You think you’re caricaturing my view but yes - that’s true. Employment is exploitation, and we all know that. Why else would we all seek situations where we are shareholders or partner in a business? Because ownership is power, and using your power to profit off someone else’s labor is exploitation.

>You think you’re caricaturing my view but yes - that’s true.

That doesn't make sense though. A worker can choose not to work and do nothing, same as if the "exploitative" job wasn't offered at all. Are you saying the existence of the choice is immoral, and that someone else should decide whether or not a job is a good use of their time?

First off, Uber existing and me choosing not to work for them isn’t the same thing as uber NOT existing. They’re taking up space, driving labor markets, altering our basic perception of what work is. They’re not some garage startup providing another option - they’re leveraging billions and billions of dollars of capital and shaping the world around them.

Second, the logic you just used could easily justify feudal serfdom. Does the existence of the choice to become a serf make the lord immoral? If your line of reasoning can be used to justify modes of living that we all agree are bad, perhaps it’s a flawed line of reasoning?

>They’re taking up space, driving labor markets, altering our basic perception of what work is.

Yes, because a larger number individuals choose to work for them instead of not work. If everyone (or even just a simple majority) decided not to work for them, then the company would likely die.

But to your point, I don't agree that the existence of Uber warps the labor landscape in such a way that it removes previously available jobs in other sectors. It would make them more available (and employers more desperate), if other workers moved from those jobs to work for Uber.

>Second, the logic you just used could easily justify feudal serfdom.

I don't know enough about feudal serfdom to comment on that, but I would point out that you haven't shown where my logic is wrong/flawed. Only that you think it justifies something bad. I would ask that you point out the flaw in the logic instead.

> you haven't shown where my logic is wrong/flawed. Only that you think it justifies something bad. I would ask that you point out the flaw in the logic instead.

That it can justify something bad is the flaw. For example, racism isn’t bad because it’s logically flawed. Depending on your core beliefs, something I’m not going to be able to change, it may be the logical conclusion of them. The reason it’s bad is because it is used to justify mistreatment of others.

You’re on your own dissecting if you believe in something that can justify feudalism because of bad core beliefs or because of bad logic.

Racism is bad because it is logically flawed, and the (im)morality of it derives from this logic. The logic is simple: individual behavior cannot be inferred by any prejudice against their group. From that, the immorality of racism is clear.

You are putting the horse before the cart by saying that something is bad first, regardless of whether or not it is logical. If you are saying feudalism is bad (again, I don't know enough on the subject to speak about it), but it is consistent with my logic, then you have to explain how the logic is flawed, which you have already asserted in your previous post.

> individual behavior cannot be inferred by any prejudice against their group

That's exactly what was describing as a "core belief". I share that belief, but plenty of people don't. If you hold the opposite core belief "individual behavior can be inferred from a person's group membership" bam you've got a logical chain that leads to however far down the racism spiral you want to go.

There is no logic that can prove or disprove which of those two is "correct". Empirical evidence, maybe? But that involves changing a core belief - you can show me mountains of evidence, but like anyone I'll discount the evidence that disagrees and overvalue the stuff that does. It's a long road, far too long for the HN comments section.

> You are putting the horse before the cart by saying that something is bad first, regardless of whether or not it is logical.

I'm not. As best as any human can do I am attempting to put my core beliefs first (examining them for faults and prejudices), and following logical chains to end up at my morality. Within this conversation I'm saying that I can dismiss an idea without tracing it's logic back to first principal because there is a logical chain between it and a different idea (feudalism) that I have dismissed already.