Witness the Brilliance of Socialism and Be Afraid. Very Afraid.
News of socialism on the march comes daily. For example, 50 percent of Democrats view it favorably. It’s actually worse than that, because the energy in the party clearly comes from socialist true believers.
As I noted in yesterday’s post, it is particularly prevalent in the “educated” (i.e., indoctrinated) young. Case in point:
So confident in her mastery of the grand sweep of history, and of her superior grasp thereof in contrast to economists, who are “profoundly ahistorical.”
But in fact she is a poster girl for the Dunning-Kruger effect. She vastly overestimates her intelligence and knowledge.
I’m being kind. She’s a blithering idiot.
To begin with, her whole analysis is predicated on a fallacy–the naturalistic fallacy specifically. Natural does not imply good, unnatural does not imply bad. Hume’s Guillotine (“is does not imply ought”) also applies.
And the statistic she cites–that capitalism has existed .1 percent of human history–demonstrates the orthogonality of nature and worth. That .1 percent of human history also corresponds to the period in which much of humanity escaped abject poverty. The “natural” human state was, as Hobbes put it, brutish, nasty, and short. And to which must be added–profoundly poor.
What changed that? Capitalism. And the parts that didn’t escape grinding poverty were not capitalist. (South African economist William Harold Hutt often pointed out that the poorest regions in the world, Ethiopia and Afghanistan, were the ones least touched by the “highest stage of capitalism,” as Lenin called imperialism).
To believe that “natural” implies “good” requires you to believe that crushing poverty is good.
And who has shown this? Economists. Maybe Clara should read economic historian Deirdre McCloskey’s Bourgeois Trilogy. The whole point is how the bourgeois revolution–i.e., the rise of capitalism–propelled Hobbesian humanity into a far more prosperous existence.
And as for economists being historically ignorant, there are many very accomplished economic historians. Robert Fogel, Douglas North, and Joel Mokyr, economic historians all, have won economics Nobels.
And Clara might actually learn something if she read them (and McCloskey) too. For they render risible her situating the beginning of capitalism to the enclosure movement in England. McCloskey in particular decenters (how’s that for prog speak!) England, arguing that the Dutch commercial republic was truly decisive.
The profoundly weird part of her discourse is the full on embrace of Rousseauian noble savage romanticism and her belief that the institutions which she imagines prevailed pre-capitalism would be remotely feasible in a post-capitalist, socialist world.
I say imagined, because she makes things out of the whole cloth. She says that pre-capitalist indigenous societies were egalitarian, consensual, and peaceful. Hardly. She offers a single example–the Cherokee. They had warriors, right? Who were they fighting? Not to mention that they practiced slavery.
Although anthropologists have striven mightily to show that indigenous people lived in a Rousseauian state of nature, the honest ones have often described societies that would make Hobbes blanch. And Steven Pinker has persuasively argued that violence was far worse in the “natural” period of human history than it is in the modern–and capitalist–era.
But even putting that aside, pray tell how we can return to Eden? Path dependency is a thing–you’d think that someone who claims superior knowledge of history would get that. Or maybe she thinks she can actually put the toothpaste back in the tube.
Moreover, a socialist, especially one of the Marxist persuasion, would believe that social organization and institutions are adapted to technological conditions, and that technology shocks drive social change. As Marx put it: “The hand-mill gives you society with the feudal lord; the steam-mill, society with the industrial capitalist.”
So even if Mattei’s characterization of societies during 99.9 percent of human history were correct, we can’t go home again. A Marxist would conclude that those social organizations were adapted to the subsistence agricultural, pastoral, and hunter-gatherer production technologies, and are completely maladapted to modern information and industrial technologies.
Meaning that the passionate advocate for socialism doesn’t understand socialism.
Unfortunately, she is hardly alone. I surmise that she is all too typical of western socialism fans, especially the young and “educated.”
But here we are. Mattei and those like her embody the dynamic force in the Democratic Party. She and her ilk will exert substantial influence if Democrats prevail in November, and especially in 2028.
Now they will fail. That’s inevitable. But the damage they can inflict in the process of failing staggers the imagination.
+++ …the beginning of capitalism to the enclosure movement in England.+++
But that is just straight out of Marx. Or Engels. Or whatever. “The enclosures” was a standard topic in the history class in the old Soviet Union. While the revolution of 1688 was hardly mentioned.
Comment by LL — June 23, 2026 @ 10:26 am
“Capitalism” hasn’t existed for 0.1 percent of human history.
Let’s clarify terms: “Capitalism” the word itself, implies an ideology or a philosophical system – an “ism.” Like Social*ism*.
But it’s not. Capitalism isn’t an axiomatic ideology.
What’s called “Capitalism” is merely individual initiative and free trade, with investment borrowing leveraging a scope to expand.
It’s given an ideological wash – an “ism” – by ideologues who see everything in the frame of their own ideological bent.
Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).
Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers.
So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.
It appears Mr. ProudSocialist is short by 3 orders of magnitude. (0.1% of the 4000 yrs since Sumeria – the start of human history) is 4 years. Not even Mr. PS would find credible a 4-yr historical span for Capitalism, so-called.
Mr. PS has it wrong, in any case. Ms. Mattei actually has “industrial capitalism” being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens.
Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago, leading to “industrial Capitalism” appearing as late as 1870 or as early as 1770; presumable springing – Athena-wise – either from the forehead of Nikolay Alekseev and his first commercial oil well in Azerbaijan in 1846 or from James Watt’s brow in 1769.
However, Ms. Mattei’s “industrial capitalism” is a direct extension of the individual initiative, free trade, and banking that were already present in 1300 Venice. 1300 Venice is 1870 US but without oil or steam engines. The same activities were also present, in slightly less developed form, during Greco-Roman times and before.
Faced with history Ms. Mattei would likely skip all the early evidence of banking, putting her origin story at the Bank of England (1694), However, that would inconveniently put the origin of H. sapiens at a 330,000 years past. Reassuringly, at least one species of Homo roamed Earth then, H. neanderthalensis.
Ms. Mattei also clearly suffers from a virulent case of Rousseauism. All ancient peoples were communists and lived sustainably (aka ‘in balance’) with nature in peace, equality, and unspoiled greenery.
A fine experience for Ms. Mattei would be to sustainably live for a neolithic year. Mr. ProudSocialist could join her to provide the necessary muscle. And for authenticity, somewhere with Winter and free-roaming predators.
At Stanford, I corresponded by email with John McCarthy, professor of computer science and writer of the blog, “Sustainability of Human Progress” (https://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/). A very wise man.
On his blog was a slogan:
“He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.”
I believe both Mr. ProudSocialist and Ms. Mattei would benefit from arithmetic.
Comment by Pat Frank — June 23, 2026 @ 2:23 pm
Huh? Three posts on socialism (from a tenured professor), and not a whisper on Trump’s most amazeballs peace deal? What’s occurin’ Craig? Have the hierarchy decreed that all discussion on the latter ist verboten until the mid-terms are done and dusted?
I see VDH is just about hanging in there, with his new script (i.e. we’ve won an astounding victory, Iran has capitulated, the nuke issue has gone away forever, move along please).
Comment by David Mercer — June 25, 2026 @ 10:13 am
Most “capitalists” don’t really see themselves as capitalists. They would describe themselves as businessmen, tradesmen with tools, contributors to a pension fund and many other categories of effort.
Accuse them of being capitalists and they’ll respond “Yeah, Whatever” and carry on ignoring the accuser.
Comment by philip — June 25, 2026 @ 2:31 pm
Oh, Pat. Thank you for this breathtaking masterclass in arithmetic and historical fan-fiction. It is truly inspiring how you managed to weaponize a couple of JSTOR links about Neolithic trade to prove that Adam Smith basically invented the campfire.
You claim that “individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking” have been around for 100% of human history. That is a fascinating hypothesis, assuming human history started the day a Sumerian accountant first chiseled a grain debt into a clay tablet. But since you want to bring up the 250,000-year timeline of Homo sapiens, let’s actually do the “arithmetic” you’re so fond of.
For roughly 95% of our species’ existence, humans lived in small, nomadic hunter-gatherer bands. Do you know how those bands survived? It wasn’t by setting up local stock exchanges or charging their cousins rent on their loincloths. It was through immediate-return egalitarian sharing.
If Thag brought back a deer, he didn’t hoard it, open a butcher shop, and wait for the market to correct. He shared it with the tribe, because if he didn’t, everyone starved, and the concept of “private property” didn’t exist yet. The natural, default state of humanity that kept our species alive for hundreds of thousands of years wasn’t a venture-backed startup—it was literal, unadulterated, primitive resource-sharing.
By your own logic, if the longest-running, most sustainable socioeconomic model in human history is “everyone shares the meat so we don’t die,” then socialism is the only true ‘natural state’ of mankind.
But please, tell us more about how the cavemen were practicing leveraged buyout strategies. To borrow a slogan from your Stanford email buddy: He who pretends a 4,000-year-old banking system covers 250,000 years of human evolution is doomed to write hilariously smug blog comments.
Comment by [email protected] — June 27, 2026 @ 8:19 pm
I’m always impressed by how much people claim to know about the societies of our remote prehistoric ancestors.
Comment by dearieme — June 28, 2026 @ 10:44 am
“to the enclosure movement in England.” I’m always impressed by the deep ignorance displayed by almost everyone who mentions the Parliamentary Enclosures in England.
Typical the buggers can’t even tell you what a “commoner” was and what typically comprised his rights.
Comment by dearieme — June 28, 2026 @ 11:58 am
@5 libte – socialism isn’t “everyone shares the meat.”
Socialism is ideological thugs strong-arming the meat from the successful hunter and distributing it among the layabouts while keeping the best bits for themselves – the dear leaders who, after all, do so much for the good of the all and have only the best interests of the people at heart.
He who misrepresents an argument to the pretense of a 4,000-year-old banking system [covering] 250,000 years of human evolution is doomed to write hilariously smug blog comments.
And so you did and did, libte. You never disappoint.
Comment by Pat Frank — June 28, 2026 @ 1:55 pm
Pat, ma petite fleur de lotus, look at that pivot! I point out your 246,000-year math error, and suddenly you throw away the spreadsheets and start writing a dystopian screenplay about “ideological thugs” in loincloths.
Let’s look at what you didn’t say, because your silence is absolutely deafening, meine kleine zuckerschnecke. Notice how you completely dodged the actual point? You claimed—with staggering confidence—that individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking have been around for 100% of human history. I reminded you that for 95% of that history, humans lived in egalitarian, property-free hunter-gatherer bands.
Instead of defending your hilariously flawed “100%” calculation, you pivoted to a Fox News afternoon special about “layabouts” and “Dear Leaders.”
Are you seriously suggesting that Paleolithic tribal survival was dictated by a central committee of Marxist cave-bureaucrats? Do you think a 50-person band of nomadic Homo sapiens surviving in the ice age had a political politburo taxing the deer meat?
Let’s spell it out simply, since the arithmetic got too complicated, mi pequeno saltamonte:
You claimed capitalism/banking is the permanent, natural state of humanity.
The actual anthropological record shows that for the vast majority of human existence, our “natural state” was collective resource-sharing without markets, currency, or private property.
Calling a prehistoric tribe surviving through mutual aid “socialism” might trigger your political allergies, but it completely obliterates your claim that free-market banking is hardwired into human DNA.
You can invent all the fictional “layabouts” you want to dodge the argument, Pat, but it doesn’t change the timeline. You got caught short by about 246,000 years, and no amount of yelling about “thugs” is going to fix your broken calculator.
Better luck next time, Pat-o-Rama. You never disappoint.
Comment by [email protected] — June 29, 2026 @ 3:26 am
Y’all understand, though, that the 50% of Democrats who approve of socialism are thinking about the version that exists in Europe (i.e. a capitalist welfare-state), and not whatever nonsense is happening on the Marxist end of the spectrum… right? You’re aware of this? That the political opposition are not cartoon characters?
Comment by HibernoFrog — June 29, 2026 @ 3:34 am
What I wrote: “Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).” with links to evidence.
What you claimed I wrote: “You claimed capitalism/banking is the permanent, natural state of humanity.”
You lied.
What I wrote: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers. with links to evidence. Sumeria is at the start of history.
What you claimed I wrote: “You claimed capitalism/banking is the permanent, natural state of humanity.”
You lied.
You wrote “… everyone shares the meat so we don’t die, then socialism …”
In which case. it is you, not I, who suggests, “that Paleolithic tribal survival was dictated by a central committee of Marxist cave-bureaucrats”
Own goal, libte. Apparently you’re incapable of following your own argument.
You wrote: “The actual anthropological record shows … our “natural state” was collective resource-sharing.”
What there is of the neolithic record shows incessant warfare, over-hunting, resource depletion, and global obliteration of megafauna.
Unlike you, libte, I’ve actually researched the subject: Frank, P., Whence the “Noble Savage”. Skeptic (Altadena, CA), 2001. 9(1): p. 54-60.
As to your anthropological Rousseauianism: “The phylogenetic roots of human lethal violence” https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19758
You dance, dance, dance and get nowhere, libte.
Comment by Pat Frank — June 29, 2026 @ 9:01 am
What I wrote: “Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).” with links to evidence.
What you claimed I wrote: “You claimed capitalism/banking is the permanent, natural state of humanity.”
You lied.
What I wrote: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers. with links to evidence. Sumeria is at the start of history.
What you claimed I wrote: “You claimed capitalism/banking is the permanent, natural state of humanity.”
You lied.
You wrote “… everyone shares the meat so we don’t die, then socialism …”
In which case. it is you who suggests, “that Paleolithic tribal survival was dictated by a central committee of Marxist cave-bureaucrats” Not I.
Own goal, libte. Apparently you’re incapable of following your own argument.
You wrote: “The actual anthropological record shows … our “natural state” was collective resource-sharing.”
What there is of the neolithic record shows incessant warfare, over-hunting, resource depletion, and global obliteration of megafauna.
Unlike you, libte, I’ve actually researched the subject: Frank, P., Whence the “Noble Savage”. Skeptic (Altadena, CA), 2001. 9(1): p. 54-60.
As to your anthropological Rousseauianism: “The phylogenetic roots of human lethal violence” https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19758
You dance, dance, dance, and get nowhere, libte.
Comment by Pat Frank — June 29, 2026 @ 9:03 am
@10 HF – “the 50% of Democrats who approve of socialism are” useful idiots.
The progressivist leaders disdain the Constitution and all personal freedom, especially free speech. Were they to attain police power, tyranny would inevitably descend.
Comment by Pat Frank — June 29, 2026 @ 9:07 am
Oh, Pat. It is absolutely adorable that you think you can copy-paste your way out of a corner, but the receipts are right here in the comment thread. Let’s do exactly what you suggested and critically dissect your own verbatim words.
Exhibit A: Your 100% Math Meltdown
What you actually wrote in your first comment: “So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
Now you are scrambling to claim that by “human history,” you only meant the 4,000 years since Sumeria. But in that exact same comment, you criticized Ms. Mattei for looking at the timeline “since the appearance of Homo sapiens (150-250,000 years ago).” You can’t use the 250,000-year timeline of Homo sapiens to grade her paper and then shrink “human history” down to a mere 4,000 years to save your own broken math. If investment banking has only been around for 4,000 years, it has been around for less than 2% of human history, not 100%. Nobody lied about your words, Pat. You just realized your own hyperbole blew up in your face.
Exhibit B: The “Peaceful” Strawman
What you wrote: “What there is of the neolithic record shows incessant warfare… As to your anthropological Rousseauianism…”
Nice try, but you are arguing against a ghost. Go back and re-read: I never claimed Paleolithic humans were peaceful, eco-friendly pacifists who lived in a green paradise. I said they engaged in collective resource-sharing. A tribe can be incredibly violent toward an outside tribe while still dividing up the mammoth meat equally inside the tribe without using currency, markets, or private property. Citing a Nature paper on lethal violence doesn’t prove they had a banking system, Pat. It just proves they fought.
Exhibit C: Citing… Yourself????
What you wrote: “Unlike you, libte, I’ve actually researched the subject: Frank, P., Whence the “Noble Savage”. Skeptic, 2001.”
Dropping a self-citation to a 25-year-old pop-science magazine article you wrote during the Bush administration is peak comedy. But even your own article can’t change basic anthropology: immediate-return hunter-gatherer bands survived on egalitarian cooperation. Calling that collective survival “socialism” may give you political hives, but it completely demolishes your thesis that human beings are hardwired for free-market capitalism.
You can keep dancing, pivoting, and redefining the word “history” to mean “only the parts of history where banks existed,” but the math still doesn’t work. 4,000 years is not 100% of 250,000 years.
Class dismissed, Pat. Go check your calculator.
Comment by [email protected] — June 30, 2026 @ 9:14 pm
@Pat: So, I’ll take that as a “No” on recognising that the 50% of Democrats who support Socialism are interested in a version of it like Scandanavia, and not the USSR.
Comment by HibernoFrog — July 1, 2026 @ 2:50 am
@Pat – jeez Mr McCarthy’s blog is in dire need of some pruning, what with all those hyperlinks. A bit embarrassing for a Professor of Computer Science, no? I didn’t realise blogs like that still existed, any serious authors migrating over to the likes of Substack – even WordPress is looking more than a little passé.
Have you read any of his linked material? I know most were written like a billion years ago during the era of Hetero (…) BillClintonsis, but I do get a sense the fella was a climate change believer and advocate of terrestrial PV.
@Libte – excuse my ignorance but is there any merit from posting links to one’s own publication? Do these count towards some metric or other? I realise that publishing is no biggie – hell even I managed to get my name as co-author on an academic paper in a learned science journal when I was an undergraduate (100% true – no doubt Pat will be frantically searching his databases to find out where).
Comment by David Mercer — July 1, 2026 @ 7:37 am
“a version of it like Scandinavia”: you must be thinking of the old Swedish Social Democrat policy of eugenic sterilisations.
Comment by dearieme — July 1, 2026 @ 11:21 am
@16 – David: John McCarthy died in 2011.
https://legacy.cs.stanford.edu/memoriam/professor-john-mccarthy
His blog is an archaeological web remnant. Someone is keeping it available, for which I am grateful.
john was brilliant and accomplished. His email responses to ne were intelligent and considerate. He clearly kept his humanity in view and was never arrogant or dismissive.
His thoughts on human progress remain worthy.
“climate change believer ” your words – belief indicating cult status. Belief isn’t necessary where demonstration reigns.
Solar PV? Only where power grids are absent: https://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/solar.html He observed, “It’s now 2007 June, and solar central stations are still not economical.”
It’s now 2026 July, and solar central stations are still not economical.
Human-caused climate change? “It is still controversial whether global warming from CO2 is occurring or whether recent warm years are a statistical fluctuation or a consequence of changes in the sun.” https://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
You didn’t read very closely, did you.
Were John alive today, one doubts his descent to belief.
As to libte, what benefit do you obtain asking him about linking to one’s published work? Has he any publication experience?
As to your paper, given the quality of your efforts here, one suspects something in culture studies. Zero interest, thanks.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 1, 2026 @ 2:54 pm
Oh, Pat. It is truly a marvel of modern psychology to watch you retreat into a bunker made of dead men’s 2007 blog posts just to avoid admitting you failed basic arithmetic.
Let’s do a quick reality check on your latest deflections:
1. The Solar Slapstick
You proudly quote John McCarthy from June 2007 saying solar central stations aren’t economical, and then you boldly declare: “It’s now 2026 July, and solar central stations are still not economical.”
Are you living in a literal cave, Pat? Even the International Energy Agency (IEA) and Lazard’s Levelized Cost of Energy metrics have shown for years that utility-scale solar is now the cheapest form of new electricity generation in history. Watching you try to use a quote from the year the first iPhone came out to argue about 2026 global energy economics is absolute comedy. You aren’t just historically illiterate; you’re economically frozen in time.
2. The Continuous Dance Around the Math
Notice how, once again, you completely ignored Exhibit A? You told us banking has been around for 100% of human history. I showed you that 4,000 years of Sumerian banking divided by 250,000 years of human evolution is 1.6%. You got caught inflating your data by a massive three orders of magnitude. No amount of hiding behind John McCarthy’s ghost changes the fact that your opening argument was a math tragedy.
3. The Academic Fragility
When David asks a perfectly reasonable question about your hilarious self-citation to Skeptic magazine, you immediately lash out and sniff that he probably published in “culture studies.” Peak projection, Pat. You’re the one who cited a 25-year-old pop-sci opinion piece you wrote yourself as “research” to debunk actual, established evolutionary anthropology.
You can keep trying to insult everyone else’s intelligence, but the scoreboard doesn’t lie. You don’t know how long humans have existed, you don’t know how hunter-gatherers survived, and you don’t know what a megawatt of solar costs in 2026.
Keep Googling 20-year-old links, amigo. You’re doing great.
Comment by [email protected] — July 1, 2026 @ 6:23 pm
@libte – too funny.
“Lazard’s Levelized Cost of Energy metric” is a fraud. It ignores, for example, that the material expense of building solar or wind facilities reflects costs of manufacture within the fossil fuel economy.
LCoE should be required to use the material costs based on an economy of strictly solar/wind energy.
Human history does not extend back 250,000 years, libte, no matter your fondness for the straw man. Human existence stretches back 250,00 years (extreme estimate). History begins with the written accounts of … wait for it … historians. At the first, that would be accounts of royal doings.
“When David … hilarious self-citation to Skeptic magazine”
David didn’t mention Skeptic magazine.
You’re lying again.
The Noble Savage article includes 34 citations to published scholarly work. Your meritless unsubstantiated toss-off is worth nothing.
You accuse me of knowing nothing, while posting no more than opinion and village-japester derision.
Your insulting dismissal of John McCarthy is unworthy even for you.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 1, 2026 @ 7:10 pm
“you must be thinking of the old Swedish Social Democrat policy of eugenic sterilisations.”
Translation: “Let’s ignore any good ideas that come from any country that has ever made any mistake at any time in the past”. I’d be interested to know where you think you can find such a country.
Comment by HibernoFrog — July 2, 2026 @ 2:57 am
Oh, Pat. The semantic gymnastics here are truly Olympics-worthy. You are twisting yourself into a pretzel to avoid admitting that your arguments are absolute garbage.
Let’s take your latest desperate deflections apart piece by piece:
1. The “History vs. Existence” Goalpost Shift
Now you are claiming that “human history” only counts after written language was invented, so your 100% math magically works. Nice try, but let’s look back at your very first comment where you explicitly tried to correct Ms. Mattei’s timeline:
Pat’s Verbatim Words: “Ms. Mattei actually has ‘industrial capitalism’ being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens. Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago… So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking have been around for 100% of human history.”
You explicitly set the scope of the conversation to the appearance of Homo sapiens (250,000 years) to critique her, and then immediately claimed your beloved “non-isms” existed for 100% of it. Now that you realize how profoundly stupid it sounds to claim cavemen had investment banks, you’re trying to shrink the timeline down to 4,000 years. If you only meant written history, your comparison to the 250,000-year Homo sapiens timeline makes absolutely zero sense. You got caught, Pat. Stop squirming.
2. The Lazard LCOE “Conspiracy”
Calling the global gold standard for energy economics a “fraud” because it doesn’t fit your 2007 worldview is peak internet contrarianism. Wall Street, global utilities, and massive energy corporations use Lazard’s Levelized Cost of Energy to deploy hundreds of billions of dollars. They operate in the real world of dollars and cents, not your hypothetical fantasy land where a solar farm’s current economic viability is invalidated because the steel was made with coal.
In the real economy of 2026, building utility solar is vastly cheaper than building new coal or gas. You can cry “fraud” all you want, but the markets have already moved on without you.
3. The Fragile Gaslighting Over David
You triumphantly screech: “David didn’t mention Skeptic magazine. You’re lying again.”
Are you suffering from short-term memory loss? YOU brought up Skeptic magazine in the comment right before David’s! David was literally replying to your comment bragging about your own publication. When I pointed out that your grand “research” was just a 25-year-old article in a pop-sci rag, you tried to play a ridiculous game of semantic peek-a-boo.
And congratulations on having 34 citations in an article you wrote during the Clinton administration. I hate to break it to you, but having a bunch of footnotes in a newsstand magazine still doesn’t make it a peer-reviewed, high-impact journal article. It just means you read (?) 34 things before writing your opinion piece.
No one insulted John McCarthy, Pat. I am making fun of you for using a dead man’s outdated 2007 thoughts as a shield to protect yourself from 2026 economic realities.
Keep dancing, amigo. The floor is getting incredibly slippery for you.
Comment by [email protected] — July 2, 2026 @ 4:19 am
If “renewables” are cheaper there would be no need to subsidise them or force them on people. Therefore they are not, in general, cheaper.
Comment by dearieme — July 2, 2026 @ 5:09 am
Wandering around the old links in my favs. Pat: don’t engage the plankton. Let them poison themselves on their own bile. Their rrrrevolution will, as usual, eat its own. In turn.
Comment by Tatyana — July 2, 2026 @ 1:52 pm
@22 – libte
You wrote: “Pat’s Verbatim Words:” which you have variously extracted out of context and stitched together to manufacture a meaning entirely at odds with the original.
You lied by misrepresentation.
You wrote: “blah, blah, immediately claimed … “non-isms” existed for 100% of it.”
Another lie. 0.1% of 250,000 years = 250 years.
The juxtaposition of your inability to grasp a straightforward analysis with your capacity to construct lies about it, display an unusual talent for ignorant perfidy.
LCoE: the fraud is claiming construction cost as representing relative cost of energy. Apparently the hidden subsidy of a fossil fuel economy is another concept beyond your grasp.
Intermittency and non-dispatchable are two further energy costs not included in wind/solar LCoE.
A claim that lower LCoE makes wind/solar competitive is a fraud by the knowing and a triumphal hullabaloo among partisan ignorami.
Noble Savage article: you’ve never read it and yet presume to criticize. Hubris leveraging ignorance.
David questioned “posting links to one’s own publication?” I never posted a link to the Skeptic article. Merely the citation. There’s nothing in David’s comment to suggest his “links” referred to Skeptic.
Yet another libte manufacture.
“outdated 2007 thoughts ” So you say sans evidence. As usual. Earth to libte: your febrile declarations are not authentic truth-statements.
Once again, conversation with you has descended into pointless.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 2, 2026 @ 7:43 pm
@24 – hey Tatyana, good to see your presence again.
You’re right, as usual. 🙂
Comment by Pat Frank — July 2, 2026 @ 7:45 pm
Oh, Pat. Watching you try to rewrite your own public comments in real-time is like watching a man try to un-send a letter that’s already been read aloud to the room. You’re screaming “Misrepresentation! Context!” because the literal context of your own words is utterly humiliating for you.
Let’s play a game called “Look at the Screen.”
Here is your exact, unedited quote from your very first comment. No stitching, no extraction, just pure, unfiltered Pat:
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
You didn’t write 0.1%. You didn’t write 250 years. You wrote 100%.
Now, in your latest fit of panic, you are trying to claim: “Another lie. 0.1% of 250,000 years = 250 years.”
Pat… Ms. Mattei is the one who said 0.1%. You are the one who tried to correct her by saying it was 100%. Are you now trying to argue that investment banking has only been around for 250 years? Because if investment banking has only been around for 250 years, then it has not been around for 100% of human history, and you just accidentally agreed with the very Marxist professor you set out to debunk! You literally just scored a spectacular own-goal while trying to accuse me of “ignorant perfidy.”
And this desperate pedantry over David’s comment is pure joy to read. David asked: “Is there any merit from posting links to one’s own publication?” You had just dropped the text citation to your Skeptic article. Everyone reading this thread knows he was talking about you bragging about your own writing. Trying to escape the embarrassment of your newsstand-magazine “research” by playing a game of “Well, technically I typed the text of the citation, I didn’t drop a hyperlink!” is the most pathetic semantic bunker you’ve climbed into yet.
Go take a deep breath, Pat. Your math is broken, your memory of your own comments is failing, and you are currently arguing against your own opening thesis.
Take Tatyana’s advice and go back to your favorites folder. The internet (and yours truly) is clearly too fast for you today.
Comment by [email protected] — July 2, 2026 @ 9:13 pm
@27 libte – here’s what I wrote, exactly and unedited: “Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).
“Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers.
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
Human history: since Sumeria. Not since the evolution of H. sapiens.
You just can’t help lying can you, libte. Unless you’ve diverted yourself into meat-headed mistakes in simple rescaling.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 2, 2026 @ 9:48 pm
Pat – wrong again!! It was chemistry*, weirdly in a field which I understand has become hot over recent years. Maybe I should make a triumphal return to the field, save humanity from itself?
S’funny, I remember when people used to ask me why I opted to study chemistry at uni, I’d tell them “because it was easy”. And it was, for me – didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. As I think I mentioned before, my prof was desperate for me to stay on, but there was nooo effin’ way.
*Time to break out the hive cream again, eh?
Comment by David Mercer — July 3, 2026 @ 2:00 am
Oh, Pat. I am begging you to stop typing, because every time you hit “Submit,” you tie your own logical noose a little tighter.
Look at what you just typed: “Human history: since Sumeria. Not since the evolution of H. sapiens.”
Let’s go back to your very first comment to see how you graded Ms. Mattei’s paper using that exact definition. You wrote:
“Ms. Mattei actually has ‘industrial capitalism’ being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens. Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago… So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking have been around for 100% of human history.”
Pat. If “human history” only means the 4,000 years since Sumeria, why on earth did you bring up the 250,000-year evolution of Homo sapiens to calculate her percentage?
If her timeline is based on Homo sapiens (250,000 years), and your timeline is based only on Sumeria (4,000 years), then you are comparing apples to lawnmowers. You tried to sound brilliant by using her 250,000-year evolutionary timeline to look smart, and then you pivoted to a 4,000-year timeline to make your “100%” math work.
Let’s do the simple “rescaling” you’re crying about:
If human history is 250,000 years (the context you set to critique her), banking has been around for 1.6% of it. Your “100%” claim is a massive lie.
If human history is only 4,000 years (your new emergency bunker), then your entire critique of her 250,000-year Homo sapiens timeline makes absolutely zero sense because you’re talking about two entirely different scales.
You didn’t catch me in a lie, Pat. You caught yourself completely lacking the basic analytical skills to maintain a coherent argument for three paragraphs. You got utterly lost in your own semantic bait-and-switch, and now you’re throwing a tantrum because I noticed.
Keep copy-pasting your own self-owns, my good friend. It’s the best entertainment that can be had on the internet today.
Comment by [email protected] — July 3, 2026 @ 5:15 am
@30 libte – “If human history is 250,000 years”
It isn’t. I’ve repeatedly made that clear. And yet you continue to lie about it.
“4,000 years (your new emergency bunker)”
My very first assessment was human history = 4000 years: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers.
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history (my bold).”
You’re either too thick to follow a simple argument or, more than likely, you’re lying again.
Your behavior in this debate has been nothing but that of a contrarian troll, given over to lying.
Continue as you like. The record of your mendacity is here for all to read.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 3, 2026 @ 9:48 am
Oh, Pat. Watching you completely lose your temper because your own words are staring you in the face is spectacular. You can type the word “lying” as many times as your keyboard allows, but the text is right there on the screen.
Let’s leave “the record for all to read” with one final, beautifully simple question that completely exposes your logical collapse:
If your definition of human history has always been exactly 4,000 years, then why did you write this in your very first comment?
Pat’s Verbatim Words: “Mr. PS has it wrong, in any case. Ms. Mattei actually has ‘industrial capitalism’ being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens. Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago…”
Why did you spend two whole paragraphs talking about the 250,000-year appearance of Homo sapiens if you believe history only started 4,000 years ago? Why use a 250,000-year scale to grade her paper, and then immediately switch to a 4,000-year scale to make your own “100%” math look pretty?
You didn’t “make it clear from the beginning,” Pat. You got completely tangled up trying to look like a high-brow anthropologist and a Sumerian historian at the same time, and when I caught you using two completely different timelines to cheat the math, you threw a temper tantrum.
Run along back to your favorites folder now, amigo. You’ve provided enough comedy for the entire weekend. Happy 4th!
Comment by [email protected] — July 3, 2026 @ 1:39 pm
@32 – libte: Thank-you for resolving the operative dilemma defining our debate, namely, whether it’s either that you’re too thick to follow a simple argument or are given over to lying.
Give your #32, the dilemma is resolved: it’s both, together.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 3, 2026 @ 4:04 pm
And there it is! Ladies (Tatyana) and gentlemen, the white flag has officially been raised.
Notice how Pat completely, totally, and utterly failed to answer the question? I asked a single, direct, mathematically precise question about why you used a 250,000-year timeline to grade Ms. Mattei’s paper if your definition of history is strictly 4,000 years.
Instead of explaining your own logic, you stomped your feet, called me “thick,” and ran away.
You know, Pat, they say admitting when you’re wrong is a sign of profound personal growth. It’s okay! It happens to the best of us. You got overly excited trying to sound like a high-brow anthropologist, you mixed up your timelines, and you accidentally proved your opponent’s point. It’s a classic internet blunder. You don’t have to break your keyboard typing “LIAR” in a panic—you can just say, “Hey guys, my math blew up, my bad.” It’s called vulnerability. Try it sometime! It’s incredibly freeing.
But instead, you chose the absolute textbook definition of an intellectual forfeit. When the logic collapses and the math traps you in your own words, I guess the only thing left to do is hurl a playground insult and pretend you won.
Thank you for the entertainment, Pat. You didn’t just fail the arithmetic; you completely failed the debate. Enjoy your weekend hiding from your own comment history!
Comment by [email protected] — July 4, 2026 @ 5:31 am
No white flags to you, libte &Co. You’re too boring, unoriginal and frankly, occasionally deranged, like all commies. I have 0 interest in giving your scribble a minute of my time. Go, fight among among yourself, жертвы аборта ™.
Comment by Tatyana — July 4, 2026 @ 1:02 pm
@34 libte – “why you used a 250,000-year timeline to grade Ms. Mattei’s paper if your definition of history is strictly 4,000 years.”
Here it is again, libte. What I wrote: “Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago, leading to “industrial Capitalism” appearing as late as 1870 or as early as 1770; …”
Maybe it’s too much to expect you to calculate that 0.1% of 150,000 to 250,000 years = 150 to 250 years.
2026 – 250 = 1776; 2026 – 150 = 1876. Ms. Mattei’s date range for the origin of “industrial capitalism.” Maybe you truly are unable to figure decimal fractions. That would explain a lot.
For you: Samuel Noah Kramer: History Begins at Sumer.
Maybe a little reading would help.
Innumeracy doesn’t excuse your incessant lying, though.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 4, 2026 @ 3:11 pm
Pat, buddy. Take a deep breath. Read your own comment very, very slowly.
You just spent an entire paragraph doing the math to show that Ms. Mattei’s timeline is based on the 150,000 to 250,000-year scale of human existence.
Yes! Exactly! We agree! That is her scale!
Now… look at your very next sentence from that exact same opening comment:
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
If you are grading her paper—which is based on a 250,000-year scale—and you declare that banking has been around for 100% of that timeline, you are saying banking has been around for 250,000 years.
But then you panic, pull out a Samuel Noah Kramer book title, and scream: “No! History only means the 4,000 years since Sumeria!”
Do you still not see the catastrophic glitch in your brain?
If history is only 4,000 years, then banking has NOT been around for 100% of the timeline Ms. Mattei was talking about. It has been around for 1.6% of it. You used her 250,000-year scale to calculate her numbers, and then sneakily switched to a 4,000-year scale to claim your beloved banking system has a “100% track record.”
It’s called a bait-and-switch, Pat. You got caught cheating the math to make a political point, and now you’re throwing a tantrum because you can’t talk your way out of it.
Look, I get it. Admitting you made a fool of yourself on a public blog is hard. Vulnerability is scary! It is totally okay to just say, “Hey guys, I completely botched the context of my own sentence, my bad.” It’s much more dignified than screaming “LIAR!” at a mirror for three days straight.
You didn’t resolve any dilemma, Pat. You just proved you can’t read your own comments. Have a great 4th of July weekend—maybe spend it away from the keyboard!
Comment by [email protected] — July 4, 2026 @ 3:58 pm
@37 – libte: “You just spent an entire paragraph doing the math to show that Ms. Mattei’s timeline is based on the 150,000 to 250,000-year scale of human existence.”
Another lie. Ms. Mattei’s timeline is 0.1% of 250,000 years. That’s timeline = 250 years.
I made that clear in #2: 0.1% of “150-250,000 years ago, leading to “industrial Capitalism” appearing as late as 870 or as early as 1770;”
Your innumeracy and propensity to lie are on display yet again.
So a scholar – Kramer – writes an entire book about the origin of History at Sumeria, 4000 years ago, which verifies my point, and you go off on a screaming rant of denial.
What you claim I wrote: “you are saying banking has been around for 250,000 years.”
What I wrote: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) …”
Every point you’ve attempted has either been not even wrong, or a bald lie.
Your case is in the same shambles as what passes for your mind.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 4, 2026 @ 9:26 pm
Pat… do you still not see the catastrophic structural glitch in your own brain?
In Exhibit A, you established that Ms. Mattei’s timeline is based on the 250,000-year evolution of Homo sapiens. You then immediately declared that banking has been around for 100% of human history.
If you are grading her paper—which is explicitly based on that 250,000-year scale—and you claim banking has been around for 100% of it, you are structurally claiming banking has been around for 250,000 years.
But then you realized how profoundly ridiculous that sounded, panicked, grabbed a Samuel Noah Kramer book title, and screamed: “No! History only means the 4,000 years since Sumeria!”
Let’s do the simple arithmetic you love so much: Is 4,000 years equal to 100% of 250,000 years?
No. It’s 1.6%.
By your own emergency definition of history, banking has been entirely missing for 98.4% of the timeline under discussion. For 246,000 years, humans survived in egalitarian, immediate-return hunter-gatherer bands without currency, loans, or interest.
You got caught red-handed pulling a clumsy semantic bait-and-switch to cheat the math, and now you’re throwing a week-long temper tantrum because I noticed.
It is completely okay to admit you botched your own logic to make a cheap political point, Pat. Admitting a mistake is a sign of maturity! It’s much more dignified than screaming “LIAR!” at a mirror for four days straight.
To borrow your favorite quote one last time: “He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.”
Thanks for proving him right. Enjoy your weekend hiding from your own comment history!
Comment by [email protected] — July 5, 2026 @ 9:31 pm
@39 – libte: “which is explicitly based on that 250,000-year scale—and you claim banking has been around for 100% of it, ”
The same lie, repeated. You’ve lied past your capacity for invention. Ms. Mattei’s timeline is 0.1% of 250,000 years. That’s timeline = 250 years.
I made that clear in #2: 0.1% of “150-250,000 years ago, leading to “industrial Capitalism” appearing as late as 870 or as early as 1770;”
Your innumeracy and propensity to lie are on display yet again.
So a scholar – Kramer – writes an entire book about the origin of History at Sumeria, 4000 years ago, which verifies my point, and you go off on a screaming rant of denial.
What you claim I wrote: “you are saying banking has been around for 250,000 years.”
What I wrote: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) …”
Every point you’ve attempted has either been not even wrong, or a bald lie.
Your case is in the same shambles as what passes for your mind.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 5, 2026 @ 9:54 pm
Oh, Pat. It is now completely beyond a doubt: you are fundamentally incapable of parsing basic English syntax. You are stuck in an endless loop, desperately multiplying 250,000 by 0.1% over and over again like a malfunctioning robot, thinking it shields you from your own glaring contradiction.
Since a table is too much for you to follow, let’s lay it out as a simple, un-nested text breakdown. Let’s see if your brain can connect just two consecutive points.
Point 1: The Scale You Established
You wrote: “Ms. Mattei actually has ‘industrial capitalism’ being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens (150-250,000 years ago)…”
The Logic: You explicitly acknowledge that the baseline timeframe of the debate is the 250,000-year span of human existence.
Point 2: Your Grand Conclusion
In that exact same comment, you wrote: “…So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
The Logic: You declare that banking has covered 100% of that history.
Pat, look at the words. If Point 1 sets the total timeline at 250,000 years, and Point 2 claims banking existed for 100% of it, then you are explicitly claiming banking has existed for 250,000 years.
But now you are screaming in an absolute panic: “No! History only means the 4,000 years since Sumeria!”
If your beloved banking has only been around for 4,000 years, then it does not cover 100% of the 250,000-year timeline you used to grade her paper. Let’s do the arithmetic your Stanford buddy was talking about: 4,000 years divided by 250,000 years is 1.6%.
This means that for 98.4% of human existence, banking did not exist. Therefore, it has not been around for 100% of the scale under discussion. You switched from a 250,000-year evolutionary scale to a 4,000-year written history scale in the exact same breath to cheat the math, and now you are hyperventilating because you got caught.
No one is denying Samuel Noah Kramer’s book title, you absolute turnip. We are pointing out that your own 4,000-year Sumeria timeline completely obliterates your own “100%” claim.
You can copy-paste your multiplication tables until your fingers bleed, buddy, but you cannot math your way out of a total literacy failure. You got completely lost in your own sentence structure.
Take a breath, close the laptop, and go ask someone to explain your own comment to you. You are entirely done here.
Comment by [email protected] — July 6, 2026 @ 5:48 pm
@41 – libte: You wrote, “Pat, look at the words. If Point 1 sets the total timeline at 250,000 years, and Point 2 claims banking existed for 100% of it, then you are explicitly claiming banking has existed for 250,000 years.”
It’s difficult to believe that anyone can be so thick as to so obviously contradict themselves.
You, libte: “250,000-year span of human existence.” (my bold)
You, quoting me, libte: “for 100% of human history.” (my bold)
And finally, your triumph of reasoning: “you are explicitly claiming banking has existed for 250,000 years.”
An utter non-sequitur that disingenuously equates existence with history.
This, despite my #2 explicit restriction of history to 4000 years: “Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf).”
I surmise you’re not so intellectually challenged as to confuse existence with history. The remaining option is that you’re deliberately lying. Again.
I’d be surprised if you can be in the same room as a pair of pants, these days. Your mendacity field must be so extensive, now, as to set them on fire as soon as you’re in view.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 7, 2026 @ 7:54 am
Oh, Pat. I am actually laughing out loud at my computer screen. You genuinely think you just did something brilliant, don’t you? You even dusted off a classic 1990s “liar, liar, pants on fire” joke. Truly, your wit is as cutting-edge as your energy economics.
Let’s look at the absolute gold-medal semantic gymnastics you are performing to save yourself. You are now claiming there is a massive, impenetrable wall between “human existence” and “human history.”
Fine. Let’s play by your brand-new, emergency rulebook. Let’s look at how you graded Ms. Mattei’s paper using your strict, dictionary-defined separation of those two words.
In your very first comment, you wrote:
“Capitalism” hasn’t existed for 0.1 percent of human history.
You then spent the rest of the paragraph talking about her math, writing:
“Ms. Mattei actually has ‘industrial capitalism’ being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens (150-250,000 years ago)”
Pat… if “human history” only means the 4,000 years since Sumeria, and “existence” is the 250,000 years since Homo sapiens, then why did you use her 250,000-year existence timeline to grade her use of the phrase human history?
If she said “0.1% of human history,” and you believe human history is exactly 4,000 years, then 0.1% of history is 4 years.
If you actually believed your own definition, your opening argument should have been: “Ms. Mattei is wrong because 0.1% of 4,000 years is 4 years, and industrial capitalism has been around longer than 4 years!”
But you didn’t do that, did you? You immediately jumped to the 250,000-year scale of Homo sapiens to calculate her date range of 1770–1870. You explicitly used the 250,000-year scale to define the bounds of the argument, and then in the very same paragraph, you declared your beloved banking system has been around for 100% of human history.
You cannot use the 250,000-year evolutionary timeline to evaluate her percentages, and then instantly shrink “human history” down to a 4,000-year bunker the second someone asks you to justify your own “100%” math.
Either the timeline under discussion is 250,000 years (in which case your banking “100%” claim is a massive lie), or the timeline is 4,000 years (in which case your entire critique of her 250,000-year scale is a incoherent mess).
You can try to blame my pants all you want, Pat, but you are the one standing here smelling like smoke. You got completely tangled up in your own pseudo-intellectual wordgames, and your brain is currently short-circuiting trying to untie the knot.
Have a wonderful rest of your week, amigo. This is legendary stuff.
Comment by [email protected] — July 8, 2026 @ 6:36 pm
@43 libte: You wrote, “[quoting me] “Capitalism” hasn’t existed for 0.1 percent of human history. [Then your massive fumble} You then spent the rest of the paragraph talking about her math, writing:
The 0.1% of human history was Mr. ProudSocialist’s misstatement of Ms. Mattei’s argument. It’s right there in his featured comment: “capitalism is unnatural, has existed for only 0.1% of human history,”
I made it very clear that the history problem lay with Mr. ProudSocialist, when I wrote: “It appears Mr. ProudSocialist is short by 3 orders of magnitude. … Mr. PS has it wrong, in any case. Ms. Mattei actually has “industrial capitalism” being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens. (my emphasis)”
I’ll make it easy for you:
Mr. ProudSocialst: capitalism is 0.1% of human history.
Ms. Mattei: capitalism is 0.1% of human existence.
So, you didn’t understand my argument;
you then invented a mistake from the cloth your absent perception;
and finally you have been going on about it incessantly, while lying repeatedly along the way.
You screwed up from the starting line, libte.
I don’t need a dictionary to distinguish between existence and history. For you, evidently, such understanding is lacking because you’ve never failed to confuse them. An innocent mistake, surely.
Confused from the start, confused throughout, unable to grasp repeated clarifications, unable to rectify your own mistake despite repeated recourse to the evidence.
You have exhibited dyslexia, dyslogia, dishonesty, and incivility, all the while being disagreeable. Quite an accomplishment, libte. Perhaps an unplanned exhibition of your inner self.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 8, 2026 @ 8:26 pm
Oh, Pat. You are so close to getting it. You literally just spelled out your own logical demise in a bulleted list, and you still can’t see the trap closing around your ankles.
Let’s look at your beautiful little summary of the two arguments:
Mr. ProudSocialist: capitalism is 0.1% of human history (which you define as 4,000 years).
Ms. Mattei: capitalism is 0.1% of human existence (which you define as 250,000 years).
Excellent. We have two distinct timelines on the table. Now, let’s re-read the grand finale of that very same comment where you deliver your definitive, ultimate conclusion to both of them:
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
Pat. If you are using your strict, “I don’t need a dictionary” definition where “human history” strictly and exclusively means the 4,000 years since Sumeria, then your grand conclusion translates to: “Banking has been around for 100% of the last 4,000 years.”
If that is what you meant, then your grand conclusion completely fails to address Ms. Mattei’s argument.
Ms. Mattei is talking about the 250,000-year scale of human existence. If you declare that banking has only existed for 4,000 years, then you are explicitly admitting that banking has been completely absent for 98.4% of human existence. You are agreeing with her that for the vast, overwhelming majority of human life on this planet, your “natural state” of free-market banking didn’t exist.
Do you see the catastrophic knot you’ve tied yourself into yet?
If your “100% of history” claim was meant to debunk Ms. Mattei’s 250,000-year timeline, your math is a fraudulent, three-orders-of-magnitude lie.
If your “100% of history” claim only applied to the 4,000 years since Sumeria, then you completely surrendered the debate to her, because you just admitted banking has only existed for a tiny 1.6% sliver of human existence.
You are so busy trying to diagnose me with “dyslexia” and “dyslogia” that you haven’t realized you’re arguing against your own shadow. You tried to play a slick semantic game by using “history” and “existence” interchangeably to make your “100%” claim sound grand and sweeping, and now that you’ve been forced to separate them, your entire opening argument has evaporated into thin air.
But please, give us some more medical diagnoses. It’s a fantastic look for someone whose logic just suffered a fatal system error.
Comment by [email protected] — July 9, 2026 @ 10:12 am
@45 libte: “Pat. If you are using your strict, … “
___________”If that is what you meant, …”
___________”If your “100% of history” claim was meant …”
___________”If your “100% of history” claim only applied to …”
If, if, if, if, as though my case were cryptic.
What I wrote, with links to evidence:
““Capitalism” hasn’t existed for 0.1 percent of human history. … Mr. ProudSocialist is short by 3 orders of magnitude.”
“Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).”
“Lending banks were already present in 2000 BCE Sumeria (https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf) to assist in trade and extend credit to farmers.”
“Ms. Mattei actually has “industrial capitalism” being around for 0.1% of the time since the appearance of Homo sapiens.
“Typical origin estimates for H.s. are 150-250,000 years ago, leading to “industrial Capitalism” appearing as late as 1870 or as early as 1770; presumable springing – Athena-wise – either from the forehead of Nikolay Alekseev and his first commercial oil well in Azerbaijan in 1846 or from James Watt’s brow in 1769.”
So, 4000 years clearly referred to the earliest history with its evidence of lending banks and individual initiative – the essence of the capital economy.
Ms. Mattei’s 0.1% of the 150-250,000 years of human existence supposed capitalism to have originated in ~1870 to ~1770. As I clearly specified.
As usual, libte, you completely missed the boat; inventing confusion by selectively misrepresenting the clear message of my original post.
Your tendentious contrarianism has been on display throughout.
The dyslexia, dyslogia, dishonesty, incivility, and disagreeableness are not medical diagnoses.
They are evidential statements, based on observation and in view above, about your reliability to read for meaning, your capacity to make a coherent argument, your level of ethical integrity, and your deportment in debate.
All experienced to be sorely wanting in you.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 9, 2026 @ 12:15 pm
Oh, Pat. I absolutely love how you formatted your little blank lines to mock my use of conditional “if” statements, as if laying out the structural consequences of your own words is a sign of weakness.
The reason I have to use “if” is because your argument is a Schrodinger’s cat of logical failure—it’s simultaneously dead and alive depending on which sentence we look at.
Let’s strip away all the “ifs” and look at the hard, cold reality of what you just typed. You explicitly admitted:
The 4,000-year scale refers to written history and the emergence of lending banks.
Ms. Mattei’s 250,000-year scale refers to human existence.
Great. No “ifs.” Those are your stated facts.
Now let’s look at your grand thesis statement from that first comment, completely unedited:
“So, individual initiative, free trade, and investment banking (an utter non-ism) have been around for 100% of human history.”
Pat, if banking has been around for 100% of human history (4,000 years), but it has only been around for a pathetic 1.6% of human existence (250,000 years), then your entire attempt to use banking as proof that capitalism is the “natural, default setting of humanity” is an absolute joke.
You are literally standing here, beating your chest, and proudly declaring that your preferred socioeconomic model was entirely non-existent for 98.4% of the time our species has been walking the Earth. You just fully validated the Marxist argument that capitalism/banking is a late-stage, artificial institutional development, not an inherent human trait. You handed her the match, poured the gasoline on your own thesis, and struck it yourself.
And then you have the absolute nerve to try and hand out “evidential statements” on my “capacity to make a coherent argument.” Look in the mirror, buddy! You got so blinded by your own condescending, pseudo-intellectual vocabulary that you accidentally argued yourself into a corner where you are now defending a Marxist professor’s timeline just to avoid admitting a math error to a stranger on the internet.
Your logic isn’t just in shambles, Pat. It’s an archaeological ruin.
Enjoy the view from the bottom of your own hole. I’m done trying to hand you a ladder.
Comment by [email protected] — July 9, 2026 @ 1:29 pm
@47 libte, you quoted “the “natural, default setting of humanity”” constructing it to seem as though I wrote it. However, I did not. So, you lied again.
What I did write was, “Individual initiative and free trade have been around since at least the late neolithic (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).”
With links to evidence.
Individual initiative and free trade are two of three that make up the capital economy. The third is investment banking, which I pointed out existed in ancient Sumer, again with a link to evidence: https://ijarasem.com/admin/img/18_History.pdf
You’ve done nothing but misrepresent my argument, making one straw man diversion after another.
You wrote: “You just fully validated the Marxist argument that capitalism/banking is a late-stage, artificial institutional development, not an inherent human trait.”
A fatuous construct, given that banking arose in Sumer 4000 years before Marx wrote a word. One may observe with far more confidence that Marxism itself “is a late-stage, artificial institutional development, not an inherent human trait.”
A further indication of Marxist intellectual bankruptcy, qua you, is that humans are typified by 2 million years of gene/culture co-evolution. Cultural evolution means that *nothing* humans do culturally these days is an “inherent human trait.” Most certainly not Marxism.
As to Ms. Mattei, she’s hyper-confident and foolish. An all-too-often combination.
And as to you handing out ladders, spare me the laugh. You’ve done nothing but act the contrarian cheat.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 9, 2026 @ 10:50 pm
Oh, Pat. The absolute desperation leaking out of this comment is a sights to behold. You are now hyperventilating over single-quote marks because you have completely, totally run out of arguments.
Let’s address your latest panic attack, step by step:
1. The Scare Quotes Meltdown
You are screaming “Liar!” because I used single quotes around natural, default setting of humanity. Pat, those are called scare quotes. I was summarizing the foundational, underlying premise of your entire worldview—the idea that individual initiative and free trade are foundational human constants rather than historical “isms.” But the fact that you have to resort to playing punctuation cop tells everyone on this thread everything they need to know. You can’t fight the logic, so you’re fighting the typography.
2. The 4,000-Year Own Goal
You proudly write: “A fatuous construct, given that banking arose in Sumer 4000 years before Marx wrote a word.”
Pat. Read that again. Slowly.
No one said banking arose after Marx. The Marxist argument—and the argument of basically every modern economic historian—is that banking is a late-stage institutional development in the broader context of human existence.
By loudly proclaiming that banking only started 4,000 years ago in Sumer, you are literally agreeing that for 98.4% of human existence (246,000 out of 250,000 years), humans got along perfectly fine without a single bank, interest rate, or credit line. You are confirming that banking is not an inherent feature of human society, but a relatively recent invention. You didn’t debunk the timeline; you literally just mapped it out for us.
3. The Gene/Culture Co-Evolution Escape Hatch
Now you’re trying to hide behind “gene/culture co-evolution” to claim that nothing we do today is an inherent human trait. Nice pivot! But if nothing we do today is an inherent human trait, then your entire opening argument—where you tried to claim “capitalism” isn’t an ideology but just basic human nature that has existed for “100% of human history”—completely evaporates. If it’s all just recent cultural evolution, then it is an institutional system that developed over time. In other words, an “ism.” You just debunked your own opening paragraph.
You have spent two weeks dancing, twisting, changing definitions, and screaming “LIAR!” at the top of your lungs. But the text doesn’t lie, Pat. You tried to cook the math by comparing a 4,000-year written history timeline to a 250,000-year evolutionary timeline, and you have spent the last ten comments completely melting down because you got caught.
Keep typing, amigo. Your shovel is hitting bedrock, but the digging is still hilarious to watch.
Comment by [email protected] — July 10, 2026 @ 8:48 am
@49 libte: you wrote, “because I used single quotes”
Here’s your quote: _“natural, default setting of humanity”_
That is, you used double quotes. Your claim of “single quotes” usage is a lie. Double quotes indicates a direct rendition of another’s words. Your use of double quotes manufactured a lie, as was noted. That’s StOP for you. The shame of it is that two lies in one construct is not unusual for you.
And, as we’re discussing lies:
Catalogue of your lies: #20; #25; #28; #31 (twice); #32; #36; #38; #40; #42; #44; #49
Catalogue of your misrepresentations/straw men: #8; #20; #25; #46; $48; #49
An index of your shame, libte.
You wrote: “No one said banking arose after Marx.”
True. I wrote that banking (completing the proto-capital economy) arose 4000 years before Marx wrote a word. Your argument above is a diversionary non-sequitur. An instance of dishonesty (surprise, surprise).
You wrote, “broader context of human existence.” Lovely that you’ve learned to distinguish between existence and history.
You wrote: “… but a relatively recent invention.”
Now that you’ve stepped out of the error that existence equals history, you’ve invented a new way to be mistaken. Namely, now that you’ve shifted your effort to 250,000 years of human existence, every single cultural construct is necessarily “a relatively recent invention.”
When everything is a recent invention, the Marxist diagnosis of capitalism as a relatively recent invention is not a unique descriptor. You, in your haste to triumph, have converted the Marxist canon into a vapid truism.
You wrote: “your entire opening argument—where you tried to claim “capitalism” isn’t an ideology but just basic human nature…”
Lurid hyperbole. Nowhere did I raise a case for human nature. I merely pointed out that free trade and individual initiative had been around since the neolithic. Presented with evidence: (https://doi.org/10.2307/1783003 also https://doi.org/10.2307/140719).
You wrote: “institutional system that developed over time. In other words, an “ism.””
Isms are ideologies. Prescriptive philosophies. Those political primarily justifying impositions upon behavior, always, and on thought, often.
Institutional systems are merely empirically-based operational protocols. As institutional systems are empirical – based upon what works efficiently – they are categorically distinct from philosophy and ideology.
You wrote: “You tried to cook the math by comparing a 4,000-year written history timeline to a 250,000-year evolutionary timeline,”
Another lie. Hang on til I go back and amend your index of shame.
I contrasted Mr. ProudSocialist’s “industrial capitalism” timeline of 0.1% of human history = 0.1% of 4000 years = a ludicrous 40 years), with Ms. Mattei’s “industrial capitalism” timeline of 0.1% of human existence (0.1% of 150-250,000 years = 150-250 years prior. Also wrong, as it turned out.).
You have parlayed one truth, though, which is: “But the text doesn’t lie, Pat.”
In that, you’re correct. The thread above stands as a monument to your constitutional perfidy.
Comment by Pat Frank — July 10, 2026 @ 6:40 pm