God helped society put its thumb on the scales
When thinking through new ways of configuring society’s organisational models (ie how together we can work, live, trade, and agree goals and values most effectively) it’s useful to reflect on the characteristics of the most successful models humanity has used thus far. Amongst these are the village, guilds, armies, and religions. These have independently evolved ...
A Europe to die for.
This is probably one of these posts which will get me in trouble, but cycling past the soldiers standing in the rain this morning — marking the anniversary of the Somme — I was moved to tears and anger. In that 4 month long battle 1,000,000 men died to fight for 5 miles of mud. Such huge losses for ...
Do smart people change faster?
Is there a correlation between the adoption curve and IQ (or whatever measure of general intelligence / compassion / connection making etc you choose to use)? If this is true, new services start and seem interesting, but for every subsequent member that joins there is a fall in average IQ for for group. Adoption curve ...
Mastery, Autonomy, Purpose & Utopia
Mandating “Good Things” = very hard and lots of fights Listing “Unacceptable Things” = really easy, lots of consensus Listing “Desirable Things” = easy, lots of consensus if not mandatory Things that make all humans happy: Mastery, Autonomy, Purpose. Allow people to work towards desirable things (purpose) without mandating them (autonomy) whilst getting better at ...
The peace of the lobotomised or the peace of the contended?
That we’re getting better at not killing each other because of international trade co-dependence is a double edged sword. It brings a certain type of peace, but also eg economic sanctions which keep people incompetent. Peaceful, yes. Prosperous no. Not having citizens protest in the streets because they’re resigned to its futility is peaceful, too. ...
Fossil fuel vs Renewable subsidies
I this I has time to do more research on this, but I don’t, so this will have to do. From a quick Google and news review: A crude but indicative total fossil fuel subsidy in the UK of somewhere between £9bn and £12bn per year. In 2011 just over £3bn was spent on renewable energy ...
10 things I’d like the Green Party to do
I wrote this in reply to this Facebook status from a Green Party candidate: A question for all my green yet not Green friends – what might stop you voting for us? Genuinely interested as there seem to be a lot of people that I know who are working really hard to help make Bristol ...
Now for some thoughts on sheep.
We are herd animals. We appreciate and value the safety, surplus, and sharing offered by the herd. But that can only happen if we remain as a definable flock – stray too far and we loose the benefits. When we’ve grazed all that can be grazed and some of the weaker ones are getting hungry, ...
Attention-hungry child makes up song about immigration
You know a group of children are playing, then some new kid comes along behaving badly, but getting all the attention? And then when the other children start behaving even more badly than the new kid so they can get attention again? “I respect Nigel Farage,” says George Osborne on BBC News