voice of humanity: Roger Eaton's Collection of Solutions
Roger Eaton's notes towards a collective voice for humanity on the web
 Roger Eaton's Collection of Solutions14 comments
12 Nov 2003 @ 18:27, by Roger Eaton

Natalie d'Arbeloff and her friend Augustine have kicked off the Bloggers Parliament, a search through the web for solutions. It looks like fun to me and it is related to the voice of humanity concept so I have joined in to see where the Parliament takes us.

The idea, again, is to round up and post solutions from cyber space. The problems we know already, but just in case, here is a starter list of problem categories:

  1. On-going conflicts, wars and post-war chaos.

  2. Threats or dangers to individuals, countries or the planet.

  3. Local issues specific to one country or area.

  4. Race or religious conflicts.

  5. Poverty, hunger, illiteracy.

  6. Health & environment problems, local or global.

  7. Economic imbalances/ Money/ Unemployment/Consumerism.

  8. Lack of communication and/or reliable information.

  9. Corruption and crime: on small or vast scale.

  10. Individual and collective morality & responsibility.

  11. Technology: problems it causes or which it could solve.

  12. Psychological blocks and blind spots.

  13. Spiritual issues.

  14. Problems in Education, Arts or Culture

I plan to post the solutions that I discover as comments to this article. If you have your own blog, you too can be an MBP by signing up in the comments at the Bloggers Parliament home page. Solutions may come from our own imaginations, but we also want to find solutions that are already "out there". Good hunting!

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14 comments

13 Nov 2003 @ 17:28 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.130 : Solution for Terrorism
 
Category 2: Threats or dangers to individuals, countries or the planet.

Here is a good recipe for combatting terrorism. It is written from a U.S. perspective, but applies broadly. Seven Keys to a Safer Nation by Eisha Mason of the Center for the Advancement of Nonviolence

The Seven Keys (but do click in for the details):

1. Strengthen International Institutions and Commit to International Cooperation
2. Stop International Money-Laundering
3. Enforce Restrictions on Arms Trade
4. Cease Covert Operations & Close Military Training Schools
5. Eliminate Weapons of Mass Destruction
6. Address Root Causes of Violence-Poverty, Inequity & Hopelessness
7. Decrease Our Dependency on Oil  

14 Nov 2003 @ 08:09 by mre : A Better Prosthesis for Landmine Victims
 
Category 6: Health & environment problems, local or global

Inne ten Have has developed a super idea for a simple below the knee artificial leg suitable for impoverished areas such as Cambodia. He wants our help getting the word out. It is a wonderful solution he proposes but he faces the typical problem getting the word out when there is no money to be made off an idea. See his excellent write up in English and send him a word of encouragement at inne@xs4all.nl.  

16 Nov 2003 @ 07:26 by mre : Alternate Nostril Breathing
Sixty second fix for stress on the job. Well this seems easy enough to be worth a try.  

17 Nov 2003 @ 15:16 by mre : Giving Humanity a Voice
 
Category 1: On-going conflicts, wars and post-war chaos.

This one is my own experiment in dialogue between groups in conflict, in this case two small Arab/Jewish groups. The method should be applicable to group conflict in general. See the writeup under the heading Arab/Jewish Email Dialogue. This entire "voice of humanity" blog is aimed at setting up a global network to give our common humanity some leverage when groups conflict.  

20 Nov 2003 @ 15:31 by mre : A Safe Place
 
3. Local issues specific to one country or area

Here's an in depth analysis of how British Columbia came up with creative solutions to the forest management dispute involving local tribes, companies and both local and global environmental groups. Co-Creative Power - Engaging Stakeholder Networks for Learning and Innovation. Modeling a complex multi-party dispute that produced an emergent innovative solution gives some general clues for similar situations.

Quotes from the article: "Finding a way out of the mess requires tapping the collective intelligence of the whole." "This exercise is really about collaborative inquiry and learning. It is not about stakeholder negotiations on social license issues, but the next generation model where we ask, 'How do we learn together? How do we innovate together despite the fact that occasionally we hate each other and we can’t get along?'" "...we had to create a safe place where we could go to examine alternatives to the status quo."  

20 Nov 2003 @ 17:15 by mre : Free Speech for Humans Only
 7. Economic imbalances/ Money/ Unemployment/Consumerism

Dr Morton Winston has given us a rather good essay about the nature of solutions we should be looking for. His trivalue scheme made me remember an old idea I've written up before about restricting free speech to humans. If we seriously control how the corporations express themselves we get a big win/win/win. 1) The economy benefits because marketing will wither as we restrict the corporations rights to persuade us via advertising. Many talented people now engaged in what amounts to chicanery will be freed up for useful tasks. This is the gold win. 2) Again, because the advertising carries the subliminal message that people are fools (because they must be to listen to this stuff!) when we get rid of it, we will feel much better about ourselves -- this is blue win. And 3) when corporations cannot influence politics by giving money and lobbying, the environment will win big, since it is corporations that have the great interest in degrading the environment in order to externalize their costs. This is the green win.  

23 Nov 2003 @ 04:18 by Natalie @82.35.43.4 : Bloggers Parliament
Roger, thanks very much for setting up your BP page. I'm eager to see the solutions that will be filling it , the voice of humanity that will drown out the cacophony of inhumanity which assails us.
I was on the march in London this past week, adding my small voice to the thousands of others who are saying "Enough!"
There's a report in Blaugustine,
[link]  

25 Nov 2003 @ 11:12 by ylek @200.55.7.238 : roger solutions
excelentes tus propuestas!  

26 Nov 2003 @ 16:51 by Roger Eaton @66.126.227.70 : How to Find Your Soul
13. Spiritual Issues

In a world where spiritual materialism is rampant, it is refreshing to find the real thing. Climbing Jacob's Ladder by Alan Morinis is an up close and personal introduction to Mussar, a little known, nearly obliterated form of Jewish Wisdom which aims in the most practical way to help anyone find his soul and then to cut through the clutter to balance and strengthen that soul by various techniques. There is no quick fix here, but what this book has to say jibes with as much as I have learned. Spirituality is largely a matter of practice. God helps those who work on their technique!  

10 Jan 2004 @ 15:34 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.129 : re: alternate nostril breathing
A friend at work was complaining of stress on the job, so I remembered the alternate nostril breathing solution and suggested he try it. "Ahh", he said, "One of my nostrils has been blocked from birth!" Got him laughing, anyway.  

3 Feb 2004 @ 12:23 by Steve Moyer @165.121.129.209 : I share your purpose; use the MetaMind
Roger,
I've been saying the same thing for years. We need to share solutions in the open. I've built the
MetaMind for this purpose. Open data, all the way. Please check it out.
If you or any of your readers want a free account, sign up as a Beta Tester at:
[link]

Steve Moyer
802-363-7179

P.S. I'd like to talk with you on the phone if you have the time.  

8 Feb 2004 @ 10:30 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.129 : time problem always, but
here's my phone number: 310 390 5220  

29 Mar 2004 @ 08:17 by Roger Eaton @208.187.17.228 : Bloggers Parliament Group Blog
Bloggers Parliament now has a group blog.  

3 Apr 2004 @ 18:30 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.130 : Keynes' Clearing Union idea
There is an article by George Monbiot on Znet which is an argument for a world parliament. But the interesting nugget that I would like to bring up is his mention of Keynes "Clearing House" idea. As he explains, every year the nations would be charged interest on their trade deficits AND on their trade surpluses. This would encourage everyone to clear their account and so would discourage both surpluses and deficits. Result: it would be harder for the rich countries to exploit the poor countries.

Two more articles that mention this clearing union idea:

First by Michael Rowbotham. Another web article suggests the idea of such a clearing house belonged to progressive Jerry Voorhees.  

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