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Noam Chomsky
"What strange form of intelligence is it that enables great accomplishments to be achieved but is unable to ask the question – will we survive and how can we ensure our survival?" – Chomsky

critique of the capitalist system

alternatives to capitalism

political propaganda

the United Nations

Dooms day clock

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Noam Chomskys work from the 1950s revolutionized the field of linguistics by treating language as a uniquely human, biologically based cognitive capacity. Through his contributions to linguistics and related fields, including cognitive psychology and the philosophies of mind and language, Chomsky helped to initiate and sustain what came to be known as the “cognitive revolution.” Chomsky also gained a worldwide following as a political dissident for his analyses of the pernicious influence of economic elites on U.S. domestic politics, foreign policy, and intellectual culture. (Britannica) He was Professor for Linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is one of the world's best-known intellectuals and one of the most prominent critics of American politics since the 1960s.

The Alternative to Capitalism

“We should bare in mind that don’t have a capitalist system as no capitalist system has ever survived. It would self-destruct in five minutes. So what we have is a kind of state capitalist system with the state playing a substantial role in American History, a very substantial role in economic development in production and research and development and lots of other devices to keep the private sector viable so its a kind of a state capitalist system like many others - they vary a little in how they do it – so is there an alternative to this?

Of course for example the alternative is that was taken for granted by 19th century workers before it was sort of beaten out of people’s heads by massive propaganda. They go right back to the Industrial Revolution. It was the period probably the freest press ever in the United States there lots and lots of newspapers representing different ethnic groups and classes and there was lots of participation, direct participation, a very lively press widely read and so on and if you are looking at the working-class press they were expressing the common view of working people namely that those who work in the mills should own them and run them. As I say we have come close a lot of times - terrifying for private owners.

They also held that wage labour is basically no different from chattel slavery except that it’s temporary and that was such a popular idea that it was a position of the Republican Party, that Abraham Lincoln espoused it and it makes sense I mean there’s nothing holy about wage labour. You are renting yourself which is not very different from being a slave except that maybe lens in time.

So those are alternatives: self-management, the democratic control of institutions whether their communities or workplaces or any others, alliances among them, federal arrangements - these are all perfectly feasible alternatives. There is no economic or political theory that tells us there’s anything wrong with them. They conflict with the structure of existing power systems and therefore the educational and cultural system tries to drive them out of your minds and make them seem insane or crazy or unthinkable but there’s nothing unthinkable about them. (…) they could reach the scale of say producing the green technology, high-speed rail and so on that the country badly needs.

It’s not a law of nature that we have to import solar technology from China you know poor developing country or that we have to get high-speed rail facilities from Spain. Those aren’t laws of nature those are social economic and political decisions that can be made differently. If they are made differently enough we will be moving towards a kind of an anarchist type society.” (Chomsky, 2015)

(4:55 – 6:20) The perspective of the alien

“What he sees is this remarkable species that developed higher intelligence and is now using it in order to destroy itself and is on the verge of destruction. And they might watch something like the current electoral campaignes in the United States, everyone paying attention to it, and notice a very curios fact: no of this is being discussed.

Whats being discussed is tweets at 3 am, various kinds of vulgarity anything but seriouse problems and the two most serois problems ever risen in human history. Namely - “Are we going to survive?” - is not being discussed. (see Obamas nature documentary about climate change) Why not? Thats an interesting question. (…) What strange form of intelligence is it that enables great accomplishments to be achieved but is unable to ask the question “will we survive and how can we ensure our survival?”.

Of course there are plenty of people doing it, they are just off the mainstream. So you dont see it in the electoral campaign and you dont see it in media commentary. You do see it in popular activism all over. (…)" (Chomsky, 2016)

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(6:20 – 9:40) Why hasn´t humanity managed to unite itself?

"It has tried several times. In 1945 at the beginning of the nuclear age it was recognised by people who were thinking that we simply have to unite in order to overcome the thread we have created for our own existence. Quoting Albert Einstein: “We must have world government or else we are finished.” And other drew the same conclusion. In fact if we go back to the late 40s some of the top best sellers were discussions of how we can move on to world government. And there was an effort “the United Nations” which at the binning it was hoped have promise of moving in this direction but it was pretty quickly undermined by competing nationalism actually the United States was of course in the lead because it was the end of the second world war. The US had enormous power without any historical precent even remotely like it. (…) In the early years the US used its power to dominate the UN and basically to turn it into a battering ram against its major enemy the Soviet Union. (…) It changed over the years but not in a way that made the UN a functioning independent force that might bring people together. (…) Decolonisation began. All that led to a diversified international system." (Chomsky, 2016)

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(9:40 – 11:00) The history of the US in the UN

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(12:38 – 18:20)
"In 1947 at the beginning of the nuclear age there was established what they call a doomsday clock. A clock with a minute hand and the question is “How far is the minute hand from midnight - midnight means termination, we are done.” Every year they collect a group of specialist experts to try to set the minute hand. Two years ago they moved it two minutes closer to midnight. Now we are at three minutes to midnight which is the closest that it has been since the early 1980s when there was a major war scare." (Chomsky, 2016)

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→ https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/current-time/ Dooms day clock today

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(18:20) “One person per second is fleeing the effects of severe weather.” (Chomsky, 2016)

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