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Building Atlantis; find the flaws

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14 hours ago, softwareNerd said:

How do you anticipate these people will earn a living? 

My current idea, subject to change and improvement, is to build facilities that can be rented out on AirBnb. Then I could hire one person to do the management of the facilities when I'm not there. Short term it won't be the most lucrative job, but for someone who takes a view of a few years it might be very attractive. We will then get a lot of feedback on how things are working, and can improve. When the facilities are working well, we can start inviting more people of Objectivist bent, maybe first a stay of a week, then a month.

I've also been thinking of setting up a fund that could do an initial round for people who want to start their own business, but I think that it would be a lot of work, so I'm not sure if that's a good one.

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13 hours ago, StrictlyLogical said:

I think this should be a sort of living /standing sketch of what is possible.  Call it an Exposition, or a theme park, or a living monument.  Make a vision of the future with actors, a story, a fake history and have that alongside a resort.  The resort should be fun and beautiful enough to attract people while the theme park would be a reason certain people would go to your resort.  Target lawyers engineers doctors people who could donate money and contacts for refining the exposition ao that it eventually could become reality.  Allow volunteers to work at the theme park and live at the resort. Time share or permanent.  Slowly adapt the monument into reality, real systems infrastructure, real living spaces, allow people to start living there.  Slowly your ant farm spectacle could become reality.

Thank you for your ideas StrictlyLogical.

I'm afraid of relying on donations and volunteers; I have little experience in how these things work. I know that some people can utilize other people's time and money effectively, but I stick with what I'm good at.

Yes, we definitely are taking a gradual approach. So many of the details needs to be figured out over time though. All I can see is the end vision, and the next few steps. Everything in between is quite diffuse, and needs to be figured out as we go.

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5 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Shorter to what?

As for problems:You would have a hard time finding funding at all for seasteading, while a moon base has some real economic value that would attract investors.

Sorry I didn't explain that well. Shortest path to a peaceful society based on individualistic law and morality instead of altruistic morality.

Funding: we don't need funding for a long time.

Moon: I don't think I have the self-esteem needed, as well as many other things needed. I'm ambitious, but I need some more victories before I can take on the moon. Self-esteem is the reputation I have with myself, and it must be built over time.

6 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Seasteading - or at least Mindshore - is equal to building a cabin in the woods and inviting people, I'm not seeing a difference. At best, it's a slightly modernized Walden experience.

There's a fix to that. Agreements and explicit co-operation with existing governments, perhaps as an independent special zone with its own municipal government for you as you offer various services that are lucrative on their own.

Cabin in the woods: I'm sure it will look like that to many. We need to build value that attracts customers, even though the scope initially is very small.

It is a longer term goal to make it a special economic zone. If we can get that, reduced or eliminated taxes etc, then we're probably going quite strong already. My opinion is that doing so would be starting too big, but I could be wrong here. I'm a strong believer in starting small, or even tiny.

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6 hours ago, Eiuol said:

You seem to be after "a group of people run as a business". Sounds more like an idea that's based on anarchist premises that only needs to be market-efficient. But it needs grounding with government.

SL mentioned Epcot - that's the closest example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPCOT_(concept)

What I'm after is building an English speaking culture of rational individualism. The details of how it will work I do not know, but I guess it might involve a lot of software, because software is so good at what it's doing.

I don't claim to know if we need a government or not, but I am 100% certain that there are other options for how humans can interact peacefully than the options that are on the table today. I'd think there are at least 100 million different options out there. So far humans might have tested 50 options, though maybe someone has a better guesstimate than mine. There are a lot of possible combinations of systems that could have a positive result. Just like all businesses are designed slightly different, so I think that social systems also need to be different; they need to be designed for each specific need.

Just like Roark designed each house depending on its function and it's circumstances, so also each social structure needs to be built for a specific purpose.

 

Link: Thanks. I think Walt Disney at the end of his life was in quite a different position than what this project is in. Walt had a track record of a lifetime of success. He could trust his judgement to a very high degree, he had trusted people and money. I can guarantee with 100% certainty that if I attempted to do what Walt did, I would fail. Walt could have built it I'm sure. I cannot. I have to start small.

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2 hours ago, Mindborg said:

My current idea, subject to change and improvement, is to build facilities that can be rented out on AirBnb. Then I could hire one person to do the management of the facilities when I'm not there. ... ...

Why not do this in the U.S.: say the Florida Keys, or some nice beach-town in the Carolinas?

Of all the aspects of your plan, the one the seems of most value in "this life" is: having a bunch of friends nearby, and perhaps working with some of them. This can be done in some U.S. cities with a bit of organizing, where nobody has to move. If you want to try something more ambitious, but still "agile" small steps: congregate in some small town where you can set up way more easily. That seems to be the agile way to test the waters.

In fact, why even choose a small town. You could choose a decent-sized city and group there: more cool stuff to do, and more job-prospects. (As for living on the moon! Why would anyone want to do that: seems like the most boring thing to do. To each his own, but I doubt you'll find that a popular idea with customers, so you're right to reject it.)

Edited by softwareNerd
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23 hours ago, softwareNerd said:

If I ever were to move to a community of self-described Objectivists, it's likely that I'll be in the middle of some schism within a year and that I and my closest friends will either leave or be forced out through some boycott or some such tactic :) 

 

21 hours ago, Mindborg said:

Thank you for that softwareNerd :)

It's a very valid objection. I've met some libertarians and found that some I enjoyed hanging out with, and others not. I don't yet know what would make this different, but I do think that it should be possible to figure out systems that can minimize the impact of all the shortcomings of Objectivists (I certainly know I have many shortcomings) and boost their strengths.

Perhaps it's possible to build a social machine that is handling the conflicts that usually arise between Objectivists?

Having recently discovered the Playboy Interview with Ayn Rand, the schisms have some light shed on them in this extracted Q/A:

PB: Can’t Objectivism, then, be called a dogma?
AR: No. A dogma is a set of beliefs accepted on faith; that is, without rational justification or against rational evidence. A dogma is a matter of blind faith. Objectivism is the exact opposite. Objectivism tells you that you must not accept any idea or conviction unless you can demonstrate its truth by means of reason.

PB: If widely accepted, couldn’t Objectivism harden into a dogma?
AR: No. I have found that Objectivism is its own protection against people who might attempt to use it as a dogma. Since Objectivism requires the use of one’s mind, those who attempt to take broad principles and apply them unthinkingly and indiscriminately to the concretes of their own existence find that it cannot be done. They are then compelled either to reject Objectivism or to apply it. When I say apply, I mean that they have to use their own mind, their own thinking, in order to know how to apply Objectivist principles to the specific problems of their own lives.

In regards to building the social architecture to handle the conflicts, this captures the essence of the approach needed:

PB: Do you believe that Objectivism as a philosophy will eventually sweep the world?
AR: Nobody can answer a question of that kind. Men have free will. There is no guarantee that they will choose to be rational, at any one time or in any one generation. Nor is it necessary for a philosophy to “sweep the world.” If you ask the question in a somewhat different form, if you say, do I think that Objectivism will be the philosophy of the future, I would say yes, but with this qualification: If men turn to reason, if they are not destroyed by dictatorship and precipitated into another Dark Ages, if men remain free long enough to have time to think, then Objectivism is the philosophy they will accept.

from The American Flag thread:

On 6/15/2017 at 9:56 PM, Mindborg said:

People want products, not theories. We have a badass philosophy for those who want to live. If we can transmute objectivism into a usable product, I think people will love it.

The usable product aspect comes from Miss Rand in her answer to If widely accepted, couldn’t Objectivism harden into a dogma?

It needs to be discovered by those who ultimately turn to reason to live their lives. From an essay written for a martial arts test by a fellow practitioner—paraphrased and modified:

{An Objectivist} [A Sensei] is only a signpost. They can point the way, indicating the direction to go. Those seeking the destination have to discover the actual path for themselves.

Edited by dream_weaver
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14 minutes ago, dream_weaver said:

PB: If widely accepted, couldn’t Objectivism harden into a dogma?
AR: No. I have found that Objectivism is its own protection against people who might attempt to use it as a dogma. ...

... They are then compelled either to reject Objectivism or to apply it.

The part that Rand misses -- probably because of a lack of experience -- is that so many people will adopt Objectivist ideas dogmatically, just as they adopt other ideas dogmatically. And, that most will not be die-hard dogmatists, but a mix. And while one might argue that these people have rejected Objectivism, it does not mean they explicitly reject it. It's likely that they think they still accept it, and think they are right in interpreting it in whatever way they do. nothing stops these people from self-identifying as Objectivists -- since this is how they genuinely think of themselves. 

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13 hours ago, Mindborg said:

I don't claim to know if we need a government or not, but I am 100% certain that there are other options for how humans can interact peacefully than the options that are on the table today.

Fundamentally, there is either government or there is not. There are many ways anarchy can go, and there are many ways government can go, but the point is either you will end up with a society that has government or does not. Doesn't matter if it's through software, your ideal is one or the other. If you don't know which is better, you need to figure that out.

13 hours ago, Mindborg said:

I can guarantee with 100% certainty that if I attempted to do what Walt did, I would fail.

Well, it's good to be realistic, but you seem to have a lot of doubt. I don't mean just the Epcot idea. I'm not sensing passion about Mindshore (passion about ideas, yes, but not the seasteading specifically). That's the biggest flaw of all. I don't say that to be mean - if you have at least the drive to try, that can be directed.

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21 hours ago, softwareNerd said:

Why not do this in the U.S.: say the Florida Keys, or some nice beach-town in the Carolinas?Of all the aspects of your plan, the one the seems of most value in "this life" is: having a bunch of friends nearby, and perhaps working with some of them. This can be done in some U.S. cities with a bit of organizing, where nobody has to move. If you want to try something more ambitious, but still "agile" small steps: congregate in some small town where you can set up way more easily. That seems to be the agile way to test the waters.

Thank you for your comment softwareNerd.

The chance of gaining political independence in Florida seems very low. In Tahiti political autonomy is a real possibility, perhaps in only a some years Mindshore could have a different tax system. If it doesn't work in Tahiti, doing this project in a different location might be an option yes, I've thought of ways to get to international waters faster. It does probably require many years and tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars though, so it's a longer path than the path I'm trying now.

Regarding moving; perhaps it's a downside, perhaps it's a good thing. The threshold is so high for moving to Tahiti that the chance of getting false positives on this project is very low. If this idea is not going to work, I want to find out fast, because my life is short and I have a lot I want to do. If it fails, it's better if it fails fast. I'm afraid that if I did this project in an existing city it could take a long time before I get good feedback.

 

22 hours ago, softwareNerd said:

In fact, why even choose a small town. You could choose a decent-sized city and group there: more cool stuff to do, and more job-prospects. (As for living on the moon! Why would anyone want to do that: seems like the most boring thing to do. To each his own, but I doubt you'll find that a popular idea with customers, so you're right to reject it.)

Job prospects: This part will be very difficult to solve, and is a major risk to the project. If we cannot solve this problem, the project will fail. By forcing creation of jobs early on on Mindshore, we can take care of the high-risk items first. If we cannot solve the job problem, this project is never going to work. I want the project to fail fast, so to me this is a good reason to start in Tahiti, where we got all the odds against us.

Moon: Perhaps some would find it boring, but many would enjoy it very much. Low gravity, totally new problems from those on earth... I'm quite sure I would like it, I'm an introvert who loves engineering of all types. Light only needs ~1 second to travel there, meaning internet would be almost normal.  I've been thinking about cheaper ways to do both transportation and construction on the moon. There is so much money to be made from utilizing the moon, and I think a lot will be done within the next 30 years. But again, I think it's a much higher threshold than moving to Tahiti, at least for now.

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22 hours ago, dream_weaver said:

from The American Flag thread:

The usable product aspect comes from Miss Rand in her answer to If widely accepted, couldn’t Objectivism harden into a dogma?

 

Thank you for that series of Rand quotes dream_weaver. I found them very good and inspirational.

 

As for usable product, if I remember correctly my path it actually came from a very different path of thinking; inspiration from using Apple products many years ago. I realized that people don't discuss if electromagnetism works. There's no discussion because they are using the products that comes from it. Rand has been an inspiration for many years, but I cannot directly credit her with leading me to this.

The reason people still discuss philosophy and many other things is because there's no product for the theories. Some people think the moon landing was hoax. Why? Because you cannot buy a return ticket to the moon for 1000 dollars to see the landing site. When you can, the debate is gone.

When we have a operational society based on reason, and people can see the results, educate themselves and participate in the huge profits that comes from minds dedicated to reality and life, the debates will evaporate, as if they never existed. If someone successfully builds a rational society, whether its Mindshore or more probably some other project, there will be no discussion about what principles make a society function.

 

22 hours ago, dream_weaver said:

It needs to be discovered by those who ultimately turn to reason to live their lives. From an essay written for a martial arts test by a fellow practitioner—paraphrased and modified:

{An Objectivist} [A Sensei] is only a signpost. They can point the way, indicating the direction to go. Those seeking the destination have to discover the actual path for themselves.

Excellent quote. This is exactly what objectivism is. It's a signpost saying "Looking for happiness? Buckle up for pain. You have to think for yourself, make your own mistakes and be different from those around you."

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22 hours ago, softwareNerd said:

 is that so many people will adopt Objectivist ideas dogmatically, just as they adopt other ideas dogmatically.

I think it's most certain that this can and will happen. Might it be possible though, to design software systems, educational systems and whatever other systems are required, systems that are doing the work of changing people from dogmatic to actual independent thinkers? I think it is. Difficult? No doubt. But it requires no magic, "just" serious skills and creativity.

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11 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Fundamentally, there is either government or there is not. There are many ways anarchy can go, and there are many ways government can go, but the point is either you will end up with a society that has government or does not. Doesn't matter if it's through software, your ideal is one or the other. If you don't know which is better, you need to figure that out.

You are correct Eiuol. It needs to be figured out. I have some ideas on how things can work, but experiments needs to be run to verify if it works in practical life. I have very good reasons to believe the systems for governance will work, when fully operational, several orders of magnitude better than the systems that are used today, but the assumptions and implementations still needs to be tested against reality.

11 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Well, it's good to be realistic, but you seem to have a lot of doubt. I don't mean just the Epcot idea. I'm not sensing passion about Mindshore (passion about ideas, yes, but not the seasteading specifically). That's the biggest flaw of all. I don't say that to be mean - if you have at least the drive to try, that can be directed.

Eiuol, I don't find you mean. I am very encouraged by the fact that you use some of your valuable short time here on earth to respond at all, it means you care far more than nothing.

As for being realistic; yes, I have a lot of doubt. The facts are that this is a venture with so low probability of success that being certain of anything would be lying to myself. The more I work on it, the more I see that it should be possible, but also that there's an almost endless list of problems that needs to be solved. So many of the problems can temporarily halt or permanently sink the project. Here's just a few issues:

- Can we successfully create jobs?

- Can we successfully create an economy?

- Can we successfully get a tiny market of objectivists interested?

- Can we successfully create a positive and engaging culture?

- Can we successfully get intelligent people interested?

- Can we successfully get a lot of these people to move to Tahiti?

- Can I learn to become the leader that this project needs to succeed?

- Can we successfully deal with political issues? Are politicians going to stop this?

- Can we successfully deal with the engineering issues?

- Can we successfully build the safety needed, or will there be drowning accidents that crater the project?

- Can we successfully deal with the local population in Tahiti? Are they going to hate us and stop the project?

 

Even with a ruthless adherence to reality, once you're stacking these problems on top of each other and do the math on the probabilities, you'll see that even if we humans can change probabilities and bend reality to our will, there are limits. I have a lot going for me, one of my best assets being a level of creativity and problem solving skills that are very rare, along with the fact that I don't need to raise money for a very long time.

There's a circle of possible fading into the impossible on the edges. This project I think is just around the mist between the two. I think that if I can get a product / market fit, then I might attract the talent this project needs to succeed. Our philosophy should provide a good pool of people to select from.

 

As for passion for Mindshore:

You guys in this forum have given me a lot of optimism. I expected to struggle much harder before I got any kind of response and criticism, I even expected to pay people to criticize this project because most would see it as completely uninteresting.

That said, I've probably not expressed it, but I'm on fire for this project. I think about it and work on it day and night, 7 days per week. I'm supposed to take the weekend off, but I am doing little else with my time but optimizing my probability of success. I don't think that would be doable without inspiration.

I am hesitant to express too much of my big long term visions, because it turns some people off. But I do have goals that are pulling me out of bed every morning.

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4 hours ago, Mindborg said:

The chance of gaining political independence in Florida seems very low. In Tahiti political autonomy is a real possibility, perhaps in only a some years Mindshore could have a different tax system. If it doesn't work in Tahiti, doing this project in a different location might be an option yes, I've thought of ways to get to international waters faster.

Fair enough, if your primary aim is getting out of the U.S. and starting your own country. That is very different from a primary aim of living and working among fellow Objectivists. The latter is the only kind of value I'd personally find attractive; though, in fairness, probably not attractive enough even to move to Florida :) 

I'm never giving up my U.S. citizenship, and so will pay U.S. taxes wherever I live. Anyhow, taxes are not really that fundamental.

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1 minute ago, softwareNerd said:

Fair enough, if your primary aim is getting out of the U.S. and starting your own country. That is very different from a primary aim of living and working among fellow Objectivists. The latter is the only kind of value I'd personally find attractive; though, in fairness, probably not attractive enough even to move to Florida :) 

I'm never giving up my U.S. citizenship, and so will pay U.S. taxes wherever I live. Anyhow, taxes are not really that fundamental.

Well, I'm not actually from the US., and though it's very tempting to me, I've never entered the US. I might take the trip one day, I guess there's a reason so many awesome people are living there.

For potential customers who are quite happy with their current status, we'll have to provide a huge value before this project can even be a temptation. But in some years we might be able to have solutions to problems you don't even know you have. My hope is that we can provide value for one customer at first, then to two customers, then three, and maybe one day we got so good systems that even you will be tempted to visit for just a week.

And like any awesome experience, maybe you'll be hooked before you know it :)

That's what I aim for, but it's probably just a dream.

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23 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Fundamentally, there is either government or there is not. There are many ways anarchy can go, and there are many ways government can go, but the point is either you will end up with a society that has government or does not.

If the term "government" is understood in it's broadest sense, then any social organization will have one.  This is true for a nation, a state, a county, a city, a corporation, a non-profit charity, a family, etc.   Even the primate cage at the zoo has a something that works as a "government".  So too a wolf pack and the herd of deer being hunted by the wolves.

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9 hours ago, New Buddha said:

If the term "government" is understood in it's broadest sense

That's a metaphor. It's a totally different concept, not a broadening of the concept I'm talking about. I mean the presence or absence of a state. I am not sure if Mindborg has really reasoned out anarchy or government. I think similar projects failed for not bothering to involve with a government. That might work in Atlas Shrugged, but in our world, there are many governments interested in rights. We don't need to reinvent the wheel and start from scratch here.

19 hours ago, Mindborg said:

I think that if I can get a product / market fit, then I might attract the talent this project needs to succeed.

Is it a product, or a society to live in? A society is not a product, but real estate is. To me, "buying" a piece of Mindshore or any similar project is too "cult-y". If it's real estate, no problem. If I'm being offered a society-as-a-product, without showing me how my rights are protected, then it doesn't sound so individualistic to me.

If you somehow, some way, established a special zone of sorts, that might be worth looking into. Something better than an island in the Pacific.

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5 hours ago, Eiuol said:

 I am not sure if Mindborg has really reasoned out anarchy or government. I think similar projects failed for not bothering to involve with a government. That might work in Atlas Shrugged, but in our world, there are many governments interested in rights. We don't need to reinvent the wheel and start from scratch here.

Thank you for your comment Eiuol.

You're spot on; I have not reasoned out how it should be. After spending a lot of time designing software and working on startups, I am very suspect to anyone who claims to be able to reason out how any system should work in detail. This is simply because I used to do it, and ended up with designs that didn't actually solve the problems. My experience is that up-front design is mostly a waste of time unless you have done the thing multiple times before. Houses has been done before, and you know what to expect, so then planning makes sense. You can plan and know for sure that people will buy the house. Here we're designing a community. It has never been done before, and I think none of us even knows if it's possible. The plans will go in the wastebasket faster than they can be written.

I have some abstract ideas, and I'm sure you have ideas as well. I think we should reinvent the wheel and start from scratch, because we have different tools available today than when societies were designed hundreds of years ago. We also have very different problems.

Paraphrasing Rand, she describes one of the heroes; I think it's in Atlas, as follows:

[The industrialist] studied the field for a long time. Then he redesigned it as if he had never heard of it before, upsetting all precedent.

My key difference is that I know I'm ignorant, and I question very many things down to the root. Most people think they know, and because they know it all already, they just slightly modify solutions that has worked in the past. What some of the great investors of Silicon Valley says is that you should go to first principles, and reason from there.

We need to start from absolute scratch.

- Why do individuals need to live in a society at all?

- What people are needed in a good society for it to operate smoothly?

- Are the ideas people hold of any consequence to how they act? If so, should we care? If so, how can we assess what ideas are constructive and what are destructive? If so, can we create systems to ensure we repel the people with destructive ideas and attract the ones with constructive ideas?

- What systems are needed to ensure that people are behaving in their own long term self-interest?

Yes, I want to throw all existing social structures out the window, start from scratch and see what problems we encounter, and then solve one problem at a time. If it grows, we'll encounter totally different problems than what other societies encountered before, and we need different solutions. If we copy existing structures and ideas, we'll also copy their results. I don't like the results that I'm seeing around me.

In a society where you have multiple religions and languages you require very different structures from an atheist society with a single language. In a society composed of different philosophies you require very different structures then a society of a single strong rational philosophy. A philosophy of egoism requires very different social structures than one of altruism.

I know this evolutionary, no-planning, on-the-spot problem solving approach contradicts how most people think, and it might be a hard struggle to see how an evolutionary process can work at all. But the fact of the matter is that pretty much 100% of startup companies today are done this way. Why? Because it works, and it's fast. I want us to apply what works in business and software to also design a society.

 

 

5 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Is it a product, or a society to live in? A society is not a product, but real estate is. To me, "buying" a piece of Mindshore or any similar project is too "cult-y". If it's real estate, no problem. If I'm being offered a society-as-a-product, without showing me how my rights are protected, then it doesn't sound so individualistic to me.

If you somehow, some way, established a special zone of sorts, that might be worth looking into. Something better than an island in the Pacific.

Excellent comment, thank you for this Eiuol.

I don't know what to call it; I guess it has no name yet, so I just call it a product. It doesn't exist yet, so making it real and creating something of value to customers are the first problems. Right now it's just untested ideas.

As for being a cult; I trust your own awake and aware mind will keep you far away from this project if it turns into a death cult. You love your life right? That love will take you far away from any death cult. I am not afraid of that however. Might it become a "cult" of people who ask critical questions, who are interested in science, in building businesses, making money and living happy in this life? I hope so.

As for demonstrating how your rights are protected, that's a very valid point. It's important that each customer can know with certainty how they will be treated before even ordering a trip to Tahiti, and that there are systems in place to make sure Mindshore is held to a much higher standard than what's normal.

I can guarantee that we'll make mistakes and that some people's feelings are going to get hurt. But I can also promise that we'll make improvements as we go along, if there's enough interest to get it off the ground.

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16 hours ago, New Buddha said:

If the term "government" is understood in it's broadest sense, then any social organization will have one.  This is true for a nation, a state, a county, a city, a corporation, a non-profit charity, a family, etc.   Even the primate cage at the zoo has a something that works as a "government".  So too a wolf pack and the herd of deer being hunted by the wolves.

Good point New Buddha.

I think of a government as just a way to organize people, objects and systems to do a certain set of tasks that needs to be done. Those tasks can probably be done in a different way much more effectively today than 100 years ago.

I think these systems can and must be redesigned from an individualistic moral code. When we expect people to act in their own rational self-interest, and not "for the greater good", it changes incentives very much. With a better understanding of incentives we can get the systems and people to better produce the results we want.

Edited by Mindborg
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10 hours ago, Mindborg said:

We need to start from absolute scratch.

Absolute scratch would be plopping down in the middle of a forest without clothes or anything and not using any ideas people have developed. Clearly there are ideas you are using, principles others developed, principles you developed, and plenty more ideas are great and should be used. We know that a state is essential, and that such a state needs to operate to protect rights through a monopoly on force. The implementation may need to start from scratch, but you know enough to say you need to operate with a government that protects rights. Perhaps a Republic is not the best way to do this, maybe there is a great system you have in mind, but you need a government.

 

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7 hours ago, Eiuol said:

Absolute scratch would be plopping down in the middle of a forest without clothes or anything and not using any ideas people have developed. Clearly there are ideas you are using, principles others developed, principles you developed, and plenty more ideas are great and should be used. We know that a state is essential, and that such a state needs to operate to protect rights through a monopoly on force. The implementation may need to start from scratch, but you know enough to say you need to operate with a government that protects rights. Perhaps a Republic is not the best way to do this, maybe there is a great system you have in mind, but you need a government.

 

Absolute scratch:

I see I explained myself ineffectively, sorry about that. Technologically we build on all the work that has been done before. But in the questions I think we should start from the very basic, and instead of using the same answers that has been found before, we should find new solutions based on new technology.

For example, I take it as a given that we need money, but lately there has been invented new models for how to do money very differently and more decentralized than having a central bank. Bitcoin is approaching a decade of almost flawless execution, better than any other financial system thus far, and it's doing so with new technology and it's big advantages and disadvantages. You might like it or hate it, but you have to admit that it's doing what it was designed to do.

I think it's possible to use and create new technologies to answer questions differently than they have been done before.

 

On government:

Wikipedia defines government as:

A government is the system by which a state or community is managed.

It's a system to manage a state or community. Do we need that? Absolutely. Chaos is the default if people are not working and operating in a systematic way. If there's only a void after a state collapses, often it means rule by brute force. We need systems that are operating properly so that people can live in peace.

I think, however, there are more than a million different solutions that could work for that problem. So to a large extent I agree with you Eiuol.

 

On violence:

I think that better and better systems have been reducing the amount of violence needed to make societies all over the planet work, and I think this trend will continue. Eventually we might get to a society where violence and violating other's rights are activities so expensive that they are pretty much non-existent.

Edited by Mindborg
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On 6/19/2017 at 8:16 AM, Eiuol said:

If you somehow, some way, established a special zone of sorts, that might be worth looking into.

Yes, that might be coming down the road.

 

On 6/18/2017 at 2:28 PM, softwareNerd said:

Fair enough, if your primary aim is getting out of the U.S. and starting your own country. That is very different from a primary aim of living and working among fellow Objectivists.

Yeah, starting a country seems ambitious, especially when you see where I want to start. Most of you will probably laugh and say it's impossible.

On 6/18/2017 at 10:55 PM, New Buddha said:

If the term "government" is understood in it's broadest sense, then any social organization will have one.  This is true for a nation, a state, a county, a city, a corporation, a non-profit charity, a family, etc. 

Yes, there needs to be rules, though very simple at first.

 

As you know I want to build a community for rational individualists in Tahiti. As a very early start to doing this, I am asking for feedback on my ideas. If you hate the idea, I want to hear it. If you love it, think it's boring, think it needs adjustment, I would like to get your feedback. If you want to laugh at it because it's silly, please tell me, and also how I can make it less silly.

Why would this be of interest to you?

Starting small, I think that it's possible for us to create market value specifically for objectivists. It might be a possibility that a community can start growing in Tahiti over time if we can provide enough value. Over time we might create the systems needed for a more rational society to grow. We might also create systems to help people develop their reasoning skills and promote objectivism.

If you please have a look at this link:

http://mindshore.weebly.com/pre-sale.html

and then tell me what you think of it?

Is it tempting, boring, not serious, looks like a scam, beautiful, "I'm in" or anything else?

Don't worry about my feelings, I just want your opinion. What do I need to change to get you aboard?

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On ‎6‎/‎19‎/‎2017 at 9:52 PM, Mindborg said:

Absolute scratch:

I see I explained myself ineffectively, sorry about that. Technologically we build on all the work that has been done before. But in the questions I think we should start from the very basic, and instead of using the same answers that has been found before, we should find new solutions based on new technology.

For example, I take it as a given that we need money, but lately there has been invented new models for how to do money very differently and more decentralized than having a central bank. Bitcoin is approaching a decade of almost flawless execution, better than any other financial system thus far, and it's doing so with new technology and it's big advantages and disadvantages. You might like it or hate it, but you have to admit that it's doing what it was designed to do.

I think it's possible to use and create new technologies to answer questions differently than they have been done before.

 

On government:

Wikipedia defines government as:

A government is the system by which a state or community is managed.

It's a system to manage a state or community. Do we need that? Absolutely. Chaos is the default if people are not working and operating in a systematic way. If there's only a void after a state collapses, often it means rule by brute force. We need systems that are operating properly so that people can live in peace.

I think, however, there are more than a million different solutions that could work for that problem. So to a large extent I agree with you Eiuol.

 

On violence:

I think that better and better systems have been reducing the amount of violence needed to make societies all over the planet work, and I think this trend will continue. Eventually we might get to a society where violence and violating other's rights are activities so expensive that they are pretty much non-existent.

In order to understand what the concept "Government" means to an Objectivist, and what would constitute the only proper role of Government to an Objectivist, please refer to this:

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/government.html

 

 

 

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1 minute ago, softwareNerd said:

What's typical round-trip from the U.S. to Tahiti?

I spent ~1 minute searching and find tickets for about 1200-1300 dollars from LA to Tahiti, you might get better price if you spend more time searching.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Do we need a government?

If we need a government, how should it be structured?

How could a well-functioning individualistic society be organized?

So many people have strong opinions about this, but they are all wrong, including you.

The only correct answer to these questions is “I don’t know”. If you think you know, it’s probably because you have not yet started building and implementing this thing.

My huge advantage is that I have applied the scientific method in many areas of my life, and any half-good scientist loses arrogance very fast. I have assumptions that I might think have a fair chance of working. I often even assign probabilities to the different outcomes. But I only know something after I have run an experiment, and even then I am open for the possibility that I might have made an error.

I know that the only way to find out is by experimenting.

But how many experiments do you need? In software we’re used to feedback cycles of seconds, minutes, hours, days and weeks at most. In software we know that the possible things you can build are infinite, and for this reason you need to be sure to get feedback very rapidly to avoid getting off course. Customers decide what should be built. When was the last experiment in governance? How frequent are the experiments run; once per decade or century? How can anyone with a serious face claim to know what works in governance when all you have seen is a few hundred experiments? When did your government last ask you “what do you think of our service? Do you see any room for improvements?” It never happened.

The internet is awesome because there have been perhaps millions of experiments, and most didn’t work out. A few become great systems that are working well.

The fact is, you don’t know what will work in governance, and neither do I. Let's be honest and say so. Then we can experiment and find out.

Let’s use science and reason to build an English speaking society of rational individualism, not faith and force.

What do you think? Is there a way to use science to finding these things out, or should we crawl and use blind faith?

 

Original blog post found here:

http://mindshore.weebly.com/blog/do-we-need-a-government

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