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Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

Nope. You are making one or both of these mistakes. (1) Overlooking that the same logic can lead to different outcomes depending on the premises to which the logic is applied. (2) Overlooking that real life is analog, not digital, and so thinking the premises are the same when they are not.

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The targeted outcome is the redistribution of wealth away from the capital class to the working class. Capitalist exploitation of labor was analog to begin with, and the same premise does apply: the capital class absorbs the fruits of labor, training, and education that is performed by the masses in order to enrich themselves. The capital class owes a tremendous debt to society and if they don't plan on paying we should plan to seize it.

And how has exproproation been working out for you? What is that? Massive poverty and nobody wants to trade with you?

The exploitation of labor has has a tremendous negative impact on the environment and the health of humans. Recall that it took dragging the factory bosses from their and beating them to death to get an 8 hour work day, a weekend, and restrictions on child labor.

We can do it the easy way —- government redistribution of excess profits — or we can do it the hard way. I suspect the people in charge won’t realize they could have taken the easy way until it’s too late.

Pretty sure we had to sanction/assassinate/goad into self-destructive military campaigns the Red Terror to beat it. And even then, the major survivor still beat us to cyberpunk dystopia (the cool one with hologram skyscrapers, not the uncool one with decaying suburbs).

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