aurum

This is a good theoretical game to play. The most common argument against UBI besides “people will be lazy” is “how do we pay for it?” Financing is of course a real question. There does need to be a plan to finance UBI. But ultimately, I find this argument holds little weight. If we want it, we can find a way to finance it. I’ve various plans that have been proposed, from Andrew Yang’s VAT tax to a cryptocurrency direct deposit. Most of them I feel would work fine. I think the most credible argument is that UBI is just too radical. It’s too big a shift for society to make all at once. It needs to be further tested at smaller levels before it should considered at the nation-state. There are many other critiques worth mentioning too. One is that UBI could be used to dismantle the welfare state, when in reality you likely want some of both. Another critique is that UBI is just another redistributive policy and isn’t radical enough. And I’ve also heard people who argued that UBI will reduce tax revenue for the government, actually making it harder to pay for UBI in the future. I think all these critiques are relatively straight forward to solve. But people do make them and so they should be addressed.

I agree with that. These solutions are unscalable. That I do not agree with. The work being done at many of these places is integral to solving the really big stuff IMO. I feel it is both going to scale up and scale down. Here are some assumptions I'm making: 1) Society is set up for globalization and centralization 2) The directionality of society is for increased globalization and interconnection 3) There are real benefits that can only be had at the local / scaled down level Therefore, what I feel needs to happen is a sort of integration between localization and globalization. Let's look at something like regenerative agriculture. I'm not a farmer, but from what I understand, inherently regenerative agriculture does not scale well beyond a certain point. It is highly productive, but it is too labor intensive and requires the farmer to really be in relationship with that land. And yet, regenerative agriculture is exactly what we need. Industrial, large scale agriculture cannot last. It destroys the soil, requires chemicals that pollute, destroys biodiversity via mono-culture crops, destroys the ecosystem of that area, uses too much water and cuts people off from their relationship with their food. It's only benefit is that you can do it at a larger scale, at least temporarily until the Earth gives out. So something like agriculture needs to scale down. It's done better at the local level. I've not heard anyone argue otherwise. At the same time, some things need to scale up. Our human capacity to collaborate and innovate from that collaboration would be one good example. That I think is something everyone would agree only gets better at a global level. We need more of that, not to shut ourselves out from the world. So we have this interesting problem of benefits from both localization / scaling down and globalization / scaling up. Which leads me to think, is it possible to do both? Can we scale down what needs to be scaled down and scale up what needs to be scaled up? Can we find a way to get the benefits of both? I do not have all the answers to how this would happen but it seems plausible to me. We've evolved for small tribes and local living, is it not possible that we can find a way to integrate that into the modern global world? And there certainly is a role for government in all this, especially considering government is what we got. I am also not convinced everything can be totally decentralized, especially not any time in the meaningful future. There are plenty of public policies I would like to see implemented.

I would like to continue this conversation but I will not. I find your rhetoric unnecessarily rude and combative.

Where is what I said wrong? I am open to critique. That is the point of this dialogue. But so far in both your responses you have provided no counter points, you've simply dismissed mine as naive and simplistic. I am not comparing government debt to personal debt. I'm aware of MMT and its ramifications. Exactly. You're essentially talking about a ponzi scheme. Create more money to pay off your debt, which then creates more debt, which means you need to create more money, which means more debt, ad infinitum. It is a problem, because more debt essentially equates to more economic activity. Which equates to environmental pressures on a finite planet, as well as psychological limits of people continually having to work to service debt. You're welcome. Don't feel bad, most people don't have any idea because it's never taught. I myself would probably have no clue except that I studied economics at university. As far as the disaster waiting to happen, I'm more optimistic. It is unlikely that any government will default, it would simply be too big of a collapse. They will likely keep creating new money to pay down the debt as @datamonster mentioned. That said, I still find it a highly problematic. The modern monetary system was largely created at Bretton Woods after WWII, and it feels to me that it is starting to outlast its usefulness.

I agree, I would actually be in favor of it if I thought there was a the right economic plan in place to make it happen. Happily. It is very simple if you understand the monetary system and how money is actually created. Money is not created by the government printing paper. At least not any significant amount of it. The vast majority of the money supply is loaned into existence via commercial banks and the fractional reserve system. In this way, every $1 dollar created is the equivalent of $1 of debt created. Money actually equals debt. There is a one to one ratio in our current system. If everyone paid off their debt tomorrow, including governments, you would completely destroyed the money supply. There be nothing left. In sense, as long as we need money and keep our current system, it is impossible to pay off all debts. There be no more money. BUT it is actually far worse than that. Because a loan from a commercial bank never comes with 0% interest. There is always some amount of positive interest attached to any loan, e.g 4%, 8% etc. So in reality, you didn't create a one to one ratio of money to debt. You created MORE debt than money. Because someone has to pay not only that loan back, but also the interest. Compounded over time, there is no other option but for exponential debt to accumulate. However fast the government thinks they can pay it off with taxes, it will never happen. Which is of course why they never have been even close to doing so in over a hundred years. Here are independent sources backing up what I'm saying: And if you really want to go deep:

It's a good question. Partly because people like Joe Manchin would never vote for it. You also have to account for inflation. Pump too much money into the system and and you risk devaluing the currency. But as I said before, I feel the biggest problem is with the monetary system. People who say "who cares about the deficit, rack it up as much as you want" are half-right. They're right in the sense that governments do not technically need to keep balanced budgets to operate thanks to their ability to create money. In that sense, they are not like a household that must budget. But the debt is still highly problematic. Because debt is what keeps the hamster wheel of capitalism running. As long as you are in debt, you must keep working. But our debt is a constantly growing, moving target because of how the monetary system works. We will never, never, never pay it off. It is mathematically impossible. And even if we did, it would simply start growing again and we'd be right back here. So in practice, huge stimulus like 10k checks for everyone would be problematic. You'd either have to pull huge amounts from other places in the budget, like the military (good luck with that). Or the government would have to create it as new money, which would inevitably would drive up the debt by some degree. But these are very different reasons than what conservatives usually give, like "people don't need it" or "people won't work".

@Socrates Good video. It’s a shame because there are a lot of good ideas in the self-help world, even at stage Orange. But it gets abused and then can even turn people off from the whole thing. Even Tony Robbins I feel falls into this trap to a certain degree. When you go to UPW, there’s tons and tons of sales pitches. The biggest one being for Tony Robbins platinum group, which is like 80k a year if I remember correct. It’s set up with a whole story Tony tells beforehand about how success is all about proximity to powerful people. “Proximity equals power”. By the way, have you joined our inner, inner circle of super successful people? Can’t afford it? Limiting belief. I know one guy who is in it. From he told me, most of the people are just people who can’t possibly afford it and even go into debt. I can’t confirm that, but I wouldn’t be surprised. Witnessed the same thing at Grant Cardone’s 10XGrowthCon. Less pitches than Tony but still many upsells. And of course if you buy the highest ticket, you think you’re going to be rubbing shoulders with all these successful people, but it just ends up being people who can’t afford it. You really gotta watch out for these business gurus. Most of the value they provide could be learned from cheap books. Leo remains one of the most legit people in this space.

Why not? I'm assuming you believe there will still need to be central, global authority running the show and managing everything. I feel this misses the point. The solutions presented by these villages are not supposed to scale. Scaling is the problem. The solutions we need now are unscalable in many ways. In other words, it seems to me that we need to scale the unscalable. Which is what this movement is about.

@integral I'm loosely helping out with this project, it's definitely excellent and the team is good people. Would recommend anyone here who is interested in Game B type of thinking to get involved, especially if you're local to British Columbia. Looking for engineers, real estate developers, builders, architects etc.

I would argue the debt is a much more complicated issue than that. Yes, the debt isn't good. But the debt caused largely by our monetary system, which only creates money as interest-bearing debt. There is no inherent "budget" for government money, money does not exist. It is created entirely out of nothing at all. You're not solving the debt crisis without changing the monetary system or a debt jubilee. Maybe both. Of course, in a practical sense, governments do have budgets. But this misses the point. If we have social problem, lack of money should not be a obstacle to solving that problem. Money should only serve as a tool to coordinate human activity, not something that enslaves us to it. Also, we have to consider how the current budget is allocated. Are we wisely spending the money that is in circulation? I'd argue we are not. Conservatives often are concerned about the budget until it's time for spending on what they want. Finally, we also have to consider that stimulus = people spending money = taxes = government revenue = able to pay off the budget. It's not like you're just throwing it down a hole. I would fact check whoever said this. Considering most people are in debt and living paycheck to paycheck, it's hard to imagine anyone who couldn't use the money. I'd argue this narrative is just an excuse to not send out stimulus money. Again, I really have a problem with this narrative. The government does not "have" a limited amount of money. It literally just creates it. It can create as much as it wants as long as you account for inflation. The problem is more so the monetary system. It is old and needs to be redone. For now, send the stimulus money. We had no problem doing huge amounts of stimulus for corporations when the pandemic hit, why are we suddenly on such a shoe-string budget now that it's about the average person?

@abrakamowse I've been a proponent of UBI for a while now. It would have huge ramifications, especially when implemented at a nation-state level. The conservatives who argue that people "won't want to work" if everyone gets UBI are partially correct. Our current economic system essentially runs on wage slavery, i.e your work this job or you won't have money and you'll starve. We soften this with a welfare state, but it is nonetheless still the paradigm we operate in. How else do you get someone to drive a garbage truck for 8 hours a day, for 30 years? You need a gun to their head. So essentially what we have is a carrot and stick approach to economics. Work, and you'll be rewarded. Don't work, be severely punished. UBI is us moving into a new paradigm. It's us saying "there is nothing you have to do. We trust that you are intrinsically motivated to do the things society needs to be done." No more carrot, no more stick. This is of course dangerous if you have a low consciousness population that only understands the carrot and stick. But as we move closer to stage Green, these ideas are beginning to surface. So will people work if they get UBI? The answer is yes and no. In many cases, no they will not work. They will not work degrading jobs for slave wages anymore. Those jobs will either have to be removed from society or there will have to be a drastic rise in wages for them. We also must consider that it's not desirable for people to work so much. Much of the work being done right now is not only totally unnecessary, i.e David Graber's "bullshit job" theory, it actually is causing harm. It's destructive towards the environment and it makes everyone always busy. This degrades community and makes it so people cannot focus on higher spiritual needs. Given our technology, there is no reason people should have to work as much as they do, except for that we keep choosing to do so. But of course, there is still work to be done. But with UBI, much of this work will be done outside the market economy. For instance, if I'm an artist who is getting UBI, maybe I don't need to worry about whether I should monetize my art or not. Maybe I can just create it and share. Or maybe I want to spend my time restoring a local ecosystem, even if no one pays me. In both cases, work is still being done, it's just not being done in the market. This is desirable. Markets encourage a transactional mindset, and we want to be shifting people towards a giving, relational mindset. UBI is also unlikely to be such a high amount that everyone quits their job. It will cover some of the basics and that's about it. Most people will of course still need to work in a traditional sense in the market, but we're very slowing moving away from that. So yes, I'm very excited about UBI. I don't think it's going to solve everything, there certainly need to be many other policies than a UBI implemented. But I feel it's a step in the right direction. It's not just another welfare state policy, it will actually disrupt society.

Here's the communities I would add: 1) Damanhur, Italy 2) East wind, Missouri 3) Ecovillage Ithica, New York 4) Sirius Ecovillage, Massachusets 5) Earthhaven, North Carolina 6) Lost Valley, Oregon 7) Meadowdance, Vermont 8) Acorn Community, Virginia 9) Twin Oaks, Virginia 10) Mariposa Grove, California 11) OAEC, Sowing Circle, California 12) Sacred Nectar Sanctuary, New Hampshire 13) Bruderhof, multiple locations (NY, PA, NC, FL, WV, TN, MN, CO) 14) The Garden, Tennessee 15) Unadilla Community Farm, New York Notable Aspirational Communities: 1) Coalesce Ecovillage 2) Civium (Jordan Hall's project) 3) One Global Community 4) Oceanix 5) The Venus Project, FL 6) ReGen Villages Alternatively, you can just search the Ecovillage.org or IC.org database. Even if someone decides not to join one of these places, I find their mere existence exciting. It says that there are large numbers of people who have come together to live a radically different lifestyle, and sometimes very successfully. What will this list look like in 100 years? 200 years? 500? The potentiality for a better world is incredible right now. From an egoic perspective, we will never see it, as we will likely be dead. But even seeing cracks coming through the clouds is exciting to me.

@integral I won't say it's justified, but I can't say I'm surprised either. The US has been doing this kind of thing for years. Our economic system thrives, and to a certain degree depends, on war. I did not imagine Biden was somehow going to change all that.

I mean sure, if you're super uncalibrated. That's why you go to bars and nightclubs. Everyone is drunk and sloppy and you can get away with it. There is a point where you can damage your reputation, but that's not your problem. Your problem is you not approaching. I used to have guys approach 50-100 people in a single night. Nothing bad ever happened. This is not actually how you create abundance. Ironically, it's often guys in scarcity that are surrounded by women. But that's a lesson I didn't realize until later. Go forth and approach.

@Danioover9000 The most important point for me was the one he put last. The degradation of our attention span and intelligence is highly significant. He did not even mention how the AI for these platforms is continuing learning, getting better and better at how to keep your attention. Not only is this problematic for spiritual work, this can also lead into a downward spiral, where we actually become less capable of solving the problems we are creating.

I don't know about wisdom, but we got plenty of selfishness to swing us full-circle. Sometimes one is so foolish one stumbles into wisdom That makes sense. If there’s one thing humans have been good at so far, it’s survival. I don’t think we are heading for “self-termination” as Daniel puts it either. I do appreciate his perspective though, it’s a sobering bit cold water. To not self-terminate still means we will have to make good choices. Perhaps even scarier to me though is that human beings survive, but only at a continual greater and greater sacrifice of what really makes life worth living. In some ways we are already doing that. I don’t think that will happen either, but if it did, I’d rather self-terminate.

The problem I see with nuclear power is that its main benefit is only carbon reduction. And you cannot reduce the ecological crisis to simply reducing carbon. The earth is a far more complex system than that, and therefore you need a much more holistic approach. So even if it is possible to carbon emissions down to 0 with nuclear power, you’d still have an absolute disaster on our hands unless you made more fundamental societal changes. In fact, that would possibly make the problem worse. Because now industrial society and endless growth can continue on with us having to question it. I find it very convenient that our solutions to solving the problems of industrial society tend to be another industrial project. And this is all part of the problem with the “net zero carbon emissions” paradigm in general. Reducing carbon is actually a relatively straight forward and simple goal to accomplish within the paradigm of modern capitalism. Just build some more machines (through more consuming of earth’s resources), charge people money to buy them, and there ya go. But solving for deforestation, or coral reef die off or any of the other numerous ecological problems is not easily done through capitalism. Capitalism so far really only knows how to consume the earth, not heal it. None of this is to say that excess carbon isn’t a problem. I’m simply saying it’s far more complex than that and we are foolish for focusing so much on it.

I've never done 5Me0. Would you say it's good at low doses for more "human" insights? I.e, insights in your life purpose, your relationships, health etc. My sense is that the boost in consciousness from 5Me0 would make anything you turned your attention on clearer. But I'm totally speculating from a noob perspective. Perhaps it's too powerful for that.

Would that not imply though that we have the wisdom to not cause our own extinction?

I agree with your point this is going to take a long time and we shouldn't have unreasonable conversations. This is a good conversation, and I think we're going to the heart of the matter. Is institutional philanthropy fundamentally broken and beyond repair? Or can it be reformed? I do believe it can be reformed. As an example, someone like Daisee Francour is doing important work in this area. I'd refer you to a snapshot of her perspective here: https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/indigenizing-philanthropy Indeed, if we as individuals are capable of generosity and giving, then there appears to me no reason why this giving could not theoretically be institutionalized. I don't intend to downplay whatever accomplishments NGOs and philanthropists have made, my intention is to call attention to where it is not succeeding and why.

I feel the spirit of philanthropy and what it is supposed to represent is entirely correct. The spirit of philanthropy says, "I will give because I have more than I need. I do not expect anything in return for this. I do this because I am generosity and see others pain as my own". That is the kind of mindset we need more of. My critique is of the way philanthropy is used in practice. Even NGOs often make problems worse. Or have an incentive to keep the problem going so they can continue being its champion. So in practice, I see very little if any positive change being made by philanthropists. While certain individuals may have won short term gains, collectively over the long term it has been a failure. For instance, the numbers seem to show that poverty has actually risen over the years. While this is obviously a complex problem, it seems clear to me that an exploitation / philanthropy model is inherently incapable of making these changes. If I steal $100 from you and then give you back $30 so that I seem like a nice guy, is this really defensible behavior? Is that really "giving"? Admittedly I am simplifying the problem with the above example, but that is the essence of what is going on.

Giving away almost all his fortune? He still is worth over a hundred billion dollars. That is more than the annual GDP of many countries. And it has mostly only increased over time. Some how I expect he will continue to do quite well financially in the future. I'd argue that ignores that philanthropy has been used since the beginning as a tax haven for the rich. And a way to keep the pyramid structure of our society intact. Many of those developmental problems would likely not exist if it weren't for years of exploitation already. I agree. That's the tricky thing about systems. What could Bill Gates reasonably do? The answer is not much. Just as our system generates poverty, it also generates mega-wealthy like Gates. If not him, it's somebody else. This is why I don't think he's evil or even consciously looking to do harm. I'm sure he has genuine concern about many global issues. He just doesn't know how to solve them. And when he does try to solve them, it usually involves him using his fortune in a undemocratic, unilateral way to shape the lives of everyone. That kind of power should only be had by a representative government. Or some sort of direct democracy. Otherwise we might as well hang up democracy and say that we live in a oligarchy.

@Gili Trawangan This is really cool. My only critique is that I think it would pop a lot more if the drums were stronger. They feel kind of weak to me. The beat itself is cool, but it's hard to vibe to because the drums don't really "punch" for me. Otherwise, I like it. Vocals are great. And I like that you used more of a hip hop beat instead of a standard rock beat, makes it interesting. Cool stuff man! I don't know anything about this world but it looks awesome. And thanks for the feedback everybody.

Relevant: I don't think Bill Gates is evil. But I certainly don't see him as some savior either. People are fooled into thinking that because he gave some money away he must automatically be a good guy. But of course it's not that simple.

I'd say that's it. It's a good lesson for everyone here. Most of us are probably moving way too fast. When the mind slows down and a person adopts a healthier lifestyle, they slow down in general. Less anxiety and need to speed things up or fidget. Grounded.