How bad does it have to get for you to leave?
Straightlinelogic recently and eloquently stated that he wants his freedom back in a couple of different posts. This is why several of us are game planning for Atlantis. Some of us want a physical Atlantis to give us hope. Some would like multiple distributed Atlantises, and I am not opposed to that.
What I am asking you to rate on a scale of 0 to 100 each of the following:
A) Your hope for your current country (Please state either US or non-US as well;
B) What your hope would be if we built Atlantis; and
C) What your hope would have to be in order for you to be so desperate that you would have to leave.
Remember Atlantis won't happen overnight. Many, including myself, are not planning on going unless things get really desperate. I have as good a shrug position as I could ever get.
What I am asking you to rate on a scale of 0 to 100 each of the following:
A) Your hope for your current country (Please state either US or non-US as well;
B) What your hope would be if we built Atlantis; and
C) What your hope would have to be in order for you to be so desperate that you would have to leave.
Remember Atlantis won't happen overnight. Many, including myself, are not planning on going unless things get really desperate. I have as good a shrug position as I could ever get.
Previous comments...
No offense to you personally intended. I'm certain that your skills would be highly valued in the Gulch.
It was exhilarating. I have read every response and I must say, I often had goose bumps, I felt the kinship of open minds and yet so grave a discourse. The frustration transmitted flowed thick and sticky like honey, but with non of the sweetness.
Sometimes we are so caught up in the subject that we become shortsighted and see the immediate in our current lives and only as far as we can envision living... all appropriate for the question posed.
But, what if...what if we can only live through this from where we are and do so badly? I ask the question how do we preserve our philosophy for after we are gone? It seems that a large number of gulchers are over the 50 mark. We would need a dynamic society to continue to perpetuate these ideals so they too do not perish with us. It is feasible to think it could take years to get into Atlantis and years to get out of it. It will take time to arrive at complete anarchy perpetuated by this insidious yet relentless disease of socialism.
If I really dig down deep into my psyche, I would have to say that we will not be able to hide from the rest of a broken world as did the gulchers in AS. We will be visible and so being, open to attacks of all manner. Just our very existence will be threatening to anyone on the outside, persons, organizations and nations. To have such pure thought, such joy, such absolute freedom all in one place is a prime target.
Now, if someone, and I know this may sound crazy, but if someone had mentioned a spacecraft, self-sustaining environment, capable of searching the galaxies for a new home to start over... yes, I would sign up tomorrow.
This may seem drastic, but I do not believe that this earth, in the long run, is recuperable from socialism in any sense of that word. So, while I would love to have a few years to live with fellow gulchers, I do not believe that we will be allowed for very long, to continue on our own volition under the declaration of an independent state where ever that might be, here in the U.S. or otherwise. We might have a better chance standing our individual ground, fighting for what we believe and spreading the word to those we come in contact with. To have meeting places that we could come together at various times would be manna in the wilderness.
But in my heart of hearts, I would wish for a complete break with all the rulers and governments of this world The fear of the powerful that can turn your life into a nightmare over night. I could live without by renouncing, but I could not live without having had it stolen or destroyed at the whims and fancy of others. There is a big difference.
So, I would choose to leave this planet and create a society by the beliefs that we hold so dear and are willing to give up everything for, even our life. "I swear- by my life and my love of it-...".
Put me down as:
A) 50% possibility to pull through
B) 100% hope that it would happen
C) 50% halfway mark time to clear out
I know. I wish it were more like typical space operas. The first Gulches will be on earth.
Yes! That's why I think the Gulch should be a business incubator / hotel. The incubator would have a lot of startups with many young people, people who don't mind limited space and a stint of separation from friends and family..
A. Hope?
B. Well, okay, that we begin to understand that we don't have to "build" anything to have Atlantis...it will manifest through our intention.
C. There's nowhere else I'd rather be than here now.
Rate 90 on A) For U.S. If the November election gives a sizeable majority to conservatives and even middle-roaders taking out the Obama regime in the legislature, then there is a chance. If that doesn't happen, then forget it. The US is a snowball rolling downhill, but instead of getting bigger it will get smaller until it disappears.
Rate 60 on B) My hope would be a real Objectivist Atlantis, but the reality is that it won't happen in an ideal manner. Even the founders of the US had had major differences and there will be no way to keep the endeavor on track.
100 on B). My hope would be A new beginning for humanity.
B) 70 Since 70 is also my age, my hope would be that I would be able to contribute enough to be productive.
C) 75 Global financial/economic/social meltdown would motivate me to move, but I would hope that entry and settlement in Atlantis would be by invitation only.
P.S. What about a virtual Atlantis with off-the-grid occupants?
B)10 to get built; 90 once land, permits, etc secured
C) if either obummer or hillary are in office a/o 2016
B: 100
C: 30
It's close to being bad enough to consider Shrugging or finding that Atlantis.
The "rich" are now evil, the poor are the sacred. Why bother supporting this type of society... <sigh>
I am a retired senior citizen with a fixed income and a couple of health issues. So this old dino is pretty much stuck in A),
I have a #51 glimmer of hope that the Founders made this country strong enough to withstand the Obamanations it has suffered for the last 100 years and that eventually enough low information voters will finally wake the freak up for perceiving that they live in poodoo (a Star Wars prequel word) of their own making..
http://www.gizmag.com/adak-camping-trail...
B. If Atlantis existed, especially as Rand described it, I would be there in a heartbeat, even if it meant learning how to be a lineman or a water-main fitter. In fact, if Ragnar Danneskjöld's ship sailed the seas, I would sign on even if it meant being a lowly deckhand! (I might have enough skill to be a corpsman or a lab tech in the Sick Bay of his ship.)
C. Right now I am an "unperson" according to the BLS. Anything's better than this.
I can also bring enough IT skills to mock up a new computer application.
I'm sure I could also learn to field-dress a wild animal killed in a hunt. For reasons I don't have space to go into here, I cannot vouch for my accuracy in making a kill. But I have some knowledge of how to handle the kill afterward.
Think of me as "the writer who couldn't get his work published because the publishing houses were more interested in printing the kind of pabulum the looters appreciated."
And who has already convered a good part of what wealth he has into gold and silver coin.
B- 50 and falling with each election, every tax increase and every executive order by our president.
C - less than A depending in when it falls. My business is difficult and expensive to move. The more that is free and clear the easier it would be to walk away.
I do believe the drop from 40 to 20 or less will happen quickly when it happens.
"Well, you may not know this; but there's things that gnaw at a man worse than dying." — Charley Waite
B: 50
C: 75
If there was anyplace to go that wasn't infected by the Central Banking cabal/UN BS, regardless of how bad the weather, I would go there.
Anyways,
A: 5 (no hope, no change either)
B: 70 (Got systems engineering/enterprise architecture? hey I'm six sigma green belt certified, let's get lean!)
C: Don't know.
As for Bora Bora and Diego Garcia, they have come up in discussions. The Fijians are in first place right now, but the sample size is pretty small.
B) It would be a vacation spot and a place to have conferences on new technologies and new ideas, even things like new-age woo if they want to have their event there. It would be a place to push the limits, doing things like controversial medical research like cloning, risky therapies, or connecting a human volunteers' brains to a computer interface. - 99
C) I reject the premise. "How amazingly good would the Gulch have to be to make me leave my wonderful home in a country with amazing opportunities for those willing to work hard?" It would have to be very nice. More likely I'd find a condo there and rent it for a few weeks a year.
I shouldn't reject the premise. Things sometimes do fall apart. I think I would probably fight to maintain the US until the bitter end, but I can never know until it happens. - 05
My answer is in comparison to other human gov't institutions around the world throughout history, not compared to what I think we will achieve in the future.
Also, the answer takes into account things like people's right's being respected without regard to group identity, opportunities to earn an honest living that provides more than basic needs, chance of being victim of a crime, level of violence in all areas of life, presence of a legal system to enforce agreements and laws, access to information, access to means of publishing your ideas, and so on. Modern-day US is amazing. It's just the kind of place from which I expect people will launch Gulches.
B) I want to pursue Atlantis because it seems like a great thing to do. I have dreams of creating a city state that converts the desert(cheap undervalued land that requires water harvesting) into a great tree-abundant location.
My idea for creating the funding is to have an insurance company that sells a block of land in place of a fiat-currency-backed policy payout scheme.
[my idea for valuation of a ten acre block would be priced at AUD$ 1,560,000 for outright purchase; costing more if it is on a 'rent-to-own' payment scheme].
The idea is that a Gulch could be discreetly positioned within.
The business case I would make is creating an industrial-scale organic food production company that uses its location to create a research precinct that projects the technology prototypes necessary to engineer the environments of other planets.
Now I think that I am closer to the 'assistant' 'loaned' to Hank Rearden by the State Science Institute in being able to make it a reality but I am spending my time and money towards getting it closer to existence.
C) I want to get people thinking of frontier possibilities like that caused by America in Europe - the contrast causes reexamination of what is considered achievable.
A diversified portfolio of equities, bonds, and real estate.
"The dollar used to be a better store of value than other countries' currencies. "
To me this is like comparing whether a pick-and-place machine or a Honda is a better store of value. I think the Honda may be better b/c there's less change in the auto industry, and they're more liquid. But this is silly. Pick-and-place machines stuff parts on boards. Hondas take us from point A to point B.
If everything sucks in the economy though, having a stable store of value is meaningless. All the value in the world is contained in things like equity in businesses, real estate located near jobs, good businesses, and nice neighorhoods. If you don't have those things, the problem is not your store of value.
I don't agree with, though, that its impossible to create a diversified portfolio of bonds, equities, and real estate. For further protection against economic fluctuations, you could either buy annuities with a guarantee or do it yourself by writing call options and using the proceeds from writing them to buy put options. You don't really need to be that sophisticated. A boring diversified will do the job.
I didn't mean to buy puts to speculate on market timing. I was saying someone could buy stock indices, protect the downside by buying out-of-the-money puts, and collect premiums from writing out-of-the-money calls. I wouldn't actually do something that complicated b/c there are annuity products that do the same thing. My point is there are financial products that store value effectively.
B)Slightly improved. Only the very wealthy could afford this at first.
C)The question is self-answering. Desperation would get me to leave.