Previously "One humanity, all in the same boat"
A short note: We should refrain from saying "one humanity" because that
would exclude alien species. I use unity in this case to
mean all sentient beings.
I would like to ask readers here to consider a world separated more on
ideological divisions rather than mere race, geographical
location and skin color (or other equally superfluous different). In this
world, different communities abound where each community
offers a unique ideology where one can subscribe to.
One can choose to join any of these communities freely, and can start a new
one if neccessary. This provides free competition (in
the uniquely productive rather than redundant sense). The communities will
follow a non-interventionist policy what some basic
important rules:
1) Communities cannot detain people who wish to leave
2) They can restrict the people they take
3) Those who choose to stay or enter without permission will subject
themselves to the internal rules of the community (such as
punishment)
4) Communities cannot interfere in the affairs of the other communities who
signed this treaty
Given this, no dictator can rule his or her own people without having
concern about them because these people can always choose to
go to another community. Meanwhile, it does not deprive others of the choice
to join, say, this dictatorship because of certain
(perceived) advantages that we might not consider rational (such as for
religious reasons).
Such a world would provide vastly more choice for all people than say, one
dominated by socialist sentient AI (I mean this in a
positive way!) or a world dominated by an anacho-capitalist society. We
should not assume that people will have the same goals as us
(such as the pursuit of self-interest) or even that they have no goals at
all, but to provide them with choices such that they can
choose their own path.
This could stop a lot of conflicts from happening because if people can live
the way they disire, then presumely they would not need
to fight for their "cause" whether we consider these rational or not. The
exception, of course, lies with those whose ideologies
require them to enslave or at least "take over the world". This could cause
some problems until a system exists to keep them in
check (or wait until most people venture space leaving these people with a
sparsely populated planet Earth).
I suggest considering this approach of "many ideologies, many societies"
over alternative approaches that champion any one of the
proposed social systems. No shoe can fit everyone and we should learn that
the easy, rather than the hard way.
We should also have a wider prespective rather than the egocentric "my
people", "my country", "my planet" and even "my species"
thinking. This kind of attachment causes a lot of unneccessary problems when
they conflict with others thinking along similiar
lines.
Perhaps the first lesson any advanced sentient being can teach us, on first
contact, would consist of knowledge on how to live with
ourselves. Technology will not serve us well if we only bothered to use it
to build bombs to blast each other.
For some additional ideas, refer to:
http://sociologistics.webhop.org
http://ascension.webhop.org
http://eric.webhop.net
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat May 11 2002 - 17:44:31 MDT