Rome is literally America or why Sargon of Akkad should not be taken seriously

[Notter]

You can make the same point without making erroneous comparisons to Rome.

well, no one's perfect, eh?

personally i don't really care how accurate his comparison was, because it's just a his way of delivering a narrative.
you need to understand, he wasn't making an academic study here, so you finding faults, does not shock me nor should it matter.

basically, you're overreacting.

[Soikona]

British accent? Check.
Whines about religion? Check.
Whines about feminism? Check.
Arrogant? Check.

These guys are a dime a dozen on youtube. It's like if you have a British accent people automatically assume that you know what you're talking about.

What exactly is a British accent??

[sarahtasher]

Anyone saying that the poor were fed by wealthy Romans to achieve political ambitions does not understand, at all, the system of the time

1)There was a massive disdain in the Greek-Roman world for manual labor, platitudes about the Roman patrician living the simple life in the countryside aside. Hard work was for slaves, not citizens. (IE the whole idea of ''welfare'' is not really applicable in a world where the citizen was usually not working. The most blatant case would be the idols of the right, the Spartans, who, to the awe of the rest of the world, did not had productive activities for their entire lives)

2)Romans electoral process, completely a sham well before the principate, did not made ''I'm going to pay the poor to vote for me'' a working concept. The idea was to vote in ''centuries'' organized on wealth The 100 ish richest citizen vote as one unit, then the second 100ish, and at the end everyone else. Of course, it was usueful, for ''electoral campaigns'' to have following you a large crowd of clients,to show your power, generosity and influence (beating up the opposition was not that important in that perspective)

3)Feeding the poor was related also to a key concept, evergetism, that is, benefactor, the rich citizen (the princeps, or any ambitious Roman politician) giving to the community. It was completely excepted at the time that the rich dude organized feasts and religious ceremonies with his fortune. What else he could do with it ? (That's not a rhetorical question)

[NED funded]

well, no one's perfect, eh?

personally i don't really care how accurate his comparison was, because it's just a his way of delivering a narrative.
you need to understand, he wasn't making an academic study here, so you finding faults, does not shock me nor should it matter.

basically, you're overreacting.

Details can make or break narrative. Unless you believe narrative>facts.

[GennGreymane]

Who is this person?

[Notter]

Details can make or break narrative. Unless you believe narrative>facts.

details did not break his nerrative, since it wasn't intended to be literal in the first place, as you took it.
i think you're refusing to understand that part.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

I don't think Doom and gloom really helps.

[NED funded]

details did not break his nerrative, since it wasn't intended to be literal in the first place, as you took it.
i think you're refusing to understand that part.

Yes it does. Specially when he tries to compare slaves to immigrants.

[Theodarzna]

I haven't watched the 90 minute video you posted, so forgive me if I'm missing something .

If I need to cite it I will link to specific relevant moments in the talk? Okay?

However, to summarize:

Complexity requires energy, as societies get more complex the problems they have to solve eventually overwhelm said society leading to the collapse of complex societies. Societies do not by default become complex, and many often avoid complexity because of the costs and difficulties associated with it. His point is that we, like all civilizations prior will be overwhelmed by problems, even as we solve other problems our solutions will have problems of their own.

- Societies change, thus the only thing that one can do is adapt to those changes, the only thing we can do is make the transition smoother for those left out, this holds true for most forms of governing. Education gives a sense of stability since you can fall back on the skills acquired to get a newly job, if they ever fire you and social safety nets are a thing. Wheather or not stability of labor will hold true later on is a different issue that I lack the knowledge to discuss.

Societies may change, but do they change multiple times in a single human lifespan? Do they have a constant need to change and is the change always all encompassing and global? The problem today is that we make lots of rapid changes that outrun the ability of any human to "adapt," to them. Education gives no sense of stability of it assures nothing and consumes time. Consider this, effectively education today is "Sink 4-6 years of life in an institution to get a credential that costs you the equivalent of a house that assures you no career or secure job." Now the job market is increasingly casual, temp work and insecure. Jobs have few benefits, no stability, nothing to build a life on.

Even now, the stability of knowing what you will be doing in 10 years with any confidence is just not there, people can't plan a life around that kind of chaos.

the idea that the USA is an oligarchy comes from a study that stated :
Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organised groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.

The policies proposed by trump's base are backed by corporate industries that do not like competition from other countries, so in that sense even if their base gets what they want they'll do it because there has been a shift in corporate interests. Not because individuals or large base groups advocated for it.

Policies proposed by Trump enjoy popular support, not necessarily corporate support. The Investment banks are with Clinton, Wall-Street is with Clinton, its Labor that isn't largely with Clinton..... well the actual Laborers that are not.

Globalization has its costs, those costs IMHO are not being dealt with. More importantly, problems tend to not come at you individually, as Dr. Tainter puts it, the issues a civilization encounters will often seem tractable and solvable at first but these problems often develop commutative costs.

[Lady Dragonheart]

Comparing the US to Rome not only sounds drastically shortsighted, but it's little more than doom-saying by this point.

[Darkeon]

OP got triggered?

[Nadiru]

OP got triggered?

Sargon of Cuckkad has always been a low-tier youtube """philosopher.""" If I needed a conservative-nationalist bent with a British accent I'd just watch Peter Hitchens videos.

[Darkeon]

Sargon of Cuckkad has always been a low-tier youtube """philosopher.""" If I needed a conservative-nationalist bent with a British accent I'd just watch Peter Hitchens videos.

And that's completely fine. Why would you feel the need to state that, while personally insulting someone, is way beyond me. But you are free to have your preferences~

[Theodarzna]

Comparing the US to Rome not only sounds drastically shortsighted, but it's little more than doom-saying by this point.

The comparison really only works in the shallowest sense that,

We, like all civilizations before us, are ultimately doomed.

The ability to draw parallels with Rome is purely because Rome has a lot of first hand documentation and looms large among the Western Imagination.

But really the comparisons are only illustratively useful.

[Nadiru]

And that's completely fine. Why would you feel the need to state that, while personally insulting someone, is way beyond me. But you are free to have your preferences~

Because this is America the internet and you can be a dick on the internet if you want to be a dick on the internet.

[Darkeon]

Because this is America the internet and you can be a dick on the internet if you want to be a dick on the internet.

I find that it says a lot about one's maturity levels when someone confuses "Can" with "Should". But hey, whatever floats one's boat!

[May90]

There are many people on Youtube with silly opinions. Just ignore them and move on.

[Nadiru]

I find that it says a lot about one's maturity levels when someone confuses "Can" with "Should". But hey, whatever floats one's boat!

I find it says a lot about one's intelligence levels when someone conflates "Is doing something right now" with "Always does that as a matter of course."

[AztechZero]

Sargon almost sounds like Glenn Beck in this video. i remember years ago, Glenn Beck was barking up this same tree all the damn time.

[NED funded]

If I need to cite it I will link to specific relevant moments in the talk? Okay?

However, to summarize:

Complexity requires energy, as societies get more complex the problems they have to solve eventually overwhelm said society leading to the collapse of complex societies. Societies do not by default become complex, and many often avoid complexity because of the costs and difficulties associated with it. His point is that we, like all civilizations prior will be overwhelmed by problems, even as we solve other problems our solutions will have problems of their own.



Societies may change, but do they change multiple times in a single human lifespan? Do they have a constant need to change and is the change always all encompassing and global? The problem today is that we make lots of rapid changes that outrun the ability of any human to "adapt," to them. Education gives no sense of stability of it assures nothing and consumes time. Consider this, effectively education today is "Sink 4-6 years of life in an institution to get a credential that costs you the equivalent of a house that assures you no career or secure job." Now the job market is increasingly casual, temp work and insecure. Jobs have few benefits, no stability, nothing to build a life on.

Even now, the stability of knowing what you will be doing in 10 years with any confidence is just not there, people can't plan a life around that kind of chaos.



Policies proposed by Trump enjoy popular support, not necessarily corporate support. The Investment banks are with Clinton, Wall-Street is with Clinton, its Labor that isn't largely with Clinton..... well the actual Laborers that are not.

Globalization has its costs, those costs IMHO are not being dealt with. More importantly, problems tend to not come at you individually, as Dr. Tainter puts it, the issues a civilization encounters will often seem tractable and solvable at first but these problems often develop commutative costs.

I concede point 1 since I really haven't read on labor disruption caused by technology in a while, but STEM should be a safe bet in terms of labor security.
On the second point I don't think you are understanding what I'm saying. The US is an oligarchy because corporate interests drives policy, the fact that this policy has popular support only makes the process easier. The corporate interests in the case of Trump are companies that benefit from not having to face competition and right now they are the ones drafting Trump's plan.