The Guild of Aeonic Alchemy

Notes I've made on material taken from the 'Venus Project http://www.thevenusproject.com' and also from the 'Zeitgeist Movement http://thezeitgeistmovement.com' with a little editing done by me to make the separate sources fit together. I took the information from books, web sites, radio interviews and videos.

“We seek to create a society where people are free to choose their life's work, develop hidden potential, and pursue dreams without government intervention or financial constraint.” Zeitgeist Movement website.

A newborn child enters a world not of his or her own making. Each succeeding generation inherits the values, accomplishments, hopes, successes, and failings of previous generations.

Present human activity and its consequences does not have to be
shaped by the needs and values of our ancestors.

We can make a jump to the understanding that the world is a whole interrelated system with all its people as one family.

These lessons are designed to challenge the reader to direct the future;
not just one’s own, but that of society in general; and not just for one’s own
generation, but for those to follow.

The future does not just happen. Except for natural events like earth-
quakes, it comes about through the efforts of people and is determined
largely by how well informed people are. You can play a role in the shaping
of tomorrow’s world by asking yourself  questions like, “What kind of world do
I want to live in?”

Here is a scenario for you to consider: Suppose you were called upon
to redesign planetary civilization without any limitations based on how things
are done today. The goal is to help rid the world of war, poverty, hunger,
and environmental degradation, and to create the best world for all inhabi-
tants, given the resources at hand, for the longest period of time. 

Remember, you are free to rearrange society in any way you think will
work. The only limitation is that your social design must factor in the carrying
capacity of the planet, which means the resources have to be sufficient to
support life on the planet. 

You can rearrange the entire civilization to make what you consider
the best of all possible worlds, bearing in mind that any unmet need for any
segment of the population reduces the standard of living for all. This may in-
clude not only environmental protection, but also city design, transportation
interpersonal relationships and the restructuring of education, if you feel it is necessary. 

The options are limitless. Would you have separate nations? Would you
have an international advisory board? How would you manage and distrib-
ute the resources of the world to accommodate the needs of all? Would
you use the scientific method to make decisions, or rely on politics or mysti-
cism? How would you handle differences in religious beliefs? You may even
consider another system of distribution that doesn’t use money as a medium
of exchange.

On a personal basis, would you seek a position of advantage over oth-
ers? Would you claim a bigger house, a more luxurious car, or high-definition
TV? On what basis would you say you deserve these things? Or that others
don’t deserve them? Your skill level? Your investment of time and/or money?
Remember, if you force any predetermined set of values on other na-
tions, or others in your own nation or neighborhood for that matter, you will
generate bad feelings. How would you prevent political corruption? Would
you declare universal laws and treaties? Would you use military and police
methods for enforcement? Would you declare all resources the common
heritage of all nations? 

This is a difficult project requiring input from many disciplines.

In 2005 there were 43,200 thousand deaths in the US from car acci-
dents, plus hundreds of thousands of injuries. But consider another way we
get people from one place to another – the elevator. How many people
have been killed in collisions between elevators? These devices carry millions
of people every day without a single mishap because of their intelligent de-
sign. How might highway transportation be similarly arranged? 

If you believe that transportation should be designed so that it is almost
impossible for anyone to be killed or injured in a collision, this book is for you.
If you believe that scientific investigation can find out how to restructure so-
ciety to give each individual a greater opportunity for self-realization and fulfillment, then you will probably appreciate these ideas.

You will understand these ideas best if you can see today as a step-
ping-stone between yesterday and tomorrow. You will also need sensitivity
to the injustices, lost opportunities for happiness, and deadly conflicts that
characterize our twenty-first century civilization.

The shape and solutions of the future rely totally on the collective effort
of people working together.  We are all an integral part of the web of life.
What affects other people and the environment has consequences in our
own lives as well.

What is needed is a change in our sense of direction and purpose -- an
alternative vision for a sustainable new world civilization unlike any in the
past. Although this vision is highly compressed here, it is based on years of
study and experimental research. 

These writings offer possible alternatives for striving toward a better
world. It arrives at decisions using the scientific method. Like any new ap-
proach, it requires some imagination and a willingness to consider the un-
conventional in order to be appreciated.  Remember that almost every new
concept was ridiculed, rejected, and laughed at when first presented, especially by the experts of the time.

  That’s what happened to the first scientists who said the earth was
round, the first who said it went around the sun, and the first who thought
people could learn to fly. You could write a whole book, and many have,
just on things that people thought were impossible up until the time they happened. Imagine going to the moon, for example! Your great-
grandparents would have laughed at such a notion! Such notions were the
ramblings of science fiction writers. Many forward thinking people have
been locked up and even executed for saying such things as the earth
wasn’t the center of the universe. 

Almost everyone you know will go for the scientific way when it comes
to surgery, airplane rides, or building things like skyscrapers, bridges, and
cars. Over the centuries, we seem to have developed a consensus that
when it comes to matters of personal safety, we will go with the science
rather than the magic. Why is that? Probably because it works, and every-
body can see that it does.

Then why don’t we do that when it comes to planning our societies,
our cities, transportation systems, agriculture, health care, and so on? If you
thought we were already doing all those things scientifically, look again! If
science has a lot to do with what works, then clearly there’s much about to-
day’s social and economic setup that isn’t scientific, because things aren’t
working very well for the majority of the world’s population or the environment.
If they were, war, poverty, hunger, homelessness, pollution, etc., would not
be so prevalent today. Unfortunately our social structures evolved with no
overall global planning. 

One condition for the assignment of redesigning society is that your social design must live within the carrying capacity of our planet. This means
our resources have to support life on the planet for everyone.  This will cer-
tainly require scientific methods of evaluation.

If one wishes to put a person on the moon, one cannot just build a
rocket and head for the moon. We must first test what forces the human
body can stand. We would put a person in a centrifuge to see just how
many “G’s” the body can withstand. We would put a person through a barrage of tests. For instance, we would test to see how the body functions in a
gravity-free environment and the effects on human health. We would also
need to have information about survival possibilities on the moon; for example, is there water, air, an acceptable temperature range, etc. 

In much the same way we must look at the entire planet as a whole
and ask “what have we here?” We want to apply this same intelligent
method of planning using a scientific system of Earth sciences for planetary
survival. The degree to which we don’t apply this scientific method to the
way we live on Earth may very well determine the unnecessary amount of
suffering that will occur.  How do we do this?

Many people think greed is a part of human nature. Since people lived
with scarcity or the threat of scarcity for centuries, that has developed behavioral patterns such as greed, and admiration of those who have accumulated wealth through crime, embezzlement, and more. These patterns
have been with us for centuries so many think it is just human nature and
can not be changed. But consider this example: if it rained gold for a week,
people in a scarcity culture would rush outside and fill their houses with gold.
If the rain of gold continued for years, they would sweep it out of their
houses and throw away their gold rings. In an environment of abundance
and emotional security, many negative patterns would no longer be preva-
lent.

In an environment of great scarcity of food stuffs, people horde food.
This behaviour results from the scarcity of food.  But on a South Sea island with low population and abundant food, human behaviour is quite different.
When fish are caught, they are shared with everyone.

Many other examples show how environment sets patterns and values. In a hostile environment, smaller people will tend to develop the weapons. After World War II, even the most respectable German families fought over scraps of food in garbage cans to survive. In a scarcity-oriented society, generosity is a rare occurrence. If a girl is very attractive by established social standards, she will attract many male admirers. On the other hand, when a girl is less attractive, she tends to develop other attributes to level the playing field. People with little knowledge of the physical world tend to see gods and demons as the prime controllers of natural phenomena. There was a time when men of great strength were admired and held in high esteem in armies. The advent of the gun tended to equalize their combat abilities. There have been wars ever since people have been on earth, and many attribute this to human nature. But it is really the scarcity of resources which causes territorial disputes. 

Many people today see genes as a reason for aberrant behaviour, but
the major influences have been shown to be environmental. Genetic make-
up alone does not fully explain or illuminate human behaviour. The sciences
of human behaviour deal with a complex system of genes, environmental     
conditions (food, shelter, family dynamics, education, religious training, per-
sonal experiences), and the interpretation and decisions people make
about the world and their place in it. 

What is considered appropriate behaviour today may be considered     
un-sane in the future. One question that remains is how much of our value
system is programmed by society’s efforts to perpetuate existing and estab-
lished institutions. It is not human nature, but human behaviour that we need
to be concerned with. That can easily be changed by appropriate and   
relevant education, and the design of an environment which coincides with
the carrying capacity of the earth. Better values, ideals, and behaviour   
cannot be fully realized while there is still hunger, unemployment, deprivation, war, and poverty. 

Next Phase in Social Development.

What is it that we all have in common? Where should our priorities lie?
All nations and people, regardless of political philosophy, religious beliefs, or social customs, depend upon natural resources; we all need clean air and
water, arable land for food, and the necessary technology and personnel to
maintain a high standard of living. Perhaps we should update the way society works so everyone on earth can take advantage of our technological
ability to maintain a clean environment and a high standard of living. There is not enough money to begin to pay for this type of change, but there are
more than enough resources on Earth to create it. 

To review: the Earth has abundant resources and our practice of 
rationing these resources through the use of money is an outdated method
which causes much suffering.  It is not money that we need but the intelligent management of the earth’s resources for the benefit of everyone. We
could best work towards achieving this by using a resource based economy.

Resource-based Economy

This is a very different concept than anything else put forth today. To
put it simply, a resource-based economy uses resources rather than money,
and people have access to whatever they need without the use of money,
credit, barter, or any other form of debt or servitude. All of the world's re-
sources are held as the common heritage of all of Earth’s people.

In a resource-based economy, resources are used directly to enhance
the lives of our total population. In an economy based on resources, we can easily produce all of the necessities of life and provide a very high standard of living for everyone.

Future By Design — Emerging Into a Saner Future
First Steps

To begin implementing a resource-based economy, social designers
must utilize the scientific method and pose the question “What do we have
here?” With the requirement that all be provided for in the most efficient,
comfortable, and enduring manner possible, the first priority is making a
purely technical assessment of basic needs of the total global population.
The amount of housing, food, water, health care, transportation, education,
and other such needs must be compared to the available resources the
planet has to offer. This has to be balanced with the needs of other species
that make up the web of life on Earth. 

The main objective is to overcome scarcity and provide for the needs
of all the world’s people.  In order to create a workable and sustainable 
civilization as quickly as possible, we need vast amounts of energy. What is
desperately needed is an energy development strategy on a global scale,
requiring a joint venture of international planning on a level never before
achieved. 

Energy

One of the most useful measures of the development of civilization is
the amount of available energy per person. To a large extent the degree of
physical comfort you enjoy today correlates with the energy at your 
disposal. Imagine the paralyses that would occur if your electricity and
gasoline supply were cut off, and you had to use your own muscles to get
things done.

The resource-based economy quickly goes to work on clean sources of
energy. This is only possible when there are no more monetary limitations in
the way of accomplishing or providing what’s needed. With the restrictions
of profit, property, and scarcity eliminated, research labs would quickly 
begin working together and sharing information freely. There would be no
need for patents or proprietary information since the end goal is not to
make money in order to continue working, but to achieve results that are
freely and quickly available to the planet’s entire population. 

This is a project that many people would be eager and grateful to work on,
when the results immediately benefit all people. Interdisciplinary teams of
qualified personnel, in line with the project’s requirements, will work on energy and automated systems to produce and supply goods and services on
a massive scale. Even the university students will help participate in arriving
at fast methods of solving these problems. 

These can be the armies of the future, a large peaceful mobilization to
restore and preserve the earth and its people. This has never been done 
before and can only be done when money is no obstacle. The question is
not do we have the money, but do we have the resources and means to
accomplish this new direction.   

During the transition from one system to another, scarcity regions are
provided with heat concentrators for cooking and sterilizing water. Foods for
those areas are dehydrated and compressed to save shipping space. The
packaging is biodegradable and may double as non-contaminating fertilizers. Regions without arable land will use hydroponic farms, land-based fish
farms (Jai's note: fish farms do not get my support), and sea farming (Jai's note: of sea vegetables only, to get my support). To conserve energy during the transition, instead of each family preparing food, there are food distribution centers with food shipped directly to homes and restaurants. These massive methods of supplying goods and services are applied throughout the world.

Vast sources of energy will be explored and developed. These include
wind, wave and tidal action, ocean currents, temperature differentials, 
falling water, geothermal, electrostatic, hydrogen, natural gas, algae, bio-
mass, bacteria, phase transformation, and thermionics (the conversion of
heat into electricity by boiling electrons off a hot metal surface and 
condensing them on a cooler surface). Additionally, there is the potential 
of Fresnel lenses to concentrate heat.

Fusion energy is the same energy that drives the cosmos and the stars.
When we learn how to harness it, the world’s energy problems will be solved
forever, without any detrimental effects or dangerous toxic materials to be
disposed of. The only residue would be the clean ash of helium. 

In our resource-based economy, there are comprehensive studies of
the environmental and human impact before starting any large projects.
The major concern is to protect and restore the environment for the benefit
of all living creatures in the community of life. The purpose of the construction and development of these power projects is to free human beings from unnecessary laborious tasks. In order to achieve this society, we will need to automate most jobs as quickly as possible. 

To have a world without pollution and waste, yet keep parks, 
playgrounds, art and music centers, schools, and health care available to
everyone without a price tag, requires profound changes in the way we
plan our cities as well as our lifestyles.

The key to achieving abundance and a high standard of living for
every person on the planet, is to automate as much as possible in the 
shortest period of time. By replacing human labor with machines and 
implementing a global resource-based economy, everyone lives better than
the wealthiest of today. A future without locks on the doors, and no fear of
someone hitting you over the head to steal your goods or money is possible 
because everyone has free access to all that is available. And there can be
much available by automating and using resources wisely.

Cybernation, the merging of computers with production, will unleash
an outflow of goods and services never before experienced. There is much
work to be done on artificial intelligence (AI). AI is computer programming
that simulates human decision-making and hypothesis testing along with
self-correction. AI redesigns mechanical and electronic systems to simulate
and improve upon human performance. As exciting as these developments
are, we are just at the beginning of the possibilities.

Cybernation can be regarded as the only real emancipation proclamation for humankind when used humanely and intelligently. It enables
people to have the highest conceivable standard of living with practically
no labor. It frees people for the first time from the routine of repetitive day-
by-day activity. When humans are free of the outmoded methods of a
monetary system, we will finally begin to understand what it means to be
civilized

(Jai's note: Civilizing society is where I feel religion would fit in very well with a resource based society. People would be fit, healthy and have time on their hands to inquire about who they are and what are their origins. People would not be limited only to the arts, science and philosophy. Religions will be there to give their message. All these sources of information and practices will be contributors to civilizing people).

Conclusion

The conflicts today with our fellow human beings are over opposing
values and limited access to the necessities of life. If we manage to arrive at
a saner future civilization, the conflicts will be against problems common to
all humans. In a vibrant and emergent culture, rather than having conflicts
between nations, the challenges we will face will be overcoming scarcity,
restructuring damaged environments, creating innovative technologies,   
increasing agricultural yield, improving communications, building communi-
cations between nations, sharing technologies, and living a meaningful life.

People would be free to pursue whatever constructive endeavors they
chose without economic pressures, restraints, and taxation that are inherent
in the monetary system. By constructive endeavors, we mean anything that
enhances the lives of the individual and others. With these major alterations,
people would eventually live longer more meaningful and healthier lives.
The measure of success would be the fulfillment of one's individual pursuits
rather than the acquisition of wealth, property, and power.

As we enhance the lives of others, protect our environment, and work
toward abundance, all our lives can become richer and more secure. If
these values were put into practice, it would enable all of us to achieve a
much higher standard of living within a relatively short period of time; a stan-
dard of living that would be continuously improved. When education and
resources are available to all without a price tag, there will be no limit to   
human potential.