Talk:Broderick CTF Essay

From Wise Nano

The Long Wave

I have noticed a similarity to an article I found in Whole Earth years ago.

It is The Long Wave Or why Asian economies are collapsing and the Democrats are cutting welfare By Donella H. Meadows of Limits to Growth fame.

It appeared in Whole Earth Summer 1998.

I would not want to place this at the bottom under Further Reading without Broderick's permission, so here it is.

SunCat 01:52, 28 March 2006 (CST)

Wilber and Beck's Color Code

Wilber and Beck

brute survival

tribal Animism

impulsive Egocentrism

disciplined Authority

managerial/ scientific Strategic

communitarian Consensus

multicultural Ecology

new age global Holism

Green, Wilber warns, tends to "dissolve blue", which can wreak catastrophic damage on prickly red (tribal/gang) cultures or subcultures struggling to shift "upward" toward Enlightenment/ Commercial orange, by invalidating support for the intermediate "conservative" or blue Guardian stage in the interests of a premature holism.

SunCat 22:25, 28 March 2006 (CST)

A for Anything Commentary

I recall reading "A is for Anything" and being rather disappointed in it. The author started off with a fascinating premise, developed it to the point where society was falling apart - and then dumped it all into a dull feudal stasis with really rather thin justification.

I wondered why, with everything free EXCEPT labor, it was necessary to regress to slaveholding, instead of simply shifting (after a period of confusion) to trading services. My conclusion was that the author simply decided it wouldn't make a very interesting story. It'd be too dully normal - "and then everyone went back to living pretty much as they always had, except the only thing traded was services", or too dully pollyanna-ish - "And everyone made their own spaceships and flew off to settle the universe".

Still, the author's choice of having a small minority somehow enslave (or kill off?) the rest of the human race always struck me as uninteresting and improbable. More likely, governments would restore minimal order by declaring martial law, and promising a new "electronic credit" money system for trading services, land, etc. From there, the story could follow a dozen or so unique and interesting alternative paths people would start exploring. Ex-criminals and would-be slave-lords, yes - but they'll be met by quickly organized neighborhood protection groups. Space enthusiasts would flock together to start building and testing - but Greens would also flock together to figure out how to avert the certain disaster they will see coming from duplicators. Utopians of every stripe would meet and talk and talk, and maybe even run off and try to live their dream society in some previously worthless patch of desert. Many ordinary folks would see this as a chance to go on permanent vacation, and rush to grab and squat on a good patch of land. But most will simply adapt and wait to see what'll happen next.

I expect something similar might happen, if molecular manufacturing happens to arrive with rapidity equal to that of duplicators in the story.

Tom Craver 01:52, 28 March 2006 (CST