Category Archives: 2021. The year for change.

THE BEADY EYE ASKS. WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE.?

27 Wednesday Jan 2021

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., The Reset. Fact or conspiracy., THE WORLD YOU LIVE IN., THIS IS THE STATE OF THE WORLD.  

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( Half an Hour read.) 

If I was writing a post about what is right about the world it would be a few minutes read. best things in world

Of course, this is a flippant remark as there are many things right with the world. 

Technology and Science has produced vaccines to fight Covid-19 and millions of us are every day doing our bit, to ensure that the most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself.

However, to put it mildly, we live in a topsy-turvy world and its present state is pretty grim right now.  

In a world that has been governed by inequality and recently by ‘fake news’ and leaders who dismiss ‘facts,’ it no wonder that we are in such a mess.  

With this continuing statistically meticulous presentation of global trends is vitally important to understand the world today, including the economic, health, and geo-political reverberations of Covid-19.

 

The overall state of our world makes sad reading. 

ACCORDING TO WORLD REVOLUTION ORG.

THIS IS THE STATE OF THE WORLD.  

  • Around 258 million people live outside the country of their birth.
  • 14% of the world’s children are economically active
  • Nearly 2 billion people in the world are overweight or obese.
  • More than 800 million people are undernourished.
  • By 2050 almost all seabirds will have ingested plastic.
  • Nearly 50% of the world’s economic output is generated in places aiming to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
  • Violence costs the world around $8.3 trillion a year – twice the amount needed to meet the UN’s development goals.
  • There have been over 250 major wars in the world since World War II, in which 23 million people have been killed., tens of millions made homeless, and countless millions injured and bereaved.

    Over 35 major conflicts are going on in the world today. In armed conflicts since 1945, 90 percent of casualties have been civilians. 3 out of 4 fatalities of war are women and children.

    In the wars of the last decade, more children were killed than soldiers. In the last decade, child victims of war include an estimated 2 million killed, 4 to 5 million disabled, 12 million left homeless, and more than 1 million orphaned.

    There are 300,000 child soldiers in the world.

    Landmines maim or kill approximately 26,000 civilians every year, including 8,000 to 10,000 children. At least 75% of landmine victims are civilians. It is estimated that there are between 60 and 70 million landmines in the ground in at least 70 countries.

    More than 500 million small arms and light weapons are in circulation around the world. In major conflicts since 1990, they have caused 4 million deaths – about 90 percent of them civilians, and 80 percent women and children.

    There are approximately 30,000 nuclear warheads in the world today. Some 5,000 nuclear weapons are on hair-trigger alert, ready to be launched at a few minute’s notice.

    Current global military spending is approximately $800 billion per year; more than the total annual income of the poorest 45% of the global population.

    Genocide and other mass murders killed more people in the 20th century than all wars combined. Between 54 and 80 million people have been killed in genocides in the last century. Between 170 and 360 million people have been killed, in total, by governments (democide) in the 20th century, apart from war.

    Human rights & social justice.

    33% of the world’s people live under authoritarian, non-democratic regimes. 35% of the world’s people live in countries in which basic political rights and civil liberties are denied (such as freedom of speech, religion, press, fair trials, democratic political processes, etc).

    1 billion people – 1/3rd of the world’s labor force, are unemployed or underemployed. An estimated 37 million people are enslaved around the world, including an estimated 20 million people held in bonded labor (forced to work to pay off a debt, also known as ‘debt bondage’). At least 700,000 people annually, and up to 2 million, mostly women and children, are victims of human trafficking worldwide (a modern form of slavery — bought, sold, transported, and held against their will in slave-like conditions).

    About 246 million, or 1 out of 6, children ages 5 to 17 worldwide are involved in child labor. Nearly three-fourths of these, about 180 million children, including 110 million under age 15, are exposed to the worst forms of, or hazardous, child labor. Some estimated 8.4 million children are trapped in the most abhorrent forms of child labor – slavery, trafficking, debt bondage, prostitution, pornography, and other such activities.

    Women account for 70 percent of the world’s people who live in absolute poverty. Women work two-thirds of the world’s working hours, produce half of the world’s food, and yet earn only 10% of the world’s income and own less than 1% of the world’s property. Worldwide, a quarter of all women are raped during their lifetime. Depending on the country, 25 to 75 percent of women are regularly beaten at home. Between 10% and 50% of women report they have been physically abused by an intimate partner in their lifetime. Over 120 million women have undergone female genital mutilation. Women hold only 12% of parliamentary seats worldwide. Women account for 2/3rd of the world’s illiterate adults, and girls account for 2/3rd of the world’s children without access to education.

    In 1998, extrajudicial executions were carried out in 47 countries, ‘disappearances’ occurred in 37 countries, torture occurred in 125 countries, prisoners of conscience were held in 78 countries, unfair trials for political prisoners occurred in 35 countries, detentions without charge or trial occurred in 66 countries, executions were carried out in 36 countries, and human rights abuses were committed by armed opposition groups in 37 countries.

    There are over 45 million refugees and internally displaced people in the world.

    Poverty & development.

    3 billion of the world’s people (one-half) live in ‘poverty’ (living on less than $2 per day). 1.3 billion people live in ‘absolute’ or ‘extreme poverty’ (living on less than $1 per day).

    800 million people lack access to basic healthcare. 17 million people, including 11 million children, die every year from easily preventable diseases and malnutrition.

    800 million people are hungry or malnourished. Nearly 160 million children are malnourished worldwide. 11 million people die every year from hunger and malnutrition.

    2.4 billion people lack access to proper sanitation. 1.1 billion do not have safe drinking water. By 2025, at least 3.5 billion people, or nearly 2/3rd’s of the world’s population will face water scarcity. More than 2.2 million people, mostly children, die each year from water-related diseases.

    275 million children never attend or complete primary school education. 870 million of the world’s adults are illiterate.

    3 million people die every year from HIV/AIDS. Approximately 25 million people have died from AIDS in the last 20 years. 70 million will die from AIDS by 2020. 40 million people are currently infected with HIV/AIDS, who will die within 10 years. 13 million children have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS since the epidemic began, and the number is expected to double to 26 million by 2010.

    Over 100 million people live in slums. An estimated 25 to 50 percent of urban inhabitants in poor, developing countries live in impoverished slums and squatter settlements.

    The richest 1% of the world’s people earned as much income as the bottom 57% (2.7 billion people). The top 5% of the world’s people earn more income than the bottom 80%. The top 10% of the world’s people earn as much income as the bottom 90%. The richest 16% of the world’s population receives 84% of the world’s annual income.

    The wealth of the world’s 7.1 million millionaires ($27 trillion) equals the total combined annual income of the entire planet.   The combined wealth of the world’s richest 300 individuals is equal to the total annual income of 45% of the world’s population.  The world’s 3 wealthiest families have a combined wealth equal to the annual income of 600 million of the world’s people.  The wealthiest one-fifth of the world’s population receive an average income that is 75 times greater than the poorest one-fifth.

    Poor countries (which contain 4/5th’s of the world’s people) pay the rich countries an estimated nine times more in debt repayments than they receive in aid. Africa alone spends four times more on repaying its debts than it spends on health care. In 1997 the foreign debts of poor countries were more than $2 trillion and growing. The result is a debt of $400 for every person in the developing world – where the average annual income in the very poorest countries is less than a dollar a day.

    Environment & sustainability.

    Half of the forests that originally covered 46% of the Earth’s land surface are gone. Only one-fifth of the Earth’s original forests remain pristine and undisturbed.

    Between 10 and 20 percent of all species will be driven to extinction in the next 20 to 50 years. Based on current trends, an estimated 34,000 plant and 5,200 animal species – including one in eight of the world’s bird species – face extinction. Almost a quarter of the world’s mammal species will face extinction within 30 years. Up to 47% of the world’s plant species are at risk of extinction.

    60% of the world’s coral reefs, which contain up to one-fourth of all marine species, could be lost in the next 20–40 years

    Hundreds of thousands of sea turtles and marine mammals are entangled and drowned by irresponsible fishing practices every year.

    More than 20 percent of the world’s known 10,000 freshwater fish species have become extinct, been threatened, or endangered in recent decades. Sixty percent of the world’s important fish stocks are threatened by overfishing.

    Desertification and land degradation threaten nearly one-quarter of the land surface of the globe. Over 250 million people are directly affected by desertification, and one billion people are at risk.

    Global warming is expected to increase the Earth’s temperature by 3C (5.4F) in the next 100 years, resulting in multiple adverse effects on the environment and human society, including widespread species loss, ecosystem damage, flooding of populated human settlements, and increased natural disasters.

    An estimated 40–80 million people have been forcibly evicted and displaced from their lands to make way for the construction of large dams, resulting in economic and social devastation for these people.

                                      ——————————

 

IT APPEARS THAT THE WOLRD IS IN SUCH A STATE THAT TRUTH HAS ALREADY CEASED TO MATTER AND EVIDENCE OF THIS IS WHATEVER OF APPROVAL NARRATIVES WANT IT TO BE. 

We think we understand environmental damage: pollution, water scarcity, a warming world. But these problems are just the tip of the iceberg. 

Evidence is growing that the thermohaline current may be slowed or stopped by cold freshwater inputs to the Arctic and North Atlantic oceans. This could occur if global warming is sufficient to cause large scale melting of arctic sea ice and the Greenland ice sheet. Such a change in the current may be gradual (over centuries) or very rapid (over a few years).

Either would cause planet-wide changes in climate. This effect may be part of what starts and stops the ice ages.

The land in the northern hemisphere has been unfrozen for less than half of the last 400,000 years.  In 2005, it was discovered that deep water formation under the Arctic “Odden ice tongue” had almost stopped.

                                       ——————

If perpetual economic growth on a finite planet is impossible, what are the alternatives?

Can national governments manage the transition to sustainability, to a world of sharing?  

I think not. 

The capitalist system and its institutions have lurched from disaster to disaster, blatantly incapable of mastering the social, economic, environmental, and now health emergencies it has created.

Industrial civilization, economic growth, and the lifestyles of the developed world are dependent on inexpensive oil and gas. The energy and products from cheap oil have made possible the major changes in globalized industrial civilization in the last 100 years, including its huge impact on indigenous cultures and planetary ecosystems.

Affordable food production by industrial agriculture needs inexpensive natural gas and oil inputs for fertilizers, pesticides, industrial machinery, planting, cultivating, harvesting, processing, packaging, transportation, and marketing.

We use six times as much water today as we did 100 years ago.

Where do we go from here? 

One question is:

How did we get to this state of extreme polarization?

Who (or what) started us down this destructive path?

All hail to the machine learning profit-seeking algorithms that run Social Media.

We are only as strong as our weakest link and the weakest link is Big Tech which is completely out of control.

Suppression of information, online bullying, and intimidation— are good if they serve politically correct causes, for which the ends justify the means but do anyone with a functioning brain not now realize that is it is conceivable that well-trafficked truth-telling sites are impossible?  

Does this information break your heart?

Of course not.

Because we don’t see where the locus of power is, that it lies with the interlocked networks of corporations that command advanced communications technology, not in “their” government.

So wherever we are right now is not necessarily where we’ll end up.

The coronavirus has changed everyday life for many around the world affords us the opportunity to take responsibility for each other—to leave the myth of individualism and blaming behind, but the problem: Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, etc., are not “private companies” in any meaningful, real-world sense. These-are-private-companies like Facebook Twitter, Google, etc, simply aren’t in the real world.

These are private companies; they can do business with whoever they please and deplatform whoever they please. The myth of individualism has all but disappeared. 

Social media is legitimately criticized as a destroyer of your time. ( See previous Posts) 

The evidence for this is what happened in the Twitter presidency of the USA, the rejection of membership of the EU by England on lies, the Arab spring, and now the continuing coronavirus death toll.    

New social media uploads last as long as those who control information want them to last. 

Now, Biden says he wants “healing.” Biden-Harris “healing” will mean bowing before the cult of woke, a baffling concept because the awakened are still asleep.  

Of course, slavery is an abomination. Of course, there should be free speech. Of course, there should be full emancipation of women. Of course, there should be the defense of all the Great Freedoms, even religion. That is how we progressed to this lofty condition of humanity.

Lots of ideas fail when put into practice.

It’s worth pointing out, too, that today’s striven-for norms may well confound the concepts of future generations. Although the wokes, or the wakes, hold strong opinions now who is to say what other ideas may take over and differently bias the next to awaken?

One wonders if when the pendulum swings future generations might not come to regard the woke clientele as equally misguided, just as today’s woke contingent deplores the earlier generations that thought memorial statues and patriotism well worth it.

Meanwhile, Rule Britannia and Land of Hope, and Crosby may be held to refer to slavery but are all also part of the great learning curve of human progress.

Perhaps we should all start replacing the customary ‘Good Morning’ greeting with an abject apology for consuming the commonly shared oxygen supply of the planet.

Anyway, I’ve had about enough of hearing the whining of those who stand, head bowed, around the catafalque of patriotism.

The speed at which things have been unraveling in 2020 has been jarring. From normalcy to Pandemic Panic lockdown with maximum fear in a matter of weeks; from ostensibly united against the pandemic to if we were not careful to nationwide riots and cultural revolution in a matter of days not years. 

While the threat of the former will inevitably pass with time, the threat inherent in the latter is pervasive, aggressive, and emboldened.

Where do we go from here?

Even though we are living in a technological age every day we see appeals to save critically endangered animals, from Bees that are dying at an alarming rate, to Children, to Climate change. 

In the next decade, we will see more than a hundredfold boom in the world’s output of human genetic data thanks to Covid-19 from the cradle to the grave which will not save the Bees that pollinate our plants. I would say that relatively few people would on reading this think that the world they are living in is getting better.

What comes next is anyone’s guess.

Giving up your freedom, trusting “your” government, wearing your face mask, and by the way, getting the jab so you can go back to consuming, while the real economy drops into the worst depression of modern times.

We might be confused by what is happing in the world but we should not be deluded.

There’s always something we can do.

At the moment with covid-19 there is a lot of millionaires Davos verbal diarrhea on social media about a Reset – without any financial commitments – it is just multimillionaires and multi-billionaires spouting their neoliberal capitalist ideology turning nature into a product. 

There is huge inequality in the world and they are literally the representatives of the 1%, actually, the 0.001%.

The only thing that can be reset is Accountability and Transparency, with large financial fines for breaches of sustainability, while harnessing profit for profit’s sake to convert the world to green economies. ( See previous post: World aid commission of 0.05%  

 

 

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE BEADY EYE ASKS. WHAT IS BORROWING? WHAT IS MONEY?

22 Friday Jan 2021

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., COVID-19, Human values., Inequality., POST COVID-19., WHAT IS BORROWING?, WHAT IS MONEY?, What Needs to change in the World

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(Fifteen-minute read)

 

As you know the workings of the world of finance are screaming compilated.

All money is created as debt and destroyed when repaid.

Money originated as commodity money, but nearly all contemporary money systems are based on fiat money. ( Fiat money does not have intrinsic value and does not have use-value.) 

It has value only because a government maintains its value, or because parties engaging in exchange agree on its value.

There are three major theories regarding the origin of money:-

1 Money was created for trading purposes;

2 Money was created for social purposes;

3 Money was created for religious purposes.

Money is an unconditional means of payment, a token for wealth, worthless of itself, but symbolizing wealth because it is enshrined in law. It is then administered by Governments as a public resource, for and on behalf of the People.

Money today has no connection with earthly resources, and actually many earthly resources are diminishing while money (or at least the number on the pieces of paper) gets bigger and bigger.

I think we’d soon find out how money has stopped us from appreciating the true value of the earth we live on.

In the coming years, we need to get this reality of money out to everyone.

I imagine the scenario whereby ‘money’ in its present form disappeared in a flash, there would be no physical change in anything, just a lot of renegotiation.

With Facebook’s Libra looming on the horizon and the Covid-19 pandemic further depressing the use of physical cash perhaps it’s time for Central Bank digital currency (CBDC) to be introduced.

To give policymakers more effective tools to support the economy, particularly during times of crisis, while maintaining financial stability. Allowing central banks to distribute newly created public money directly to citizens rather than going through financial markets. 

What happens if the world does not return to normalcy within, say, a few years?

If so, governments will find themselves writing enormous cheques every month to sustain comatose economies. If that happens, all bets are off.

The bottom line is, we are not at the mercy of just a virus but a world economic depression with governments issuing epic amounts of debt. For now, confronted by an overwhelming emergency, governments have little choice but to engage in deficit spending on a giant scale, embarking on one of the greatest peacetime borrowing binges in history.

This is and should be raising many questions when it comes to borrowing, severely tests the question of how much the governments can borrow.

Apart from the tragic human consequences of the COVID-19 coronavirus epidemic, the economic uncertainty will likely cost the global economy trillions. 

In fact, the urgent question isn’t whether countries can afford to take on more debt. It’s whether they’re taking on enough debt to fund the stimulus programs necessary to avert an even deeper downturn.

There’s a degree of anxiety now that’s well beyond the health scares which are very serious and concerning. No matter how expensive an outpouring of government aid may seem right now, it is cheaper than dealing with a depression down the road.

After all, it consists of one arm of government creating money in order to buy debt issued by another arm of government,  which looks perilously close to a shell game in which central banks monetize government debt and distort markets. 

The amount a government can borrow depends on many factors, such as

  • Does it print its own currency?
  • Do markets trust the government to maintain low inflation and not default?
  • What is the interest rate on government bonds?
  • What is the state of the economy?
  • What is the purpose of government borrowing?
  • To what extent is the government borrowing from domestic or foreign investors?

Should we worry about the long-term effects of this new borrowing?

Without question, the new debt will leave taxpayers with a significantly larger burden to carry in years to come.

Some commentators believe debt-challenged governments may eventually be forced to go even further and turn to “helicopter money,” a maneuver in which central banks would simply create money, without issuing any corresponding debt, and the government would funnel the new cash to people and businesses.

The lender of last resort.

If there is no lender of last resort. 

The nightmare scenario where the virus continues to suffocate the global economy for a year or more would lead to the unpardonable sin of blurring the distinction between fiscal and monetary policy.

Disaster Capitalism.  

But until we win the battle against COVID-19, and revive our battered economies, we are in uncharted territory. Best to not rule anything out.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 coronavirus will be different than anything we have seen before. 

This is the calm before the storm.

How far can a currency fall before the government has to protect its citizens from the effects of a worthless currency? 

STIMULUS DOES NOT NECESSITATE EXTRA DEBT.

Money should become Man’s servant rather than his master.

In fact, central banks act as a broker between the governments and private bankers who lend the nation its own national currency at interest.

It does this by issuing gilt-edged bonds.

Markets are allowing all the major countries to borrow plenty at ultra-low rates of interest, underpinned by Central Banks buying up a lot of the debt.

This only has to change where inflation picks up, which so far it has not.

Inflation reduces the real value of the government debt, but, that means people will be less willing to hold government bonds.  

Inflation will require higher interest rates to attract people to keep bonds. In theory, the government can print money to reduce the real value of debt; but existing savers will lose out.

If the government creates inflation, it will be more difficult to attract savings in the future.

But in an economic depression, inflationary pressures vanish so it is much easier to finance a deficit by borrowing.

So do government debt and deficits don’t matter.

2021 will be the first year where the three main economies or trading blocs of the world – the US, the European Union (EU), and China – will refocus their efforts on fighting climate change.

Can the world afford this avalanche of new borrowing?

With the coming economic depression and the need to redefine our association with nature, while addressing climate change, and getting control of the pandemics there is no choice. 

It sticks out like a sore thumb if we are to win the war against this virus inequality has to be addressed by paying for the protection of our ecosystems.

In other words, to make it less profitable to destroy rather than to create. 

This can be achieved without the need to borrow with the technology we have at our disposal by placing a 0.05% World Aid Commission on all activities that generate profit for profit’s sake. ( See previous posts) 

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once society gains control of the issue of money, it cannot let the bankers issue money ever again. 

 

 

providing a safe public form of money and breaking the oligopoly that banks currently have on the digital money and payments system.

 

It does need standards and global agreements but the potential advantages clearly outwiegh the disadvantages.

endorsed digital currency is the way forward> this potentially is a great (and cheaper) way to distribute money to where its needed and this is more importnat than ever right know for obvious reasons.

Created money is already inflationary,

 


BORROWING COMES IN FORTY SHADES OF GRAY

a surge in misleading and unsubstantiated medical advice since the Covid-19 outbreak.

The first is that borrowing has been historically high in recent years following the financial crisis in the late noughties,

the deficit

GDP reflecting the need to spend and borrow to win the war.

Bank of England is buying in substantial quantities of the debt.

There is no need to count the interest paid on the debt owned by the Bank of England, as taxpayers and government get that receipt.

The debt taken on by the UK now has to be serviced by the following generations. And what are they getting in return for that debt? Just about nothing.

Quantative easing, which is bond buying by central banks

as it’s known in the jargon –

 

Covid is going to be around in the world for decadesa

possible total deficit of £7 trn by 2050.

By hoovering up domestic bonds, these central banks are creating artificial demand for bonds and thereby driving down interest rates (which move in the opposite direction to bond prices).

Central banks’ balance sheets are expanding furiously as they gobble up government bonds and other forms of debt.

 

 

THE BEADY EYE ASKS. IS IT TIME TO STOP ANONYMITY ON THE INTERNET.?

20 Wednesday Jan 2021

Posted by in #whatif.com, 2021. The year for change., Artificial Intelligence., Communication., COVID-19, Dehumanization., Democracy., Digital age., DIGITAL DICTATORSHIP., Disconnection., Fake News., Freedom, Freedom of Speech, How to do it., HUMAN INTELLIGENCE, Human values., Humanity., Modern Day Communication., Our Common Values., Post-Covid-19, Social Media, Social Media Regulation., Technology, Technology v Humanity, The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Internet., The Obvious., The state of the World., The world to day., Unanswered Questions., VALUES, We can leave a legacy worthwhile., What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage.

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( Ten-minute read) 

Since the internet was in its infancy, the rights of users to use it to express their opinions were sacrosanct.

However, there is a price for “free” internet, and that we’ve given up more of ourselves than we ever intended to.

Concern already exists that Facebook and similar social media platforms act as echo chambers that validate opinions we already hold – fuelling precisely the type of extreme views that Facebook says it has a right to edit.

Might this new position simply result in more fake news?

The Internet has and is empowering masses of people by access to world-wide information sources, education, and communication but what is now considered permissible and acceptable online is shifting.

The question is with this newfound freedom, that is influencing every aspect of our lives for good or bad, should we be requiring people to register their identity when using the internet.?

If so how.

It would be true to say as we have become constantly connected, none of us are as anonymous as we think.

George Orwell presciently realized that if citizens don’t know what is true and what is false, they can’t make a judgment about what to object to in their lives.

Is it time to introduce an online digital passport to eradicate individual desires, such as credulity, abuse, gender-swapping, exploration, radicalizing, hacking, trolling, spreading false news, promoting popularism groups, bullying, racism, the list is endless? 

( Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights says. 

“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; the right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers.”

The GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 give internet users the right to privacy and the right to withhold their personal details.

The Malicious Communication Act 1988 and the Communications Act 2003 make it possible to prosecute “trolling” – and many other forms of online harassment are also now covered by the legislation. )

Platforms on the internet avoided liability by claiming they were “mere conduits” of these views and not “publishers” of them.  The argument goes that this includes protection for freedom of expression by the right to remain anonymous online.

So which should remain enshrined: freedom of speech or freedom from abuse?

The world feels smaller and we’ve celebrated this but in any human population, there will be people with irreconcilably different understandings of the truth.

Repressing speech has costs, but so does allowing it.

The world, however, has changed, and many of us may be in the time warp of old values. Human beings are poor witnesses, easily misled by a personal bias, profoundly influenced by their social environment.

As products of their society, social media and journalists are no exceptions. 

The world is now a much more dangerous place, not because of Covid -19 which is plunging it into a Depression with social media exposing a system of governance corseted by greed – profit before the people. Then, on the other hand, social media is like cancer at the heart of societies spreading the news, not what the facts are, but what men wish to see.

The press once seemed to have a conscience, thanks to history’s painful social conflicts and questions of war and peace.

Social media is not concerned with any historical lessons it being a wildfire of the short-term reactions of unfounded populism without any in-depth investigative journalism.      

It is becoming impossible to distinguish between paid news and actual, unbiased news.

You could say that the world has more pressing problems.

However, our current and future problems, like the internet, are all interconnected.

Shifting trends and the advancement in communication technology require a re-examination of the underlying principle and its application in new contexts.

There are attempts to get some control.

Free-speech advocates typically claim that the value of unfettered expression outweighs any harm it might cause, offering assurances that any such harm will be minimal.

Because like several other precious freedoms, free speech must be placed outside the reach of political exigency.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, it is impossible to pass binding regulations or laws that don’t restrict the sanctity of free speech.

Free speech or the freedom of expression is the modern civilization’s most precious gift to human society but it can’t be reaffirmed by drowning out its opponents.

                                                         ————

The issuing of Digital Passports could not be left to the whim of Facebook or any other internet providers.

Also “Digital identity solutions leave us open to data exploitation with the valuable data from these solutions (being) used for other purposes, so governments could not be involved in their issuing other than making supporting laws with large fines. 

The most obvious hitch in this plan is that not everyone has a smartphone,

With the current Pandemic and vacations, there will be an attempt to introduce Covid-19 free digital health certification (Of course, this would only be applicable to people with smartphones.) and they could become a prerequisite for some activities.

But for now, we’re many steps removed from that kind of streamlined process even becoming possible. Widespread adoption of so-called immunity passports would require a level of coordination and organization uncharacteristic of any country’s response to COVID-19 so far.

So here is the challenge. 

Is it possible to create a Digital Passport that is unhackable, that can be applied for online, that would combine your present Passport information, that you could use to vote, to register an internet identity, and carry your medical history. 

People would only accept such a thing if it commands public trust.

As evidence with the recent election in the USA entrusting your democracy to a black-box proprietary system that is subject to hacking, glitches, and errors, but NOT subject to scrutiny, analysis, or independent verification, is the surest and quickest way to lose your democracy. 

However, creating an internet user register could be possible not only authenticating the user but making it more transparent and ensure that users have the right to remedy when wrong decisions are made.

As for platforms, they know what they need to do because civil society has told them for years.

Just in case they have not got the message they should ensure that the decisions they make about speech are in line with global human rights standards, rather than making the rules up as they go.

 

 All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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THE BEADY EYE SAY’S. IF YOU LOOK AROUND YOU AT THE PRESENT STATE OF THE WORLD YOU SHOULD NOT BE FORGIVEN FOR FEELING DISPARE.

17 Sunday Jan 2021

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., Algorithms., Artificial Intelligence., Capitalism, Climate Change., COVID-19, Dehumanization., Digital age., Disaster Capitalism., Earth, How to do it., Human values., Humanity., Imagination., Inequality., Life., Modern day life., Our Common Values., POST COVID-19., Poverty, Robot citizenship., Social Media Regulation., Stimulus package., Survival., Sustaniability, Technology v Humanity, The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Obvious., The state of the World., The world to day., Unanswered Questions., Universal Basic Income., We can leave a legacy worthwhile., What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage., World Aid.

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(Fifteen-minute read) 

As we floundering around in the midst of COMPOUNDING PANDEMICS that are far from over, the future is not here yet.

With our planet is crying out, our political leaders are like fish out of water, apart from the obvious, it seems that we have lost the plot. Compounded by ignorance, short term self-interest, the pursuit of wealth, and political interests, any actions that are vital for survival are stymieing by the lack of conciliation. 

Climate Change, Biodiversity, Artificial Intelligence, Poverty and Inequality, Population all on the top of the list. All of them are presenting overwhelming challenges ahead.

There is no way of sugar-coating any of these threats, they have no borders.

We are brought up with other people’s perceptions of life.  

Not until we develop enough, intellectually, can we change those perceptions, and even then it can be difficult to change our perceptions about the world until we start to really question it.

Anything else is a blatant lie.

With millions of dead and millions more death to come, we can only prevent any one of them from coming to fruition if we take all of them especially the environmental threat seriously.

With large swaths of people still dealing with entrenched inequalities, it is no wonder we are unable to see the above threats as reality. 

If there was ever a time to join together it is now.

We all have an identity and cultural distinctiveness, but if we bound together in a common cause, we could accomplish spectacular things.

To do this we must first start to see ourselves as HUMAN BEINGS, and the planet earth as HOME, not our individual countries.  

                                                   ————

I am sure you will agree that the world order is destined to change and it’s urgent that humanity gets a way to preserve what’s left on Earth. 

In this regard, technology is not a destiny jobs will be for robots and life for people.  

The problem is who is the owner of the robots and how do we ensure that we all benefit. 

At the moment there are millions wasting their time in useless jobs to scratch a living.  Rest assured that capitalism will come up with millions of more useless jobs. 

                                                 ————

Unfortunately, we are not able to act as one, and even if we could there would be no point in becoming mindless drones with no culture.

There would be no point in living because it’ would be all just be one culture with no distinct forms. 

The raw reality exposed by the current pandemic is that everyone is only just a human unable to act as one due to greed-driven by unregulated social media and profit-seeking algorithms.

                                                  ———– 

The big question is what can be done?

SOLUTIONS WITHOUT FUNDING, ABOUND ON TED TALKS. 

We know that poverty is one of the main driving forces when it comes to any long term perspective to protecting the earth.

Poverty is not due to a lack of knowledge. POVERTY IS CREATED BY SCARCITY, not a personality defect as Maggie Thatcher once said.

As George Orwell said  “Poverty annihilates the Future “

 You would think by now we would have figured out the reasons for its existence.  

ALMOST EVERYTHING NEEDED FOR LIFE IS MADE SCARCE BY APPLYING CAPITALIST PROFIT, TURNING ALMOST EVERYTHING INTO A PRODUCT TO BE TRADED.   

SO WHEN ONE IS UNABLE TO ACQUIRE WHAT IS NEEDED DUE TO THE LACK OF CASH YOU HAVE POVERTY.   If we genuinely ask why do the poor make so many bad decisions THIS IS THE MAIN REASON. 

Till now we have ignored the symptoms of poverty to our cost, and now to the chilling silence of Earth protests, we find ourselves unable to enjoy the Earth we live on. 

To date, we have created World organizations without the power of funding that vents verbal warnings,  that no one takes heed of unless it is in their own interest to do so

Take Co2 admissions. We continue to pump Co2 into our shared atmosphere.  (Earth isn’t the only planet in our solar system with an atmosphere, it is the only one in which we humans can survive.) 

It is blatantly obvious that we are not able through our global conversation whether they are online or not due to profit-taking we are not able to establish any solidarity. 

A lot of religious people mentioned that there is a leader who is going to save this world and stands for oppressed, poor, and homeless people.

While we are waiting we need to be more creative in our imagination if we want to match the relentless progression of biodiversity loss, climate change, and the other problems facing us all that are going to drive the Scarcity market.   

 A basic income is an idea that has and is being kicked from pillar to post for years.

Free money for everybody.

Not the welfare state but AN INCOME FOR ALL –  UNCONDITIONAL YOU DO WHAT YOU WANT WITH IT.

Where will the cash come from?

( See previous posts. A World Commission of 0.05%)

Of course, no one or anybody is going to take on or take down the holy grail of profit for profit’s sake.

After all, we live in societies that have allowed themselves to be subsumed by greed with ethics still being sacrificed on the altar of turnover and growth at all costs- GDP.

What is truly galling though is how the rot persists, where people cannot see the direct causal link, to overconsumption prompted by the advertising industries.

Profit is not intrinsically bad, but profit for profit’s sake alone is not just bad it’s unimaginably damaging.

Profit has to be extracted in such a way that every partner in the supply chain profits; from the workers to the shareholders, from the local community through to the nation itself.

That means creating a system where people are empowered to speak, where processes are so transparent that nothing can be hidden and where part of those profits is reinvested into those communities to sustain growth and development for generations to come.

So before we find ourselves teetering over the edge of the precipice. We need to speak truth to power when we start to feel discomfited, not when we have already entered the realm of cognitive dissonance or, worse, open and cynical collusion in the Bell Pottinger mode.

We have been gifted by the current pandemic which is yet to reach its apogee. It is daring us not to be paralyzed by our past.

It is offering a chance to find and resolve, to do things differently.

To call out the emperors of technology, when they stride about us in their unabashed nudity to put sustainability at the core of their online and off-line operations. 

They are now the praetorian guard of citizen and corporate activists and it is essential in this post-covid-19 economic depression that society should be saved from exploitation.

Unfortunately, they are unable to regulate themselves. This can be done only when the state interferes with total transparency. 

Is it not time that all non-essential products are labeled with their carbon footprint. 

What is Cash but transparency, in its naked form, creating fair competitions.   

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

while we pump CO2 in

https://youtu.be/aIL_Y9g7Tg0

THE BEADY EYE SAYS. IN ORDER TO BECOME PROACTIVE AND NOT REACTIVE WE NOW SHOULD BE BUILDING A NEW LIST OF GLOBAL PRIORITIES.

12 Tuesday Jan 2021

Posted by in #whatif.com, 2021. The year for change., Capitalism, Civilization., Climate Change., COVID-19, Dehumanization., Digital age., DIGITAL DICTATORSHIP., Disaster Capitalism., Evolution, Fourth Industrial Revolution., How to do it., HUMAN INTELLIGENCE, Human values., Humanity., Inequality, Life., Modern day life., Modern day Slavery, Our Common Values., Post-Covid-19, Reality., Robot citizenship., Survival., Sustaniability, Technology v Humanity, Technology., Telling the truth., The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Future, THE NEW NORM., The Obvious., The pursuit of profit., The state of the World., The world to day., Unanswered Questions., VALUES, Viruses., We can leave a legacy worthwhile., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage.

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(Ten-minute read) 

Why?

We cannot come back from Extinction.

BECAUSE  The world we now have is a tragic begging world. 

WE MUST BECOME PROACTIVE, NOT REACTIVITY.

Because humanity is entering a new age, where we are faced with not only existential risks from our natural environment but by those of our own creation. 

Two hundred years ago we didn’t understand the basic causes of a Pandemic. 

Because the world is now so interconnected (with a vastly increased population than any time in our history) pandemics have more opportunities not only to spread new diseases but to originate new sources.

Because we are reaching “The Precipice”  a time where we’ve reached the ability to pose an existential risk to ourselves, which is substantially bigger than the natural risks, the background that we were facing before.  

Because we need to understand our vulnerability and determine what steps must be taken to end this pandemic. 

Because just a few years ago more than one bomb was created.

One in the hands of a few decision-makers that could destroy civilization the other the Internet, not in the hands  

The current bombs are created by our continuing abuse of the planet we live on. They are not in the hands of deranged dictators or impeached presidents but in the hands of a system of exploitation called capitalism now becoming more and more driven by profit-seeking algorithms.   

Because we think everyone’s interests matter equally, approaches to improving the world should be evaluated mainly in terms of their potential for long-term impact.

Because there are vast differences between the effectiveness of working on different global problems we need better global prioritization.

Because as technology improves and the world economy grows or shrinks, it is getting easier to cause destruction on an ever-larger scale.

(New transformative technologies may promise a radically better future but also pose catastrophic risks.)

Because Covid-19 is showing us that there are many available avenues for improving the world, in terms of social value.

Because now there is much uncertainty around the value of specific options.

Because not enough cause prioritization is done, from the perspective of total social welfare.

The reasons are endless.

However to build the new field of ‘global priorities’ and to try to work out which global problems are most pressing and make progress on foundational questions about how best to address them we need to start understanding that just as the fate of gorillas currently depends on the actions of humans, the fate of humanity may come to depend more on the actions of machines than our own.

Rapid progress in machine learning has raised the prospect that algorithms will one day be able to do most or all of the mental tasks currently performed by humans. This could ultimately lead to machines that are much better at these tasks than humans.

(New transformative technologies may promise a radically better future but they also pose catastrophic risks. How one might design a highly intelligent machine to pursue realistic human goals safely is very poorly understood.)

Comparing global problems involves lots of uncertainty and difficult judgment calls.

If AI research continues to advance without enough work going into the research problem of controlling such machines, catastrophic accidents are much more likely to occur. Nonetheless, work on mitigating many risks remains remarkably neglected. 

Prioritization research appears to be in its infancy. With common prioritize interventions almost zero it remains impossible to assume some common world values.

Why is this? 

Once again the reasons are numerous – but they can be encapsulated in the word inequality, in all its forms.  

Causes have to be made before developing a deep understanding of an area that required prioritization – climate change for example.

Covid-19 is shining a light on the need to develop world health versus biological research – which received very little attention up to now. 

While billions are spent making AI more powerful, there are fewer than 100 people in the world working on how to make AI safe. 

AI could lead to extremely positive developments, presenting solutions to now-intractable global problems, but they also pose severe risks.

Humanity’s superior intelligence is pretty much the sole reason that it is the dominant species on the planet. If machines surpass humans in intelligence, then common beliefs could easily originate from websites.

This is why it is necessary that we create a list ranking of which problems we think are most pressing for people.  That promotes civilizational resilience, mitigating great power conflict, or laying the foundations for the governance of outer space. 

If you have read this post you could not be blamed for thinking that the idea of creating a new list of global problems is worthless. BUT ALL THE TALK, AND AGREEMENTS IN THE WORLD ARE WORTHLESS UNLESS THEY ARE FUNDED TO BECOME PROACTIVE.  

( See previous posts recreating such a fund – 0.005% world Aid Fund, before the current third revolution of Artificial Intelligence, invents the machine with intelligence that far surpasses our own.)

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

 

 

THE BEADY EYE SAYS. LET’S PUT COVID-19 DEATHS IN CONTEXT TO THE 20TH CENTURY ?

08 Friday Jan 2021

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., Civilization., COVID-19, Denial of Death., Humanity., Our Common Values., POST COVID-19., The common good., The essence of our humanity., The state of the World., The world to day., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World

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(Four-minute read) 

Yes, as humans we face natural disasters and pandemics but neither can hold a candle to the carnage that humans inflict on each other. 81.5 billion people died because of war, 800,000 because of disaster, less than 5 billion from all diseases including cancer.

You could say that religion is the biggest killer of all but would be wrong, even ignoring the big epidemics, the death toll through the years from things like Cholera, Malaria, and yearly flu outbreaks, Smallpox, The Black Death, The Plague of Justinian, HIV, 1918 Influenza, TB, Polio have no connection to religious belief.

Almost three-quarters of deaths are from non-communicable diseases, with obesity and diet amongst the most significant contributors. Coronary heart disease is the leading cause of early deaths across the globe.

You could also say that the world’s health lies outside of the control of the individual; war, conflict, or environmental factors, which is also untrue. 

What is true is that Climate Change will be the all-encompassing killer.

Death by many cuts. 

 

The world population has increased from 1 billion in 1800 to 7.7 billion today.

Global deaths from COVID-19 passed 776,000 in mid-August 2021 with 7.7 billion of us it has the potential to get rid of a lot of us. 

The annual mortality rate for the seasonal flu is about 0.01% or 12,000-61,000 deaths per year.

To get some perspective and context here are some of the main killers the world has seen.  

The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, the deadliest in history, infected an estimated 500 million people worldwide—about one-third of the planet’s population—and killed an estimated 20 million to 50… 5.26% of an estimated global population of 950 million, died.  The pandemic lasted for two years.

 



The Irish Famine. 

Around a million. 

 Genghis Khan

40 million deaths.

Genocide.

The Armenian Genocide (800,000 to 1,500,000), The Assyrian Genocide (150,000 to 300,000), and the Greek Genocide (289,000 to 750,000) combined with the Great Famine of Mount Lebanon (200,000).

The Cambodian Civil War.

Pol Pot, Around 2 million people.

Ranavalona I of Madagascar

Around 5 million to 2.5 million

The Congo

10 million deaths

Japan.

Millions. 

Hitler Germany The Nazi Holocaust.

17 million.

China. 

The Nationalist government of China is responsible for between 6 and 18.5 million deaths. Mao Zedong Chairman Mao Catastrophes alone 15 million.

Stalin.

From 4 to 10 million. Stalinism killed more soviets than Nazism: a total of 12 million death of soviets were attributed to the Nazis, while up to 25 million deaths in total were by Stalin’s orders.

Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Killed between 129,000 and 226,000 people.

The British Empire killed with famine, sword, and fire more people than

Genghis Khan, Attila the Hun, Hitler or Stalin.

It must be said that many empires behaved this way, and the British are not an exception. Most large empires will have blood on their hands to varying degrees, whether it is through conquest, colonization, the implementation of the rule, control of the colony, or suppression of the people and opposition.

Inevitably, given that the British Empire was the largest in history and that it existed from the sixteenth century into the twentieth century, the activities and policies of the Empire would have resulted in the deaths of many people – or perhaps it saved more people than it extinguished. 

I doubt you could put an exact figure on it because there’s no systematic way of knowing the real number in our modern days – either way, it has a gritty past. 

9/11, Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, Isis, and recent conflicts, such as those in Syria, Yemen, South Sudan, and Libya, yet to be counted. 

Road traffic.  According to the World Health Organization, caused an estimated 1.35 million deaths worldwide in 2016. That is, one person is killed every 25 seconds.

Illicit drugs are drugs.

Who knows how many. Directly and indirectly – it is over 750,000 per year. 

Murder.

The murder rate is 7.6 for every 100000 people globally. Think this works out to be around 6 million homicides per year globally.

Poverty.

Around 18 million die from poverty.  

The ice age.

It killed an estimated 75 million people, including 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population.

If you are reading this consider yourself lucky.

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

THE BEADY EYE ASKS. IF WE HAD TO CREATE AN ALTERNATIVE TO CAPITALISM WHAT WOULD IT BE CALLED.

05 Tuesday Jan 2021

Posted by in #whatif.com, 2021. The year for change., A Constitution for the Earth., Algorithms., Artificial Intelligence., Capitalism, Civilization., Climate Change., COVID-19, Dehumanization., Disaster Capitalism., Disasters., Disconnection., Earth, Evolution, Foreign Aid., G20., G7., GDP., Green Energy., HUMAN INTELLIGENCE, Human values., Humanity., Inequality, Life., Modern day life., Natural World Disasters, Our Common Values., Post - truth politics., POST COVID-19., Reality., Stimulus package., Survival., Sustaniability, Technology v Humanity, Telling the truth., The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Future, THE NEW NORM., The Obvious., The pursuit of profit., The state of the World., The world to day., Unanswered Questions., United Nations, Universal Basic Income ., VALUES, We can leave a legacy worthwhile., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage., World Leaders, World Organisations.

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(Ten-minute read) 


We, humans, live on an ecologically fragile planet with limited resources that must be sustained for future generations we must move humanity to an alternative world system — one committed to social justice, deep democracy, environmental sustainability, a safe climate, and planetary health.

The COVID-19 pandemic contains the fuel for social change – verbal with little imagination as to what to change. 

History tells us that social changes can occur quickly once economic, political, social structural, and environmental conditions have reached a tipping point.

Humanity is now obviously at a crossroads or perhaps several crossroads: one is business-as-usual which is sure to result in dystopia; another is a shift to some variant of green capitalism, which is gaining considerable support; and finally an eco-socialist vision that, while muted at this time, will hopefully become stronger as the need for it becomes more apparent to the mass of humanity.

Thanks to Covid -19  the world is off-balance – and it will remain so for years to come.

Far from settling into a ‘new normal’, we should expect a COVID-19 domino effect, triggering further disruptions – positive as well as negative ­– over the decade ahead.

It has underscored the interconnectedness of our natural, social and economic systems, and provided a stark reminder of the scale of systemic risks that can build up when we allow weaknesses and negative impacts to accumulate over time.

Continuation on the current pathway will, over time, only lead to deeper and deeper crises, including an ever-escalating climate change crisis, the result of growing greenhouse emissions spewed by the capitalist treadmill of production and consumption.

Combating both climate change and global capitalism go hand-in-hand however the raw truth is that Capitalism will certainly not consciously permit the eventual demise of global capitalism and the emergence of an ecosocialist world system promoted by many. 

In previous posts, I have advocated that without funding all alternatives will fail whether they are green capitalism and existing climate regimes, including the United Nations Framework on Climate Change, which is not sufficient to mitigate climate change in any serious way.  

How can we expect the system that created the problem to solve the problem?

Despite the daunting difficulties that much of humanity currently faces, and will continue to face over the course of this century capitalism today continues unabated to pump Co2 into the atmosphere and will continue to do so after the Climate Summit this year in Scotland.  (By the deadline of December 31, 2020, only 70 out of 192 countries had presented their new Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs): the individual commitments made to fight against climate change.)

One doesn’t have to have to be a delegate to this summit to know that if we manage to get on top of the current Pandemic which is bleeding the coffers of countries endeavoring to save their economies the emissions will triple on returning to anything that looks like normal. 

Of course, we will be told that we have learned the lesson that Green is the way forward.  It is true to say that the construction of ecosocialism needs to be based upon a commitment to a long-term sustainable balance between sociocultural systems and the natural environment but it is also true to say that the capitalist world system continues to self-destruct due to its exploitative, oppressive, socially unjust, and environmentally unsustainable practices – this will continue with artificial intelligence to plunder the earth for a profit with machining mining called data, fed to machine unregulated algorithm, making us all but powerless. 

Ecosocialism constitutes a vision against the mal-distribution of resources on a global scale that capitalism produces is bound to keep alive, notions of social justice and equality, deep democracy, and socialism in oppressed classes.

It is only by spreading the cost of change fairly that we can reinvent capitalism.

We could adopt a universal wage and let people fend for themselves but this won’t change our habits.  

It is time to envision future scenarios and strategies for achieving an alternative world system.

Once again here’s how. 

Because we live in different cultures, transparency is vital to address the main problem –  Inequality in all its forms. 

To do this the cost of change has to be spread fairly.

This can only be achieved by making a profit for profit sake contribute.

Not by taxation, IMF loans, foreign aid, or begging charity aid programs. 

The UN is now relied upon by the international community to coordinate humanitarian relief operations due to natural and man-made disasters in areas beyond the relief capacity of national authorities alone.

We currently have the technology that maximizes profit and future profit, like high-frequency trading that runs 90% of world stock exchanges. 

THERE IS NO REASON NOT TO PLACE A WORLD AID COMMISSION OF 0.05% ON ALL ACTIVITIES THAT ARE NOT SUSTAINABLE TO CREATE A PERPETUAL FUND TO TACKLE CLIMATE CHANGE AND OTHER PRESSING WORLD PROBLEMS.

ALL OF ITS AID WOULD BE GRANTED NON-REPAYABLE. 

THIS FUND COULD BE ADMINISTERED BY ELECTED MEMBERS. 

ALL PROJECTS OTHER THAN DISASTER RELIEF WOULD BE SUBJECT TO APPROVAL AGAINST A WRITTEN EARTH CONSTITUTION THAT TRULY ALIGNS MARKETS WITH THE NATURAL, SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC SYSTEMS ON WHICH WE ALL DEPEND.   

It is about building real resilience, driving equitable and sustainable growth, and reinventing capitalism itself.

PROJECTS THAT MEET THE REQUIRED PERMATERS WOULD THEN BE ELIGIBLE FOR FUNDING.

TO AVOID CORRUPTION AND LOBBYING ALL APPROVED PROJECTS ARE PLACED IN A TELEVISED YEARY DRAW. 

50,000 – 100,000

100,000 – 250,000

250,000 – 500,000

500,000 – 1 MILLION

1 MILLION AND GREATER.  

Here is a suggestion that could be funded. 

Products Labeling. 

Marketers use labeling for their products to bring identification to impart information to the consumer about the product.  They allow customers to know about the item and give necessary messages including ingredients, instructions, and uses. 

Why not their carbon footprint with a symbol showing their contribution to Carbon emissions. 

Human and nonhuman, have a natural right to sustenance.

( See the previous posts on a world aid commission.)

All human comments and imagination appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE BEADY SAYS; THE TIME HAS COME TO COMMENCE CREATING A NEW IDOLOGY TO LIVE ON AND WITHIN EARTH.

03 Sunday Jan 2021

Posted by in #whatif.com, 2020: The year we need to change., 2021. The year for change., A Constitution for the Earth., Artificial Intelligence., Capitalism, Civilization., Climate Change., COVID-19, Disaster Capitalism., Earth, Environment, Evolution, Fourth Industrial Revolution., Fresh Water., How to do it., HUMAN INTELLIGENCE, Human values., Humanity., Inequality, Life., Natural World Disasters, Our Common Values., Pandemic, Paris Climate Change Conference 2015, Political Trust, Politics., Populism., Post-Covid-19, Privatization, Reality., Sovereign wealth fund, Survival., Sustaniability, Technology v Humanity, The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Future, The Obvious., The pursuit of profit., The state of the World., Trade Agreements., Truth, Truthfulness., Unanswered Questions., VALUES, We can leave a legacy worthwhile., Wealth., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage., World Economy., World Leaders

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( A seven-minute read) 


IF THERE IS ANYTHING TO LEARN FROM COVID IT IS THAT WE HUMANS MUST CHANGE THE WAY WE LIVE COLLECTIVELY AND INDIVIDUALLY ON THIS PLANET.

CURRENTLY, WE ALL LIVE WITHIN IDEOLOGIES THAT ARE BROKEN.

SOME VISIBLE SOME NOT. 

(An ideology (/ˌʌɪdɪˈɒlədʒi/) is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons, especially as held for reasons that are not purely epistemic, in which “practical elements are as prominent as theoretical ones.” Wikipedia. 

There are many different kinds of ideologies, including political, social, epistemological, and ethical.

  • “We do not need…to believe in an ideology. All that is necessary is for each of us to develop our good human qualities. The need for a sense of universal responsibility affects every aspect of modern life.” — Dalai Lama.
  • “The function of ideology is to stabilize and perpetuate dominance through masking or illusion.” — Sally Haslanger
  • “[A]n ideology differs from a simple opinion in that it claims to possess either the key to history or the solution for all the ‘riddles of the universe,’ or the intimate knowledge of the hidden universal laws, which are supposed to rule nature and man.” — Hannah Arendt)

At the root of all these ideologies is the value of money.

HOW IT IS ACQUIRED AND DISTRIBUTED IS WHAT NEEDS TO BE CHANGED.

A religion may present a vision of a just society, but it cannot easily have a practical political program with or without money.  

All idea systems have a class basis. This class bias is defined by the acquisition of wealth in one form or another – assets, power, etc. Nither however can any longer dominate the state through an appeal to the populace, and then use the powers of the state to control both the economy and the private lives of the citizen’s work.

No longer can politics itself, acquire certain ideological characteristics whose true nature is concealed.

All forms of isms that belong to the 19th or 20th century may suggest that ideologies are no older than the word itself—that they belong essentially to a period in which secular belief increasingly replaced traditional religious faith.

So let’s ask the question.   

Where are we?

In terms of truth we now in a world both connected and disconnected in the extreme sense of the word connected.

IT IS CLEAR THAT THE WORLD NEEDS TO MOVE BEYOND SLOGANS.

A system that rewards those with capita while taxpayer’s money is used to support food banks for those out of work is not sustainable.

The economic injustices are plain to see with historic debt the inheritance of the young along with irreversible climate change and biodiversity collapse.

We now need an ism that shifts human values to a different set of values by placing the earth’s healthy existence at the forefront of all our values.

WE MUST NOT ONLY CONFRONT OUR MISUNDERSTANDINGS OF THE NATURAL WORLD WE MUST USE KNOWLEDGE NOT AS A MEANS TO CREATE WEALTH BUT AS A GLOBAL UNDERSTANDING WHERE WE ARE AT. 

WE CAN NO LONGER STAND BYE AND WATCH BIG TECH MONOPOLIES COMPANIES SWALLOW WHAT IS LEFT OF COMPETITION.

WE CAN NO LONGER STAND BYE AND WATCH A MARKET PLACE THAT CREATES WINNERS AND LOSERS ON THE BASES OF WEALTH. 

WE CAN NO LONGER WATCH WORLD ORGANISATIONS GOVERNED BY VETOES.

WE ALL DEPENDENT ON EACH OTHER AND OTHERS AND MUST COLLABORATE WITH ALL THAT SURROUNDS US.  

No longer is it possible for any system whether it’s socialism, communism, anarchism, fascism, nationalism, liberalism, and conservatism to be FREE OF INTERFERENCE FROM ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, MACHINE LEARNING, AND UNCONTROLLED ALGORITHMS.

THESE TECHNOLOGIES IN THEIR PRESENT STATE ARE SIGNALING THAT INTERPRETATIONS OF IDEOLOGIES ARE OUT OF DATE. 

You only have to look at the world to see the inequalities created by the pursuit of growth at any cost. This pursuit has turned all of earth’s resources into products to produce more products sold in a marketplace governed by short term profit. 

No longer is it possible to take fresh air, fresh water for granted. 

If we don’t want a world where from birth to death is viewed as an opportunity to exploit our weaknesses and essential needs to live out our lives in the first place,  we need AN NEW IDOLOGIE CALLED REALISM, NOT ESCAPISM, NOT APATHY, OR ANY MONOTHEISM, OR NEOREALISTS

“ Rather a collective meanings that constitute the structures which organize our actions.”

There is only one solution.

That is as advocated by this blog in several posts to Harness PROFIT FOR-PROFIT SAKE.

High-frequency trading with algorithms, sovereign wealth funds buying earth resources – land, water, energy, futures/ hedge funds – betting on demand, currency exchanges manipulating value, trade deals excluding fair trade, the list is endless. 

ALL ACTIONS THAT ARE NOW REQUIRED TO CHANGE COURSE REQUIRE FUNDING.

A 0.05% WORLD AID COMMISSION ON ALL ACTIVITIES THAT ARE NOT SUSTAINABLE WILL CREATE A PERTUTIAL FUND OF TRILLIONS TO CREATE A WORLD THAT’S WORTH LIVING ON.  

There is one thing for certain change is happing but the window for change is closing.

Climate change is not something that might happen in the future. 

We need a new relationship, to a more sustainable relationship with the natural world.

Creative imagination is what’s required so if you read this post let’s hear your comments.  

 https://youtu.be/GCwHki1q_I8

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Social unrest in the long tall grass while a few billionaires laugh there a way to the bank 

 

 

 

 

 

THE BEADY EYE SAYS. 2021 WILL BE THE YEAR OF THE BANSHEE.

02 Saturday Jan 2021

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., A Constitution for the Earth., Climate Change., Disasters., Earth, Fourth Industrial Revolution., Human values., Humanity., Life., Modern day life., Natural World Disasters, Our Common Values., Post-Covid-19, Survival., Sustaniability, Technology v Humanity, The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Future, The Obvious., The state of the World., The world to day., Truth, Unanswered Questions., Uncategorized, VALUES, Viruses., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World, Where's the Global Outrage.

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( Four-minute read) 

It is impossible to address all that is wrong with our world at this moment and time. 

We could say that history repeats itself or that it would be easier to imagine the end of the world than capitalism which like viruses doesn’t get tired. 

No matter our problems, whether they be wars, economics, pandemics, destruction of our ecosystems, mass shootings, genocide cleansing, natural disasters, inequality, pollution, finite resources, mass unemployment, racism, or our addiction to checking our smartphones. OUR COLLECTIVE DETRIMENT ACTION OF YET ANOTHER YEAR OF PUMPING CARBON INTO OUR ATHOMISPHERE OUT WEIGHT THEM ALL.

IN THE BACKGROUND NOISE OF OUR ONLINE LIVES, CONSUMERISM  WHICH FORTUNATELY HAS NOW BEING RUDELY INTERRUPTED BY THE WAIL OF AMBULANCES CARRYING COVID-19 VICTIMS IS GOING TO BE THE BANSHEE OF 2021. 

What can anyone do about it?

It is inaccurate to say that the pandemic has not brought positive changes like the growing spotlight on healthcare inequity (the result of the poor and people of color suffering disproportionately from COVID-19).

It is accurate to say that the pandemic has set in motion a tsunami of new content and it would be naïve to think none of these are going to stick.

Warnings are powerful and even dire, but they still fall on fatigued ears, immediately forgotten or superseded by the next disaster, the new normal. 

With nearly 270 million people around the globe marching toward starvation with Climate change, the next climate change world gathering in Scotland is already turned into a political coo by Boris Johnston the banshee of the European Union.    

(A Banshee is an Irish female spirit who wails outside a home to warn of the imminent death of a family member. Often heard before she is seen, her wailing is that high-pitched that nobody willingly dares to attempt to witness this terrifying spirit.)

People need to brace themselves for the cold reality of what’s in front of them.

The vaccine is not a panacea.

It’ll take a year or more before some real material changes appear to the way we live and this journey from here to there is not a simple one.

WE ARE UNABLE TO VACCINATE AGAINST THE CONTINUING DESTRUCTION OF LIFE FOR-PROFIT WHICH WE DEPLORE.

AND WHICH IS THEN IMMEDIATELY FORGOTTEN OR SUPERESED BY THE NEXT DISASTER. 

Humanity should not be an ONLINE AI TOY in the hands of a handful of rich people!

We know that those who have already died are mourned by all, the waste of life deplored by all.  May they rest in peace. 

2021 like any year holds the unknown but in the end, it is the earth that keeps us alive and it is the Sun that will kill us all. 

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE BEADY EYE SAYS. HERE IS SOMETHING WE ALL SHOULD HAVE A LOOK AT. EARTH FROM SPACE.

28 Monday Dec 2020

Posted by in 2021. The year for change., Earth, Earth from Space., How to do it., Human values., Humanity., Imagination., Life., Modern day life., Our Common Values., POST COVID-19., Technology v Humanity, The common good., The essence of our humanity., The Future, The Obvious., The state of the World., The world to day., Unanswered Questions., VALUES, We can leave a legacy worthwhile., WHAT IS TRUTH, What Needs to change in the World

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(Six-minute read)

Until touch down the fragility and unity of life are not apparent, nor the inequity that exists on Earth.  

One billion inhabitants without clean drinking water, countless numbers hungry, social injustices rampant, conflicts, poverty, out of control artificial intelligence-driven by capitalism, racism, with near-total disregard for its overall ecosystems exploited for short term financial gain. 

Unfortunately, most of us now see the world through small windows – Smartphones, I Pads, and TV screens with our brains unable to take the above overview experience and converting such an overwhelming concept into our behaviors and thoughts.

So if you were approaching Earth from any other universe at the speed of light what would we see?

At this speed, we would be traveling back in time so our approach each day might contain one million years, each minute equivalent to 695 years, with each second to 11 years.

Earth would look like it is quivering and shaking as its faces continuously change like a living cell. 

The annually varying coloration of the earth, the spread, and retreat of the polar icecaps would be invisible. Totally new patterns would emerge, the drifting of the continents, the growth of mountains, erosion of the land, the eruption and disappearance of islands, the spreading of deserts. We would see the continents separate, and the ice ages come and go in seconds.

Our lives would be in seconds. 

Mostly for unknowing reasons earth periods of changeover from acceleration to deceleration and vice versa are accompanied by a dramatic increase in the number of species that become extinct. 

There is now more than enough evidence that we are heading to another changeover that is close or even imminent so it is necessary for the next steps in the evolution of human civilization and consciousness, that we start to see Earth as a whole. 

If we could do so would the perceptions of ourselves and our planet, and our understanding of the future change?

Yes. 

So let’s put on the back trusters and slow things down to a few hundred kilometers an hour.

With the glare of the sun-Earth would remain hidden from view till we got to within around 14 billion km away when it would start looking like a star.  A pixel dot. 

Around the distance of Mars, Jupiter, Saturn it would start to become a brighter star, one of the trillions in the cosmos against a backdrop of infinity.

You definitely hear it before you would see it.

By the time of the moon, it would be a bright blue sphere, not a perfect sphere, with white swirls and areas of brown, yellow, green, and white, surrounded by a polluted atmosphere with a magnetic field. 

Perhaps it’s easy to take the view for granted if you’ve watched enough videos… but imagine for a moment that you are watching earth from a window as a single orb in the expanse of space, hanging in a void.  

Would it change the way you feel about your life, your species, and your place in the universe?

It should and the fact that we are all still here is a testament to just how resilient and capable we are of overcoming what is still to come our way.

These days, it’s not just knowing information and facts that will create change, it’s changing ourselves, how we go about communicating and re-assessing the underlying stories, ideas, and beliefs that form our world.

As divided as we may currently seem, communities all across the world, whether or not their actions are in alignment with your overall perspective of what’s going on we actually still have the same core intention.

Where some of us see things in one way while many others see things completely differently, but both think the other is flat out crazy and/or “blind” to not be in agreement with them. We cannot lose sight of that core similarity -and it’s a similarity that exists even if your beliefs aren’t as drastic as the examples

While certain mega-companies may be thriving, true heroes have risen out of this pandemic situation we now find the world in.

The sooner we cut the name-calling and instead start focusing on how we can truly get beyond this while uncovering whatever the truth really is, the sooner we can all get back to what we know and love.

It is said that Earth’s gravity comes from all its mass. 

Gravity is very important to us. We could not live on Earth without it. It holds down our atmosphere and the air we need to breathe. Gravity is what holds our world together.

It is gravity that holds the planets in orbit around the sun and what keeps the moon in orbit around Earth.

It is our created gravity of greed of inequality, that has to be stabilized if we are to see Earth as a whole, as Isna la -wica ( Teton Sioux) said away back in the 19th century,

” I have seen that in any great undertaking it is not enough for a man to depend simply upon himself.” 

Even the most introverted among us cannot say that this Pandemic has taken its toll on all of us, but it has also given us a number of glimpses into humanity that I’m sure many of us thought we may never see in this lifetime.

To ensure 2021 and beyond we must see our world as a whole, not through a personalized window of technology but much closer to what the human experience was designed to be:

Free.

 

All comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.