No.

Although I don't know about indigenous communities.

so, in all of societies, from the beginning of time,you don't kow of one society that has met that standard or even one that you would be willing to present as successful.

Yet, you feel it is appropriate to say that it is a logical solution.

You also feel that it is appropriate to put blame on a small group of people , isolating them, for all the ills of the world.  or wait two groups of people

1.  the wealthy

2. those you name as making money from war.

I didn't name people who specifically made money from war. But companies do. They really do. Huge money. And they rely on other companies and other companies rely on them to stay in business- and without war, there'd be no use for the weapons of war, right? Or do you think I am wrong?

Greed, lust for power is the driving force behind wars. I can think of no other reason anyone would want one. It's absurd to use killing machines to solve problems and turn a profit, and that's what people at the very top decide on our behalf. If there had been no weapons and a refusal on all sides to resolve problems with violence and not dominate but cooperate- there wouldn't be war breaking out right now. But powers don't think like that. And as a consequence probably lots of people are going to die, they already are, and a few people are going to get rich off of military procurement deals- the economy of the people will be indebted to the world lenders and their recovery will be painful. And it is not just! No there hasn't been a society that I can name, that I know of, that didn't place a barter and trade value for human lives but God I wish that wasn't so! Can we try something different one day- because this has been tried and tried- but I don't believe it's 'true'.

What would happen if all weapons manufacturing stopped. People everywhere just said no? We want peace. We don't need them anymore. How would that affect global markets? You probably know better than I what might happen if a major multibillion dollar industry just halts production. What would happen to the industries that depend on sales to that industry?

Just proposing the 'what if?' it's a far off day dream- but what if?

? UnDefinitive, how did you learn what you consider truths.

Pinga, Through active process of making sense of new information within the context of my own understanding and experience.

Money is just a bargaining tool.  You can use what ever you want for exchange, you are still bargaining, whether it be sharing or not....there is a decision to value something and then find out a way to exchange.  Underground economies are still economies, barter is still assigning a value to something.   Someone is deciding what hte haircut is worth that you got. Someone is deciding what that apple is worth.  

But what if I could decide to get a haircut from a person who just loves to cut hair for the sake of cutting hair who expects nothing in return? And what if that same person can pluck and eat the next apple that they see if that same person decides it is worth it to them?

Money unites.  It drives people to make agreements.  Honestly, what do you mean "money divides".

It seems to me that people make agreements much easier when money is not part of the equation.

How do you see equality in any society?  Can you name a society that you see equality in?  What do you call equality? Is someone doing hard labour for 8 hrs equal to someone who studied for 10 years and then did easy labour for 8 hrs? is one's labour hour worth more or less?  If you can give me a simple answer to that, regardless if money is involved or not, I would be interested.

It seems to me that every hour of labour produces it's own worth.

Usership would be better than ownership?  hmm, how does that apply to housing?  Do you wish the government ot own all houses?  Do you feel we should all have the exact same house? who woudl define what kind of house you would have?

I would not wish anyone to own housing.  I feel we should all have freedom to create whichever type of home we feel most comfortable in and I would determine the type of home that I would have based on respect for natural and personal space in the area of the world that I chose to live.

open source to technology does provide some advantages; however, it also introduces risk regarding vulnerabilites introduced by folks who can....coz no one is watching or managing the ultimate deliverable.  plus, how does open source to technoloyg equal total access to all riches on earth? really? to the potato int he ground in PEI?

I believe that transistion to a money free society could eliminate the motivation for people to use technology in a competive or destructive fashion. If I am tired of eating the potatoes that I grow in my own yard that I chose not to be in PEI I can just hop on a plane that nobody owns that is flown by a pilot that is a pilot because they are good at it and happens to love flying other people to PEI to eat potatoes.

status should be obsolete?  what do you mean by that?  should I no longer identify who is a licensed lawyer versus someone who gives legal advice?  shoudl the brain surgeon not be identified as same?  or are you referring to the uality of the brain surgeon? should I not care if someone is known as a quack? how does status become irrelevent in any society, whehther money is at play or not

Lawyers would no longer need licenses ... you would identify a lawyer or a brainsurgeon the same way you do now ... by their ability and reputation ... They would not charge you anything for their service because they would give their service to mankind freely just as you or I would.

Kimmio, I don't know, why don't you look at rwanda?    Without high tech weapons of war they had such a terrible time killing each other.

Hmm, let me think.  There is no war or death in any location where technology is low.  Middle East has had significant problems killing each other without weapons from war, right?

Kimmio, if you look, what you will see is countries that spend a fortune on weapons of war tend not to go to war with each other these days.

Nww, if you are referring to say, the US or Canada going into other countries , then, I'm happy to talk about it.

But, if your premise ist hat getting rid of the weapons of war (ie, missiles, tanks) are goign to stop people from killing each other in wars, then, I hope you reflect on Rwanda for a while.

I'm just suggesting what if all people said enough- and turned swords, and tanks, etc. etc. into plowshares? I really don't agree that proliferation of high tech weapons makes for a more peaceful planet. It makes for a planet constantly at the mercy of people at the top, whom, we have to trust that they have the planet's best interest at heart. Nope. I think we should try to spread peace- one day get rid of all those God awful death machines. All of them. It would be a different world with different priorities- and places like CAR could be helped. More hope, more peace all around. I can only hope and believe that would be better than the world we've got now.

so to be clear

It is the people that must decide to quit killing each other that will stop war everywhere?

Is that your new premise?

Yes. But you don't see the people in the highest most powerful places profitting off of the weapons and spoils of war deciding that, do you? They make decisions to build and sell and expect others will get killed with the machines they build- that's what they're for. What are the chances that they'll change their ways? Retire on an island somewhere? Turn weapons factories into clean energy facilities? Think they will? We're captive to their business at this point in time, don't you see that? Unless we reject what they do- just say no, in our consciences. Having thousands of devestating high tech weapons on the planet does not make it a safer place. It doesn't. Make your retort if you want but I'm going to step back. This is an ugly topic. It's real, wars are happening, though, that's why it's come up.

Kimmio

You really love to blame the people you do not know.  You have these huge ideas ......whether it be that all men are basically rapists,  all people at defense contractors are pro war and killing, and that let me see,  all rich are evil and only got to be rich by being dishonest.

Do you have any greys in your world?

Do you accept personal responsibility for how the world is, or is it always "blame the other"?

I accept personal responsibility for getting caught up in consumerism and at one time thinking the corporate path might not be so bad. It's not for me. Yeah, I am part of the problem too. I buy too much plastic packaging. I don't buy everything recyclable. I have to get more disciplined about that. Lots of flaws, I have. Money doesn't interest me but for now it's what we use to get by. We have no choice. I don't think people get to be multibillionaires through simply hard work, no. They have to make moral compromises that affect people on a larger scale because with more power comes more responsibility. I've never been pro war, pro military power. I never said all men were rapists. End of discussion tonight. Goodnight, Pinga.

Utopia. :)

i have decided.  My 8 hrs of labour will be reading. i think that reading has value, so that will be my 8.  I also think that gaming is of value, so I am going to work double time, for 8 hrs gaming. hmm, maybe on two days I will do that.  The other 3days, I will cook food. I'm a shitty cook. I am sure you dont mind and are willing to pay me for it.    I will also spend time painting, coz, my hour of painting is equal to the artists down the street, right?

utopia.

Now, who is going to pick up the garbage?

Utopia Indeed Pinga ... Not only will you be free to read and game and cook and paint equally to the task ...  you will be allowed to do it for free ... and I will be free to pick up the garbage ... or perhaps a person (such as kimmio) who is courageous enough to dare to dream of saving the planet ...  maybe that person could find equal value (and possibly even joy) in throwing out the trash!

Right, undefiitive.  No doubt.  Of course, I will be free to hang out a shingle and call myself an economist or a doctor at will, and it is through word of mouth that people will determine how good I am.    A dcotor, well, I am sure that will be based on how few people have died under their care, yes?  That sounds like a reasonable item.  A surgeon? Maybe you tell by who is walking around without limbs because they made the mistake of believing a shingle....

What undefinitive and Kimmio are missing is that the items that they so shun, funds, authority, policikng, taxes, entrepeneurship, business risk takers,  pay   exist because they work.

In your utopia of the plane, who is going to put the gas in the plane?  Who is going to make the gas? Who is going to make the pipelien to get the gas to the plane?

I your utopia of housing, you would make whatever type of housing you are comfortable with?  hmmm...there is a reason that houses don't collapse.  It is due to building inspectors, standards of construction, engineers who design. ...oh wait, i get it, it is a population reduction. You feel that the countries that have buildings coll.apse is a good thing, yes?

dup

In Utopia, people trust one another- there want to help, not compete- so that no one who doesn't how to practice medicine or home building would do so because they don't want anyone to be harmed- people do what they do because they like to and want to- that would be understood. In Utopia people love you for who you are and your painting is your expression and your expression has just as much value as anyone's. ...in Utopia.

It seems that this utopia needs not only a new system,but also new human beings.  The old ones are obsolete, what with all their personal flaws, and have no place in the new order.

Utopia also needs new technology to literally do everything that these Human 2.0 beings don't want to do, or don't find fulfilling.

So, utopia only needs new, genetically engineered people and an abundancy of new, sustainable technology to see us live as we all want, with no needs that go unfulfilled.

Shouldn't be a problem.

It needs primarily a commitment to casting off greed, and cynicism, and adopting forgiveness, and working towards things that heal not harm- mentally, physically, spiritually. It would be okay to have flaws and do your best- and someone else without those same flaws would compensate- just because they can and they care. So, then, flaws are not really flaws at all. And we help one another heal and be their best- and there is no hatred for 'the weak'. It involves changing the way we think about the world and each other. The specific pieces could then fall into place because- what is needed is simply understood and agreed upon and cared about. Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount. John Lennon dreamed the same dream...And many others. Imagine replacing the requirement for armies and arms with green technology and good medicine?

A perfect social order would that be acceptable to those that like to get more of their share? Sounds like a dark conspiracy to me ... perhaps occult if not obfuscated ... certainly a concept of someone with fuzzy logic if you look at the way things are ...

Is logic like LOGOS in a weird translation or transmutation of food for thought ... transcendance? Too close to knowledge for the pious to ponder ... things are good the way they are without learning something new ...

I think some people call it a coverup for your tracks ... some say your hind end ...

Is it then we see the gods going or is that the devil?

Depends on perspective ... especially when there can be "no" knowledgeable mediums ... a huge cosmological joke ... wouldn't you say when people come into the game bias'd ... either have it or not and if they do they want more and if they don't, where will those to do have it, have to  ... get more?

Thus the die is caste as a chitty anti social concept ... some sympathy and eM pathy required and one would have to be sensitive to some strange people to sympathize with that caste of crap below our standards ... well formed in-transparent chits? Causes dark nights if you stand in a Gael like that ... regular chit-storm ... this is where we're at if you look at it from afar like me ... a far out person according to Heiseinberg Prin ...

If you like and grab for excess money it shows doesn't it ...? Some call this avarice ... in the urge to control servants mercilously!

At one times the lords of the land used to screw the servants over brutally ... but I'm told they don't do that anymore ... if you can believe that you possibly live in La-La land as all things are possible ... Paul said ... then he fell of a horse too ... he may have Jared his noodle ...

Some people say they don't beleve in mind, thought, or anything thunk ... and thus the leaders of this sort are going down the road to loneliness ... as the bulk of society works their way below the subsistance line while some fool collects hundreds of mile that they don't need ... for what?

In my opinion, your best post ever Azdgari.

Cousin, you're such a dreamer, and your dreaming is great, and wonderful, and powerful.

Not exactly realistic, but I hope you keep producing such dreams.

  I agree Kimmio and I see it everywhere - in what I think is a kind and globally aware society.  To name one mega rich person - Elon Musk - co-founder of Pay Pal - now CEO of Tesla Motors.  Would you include him in your broad generalizations?  Look at the amazing work accomplished by NGO's.  Even UCCan folks have upped their emergency fund donations.

Cast off your cynicism and work to make your piece of the world a better place - the power of one is all that is needed

In the utopia I dream of- no money required. No CEOs. Just people. People blessed with the gifts they have 'serve' those who don't have those gifts- and everyone has gifts, because we value people- and everyone shares what they have- the 'field' is even and horizontal- not a vertical power structure- in a perfect world. I am thinking of ideas, not people. Ideas are free to be dreamed of and anyone can embrace or reject them. Current CEO or homeless person- this is a dream. So, broad generalizations, sure. Why not? I suppose I am cynical about the way the current world works- because it's clearly not working for 3.5 billion - and with all our efforts in these systems we have lauded (capitalist, communist, etc. etc.) -we can't overlook the fact that somehow we reached a stage where there are 3.5 billion people in poverty, and 85 who own the other half- and it's getting tougher- survival of the fittest? Things the way they are can go on and on and as long as half the world is owned by a only a few the other half is in a position to struggle. I dream of something different.

Kimmio, that;s how Garden of Eden started out and look what happened. From Utopia to a Snake Pit.

Do you think we can get 'back there', CH? Or accept the snakepit we have now and keep doing the same thing? That cannot hold out forever, and at some point we'll have to get on board with something different- the prophets of every age have had the same concern that 'this can't last like this'. I dream of something better. I believe in a better world.

Some one said that's not realistic ... is it perhaps a coincidental evidence of the absract mind ... something imaginary with great creative input? I'd rather live in La-La land with the Yah-Yah Girls than in reality ... and thus the recessve nature of the subtle mind as an underlying support system (aDamah) for reality ... keeps the fili's out of chitty circumstance ... and thoughts take flight as UFO's!

Taken from Jeremiah 29:11 which many people can't see thus the conclusion of the unseen mind bunch ... sort of an unseen power ... who 'ear has seen the wind of the mind as Eire?

Reality just can't imagine such far route's tuff ... as farce ID and thus full of RIFFels ... like wa' ve's that the Greek called Nus ... a bit of la Nich ... san fleece?

We could do without the bull market fleecing us ...

PINGA: How does the bull (molloch) market reconcile the Golden Rule in an environment of ascertion and Greed? Tends for a haggi deis ... and thus some of us are happy when dai sends and emotions rest!

You don't understand ? Good serves to allow space to hide the thingking sects ... pumb my' sol' to goath ...

Fear of war is a reason for spending on defense and aggression weapons. You don't need war to drive a spend.  Fear of the other is a suitable reason for spend.   

The reference to the FLQ  earlier was that was the potential start to a civil war in Canada.  It didn't happen.  We have  a strong middle class, good infrastructure, political systems that are stable, banking, etc.

You see that greed and lust for power are the driving force.

It may be for some

For others, it is about freedom, it is about what is rightfully the region or peoples as a society.   In locations with religious differences for generations, it is about hurts, fears and retaliations.

Conflicts arise, injustices are done, and wars occur.  There are mutltiple causes.  

It sometimes is about power , greed, such as are occurring in Mexico between cartels.

It sometimes is about overthrowing colonial systems and then the battles between rival groups as they try to bring leadership into an area.

It never is simple

I agree that fear of war drives up spending on war and fear of the other drives up aggression. But the aggression and greed/ need for power go hand in hand- the clinging to power reinforces the perceived need for aggression- to protect the power. None of which serves the desire to live freely and share. Weapons of war provide a false sense of security (if the other try to take what is ours we have enough means at our disposal to stomp them out so they better not mess with us- is the stance served by weapons of war). You have false peace. A holding pattern. And then you run the risk of people saying "why stop here. We'll just stomp them out and take whatever we want until we control it all- witness imperialism). Real security, real peace, can only really happen if nobody is out to take more they need at the expense of anyone who has less- it's a mentality. What if noone was without and noone was greedy- and there was more than enough for everyone so there was no need to dominate- an absurd thought? I believe that's where it needs to shift. I think disarmament would be an excellent place to start. It's a hope I hold. But there needs to be an alternative to the financial marketplace as it is- because that is the underpinning of how the world works now. It depends on weapons of war because they represent billions and billions of dollars and therefore need to be manufactured and bought and sold- therefore they depend on fear and thirst for power and greed. Not real peace.

What's so wrong with it? Why does it make you angry? It's a far off dream. It's not this world. It'll happen one day.

Why do you presume I am angry?

You're not? Okay, that's good.

Hello all,

Something is coming down the road and the great majority in our enlightened context have no desire to see what it is, how it may be averted or, at least, its implications minimized.

Our context is wholly subdued by the influence of power expressed in the realm of money. There is the appearance of democracy under the jurisdiction of diverse oligarchs.

Democracy is radically critiqued by persons from many perspectives. We may think of Socrates with his notice of democracy as the precursor to tyranny.

Democracy is viable only where each and all consider critical thought prerequisite to responsible participation in governance for balance; well-being.

Ask the millions to think about the present situation, its origins, its trajectory, its destination. You will harvest sound bytes subliminally implanted by mass media.

Persons are scripted by persuasive agency expressed as stimulation of desire for the sake of profit; irrespective of non-economic consequence.

What are we taking to the globe in the name of progress? Has the stated purpose anything in common with the press for cooperation by which we may yet salvage our highest hope?

We are, as Kimmio notices by her free imaginative manner, governed by a large dog with sharp teeth. The dog's name is "War".

This coercive presence is ubiquitous in our context. It will never be of concern for those well conformed to the structures of opinion by which money manipulates the present to shape the future.

Any who step across the unstated boundary, in the exercise of critical capacity by effective action, and the velvet glove comes off.

I valued UnDefinitive's "learnings". First that they were not presented as truths. Perhaps they might best be considered as ideals towards which we might cooperatively strive.

Not as a realized utopia, but as a guiding vision. Each of us, every day, determining to disengage from that which hinders to engage that which helps.

Some have it that these are the best of all times. Indeed, we are on the threshold of that future the myths of progress promised. Just a little while more and all will be well. 

As if we we unconcerned that our prisons were filled to bursting with the angry and non-compliant poor, and, increasingly, the mentally ill.

By what limiting factor has our progress in the way of justice been curtailed? Why do the unjust profit? The sugar sellers have devastated our bodies and even more so the bodies of our young.

This with the aid of the subtle seducers who elicit attraction by which we are indebted to have the latest and newest technologically enhanced product.

Is this what we are spreading around the globe? This sickness unto death?

The middle class is vanishing. In its place we are experiencing the rise of the necessary consumer. These being credit worthy persons with services necessary to the machine. For this loyal service obtaining the material goods produced in the service of capital interest. I suspect that this is the pattern in India and China, as it is the pattern here.

There is an example of the model UnDefinitive has sketched. It is nature in and through all its relationships. What the Cree point to saying "All my relations". The same Cree who were on the receiving end of an early globalisation initiative. Cree who may yet teach us what matters most and what matters not at all.

I follow in the way of two literary exemplars. First is Moses and his part in the Exodus narratives. Second is Jesus and his part in the Collapse of the Roman Empire narratives. This has me standing with the exploited and the oppressed, calling for the leveling of our common human being, in and through the natural order.

To whom much has been given much will be expected. This levelling offers a way of remedy. Refusal will precipitate unwelcome consequences.

I recall a tree in the story of a little prince"

"Now there were some terrible seeds on the planet that was the home of the little prince; and these were the seeds of the baobab. The soil of that planet was infested with them. A baobab is something you will never, never be able to get rid of if you attend to it too late. It spreads over the entire planet. It bores clear through it with its roots. And if the planet is too small, and the baobabs are too many, they split it in pieces . . .

"It is a question of discipline," the little prince said to me later on. "When you've finished your own toilet in the morning, then it is time to attend to the toilet of your planet, just so, with the greatest care. You must see to it that you pull up regularly all the baobabs, at the very first moment when they can be distinguished from the rosebushes which they resemble so closely in their earliest youth. It is very tedious work," the little prince added, "but very easy." "

George

The thing that bothers my conscience is everytime I spend a buck, unless I spend it at a hobby farm which is not realistic for me to do everyday, my conscience knows it is going towards things I don't agree with. There are things happening beyond my control that a portion of dollar is going to. But I have no choice so I think "forgive me" and take the good with the bad. Some day it would be nice not to be caught in that moral predicament, wouldn't it?

Moral predicament ... restricted democracy that has eM-pathy for all god's children? I could relate to that as in alchemii ... but people really don't understand that word ... for they have no reverence for the love of LOGOS ... in which wisdom is buried ... as powerful gods/heros didn't wish to know ... thus satyr and satire ... and we worship the god of naivete, and not the god of wisdom ... for them we'd know better than that one step beyond delight ... H-8 ... when one looses IT and transcendence occurs as alien impulse ... a blo'  in the dark? (extracted from Proverbs 29:25 on safe Gods, eM that are buried or subtle to a hateful dimension).

"It is never simple" the way it is with underlying gods ... wee demons that contemplate resrictive and reverential democracies in which all are attached to the soical order ... wouldn't work in an anti-social disorder as run by totally emotional gods ... a kind or stray idealism ... thy rant an rave plainly ... if you rant on complexity ... the naive will not listen ... to complex! This is the world with the Sea of LOGOS ...  vast pile a words that are piled up as unknowns ...

Did you know there are 600,000+ words out there for AngloSaxon derivation alone ... and then there are even stranger lost tongues ... really alien an piles up in the vast recessive mind ... doesn't dares show itself here with so many emotional gods ... thus the concept of adamah ... or eD'm-ism ... underlying factors ... leaving us incomplete or an incarnation of ... what else: abstract (as a figment for the imagination)! Á Lass ... few know these things ... you can't see it until the physical self is going ... a'NDE, or justified end? Some types of Christians can hardly wait to be justified as sanctified and completely out of cognizance ... well into the dark and not a sparkie carried!

Do you know what's hodden in BaobAB trees? The: Ba-soul, ob-dark as obtuse/occult and a sense of ABs the lower end? The "IF" emmerges as the rational for gathering light ... for to carry without you in de crossing over ... some religious believe if you just burn the "other" that'll shed light! Why the if statement in the logic schematic about slowing down to dis emmanate ... but who knows about non destructive pathology? It is something to ponder in a world where conflict and aggressive is held high in esteem as so much Molloch or BS!

if you have no respect for metaphical satyrs ... you canniot grasp such things ... slippery as  Medussa a spin off on the aD'r ... cosmological accounting as it turns?

One must really conspire to know obfuscation in a world devoted to passion and naivete (devoid of knowledge) a state that just blows my mind and thus one can't think once on has lost it in a Mac Pherson-like rant ... 

The the bible does say that wisdom is troublesome to them that knows ... so keep it under cover folks ... like they say cover your no-end ass! In god's world it is so easy to make an ass of your'self ... just appear to know something ... and someone will pick on it ...

I think Utopia requires not so much a genetically new human being, but a newly aware human being.

It requires a human being who is aware of the unified state of synthesis as the basic state of being. It requires a human being who is aware that ultimate Truth is antithetical to analysis, meaning it cannot be derived by logical analysis alone.

The ultimate, syncretic reality has to be experienced to be real for us, and is being experienced, in the pure, unconceptualized experience. This is when we experience reality not as we think it is, but as it really is: a unified whole in a state of synthesis! And along with the unified universe we experience unitive love, the glue that binds the seemingly disparate and separate parts of the universe into a unified whole.

Experiencing reality as a unified whole, together with the unitive love that keeps it together, is, I think, an or THE experience of Grace. And acting directly from the depth of that experience is enacting Grace.

Our knowledge is fragmentary, and our prophecies are fragmentation.

But when that which is perfect has come, then the fragmentation will end.

1Cor13:9,10 (Luther Version)

To my mystical mind, "that which is perfect" is the experience of reality as a unified whole.

My mistake in my entering the dialogue was that I thought we were discussing reality or possibility rather than a science fiction or fantasy novel.

Now that I know that Kimmio and undefined are writing a dream that requires a new form of genetic human , i can play the game.  (maybe Monsanto would be interested?)

I'm picutring a world where kickstart raises billions of dollars for new airports, high speed trains and hospitals

Where some people are genetically modified to remove their sense of smell,so that they don't mind doing stinky tasks.

Of course, we ahve been genetically modified to remove any argumentative capabilities.  We all agree all the time, because to disagree would drive dischord into the community.   Anti-anxiety meds are placed in the water systems.

We accept that people die due to others just deciding to try to do things.  It is ok, for, after all, everyone is allowed to do what they wish without any checkpoints on capabilities or licensing centres.   The anti-anxiety meds help with our feelings of loss regarding those deaths.

Further to my above post, I think it will not be religion but science that will usher in this new awareness by proclaiming that reality ultimately is in a unified state of synthesis.

Energy, the eternal substance of the universe, cannot be pluralized. There is only one energy.

The lamps are different,

but the light is the same:

One matter, one energy, one light, one light mind,

endlessly emanating all things.

-Rumi

Hi GeoFee,

No, it doesn't.

It might possibly mean things are not as bad as they are made out to be.

And when knowledge is embraced as power it is not surprising when counterfeit currencies arise.

Truth is to gold as untruth is to fool's gold.

And that is where obfuscation begins.

For some the obfuscation comes when untruth is used to detract from truth.  Trickle down theories of economics for example.

For others the obfuscation comes when impotence is railed against.  9-11 was an inside job.

Both use the seductive allure of fool's gold to the benefit of their personal economies.  One to keep their stock in real gold from being diluted and the other to amass a greater quantity of fool's gold in the hopes of all that glitters being counted the same.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Yeah, that's why it's still a dream. It's too bad that the world's so messed up those communities have to call themselves intentional communities and a caring and sustainable way of life isn't natural for most of the world anymore. The instinct is still there but it's stifled.

I think governments have largely laid the foundations for conspiracy theorists. And, more correctly, conspiracy con artists. By being secretive, by staging coups and arming militants and spying and all sort of actions, now some will see this activity even where it doesn't exist. Even where it can be shown to not exist.

The Internet is great for quickly researching and explaining things, but it can not break through where someone has made up their mind despite the evidence. I can show where con artists are lying, but they will always have their fans. I find that hard to accept, but I have to. The important thing I have to keep in mind, is that most people see the lies miles away. The conspiracy con artists prey on those who are fearful and easy to manipulate.

And this is where I think government, like the US, are happy about conspiracy con artists - they distract from what is really happening. Find me a conspiracy theory website that has been shut down, or that the US government has tried to shut down. Compare that to the US treatment of WikiLeaks and Snowden. If the conspiracy theory sites actually had anything, they'd be under attack like Snowden and Julian Assange are. They're not. The government doesn't care, because they're essentially entertainment sites.

Liberty is the Mother, not the daughter of order. (Pierre-Joseph Proudhon) 

Any attempts to rebalance things into that order will make one appear as an anarchist and a threat to "freedom". It upsets governments and it's people. A farewell to what we know and no hesitation for what's to come creates social upheaval when most are only familiar with "one way" of doing things. Generationally freedom gets redefined and accepted in ways that it was never intended. Those striving to create change can be opposed from both sides.

Since the topic of sustainability came up on this thread, I had been trying to recall the thesis of an essay that I read in my Environmental Economics course that I took about six years ago. I think I remember now. It's something like, "Sustainability is impossible because we can never adequately plan for unforeseen externalities." (paraphrase) Any comment, Cousin, on the thesis as I recall it? Sorry, I don't recall the author's name.

You keep learning as you go- being creative and resourceful adapting to the changes, helping one another- respecting what the other needs as much as you (you/ me/ all of us) and sharing so that everyone can be sustained. Is what I would say. When one link in the web of life is broken- the whole thing is weakened- or, when the house is divided against itself (by greed anger envy competition), the whole thing falls apart. Without social cohesion/ cooperation/ empathy. The problem is, as we've adapted and learned and evolved we've largely forgotten that we're interdependent and need to share- and that affects everyone. We might not even be faced with the troubles we are faced with now if we'd kept that first and foremost in mind instead of competition/ survival of the fittest mentality- IMO. So, that 'garden of Eden' was corrupted and here's where we are now- we don't trust, we're cynical and xebophobic, impatient, we build higher walls to protect our turf from others and them from us. We weren't intended that way. I get the symbolism of the garden.