Tatterdemalian: It's the only thing that ever held social constructs together. Government, economy, culture... all these things are at their most basic level one person trying to make another listen to his/her non-factual opinion.

Only at their most civilized. Government and culture also include the less subtle option of giving up trying to make the other person listen, and reverting to "Og smash Gred with rock".

Tatterdemalian: And economics as well, if you add the clause "and take Gred's stuff."

Fair enough.

Tatterdemalian: working together are stronger and can do more stuff

...as a general tendency, anyway.

abb3w: Tatterdemalian: It's the only thing that ever held social constructs together. Government, economy, culture... all these things are at their most basic level one person trying to make another listen to his/her non-factual opinion.

Only at their most civilized. Government and culture also include the less subtle option of giving up trying to make the other person listen, and reverting to "Og smash Gred with rock".

There are three ways you can get somebody else to do something:

1) Condign; through punishment or the threat of punishment. "Do this or I kill you." Might makes right. The valueset of The Strong, the ideology of militarism. The ruling class is The Army.

2) Condition; through persuasion, manipulation and influence. "Do this or bad things will happen." Opinion as fact. The valueset of the Shrewd, the ideology of theism. The ruling class is The Clergy.

3) Compensatory; through bargaining, bartering and bribing. "Do this and I'll give you this." Material accumulation. The valueset of the Swift, the ideology of trade/capitalism. The ruling class is The Merchant.

There is also an informal fourth way:

4) Competence; through aptitude and technical skill. "Do this because no one else can." Acquisition of knowledge. The valueset of the Smart, the ideology of utilitarianism. The ruling class is the Scientist.

I say it's informal because throughout the entirety of history the first three methods have all held power in one form or another (varies between location, culture, and time period), but the fourth group has never held power in any known culture anywhere. It is frequently abused by the first three methods, in fact, which is why it's informal; it's not technically a method of power at all.

These are the Methods of Power..... which is, in the most naked and raw of definition, simply the ability to get others to do what you want. You can beat them, you can trick them, or you can pay them. This is how all labor in human history has been organized; it is how all work is accomplished.

I know what you're thinking: That I may have left out "political power", through governments and social hierarchies. Well, no, because the truth is governments and social hierarchies are not power methods themselves. They are simply empty vessels, containers that are ultimately filled by whatever power methodology is strongest. Governments can be military dictatorships, religious fundamentalisms or capitalist oligarchies. Don't mistaken the institution (the ends) for the methodology (the means).

/this is what happens when I'm up for two days and no coffee

Ishkur: 1) Condign
2) Condition
3) Compensatory
4) Competence

The first and last I usually file as "Dominance" and "Prestige" within the broader concept of Authority; the other two suggest interesting further nuance distinctions.

I'd also suggest "Engineer" rather than "Scientist", but that's a quibble. However, it sounds like "The Anatomy of Power" is worth adding to my list. Is Competence one of Galbraith's suggestions, or someone else's?

Ishkur: I know what you're thinking: That I may have left out "political power", through governments and social hierarchies.

No; I'm too familiar with the Riddle of Varys. The implications follow.

Tatterdemalian: The first three methods have held power throughout history because the fourth is a delusion created by the modern entitlement generation to try to pretend they're special and should get provided for without having to work.

Tell it to the ghost of Robert Oppenheimer.

Tatterdemalian: /protip: you're not special, and anything you can do can be done by someone else

Not necessarily by everyone, however; for example, many people find the logical mindset for engineering, computer programming, and so forth to be beyond their mental ability, or so difficult as to be useless when time constraints are non-trivial. Occasionally people have useful skills so rare that cannot be comparably duplicated by anyone else living. The extreme of complete uniqueness, however, is not an absolute requirement to have significant value.

abb3w: I'd also suggest "Engineer" rather than "Scientist", but that's a quibble. However, it sounds like "The Anatomy of Power" is worth adding to my list. Is Competence one of Galbraith's suggestions, or someone else's?

Yeah. Can you tell I'm a big fan of JKG?

He only lists the first three -- I actually added the fourth myself, which I kinda drummed up after watching a James Burke marathon (nobody summarizes the history of technology better than him).

There is some merit -- some power -- in being an engineer/scientist/technocrat.... you have abilities that no one else has. More importantly, those abilities are in demand. The purest, most egalitarian example of this is sports, but it exists in every profession: There is a top echelon of people who are simply smarter/better/faster/more creative than everyone else. And they ply these skills for power and prestige.

Why the technocrats have never been a ruling group is a fairly easy answer: Historically speaking, technological progress was barely noticeable up until the Industrial Age. And most of it was in service to the army.

Things have changed within the last generation or so, and it all has to do not with technological progress, but the RATE of technological progress. For one, it is annihilating tradition at an increasingly astonishing rate. And for another, age seems to slow down the learning faculties in the brain, so it becomes harder to keep up with the pace of change as one gets older (especially since it is accelerating).

It is my summation that we are slowly entering a new Age of techno-haves and have-nots, or as Burke aptly put it: "Never before have so many people understood so little about so much."

I was hoping this would spark more discussion in this thread. Oh well.

Ishkur: Can you tell I'm a big fan of JKG?

With the aid of Google.

Ishkur: He only lists the first three -- I actually added the fourth myself, which I kinda drummed up after watching a James Burke marathon (nobody summarizes the history of technology better than him).

You might find Joe Heinrich's papers on the Dominance/Prestige distinction of authority somewhat interesting, in that light.

Ishkur: I was hoping this would spark more discussion in this thread.

Keep banging those rocks together; maybe another thread will turn out to be a fuse.

Tatterdemalian: Oppenheimer himself never believed his understanding of physics was somehow unique, and eliminating him, or even the entire Manhattan Project, would only have caused the atomic bomb to be invented by someone other than the USA first,

So... there was no-one else who could have developed the atomic bomb in that time frame?

Tatterdemalian: No-one else did, but that doesn't mean no-one else could.

General Groves seemed to think otherwise at the time.