The Prompt
"How do you perceive your ideal self in the technological future? In other words, we want you to write a post that looks into the distant future of your lifetime and imagines what technological and scientific advancements you expect to see, then explain which advancements you would adopt and which ones you would reject and give your reasons why.
Your reasons are ALL valid. We want to hear if you have spiritual or sacred reasons or if you have cold calculating ones."
Dystopia or Utopia the Choice is Ours
So far the entries depict techno-dystopian futures. I can't say that I disagree with the logic of their conclusions, that a techno-driven world would be less-than-ideal (to say the least). Check them out Here
However, my approach is going to be discussing a tech-minimal future. Before we begin, I'd like to give my basis for choosing a positivistic approach to this question. I know that all of creation first begins in the mind, and I further know of the power of collective thought. Therefore, I know of the dangers of thinking about apocalypse and dystopia as it is these very thoughts that will manifest reality and drive our society to that end. So, I would much rather focus my thought energy towards what it is that I do want, and would wish to see. Further, I will discuss a future that I am presently creating in my mind and focusing thought to create.
An Intentionally Designed Future
This upcoming passage is a pseudo-fictional story. It is fictional only to the degree that it hasn't happened yet. 😃
All across the globe today people are beginning to ask a simple question. A question that has been long since forgotten. A question that is the topic of this challenge...
"Where is society headed?"
As people began to ponder this question. All manner of ideas came forward, some dystopian some utopian, but most often these ideas didn't engage ones true being or desires. The idea of living in these societies wasn't wholly fulfilling. When people shared their thoughts of these futures, there was a part of them that felt dead, as they dreaded an existence in these idealized worlds. It didn't take long for people to start to wonder:
- Why are we thinking of worlds we don't want to live in?
- Wouldn't it be much better to aim society towards a goal that would be the most beautiful world we can imagine?
Dead Technology vs. Living Technology
I'll give just a few examples to highlight the distinction. Thought there are near-countless more than these!
Opposed to genetically modifying seeds in a lab to arbitrarily attempt to meet some of our superficial needs; we can co-create with nature and combine our personal DNA into our seeds to help that plant bring forth fruit specifically designed to bring optimal vitality. Bringing flavours and health that are the best we have ever tasted, as they are designed for us in mind.
Opposed to splicing genes of our children in the womb to artificially attempt to promote certain characteristics. We will learn to utilize the power of the mind to alter our DNA at pre-inception and inception to promote and dictate certain qualities in our children.
Opposed to creating a super-computer that can think for us, we will re-train our minds how to think, tossing off the crutches of modern material-technology to regain and master the unlimited potential of the human mind; a potential that can never be matched by material technology. Material technology cannot grow to become more powerful than the mind, the mind can only atrophy to become as weak as material technology.
Opposed to developing virtual reality games to reach near full sensory stimulation. We will learn the techniques for lucid dreaming and mental visioning to create our own realities and develop these skills to the point of creating our own forms of 'out-of-this-world' entertainment that no-one else's dreams (their games) can compare to, as we're creating it in the moment specifically for us!
False Progress
Imagine a future many millions of years from now, where a crew of people were living on the most state-of-the-art spaceship imaginable. A spaceship that is entirely self-regenerative and creates it's own living conditions for the inhabitants. Now, imagine that all of the sudden 99% of the knowledge about that spaceship was lost from the conscious awareness of the crew. Suddenly the crew starts ripping gadgets out of the wall to build primitive 'tools', tearing out components to create trinkets and decorations. Dismantling the spaceship and calling it progress as they create ever more sophisticated (in their primitive minds) tools opposed to seeking to fully understand the ship their on and its inherent potential.
This is the condition we find ourselves in today.
A Future for the Living
I imagine a future where cooperation with nature to create a more beautiful world, was the prime directive. A future where every house is surrounded by a garden of paradise capable of supplying us with all of our physical needs without any requirement to 'work'. This is possible because we have fully applied the technology of design we are already aware of. We have created fully functioning forest ecosystems where every plant supports the rest of the system, providing 'pest-control', 'fertilization', 'nutrient cycling' and all other aspects we have tried to master in food production over our primitive human progression. Not only will this food come effortlessly it will be of the highest quality imaginable and we'd be able to consume it immediately after plucking it from it's life-source; imbibing the entirely of it's vitality that it is to offer us.
We will abandon all ideologies and philosophies about the 'science' of diet and learn to trust our instincts. Over the years we have learned to connect with our instincts and become fully aware of what our food-forests have to offer. This has allowed our bodies to offer us simple hints as to what foods it needs and when. So, as we walk through our paradise gardens we eat whatever food catches our attention taking advantage of our 'sub-conscious' awareness of what we need and when. Eating food of this quality will provide us a future where disease is unknown as our bodies are provided with optimal nutrition. It will not be uncommon for many to live to hundreds of years old, disease free as we master our health by cooperating with our life-source. Our minds will become clearer and our thinking faster. Our spiritual abilities will magnify as we become more aware and conscious of the world through imbibing a divine diet.
Our abilities will begin to compound on themselves.
Freedom of Mind
In the future we will transition away from our dead technology and begin to better understand our living technology. We'll become aware that dead technology requires our mental attention, repairs, updates, and replacements (essentially servitude) and we'll opt towards living technology that frees us of these obligations. We'll begin to understand how burdened our thought had become with all the concerns of our technocratic world and we'll begin to free ourselves of these burdens.
Think about it, how much time do we spend today fixing, updating, working on systems that were designed to make our lives simpler? Our lives are busier, more chaotic, and filled with more noise than ever before in recorded human history. This is after all our efficiency creating technology. We'll opt to use our new found mental abilities to design ourselves lives that are more harmonious with our natural world to a degree that all of our needs are met with minimal effort or continued thought. This new found leisure will open a paradigm of complete abundance and freedom of thought.
As we begin to reject all the thought robbing technologies of our 'entertainment' and programming industry, we'll become more lucid of ourselves, our desires and our passions. As more people begin to free themselves we'll begin to understand the power of collective thought as we are able to focus our new mental abilities towards creating a paradise on earth and eventually other planets as well. We'll clean the air, make every water-source drinkable, spend the majority of our time with our loved ones, our families and our children. We'll enter new understandings of how deep and authentic human relationships can go when unencumbered by the endless barrage of distractions inherent in our technological world. We'll finally understand the meaning of melting into a lovers body and mind as our new mental abilities help us to better merge our beings with others. We'll learn to better communicate with non-human animals and create deep relationships with them. As our minds become free and our leisure abundant we'll take to creating friendships with these other beings, sending our children on flights with eagles and learning to swim with dolphins and whales. As we shift away from the technocratic distractions we'll begin to see the absolute beauty and perfection of our world and it's natural systems. We'll begin to understand our role as co-creators of a beautiful paradise as we remember that we are flying on the most high-tech spaceship this universe has ever known. We'll stop tearing it apart and building our primitive "technology" and we will once again remember the divine and incomparable joys that our world provides.
Functional Philosophy
Now, there is no point in philosophy if it isn't functional. This story would only remain a story if there were no concrete action plan to create it into reality. That is precisely why I have been designing a society that will get us to this reality. As this is my main goal, not only in life, but also on Steemit all of my content will in one form or another be related to this theme 😃
If you would like to read the proposal for this creation, check it out here: Our NeighbourGood (ON): Co-Creating Societies Designed for the 21st Century and Beyond! (September 2017 Update)
Rieki
Word-Smithing New Societies
