superconcepts
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Stuart Dobson (M)
Melbourne, AU
Immortal since Dec 1, 2008
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We all change. The future is emergent and dynamic, evolving with our minds and our society. Technology plays a fundamental part in this evolution, this evolution of complexity. So I ask, how does technology affect society? How does technology affect our minds and then society in turn? How does our economic and political system affect society and technology? What are the products of this evolution – and what are our goals?
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    Wed, Dec 31, 1969  Permanent link

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    nagash     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    that's, more or less, what the venus project advocates
    superconcepts     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    I'm well aware of the Venus Project and did used to promote it. But I would rather not get the Venus Project involved in these concepts. This is not the Venus Project. TVP comes with its own assumptions and ideas. If you say "this is The Venus Project" then this idea is packaged up with everything else that comes along with it.

    It's best we address these points on their own merit, outside the context of the Venus Project.
    BenRayfield     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    You do not have a "right" to clean water.

    As long as we're making arbitrary statements based on nothing at all, I say everyone as the right to the basic needs of life on the condition that they put in a reasonable effort to improve the world, and everyone has the responsibility to cause those people to have at least those basics if they satisfy the condition.
    superconcepts     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    How do you come to the conclusion that these basic needs are a "right"?

    "Rights" are decided by people and declared in treaties and constitutions, but they are not based on nature or reality. It is an abitrary concept. If we decide it should be people's rights, then we can make it happen. But it's not something that comes automatically. We will say "everyone should have the right to clean water" but it is just an opinion, never is it actually an obligation, because who is actually obliged to fulfil this? And wouldn't this then infringe on their "rights" not to be forced into something?

    No, we have to get away from this whole concept of believing we are owed something. By implying rights, we are forcing obligation from another party, therefore denying their rights.

    Now you should have realised that I am playing devils advocate with an underlying concept here. Of course I believe that everyone should have the basic essentials. But they should be provided voluntarily by society. And they can be.
    Infinitas     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    I agree that the world owes no one anything. All life on this planet has struggled for survival over hundreds of millennia for the necessities of life. Just because humans have a more evolved consciousness, does that mean we don't have to abide by the same global sovereignty from which we were born?

    Once people have these basics, it shifts the priorities of life. If you don't have to work, you will only do work that you choose. Pointless jobs disappear. Petty crime reduces.

    With people focused only on creative, technical, scientific, humanitarian, and business pursuits, imagine the explosion of value on society with everyone focusing on pushing society forward - and having the means to do it because they are not held back by the shackles of a pointless job.


    What do you consider a pointless job? Toll worker, janitor, actor, petroleum engineer? While it would be grand to have to not have to work, and only pursue creative, technical, scientific, humanitarian, and business dreams, someone's still going to have to clean the toilets, and since humanity has just passed the 7 billion mark, there's more shit than ever.

    How about the people who don't know what they want to pursue? There are many people like that today that would prefer to sit and watch the tube, than take a risk and create a new meme. It's comfortable, safe, and hey, if I get food, water and shelter for nothing while other people are actually working, willingly, to pay for their own food, house and water, they are the fools, no?

    While directing our society to something greater than itself is graceful and sublime, I think the only way we can do it is by leaving no man behind. We need to evolve together... help each other evolve together. That's the only way we are going to get everyone to push society forward.

    "I think that all the powers of soul and of mind of good people, who wish to be of service to men, should be directed to that end. When that is accomplished, all else will be accomplished too."
    -Leo Tolstoy
    BenRayfield     Sun, Nov 20, 2011  Permanent link
    superconcepts we're probably just disagreeing on definitions. Rights and owing or debt don't make any sense to me. I represent all mental states as knowledge and goals. A right to x is many peoples' shared goal that x be true for everyone who wants it. A debt is many people's shared goal that many people keep track of amounts of things moved between people and that these numbers oscillate around zero (paid back). I was proposing something nonintuitive that many people may agree on if they thought about it long enough, another thing to become a common goal.
    nedzen     Thu, Dec 15, 2011  Permanent link
    it might seam like a good idea but maybe in a society where are way more passionate and interested people than those who are couch potato like. And there are other factors to be taken in consideration when addopting this measure, the consumerism mentality in a world where you are satisfied basic needs for free won't go very well together. Some may just make a lot of kids and watch tv and consume. Apart from doing harm to themselves they become a bad example for their kids.
    I say society is not ready yet for this, at least not on a global scale unless someone wants to preserve some fat couch potatoes in the zoo style like.
    superconcepts     Thu, Dec 15, 2011  Permanent link
    Nedzen please read my other post, $lavery, which I have linked to in the synapses. The problem is that our economy, which based on consumers being producers, is failing. This is mainly due to automation but there are lots of other factors. A system where everyone is provided for is almost a foregone conclusion, if we are to continue having any kind of economy whatsoever.

    And you may find that if society is structured differently, the same rules and assumptions about everyone being lazy no longer apply.

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