An economy for aspies? The Venus Project ...

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Really, it could be an economy for aspies and NTs, but I think it would take an aspie to conceive of such an idea, probably.

Wow ... One more giant step for mankind ...

http://www.thevenusproject.com

- Ray M -

I already distrust it. When somebody starts asking to redesign our culture I start thinking about the overarching goal of totalitarian governments. This seems almost ridiculously similar to what the comic version of "The Road to Serfdom" I posted on the other thread attacked. I really tend to doubt the capability of techno-utopianism simply because of the problems with centralized planning. In the Soviet Union and Communist China such control only led to the deaths of millions and technological stagnation, I really don't think that in this modern age things will really be any different.

I'd be more interested in hearing what they actually planned on doing--the exact changes they'd want to take place, etc. I personally think that our society is completely screwed up and DOES need some kind of revamp/remix, but not enough of the web site (at least not much that I saw) actually spoke of what specifically they're doing with the Venus project.

I'd second that!! The road to hell is paved with good intentions!!

While trying to look up some obscure sanskrit word earlier, I wandered across this site. They may or may not be directly related, though I thought I would place this hypersigil as it also appears to be Unicommunical.

Why not change our culture? We already live under a system completely ruled by a few people.

The Bank for International Settlements, the single body controlling all the central banks, is controlled by the Basel Committee, so called because it is based in the city Basel, in Switzerland.

The Basel Committee was established by the Group Of Ten nations in 1974 to organise and make best use of the system of The General Arrangements to Borrow (GAB).
It just so happens that the International Monetary Fund, the financial institution which controls which nations develop or not, is overseen by the Group Of Ten and the Basel Committee. Two of the major players involved in setting it up were John Maynard Keynes and Harry Dexter White. "The IMF is viewed by some as a global organization, but it should be noted that the U.S. has 18.25 percent of the vote on the IMF board, or three times more than any other member. In addition, it is based in Washington, DC."

How did it all come about? Toward the end of World War Two, representatives from dozens of Allied nations got together at Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to develop this global economic system. This United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference is also known as the Bretton Woods conference, and its results are known as the Bretton Woods system. Run by the Group Of Ten in collaboration with all the nations whose central banks are governed by the BIS, it is this global economic system which runs our governments. And much of the control for this system is based in Basel, Switzerland.

General Arrangements to Borrow

• IMF Borrowing Arrangements: GAB and NAB
• GAB at Reuters financial glossary
• General Arrangements to Borrow Renewed

Group Of Ten:

• Group of Ten at BIS
• Group Of Ten: Report on Consolidation in the Financial Sector
• Wikipedia

International Monetary Fund:

• IMF official website
• Global Banking: The International Monetary Fund
• Wikipedia

Why not change our culture? Dude, look, I don't want my freedom abridged because somebody feels that I think wrong or because of some idealistic interest. The suggestion given by the OP IS totalitarianism and is worse than any s**t headed policy that Bush has ever embarked upon. The ultimate result of this is the elimination of all freedom, brainwashing, and almost certainly inefficiency as market forces are eliminated, as corruption takes hold, and as decision making is removed from individuals and put in the hands of incompetent legislators. The totalitarian systems of the past were not noted for their efficiency but rather their lack of, and to think that this system will avoid those problems is ludicrious.

By the way, the central banks do not own us and they are not dictators, to suggest as such is ridiculous. The groups that you mention only control monetary policy which still leaves most decision making in the hands of the market, in local governments, and in individuals.

Too bad none of those are reliable decision makers.

The Market: Concerned only with getting as much cash as possible. Screw up the environment? Sure! Rip off consumers? Why not. Put out products damaging to consumers' health? Let's do it! Lay off workers and hire ones overseas because they'll work for practically nothing under horrible conditions? Yes, yes, yes. Kill off any products that may be damaging to how much cash certain corporations get even if it's helpful to the consumer and the environment (cough cough electric car cough cough)? Why not. Act with all the symptoms of a psychopath and get away with it because of how much money you got? If you're the Market, that's what you'll do.

The Local Governments: Warmongers who talk about freedom, then turn around and limit it (making gay marriages illegal, attempting to make abortions illegal, etc.). The government uses unwarrented wiretap tech to make transcripts and recordings of every phone call ever made. And meanwhile, the government's current administration didn't come into power via legal means, but instead cheated with electronic voting machines, not to mention the whole "black men in Florida not having their votes counted" thing.

Individuals: Generally? Free-thinking, immature, arrogant, jingoistic buffoons who really just don't know what's good for them and think that their country's better than others just because they were BORN in it. Most people are dishonest and not mature enough to admit it when they're wrong, and like it that way. Most people are immoral. Most people would be just as (or at least almost as) bad as the current administration if they were in power, and ditto if they were CEO's of the most horrid corporations.

Methinks our culture doth need some change. Not saying that the OP should be what that change is, though. I really dislike totalitarianism. But I DO think we need some change....

Nobody said that this was a perfect world Veresae, and I honestly think that there never will be a perfect world, perfect worlds require perfect people and we don't have any of those. However, those 3 things offer more freedom than any dictator ever could, especially the last one. Now, as bad as you paint out all 3 of those, how bad do you think the world would be if just one of the first 2 had power? At the very least 3 unscrupulous forces leave more balance than one free to oppress at will. If one CEO controlled the market and the government then would he not force us to work 80 hour work weeks and I mean every single man, woman, and child and give them in return only a pittance? Yet we do not have that, you may think the current system to be bad but I think we both know it can be terribly worse. If Bush controlled every aspect of our community then wouldn't he harm people equally bad as the afforementioned CEO? Let me put it this way: having Bush or somebody worse have absolute control over the economy would be bad and if we give anyone absolute control over the economy then they have the power to oppress at will. That is what I see as the ultimate result of this kind of program, as almost without question a bad leader will come into power or a bad cabinet and given the concentration of power required to create a working economic plan this group will create an even worse world, a hell on earth in other words, fit for a dystopia novel.

Yes, many people do think our culture needs to be changed and it is not perfect, however, it is better to leave it alone than to give anyone the great control over it required to change it in a meaningful way. The sheer selfishness and stupidity of human nature is argument enough for that point and the evils of humanity are something you are sheltered from by a relatively free-market system(where various self-serving organizations compete and where economic power isn't centralized) and republican system of government(which balances the idiots below with the idiots at top) based upon some idea of rights(if we had no rights then we could never complain about our system or Bush). The division of power is the greatest defense of the common good and that is what our founding fathers ultimately realized and what this idea forgets.

First of all, the Venus project is not proposing a utopian society. the term utopia refers to a perfect and static culture. The venus project acknowledges that we live in a world that is ruled by the emergent and symbiotic laws of nature. With the venus project, there are no fnal frontiers, tere is no perfection. Things are constantly changing and there is nothing in the veus project that states that anyting will stay the same.

Second, the venus project is not communist. omunism has governments, the military, money, banks, prisons, police, scial stratification, and war. What he venus prject proposes is a resource based economy that aims to ERRADICATE these symptoms of a failed social system.

The venus project is completely unlike anything that has ever been tried before, and it dispairs me that people hear 2 seconds worth of an explanation of what it is and they suddenly launch into a "so basically it's just communism then" tirade.

In the world which the venus project advocates, all governments are gone, all police, gone, military, gone, money, gone, prisons, gone. Nothing communist about that.

Check out heir official site if you have ay questions.

www.thevenusproject.com

Being wary of never-never land I look at surfaces first and the slick drawings out of science-fiction have a rather strong odor of some sort of scam. New worlds are not birthed bloodlessly and I always see self designated "experts" possessed by hidden agendas. Somewhere along the line there will be a call for funds. Watch out.

Well tell you what, the official site has a very extensive Q&A section. How about you peruse it ans assertain for yourself whether it is smething for you or not?

Well.... to start off, you are quoting me on something I wrote 3 years ago. I am not even obligated at this point to say that I have to rebut this or something like that.

In any case, I disagree with the assessment of the term "utopian", as I consider utopianism often to be a matter of making radical changes for radical improvements, usually without caring as much about the risks of making any radical change. So, let's say that conservative is keeping society roughly the same, and progressive is changing society in whatever direction, I would say that utopianism is often hyper-progressivism: willing to make dramatic changes and expecting dramatic improvements. (note: my use of terms isn't matching the conventional political scheme as I don't mean conservative as right-wing or progressive as left-wing)


Well, for one, communism was never intended to have a lot of those things.

Secondly, none of those things you mentioned are relevant in an assessment of how the economy really works. The only things I see here are "money" and "banks", that have anything to do with economic functionings, and frankly, if the Venus project is even a working system, they're going to just reinvent both in some form or fashion. Maybe not with something they'll want to call money, but a unit for exchanging labor for resources. Maybe not with a bank that individuals hold their money in, but a center for coordinating investment. In fact, I know that they are basically rejecting terms, but whatever.

Thirdly, all social systems fail. The fact that technocracy is not planning to just shows a lack of realism.


Well... the fact that it is "unlike anything that has ever been tried before" and seems to promise dramatic improvement, is one of the first things that says to me "utopian".

Secondly, it is just communism. I've had this debate before, I've looked over the idea of technocracy before, and etc. Basically, when it comes down to it, I think it is a form of socialism. I mean, the question isn't "where are the police, military, prisons, banks, and money?", but rather "what coordinates the allocation of resources in this system?". In a technocratic system, this allocation mechanism is either completely ignored with a hand-waving thing saying "once we get rid of money, we'll all be so rich!!", which is the the cry of earlier utopian socialists, or it seems to have to be coordination by a community group of experts given the technocratic desire for expert rule, and that is a more centralized rule that reflects a major issue I have with socialist systems. In either case, I don't see technocracy as dramatically different than socialism, and I don't see much reason to pretend otherwise. I mean, maybe they'll try to rename everything and change the systems up and things like that, but still.


Actually, there is a lot in the communist ideal that does agree with all of those things.


I don't have any questions. You neither brought up questions, nor did you bring about any real doubt I could have in my position.

Be that as it may, the venus project is not utopianist.



Yes, but they did, and were centered around and upheld by them. This mere fact is no reason to blithely exclude the possibility of any new idea which reminds you of it.



You should know that since we live in the monetary system, money and banks have EVERYTHING to do with economic functionings since these are the very institutions that fuels the economic system. Without money, there would be no need for commerce. No need for advertising, no need for establishments of debt.

The Venus project proposes the implementation of a RESOURCE based economy. Where any idea of money, barter or debt and servitude our outmoded and unacceptable ideas. People live in this economy as free beings that have access to what tey need without a price tag or any form of debt. Think about it, it is not money that people need, it is the access to resources. The only reason why a price tag is put on them in the current economy is because everthing has a certain degree of debt or servitude applied to it's acquisition. The economy would not be able to function without purchasing power being maintained. And how do people achieve this purchasing power? By offering their skills as a commodity in the open market. This ensures the system and its people are dependent upon each other.

The venus project aims to revise this with the resource based economy. Access to resources is provided without debt or servitude. no barter system, no money, no banks.





The venus project is not a technocratic organisation.



That is your interpretation, but I can sure you the venus project is not an end result. It is not a utopian society. it acknowledges continual change and fluidity. Therefore negating any precept that it is utopian.



The venus project is not communist, or sociaist, or technocratic. All systems that utilise the idea of money, that being a sytem which is centered around the aquisition of wealth is a CORRUPT system. The venus project's official site has an extensive Q&A section and I must admit an exhaustive explanation on how the venus project differs from communism. Once again I must point out the venus project is not technocratic either. The reason systems of money are corrupt is because it is the pursuit of power and self interest. You cannot expect decency and ethics in that sort of system.

In the venus project, decisions are not made, but ARRIVED at. Through the appliation of he scientific method for human concern.



Well it seems to me that you have a rather uneducated opinion of what the venus project is, and your resistance to get the word from the horse's mouth shows that you don't wish to understand. Just do me on favour. If you wish to call the venus project communist, or technocratic or anything else that it is not, do your own research and realise that it is different than what you assume it is. You are entitled to your opinion, but I don't value it highly because it is uneducated and blithely ignorant.

But hell, don't take my word for it that the venus project is not what you assume it to be, go and see for yourself.

The following are just 5 major differences between technocracy and the venus project.

Technocracy
Scientists and engineers make the governmental decisions
Energy certificates are currency
Human labour is utilised to power the economy
Incentive is the aquisition of power and self interest.
Divisionary notions such as nations and territories are upheld

The Venus Project
No human makes any governmental decisions
No currency barter, debt or servitude
Machine automation frees man
Incentive is the betterment of life an higher understanding.
The world is seen as one organism comprised of countless symbiotic and emergent elements.

Sounds cool. A world nation would be better though, but that would be too good to be true.