Why do we have society where this can happen, and what should we do to fix it? Traditionally problems like that are addressed towards government-like structures of various levels (federal, municipal...) and kinds. How we should work with these problems, which are systemic?
You could ask James Madison, widely considered to be the most heavily contributing of the drafters of the U.S. Constitution:
Man who preys both on the vegetable and animal species, is himself a prey to neither. He too possesses the reproductive principle far beyond the degree requisite for the bare continuance of his species. What becomes of the surplus of human life to which this principle is competent?
It is either, 1st. destroyed by infanticide, as among the Chinese and Lacedemonians; or 2d. it is stifled or starved, as among other nations whose population is commensurate to its food; or 3d. it is consumed by wars and endemic diseases; or 4th. it overflows, by emigration, to places where a surplus of food is attainable.
It would be a non-sequitur to suggest that Jefferson gave a response at all as this quote is from an essay Madison submitted to the National Gazette, not from the transcript of any debate, conversation or speech.
The argument of the letter is that the multiplication of the destitute is the acceptable tradeoff a nation pays in exchange for having as many workers as possible, as many businesses as possible and as many soldiers as possible, all in service of gaining marginal advantages over the other nations of the world with which it is engaged in unceasing, zero-sum competition.
Seems like a contradiction to other ideas expressed in founding documents. Also the flexibility of the system surely shifts the focus from plans of original builders towards means and intents of current thought and executive leaders.
Trying to answer this would fill (and almost certainly has filled) numerous Ph.D dissertations.
There are a multitude of reasons. In no particular order:
* The utterly broken and ruinous US Senate, whose composition would be unconstitutional were it not written into the constitution[1], enabling a tiny minority of the country to block any meaningful federal progress on a host of issues
* The US's strong mythos of the Protestant Work Ethic, which leads many people to believe that people succeed or fall on hard times due to merit rather than luck
* Newt Gingrich, who in the 90s introduced hyperpartisanship to Congress, turning a body where members of different parties were friends and had good working relationships into a zero sum game
* The fact that one of the two major parties campaigns on "government doesn't work" and as soon as they're elected to their best to turn that sentiment into reality
* The impact of greed in the US and its successful capture of the media and significant chunks of regulatory apparatus
* The utilization of that media control to push divisive narratives that pit the lower classes against each other instead of focusing on the real problems and their causes
* The goldfish-like memory of too many US voters who buy into narratives like "they're all the same" or get frustrated when one party can't fix everything in 4 years and elect the other party - paying no heed to the fact that building is much slower than destruction or the obstructionist tactics.
It’s the bifurcation of meaning. We speak unintelligible languages at each other using the exact same vocabulary. I developed the Semiotic-Reflexive Transformer that empirically proves this and provides the solution. No more black box. Computational semiotics is the most underrated technology of 2026.
Why do we have society where this can happen, and what should we do to fix it? Traditionally problems like that are addressed towards government-like structures of various levels (federal, municipal...) and kinds. How we should work with these problems, which are systemic?
You could ask James Madison, widely considered to be the most heavily contributing of the drafters of the U.S. Constitution:
Man who preys both on the vegetable and animal species, is himself a prey to neither. He too possesses the reproductive principle far beyond the degree requisite for the bare continuance of his species. What becomes of the surplus of human life to which this principle is competent?
It is either, 1st. destroyed by infanticide, as among the Chinese and Lacedemonians; or 2d. it is stifled or starved, as among other nations whose population is commensurate to its food; or 3d. it is consumed by wars and endemic diseases; or 4th. it overflows, by emigration, to places where a surplus of food is attainable.
Yeah maybe. I didn't understand this rather rambling point at all. What was Jefferson's response then?
It would be a non-sequitur to suggest that Jefferson gave a response at all as this quote is from an essay Madison submitted to the National Gazette, not from the transcript of any debate, conversation or speech.
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-14-02-010...
The argument of the letter is that the multiplication of the destitute is the acceptable tradeoff a nation pays in exchange for having as many workers as possible, as many businesses as possible and as many soldiers as possible, all in service of gaining marginal advantages over the other nations of the world with which it is engaged in unceasing, zero-sum competition.
Seems like a contradiction to other ideas expressed in founding documents. Also the flexibility of the system surely shifts the focus from plans of original builders towards means and intents of current thought and executive leaders.
> Why do we have society where this can happen
Trying to answer this would fill (and almost certainly has filled) numerous Ph.D dissertations.
There are a multitude of reasons. In no particular order:
* The utterly broken and ruinous US Senate, whose composition would be unconstitutional were it not written into the constitution[1], enabling a tiny minority of the country to block any meaningful federal progress on a host of issues
* The US's strong mythos of the Protestant Work Ethic, which leads many people to believe that people succeed or fall on hard times due to merit rather than luck
* Newt Gingrich, who in the 90s introduced hyperpartisanship to Congress, turning a body where members of different parties were friends and had good working relationships into a zero sum game
* The fact that one of the two major parties campaigns on "government doesn't work" and as soon as they're elected to their best to turn that sentiment into reality
* The impact of greed in the US and its successful capture of the media and significant chunks of regulatory apparatus
* The utilization of that media control to push divisive narratives that pit the lower classes against each other instead of focusing on the real problems and their causes
* The goldfish-like memory of too many US voters who buy into narratives like "they're all the same" or get frustrated when one party can't fix everything in 4 years and elect the other party - paying no heed to the fact that building is much slower than destruction or the obstructionist tactics.
That's just scratching the surface.
[1] Seriously, the Supreme Court has ruled it unconstitutional for any legislative body to be based on land instead of population. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reynolds_v._Sims
The two-party system is also ruinous. Both parties are corrupted by the knowledge that they are the only realistic alternatives to each other.
It’s the bifurcation of meaning. We speak unintelligible languages at each other using the exact same vocabulary. I developed the Semiotic-Reflexive Transformer that empirically proves this and provides the solution. No more black box. Computational semiotics is the most underrated technology of 2026.
This is so ageist. Literally everyone is turning to AI.