Modelearth File

MODEL EARTH
Designing the Future of the Earth

Collaboratively
MODEL EARTH INVITATION
AN APPEAL TO ACADEMIA
CREATING PEACE
DEFINING SUSTAINABILITY
CREDIT and DEDICATION
WRITINGS
back to: MODEL EARTH
invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

peace defining sustainability credit and dedication
Model Earth - An Invitation
to participate in creating of a co-operatively,

collectively designed, interactive model of an
ideal, ecologically and socially sustainable Earth,
a model that would portray an Earth possessing
optimal living conditions for all those who share it
for the purpose of there being a universal
reference that would be helpful in any projects
concerning the future of any social entity--from a
locally based community, to the whole Earth.
Why Model Earth?
It is obvious from reality that the hierarchical

forms of government that are in existence now,
no longer can cope with the increasing magnitude
of problems that humanity is forced to face. Since
any attempts, so far, (in the form of reforms,
revolutions, etc.) to improve humankind's lot
failed to achieve any significant results, perhaps
a new approach should be considered.
There are already many people with good ideas

about a better future for a better future actually to
start happening, one could think. However, most
of these ideas (on the whole) are not
synchronized, and in many instances these ideas
are quite vague, untested properly against all the
other ideas that there might exist about our
collective future, and mostly addressing only very
superficial concerns. Thus, even though it would
seem that a great deal is being done for a better
future, on the whole the situation in the world
continues becoming worse. Many of those ideas
are often contrary to each other, and conflicts
might evolve when those ideas are in the state of
realization--something that the model would try
prevent by resolving any possible discrepancies
among all such ideas within the model before any
conflicts could develop in reality with far greater
efficiency than , probably, any discourse, or any
diplomatic processes of today could ever
accomplish.
It could also be said that a kind of a model of a

better Earth future already exists in the minds of
all those who think about what their future and
the future of the world should be like, but for any
expedient and practical purposes this model that
might exist in the general world consciousness is
too vague and is not explicit enough for any clear
reference, something that Model Earth would
surpass by being there accessible for any
purposes of reference, discourse, and "round-
table" style discussions.
Model Earth would be co-created by virtually

anyone, from anywhere on Earth, who would like
to match one's own ideas of what his/her ideal
future should look like with the ideas of everyone
else; at present a very few people try to co-
ordinate their ideas about their future with the
ideas of all others.
This process would not be based on any arbitrary

notions, however, but based on all the knowledge
that there would be available of any pertinent
issues involved in the modeling. From their
involvement in the modeling process it would be
obvious to the participants what ideas that they
might have about their future would be viable,
and what ideas would not be so--this interactive
model would be the best educational tool
available, addressing participants' ideas in terms
of justifiability with the current state of knowledge
and with the ideas/wishes of all other participants.
The advantage of using this modeling tool over

the current way of deciding the Earth future
would lay in its being impartial and non-partisan--
neither suppressing, nor favoring anyone's ideas
over those of others. This model that would be
being created on ongoing basis (because
knowledge and ideas evolve constantly) would be
authoritative not because of possessing any
executive authority, but because of its portraying
most realistically what the optimal state of Earth
should be, according to current state of
knowledge; influenced not by any partisan
interests, but, based on the realistic wishes of
virtually all who would chose to use this
modeling tool.
This modeling tool could be used in arbitrating of

conflicts, it would be impartial, and it would be
taking into consideration the opinions of even
those parts of populations that otherwise would
be left out from decision-making processes.
Think of this model as a universal "ombudsman"

that would be authoritative not because of
possessing any executive powers, but
authoritative because presenting an Earth with
optimal conditions for life.
This interactive model could co-ordinate the

efforts and enhance the scope of perspective and
efficiency of the many existing groups that aim to
improve living on Earth (NGO and others), and
would allow sharing of all of their available
databases.
This model would be possible to be created on

existing computers linked by the Internet. The
technology that would allow linking of a virtually
unlimited number of computers together to form a
supercomputer already exists (one of the terms
used is "distributed computing"), and would not
demand any outlay of much more than volunteer
energy.
There would be a need for volunteers at the start:
* computer specialists to link all the

participants' computers in to a vast
"supercomputer" ("distributed computing"), and
to create the programs that would enable the
interaction of the participants with the model,
* scientists and specialists from all imaginable

fields to connect the model with all the available
data bases that would allow checking of ideas for
viability and that would direct participants to
knowledge pertinent to whichever issue might be
involved, and
* a number of organizers to direct the setup

and the development of this project.

An Appeal to Academia.
Despite the advances that are being made in

amassing of knowledge by humankind, not
enough of this knowledge is being used to
improve the overall quality of life on Earth, even
though, arguably, there is enough knowledge
available that would enable humankind to
improve the living conditions of all Life on Earth
considerably.
That humankind's knowledge is not fully applied

to improving the quality of Life on Earth might be
mainly due to the fact that the application of
knowledge to the what-so-ever various problems
that might exist on Earth rests in the hands of
people whose power and wisdom to apply
knowledge to solving our problems is limited at
most times.
This creates a situation where on one hand

individuals who specialize in creating and
enhancing of humankind's knowledge are free to
create and enhance as much knowledge as they
can and want, only to see, on the other hand, this
knowledge not being applied to its full potential
extend.
Humankind's knowledge has become very

specialized--it is impossible for anyone to know
enough on most subjects in any of the fields of
knowledge. This situation limits our ability to plan
our future effectively--it is difficult to achieve an
agreement on what the ideal future should be.
This situation might be helped by creating of a
model that would present the composite of what
each participant creator of the model (ideally any
and all humans on Earth) would think an ideal
state of affairs on Earth should be, in which any
and all knowledge available would be applied
optimally to solving problems that humankind
faces by all who might think that they know
anything (not only academicians) on whatever
subject that might be thought important for life on
Earth. All proposed solutions would be tested for
compatibility with each other, and with the data-
base that would contain all to the whole Earth
pertinent knowledge.
Creating of such a model would permit a vast co-

operation across all the fields of all sciences--the
closest thing to unification of sciences there
might ever happen. The model would be based on
the best reason for the existence of science: an
actual application of knowledge for the benefit of
life on Earth. The on-going creation of such a
model would eventually start presenting a picture
of life on Earth as it ideally could be--the model
would be an "ombudsman" without any executive
powers, however one that would be powerful by
the strength of presenting a model of for life on
Earth optimal conditions based on the knowledge
available, to whose opinions the powers-that-
there-might-be could gradually be attuned and
subsequently sufficiently educated to apply their
powers appropriately to the real needs of life on
Earth.
No situation, or a research objective modeled

could be too small, nor too large in scale, nor
would anyone be prevented from trying to
improve on any instance modeled, since the
model would be ideally accessible by anyone on
Earth. Any solutions to any problems would have
to be, beside being consistent with the knowledge
available in the database, open to anyone's
critique and to anyone's improvements.
All the components necessary for the creation of

such a model are readily available--potentially all
the PC's in the world linked together by, perhaps,
using "distributed computing" (which would
enable the model to exist without requiring any
particular physical location) and the existing data-
bases at all the institutions of learning there are.
The labor necessary for running of the model
could be gotten by diverting of the effort that
goes into research that is being done already on
solutions vital to humanity into conducting
research within the model, thus reducing
unnecessary redundancy and improving the
quality of research by enabling more researchers
from many more fields of science than is
currently possible to work on those research
problems together, and so vastly enhance the
quality of any such research.
The Earth has only one possible future, a future

that is the result of all the individual actions that
are meant to improve the lives of all the individual
actors and their progeny. By resolving conflicts
that are a natural consequence of carrying out the
individual actors' wishes for better conditions of
their lives in a model, rather than in real life, a
great amount of unnecessary suffering could be
avoided.

CREATING PEACE:
Designing a Peace That Would Last.
Knowing that every time of peace in human

history ended in a war, what should "Peace on
Earth" look like, so it would not result in a war
again?
Unless we can answer this question, and unless
we can unify and harmonize all the eventual
answers in order to prevent any discrepancies in
the answers to cause strife in real life, we can
never achieve real "Peace on Earth".
We should learn how to imagine, in as much

detail as possible, what would constitute a real
"Peace on Earth", and then, since we each have
different concepts of the idea, we should learn
how to constructively reconcile all the differences
in order to arrive at a unified design of "Peace on
Earth", because the Earth can possibly have only
one future.
Unifying of all the different ideas that we might

have about the future of the Earth in a model
would prevent conflicts from happening in real
life, since, after all, wars happen because people
would go to war so that Peace happens their way.
SURVEY:
What is your idea of what a "Peace on Earth" (one
that would not again end in a war) should look
like?
Please write to modelearth at google com, with
"Peace" in the subject.
Thank you!
"Es reicht nicht aus einen Krieg zu gewinnen -

viel wichtiger ist es Frieden zu organisieren."
(Aristoteles) - from: http://www.ogee.de/blog/?
p=53
(It is not enough to win a war--far more important

is to organize Peace.)

Defining Sustainability.
(an ongoing draft)
It appears that as the subject of "sustainability" is

gaining popularity, the definition of sustainability
is becoming less focused; although there is a
myriad of projects whose concern is professedly
"sustainability", "sustainability" is becoming
progressively less likely achievable, because it is
hard to achieve something that we don't know
what it actually is.
It is not that individuals would not know what
"sustainability" might mean to them, but it is that
each person's "sustainability" might be very
different, if not even at odds with, from what
"sustainability" might mean to others.
Not the least problem with "sustainability" is that

mercenary concerns rate, in most instances,
higher than any other; thus "sustainability" might
just be an excuse for achieving higher
economical gains. This distorts the meaning of
"sustainable"/"sustainability" considerably even
further.
"Sustainability" could be modeled, creating a

"picture" of what an ideal "sustainable" future of
any geopolitical entity on Earth should be, using
as input all the various ideas that virtually all
people might have about what "sustainability"
might mean together with the sum total of what
we know of Earth in order to see how each and
any of those ideas would fare under "real"
conditions in a model.
The Earth is facing unprecedented hardships
caused by human ignorance, and by modeling the
future we would eliminate the very costly process
of deciding what works and what doesn't--in
trying to remedy the situation--by the currently
used "hit, or miss" method.
The Earth future, at any point of time, is a result

of the actions all the inhabitants of the Earth take
in order to ensure a satisfactory future for
themselves and for those whose future matters to
them. But because our desires for a satisfactory
future are, not infrequently, at odds with the
desires of others, the final outcome--the future
that we experience now-- usually pleases only a
few.
It would be different should all the differencies

that there are among all the individuals' wishes
for future resolved harmlessly in a model, rather
than with often tragic consequences in real life.
Such modeling of our common future would be a

profound educational experience for all those
who would participate in this modeling process,
because individually we usually have but a very
limited view of all the factors that go into making
a future to happen, and the modeling process
would show clearly where all those deficiencies
might lie. In the modeling of our common future
we would learn what we actually need to learn for
a satisfactory future to happen.
By directly participating in designing our own
future in a model our education would become
meaningful to us; furthermore--we would learn at
our own pace, and only that that would make
sense to us--we would learn "on-the-job". We
would not be learning something that would not
have a direct connection with our lives.
We have all the technology necessary for

designing of the future. By using "distributed
computing", for an instance, software for which is
available in the form of "open source", the model
could "reside" on all of the participants'
computers thus eliminating the need for any
physical structures. The process would be
accessible to anyone interested in having a hand
in the creation of one's future--something that
our current reality denies to most.
Would there exist a model of what to all an

optimal future should look like, the currently
available process of creating our common future
that currently is in the hands of people whose
interests are not necessarily identical with that of
those they represent would benefit by the fact
that every one could compare the performance of
those who govern to that what actually should be
happening.
The possible uses for such a model would be

many.
Please, let me know what you think of the idea.

There is more about the idea at:
http://www.modelearth.org
Thank you, sincerely - Mr. Jan Hearthstone.
Notes.
A general observation pertaining to the
sustainability of a solution to problems of
sustainability could be that simpler, less complex
social structure permits easier monitoring of
processes affecting the ecological conditions,
and, vice versa, that simpler solutions to
ecological sustainability problems require a less
complex society to implement those.

CREDIT
for the ideas presented in

"MODEL EARTH"
goes to
Mahayana Philosophy
and to
The Path of Least Resistance by Robert Fritz.
(Salem, MA, DMA Inc., 1984, ISBN: 0-930641-00-0.)
DEDICATED
to the optimal physical and mental well-being of

all beings anywhere and anytime.
© - Modelearth - 1999, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007 -
modelearth at gmail dot com
Writings
(all are drafts, except "Indigenous Hawai'ian Culture ...")
"Legalize" the Right to Sleep.

Petri Dish Called Earth.
Sustainable Education.
Making Peace from All Sides of Conflict at the Grass

Root Level.
Torture Starts at Home.
Ecologically and Socially

Sustainable Crestone.
Transportation
and
Ecological and Social Sustainability.
Our Troubled Science:

Why We Are Descending into Dark Ages.
Mahayana, Homelessness, and Benefitting All Beings.
Indigenous Hawai'ian Culture

and
ECOLOGICALLY AND SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE

EDUCATION.
Natural Human Rights

and
Good Homes, not More Prisons is the Answer.
Defining Sustainability (?).
Designing Sustainable Future for the Earth.
Mahayana
and
Designing the Future of the Earth Collectively:

A Grand Unification of All Science Effected by Making
All Available Knowledge Useful for Solving Earth's
Problems.
Credit and Dedication.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
"Legalize" the Right to Sleep.
Every night thousands of people don't know where to

go to sleep. Sleep they have to, eventually, and in
order to get some rest they are forced to trespass, for
which they are frequently penalized. The homeless
trespass where-ever they go most of the time, in fact.
When they move from place to place (they cannot
well be denied that--all "normal" people do that) they
are somewhat safe. However, when it comes to trying
to get some rest (which "normal" people do at their
residence they own, or at places that they rent), they
become conspicuous, an object of scrutiny, and
unless utterly inured to their predicament, they are
made uncomfortable.
As a result of all this, the homeless rarely, if ever, get

a proper rest. Even for the few, who go to spend the
night in an "emergency (a state of existence that for
some is protracted to the day they die) shelter", the
place, usually, is not designed with providing comfort
to them in mind. Those who, out of choice, or out of
necessity, have to spend the night outdoors, have to
hide from being found by either the law enforcers, or
other desperate people who prey on the weaker
ones, and there are fewer and fewer places to hide.
Not getting proper rest becomes a way of life. One's
senses become dulled, one's judgment suffers; tired
people make fewer wise decisions, and it is a short
distance from being a trespasser to being a criminal
and/or a substance abuser. Who had not any
problems with the law, or was not a substance abuser
before becoming homeless, has a far greater
opportunity to become so when tired, and not being
able to think clearly.
It is a conclusion that requires no great wisdom to
make that the society, as a whole, does not benefit
from having any of its members not being able to
make sensible decisions about their lives. It should
also be wholly unnecessary to point out the great
advantages of having a society of people who are
able to get a rest needed for their functioning well.
Mistakenly, many people think that the right to sleep

is implicit; that it is a right that does not have to be
legalized. Many think so, till they find out otherwise,
either first-hand by becoming homeless, or becoming
awakened to the needs of others (a less and less
happening occurrence).
Sadly--it feels indecent to point out a truth--but there

are such that benefit from others' misery,
undoubtedly, otherwise how could such an injustice
(a thing very obvious to a sane mind) persist? Why
not follow reason and legalize the right to sleep?
Imagine a society where everybody had an explicit
right to rest! It would be a beginning of a new, saner
era.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
Petri Dish Called Earth.
It happens, now and then, that when microscopic

organisms grow in a petri dish that a species
starts suddenly taking over all the available
"lebensraum", crowding all the other cultures out,
and suddenly disappears after having killed most
of its fellow organisms, not having any more
room to expand in. It is wholly natural happening,
observable also during the stages of developing
ecosystems before they reach a state of a relative
stability. A species suddenly flourishes,
seemingly triumphing over other species, to
disappear in a blink of an eye, as if. This
phenomenon might happen a few times during
ecological successions that ensue when an
ecological system gets disturbed from the outside
of that system, and that continues till the
ecosystem reaches a state of a dynamic balance
in which ecological processes cycle around their
mean values.
Analogically, one could see the entire earth

system as being a vast petri dish that got
disturbed from the outside by an asteroid some
sixty million years ago, whose impact caused the
demise of a vast number of faunal and floral
species. Ever since then the earth ecological
system has been recovering from the
disturbance, going through successional stages
that eventually will result in a relatively stable
climax, unless another asteroid, or other unusual
catastrophe would cause a process of re-
stabilization anew. And, as in any other isolated
system that is undergoing a process of
stabilization, we might be able to discern the
evidence of species coming and going in ongoing
successions. One of those species in our giant
petri dish earth is a hairless ape that is coming to
a prominence currently, one that started over-
crowding the earth, crowding out many other
fellow "petri dish" species. Most likely this
species will also suddenly disappear after its
bloom and will be replaced by some, till now
insignificant, contender. These goings-on will
continue till the earth system reaches a relative
stability again, eventually (unless disturbed from
the outside of this relative system again, etc.).
This currently on earth dominant species is us,

humans, of course, and we are not the only
species that happens to ever have been dominant
(from time to time) in our giant petri dish. Our
behavior is nothing unnatural, we behave as a
myriad other species in a myriad of ecosystems
would - we are fully natural, and so is everything
we do. We are an indelible part of the nature. We
might even expedite our own (and most of other
species around us) extinction, but that would be
also fully natural, judging by what we know about
ecological developments. Looking at our earth
petri dish from a macroscopic point of view,
business is always as usual. So - why should
anyone care about what humans are doing?
The answer is that we, humans, should care, for

purely selfish reasons, if we ever do care about
ourselves and about our offspring. It is very
obvious that most calamities and sufferings that
humans are subject to are human made. Humans
are their own main source of their miseries. They
are very much like any microscopic organism
(presumably non-intelligent) in a petri dish that by
its very own success as a species undermines its
own future continuity and well-being. Humans do
not seem to be any different from any such
species, despite their own self-declared
superiority to all other life. We even call our own
species "sapient" ("full of knowledge",
"sagacious", according to Webster's). This self-
denomination, obviously, is not true, judging by
the overall human behavior which is not different
from the behavior of any "successful" species in
any petri dish. It would very much seem from
observing life in petri dishes that the real recipe
for a real long term success for any truly
intelligent species would be to strive for a
stability of existence of all the different
microorganisms in any petri dish, including the
petri dish Earth, and if there is a real intelligence
in any petri dish (be it a glass one, the petri dish
earth, or the petri dish universe), it would be
undetectable, not distinct from any other
organisms around, because an intelligent species
would have to, for purely selfish reasons, in order
to succeed in the long term, care as much about
any other species as about itself. This paradoxical
recipe for success might not make sense to many
humans today, but unless it does, we cannot call
ourselves "Homo sapient". Judging by our
"success" we are enjoying now at the expense of
other life in our petri dish, we are not enough "full
of knowledge" yet.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
Sustainable Education.
Imagine an education in which students would be designing

a world in which they would like to live.
At first they might come up with ideas that might appeal to
them, but that might not be possible to realize.
From this point on, the real educational process would

start--in order to find out whether the idea of what one's
ideal future would be possible to realize, the student would
have to learn all, or at the least as much as possible, about
what facts and what knowledge they have to have in order
to prove the viability of their idea, and then they would have
to harmonize their ideas about what their future they would
like to look like with the ideas of any- and everybody else,
otherwise--how would they be able to make their ideas
come true in real time/space without, sometimes even
violent, conflicts?
The students would grow up with well informed ideas about

what they want in their lives, they would clearly learn what
would directly matter to what they want in their lives, and
this would empower their actions to obtain the kind of lives
that they would like to have.
The possible variations on the theme are many.
One possible scenario:

As soon as students would start being interested in what
the future might bring them, it would be made possible to
them to start designing a future for themselves that they
would like to have. They first drafts would indicate what it is
that they would have to learn in order to see whether their
designs are possible to realize, or not.
Sustainable education should not be confused with any

education about "sustainability", unless education about
sustainability would directly lead to establishing of a
sustainable world.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
Making Peace from All Sides of Conflict at the

Grass Root Level.
To whom this may concern--
I have an idea that, perhaps, could be helpful in

diffusing of inter-national conflicts--maybe you
might even know of people who would be able to
help with implementing of this idea? These days,
during most, if not all, violent conflicts the
majority of people involved in those conflicts
doesn't have much say in influencing of the
outcome of such conflicts; the course of action is
very much in the hands of the leaders (be those
elected, or not).
What I am trying to propose is that by using

existing technological possibilities (perhaps
"distributed computing" based modeling--a
proven thing) potentially all people on a grass-
root level from of all the sides of any conflict
would together create a model of an ideal
peaceful co-existence that would be acceptable
by all the sides involved.
This model would attempt to reconcile
differences that there might be among all the
individual ideas all those who would participate in
a creation of the model might have about what
their future peaceful coexistence should look like.
Since most people's ideas about what their future
should be differ from the ideas that others have,
this model would aim at preventing of differences
reconciling in real life, which not infrequently
happens even in a violent way.
The model would be accepted only on the basis

of its reasonableness--the model would
eventually show graphically, after being inputted
by the participants in the conflict repeatedly to all
of the involved mutual satisfaction, the optimally
possible state of things in the territories and
societies that are involved in the conflict.
The model (that would exist in the "distributed

computing" "supercomputer"--that means in the
cyberspace--no physical location would be
required for the model's existence) would show
clearly how resources, peoples, communities,
borders, and all such would be situated, and also
the model would show why this should be an
optimal state of affairs according to all facts
pertinent to the conflict.
In any case, should anyone object to any part of

thus collectively created model, those who would
object could always improve on it, providing they
could justify that their improvements are founded
on valid data.
At present there exist enough many data-bases

containing data pertaining to availability of
resources, data that take into account existing
and preexisting inter-group relationships, and all
such that are publicly accessible, and that are
necessary for creating of such models.
The model would be created by all the people who

have an interest in satisfactorily resolving of the
any conflict anonymously--no one would have to
be exposed to any fears of repercussions that
might possibly there be for their participating in
trying to peacefully resolve a conflict. I think that
although this idea might be fairly new, it might be
worth considering, if only because in many cases
today officially sanctioned solutions rarely work,
and rarely really satisfy all involved for long. The
costs needed for creating of such a model would
be relatively modest (most software for
"distributed computing" is free), and only a
fraction of what is spent on weapons that
normally are used for solving conflicts. Trying to
solve conflicts at a grass-root level should,
perhaps, be given a chance.
At first such a model would not be inputted by too

many, perhaps. But if the existence of this model
would become known, it would become a subject
to a scrutiny and a critique that would be actually
welcome--in the case of such a model only a
constructive criticism would be possible, since
(as already mentioned above), if someone should
not like the model, they would have to come up
with better versions of it; versions that would
have to be acceptable by all the participating
model builders, acceptable on the basis of being
more in accord with what might, or might not be
possible to have in the situation modeled
according to all knowledge pertinent to the
situation. The existence of such a model would
influence the decisions of those either
negotiating and/or fighting in any conflict whose
favorable, optimal resolution is being modeled,
and perhaps such a model could eventually
become an arbiter of sorts, whose influence
might, perhaps, extent well into the peace times,
perhaps even augmenting and enforcing a better
governing of the territories and of the peoples
that are being modeled. I am aware that, perhaps,
my explanation of the idea might not be entirely
quite clear, and I would gladly discuss this idea
with anyone who could see if only a bit of a
potential in this idea.
Thank you sincerely - Mr. Jan Hearthstone.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
Torture Starts at Home.

(Stop Torturing the Homeless!--Defend the
Natural Human Right to Sleep!)
By what right, or a rationale should torturing of
the homeless be a good thing? That one is not
automatically guaranteed any basic natural
human rights--such as is the fulfillment of the
natural need to sleep, of the natural need to take
a basic care of one's bodily functions, nor of the
natural need for, if only a very basic and for one's
well-functioning necessary habitat--upon one's
birth doesn't become apparent to most people,
unless they end up in circumstances where the
exercise of these natural Human rights becomes
impossible--impossible not because of strictures
imposed on one by "nature", but because other
humans will actively prevent one from trying to
take care of those very basic needs.
It does become impossible for quite a few who

become homeless to take an adequate care of
their basic bodily needs (never mind their non-
corporeal needs for now) when they find
themselves unable to find a place to perform
those, for life very necessary, functions, due to
being unable to find a place to live. Suddenly they
find themselves being persecuted, punished,
tortured for not being able to come up with the
unreasonable, out-of-proportion, ever increasing
price of a place where they could take care of
things that are absolutely necessary for their life
support. Suddenly it becomes obvious that the
right to just live, no matter how simply, actually
does not exist at all in our society! It can only be
purchased, with some losers, who don't have
enough for even the worst available, left behind.
On the one hand the practice of torture is, at least

pro forma, prohibited by law--if someone were to
deprive someone of sleep, the victim could, at
least in theory, sue the torturer in court of law. If
someone would be depriving animals of sleep or
rest, he/she could be taken to court and charged
with cruelty to animals!
On the other hand there are thousands of

individuals who are being actively deprived of
sleep every night (by the various law enforcers,
who just follow our orders, after all), night after
night, yet no one would think to call it a torture,
even though this practice is nothing else, but
torture. It is torture that is being committed right
in front of everybody's eyes! And, apparently,
everybody is perfectly comfortable with it, maybe
because of having been brought up with this
injustice as being a "natural" part of our culture.
Some might argue that people become homeless

because they either have mental problems, or that
they abuse substances to the point where they no
longer are capable to function properly. But the
truth is that there is a plenty of people who either
are mad, and/or abuse substances who are not
homeless, yet the only difference between the
homeless and them is that the latter still have a
place to live. The determining factor is the ability
to pay for lodgings, and not to be able to do so is
not the province of the mad, and/or substance
abusers solely. One just need to be sufficiently
poor to qualify. Homelessness is a social stigma,
most people who are homeless try to remain
"invisible"; it is only when they are worn out and
tired to a point of not caring about appearances
that they become "visible" in a non-flattering
light.
And because the very steep step between not

having anywhere to sleep, and to be able to
afford what is being offered at the lowest point of
the scale--a step that keeps increasing with time--
the number of those able to purchase a place to
sleep and just to take care of their very basic and
necessary life needs just keeps on increasing.
It is a paradoxical situation, in which the barbaric

side of our human nature that rules this situation
is clearly in control, this in spite of laws that
proscribe torture and moral prescriptions
professed by the majority of the population. It
shows the true nature of our society that has not
much progressed from being a horde of
barbarians always waging a war of exploit against
others and against their inhospitable
environment, in whose camp there is a little use
for losers of any kind, except, perhaps, as a
training material in times of shortage of real
enemies to exercise cruelty on. This behavior
also harks back to the frontier days when losers
were either left behind in the hinterland,
excommunicated into the "wilderness", or
outright killed.
Torturing the defenseless ones does not have a

place in a civilized society. However, in truth, we,
as a society, are still on a war path, this time even
against each other globally (albeit now it is an
economical warfare that creates victims, but real
victims none-the-less--a warfare that keeps on
escalating), and because the territory boundaries
have been stabilized in ages ago, any "losers"
that there might be can no longer be left behind,
nor very easily "excommunicated"--they stay
right with us. The only option left is to torture
them, and to torture them we do, with little
thought of consequences of so doing. But those
consequences stay right with us, causing the
society much harm, with no benefits to the
society whatsoever.
Perhaps best to see what those consequences

are would be to try to see what benefits there
would be if the basic rights to the fulfillment of
the basic natural needs would be guaranteed (it
would be hard to say "granted", because that
would imply a sort of a charity; we could hardly
be called "charitable" if we would "grant"
someone the right to eliminate body wastes, for
an instance).
Imagine what would happen, if suddenly no one

could be persecuted for trying to go to sleep,
even if such someone would have no place that
he/she could call their own, nor could they rent
any such place. That either they could do so at
any handy place where they would not obstruct
any traffic and impose on anyone greatly, and
where they could not cause any sanitary hazards,
or they could do so at especially for the purpose
designated places on municipal, state, federal, or
any public land that would be geared, if only
modestly, towards providing such needs. That in
itself should not cause any huge outlay of public
money, and as for labor needed in keeping such
places up, the people who would be using such
places could be educated over the time to help
with the upkeep.
Over the longer run, the consequences of

guaranteeing ad facilitating to anyone the
exercise of just this one natural Human right--the
natural human right to sleep--would be profound.
(A rhetorical question--might there be any other
natural rights--other than those already
mentioned-- that are still being violated habitually
in our society?)
Rested people would be better fit to take care of

their affairs more independently. Many people
who today pay an unreasonably high price for
having a place to live would probably choose
eventually to become homeless voluntarily once
the stigma and onus of being homeless would no
longer exist. The out-of-proportion price of real
estate would go down to become more realistic
and more affordable again. People would no
longer have to work at nonsensical jobs just to
make ends meet--the quality of the out-put of
work would increase considerably, because
people could afford more to work at jobs that they
would like to do. There would be fewer jobs that
exist today just for the sake of having jobs with
no thought of actually accomplishing anything at
all by having those--a step towards sanity. The
abstract, meaning nothing to the average person,
really, GNP would go down, while the actual, real
quality of life (measured by reduction of busy-
ness and stress) would improve. People who
would be rested would be less prone to become
criminals, and the esteem of, and the trust and
confidence of every one in our social system
would increase. The possibility of an actual
existence of a "social contract" would become
real. People whose natural human rights would be
defended and guaranteed would start actively
care for their society and have a society that they
could be proud of without resorting to hype and
empty rhetoric. Humanity would score a point
against the "pursuit of happiness" at the expense
of others.
We, the members of this society, are suffering

from great societal stresses that we ourselves
create and perpetuate. If we give ourselves a
break--from among other possibilities--in the
form of eliminating unnecessary cruelty towards
our fellow society members, the whole society
would benefit. We just need to start wanting to
see that we live in an almost closed system (the
Earth globally), and that "what goes around,
comes around". If we cause unnecessary
suffering, then we, or our children, will reap the
fruits. It is hard to predict the future, however it is
possible to observe trends. The observable trend
in our society is an ever increasing stress and
hardship, as evidenced by the rise in numbers of
those with mental problems, those who cannot
afford adequate housing, and the rise of
criminality. The question might present itself: If
we torture our homeless today without anyone in
the "normal" portion of our society doing
anything that would solve the problem of
homelessness humanly, what will be permissible
to do to them, and other disadvantaged groups in
the future? If no one protests the torture of the
homeless today, who will protest when cruel and
unusual treatment of other disadvantaged groups
will become the norm also? Isn't there a
possibility that we, and/or our family members
(who already get the short shrift in their old age,
because we are too busy to take care of them)
and friends might be included in one of those
groups ourselves? We still can stop this rise in
civic apathy--we all will benefit if we become
kinder and gentler to ourselves in deed.
To be causing homelessness and to withhold

from people the natural human right to sleep
(along with other "proscribed" natural humann
rights) is a grave and insufferable social injustice
that can only be righted by guaranteeing and
defending of this natural human right in disfavor
of making an unreasonable profit from human
misery.
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Ecologically and Socially Sustainable Crestone.
To become sustainable seems to be necessary to

many people. What is not clear is what
"sustainability" might mean to various
individuals. When we say "sustainable", do we all
mean the same thing? Could one's
"sustainability" be more sustainable than
someone else's? It would be useful to find out
what different people might imagine what a
sustainable Crestone would look like.
In what way would a sustainable Crestone

community obtain the basic necessities for life?
Could all food be obtained in a sustainable way?
Could all materials needed for construction of
shelters be also gotten in a sustainable way?
How sustainable would be a sustainable
Crestone's social structure? What would a
sustainable Crestone's government look like?
Please, submit your ideas about what a

sustainable Crestone should be like to
suscrestone@myway.com .
Thank you, Hearthstone modelearth.org .
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Transportation
and
A very important issue is hardly ever mentioned

now-a-days--what should be the ideal model of
sustainable transportation? Most ideas dealing
with ecologically correct transportation merely
suggest forms of transportation that would be
less harmful to the environment--less polluting,
not petrochemical resources based, and also
included might be improved mass public
transportation, car pooling, and such. Rarely, if
ever, the ideal ecologically and socially
sustainable transportation is presented as such
that would not be needed at all, following the
principle that the best solutions are such that are
as simple as possible.
Consider: If everything that is needed for a

comfortable life could be obtained within a
walking distance of one's dwelling, what
transportation would there be necessary at all?
Ways of growing of all the food at home one
might ever need have already been researched
and are known; materials needed for construction
of dwellings can be found and grown in the
vicinity of one's dwelling also, and the solution to
visiting relatives and friends (that "normally"
might involve traveling great distances across the
globe, at times) would be solved by concentrating
of all those within one's walking distance, and if
that could not be done, than walking the distance
could be the way, providing that one could stop
and work for one's upkeep along the way with the
understanding that a similar courtesy would be
extended to any travelers passing through one's
own locality.
A good reason to consider non-transportation of

person and goods as the best way of transporting
is that no matter how much more benign any form
of transportation could be made (be it by lowering
fuel consumption, or by making mass public
transportation more available), the result would
be still doing harm to the environment, no matter
how much lesser that harm would be. Consider
the advantages of not having to support any
heavy industry necessary for production of any
means of transportation (even that of bicycles);
an industry that could never be made sustainable
even socially, if not only ecologically, because of
the high degree of social organization necessary
for sustaining of such industries. And the last,
but not the least, reason for promoting non-
transportation of anything (by the virtue of having
everything necessary for life within walking
distance) is that usually the simplest solutions
are the most efficient and elegant ones.
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Our Troubled Science:

Why We Are Descending into Dark Ages.
There is a growing sense of unease among the science

community caused by the growing support of the general
public for the various forms of fundamentalism,
creationism, and the increasing power of religions
generally. There seem to be a controversy between science
and religion that is, to many scientists, incomprehensible;
how can anyone not understand the very clearly presented
findings of science? The answer could perhaps be that
science is not as useful to humanity as scientists would like
to believe.
Why should our sciences fail us? The main reason could be
that for the ordinary people a religion, and whatever quality
solace a religion can provide, is easier obtain able. Most of
science can provide might be brilliant and a subject to clear
reason, but, even more so, the fruits of science are
increasingly becoming a commodity, and increasingly
inaccessible to ordinary mortals.
While most people in the world live in substandard
conditions, scientists, with some debatable
exceptions,spend their energy on projects that, to most
humanity, must seem trivial. Should science regain any
useful standing in the society, scientists would have to
curtail doing whatever it is that they are busy with at the
moment, put their existential preoccupations aside as much
as possible, and seriously use their knowledge to address
the most pressing problems that we, as the whole society,
are experiencing. And not only superficially, but they would
have to strive for fundamental cures, such that would do
away with the problems that have been with humanity for
almost forever, but that don't have to exist at all--wars,
poverty, humans devastating the Earth.
Unless the scientists start actively cooperating together on
solving humankind's and the Earth's dire problems soon,
there is the danger of science becoming a keepsake of the
Earth's powerful factions, and the vast majority of humans
not caring whether they live on a flat, or a round Earth, but
interested more in living a better quality of life, something
that science cannot really provide to a majority of them, but
something that religions seem to be able to promise to
provide.
A related article: An Appeal to Academia.
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Mahayana, Homelessness, and Benefitting All

Beings.
Mahayana is a philosophy that holds that our happiness is

directly, indirectly dependent on the happiness of all beings
"in all three times and all ten directions of space" (including
here and now, implicitly).
Those beings who are deprived of the possibility to sleep,
rest, and taking care of things that are necessary to do for
one's life's satisfactory continuation become burden for
others sooner, or later by losing their ability to think clearly,
and are likely to do actions that are detrimental to the whole
community.
To sleep, to rest, and to not be hindered in taking care of
one's natural needs are "natural rights"--not determined to
be "natural rights" arbitrarily, but by recognizing that
without granting those rights the whole community would
suffer adverse consequences.
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Indigenous Hawai'ian Culture

and
UHH
Anthro 499
Spring 2002
hearthstone at myway-com--subject: 499
Keywords.
Sustainability, ecological, social, "ecological
sustainability", "social sustainability",
sustainable, "ecologically sustainable", "socially
sustainable", indigenous, Hawai'ian, culture,
design, model.
Abstract.
The mounting ecological and social problems
that humanity is experiencing today might force a
sincere cooperative effort in, hopefully, not too a
distant future, in order to solve those problems.
No matter what the results of such a cooperation
might be, for them to be satisfactory, any such
result will have to be a design of a world that
would be ecologically and socially sustainable.
Most of the knowledge and means necessary for
an actualization of such a sustainably balanced
world is already available. There is enough known
about ecologically sustainable technologies,
however - only a very few widely known
ideologies that would foster the establishment of
a truly ecologically and socially sustainable
future are widely enough known today. Such
ideologies will have to be found and developed.
One possible source for development of such
ideologies could be cultures that used to live in
balance with their environment and with their
neighbors.
This paper essays to find if there are any
explicitly stated ecologically and socially
sustainable ideologies in the indigenous
Hawai'ian culture, and whether it would be
possible to transfer those ideologies from the
context of the indigenous Hawai'ian culture into
the now pre-dominant global culture.
That humanity as a whole has become the enemy

of itself and of most other life around on the Earth
has become axiomatic, - one only needs to see
the vital statisticcs and follow the news to see
this. If quality of life might be said to be
improving, this might be true only in some
localities and for, proportionally, a very small
number of people, and it can be shown invariably
that this happens at the expense of other parts of
the whole Earth system.
If the trends observable today in the world could
be taken as indicative of the world's future, then
the future of the world would be one of increasing
misery for most life on Earth. Any hopes to the
contrary would be unfounded. Any measures
meant to heal the plight, either currently
implemented or contemplated, can only result in
slowing down of the destruction, because the
ultimate goals of any such measures are not the
achievement of a true environmental and social
balance, but only to achieve a temporary, limited
relief. Only by aiming for a true environmental
and social balance (those two go hand in hand:
there can be no social balance without living in a
balanced ecology - the anxieties about resources
would not allow it, and there can be no ecological
balance without having resolved intergroup
conflicts - people who fight do not have the
leisure to bother with environmental problems) on
Earth can any effective and lasting results be
achieved. Since different people have different
ideas about what the ideal future of the world
should be, they have to overcome their
differences, sit down around a virtual round table,
design a world that would be ecologically and
socially balanced (a world that would be
ecologically and socially truly sustainable), and
proceed to find ways that would result in
achieving of such a world.
The knowledge and the means for doing so is
mostly available, and if not available such
knowledge would have to be found. There already
is a great amount of knowledge concerning
ecologically sustainable technologies. However,
as of now, there are virtually no widely enough
known ideologies that would foster ecological
and social sustainability and state so explicitly,
even though there were many (or, perhaps, there
still might be some, marginally surviving)
cultures that might have lived in balance with the
ecological processes and in harmony with other
peoples. The purpose of this paper is to try to
find any such ecologically and socially
sustainable ideologies (that would be stated
explicitly) in the indigenous Hawai'ian culture,
with the hope that those ideologies could be
adopted in designing of a sustainable world.
Since anything connected with the production of

this paper is constrained by the very short time-
span allowed (this current semester - Spring
2002) the methodology employed is very simple: a
several individuals presumed to have some
knowledge of the indigenous Hawai'ian culture
were approached by the means of electronic mail,
the results to be briefly analyzed for the purposes
of this paper and then used in farther research.
The message to those randomly selected
informants-hoped-to-be (from various lists of
Hawai'ian organizations and from people known
to the author) was as follows:
Dear people!
I am an undergraduate at the UHH, my
Major is Anthropology, and my main
interest is the Design of Ecologically
and Socially Sustainable Communities.
I am interested in finding ideologies
that would support the establishment
of ecologically and socially sustainable
communities. I would appreciate if you
would read the following, and see if
you could help me in any way. I will be
interested in any constructive input.
With the increasing degradation of the
world's environment and with the
decreasing quality of life of most of the
world's humanity, it is only a question
of time that really effective, and really
sincere solutions for the problems of
the world will have to be sought. The
most expedient solution to the most of
world's problems would seem to stop
creating problems, and start undoing
the damage done in the past. The
simplest and easiest way to
accomplish this could be for humanity
to strive to live in harmony with the
ecological processes of the Earth and
in harmony with the social processes -
to live ecologically and socially
sustainably. There is already a fair
amount of knowledge of ecologically
sustainable technologies, however - as
of now, there are only a few
philosophies that would foster
ecological and social sustainability,
and state so explicitly. Maybe there are
such explicitly stated philosophies still
surviving in cultures that used to live
in harmony with their environment and
in harmony with other peoples, and
maybe those philosophies could be
used in the present day need - the
members of the now dominant global
cultures are in many cases many
generations distant from the times
when those cultures might still have
been living in harmony with their
environment and in harmony with other
peoples, and have, by now, no (or a
very little) memory of those distant
times. I understand that there might be
many sustainable (ecologically and
socially) ideas in the indigenous
Hawai'ian culture that are implicit,
however - are there any ecological and
social ideas in the indigenous
Hawai'ian culture that would be
explicit, so that it would be, perhaps,
possible to transfer such ideas into
other cultures, most importantly - into
the now prevalent global culture,
without the need to transfer the whole
of the indigenous Hawai'ian together
with those ideas?
Thank you, sincerely - Mr. Jan

Hearthstone.
The message that I emailed to the various

individuals and organizations that I presumed to
be knowledgeable about the indigenous Hawai'ian
culture, brought a very little response, and not a
single person who replied would come with an
idea that would be possible to use out of the
Hawai'ian cultural context. This lack of positive
results leads to many speculations, which, in
turn, might form a basis for further research.
Some of those thoughts and speculations:
1) It is possible that the difficulty in answering my

query lay in the vagueness that the terms
"ecological sustainability" and "social
sustainability" evokes. A better, more practically
useable definitions of "ecological sustainability"
and "social sustainability" should be formulated.
The term "sustainability" has a wide range of
meanings to different people, and thus elicits a
widely disparate responses. This should not be
surprising, - to date there have been rather too
many attempts at defining the term, especially
when the term is meant to be used within the
context of human ecology, and many of the
definitions are being formulated on ambiguous
and arbitrary basis. It is obvious that unless a
definition of "ecological sustainability" is arrived
at on more satisfactory basis , one that would be
based on some universal, axiomatic, widely
acceptable ecological principles, no meaningful
progress can be expected to start in the field of
modeling of an ecologically (and socially)
sustainable world.
2) It is possible that the need for global-wide

solutions to global-wide problems is not widely
enough perceived. It is conspicuous that
although the globally expanding culture is
effecting progressively more and more aspects of
everyone's life in the whole world, the response
to this culture negative aspects is not globally
coordinated. It could be said that there is a lot of
local response to the negative features of the
global development, but no global ideology that
would make the local responses globally united
for them to be really effective. Thus there are
many locality based groups that profess an
opposition to global expansion, however - most
(if not all) of any such locality groups operate on
principles that basically can never threaten
"globalization" seriously. There are many
movements for political and culture
independence among peoples who were formerly
exploited by colonizing nations, however - their
agendas (for most), if not all) are based on
gaining political independence, while the issue of
becoming also ecologically sustainable
(something that would mean real independence)
is absent. Witness all the formerly colonized
nations that are now "independent" politically,
while in reality they are fully depend on outside
commerce and handouts. Closer to home - in
Hawai'i the independence movements do not
promote any ideology from the past that would
stress the tie between land and the people who
live on it (read - ecological sustainability) in any
clear detail as much as they stress the
importance of gaining political and cultural
independence first - something that does not
challenge economical dependency of Hawai'i on
international power brokers. To mind comes the
ancient dictum of "divide and conquer" - there
are many groups in the world today that actively
support the powers of globalization by depending
on its economic support, while struggling for
political and cultural independence. This
observation is supported by the absence of any
detailed models of an independent Hawai'ian
nation that would show any degree of ecological
and social sustainability (an indicator of real
independence from the global economically
dominant powers).
Conclusion.
In order to be able to use any ideas from
indigenous cultures that might have been
ecologically and socially sustainable in designing
of an ecologically and socially sustainable world
model, it would be necessary to find experts on
indigenous cultures that used to be sustainable
ecologically and socially, experts who would also
be interested in designing of a sustainable world
model, and who would see the necessity of a
global approach to global problems that
globalization presents. There, no doubt, might be
such experts somewhere, but I failed to find them
in Hawai'i. I myself am not qualified to decide
whether it would be possible to use any ideas
from Hawai'ian indigenous culture in designing of
a sustainable world model.
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ECOLOGICALLY AND SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE

EDUCATION:
Creating a Sustainable World.
Author:
Mr. Jan Hearthstone
Abstract.
The purpose of ecologically and socially
sustainable education is to teach the skills and to
impart knowledge necessary for the
establishment and perpetuation of ecologically
and socially sustainable society. The first step in
ecologically and socially sustainable education is
to determine what an "ecologically and socially
sustainable society" is. This is achieved by
reconciling and unifying of all individual ideas
that there ever might exist of what should
constitute an "ecologically and socially
sustainable society" into a unified model--a
model acceptable to all because it is based on all
knowledge and data pertinent to the subject. This
unification in a model is necessary in order to
avoid costly resolving ("costly" in terms of time,
energy, and resources) of differences among
those ideas in real life. Once it is known what an
"ecologically and socially sustainable society"
should be, "ecologically and socially sustainable
education" would provide the means for
establishing and maintaining of "ecologically and
socially sustainable society".
Keywords.
"ecologically and socially sustainable education",
"ecological and social sustainability",
sustainable, sustainability, education, "Path of
Least Resistance", Robert Fritz, Mahayana,
philosophy.
The aversion to suffering is fundamentally the

basis, the reason for the emergence of
"ecological and social sustainability". It is
obvious that most of human suffering is caused
by humans themselves, and to see that by merely
addressing the by the humans caused suffering
the greater part of all human and other beings'
suffering could be eliminated.
It could be argued that for humans to live
sustainably is the optimal way to exist, a way that
would generate the least amount of suffering for
humans and many other beings who share this
world with them. The principal idea expressed in
this paper--the purposeful and conscious
designing of our collective sustainable future
collaboratively--is based on the philosophy of
Mahayana and the practical approach to creating
of desired results as it is formulated in The Path
of Least Resistance by Robert Fritz (Fritz 1984).
Mahayana's noble goal is to cause all beings to
become ultimately happy, to become
"enlightened", with no beings left behind in
suffering. Thus Mahayana philosophy might be
best suitable for creating and maintaining of
ecologically and socially sustainable society,
because Mahayana's concern is the ultimate
happiness of all beings, transcending all
differences, be those differences in species,
ideologies, creeds, classes, and any such
differences that divide all beings. All beings'
welfare is important in Mahayana's view, as it is
in true sustainability.
To live ecologically and socially sustainably does
not imply a complete abolition of all beings'
suffering which is the goal of Mahayana--that
would be impossible to achieve with our "earthly"
means--, but to live sustainably would prevent
most of unnecessary sufferings from happening,
at least. The Path of Least Resistance by Robert
Fritz (Fritz 1984) teaches how to create results
that one desires without concerning oneself with
whether a particular goal might, or might not be
achievable at the moment, without concerning
oneself about (this is important) what not to have
in a desired ideal. What is important in any
creation is that we know what it is that we want to
have, what we want to create. What matters is
whether one cares, wants to see one's particular
goals realized.. A condition for the realization of a
goal is that the goal to be achieved is imagined in
as fine a detail as possible, or, at least, to know
what one wants to achieve so well that when one
would encounter this goal realized, one would
recognize it without a fail. Obviously, it would not
matter to know what it is that one does not want
to have in the desired result, because this would
never make any desired goal any clearer. There
just might be an infinity of things that one might
never want.
The process is described in the The Path of Least
Resistance as "creating", because it concerns
bringing into reality results that might not have
existed ever before, bringing into being results as
if out of nothing (the foregoing sentence is
loosely paraphrased from the book--The Path of
Least Resistance by Robert Fritz--Fritz 1984).
At present there are many people who know what
they do not want in their lives, but a very few who
have formed a definite image of what their ideal
life should be. Moreover there exist a myriad
definitions of "sustainability", many of which are
not even compatible with each other, and a lot of
time resources, and energy are being wasted on
trying to reconcile the differences among those
definitions in real time and space, while all this
waste could be avoided by reconciling these
differences in a model, i. e. by deciding the
viability of any idea by modeling in virtuality
"concrete" applications of any ideas in
consideration.
Even people who do not "believe" in
sustainability could use the modeling process to
see how their ideas of what an ideal world should
be like in a model. I contend that by using the
modeling process continually, even using input
of people who do not "believe" in sustainability,
eventually the result would have to, inevitably, be
a portrayal of a sustainable world, because no
other way other than sustainable could ever be as
justifiable, nor any other results could ever be as
elegant and parsimonious as sustainable ones.
The modeling of the ideal, would never be in any
way influenced by any ideologies, creeds, or
personalities of the inputters. Only the realization
that we all have to share the Earth together with
as little conflict as possible would matter. Only
the relevance of ideas to creating of the ideal
would matter.
The modeling of an ideal future could be used
even in small scale situations in conflict
resolutions, in deciding the future of small
communities using the concept of the "round
table" executed in any applicable form.
What is "ecologically and socially sustainable

education"?
Ecologically and socially sustainable education
helps to establish and maintain an ecologically
and socially sustainable society. It shows the way
towards establishing and maintaining of a
sustainable world.
What is an "ecological and social sustainability"?

There are many definitions of what constitutes
"sustainability", let alone "ecological and social
sustainability". Some are less abstruse than
others, but there is not a single one definition of
"sustainability" that would satisfy everybody.
In my opinion, although the emphasis currently is
on the "ecological" part of "sustainability, it
would be impossible for "sustainability" not to be
"sustainable" also "socially". For a society (or
more fittingly in the sustainable sense--a
community) to be able to readily react to the
demands of ecological balance, the community
itself has to be "sustainable"--i. e. - to be self
regulating at the very basic level; to be
"transparent" in order for its members to react
swiftly should any societally exigencies arise that
would threaten the ecological environment (read-
-the home) of such a community.
The need for a model that would show what an

"ecologically and socially sustainable" world
should look like.
The unification of all ideas about what our
collective future should be like in a model is
necessary in order to avoid costly resolving
("costly" in terms of time, energy, and resources)
of differences among those ideas in real life.
It is necessary to have a good definition of
"sustainable" for working purposes. Only by
modeling of this definition we can get definitions
of "sustainable" that actually would be "visible"--
made "visible"--by "concrete" applications of
"sustainable" in a model.
To reconcile all the various definitions of
"ecological and social sustainability" (and to
unify all ideas about what our collective future
should be like generally) I propose that all of
these are used to construct a model that would
portray what an "ecologically and socially
sustainable" (henceforth "sustainable" in this
paper, for brevity sake) society, or any social
entity of any size--from a local community to the
whole Earth encompassing humanity. In such a
model it would be possible to "see" what the each
definition of "ecological and social sustainability"
("sustainability" from now on, but let us not forget
that "sustainability" should be a holistic concept,
that demands all of its components to be
thoroughly "sustainable" themselves) would look
like when translated from the abstract to a
"visible" representation of "sustainability", if in
virtuality only. In this way each of the definitions'
viability could be "seen" and evaluated against all
other definitions and against all knowledge that is
important in deciding what is "sustainable" and
what is not so (e. g.--availability and distribution
of resources, particular societal composition and
traits of particular societal groups, and such).
It is important to stress that this modeling should
not be about "problem solving"! According to
Robert Fritz in The Path of Least Resistance (Fritz
1984) the process of creating the results that we
want to have in our lives cannot depend on
"problem solving", because we never, really, run
out of problems ever, and even, very unlikely,
when we solve all of our problems, we still might
not be even close to having what we really want
to have, especially, if we don't know what that
might be. The modeling has to focus on the
results that we do want to have in our common
reality.
The resultant emerging portrayal of an ideal state
of things would not depend on the personalities
of people inputting the model--only ideas would
compete with each other. The process would not
be hampered by the prestige, or the lack thereof,
of people inputting the modeling process. Nor
could anyone personally profit from taking a part
in the process. The "profit" would lie in making it
possible for all to design and to strive for the
optimal home ever possibly obtainable with no
one excluded from the process of doing so.
In essence the shaping of human society on any
level, from a local community government to
global concerns, driven by the desire to approach
the ideal, would supersede, eventually, any form
of government in existence currently, because
once a justified, unified objective would be
identified, the actions to achieve it would always
be defensible, and because no one ever would be
excluded from the political action. There is a
qualitative difference between the way the society
would be governed by using the modeling
process and the way politics is being conducted
currently. Today our future is being shaped by a
very small portion of humanity, with a huge
proportion of people who cannot influence their
future significantly. Much discontent thus
generated will create problems in the future,
problems that will be resolved to the satisfaction
of only a few again--the number of problems will
be increasing till they will be "solved", for a while,
by some major societal catastrophe.
In contrast, no one ever would be excluded from
modeling the ideal state of the world--all who
would care to live in a better world would always
be able to improve on the ideal. No one's effort in
modeling of the ideal and in contributing to
achieving of the ideal would be wasted--actions
small and actions big will all flow coherently into
the realization of the ideal--both in the model and
in reality. Differences that there are among
people and cause so much unhappiness in real
life could be dealt with, could be resolved in the
model, in most cases pre-emptively.
Sustainable education springs from the need of

bridging the current reality with the desired state
of affairs.
With a visible, collaboratively being created, and
generally upon agreed model of what our ideal
common reality should actually be, it would
always be possible to see what the discrepancy
between what is desired and what actually exists
currently, in relation to the ideal, is. This
discrepancy between the desired goal and what
there is in reality (in respects to the desired goal)
alone would be the driving force of sustainable
education (I am alluding to Fritz's description in
The Path of Least Resistance--Fritz 1984--of how
"structural tension" between the desired
objective and its "current reality" drives the
creation of desired results).
Sustainable education always makes sense,

because at each point the whichever particular
knowledge that is being acquired is clearly "seen"
(by comparing the modeled desired reality with
the current reality) as being necessary to know in
order to achieve that which is desired.
The start of the modeling process itself would be
the start of sustainable education.
Conclusion.
Most problems that humanity experiences are
human made, and this fact implies a hope--it
might well be within human powers to effect the
healing of our world.
The "old" way of doing things will never do;
obviously the "old" way got us to where we are
now. We cannot look back trying to find solutions
to our present problems, because any "solutions"
from the past helped to get us exactly to where
we are now. Any solutions based on humanity's
experience from the past that have been tried
have been proven ineffective, so far; ineffective in
trying to deal with issues that really matter--
fulfilling basic human needs satisfactorily--QED.
We have to look, as if, into the future for
solutions, more precisely--we have to design our
future to our collective satisfaction, and then we
can work to make this designed future our reality.
It is very important to know what it actually is that
we desire to have.
Alone the existence of a constantly updated,
evolving model of an ideal state of the Earth
would greatly improve even our current political
process by "seeing" to what degree each political
decision would, or would not, help to achieve the
ideal state.
References.
Fritz, Robert
The Path of Least Resistance, Salem, MA, DMA,
Inc., 1984, ISBN: 0-930641-00-0
Mahayana
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahayana#Bodhicitta,
a one out of many Internet searches--terms:
"Mahayana" and "Bodhicitta".
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back to: WRITINGS
Natural Human Rights

and
The attributes of ecological and social sustainability

include simplicity and transparency. In simpler situations
fewer things can go wrong, and simpler situations are
easier to monitor by more members of the society.
The transition to an ecologically and socially sustainable

society would be greatly helped by enabling people to live
more simply if and whenever they would want to do so. It
would not be necessary to further complicate the already
existing complexity by creating of yet more laws that
would try to regulate the making of our lives "more
simple" and more "sustainable"--this could hardly be
achieved by such means.
The end of making our human existence more ecologically

sustainable and socially sustainable could be helped along
by recognizing of some basic "natural human rights" that
already exist, that stem from being human, and that are
being neglected in our present day society to a great
detriment of us all.
"Natural human rights" are rights that enable the

fulfillment of the very basic and natural needs that a living
entity might have, such as--the need to sleep, to rest, to
nourish itself, to rid the body of body wastes, to keep
clean, etc.
Since "natural human rights" are not recognized in our

society, not only there are people (the "homeless") who are
subjected to living in conditions that would be
unacceptable to allow to exist for most animals that people
care about, but also that other people who, although still
able to manage to maintain conditions suitable for
sustaining life, live in a dread of eventually, perhaps,
being prevented from doing so. This persistent anxiety is a
stress that causes a great number of problems for our
society.
Should "natural human rights" be recognized and

guaranteed, this fact alone would engender some very
basic and lasting benefits for the sanity of the entire
society. Honoring of the natural rights would mean in
effect that every individual of the society would have a
right to a very basic, if only a humble habitat that would
exist independent of any considerations of the commodity
market. One would not necessarily have to "own" this
fundamental, rudimentary, for one's well-functioning
within the society vitally necessary place, but one would
"own" the inalienable right to it.
Being able to exercise the "natural human rights" is a

foremost condition for the well-being of the whole society
and a foundation for establishing of a socially sustainable
society. People who are prevented from the exercise of
their "natural human rights" become stressed, their
physical and mental health suffers, and they are less able
to contribute to the common weal of the society
meaningfully. They, instead, become liabilities. Most of
social ills and many health problems (both--physical and
mental) can be directly attributed to the inability of people
to exercises their "natural human rights".
The recognition, assurance, and defense of "natural human

rights" would make the transition to a true ecological and
social sustainability easier--a socially sustainable society
would eventually eliminate processes that are harmful to
the environment, because such processes are possible to
exist generally only in a society where "transparency", the
ability to see the consequences of such harmful-to-the-
environment processes is absent--people who lead
stressful lives don't have the leisure to observe the
consequences of their actions, they are busy trying to cope
with stress; Such "transparency" is possible only in a
society that is socially sustainable, where people have
more leisure, and therefore they are able to exercise a
greater control over their lives. A society that self-abuses
itself cannot be expected to take care of its environment in
a sustainable way.
The above term "natural human rights" is not quite related

to the Lockeian "natural rights", mainly because in John
Locke's time there still was a very little, if any, concern
about ecological sustainability. The "nature" of his time
was still being perceived as bountiful, inexhaustible, and a
subject to being conquered. In his opinion a native
American Indian, who by our today's standards might have
lived in harmony with his/her environment, was not
making full use of Nature in comparison with a European.
This attitude persists to present day. Concerns about
"ecological sustainability" , generally, have no place in
societies that are based on expansion and domination.
Similarly--concerns with "social sustainability" started

arising only very recently, and the definitions of the term
are still very vague. Till the world filled up with humans,
social misfits were disposed of, unless those managed to
move to still of "civilization" devoid parts of the globe,
and thus they spread the very same "civilization" globally.
Today's conditions in the world are without a precedent in
human history. Although the the traditional mechanisms of
solving social problems are still in effect, social "misfits"
have no place to go anymore. We have to find ways how
to make our society "socially sustainable". To recognize
and guarantee "natural human rights" would be a good
start.
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back to: WRITINGS
Good Homes, not More Prisons is the Answer.
Most people who populate our prisons come from

substandard homes. Homes, that instead of being
havens where one replenishes one's strength to
be able to live as a productive member of the
community, are a source of existential anxieties,
mostly because "homes" are becoming less and
less obtainable due to their ever-rising cost,
which causes an ongoing decline in quality of
what a "home" should be: "an environment
offering affection and security" (an apt definition
according to WordNet Search - 2.1.).
A very simple remedy of this situation would be

to recognize that human physical bodies have
basic requirements that must be met for humans
to be able to function properly. If those basic
requirements are not met, then the stress thus
caused generates various physical and mental
dysfunctions that impair the capability of humans
to function well and to be effective in
meaningfully contributing to the welfare of their
communities. To be able to take care of one's
basic needs is a natural, unalienable human right,
because without honoring this right the whole
society suffers. As it is now, this right is not
being honored, to the extend that even just to
sleep and rest is not legal, unless one is able to
purchase this right.
The benefits of honoring and defending this right

would be far more greater than could ever be
assessed on monetary basis. Without having this
right our social miseries will keep on escalating
to the point of destroying the whole of humanity.
That this right is not being recognized and

honored is due to the fact that the right to pursue
happiness at the expense of others (read: the
right to pursue profit at others' expense) is placed
above more, for the benefit of the whole system,
important considerations.
A physical place, where the very basic

requirements necessary for one properly being
able to function in one's community could be
very simple, with no frills--not much more than a
safe and a sanitary campground--for a start.
It is still not too late for us to become fully

humane. All we have to do, is to give ourselves a
big break. Honoring the very basic natural human
rights will be, even in the short run, immeasurably
cheaper than the cheapest prisons possible.
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Defining Sustainability (?).
Since there are so many opinions on what the term

"sustainability" should mean, the best way to arrive at a
definition that would be best defendable, would be to
actually model "sustainability", using all of the varied
available definitions of "sustainability", to see graphically in
a model to what degree all those definitions really are
sustainable.
In a model that would represent either a region, or even the
entire Earth, it would be readily seen how a which definition
based on managing of a virtual reality (that would mirror
reality as close as possible) is effective, or not.
The reason, the need for wanting to define "sustainability"

is to know what "sustainability" is, in order for humanity to
actually, eventually, become sustainable. If we don't know
what that that we desire looks like, what it should be, then
the chances are that we will never achieve it.
back to: MODELEARTH
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Designing Sustainable Future for the Earth.
It appears to me that as the subject of

"sustainability" is gaining popularity, the
definition of sustainability is becoming less
focused; although there is a myriad of projects
whose concern is professedly "sustainability",
"sustainability" is becoming progressively less
likely achievable, because it is hard to achieve
something that we don't know what it actually is.
It is not that individuals would not know what
"sustainability" might mean to them, but it is that
each person's "sustainability" might be very
different, if not even at odds with, from what
"sustainability" might mean to others.
Not the least problem with "sustainability" is that

mercenary concerns rate, in most instances,
higher than any other; thus "sustainability" might
just be an excuse for achieving higher
economical gains. This distorts the meaning of
"sustainable"/"sustainability" considerably even
further.
"Sustainability" could be modeled, creating a

"picture" of what an ideal "sustainable" future of
any geopolitical entity on Earth should be, using
as input all the various ideas that virtually all
people might have about what "sustainability"
might mean together with the sum total of what
we know of Earth in order to see how each and
any of those ideas would fare under "real"
conditions in a model.
The Earth is facing unprecedented hardships
caused by human ignorance, and by modeling the
future we would eliminate the very costly process
of deciding what works and what doesn't--in
trying to remedy the situation--by the currently
used "hit, or miss" method.
The Earth future, at any point of time, is a result

of the actions all the inhabitants of the Earth take
in order to ensure a satisfactory future for
themselves and for those whose future matters to
them. But because our desires for a satisfactory
future are, not infrequently, at odds with the
desires of others, the final outcome--the future
that we experience now-- usually pleases only a
few.
It would be different should all the discrepancies

that there are among all the individuals' wishes
for future resolved harmlessly in a model, rather
than with often tragic consequences in real life.
Such modeling of our common future would be a

profound educational experience for all those
who would participate in this modeling process,
because individually we usually have but a very
limited view of all the factors that go into making
a future to happen, and the modeling process
would show clearly where all those deficiencies
might lie. In the modeling of our common future
we would learn what we actually need to learn for
a satisfactory future to happen.
By directly participating in designing our own
future in a model our education would become
meaningful to us; furthermore--we would learn at
our own pace, and only that that would make
sense to us--we would learn "on-the-job". We
would not be learning something that would not
have a direct connection with our lives.
We have all the technology necessary for

designing of the future. By using "distributed
computing", software for which is available in the
form of "open source", the model could "reside"
on all of the participants' computers thus
eliminating the need for any physical structures.
The process would be accessible to anyone
interested in having a hand in the creation of
one's future--something that our current reality
denies to most.
Would there exist a model of what to all an

optimal future should look like, the currently
available process of creating our common future
that currently is in the hands of people whose
interests are not necessarily identical with that of
those they represent would benefit by the fact
that every one could compare the performance of
those who govern to that what actually should be
happening.
The possible uses for such a model would be

many.
Please, let me know what you think of the idea.

There is more about the idea at:
http://www.modelearth.org
Thank you, sincerely - Mr. Jan Hearthstone.
Notes.
A general observation pertaining to the
sustainability of a solution to problems of
sustainability could be that simpler, less complex
social structure permits easier monitoring of
processes affecting the ecological conditions,
and, vice versa, that simpler solutions to
ecological sustainability problems require a less
complex society to implement those.
back to: MODELEARTH
back to: WRITINGS
Mahayana and Ecological and Social

Sustainability.
Mahayana is a view that acknowledges the

interconnectedness of all phenomena across all time and
space, and that any one's well-being depends on the well-
being of every other being across all time and all space.
A Bodhisattva is one who strives to realize the ideal of

Mahayana, and therefore regards the well-being of all other
beings as important as one's own.
To live ecologically and socially sustainably means to

acknowledge the need of all other beings to live well also.
The need for living ecologically and socially sustainably is

implicit in Mahayana.
Therefore an aspiring Bodhisattva would help all beings to

be mentally and physically optimally well, and therefore an
aspiring Bodhisattva would promote the way of living
ecologically and socially sustainably.
Please dedicate your practice to the optimal benefit of all

beings of all three times and ten directions of space,
starting here and now; on Earth, in these troubled times.
Links:
Creating Peace
An Invitation
back to: MODELEARTH
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Designing the Future of the Earth Collectively:

A Grand Unification of All Science Effected by
Making All Available Knowledge Useful for
Solving Earth's Problems.
Most differences that there might be among people could be

resolved in a model, rather than, as it is a common practice,
in real life with results that are not always satisfactory.
A desirable future for any geo-social entity could be

portrayed in virtuality by using input from anyone who
would care to do so, however, it would not be personalities
inputted into the model, but rather ideas that would shape
this virtual world. A world that would not be much different
from our own Earth, except that in this model better ideas 1
would "win"/prevail on the basis of defendability from any
point of view. Eventually a model of Earth would emerge
that would be as close to being ideal as possible, a model
that could serve as a basis for real life decisions affecting a
satisfactory future.
Any ideas inputted into this virtual Earth would be tested

against each other and against all data bases available that
hold data pertaining to life on Earth--availability of
resources, atmospheric conditions, socio-political
conditions, possible demographic trends, etc., etc.
Any and all sciences would find a meaningful application in

this model.
This model would unify all the disparate attempts at making

the Earth a better place to live by coherently dissolving
differences in the ultimate goals of those attempts,
projecting all those goals into a virtual reality, where the
viability of the which every notion could be tested.
A model that would be thus being created could be the

ultimate authority for a broad range of purposes--from
government to education--an ultimate authority, because
should anyone ever disagree with the portrayal of the
virtually optimal conditions for life on Earth as presented in
the model, they would have the option to improve on it at
any time.
This idea of modeling the future collectively is also

presented at http://www.modelearth.org
---
Footnote:
1. Better on the grounds of being more conducive to
establishing as optimal conditions for all life on Earth as
possible, and on the grounds of compatibility with all the
data bases available containing as much about life on Earth
as possible.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------
I would like to extend the license for this proposal to
anyone being able to try to present the idea--resolving any
differences of any people in a model peacefully, rather than
in real life with possibly grave and irreversible
consequences--in a clearer way.
Also--if any of the above is unclear, I would very much like
(if only for my own edification) discuss any of the above
with anyone.
Thank you sincerely -

Mr. Jan Hearthstone (BA Anthro UH at Hilo, May 2002).
back to: MODELEARTH
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CREDIT
for the ideas presented in

"MODEL EARTH"
goes to
Mahayana Philosophy
and to
The Path of Least Resistance by Robert Fritz.
(Salem, MA, DMA Inc., 1984, ISBN: 0-930641-00-0.)
DEDICATED
to the optimal physical and mental well-being of

all beings anywhere and anytime.
© - Modelearth - 1999, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007 -
modelearth at gmail dot com

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MODEL EARTH

Designing the Future of the Earth

CREDIT and DEDICATION

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invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

Model Earth - An Invitation

to participate in creating of a co-operatively,

Why Model Earth?

It is obvious from reality that the hierarchical

There are already many people with good ideas

It could also be said that a kind of a model of a

Model Earth would be co-created by virtually

This process would not be based on any arbitrary

The advantage of using this modeling tool over

This modeling tool could be used in arbitrating of

Think of this model as a universal "ombudsman"

This interactive model could co-ordinate the

This model would be possible to be created on

There would be a need for volunteers at the start:

* computer specialists to link all the

* scientists and specialists from all imaginable

* a number of organizers to direct the setup

invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

Despite the advances that are being made in

That humankind's knowledge is not fully applied

This creates a situation where on one hand

Humankind's knowledge has become very

Creating of such a model would permit a vast co-

No situation, or a research objective modeled

All the components necessary for the creation of

The Earth has only one possible future, a future

back to: MODEL EARTH

invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

Knowing that every time of peace in human

We should learn how to imagine, in as much

Unifying of all the different ideas that we might

"Es reicht nicht aus einen Krieg zu gewinnen -

(It is not enough to win a war--far more important

back to: MODEL EARTH

invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

It appears that as the subject of "sustainability" is

Not the least problem with "sustainability" is that

"Sustainability" could be modeled, creating a

The Earth future, at any point of time, is a result

It would be different should all the differencies

Such modeling of our common future would be a

We have all the technology necessary for

Would there exist a model of what to all an

The possible uses for such a model would be

Please, let me know what you think of the idea.

Thank you, sincerely - Mr. Jan Hearthstone.

back to: MODEL EARTH

invitation to co-creating the future appeal to academia creating

for the ideas presented in

to the optimal physical and mental well-being of

back to: MODEL EARTH

"Legalize" the Right to Sleep.

Making Peace from All Sides of Conflict at the Grass

Torture Starts at Home.

Ecologically and Socially

Our Troubled Science:

Mahayana, Homelessness, and Benefitting All Beings.

Indigenous Hawai'ian Culture