to the debt machine known as the monetary system -
hence creating the monetary-market paradigm
which defines the global economy today...
there is one consequence that runs through
the entire machine:
Inequality.
Whether it is market system which creates a natural
gravitation towards monopoly and power consolidation
while also generating pockets of wealthy industries
that tower over others
regardless of utility -
such as the fact that top
hedge fund managers on wall street
now take home over 300 million dollars a year
for contributing literally nothing.
While a scientist looking for a cure for a disease
trying to help humanity
might make 60 thousand dollars a year if they're lucky.
Or whether it is the monetary system
which has class division built right into its structure.
For example:
If I have 1 million dollars to spare and I put it into a CD
at 4% interest -
I will make 40,000 dollars a year.
No social contribution- no nothing.
However, if I'm a lower class person and have to take loans
to buy my car or home
I am paying in interest which
in abstraction
is going to pay that millionaire with the 4% CD.
This stealing from the poor to pay the rich
is a foundational, built in aspect of the monetary system.
And it could be labeled "Structural Classism"..
Of course, historically, social stratification
has always been deemed unfair
but obviously accepted overall
as now 1% of the population owns 40% of the planet's wealth.
But material fairness aside
there is something else going on
underneath the surface of inequality
causing an incredible deterioration in public health as a whole.
Well, I think people often are puzzled by the contrast
between the material success of our societies
- Unprecedented levels of wealth -
and the many social failings.
If you look at the rates of
drug abuse or violence or self harm
amongst kids or mental illness
there is clearly something going deeply wrong
with our societies.
The data I have been describing
simply shows that intuition that people
have had for hundreds of years, that inequality is divisive
and socially corrosive.
But, that intuition is truer than I think we ever imagined.
There are very powerful psychological and social effects
of inequality. More to do I suppose with feelings
of superiority and inferiority.
That kind of division...
Maybe going with the respect or disrespect
- People feeling looked down on at the bottom
which, by the way, is why violence is
more common in more unequal societies -
the trigger to violence is so often people feeling looked down
upon and disrespected.
If there is one principle I could emphasize
that is, the most important principle underlying
the prevention of violence
it would be "Equality"...
The single most significant factor
that affects the rate of violence
is the degree of equality versus the degree of inequality
in that society.
So, what we're looking at is a sort of
general social dysfunction.
It's not just one or two things that go wrong
as inequality increases
it seems to be everything, whether we are talking about
crime or health or mental illness or whatever.
One of the really disturbing findings out there in public health
is never ever make the mistake of being poor.
Or being born poor.
Your health pays for it in endless sorts of ways:
something known as the 'health socioeconomic gradient'.
As you move down from the highest strata
in society, in terms of socioeconomic status
every step down, health gets worse
for umpteen different diseases.
Life expectancy gets worse.
Infant mortality rate -
everything you could look at.
So, a huge issue has been
why is it that this gradient exists.
A simple obvious answer
which is, 'if you're chronically sick, you're not
going to be very productive
so, health causes drive socioeconomic differences. '
Not that in the slightest -
on the very simple level that
you could look at the
socioeconomic status of a 10-year-old
and that's going to predict something about their health
decades later.
So, that's the direction of causality.
Next one- 'Oh, it's perfectly obvious' -
poor people can't afford to go to the doctor...
it's healthcare access?
It's got nothing to do with that
because you see these same gradients
in countries with universal health care and
socialized medicine.
Okay – next 'simple explanation':
Oh -on the average- the poorer you are
the more likely you are to smoke
and drink and all sorts of lifestyle risk factors.
Yeah, those contribute but careful studies have shown
that it explains maybe about a third of the variability.
So what's left?
What's left is having a ton to do
with the STRESS of poverty
So, the poorer you are, starting off being
the person who is one dollar of income behind Bill Gates...
the poorer you are in this country
on the average, the worse your health is.
This tells us something really important:
the health connection with poverty
it's not about being poor it's about feeling poor.
Increasingly we recognize that chronic stress
is an important influence on health
but the most important sources of stress
are the quality of social relations.
and if there is anything that
lowers the quality of social relations
it is the socioeconomic stratification of society.
What science has now shown is
that regardless of material wealth
the stress of simply living in a stratified society
leads to a vast spectrum of public health problems
and the greater the inequality, the worse they become.
Life expectancy: longer in more equal countries.
Drug Abuse: Less in more equal countries.
Mental Illness: Less in more equal countries.
Social Capital - meaning the
ability of people to trust each other:
Naturally greater in more equal countries.
Educational Scores: Higher in more equal countries.
Homicide rates: less in more equal countries.
Crime and Rates of Imprisonment:
Less in more equal countries.
It goes on and on:
Infant mortality – obesity - teen birth rate:
Less in more equal countries.
and perhaps most interesting:
Innovation: Greater in more equal countries.
which challenges the age old notion that a competitive
stratified society is somehow more creative and inventive.
Moreover, a study done in the UK
called The WhiteHall Study
confirmed that there is a social distribution of disease
as you go from the top of the socioeconomic ladder
to the bottom.
For example, it was found that the lowest rungs
of the hierarchy had a 4-fold increase
of heart disease based mortality
compared to the highest rungs.
And this pattern exists, irrespective of access to health care.
Hence - the worse a person's relative financial status
the worse their health is going to be on average.
This phenomenon is rooted in what could be termed
Psychosocial Stress'
and it is at the foundation of the greatest social distortions
plaguing our society today.
Its cause?
The Monetary-Market System.
Make no mistake:
The greatest destroyer of ecology...
the greatest source of waste, depletion and pollution...
the greatest purveyor of violence -
war - crime - poverty - animal abuse and inhumanity...
the greatest generator of social and personal neurosis...
mental disorders - depression anxiety...
Not to mention, the greatest source of social paralysis
stopping us from moving into new methodologies
for personal health, global sustainability
and progress on this planet
is not some corrupt Government or legislation...
not some rogue Corporation or banking cartel...
not some flaw of human nature...
and not some secret hidden cabal that controls the world.
It is, in fact:
The Socio-Economic System itself
at its very foundation.
[Part 3: Project Earth]
Let's imagine for a moment we had the option
to redesign human civilization from the ground up.
What if, hypothetically speaking
we discovered an exact replica of the planet Earth
and the only difference between
this new planet and our current one
is that human evolution had not occurred.
It was an open palette.
No countries, no cities, no pollution, no republicans...
just a pristine, open environment.
So what would we do?
Well, first we need a "goal", right?
And it's safe to say that goal would be to survive.
And not to just survive, but to do so in an optimized, healthy
prosperous way.
Most people, indeed, desire to live and
they would prefer to do so without suffering.
Therefore, the basis of this civilization
needs to be as supportive and hence
sustainable for human life as possible -
taking into account the material needs
of all the world's people
while trying to remove anything
that can could hurt us in the long run.
With that goal of "Maximum Sustainability" understood
next question regards our "method"...
What kind of approach do we take?
Well, let's see -
last I checked, politics was the method of social operation on Earth...
so what do the doctrines of the republicans, liberals
conservatives or socialists have to say about societal design?
Hmmm... not a damn thing.
Okay then - what about religion?
Surely the great creator had to have left some blueprints somewhere...
Nope... nothing I can find.
Okay then - so what's left?
It appears something called "Science"...
Science is unique in that its methods demand not only that ideas
proposed be tested and replicated...
but everything science comes up with is also inherently falsifiable.
In other words, unlike religion and politics
science has no ego
and everything it suggests accepts the possibility
of being proven wrong eventually.
It holds on to nothing and evolves constantly.
Well, that sounds natural enough to me.
So then - based on the current state of scientific knowledge
in the early 21st century
along with our goal of "maximum sustainability"
for the human population
how do we begin the actual process of construction?
Well, the first question to ask is:
What do we need to survive?
The answer, of course, are Planetary Resources.
Whether it is the water we drink, the energy we use
or the raw materials we utilize to create tools and shelter
the planet hosts an inventory of resources -
many of which are demanded for our survival.
So, given that reality
it then becomes critical to figure out what we have and where it is.
This means we need to conduct a survey.
We simply locate and identify every physical resource on the planet
we can, along with the amount available at each location
from the deposits of copper, to the most potent locations for
wind farms to produce energy
to the natural fresh water springs
to an assessment of the amount of fish in the ocean
to the most prime arable land for food cultivation, etc.
But, since we humans are going to be
consuming these resources over time
we then realize that not only do we need to locate and identify -
we also need to track.
We need to make sure we don't run out of any of this stuff...
that would be bad.
And this means not only tracking our rates of use
but the rates of earthly regeneration as well
such as how long it takes for, say
a tree to grow or a spring to replenish.
This is called "Dynamic Equilibrium"...
In other words, if we use up trees faster than they can be grown back -
we have a serious problem, for it is unsustainable.
So then, how do we track this inventory
especially when we recognize that all
of this stuff is scattered everywhere.
We have large mineral mines in what we call Africa
energy concentrations in the Middle East
huge tidal power possibilities on the Atlantic coast of North America
the largest supply of fresh water in Brazil, etc.
Well, once again, good old science has a suggestion:
it's called "Systems theory"...
Systems theory recognizes that the fabric of the natural world
from human biology to the earthly biosphere
to the gravitational pull of the solar system itself
is one huge synergistically connected system - fully interlinked.
Just as human cells connect to form our organs
and the organs connect to form our bodies
and since our bodies cannot live without the earthy resources
of food, air and water, we are intrinsically connected to the earth.
And so on.
So - as nature suggests, we take all of this inventory
and tracking data and create a "system" to manage it.
A "Global Resource Management System", in fact
to account for every relevant resource on the planet.
There is simply no logical alternative if our goal as a species
is survival in the long run. We have to keep track as a whole.
That understood, we can now consider production.
How do we use all this stuff?
What will our process of production be and what do we need
to consider to make sure it is as optimized as possible
to maximize our sustainability?
Well the first thing that jumps right out at us is the fact that
we need to constantly try and preserve.
The planet's resources are essentially finite.
So it is important that we be "strategic"...
"Strategic Preservation" is key.
The second thing we recognize, is that some resources
are really not as good as others in their performance.
In fact, some of this stuff, when put into use
has a terrible effect of the environment
which invariably hinders our own health.
For example: oil and fossil fuels, no matter how you cut it
release some pretty destructive agents into the environment.
Therefore, it is critical that we do our best to use such things
only when we really have to - if at all.
Fortunately for us, we see a ton of solar – wind – tidal – wave -
heat differential and geothermal possibilities for energy production
so we can strategize objectively about what we use and where
to avoid what could be called "negative retroactions"
or anything that results from production or use
that damages the environment and hence, ourselves.
We will call this "Strategic Safety"
to couple in with our "Strategic Preservation.
But production strategies do not stop there.
We are going to need an "Efficiency Strategy
for the actual mechanics of production itself.
And what we find is that there are roughly
three specific protocols we must adhere to:
One: Every good we produce must be
designed to last as long as possible.
Naturally, the more things breakdown
the more resources we are going to need to replace them
and the more waste produced.
Two: When things do break down
or are no longer usable for whatever reason
it is critical that we harvest, or recycle as much as we possibly can.
So the production design must take this into
account directly at the very earliest stages.
Three: Quickly evolving technologies, such as electronics
which are subject to the fastest rates of technological obsolescence
would need to be designed to
foreshadow and accommodate physical updates.
The last thing we want to do is throw away an entire computer
system just because it has only one broken part or is outdated.
So we simply design the components to be easily updated
part by part, standardized and universally interchangeable
foreshadowed by the current trend of technological change.
And when we realize that the mechanisms of "Strategic Preservation"
"Strategic Safety" and "Strategic Efficiency"
are purely technical considerations
devoid of any human opinion or bias
we simply program these strategies into a computer
which can weigh and calculate all the relevant variables
allowing us to always arrive at the
absolute best method for sustainable production
based on current understandings.
And while that might sound complex
all it is is a glorified calculator
not to mention that such multi-varied
decision making and monitoring systems
are already used across the world today
for isolated purposes. It is simply a process of scaling it out.
So...
Now, we not only have our Resource Management System
but also a Production Management System
both of which are easily computer automated
to maximize efficiency, preservation & safety.
The informational reality is that the human mind
or even a group of humans, cannot track what needs to be tracked.
It must be done by computers and it can be.
And this bring us to the next level: Distribution.
What sustainability strategies make sense here?
Well, since we know that the shortest
distance between two points is a straight line
and since energy is required to power transport machines
the less transport distance, the more efficient.
Producing goods in one continent and shipping them over to another
only makes sense if the goods in question simply cannot
be produced in the target area.
Otherwise, it is nothing but wasteful.
We must localize production, so distribution is simple
fast and requires the least amount of energy.
We'll call this the Proximity Strategy”
which simply means we reduce the
travel of goods as much as possible
whether raw materials or finished consumer products.
Of course, it might also be important to
know what goods are we transporting and why...
And this falls under the category of Demand.
And demand is simply what people need to be
healthy and to have a high quality of life.
The spectrum of material human needs
range from core life supporting necessities
such as food, clean water and shelter...
to social and recreational goods which allow for relaxation
and personal - social enjoyment -
both important factors in human and social health overall.
So - very simply- we take another survey.
People describe their needs, demand is
assessed and production begins based on that demand.
And since the level of demand of different goods will
naturally fluctuate and change around different regions
we need to create a Demand / Distribution Tracking System"
so to avoid overruns and shortages.
Of course, this idea is old news
it is used in every major store chain today
to make sure they keep up with their inventory.
Only this time, we are tracking on a global scale.
But wait a minute. We really can't fully understand demand
if we don't account for the actual usage of the good itself.
Is it logical and sustainable for every single human to, say
have one of everything made? Regardless of their usage?
No. That would be simply wasteful and inefficient.
If a person has a need for a good but that need is only for say:
45 minutes a day on average
it would be much more efficient if
that good was made available to them
and to others when needed.
Many forget that it isn't the good they want
it is the purpose of that good.
When we realize that the good itself
is only as important as its utility
we see that "external restriction"
or what we might call today "ownership"
is extremely wasteful and environmentally illogical
in a fundamental, economic sense.
So we need devise a strategy called: "Strategic Access"...
This would be the foundation of our
"Demand / Distribution Tracking System.
which makes sure we can meet the
demand of the population's needs
for access of whatever they need, when they need it.
And as far as physically obtaining the goods
centralized and regional access
centers all make sense for the most part
placed in close proximity to the population
and a person would simply come in, take the item
use it and when finished, return it when no longer needed...
sort of how a library works today.
In fact, these centers could not only exist in
the community in the way we see local stores today
but specialized access centers would exist in specific areas
where often certain goods are utilized
saving more energy with less repeat transport.
And once this Demand Tracking System is in order
it is tied into our Production Management system
and, of course, into our Resource Management system
hence creating a unified dynamically updating
global economic management machine
that simply makes sure we remain sustainable
starting with securing the integrity of our finite resources
moving to make sure we only create the best
most strategic goods possible
while distributing everything in the
most intelligent and efficient way.
And the unique result of this preservation based approach
which is intuitively counter to many
is that this logical, ground up
empirical process of preservation and efficiency
which can only define true human sustainability on the planet
would likely enable something never before seen in human history.
Access Abundance...
not just for a percentage of the global population...
but the entire civilization.
This economic model, as was just generalized...
This responsible, systems approach to total Earth
resource management and processes
designed again to do nothing less
than take care of humanity as whole
in the most efficient and sustainable way
could be termed:
"A RESOURCE-BASED ECONOMY"...
The idea was defined in the 1970s by
Social Engineer- Jacque Fresco.
He understood back then that society was on a collision course
with nature and itself - unsustainable on every level
and if things didn't change
we would destroy ourselves, one way or another.
Are all of these things you are saying, Jacque...
could they be built with what we know today?
Or are you guessing... based on what we know today.
No, all of these things can be built with what we know today.
It would take 10 years to change the surface of the earth.
To rebuild the world into a second Garden of Eden.
The choice lies with you.
The stupidity of a nuclear arms race...
the development of weapons...
trying to solve your problems politically
by electing this political party or that political party...
that all politics is immersed in corruption.
Let me say it again:
Communism, socialism, fascism... the Democrats
the liberals- we want to absorb human beings.
All organizations that believe in a better life for man:
there are no Negro problems or Polish problems
or Jewish problems or Greek problems
or women's problems – there are human problems!
I'm not afraid of anybody; I don't work for anyone;
no one can discharge me.
I have no boss.
I am afraid to live in the society we live in today.
Our society cannot be maintained by this type of incompetency.
It was great - the free enterprise system -
about 35 years ago. That was the last of its usefulness.
Now, we have got to change our way of thinking or perish.
The horror movies of the future will be our society...
the way it didn't work
and politics...
would be part of a horror movie.
Well, lots of people today use the term 'cold science'
because it's analytical
and they don't even know what analytical means.
Science means: closer approximations
to the way the world really works.
So, it's telling the truth - is what it is
A scientist doesn't try to get along with people.
They tell them what their findings are.
They have to question all things
and if some scientist comes up with an experiment that shows
certain materials have certain strengths
other scientists have to be able to duplicate
that experiment and come up with the same results.
Even if a scientist feels that an airplane wing
due to mathematics or calculations
can hold up a given amount of weight
they still pile sandbags on it
to see when it breaks and they say
you know my calculations are right or they are not correct'.
I love that system because it's free of bias
and free of thinking that math can solve all the problems.
You have to put your Math to test also.
I think that every system that can
be put to test should be put to test.
And that all decisions should be based upon research.
A Resource-Based Economy is simply the
scientific method applied to social concern -
an approach utterly absent in the world today.
Society is a technical invention.
And the most efficient methods of optimized human health
physical production, distribution, city infrastructure and the like
reside in the field of science and
technology - not politics or monetary economics.
It operates in the same systematic way as, say an airplane
and there is no Republican or Liberal way to build an airplane.
Likewise, nature itself is the
physical referent we use to prove our science
and it is a set system -
emerging only from our increased understanding of it.
In fact, it has no regard for what you
subjectively think or believe to be true.
Rather, it gives you an option:
you can learn and fall in line with its
natural laws and conduct yourself accordingly -
invariably creating good health & sustainability...
or you can go against the current - to no avail.
It doesn't matter how much you believe you can just
stand up right now and walk on the wall next to you
the law of gravity will not allow it.
If you do not eat - you will die.
If you are not touched as an infant - you will die.
As harsh as it may sound, nature is a dictatorship
and we can either listen to it and come in harmony with it
or suffer the inevitable adverse consequences.
So, a Resource-Based Economy is nothing more
than a set of proven, life supporting understandings
where all decisions are based upon
optimized human and environmental sustainability.
It takes into account the empirical "Life Ground"
which every human being shares as a need
regardless, again, of their political or religious philosophy.
There is no cultural relativism to this approach.
It isn't a matter of opinion.
Human needs are human needs
and having access to the necessities of life, such as clean air
nutritious food and clean water
along with a positively reinforcing, stable
nurturing, non-violent environment, is demanded
for our mental and physical health
our evolutionary fitness
and hence, the species survival itself.
A Resource-Based Economy
would be based upon available resources.
You can't just bring a lot of people to an island
or build a city of 50,000 people without having access
to the necessities of life.
So, when I use the term 'a comprehensive systems approach'
I'm talking about doing an inventory of the area first
and determining what that area can supply -
not just architectural approach -
not just design approach -
but design must be based on all of the requirements
to enhance human life
and that's what I mean by an integrated way of thinking.
Food, clothing, shelter, warmth, love -
All those things are necessary
and if you deprive people of any of them
you have a lesser human being, less capable of functioning.
As previously outlined, a Resource-Based Economy's ground up
global, systems approach to extraction, production and distribution
is based upon on a set of true economic mechanisms, or 'strategies'
which guarantee efficiency and
sustainability in every area of the economy.
So, continuing this train of thought regarding logical design -
what is next in our equation?
Where does all this materialize?
Cities.
The advent of the city is a defining feature of modern civilization.
Its role is to enable efficient access to the necessities of life
along with increased social support and community interaction.
So how would we go about designing an ideal city?
What shape should we make it?
Square? Trapezoid?
Well, given we are going to be moving around the thing
we might as well make it as equidistant as possible for ease...
hence the circle.
What should the city contain?
Well, naturally we need a residential area, a goods production area
a power generation area; an agricultural area.
But we also need nurturing as human beings - hence culture
nature, recreation and education.
So lets include a nice open park
an entertainment/events area for cultural purposes and socializing
and educational and research facilities.
And since we are working with a circle
it seems rational to place these functions in Belts
based on the amount of land required for each goal
along with ease of access.
Very good.
Now, let's get down to specifics:
First we need the consider the core
infrastructure or intestines of the city organism.
These would be the water, goods
waste and energy transport channels.
Just as we have water and sewage systems under our cities today
we would extend this channeling concept to
integrate waste recycling and delivery itself.
No more mailmen or garbage men.
It is built right in. We could even use
automated pneumatic tubes and similar technologies.
Same goes for transport.
It needs to be integrated and strategically designed to reduce
or even remove the need for wasteful, independent automobiles.
Electric trams, conveyors, transveyors and
maglevs which can take you virtually
anywhere in the city, even up and down
along with connecting you to other cities as well.
And of course, in the event a car is required
it is automated by satellite for safety and integrity.
In fact, this automation technology is in working order right now.
Automobile accidents kill about 1.2 million people every single year;
injuring about 50 million.
This is absurd and doesn't have to occur.
Between efficient city design and automated, driverless cars
this death toll can be virtually eliminated.
Agriculture.
Today, through our haphazard, cost-cutting industrial methods
using pesticides, excessive fertilizers and other means
we have successfully destroyed much
of the the arable land on this planet
not to mention also extensively poisoning our bodies.
In fact, industrial and agricultural chemical toxins
now show up in virtually every human being tested, including infants.
Fortunately, there is a glaring alternative -
the soilless mediums of hydroponics and aeroponics
which also reduce nutrient and water
requirements by up to 75% of our current usage.
Food can now be organically grown on an industrial scale
in enclosed vertical farms.
Such as in 50 story 1 acre plots -
virtually eliminating the need for
pesticides and hydrocarbons in general.
This is the future of industrial food cultivation.
Efficient, clean and abundant.
So, such advanced systems would be, in part
what comprise our agricultural belt
producing all the food required for the entire city's population
with no need to import anything from the outside
saving time, waste and energy.
And speaking of Energy -
The Energy Belt would work in a systems approach to
extract electricity from our abundant renewable mediums
- Specifically wind, solar, geothermal and heat differentials
and if near water potentials - tidal and wave power.
To avoid intermittency and make sure
a positive net energy return occurs
these mediums would operate in an integrated system
powering each other when needed
while storing excessive energy to large
super capacitors under the ground
so nothing can go to waste.
And not only does the city power itself
particular structures will also power independently
and generate electricity through photovoltaic paints
structural pressure transducers, the thermocouple effect
and other current but under utilized technologies.
But, of course, this begs the question:
how does this technology, and goods in
general, get created in the first place?
This bring us to Production:
The Industrial Belt, apart from having hospitals and the like
would be the hub of factory production.
Completely localized overall
it would, of course, obtain raw materials by way of
the global resource management system, just discussed -
with demand being generated by the population of the city itself.
As far as the mechanics of production
we need to discuss a new, powerful phenomenon
which was sparked very recently in human history
and is on pace to changing everything.
It's called Mechanization
or the automation of labor.
Well, if you look around, you'll notice that almost
everything that we use today
is built automatically.
Your shoes, your clothes, your home appliances, your car and so on...
they are all built by machines in an automatic way.
Can we say that the society has not been
influenced by these major technological advancements?
Of course not.
These systems really dictate new structures
and new needs and they make a lot of other things obsolete.
So, we have been going up in the development
and use of technology in an exponential way.
So, definitely automation is going to continue. You cannot stop
technologies that just make sense.
Labor automation through technology is at the bottom
of every major social transformation in human history.
From the agricultural revolution and the invention of the plow
to the industrial revolution and the invention of the powered machine
to the information age we live in now through
essentially the invention of advanced electronics and computers.
And with regard to advanced production methods today
mechanization is now evolving on its own.
Moving away from the traditional method of
assembling component parts into a configuration -
into an advanced method of creating
entire products in one single process.
Like most engineers, I'm fascinated by biology because it is
so full of examples of extraordinary pieces of engineering.
What biology is - is the study of things that copy themselves.
As good a definition of life as we've got.
Again, as an engineer, I have always been
intrigued by the idea of machines copying themselves.
RepRap is a three-dimensional printer -
that's to say it is a printer that you plug into your computer and
instead of making two-dimensional sheets of paper with patterns on
it makes real, physical, three-dimensional objects.
Now there's nothing new about that
3D printers have been around for about 30 years.
The big thing about RepRap is that it prints most of its own parts.
So, if you've got one, you could
make another one and give it to a friend
as well as being able to print lots of useful things.
From the simple printing of basic household goods in your home
to the printing of an entire automobile body in one swoop
advanced, automated 3D printing now has the
potential to transform virtually every field of production.
Including home construction.
Contour Crafting is
actually a fabrication technology -
the so-called 3D printing- when you directly build
3D objects from a computer model.
Using Contour Crafting, it will be possible
to build a 2000 square-foot home
entirely by the machine, in one day.
The reason that people are interested in automating construction
is that it really brings a lot of benefits.
For example, construction is pretty labor-intensive
and although it provides jobs for a sector of the society
it also has issues and complications.
For example, construction is the most dangerous job that there is.
It is worse than mining and agriculture.
That has the highest level of fatality in almost every country.
Another issue is the waste.
An average home in the United States has 3 to 7 tons of waste.
So this is huge if we look at the impact of construction
and knowing about 40% of all materials
in the world are used in construction.
So, a big waste of energy and resources
and big damage to the environment as well.
Making homes using hammers and nails and wood
with the state of our technology today, is really absurd
and will go the way of our labor class in
regards to manufacturing in the United States.
Recently, there was a study by economist David Autor of MIT
that states that our middle class is obsolete
and being replaced by automation.
Quite simply, Mechanization is more productive
efficient and sustainable than human labor
in virtually every sector of the economy today.
Machines do not need vacations, breaks, insurance, pensions
and they can work 24 hours a day, everyday.
The output potential and accuracy
compared to human labor, is unmatched.
The bottom line: repetitive human labor is becoming obsolete
and impractical across the world
and the unemployment you see around you today
is fundamentally the result of this
evolution of efficiency in technology.
For years, market economists have dismissed this growing pattern
which could be called "Technological Unemployment"
because of the fact that new sectors always seemed
to emerge to re-absorb the displaced workers.
Today, the service sector is the only real hub left
and currently employs over 80% of the American workforce
with most industrialized countries maintaining a similar proportion.
However, this sector now being
challenged increasingly by automated kiosks -
automated restaurants and even automated stores.
Economists today are finally
acknowledging what they had been denying for years:
not only is technological unemployment exasperating the current
labor crisis we see across the
world due to the global economic downturn
but the more the recession deepens
the faster the industries are mechanizing.
The catch, which is not realized
is that the faster they mechanize to save money;
the more they displace people -
the more they reduce public purchasing power.
This means that, while the corporation
can produce everything more cheaply
fewer and fewer people will actually have money to buy anything
regardless of how cheap they become.
The bottom line is that the labor for
income game is slowly coming to an end.
In fact, if you take a moment to reflect
on the jobs which are in existence today
which automation could take over right now, if applied
75% of the global workforce could be
replaced by mechanization tomorrow.
And this is why, in a Resource-Based Economy
There is no Monetary-Market system.
No money at all...
for there is no need.
a Resource-Based Economy
recognizes the efficiency of mechanization
and accepts it for what it offers.
It doesn't fight it, like we do today.
Why? Because it is irresponsible not to
given any interest in efficiency and sustainability.
And this brings us back to our city system.
In the center is the Central Dome
which not only houses the
educational facilities and transportation hub -
it also hosts the mainframe that
runs the cities technical operations.
The city is, in fact, one big automated machine.
It has sensors in all technical belts
to track the progress of architecture -
energy gathering, production, distribution and the like.
Now, would people be needed to oversee these
operations in the event of a malfunction and the like?
Most probably: yes.
But that number would decrease
over time as improvements continue.
However, as of today, maybe 3% of
the city population would be needed
for this job when you break it down.
And I can assure you:
that in an economic system which is
actually designed to take care of you
and secure your well being
without you having to submit to
private dictatorship on a daily basis...
usually to a job that is either
technically unnecessary or socially pointless
while often struggling with debt that doesn't exist
just to make ends meet...
I guarantee you: people will volunteer their time left and right
to maintain and improve a system
that actually takes care of them.
And coupled with this issue of 'Incentive' -
comes the common assumption that
if there isn't some external pressure
for "one to work for a living"
people would just sit around, do nothing
and turn into fat lazy blobs.
This is nonsense.
The labor system we have today is
in fact the generator of laziness -
not a resolver of it.
If you think back to when you were a child -
full of life, interested in new things to understand -
likely creating and exploring...
but as time went on, the system pushed you
into the focus of figuring out how to make money.
And from early education
to study at a university, you are narrowed.
Only to emerge as a creature which serves
as a cog in a wheel in a model that
sends all the fruits to the upper 1%.
Scientific Studies have now shown that people are, in fact
not motivated by monetary reward
when it comes to ingenuity and creation.
The creation itself is the reward.
Money, in fact, appears only to serve as an incentive
for repetitive, mundane actions -
a role we have just now shown can be replaced by machine.
When it comes to innovation
the actual use of the human mind
the monetary incentive has proven to be a hindrance
interfering and detracting from creative thought.
And this might explain why Nikola Tesla, the Wright Brothers
and other inventors who contributed massively
to our current world
never showed a monetary incentive to do so.
Money is, in fact, a false incentive
and causes 100 times more distortion
than it does contribution.
Good morning class. Please settle down.
The first thing I would like to do is go around the room
and ask what everyone would like to be when they grow up.
Who would like to go first?
Okay, how about you Sarah?
When I grow up I want to work at McDonald's like my mom!
Oh, family tradition, eh?
How about you, Linda?
When I grow up, I'm going to be a
prostitute on the streets of New York City!
Oh! glamour girl, huh?
Very ambitious.
How about you, Tommy?
When I grow up, I'm going to be a
rich, elitist businessman who works
on Wall Street and profits off of
the collapse of foreign economies.
Enterprising...
And great to see some multicultural interest!
[Victims of Culture]
As stated before, a Resource-Based
Economy applies the Scientific Method to social concern
and this isn't limited to simply technical efficiency.
It also has the consideration of
human and social well-being directly and what comprises it.
What good is a social system if, in the end
it doesn't produce happiness and peaceful coexistence?
So, it is important to point out that
with the removal of the money system
and the necessities of life provided
we would see a global reduction in
crime by about 95% almost immediately
for there is nothing to steal, embezzle, scam, or the like.
95% of all people in prisons today are there
due to some monetary related crime or drug abuse
and drug abuse is a disorder - not a crime.
So what about the other 5%?
the truly violent...
often seeming to some as being
violent for the sake of being violent...
are they just "evil" people?
The reason that I frankly think it's a waste of time
to engage in moral value judgments
about people's violence is
because it doesn't advance by one iota
our understanding of either the causes
or the prevention of the violent behavior.
People sometimes ask if I believe in "forgiving" criminals.
My answer to that is
No, I don't believe in forgiveness
anymore than I believe in condemnation.
It's only if we, as a society
can take the same attitude of treating violence as
a problem in public health and preventive medicine
rather than as a moral "evil"...
it's only when we make that change in our
own attitudes and assumptions and values
that we will actually succeed in reducing the
level of violence rather than stimulating it -
which is what we do now.
The more justice you seek, the more hurt you become
because there's no such thing as justice.
There is whatever there is out there. That's it.
In other words, if people are conditioned to be racist bigots -
if they are brought up in an environment that advocates that
why do you blame the person for it?
They are a victim of a subculture.
Therefore they have to be helped.
The point is, we have to redesign the environment
that produces aberrant behavior.
That's the problem.
Not putting a person in jail.
That's why judges - lawyers -
"freedom of choice" - such concepts
are dangerous, because it gives you mis-information.
That the person is "bad"... or that person is a "serial killer"...
Serial killers are made
just like soldiers become serial killers with a machine gun.
They become killing machines, but nobody
looks at them as murderers or assassins
because that's "natural"...
So we blame people.
We say, "Well, this guy was a Nazi - he tortured Jews"...
No, he was brought up to torture Jews.
Once you accept the fact that people
have individual choices and they are free
to make those choices... Free to make
choices means without being influenced
and I can't understand that at all.
All of us are influenced in all of our choices
by the culture we live in, by our parents
and by the values that dominate.
So, we're influenced - so there can't be "free" choices.
What's the greatest country in the world?' - the true answer:
I haven't been all over the world and I don't know
enough about different cultures to answer that question. '
I don't know anybody that speaks that way.
They say 'it's the good old USA!
the greatest country in the world!'
There is no survey... 'Have you been to India?' - 'No.'
Have you been to England?' - 'No. '
Have you been to France?' - 'No. '
Then what do you make your assumptions on?'
They can't answer- they get mad at you.
They say, 'God dammit! Who the hell
are you to tell me what to think?!'
You know... Don't forget: you're dealing with aberrated people.
They are not responsible for the answers;
they're victims of culture and that means
they have been influenced by their culture.
[Part 4: Rise]
When we consider a Resource-Based Economy
there are often a number of arguments that tend to come up with...
[EH!] (Interrupted)
[Eh! Hey!]
[Now hold on just a minute!]
[I know what this is. This is called Marxism, buddy.]
[Stalin killed 800 billion people because of ideas like this...]
[My father died in the Gulag!]
[Communist! Fascist!]
[You don't like America you should just leave!]
All right, everybody just calm down...
[Death to the New World Order!]
And as the irrationality of the
audience grew, shocked and confused:
suddenly the narrator suffered a fatal heart attack. '
And the seemingly communist propaganda film was no more.
[System Error]
[Backup Initiated - Restored]
But you know, I've said that sort of thing to people
in 'think tank' type situations
you know these Club of Rome types and so forth...
they say "Marxist!"
What? Marxist? Where did that come from?
They just got this icon they hold onto -
It's their Holy Grail
and it's such an easy one, you know.
People ask if I'm a Socialist or a Communist or Capitalist
I say I am none of the above. Why do you
think that those are the only options?
All of those political constructs
were created by writers who assumed
we lived on a planet of infinite resources.
Not one of those political philosophies even
contemplates that there might be a shortage of anything.
I believe that communism, socialism, free enterprise, fascism
are part of social evolution.
You can't take a giant step
from one culture to another -
there are in-between systems.
Before there's any "Ism", we have a life ground
and the life ground is as I've just described
most easily as all the conditions
required to take your next breath
and that involves the air you breathe
the water you get, the safety you have
the education you can access- all
these things that we share and use and that
no life, in any culture, can do without.
So we've got to reset down to the Life Ground
and the life ground is no longer any "Ism"...
"It's life value analysis."
[Beyond The Pale]
It's simply a matter of historical fact
that the dominant intellectual culture
of any particular society reflects the
interests of the dominant group in that society.
In a slave owning society
the beliefs about human beings and human rights
and so on will reflect the needs of the slave owners.
In the society, again, which is based on
the power of certain people to control and profit from
the lives and work of millions of others
the dominant intellectual culture will
reflect the needs of the dominant group.
So, if you look across the board, the
ideas that pervade psychology and
sociology and history
and political economy and political science
fundamentally reflect certain elite interests.
And the academics who question that too much
tend to get shunted to the side or
to be seen as sort of "radicals"...
The dominant values of a culture
tend to support and perpetuate
what is rewarded by that culture.
And in a society where success and
status is measured by material wealth
- Not social contribution -
it is easy to see why the state of the world is what it is today.
We are dealing with a value system disorder
- Completely denatured -
where the priority of personal and social health
have become secondary to the detrimental
notions of artificial wealth and limitless growth.
And, like a virus, this disorder now
permeates every facet of government
- News media - entertainment - and even academia.
And built into its structure
are mechanisms of protection
from anything that might interfere.
Disciples of the Monetary-Market religion
the Self-Appointed Guardians of the Status Quo
constantly seek out ways to avoid any form of thought
which might interfere with their beliefs.
The most common of which: are Projected Dualities.
If you're not a Republican, you must be a Democrat.
If you are not Christian, you might be a Satanist
and if you feel society can be greatly improved
to consider, perhaps - I don't know -
taking care of everyone?
you're just a "Utopianist"...
And the most insidious of them all:
if you are not for the "free-market"
you must be against freedom itself.
I'm a believer in freedom!
Every time you hear the word freedom
being said anywhere or government interference
said anywhere, it means, decoded:
blocking maximization of turning money
into more money for private money possessors.
That's it. Every other thing they'll say:
'Oh, we need more commodities for people';
'Oh, this is freedom against tyranny' and so forth
every time you see it, you can decode it down to
that and I think you'll find a one-to-one correlation
with every time they use it.
And this, in a sense, we might call:
a Syntax. A governing syntax of understanding and of value.
So, it governs beneath their own recognition of it
so they might say: 'Oh, I didn't mean that at all!'
but in fact, that's what they do.
Just like you may speak a grammar
and you have rules of grammar you follow
without recognizing what the rules are...
and so what we have is what I call the "Ruling Value Syntax"
that underlies this. So, every time they use these words:
government interference'; 'lack of freedom' or 'freedom'
or 'progress' or 'development'
you can decode them all to come back to mean that.
Of course, when you hear the word 'freedom'
it tends to be in same sentence
with something called 'democracy'.
It's fascinating how people today seem to believe
that they actually have a relevant
influence on what their government does
forgetting that the very nature of
our system offers everything for sale.
The only vote that counts is the monetary vote
and it doesn't matter how much any
activist yells about ethics and accountability.
In a market system, every politician, every legislation
and hence, every government is for sale.
And even with the 20 trillion dollar bank bailouts
starting in 2007
an amount of money which could have changed
say, the global energy infrastructure
to fully renewable methods
instead going to a series of institutions
that literally do nothing to help society
institutions that could be
removed tomorrow with no recourse...
the blind conditioning that politics and
politicians exist for the public well-being still continues.
The fact is, politics is a business
- No different than any other in a market system
and they care about their self-interest before anything else.
I don't really, honestly, deep down believe in political action.
I think the system contracts and expands as it wants to.
It accommodates these changes.
I think the civil rights movement was an accommodation
on the part of those who own the country.
I think they see where their self-interest lies;
they see a certain amount of freedom seems good
- An illusion of liberty- give these people a voting day every year
so that they will have the illusion of meaningless choice.
Meaningless choice- that we go, like slaves and say
"Oh, I Voted." The limits of debate in this country are established
before the debate even begins and everyone
else is marginalized and made to seem either
to be communist or some sort of disloyal person
- A "kook" -- there's a word...
and now it's "conspiracy"... See - they made that.
Something that should not be even entertained for a minute:
that powerful people might get together and have a plan!
Doesn't happen! You're a "kook"! Your a "conspiracy buff"!
And of all the mechanisms of defense of this system
there are two that repeatedly come up.
The first is this idea that the system has been "the cause"
of the material progress we have seen on this planet.
Well... No.
There are basically two root causes which
have created the increased so-called "wealth"
and population growth we see today.
One: the exponential advancement of production technology;
hence scientific ingenuity.
And Two: the initial discovery of abundant hydrocarbon energy
- Which is currently the foundation of the entire socio-economic system.
The free-market / capitalist / monetary
market system - whatever you want to call it -
has done nothing but ride the wave of these advents
with a distorted incentive system and a haphazard
grossly unequal method of utilizing and distributing those fruits.
The second defense is a belligerent social bias
generated from years of propaganda
which sees any other social system
as a route to so called "tyranny
with various name droppings of Stalin, Mao, Hitler...
and the death tolls they generated.
Well, as despotic as these men might have been
along with the societal approaches they perpetuated...
when it comes to the game of death
- When comes to the systematic
daily mass murder of human beings -
Nothing in history compares to what we have today.
Famines - throughout at least the last century of our history
have not been caused by a lack of food.
They have been caused by relative poverty.
The economic resources were so inequitably distributed
that the poor simply didn't have enough money
with which to buy the food that would've been
available if they could have afforded to pay for it.
That would be an example of Structural Violence.
Another example: in Africa and other areas -
I'll particularly focus on Africa -
tens of millions of people are dying of AIDS.
Why are they dying?
It's not because we don't know how to treat AIDS.
We have millions of people in the wealthy countries
getting along remarkably well because
they have the medicines that will treat it.
The people in Africa who are dying of AIDS
are not dying because of the HIV virus...
they are dying because they don't have the money with
which to pay for the drugs that would keep them alive.
Gandhi saw this. He said:
"The deadliest form of violence is poverty."
And that's absolutely right.
Poverty kills far more people than all the wars in history;
more people than all the murderers in history;
more than all the suicides in history...
not only does Structural Violence kill more people
than all the behavioral violence put together
Structural Violence is also the
main cause of behavioral violence.
[Beyond the Peak]
Oil is the foundation of
and is present throughout, the edifice of human civilization.
There are 10 calories of hydrocarbon energy –oil and natural gas–
in every calorie of food you and I eat in the industrialized world.
Fertilizers are made from natural gas.
Pesticides are made from oil.
You drive oil-powered machines to plant - plow - irrigate – harvest
transport - package. You wrap the food
in plastic – that's oil. All plastic is oil.
There are 7 gallons of oil in every tire.
Oil is everywhere; it's ubiquitous. And it's only because
of oil that there are 7 billion people or
almost 7 billion people on this planet right now.
The arrival of this cheap and easy energy
which is equivalent, by the way, to
billions of slaves working around the clock
changed the world in such a radical way over the last century
and the population has gone up 10 times.
But, by 2050, oil supply is able to support
less than half the present world's
population in their present way of life.
So, the scale of adjustment to live differently is just enormous.
The world is now using six barrels of oil for every barrel of finds.
Five years ago it was using four
barrels of oil for every barrel it finds.
A year from now it is going to be using
eight barrels of oil for every barrel of finds.
What's disturbing to me is the
lack of any real effort from governments worldwide
and industry leaders worldwide to do something different.
We have these, sort of, attempts to build more wind power
and to maybe do something with Tide...
we've got attempts to make our cars a little bit more efficient
but there's nothing which really looks like a
revolution coming along- these are all pretty minor
and that I think is pretty frightening.
And the governments who are driven by these economists
who don't really appreciate what we're talking about
are trying to stimulate consumerism to restore past prosperity
in the hope that they can restore the past.
They're printing yet more money lacking any collateral at all.
So, if the economy improves and
recovers and the famous growth comes back
it will only be short-lived because
within a short period of time counted in months
rather than years it will hit the supply barrier again;
there will be another price shock -
and a deeper recession. So I think
we go into a series of vicious circles
So you have the economic growth going up- price
spike- everything shuts down. That's where we are now.
Then it starts to come up again but what we have now is this
area where there's no more ability to produce cheap energy.
We're at the peak- were on the down slope of oil production.
No way you're going to get any more out of the ground any faster
which means that things shut down, the price of oil drops
which it did in early 2009 but then as you have a recovery
the price of oil starts to come back.
It's recently been hovering at about $80
a barrel and what we see is that at even at $80 a
barrel now, with the financial and economic collapse
people are having a hard time affording that.
World oil production right now is about 86 million barrels a day.
Over 10 years, you're looking at
roughly 14 million barrels a day having to be replaced.
There's nothing around which can come even
within 1% of meeting that sort of demand.
If we don't do something pretty quickly
there's going to be a huge energy deficiency.
I think the big mistake is in not recognizing
a decade or so ago that a concerted effort
needed to be made to develop
these sustainable forms of energy.
I think that's something our grandchildren will look back on with
total disbelief. 'You people knew you
were dealing with a finite commodity...
how could you possibly have build your economy
around something which was going to disappear?'
For the first time in human history
the species is now faced with the depletion of a core resource
central to our current system of survival.
And the punchline of the whole thing is
that even with oil becoming more scarce
the economic system will still blindly push
its cancerous growth model...
so people can go out and buy more oil powered cars
to generate GDP and jobs... exasperating the decline.
Are there solutions to replace the
edifice of the hydrocarbon economy?
Of course.
But the path needed to accomplish these changes
will not manifest through the Market System Protocols required
since new solutions can only be
implemented through the Profit Mechanism.
People are not investing in renewable energies
because there is no money in it in both long and short term.
And the commitment needed to make it happen
can only occur at a severe financial loss.
Therefore, there is no monetary incentive and in this
system, if there is no monetary incentive, things do not happen.
And on top of it all, Peak Oil is
just one of many surfacing consequences
of the environmental-social train wreck gaining speed today.
Other declines include Fresh Water
- The very fabric of our existence -
which is currently showing
shortages for 2.8 billion people
and those shortages are on pace to reach 4 billion by 2030.
Food Production:
The destruction of arable crop land, from which
99.7% of all human food comes from today
is occurring up to 40 times faster than it is being replenished
and over the last 40 years, 30% of the
arable land has become unproductive.
Not to mention that hydrocarbons are the backbone
of agriculture today and as it declines...
so will the food supply.
As far as resources in general
at our current patterns of consumption, by 2030
we will need 2 planets to continue our rates.
Not to mention the continual destruction
of life supporting biodiversity
causing extinction spasms and
environmental destabilization across the globe.
And with all of these declines
we have the near exponential population growth
where by 2030 there might be over
8 billion people on this planet.
Energy production alone would need to
increase 44% by 2030 to meet such demand.
And again, since money is the only initiator of action -
are we to expect that any country on
the planet is going to be able to afford
the massive changes needed to revolutionize agriculture
water processing, energy production and the like?
When the global debt pyramid scheme is
slowly shutting the entire world down...
Not to mention the fact that
the unemployment you currently see
is going to become normality due to
the nature of technological unemployment.
The jobs are not coming back.
And finally, a broad social perspective.
From the 1970 to 2010, poverty on this
planet doubled due to this system...
and given our current state -
do you honestly think we will see
anything less than more doubling...
more suffering and more mass starvation?
[The Beginning]
There is not going to be any recovery.
This is not some long depression
that we're some day going to pull out of.
I think the next phase that we are going to see after the
next round of economic collapses is massive civil unrest.
When unemployment checks stop being
paid because the states have no money left.
And when things get so bad that people lose confidence
in their elected leaders, they will demand change
if we don't kill each other in the process
or destroy the environment.
I'm just afraid that we might get to the point of no return...
and that bothers me to no end.
We do all we can to avoid that condition.
It's clear that we're on the verge of a great transition in human life...
That what we face now is this fundamental
change of the life we've known over the last century.
There has to be a link between the economy and
the resources of this planet
the resources being, of course, all animal and plant life;
the health of the oceans and everything else.
This is a monetary paradigm that will not
let go until it's killed the last human being.
The "in" group will do all it can to stay in power
and that's what you've got to keep in mind.
They'll use the army and navy and lies...
or whatever they have to use to keep in power.
They're not about to give it up
because they don't know of any other system that will perpetuate their kind.
[Live from New York]
[Global Protests Shut Down World Economy]
[London-Live]
[China-Live]
[South Africa - Live]
[Spain - Live]
[Russian - Live]
[Canada - Live]
[Saudi Arabia - Live]
[Western Crime Rates Soar]
[UN Declares State of Global Emergency]
[Global Unemployment Hits 65%]
[Fears of World War Continue]
[Debt Collapse now causing food shortages]
[Take it Back]
[While no violence has been reported as
the unprecedented protests continue...
it appears that the equivalent of trillions of dollars
are being systematically withdrawn from bank accounts
across the world and in turn...
evidently now being dumped in
front of the world's central banks.]
[THIS IS YOUR WORLD]
[THIS IS OUR WORLD]
[THE REVOLUTION IS NOW]
[WWW.THEZEITGEISTMOVEMENT.COM]