From: "John \"sb\" Werneken" <john.werneken@gte.net>
Enjoyed the latest Colloquium and the latest newsletter.
Sure wish we had Augment for the newsletter - it's getting too long for me to hold as one picture in my mind! Maybe we should work on this, our communications medium itself?
Bernie is right, in present climate informal on-line communities functioning like professional societies or -dare I say it - NICs can and do get some C-work done. Let's do more, here!
Clark is right. Education of the "buyer" is a key strategy. Maybe not all can or need be educated but a critical mass can move society. For example, a minority of packaging-conscious shoppers has changed how groceries handle bagging and may change how retail goods are offered.
Eric, you stated:
The legislation helps to create an environment in which it is not *necessary* for everyone to be educated on the subject.
It's not perfect solution, but it greatly improves the percentages.
I believe we actually see co-evolution of legislative initiatives and private ones. IN the best cases regulation buys time and eventually can be reduced as private initiatives gain steam. However in the typical case regulation only purchases the illusion of protection, while destroying and slowing practical efforts at change, and is removed or reduced only with great difficulty. If the judgment is the greatest good for the greatest number for the most time, avoiding the regulation entirely would be wisest. Also if the judgment is made legitimately i.e. based on the moral values of freedom of action and of responsibility for the individual.
Mike T makes the above point at greater length and with greater eloquence.
Paul's "singularity" epistle is IMHO a wonderful statement of the most likely future: scarcity-based issues are likely to vanish, at least as we know them today, under a flood of faster-better-cheaper-exponentially-growing technology.I don't doubt that the humans of 2050 will conjure other goods/services/freedoms to feel jealous of each other over, possible unimaginable today - people are like that (which drives progress). (Did you know that serious thinkers circa 1830 wondered what would happen to their society in 50 years, when every person had machine-made clothes and furniture in their homes and scarcity had been abolished?)
Paul's call for a major sub-theme to be Bootstrapping to enhance our moral senses is in my humble opinion spot on.
Finally, I notice a huge gap between the future DKR Peter Yim painted and the present reality this missive of mine forms a small part of. Concentration on B-work to improve our own communications (information sharing seems to be our A-work at this point) might pay off handsomely, in immediate benefits to us bootstrappers and as a better example of what Peter talked about.
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0.0 : Tue Aug 21 2001 - 18:56:39 PDT