tell people to make a run for it - first come, first served - which would put some of them at an unfair advantage (like those who live near by, or those who are faster and stronger, etc.) and is most likely to create havoc? Or you are going to make authority figures decide who has the right to travel, and who does not? The former case seems like anarchy, the latter sounds very totalitarian. Again, people having to get state permits to travel was something that was attempted in some of the real-socialist countries, and people weren't very happy with it...
But, bad as real-socialist/communist countries were, none of them were that crazy to try to abolish money. Marx or Engels never suggested that... probably because, unlike Roddenberry, they actually had a clue about economy.
What about CULTURE and ENTERTAINMENT?
Sure, there are going to be mass products, like padds with books and holoprograms, that you can get for free. Just like we get music and video files and whatnot from the Internet, for free - well, sort of. But what about originals of paintings or sculptures, what about antique? People tend to value originals more than copies.
More importantly - what about the things that cannot be copied or replicated at all - such as live performances? You may broadcast or record a concert or play or a sports game, so that everyone can enjoy it in some way or another... But the thing is, many people will still want to attend a concert, a play, or a sports game in person. Just like they do today. And it's just physically not possible to have an unlimited number or people present and able to actually see or hear what they want to see or hear.
So, if everything is FREE in the Federation - or at least Earth - society... and a HUGE number of people want to see this particular artist perform, how do you decide who gets to see the concert, and who will have to wait for some other time, or be content with a recording?
Either you'd have a complete mess on your hands, or you'd need a totalitarian state that decides who, where and when is allowed to travel, who is allowed to attend a concert and who isn't, who is allowed to live where...
Do you really think that everyone in the world would be happy with just eating food made by a machine (with nobody growing any real vegetable or fruit anymore), living in an apartment identical to millions and millions of other identical apartments, not travelling anywhere unless the state allows them to? Is that an ideal, utopian society you have in mind?
Gene Roddenberry had some good ideas, and some bad ones. This one was, frankly, a very stupid one. It just sounds nice, i"We don't need money, because our society is ideal!" but it makes no sense. It seems that he just didn't think it through. And it's not surprising that we NEVER actually SAW on the SCREEN how this money-less society works.
Which is why, as I already said, it is absurd to argue that moneyless economy is a "PREMISE" that one has to accept to be able to enjoy Star Trek. Space travel, warp speed, transporters, replicators, universal translator, humanoid aliens, inter-species mating and reproduction, united Earth as a leader of a Federation of Planets - these are the basic premises of Trek. (And still, some of those were questioned in this forum.) The idea about money-less society is not a premise of anything, it never produced a single storyline in Star Trek. In fact, if it weren't for a couple of speeches given by Starfleet captains, we wouldn't even know about it. Alien spores that make people happy are far more a premise of Trek - they were a premise of a (very good) episode. Transporters splitting people into a civilized and animalistic dopperganger are a more important premise, they produced another good episode. All-powerful godlike aliens are a far more important premise, they figure in a number of episodes and movies. Time travel, a very prominent premise. Heck, people devolving into lizards and other lower life forms is more of a premise, it was the basis for at least 3 (bad) Trek episodes.
All of this makes sense if we assume humanity stays exactly the same as it is right now. Me, I hope we don't and that's what I enjoy about Star Trek. It assumes humanity has moved beyond short-sightedness and works to better the common good for themselves and for others.
Call me whatever names you wish, DevilEyes.
Call me whatever names you wish, DevilEyes.
It's claimed that food and drink from the replicator is absolutely indistinguishable from the real thing. In that case here's how I imagine the Picard wine business works.
Nobody wants the stuff.
Why would anyone go to the trouble of obtaining the stuff when you can just get a glass of it from the replicator in your living room, bedroom or even from the bathroom repicator? Way too much trouble to walk or drive to the Picard vineyards and carry the shit back home. If you're a friend and go visit the Picards and they stick a bottle in your aircar, you just toss it out the window because it's too much trouble to carry it from the car into your house.
Hell, even if the Picards comes to YOUR house and inflicts you with the hootch, you just toss it into the trash after they're gone. Too much trouble to 'sigh' uncork the damn bottle, get an empty wine glass and pour the shit when you can just get a glass already poured and everything from the replicator.
Eventually when the Picards realized that absolutely no one wants their wine, they took to just pouring the wine out on to the ground to use the bottles for the next batch of wine which will get poured out in about ten years.
Robert
Nobody wants the stuff.
Why would anyone go to the trouble of obtaining the stuff when you can just get a glass of it from the replicator in your living room, bedroom or even from the bathroom repicator? Way too much trouble to walk or drive to the Picard vineyards and carry the shit back home. If you're a friend and go visit the Picards and they stick a bottle in your aircar, you just toss it out the window because it's too much trouble to carry it from the car into your house.
Hell, even if the Picards comes to YOUR house and inflicts you with the hootch, you just toss it into the trash after they're gone. Too much trouble to 'sigh' uncork the damn bottle, get an empty wine glass and pour the shit when you can just get a glass already poured and everything from the replicator.
Eventually when the Picards realized that absolutely no one wants their wine, they took to just pouring the wine out on to the ground to use the bottles for the next batch of wine which will get poured out in about ten years.
Robert
...So...what does that mean, exactly?
Even if it were really indistinguishable (which I don't believe), someone would want it and it would be more valuable just for the virtue of being the real thing.
Few people can distinguish a good fake from an original Rembrandt, but people still value the real Rembrandt more.
And there are always people who want to have fruit and vegetable or eggs or milk that has been grown by farmers rather than the mass produced stuff, whether the former tastes better than not. Why? Perhaps for the same reason that some people hate technology and prefer everything that is home-grown and 'natural', believing it to be healthier or better or whatever.
I find it hard to believe that people would change so much in 400 years that EVERYONE in the world will be enamored with industrial stuff and food from replicators, with no Joseph Siskos who'll say "I don't want to eat that thing from your machine, made out of someone's shit. Take that crap somewhere else"...
Also, that world would be a rather boring and kinda creepy.
I'm wondering the same... I dunno... they evolved into another species, the kind of humans that we actually never saw on Star Trek, one where individuals don't have any kind of desire or conflict and everyone thinks and acts the same? Kinda like Borg? 
To whit, we have in the ep, "In The Cards", an illustration:
Nog: Use your own money.
Jake: I'm human. I don't have any money.
Nog: It's not my fault your race abandoned currency-based economics in favor of some...philosophy of self-enhancement.
Jake: Hey, there's nothing wrong with our philosophy. We Work To Better Ourselves, And The Rest Of Humanity.
(Y'know--that's exactly, word-for-word, what Picard said. Is it a dang mantra, or something?
)
Nog: So what does that mean, exactly?
Jake: It means--it means we don't need money.
Nog: Well if you don't need money--than you certainly don't need mine.
The problem? That baseball card is for sale in an auction--and auctions require money!!!
Nog: Use your own money.
Jake: I'm human. I don't have any money.
Nog: It's not my fault your race abandoned currency-based economics in favor of some...philosophy of self-enhancement.
Jake: Hey, there's nothing wrong with our philosophy. We Work To Better Ourselves, And The Rest Of Humanity.
(Y'know--that's exactly, word-for-word, what Picard said. Is it a dang mantra, or something?
)Nog: So what does that mean, exactly?
Jake: It means--it means we don't need money.
Nog: Well if you don't need money--than you certainly don't need mine.
The problem? That baseball card is for sale in an auction--and auctions require money!!!
Yeah, it's lines like that that sometimes make Federation people sound brainwashed. Almost makes you wonder, they repeat that stuff in schools every day, like a prayer? Do they have media announcers repeating it every day?Jake: Hey, there's nothing wrong with our philosophy. We Work To Better Ourselves, And The Rest Of Humanity.
(Y'know--that's exactly, word-for-word, what Picard said. Is it a dang mantra, or something?
The rest of the conversation should probably go something like this:Nog: So how did you mean to auction for that baseball card, with no money?
Jake: Well... we use Federation credits.
Nog: What are Federation credits?
Jake: It's something we use to buy things. But it has no other use.
Nog: You mean, money?
Jake: It's not money!
Nog: What is the difference??
Jake: ...
See, the very fact that Jake wants the baseball card, single-handedly ruins the entire argument about Federation people having no desires other than their basic needs and stuff that can be replicated. A baseball card is not something that anyone needs for a living, yet Jake desires to possess it (and believes that his Starfleet captain father will be happy to obtain it), and is ready to auction for it! And the fact that it is unique, makes it more valuable than many other things Jake can get from the replicator or for a very little latinum at Quark's.
I for one don't think that the things that cause the existence of money are bad things -- or that they're the cause of suffering today. I think that ambition, and the desire to achieve more and gain more, if properly channelled, can be a force for good, provided they are tempered by, as you noted, the desire to better the common good and a greater sense of the need to avoid short-sighted decisions.
Joss Whedon's Serenity was about that theme -- the danger of deciding that you can make people "better," that it's your right to say that people aren't sufficiently "good," and that there can be a world without sin. As he put it in his commentary, the very things that we tend to think of as "sins" are also sources of good in humanity.
Or, as Mister Spock put it in the TOS episode "The Enemy Within," humans need their aggression and ambition as well as their compassion and their desire for peace.
I need to preface this by saying I'm firmly in the "Federation does have money" camp, but I think I understand how the vision of a "Moneyless Federation" is supposed to work, so I'll explain it.
Here's how it works: I make wine because I like making wine. I give the bottles away as gifts. I may want to save a few for my future use, but I'll give them to most anyone who asks for one.
What if more people ask for them than I have bottles to give? Perhaps they decide among themselves who wants it most, perhaps I decide for them. Perhaps I rule a few out because I don't like them for some reason. That's entirely fair: the reason I'm making wine in the first place is because it makes me happy, so I should give it to the people it makes me happiest to give it to.
Sisko's dad runs a restaurant because he likes it. He likes cooking meals for large numbers of people, sharing his artistic creation of food. And he gets his ingredients from people who like being farmers, and give him their produce because they like the idea of him sharing the fruit of their labor with many people.
Basically, the idea is that in the Federation, nobody is doing what they do because they wanted a bigger house, or a better view, or because they wanted to make sure their kids went to college. Everybody does what they do because it is what they love doing. People work not out of a desire for profit, but out of a desire to be productive and useful, to contribute to society.
It is a lovely idea, and certainly might work at least on the small scale.
But for every on-screen reference to the world being that way, there are at least two where it obviously isn't.
Why would I be willing to trade for that table: he's giving them away for free?
Here's how it works: I make wine because I like making wine. I give the bottles away as gifts. I may want to save a few for my future use, but I'll give them to most anyone who asks for one.
What if more people ask for them than I have bottles to give? Perhaps they decide among themselves who wants it most, perhaps I decide for them. Perhaps I rule a few out because I don't like them for some reason. That's entirely fair: the reason I'm making wine in the first place is because it makes me happy, so I should give it to the people it makes me happiest to give it to.
Sisko's dad runs a restaurant because he likes it. He likes cooking meals for large numbers of people, sharing his artistic creation of food. And he gets his ingredients from people who like being farmers, and give him their produce because they like the idea of him sharing the fruit of their labor with many people.
Basically, the idea is that in the Federation, nobody is doing what they do because they wanted a bigger house, or a better view, or because they wanted to make sure their kids went to college. Everybody does what they do because it is what they love doing. People work not out of a desire for profit, but out of a desire to be productive and useful, to contribute to society.
It is a lovely idea, and certainly might work at least on the small scale.
But for every on-screen reference to the world being that way, there are at least two where it obviously isn't.
Which means that people can or cannot get something they want based on whether someone likes them, or expects them to return a favor in the future and they have something he/she needs. This breeds inequality, is more unfair that selling things to people, because it limits people's access to certain types of goods and services even more so than if they had to pay for it, and it poses a real danger of the society becoming divided in cliques, with personal relationships deciding who gets what (beyond the basic needs).
When it comes to something like Sisko's restaurant, it is not a serious problem and it can work, but it becomes a lot more serious and problematic when it comes to things like, who gets to travel to Mars on the next flight and who gets turn away, or, even more serious, who gets to live on this little piece of land on Earth, and who will have to go and look for a place to live on one of the colonies, even though they'd much rather stay on the land where their ancestors lived (and this is likely to be an especially serious problem, since Earth would certainly be overcrowded in the 24th century: even taking the World War 3 into account, with the advancement in medicine, higher life standard, lack of any wars on Earth, the population of Earth would quickly rise to tens and tens of billions). Who would decide on these things? There would have to be established many authority bodies which would rule who is more worthy or more in need of real estate, travel tickets, etc. People in such positions of authority would be very powerful, and unless every one of them happened to be as ethical as Picard, this would open all sorts of possibilities for misuse of power. If you think selling and buying is unfair, what should we think of giving things away to friends, relatives, people you just happen to like, famous people, good-looking or charming people, people who have done you a favor or you expect them to make us a favor (maybe even sexual favors)... Think of the nepotism and corruption that exists today, and multiply it many, many times.
No, not based on any expectation of receiving anything in return, merely based on whether it would make the giver happy.
Ideally, if a stranger wants it really badly, if receiving it would increase his happiness more than it would for any of your friends, then giving it to him instead would make you happier than giving it to a friend.
I grant it is full of problems, but I think that is what Gene had in mind when he said they had no money: everyone follows his muse and nobody wants for anything.
Of course, this is often contradicted on screen.
I mean, look at Tapestry: Lieutenant Picard expresses and interest in pursuing a command position, and Riker and Troi both tell him no, basicly. "You can't follow your muse, Lieutenant, because you aren't any good at it." Nobody cares if you spend all your time being a bad painter, but a bad Captain gets other people killed. So not everyone gets to follow their muse.
And there are plenty of examples of unique or rare items. Now, Kivas Fajo was portrayed as sick because he wanted to own rare things simply because they were rare, but Sisko has his baseball, and Picard has his alien katchina-doll thing, and Jake wanted that baseball card for his dad. While Picard certainly liked having such a rare piece, and valued it as a gift from his professor, shouldn't he have been happier to give it to a museum where it could be seen by dozens of people each day?
A common scene in fiction is the guy visiting an artist's studio who really admires a painting there and the artist gives it to him as a gift, just because owning that painting would make the guy happy. Gene sort of imagined that writ large: everything is given for free because it makes the giver and receiver happy. Nobody wants what they don't have, because they realize that the people who do have it are happy, probably happier than they would be.
Here's where it gets hard to grasp: if there isn't enough of something to go around, people stop wanting it. They actually decide that they would be happy if that went to someone else. It isn't a matter of "who gets to stay on earth and who has to move to a colony", it is more like "who gets to stay on earth and who gets to move to a colony". Only a certain number of people can want to live on earth at any given time. Not can live on earth, can want to live on earth: hit that number, and people start wanting to leave. But no more people want to leave earth on any given day than there are available births on outgoing ships.
At least the Borg are honest about their mind control, but for something on the scale of the Federation to truely work without money of any kind, everybody has to allow what is best for the group to dictate their personal desires.
Ideally, if a stranger wants it really badly, if receiving it would increase his happiness more than it would for any of your friends, then giving it to him instead would make you happier than giving it to a friend.
I grant it is full of problems, but I think that is what Gene had in mind when he said they had no money: everyone follows his muse and nobody wants for anything.
Of course, this is often contradicted on screen.
I mean, look at Tapestry: Lieutenant Picard expresses and interest in pursuing a command position, and Riker and Troi both tell him no, basicly. "You can't follow your muse, Lieutenant, because you aren't any good at it." Nobody cares if you spend all your time being a bad painter, but a bad Captain gets other people killed. So not everyone gets to follow their muse.
And there are plenty of examples of unique or rare items. Now, Kivas Fajo was portrayed as sick because he wanted to own rare things simply because they were rare, but Sisko has his baseball, and Picard has his alien katchina-doll thing, and Jake wanted that baseball card for his dad. While Picard certainly liked having such a rare piece, and valued it as a gift from his professor, shouldn't he have been happier to give it to a museum where it could be seen by dozens of people each day?
A common scene in fiction is the guy visiting an artist's studio who really admires a painting there and the artist gives it to him as a gift, just because owning that painting would make the guy happy. Gene sort of imagined that writ large: everything is given for free because it makes the giver and receiver happy. Nobody wants what they don't have, because they realize that the people who do have it are happy, probably happier than they would be.
Here's where it gets hard to grasp: if there isn't enough of something to go around, people stop wanting it. They actually decide that they would be happy if that went to someone else. It isn't a matter of "who gets to stay on earth and who has to move to a colony", it is more like "who gets to stay on earth and who gets to move to a colony". Only a certain number of people can want to live on earth at any given time. Not can live on earth, can want to live on earth: hit that number, and people start wanting to leave. But no more people want to leave earth on any given day than there are available births on outgoing ships.
At least the Borg are honest about their mind control, but for something on the scale of the Federation to truely work without money of any kind, everybody has to allow what is best for the group to dictate their personal desires.
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My brother makes a slightly friendlier case:
Say that tapping your foot makes you happy. Then the guy sitting next to you asks you to stop, saying it is annoying him. You stop, not just because that's the nice thing to do, but because the knowledge that it is annoying others makes you unhappy. For the moment, tapping your foot no longer makes you happy.
If earth is getting overcrowded, your bad feelings about contributing to that problem for everyone begins to overwhelm your desire to stay. Eventually, you leave. When the population of earth reaches a number that doesn't create that feeling anymore, people stop, and the people who remain on earth just happen to be the people who wanted it most (whose desire to stay was stronger in comparison to the desire to not crowd others).
No sinister mind control, just an extreme value for the comfort of others.
Say that tapping your foot makes you happy. Then the guy sitting next to you asks you to stop, saying it is annoying him. You stop, not just because that's the nice thing to do, but because the knowledge that it is annoying others makes you unhappy. For the moment, tapping your foot no longer makes you happy.
If earth is getting overcrowded, your bad feelings about contributing to that problem for everyone begins to overwhelm your desire to stay. Eventually, you leave. When the population of earth reaches a number that doesn't create that feeling anymore, people stop, and the people who remain on earth just happen to be the people who wanted it most (whose desire to stay was stronger in comparison to the desire to not crowd others).
No sinister mind control, just an extreme value for the comfort of others.
^ That would imply that not just the society, but human nature itself has changed in just 4 centuries. Which Roddenberry might have believed possible, but which is actually extremely hard to believe, and unsupported by what we have seen on the screen (how many crazy rogue captains and bad/evil admirals have we seen on Trek?). And if so, if people were so perfect and without greed and desire for power, there would be no need to abolish money, a very useful and practical means of facilitating trade. People would just be using it for practical everyday matters, rather than trying to amass wealth.
Roddenberry got it backwards: it's not the money that is the reason for greed and inequality. It's the human nature, it's the possessiveness and desire for power, status, and/or luxury. If that were possible to change, it wouldn't matter at all if there is money around or not. Money in itself is nothing but a substitute for something else. And if you abolish money, but people are still the same, then greedy people will still be greedy, but for something else - goods, land, power, influence, people they can control...
Roddenberry got it backwards: it's not the money that is the reason for greed and inequality. It's the human nature, it's the possessiveness and desire for power, status, and/or luxury. If that were possible to change, it wouldn't matter at all if there is money around or not. Money in itself is nothing but a substitute for something else. And if you abolish money, but people are still the same, then greedy people will still be greedy, but for something else - goods, land, power, influence, people they can control...
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