An Educated Society Needs No Control – The Venus Project (Video)

An Educated Society Needs No Control - The Venus Project (Video) | Third Monk

The Choice is Ours is a documentary series presented by the Venus ProjectInterviews by a variety of scientists, media professionals, and other thinkers explores a variety of issues that are of social, economic, and technical interest.

The Venus Project created this informative documentary to compel the viewer into rethinking what’s possible in our world. To question the values, behaviors, origins and consequences of our social structures is of vital importance to our survival as we look to the future.

Part 1 is introduction and discussion of determinants of behavior.

Part 2 is a breakdown of problems in our present system; an obsolete monetary system. It covers the media as a tool of the established political and economic elite, corruption of all politics in all nations, and environmental challenges.

Part 3 will show solutions and proposals and will depict and illustrate Jacque’s Fresco’s life work to redesign the culture.

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Living to Work – Waking Life (Video)

Living to Work - Waking Life (Video) | Third Monk

This scene from Waking Life describes how modern work conditions can delay the progress of conscious beings.

The trick is to combine your waking rational abilities with the infinite possibilities of your dreams. Because, if you can do that, you can do anything.

Did you ever have a job that you hated and worked real hard at? A long, hard day of work.

Finally you get to go home, get in bed, close your eyes and immediately you wake up and realize… that the whole day at work had been a dream.

It’s bad enough that you sell your waking life for minimum wage, but now they get your dreams for free.

Waking Life

The Money System Is Driven By Waste and Division – Zeitgeist Movement (Video)

The Money System Is Driven By Waste and Division - Zeitgeist Movement (Video) | Third Monk

Erin of RT’s Boom and Bust brings you Peter Joseph, a filmmaker and founder of the Zeitgeist Movement.

Joseph believes that our current system is unsustainable, and he explains how the Zeitgeist Movement’s approach can improve the economy and society.

How would a non monetary society be more sustainable?

Because it would be based on actual technical premises of sustainability, things that we don’t do in the monetary system because market needs turnover. Market needs inefficiency. If you want to have a very robust market economy, you need an immense amount of things to service.

I’ll give you an example, cancer. If we’re able to resolve cancer, if we’re able to actually go after lifestyle factors, the genetic propensities, and stop this massive growth of cancer which is continuing on this planet, there would be billions if not trillions and millions of jobs lost tomorrow if this actual resolution was put forward.

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Poverty is the Worst Form of Violence Reinforced by Our Society – Peter Joseph (Video)

Poverty is the Worst Form of Violence Reinforced by Our Society - Peter Joseph (Video) | Third Monk image 2

Abby Martin speaks with Peter Joseph, founder to the Zeitgeist Movement about the philosophy behind the organization, the current unsustainable economic system and the model proposed by the movement for a sustainable future that works harmoniously with nature.

Poverty and Structural Violence

structural-violence-Peter Joseph

If you have inequality, you’re going to have conflict and psycho-social stress caused by relative deprivation. Relative deprivation is insidious and has to do with our social nature and how we perceive ourselves in the social hierarchy. When we see other people doing “better” at a higher class status, it creates tension – unfortunately this is exactly what wealth division is doing in our society.

Take a person and stick them in a poverty-stricken environment, and they develop heart disease which is known to have a direct link to low socioeconomic status. Studies have shown that if you’re just in the existence of low social economic status, the relative deprivation, the way you think about yourself has incredibly inhibiting effects over the way your body and mind works and you will develop high stress levels and cardiac problems.

What if that person with heart disease dies early at 50 because of poverty and low social status? This is a completely avoidable circumstance, which the Zeitgeist movement’s argument.

There’s no reason for anyone to be in poverty, there’s no reason to have massive wealth gaps. This is structural violence, and it has killed more people than any dictator and war combined.

Gandhi agrees, he said “Poverty, is the worst form of violence.”

Constant Consumption

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You have all these factors that force economic consumption, which forces resource consumption. The entire façade of market capitalism looks at the earth as one big inventory. At its core philosophical foundation, you can’t have a society of this nature and assume it will ever be sustainable ecologically.

Scarcity and Greed

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The economic system we have today is culturally unsustainable because it perpetuates inequality by design. Take a look at the incentive structure: in a scarcity driven world view, narrow self-interest will prevail. If you have a self-interest world view in a scarcity driven society, you’re going to lead to competitive behavior.

Competitive behavior will always develop into power consolidation, like the State, Federal Reserve, or FDA. Massive collusion working for self-interest for small isolated groups of people. If you have these pockets of consolidation and constant interest in competitive advantage, you’re going to have a constant and increasing wealth imbalance.

The market has an inherent propensity to create inequality which people love if you believe in social Darwinism, because everyone walks around reinforced to think that they’re better than everyone else because of all their property and status.

When it comes to public health, inequality is one of the most caustic things a society can generate.

Carl Sagan’s Ideas Foreshadowed the Zeitgeist Movement (Video)

Carl Sagan's Ideas Foreshadowed the Zeitgeist Movement (Video) | Third Monk image 2

The late Carl Sagan (1934-1996) was a hero in the scientific community and a role model for everyone around the world. Carl Sagan’s’ influences carry today because his words, hence his empirical point of view, seem to be ever more appropriate in our current economic and political climate.

The video does not advocate that Carl Sagan supported The Zeitgeist Movement as he passed long before its conception. Rather, using his own words, to simply show how Carl Sagan was in line with the thoughts and direction of this movement that concerns all of human kind.

For more information on the Zeitgeist movement, click here.

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The Progress of Technology Makes “Earning a Living” Obsolete – Buckminster Fuller

The Progress of Technology Makes "Earning a Living" Obsolete - Buckminster Fuller | Third Monk image 2

Buckminster Fuller was an American architect, inventor, and philosopher known to many of his friends and fans as “Bucky” Fuller. He developed numerous inventions, the most famous of which is the geodesic dome.

Bucky designed his inventions with the core belief that there are more than enough resources available to feed and house every single human being in the world.

Fuller’s philosophy claims that convoluted politics and unnecessary labor are the biggest obstacles of human progress:

The Sale of Existence

Banksy-Slave-Labor-Buckminster-FullerWe must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest.

The youth of today is absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living.

We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian-Darwinian theory, he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors.

The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had to earn a living.

Pressure from an Illusion of Scarcity

working-resource-based-economy-Buckminster-FullerMan is operating on a fundamental fallacy that assumes there is nowhere nearly enough resources to go around and never will be. The idea that man is supposed to be a failure and therefore has to prove his right to live has led to a division in consciousness:

“It has to be you or me. I must show I can earn my living, and let other people go die.”

On this basis, society has been assuming it is a handout or socialist system if you’re not “earning a living” at some job somebody has set out for you.

So we have the idea of a job as something you have to do that you don’t like in contrast to what your mind tells you needs to be done or what you’d like to do.

The Inventions of Buckminster Fuller

A brief look at Buckminster Fuller and his legacy, now more relevant than ever.

Greed Suppresses Inventions, Slows Down Progress of Society

Greed Suppresses Inventions, Slows Down Progress of Society | Third Monk image 1

If you had the resources to block a competing technology that was more efficient and better for the environment, would you do it to protect your profits? In a cash driven society, many of the wealthiest companies have no remorse about choosing profit over progress.

The consumer tech industry will delay the release of better models until the current ones finish their sales cycles and become obsolete. Hospitals make money off a sick population, there is no incentive to push through medical breakthroughs when there is little profit to be made from a healthy society.

Here are examples of the most suppressed inventions ever:

Cannabis, Medicine Disgraced by the Pharmaceutical Industry

suppressed-inventions-marijuana-cancer-cureIn 2001, Rick Simpson discovered that a cancerous spot on his skin disappeared within a few days of applying an essential oil made from marijuana. Since then, Simpson and others have treated thousands of cancer patients with incredible success. Spanish researchers have confirmed that THC, an active compound in marijuana, kills brain-tumor cells in human subjects and shows promise with breast, pancreatic and liver tumors.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, however, classifies marijuana as a Schedule I drug, meaning that it has no accepted medical use, unlike Schedule II drugs, like cocaine and methamphetamine, which may provide medical benefits. Bullshit.

 

No Profit in Free Energy, An Example of Society Going the Wrong Direction

suppressed-inventions-teslaNikola Tesla was an undisputed genius, he figured out a way to bypass fossil-fuel-burning power plants and power lines, proving that “free energy” could be harnessed using ionization in the upper atmosphere to produce electrical vibrations.

J.P. Morgan, who had been funding Tesla’s research, had a bit of buyer’s remorse when he realized that free energy for all wasn’t as profitable as, say, actually charging people for every watt of energy use. Morgan then drove another nail in free energy’s coffin by chasing away other investors, ensuring Tesla’s dream would die.

 

Oil Companies End Desire for the Streetcar

suppressed-inventions-streetcarIn 1921, the streetcar industry netted $1 billion, causing General Motors to hemorrhage $65 million in the face of a thriving industry. GM retaliated by buying and closing hundreds of independent railway companies, boosting the market for gas-guzzling GM buses and cars.

While a recent urban movement to rescue mass transit has been underway, it is unlikely we’ll ever see streetcars return to their former glory.

 

Hot Fusion, Safe and Cheap Energy Halted by Government

suppressed-inventions-tokamak-hot-fushion-afp-gettyWhen two physicists who were working on the decades-long Tokamak Hot Fusion project stumbled across a cheaper, safer method of creating energy from colliding atoms, they were allegedly forced to repudiate their own discoveries or be fired; the lab feared losing the torrent of government money for Tokamak.

In retaliation, the lead researchers created the Focus Fusion Society, which raises private money to fund their research outside of government interference.

 

Electric Car Unplugged by Oil Companies

suppressed-inventions-ev1Perhaps the most notorious suppressed invention is the General Motors EV1, subject of the 2006 documentary, Who Killed the Electric Car? The EV1 was the world’s first mass-produced electric car, with 800 of them up for lease from GM in the late ’90s. GM ended the EV1 line in 1999, stating that consumers weren’t happy with the limited driving range of the car’s batteries, making it unprofitable to continue production.

Many skeptics, however, believe GM killed the EV1 under pressure from oil companies, who stand to lose the most if high-efficiency vehicles conquer the market. It didn’t help that GM hunted down and destroyed every last EV1, ensuring the technology would die out.

 

Tylenol Wants to be the Only Pain Relief

suppressed-inventions-electrodesThe Transcutaneous Electronic Nerve Stimulation (TENS) device was created to alleviate pain impulses from the body without the use of drugs.

In 1974, Johnson & Johnson bought StimTech, one of the first companies to sell the machine, and proceeded to starve the TENS division of money, causing it to flounder. StimTech sued, alleging that Johnson & Johnson purposely stifled the TENS technology to protect sales of its flagship drug, Tylenol. Johnson & Johnson responded that the device never performed as well as was claimed and that it was not profitable. StimTech’s founders won $170 Million, although the ruling was appealed and overturned on a technicality. The court’s finding that the corporation suppressed the TENS device was never overturned.

 

Corn Used as Fuel Over Hemp, The More Efficient and Environment Friendly Choice

suppressed-inventions-hempHemp, is often identified as the same plant as marijuana and therefore unfairly maligned. Governmental roadblocks prevent hemp from becoming the leader in extracting ethanol, allowing environmentally damaging sources like corn to take over the ethanol industry.

Despite the fact that it requires fewer chemicals, less water and less processing to do the same job, hemp has never caught on. Experts also lay the blame at the feet of Presidential candidates, who kiss up to Iowa corn growers for votes.

 

Water Powered Vehicles, A Threat to Profit

suppressed-inventions-stanley-meyers-dune-buggyDespite how silly it sounds, water-fueled vehicles do exist. The most famous is Stan Meyer’s dune buggy, which achieved 100 miles per gallon and might have become more commonplace had Meyer not succumbed to a suspicious brain aneurysm at 57.

Insiders have loudly claimed that Meyer was poisoned after he refused to sell his patents or end his research. Fearing a conspiracy, his partners have all but gone underground and taken his famed water-powered dune buggy with them.

 

Efficient Light Bulbs Slowed Down By Inferior Companies

suppressed-inventions-light-bulbPhillips, GE and Osram engaged in a conspiracy from 1924 to 1939 with the goal of controlling the fledgling light-bulb industry, according to a report published in Time magazine six years later.

The alleged cartel set prices and suppressed competing technologies that would have produced longer-lasting and more efficient light bulbs. By the time the cabal dissolved, the industry-standard incandescent bulb was established as the dominant source of artificial light across Europe and North America. Not until the late 1990s did compact fluorescent bulbs begin to edge into the worldwide lighting market as an alternative.

> The 18 Most Suppressed Inventions Ever | Tru

Jacque Fresco – Money Corrupts Our Bond with Nature

Jacque Fresco - Money Corrupts Our Bond with Nature | Third Monk image 2

Jacque Fresco of the Venus Project gives a talk on how the monetary system prevents society from progressing into the future. 

Connection with Nature is the Most Important Human Relationship

All people would be trained or educated to understand our relationship to nature. If you violate that relationship, it won’t work. All man made laws are artificial. We have to study our relationship with nature:

If we damage the air, we damage ourselves.

If we damage the oceans, we damage ourselves.

If we cut down the forests, we damage our ability to maintain health.

Profits of Corruption and War

As long as the monetary system survives, you’re going to have problems. Money, yes it does produce incentive. It also produces incentive for corruption, embezzlement, taking care of your friends, and taking care of yourself.

When people seek advantage by money, you can’t have a decent world. When you have wars and people make billions of dollars off submarines and aircraft carriers, then war becomes a terrific business.

A Future Without Waste

People would study whatever they want. There would art centers, music centers, cultural centers open to everyone, without a price tag. There would be:

No Banks

No Investment Brokers

No Advertising

No Commercials

No Armies

No Navies

No Prisons

No Police

When people have access to the necessities of life, they do not steal.

If you don’t understand, imagine people living near a big water fall with lots of fresh water. No one comes at night to steal water.

2pac On Income, Class Inequality and the Rich Wasting Resources in Excess (Video)

2pac On Income, Class Inequality and the Rich Wasting Resources in Excess (Video) | Third Monk

Because I feel like, you know, it’s too much money here. I mean, nobody should be hitting Lotto for 36 million and we got people starving in the streets. That is not idealistic, that’s just real. That is just stupid. There’s no way that Michael Jackson or whoever Jackson should have a million thousand droople billion dollars and then there’s people starving. There’s no way! There’s no way that these people should own planes and there people don’t have houses. Apartments. Shacks. Drawers. Pants! I know you’re rich. I know you got 40 billion dollars, but can you just keep it to one house? You only need one house. And if you only got two kids, can you just keep it to two rooms? I mean why have 52 rooms and you know there’s somebody with no room? It just don’t make sense to me. It don’t. And then these people celebrate Christmas. They got big trees, huge trees, all the little trimmings, everybody got gifts and there’s somebody starving. And they’re having a White Christmas. They’re having a great Christmas. Eggnog and the whole 9. That’s not fair to me.” – Tupac Shakur

Jacque Fresco Interview on Larry King Live 1974 (Video)

Jacque Fresco Interview on Larry King Live 1974 (Video) | Third Monk

Back in 1974 Jacque Fresco was told he was a man before his time. Observe this Larry King interview and see for yourself. See that he is not a man before his time but a man trying to change the social culture of his time (and for good reason).

This is a new science: socio-cyberneering. And this is its inventor, the extraordinary Jacque Fresco. He’s my guest this weekend on News Weekend. My guest is an extraordinary Miamian: Dr. Jacque Fresco. I could go through all the things that Dr. Fresco has done. He’s a social engineer, industrial engineer, designer, inventor, was a consultant for Rotorcraft Helicopter, Director of Scientific Research Laboratories, Los Angeles, designed and copyrighted various items, ranging from drafting instruments to X-ray units, has had works published in the Architectural Record, Popular Mechanics, Saturday Review, and has been a technical and psychological consultant to the motion picture industry, member of the Air Force design and development unit at Wright Field, developed the electrostatic anti-icing systems, designed prefabricated aluminum houses.