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Zero Hedge: What Should We Do?
Zero Hedge has the smartest readers of just about any site in the world ...
Most of us know that just about every government in the world is thoroughly corrupt, and that all of the economic indicators are wholly manipulated ...
And that the big insiders skew the playing field through high frequency trading, quote stuffing, insider dealing, central bank shenaningans, etc. ad nauseum ...
Most of us are just trying to protect our assets and our families ...
And we know that the big reset is coming, because the Matrix can only suppress reality for so long ...
So what's this about?
All of us together are smarter than any one of us individually. (I learn as much from reading your comments as I do from my own research and writing).
Here's the question: How do we build a sane, free world out of the ashes of the fallen system?
It's easy to point out the problems. But I want to hear from wiser souls as to SOLUTIONS.
How do we build local NETWORKS of mature, freedom-loving individuals so we can hit the ground running? After all, we can all go into our own caves to weather out the storm. But - at some point - we have to rebuild community and civilization.
Empires have collapsed one after another for thousands of years ... and then the people have seemingly started over at zero.
How do we build networks of trust, strenth and prosperity to weather the hurricane of change?
I'm not even pretending to have all of the answers. I'm just humbly trying to start the conversation ...
What do you think?
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make sure the ones responsible for the destruction do not get away with it
Stick to your core competancies - news & commentary w/ a technical+economic bent.
The comment section is robust enough to give the site/brand a flavor & direction, so pull back from the political stuff unless it's straight-up factual/scoop news. Again, you have contributors whose political content is more than enough, i.e. no need to pile on the obvious/editorial in the political realm as your contributors & readers bring that baggage w/ them already.
Consider an audio/podcast feed or daily wrap-up that you could syndicate, i.e. 30-105second report for top-of-the-hour radio consumption - this would be a great way to spread the ZH magic to a broader audience, as I'm sure that radio/content broadcasters are definitely looking for cost-effective alteranatives to MSM feeds for which they are over-charged.
Resist the urge to 'dumb down' content. If anything, push editors/writers to get smarter and challenge the readership - it will respond.
Think about where/how media will be digested in 10-20 years time... ZH is at the vanguard presently, but much more change is coming.
Oh, and continue to focus on obvious catalysts & paradigm shifts like bitcoin, etc. Over time, ZHwill become the one of the go-to repositories for discussion/sharing per these topics, which will bring an exponential accumulation of streetcred.
Boycotts, barter, black markets and pitchforks.
Anything less has never been a real, lasting solution.
Otherwise we could just sit around and wait for another great plague. Those are pretty good equalizers.
Focus all efforts like a laser against the banks. Strike at the root.
Find the real power behind the banks.
Yes, exactly what I was thinking. Someone yesterday was livid and is one those people who is so far gone he wants immediate conflict. But that isn't the way to do it. When you played 'war' as a kid, you never just tried to overrun you're enemies position with a frontal assault, that would have been foolish. You confered, strategiesed, planned, reviewed, set your goals so everyone knew their part, set out decoys, encircled and surprised. If we are going to defeat them and put them back in their place then we have to be smatter than them and absolutely stay away from violence. Violence means they win. You have to be able to attract the majority of citizens to your point of view, including the military, and you will never accomplish that by invoking chaos. The very people we are going to need to make this all work are rightly fearful of chaos.
The internet is crucial. A secure internet, free from prying eyes is even more crucial. It is the bulletin board or town post office of the 21st century. In terms of keeping it functioning, and safe and free, we already have our own 'special forces' at work, and that would be the group that calls themselves Anonymous. Now I don't know anything more about them than what I read in the press, and that's a good thing. We want them to remain anonymous, deeply hidden and deeply committed to creating a honest and functioning society.
I would also be sure to tell people not to despair. History is replete with examples of able people coming forward at exactly the moment they were needed, you just have to keep your eyes and your mind open to seeing them, letting them lead and do their thing. Winston Churchill, Mathatma Ghandi, William Wallace come to mind immediately, but there are many down throught the ages, including the Father's of the Ameican Revolution. They were interesting people. They had been educated in a British system, had tremendous powers of oratory, reason, debate, insight, practical skils like a powerful knowledge of trade and economics, etc. IMO they probably stand alone in the last 300 years of history as being the most honorable and capable men to have ever lived.
I agree that everything begins and ends with the Constitution. It is the roadd map of what to do and how to do it. I truly believe it was an inspired document. It is pretty straightforward and simple so most people can understand it. It has it's origins in the great Magna Carta, that was the very first breach in the wall of the divine right of kings and absolutism.
I have a lot more ideas, from a philosophical point of view, of what needs to be done, when, how much and what the desired outcomes would be, but my bed becons. I'll be around.
Replace George Washington with Open Source Software. (think metaphor)
We could also expand this thread to things 'not to do'.
Like give up your guns.
You know, when you think about it, the gov't has pretty much always done whatever the hell it wants. The put on a front and keep us all occupied in our little worlds, then they are plotting worldwide destruction/takeover plans etc etc etc behind the scenes. It's just getting worse.
Another one is to not let them fk up the internet. We're not gona be having this type of conversation with this many people any other way. Techies need to start working on alt. net systems immediately. And then you have the problem of the gov't stepping in "federal offense and jail if you get caught, huge fines, etc". Everything's fine and dandy except when you do shit they don't like.
Other ideas: TERM LIMITS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just imagine when transhumanism is here.............can you imagine an eternal Diane Feinstein and John McCain????
Other than pleading with an alien mothership to beam up DC and deposit it on the sun i'm not sure where to start.
End private central banking by seizing the individual's opportunity to direct and manage his own low-cost energy production.
Unleash the potential of individual citizens to create and amass wealth through new currencies backed by competitive labour certificates and powered by free energy technologies.
http://www.e-catworld.com/2015/08/12/history-being-made-as-we-speak/
The goal: economic liberty begetting grass-root political and material wealth beyond the limit that traditional oligarchy can suppress and control.
Destroy the cancer's DNA and you kill its capacity to destroy.
Nice to see the FED has at least 2 readers on ZH...lol
solutions? what to think?
water is the universal solvent,
the solvent of a universal solution.
.
@"what should we do?"
, that. i ask who are "we",
you know? if you know that, there
is nothing need be done; it is done in the
concept of "we". it is all good. ah, but never
mind any o' that.....
.
so, i say let it be so, done.
.
that leads to what to do next. that
is your problem, so do it and leave me out
of it if you would be so kind and disconnected.
.
know i love you AND can do no more if
that is not enough for you.
.
so what? so;utopia;lutions.
.
the sea is the earthly solution, briny,
sail on.
.
Sailing Shoes - Little Feat
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN_SzObr1Ug
.
Brother,
There's times I think you're nuttier than squirrel shit... and then you come up with... Little Feat.
Guess I should check for nuts in my own poop.
i always work on nutty for my own sanity and
little feat always works hard.
.
speakin' o' squirrels, today one taught me
a certain click, click, click followed
by a harsh throat screech.
freaked me out too but there i was, now telling
you. at first i assumed it was a bird but no,
it was a squirrel in a tree noising up and
signifying nothing much, but, i heard it.
OT: Just some old forgotton woodsmanship lore:
Most animals communicate vocally, and inter specie, but its just us dumb humans are to conceited or self absorbed to even listen or learn the language. With Crows, what I have been able to decipher, its pretty complex.
The click click click sound is a squirrels way of mate attraction. A mating call if you will. It sounds like two quarters being tapped together, one flat and the other on edge. (old time hunters actually used quarters for this making a sound chamber with their hand).
The harsh screech is a squirrels alarm. An intruder alert that he has you spotted and is warning everything for miles that you are there.
When those two are used together- You spoiled his date and he told his girlfriend to get in a hole?
If you are hunting game and a squirrel busts you out like this, good luck seeing anything as deer and other animals understand this alarm perfectly, everything in the woods does, except the oh so smart human. The deer have the same intruder alert alarm but it will sound like a blowing/wheezing/snezzing type noise. You will hear it before you see them, and after they make that sound you never will see them. Think of it like this,You are the bumbling out of place idiot in the woods moving like a Sherman tank, not them, your in their living room.
Nathan Rogers - Three Fishers (live)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thkxwP4cex0
.
Stan Rogers - Three Fishers.wmv
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_7pepho8mI
The only way to keep sustainability and integrity in government is to place the most power in the most local elements of it. That means having the Sheriffs, Mayors, and city/county councils exercise operational supremacy in accordance with the Constitution that is already there. DC should serve to defend the borders and conduct international affairs and that is all. If a congress needs to be called to address a loophole or a required new law, then it can be assebled at the behest of the Sheriffs. Otherwise, there is no 555 people in DC running amok around the world and burying their own people. The Govenors of each state determine what actions DC takes internationally and allocate temporary representation if required to go to DC.
BOTTOM LINE IS DECENTRALIZE POWER OR ELSE WE END UP BACK WHERE WE ARE NOW.
Buy back all politicians from the elite. Elections at every level of gov't should be paid for by the taxpayer. Private funds need to be abolished. Congress and senate must only meet for 2 weeks a year and laws passed limited one sentence and in plain english. All politicians at all levels should be fitted with microphones locked to their ankles and a video camera sown into their foreheads. Bribery should face immediate death by stoning.
The current paradigm stays in power due to three things:
1. Control of energy (oil/ nuclear)
2. Control of money (FED and other CB systems)
3. Control of the martial (military, police state, etc)
Replace or make irrelevant any one of the above, and the other two become vulnerable. Distributed electrical generation--the smaller the better--as opposed to centralized electrical generation would be a good area to focus. A device that could meet the electrical demand of a household would be a huge game-changing invention.
Start with the Constitution.
That is the blue print. The breakdown of that document was the start of our problems.
The founding fathers didi the hard work. We have to follow what they did. Easier said than donne.
Not sure about the 'we can do' part but here is what must be done :
1. End the Fed and restore honest money of gold and silver. All paper money must be a 'pay upon demand' certificate payable in gold and silver at any bank. All exsisting systems can remain in place, credit, debit cards, checks, etc.
2. End fractional reserve lending. Money must be a measure of human labor, no more and no less. No group of people should ever have the sole 'right' to create currency from nothing. Loans must be derived from actual savings on deposit.
3. End the income tax. This was only enacted to pay the bankers the interest on Federal debt. With honest money and no fractional reserve lending there is no need for an income tax.
4. Restore Dodd Frank and restore banking to a very boring, low margin utility, that is prohibited from 'playing' in any markets anywhere.
Everything else that needs to be changed for the better wlll happen in due time just by doing the above three things. War cannot be waged if citizens actually have to pay for it. The bankers who own and control academia, the media, the entertainment industry, governments and corporations will simply stop doing what they have been doing because they cannot pay for it or profit from it. Asset flipping would end instantly, and since there will be no profit in and impossible to pay for, the current dumbing us down, dividing us, making us dependent on government and corporations and distracting us will also end.
The hard part might be convincing most of the population of the incredible extent of the matrix and massive shit show and directed history created by our banker overlords. The truth is too many of us work in completely fake industries and have very few real skills in creating a product or service that someone will actually buy. Leasing, banking, finance, insurance, much of the medical complex, military, much of the government aparatus, all fake, created by bankers for their own profit and for plundering the rest of us.
Bankers have been working overtime to convince us that we are animals and are born to eat, have sex, and accumulate wealth. There is no afterlife, no God or Buddha's and there are no consequences for our actions. Of course these are all lies and the opposite is true. It will be difficult but essential for many humans to accept this. Give the bankers credit - a masterpiece of worldwide mass brainwashing and deception, ongoing for generations. They've got most of us putting the chains around our own necks and feeling good about it as we look up to and revere the worst criminals on the planet : banking families, politicians, 'leader's', and virtually anyone in position of power and/or authority.
While I agree with the goals expressed by OKBoss, as well as the original post by George Washington, I would like to point out a number of specific obstacles that lie in the path of getting from here to there.
The income tax, as originally formulated, is a fair way to raise government revenues, as it has the potential to redistribute income away from the top levels and relieve the poor from bearing the weight of government, as other tax systems do. In order for it to work, it needs voluntary compiance from most of the citizen participants. Oddly enough, the US is one of a very few countries that have implemented a successful income tax system. Many others have attempted it and failed. Instead, they have fallen back onto a value added or sales tax system which does nothing to correct unbalenced income distribution, and what is more, it interferes with legitimate commerce. Before there was an income tax, governments relied mostly on tariffs on international trade. If wiisely implemented, this system had its advantages, as it protected nascent industries and promoted autosufficiency in food production. Always the tool of industrial and commercial conglamorates, the neo liberal economists have strongly criticized a tariff regimen as being economically inefficient. But what price do we have to pay for efficiency? In a purely mechanical calculation, a tariff regimen promotes a lower standard of living, but it also provides the opportunity to control a nation's own destiny without the risks of unpredictable capital flows and the domination of multinational conglamorates.
The fractional reserve system is frequently criticized on this site. But there is a direct link between the use of credit cards and the fractional reserve system: the use of credit cards gives each of the multi-million card holders the power to force their bank to make them a loan, which is the essence of money creation. If you want to put an end to money creation, you must first disable all credit cards.
The third observation I would like to make regarding the previous comment has to do with the role of a central bank or national treasury in the process of issuing the national currency or money supply. Almost all countries have a central bank or rely on the central bank of another country or regional group for their national money supply. This came about through evolutionary processes of economic development, and not a conspiracy of some group of bankers. The problem is not whether or not you have a central bank, but rather who controls it. The constitution says that the congress will issue money. But as a practical matter, it was soon realized that congress, by itself, could not exercise this function in an industrializing economy, not to mention the risks of exercising this power in an atmosphere of partisan politics. After a long period of experimentation with the creation of national banks, treasury issued "greenbacks" and notes issued by individual commercial banks, the US settled on the Federal Reserve System in 1913. This is a system controlled, by design, by the large commercial banks. But it neverthless is effectively restrained, or should be, by the president's ability to nominate members of its board, and the requirement that its chairman be called to testify before the congress. The legislative and executive branches of the government can also temper the Fed's ability to create or reduce the money supply by the issuance of treasury currency in the form of US notes (greenbacks) or silver certificates. These latter were still in circulation up to the '60s. IMO, the Fed is an existing institution that can be modified to adapt to changing conditions. It is not necessary to abolish it.
RMoli - sorry, had to downvote you. The income tax is not the vehicle for 'redistributing income away from the top levels and relieve the poor'. Neither is that any governments perrogotive, except those thoroughly communist or socialist. The insane difference in income levels is directly linked to our Ponzi monetary system. Money is created from nothing and bankers use it to buy up the world. Other folks have realized that with this current system, asset flipping is the best way to attain wealth - you cannnot fault that, they've figured out how to game the rotten system. When money goes back to representing the labor of a man or woman, insane disparities in income are impossible and will dissappear as will unproductive asset flipping.
Re credit cards - banks lend nothing on any credit card. They very cleverly, legally, (of course) made the signing of a credit card chit money. Banks put up exactly nothing, your signed credit card chit is legally considered money. Putting an end to money creation by banks from nothing does not change this. There is nothing wrong with credit, credit extended from productive enterprises is a part of doing business. Let businesses extend all the credit to any customer they want, but not banks, who produce nothing. Money cannot be credit or debt no matter how many times we are told otherwise.
Not necesary to abolish the Fed? Really? Central banks did NOT come into creation through an "evolutionary process of economic delvopment". They were created by bankers after putting in a whole lot of effort and work and time. Central Banking, fiat currencies, fractional reserve lending and the income tax are all facets of a massive transfer of wealth scheme. How can anyone possibly argue that it's a good thing that banks create money from nothing and charge the world interest on it? Have a look at the growth of banks and the shrinking of the middle class over any period of time. Banks produce nothing but receive all/most of the wealth. Working men and women create wealth but don't get to keep much of it. This is no accident, it's by careful design. The Fed is a criminal organization hiding behind 100 years of propaganda and lies that has managed to fool good people like yourself. END THE FED!
With all due respect Moli, you have supported my greatest fear - that most folks won't recognize the current system for what it really is, even when explained to them.
and you said it so nicely, too. most of us facepalmed so hard all we really wanted to do was slap him upside the head half a dozen times
soil. From this inequitable but effective defensive system emerged an inequitable distribution of political power and, in turn, an inequitable distribution of the social
economic income.
-Tragedy and Hope
Carroll Quigley
Until this is addressed, nothing will change.
The problem is - there is NOTHING that can be done --- unless someone can figure this out:
HIGH PRICED OIL DESTROYS GROWTH According to the OECD Economics Department and the International Monetary Fund Research Department, a sustained $10 per barrel increase in oil prices from $25 to $35 would result in the OECD as a whole losing 0.4% of GDP in the first and second years of higher prices. http://www.iea.org/textbase/npsum/high_oil04sum.pdf
HOW HIGH OIL PRICES WILL PERMANENTLY CAP ECONOMIC GROWTH For most of the last century, cheap oil powered global economic growth. But in the last decade, the price of oil production has quadrupled, and that shift will permanently shackle the growth potential of the world’s economies. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-09-23/how-high-oil-prices-will-permanently-cap-economic-growth
THE END OF CHEAP OIL Global production of conventional oil will begin to decline sooner than most people think, probably within 10 years Feb 14, 1998 |By Colin J. Campbell and Jean H. Laherrre http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-end-of-cheap-oil/
BUT WE NEED HIGH OIL PRICES:
Marginal oil production costs are heading towards $100/barrel http://ftalphaville.ft.com/2012/05/02/983171/marginal-oil-production-costs-are-heading-towards-100barrel/
The marginal cost of the 50 largest oil and gas producers globally increased to US$92/bbl in 2011, an increase of 11% y-o-y and in-line with historical average CAGR growth. http://ftalphaville.ft.com/2012/05/02/983171/marginal-oil-production-costs-are-heading-towards-100barrel/
Steven Kopits from Douglas-Westwood said the productivity of new capital spending has fallen by a factor of five since 2000. “The vast majority of public oil and gas companies require oil prices of over $100 to achieve positive free cash flow under current capex and dividend programmes. Nearly half of the industry needs more than $120,” he said http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/11024845/Oil-and-gas-company-debt-soars-to-danger-levels-to-cover-shortfall-in-cash.html
Sanford C. Bernstein, the Wall Street research company, calls the rapid increase in production costs “the dark side of the golden age of shale”. In a recent analysis, it estimates that non-Opec marginal cost of production rose last year to $104.5 a barrel, up more than 13 per cent from $92.3 a barrel in 2011. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/ec3bb622-c794-11e2-9c52-00144feab7de.html#axzz3T4sTXDB5
WE ARE FUCKED
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a74uarqap2E
You can learn from India actually,
Indians use gold as a medium for wealth holding. They do not trust their own currency. They do not trust even the U.S. Dollars.
Even someone cleaning the streets would own a few grams of Gold.
You will see gold traders in every street in cities and also in villages.
They protest aggressively when price of anything goes up.
For example the riots against increase in price of onions.
Every smart man would sabotage the Government efforts at tyranny that the country has no choice but to focus on actual devcelopment for common good.
It still does not stop all corruption at government level. But it helps hold things in check. The leaders are not the only ones who are corrupted.
The most critical is that nobody follows the law. They corrupt it to the point where nobody can use law to control others.
The goal of achievement personal and otherwise will probably be the same.
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the problem of people not being able to see other people as people will also persist
.
the government will always be increasingly filled with people who want to exploit the people who don't know what a person is
.
the more successful the government seems to be the more expensive and less power we as people actually have to reserve for ourselves
.
i say tax people 100% in the next government and see who thinks they benefit the most every 10th year so our doomed to self empower slavemasters don't shine themselves on to much regarding the peoples expense.
The United States of America is destroyed because of William Jefferson Clinton, & Greenspan, Phil Graham, Congress, and The Committee To Ruin The World. Reinstate Glass-Steagall, and reinstate the ethics of Christianity back into business ethics, and banking. Get rid of HFT, REPO 105, Naked shorts, and every insider trading Jew on Wall Street. And when that is accomplished let me know and I'll give you another list of changes I want instituted.
I have a question for you George that is somewhat related to your question. I know a small collaboration of a few people planning to buy 6 acres with home on the west coast of one of the Hawaiian islands and make the place entirely self-sufficient (which it partly is now).
However, they worry about the actual and future impact of past and ongoing Fukashima pollution on them. You have written much about this topic, but not so much lately, and perhaps I've missed your answer to this question.
What is your take on this?
Love your stuff, and thanks in advance for your answer.
-----
PS: My answer to your question is... form small collaborations, go somewhere safe, and create self-sufficient digs. Perhaps some of the collaboration move there immediately and keep the place operational, while others keep operating within the system until the need to escape for their lives [at the last minute]. Personally I think waiting like that is insane, but I'm afraid most people insist on taking their chances to earn a few dollars more (or hope the SHTF doesn't actually happen).
Any larger scale attempts simply don't work in my opinion, and amount to what I decided to call attempts at "collectivist individualism". No large scale "movement" of individualists or liberty-advocates will ever work. But one or a few individuals CAN quite practically get the hell outta dodge and set themselves up in quite viable and wonderful digs and lifestyles. And so they should.
They shouldn't worry about it too much.
Contrary to popular belief, you will get more exposure to Fukushima radioactive particles through the air than through the water, even in Hawaii.
Here on the west coast I'm starting to see things with my geigercounter during the last few months (not before) that could be waves of temporary 5-10% increase in atmospherical radiation coming in. (But it could also be a neighbor who had a cancer treatment doing walks along my street - these things are very difficult to pinpoint with statistic significance.)
I'm not really concerned at all as long radiation levels from normal background levels don't start to triple or so.
If their plan is to live to a major part from caught fish, they might want to buy sensitive geigercounters and learn how to measure correctly, so you will know when to start avoiding seafood (if ever, after all the ocean is the best dilution medium we have on earth.)
That's a good idea, to find a super-sensitive radiation measuring device to check caught fish. I'm quite certain they'll take advantage of the many delicious fish that wander the ocean offshore (as well as tropical lobster and such).
I suppose even better would be a mass spectrometer. I wonder what the cheapest used unit will cost that is sensitive enough. Hmmm. Thanks for the idea, I'll pass it on.
I believe it's 30Kfor a real unit to test food. And you can't eat what you test. No handheld device is either designed for nor accurate re food testing. Re the tropical lobster and "many delicious fish" - if someone has Hawaii fishing skills it's doable only on the outer islands imo, with much work, time, and effort. With no experience, completely forget about it. On Oahu, where Honolulu is, it's pretty fished out and your worst bet for catching your own fish to eat.
I agree that being as self sufficient as one can is absolutely the way to go. But, when the question is "what should we do?", being self sufficient is great and highly recommended but without returning to an honest monetary system nothing will change and the power base of banks/government/corporations will simply grow stronger. The only possible way to kill the beast and free humanity is to end the bankers sole right to create money from nothing and charge the world interest on it. It's pretty depressing to read all of the comments on this thread and see that most folks are completely clueless as to the problem let alone understand the only solution. Wake up people! They own us and the world because of the fake money they've forced on us. Take it away and restore honest money and they scurry away like the true cockroches they are. End the Fed!
True, but because humans are so worthless, the only remote possibility the fiat and fractional reserve debt currency system will end is... absolute, total, utter collapse.
So, given human nature of modern humans...
Humans are finished.
Sad but true.
Bon voyage. What do we owe to those who will not think? A delusion of man is accepting responsibility for others malfeasances. What god, or destiny made us responsible for others? A ship's captain ought not endanger his ship to save others.
I wonder what the sustainable population of Hawaii was historically, and how much fresh water is left in the aquifers.
Desal equipment could be useful.
On Maui where I lived for years, there is a spot where rainfall is about 400 inches per year, while another spot just 5km or so away on the coast gets 5 inches per year.
Somewhat less radical instances of this phenomenon exist on most of the islands. My point is, with modern but low-tech water collection and storage systems, they could probably assure enough water for the 1-million plus without aquifers.
The climate is perfect for growing all year, so they could also easily feed themselves. But this would require planting some areas not currently growing food.
Thus, when the SHTF, there won't be enough food, at least not for months. And since I have no confidence humans would behave rationally in any SHTF scenario, my bet is they won't immediately plant and grow new supplies of food... they'll just go crazy and kill each other. After all, that's what all the movies tell them they'll do, and few humans think for themselves.
That's what we worry about here on Kauai
I know this is easier said than done, but try to find some like-minded souls, someone with a huge parcel of empty land, and plant tons of heirloom seeds.
If you can help people with aloha spirit when the SHTF, many of them will help you defend your setup, and you may be able to keep at least part of your island viable and mostly non-violent.
If I still lived in Hawaii, that's what I'd try.
The best of luck to you, old friend.
Hmm. History suggests about half a million people.
Current population is double that. Some modern technology will be useful.
What we SHOULDN'T do as a community:
Assign a handful of people to control 90% of community assets. We shouldn't then expect those people to live off the rest of the community's labor while deciding what to do with the produce, and how the rest of us should toil for them.
What we should do (just a basic outline):
Begin with a principle of indiviudal human freedom in a civilized community in harmony with nature. Do away with moronic nonsense like "channeling greeding". That's just an excuse to pursue greed. "Scarcity" is invented by Ruling Class to create scarcity, while they have more than they need, and it is belied by the general progress and overproduction of society.
Move to hemp based society as currency. Hemp is not fiat but practical, can be put to huge variety of uses, from food to clothing to buidling materials (Henry Ford made a car body out of hemp). It's easy on the soil and easy to grow. You can never flood the market with hemp dollars because they can be channeled into productive use (as toilet paper or "firewood" if necessary). Hemp can never be made scarce if we ensure that everybody can grow it and learn to work with it (and thus making the individual more independent).
Use technology to liberate humanity. Produce for high quality of life and free time, not for profit of few. Do your work to contribute to the upkeep of society (including working for others) and the rest of your time is your own. Those who study a profession will be exempt from work of community upkeep (status) and enjoy a financial reward for dedication to an involved profession, but not so much that the community risks ceding control or significant influence to one or a minority of persons.
You can also be exempt if you create something people will buy: book, music, invention. The popularity of you production will reward you financial (as now).
Inevitably such a society will produce an excess (by not supporting idle rich or disfunctional poor, or cost of combating big criminals, and cleaning up the messes they make or fighting their wars, etc.). This fund will go to providing those who need it (elderly, children, accidents, illness, general misfortune).
The incentives to cheat, commit fraud, and petty crimes will be significantly reduced due to the great freedom and abundance already enjoyed by all and the lack of practicality there will be in such useless indulgence compared with the stiff possible punishment as a consequence.
The hard part is convincing people its possible.
With or without (so called) progressives?
Thanks G.W. for asking the question. Every year or so a sight will submit for solutions. Please read this because there is one, It will work. It will change your outlook. You will sleep better. If you read all the post they fall into categories. They are the same categories on different boards asking the same question, revolution, rebellion, non-participation, reorganization, re-education, self-enlightenment, self-improvement, re-birth, exclusion, cohesion, God, sarcasm, wit, social justice, foundations, principles, repetition, etc., Before you find a solution you have to know the problem. The "problem" is as stated in the post: Elites, sociopaths, ignorance, education, apathy, human nature, cycles, banker, etc. Are these really the problems and are those really the solutions and how would we know? Would we agree? Do these items have a common thread and what is it. PRINCIPLE # 1 – We must treat the effort of finding a solution as a science, not just an outlet for frustration and opinion. Question – how will you do that?. PRINCIPLE # 2 - You must have a platform. Question – is a blog thread the most efficient and productive platform? PRINCIPLE # 3 - The platform must have permanence. What I mean by this is that it must be as relevant tomorrow, a year from now and a decade away as it is today. GW's thread by most accounts will be old news and forgotten for all practical purposes months if not weeks from now, and we accomplished what? PRINCIPLE # 4 The platform must perform a function, accomplish something enduring. Question - Will this thread accomplish anything measurable or at a rate of change to avert destruction. PRINCIPLE # 5 The core problem must be addressed. Question – what is the core problem.
I will start there because this is what my entire premise is built on. I hope someone is paying attention out there. This is the future. Look at it as an opportunity for money, change etc. The human brain is a very able and advanced computer. We as individuals come to conclusions via perceptions. It is adaptive to a harsh environment. Societies and cultures come to conclusions via perceptions. So which is the stronger conclusion the individual or the societal, it depends? Either way we both characterize our views as logical, justified, rational, right etc., but are they. Can logic and reason exist outside the human perception? That is a very important question, one which Principles 1-5 are addressing. It is also the reason why we are in so much trouble. Because we earnestly believe those we TRUST the most can embody principles 1-5 and they CANNOT. 100 years ago this post would be a moot point, not today. This is the age of software and circuits. We dream big. History – 8 yrs. Ago an article surfaced which showed 6-8 "normal" adults pitted against the MIT grad with IQ > 145 in a trial of reason and logic. The normal persons prevailed. Collective intelligence, not collective consciousness not group think, not nice hair, nice suit and sway, RATIONAL AND LOGIC SHARED COLLECTIVELY.
Principle # 1 software which enables the application of rules and logic to propositions put forward. Cut out the fat, the posturing, the fluff, reach the core proposition. Principle #2 – Platform must be totally and absolutely transparent, source code and all. Every conclusion reached must show proof, be replicable, approachable and open to critique 24/7/365. Every proposition produced by a human must be absolutely and unequivocally DISASSOCIATED from the person offering the proposition. The conclusion reached must be HUMAN not racial, political, regional, gender based, etc. The conclusion is attributable to all and serves all. Principle # 3 Your life and the future of humanity depends on this platform it must be handheld if needed. There always as a resource. There to absorb the angst of the human experience. Principle # 4 The result must be authentic, tested and functional, adaptive available to ALL, Logic and reason must rule, SOLUTIONS MUST BE FOUND, We must endeavor, strive and thrive together. Principle #5 The core problem is that we all come from different experiences, Ignorant people are not necessarily bad, religious people are not necessarily bad, sociopaths are not necessarily bad, etc. THE CORE PROBLEM IS OUR COMPUTERS ARE NOT CONNECTED IN A FUNCIONAL WAY.
Call me names if you must but prove me wrong by proving me right. Change the playing field, upend the landscape, change the game it is the only way. We must EVOLVE.
G.W. Open a site dedicated to a solution and keep it open until it succeeds. Ask the world to help. Your gambit is the soul and goodness of humanity.
zzmop,
In your 3rd paragraph, you vaguely describe a system described by Sapiocracy; an idea I have been researching and developing for some years. The website is sapiocracy.com and I welcome you to join. You are one of very few who have this kind of vision which I agree is the inevitable way forward.
-sapioplex
After reading your site the one fundamental point which I would make known is that I don't see "governance" as an objective. How that works out is not my concern. Perhaps it will stay much the same perhaps not. What I am concerned about are the conclusions arrived at by the individual. The irrational and illogical path that often guides the process. What I envision is a platform where input is anonymous, not attached to any race, religion, nationality, gender, age or political affiliation etc. The proposition stands by itself and represents only "humanity". The conclusions reached are not elevated or lowered by association. They are the product of computer aided reason and logic. This will change the environment for all involved. For instance a few years ago Pier Morgan was on his gun control crusade. On his blog one day I just started posting fallacies one after the other. It was amazing, he was using at least 8 or 9. I posted 15 or so. He was very good at what he was doing. He got away with it. Now what if you could bring his transcript to a site for evaluation and have it picked apart by an impartial software and then decide what you think. Things have changed!
Humanity has group behavior built-in, which essentially means some form of governance, even if that's just the alpha male in charge of a tribe. Some tribes will have different rules than others. If you look at it the right way, all human interaction results in 'governance' to some extent. The larger the group, the more governance will evolve out of it. The trick is to structure that governance so it cannot become corrupted.
I have given Sapiocracy its name simply because it optimizes communication. I also agree 100% tht no individual or group can own such a system without the system becoming inherently corruptable by definition. This is why the specifications and node implementation are structured such that any third party can independently implement, verify and become part of the system without interference. So yes, we agree - there is no 'brand' that would imply any ownership of the system itself, except by the whole group of those people agreeing to be governed by the rules it aids in advancing.
Also, please copy/paste this stuff into the forum over there just so others who happen by later can see these replies. Others will benefit from it.
Hi, Thanks for the reply. I looked at your website and for all practical purposes we seem to have the same viewpoint and to be going through the same dilemma, which is strange because I thought I was all alone on this one. Perhaps there are others? How do we find them? Here is my story I will try to make it brief. I started trading stocks late 1999 and read the bears on Kitco as they explained over and over and over how the wrongs would right themselves, how the good guys would come out on top and the bad guys fail. They were intellectuals and were right in their theory. They were just wrong in how the world works. Some twenty years ago I read an article by William Rasberry on gun control, three paragraphs, three relevant sentences, one false, one speculation, one debatable, sold to the public as a convincing article, hmmm. Then some 8-10 years ago I read the MIT article and it finally made sense to me. Endless bitching as you say will never win. A blog with 10,000 post will accomplish nothing of consequence in the near future. Justice was an impossibility. There had to be another way. Then I came across epistemology and bought books on fallacies. I thought, people are intelligent, just misguided by their perceptions. The computer on top was corrupted by many and numerous influences. So how do you keep the human, keep the computer on top and make it all work? Collective Intelligence, we had to change. Your posting of July 20 sounds so familiar. I thought it would be easy. It made perfect sense to me. My first try, my engineer uncle, 2 seconds, won’t work. I tried with different friends and relatives and only received the 2 second, intuitive I suppose, NO or the silent I’ll pretend I didn’t hear you then we can move onto something we can talk about routine. In the last 6 years or so I have had one person say something positive, like ”that sounds like a good idea” yet at the same time never follow it up. Saving the world was not on their to do list I suppose. I have had what I will call “positive silences” no questions or exploration just the absence of rebuke. Somehow they just can’t process it which is good in a way. It means that when it does come to fruition it will be monumental, earth changing. This is what is has to do, change the playing field. It will come. I see hints of it often. I just don’t know if it will arrive in time. We or at least I was born into the notion of apocalypse. I am so afraid the idiots will go there like lemmings to the sea. I applaud you for your site. This is something I could never accomplish. My only critique would be not to brand it. We are talking about the intimate and hard fought reaching of humanity, the very life of man. It can be owned by no one. It belongs to no one. That is the elegance as you say, it belongs to all yet to no one. It will make what is a hard sell only harder. I say we discuss it here on this blog while all the others talk about how they will rearrange the chess pieces, kill the bishop and take down the queen all while growing a self- sufficient backyard garden. Maybe they will take notice and actually think about it if we use up enough space.
All good points. I have reasoned responses, but here is not the most productive place to do it. Also, the reply to GW has produced a lot of inquiries that are sucking up some of my already limited time. So, I encourage you to (please) cut/paste this into the forum over there and then my replies will be visible to everyone watching there and everyone who can view it later.
I agree most don't have a thoughtful response. I've challened many, many people over the past few years directly and pleaded with everyone for anything that could possibly make it fail and not one has come up with a credible reason it won't work. This only validates my theory that it will work. The only things missing are specifciation, implementation and demonstration - something which I will have the resources to do (even by myself if necessary) shortly.
Reject not Nature's plan. What we know of the future is nothing. What is the best plan? Sexual reproduction with multiple unknown variations. The delusion is some master plan could be selected. What we know is little to nothing. What we perceive is a minute portion of a multidimensional world.
Trust in what? Trust in who? What happens if a EMP pulse hits our planet from our sun? Or an asteroid? Or a genetic mutation of a virus? Mankind's error is uniformity. It goes against our natural sexual created diversity. Our great common central plans are failing. What is insanity, but repeating past failures.
The solution is to allow diverse experiments, aka the enemy of governments. What I know is nothing. What government knows is even less.