By RICHARD JOHN STAPLETON
Rout Logger’s Group: To Save Earthian Civilization is a work in progress. While settings, plots, theories, objects, and narratives in this novel may be loosely analogous to the same that have happened in various realities, the names, actions, and attributions of characters cast herein are fictional. All parts of this novel will be published in the Effective Learning Report at various intervals on the Internet, subject to revision at any time, hopefully culminating in a final print edition offered for sale to the public.
Copyright 2020 by Effective Learning Publications. All rights reserved. No part of this novel may be copied or printed on paper without permission. Share on the Internet as you wish.
To refresh yourself about what happened in earlier episodes, go to the following website addresses:
Internet Episode 1, https://blog.effectivelearning.net/the-group-to-save-spaceship-earth-part-1/.
Internet Episode 2, https://blog.effectivelearning.net/the-group-to-save-spaceship-earth-episode-2/.
Internet Episode 3, https://blog.effectivelearning.net/the-group-to-save-spaceship-earth-episode-three/.
Internet Episode 4, https://blog.effectivelearning.net/the-group-to-save-spaceship-earth-episode-four/.
Internet Episode 5, https://blog.effectivelearning.net/the-group-to-save-spaceship-earth-internet-episode-five/.
A list of names of forty cast members with a short biographical blurb about each is presented in Internet Episode 1.
INTERNET EPISODE SIX
SESSION FOUR
FEBRUARY 2020
DALLAS, TEXAS
The Truther Selected Martin as the rooster crowed
Martin–Here we are in the Heart of Texas, or should I say in the heart of Texas traffic. I don’t think I have ever seen such a tangled mess of traffic in my life, cloverleaf intersections and entrances and exits everywhere. I’m lucky I took a cab in from the airport. I can’t imagine how anyone could learn to get around in this mess of highway mazes. I never realized Dallas was as large a city as it is. On the other hand, once you get into the hotel, it’s like we are home again. One central city hotel is about like another.
As a religious studies professor it seems to me the biggest problem right now is people not having a firm set of anything they can believe in, something to put their faith in, not knowing whether there really is a god, and if so, what kind of god. It seems to me the alternative prescriptions are all authoritarian, dogmatic and doctrinaire, telling people not to question what the bible says. On the other hand, can humans develop some sort of non-authoritarian god , a non-anthropomorphic god, with no human characteristics, that does not care for anyone personally or human relationships, who merely creates certain scientific principles and phenomena, such as what we can see, hear, and feel in the physical world, the verifiable world of cause and effect, somewhat akin to the great spirit of native peoples on north America, as mentioned in that article Rout made us read during our last session.
It seems to me this is what is most akin to what is really going on in reality. I have not seen one scintilla of evidence with my own eyes that any sort of god has ever told anyone to do anything or who has ever done anything because of having been asked to do something in any sort of prayer. Thus there is no way to have any sort of human-like relationship with any sort of god. On the other hand one can believe in and have faith in the laws of nature.
This kind of god created by humans themselves would simply be a human spirit that infuses humans with confidence and courage, and an ability to see reality for what it is. This god is similar to what was recommended in ‘The Evolution of Spaceship Earth, Inc.’ This is what I recommend today, that humans evolve such a god and spirit and forget about heaven and hell and dogma and doctrine and authoritarian threats.
Ellen–I am inclined to agree with you, Martin. On the other hand, I do not believe most people would take this view. Most people have been so ingrained with authoritarian religious notions and threats of everlasting hells and such, and even physical punishment on earth, such as beheadings, floggings, and stonings, and the like that they would never go along with this. Some people even remember that humans were burned at the stake for not believing certain religious dogmas and doctrines not too many years ago.
Margaret–As a civil servant for the government I can tell you in our current political culture you had better keep your mouth shut about such things when at work and at most places or you can damage your career. You might not get fired for talking about such things but you can be punished in other ways, not promoted or not given decent raises. The best thing to do about religion is not say anything about it in public.
Clarence–As a lawyer it’s interesting to me how religious people especially evangelicals keep trying to cram religious oriented laws down the throats of people, even the idea that there should not be separation of church and state, and god runs everything. There are those in the US who are just like the Taliban in Afghanistan, who want to turn the US into a religious theocracy of some sort. There are those who think that god should actually run the country. Remember Bush II telling us god told him to invade Iraq? We have had presidents in recent decades, such as Bush II who told the USian people that they actually did things like start major wars because a god told them to. Now this is really problematic. Did Bush II actually hear a voice in his head that he really thought was god who told him to go to war? I doubt it. Was he lying about this? Most likely but who could prove it? The problem is nothing about god can be proved, and consequently manipulators and despots can use the notion of god to manipulate people at will, which is lying of the worst kind, but there is nothing anyone can do about it. Trump does this sort of time all the time, even participating in religious rituals with a sanctimonious look on his face, and later saying to others in private he thought it was pure bullshit.
Napoleon–It’s similar to the don’t ask don’t tell policy of the military regarding homosexuals. Just pretend it does not exist. Even if you believe it does. There ain’t no way in hell to win that war. People have been fighting over religion for centuries and nobody has ever won one yet. Yet the major religions are as strong financially now as ever. True enough there are more nonbelievers percentage-wise than there used to be. I’m not sure about the numbers on this but I am pretty sure most people are not as brainwashed by religion as they used to be.
George–There is no way you can win an election in the US today if you do not pretend to believe, without saying things like god bless you and God bless America and such. Bush II is a good example. He got religion here in Texas when he lost an election for a minor post, and vowed he would never get out-Christianed again. That’s why he started hearing god talking to him in his head, maybe after he gave up drinking. When you get right down to it religions are like political parties. People, some people at least, are so fearful of what will happen to them after they die that they will pay money to preachers to save them from hell, and some are so greedy that they will sell their souls on earth to get a better seat in heaven, but most in my opinion join religious organizations to gain political power and support in their communities to satisfy their own selfish day in and day out needs, or to help insure that they are not marginalized or punished in some way. Joining a church makes people feel more secure, especially politicians, in their daily lives and careers, not only in their presumed afterlives.
Luke–I’ve stood it as long as I can. I sold my soul to the devil for five thousand dollars a month to come to these meetings and put up with the blasphemy I’ve heard, and I have tried to keep my mouth shut, knowing full well it was hopeless trying to convince you sinners of the error of your ways. I am now convinced this group is the work of the devil, a plot of Satan conceived in the very bowels of hell, where you people, or at least most of you, most assuredly deserve to go. I have tried to pray for you and for your immortal souls, but I am losing my patience. You are damned for questioning and criticizing the holy word of the Lord.
Julia–I wish we didn’t talk about this. It makes me sick to my stomach.
Paul–I wish we didn’t too, but we have to. Who can sit back and watch and listen to what is happening to our world and not say something about what one thinks is the truth of the matter? For sure some of the most serious hatreds and problems including wars are still being caused by or partly caused by religions and religious beliefs, dogmas, and doctrines. What is the major cause of war? I think the main cause is simply a lust for power and arrogance. People not only want to possess power but to have the ability to tell others what to do, bullies fighting other bullies just for the fun of it, but the next major cause of war is poverty, too few resources poorly distributed to satisfy needs, so one group or organization or country is always trying to steal resources from others. It’s built in to society, but religion is a factor since it enables people to get power, as has been discussed today. What is the solution? Outlaw religions? Communist Russia tried that. Look what happened. They not got poorer and poorer economically while they got politically more powerful developing nuclear bombs and military might, but they wound up getting rid of not only communism but atheism, after realizing shooting off their nuclear bombs would surely result in their own destruction. Putin and Russia are now as hypocritical about religion as were Russian czars. The place is now run by Putin as a military dictatorship and oligarchy for the rich, using their longtime orthodox religion much the same as Russian czars did to manipulate and exploit serfs before the Russian Revolution of 1917.
Joan–As you know I work for an insurance company and I can tell you religion is not something you want to talk about at work in in a large insurance company. In fact you don’t want to talk about anything but what you have to talk about doing your job. Most people who work for a living do not have time to think about religion. It is not only irrelevant it is unproductive. It saps the productive energy of workers. One fringe benefit to having a good job like I have is that you do not have time for or any responsibility for even thinking about religion, you are free of it at work. I think all people should be.
SESSION FIVE
MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA
MARCH 2020
Much discussion had occurred on various subjects but it was disjointed and unorganized. Should Rout start writing some sort of book or report for the donors now letting them know what had transpired? It was not easy keeping track of all the common threads in the discussions in terms of content, but it was even more difficult to accurately note and assess the changes that had occurred in the personalities of the group members. The group had become more cohesive and more Game-free and it appeared some of them were now enjoying participating in the discussions rather than just going through the motions.
It was becoming clear the new Corona virus, Covid-19, was a real and serious threat and would cause The Group to cease operations in its current face-to-face format. Rout decided not to open this for discussion in this session. He would let the group members know what the donors had decided to do about the Covid pandemic during the first two weeks of April.
The Truther selected Marshall as the rooster crowed
Marshall–Well, being a weatherman it seems to me the biggest problem today is climate change, caused by human-caused global warming, burning too much fossil fuel. As you know there are no easy answers. But probably the major problem is that must humans have not accepted the fact that human caused climate change has happened. Personally, I think it goes back to the religion problem. It seems to me most people believe a god will solve all their problems regarding the environment. They do not believe the problem has to be nor can be managed by humans. They believe since god is all powerful he must want the climate to be the way it is, since he created the earth and all its processes, including the climate. And to some extent they are right. What power does the average person have to affect the climate working alone? Absolutely none if only a few individuals worked on the problem, but if all humans, all seven plus billion of them now on Earth, worked on the problem they could perhaps help correct the problem, by doing things such as driving cars less or changing their diets to consume less food produced by processes requiring fossil fuel.
Factory agriculture is a problem. It requires using automated machinery instead of human energy to plant and till crops, machinery requiring the burning of fossil fuel as an energy source and instead of controlling weeds and insects by human energy chemical fertilizers are required, many of which are chemically derived from fossil fuel that has to be heated and processed.
I watched the town hall meeting last night and listened to the democratic candidates giving their opinions on climate change. I was surprised that most of them agreed that climate change is real and is a threat. Some of them hammered the point home that humans only have about eleven years before it will be too late to prevent catastrophic consequences, possibly extinction.
As several of them pointed out hundreds of human species are being rendered extinct right now, largely caused by increases in human population. The human population has about doubled in the last fifty years requiring quantum increases in resources to feed and house them. If the human population should double again in the next fifty years this alone could insure human extinction and the extinction of most other species on earth, largely because of habitat destruction.
As some of the candidates pointed out humans need to start thinking about Spaceship Earth more and worrying about their nations of origin less. Selfishly pursuing your own interests as an individual or as a group, especially as a member of a large nation, could cause human extinction. Selfishness is a major problem. Humans have got to think more altruistically and benevolently or else the end is nigh, or so it seems to me.
How to get humans to do this it seems to me is a major problem. This sort of change will require changing not only economic systems and but also religious systems. The capitalistic economic system is basically obsolete. How to shift from what we have now to a viable and feasible economic system is perhaps the greatest problem.
Quite naturally this is going to require cooperation between nations and much less competition. I agree with the author of the Evolution of Spaceship Earth that this is the way to go. I’m not sure however whether we have enough time left for this sort of evolution to naturally occur and correct the problem.
John–it might be feasible to write computer code to use something like linear programming as suggested in the Evolution of Spaceship Earth, that Rout had us read back in the Asheville meeting, but how could you possibly make the required political and religious changes. In all organizations the biggest problem is not writing computer code to make the organization more efficient but resistance on the part of managers and others who do not want their power an perks to be reduced. If you look at this problem within countries the problem is horrible. Can you imagine getting heads of all corporations worldwide and current stockholders within corporations worldwide to consent to turn over their power and perks to computer programmers who would write computer code to determine what and how resources would be used to produce and distribute the necessities of life to all humans around Earth in an optimum manner, including using clean green energy sources instead of fossil fuel. It would require a massive redistribution of wealth the likes of which has never been seen on Earth before.
Socrates–Right on John. People have a will to power and having power is what makes the world go round. You can build a case if you were to cut the power of people to this extent it would cause widespread depression, loss of self-esteem, life satisfaction, and whatnot. What good would life be if there was nothing to work for as goals? If all you had to do every day was sit around and wait for your dividend checks to get deposited in your bank account what sort of purpose in life would be this be. In effect there would be no purpose for humans. Relative to computer artificial intelligence systems they would be worse off than children relative to their parents in terms of dependence and the like. Buckminster Fuller’s notion that humans should never do work that machines can do better is one of the most dangerous propositions I have ever heard of.
Sam–Yes, but what option do we have but to at least try to bring something of this nature about? I assure you I will continue to write articles advocating this sort of thing, the problem though is how do you get people to read such articles? One of the major problems right now is that there is so much information out there from so many different sources on the Internet that no can possibly absorb it all. How can anyone have any impact as an individual? The national security administration right now can capture just about any human transmission that is made electronically, emails, Internet posts, and what have you. They have a data center out in the middle of a desert capable of storing billions of transmissions daily. The problem is even using computers they have no way of sifting through the data so as to pick out what is most relevant. Most writers and social activists are preaching to their own choirs, small numbers of people.
Barbara–As a housewife I feel as if I am a fish out of water here but I will say something. Most of you people are far more qualified than I am to say things to this group. But what difference does it make if you are qualified or not. Nobody knows anything for sure. When I am not taking care of my kids or doing chores around the house I do sometimes listen to the news and learn a little about what you are talking about here. I have no idea what linear programming is and I know nothing about computer programming. I have no idea how it’s done. But I can tell you most of what you are talking about here would never be mentioned on the TV programs I watch. Most people like me are totally shut off from these kinds of questions and issues. I can’t imagine how anyone like me could possibly be of any value in working these sorts of problems out. Why would you want to pay me five thousand dollars a day to just sit here and listen and say something about something I have no idea about is beyond me, but so long as you keep on payin’ out the money I have no choice but to keep on comin’ to these meetings. I need the money for my family.
Albert–I’m with you Barbara, except I am a university professor, not a housewife, a professor of sociology, and I can assure you I am not qualified to write computer programs or depose corporate chief executives or convince politicians we need a new economic system. But I can say something about class structures which are relevant here. As Karl Marx pointed out most economic activity is class based, and classes evolved from high to low with a hierarchy and various levels of well-being, prestige and power. It seems to me so far in history class structures have never been eradicated in societies. This Spaceship Earth idea involves a basically classless society, one class of shareholders in a giant monolithic corporation, owning one share of stock, who receive all their necessities of life as a dividend on their one share of ownership stock. They in effect own Spaceship Earth, which if it were to be implemented today, would entail about seven and one half billion stockholders. On the other hand, this system would allow humans to do other things on their own in small businesses and careers for additional money and rewards, based on their inherited abilities, whether artistic, athletic, or whatever, or do mundane service jobs for extra money if they wished. In this sense there would still be a status hierarchy in such a society. How you would regulate the winners in this process to prevent what the winners do now by exploiting the less fortunate I don’t know. Would the AI computer system somehow do this. Some people are now afraid AI robots could become so much more intelligent than humans that they would rule the roost at the top of the status hierarchy, and possibly decide to exterminate some or all humans. If AI robots should develop general intelligence that exceeds human general intelligence as much as computer accuracy and data processing speed doing mathematical calculations now exceeds human capabilities, then what hope would humans have of ever controlling them? Quite a few smart people are beginning worry about this.
John–Yes, but bear in mind that up to now computers can only do what they have been programmed to do, and they cannot make mistakes. They have to do what they are told at all times. Abraham Lincoln said there are two types of people who never amount to much in life, those who cannot do what they are told, and those who cannot do anything but what they are told. Computers and AI up to now fall into the latter category. They are very useful efficient idiots. The issue is whether computers can ever learn to program themselves about something that has not already been programmed into their computer memories. If they are never able to truly program themselves then if humans make sure they never tell them to do anything antisocial then nothing bad will happen. At the same time one can also build a case that humans are incapable of programming themselves to do something that has not already been caused to happen in their memories.
Ellen–I majored in accounting in college and I took some computer courses and learned a little something about programming but nothing we studied was remotely like what you are talking about here. It is one thing to figure out how much money a business made in one year or what its assets and liabilities are but to think you could develop a system to produce and distribute goods all around Earth in an optimal fashion is off the charts. I don’t think it could ever be done.
Bubba–I’m with you Ellen. I’m a farmer and I sure don’t want anyone telling me what to produce and who to sell it to. Why that is pure socialism or communism. And its un-American. Hell, anybody should know that is nothing but bullshit. Excuse my French.
Hellen–Being a nurse I can tell you no computer can ever take over my job. Somebody has got to be there face to face to help people when they get sick or hurt. You can use all the computers you want to diagnose diseases and prescribe treatments but there is no way you can program a computer to do what nurses do, such as giving someone a shot for example, or taking blood pressure. Such treatments would be part of the necessities of life, but it could not be allocated or produced by a computer, or would the computer decide who would be given treatment or not, in effect making decisions about who would live or die because of having some sort of disease but who could not have treatment?
Judy–I’m just a housewife too and I can tell you it would be nice for many of us to know that we would be entitled to food, clothing, and shelter because of owning one share of stock in Spaceship Earth. What would it do? Have it delivered to your door using something like Amazon or Fed Ex. I’m all for it. Bring it on as soon as possible.
Andy–I would assume police services would be considered a necessity of life. How would a computer allocate what us cops do? Some things just cannot be decided by computers. Or is it this wonderful computer system would somehow get rid of bad guys. Would everyone being born rich so they did not have to work eliminate crime? I doubt it. Some criminals just enjoy being criminals. They do it for the fun of it. They get bored just sitting around doing nothing. Seems to me this Spaceship Earth idea would make life boring as dirt.
Adam–It is interesting that the economics profession has historically had very little to say about the problem of boredom. It was assumed if there were no limited resources that people would have sense enough to figure out how to entertain themselves. Besides this Spaceship Earth idea assumes certain people would want to entertain others for extra pay. Are you saying Andy that you think some people can only entertain themselves by committing crimes.
Andy–No, not necessarily, but I am saying I think some people like to commit crimes to entertain themselves. They get some sort of kick out of it, some sort of psychological charge.
Trudy–For whatever it’s worth I can tell you as a psychotherapist that some people do like to commit crimes to satisfy their psychological needs. There is a psychological Game called Cops and Robbers that has been identified by transactional analysts. People get used to certain kinds of strokes for doing certain kinds of things in early childhood, such as being naughty and trying not to get caught. People play psychological Games of all sorts for stimulus, structure, and recognition. There is more to life than food, clothing, and shelter.
Martin got selected next by The Truther as the rooster crowed
Martin–It seems to me homelessness is one of the greatest problems in the US and around Spaceship Earth. For sure poverty is the majority cause or symptom but mental illness is also a cause. Many of the homeless are indeed mentally ill. The alternatives include constructing better mental health facilities and more treatment centers, and of course programs to eliminate poverty. President Lyndon Johnson in the sixties in his Great Society program attempted to eliminate poverty in places like Appalachia and elsewhere. Needless to say it did not work, or at least it did not work for long. Poverty in the US is now increasing. Curing poverty entails possibly doing many things, creating more government jobs, infrastructure jobs, requiring raising taxes and cutting military expenses among other things. But you can also build the case that the capitalistic system is also to blame. Some stay the solution is more socialism or socialism period. I agree that we need more government ownership and control, more socialism. That’s what I recommend. And for sure I recommend Bernie Sanders for president in 2020.
Thank you Truther for selecting me to start a new discussion.
Marian–I am not sure I agree with you that homelessness is the most serious problem right now. I fully agree it is a serious problem for far too many people. As a retired school teacher I am one of the lucky ones in that I have a defined benefits pension plan, something that is becoming more and more of a rarity in the US. Corporations stopped providing them for most workers many years ago. Thus my husband and I have a better retirement than most people, and we are not particularly worried about homelessness for ourselves. On the other hand, many older retired people are. Most of the homeless I am sure do not have even Social Security benefits if they are old enough to be retired. Almost no one could live on the maximum Social Security benefit payment right now. But for sure it helps.
I recommend that the government increase Social Security benefits by requiring rich people to pay the full Social Security premium on their full incomes, more than only on up to two hundred thousand dollars per year or whatever it is they now pay. That might be enough to keep Social Security solvent for a long time. I have no idea whethwe it would be feasible to increase Social Security payments but for sure they need to be increased for most people.
Paul–I agree with you Marian, but the problem is that many people today will never have even the full Social Security benefit however inadequate that might be for retirement income. There are probably millions of people in the US who do not contribute to the Social Security system for a lifetime. There are people working in the so-called underground economy who are paid in cash. They are not listed as employed or unemployed with the government or employers. Many are undocumented migrants. This ties in with the whole employment problem, which is worsened by automation and AI. More and more jobs are being taken over by machines. I read just a few days ago that McDonalds has now figured out a way to automate its order-taking process. Someone has invented a robot that can take orders and somehow dispense food. So even these low paid manual labor jobs could be eliminated. Truck drivers are at risk of having their jobs eliminated. If you eliminate jobs currently requiring humans to drive some sort of motorized vehicle you are talking about a lot of unemployment.
More and more the Spaceship Earth article Rout had us read in Asheville is becoming more and more relevant. I have seen several Internet articles advocating basic income schemes. One of the democratic presidential candidates, Yang, advocates allocating one thousand dollars a month to all citizens, which is more than the Social Security benefits of some citizens who retire now. While the one thousand a month would help it would not be enough to live on. The Spaceship Earth plan advocated distributing the necessities of life to all Earthian human citizens which for sure would cure the problem of retirement. In effect no one would ever have to retire under this scheme since the necessity of life shipments would never cease until death, speaking of which, the article assumes natural deaths will result in a serious lowering of Earth’s human population through time through natural attrition, natural deaths exceeding births, until Earth’s human population reaches a sustainable level.
The overall problem however is horrendous. What it boils down to is that billions of would-be workers alive around Spaceship Earth are basically unneeded as workers. You don’t need that many manual labor workers anymore. What you need are thinkers and problem solvers, mind workers, if you will. Buckminster Fuller was quoted in The Evolution of Spaceship Earth as saying governments could eliminate all unemployment overnight by awarding mind grants to all citizens. And for sure you don’t need that many billionaires, people who don’t work for a living but who travel around and do whatever they want to do thanks to the wealth they have inherited and/or amassed. And you sure as hell don’t need billionaires to provide surplus money for investments, grants, and such. Central bankers can create all the new funny money you need for this by just punching digits into computers and calling the numbers money.
To rationally allocate resources in the short run given where we are technologically and maintain even a semblance of the quality of life and human dignity we have now billions of humans would have to be provided the necessities of life free or the small percentage of humans alive who are currently needed for thinking and problem-solving work would have to sit back and watch billions of humans starve.
On the other hand, it seems to me there is little chance Yang’s idea of even one thousand dollars per month of basic permanent income happening in the US would have a chance of passing anytime soon. And imagine trying to implement something like this around Spaceship Earth, now populated by almost eight billion humans.
I recommend however at least trying to implement something like Spaceship Earth Inc as soon as possible, which would require a serious overhaul of the capitalistic system. Just saying we need socialism is tantamount to saying nothing because there is nothing concrete in such a statement, just poppycock and blather.
The Truther selected Sam as the rooster crowed
Sam–Well, it seems to me right now that the biggest economic and political problem around Spaceship Earth is this matter of polarization. Not only in the United States but around the world people are getting more set in their ways and are getting angrier as their economic and political plights worsen, as their incomes stagnate or go down, as their lives become more and more precarious. Here we are on the cusp of another global recession or depression, maybe worse than 2007, maybe as bad as the 1930s. Trump is in the White House and Biden is being touted as the front runner of the Democratic National Committee. He’s the obvious choice of the corrupt DNC and the Deep State as the Democratic presidential candidate for 2020 to run against Trump. We will again be faced with the choice of choosing between the lesser of the evils, picked and manipulated to serve the interest of establishment politicians and the deep state.
Maybe the most worrisome thing is what seems to be increasing anger and tendency to violence between extremists on the left and right. I read on the Internet that regardless of who wins in 2020 there could be violence and bloodshed. We have scattered shootings now by extremists or terrorists or whatever you want to call them in the US against other groups. This sort of thing could worsen after the presidential election in 2020.
Regarding the alternatives for dealing with this I supposed the best thing we can do is resort back once again to the Hope for a Better Day Strategy. Since there are no known answers at present. What could be done that has not been tried. This Game-free seminar approach was supposed to help correct this problem. Well we have been talking in this group for several months now and I can’t tell it has done one whit worth of good in the broader environment. Sure we have learned to tolerate one another more in this group given our diverse backgrounds, but what about similar groups in the outside world in the meantime. For sure they have not gotten any better off. Most are locked into their small worlds seeing and hearing the same stuff over and over. We have got nothing but politics as usual and more kicking the can down the road. Humans not only in the US but in most European countries are following a similar path, and if anything right-wing extremists are gaining the upper hand. It looks like humans are inexorably heading into a dystopian fascistic world, less freedom, less human dignity, less human security, with global warming and climate change hanging over their heads like a Sword of Damocles.
Of course I recommend that Rout and his donors make public what has happened in this group and spread the word that people can learn to get along better and see the viewpoints of other polarized people better if subjected to a Game-free group such as this one, especially if you pay them five thousand dollars a month to do it. The problem is where are you going to get the kind of money these rich donors have coughed up for this experimental group. Sure you can bribe people to get together in a group such as this if you have enough money, but how could this ever happen generally in the real world? Rich people like being rich and they are not going to willingly give up their riches and power, which they think they honestly won and deserve.
But that’s about all I can think of recommending right now. For sure I do not recommend any sort of military action. That has been disastrous in the last five or six decades. All it’s done I can see is cause more and more military expenditures every year. Socialism? Big deal. How is it possible to even dream of making something like this happen anytime soon. And what is socialism? There is no clear-cut definition of socialism, what degree of socialism etc. More taxes? Sure raise the taxes of the rich as much as you can, but good luck, since they have already bought off the politicians, and voters keep voting for their friends who will also be bought off in Washington, inundated as it is with billions of dollars of lobbying bribery money flowing around the place like flood water from a massive hurricane. Infrastructure spending? Yes for sure. But where is the money to come from? Yes seriously raise taxes on the rich sending tax rates back to eighty percent or more, but good luck making it happen. Do you want to keep creating more funny money? Money is almost worthless now; seventeen percent of all sovereign debt around the world is now in negative interest rate money. People are loaning their worthless digital money to their governments at negative interest rates just hoping they will get some of it back to buy things with in ten or more years. How fucked up can an economic system get?
So I recommend to you my fellow Spaceship Earth DeGaming group members that you keep taking five thousand dollars for one day’s work or bullshitting as long as the donors see fit to dole it out. And I recommend trying to set up similar groups around Spaceship Earth as soon as possible by any means possible. The only hope is to create new peaceful consensual answers to new economic and political systems. What Earthians have now is not working.
Paul–I agree with you Sam. Somehow Earthian humans have to improve their communication systems. One can build a case right now the Earthian human world is insane. Most economic and political systems are obsolete and dysfunctional for eighty or so percent of humans alive on earth, but some are satisfied, the rich, and powerful, and the brainwashed, the poor who think believing what they are told is somehow satisfying since they are actually superior to non-believers, believing believing what they believe will cause them to live in eternal bliss eternally after they die.
The only hope somehow is for Earthian humans to construct better educational systems. And I am not talking about the current school and university educational systems around Earth. I am talking about the total educational process, starting at birth, the whole set of messages humans are exposed to from biological parents and others in their earliest years, and even the electro-chemical messages they receive in the wombs of birth mothers. Somehow Earthian humans have to be given permission to think about reality itself, from an early age, not just believe what they are told, in many cases told by parents who do not have a clue about what is really going on, and may not care what is really going on, who spend their time watching soap operas, sports and entertainments and distractions of all sorts, political, religious, or Hollywood fantasy.
Luke–Ah, the one and only Paul, the fount of wisdom has spoken. And after several months of brainwashing I must say I am beginning to agree with him. I must admit I don’t believe like I did. I mightily fear in my heart of hearts that this might get me sent to hell for losing my faith. I still believe the one true Lord God is merciful. Maybe He will understand how I fell in with this group, knowing how much I needed the money. Maybe he will forgive me since this group made me do it.
Albert–Don’t worry Luke. I think you will be fine. One thing no one has brought up in our discussions is that in the beginning there was nothing in the universe except bosons and quarks. There were no people. Everything evolved from those basic particles over eons. Humans came along several billion years after the first bosons and quarks started evolving into higher matter. If we go back to that so what. It will be part of a natural process, global warming or no global warming on Earth, a trivial event in cosmic history.
As to there being an alternative universe nobody has ever seen before, even with the most powerful telescopes, I doubt there is such. There is the slightest chance there might be I suppose, but I doubt it.
Regarding the argument there must be something there or millions of people would not believe like Luke used to believe, it seems to me all religions came about because of the inherent unfairness, precariousness, and banality of human life. People knew they would inevitably die, which was sad enough, and they knew that pain and misery could befall them at any time. Were they happy? Sure for fleeting moments but most of the time they lived under dread and anxiety, which caused them to fight for more resources than they really needed, trying to steal for gain and power and wealth, and so forth, and it caused them to assume there must be some sort of god-like forces making things happen, so they developed various religious systems. In my opinion those who imagined there were multiple gods making things happen were more correct than those who imagined there was only one god making everything happen. Any reasonably bright human would have known that various natural events were causing the plights of various members of their family and community. Some died of this that or the other, some were killed by wild animals, snakes, and so forth, some were killed by hostile tribes. Some seemed to get through their short lives much easier and better than others. Many people assumed some sort of god must have blessed them, while they thought those who had horrible difficulties and problems probably brought it on themselves one way or another.
In reality these effects observed by humans were the results of inevitable cause-effect chains existing in infinity. Most likely there is no free will; if so everything is either accidental or inevitable, depending on how you look at it. Events are like dominoes falling in infinite cause-effect chains. Every event is both an effect and a cause of other events. Rather than see that some people were merely unlucky enough to be the results of cause-effect chains producing certain diseases and negative events and others were lucky enough to be the result of cause-effect chains inevitably producing good health, good looks, intelligence, wealth, prestige, power, etc., they assumed gods and humans were making these anomalous unfair events happen, and thus various individuals deserved to be reviled, pitied, admired, praised, rewarded, condemned, punished, exterminated, etc. This un-managed unfair process enabled various kinds of power people (priests, preachers, kings, queens, barons, presidents, fascist dictators, corporate CEOs, generals, etc.) with communication skill and charisma to dominate weaker humans who believed power people were chosen favorites of the god(s), and thus were entitled to require weaker humans to hand over to them as their god-ordained rulers labor, food, money, and other necessities of life, for performing rituals and playing psychological Games, i.e. for Persecuting, Rescuing, and Victimizing various kinds of humans, groups, and organizations, practicing mumbo-jumbo.
The best hope for Earthian life is that new and better imagoes, scripts, schemata, and behaviors will be caused in human brains, hopefully causing humans around Earth to implement Game-free democratic I’m OK–You’re OK groups such as this one, that will help change a disastrous mindless master-servant I’m OK–You’re Not OK authoritarian course, that humans around Spaceship Earth have set, heading full-sail into hell on Earth.
TO BE CONTINUED…
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