Why pay more?



Well.. clearly the professor is not a watch enthusiast and don't understand how the watch industry work.
Nobody wears a mechanical watch for function. Its all about prestige, art and the history behind the watches first, function second.
I would argue that expensive watches also help people in Switzerland and Germany keep their jobs. Immoral ? Hardly.
What would be immoral is getting the money from corruption or bribes.
 

Well.. clearly the professor is not a watch enthusiast and don't understand how the watch industry work.
Nobody wears a mechanical watch for function. Its all about prestige, art and the history behind the watches first, function second.
I would argue that expensive watches also help people in Switzerland and Germany keep their jobs. Immoral ? Hardly.
What would be immoral is getting the money from corruption or bribes.

I have to disagree here bro. Don't think the focus is on whether mechanical watches are better than quartz watches. It's on the conspicuous consumption of people, and the author has a point in that aspect. I don't agree with everything he says, for example:
We can adapt that judgment to the man or woman who wears a $30,000 watch or buys similar luxury goods, like a $12,000 handbag. Essentially, such a person is saying; “I am either extraordinarily ignorant, or just plain selfish. If I were not ignorant, I would know that children are dying from diarrhea or malaria, because they lack safe drinking water, or mosquito nets, and obviously what I have spent on this watch or handbag would have been enough to help several of them survive; but I care so little about them that I would rather spend my money on something that I wear for ostentation alone.”

It's debatable whether "ignorance" or "selfishness" is the main feature of luxury goods consumers, because when you start on that path, then the whole developed world should start throwing off our various "luxuries". Why need to sleep in air-con room? Throw away your air-con and save the children! Why need to use computer? Just read books in the library! Throw away your computer and save the children! Why buy an iProduct? Just buy dirt cheap China imitations and save the children? So on and so forth. He qualifies it later on by saying that:

Of course, we all have our little indulgences. I am not arguing that every luxury is wrong. But to mock someone for having a sensible watch at a modest price puts pressure on others to join the quest for ever-greater extravagance. That pressure should be turned in the opposite direction, and we should celebrate those, like Sikorski, with modest tastes and higher priorities than conspicuous consumption.

Which I can't help but agree with. In the same breath, I don't think we need to go out of our way to live like paupers either. Cheers.
 

Comparing mechanical watch and a quartz is like comparing Da Vinci's painting with a modern poster sized photo. (OK, maybe I should stick with apple and orange).

It's simply not the same.

Here's one of my fav: Ulysse Nardin Genghis Khan

[video=youtube_share;O78ybHEMG3Q]http://youtu.be/O78ybHEMG3Q[/video]

It's artfully done!

Maybe it's not as accurate as the cheapest quartz anyone can find in pushcart, but this watch using nothing but gravity and Newton principal to keep time.
 

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Peter Singer is a ethics philosopher, who, while making several insights into ethics and morality, is getting incredibly tiresome on his various thrusts to "save the world".

To this (now getting ridiculously repetitive) article, I shall continue to say, As I told my ethics professor before, that

1. the world runs on luck
2. Some people live well, some people not as well
3. That I certainly won't die trying to save every soul out there

About his reference to horology, well, I don't think he can understand or appreciate the art of watchmaking. But I think he is merely using this to make his larger point.
 

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I think you guys miss the objective of this article.
He is not saying that it is sinful to wear luxury watch.
However, when the watch cost more than the salary of the ministers.
The question is where does the money comes from ?

He is indirectly implying that the government is corrupted.
 

I think you guys miss the objective of this article.
He is not saying that it is sinful to wear luxury watch.
However, when the watch cost more than the salary of the ministers.
The question is where does the money comes from ?

He is indirectly implying that the government is corrupted.

So the title of the thread is wrong? Haha no offense. All are right, branding cost $. Mechanical watches are different from electronics and most importantly, corruption is .....
 

If your intention is to tell the time. A cheap quartz watch is more accurate than a costly branded mechanical watch.
 

I think you guys miss the objective of this article.
He is not saying that it is sinful to wear luxury watch.
However, when the watch cost more than the salary of the ministers.
The question is where does the money comes from ?

He is indirectly implying that the government is corrupted.

Really ? He only mention it briefly in the first paragraph.. all other paragraphs are about watch and luxury goods bashing.
Officials are not born into their role, its possible that they were businessman, or come from wealthy families.
I think this prof is too narrow minded. He only knows about ethics and nothing else.
By his logic, we should only buy cheap Primark clothes made in Bangladesh.
And why the rich should pay millions of dollars for a Renoir or van Gogh when I'm selling my stick man drawing for $500 (cheap right?.. it comes with COA too :angel:)
 

free market la
do what you like with your money
as your conscience dictates.
 

Next time when you are invited to an official function in MBS just bring your own food from Lau Pa Sat.
 

Really ? He only mention it briefly in the first paragraph.. all other paragraphs are about watch and luxury goods bashing.
Officials are not born into their role, its possible that they were businessman, or come from wealthy families.
I think this prof is too narrow minded. He only knows about ethics and nothing else.
By his logic, we should only buy cheap Primark clothes made in Bangladesh.
And why the rich should pay millions of dollars for a Renoir or van Gogh when I'm selling my stick man drawing for $500 (cheap right?.. it comes with COA too :angel:)

Although it seem like he is talking about watches but actually he is talking about people.
It is like saying that why we pay our MP so much money when other countries, who are also very well manage, don't have to pay so much money to get good MP.
 

different countries work differently.

just because a system is a success in one, doesn't mean that it'll be a success in another.

don't forget that the factors that remain different are socio-cultural, land history and education amongst others.
 

it's like asking why buy a Leica?
really why do ppl spend so much on a Leica?
 

+1

Why buy leica when zeiss or even sigma is sharper? Leica glow? Marketing gimmick nia... no offence to any leica bros here, just a poor man's view :p

The standard answer lor: "those lesser beings will never understand."

And the standard response from the lesser beings is the usual: "it is the skill of the person not the gear that matters."
 

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I think you guys miss the objective of this article.
He is not saying that it is sinful to wear luxury watch.
However, when the watch cost more than the salary of the ministers.
The question is where does the money comes from ?

He is indirectly implying that the government is corrupted.

Yeah I missed it. Realized it after reading it again.
Sorry.