Art of Climbing Trees

Introduction / Key

Goals

• ‘Complete’³⁶⁰ Eutopia within 200 years.
• Heal, grow love, sensitivity, intimacy¹⁰⁴, consciousness, transcendence⁵⁸.
• Keep the advantages of a complex society while reconnecting with the Earth.
• Create a sense of safety for each other with the sympathetic/parasympathetic nervous system in mind⁹².
• Cleaning up/dismantling our mess.
• Zero emissions by 2030.
• Re-stabilise climate to Holocene.
• Share the Earth equitably and sustainably with all species/Establish cultures of equality and reverence for all species.
• Actively rejuvenate nature and allow nature to rejuvenate him/her/themselves in both halves/parts²⁹⁹ of the Earth.
• Find the balance of freedom and responsibility/diversity and homogenisation of standards.
• Free movement of all people in our part of the Earth²⁹⁹ while limiting our movement across soft borders into designated wildlife zones (the other part).
• Adventure.

Guiding philosophies and principals

• The current system fosters psychopathy¹¹⁴.
• Our project is still the same as it ever was: to agree on what is poisonous or dangerous and then co-operate to survive.
• Tend the soil⁶²/create conditions that make empathy and sharing easier.
• Nature vs nurture? We prioritise nurture since it’s the only element of the question we can control (while being mindful of hormonal realities¹⁸³). The right kind of nurture brings out the best in our nature.
• The world is our shared commons, and everything is connected. However, local commons are stewarded by locals (within broad globally agreed-upon environmental/human rights standards).
• While eliminating our use of fossil fuels, prioritise reducing energy consumption over increasing renewables.
• Progressive regression/degrowth.
• Less is (usually) more.
• Keep the baby when throwing out the bathwater.
• Avoid solving a problem and causing another problem³²¹.

Communication

• Aim for intimacy.
• All talks are peace talks¹⁹⁹.
• Avoiding the Tragedy of the Commons⁵⁷ relies on communication.
• Share the resources fairly while living within the planet’s limits.
• I am an animal and just one species of many. I am a global citizen, just one of many. I am the universe protecting itself.
• I am just part of a continuum; seven generations are in me, and I will be in the seven generations to come^116a.
• A healthy biosphere is our life support system, convalescence home, and the primary source of mental and physical health³¹².

Money and energy

• Energy and resources are real; stock market abstraction is fiction.
• In an emergency, we can see money for what it is: irrelevant¹⁰⁷.
• Private sufficiency, public luxury.

Equality

• Equal access to resources creates opportunities for equality/liberates the individual, reduces the chance of toxic power (particularly patriarchy), and allows for genuine democracy.
• Achieving equality and a sustainable civilisation necessitates limiting the individual’s consumption.
• Inequality = violence, suffering, uncertainty, suicide by ideology/system design.
• Our access to resources/ideas and the nature of our surroundings are the soil that determines our shape, size, and resilience⁶².
• Convenience for one is often the labour of many.
• No-one gets cake until everyone has bread.

Aim for simplicity
Occam’s razor/the law of parsimony paraphrased states that ‘the simplest solution is most likely the right solution’. This may be true for designing a system because we like to use the less energy-intensive System One thinking¹⁵⁷ for daily life, and most people avoid more complex and energy-intensive System Two thinking. We mainly want to get on with life without too much mental titivation. Whichever idea we use should then be simple enough to appeal to a System One process.
On the surface, capitalism is a sound System One thinking system because the only rule is ‘each man for himself’, and if you work hard, you can accumulate to create your safety. If everyone pulls their weight, everyone will be OK. (It doesn’t account for inevitable externalities such as poverty, which capitalism relies on, and monopoly, which results from accumulated power causing further exploitation and poverty).
The Green Print may seem complicated on the surface, but its root is pretty simple. Let’s also not forget that our current system has complicated instruments such as stock market futures and intricate layers of bureaucracy.
Distilled for a System One perspective¹⁵⁷, we get decentralised/distributed power, a limit to individual wealth, alongside individual freedom within our science-supported boundaries.
Rather than thinking in terms of left or right-leaning ideas, which have become a muddier shade of purple, I am trying to use logic, reason (and empathy) fit for a crisis, examining cause and effect, noticing our needs and limitations, and accommodating them.
Some elements of the following plan may fall into a chicken or egg scenario or must be delivered simultaneously to work. Achieving genuine democracy, for example, will be impossible (at least in the long run) while enormous economic equalities still exist and corporations own the messaging system¹⁵⁷. Transforming the financial system runs in parity with recreating decision-making processes. Similarly, an Environmental Audit will be difficult to collate, while inequality allows power to corrupt the data.

A common argument is that there’s no point in acting if the US, or India continue doing business as usual. However, the LDI should work at all scales. And if just enough smaller countries are willing to risk setting aside free market trade rules, forgo cheap imports, begin their transition and set real-world based standards and clear energy and pollution decent strategies (see below), then what choice will India or the US have but to change? Cuba has proven it is possible to survive – perhaps even thrive (depending on your perception of entitlement) – with minimal access to the global market economy. For health care, for example, Cuba ranks 39 compared to the US at 37. (Although all Cubans receive the same level of care, whereas US citizens do not). Classic arguments for continuing neoliberal globalisation are maintaining development in underdeveloped countries, and the lost employment if global trade were slowed to a hobble. Instead, I propose sharing the spoils of the Earth more effectively and fairly, scrubbing debts, and equalising currencies. Countries needing development can give all their energy to improving their lives rather than growing blueberries (for a pittance) to improve mine, increasing development exponentially.

Please try using the (efficient) ‘Six Thinking Hats’ method of parallel thinking for sharing your ideas.
It helps us to organise our thoughts and feelings. Wear the Black Hat for critisism/doubts; the Green hat for creative suggestions; the Yellow for positive responses, Red for gut feelings; White for information. I am wearing the Blue Hat now, when I say we are here to design Eutopia.

Simply write ‘Black’, ‘Yellow’, ‘Green’, etc, before your given response. Then, start a new paragraph for ideas of a different coloured hat.