[SC.LUG] Prosperity

[Matthew Tolley]

> I agree with what you say, it's a good outlook. It does sound like you've
> been reading a few too many American self-help books, though.

Well I read "As a Man thinketh" by James Allen, but he's an Englishman. I
went to a prosperity talk once too, but that guy was Canadian. As for me
public speaking - yes I'm on the circuit a little!

I'm certainly into self-improvement, but I wouln't call it self-help because
that's a misleading, and a little derogatory word, plus I could write
chapters on the issue of why 'helping' someone may be what they LEAST need
to improve their lives!! But if you acccuse me of being into
self-improvement, I plead guilty.

Do I detect anti-American sentiment there? I happen to think that the US has
been responsible for a lot of good ideas as well as some Foreign Policy
errors!!! If someone from America sent you next week's winning lottery
numbers, would you refuse to buy the ticket because the idea came from the
US?

> One problem;  the idea of quality implies discerning between different
things
> as to their "fitness for purpose". This requires extended experiences or
> understanding  (of mobile phones or cars or carpets)  which your landlady
has
> probably not had the means to acquire, either because of her finances,
> friends, culture  or circumstances.

It's not a problem really, because the answer is inside each of us, and
what's quality to me may not be quality to you. Fred might like sports cars
while Barry might like Jeeps. Carlos meanwhile, who's never had any
transport of his own, feels fantastic in anything that gets him from A to B
and that's prosperity for him. You're raising the objection that there must
be an objective measure of prosperity - it's the most subjective thing there
is. In marketing there's an expression - "Quality is whatever the customer
says it is". My landlady chooses to live a poor quality life by her own
standards, and that's what's sad.

> You criticise her for who she is, but that's a result of her life up to
now.

Not her, but her choices I criticise. You're not one of those frightful
DETERMINISTS are you ??????  :)

> Of course, she might just be a miserable old trout.....

Hmmmmm, quite possibly!  :)