• Minimum wage, gaia brain, commons management, starry night sky
  • Gaia Brain, Hegel, capitalism-communism synthesis, environment 

    Minimum Wage and Gaia Brain
From jchampag@lonestar.jpl.utsa.eduTue Jun  9 14:37:38 1998
Date: Wed, 3 Jun 1998 12:10:52 -0500
From: "John C. Champagne" 
Newsgroups: alt.politics.reform, alt.politics.usa.misc
Subject: Minimum wage, gaia brain, commons management, starry night sky

Minimum wage laws seem to help those who have jobs at or near that wage 
level, and those who make machinery that replaces low-skilled workers, 
while it hurts those whose skills and experience make them somewhat less 
valuable to an employer than what it would cost to hire them.  Minimum 
wage laws harm everyone if the rising cost of labor causes employers to 
choose a method of achieving their goals that causes more pollution or 
depletion of resources than a more labor-intensive method would.

We cannot create wealth by legislation, but we can alleviate poverty by
ending the current practice of theft of natural resources from the people. 
If we all own the air and water, that is, if we all have an equal right to
use the air and water, and to say what limits we ought to place on the
putting of pollution into the air and water, then we could attach fees to
the putting of pollution, at a level that would result in the amount of
pollution that the people deem permissible.  The fee proceeds could be,
should be shared among all people equally.  After all, we would be
measuring the economic value of something that we all own. 

The same principle could be applied to the management of other commons
resources.  The number and diversity of fish in the sea is decreasing.  We
could attach a fee to the taking of those species that are threatened with
depletion.  We could attach VERY HIGH fees to the taking or killing of any
member of a species that we do not want anyone to take, so that no one will
see that activity as profitable.  

Biodiversity is being lost at a frightening rate.  Considering the pace of
forest destruction and paving of wilderness areas, it is easy to wonder do
we care what kind of world we will leave for our children.  We could
charge a fee for any land use that disturbs or decreases biodiversity,
from monoculture to asphalt, with the fee greater for the more harmful
impacts on the earth.  With all people voting on whether the amount of
paving, etc., on the earth is acceptable or should change, we would have a
system where all people could share in sculpting the overall human impact
on earth.  We would shape the world to match what we would want it to be. 

The amount of money collected through fees on the putting of pollution and
the taking and degrading of resources would be substantial.  We may not be
able to afford such a system AND the current system of taxes on income and
sales.  We may want to eliminate those taxes, or reduce them to negligible
levels, (some sales tax would be appropriate, to cover the cost of
policing the marketplace), and fund community services from fees on those
things that we do that have an adverse impact on others, on the larger
community and environment.  The monies collected could be shared among all
people equally.  We could each spend an agreed-upon fraction, perhaps
half, on community needs, (e.g.: libraries, schools, fire protection), and
spend the remainder on our own personal needs.  We would all share in
creating the kind of environment that we would choose, we would share in
deciding what are our community priorities, and no one would live in
abject poverty. 

This gaia brain paradigm sees the role of government as an arbiter between
the individual and community.  It recognizes no authority of government 
to initiate the use of force against citizens.  Only those actions, by
individuals or corporate entities, that adversely affect others would come
within the purview of government.  In fact, government per se would not
exist as we know it.  The decisions of government would become dispersed,
decentralized to all the people.  I think this is an important point,
because such profound change cannot occur except through the active
support of the people.  Many people subscribe to the libertarian view 
that the government ought not initiate the use of force against citizens. 
I would expect that libertarians would enthusiastically embrace this
paradigm if they are persuaded that it appropriately draws the line
between regulated or restricted actions, (those that affect others or 
the community), and actions which are the free choice of individuals, 
(private behavior). 

I think that the prevalence of outdoor advertising signs and billboards is
too high to allow for an aesthetically pleasing visual landscape.  I think
that the prevalence of outdoor lighting is so high that our ability to see
the stars is deminished to unacceptably low levels.  (We may want to adopt
a few "lights out" nights, to remind ourselves that there are stars out
there.) If others share my views, our wishes can be translated to reality. 
I hope that someday the power to decide these questions is put into the
hands of the people.  It will be, if we, the people, care enough to take
that power into our hands. 

John Champagne   http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag

Gaia Brain Theory  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/gaia.html

Gaia Brain abstract  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/abstract.html

Cronkite for President  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/cronkite.html

Cronkite on nuclear war  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/nuclear.html

vote on Gaia Brain at MIT  http://learning.mit.edu/ide/BI/BI-031.html

        If you like this idea, please vote.  You can help to counter-act
an apparent attempt at 'ballot stuffing'.  I noticed a burst of 40 votes
in one day, (feb 11-12), that brought the rating down from 63% to 39%. 
The rating climbed back up to 60%.  Then another burst came, (92 votes),
and brought it down to 43%.  (If you don't like the idea, please share 
your objections with me.  Thanks!)

vote on my proposed response to these 'ballot stuffing' tactics:
      http://learning.mit.edu/ide/BI/BI-048.html

Gaia Brain, Hegel, capitalism-communism synthesis, 
environment

From jchampag@lonestar.jpl.utsa.eduWed Jun 10 13:20:03 1998
Date: Wed, 3 Jun 1998 12:29:04 -0500
From: "John C. Champagne" 
Newsgroups: talk.philosophy.misc, talk.politics.theory,
    alt.politics.radical-left, talk.politics.misc
Subject: Gaia Brain, Hegel, Capitalism-Communism Synthesis, environment

Hegel said that our ideas create reality.  He also said that a particular
time in history is defined by a particular idea or set of ideas.  Over
time, the contradictions or shortcomings of the dominant idea eventually
show themselves.  A competing idea is proposed, in opposition to the
dominant idea, to address these shortcomings.  It, too, has shortcomings. 
At some point, the two ideas are synthesized into a new way of thinking
that incorporates essential elements of the original thesis and its
antithesis, thus creating a new starting point, a new dominant idea of an
era.  Hegel called this process of thesis generating antithesis followed 
by synthesis the historical dialectic. 

Marx said that Hegel was right about the historical dialectic, but that 
he was wrong about ideas creating reality.  Marx said that reality, or 
material existence creates ideas.  I think it is time for a synthesis 
of these two.  Is it not true that our ideas and our material world 
affect one another, that there is a dynamic interaction between the two?  

Is it not also time for a synthesis of capitalism and communism?  Could 
we combine free markets and free movement of capital with ownership of 
natural resources, (a means of production), vested in the people?  

We could realize such a system by charging fees for use of natural
resources, with the fees rising when most people believe that levels of
resource use are too high and ought to be reduced, and falling when people
believe that we can increase our use of resources without any harm to
ourselves and future generations and without excessive harm to other
living things on this planet.  The resource user fees would act as a
sensory nervous system for the planet, transimitting information about
injury to the earth to society, and causing reduction of that injury. 
When we share the proceeds of these resource-use fees among all people
equally, we will have created a system of ownership and management of
natural resources by the people, in the context of free political and
economic systems. 

I think that this practice of asking and pondering what are acceptable 
human impacts on earth would profoundly affect our mental and conceptual 
development.  The gaia brain paradigm would translate our expressed 
wishes--what we think ought to be--into reality. 


Gaia Brain Summary
                                      

John Champagne   http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag

Gaia Brain Theory  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/gaia.html

Gaia Brain abstract  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/abstract.html

Cronkite for President  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/cronkite.html

Cronkite on nuclear war  http://lonestar.utsa.edu/jchampag/nuclear.html

vote on Gaia Brain at MIT  http://learning.mit.edu/ide/BI/BI-031.html
   
        If you like this idea, please vote.  You can help to counter-act
an apparent attempt at 'ballot stuffing'.  I noticed a burst of 40 votes
in one day, (feb 11-12), that brought the rating down from 63% to 39%. 
The rating climbed back up to 60%.  Then another burst, (92 votes), 
brought it back down to 43%.  (Maybe the designers of this site will 
change the way the votes are displayed, so everyone will be able to see 
which votes came in as part of a big burst of dozens of votes all from 
the same source, all in the same hour.)  If you do not like the idea, 
please share your objections with me.  Thanks!

vote on my proposed response to these 'ballot-stuffing' tactics: 
        http://learning.mit.edu/ide/BI/BI-048.html

   © 1998 jchampag@lonestar.utsa.edu

    Gaia Brain: democratic ownership and free market management of natural resources

    Cronkite for President - Can we find someone, (someone over 35 years old), who we could most all agree on for our next President?

    © 1998 jchampag@lonestar.utsa.edu

    to the center of the Gaia Brain/Cronkite Draft page 1