Greed

[stonerblue]

What have you bought that you didn't want/need?

I try not to buy useless things but do have a penchant for trendy togs (despite what my daughter says) instead of wearing crimplene keks with elasticated waist and an old sack. I'm a bit of a sucker for a designer label.
The last thing i bought that i didn't want or need was public liability insurance. Oh, and a fathers day card.

Point i'm making is that the i don't subscribe to the we are manipulted into buying , greed is a part of human nature it isn't manufactured.

Of course we're manipulated. Electronic and print media is founded on advertising. PR is a huge industry that exists purely to plant people, events and products in our heads.
You might not think you're being 'greedy' buying cards for mum/dad/gran/xmas/valentine/easter/ramadan but the card industry is raking in a fortune after manipulating the market.
But just getting the card isn't good enough these days. We're now under pressure to get a pressie as well. Miraculously, and completely by chance, the perfume ad or the compilation cd of driving songs ad pops up. A nice little earner for the house of Chanel or Sony who obviously need a few more quid.

 

[zangatangring]

You really have the wrong conviction here. Greed is an immutable aspect of the Human mind. People strive to survive as well as live. War exists because peace exists, love exists because Hate exists and greed exists because empathy exists.

Entropy governs the physical as well as the social aspects of the world. You socialists who make a meagre attempt at convincing yourself you understand why the world is so corrupt are falling into a trap. The world exists because it is the world.

yeah... err...bollocks

Actually it's not bollocks. How can you argue that humans aren't inherently greedy.

If humans weren't hard wired as such we would still be living in caves.

It is that quest for more (and more money) that has been the driving force for most of the things that make our life easier to live today.

How do you think 99% of people's lives were lived 200 years ago? In long, back breaking work, grinding poverty (real poverty - hunger, rags for clothes) and death before you were 50.

It is capitalism and human greed that has created things such as central heating, advances in medicine and the medium which we are talking on right now.

The real question is how we can best harness that for the greater good. And I would agree that we are currently failing in that regard.

But to try and argue that humans aren't, by nature, greedy is naive in the extreme.

This.

 

[metalblue]

fwiw the consensus is that companies are hugely undervalued with great room for growth over the medium to long term.

I'd respectfully disagree with this but then if we all agreed we wouldn't have a market!!!

-- Fri Aug 12, 2011 5:44 pm --

A guessers game, with some guesser, as with any sort of gambling, being more informed and knowledgeable than others.

Hush now, that bit is a secret!!!

Based on? Certainly not P/E ratio which shows the Market massively underpriced.

Plus I'm sure you know more than Warren Buffet of all people. Look him up.

Based on, what I consider, to be the flawed logic that even over valued stock are better than cash (i assume you hear the same arguments) as they offer at least some sort of dividend return (versus nothing on cash). Although I think recent volatility may well have shaken some back to cash, lest we forget the market is a great price discoverer.

P/e ratios, what sector(s) are you referring to? P/e on it's own would suggest some sectors are undervalued but let's not discount that high inflation and low p/e ratios are nothing new.

That warren buffet comment was pretty poor, as I said I disagree with you I didn't say you were wrong, would ask you show me the same professional courtesy going forward.

 

[1.618034]

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[bluetoo]

You really have the wrong conviction here. Greed is an immutable aspect of the Human mind. People strive to survive as well as live. War exists because peace exists, love exists because Hate exists and greed exists because empathy exists.

Entropy governs the physical as well as the social aspects of the world. You socialists who make a meagre attempt at convincing yourself you understand why the world is so corrupt are falling into a trap. The world exists because it is the world.

yeah... err...bollocks

Actually it's not bollocks. How can you argue that humans aren't inherently greedy.

If humans weren't hard wired as such we would still be living in caves.

It is that quest for more (and more money) that has been the driving force for most of the things that make our life easier to live today.

How do you think 99% of people's lives were lived 200 years ago? In long, back breaking work, grinding poverty (real poverty - hunger, rags for clothes) and death before you were 50.

It is capitalism and human greed that has created things such as central heating, advances in medicine and the medium which we are talking on right now.

The real question is how we can best harness that for the greater good. And I would agree that we are currently failing in that regard.

But to try and argue that humans aren't, by nature, greedy is naive in the extreme.

Theres a difference between greed and desire or the wish for self improvement or whatever you want to call it. Humans are hard wired to be progressive. Greed is conditioned. Greed didnt create central heating...the desire to improve living conditions did.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

yeah... err...bollocks

Actually it's not bollocks. How can you argue that humans aren't inherently greedy.

If humans weren't hard wired as such we would still be living in caves.

It is that quest for more (and more money) that has been the driving force for most of the things that make our life easier to live today.

How do you think 99% of people's lives were lived 200 years ago? In long, back breaking work, grinding poverty (real poverty - hunger, rags for clothes) and death before you were 50.

It is capitalism and human greed that has created things such as central heating, advances in medicine and the medium which we are talking on right now.

The real question is how we can best harness that for the greater good. And I would agree that we are currently failing in that regard.

But to try and argue that humans aren't, by nature, greedy is naive in the extreme.

Theres a difference between greed and desire or the wish for self improvement or whatever you want to call it. Humans are hard wired to be progressive. Greed is conditioned. Greed didnt create central heating...the desire to improve living conditions did.

Yeah I'm sure the guy who invented central heating was thinking about his fellow man and not his house in the country every time he dragged himself out of his (cold) bed when he was developing his idea.

The difference is I don't see anything wrong with that.

Greed is conditioned? That must be why the Vikings and Romans were such gentle folk.

 

[zangatangring]

Theres a difference between greed and desire or the wish for self improvement or whatever you want to call it. Humans are hard wired to be progressive. Greed is conditioned. Greed didnt create central heating...the desire to improve living conditions did.

Yeah I'm sure the guy who invented central heating was thinking about his fellow man and not his house in the country every time he dragged himself out of his (cold) bed when he was developing his idea.

The difference is I don't see anything wrong with that.

Greed is conditioned? That must be why the Vikings and Romans were such gentle folk.

Weren't you listening to anything me and gordon said? Jeez, you really are digging your self a hole.

 

[stonerblue]

Actually it's not bollocks. How can you argue that humans aren't inherently greedy.

If humans weren't hard wired as such we would still be living in caves.

It is that quest for more (and more money) that has been the driving force for most of the things that make our life easier to live today.

How do you think 99% of people's lives were lived 200 years ago? In long, back breaking work, grinding poverty (real poverty - hunger, rags for clothes) and death before you were 50.

It is capitalism and human greed that has created things such as central heating, advances in medicine and the medium which we are talking on right now.

The real question is how we can best harness that for the greater good. And I would agree that we are currently failing in that regard.

But to try and argue that humans aren't, by nature, greedy is naive in the extreme.

Theres a difference between greed and desire or the wish for self improvement or whatever you want to call it. Humans are hard wired to be progressive. Greed is conditioned. Greed didnt create central heating...the desire to improve living conditions did.

Yeah I'm sure the guy who invented central heating was thinking about his fellow man and not his house in the country every time he dragged himself out of his (cold) bed when he was developing his idea.
The difference is I don't see anything wrong with that.

Greed is conditioned? That must be why the Vikings and Romans were such gentle folk.

In the 13th century, the Cistercian monks revived central heating in Christian Europe using river diversions combined with indoor wood-fired furnaces. The well-preserved Royal Monastery of Our Lady of the Wheel (founded 1202) on the Ebro River in the Aragon region of Spain provides an excellent example of such an application.
wiki.

 

[bluetoo]

Actually it's not bollocks. How can you argue that humans aren't inherently greedy.

If humans weren't hard wired as such we would still be living in caves.

It is that quest for more (and more money) that has been the driving force for most of the things that make our life easier to live today.

How do you think 99% of people's lives were lived 200 years ago? In long, back breaking work, grinding poverty (real poverty - hunger, rags for clothes) and death before you were 50.

It is capitalism and human greed that has created things such as central heating, advances in medicine and the medium which we are talking on right now.

The real question is how we can best harness that for the greater good. And I would agree that we are currently failing in that regard.

But to try and argue that humans aren't, by nature, greedy is naive in the extreme.

Theres a difference between greed and desire or the wish for self improvement or whatever you want to call it. Humans are hard wired to be progressive. Greed is conditioned. Greed didnt create central heating...the desire to improve living conditions did.

Yeah I'm sure the guy who invented central heating was thinking about his fellow man and not his house in the country every time he dragged himself out of his (cold) bed when he was developing his idea.

The difference is I don't see anything wrong with that.

Greed is conditioned? That must be why the Vikings and Romans were such gentle folk.

Im pretty sure also that not everyone who invents something is thinking solely about how rich it will make them. Do you believe that most people who have invented things start off with the idea first or do they say....I want to get rich...what can I invent? And yes...the levels of greed that I alluded to in my OP are most certainly conditioned....if it wasnt there would be no need for ad campaigns, specifically those which con people into believing they have an automatic right to obtain and posess goods and or services which are outside their earning capacity.To dismiss greed as though it were unavoidable is missing the point and a way of avoiding actually doing something about it.

 

[zangatangring]

Im pretty sure also that not everyone who invents something is thinking solely about how rich it will make them. Do you believe that most people who have invented things start off with the idea first or do they say....I want to get rich...what can I invent? And yes...the levels of greed that I alluded to in my OP are most certainly conditioned....if it wasnt there would be no need for ad campaigns, specifically those which con people into believing they have an automatic right to obtain and posess goods and or services which are outside their earning capacity.To dismiss greed as though it were unavoidable is missing the point and a way of avoiding actually doing something about it.

You are so far off it's unbelievable.