The Future and Beyond by Jacque Fresco

[Reveling John]

Originally Posted by elirien

First of all thank you for the separation of the subjects at hand John.

No problem

When you ignore the individual and digitize the masses to social engineering statistics that will happen all over. Failure is built in these systems because it ignores the other side of humanity that science tries to learn and control of, spirituality. What the hell do these people think. If I put my head in the sand that it will go away? Hell no. There is more around you then you can even imagine. Why in logic's name would you want to use systems that oppress the individuals development by sucking them dry of their energy in form of money, motivation and intellect?

Well, Elirien, you are not making any sense. None of your commentary is directly addressing any of the quotes you are using. Here you say "why would you want to use systems that oppress the individuals development by sucking them dry of thier energy in form of money, motivation and intellect..." when this entire essay is the very anticedent of that. To prove my point I quote:

"...When education and resources are available to all without a price tag, there would be no limit to the human potential.

...The social designs that are proposed in this writing merely provide the opportunity for individuals to develop their fullest potential in whatever endeavor they choose without the fear of loss of individuality or submission to uniformity.

...People would be free to pursue whatever constructive field of endeavor they choose without any of the economic pressures, restraints, debts and taxation that are inherent in the monetary system of today."

-J.F.

Your arguments don't seem to be connected to any specific sentence or overall intent. Maybe you just have an issue with laying out the argument clearly, and if that's the case I would suggest quoting only one or two sentences at a time and fully addressing only that fragment before moving on to the next idea. Also it doesn't appear that you've read the entire essay, which makes it difficult to respond to a specific segment if you don't know how that segment relates to the whole piece. It's like going on a rant about a 5 sec clip from a film, without watching the rest of the film to see that clip's relationship to the entire composition. So, maybe you should finish reading before you make any further statements.

"The failure of communism to provide for human needs and to enrich the lives of its citizens is not unlike our own failures. Both failure and success are inherent in the on-going experiment that is social evolution. In all established social systems it is necessary to devise different approaches to improve the workings of the system. "
-J.F.

When you ignore the individual and digitize the masses to social engineering statistics that will happen all over.

What do you mean "that will happen"? It HAS happened. It IS happening. Human history is a history of dominant, boundary-defining, fragmented, and oppressive societies. Why are you addressing such memes as "ignore the individual" and "social engineering statistics" when this paper mentions none of those things except to implicate the current society's duplicity in breaking down the individual into a collection of meaningless cultural classifications? And if you think that's what is being said, you need to quote such references and clearly express what your comprehension of those passages are, before proceeding to rebuke them.

What does "digitize the masses" mean to you? While I await your extensive explanation, may I remind you that if you have an extensive knowledge of music, film, literature, games, etc. you can relegate a large portion of your capacity to know these things to the 'digitizing' of these various artifiacts. More than 90% of the media I've ever experienced, including text, music and film has come to me in a digital form and it was only the scientific/techinical process of digitization that allowed me to experience these things at all. I would say that this is true for most denizens of the western world, yourself most likely being included in that. But more importantly, what specific point are you addressing by using that phrase?

Besides linking "vision" to many esoteric symbolism there is the grand problem with his theory that he himself addresses. Everything changes in the universe. The problem with social engineering is that it tries to blend humanity to a form that they believe is to be true because of the meek science that has just understood a very small bit of what could be deemed as reality. Since everything changes in this "reality" there can be no "one perfect system" or "order".

First I want to address the "grand problem", then I will move one to this alleged 'social engineering'.

"Everything changes" is the foundation of the Venus Project.

The point is that current society and the current state of our proto-civilization is one that ignores the modern acheivements of science. Our economic system ignores and suppresses new technologies. Our foreign policy ignores experiementally proven observations about human psychology and sociology. Our social infrastructure places little value on systems theories and the scientificly established notion that we are all connected in being, action, and thought. WE ARE NOT A RATIONAL OR LOGICAL CIVILIZATION because we ignore the progress that has been made towards understanding nature (including human nature), in order to preserve an old, out-dated world-view (which we are all still operating with, btw).

A society that accepts the reality of emergence-- emergent cultures, emergent sciences and emergent possibilities-- is one that is ALWAYS changing, always opting for the more logical and tolerant approach to any given problem. That IS what this essay affirms OVER and OVER AGAIN.

Social Engineering

The only time the term 'Social Engineering' is used in this entire thread is when you use it to charactice the Venus Project (and here, in this reply). Go ahead, do a word search, and you will not find a single instance of that phrase in the original essay. That poses 2 problems:

1) You never define the term so I don't know what you are talking about. Since you are presumably """borrowing""" the idea from the essay you should at least choose some very specific quotes and then outline HOW these quotes support your claim that this material is about "social engineering".

2) The fact that you use terms to characterize an essay in which those terms are never used, gives me serious doubts as to your ability to use language as a means of expressing and developing ideas, rather than as a means of creating limited abstractions of ideas, further diminishing the intent and meaning of those ideas.

The second problem is particularly unforunate because it encourages me to believe that you are not comprehending the intent and meaning of MY ideas, so possibly these few statements that I've made are completely lost on you. I certainly am not comprehending the meaning of many of YOUR ideas due to what I percieve as a lack of explanation. For my sake, I would ask that you spend more time formulating and composing your sentences and that you address ONE idea at a time.

Thanks for your audience and participation in these discussions.