Category: 11 Society

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Event: Free Online Download Why Stone-Age Instincts Run Your Life & How Science Can Change That

04 Education, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Communities of Practice, Cultural Intelligence, Earth Intelligence, Ethics, Methods & Process, Strategy, Threats
Tom Atlee

Dear friends,

I’m excited to let you know about an upcoming free teleseminar by colleagues of mine, Michael Dowd and Connie Barlow. This couple is well known for their work in translating the various evolutionary sciences into practical wisdom for meeting the challenges of everyday life.

The focus of their hour-long audio seminar will be, as they summarize it: “Why the Stone-Age instincts we’ve all inherited can so often challenge us in our modern-day settings—and how new discoveries in the evolutionary and human sciences offer perspectives that are both practical and profound.”

Michael and Connie were the ones who launched me into my own evolutionary perspective, which expanded and deepened into the vision in my book REFLECTIONS ON EVOLUTIONARY ACTIVISM.

I'm beginning to see an emerging whole-life curriculum to bring actionable evolutionary understandings into virtually every aspect of life, just as feminist and ecological understandings have spread into every niche.  The first rough outline of such an “evolutionizing” curriculum might look something like this:

*  Evolutionize yourself and your relationships:
Connie and Michael's class
*  Evolutionize your groups, organizations and communities:
Peggy Holman's ENGAGING EMERGENCE
*  Evolutionize your society and social systems:
Tom Atlee's REFLECTIONS ON EVOLUTIONARY ACTIVISM
Robert Wright's NON-ZERO
John Stewart's EVOLUTION'S ARROW
Paul Ehrlich and Robert Ornstein's NEW WORLD, NEW MIND
*  Evolutionize your worldview
Elisabet Sahtouris' EARTHDANCE
Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme's THE UNIVERSE STORY
Michael Dowd's THANK GOD FOR EVOLUTION
David Sloan Wilson's EVOLUTION FOR EVERYONE

There are many other dimensions that could be included in such a curriculum — evolutionizing technology, education, heatlh care, you name it — and dozens of other really fine books and other resources that could be used — but the general idea in this outline intrigues me and, I hope, others who might act on it.

I invite you get a good whiff of how this perspective could play out in your own life.  Check out Connie and Michael's free evening teleclass this Wednesday (May 18th) — “Evolutionize Your Life: The Science of How to Decode Human Behavior, Eliminate Self-Judgment, and Create a Big-Hearted Life of Purpose and Joyful Integrity”.   You can read more about it and register at http://bit.ly/EvolutionizeLifeClass .

Enjoy!

Coheartedly,
Tom

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Secrecy News: Executive Privilege–Thomas Drake, Whistleblower, as a Political Prisoner in the USA…

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Government, Officers Call, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy
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A CLOSE LOOK AT THE THOMAS DRAKE CASE

An insightful account of the pending prosecution under the Espionage Act of former National Security Agency official Thomas A. Drake appears this week in The New Yorker.  Author Jane Mayer delves deeply into the origins of the case stemming from Drake's critical view of NSA management and surveillance practices. She explores the unfolding consequences of the case and its larger significance.

Among the article's many striking observations on the Drake case is the concluding quote from Mark Klein, a former AT&T employee who exposed warrantless surveillance activity by the Bush Administration. “I think it’s outrageous,” he says. “The Bush people have been let off. The telecom companies got immunity. The only people Obama has prosecuted are the whistle-blowers.”

See “The Secret Sharer” by Jane Mayer, The New Yorker, May 23, 2011.

Photo Caption:  Drake, a former senior executive at the National Security Agency, faces some of the gravest charges that can be brought against an American citizen. Photograph by Martin Schoeller.

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MUST READ CAPSTONE WORK: Noosphere — The Next Stage in the Evolution of Human Consciousness, A Testimony by Jose Arguelles

11 Society, 6 Star Top 10%, About the Idea, Advanced Cyber/IO, Augmented Reality, Consciousness & Social IQ, Cosmos & Destiny, Culture, Research, Ethics, Historic Contributions, InfoOps (IO), Information Society, Intelligence (Extra-Terrestrial), Intelligence (Public), Intelligence (Wealth of Networks), Methods & Process, Nature, Diet, Memetics, Design, Officers Call, Philosophy, Real Time, Strategy, Strategy, Truth & Reconciliation, Values, Ethics, Sustainable Evolution, Voices Lost (Indigenous, Gender, Poor, Marginalized)
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Phi Beta Iota: We reproduce the excerpt in order to add links to all of the books and individuals mentioned.  Tip of the Hat to Reality Sandwich for this offering, and to Evolver Editions (North Atlantic/Random House) for their new Manifesto series in support of human consciousness and planetary synthesis.

Noosphere: The Next Stage in the Evolution of Human Consciousness, A Testimony

Amazon Page

To mark the recent passing of José Argüelles, we offer an excerpt from his upcoming book Manifesto for the Noosphere: The Next Stage in the Evolution of Human Consciousness, available from Evolver Editions/North Atlantic Books in October 2011.

EXCERPT:

We must enlarge our approach to encompass the formation taking place before our eyes … of a particular biological entity such as has never existed on earth-the growth, outside and above the biosphere, of an added planetary layer, an envelope of thinking substance, to which, for the sake of convenience and symmetry, I have given the name of the Noosphere. –Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Future of Man

Amazon Page

Manifesto for the Noosphere is the result of forty years of study, contemplation, investigation, and synthesis. While the noosphere may be beyond the grasp of conventional science, it is a deep and pervasive intuition that has gripped the minds of scientists, philosophers, poets, and artists since the concept first emerged in 1926. It is an evolutionary concept posited by studies in both biogeochemistry and paleontology. It is a whole-systems paradigm that melds prophecy and analysis of current world trends. It is a perception that the transformation of the biosphere is inevitably leading to a new geological epoch and evolutionary cycle, and it is due to the impact of human thought on the environment that this new era — the Noosphere — is dawning.

Continue reading “MUST READ CAPSTONE WORK: Noosphere — The Next Stage in the Evolution of Human Consciousness, A Testimony by Jose Arguelles”

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USG on Oil: Doing the Wrong Thing Righter….

01 Agriculture, 03 Economy, 05 Energy, 06 Family, 07 Health, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 11 Society, 12 Water, Commerce, Corruption, Earth Intelligence, Government, IO Impotency, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy, True Cost

Obama says ‘Drill, baby, drill.' Will new oil policy ease gas prices?

President Obama used his weekly address to announce steps to promote greater domestic oil production and reduce the burden of high gas prices. Republicans say it's not enough.

Big Oil's Political Ploy

Whatever else we might say about Big Oil in the United States, we have to give the industry credit for one thing: it has mastered the art of scamming us with a perfectly straight face.

Freshmen challenge energy subsidies

Pompeo and Labrador were joined by Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform and Mike Needham of Heritage Action Fund. The two organizations joined a coalition of conservative groups in March, including Americans for Prosoperity, in a letter calling for an end to energy subsidies.

 

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Phi Beta Iota: US politicians have substituted ideology for intelligence (decision-support) and borrowing for thinking.  There is nothing intelligent in US energy policy, because there is no policy–just a long string of subsidies and hand-outs and tax exemptions.  The oil drilling decisions are an example of doing the wrong thing righter, instead of the right thing (Russell Ackoff).  The “policy” decisions are also hypocritical because nothing being decided today will have substantive effect in less than ten years.  Here's what an intelligent government would use to think about energy futures…and everything else, all together.

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Is ‘Arab Spring’ Coming To Kabul?

08 Wild Cards, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, InfoOps (IO), IO Sense-Making, Methods & Process, Mobile
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Is ‘Arab Spring' Coming To Kabul?

Radio Free Europe, 13 May 2011

The recent emergence of the first, large-scale Facebook movement among Afghan university students calling for reform can't help but raise the question — will the wave of antigovernment dissent in the Middle East reach Afghanistan?

Since March, some 1,500 university students in Kabul, and another 3,000 elsewhere around the country, have “friended” the Facebook page “Reformists.” There, they meet daily for discussions about how to exert grassroots pressure on the government — pressure that barely exists in Afghanistan today.

In some ways, the movement is very much like similar Facebook groups in the Arab world.

Read more….

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Taliban on Twitter, The End Is Near!

05 Civil War, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Military, Non-Governmental
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The Taliban Are On Twitter

By Chris Gayomali on May 12, 2011

TechLand (Time)

Due to a strict adherence to Sharia law, the Taliban have long shunned modern technology, particularly personal televisions and computers. But in the wake of a recent offensive campaign in the Afghan city of Kandahar, the group has emerged on a new, if unlikely, modern platform: Twitter.

At the the time of writing this, the account in question (@alemarahweb) has 363 followers. Most of the messages are broadcasted in the militant sect's native Pashto. But, as the Guardian points out, on early Thursday morning a message that read in English was sent across the Twitter-sphere. Like most of the tweets posted, the message concerned exaggerated reports of “strikes against the ‘infidel forces'” that typically feature links back to The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan website, a frequently relocated Web headquarters for the splintered Taliban's makeshift government.

PHOTOS: Inside bin Laden's lair

The account also follows 12 other users (at least at the time of writing this), notably @Afghantim, a “USAF Logistics Readiness Officer currently deployed as a combat advisor to the Afghan Army,” and numerous Afghani news and development groups. The Guardian surmises this to be a practice of the old axiom “keep your friends close but your enemies closer.” (More on Time.com: See the 140 best Twitter feeds)

The emergence of Twitter has consistently been one of the key stories concerning the revolutions in Egypt and other uprisings. And it has proven, time and time again, pivotal to community leaders for organizing unified protests on a massive scale. The adoption of social media by a decentralized group like the Taliban is perhaps an acknowledgement of the platform's communicative potential, whether that be for strategic or merely propaganda purposes.

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Secrecy News: F-35 “True Costs” Disclosed

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corruption, Military, Officers Call, Peace Intelligence

F-35 SELECTED ACQUISITION REPORT DISCLOSED

The latest annual report to Congress (pdf) on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Program details the soaring costs and deferred production schedule associated with the program.  The report, which has not been publicly released, outlines total program costs from last year as well as per-aircraft costs and planned annual spending rates.

It's “a useful primer on the Pentagon's most expensive weapons program,” said one close observer of defense procurement.

A copy was obtained by Secrecy News.  See the 2010 Selected Acquisition Report (SAR) for the F-35, April 2011.

Phi Beta Iota: Congress has abdicated its Article 1 responsibilities across the board, but particularly with respect to war and the cost of war.  Coincident with the insanity of the US Intelligence Community claiming it can restrict the use of unclassified information in legal proceedings (See Drake Leak Case), what we have is a government that is “out of control” and incurring costs “in our name” that are unaffordable and often immoral as well as illegal.  Transparency of true costs is a major foundation for sane democratic policies.

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