New Civilization News: A New Heaven    
 A New Heaven24 comments
picture2 Jan 2004 @ 20:31, by Roger Eaton

At this point, the plans for a voice of humanity are sketched out and time has come to begin coding. Fact is, though, a combination of the flu and the holidays has slowed me down and I'm finding it hard to switch over from the 2 percent inspiration stage to the 98 percent perspiration long haul, so I've decided to recap what has been developed so far before settling down to work.

To recap, then, the plan is to create a voice of humanity (voh) by building peer-to-peer internet middleware that will serve to connect online communities and facilitate the sending of collective messages. "InterMix" will be written in Python using the excellent WingIDE Python programming environment, which is free for open source projects.

The voice of humanity will be implemented in a bottom up hierarchy of internet communities. Network messages will be rated for interest and approval, and those messages with high marks will be sent up the hierarchy so they will be more widely visible. Messages that reach the top will be globally visible and therefore doubly important, first for themselves, and second because everyone will be reading them. A bandwagon effect will reinforce these messages to the point where everyone will know that everyone knows that everyone has read them, thus creating a global consciousness.

Messages that reach the global level will by definition be both highly approved and of great interest, so it will be difficult for partisan and hateful messages on the one hand, or dull and platitudinous messages on the other to succeed. Kind and witty words that finesse a difficulty or point the way to a win-win solution should do best. Over time, a voice of humanity will redefine the "other" in a positive way, and the human race will come to have a better view of itself. Stupidity, hatred and greed will be at a disadvantage in the new conditions, which will validate the global perspective required to solve the great problems of war, social injustice and environmental destruction.

Every individual or community will be able to send a message to any other community or individual in the voh network. A message from a community begins as a "suggested" message written by a member of the community. If the candidate message reaches consciousness in the sending community and achieves the pre-agreed threshold of ratings, InterMix will automatically forward the message to the addressed individual or community. When a community receives a message, a "listener" sub-hierarchy of the receiving community will process the message. Depending on the "strength" of the message and on the reaction in the listener groups, the message may rise in the listener hierarchy until it comes to community consciousness. (The "strength" of a message has to do with the size of the sending community and how high the message's ratings were in the sending community.)

Importantly, a structured mediation service will be available to handle inter-group conflicts. Where there are two groups in conflict, there can be three voices to resolve the problem, that of each of the groups, and that of the two groups together as one. This bringing in of the common humanity of conflicting groups is an altogether new and promising approach to inter-group conflict that really really needs to be followed up on.

There is yet another extraordinary, even transcendent, result to be expected from the voh network: the development of collective personalities. Through the exchange of collective messages, every great community will develop its own recognizable sense of self.

We may imagine in today's world that a nation has its own character, but when a country has become truly articulate, when it can crack a joke or make a promise, then its personality will be much more discernable. The possibility of a fantastical new world civilization emerges, where not only humanity, but also Womankind, China, Islam, Academia, Business, Paris, and all the other collectivities have developed each their own immortal personas, forming a lively, buzzing new heaven, where the force of personality will be the currency.

A new heaven and so a new earth. We mortals will be fascinated and much impressed. Mankind and Womankind will be King and Queen of the new realm, with nations and cities as peers, and the religions, parties and scholarly trends as advisors. Humanity will overarch all as arbiter and guide.

This could be a disturbing picture of the world giving in to an almost medieval authority structure, except that each of these new gods and goddesses will be under our control in a system that gives the grand prize to love and wit. Moreover, this new governance for the world will not be a replacement for the current national and international structures, but rather an addition, holding only moral sway, not directly in control of military and economic might. People, who are now alienated by colorless bureaucracy, will want to be involved, because the issues will have been personalized and so made accessible. Most people have little patience with the issues of government, great or small, but if China snubs Womankind, *that* will need to be discussed and understood, and maybe something will need to be done! Within this hive of activity, the real issues of importance could get lost, to be sure, but under the guidance of humanity, a coherent set of sensible policies for planet earth should be more feasible than under the current nation-state system, which is not coping very well with population and technological advances.

It does sound farfetched, this new heaven and new earth, so I was glad when I stumbled on the idea of the Annotated Web. The AntWeb, as it might be called, will enable voh communities to share information about websites on a topical basis. The blogger community will be targeted because sharing information about websites is a big part of blogging, and getting the breakdown by topic right for bloggers has not yet been quite satisfactorily accomplished, so this is an opportunity to get the voh network off the ground without requiring a religious conversion on the part of the users.

InterMix will be implemented first in conjunction with the open source Chandler personal information manager. Chandler's 1.0 debut is scheduled for late in 2004, a good target date for the first usable InterMix. Chandler is likely to be quite popular, so InterMix could get a good boost by being Chandler-compatible.

I need help, btw, if you have ears to hear! Let's make a voice of humanity to be our fulcrum and change the direction of the world for the better. It's very doable. I need Python programmers, PR people, strategists. Are you from Los Angeles? Let's get together to talk over what you can do. Call me - 310 390 5220. Email me -- rogereaton@earthlink.net.



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24 comments

2 Jan 2004 @ 21:03 by swanny : Belief Networks
Just wonderin about these?

sir  



2 Jan 2004 @ 23:32 by craiglang : Rating and Approval?
You mention that messages will be rated according to interest and approval. Just curious, who does the rating, approving, etc?  


3 Jan 2004 @ 01:19 by shawa : Keep us "ant-noted"...
...somewhere.
http://www.earthsanctuary.net/
Really sorry for not being able to help you technically.  



3 Jan 2004 @ 09:26 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.129 : Belief Networks / Rating and Approval
Hmm... Belief Networks may not want to play, at least not the hardcore type, but then they lose the chance to influence the outcome, so they are conflicted. The voh setup excludes no one, but favors those who can be flexible and find a way for their beliefs to jibe with the rest of the world.

Craig -- messages will be rated by the participants -- the same people who write and read the messages.  



3 Jan 2004 @ 09:43 by swanny : Thankyou sir
I have just recently come across that concept...
And while intriqued I perhaps concur with you.....
Is that then sort of "consensus" of majority paradigm then.....
A sort of "technodemocracy" of sorts....
and what....... well...... retains the expert "fairness" that
is now done by judges in the present system.......
although it doesn't per sae always work......
Is there sort of "transparency" process of some sort....

I had a thought the other day on this exact problem now
what was it.....?????
Perhaps a review or "resolve" period of some sort......
but sorry I can't seem to recall it exactly at this time

Thanks very much Roger

Alfred  



3 Jan 2004 @ 13:00 by ming : InterMix
Congratulations on reaching clarity, Roger!  


5 Jan 2004 @ 13:25 by taranga @217.158.116.147 : Intermix
Why not replace the "back" link of each article - such as the above - with seven [a nice auspicious number] links under the b a c k _ u p letters giving a score from 1 to 7 for increasing approval - thus your communal blog would break away from the chronological norm [though this should still be a reader option] into a most appreciated order. Anyone who doesn't want to rate it or doesn't care just drops the thread or uses the browser back button.  


5 Jan 2004 @ 14:11 by Roger Eaton @204.250.12.246 : smart thinking
Some variation of the b a c k _ u p idea just might be workable. The smart thing about the idea is that there are no extra steps for the user.  


6 Jan 2004 @ 14:36 by Natalie @82.35.40.166 : Voice of humanity
Roger, it sounds wonderful. I'm not a techie so I can't offer that kind of help but you can count me in as a participant.

And a very happy New Year to you and yours.  



7 Jan 2004 @ 16:06 by Roger Eaton @204.250.12.246 : belief networks revisited
Ahh... the light dawns that Alfred (Swanny, above) was referring to {link:http://dmoz.org/Computers/Artificial_Intelligence/Belief_Networks/|Bayesian Belief Networks}, not to faith groups -- duh! BBN's do not seem appropriate for the voh. It would be prohibitively expensive in both computing power and human input to try to build a Bayseian Belief Network to categorize general text, such as websites or email. I think it would anyway. Please someone correct me if I have this by the wrong end.  


7 Jan 2004 @ 16:27 by swanny : Correcto mundo
I suppose it would be a logistics nightmare.....
and well probably impossible to boot.....
I was just wondering about it though....
perhaps I need another hobby....???

*smiles*

sir  



7 Jan 2004 @ 16:44 by swanny : The variables
The problem is the amount of variables....
If there was a way to limit them objectively and fairly
but that is like the problem in fuzzy logic of
"truth values".....
Anyway we have certainly progressed along the path
from where we were just 50 years ago.
Keep up the good work.
No life ain't fair but that is
the challenge then to seek to make
it more fair and more just.....
and to become a more... just and fair society,
planet and civilization!!!

sir  



7 Jan 2004 @ 17:56 by ming : Bayesian Networks
Bayesian Belief Networks sound interesting, but very complicated and computing intensive. But more simple Bayesian algorithms, like what is being used in spam filters, might fit with some of what you've been talking about, Roger. You know, keeping track of word frequencies, and how likely it is that one will be interested in a certain item. Bayesian filters does it better than that. Although I don't understand exactly how. But take a look at {link:http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/2003/11/20.html#a851|Bayesian Categorizers}.  


8 Jan 2004 @ 19:22 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.130 : Bayseian Categorizers
I am sure we will use of bayesian spam filter technology to automatically categorize items. I like that you can determine which words are most active in causing an item to be categorized one way or another. One idea would be to have a spider follow up links from items listed in a collective portal, looking for more items to be considered by the group.  


8 Feb 2004 @ 11:09 by lugon @80.58.19.44 : open idea project
Roger, I hope Jeff Archambeault will refloat his http://www.openideaproject.org soon. I've been clicking on his URL every once in a while and recently I see he has an apache on it - I don't keep his email, though. I can't help myself so I'm not wishing to disturb him. :)  


22 Feb 2004 @ 13:42 by sharie : Heaven?
A New Heaven? What's wrong with the old one?
That's what I was wondering.
Why did we all leave heaven in the first place? (I wondered)
But then I knew the answer right away.
Heaven isn't all that satisfying.
I'm sorry to say to all those christians who can't wait to die and get there.
That's why we came here to earth. (Roger, since you don't know me, you don't know that this topic of heaven is my number one favorite, and my NCN newslog talks about heaven, the river of living water, the spirit of life, and so on, as if it was all that really matters... )

In the end, it's Heaven on Earth that will be all the rage, and I do appreciate all the work you have done and are doing and will continue to do toward that end. I laid in a coma and otherwise on my deathbed for several years, so I'm not up to par on the technological end of things, but if you have any questions about heaven - or Heaven on Earth - you're welcome to email me. What is heaven but love, truth, peace, and joy, and this lives within us all. By sharing our heaven within, we manifest heaven on earth. Thank you so much Roger, and thank you for responding to everyone's comments and questions.

Sincerely,
sharie  



22 Feb 2004 @ 23:23 by Roger Eaton @208.187.17.218 : Talkin' 'bout Heaven
Hat's off to you, Sharie. I'm sure there is something about coming back to life that makes one feel so glad!  


23 Feb 2004 @ 17:39 by sharie : right
Years before my coma, I experienced nirvana and other spiritual phenomenon from the age of five.

I choose heaven on earth and that's what I'm working to create.  



24 Feb 2004 @ 11:33 by Roger Eaton @209.55.71.130 : heaven on earth
A taste here or there I have, but maybe those tastes are a little misleading. Better that I should realize that the groundswell of my life *is* heaven on earth. I hope I don't regret posting this!  


24 Feb 2004 @ 15:33 by sharie : Our life is heaven on earth-you're right
We can create anything we want, and I choose heaven on earth.

It's already here, it's our privilege to manifest it.

I want to write more about this...
I've written many articles about it on my newslog already.  



27 Feb 2004 @ 08:22 by DutchArtistJelke @213.46.6.32 : heaven be not on earht
earht the place of doom we all are bannisch to this place even you born children see the endless sky look what you are note how long you be a live a fraction of time from eternity there be no mechanical evolution some people assert, consider how many dimensions there must be to hold everything in balance , there was no big boom from nothing ,if you were in coma for years and have not leave your body you can,t tell what there will be if we die ,believe it our souls are really Why you can think and not the mountains the trees the animals (what be that energy in your brain and tinny cel that keep you a live ) all the water come fom space the water that did chemical arise all live include us living human on this planet ,heaven be a place not on this earht because there be no matter at all ,but you will only see it if you die so be prepare , believe it or not it will be not the end ..without the living water earht was like the moon or one burning globe realize where we live on with all our greeds ,needs ,hate,lust for money and power .stop war and terror help and share with others that are in desperated need feet the childeren and poor people try to make this very dangerous world we live on change in harmony and a peace full place for all no matter what color or believe they have because we are all the same .
Don,t misunderstand me also you going to Die one day ! maybe later but it will happen the best and easy way push it forward and close your eyes and live your live don,t help your mother or father kill you sister or brother and don,t feed your child and let happen what happen ?,our change your thinking inside and try to change the world outside to become a paradise again.
Heaven be not on this earht or any place in our universe .  



21 Jun 2004 @ 11:23 by a voice @207.69.33.39 : I awoke with these word from a dream(?)
send a message to the voh:

"the next stage of battle has begun"

(the voh are those who do not realize that they are already dead)  



22 May 2007 @ 07:29 by Greg Houston @70.243.108.14 : Slashdot
The rating system you describe, though not the same, sounds similar to that used on Slashdot. The Slashdot rating system is excellent at bringing quality comments to the surface.

http://slashdot.org/  



8 Jun 2009 @ 05:56 by jewelry @218.19.53.159 : pearl
Read to exercise the brain.
Surround yourself with friends.  



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