A New System to Bring About Prosperity. A Solution to the World's Problems.

I think this could work. I had an idea that I realized actually could save America from our downward spiral and bring in a new age of benevolence and cooperation as well as spawn creative thinking to bring about new kinds of jobs that have never even existed.

It's not really a new government or economic system, although if the government and economic systems we have in place made some changes to fit around this premise, it would serve to amplify this new system's success tremendously.

It's an education system. Please hear me out.

Take a look at human existence. All we need is food and shelter and in order to do that, we have to work for it. That's not just humans though, that's all life. Now look at what else we do that is not directly related to our survival. There are a lot of things. But that's okay, this isn't about trying to do away with anything. It just helps illustrate what I'm going to talk about if you think about those things first.

Now look at our education system. It's about training a child to grow up to become a mature adult who can handle responsibilities and become either an entrepreneur or be skilled at some specific task. But ask yourself with honesty, "How much education do we really need to survive?" What I mean is, there are a lot of trades out there that really only require on-the-job training for someone to learn how to perform those specific tasks. Yet, we devote countless hours of our time, as children, studying about things that we probably will never apply to our lives.

This isn't about socialistic assignments. This isn't about doing away with the currrent education system we have and putting a new one in its place that only teaches relevant information. This is about understanding that to survive, we really don't need to learn all of those things. However, I think those things are great which is why I think at a certain age the child, after he/she becomes acquainted with life and its demands, should be able to make a choice between two educational paths. One of those paths would be very similar to the educational system that is in place now, and the other ecducational path would be one that is much different, but still relevant and still providing the necessary skills of survival, discipline, and responsibility.

If you really think deeply about what I am about to propose, maybe you could help me determine if it is plausible and if it would actually help. But I need you to think about it hard and try to imagine its implications and try to see what our society would look like in 20 years if this were to go through.





The Plan


The new educational system would really be two educational systems. There will be a choice for the child, at the proper age, which path he/she wants to take. The idea is to promote balance in the world so that our aspirations aren't completely geared towards destructive behavior. The current educational system is one based on objective reasoning and the scientific method, which I think is great and highly appropriate, but it seems to me that we are missing something.

The human doesn't just learn objectively, it also learns subjectively. That's what life is all about. That's why I would call this path something like, "the life path". Basically, it teaches the child the ways of being socially successful as well as the character building disciplines of hard work. By graduation, the young adult would be completely prepared to go out into the world and make a valid contribution to society, only the difference is, this young adult would have learned how not to make a name for him/her self, but the importance and necessity of helping his/her environment.

Of course, this path wouldn't include training in anything like nuclear physics or biology, although those things would still be around because there would be a choice for the child to take that path if he/she desires. This path would include things like farming, new forms of entertainment, construction, architecture, things that don't require much objective knowledge but things that tap into the creativity of a human and activities that promote only benevolence. There will be history classes, but also life skills and morality classes. There will be a social cause and effect class that teaches how good actions bring about good outcomes and bad actions bring about bad outcomes. They will learn psychology, sociology, and philosophy.

Basically where the former education system brings a child up to be a successful entrepreneur and highly skilled laborer, the new educational system still allows for that, but their is an alternative path the child could take. The main thing the young adult on the new path walks away with is life skills, wisdom, and an overall desire to seek out the betterment of mankind and the world. It is training not just to increase self-wealth, but make the world a better place. The young adult would graduate with the highest moral integrity and courage that this world has ever known.





The Implications


With the steady increase of population, jobs become scarce. People wind up working in jobs they hate and buying consumer products that they don't even know why they buy. The young people had been trained to have a completely different outlook on existence that was so different that they were satisfied doing activities that the previous generation had no aspiration to do.

I can't even imagine what new things the new generation would be doing. But I would expect that whatever they do, it would be beautiful. People everywhere would finally say, "I love this world". There wouldn't be the degree of disgust that there is. People would be happy. That's really what everyone wants. People want to be happy, but a lot of people don't know how to be. The new generation would know how. In their happiness, they would find countless creative ways to make other people happy. Pepole want happiness even if they don't know they do. That's all people really want. Some people think that their jobs will make them happy. They think that possessions will make them happy, so that's what they go after. People go after the things that they think will satisfy them. The new generation, under the new education system, would be very appropriate, because they would know how to be happy without material possessions. They would know how to be happy just by helping others and seeing others being happy because that would be what they were trained to do at an early age.

This is what the world needs. Happiness training. I'm not even close to joking. What more could one want than happiness and survival? Well that's what this new education system would specialize in. Happiness, life skills, survival, responsibility, good will, wisdom, discipline, appreciation, honesty, character, and most of all the knowledge of why these things are important and how they could use them to help society in any way society needs help.

I believe this educational system could bring about the highest quality of life mankind has ever experienced. It would definitely be something new and could set humanity in a new direction that would keep us from destroying ourselves and best of all, make living on Earth be something that no one can have the capacity to say, "I hate this world."

I believe the world could be a completely new and better place.

reply to post by smithjustinb

socially successful

Please define this term

and morality classes

Whose morality?

reply to post by smithjustinb

I could be misunderstanding what you are saying here because some of your terms need clarification. What it sounds like is brainwashing the young to believe the collective is greater than they are.

Originally posted by DarthMuerte
reply to post by smithjustinb

 

socially successful

Please define this term

and morality classes

Whose morality?

edit on 13-12-2011 by DarthMuerte because: (no reason given)

Socially Successful- the ability to be happy and make others happy in social situations to the point where your presence is appreciated and welcomed.

Morality classes would teach good morals and the importance of those morals and their effect on society and others perception of the student who might obide to those morals.

Originally posted by smithjustinb
Basically, it teaches the child the ways of being socially successful as well as the character building disciplines of hard work.

Isn't that what the parents should be doing ?

Beware!
Central Planning Ahead!

Woo...what a horrible thought.

So you want to "force-fully" divide people into "left-brains" and "right brains" (the ones being people sophisticated in arts, social matter, music, philosophy etc..)...and the others being "subjective" and focusing on things like sciences?

I don't even know where to start why this is bad..

First..the idea of such a "choice" is a horrible one since in reality this seems like a limitation to me. We are indeed free RIGHT NOW to choose what we want, why should anyone need to make a choice in either/or direction?

Black/White thinking...it cannot be the goal to separate intuition/philosophy/social skills from so called "objectivism"...but rather a symbiosis of the both.

Modern science will agree that sometimes borders are very fluent, a scientist involved in quantum theory does NOT necessarily have a lack of philosophy/spiritualism...and why should a scientist or "worker" voluntarily give up the freedom to engage in such things?

And why do you need to split society into two and separate something which should grow together and not be separated?

Edit:

This system would not create "prosperity" but rather idiots...people who forced into one way of thinking..and there is simply no need for this....

Originally posted by DarthMuerte
reply to post by smithjustinb

 

I could be misunderstanding what you are saying here because some of your terms need clarification. What it sounds like is brainwashing the young to believe the collective is greater than they are.

It definitely is greater. 2 is greater than one. 1 person can lift 200 pounds. 2 people can lift 400. 100 people can work in a factory. More like unbrainwashing the young that believe they are better and others are subservient. No that is unbalanced. The new school would definitely promote equality, but also be mindful and respectful of diversity so that all students are aware that everyone can make a valid contribution to the betterment of the whole.

reply to post by smithjustinb

Morality classes would teach good morals and the importance of those morals and their effect on society and others perception of the student who might obide to those morals.

Again, whose morality? Obama's? Clinton's? Yours? Mine? Whose?

Socially Successful- the ability to be happy and make others happy in social situations to the point where your presence is appreciated and welcomed.

Government schools cannot teach this, unless they get to define what your happiness is. Since happiness is different for different people, a mass education system cannot do it.

Originally posted by smithjustinb

Originally posted by DarthMuerte
reply to post by smithjustinb

 

I could be misunderstanding what you are saying here because some of your terms need clarification. What it sounds like is brainwashing the young to believe the collective is greater than they are.

It definitely is greater. 2 is greater than one. 1 person can lift 200 pounds. 2 people can lift 400. 100 people can work in a factory. More like unbrainwashing the young that believe they are better and others are subservient. No that is unbalanced. The new school would definitely promote equality, but also be mindful and respectful of diversity so that all students are aware that everyone can make a valid contribution to the betterment of the whole.

Yeah, I could never support such collectivist claptrap.

The word "We" is as lime poured over men which sets and hardens to stone and crushes all beneath it and that which is white and that which is black are lost equally in the grey of it. It is the word by which the depraved steal the virtue of the good by which the weak steal the might of the strong by which the fools steal the wisdom of the sages. Perhaps in those days there were a few among men a few of clear sight and clean soul who refused to surrender. What agony must have been theirs before that which they saw coming and could not stop! Perhaps they cried out in protest and in warning. But men paid no heed to their warning. And they these few fought a hopeless battle and they perished with their banners smeared by their own blood.

Originally posted by flexy123
Woo...what a horrible thought.

So you want to "force-fully" divide people into "left-brains" and "right brains" (the ones being people sophisticated in arts, social matter, music, philosophy etc..)...and the others being "subjective" and focusing on things like sciences?

Well. Not forcefully. I said let them have the choice to pursue which ever path suits them best. It is true there are left-brain people and right-brain people. Why not let those people decide if they want a left-brain education or a right-brain education and then go on to do left-brain work or right-brain work when they graduate?

I see it as an opportunity for the right-brain people to take a respected position in this world. The current education system does have some "right-brain" qualitites, but it is obvious that our current education system is unbalanced and biased towards left-brain. I believe the new system would promote balance.

I don't even know where to start why this is bad..

First..the idea of such a "choice" is a horrible one since in reality this seems like a limitation to me. We are indeed free RIGHT NOW to choose what we want, why should anyone need to make a choice in either/or direction?

But we aren't free. We have to go to a school that focuses primarily on the left-brain orientation. We would be free if we had the choice between a left-brain education system and a right-brain education.

Black/White thinking...it cannot be the goal to separate intuition/philosophy/social skills from so called "objectivism"...but rather a symbiosis of the both.

They separate themselves. We already separate ourselves this way. But society, as a whole, neglects the right-brain people in a way. The conflict is in the imbalance. Not individual imbalance, but imbalance between an individual and the individual's environment. If like minds could come together and not be distracted from those of unlike minds, then productivity would sky-rocket.

Modern science will agree that sometimes borders are very fluent, a scientist involved in quantum theory does NOT necessarily have a lack of philosophy/spiritualism...and why should a scientist or "worker" voluntarily give up the freedom to engage in such things?

I agree. I am not talking about a complete separation but a two-part system that is biased more towards one or the other. Some left-brain skills may be necessary for developing right-brain faculties and vice-versa. The "worker" doesn't voluntarily give up his freedom to engage in that. But he does freely choose to not formally participate in that kind of training.

This system would not create "prosperity" but rather idiots...people who forced into one way of thinking..and there is simply no need for this....

edit on 13-12-2011 by flexy123 because: (no reason given)

People can think however they want to think. How seriously did you take school? Maybe you would have taken it more seriously if you were learning about something you wanted to learn about and not something that THEY wanted you to learn about. No one's forcing you to think a certain way. You just choose a path of formal education. What you do in your own time is your own business. But once you choose a path, you will be tested, and therefore, you must learn. We are already forced to learn. At least in this case, there would be a choice of what you get to learn. And it could be put to practical use.

Originally posted by DarthMuerte
reply to post by smithjustinb

 

Morality classes would teach good morals and the importance of those morals and their effect on society and others perception of the student who might obide to those morals.

Again, whose morality? Obama's? Clinton's? Yours? Mine? Whose?

The student.

Socially Successful- the ability to be happy and make others happy in social situations to the point where your presence is appreciated and welcomed.

Government schools cannot teach this, unless they get to define what your happiness is. Since happiness is different for different people, a mass education system cannot do it.

The way to happiness is not dependent on the individual but dependent on the circumstance. There are multiple ways, but each way can be known and applied at the appropriate time depending on the circumstance. Happiness is happiness. The object of happiness is the only thing that is dependent on the individual.

Originally posted by Sherlock Holmes

Originally posted by smithjustinb
Basically, it teaches the child the ways of being socially successful as well as the character building disciplines of hard work.

Isn't that what the parents should be doing ?

They should be. But they are only the people that their government has allowed them to be. The government doesn't teach people how to be happy or know how to be happy. The government only teaches people how to be technological.

Yeah, we are fully capable of figuring out how to be happy on our own and there are plenty of happy people in this world. But there are also people who aren't and who don't know how to be. If only they had training they could trust.

here's a reality check....

i was attending the Milton Hershey School...in Hershey PA of course...
when one student reaches 9th grade--- they have already taken a battery of tests, been interviewed by career administrators, We also have already been given the Strong Aptitude test to determine just what avenue of education to take from grades 9-12...


the school had two areas of education ...The College Prep. and The Trades...



In the Trades one could learn: Auto Mechanics, Tool & Die, Carpentry, Printing, Plumbing, Shop, Construction Engineering... there were more but hey, its been 40 years in the past so don't hold it against me for not laying out the whole smorgasbord of shops & tops...(i was in Drafting Class when JFK was assassinated)


we in the Trades, would get 2 weeks Trade learning then 2 weeks academic studies (& then some of us would go back to the Dairy Barns to work)...in the 2 weeks shop immersion, we would be doing Trade projects with the tool & machinery of the profession, a hands-on learning experience... not just book learning about the Trade.
I was learning the 'offset' Printing process, doing the camera work, burning plates, making copy with the then ATF typesetter, doing layouts to make the plates, then running the offset presses, collating & binding the products..also some letterpress work


the College Preparatory elites would get a steady diet of academics like calculus, physics, political science, Global history, college electives, foreign language, SAT prep, etc


i always thought that was an excellent set-up... the egg heads could be their nerdy selves... and the rest of us blue collar guys could earn a 2 year minimum of 'Apprenticeship' in a Trade


now that's what i call preparing for the world...
none of the present day 'entitlement fantasy' where a slob could game their days away on a playstation


i feel that school was 20 years ahead of its time back in the 1960s
as for now... i bet it's still different than the public & magnet schools

Yet one more reality check please?

Some years ago I went for job aptitude testing. I had three degrees, was an Army Company Commander, a Federal agent, and a college instructor.

I was told they had two career fields perfect for me: Roofer and Florist.

I will fight this plan in any way that I can.

Not sure I understand this plan 100% its a little lofty in places so I cant quite grasp it. However, I think we should go back to the old system of the tech/trade schools. I know they still exist in name but they, to my knowledge, just have the name tech and teach the same curriculum with a few electives in the trades. However, the public schools have moved to this too. My high school had tons of auto, wood, metal, etc. shop classes. I had friends that had no desire to go to college and where already working part time in the trades, and it always seemed like a waste of both time(their and everyone else's) and money to force them to take college algebra and advance sciences. I think all kids should be tough basic science and math because it has some use and establishes as thought process, but if you have no desire to go on in school I think we could shorten the process for those kids. Or at least work on an advanced skills or intern type program to prepare them for the real world.

My main problem with kids picking their path is that they are just that, even in high school. They cant be expected to choose their life path because they are generally short sighted. I think there are alot of people who want to go to college who have no business there and plenty of kids who should go and are just being dumb. The standardized test process should certainly be over hauled, especially for people like myself which it told basically to pick whatever path I wanted.

I think the main issue with education is, no matter how much you improve it we wont be able to put a large dent in the idiots of the world. There has been a huge push to improve urban schools, but you are still dealing with the culture. You can give them all the nicest things and forgive college loans to draw in good teachers but the gangster culture is still pervasive. Many will not take it seriously no matter what you do, because its not gangster to be smart. There is no way to remove that element because it is part of cultural identity. Its the same thing with many welfare dynasties. No matter how much you try to break the cycle, many still see it as easier to live in marginal poverty than to work for anything. I think education is only a small part of the battle

So basically, the latter will end up with useless degree almost unusable in a real world. Nope, we have more than enough unemployable liberal arts graduates now. Also:

A Solution to the World's Problems.

Thats a gross overestimation lol. To solve the worlds problems would require far more than more liberal arts graduates with no clue about natural sciences.