If you could create your own state,
what would it look like?
A social semi-anarchistic state with Platonic overtones. Somewhat inconsistent, isn't it?
In reality, a modified system similar to much of Western Europe. A state I'd like to live in.
I am torn, because what my ethics would dictate would not, ultimately, be a very INTERESTING place to live in. A perfectly fair and stable society conflicts with the uncertainty and lack of predictability needed for life to be exciting.
Lets all adopt a Mayan system.
Priests! Warriors! Fertility rites! Oh my...
In my state
>Women and men would be kept seperate in / be kept in seperate higher education facilities.
Why?
>Politicans would be forbidden to have any private or otherwise associated property.
Then what incentive is there for an honest person to become a politician?
I'm assuming the first is a result of research that seems to indicate women generally learn better when not surrounded by men. Either that or to prevent the spread of STD's.
I just know >>5's going to have some other reason tucked up his sleeve though.
I wonder what would happen if people were randomly selected from the educated classes (or a spread across classes with weights as preferred) to serve in office for specific terms. Perhaps an election could be held for the randomly selected individuals.
Of course that won't eliminate the possibility of corruption, but neither will the prevention of property ownership.
> Why?
To establish, nurture and further stronger gender characteristics.
> Then what incentive is there for an honest person to become a politician?
Ethics? Personal concernment? Why did people ever become mendicants in the first place?
Admit it, you just want to get some Marimite action going.
Catholic schools gave us Britney Spears and Olivia Newton-John
Girl's Schools gave us women, today's academia's facilities produce naught but drones with female bodies.
At the risk of sounding like a chauvenist pig, I'm tempted to support that assertion.
My favorite girlfriend (if I had to choose, they were all wonderful women) came from a girl's school. She was intelligent, well-read, engaging, well-dressed, and just generally high-class. I could spend hours talking or listening to her.
Of course one sample is hardly enough to judge by. I've seen some scary examples too.
× chauvenist
○ chauvinist
> if I had to choose, they were all wonderful women
hahahahaha
do they post here?
>>To establish, nurture and further stronger gender characteristics.
So you're a homophobe?
:P
I fail at Englisch.
> do they post here?
Need you ask? >.>;
> So you're a homophobe?
what
Answer the thread's original question already, jackass
what is Dystopia? The Opposite of Utopia? afraid
http://m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=dystopia
Main Entry: dys·to·pia
Pronunciation: (")dis-'tO-pE-&
Function: noun
Etymology: New Latin, from dys- + -topia (as in utopia)
1 : an imaginary place where people lead dehumanized and often fearful lives
2 : ANTI-UTOPIA 2
who would want a world like that :?
The goal of my future society is to place the focus of all spending and research into destroying the planet therby ending all forms of (known) suffering. IT WILL BE UTOPIA.
Mad Scientist #696123: "I'll create a new world... after I destroy this one first and all who made fun of me at preschool!"
I'd create a purely chaotic society where reality is functionally and psychologically indistinguishable from fantasy. A society where dualism is as fictional as everything else may be.
It will encourage everyone to live in the context of a self-defined role in a self-defined setting, either or both of which may change at any time without consequence.
Those who take on incompatible roles and live in incompatible settings will have to reconcile with each other--and whoever else gets pulled into the chaos by direct or indirect involvement--on entirely subjective bases because there is no measurable, objective standard to say that one expression is more or less real than any other.
Laws of matter, energy, space, time, and all of physics will yield to the collective will of selective perception.
There will only be two universal truths:
Life and truth will be a tapestry woven by unchecked and equal expression of every individual's innate consciousness.
> 1. You only live once, as does everyone else.
Sux. It takes more than a few lives to master a game.
> 2. The past cannot be undone.
No patches allowed in case of game bugs?
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius is a masterpiece!
It can be studied here: http://www.its.caltech.edu/~boozer/etexts/tlon.html
The Wikipedia article on it is almost as long as the story itself, and is quite interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tl%F6n,_Uqbar,_Orbis_Tertius. Read the story first, though.
I'd outlaw harmful religions. I'd make people pay and mobilize the masses. I'd also further pump money and energy into natural sciences, structural sciences and the schools of law and thought. In my society, freedom will be a most exceeding honor to have, shared by everyone.
How do you define "harmful religion"?
Whee, slippery slope there. :p
Religion that harms the well-being and the image of the state.
How can you have freedom if you're not allowed to belong to which religion you want?
Now that's a paradox, huh? I'll give you a hint: Absolute freedom is dumb in about any political theory.
Sure. But if you're not going to make good on it, you shouldn't say you will.
Old but interesting thread I haven't seen before appeared, w00t.
My state would certainly have high taxes, like the one I currently live in - everything works nicely enough here that I can't really convince myself it's anything else than a good idea. This is just the most boring part though.
There will always be crime (and it even arguably serves important functions in society!). There would absolutely be no death penalty in my society, but instead there would be a special punishment for people who had commited more hideous crimes. These people would have their memories temporarily blocked, and they would be sent to a Haibane Renmei-style facility with only faint memories of their crimes. In their new home, they would integrate into society and come to peace with themselves, and depart for the "real" society when they are ready for it again. Those few who can't come to terms with their sins would stay behind, in effect in life imprisonment. This of course assumes the society would have some interesting technology we don't have. ; )
Another (in my opinion) interesting point would be sports. Team sports would have the highest status, because of the importance of the collective combined with freedom of individuals to live in extraordinary ways. However, the competitive atmosphere that exists today wouldn't be there: the finest possible result would be a draw (whatever the correct term is). Players would be trained to play at their usual level whenever they are leading in points, but everyone would celebrate euphorically when a "draw" is achieved.
Assuming no extraordinary futuristic tech for this would be available, transportation through a personal automobile would be incredibly expensive - only those who like it enought to dedicate their entire lives and large amounts of funds to it could do it. The train system would be a lot more extensive than it is today, and the parts not covered by it would be supported by bicycles and collective, free bus and - in special cases - taxi services.
Air transportation would be provided by huge airships, which would serve as a symbol of the splendour of my society: there would finally be airships larger than the Hindenburg built in nazi germany, instead of our current wimpy planes. A similar attitude would be taken towards architechture: a huge amount of value would be put into the positive attitude and other additional value that beautiful, elaborate and huge buildings would give.
Is this enough rambling? ; )
> But if you're not going to make good on it, you shouldn't say you will.
what
I like >>33's utopia quite a bit.
I'd instate monstrous gauss-curved taxes, of which a risibly small amount would be spent on military, law and order ("security"), whereas the main share would go into welfare, culture, science and education.
All book religions plus hinduism would be abolished, strict secularism in public would be instated, making religion an entirely private matter and effectively banning the appearance of religion in public. To compensate for the "lack in guidance" (hah), I'd kick up cultural and philosophical education up a few notches.
Lavish spending would reign in the health sector, the arts, the music and the basic supply systems (water, electricity, public transportation, ...). Kindof like this country in the 70s.
The consumption of stored artworks (glaring at paintings in museum or looking at repros at home, listening to recorded music at home, ...) would be of no cost, paid for by a watering-can type of governmental patronage and fees for live-consumption (performance art, concertos).
Medical attention would be entirely free of charge whenever it served the quality of life of an individual.
Water and electricity would come at very low fees; public transportation would combine today's efficiency (a bus into every direction every 12 minutes, even in the most remote hick region) with low or no cost.
Modern architecture would be boosted with governmental subsidies for innovative projects.
Political control would effectively be in the hands of very small imperatively mandated councils, ensuring a maximum amount of federalism and direct control and accountability.
Personal privacy would be the highest-ranking moral concept.
What little punishment of criminal offences was necessary would probably be some crude and largely easy/laughable task in small cases ("walk a mile", "paint a wall", "be the driver of the dogpancaker for a day"), in cases with worse offences I'd stick with the "careful resocialization" some more advanced nations have been experimenting with.
Also, all dogs would be pancaked with a huge, black circa 1900 steamroller with menacing teeth decals upon sight.
Just saying that if one of your principles is to limit freedom, you shouldn't say freedom is one of your other principles. It's just insincere.
>>33 reminds me:
My utopia would do away with wasteful urban sprawls, replacing them with compact and efficient arcologies. Huge structures built in all three dimensions can at the same time decrease land usage and make for bigger and more open urban spaces, and can also more efficiently use resources and solar power.
They also look DAMN COOL.
> Just saying that if one of your principles is to limit freedom, you shouldn't say freedom is one of your other principles. It's just insincere.
No, it's not. Freedom is shared by everyone, to certain degrees. Absolute freedom of one results in enslavement of everybody else.
My utupia is where there are a lot of independant city-states with their own laws etc.
They can communicate, trade etc. with each other but they should have complete sovereignity.
> independant city-states
Wouldn't last very long...
...not to mention that docking to them with dirigibles is really awesome!
>>41 is correct! This is another example of efficiency, as you do not need to use huge areas of land for air fields.
I have not done the maths on this, but it is likely that a big airship could be powered entirely by solar power too, if you covered it in solar cells.
I'd make my state anything goes... Somebody pisses you off? kill them! I don't care for taxes, maintainnace etc... you need food to eat? Go hunt and kill it! you need a place to live? chop wood and build it!
Honestly, I think we can live just as well without all this BS right now.
>>43
As I'm just a learner of English, I don't know how to describe my feelings properly in a word like in this situation. When I read you, found you very funny and wanted to say something like "you made me laugh and I like it because I know you were just kidding" in a casual way, then what should I say? I mean,
what would native English speakers say casually? Well, anyway, I love your joking!
>>44
The usual English saying online in this situation is "LOL" or "ROFL". Those stand for "laugh out loud" or "rolling on (the) floor, laughing". Saying these too much may seem annoying, just like saying "ワロスwwwww" in Japanese too often is annoying. A more adult way is saying "heh", which stands for a chuckle or small laugh.
There are no specific words or phrases (that I can think of) to express this emotion of pleasure at someone's serious joke in English, so English speakers usually just laugh or chuckle. You could also say "funny" or "nice one" meaning that the joke is humorous.
Online it is hard to tell whether a person is joking or not. Sometimes people seem to be joking but they are actually serious. Then they will get angry at being laughed at. Since online life is not like real life, it's still okay to laugh at them; if they let their feelings get hurt by a post they are too sensitive.
Don't ever say "You are funny". It's too hard to tell if you are saying that the person is humorous, or that the person is weird. English speakers usually know the difference, but foreign people have a hard time. It is like saying "あなた、面白い" in Japanese -- maybe an insult, maybe not. Instead say "That's funny" which doesn't point at the person. You can say "You're funny" to close friends who will know that the implied insult is not serious.
heh heh
What do people find attractive in the Jetsons like future?
To me it seems like a bleak picture of the future where there is nothing of classical beauty anywhere...
100/2 GET
>>49
One word: flying cars. :)
Oh, and they don't seem to have any wars. All those tall buildings... or maybe wars are raging on ground level and that's the why of such high altitude buildings?
I would like to create a state whose power was far-reaching, stable, but corrupt and utterly incompotent leadership. They would go to war, from time to time, but not many people would be killed because the only people killed would be the ones dumb enough to sign up for the military (Conscription would not be allowed).
They should have no idea whether they want to be a socialist state that shovels money to the poor people who have no idea how to use it, or an utterly capitalistic state where capable people are rewarded, but poor stupid schlubs simply get poorer. It should be the strongest who survive, but the weakest would still be taken care of, if only barely.
My point is that your Utopias are bad ideas. There has to be conflict or it simply isn't attainable. I think that in order for society to work, in order for people to build, they have to be able to compete. Like an A-frame. It's the two parts that want to fall down in their own directions that keep the thing standing. But at the same time, we can't overlook compassion or else we lose our foundation.
And flying cars.
It was an interesting read until the "...your Utopias are bad ideas... there has to be conflict or it simply isn't attainable".
Have you actually read this thread?
no
"An interesting read"? Have you been reading Slashdot again?
Der Flitterkars!
Fliegenauto?
>>58
It's called polite fiction.
Whatever you say, Mr. Western Europe.
Actually, I was referring to that exact phrasing you used, which in my mind is one of the archetypal Slashdot news article clichés, but your interpretetaion was funnier.
Utopia itself is a bad idea. Idiots.
You say it's bad, so support the asse>>66 is DQN
When a civilisation thinks that war is a good thing, that civilisation is degraded and on the way out.
War occurs when negotiations (aka politics, in the good sense of the word) have failed.
IOW, warring civ's are DQN.
> An ideally perfect place, especially in its social, political, and moral aspects.
A utopia is, by definition, a good idea. >>64 is nonsensical and also DQN.
It could be said, though, that >>64 has a philosophical point of view that rejects all forms of idealism and that thus all ideas that involve any ideals are bad.
I'd still assert he's DQN, though.
You're too wrapped up in new age nonsense. I don't reject idealism, I just have a darwinist ideal. I think that war is a often a good thing, for ensuring the best states with the best governments survive. Like the British during their imperialist era, or the whole thing with the USA winning the cold war (ok, not a real "war" but whatever).
Utopia usually can't involve war or often even conflict, so it is not a good idea. Also, the idea of a Utopia is that it's completely stable, and so things can never change. Perfection leaves little room for growth, conflict = improvement.
> Also, the idea of a Utopia is that it's completely stable, and so things can never change.
Please point out where in the definition I quoted, or in another definition taken from a dictionary of your choice, that this claim is made.
You seem to take "utopia" as some sort of objective ideal - this is of course impossible to achive, and this is why the concept is interesting - it is very subjective. And exploring that is the purpose of this thread.
So you're expecting me to call a world where people could kill each other, where poor people are allowed to suffer, where medical care is not metted out generously, and where intellectual and/or spiritual advancement is secondary to simply surviving a utopia?
By "could kill" i mean something else. Just ignore that.
If you think that would be the ideal world, yes. That is the meaning of the word.
I'd still call you DQN, though!
I don't buy that there's no objective definition for utopia. From the first time it was written about, it was always a place of good or light, limitless supply of food ETC... Nobody ever writes about a dark Utopia.
> Nobody ever writes about a dark Utopia.
You're free to do so itt.
Others might call your vision a dystopia, though.
A real life implementation would not be utopia but eutopia :v
This is relevant:
● The Ten Stupidest Utopias!
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2005/20050905/stupid-utopias-a.shtml
> Smith is like most American libertarian sci-fi writers in that he's essentially a small-town boy trapped in a big world populated by people and ideas he doesn't understand...
Ouch, snarky!
This isn't really relevant at all:
I'd form a confederacy of all the people in my country. Each area would send ten people to the capital to decide issues of common interest. I would only have the power to make a decision when the delegates cannot come to a conclusion, meaning that 75% of them agree on the issue at hand.
The groundrules of my Confederacy:
1.) No human can tell another where when or how to pray.
2.) No human can harrass or bring another human up on charges for mere speech.
3.) No law can forbid an act that causes no harm to others (thx Heinlin)
4.) All humans are created equal. None can be held as unequal under the law.
5.) Once a man buys his land, he can never be forced off of it for any reason.
6.) All must learn a trade, thus public education would be funded.
>4.) All humans are created equal. None can be held as unequal under the law.
Not really true. Some will work harder and become better than others. Some are more qualified to some task than some other. Some are naturally gifted and may perform better.
By levelling everybody down to the lowest common denominator, one ends up with a Swedish-like country. :P
> Not really true.
He said:
> groundrules
Rules aren't subject to being true or not.
>By levelling everybody down to the lowest common denominator, one ends up with a Swedish-like country. :P
What, a prosperous one? ; )
high, probably due to lack of sunlight. And for males, seeing all the Swedish models and not getting one.
And I wasn't talking about economics, just politically.
> 2.) No human can harrass or bring another human up on charges for mere speech.
What about yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre, causing a stampede that kills several people? That's mere speech.
> 3.) No law can forbid an act that causes no harm to others
What's "no harm"? No physical harm? No mental harm? No financial harm?
> 5.) Once a man buys his land, he can never be forced off of it for any reason.
Oh, so land owners are special? I thought you said everyone was equal under the law, but apparently land owners have a refuge from the law that others don't.
>>91
I suspect there is a relation between pretty girls and male apathy. The more the males are in low spirits, not even trying, the prettier the girls can be, because there is no risk for them. Also because the girl has to work much harder to get the attention of the guy she wants. :)
anyone can own land. yesh.
Oh, they hand it out to just anyone these days, do they?
Don't pick too much on that irrational fixation on land - we all have sides like that, including those who happen to be intelligent. ; )