What Do We Want …

 

Introduction

This is the second part in, what I plan to be, a series of three articles about the future. The first article looked at the choices we have about the future. It seems to me that we, as a species, have great potential to build a better world for all. A sustainable future that is also in balance with the planet. Yet, as it appears to me from my corner of the Universe, the groups and individuals that are successful in driving their idea of the future forward are also building what I would consider a dystopia. From techno-fascism to religious theocracy.

In this second article I thought I would outline my vision of the future. In some ways this could be considered a manifesto for the future.

A Future Society

The Goal : Highest standard of living for the longest time possible

The goal (which originates with Technocracy Inc.) outlines what I think a future society should aim to achieve, the rest that follows is about what I think the goal means when it comes to implementation.

1. Demarcation between the complex, technical aspects of society, on the one hand, and the social, people, side of society, on the other hand. The technical side effectively forms the life support systems that keeps society running such as mining, farming, production, distribution, and housing as well as health care, for example. The social, people, side deals with people to people interactions, ethics, morality, and spirituality, for example.

2. Expert management of the technical side of society. From the goal, I would argue, the highest standard of living can be achieved by the application of science and engineering to society. That means society will be hi-tech. A hi-tech, complicated, society has many different parts which takes many years to learn and understand before a person can make a competent decision in a given area. Therefore, this vision of a future society calls for teams of skilled domain experts to manage the areas that they have knowledge and expertise in (which makes this system a type of technocracy). This approach will allows us to build a substantial society that minimises work through robotics and automation and thereby increase individual freedoms. Giving people more time to be human. It also allows us to build a world based around what people can do, not what they look like, their gender, sexual orientation, or the clothes they ware. But even so, to benefit in this future society, you just need to be a sentient life form. It’s a society that works for all, regardless.

3. Direct democracy for the social side. Not all aspects of society have a correct technical solution. We propose that people would live in communities where they would use direct democracy to manage the social side of the community (people themselves are the best experts to manage people related issues). Following from the goal, individual freedoms are to be guaranteed. Freedom of movement, freedom of speech, freedom of association, right to life, etc.

4. A moneyless socioeconomic system. This also follows from the goal. Sustainability is built right into the system from the start. We can’t maintain a high standard of living for the longest time possible in a society that is unsustainable like today society. Today’s socioeconomic system is a money based, for profit, system, that relies on infinite growth with finite resources. Instead, we would need an alternative resource allocation system. I propose a system of Energy Accounting as a means of managing the supply of goods within a society. In an Energy Accounting System we measure the production capacity of society in energy terms. The people can then choose the allocation of production capacity through the allocation of energy credits. The energy credits represents each individual’s share of the production capacity in energy terms. This also leads to a system that is extremely equal. Everyone has the same access as everyone else to the resources available.

5. A holonic socioeconomic structure. We propose a non-nation centric structure built around communities, network of communities, and projects. This would form a “building block like” structure where people would work locally within their own community on various projects. Projects could link up with other projects and communities with other communities in a network that would lead to a world around system. Using a holonic structure is a form of biomimetics, so we are emulating how nature works. It is also an example of applying engineering and science to society. This type of structure would allow for a great deal of diversity. Different groups of communities having their own culture and language as well as laws. Each community will deicide how much or how little it interacts with the technology side. So, we could find very primitive communities that want to be free from technology to all embracing transhumanists communities and anything in-between.

6. No private ownership. As all the means of production come under the management of experts, ownership makes no sense. Instead we would have a form of user rights. Some items such as personal items and housing would have exclusive user rights but most items people will have the right to use as they need such as ground vehicles.

7. Environment design. We aim to design environments not only to allow people to develop to their full potential but also to discourage aberrant behaviour. Just removing money and making a more equal society where we can meet people’s needs could reduce crime dramatically, for a start. But environment design also means building a world with a high standard of living for people but sill balancing our needs with those of the planet. So even nature, and all life, befits from this future society.

Examples

This approach to society hasn’t been tried before. The closest real society I could find is the Inca empire, which was a moneyless society, but otherwise is quite far from my vision. But science fiction does provide a few examples that have some characteristics of the type of society I envision.

United Federation of Planets of Star Trek

“The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity.” - Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek TNG.

Gene Roddenberry was influenced by a number of ideologies such as secular humanism. But in the design of the United Federation of Planets, some similarities between the Technocracy movement in the US and the United Federation of Planets can be seen. Both are moneyless, hi-tech, societies, for example. The United Federation of Planets also has similarities to the vision I present here. There is a high emphasis on education and self improvement, for example, which would be needed in a hi-tech society that values science and engineering. The decision making process is based on expert opinion and positions of importance and power are achieved through individual expertise and the contribution that they make.

There are some differences, however. The United Federation of Planets still maintains a democratically elected government. Society isn’t divided between a technical side and a people side. It is also a hierarchical society rather than a holonic society. It is a post scarcity society but doesn’t appear to use a resource allocating system such as energy accounting, so in that regard, it differs from my vision.

How the economy works in the United Federation of Planets is never fully explored beyond being moneyless. One could surmise that there will be a great deal of computer control. However, I would imagine that such a society is going to require some kind of expert management to be able to keep it running.

Another aspect of the United Federation of Planets is it’s level of freedom, opportunity, and equality. Like in my vision, it only matters what you can do and the effort you put in in the United Federation of Planets. This can also be seen in the high level of diversity, where people from all kinds of backgrounds are accepted.

“… the prejudices people feel about each other disappear when they get to know each other.” Captain James T. Kirk, Star Trek.

Moonbase Alpha

By JefferyWright

“And you are not political on Alpha?”

“No, we’re not!” - Zamara and John Koenig, Space 1999

In Space 1999, the moon is blasted out of orbit in a nuclear accident. The moon then drifts (with the aid of space warps) from one star system to another. Located on the moon is Moonbase Alpha, whose inhabitants now have to survive in a hostile environment.

The governing structure on the moonbase resembles, in some ways, my vision for the future. It is a technological society reliant on science and engineering and is ruled over by a base commander who has a number of technical experts, and a computer, to aid him. It is not quite a dictatorship as the commander and the various senior staff members arrive at their decisions through the application of science and engineering, making it a type of technocracy. Survival is the main focus of the moonbase’s inhabitants, which means resources are allocated as needed, so it can be seen as a moneyless society.

The governance also differs a bit from my vision. It is a bit more militaristic in it’s structure with a hierarchy and an overall commander in charge rather than a holonic structure, where power is distributed. There is no split between the people side and the technological side and there is no democratic element. There is diversity on Moonbase Alpha in terms of people but the culture is uniform.

Trantor

Trantor is a planet wide city and the capitol of Asimov’s Galactic Empire in the Foundation series of books. The planet is almost totally covered in domes, each with it’s own society underneath. In some ways Trantor is similar to a holonic structure. Each community under each dome is autonomous to a degree and has it’s own specialisation that contributes to the whole. Governance could be seen as a nested structure, similar to a holonic structure, that combines together to produce a planet around governance. In this way, Trantor is an example of the holonic structure that I envision for a future society. However, it doesn’t fit perfectly.

Trantor differs from my vision in that it doesn’t appear to have feedback loops, which would be needed for it to be a true holonic structure. The whole governance is still top down for the planet and the Empire as a whole with the emperor at the top. Rather than bottom up as it would be in a holonic structure.

However, Trantor is still a hi-tech society. It is at the centre of a Galactic, space fairing, Empire.

Summary

 

I envision a future society that has it’s roots in the application of science and engineering to society. A sustainable society that balances our needs with those of the planet. A decentralised society that is diverse and equal where people have more freedom. You can find out more about this vision of the future in The Design.

How can such a society be built? That will be the subject of the next article …

Failed

Introduction

We hit another heat record this year. According to NASA, July was the hottest month on record. Heat record we recorded all around the planet. And the heat records continued on in to the second half of 2023. This all shouldn’t come as a surprise as we haven't really done anything about global climate change. We have done “something”, make it look like we have tried but I would argue that all that we have done is try to solve the problem using the same thinking that caused the problem in the first place, not really dealing with the problem itself. Effectively, we just green wash things. If we actually wanted to get to grips with the climate change problem and really deal with global warming then we would have to look at the root causes of the problem; the free market, capitalist based socioeconomic system we have. We would need to look at alternatives.

Where to go?

The current socioeconomic system we have has created a lot of benefits for people over time but in doing so it has also set us on a path of self destruction. We would like to maintain as many of the benefits as we can but avoid the more negative aspects of our current system.

EOS proposes a system that aims to maintain as high a standard of living for as long as possible. A high standard of living for everyone, not just a select few, and for as long as possible means sustainability is built in at the core of the system. The system starts with seeing society as highly complex. So complex it will take many years to study and understand just a part of it. This means that to manage a future society we would need teams of experts taking a scientific and engineering approach. So we start there, dividing society into a technical side and a people side with teams of experts managing the technical side. Scientists and engineers but also accountancy, medical personnel, cleaners, farmers and so on. Each with their own specialisation, each contributing to managing a society to achieve the overall goal.

The system proposed by EOS is also a moneyless system. One of the major problems with our current system is the drive for profit. Profit seeking behaviour pushes infinite growth with finite resources at the expense of the very planet we depend on. Removing money would remove this destructive behaviour. But we will still have resources that need to be allocated to talks. The way EOS proposes to do that is to use a system of energy accounting. We need energy to do anything and we have a certain amount of energy every year that we can allocate to doing things, like producing things. So, we allocate the energy we have available to people and let them allocate the energy to production of items they want. Those items available will be produced in a system managed by skilled experts so as the items are produced in a sustainable way. Thus, we can balance our needs with those of the planet.

In such a system we can automate as much work as we can, minimising the need for work and giving people more time to be human as people don’t need to work to make a living. We can minimise production by making items last longer. We can minimise the amount of items produced by planning and sharing resources (think about cars; what do cars do most of the time and how can we better utilise cars?). Minimising in such a way will allow us to still maintain a high standard of living but lessen our impact on the planet making the system sustainable. The system is also rooted in the application of science and is holonic in nature. So, it’s an open and free society that uses technology to benefit everyone but still maintains a balance with nature. “Balance” is a keyword.

Examples of a future sustainable society

We have not built such a moneyless system managed by skilled experts before so we can’t really point to an example of this type of system today. But fiction does provide us with some examples of societies that have some characteristics of the future World we would like to build. Here is a quick look at a couple; Space 1999 For those of us who were lucky enough to have our childhood in the 1970, we might remember a fascinating sci-fi series called

Space 1999.

Moonbase Alpha, Space 1999

Set on a moon that has been blown out of Earth’s orbit and set a drift in space. The inhabitants of moonbase Alpha have to survive in a hostile universe as the moon is transported from one star system to another via a network of space warps. 

The society on moonbase Alpha is very technical and run by technical experts. Dr. Hellen Russell, in charge of the medical section, Tony Anholt, in charge of security, David Kano, responsible for the computer systems, and Alan Carter, pilot to name but a few. They are all under the command of John Koening with Paul Morrow as second in command. The society is open and decisions are made are decisions where each expert can put forward their opinion. The society is hierarchical, rather than holonic as EOS’ system, but divided into technical domains, like the system proposed by EOS. The economy of moonbase Alpha is not really explained but doesn’t appear to be money based. Production is limited but meets the needs of the inhabitants. The base is also physically limited as everything on the moon outside the base is uninhabitable. Everything produced is maintained within the base which means everything must be recycled and with no waste.

Star Trek

Star Trek TNG

The Federation in Star Trek is another example of a technological organised society. The society is also moneyless. The exact workings of the economy is not fully explained but given the technological nature and the importance of science one can imagine it would be some form of energy accounting. If we look at the starship Enterprise, we again see a society that is organised around technical areas run by technical experts. Mr. Spock as science office, Montgomery “Scotty” Scott, responsible for engineering, Nyota Uhura, in charge of communications, and Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy as chief medical office, for example. All under the command of Captain James T. Kirk. The society is still hierarchical but discussions are still held and the opinion of the experts taken into account.

Do you want this kind of future?

If so, then we need to start building it. It won't happen by itself and given the failure we have seen regarding climate change, we need to be more proactive. We would need people who agree with and understand what is proposed. Scientists and engineers but also experts in other fields need to form groups and clubs to start building in the real world. Join up with like minded people. We would need funding, even if we want to build a moneyless society we are not there yet.

We need to start acting. Start doing. If we don’t, then we wont get this king of future. Fiction also provides us with plenty of examples of other types of societies. In the end the choice is ours. Build a better society or settle with what is coming.

EOS is one example of people working together to try and build a better future. Want to join us? Why not start your own group and form a network with us? Much of the ideas are explained in the Design but we are open to discussion if you want to learn more.

Building a Star Trek Economy – going from here to there.

 

Starbase - proto-type community of the future?

Having vision doesn’t bring about the reality; we also need to act. So, having some idea of what we mean with a Star Trek Economy, how do we bring one about? Especially, how do we bring one about when we have limited resources?

Evolution

Rick Webb sees the evolving from the social democracies in Europe. The European social democracies achieved a great success during the 20th century as they brought countries Such as Sweden form the level of a poor “third world” nation to the level of a modern wealthy industrial nation in the span of a life time. However, they began to run into problems of their own towards the end of the 20th century for various reason (but all to do with their success). In addition, the social democracies do have quite the right vision. Although equality features highly in both the vision for a Star Trek economy and the Social democracies, social democracies still have the idea of work for all as central. Whereas, in a Star Trek economy we would see technology more at the centre reducing the need for work. Thus, we would need a change in direction away from the current social democracies. It can work out harder to change something than to start again. So, rather than redirecting one ideology, perhaps we should work towards build another? 

On saying that, the idea of a Star Trek economy does have a lot of overlaps with social democracy so I could see many social democrats would also support a Start Trek economy. This could lead to another way to bring about such a system; work within the groups and organisations that have similar goal with a view of society. For example, a Star Trek economy should have a sustainable nature and balance between nature and society. In so doing it overlaps with many environmentalist. It would not take a hug step to go from sustainability or equality to the sustainable, equal and moneyless society of a Star Trek like economy. 

Here in I see one way we could go; evolution. From a multiple of compatible ideologies in the world we could see a gradual step towards the idea of sustainable, moneyless, science based Star Trek economy. For that to work we would need many small groups to star working on the same goal; independent groups, self-starting groups to start with. As more groups form with the same vision, networking will occur and strength each group. As we have more and more follower we have the potential to raise finances and in doing so, to start to build something. Small sustainable communities at first; “starbases” on Earth. The network could grow and evolve towards a type one civilization; working towards the vision. 

The vision has a key role; the vision of a future, a Star Trek, economy, unites otherwise separate groups. Beyond vision, however, we also need skill and willingness to act. So many people have enthusiasm but so few have skill.

Building starbases on Earth?

Stepping Stones.

The process I outlines of a vision orientated goal directed building up of a sustainable moneyless system I call stepping stones. What I present could form one way to achieve such a system with minimal resources. We just need people and skills. Any volunteers?

Building a ”Star Trek” Economy – Definition

I thought I would write a bit about how we go from A to B with a Resource Based Economy (RBE), or more colloquially know as a “Star Trek” Economy. But before that, I thought I would need to define a “Star Trek” economy and how it exemplifies an RBE. However, I found Rick Webb has already given a good definition and overview of “Star Trek” economics, although I don’t agree with all the point he mentions. So, for this definition I will take Rick’s article and add a few comments of my own as well and compare it to the Energy Accounting (EA) system that we, in EOS, propose.

Pre-planned and Capitalist Economics.

Rick begins his article talking about “Star Trek” economics a little way down with pointing out that “The Federation is clearly not a centrallyplanned economy” and “Private ownership stillexists” (Although some sources describe the system as post-capitalist). This matches with the EA system we propose. EA has a distributed, demand driven nature. The system makes available what it can but it adapts to the demands of the people. It does this through self-organisation and through expert management and computer control. The system can predict demand to a degree (using AI and data mining, for example) but also runs at about 80% capacity to allow for unforeseen demand or problems. 

As for having a capitalistic nature, ownership has no relevance in EA. You can still have private property, especially personal possessions and pre-EA property, but the production resources come under expert management and get used as needed in the system, regardless of who owns it. The system, however, will also constructed new facilities and these will most likely have no owner or someone will own the property for life or till they relinquish ownership (such as a house, for example).

Post-Scarcity or Proto-Post-Scarcity?

 

You can find some references giving a “Star Trek” Economy as an example of a post-scarcity economy. However, Rick argues that we should consider it an example of a proto-post-scarcity economy. Rick gives an example that famines still occur. 

“The Federation mighthave enough food, but at any time some planet may well be starving or in needof medicine that needs to come from somewhere else.”

As well as pointing out :

“Can everyone haveanything? Anything at all? Is the Federation a perfect post scarcity society?The answer seems almost certainly no. If you went to a replicator, or a dealer,or the Utopia Planatia Fleet Yards and asked for 10 million star ships, theanswer would be no.”

However, I would argue that neither example goes against the idea that a “Star Trek” Economy exemplifies a type of post-scarcity economy.  I would argue that “post-scarcity” does not mean perfect nor limitless. If you ordered an infinite supply of star ship you would break any real system.  I would argue that we should define a post-scarcity economy as one that can met demand “within reason”. So, if a citizen orders 10 million star ships and the system fails to produce I would argue that such as order does not come within the bounds of “within reason”. But what defines “within reason”? Firstly, I think the culture of such a society would define “within reason”; as Picard points out “we work to better ourselves and humanity” and ordering more than you could possibly use and breaking the system does not “work to better yourself nor humanity” and may even work in the opposite direction That then brings me to the other things that defines “within reason”; the finite capacity to consume. People can only consume so much and many items they don’t need all the time so the limits of human beings and the ability to share parts of the system (such as transport) will limit the demand. So, someone would not order 10 million star ships as they could not use 10 million star ship nor would they want to do so. 

As for famines, even if a post-scarcity system has the capacity to meet demand in general it can still fail on a local level. The system could experience occasional failures and local spikes in demands. This results for its distributed and demand nature; we don’t all live in the same place nor produce everything where we live. As the system develops over time it should get better at handling such failures and in doing so, famines will occur less and less. 

So, to my mind, so long a “Star Trek” Economy can met demand within reason then it forms an example of a post-scarcity economy. 

Work in a “Star Trek” Economy

“Citizens have nofinancial need to work, as their benefits aremore than enough to provide a comfortable life, and there is, clearly,universal health care and education. The Federation has clearly taken theplunge to the other side of people’s fears about European socialist capitalism:yes, some people might not work. So What? Good for them. We think most stillwill.”

And I almost agree and we, in EOS, see things in a similar way. People would get intensely board if they did nothing. Work in a “Star Trek” Economy gives people the opportunity to do something they want to do, to develop themselves. We would have automation to do much of the dull work as well. But if some people don’t want to work? In EOS we do talk about the idea of having a minimum amount of work like 16 hours a week for a few years. People tend to treat things better if they see it has a “cost”. If they do the minimum service and then don’t want to work after that then OK but they can, of cause, continue to work if they want to.

Accountancy in a “Star Trek” Economy

“… behind the scenesthere is a massive internal accounting and calculation going on — the economics still happen. Theyjust aren’t based on a currency unit, and people don’t acquire things basedupon a currency value.”

“… the accounting isdone in energy units, so that there is no need for currency.”

And that basically sums up the Energy Accounting system we propose in EOS. Using energy allows us to measure our production capacity. People then have an equal allocation of production capacity that they allocate as they will. This makes the system demand driven and connected to the actual physical resources we have in the system.  

Actually, we propose the use of exergy, which means the usable energy in the system. Exergy also allows us to account for materials and information so we have a common accountancy unit.

“It is tempting toargue here that the massive accounting system uses a unit called the FederationCredit, but I don’t believe that’s the case. If it were, the credit would betoo much like money because a) accounting is done in it, b) it is issued by agoverning body (like a fiat currency) and c) it is fungible, i.e. you canalready buy things with it and if you could buy things with it AND a and b weretrue, it would pretty much be a currency. This would fly in the face ofRoddenberry’s absolute diktat that the Federation has no currency.”

At this point I would disagree. In our Energy Accounting system we allocate production capacity as measured in energy terms to the people so everyone gets an equal share of the production capacity. That measure of production capacity we refer to as energy credits and I would argue that “federation credits” equals the same thing; a measure of production capacity.

In such a system you, as a citizen, allocate production capacity to produce an item you would like though allocating energy credits. This does not equate to money. Money you can save, energy credits you cannot. If we had the capacity to produce 100 units a year but only produced 80 in one year then we cannot produce 120 next year. We still only have the capacity to produce 100 units.

Summery

We can define a “Star Trek” Economy as a post-scarcity, demand driven system that uses energy as an accounting unit. I would also add that as the Federation has an enlightened nature it would also have a sustainable system as well that doesn’t destroy the planet’s environment.  System a system presents o vision for the type of system that EOS aims to build.