Building Atlantis; find the flaws

[Mindborg]

3 hours ago, New Buddha said:

If you truly have the money and/or backing for a development of this nature, then you need to seriously overhaul your website.

Here are two things that caught my eye.

For the first stage, we build a floating hostel for up to 10 people with private capsule beds and shared spaces. We welcome all people interested in living here with low cost, since we’re going to collect feedback to improve our product.

Early on we may cover the basics like rent for the first settlers. In exchange for this, the early settlers would be expected to do work like maintaining, improve and build new facilities, improve their knowledge of rational individualism , building systems for making sure the culture is keeping a high and improving standard.

This makes your project sound like Scientology.  What successful, accomplished professional living a comfortable life in the U.S. would be attracted to this?  Giving you, essentially, free labor in exchange for being judged for how well they “improve their knowledge of rational individualism”.  The type of people that this would be attractive to would be the last people in the world that you would want.

When I went to the Seasteading website (to see who did all those beautiful professional renderings) one of the first things I looked at was the Bio page.  That goes a long way to establishing credibility. You really should provide more info about who you are, when you formed, an address, etc.  You’re way too anonymous.

To be clear, I’m not criticizing the project, I’m criticizing the presentation.  There really isn’t any information on the project to provide feedback as to it’s feasibility.

Excellent comment New Buddha

I appreciate that you’re direct, honest and take the time to voice your opinion.

As for funding; the function works like this: time = money / burn rate. So I’m saying that the burn rate is very low, and I intend to keep it like that for long  

Yes, collection of data is very important. There most certainly will be a long list of problems regarding living on the sea. I will probably have to live there and take the risk at first, and then when it’s safe, we can open for more. As for 10 persons, this has now been corrected to “a few people”. I think 10 people are too high expectations early on.

 

Scientology:

I’m not very familiar with that religion, but you might have a valid point. So one idea is to perhaps rent the facilities out on AirBnb and get feedback that way. Then a person who’s very interested in this project might have a managerial role, maintaining the facilities etc. I’ve found that many libertarians have not bothered to read and learn much philosophy, so that’s why “improve their knowledge…” is in there. Since continuous learning and philosophy is so important to the culture, I put that in there.

Do you see some wrong assumptions here, or should I formulate it differently perhaps?

I did change it on the website, it’s now saying that early settlers are expected “to give lot of feedback so we can improve the facilities and build the systems needed for further expansion.”

As for free labor;

It would be an exchange of value. Free rent and the experience is certainly a value, but there could be others. Perhaps options in the project, perhaps direct payments. I think experiments need to be run to figure out what will work the best.

 

As for credibility:

TSI has credibility I have no hope of matching. I am a very private person, and have chosen to take the most difficult path to success by trying to establish credibility while remaining quite private. Quite feasibly it’s an impossible path to take, but I have seen artists do something similar; Daft Punk being one success story, Satoshi Nakamoto another. If this project succeeds it might become big news. If it becomes big news people will recognize my face if I’m public, and I cannot walk in the streets without people wanting to take pictures etc. I love walking in the streets and think for myself. I don’t want to be famous, at least not for now. I want to establish credibility by my actions and my ideas over time. When you meet me in person you’ll see my face.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this. It would be so much easier in the short term to make my face public. But I’m here for the long term, and I have to optimize for long term happiness. I’m very open for being wrong on this, but thus far I have not seen the evidence that will convince me. If I see it, I will be more public.

At the same time, I think that many people today automatically associate public figures, faces and addresses with trustworthiness. I think that is a mistake. In Galt’s Gulch Chile all the people were public. It didn’t matter, and the victims are no better off for them being public. If the leaders were anonymous they wouldn’t get away with anything of it, because people would be much less gullible. In the same way, if I can fight such an uphill battle as steep as having a robot face and still gain the trust of those around me, then I can only do that by having a different level of integrity. If I’m a person of integrity it will shine through my actions and my words.

Said in a discussion between Gail Wynand and Howard Roark (paraphrased):

(Howard) “I had an ally I could trust”

(Gail) “Who? Your integrity?”

(Howard) “No. Yours Gail”.

You have to judge for yourself if I’m trustworthy or not. Many, probably most, will have a difficult time trusting a person who doesn’t want to show his face in public. I’m increasing the short term risks of the project by doing it this way. I still think it’s doable.

I don’t expect other participants to be more public than me at current stage. It might change later.

 

Feasibility:

I agree; there’s too little information on this point. My current thoughts (subject to change) are as follows:

1. Get a lot of feedback from this forum. Thank you all, you have no idea how much I appreciate you taking the time. You might not buy in with cash until later, but you buy in enough to care to write comments.

2. Try to get some buy-in for the project. This will take time.

3. When I have some buy-in, start building in Tahiti.

4. Take pictures; display the facilities and why people should come.

5. Make experience good to awesome. This will be very difficult. Get a lot of feedback from first people. Improve things a lot and repeat.

In other words, I hope to increase the credibility of the project over time, as well as demonstrate its feasibility. By documenting facilities, progress etc.; I think that it should be possible to establish a track record and reputation over time.

 

Ah, one more thing. People who have established lives are not the target market for round 1. I don’t want married couples with kids to uproot and take the kind of risk that is in this project. As I say, it will probably fail. You don’t want to quit your job when there’s a 70-80% chance that things will fail.

I think early on I should take most risk, and perhaps we can find some young people with no responsibilities with high ambitions and dreams. Then as the risk reduces, we can take people with smaller risk tolerance.

[Mindborg]

2 hours ago, New Buddha said:

This is a good thing.  It’s hard to tell if you think it’s good or bad.

I have no idea if it’s good or bad, or even how to judge it. My point is that once you set up certain systems, they tend not to change for a very long time. I think the same can be done here. If we set up the culture and systems in a certain way, it will maintain itself.

[softwareNerd]

1 hour ago, Mindborg said:

… perhaps we can find some young people with no responsibilities with high ambitions and dreams. Then as the risk reduces, we can take people with smaller risk tolerance.

How do you anticipate these people will earn a living? 

[StrictlyLogical]

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.

 

PS come to think of it, I think Walt Disney had an approach something like this in mind when he started Epcot centre?  I’m not sure …

One big reservation with this approach is that it will not be organic and completely free but more of a “planned” community effort… perhaps allowing true freedom would only happen much later.

[Eiuol]

9 hours ago, Mindborg said:

The problem there is that I’d need substantially more money than I currently have, and I’d have to operate inside of current legal structures here on earth. Most of the assets would be placed on earth, giving governments substantial leverage. Perhaps I’m wrong, but from my perspective the route of going to sea seems to be shorter.

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. 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.

Being explicitly connected to a government is desirable, I’d imagine the EU or anyone else at all would be able to offer legal leverage as far as ability to protect rights. That’s all you need to be a potentially viable urban development, whether on the moon or in the Pacific.

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.

9 hours ago, Mindborg said:

As for resort, I don’t know much about it. Can you guide me to some links or tell me more about this?

SL mentioned Epcot - that’s the closest example.

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

[Mindborg]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[softwareNerd]

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.)

[dream_weaver]

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.

[softwareNerd]

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. 

[Eiuol]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.”

[Mindborg]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[softwareNerd]

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.

[Mindborg]

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.

[New_Buddha]

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.