With world markets dropping like a stone, crucial resources such as oil depleting and pollution in the form of global warming threatening our very habitat, I still have hope. Why?

Strangely, five years ago, when nearly everyone else was partying, I was afraid. I strongly suspected the credit crisis was coming, I was investigating peak oil and was raised to be concerned about our environment. I was a doomer.

Today I am optimistic. I do have concerns and things could certainly go down the pan, we have a long struggle ahead of us. Now that the problems are largely being recognised I feel a sense of relief and am able to focus on what needs doing more clearly.

Perhaps I just like to be contrary, but there is reason to my madness. As anyone who has followed this blog will notice I find Graves’ E-C theory fascinating. It is popularly known as Spiral Dynamics and deals with how humans value their lives and the world. Although his theory predicts some reasons to fear, my reading of the current situation is hopeful. Here is why.

Graves studied how people value the world and how that impacts on their behaviour, I have written about it elsewhere on the site, so will not go into a lot of detail here. It is complicated to sum up the whole theory in a sentence without oversimplifying, but essentially the way humans value the world is evolving.

For the last few hundred years a values system known as ER (orange) has been growing in strength as more people embrace its ideology.  This system is characterised by an ‘express self’ attitude, where we put our selves and our own needs first. Yet it is a system that does so through planning rather than immediate gratification. It is a rational, thought out value system, but one that is reductionist and tends to have tunnel vision. For all ER’s ability to create an economy that can produce unparalleled wealth and freedom it is useless at seeing the side effects of its externalisations. It does not equate the waste or resource streams into its economic model because equating them is not in its  foundational interests. As a result we have major economic crashes, depleting resources and an eco system that is becoming unfit for civilisation as we know it. This value system has brought us many great things from democracy through to the scientific method, it is not that the system is bad, just that it has had its day. It is time to develop a new way of valuing the world that takes on board the best that ER offers us, yet also has inherent appropriate responses to the problems it has caused.

For all its flaws the ER system has many benefits over the previous dominant value system, DQ (blue). DQ is an absolutist, dualistic, fundamentalist, dogmatic value system in which it is believed everyone has their place. This was a world of caste systems, an absolute belief in how life works that is handed down from superiors without question.  DQ is still around today, it is still a strong value system that many embrace whole heartedly, there are even more primitive value systems around to a lesser effect. The world is a complex place.

It is important to stress that these are systems in people, not people in systems.  A person is not in the DQ system. DQ is a system that is operating in a person, often at the same time as other value systems. People are complex.

If we have overshot our resources to such an extent that the ER system is no longer viable then it is very likely that the dominant system will descend back towards DQ. There is a very good historical example of this happening before. 1930s Germany.  ER science with DQ values is not a pretty sight. As I said, I am not without my concerns.

However, I have hope, and it is with reason.

Over the last 100 years a new value system has been evolving in response to the shortcomings of ER. It is known as FS (Green). FS takes Newtonian physics and relativises it. FS takes a colonial anthropological perspective and pluralizes it.  FS takes modern art and post-modernises it.  FS takes the scientific method that ER created and runs with it, transforming it into a multiperspictival tool. Rather than looking for a single formula that explains all existence, it conceptualises a formula to its environment. Someone with FS values cares about the environment beyond their back yard, they care about peoples happiness and ability to live life to the full regardless of their cultural origins. FS inherently develops economies that care about the resource and waste streams and it is capable of doing so without abandoning all the benefits that the ER economy brought about.

FS is a ’sacrifice self’ value system as was DQ. However the sacrifice is not to an omnipotent dictator or creator, but to the equality of all. DQ develops a strong sense of community but where everyone outside of that community is an evil ‘other’. Everyone with FS values appreciates community, but that community is different for every person, it extends to everyone that touches that persons life, no matter how far away that person is or how culturally different they are. A purely FS system of government would be inherently anarchistic, but not in the sense of the barbaric CP value system, it is a peaceful, peer reviewed, consensual seeking anarchism. It is democracy as it truly could be, with everyone having a say.

FS brings its own problems, it can take a long time to find consensus, but solutions to these will be found, in fact they are already on the horizon. Lets not race ahead, ER loves to get to the top of the pile and when ER looks at the system after FS (GT) it sees something it wants to be, but it can’t, not without first developing through FS. We need to deeply identify the problems with FS before GT can evolve to resolve them.

The reason I have hope that society is going to move forwards rather than backwards is several fold.

Firstly, moving to new systems of governance involves the destruction of the old.  When Galileo challenged the church, we were starting our transition to the ER system, it was not without conflict. The transition to FS should not be so bloody, if it is then it is likely we are descending to DQ rather than ascending to FS. Thus it is natural for there to be turmoil. In an individual under transition, there is a great deal of psychological upheaval as the foundations of how the person perceives the world changes and this process often takes time, this will be even more true in society. The problems we are struggling with could just as easily be caused by ER shifting towards FS. A temporary regression is understandable and probably inevitable.

Secondly, everywhere I look I see examples of FS thinking. From global warming scientists who will not come off the fence about exactly how bad the situation is because they understand the complexity it. To people in my local community running climate chaos kitchens and organising a transition town.  People everywhere questioning, knowing that the way we have been living is burning up and that we need to find a new way, we need ‘change’.

I grew up in a bohemian family and throughout my childhood I often came across a framed poem on the walls of my parents friends houses. It was claimed to be from an anonymous monk, but it was actually written by Max Ehrmann, a poet and lawyer in 1927. It is called the Desiderata.  A line of the poem keeps returning to me.

‘With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams; it is still a beautiful world.‘

This is a 3AM idea. (what is a 3AM idea? )

I actually woke up at around 2 last night. Worst night I have had in ages, but the ideas didn’t really start until 3 or so, which inspired the name for the 3AM category.

It started on the usual theme. Civilisation has come to an end. My immediate family is the only one left (me, wife and two kids). Started wondering what life would be like from a Spiral Dynamics, values perspective.

Essentially I decided that the life conditions would be an-BO. (Will try and remember to link all these terms up when I have the Spiral Dynamics intro written). This would mean that the mind conditions of our kids and subsequent generations would be severely limited. (assuming meet enough other survivors to tribe up and genetic variability is wide enough to survive.

In my semi lucid state I started planning ways that information could be encoded for them that would enable a swift transition up the values systems and enabling civilisation to restore itself.

By about 5AM I had moved on to DQ and ER.

By 6, I was thinking up to GT and how the same technique could work between ER and GT even though society is essentially centred somewhere between dq-ER and ER-fs at the moment.

By 7, I was planning a foundation in my head that would be setting up an international values treasure hunt for survivors should civilization collapse. The foundation would also be working in the present to promote civilisation to express all the systems in healthy expressions and also to help move the centre of gravity above ER (ER is crap at seeing the waste stream of society - need to write a post on that!).

And all this whilst half asleep.

For each stage of values development new knowledge would be hidden in the world in ways that it would not be obtainable with out some of the technology just before it. The treasure would be in the form of technological knowledge and information, but also warnings about the problems society faces when it has the values that develop with that particular technology ability. It would not be a precise process - but perhaps it could be close enough. Each ‘treasure’ would be in a form that would be hard for that values system to destroy completely. Each survival system would not concentrate on just one survival system but a cross section. E.G. BO to DQ.

BO - DQ : A series of tablets, mass produced out of very hard material that does not erode under the elements and is hard to destroy with any pre DQ technology and is not materially valuable. Some of these would be embedded in mountain sides, outcrops etc. Especially in places that are geologically stable. The plates starts with a single paragraph intro in modern language, explaining their purpose. The first thing on the tablets would be an oral story in BO language, in simplified phonetic language where all the letters are easily discernible from each other. The story includes guidance from the ancestors to remaster the written language on the tablets should it be forgotten, that this is the task the ancestors have set them. It also tells the story of the fall of the ancestors from godhood and a stark warning about the cause of failure, e.g. ‘The gods did not understand the importance of their shit. They did not care what they did with it or where they put it and in punishment they fell from godhood.’

Second would be a set of instructions for maintaining knowledge of the written knowledge which would be in two sections. The first instruction is to tell the story, that this is the job of the elder, but the skill is taught to all. The story would also include some clever help to aid that - not sure what at the moment. The second set of instructions would include instructions for teaching the written language, written with a DQ overview, but using BO and CP nouns and language structure. Essentially something along the lines of setting up a tradition, that every child has to master the letters and be able to duplicate the tablets. That everyone’s reproduction of the tablets should be kept and buried with them (extra backups). To write the reproductions on material that lasts a long time. EG. etch on bone. The ancestors have charged everyone with this task. The third section on the tablets would essentially be a language guide to help understand the meaning of words. A minimum number of words are used to communicate the learning. A very simplified language, but understandable to someone today. Only elders have to reproduce this section, incentivising it to a privileged position.

The fourth section of the tablets would be written to talk to CP. Not sure how to do this. It is probably the hardest part. It would start off with another oral story, saying how the reader will know that their tribe has reached CP (population density + rebellion from BO. It will warn of the benefits of this and warn of the dangers in a constructive way. CP does not exactly take instruction, so this is a challenge. Further instructions and extra language definitions. Skills to encourage development to DQ, e.g. agriculture - communicated simply.

The sixth section would be in basic DQ language. And warn of DQ dangers and benefits, plus provide safe DQ technological information. It would use absolutist language such as commandments with promises to the promised land if the instructions are followed. It would include a global map with spots marked on it that contain another set of tablets. These tablets are only obtainable with advanced DQ technology. E.g. buried at least 50 meters deep through difficult to excavate material. With large markers on top, such as pyramids. These new tablets are also stored in places that are not quite so hard to access, but also not marked on the map, such as deep in caves, high up mountains etc.

The advanced DQ tablets contain basic ER information (safe technology) and stark warnings in DQ-ER language about the failings of the past and an understanding of the values needed to progress. They also include further instructions for accessing an even more advanced set of tablets of which only a few would be made. These would be buried very deep and be hard to reach. Eg 500 meters deep and would contain advanced technical knowledge and interpretation of all values as we now understand them. And it would wish the new civilisation better luck in moving forwards than we had.

The idea of this plan is that if society does collapse, it has a hand up from the point it collapsed to.

All the above would only be one branch of the Foundations purpose. It would also be promoting the healthy use of value systems and development to sustainable values in our current civilisation. I am not presuming that we will collapse, just putting in a multi level interlinked safety net in case we do. We need to shore advanced values up in ways that that are based in life conditions and mind conditions.

Relatively, I do not think this would cost all that much… a few hundred million at a guess. Convincing people we need it would be another issue. If civilisation does start going down the spout, there would probably be some wealthy financiers steeping forward. The challenge would be to design the templates before that.

It is now 09:40. I have been writing since 07:30.
Reminder: this is a middle of the night idea. There are bound to be some crazy elements, but I wanted to get it down in case there is a gem at the core. It is important to stress I am not a doomer, I just like covering all the possibilities. I hope we make through the peak resources/Ignored waste stream issues that is facing civilisation at the moment, but you never know. Best take a raincoat if there is a chance of rain, especially on a cold day.

Time to let it rest a bit and see if it breeds in my mind.