Ten Proposals for improving the world

by R. Buckminster Fuller
from Earth, Inc
Written in 1973 (???)

The intellect, vision and courage of Mahatma Gandhi conceived of passive resistance with which bloodless revolution he broke the hold on India of history's most powerful sovereignty. Passive resistance will not amplify the production of life support.

In extension of the Mahatma's magnificent vision we are committed to the design science revolution by which it is possible bloodlessly to raise the standard of living of all humanity to a higher level of physical and metaphysical satisfaction than that hitherto experienced or dreamed of by any humans. All the knowledge and resources are now available with which to accomplish that comprehensive success. This can all be realised by 1985 without any individual profiting at the expense of others or interfering with another's enjoyment of total planetary citizenship. It requires the competent design science commitment of world- around youth to realise the Gandhian integrity. Youth's spontaneously mutual commitment can only be inspired through experientially gained knowledge and love-sustained innate faith in the eternal reliability of cosmically manifest principles as discovered by science.

The world-around problems that have to be solved by bloodless design science revolution are:-

  1. Education Revolution: The Highest Priority of All
  2. Conversion of World Accounting System
  3. Elimination of Property by Making Ownership Onerous
  4. World Democracy by Electronic Referendum
  5. Elimination of all World Sovereignties
  6. Theoretical Exploration Through World Game
  7. Realisation of Design Science Competence
  8. Realisation of Humanity's Unique Functioning in Universe
  9. Identification of Mathematical Co-ordinate System of Universe
  10. Philosophical Realisation that Physical is not life

1. Education Revolution: The Highest Priority of All

An education revolution based on synergy, which means behaviour of whole systems unpredicted by behaviour of any of its parts taken separately, requires the reversal of our present system of compartmentation of knowledge and of going from the particular toward the ever more special.

We must commence education with the inventory of all known, i.e., all as-yet-discovered, generalised principles and proceed from that whole to the realisation of special cases. This calls for the elimination of all specialisation, with generalists in limited-period plunges-in-depth to special case studies and applications of the omni-interaccommodative generalised principles. Plunges in depth involve unique subcomplexes of the whole. These generate the applied science. The education revolution requires the elimination of exclusively academic tenure. All of humanity must be given lifelong research fellowship tenure. All objective work must be spontaneously inspired and co-operatively initiated as with children's games. Participation on all "varsity" production and service playing teams must be attained through demonstrated competence.

Learning is to be accomplished by use of cassette-tape type video documentation with the individual child learning to find the most competent answers to the child's own questions. It is programmed by the child who spontaneously presses the obvious symbol buttons: Why is the sky blue?

2. Conversion of World Accounting System

The world accounting system must be converted from annual agricultural metabolics to an eternal world-around accounting which includes all generations to come, and which is consistent with the cosmic economics of an eternally regenerative physical universal system. The accounting system would include a redefinition of wealth with the scarcity model of economics to be made obsolete by the magnitude of man's participation in the irreversible amplification of the inventory of information: i.e., know-how. This eliminates economic competition. As a by-product of the new accounting system, competition for the monopoly of affection may also be surrendered along with the onerousness of ownership. We must advance from an inherently depreciative to an inherently appreciative commonwealth.

The Universe is not operating on a basis in which the Star Sun opines ignorantly that it can no longer afford to let Earth have the energy to keep life going because it hasn't paid its last bill: "We Stars have got to make a profit!". The cosmic accounting assumes omnivalidity. Humanity must eliminate the requirement of "Earning the right to live". Living for all at high standard must be accredited. Work and right-to-live must be divorced. Work must be considered the greatest human privilege.

3. Elimination of Property by Making Ownership Onerous

The elimination of property by making ownership onerous is to be accomplished by making man a world citizen, each to enjoy all the treasures of the whole Earth. He can't any more "take it with him" around the world than he could "take it with him" in yesterday's concept of "into the next world" He "can't take it with him" and enjoy the new world of Universe citizenship, and its natural emancipation from slavery chained to ponderous thingness.

4. World Democracy by Electronic Referendum

World democracy is to be incorruptibly accommodated by continual electronic referendum, being progressively fed by subconsciously telepathic ultra-ultra-high frequency electromagnetic wave propagation, signalling subconsciously reflexed attitudes toward specific propositions coping with evolutionary problems as educationally manifest.

5. Elimination of all World Sovereignties

All the customs barriers disappear as man goes from guarding the local roots of his originally exclusive agrarian metabolics life support into a world-around imperishable metals-sustaining impoundment of cosmic energy, and eternally regenerative energy, labelled industrialisation in the world economy.

The high performance necessary to sustaining all life can only be realised by free access to all sources everywhere.

6. Theoretical Exploration Through World Game

World War gaming considers total use of total resources only for the maintenance of killingry in support of unilateral survival , on the mistaken a priori assumption of fundamental inadequacy of planetary life support. World gaming discovers he inventory of metaphysical capabilities can amplify the life support effectiveness of the inventors of physical resources to accommodate all humanity.

The 92 regenerative chemical elements themselves are non-dissipatible and are only re-circulatable. The energy of Universe is eternally regenerative and inexhaustible. The metaphysical resources always increases. The game is "How to make humanity a successful Universe?"

7. Realisation of Design Science Competence

How to continually employ the total context of known generalised principles and resource inventory in realising ever higher magnitudes of performance satisfaction loaded into each recirculation of the imperishable chemical element associations and reassociations. How to do so with so little in support of total ecology as to render all humanity economically and physiologically successful.

8. Realisation of Humanity's Unique Functioning in Universe

Humanity's unique antientropic functioning in Universe is as a metaphysically advantaged problem solver. Universe needs man's intellectual capability which discovers some of the eternal laws operating in total Universe and applies them to local problem solving. That is our only meaning to each other.

9. Identification of Mathematical Co-ordinate System of Universe

An apparently comprehensive mathematical coordinate system of Universe provides modelable conceptualisation of science which is experimentally demonstrable. This realisation of conceptualisation will reunite the sciences and the humanities.

10. Philosophical Realisation that Physical is not life

The philosophical realisation that the physical is not life will lead to the ultimate conquest of mind over muscle. This generates the historical transition of experience to a predominant mind-over-matter reality.

Misassuming that both the animate and inanimate are physical, humanity misidentified "civilization" with the burial of its dead. That is where man broke away from all the animals. Animals recognise that the carcass is not life. Kings sought to rationalise the inheritability of sovereignty by identifying life with the physical. This also generated middle class mausoleums and hereditary privileges.

Emancipation of individuality requires elimination of the slave mentality. It is the realisation of the inherently inviolable integrity of the individual.


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