A Think Tank Thread.

originally posted by: ketsuko
There was a process for solving problems we used to use in a competition manner when I was in grade and middle school that might actually be useful/worthwhile for such a forum. It was called Creative Problem Solving.

You took one problem. Brainstormed solutions. Chose your best five. Applied a set of criteria to each of those solutions to score them and picked the best one.

Then you wrote up a practical plan to go with that chosen solution.

Back in 1980 there was an article about the Delphic this or that. I haven't been able to find it since I started posting on the internet. I think it was in Omni Magazine.

Anyway it said a group of people will always have a higher IQ than an individual. In the article various groups of professionals were given IQ tests or knowledge tests as a group, that is, any person in the group could answer any question on the test and the group was treated like a single test taker.

The group was always smarter than any single member of the group.

What I don't remember is how much smarter they were, I want to say twice as smart, but maybe not that high.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

1. Realize that materialism and selfishness are mental disorder.

2. Develop and spread social awareness (taboos) against materialism and selfishness.

3. Develop and teach sciences capable of measuring and treating said disorders/addictions.

4. Outlaw excessive materialistic greed: set margins (allowances or extents to which one can be greedy/selfish/materialistic) and then outlaw anything measured to be excessively greedy. The margin(s) should be high, and really only be implemented, or serve, to reinforce the social stigma/taboos against materialism.

5. Then wait.



People want to be good, they simply need to be taught that materialism/greed is not good - that it is unjust.

a reply to: Semicollegiate

Today that group goes under the cloak called Alphabet inc.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

There was a time on ATS when most threads were thinktank threads and it was great. Even today, every thread has the potential to be a thinktank thread. But that's up to whatever the posters make of it, and we see how that works.

Even without a specific forum, you could create your own threads in such a way to request and foster that kind of brainstorming and problem-solving. I hope you do!

a reply to: ChesterJohn

Hello again C.John....you're correct about us, but I don't believe you will get those types of concise posts and singular conclusions here either as long as a post doesn't fall out the edges of our Ts n Cs, those pointless , crude and fragmented posts wilways be here.

But this is the best place still for such a tank...minus the water!

In order for such a thing to work, the thread needs to have clear rules that all participants agree to conform to. First, there needs to be an agreed upon problem, one, that all will think about solving.

So far, I've seen people throw out multiple problems and not many of those agree on what the problems are from poster to poster.

In order for a problem to be solved or even discussed, it needs to be one problem, defined by the poster, and that problem needs to be discussed. There needs to be an orderly means of proposing and discussing possible solutions, and an orderly means of determining what the best solution out of those proposed will end up being.

And again, all participants would have to agree to participate within the agreed upon framework. In a community such as this one, such agreement would be paramount as there are so many and so varied POV in the participants.

a reply to: enlightenedservant
Obama has already started that and it has taken us furture into debt as a nation.

How about we teach young people how to be self reliant and self productive as individuals and as a group. Sort of like what I am trying to do here with a think tank.

a reply to: swanne

we would need a Think tank forum and then each thread would be on certain issues and in the end after reading all the post we could come to some sort of agreement as to what would be a good route in addressing the problems and promoting the good on that topic issue.

a reply to: ketsuko
That is a way to start in each thread. As long as if you don't agree with someones point there is no resulting to name calling or bantering of any type.

a reply to: ketsuko
Exactly a forum called "think Tank" and then individual threads on one problem. even if only ten threads the focus of each thread is to discuss the upsides and down sides of the current problem and then work out actual workable solutions. then the solutions themselves can be found by anyone looking via a Google search.

An example of a think tank idea is this. Remember the treads do not have to be limited to large social issues but even other issues. I am not trying to simplify the idea of the forum but as I teach to different levels of intellects I have learned that making things simple helps get my ideas across.

So here is an example of it:

i.e.We have been promoting non polluting ways of energy for years. Up comes wind, solar that work at storing power in batteries.

So each form of electrical generation could actually be taken to form different threads of thoughts.

let's say one thread starts for the promotion of hydro generated electricity.

i.e.Currently the best power is generated by Hydro-electrical Facilities. One type that is being investigated but not perused is ocean current hydro generated electricity. Two things are constant the ocean currents and the wind currents. no way to place a generator in the atmosphere to generate so the ocean currents seem the best source.

Now we have people working on these ideas and there are lots of plans but no one is pushing for the implementation of this avenue of electrical power generations.

Why? Is it really that expensive to anchor a generator in the ocean?

If so why doesn't the city of LA not have a electric generator in its Aqueduct over the mountains from the Bakersfield area. As that water is pumped up the mountain the sudden rush of water down the other side can be used to generate electricity. But it is not.

Who is stopping Ocean current electrical Generation and why?

Who is stopping the LA aqueduct from generating electricity and why?

How can we change it so these ideas can be placed into action?

Numerous topics on different subjects, and social economical issues, political issues, Water generation, any number of topics could be brainstormed by focused minds of members (some pretty smart) of ATS.

It would be nice to see if ATS itself is interested in an additional Forum entitled "The Think Tank"

originally posted by: ChesterJohn
a reply to: enlightenedservant
Obama has already started that and it has taken us furture into debt as a nation.

How about we teach young people how to be self reliant and self productive as individuals and as a group. Sort of like what I am trying to do here with a think tank.

Yet conservatives didn't complain when Bush & Reagan were piling up record national debt levels. It seems like some people don't mind our country going into debt in order to fund wars, arms races, and to prop up brutal allies (like Saudi Arabia & Qatar). But isn't it strange that they only become concerned with national debt when that money is being suggested to help other Americans?

As for the importance of self reliance, that's just a matter of perspective. How many people preach "self reliance", yet are using the government funded roads, government funded & controlled internet, and buy corporate produced products like toothpaste, bikes & cars, clothing, shoes, shampoo, computers, paper, pens, etc? The only truly "self reliant" people I've ever met have been the Amish/Mennonites & some indigenous tribes. Everyone else is reliant on society for many or all of their products & services. So what do you mean by "teaching self reliance" & "self productive"?

To be blunt, I want to live in an advanced Utopian society. I simply don't want to live in the woods by myself, having to milk my own cows or goats, having to gather firewood everyday, and having to make my own ointments from scratch. I've done quite a bit of real "survival" living & it doesn't suit me. My tax money is already going to be taken one way or another, so I'd rather it be spent helping all of humanity instead of being funneled to our corporate overlords. I can't imagine an advanced extraterrestrial species having 50-70% of its population doing menial labor or living as individuals in caves. That's pretty much the opposite of what I'm proposing.

If others want to live as you suggest, that's fine. I've never forced someone to move forward & I never will (maybe ). But that doesn't change the fact that my ideal society simply doesn't match the vision you're speaking of. Of course, you could always visit our Utopia lol. Everyone would be welcome as long as they do no harm to others while they're there.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
How about an organization of society without govenrmnt, or minimal government.

I see a problem with that idea. Remember that all systems follow laws of thermodynamics - entropy will increase with time.

In other words, any society which is started will quickly become chaotic with time. To preserve the society's initial ideals, you need to enforce them. Thus, you need a governing body.

a reply to: swanne
Please correct me if I'm wrong for thinking somewhat counter-intuitively, Isn't it that closed systems tend to be more chaotic than open ones?
In choosing a form of government isn't it only a question of which one will last longest for the eventual entropy? If we equate a utopian form of government, heck let's even include the anarchist view of communal living to an open system; can't we extend the life of that society considerably?
Just a thought. Whaddya think?

originally posted by: swanne

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
How about an organization of society without govenrmnt, or minimal government.

I see a problem with that idea. Remember that all systems follow laws of thermodynamics - entropy will increase with time.

In other words, any society which is started will quickly become chaotic with time. To preserve the society's initial ideals, you need to enforce them. Thus, you need a governing body.

Non human systems follow physical laws. Matter and energy are passive entities that have no motives, where as human systems are made of elements choosing their power and direction according to idiosyncratic motives.

Central planning is based on a "thermodynamic" way of looking at human behavior. i.e. one size fits all.

Human systems should be based on the free will and responsibility of the individual, which is possible using an Austrian Economic approach.

a reply to: ChesterJohn

For instance: Why not use solar energy to produce electricity, heat AND generate potable water?

Place a parabolic mirror in front of a tank filled with sea water. The sun rays are focused on the water tank. The water evaporates, driving a turbine with a coil inside a magnetic field - which produces electricity. The evaporation itself distillates the water, which becomes drinkable. Finally, the salt can be used as heat storage.

a reply to: Semicollegiate

I disagree. Societies are made of people whose intelligence is average. It requires high intelligence to defy physical laws. And people using devices invented by smarter men is not a proof of these people being intelligent.

Most laws in physics can be applied to society and give surprisingly good statistical predictions.

Action = reaction. Inertia and resistance to change. Exhaustion of work in a closed system.

Did you know that the collective behaviour of smaller life forms can already be computed using laws? There are models out there, plenty of them.

I used to think that since many humans are smart, then it means the society as a whole can evade such laws. But today I realise that the high intelligence of a few is not representative of the average of the collective system.

******

To go back to the point: I can understand that some are so fed up with several current orders that they would prefer anarchy. But anarchy has a down side - it allows for people to express their darker side without ever being punished by an authority. All anarchical systems I have seen in History have all decayed quickly into either an ordered state (with the formation of a new authority) or a submissive state (they were invaded by a state with more order and thus more coherence).

I believe that a truly utopian system would be a balance between the two extremes (neither anarchic nor totalitarian, but an actual middle-point).

This is my personal opinion anyway, and I by the way I thank you for yours, which was most thought-provoking.

I'm not trying to waive the black flag here; I just like to point out that anarchism is one of the most misunderstood political philosophy, if not the most misunderstood. There was even a time in history when all the political ideologies ganged up on anarchism to try to eradicate it. On top of this, there are different camps that even the anarchists couldn't agree amongst themselves as to which school of thought to pursue.

So I guess the same applies to an utopian or a transhumanist camp?

In regards to order, there is such a thing as a neighbor's censure to maintain a semblance of order. In case of punishment, it depends on the commune or the school of anarchist thought.

The anarchist thought can be traced from the time of Lao-Tzu to Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, from Henry David Thoreau to The Sex Pistols. It was probably practiced in one form or another by the native American Indians or the nomadic tribes in Mongolia before Genghis Khan. Then there was the half-baked experiments of Kropotkin and Tolstoi in Russia to the hippie communes in the late 1960's, and who can forget Gandhi and Lennon?

It only takes a simple idea like the golden rule or a cliché like if we can't be part of the solution, let's try to avoid to be a part of the problem.

Maybe it only takes a germ of an idea to build a foundation to something much better than all... these.