by Hugh M. Lewis

I propose the establishment of a foundation within an academic context of an alternative program for research & promotion of natural systems sciences. I consider this to be truly cross-disciplinary and the first truly comprehensive framework for the integration of objective human knowledge to be achieved. Its central object is to functionally and structurally reintegrate a noetic reality that has become super-specialized and technocratically hyper-compartmentalized but essentially blind & crippled--dysfunctional from a strategic standpoint. The net consequence has been to render science the technological handmaiden of political-economic structures controlled in the main by self-serving authoritarian power structures, largely themselves controlled by Napoleonic mental midgets. This is true in virtually all state-societies, whether these are extremely capitalistic or communist or just plain socially authoritarian.

Scientific worldview is therefore fundamentally fractured in any comprehensive sense, and this serves invariably the interests of authoritarian power structures in the world. The net outcome of this disjointed global noetic system of the fractured distribution of knowledge, is the strong likelihood of global systemic failure in the structure of the long run.

Einstein's discussions of the relationship between religion and science I believe have great pertinence on this central issue. Einstein struggled with the philosophical reconciliation of religion and science. For him, science without religion was crippled, and religion without science was blind. The two therefore complemented one another in an integrated worldview that was necessary in a fundamental way to a coherent and complete view of the world.

All knowledge and forms of informational patterning has some ordered relationship within the larger framework of understanding. A comprehensive approach arises from the observation that all knowledge is by definition interconnected in a comprehensive, or universal framework, such that there is ultimately no clear definition of where or when one kind of knowledge leaves off and another form begins. Therefore, we should expect to be able to locate any kind of possible or occuring form of informational patterning within a larger framework of relationships that defines the context of that knowledge in relation to any other possible occurring knowledge.

All naturally occurring information is therefore integrated within reality. The differential field of this integration is relative to the human subject knower. Information may be considered to be constructive or destructive within any given system, depending upon the relational consequences that information has upon the patterning of the system. If a pattern appears to be relatively determined and consistent, we can speak of a constructive relational pattern, but if it appears to be relatively chaotic and inconsistent, we can refer to a destructive relational pattern such that it leads to a condition of entropy and a loss of ordered pattern. This sense of order is self-organizing and intrinsic to the natural framework, and it must also be available to human recognition. If we cast a pebble into a still pond, we create a ripple pattern that broadcasts in all directions. At first, this pattern may be quite symmetrical and orderly, but upon its rebounding from an uneven shoreline, perhaps made sharp by jutting tree-limbs and protruding rocks, the resulting pattern quickly breaks up into a complicated interference pattern until there is destructive elimination of the waves back to a still state.

There is a critical sense that, from the relativistic standpoint of the human knower, all knowledge creates some sense of responsibility in the life world of the knower, whether we realize it or not. Knowledge cannot occur in a theoretical or hypothetical vacuum of the life-world of the knower--it must impact upon this life-world in some sense, however innocuously or relatively neutral. The sense of responsibility of knowledge sets up an implicit meta-ethical gradient by which we can rate different kinds and forms of knowledge on a natural systems landscape.

Not only does knowledge create responsibility, but the human knower has an innate responsibility to know, or rather to learn. This is not just a consequence of having a big brain to use, but of living in a world that is itself defined by this big brain. We cannot escape the teleological consequences of our knowledge even if we strove to escape it, as our knowledge is intrinsic to the definition of our reality. Any attempt to escape it constitutes an abnegation of this sense of responsibility in the denial of knowledge in the organization of our reality.

Because this reality is a social reality, our knowledge is also collective. Science arises from the collective conditionality of our knowledge, as part of the shared common stock of knowledge.

The ideological-paradigmatic framework of science presents some inherent contradictions about the ontological status of science in the world. Ideal science is supposed to normally operate in a kind of normative vacuum. There is at least nominally supposed to be no commitment to outcomes in our procedures or preconceived points of view that does not accord with evidence, though a paradigmatic point of view may even be intrinsic to the research design in the first place.

But the non-normative commitment of scientific operations do not necessarily preclude other or intrinsic paradigmatic commitments in either the normal praxis of science, or in the purposes to which science can be put in the world. A post-modern critique of neutral science is that of disinterested inquiry in the service of authoritarian ideology. One would like to think that there is some inherent clause in physics that tells scientists thou shalt not build an atomic bomb just like medical doctors are supposed to follow the hippocratic oath. But we know that neither kinds of ethical obligations have been uniformly binding in the modern era and there appears nothing intrinsic to these fields of inquiry that demands rigid ethical compliance.

From the standpoint of human systems, a meta-ethical paradigm does not necessarily preclude the possibility of a normative science of humankind, as long as we can uniformly and universally agree upon our collective primes. There is a need for maintaining a strict sense of separation in the operationalization of scientific method and in the generalization of scientific theory between paradigmatic ideological and non-ideological parameters. But paradigmatic issues creep deeply into science regardless of our pretensions of neutral objectivity. This situation does not preclude abnegation of the role and responsibility of science in human reality, but makes this sense of responsibility possible and therefore necessary.

It is not the point of this proposal to become side-tracked on issues of Science and Ideology. A normative science of humankind must be based upon a realistic and relativistic view of humankind, but also on some meta-ethical primes like fundamental rights and responsibilities of humankind.

I would suggest that no single human being is responsible for the entire system, or should be responsible. I would suggest that no single human being currently in a position of political economic authority is capable of making responsible decisions for the entire world or for humanity. I would suggest that such decision making resides only in the collective body politic of humanity itself, whether it is abnegated by authoritarian power structures or not.

In such a normative paradigm, all people have by definition fundamental rights and freedoms as well as basic social responsibilities, regardless of whether these rights and responsibilities are realized in the society they reside within or not. Ultimately, all controlling coalitions or social structures are based upon volunteristic participation, or upon implicit consent of the people, whether or not this is actually given or taken and no matter how authoritarian or totalitarian and therefore anti-democratic a government may in fact really be.

States rights are therefore derivative upon and legitimized by the collective realization (or not) of individual rights. These issues also transcend cultural relativities that lead to different and unequal relations and interactions between people. The history of the modern era, as for instance, the Nuremberg trails, has taught us both that universal human rights are upheld as an international legal paradigm, whether certain cultures respect them or not, and that states rights and legitimacy are based upon and derived from these rights.

Philosophically, I believe this argument constitutes a meta-ethical paradigm for all humanity to follow, as well as a meta-ethical paradigm for a normative science of humanity. Its justification arises from the proposition that one would or should normally want for themselves at least the consequences of a general failure to follow such a paradigm. We grant to others the same considerations in terms of equal rights, because otherwise we leave open the possibility of our own forfeiture and violation of these rights. Symbolically, we can imagine the possibility of our own suffering in the suffering of other people. In fact, the relativity of this knowledge is that we can only know or learn the suffering of others, as if it were our own suffering. The possibility of dehumanization and victimization stems from the sense of power we impose over others to inflict some degree of suffering upon them. Because their suffering can only be realized through ourselves, it becomes possible to ignore or deny this form of knowledge. We impose a standard of universal equality whether equality is realizable or not.

In other words, if social life is a game to be played between competing people and parties, then we want to impose at least the semblance of fair play in the game, whether or not people actually play fairly by the rules or not. It maximizes our own chances of success in an open situation, by minimizing the possibility of the other person or party cheating against us. We forfeit the possibility of our own deceptive advantage over our opponents in order to prevent the possibility of our opponent's deceptive advantage over ourselves. Ideally, it confers equal advantage upon all players.

Thus, human rights proceeds from an implicit social contract of fair play based on a compromise between competing interests. Of course, in a world built on deception, if we play fair it is only to our own net disadvantage, but once we deceive, we are caught upon the horns of the liar's dilemma we cannot escape, such that we weave our own tangled web of words--ie, ideological and paradigmatic conundrums that rationalize our fundamental deceptions.

We come to impose such a meta-ethical paradigm as a fundamental condition of the human relativity of our knowledge in the first place, because, otherwise, we would have no uniform set of standards by which to judge and evaluate the actions of other kinds of people, whether in relation to our selves or towards others as if towards our selves.

In other words, we impose a democratic view of social reality, because this particular point of view is the best possible one to hold about reality, all things being ideally equal.

In fact, the view of scientific neutrality and objectivity ultimately derives from such a view of the centrality of the human subject as the ultimate knower in and of reality. An objective, inter-subjective view of the world that we hold as a scientific standard is ultimately a democratic view of the world, in which a fundamental equality of human knowers is at least ideally imposed upon our knowledge. In such a worldview, any ideal knower can be substituted with equal results. There can therefore be no deception.

We need some common standard in a meta-ethical normative science of human reality, by which to evaluate people on an objective basis, because otherwise and in fact all knowledge is fundamentally relative. The most common standard we can have comes from the presupposition of the ideal of the fundamental inter-subjective equality and relativity of the human observer. Human rights and social responsibilities proceeds from this ideal.

What follows is an outline for a program in natural systems theory that is based upon the framework for theoretical integration it provides, as well as for its systematic application to developmental issues within a framework of alternative development based upon some presupposition of a normative, meta-ethical science.

It is evident in working through the book on natural systems theory that the human knower is the principle subject of knowledge in a sense that fundamentally bounds and relativizes our knowledge of reality. One consequence of this, as in a normative valuation of individual rights and responsibilities that precludes cheating, is the need to place a premium value on the non-paradigmatic commitment of the individual within the framework of natural systems. This entails an emphasis in human development upon creativity, exploration, exchange, critical appreciation (hermeneutic philology) and philosophical inquiry, just as it also entails an emphasis upon the uniqueness of the individual human being. I would say it entails also emphasis upon a sense of basic responsibility of knowledge and an attitude towards knowledge that involves initiative, freedom, responsibility, risk-taking, risk minimization.

There can thus be a fundamental sense of irresponsibility in close-minded ideological commitment if it leads to an implicit denial and deception of knowledge. We are not completely free to think anything we want, if our thoughts lead us to actions and deeds that do harm to others. We can say in other words that knowledge does create responsibility in the world, just as the denial and deception of knowledge leads us to irresponsibility.

The problem of the world is that we must become our own policemen, as we cannot police one another upon the limitations of our basic freedoms and rights without the arbitrary denial of these rights and freedoms in others. Part of the challenge of human development and knowledge integration is the successful internalization of this sense of responsibility, especially in a world that is so lacking in this way.

This entails among other things in our natural systems theory and worldview that there should always be an involvement and subsidiary commitment to the humanities and a sense of social humanism regardless of the involvement or point of view of our other knowledge in the world. We cannot escape this fundamental contraint, whether we wish it to or not. We thus have a responsibility to the outcomes of our science, whether we wish to or not. If we do not define for ourselves what this sense of ethical responsibility is or will be in our world, then it will be defined by default.

There is a sense of teleological inevitability about systems design. For instance, once the Wright brothers established the notion that flight was possible, all incredulity ceased, as it lacked any foundation in empirical uncertainty. At this point, a new cycle of design development was begun that has since eventuated within the space of a single century in a broad range of aircraft and space-craft.

The suggestion is that once the empirical credibility of a certain design configuration is manifested in the world, then the teleological development of its possibilities is almost inevitable. Once an atomic bomb became possible or feasible in theory, its outcome was probably eventually inevitable, whether it was accomplished by Germans, Americans, Russians, Chinese or whomever.

All knowledge is owned by all humanity, in an ideal sense. Thus control of knowledge is collectively in the hands of all humanity.

According to Thomas Kuhn, scientific progress is a natural and expected outcome of the success of our science. A measure of that success is the modern advance of scientific technology, the application of that knowledge to the solution of basic problems in our reality. In a similar way, we can claim that the realization of human rights and responsibilities is the result of the successful progress of our social institutions. While this sounds like an enlightenment perspective, which it is, the alternative is to impose a kind of moral anarchy or relativistic chaos upon our world, which is a kind of tyranny by default.

Forthcoming from presuppositions of objectivity, equality, human rights and social responsibilities, are, I believe, further progressive doctrines about alternative development and human development that are the outcomes of the teleological involvement of our knowledge in reality. I claim alternative development because it is accurate to say that our current world is not the best of possible worlds and that the predominant trends of historical development do not necessarily lead to the best of possible worlds.

Furthermore, it is clear that at the heart of alternative development is alternative human development, because, unless and until all our technological inventions can serve the goals of the liberation of humankind and their emancipation of the bonds of tyranny, whether these are of ignorance, prejudice, hatred, ideological closure of fanaticism or extremism, or defined by social authoritarianism, criminality, victimization, etc., then they do little to alter our ideal state of being in the world. In this regard, something like the atom bomb can only be understood as antithetical to the progressive goals of human civilization, as long as it is used as a weapon against humankind itself. Weapons are tools of war, or conflict that arises from inter-human competition. They do not advance intrinsically what can be considered to be a normatively scientific state of human civilization unless their purposes are purely defensive and deterrent in effect.

I propose that human systems are also designable and subject to basic principles of human engineering. Now this issue in itself is controversial. But engineering of human systems is not bad or an inherently evil prospect, just as biological engineering is not necessarily evil in prospects. I am not talking about a Skinnerian world of behavior modification. I am talking about the design of open and humanly balanced social systems and institutional structures, complete with necessary material and cultural accoutrements, that facilitate and promote human development within a larger framework of alternative development.

The positive prospects of human engineering stem from the prospects of achieving the ability of open symbolic control and systematic symbolic manipulation over humanity that leads to greater symbolic-behavioral independence and integration of humanity. A great deal of this occurs, often by moral default, through the media and especially in broadcast advertising. Aldous Huxley broaches this important issue in his Brave New World Revisited. Basic issues in aesthetic philosophy broach the role and status of aesthetic design in human reality and social reality. Symbolic design principles underlie the organization and distribution of knowledge in the world, and the articulation and patterning of all cultures, and can be seen to be foundational in key issues of human development.

It is clear that a program in natural systems theory and science must adopt a framework that entails a non-paradigmatic commitment and openness that is the result of comprehensiveness of such a system. Part of the resolution of this inherent dilemma in the sciences is to adopt a meta-paradigmatic framework that precludes the possibility of paradigmatic foreclosure on lines of inquiry and theoretical construction. Part of this entails defining operationally the relationship to knowledge itself as critique, hermeneutic appreciation, alternative perspectives, relative knowability, and uncertainty, as contradiction and incoherence. Any field of inquiry must of necessity be an open field of inquiry. Thus a premium must be placed not on finding answers, but in asking questions.

Knowledge must put a premium on empirical consistency and internal coherence, as well as upon a sense of intuitive non-contradiction. In other words, it cannot strive to conform evidence to models, but adapt models to suit evidence. Thus model building comes as something that is derivative of the analysis of information, though analysis often proceeds from and is rooted to our models.

It involves as well specification and discussion of the possible directions of alternative development as the principle concern of outcomes for the applications. Issues of development invariably concern both strategic planning and practical applications of natural systems science to the resolution of common and specific problem sets that occur in reality.

There is an inherent danger in such a program of falling into a bounded system of programmatic commitments and programmatic calls for action that are essentially devoid of any real nontrivial value. There is also an inherent danger for such a program to become somewhat like Jonathan Swift's floating cities. There is as well a danger for such a system to mean everything, and therefore to mean nothing at all. In other words, it could be ten miles wide and half a millimeter deep. There is also the danger of its being a grand "just so" story not unlike Mao's experiment with communism in rural China. I believe the solutions to these kinds of problems can be found in the structural organization of such a program.

Basically, such a program is by its design meta-paradigmatic such that any particular point of view or possibly paradigmatic perspective within it is always contextualized within a larger framework of functional relationships of knowledge patterning at different levels. The meta-paradigmatic structure of such a system determines that whatever happens within the framework must be coordinate and consistent with the relational framework that contextualizes that knowledge. Within the framework, alternative paradigms can therefore be considered as competitive to the framework, and each is weighed in on the balance of its degree of fit within the overall framework.

There is a danger of imposing a spurious sense of systemic order to relations that are found to occur in the world. Use of the term system implies automatically some sense of underlying order or pattern that is to some degree predictable. It follows from the observable tendency towards self-organization of informational pattern in nature. Indeed if nature were totally random and chaotic and undetermined, there would be no sense of order, hence no system and therefore no information to recognize or infer from the patterning. We set up a relational table of differential values of information within a differentiated system such that some forms of relationships are more structurally significant of underlying pattern than others. All systems in nature imply some inferential structure of patterned relationships that are generally abstract and eidetic. We can go to the field and observe economic transactions between the people we study and outside traders. We can observe these traders returning every week or every month, and we might follow them to different markets. Thus we might piece together the bits and pieces of a larger pattern of economic relationships occurring in the region. We might want to claim, as some economists do, that this constitutes the defining or determining pattern of all other relationships occurring in the culture of the people we are studying. If we did so, we would be imposing a sense of paradigmatic closure upon our view of that world, such that everything we see happen is somehow interpreted as the indirect consequence of the economic relations. This would be a sense of closure that might blind us from alternative patterns and determinations that might be basically extra-economic or non-economic in origin. Such a comprehensive economic theory would not survive, or even be possible, within a meta-paradigmatic framework which by definition would make possible other kinds of relational systems.

In general, systemic pattern or order has certain design characteristics about it. First, it is generally a working system of relationships, or the result of some kind of working system. Therefore, it follows patterns that are fundamentally thermodynamic. We expect several things from thermodynamic systems. First, they rely upon some form of energy entrapment or control mechanisms. Secondly, they tend to be variable in patterning, and tend towards entropy or decay. Always, there is some kind of similarity or correspondence of pattern, both spatially and temporally occurring to relative degrees, and recurring over time, either on a continuous (recursive) or discontinuous (reiterative) basis. As a system, also, we would expect that it would be by definition bounded in some way, and that it has a finite number of discrete variables or values that compose and account for the patterning we observe. Also, to go a step further, we would expect systems to be historically developmental or evolutionary in the structure of the long run, so we should expect that the system will advance through a series of patterned state-alterations.

Natural systems sciences are complementary to the traditional disciplines, and therefore should be considered to be a form of lateral integration within the framework of the formal fields of knowledge. It suggests a kind of secondary program that cross-cuts disciplinary specializations and invites part-time involvement of a variety of scholars as well as minor programs by students. Such a program should be able to reinforce any particular scholar's involvement in whatever fields they may be specialists within, while simultaneously providing a broad range of scholars the platform for interdisciplinary communication and for heuristic exploration of ideas that may be beneficial within their own respective frameworks.

The table below sets up a kind of programmatic paradigm that covers all possible areas, and describes a kind of organizational framework for such a paradigm that would be appropriate to the organization and application of comprehensively integrated knowledge:

We may specify a functional integration of human knowledge that is defined not by the natural stratification of information in reality, as it is by the organizational and operational distribution and purposes to which such knowledge is inevitably applied or applicable in the world. This informs the structural-functional organization of knowledge systems such that this teleological chain of functional integration is consistent across different kinds of information. We can thus speak of the functional coordination and integration of various areas of knowledge application within such a framework, and the interrelationship between these areas.

We can further consider in the table below the cross-disciplinary dimensions within each of the fields, as depicted in the table below:

The possible interrelationships between levels and orders of information pattern may be obvious or not. We might infer a two-way structure, such that basic relational patterns are not to be accounted for by more elaborated and derivative systems--in this context, we cannot say that human systems predetermine and account for physical or biological systems. But we might also say that human systems can have an influence upon such systems, in multiple ways.

We would also want to set up a similar table of values for any one area or cross-section of levels and interrelate the functional categories of the systems, or compare functional interrelationships between different systems. The table below suggests the other paradigm:

We might want to ask about the theoretical aspects in each of the functional areas, or rather the humanistic aspects, etc.

Combining the three sets of tables together creates a kind of automated database system, as long as we define clearly the relational values between the different systems. If we alter the values in one area of a matrix, we might be able to determine the kind of impact such a change might have throughout the matrix. Thus, we might want to define two sets of values for any bit of information or subsystem occurring, both in its relational dimensions characteristic and unique to that instance or subsystem, and its relative values in terms of all other possible occurring systems within the framework. In such matrices, we may also multiple matrices together in different ways.

Such a program may have a number of interesting possibilities for creative organization, development and application of knowledge outside convention bound frameworks. Below is an outline of potential applications within this system:

I. Systems Theory: Natural systems theory is meta-logical in that it provides general knowledge structures about theory itself, in patterns homologous to the structure of theory at any level of natural information patterning. We can say that basic theoretical designs found at all levels of natural informational patterning are very homologous in design principle, not only because they arise one from another in a larger hierarchy of correlations but because natural information patterning in reality appears everywhere to follow certain basic principles of non-linear self-organizational design.

This suggests a noumenal design science that is independent of any given instantiation of its patterning, as well as possibilities for its elaboration and application to artificial and alternative systems of informational construction. Some aspects of this are suggested below:

1. Methodological Dialectics: The dialectics of Analysis/Synthesis arise from the multi-level interrelatedness and interconnectedness of all naturally occurring systems such that the y are everywhere and always, at the same time, systems within systems, and such that, once we specify a certain level we must recognize that there are both synergistic patterns and analytical part-whole patterns related to that level simultaneously.

2. Corelational Pattern Analysis: Consideration of this kind of analysis proceeds from the observation that strict causality is historically chaotic, but only epiphenomenal to systemic organization of patterning in the universe. In other words, things are caused to happen, like hens laying eggs and eggs hatching young hens, because they are part of a larger framework of deterministic relationships--to get at the deterministic structure of this larger framework, one must step beyond the logic of direct causal explanation as inherent insufficient language.

3. Transformational Analysis is the complement of correlational pattern analysis, in that it entails a study of the effects and causes of pattern changes within a system, which can be called state alternation.

Endogenous-exogenous

Proximate-Ultimate causality--Causality vs. complementariness of events.

4. Contextual Analysis: Any thing that happens, or any inferable system of relations, always occurs and is configured against a background field of contextual relationships, and of contexts within contexts, that requires some degree of specification and delimitation in our definition. The challenge and dilemma of contextual analysis is the specification of how much context is enough, necessary and sufficient, for an explanation of a particular pattern, process or phenomenal event.

5. Relational Structure Analysis

It suggests the operational establishment of experimental control structures & artificial research conditions & environments for the testing of theories in various levels, as well as the use of various forms of heuristic designs for modeling & prototyping of alternative design configurations.

II. Strategic studies: Strategic studies constitute the basis for research design & planning, especially when this entails the allocation of limited resources for implementation of alternative programs. Strategic studies leads to the

A. Global Perspectives:

Strategic analysis must take into consideration the possibilistic and probabilistic patternings of the structure of the long run in the largest context possible.

Systems science suggests that humanity is out-stripping its capacity to manage itself. The global ecosystem is rapidly approaching a supercritical state of over-saturation. We can look to minimal determining factors as indicators and basic predictors of the process. Economic degradation, tied to socio-environmental degradation, as evidenced especially by gross asymmetries of resource distribution, will lead to increasing conflict and violence, and will result in general disequilibriation of the entire world system.

System within a system concept imperio im imperium

Gradual conversion of old system to new system--non-disruptive revolution.

B. Regional-Interregional perspectives:

The earth may be divided into larger-geophysical realms at multiple levels.

The problem of interregional definition, integration, articulation.

C. Local perspectives:

Community action

Individual realization

Alleviation of human suffering

Ground up detailed research.

III. Educational Exchange Framework

IV. Gravitational Engineering

Gravitation devices

Geo-Thermal energy pathways

Piezo-Electric structures

Solar Hydrogen energy pathways

Gravitational energy pathways Artificial Eco-systems & Cultural Evolution

Artificial eco-systems

Artificial evolution

Zoning Experiment

Human Engineering

Symbolic modification

Hyper-suggestibility

Social Reinforcement

Human Development (Bridge)

Experimental project

Symbolic framing arises from an empirical-experimental foundation in the systematic elicitation of human response patterning under controlled conditions.

An extension of this models is to take an obverse framework. Any group of 100 individuals represents a normal distribution of human abilities and talents. This distributional patterning is normally complex and can become complexly stratified. If we take cultural factors into control--all other things being equal. How will the same cultural grouping of people respond differentially to the same sets of tasks.

Take 100 individuals, and emphasize their unique abilities and latent talents. And experimental paradigm for the Bridge: Impose a set of minimal constraints upon them. That they must be productive and responsible for the outcomes of their productivity.

Artificial Information Systems

Game Theory

Systems Sciences

Alternative Architectures

Symbolic information designs

List-processing/parsing structures

Intelligent Data-bases/Inference Engines

Heuristic systems

3-dimensional multi-media presentation systems

Working systems

Web Network

global knowledge project

Totally Integrated Intelligent Interface

Comprehensive consolidation of knowledge

Total interconnectivity project

Intelligent interconnectivity project

Electronic Library Framework

History of Knowledge project

Archive of all intellectuals deposited.

Personal record of all human beings

History of knowledge development

Library Server project

Language Project

English as a lingua franca

Global linguistics--Inter-lingual institute

Symbolic linguistics

The funding structure is also very critical in this system. This structure should be fundamentally independent of any external governing body. It should therefore constitute a kind of "system within a system" or structure within a structure. It would not be unlike a corporate business, except that profit-maximization and aggrandizement of status would not be its principle purpose for being in the world. It would also mean that its basic political structure would have to be fundamentally democratic. Employment-Apprentice structure. It would be a "safe" structure purely by the indirect sanctioning of the pan-cultural values that it entertains.

Science with a well defined sense of ethical but non-paradigmatic commitment.

Basically, my own involvement would be to help establish the design and the foundation for the entire system, but to remain operative mostly at the primary levels of the system that would represent the first stage of development. Such an organization does not have to be anywhere very large to be effective. The key is, I believe, to implement a strategically effective organization that has least cost and smallest size considerations.

What I can provide immediately for this structure is a publication and web-system framework for its foundation, the potential of which should not be underestimated. We can also straightforwardly develop some primitive production schemas as long as these were profitably productive and their cost did not overload the requirements of the system. A series of journals can be built around this framework devoted to special areas. Larger series of publications can be developed as well. In this regard we should not under estimate the power of the pen to convert swords to ploughshares.

I have toyed with a marketing structure framework. Most marketing in the U.S. is based on a premise of the most common denominator among masses of people. Broad base appeal reflects the mass production aspects of unrestricted capitalism. Furthermore, most marketing follows also a short-term r-type strategy that expects that the average customer-producer relationship is below 1 to 1. In other words, implicit to mass marketing frameworks is the concept that the average customer will be a one-time buyer, and will never return for subsequent transactions.

Offer something valuable up front:

Demand something reasonable in return.

Do not mass produce, but inherently restrict production

Maximize demand but minimize supply.

Human nature. People take, but do not give. Must be made to give something back, must be taught to value what they take.

If such a system is possible, any one nation or group of nations who could master and pioneer such a system, would be in an inherent advantage in a larger framework. Politics. XYZ system.

Defense Strategy. Israel as an example of a David & Goliath framework. Military organization. Strategy.

Pacifism and peaceful revolution. Regulation of administration. Regulation of secret agencies.

Missionary programs. Barefoot scientists. Repenetrating the cores. Penetrating closed systems--altering the boundaries separating people--redefining these boundaries.

Project oriented cycles. Invite expertise to contribute to project cycle development. Call it a grand project if you will. One that has projects within projects.

I believe that a forum can be created for international exchange. A number of non-core countries can be brought readily into a growing network. Iceland appears to be an example of this.

A tight confederation of nations. States rights, individual rates. International legal paradigm. Domestic analogy.

The role of Oceania in the integration of the globe. Island nations have critical advantages and fundamental disadvantages. Natural resource bases for instance are inherently circumscribed. These can be minimal limiting factors in developmental considerations. The hidden advantages of island nations in a framework of a global system are several. They are not necessarily subject to the down-side of development. They may more easily regulate factors of exogenous and endogenous change. Furthermore, they are not subject to the problems of hyper-development down wrong pathways, as this would be fatal for them (The case of Easter Island). Another hidden advantage, I believe derives from their basic relationship to the ocean. Territorial sovereignty of an island nation is naturally bounded on all sides. There are no inherent border issues. Furthermore, such entities can in theory at least remain relatively independent of controlling structures which surround and attempt to dominate them (i.e. Cuba).