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Тема
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 Алпинистът веган Скатов покорява осемхилядници
[re: Mod vege]
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| Автор |
Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 18.10.15 14:43 |
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За границите на човешките възможности
Алпинистът веган Атанас Скатов покорява осемхилядници
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Тема
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 Re: Алпинистът веган Скатов покорява осемхилядници
[re: Mod vege]
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~@!$^%*amp;()_+ (целия горен ред) |
| Публикувано | 18.10.15 20:21 |
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Сещам се за вица за чукчата и резачката
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Тема
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 WHO: Bacon, red meat, processed meats cause cancer
[re: Mod vege]
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Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 24.10.15 03:48 |
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"
Farmers and the meat industry have expressed concern about the impact on sales if the organisation lists processed meat as a carcinogen
The World Cancer Research Fund has already come out to say that there is strong evidence that eating a lot red and processed meat increases the risk of bowel cancer Rex
The World Health Organisation is reportedly planning to declare that bacon, sausages and other processed meat cause cancer.
Red meat is also expected to be listed as being “probably carcinogenic to humans”.
A source told The Daily Mail that the announcements were expected to be made on Monday with processed meat put in the same category as cigarettes, alcohol and asbestos.
The NHS Choices website says that “evidence shows that there is probably a link between eating red and processed meat and the risk of bowel cancer”.
“People who eat a lot of these meats are at higher risk of bowel cancer than those who eat small amounts,” it adds.
However it says beef, lamb and pork “can form part of a healthy diet” and that red meat is “a good source of protein and provides vitamins and minerals, such as iron and zinc”.
The World Cancer Research Fund says: “There is strong evidence that eating a lot of these foods [red and processed meat] increases your risk of bowel cancer.”
Farmers and the meat industry have expressed concern about the impact on sales if the WHO lists processed meat as a carcinogen.
Betsy Booren, of the North American Meat Institute, said recently: “If they determine that red and processed meat causes cancer – and I think they will – that moniker will stick … It could take decades and billions of dollars to change that.”
The Government previously warned the public in 2011 about the dangers of excessive amounts of red meat."
Редактирано от Mod vege на 24.10.15 03:49.
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Тема
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How Much Water Do You Eat?
[re: Mod vege]
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Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 24.10.15 04:18 |
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As the record-setting California drought continues, everyone is encouraged to reduce the water footprint. Numerous experts tell us to think twice before taking a hot relaxing bath, to install low-flow shower heads, to purchase water-efficient toilets, and so on. It’s all very nice but hardly anyone knows that “the food we eat makes up more than 2/3 of our total water footprint”, as the GRACE Communications Foundation has reported. So, if we really want to make the change, we have to change our eating habits. You may ask how to do that and the answer is more than simple – eat more plant-based food.
The Guardian says that “meat production requires much higher amount of water than vegetables. IME state that to produce 1kg of meat requires between 5,000 and 20,000 liters of water whereas to produce 1kg of wheat requires between 500 and 4,000 liters of water.” Ecology explains that the difference is so radical because “you have to account for the water the animals drink and also the water that goes into growing their feed.” Even California’s Governor Jerry Brown claimed that “we should be eating veggie burger” in an interview with the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday night.
As Ecology says, “you might be thinking, but the beef at the supermarket have already been grown. That water is already used, so we might as well eat it. However, if we buy and eat water intensive foods now, the food industry will continue to grow or even increase growing them in the future.” That’s why the best time to change our eating habits is today.
If you are still not sure whether it’s worth it to cook beans instead of beef tonight, scroll down and check out some statistics.
Info: The Guardian, IME, Ecology, GRACE Communication Foundation, Los Angeles Times
More info:
Meanwhile:
So, what are you going to cook today ?
Редактирано от Mod vege на 24.10.15 15:18.
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Тема
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A Scientist Who Worked on the WHO’s Report on meat
[re: Mod vege]
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Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 02.11.15 01:24 |
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Expert Mariana Stern helps us digest the new findings about carnivorism and cancer
Consuming large amounts of red meat has long been associated with higher cholesterol and other health risks, but the recent report issued by the World Health Organization has made the link more definitive—and, for hot dog fans, more scary. WHO asked 22 scientists to review more than 800 studies from around the world to evaluate the carcinogenicity (i.e., the potential for cancer causation) of consumption of red meat and processed meats. Their findings, presented in Lyon, France, a few weeks ago and released on Monday, pushed WHO to give processed meat a “Group 1” categorization as a potential cause of cancer (tobacco and asbestos exposure share that designation, though at a much higher risk).
Stern_MarianaThe only Californian on the panel, Mariana Stern, PhD, is an associate professor in the Division of Cancer Epidemiology at USC who has long studied genetics, the environment, and diet as it relates to cancer risk. Full disclosure: She also happens to be one of my closest friends. So I asked Mariana to clarify some outstanding questions we had around the office about what this all means, and how it could impact the way we eat.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty here, , “the increase in risk is so slight that experts said most people should not be overly worried about it.” How do you respond?
I do not agree with this entirely. Indeed, this is not an issue that the public should panic about. Even though processed meats now share the same category as tobacco smoke, the level of risk from processed meats is not nearly as large as that of tobacco smoke. That said, there are currently very few dietary items that have been comprehensively studied and evaluated across the entire literature to determine their role in cancer. We know that diet may contribute up to 30 percent of the cancer burden. Diet is the second modifiable risk factor after tobacco smoke. Given that most cancers are caused by multiple factors that act jointly, and likely in different combinations in different people, the more we know about modifiable risk factors that we can change, the more we can reduce the cancer burden in the population. Specifically, colorectal cancer is currently the third leading cancer-related cause of death in the US (the second among Hispanics!), and accounts for 50,000 deaths a year in the U.S. and 130,000 cancer diagnoses per year. Anything we can do to reduce this cancer burden should be important to the public. These findings give us the opportunity to make changes in our diet that may lower our risk of cancer. For multifactorial cancers, like colorectal cancer, every bit we do to lower the risk counts. This comprehensive evaluation is suggesting that we should pay attention to processed meats in our diet and try to limit their intake.
OK, what do you mean by “processed meats,” and does this include all meats, even chicken and turkey?
Processed meats, or “PMs,” are meats that have been transformed by techniques like salting, curing, fermenting, or smoking to enhance their flavor and/or to preserve them. This includes bacon, sausages, hot dogs, and cold cuts. It may include white meats like poultry, too, but the WHO’s Working Group was not able to distinguish red from white processed meats.
What about preserved fish?
That wasn’t included in the study. However, I want to mention that a previous evaluation from WHO indicated that salted fish was a risk factor for nasopharyngeal cancer.
How does processing turn meat into a cancer-causer? I thought sausage was just the same parts ground up and seasoned.
By the addition of nitrate salts and other chemical compounds. In the human body, nitrate salts are known to form powerful carcinogens called nitrosamines. Processed meats that are smoked may contain additional carcinogens.
Are some processed meats less harmful than others? Companies like Applegate Farms trumpet the use of naturally occurring nitrates in their processed meats—nitrates from celery, for example—over synthetic sodium nitrites in more mass market-oriented cold cuts.
We didn’t distinguish between “naturally” processed meats versus more industrial-scale methods—these data were not available to us from the existing epidemiological studies. That said, naturally occurring nitrate salts, such as those found in celery juice, which is used for treating these so-called “natural” processed meats, can react in the body much in the same way as chemically added nitrates. The body may not distinguish between artificially added nitrates and naturally occurring ones. Future studies should examine if the formation of cancer-causing nitrosamines is perhaps lower in naturally treated meats than traditionally treated ones. Until that evidence is out there, we should probably consider these meats just as processed as others.
That’s a bummer, those natural processed meats are a staple in my lunchbox. The Working Group also documented increased cancer risk for consumption of beef and pork—even without any processing. Where does that risk come from?
One of the key mechanisms by which red meat may increase cancer risk is due to the presence of heme iron, a molecule that transports iron in blood. High doses of heme iron have been linked to several harmful effects in the body, in particular the colorectum.
What about grass-fed cattle?
High levels of heme iron are present in red meats, and this will not change based on the feeding approach used for cattle.
What if I processed the meat myself at home, or if I ate it at a fancy restaurant that is butchering in-house and processing everything itself? Does that matter?
If they end up using a smaller amount of the nitrates for smoking, yes; if the final levels of nitrates are comparable to store-bought processed meats, probably not. Again, the new generation of studies will have to look at these different types of meat sources to refine the evaluation.
Wood-fire grilling is a big craze in restaurants these days. Is this hurting our health?
Meat cooked over flames is known to accumulate polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which have been linked to cancer (they are also present in other combustion products, including cigarette smoke). Also, meats cooked at high temperatures (regardless of flames or no flames) accumulate heterocyclic amines (HAAs), which are powerful carcinogens. So the mechanistic evidence suggests that meats cooked in this way may be harmful. Chicken cooked at high temperatures has been found to accumulate HAAs, too. There is evidence that marinating red meat in soy-based sauces can reduce the formation of HAA.
Does that apply to slow smoking, too?
Temperature and cooking duration are both determinants of HAA formation. The higher the temperature and the longer the meat cooks, the more HAA that form.
RELATED
How Faux Meat Went Mass Market
A recent study suggests that a Mediterranean diet—one that’s sparing with red meat but involves leaner animal protein, grains, greens, and olive oil—is associated with reduced Alzheimer’s risk. Now this study is emphasizing another benefit of cutting down on red meats. But research is also suggesting that many fish these days don’t just contain mercury but also plastic and fibers from artificial materials. All three of those are potentially carcinogenic. So it seems like you’re kind of screwed no matter which way you go!
The Mediterranean diet is a great example of a healthy diet: limited red meat and animal protein, but lots of fiber from fruits, vegetables, olive oil, and grains.
I understand that the purpose of the Working Group wasn’t to come up with dietary guidelines, but the question remains: How much meat is safe to eat?
Until newer recommendations come in light of our findings at the WHO panel, we should follow the current recommendations from the World Cancer Research Fund, an organization that has been evaluating diet and cancer for more than a decade. These recommendations are based on much of the same literature that we evaluated. They advise to limit consumption of red meat to less than 500 grams (18 ounces) per week, so roughly about 71 grams per day (2.5 ounces), with as little as possible being processed meat. For comparison, a hamburger is anywhere between 66 to 85 grams. So perhaps one way to process all of this information is to think about limiting those dietary factors that now are known to cause cancer (e.g. processed meats), that are possible cancer causing agents (e.g. red meat), or may cause cancer or other disorders (e.g. contaminated fish), and to enrich the diet with factors that have been found by many studies and comprehensive evaluations to protect against cancer and other diseases, including fruits and vegetables, grains, and healthy fats like olive oil. Most importantly, be physically active and keep a healthy body mass index.
Some Internet headlines about your study are implying that eating a hot dog a day is as much a risk as smoking a cigarette a day. Sounds like that is a mischaracterization.
Yes, it is. We cannot compare these two carcinogens side by side in this way. For reference a hot dog is 45 grams. The epidemiological evidence, when looked jointly through meta-analysis, shows that for every 50 grams per day of intake of processed meats the risk of colorectal cancer increases by 18%. So roughly, if you ate 50 grams per day of processed meats during your life, your lifetime risk of colorectal cancer would go from 5% to 6%.
You are from Argentina, which is famous for its meats. Has studying the potential effects of meat consumption changed the way you eat?
I have been studying the role of meat intake and cancer, and diet and cancer in general, for almost a decade now. And yes, it has influenced what I eat. I am currently a vegan.
Has the panel already experienced pushback from the beef lobby?
They have made it very clear already that they do not agree with our findings. Some of them claim that we squeezed the data to get these results, which is not true. We looked at every single study published out there and took a very systematic approach to make the final evaluations. This approach has been used by IARC/WHO for decades to evaluate 900-plus agents and it is very clearly spelled out in its preamble. All members of the Working Group were independent researchers with no conflict of interests on the outcome. Many of the members of the beef industry were present as observers and they got a chance to see how carefully we evaluated the evidence.
What are some of their key claims?
For example, they claim that the evidence is weak, that we cannot rule out that other factors linked with diets high in meat may be playing a role. Our response is that the evidence for processed meats is very strong and consistent across studies done in North American, Europe, Japan, and Australia. For the evaluation we considered only those studies that had considered carefully all possible factors that could be correlated and be associated with cancer (what we call confounders in epidemiology), as well as sources of error that could inflate our results (what we call biases), as well as random chance. There were 18 large prospective studies with data available. Of these, 12 (which included the largest studies) showed positive associations with processed meats. The chances that confounders could explain this, when the data comes from different parts of the world, and were carefully considered, is unlikely. Also, we see a dose-response effect between higher intake and higher risk, which suggests that random chance, bias, or confounding are unlikely to explain this. Moreover, the mechanistic evidence for an association between red meat and processed meats and cancer was found by the working group to be “strong.”
RELATED
Paleo Living Advocate Mark Sisson Makes His Case
We’ve heard theories on why so many people are gluten sensitive. It’s too early now, but if you were to speculate, what do you think might be an evolutionary explanation for why an omnivorous human experiences a heightened cancer risk from eating meat?
I am not an evolutionary biologist so I’m not exactly the expert to comment on this, but it has been hypothesized that our body has not evolved that much from the time we were hunter-gatherers, yet we do not live like our ancestors lived, which leads to a “mismatch” between our body adaptations and our lifestyle, which may lead to diseases. Hunter-gatherers would travel 10 to 15 kilometers per day to gather food, would eat meat sporadically, and were physically active at a level that we are not today. We evolved to crave carbs because they gave us the necessary energy to survive back then, and to hike the entire day to gather food. Meat consumption in the Western world is much higher than what it was likely back in those times, and we are not as physically active. Yet we still crave carbs, we eat highly processed foods (something our ancestors did not have!), and we are perhaps exposed to more carcinogens than we had been before, through food and air pollution and other exposures.
Science being science, we do the best we can with the knowledge we have at any given moment. And it turns out that we can end up reversing ourselves down the line as new findings come out. I’m thinking of the many reversals regarding, say, coffee—now it’s considered healthful—and various nutritional supplements. A recent study found that fish supplements and calcium supplements offer no benefit whatsoever. Do you think we’ll be reversing ourselves on this one at some distant point in the future?
A lot of these reversals happen because individual studies are cited, get a lot of press attention, and then a new study comes that contradicts that, and it gives the public the impression that we do not know what we are doing or saying. I get it. But there are comprehensive evaluations of the literature—like this one—that are done every once in a while and those tend to be most informative, and those are less likely to change in opposite directions. In fact, dietary factors that have been comprehensively studied and evaluated and found to increase risk of cancer are few. I think that different organizations, ourselves in academia included, should do a better job of educating the public. I cannot say with 100 percent certainty, but I do not think the evidence on processed meats is likely to be reversed. Perhaps we may be able to further refine the safe intake levels to better advise the public and understand better the possible mechanisms.
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Като гледам определени хора тук имат нужда от самоубеждавания и мантри.
Селективно самоубеждаване обаче,само това което диктува доктрината...
Най-тежката цена която плащаме е за самоналожения товар от доктрини,фанатизъм,правилност!!!
И когато един българин навремето ми рече че имало статия някъде където пишело че вегетарианството е болест във главата..сега след години разбрах какво е имал предвид.
Аз имах одисея с вегетарианци.
Преживял съм от първа ръка кошмара където се казва.
Интересно ми е,как живеят като отшелници тия,продължават да обвиняват ненормалния свят..имаха няколко отново прецакани от тях самите връзки след нас.
И съм сигурен че няма да има кой да им угоди на вегетарианството и изискванията.
Все някой ще е недостатъчно уважил ги,все ще бълнуват че света им се подиграва.
Да живееш вечно в чуство за вина и за това че..нищо..ние ще сме такива каквито Учителя Дънов повелява..пък те месоядните няма да наследят шестата раса.
Демек рано или късно ще стигнем на тяхната де..ако сме се осъзнаели?
Тия хора виждат противници и врагове.
Лошото е че и нас бяха почнали да ни обсебват със сектантските си разсъждения за изключителност.
Но понеже сме били готини хора..щели да ни вземат под крилцето си...щели сме да бъдем осветлени от тяхната велика мисъл.
Аз да го бях барнал когато ми спука гумите тоя страхлив мизерник,или когато ми надра колата с пирон..щях да му нарисувам един хуи на неговото чело...
И да му го завра отзад това ръждиво марташко пиронче.
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Тема
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КАКВО МЕСО ДА ЯДЕМ ? - Д-р Гайдурков
[re: Mod vege]
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| Автор |
Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 08.11.15 10:48 |
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"... Инуитите (ескимосите), североамериканските индианци, монголците и много други, са се хранели преимуществено с месо. При тях ракът и другите дегенеративни заболявания, от които масово страда съвременпният човек, са били практически непознати. Отговорът на загадката е изключително прост, но за съжаление, нито при Китайското изследване, нито при другите масово публикувани съвременни изследвания върху корелацията между употребата на меса и заболяванията, той не е взет под внимание. Този изключително съществен пропуск тотално преобръща валидността на техните изводи. Огромната по важност разделителна линия и причината за този парадокс е термичната обработка на месото. Споменатите здрави в миналото народи, са консумирали месото в сурово, главно сушено състояние. Днес редица изследвания и наблюдения потвърждават факта, че дори хищните животни, които притежават всички анатомични и физиологични механизми за безпроблемна обработка на месо се разболяват от същите дегенеративни заболявания, както и човекът, когато биват хранени с термично обработено месо (такива са домашните любимци – кучета и котки). Хранещите се със сурово месо не развиват нито едно от тях.
Познанието за тези факти може да ни служи като безценен практически ориентир за това как можем здравословно да градираме нашите кулинарни предпочитания, както и да се ориентираме безпогрешно в противоречивия на пръв поглед поток от информация, която ни заобикаля.
Най-вредната и нежелателна форма, под която можем да ползваме месата е индустриално технологично преработената. Не случайно и препоръката на Световната здравна организация днес е да се избягват точно тези меса (processed meat). Индустриално преработените меса, дори и най-вече суровите (сушените) са подлагани на третиране с вещества, най-токсичното сред които е натриевият нитрит (не нитрат,който също се добавя) – Е250, изписван също като нитритна сол.Тук спадат дълготрайните колбаси – салами,луканки,пастърми,сушено филе,шунка и др., както и консервираната, пушена и готово-маринована риба. Трябва да подчертаем също, че био-месо не означава без консерванти, а с разрешени такива, сред които е и споменатият натриев нитрит.
Най-безопасната форма, под която можем да ползваме различните видове меса е най-древната – домашното сушене. В днешно време това можем да постигнем много лесно и бързо, като филетираме на тънко месото и го изсушим само за няколко часа на дехидратор или във фурна с вентилатор на не повече от 40 гр. С (за да избегнем риска от превишаване на тези градуси, можем да настроим термостата между 50 и 0 и леко да открехнем вратичката.) За гарантиране на хигиената и безопасността е препоръчително предварителното шоково замразяване.
По отношение на видовете меса, можем на първо място да се ориентираме към месо от пасищни пилета. За тази цел най-достъпни като източник са малките, лично проверени ферми около градовете. На второ място като по-концентрирани са червените меса. Сланината е също един реабилитиран възможен избор, особено за зимните месеци. Рибата трябва да е по възможност най-прясна и може да се приготвя като домашно маринована, след филетиране и потапяне за няколко часа в лимонов сок с предпочитани подправки. Традиционното за българската кухня количество месо е около 300г, 1 път седмично. По-големи количества са допустими за таргетни групи – спортисти, работници при тежък физически труд и др.
Термично обработените меса е желателно да присъстват като празнични ястия, така, както са били в българската традиция.
Месата могат да се ползват самостоятелно или съчетани на един прием със зеленчуци – сурови и/или термично обработени. Не е препоръчителна едновременната консумация с въглехидрати като картофи, хляб, зърнени варива(особено глутен-съдържащи). Могат да се приемат и последователно, непосредствено след консумация на въглехидратни храни – по този начин те се разполагат в стомашно-чревния тракт едно след друго, несмесени.
Д-р Георги Гайдурков"
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ей ше земе да ти дойде акъла най на края
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Тема
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Футурулогия:capitalism ’mutating’ infotech utopia?
[re: Mod vege]
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| Автор |
Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 09.11.15 05:32 |
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И за който се интересува от структурата на обществото ни, от там и за икономиката и екологията:
?
ANN PETTIFOR 6 November 2015
“He needs to take into greater account the impact of technology on both increased exploitation of labour and the dominance of the finance sector.” Review of Paul Mason’s ‘Post Capitalism: A Guide to Our Future’ (Allen Lane, 2015)
Living Large - Argonne's First Computer, 1953. Wikicommons/ENERGY.GOV. Some rights reserved.
This book is an intellectually exhilarating read. While I have reservations about Mason’s thesis, I would recommend Post Capitalism to anyone interested in history, political thought, the past, present and future of info-tech, and above all, the future of capitalism. Mason draws on thinkers as diverse as Karl Marx, Herbert Marcuse and the management guru, Peter Drucker. In searching for an understanding of how capitalism may progress from here, his book draws on, and spans, a range of disciplines – history, physics (the wave form) engineering (of aircraft turbofans), computer science, economics, and political and social theory.
All this, added to his skill as a writer and his knack of drawing on his own (and his grandmother’s) lived experience in northern working class Britain, results in a book that is passionate, rigorous and challenging. Regrettably he has not included a bibliography. That would have taken up many pages, as the breadth of his sources is remarkable. As a result he has added many volumes to my reading list.
Finally Mason outlines a vision that is not entirely improbable, but could also be defined as utopian. In this unequal and divided world, we need more utopians. So despite my own pessimism about his thesis, I do recommend that you read Mason’s book.
Capitalism’s mutations
Throughout the book Mason presents capitalism as an apparently abstract force, subject to cyclical “mutations” (a word that pops up frequently).
Mutation is a natural process that changes a DNA sequence in for example, a virus. So capitalism for Mason is like a virus that may mutate into a more benign, collective and collaborative form of human activity.
By defining capitalism in this way, Mason does not attempt to identify and differentiate between the forces, or groups of individuals driving capitalism. Are they today’s oligopolists? Are they the drivers behind for example, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple? Are they organized in for example, the Bilderberg group and do they visit Davos each year? Or can they be found in Wall St, Frankfurt and the City of London? Mason keeps us in the dark. In fact insofar as he has a preoccupation with capitalists, it is with a particular group: industrial capitalists engaged in tangible and intangible modes of production, namely infotech.
Interestingly, while the working class in Mason’s account exercises agency over capitalism – resisting wage cuts, adapting to technology, organizing around technological change – capitalism’s dominant class appears not to have such power. Instead “it” – capitalism - is subject to underlying forces. “It” “adapts and morphs” into fifty-year patterns or mutations that rise and fall in long waves of capital investment in accordance with Kondratieff’s theory of long waves.
“Capitalism’s tendency” Mason writes “is not to collapse, but rather, to mutate.” (p.34)
There is one period, and one chapter in the book (Chapter 4) in which Mason acknowledges that capitalism, in particular the finance sector, was once subdued. This is the post-war period, known to most economists as the Golden Age of Economics. Mason acknowledges (p.81) that:
“the crucial factor that underpinned economic reality in the 1950s and 60s was a stable international currency system, and the effective suppression of financial markets.”
He notes:
“strict limits on bank leverage were imposed by law and ‘moral suasion – quiet pressure from central banks on banks that lent too much. ...The result created a form of capitalism that was profoundly national. Banks and pension funds were required by law to hold the debt of their own countries; and they were discouraged from making cross-border financial trades. Add to that an explicit ceiling on interest rates and you have what we now call ‘financial repression’.”
“Financial repression” as PRIME’s Jeremy Smith , is self-evidently a metaphor and a pejorative one at that. Someone or something is kept down by the repressor evoking mental images such as tanks crushing peaceful demonstrations, or robber barons “capturing” or “stealing” your money. Which is why Mason’s use of it is unfortunate.
The term was first coined in 1973 by two Stanford University economists, and Edward Shaw. Later “Hot Money Flows, Commodity Price Cycles, and Financial Repression in the US and the People’s Republic of China” (January 2013) co-authored with Zhao Liu, McKinnon explains its origin:
In the 1970s, the term financial repression originated with McKinnon and Shaw when inflation was a problem in a number of less developed countries (LDCs). In the 1960s and 1970s, governments in many LDCs intervened to put ceilings on nominal interest rates and impose high reserve requirements on their banks, along with other techniques to direct the flow of credit in the economy... Wanting to find a pejorative term —akin to political repression — to describe this syndrome, McKinnon and Shaw first used the term financial repression in 1973. (My emphasis).
Many orthodox economists followed McKinnon and Shaw in using “financial repression” as a concept. Only a few economists challenged it: for example Carlos Diaz-Alejandro, in a 1984 paper with the great title “Good-bye financial repression, hello financial crash”.
It is disappointing therefore to find it in widespread use amongst progressive economists and commentators.
But I quibble. My main beef with Mason’s book is that rather than define this period as one that was man-made – designed largely by the genius John Maynard Keynes and his Cambridge colleagues – Mason defines this period as a “Kondratieff upswing on steroids”.
Once again the implication is that this period of full employment, of science-led innovation, high productivity...high wages, consumption keeping pace with production, benign inflation and marginal speculative finance (p 86-7) is described as something beyond human agency – akin to the cycles of the moon.
Neoliberals too like to dismiss this age as beyond our present-day ken. Neoliberals too would like us to feel impotent in the face of today’s rapacious financial capitalism.
But as the Golden Age proved, we are not impotent. And we are not the subjects of periodic, abstract cycles. The Golden Age was constructed, designed and implemented by a group of economists who congregated at Bretton Woods in 1944 and that were led by John Maynard Keynes and his American competitor, Harry Dexter White. (The striking thing about the conference was that only one banker was allowed to attend – and only because President Roosevelt regarded him as tame enough not to present a threat to the proceedings.)
Keynes and colleagues were confronted by a form of capitalism that had wrought a massive destruction of lives, livelihoods and nations. They were surrounded by the wreckage of war, but were not intimidated by the scale of the challenge they faced in confronting, subordinating and managing global finance capitalism.
Nor should we be. We are not, as Mason suggests, the passive subjects of inexorable and inevitable cycles or Kondratieff waves of capitalism. We are masters of our own destiny – if only we (and professional economists) had the courage to identify, name, subordinate and manage the global finance sector – as Keynes and others have shown we can.
Mason and the notion of profits
Mason makes frequent mention of profits in Post Capitalism. But profits are a very old- fashioned notion for today’s capitalists. Profits from production involve engagement with the Land (in the broadest sense of the word) and Labour. Engagement with the Land implies limits – the ecosystem’s limits. Mason’s optimism about technology’s role in our future means that he never fully grasps the nettle of ecological limits. While there is the obligatory chapter on climate change and the ecosystem, the assumption is that technology will evolve in such a way as to never bump up against these limits.
Instead he focuses on Labour’s confrontation with Capital.
But to my mind, both the ecosystem’s limits and Labour’s resistance to exploitation explain why capitalism today prefers to make capital gains, not profits. Profits rise and fall depending on the vagaries of Land and Labour. Capital gains by contrast evade both, and can rise inexorably – until that is, they crash. Capital gains - money or rent siphoned from money and other existing assets – can be made effortlessly in effect; and increasingly, without risk.
[And while on the question of profits: Mason, like many Marxists asserts (but never proves) that capitalism periodically suffers from “a falling rate of profit”. I have great difficulty with this concept. It can never be tested or proved, but references to “the falling rate of profit’ recur throughout the book, and indeed throughout much of contemporary Marxist debate. Michael Hudson argues that it’s a misunderstanding of Marx by those who have only read Vol I of Capital. Marx expected depreciation and amortization on investment in capital equipment to rise relative to profits, in order to reimburse that investment. That is what he meant by the falling rate of profit, writes Hudson – an interpretation that seems infinitely more plausible to me.]
Identifying capitalism
We are discussing Mason’s book here in St. Paul’s - Wren’s great masterpiece – in the heart of the City of London. We are literally in the belly of the global financial beast – a sector or group of individuals and institutions – that now wields despotic power over the global economy, governments and apparently democratic societies.
And while societies are on the whole aware of the activities of the City and Wall St, there is scant discourse about its despotic power within today’s political discourse.
And, while Mason does of course discuss the finance sector, he makes infotech the main driver of the changes we are witnessing today.
I beg to disagree. Far from ‘mutating’ in cycles of 50 to 500 years, the finance sector is today growing exponentially before our very eyes, with only the occasional financial crisis to arrest that growth. This is partly thanks to the rise of infotech, but infotech in the service of finance, not as its driver.
The last financial crisis (2007-9) turbo-blasted the sector into a new fantastic growth phase. Not only was Haute Finance bailed out, it also insidiously attached itself more fully to states – and wrested guarantees and protection from these governments, their taxpayers and their central banks.
And while this particular group of capitalists may worship at the shrine of Adam Smith and Ayn Rand, they nevertheless demand and expect taxpayer-funded guarantees and protection from the discipline and losses imposed by market forces.
Despite its detachment from the “real” economy of production, the global finance sector has succeeded in capturing, effectively looting and then subordinating governments and their taxpayers to the interests of financiers. Bankers and financiers now effectively control the public utility that is our monetary system. They can gamble and speculate on global markets without fear of losses or the fear of being disciplined by ‘the invisible hand’. They know their institutions are Too Systemic, or Too Big To Fail.
They are today’s Masters of the Universe – and they do not feature largely in this book.
Finance and the rentier economy
Like so many others Mason takes the structure of the internet as a model for the evolution of capitalism and speculates that capitalism will evolve into a system in which hierarchies are flattened, machines are free and we’re all far more collaborative.
But Mason’s techno-utopianism is fundamentally about the production side of the economy. Yet, as he well knows, there is more to the economy than production. There is consumption – and Mason’s view of today’s sharing, networked and connected world may just as well be defined as collaborative consumption.
And then there’s the rentier sector of the economy – earning rent from assets (particularly financial assets like debt) effortlessly.
The last two sectors are not fully addressed in the wide sweep of this book.
It is for this reason that I believe Mason to be over-optimistic about the transformational power of info-tech. Where he sees technology “eroding the price mechanism” by generating reams of free information – in Wikipedia, crowd-sourcing, open source software – I see usury, behind very high pay walls.
Pay walls that have now barred most football and cricket fans from experiencing or enjoying in person top-level public sporting events. Pay walls that will exclude millions of people from accessing sound, investigative and balanced journalism, until recently easily available (for just a dime or two) on street corners.
Where Mason sees the “economics of free stuff” and the mass generation and sharing of information, I see the not-so-distant privatization of a great provider of “free” information, education and culture to the masses – the BBC. Let’s not beat about the bush: the BBC is under grave threat: if the government succeeds, the BBC’s precious output will be trapped behind the ever-rising paywalls of today’s media moguls – and like mass sporting events, will no longer be available to the taxpayers who have funded its development.
Where Mason sees the networked society, I also see Uber and Airbnb monetizing (with monopolistic aspiration). As Henwood tells it:
“the desperation of people in the post-crisis economy while sounding generous and evoking a fantasy of community in an atomized population.”
“Brian Chesky, the co-founder of Airbnb, uses words like “revolution” and “movement” to describe his company, which is now valued at $13 billion— making Airbnb the best-capitalized revolutionary movement in history. (My emphasis.)
(Doug Henwood, , 27 January, 2015.)
Where Mason sees a ‘a new mode of production’ – I also see a global rentier economy that is almost universal.
Mason shares with us Marx’s insight from his 1858 Fragment on Machines in Grundrisse, namely that:
“the driving force of production is knowledge, and that knowledge stored in machines is social...and that because knowledge-based capitalism cannot support a price mechanism whereby the value of something is dictated by the value of the inputs needed to produce it...it creates a contradiction that will blow capitalism’s foundation sky-high.” P.136
Capitalism of this type, Marx argued, is forced to develop the intellectual power of the worker, and will tend to reduce working hours.
Capitalism did not, as Mason notes, bear out this proposition in Marx’s time; I would argue there is no sign of it bearing out this proposition today.
Yes, it is true that we live in a world where, as Mason argues, new technology makes information and leisure time more available to the masses. In this world many have their “general intellect” expanded but cannot deploy this knowledge by working for a living – because the work is simply not there.
The ILO predicts that by 2019, more than 212 million people will be out of work, up from the current tragedy of 201 million. ( (WESO).)
Today unemployment in Europe and the Middle East – particularly amongst the young - is at historically unprecedented (and unforgiveable) levels. The social and ecological turmoil this causes is reflected in the rise of far-right parties across Europe, in Middle Eastern turmoil and in the monumental tragedy of the current refugee crisis. And even in the US and UK where employment levels are deemed to be higher, much of the working class is engaged in work that is insecure, precarious and low paid, with erratic levels of income. In the UK, almost six million workers are paid less than the living wage, the Living Wage Foundation.
There are of course some that have been liberated by technology, and for whom it is now increasingly unfashionable to work for a living. Instead they prefer earnings from effortless activity: rent-seeking.
Where Mason sees “beautiful troublemakers” and “digital rebels” I also see individuals “sharing” their cars (assets) with passing strangers and using technology in order to extract rent from benighted commuters, while cutting the already low incomes of cabbies and for example, . . Under this new form of exploitative capitalism “all the risk and capital investment are shouldered by the driver, while the fat cats at Uber and Lyft headquarters in San Francisco reap a risk-free reward”. (Dillow: ?
Travis Kalanick, Uber’s billionaire owner uses what Mason calls the “free machines” and open source software of digital technology to exploit the desperation of this precariat – car owners selling car rides. that the company has entered into a deal with a money-lender, Santander, because:
“You need a newish car to drive for Uber; if your car gets too old, that’s grounds for deactivation. But the company is ready to help: it’s entered into a partnership with Santander, a Spanish bank, to offer car loans to drivers, with the payments conveniently deducted from their paycheck. According to the terms posted on , a chat board for drivers, the payments work out to an interest rate of around 21 percent. They get you coming and going.”
This is not so much sharing, as a modern version of “sharecropping”.
But Uber’s gains are small beer compared to the rents that can be extracted by the global real estate sector: those choosing to inflate an existing asset without adding to its value; or to “share” their property with those who lack the resources to buy a home. London’s rentier economy is booming. More and more people are jumping on the rentier bandwagon, as is evident in the buy-to-let sector.
According to , average UK rent for dwellings has reached about £937 per month. It now costs an average £2,583 a month to take on a rented property in central London. By contrast, London average regular monthly earnings (as of April, 2014) were £2,860.00 before tax and other deductions, according to the ONS. ( , 2014 Provisional Results)
The world of the rentier capitalist has been to some extent “democratised’. Large numbers of us now expect to make money effortlessly – whether from the Lottery and other forms of speculation; or by extracting rent from any asset we may own – whether it be a car, a buy-to-let property or a dog. (There are (“simple, affordable (sic) and safe”) ...which involve fees and subscriptions.)
But by far the most leisure-obsessed group or class are those – for me the dominant force behind today’s capitalist class - who can use an asset that is a great public utility – money – to make more money, effortlessly.
In contrast to industrial or productive capital, bank loans, stocks and bonds are financial claims that are “like sponges absorbing the income and property of debtors – and expropriating this property when debtors (including governments) cannot pay” to cite Hudson again. Marx elaborated:
“Usury centralizes money wealth. It does not alter the mode of production, but attaches itself to it as a parasite and makes it miserable. It sucks its blood, kills its nerve, and compels reproduction to proceed under even more disheartening conditions...usurer’s capital does not confront the labourer as industrial capital...but impoverishes this mode of production, paralyzes the productive forces instead of developing them.” (Quoted in Michael Hudson, . July, 2010)
Unfortunately the activities and usury of today’s rentier capitalism are not analysed and discussed in this otherwise fascinating book. But here in the temple that is St. Paul’s, we have an obligation to act, as Jesus did, to chase the money-lenders from the temple that is our economy and democracy. Furthermore we have an obligation, as President Roosevelt said in his remarkable inaugural address in 1933:
“....to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly.
Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our
country today....
Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand
indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the
hearts and minds of men....
Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the
lending of more money. ...
They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers.
They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people
perish.
The money changers have fled from their high seats in the
temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple
to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in
the extent to which we apply social values more noble than
mere monetary profit.”
(President Franklin D. Roosevelt: . 4 March, 1933.)
Conclusion
Paul Mason in Post-Capitalism opens our eyes to the positive contribution that the evolution of technology can make to civilisation. His vision of a post-capitalist era is inspiring, but needs to take into greater account the impact of technology on both increased exploitation of labour and the dominance of the finance sector.
This article was published in on November 3, 2015, after a speech given at St.Paul’s Cathedral with Paul Mason and Phillip Blond as fellow speakers.
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Тема
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 6 Surprising Cancer Causers To Eliminate From Your
[re: Mod vege]
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| Автор |
Mod vege (старо куче) |
| Публикувано | 12.11.15 02:13 |
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We have grown to believe that our home is our castle. However, nowadays our homes may be hiding more danger than safety; the infamous formaldehyde, nitrobenzene and methylene chloride, are all carcinogens that can be found in everyday items including plastic, rubber, dyes and perfumes.
Here's a list of items thought to be harmless, and the health problems they provoke.
1. Candles
According to a study by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), 40 percent of candles on the market contain lead wires inside their wicks. Scented candles most commonly contain lead wicks. Fragrance oils soften the wax, so the manufacturers use lead to make the wicks firmer. A candle with a lead-core wick releases five times the amount of lead considered hazardous for children and exceeds Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) pollution standards for outdoor air, says the CPSC. Exposure to high amounts of lead may contribute to hormone disruption, behavioral problems, learning disabilities, and many other health problems. To keep your home softly lit and cozy without risking your health, you can use with cotton wicks.
2. Air Fresheners
Many air fresheners have carcinogens, volatile organic compounds and toxins such as phthalate esters in their formulas. A Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) study of 13 common household air fresheners found that most of the surveyed products contain chemicals that can aggravate asthma and affect reproductive development. According to a 2008 study by Anne Steinemann of the University of Washington, all air-fresheners tested gave off chemicals regulated as toxic or hazardous under federal laws, including carcinogens with no safe exposure level. None of these chemicals, however, were listed on the product labels or Material Safety Data Sheets. As a replacement, try natural fragrances from .
3. Art Supplies
Certain art supplies like Epoxy and rubber cement glues, acrylic paints and solvents, and permanent markers contain chemicals linked to allergies, organ damage, and cancer. Children are particularly vulnerable to toxins because of their higher metabolisms, and immature immune systems, so it pays to exercise extra care with the products they use.
4. Antiperspirants
Most conventional and antiperspirants contain several ingredients . Since deodorants and antiperspirants are designed to stay on our bodies for hours, this allows the potential absorption of harmful chemicals through the skin.
5. Shampoos
Unlikely as it may sound, conventional have too many toxic ingredients. Funny as it may sound, their effects are still being researched, and there is no scientific consensus whether they cause cancer. If you want to be on the safe side, use any of the myriad of bars.
6. Shower Curtains
Plastic shower curtains release toxic chemicals not only into your shower or bath, but also into the environment, emitting harmful chemicals called volatile organic chemicals or VOCs. Ensure a healthy environment for you and your family by reducing contact with the above products.
Редактирано от Mod vege на 12.11.15 02:20.
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