From: Brett Paatsch (paatschb@ocean.com.au)
Date: Wed Oct 30 2002 - 08:23:24 MST
Hi Extropes,
Not to minimise the differences between what people actually see as
desirable goals, I think the biggest challenge in realizing many peoples
desire to move to better futures, to be part of a better society, to
accelerate the singularity, or whatever you like, is the lack of a practical
plan, let alone an optimal plan, for getting from here to there.
As a group of polymathic types I wonder if you'd be interested in a sort of
though experiment aimed at brainstorming the steps involved in founding a
virtual country.
We live in a world of sovereign countries. UN membership is exclusive to
sovereign countries. Individual persons have no corresponding
meta-organisation they can join, yet a virtual country comprised of
individual citizens who had specifically opted in, could, it seems to me,
become a potent source for good whilst also benefiting it's citizens.
We have a global financial system but we don't have a global society to
underpin it. Which is ironic because capitalism or even the security to
trade and the confidence to invest and build for the long term requires the
sort of security that only a strong democracy can provide. But it seems
national democracies are currently being undermined. When politicians on
electoral cycles of three of four years struggle for votes in a world where
voters are concerned by jobs and innovation is making jobs harder to come
by. Multinational corps (to be successful) need to get into the business of
regime shopping just as politicians to protect the interests of their
constituents need to make deals to create jobs. But national democracies as
currently structured can pose substantive blocks to the emergence of an
international democracy. Its hard to set up Greek city states in 2002,
perhaps a virtual country is the way to make some new creative space.
It is difficult to manage global systems that effect us all such as the
environment, or to give teeth to international human rights, let alone
transhuman ones. The US, imo, for all its flaws is probably the best working
democracy in the world at present - its constitution and bill of rights seem
to set the standard for the protection of the rights of the individual - but
it limits these rights to its own citizens. If you don't happen to be a US
citizen you don't get to vote for Bush or Gore etc, but you do get to wear a
portion of the consequences.
I've heard it argued that democracies are usually pretty good at voting
themselves money, and perhaps this is a key part of what makes them stable,
but if this has been true in the past, it is showing signs of being less
true in the future. Money in modern democracies leaks. People cling to the
right to a job like galley slaves cling to their rights to an oar, when, if
AI come along, or even if it doesn't, it is going to make almost all jobs
redundant (ala Han's Moravec's Robot from memory), so the smart thing to be
defending is not ones job but ones vote.
If you are a wealthy US citizen, and the same applies to other western
countries, you can avoid paying substantial amounts of tax with the
assistance of good tax advice. And this is not necessarily an immoral
action. A person that legally avoid paying say US$1m in taxes may still
choose to redirect that same amount of money to he/she see as truly
benefiting the public good either in or outside their native country.
Within all existing countries there are constitutions, forms of government,
rights and responsibilities accepted by citizens. Its hard to find physical
space to found new countries as the land is already possessed but why should
a country, be bounded by land? At some point with a land purchase perhaps
the virtual country could become a sovereign country, setting up laws less
paternalistic. Cryonics for instance might be allowed as a matter of
routine. A stream lines version of the FDA could enable individuals to
assume greater share of responsibility for making informed choices and
trying experimental medicines in the context of absolute rather than
relative medical risk etc. And eventually a virtual country whose citizens
leveraged the skills and capabilities of each other in preference in their
contracts and trade would become wealthy. If they paid tax to a virtual
government (duly elected) that government could eventually buy land. Once
the virtual country was seeded and had citizens. Those citizens could also
perhaps set up more traditional political parties in existing countries.
Different existing countries have different feelings about dual citizenship,
I understand the US requires one to revoke other citizenships, however, this
need not be a show stopper, contract law alone may be enough to build a
layer of optional citizenry atop one's national obligations. Extropian or
extropian like lawyers, tax experts, investment advisors, researchers could
probably outcompete most comers on merit in a straight contest. Perhaps they
may not be so good at organisation and implementation - I'm still wondering
about that.
The founding would need to be a bootstrap operation. Countries are not born
instantaneously in their full complexity. Perhaps it might kick off by
putting together a set of core values or tenets (perhaps like the extropian
prinicples perhaps not), a sort of "declaration of transcendence" might be
structured by contemporary Jefferson's, Adamses and Franklins.
An important basic question to ask and answer would be who would be allowed
to join (those who agree to adhere to the tenets), would there be any poll
tax to do any administrating. And the core question one should ask and have
answered - what's in it for me why should I join?
It would seem that crucial is the recognition that rights and
responsibilities are intimately coupled, the country should not assert
rights for its citizens that it cannot underwrite with commensurate
responsibilities accepted by its citizens. This is a key difference I think
between many existing countries founded on notions that human rights can
exist without human responsibility existing to underwrite them. i.e.. No god
given rights unless god becomes a citizen and as a consequence we can be
sure we have the wherewithal not just the will to underwrite them.
Anyway, that's enough of a gas baggy start, my questions are what would be
the best way, the key engineering principles if you like of founding a
virtual country, what would be the key blocks that people see, does anyone
see merit in the idea of working out in crude blueprint form how to set such
up?
PS: Sorry about the verbosity, I often write long stuff and don't post it,
cause I haven't the time to clean it up, sometimes I think good content
doesn't get sent because I over self censor, maybe my inhibitions are well
founded - I'll accommodate feedback on this point as well.
Regards,
Brett
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