The True Enemy of Mankind

I dream of a united earth where everyone gets a voice and no group of people run the world. My idea is a socialistic united world ran buy a computer form of government. Basically a program where everyone can vote on important world decisions and everyone can have a say. If they don't agree with any choice they can explain why and it will be shown in a Facebook type news feed where people can read and up vote on alternatives they like. This will allow us to easily determine the most supported idea to solve a problem. This computer based voting system will also allow the language barrier to be broken and allow everything to be translated into the language of your choice.

a reply to: swanne

Eh. Screw it.
I'm in the mood for it.
Time to chop up your vapid little argument and feed it to you.

Actually, yes, yes you did.
What you said was little more than bipolar, black and white, with me or against me foolish incitement.
You claimed you were at least at one point, a realist.
There is ample evidence that is in no sense the truth.

Here's a little fact you miss, no person, other than someone suffering mental issues, likes war.
It's the reason a high percentage of soldiers returning from war suffer from PTSD to varying degrees.

To use a quote from popular culture:
"First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself?"

What is War?
It's means to a end.
Nothing more, nothing less.
But you see, it is also risk, the greatest of risk.
A gamble even from the best of positions.
With the highest of stakes.
And only fools, who are often the losers of war, do not acknowledge that fact.
Sun Tzu is a great read by the way.
To draw from a page from allegory.
As history as shown, David can, if he's smart and lucky, slay Goliath.
Which was good for David of course, but Goliath would have been better served being smarter about what fights he picks.
That being the case, war isn't something anyone with half a braincell engages in lightly.
Or "loves".

I know, in your rush to declare and shake your fist in the face of a purely illusionary "devil" and thusly "prove" your righteousness.
You haven't thought that deeply into the topic.

a reply to: stopxmove

I really like your idea. I have a similar playful concept on taxes: you choose where every single penny goes from a list of non-profit/burgeoning projects.

There's no reason such a limited and peaceful social stewardship can not be implemented somewhere as an experiment. It wouldn't be so difficult to code the software considering the level of hardware and programing skill.

Like the title of the thread says; the only real enemy is ourselves. We are so full of fear. So we allow our assets to become tools of our emotional expression. But I too am optimistic that we will awaken and start solving problems.

a reply to: swanne

And if the effect is universal, then for once, we (the whole of mankind) have the chance to share a common enemy - that is, war itself.

So you're proposing a War on War?

Well, can't blame you for trying.

I haven't said what I think the real enemy of mankind is. I think it is nature.

It is only since we grew technologically advanced as a species and were able to exert large amounts of control over the natural environment that we started thinking of nature as benign. I think the common belief that pre-agricultural tribes had some kind of mystic connexion with their environment is a fanciful one — the reason for all those nature-gods and earth-spirits they worshipped and propitiated is that nature scared them spitless.

It's only people who live in nice clean towns, safe from snakes, wild animals, disease-carrying insects, parasites and whatnot who can afford to look on nature without fear. For millennia, farmers, fishermen, sailors, travellers and traders thought of nature as unpredictable and dangerous, and did whatever they could to tame it for their own safety and prosperity.

Of course this attitude to nature is dangerous in the long run — and chiefly to ourselves. But that is just nature coming back to bite us in another way. Whether or not we make the world uninhabitable for ourselves and any number of other species, nature will go on. We, I suppose, will not. No species survives indefinitely; a million years is about average, I understand. It has yet to be demonstrated that intelligence and opposable thumbs are enough to save us from the logic of extinction.

But nature is our enemy in another way: we are animals, and in the end our animal selves seem most often to triumph over our rational minds. Our animal selves are not always our worst selves — but they follow a blind genetic agenda of competitive survival and reproduction that can have deadly results, results whose effect is multiplied and aggravated by our sheer numbers. The tragedy of human nature is the The Tragedy of the Commons.

War, too, is natural — it must be, because it is universal among the peoples of the world, or so nearly universal that counter-examples of tribes or nations that have avoided it are few indeed. Like religion, war is something characteristic of humans. It is part of our phenotype. We evolved it. Who knows why?

I don't think we'll ever really know, because we're too close to the question. Maybe one day an alien psychologist will study us — or our relics — and write a thesis about it that explains everything.

originally posted by: Boomorangatangarang
a reply to: stopxmove

I really like your idea. I have a similar playful concept on taxes: you choose where every single penny goes from a list of non-profit/burgeoning projects.

There's no reason such a limited and peaceful social stewardship can not be implemented somewhere as an experiment. It wouldn't be so difficult to code the software considering the level of hardware and programing skill.

Like the title of the thread says; the only real enemy is ourselves. We are so full of fear. So we allow our assets to become tools of our emotional expression. But I too am optimistic that we will awaken and start solving problems.

Its always a great thing to be optimistic. I Also think real change can be done. I actually started a Facebook group called operation humanity in an attempt to get something like this started. I'm working on a base system and will get input from others to perfect it. After the new system is polished I will release it to the wild where hopefully others will support it and we'll see how it goes from there.

What I believe in and what I hope society can also adopt:



1. Food, clothing and shelter is not an option that should be dictated by weather or not you have enough currency to afford it or not. They are a necessity.



2. Borders and division among nations are pointless and we should work towards uniting and making a strong planet instead of a strong nation.



3. Everyone deserves a say in huge world decisions and the only way to get everyone's opinion is through a computer program ran voting system.



4. If government decisions was done through a secure computer program where everyone gets a say in decision that will effect them then we would get rid of most corruption.



5. Life should be about pursuing goals that will make you happy and not just settling for a job that will allow you to make enough money to obtain the illusion you are living free.



6. The people volunteering/teaching/healing/helping/feeding/giving should be living the kind of life celebrities live because they contribute to society. Instead of money how about a contribution point system? The more you help others the more you make. Let's make it a goal to help others instead of yourself.



7. Instead of trying to make ourself successful and only focusing on the progression of our lives we should show true humanity and progress together as members of the same species. How can we solve starvation? How can we prevent people from having to live homeless? We throw away a lot of food, there's enough abandoned houses in the world to give every homeless person a home. We need to stand and unite to do what we think is best for us as humans and not what is best for us as a nation.



Separation through borders, currency systems, and beliefs only hurt us as a species. Think of what we can accomplish if we just adopt the thinking of be happy and allow others to be happy.