Posts Tagged ‘China’

What is Happening in the Financial System

Friday, September 19th, 2008

The current Foundation of the World Financial System, the US Economy based on the Dollar, is in a Fatal Crisis. The Solution to the Current Crisis, Bailing Out, will finally Speed Up the Crisis. The real problem is moved to the Near Future, to another Level of Society (MiddleClass, the Poor) and to another part of the World. In the End it will fireback on the US itself and deepen the Recession that is already taking place.

Money represents a Value of Something. For a very long time money was based on the value of Gold. This foundation failed. The failure of the Gold Based Money system created the Great Depression and finally the Second World War. At this moment the Financial System is without any Foundation.

To prevent a Third World War the Bretton Woods Agreement was created in 1947. The foundation of the International Money System was based on the Dollar. In 1971 the US broke up the Agreement because it was unable to stabilize the International System. At that time the US was spending too much money to fight the war in Vietnam. It became a Debtor and remained a Debtor until today.

From that Time on the International Money System is Floating but the Foundation, the Dollar, is still used. The Euro is an alternative but it is almost impossible to move to the Euro without destroying the US Economy and the World Economy. Europe, China and even Russia are Forced to help the Biggest Debtor in the World to avoid the destruction of their own Financial System. In the mean time the Biggest Debtor in the World keeps on Spending. It is even Increasing its Spending Behavior.

Many people believe that the reason behind the Financial Crisis is the Credit Crunch. They believe  poor mortgages are the cause of everything but there are mortgage lenders who help you buy your house without any hassle. Buying a  house during this financial crisis can be quite difficult, you can check us out here if your applying for a home loan.

The main reason are financial derivatives. Derivatives are very complicated ways to gamble with money. They are so complicated that almost nobody is able to calculate the value of these financial instruments. They are so complicated that almost nobody is able to keep the books. The controllers of the banks lost the control a very long time ago.

Derivatives are the playingfield of dealers and the dealers are able to confuse almost everybody when they want to play their game. The effect of playing dealers has shown itself in many cases like the falldown of Barings. The Derivatives have transformed The Banking Industry into a Casino.

The US Government and its Allies are trying to avoid a new Great Depression by bailing out or protecting every US Bank, Insurance Company and other Company (Farmers, Chrysler, Boeing, Ford, ..) that is unable to pay its debts. The US Government is moving the huge and uncertain debt from the Market to the Government hoping the Market will Restore itself. They believe the Market is going Up and Down. Someday they will be able to Sell the current Debt with a Profit back to the Market.

The strange thing is that other countries are helping the US to protect their vital companies from a certain disaster. The US, the Protector of the Free Market, is protecting its Own market and the only reason why others are helping the US is to avoid a certain disaster on the level of the World. Strangely enough they are disturbing their own market to avoid the destruction of the market of their biggest competitor.

In the background investors, Countries and Companies are slowly moving out of the US Economy. The are investing in Europa (Warren Buffett) or are creating their own financial market and currency (China, Russia, India).Nobody believes the US will recover but they have to prevent a total meltdown.

China is even taking over control of the US Economy. With their enormouss funds they will be alble to “blackmail” the US. They are already doing this. The Chinese are in contrary to the US fighting the war with the Wapens of their Opponent. They know how to win without fighting.

What many peopl don’t realize is that the long term Economic Cycle (The Kondratiev) is going Down for about 26 years. We have entered a State of Compression in 2000. The Expansion of the World Economy during the last 26 years has stopped. We are just in the beginning of the Phase of Compression.

During the phase of compression the Baby Boomers will stop working. They have invested a lot of money to buy a pension. During the compression their pensions will evaporate. During the phase of compression many people will get old and ill. The Social System will be without any money to help them. Many people will move into a very angry state when they realize what really has happened.

During the Downfall The Debts will increase tremendously. The move from the Market to the Government (and the Tax Payer) is a temporary solution. Someday the Debts have to be repayed and the only thing US Govenment can do is to accept the fact that the US and the strongly related Western Economy will enter a state of Recession.

The Economic Activity will go Down but Social Activities will Move Up. When you are losing money somebody (Your Friends, Your Family, Your Community) has to help you.

What many people also don’t realize is that the very long time cycles are supporting the DownFall of the Economic System. The very long time cycles and especially the Cycle of the Precession is Jumping to a new Level. It is jumping to a higher level of Consciousness.

The current instability of the World System is not only visible in the Financial System. It shows itself in every System of the World. It shows itself in the Psychological System, the Cultural System, The Religiouss System, the Political System, the Ecological System, the Weather System and the Planetary System.

These Systems are highly interconnected. A Disaster in one of the Systems has an impact on all of the other Systems. When the Financial System is fixed, a Political Conflict (Russia) starts and the Financial System is unbalanced. When the Political System is stabilized a huge Earthquake or a giant Tornado will move the total System into unbalance. This will go on and on until everybody realizes that we are living in a Highly Interconnected Reality.

The only thing we can do is to act on the Level of Earth and Face Reality. We have to realize that all the Isolated Systems are One and the only thing we can do is to find Balance on Every Level.

We could start to Find Balance on the Level of the Human.

We could start to Reduce the Power of the Ego, Desire, by reducing our Needs.

We could start to Reduce the Power of our Expectation, our Thinking, and start to Trust the Other.

We could start to Empower our Imagination, Spirit, and Imagine a Shared Future.

We could start to Empower our Soul, Empathy, and start to Take Care of Others.

We could start to use our Consciousness and become Aware of what is really Happening.

Many people believe the current crisis will be a Fatal Crisis, a (Financial) Apocalyps. I don’t believe this will be the case.

Imagine a world were you are not Working all the time. Imagine a Life without Stress.

Imagine a World where You don’t have to Play Political Games to Survive.

Imagine a world where You could enjoy Nature.

Imagine a World were You are able to Help without Being Payd.

Imagine a World were you are able to Create when You want to do this. Imagine a World without War and Violence. The only thing You have to do is Leave a Little Bit of Your Current Luxury behind.

If this happens the Downfall of the Bad Buck would be replaced by a tremendous Rise of Good Luck.

LINKS

How the Great Depression was created

About Derivatives, Accountants, Greed and other terrible problems in the Banking Industry

About The End of the Dollar

Monday, July 21st, 2008

A well-known scientist once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy.

At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: “What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise” The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, “What is the tortoise standing on?” “You’re very clever, young man, very clever,” said the old lady. “But it’s turtles all the way down!”

The Financial System of the World is a special version of “Turtles all the way down“. At this moment one of the pillars of the US Financial System (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) is falling and many people hope it will be supported by a financial pillar, the US Government. The two pillars have financed 5.2 trillion dollars of mortgages (5.200.000.000.000).

Since 1970, the US Federal Government has run deficits for all but four years (1998-2001) adding to a total debt of 9.5 trillion of dollars (9.500.000.000.000). If you include entitlements such as Social Securityand Medicare the debt is $53 trillion—or $175,000 for every American—andrising.

A huge part of the debt is held by two pillars, the central banks of Japan and China. The Central Banks of China and Japan are slowly moving out of the Dollar. This pillar is falling also.

The Citizens of the US are the only turtles that are left. The US Government could raise taxes, reduce its spending or raise the interest rate. In all the cases the US Economy would fall into a recession. They are unable to do this. The US voters will never elect an American President who is raising taxes or will move its country into a recession. They will always vote for the Big Spender.

Below the last pillar is Emptyness, the Abyss, The Underworld, Hell. The Universe is floating in Nothingness. The Universe is floating because it is moving. Movement is the essence of the Universe.

The problem of Turtles all the Way Down (Infinite Regress) can be solved in a Circular, Rotating, Cyclic model. In a Circular model there is No cause and there is no End. Every point is a Beginning and an End. Every Cause comes back on Itself. In the End the US has to solve its own problems and the only way to solve its problems is to accept a Recession.

The US Financial System has generated a debt for more than 30 years. They were supported by other countries to expand their economy. These countries needed the US as a buyer of their products. They also needed the US to copy their Technology and their Science.

At this moment the Economic Activity in the World is moving to the East. The countries that supported the US the most, Japan and China, are now creating their own Cycle and their own market. This cycle is completed by the addition of India and Russia. In due time they don’t need the US Market, the US Technology and US Science anymore. The US has given them all the opportunities by Outsourcing many of their activities.

Japan and China are becoming friends again and they have their finger on the trigger of the financial gun. When they move into another currency or create their own currency the US financial system dies immedeatly. They don’t need a war to win the war.

About Virtue and Wisdom

Tuesday, July 8th, 2008

When you lend somebody something you assume he (or she) will give the item back in due time. To lend you have to Trust somebody. There are many ways to create a trusted relation. When a long term trusted relationship grows out of a long chain of interactions the Iterated Prisoners Dilemma is at stake. The Chinese are the Masters of Playing this Game.

In some situations it is very clear that a try-out is not necessary. If we look at the cultures of the Earth we can see that the concept of Family or Tribe more or less guaranties a trustful relationship. In a Family it is not needed to create very complicated arrangements like contracts, procedures, laws and judges. The Family uses it own rules.

The consequence of the Concept of the Family and the Tribe is a formalization of relationships based on a Place in a Hierarchy. Everybody has to know its place.

A King has to play the role of the King and a Father has to play the role of the Father. In a Family or an Extended Family (Tribe) you are trained to play the roles you have to play in your life.

Confucius (551-479 BC) saw the universe and all living things in it as a manifestation of a unifying force called the Doe (translated as the Truth, Unity, or the Way). Doe constitutes the very essence, basis, and unit of life that perpetuates order, goodness, and righteousness.

It manifests itself in the harmonious opposition of yin (“feminine, gentle“) and yang (“masculine, strong“), and in humans through duk (“virtue“). Virtue is a gift received from Heaven.

It is through Virtue that a person is able to know the Heavenly Truth and it is the “locus where Heaven and I meet“. Virtue can be realized through self-cultivation. It provides the fundamental source of insight and strength to rule peacefully and harmoniously within oneself, one’s family, one’s nation, and the world.

There are two inter-related aspects of virtue: in (“Human-hearted-ness“) and ui (“Rightness“).

The basis of individual and humanity is the Human-heartedness. Human-heartedness is essentially relational and it involves loving, sacrificing and taking care of others. Individuals are born with Human-heartedness and experience Human-heartedness through the sacrifice and devotion of their parents.

The second concept, ui (“rightness“), notes that an individual is born into a particular family with a particular status. Rightness articulates that individuals must perform and fulfil their duties as defined by their particular status and role.

Confucius considered family and society to be hierarchically ordered, necessitating that everyone fulfil their duties. Fulfilling one’s given role as a father, mother, child, elder, teacher, or politician is considered a moral imperative and not a matter of personal choice.

Confucius considered society to be socially ordered and that each person has beun (“portion or place“) in life. Each beun had attached roles and duties, and each person must fulfil these roles and duties. Duties and obligations of each beun are prescribed by yea (“propriety“).

Propriety articulates expectations, duties, and behavior of each individual according to his or her status and role. For example, chemyon (“social face“) need to be maintained by a person of social stature defined by his or status, regardless of his or her personal preference.

Social order and harmony are preserved when people observe their place in society and fulfil their required obligations and duties.

The fourth concept is ji (“knowledge“). Knowledge allows us to understand the virtues of Human-heartedness and Rightness and to follow these virtues through Propriety. It is the basis of the development of Wisdom.

By the applying the principles of Confucius Chinese Society became a Well Oiled Machine. Every action that was taken was pre-programmed by all levels of education. Every part in the machine knew its role. Life was highly predictable and everybody accepted its place in Society. There was Harmony and Peace in the world.

If there be righteousness in the heart, there will be beauty in character,

If there be beauty in character, there will be harmony in the home.

If there be harmony in the home, there will be order in the nation.

If there be order in the nation, there will be peace in the world.

The big changes of Chinese Society came Out of the West. The English Empire destroyed the Heavenly Order by selling large quantities of Opium. The huge underclass of China was a beautiful target for the people who followed the theories of Lenin.

The Upperclass was destroyed and a new Upperclass, The Communist Party, took over. The culture of China has not changed. People still know their place and the Doe (The Way It Is) is now proclaimed by the Party. The new upperclass knows it has to keep the underclass in harmony.

The Party decided to create a higher standard of living by importing capitalistic principles from the West. It is now moving in high speed to the level of the Consumer Society. The West is paying for this move by buying Chinese products for a very low price.

In this way China has accumulated an enormous amount of money (mostly dollars). They are able to buy what they want. With the enormouss stock of dollars they are able to manipulate US Government. China is able to destroy the US Financial System in one fast move. They certainly will not do that.

The Chinese people are experts in strategy. They know how to acquire power without fighting. They keep a social face and play the game others want them to play. They are experts in applying the Iterated Prisoners Dilemma. They know Confucius and his predecessors were Wise man. They knew how to move with The Cycle, the Tao.

Western Society has lost its cultural foundation. The principles of Confucius don’t sound very strange to us. They are easily translated into Christianity.

When the West lost the basic principle of Christianity, Human-hearted-ness (in) one of the two pillars of Trust was lost. The West rationalized Empathy (Compassion, Emotion). I Think, therefore I Am (Descartes) became the basis of the Self.

When people started to do the “wrong thing” the second pillar of Trust, Integrity (ui, Rightness) dropped. Politicians were not Playing the Role of the Politician and Managers were not Playing the Role of Manager. They lost their Virtue.

Finally the Doe (Unity) of Western Society was gone. Families broke up. Everybody was Left on its Own and started to act on a Short-Term Perspective.

The Interated Prisoners Dilemma changed into a chain of disconnected attempts to leave the Prison. The best way to win such a Game is to defect. You always win but your victory is never a Win-Win. On the long term Everybody changes into a potential Enemy.

The West entered the State of Individualism and even Egoism. In this state it is almost impossible to act out of Unity. Everybody is going its Own Way or is Competing with the Other. This makes it even easier for the Chinese Masters to create a new Machine to support their Extended Family.

How to Cure Diseases with the Power of the Mind

Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

Our universe contains an unseen fifth force called the Aether. Aether is the carrier of something that was called the Force of Live in old Civilizations. The concept of the Aether was part of Science until Albert Einstein introduced the General Relativity Theory. At that time the Aether was abandoned and Space became Empty.

In reality Space contains something that could be used to cure diseases and to generate an unlimited amount of Energy. The consequences of the new and old theory of the Aether are violating almost everything we believe in Western Society.

Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr (Quantum Mechanics) have been in conflict all their lifes. Bohr believed in Statistics and Coincedence. Einstein believed in Fundamental Laws and Geometry (“God is Geometer”, “God is not throwing dice“).

Einstein was a Jew and although he was not religious deep in his hart he believed in a Creating Power. Bohr was more inclined to the Chinese Philosophy of the Tao. Niels Bohr adopted the the yin-yang symbol as his family coat of arms after a trip to China in the 1930s as he felt it symbolized the concept of wave-particle complementarity.

Until now scientists are looking for the unifying Theory of Everything. One of the most interesting candidates is String Theory. Behind String Theory is the Beta Function representing a multidimensional string.

The String is producing the Music of the Spheres (Pythagoras, Egypt). Behind every Theory of Physics we can find an old Religious System.

The man and woman in the street are incapable of understanding their physical environment. All they know is that Science has proved that the Universe was created by a Big Bang. They have found a completely Mechanical Explanation of the Universe. The Scientists are trying to prove that we don’t need a Self Aware Consciousness to explain our Reality.

Everybody is Religious in some way. The main reason is that we all are going to die and almost nobody believes everything ends at that moment. Many people have experienced religious moments and they are looking for an explanation.

At this moment Science is destroying Religion but Science is also proving many things the Religions of the World were explaining a long time ago. It looks like there is a Shared Religion behind all the Religions of the World.

They centainly share the belief in a Self Aware Consciousness that created Every Thing. There are many Scientists (like Capra, The Tao of Physics) who are trying to unite Science and one of the Religions of the World. Their number is growing.

We are in a stage of the Cycle where Religion is becoming more important to many people. We have to find a Union between Science and Religion and the Union is really not difficult to find. If we don’t find a Union the man and woman in the street will be without a long term perspective. They will be litterrally lost in (empty) space.

The old Aether Theory suggested a very simple model of the Universe. Every Force is a Stage of the Aether and the Aether operates on many Levels.

The Universe started with a Consciousness that was Aware of itself. The Self-Aware Consciousness unfolded itself at lower levels. At every Level the same structure is visible. The Universe is a self-referential system, a Fractal. We are One and we are Different.

Experiments in Physics have shown a huge influence of the Observer of the Experiment. In the Medical Field this is called the Placebo Effect. The Consciousness of the Human has a strange influence on his physical environment including his material Body.

If the Universe is a Self-Reference it is not strange to believe that a Consciousness is involved on Every Level. It also implies that our Cells (a lower part of the unfolding) are Conscious.

Science has very big problems with the Role of the Conscioussness in the Universe. The Idea of something that could be called God is frightening because in the Western Culture God is a Strict Father. He is punishing his children when they are not obeying his Laws. We are Sinners. The idea of a Nurturing Mother taking care of her children has completely disappeared.

The believe that Everything in the Universe is conscious has many more implications. When we eat, Somebody has killed Something that has a lot in common with Us. We don’t want to become aware of this fact because when this is true we are bothered by our Empathy. We don’t want to be responsible for killing something that Looks like Us.

Soldiers are killing Human Beings but they are doing this because The Enemy is Bad and we are the Good Ones. We always find a very intelligent explanation to get rid of the thought that we are doing something the Strict Father called God is forbidding. We are not responsible. They are! But sadly enough the Strict Father is aware of everything. There is no place to hide.

The only thing we can do is to deny the Strict Father. We are not religious and we are able to explain everything without the need of a Strict Father. Science is helping us to Blind the Strict Father. Science is doing this to create a highly complex system, a Veil no one can penetrate.

Our Bodies are Chemical Factories and Electro-Magnetic Structures (Fields). They are also influenced by our Consciousness and the Consciousness of Others on Our Level and on a Higher Level.

At this moment we ignore the Field and the Mind completely. We are also ignoring the Force that is Aware of itself. We don’t believe in her Love and Care. We want to solve our own problems and we are capable of doing this because the Intelligent People that are Scientists just need a little more time and money.

Plasma Cosmology shows the big influence of the Electro-Magnetic Field in the Universe. Epigenetics shows the influence of the Mind and The Field on our Body. Our Believe Systems are managing our Body.

Electro-Magnetic Therapy (or Energy Therapy or Radionics or Orgone Therapy or Psionics or..) is according to the current state of Medical Science a fraud. It has a positive influence on some of the patients and it fails with many others.

If you look at the influence of the Mind on the Body and you know that many sick people are convinced they are sick and can only be cured by an intervention in the Chemical Factory of the Body you can easily understand why this is happening. They really don’t believe the Field is able to cure and what they believe will happen.

We are proving what we don’t want to prove and we don’t want to believe what we are proving because when we become aware of the impact of the prove our believe system falls apart.

We don’t want to believe that we are able to cure ourselves because we want to feel alone in the Universe. We are left alone by our Strict Father who promised so much and nothing came through of his promises. We really don’t like Him at all.

We are desperately looking for our Nurturing Mother who was unable to do what she wanted to do. She was restricted by her Strict Husband.

Our Nurturing Mother, the Force of Life, The Aether, is everywhere available but we are making so much noise that we don’t hear her voice.

She is able to cure and to give unlimited energy but we really don’t want that.

We want to be the Victims of The Strict Father.

We want to keep on suffering because suffering really feels good because it feels bad.

We love to punish ourselves so we can believe that the Strict Father is doing this to punish us for the Sins we are really committing.

We are very strange organisms.

LINKS

About Epigenetics and Cancer

About Epigenetics and the effect of Electro-Magnetic Fields on the Body

About Epigenetics and Aging

How the Hedge Funds are Starving a 100 Million People

Friday, April 25th, 2008

The Banking Business has created the Credit-Crunch. The Banking Business has created the Great Depression. The Banking Business has created many Bubbles. The Banking Business has advised people to buy shares while they knew the shares were highly overvalued. Now the Banking Business is stimulating the Food Crisis in the World.

 Analysis being carried out by World Food Program (WFP) estimates that about 100 million people have been pushed deeper into poverty by the high food prices.

The “Silent Tsunami” will affect more people on every continent than the real Tsunami in 2004. It will destroy more livelihoods and the nutrition losses will hurt children for a lifetime.

Everybody believes that Prices Rise when there is a Shortage of Something. The highest bidder takes all.

The main cause of the World Wide Food Shortage is Western Way of Producing, Selling and Wasting Food. We are Manipulating the Market and The Consumer but we are also destroying nature by fertilizers and genetical manipulated seeds. We are also throwing away a enormouss amount of food.

The Multi-Natioals produce genetic manipulated seeds, artificial fertilizers and artificial food. They control the Transportation, the Media, The Financial streams and the Governments (The World Bank). The multi-national food companies are making record profits.
 
The profit of Monsanto has doubled. Similarly, the Mosaic Company, one of the world’s largest fertiliser companies, saw its income rise more than 12-fold. The prices of some kinds of fertiliser have more than tripled over the past year as demand has outstripped supply. As a result, plans to increase harvests in developing countries have been hit hard.

The Farmers at the beginning of the production lines are mostly poor. They will not profit from the rise of the prices of their products. This is not something new. The Poor get poorer and the Rich get richer. They are blocked to enter the Market. They are also blocked to produce their own natural fertilizers and their own natural seeds. Most of them are now unable to be self-sufficient. They have to buy food and y are unable to pay for it.

When you are very rich you can play with “the Fundamental Law of the Market“. You can buy a lot of goods, store them and create an artificial shortage. This game is called Speculation. The Multi-Nationals are creating an artificial shortage.

A very advanced Speculation Game is called Hedging.

When you are Hedging you use the Power of Money to Move the market UP to a certain point you want it to reach. If your hedge works out fine you leave the market when it Moves DOWN. At that time you let the “Bigger Fools” pay for the Downfall. At this moment the Tax-Payers are paying for the Downfall of the Speculators in the Housing Business. The Hedge Funds have already found a new Target, Hunger.

At this moment Hedge funds are Moving into the Food-business and they are making Big Money.

Commodity speculation spread long ago from standard products like oil and gold to anything edible and available for trade on the Chicago Futures Exchange. These days there are futures contracts for everything from wheat to oranges to pork bellies.

The futures market is a traditional tool for farmers to sell their harvests ahead of time. In a futures contract, quantities, prices and delivery dates are fixed, sometimes even before crops have been planted. Futures contracts allow farmers and grain wholesalers a measure of protection against adverse weather conditions and excessive price fluctuations. They can also help a farmer plan how much to plant for a given year.

But now speculators are taking advantage of this mechanism. They can buy futures contracts for wheat, for example, at a low price, betting that the price will go up. If the price of the grain rises by the agreed delivery date, they profit.

Some experts now believe these investors have taken over the market, buying futures at unprecedented levels and driving up short-term prices. Since last August, this mechanism has led to a doubling in the price of rice-including the 500,000 tons that the Philippine government plans to buy in early May to address its own shortage.

Experts are already discussing what they call a “Super Cycle,” set off by constantly growing demand in China, and by farmers unable, in the long term, to keep up with that demand as they sow their seed and harvest their crops. The planet has only a finite amount of land for farming.

Greg Warner has worked in the grain wholesaling business for more than two decades. His office sits a block away from the Chicago Futures Exchange. He’s an analyst with the firm AgResource, and he says what is happening now in the wheat market is unprecedented.

“What we normally have is a predictable group of sellers and buyers-mainly farmers and silo operators,” he says. But the landscape has changed since the influx of large index funds. Fund managers seek to maximize their profits using futures contracts, and prices, says Warner, “keep climbing up and up.”

He’s calculated that financial investors now hold the rights to two complete annual harvests of a type of grain traded in Chicago called “soft red winter wheat.”

Wagner is stunned by such developments. He sees them as evidence that capitalism is literally consuming itself.

One of the major players in this business is ABN AMRO. When somebody asked the manager of this business about ethics he answered that he was not interested in a discussion about this subject. “We are aware of the current discussions relating to agricultural commodities but we make the drills, but others have to do the drilling”.

The World Food Program is asking everybody to donate money. They need more money (775 million!) than the “real” Tsunami to solve the problems of the 100 million. The sad thing is that donating is helping the Hungry but is also helping the Rich. It helps them to sustain their Gamble.

In the end your donation will be payd to a very Rich Person who has enough money to buy an enormous amount of Food.

This also happens when Governement is “helping” the WFP. It is a very intelligent trick to move money from the Public Domain to the Private Domain. In the end You pay More and They Increase their Wealth. IT happened with the Credit Crunch. It happened with the Great Depression. It happens all the time.

Just like every Bubble the Food Bubble will also burst at a certain moment. It is not difficult to imagine when this will happen. It will happen when a very small part of the world is able to pay for the food.

The Bubble is already infecting the Economy of the Rich Countries. When a Very amount of people is able to buy Food the End State will be reached and the Prices will drop. At that moment The Hedge Funds will move into another area of (artificial) Shortage.

The poor people in the West are already unable to pay for the food. At a certain moment the Middle Class will feel the effects. When the Poor People in the Rich Countries will experience a Food Shortage they will Riot.

Just like the poor people in the Underdeveloped Countries are Rioting. When the Riots start in the Getto’s of the Big Cities the Rich will become Afraid. They will Ask for Protection of the Police or the Military. In the end they have to surround there homes with walls and create there own food supplies.

The rising prices not only affect the Poor. They also affect the Policy of the FED to stop the Credit Crunch. Higher prices stimulate Inflation and Inflation can only be stopped by an Increase of the Interest Rates. Higher Interest Rates will deepen the state of Depression.

Is this what the Investors really want?

The Ethics are not of My Concern. They are the Business of Somebody Else.

We Produce Weapons but we are not responsible for the Use of the Weapons.

We Fight a War but we are not responsible for the Killing of Innocent people.

We Advice people but we are not responsible for What we are Advicing them.

We Pollute the World but somebody else has to Clean Up.

We Use all the Resources of the Earth but somebody else has to Take Care of our Children.

In the advanced Western Civilization we just look at the Profit. Investors are playing their hedge in the Global Casino and just don’t realize that they are gambling away the daily food supply of the world’s poorest people.

In the old, “Savage”, civilizations the Decision Makers had to Evaluate their Decisions on the effect of Seven Generations. They Knew they needed Nature, their Neighbours and their Offspring to Survive.

Funny.

Every Company has turned itself into a Green Company. They want to “Save the Earth”.

Are the Poor People on this Earth not Included in their Policy?

I know Why. You Know Why. Money makes the World go Round?

My Advice:

Always Take Responsibility for Every Action.

We are all Part of an Ecology and someday the Ecology will React and You will encounter the same things Others are Experiencing.

Do You want to Live in an Environment where You are deprived of Food? I don’t think so. Nobody Wants that.

REFLECT BEFORE YOU ACT.

LINKS

About Ethics in Banking

About the Dark Middle Ages

Saturday, April 5th, 2008

mayanThere are many theories about the sudden end of the Mayan culture. One of the most evident theories is associated with a change of the climate. Mayan culture ended around 800 BC. At that time the world was suffering from the Medieval Warm Period.

At the time of the collapse of Mayan Culture the Culture of Europe was in what was called the Dark Ages. The Dark Ages are part of a longer period called the Middle Ages.

Between 450 and 700 the Chinese Empire is surrounded by the most impressive wall ever built in human history. The wall was built to stop the invasions of the Huns.

The Medieval Warm Period had a big impact on the Huns. They were unable to enter China to take the food they needed. They moved along the Wall to the West.

HunsThe Huns were superior in warfare and drove many tribes deep into the declining Roman Empire. These tribes invaded Europe and started to create their own territories. Between 700 and 950 the territories are transformed into stable kingdoms. The tribes changed their nomad culture and settled.

The only stable power at that time is the Church of Rome. Because of the famous rule and divide policy of the Roman Empire they did not destroy the Kingdoms but created alliances.

The Church of Rome gave the new leaders worldly and spiritual power. The believe systems of the “barbarian cultures” were fused with the believe system of the Roman Church. The Christian Saints replaced the old Gods and the Old rituals were replaced by Christian Rituals.

plagueDuring the late Middle Ages everything went wrong. The climate changed again dramatically. It became terribly cold (the Little Ice Age). The Plague killed 60% of the population. The Kingdoms expanded and got into conflict and the Church of Rome became internally divided. This ended with a schism.

As you see history is highly influenced by the Climate.  A warm climate causes big problems with the water supply and the production of food. Many tribes started or were forced to move. The Huns and the warm climate destroyed the Roman Empire. The warm climate also destroyed the Mayan Empire.

renaissance artWhen the temperature went down a stage of compression started. The tribes settled and compressed into kingdoms. The kingdoms compressed into Empires (The Holy Roman Empire, France, England, Spain). At the end of this compression the Renaissance started. With the start of the Renaissance the temperature started to rise again.

There is a huge correlation between the rise and fall of empires and the rise and fall of temperature. It is not clear what causes what. The periodicity of the Cycle of the Climate and the Cycle of Culture (about 1200 years) is the same.

Many people now believe that the rise of cultures causes the rise of temperature. They call it global warming and believe C02 is the enemy.

Perhaps it is the other way around.

Imagine global temperature is rising the next decades. This will cause the movement of many “tribes”. Just like the Huns they will avoid the Economic and Military walls that are created. When there is no place to go they have no choice. The choice is a certain death or a possibility to take part in the rich Western Culture. The West is still able to buy all the food that is needed although the prices of commodities are rising like hell.

How will we be able to stop them?  Are we able to see them perish? Do we have to build a Chinese Wall again?

Imagine we are entering a little or a even big Ice Age. This will affect the Western Culture the most. There is new data out now that show that the mean global temperature has fallen one full degree Fahrenheit since last year. In fact, global average temperature over the last twenty years peaked ten years ago (in 1998).

What can we do to save the West? When we perish who will help us?

About The Industrial Revolution

Thursday, April 3rd, 2008

industrial revolutionThe Industrial Revolution started with the mechanization of the textile-industry (1740-1790) in England.

A new collaboration concept the Mill, later translated in the Factory, is invented. The Industrial Revolution is preceded by the Renaissance.

The Renaissance is a Creative Phase.

The Industrial Revolution is a Social phase. A Social phase changes the way people cooperate.

Small scale cooperation structures were destroyed and replaced by large-scale cooperation structures.

The Industrial Revolution not only changed the way people cooperated in labour. It also changed the way Cities and Countries cooperated.

At the end of this phase (the Second World War) Europe and the World (UN, China, and India) started to Unite. Cooperation on the Level of the World became possible but was finally not realized.

The French Revolution (1789) breaks the power of the Aristocracy. The Bourgeois (the merchants, the entrepreneurs, the middle class) use the Mill to produce cheap standardized products on a large scale. They became the new Rulers of Society.

The mill and later the factory not only destroyed the Aristocracy.

It also destroyed the Small Scale Collaboration Structure of the Guilds. The Guilds, operating on the level of the City, took care of almost everything at that time.

They operated hospitals, educational facilities and insurance. When the mills turned into factories many people lost their job. The big cities were populated with very poor and hungry people.

Nobody took care of the sick and the old. They became the Prolitariat, the Under-Class. The existence of the Prolitariat produced a huge tension in society.

russian revolution2This tension was resolved when many pressure groups or movements (Conservatives, Liberals, Socialists, and Communists) finally agreed upon new large scale institutions.  

The State, Parliament, Democracy, Voting, and The Union came into existence.

The Social Welfare State was constructed. Government took care of almost everybody.

The first Cotton Mill was opened in 1742. In 1762 Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny. It was operated by hand.

With the invention of the steam-machine (1769, Watt) manual labour was not needed anymore.

In 1785 the first mill was opened that used a steam-machine (the power loom).

The Steam Machine became a Major Paradigm. It highly influenced Physics (ThermoDynamics, Entropy) and Psychology (Freud).

steam_engineIn 1781 Kant wrote his book Kritik der reinen vernunft. He excluded the Imagination (illusions) and the Emotions (love, care, values, quantity) out of reasoning and introduced the concept of mechanized thinking (Logic). Kant excluded Art (Imagination) and Religion (the Emotions) and invented Science.

Mechanized (Scientific) Thinking was used to Optimize the Mill. Slowly it grew into a (big) factory. At the end of the Industrial Revolution Logical reasoning produced its most briljant artefact, the All Purpose Computer. The Computer became a major Paradigm.

The-Railroads-Of-The-World-124Between 1790 and 1840 the world was covered with Railroads. They facilitated the spread of the Industrial Revolution.

Cities flourished and died according to the distance to a railroad station (A node). Many infrastructures were created in this period (Telephone, Sewers, Water, Gas, and Electricity). Later the concept of the railroad was implemented in Traffic (Highway) and Computers (networks, hubs, servers). The Railroad Network became a major Paradigm.

Mechanic thinking resulted in Standardization. Between 1890 and 1940 Mass-production, Mass-consumption and Mass-media dominated society.

TFordThe first step was set by Henry Ford and Frederick Winslow Taylor with the production of the T-Ford. The theories of Taylor are until now (most of the time not recognized) used in many forms to optimize work-processes.

The end of optimization is reached when everything is turned into a Utility. A Utility is a Network that operates without Human Beings and transports Objects.

When we look at the Industrial Revolution from a higher perspective we can see the elements of the Cycle at work.

A phase of Creativity is followed by a Social Phase. It is the phase of Power Conflicts (Competition) and the construction of new Movements, new Groups and finally of new Institutions (The State, The Corporation).

The Hierarchy was the major control paradigm of this period. Everybody wanted to move to “the Top”. The Race to the Top was also visible in architecture. The SkyScraper with the Management at the Top became the Symbol of Power.

watching tvThe Industrial Revolution gave the Masses, the Slaves of the Middle Ages a better place. They changed from a Slave into a Consumer.

The Slave was dominated by his Owner. A Consumer is dominated by his Senses. On the Macro-level we see a move from the world-view of Control/Social (Master/Slave) to a Sensory/Social-pattern.

Will Mc Whinny called the Game of Sensory/Social The Game of the Market. The Industrial Revolution produced the Game of the Market.

At the end of this period the Masses controlled the Market. We are now in a demand oriented economy. This created a big problem for the mass-producers.

They controlled the masses and are desperatly trying to keep their position by Manipulation of the Media.

What is Going to Happen?

stock marketOn the level of the Kondratiev-cycle (Period 50 years) a phase of Creativity and the Individual was started in 1950.

This phase ended around 2000.

The move to the Individual challenged the structures of Mass-Production. People wanted to be treated as a Unique Human Being.

Industry found a solution to this need. They invented Mass Customization and User Involvement and went on with the Game of the Market.

This phase is now followed by a Social Phase (Start 2000). The Customer (the new Ruler) is organizing itself in Smart Customer Networks.

The Very Long Cycle (Precession, Period 25.000 years) and the Cycle of Culture (Periodicity 1250 year) is also changing its focus.

On the level of Culture we are moving to the Centre. We are converging on a new and unknown level, Earth. During the Social Phase of the Industrial Revolution huge collaboration structures were formed (EG, UN, NATO, China, India, …). These structures are challenged by the Individual in the Next Phase. The solution of this conflict is a network of small local structures that is part of a large global network (“Think Global, Act Local”).

The precession cycle is moving from the Dark Phase into the Light. This is the most interesting and unknown development. Current Human history has never experienced a shift from the Kali Yuga to the Golden Age. The Golden Age is a period of intense spiritual development, a movement to a New Level of Conscioussness.

It shows itself in a move to religion and mysticism but also in a new awareness about what is really happening in the world.  This new awareness is frightening to most of the people. They cannot understand the major changes that are visible. The predictable future is gone. Everything is on the move and the movement is excellerating culminating in Point Omega, the Big Leap into Nothingness.  

Long Term Phases always dominate short term phases. The effect of this will be tremendous and almost unpredictable.  An unpredictable future is a Future without a Perspective.

Some people expect a dramatic negative change. They are waiting for the Apocalyps. Some people expect the Return of Paradise and a jump to a higher consciousness.

I really don’t know what will happen.

If you read my blogs I am constantly trying to find the solution of this very complex conjunction of cycles. I keep you informed. 

About the Business Cycle

Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008

A business starts when an isolated craftsman makes a unique product with his unique tools for his unique customers. To find out what the customer needs the craftsman and the customer start a dialogue. They are inventing new possibilities. Out of the process of invention new tools and new approaches emerge.

In the next stage craftsmen share their trade and move to the next level, a company. They sell and share experience to and with their clients. In a company specialization takes place. People are selling or taking care of infrastructure. To make specialization work a dialogue is needed. Specialists create their own language and don’t understand that their colleagues and their customers are doing the same. If the mapping of all the language does not take place the company will look like the Tower of Babel. It will end its activity in a conflict caused by mis-understanding.

If the dialogue is successful the company standardizes its services and creates a product. It moves to a new level, the factory. In a factory not only the processes are standardized but also the language. Specialists are replaced by software, machines and cheap labor. The employees are not users of tools but are controlled by tools. The replacement does not happen without conflicts. It causes a battlefield between two opposing powers, the employers and the employees.

By carefully analyzing all the processes, getting rid of all the waste, the employees are finally totally replaced by programmed machines. The factory moves to the level of the Utility. It becomes an invisible repeatable process. The process only shows itself to the human when it is out of order. Humans are totally dependent of utilities and a fatal error simply stops society. This generates an extreme level of collective stress.

In the next stage new craftsman emerge. They use of the new invisible, hidden, infrastructure to create new products. The cycle starts again.

Many companies are now transformed into factories and utilities. Cheap labor is provided by the new economic powers China and India. The standardization of the processes is accomplished by the implementation of packages. When the dialogue in the company is disturbed the implementation of the package results in a financial and social disaster.

The jump to the level of the factory generates a conflict and the shock of the conflict lowers the performance of the company. The transition to a factory is hard to sell to the employees and the middle managers. The reduction of the performance is not appreciated by the customers also. The customers want a predictable and gradual improvement of the performance.

Many companies are not suited to move to the level of the factory. They are providing a service. The specialists, knowledge-workers, are constantly innovating their processes.

The specialists are not helped by a standardized process, a method. Methods are not a mechanism to control. They are an educational instrument. When people learn a method they acquire experience. They make mistakes, learn and adapt the method. A dominating not adaptable toolset stops the innovation in a company.

Innovation cannot be stopped at the human level. Users start to look for an alternative to move on and abandon the dominating central infrastructure. They create work-environments of their own and connect them. The effect is a highly unbalanced infrastructue.

This has happened when the PC was introduced and will happen all the time when a new user-friendly toolset appears. At this moment many new collaborative toolsets appear on the Internet. They support the new craftsman, the knowledge-workers, in the service industry.

Many toolsets are available on the market. They are dominating, highly specialized and disconnected. The toolsets support different types of craftsman, different types of companies, different types of factories and different types of utilities.

They don’t support the dialogue to reach mutual understanding, collaboration and innovation. This causes unnecessary conflicts, stress and finally a total blockage of every activity an employee wants to start. The result is de-motivation and finally apathy. The employee just does what he is told to do. He is transformed into a machine.

We need a toolset that supports the gradual movement from the level of the craftsman to the level of the utility. This will create the harmony so many people are looking for.