Imagining a World Without Money

[Not as hippieish as it sounds. Has more to do with robots.]

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. Time Magazine's recently published The Dropout Economy is a stunningly accurate picture of where middle class America's mindset is headed. People on the ground are suffering because the old systems don't work anymore. It's frustrating to see so many resources - physical, financial and intellectual - being used to keep crooked, antediluvian institutions on life-support in a vain attempt to hold on to an unsustainable and idealized image of late 20th Century "prosperity".

This conservative way of thinking and fear of real change prevents us from putting resources into energetic and relevant new ideas and enterprises, and worst of all, stagnates evolution toward a more civilized and sustainable society.

While trying to imagine how a stateless, jobless, decentralized society might actually thrive (rather than turn into primitive feudal suburban favelas - at least hopefully with Philippe Starck-designed wind turbines,) I came across this video on Rob Walker's excellent Unconsumption blog:



So how the heck have I never heard of Jacque Fresco? It's kinda out there, but this is the kind of big picture thinking we ought to be putting our energy into. This is all classic technocracy futurist utopia stuff, but it is refreshing and quite timely to think about.

The Venus Project blog