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Lefgozers

This is no longer the home of the LEFGOZERS (DAREDEVILS)

The lefgozers now have their own domain guts4roses.org

thoughts on value

latest version (rich text format, in english)

previous version (open document format; in dutch)

The LEFGOZERS together form an open source cooperation economy by adhering to the following rules: LEFGOZERS

  • give each other freedom
  • use that freedom to take up their responsibilities towards themselves and the rest of the world, including the future

Here freedom is affermatively defined as:

  • Inner freedom is something that you can have, viz the emotional/intensional ability to behave adequately.
  • Outer freedom is something that you can give to others, viz your help to them in taking up their responsibilities.

At the heart of the LEFGOZERS lies a cooperation process supported by a tool.

The LEFGOZERS

  • are a large group of people constituting together an open source cooperation economy
  • are not creating another society, they are only concerned with economy
  • don't exclude another society but will be part of it
  • don't replace the current economy but will be a settop on top of it
  • don't form an additional or complementary economy but they form an open source cooperation economy
    • in which everybody is welcome as long as he adheres to the aforementioned rules
    • in which everybody can sustain himself (including future generations and consequently is sustainable)

Because of the aforementioned rules the LEFGOZERS:

  • share all resources
  • take no more than they need (implying abundance for Gandhi said: this world has enough for everybodies needs, but not for everybodies greeds)
  • take all concerns into account with everything they do
  • are transparant, the tool is worldreadable, with possible restrictions aiming at user safety

Transparency in it's turn ensures that the LEFGOZERS can:

  • actually take each others concerns into account
  • learn from and inspire each other
  • enforce commitment and identify free riders

One way to become a LEFGOZER is to be conscious of our unity.

To live like a monkey or to live like a monk, that's the question.

Argumentation

Here I look at the economic aspects of our behaviour. In this context with economy I mean that what can be grasped using the following meta model:

  • resources
  • actions
  • goals

I have two reasons for looking at our economy:

  • I see many possibilities for a cooperation economy
  • the world today experiences several crises (in my opinion: because of lack of cooperation)

My analysis of these crises in terms of this meta model is:

  • together the goals are crisis prone (among others they are inconsistent, infeasible and unsustainable)
  • actions do not meet the goals

I contend that we have a governance problem and that in order to expell these crises it suffices to change our behaviour (our actions) adequately, viz to behave mature.
Immaturity implies fear, whereas maturity includes consciousness and reponsibility.

The solution proposed is twofold:

  • what: adjust the goals, this is a rule task
  • how: adjust the actions to meet the goals, this is a coordination task

The rule task is easily solved theoretically. I contend that mature goals (ie goals set forth by mature people) will respect it's environment thus preventing current crises.
The coordination task currently also is obstructed mainly by fear resulting among others in intransparency. A coordination proces will be outlined below.

To understand maturity operationally I here give an affermative definition of (mature) freedom:

  • Inner freedom is something that you can have, viz the emotional/intensional ability to govern (rule and coordinate) adequately.
  • Outer freedom is something that you can give to others, viz your help to them in taking up their responsibilities (towards themselves and the rest of the world, including the future).

In particular outer freedom is not a carte blanche, neither when you give it, nor when you receive it.
Maturity implies both inner and outer freedom.
In particular mature people take all (mature) concerns into account with evertything they do.

A tool is foreseen to support both the ruling and the coordination.

Rule task

The above solution to the rule task is only theoretically valid. In practise people don't always behave mature. I propose three ways to tackle this problem:

  • just do it: the LEFGOZERS dare to be free and constitute a cooperation economy. As such this model is a true life example of the next stage of economic development.
  • millenium goals: instead of taking all goals into account we can start with (one of) the millenium goals.
  • projections: any form of organisation can be viewed from the meta model perspective and many organisations mirror aspects of the next stage (cf Yosh Tandon: TATA: there are thousands of alternatives, as opposed to the Reagan-Thatcher TINA doctrine: there is no alternative). Examples are cooperatives and LETS.

Coordination task

Once the goals are set coordination can take place. I propose the following coordination process, iteratively but not necessarily in that order:

  • administer all resources which gives rise to a state space
  • administer all goals who are functions on the state space
  • create plannings consisting of actions, each action being a transformation of the resources giving rise to a step in the state space
  • administer completed actions, so that the current status is always known

Obviously the planning activity is the main activity. The tool will suggest plannings that take into account as many concerns as possible.

Planning in this open source cooperation economy is like laying a jigsaw puzzle. The tool will suggest actions (pieces to lay) but you can also create new pieces yourself.

Each participant attains his own equilibrium when he judges his goals and necessary actions are in balance.

This game could remind you of das Glasperlenspiel by Herman Hesse.

Development

In order to develop this open source cooperation economy several aspects of the tool can be developed in parallel:

0. Construct a framework in which the following modules can function:

1. How to describe resources?

The tool distinguishes between

  • resource types
  • resource instances

A complete set of possible resource instances is called a status.
All statusses together form the state space.

2. How to describe goals?

Goals are functions on the state space, defined in terms of resource types

3. How to descrtibe actions?

The tool distinguishes between

  • action types
  • action instances

An action type is a recipe, defined in terms of resource types, explaining how to transform resource instances into each other.
An action instance is the application of an action type to a specific set of resource instances.
As such an action instance is a jump from one point in the state space (representing the specific set of resource instances) to another point.
As such an action type is a set of such jumps.
Actions can be composed (associatively, but not commutatively).

4. How to describe subsets of the statespace?

An actionplan is a pair (action type, subset of state space). It says in which situations (states) the action should be performed.
A planning is a set of action plans.

5. How to calculate paths in the state space?

LEFGOZERS can simultaneously (but always asynchronously) plan actions. So in some points in the state space several actions may be planned. How to calculate all possible paths?

6. How to suggest plannings given the goals and how to sort them (in order of decreasing relevance)?

For the description of resources, goals and actions we will use a language consisting of

  • vocabulary
  • grammar
  • logic

Connection with other developments

Although this open source cooperation economy might look rather exotic I contend that it is a very natural paradigm indeed:

First let us note that this type of economy is the way one-person households are organised. And families usually too. Even small businesses can be organised like this. As organisations grow larger internal politics can obstruct this paradigm.

Moreover when tribes were still autarchic this paradigm probably was the default. As globalisation commenced several millenia ago trust shifted from the kin group to money. In religions like islam and christianity projections of this paradigm can be found as khalifa and stewardship.

In my opinion neoliberalism neglects the necessary balance between freedom and responsibility and in this way neoliberalism is the structural expression of fear. By the way, there is nothing new about neoliberalism and it is as liberal as national socialism was social.

So in fact the LEFGOZERS paradigm is a transformation of the current economy to it's older roots whilst continuing globalisation. The internet gives us that opportunity.

And for a simple example: my neighbour is member of a foundation along the lines of the LEFGOZERS paradigm.

next steps

er moet nog een verdere uitwerking van de tool komen, ondertussen hieronder wat aanzetten

er lijkt behoefte of zelfs noodzaak aan een ander economisch paradigma
maar ik wil vooral kijken naar de mogelijkheden die we hebben
ik wil het hebben over wat er goed kan gaan, niet over wat er fout kan gaan

in het kamp van alternatieven mis ik vooral analyses
mijn (meta)analyse is dat de oplossingen/alternatieven die geboden worden kracht ontberen vanwege dat gebrek aan analyse
op zijn best zijn het fragmenten van een groter geheel, dat grotere geheel wil ik hier schetsen, obv een analyse
ik denk dat de huidige oplossingen zich teveel binnen de bestaande kaders ophouden
er mist ook een kompas, we weten wel wat we anders willen maar met de bouwstenen van het huidige paradigma als ruil en geld kunnen we geen nieuw paradigma bouwen, we hebben dus geen idee hoe we dat wat we willen kunnen realiseren

mijn analyse is dat we meer rekening kunnen houden met elkaar dan we nu doen en dat biedt geweldige perspectieven
ihb geloof ik niet dat we met een wicked problem te maken hebben
eea is ook te verklaren vanuit historisch perspectief: pas sinds een generatie zijn we ons bewust van de (mondiale) impact van ons handelen
de komende generatie zal zich bewust worden van de overvloed waarin we leven en wellicht daarna volgt de bewustwording van onze eenheid
vooralsnog denken we in schaarste en dat is een self fulfilling prophecy

ons huidige economische paradigma is gebaseerd op schaarste, angst en wantrouwen
ons huidige economische systeem is ook niet ingericht op rekening houden met elkaar
mijn paradigmashift is dat we niet meer handelen maar samenwerken

nog te doen:

  • stip op de horizon
  • volwassen gedragen (verlicht)
  • gewoon doen


mensen die hun verantwoordelijkheid willen nemen voor zichzelf en elkaar (en de toekomst)
volwassen keuzen zijn:
neem niet meer dan je nodig hebt => overvloed (gandhi)
dan is er ook geen reden om ingewikkeld te doen over eigendom
eigendom kan dan transformeren in rentmeesterschap

iedereen kan dus nemen en doen wat goed is/nodig is

we hebben dus een groep mensen
die de beschikking hebben over een stel bronnen
ieder van hen gedraagt zich volwassen
als iemand iets wil dan neemt hij wat daarvoor nodig is en doet daarmee wat nodig is
tenslotte komt de samenwerking:
ipv dat iedereen autarkisch doet wat hij wil weken we samen en dat maakt de boel efficienter

als er iemand extra mee wil doen graag dus, want vele handen maken licht werk
een van de kernen van deze economie is dus de reorgnisatie want een reorganisatie betekent hetzelfde bereiken met minder werk

dit is dus een economie waar exra werkkrachten en reorganisaties welkom zijn

 

ingredienten voor de tool:

0. Construct a framework in which the following modules can function:
1. How to describe resources?

The tool distinguishes between

    resource types
a resource type is defined by
- name
- determination algorithm
- unit (in which to measure its size)

    resource instances
a resource instance is defined by
- its resource type
- identification (a possible extra element of resourve type definition is an identifation method, such as licence plates for cars)
- size (in units)
- localisation

A complete set of possible resource instances is called a status.
All statusses together form the state space.
note that the state space is timeless.

2. How to describe goals?

Goals are functions on the state space, defined in terms of resource types, sizes and localisations
3. How to descrtibe actions?

The tool distinguishes between

    action types
an action type is defined by
- input resource types, in particular
-- labor
-- energy
- output resource types
-- all resource types in their proportions
- run time
- recipe (in natural language: how to transform the inputs into the outputs)

    action instances
an action instance is defined by
- its action type
- identification of all resource instances involved
<waar komt tijd erin? hier of al nij resource instances?>

an action instance is to be executed in one place, so all the input resource instances are to be in one place
several people can work at the same action instance though

As such an action instance is a jump from one point in the state space (representing the specific set of resource instances) to another point.
<let op: er zijn meerdere statussen waarin deze specifieke resource instances voorkomen>
As such an action type is a set of such jumps.

a special type of action instance is a logistic action instance, it is an action instance with input = output except for labor and energy, so only the localisation changes using labor and energy and taking some time

<nettypes and instances>
a net type is a set of actiontypes and associations of output resource types to input resource types of these action types (as such it is a mapping of a directed graph)

a net instance is defined by
- its net type
- an instantiation of each of its action types
- a logistic action instance for each of the output - input associations

a reorganisation type is the the replacement of one net type with another
a reorganisation instance is defined by
- its reorganisation type
- an identification of a net instance to which to apply this reorganisation type