Skeptic Project

Many people (usually individuals that have done no research other then to watch the movie) have stated their incredible wisdom on why the Venus Project can not possibly work.

Well, they are in great company with many other intelligent minds and leaders of the past! These great mind and leaders had NO foresight and BOLDLY stated what CAN'T BE DONE!!

[Television] won't be able to hold on to any market it captures after the first six months. People will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.
- Darryl F. Zanuck, head of 20th Century-Fox, 1946.

Computers in the future may...perhaps only weigh 1.5 tons.
- Popular Mechanics, 1949.

There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home.
- Kenneth Olsen, president and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977.

The horse is here to stay, but the automobile is only a novelty—a fad.
- Advice from a president of the Michigan Savings Bank to Henry Ford's lawyer Horace Rackham. Rackham ignored the advice and invested $5000 in Ford stock, selling it later for $12.5 million.

Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value.
- Marshal Ferdinand Foch, French military strategist, 1911. He was later a World War I commander.

While theoretically and technically television may be feasible, commercially and financially I consider it an impossibility, a development of which we need waste little time dreaming.
- Lee DeForest, 1926 (American radio pioneer and inventor of the vacuum tube.)

Radio has no future.
- Lord Kelvin (1824-1907), British mathematician and physicist, ca. 1897.

Well informed people know it is impossible to transmit the voice over wires and that were it possible to do so, the thing would be of no practical value.
- Editorial in the Boston Post (1865)

This `telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a practical form of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.
- Western Union internal memo, 1878

Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.
- Lord Kelvin (1824-1907), ca. 1895, British mathematician and physicist

[W]hen the Paris Exhibition closes electric light will close with it and no more be heard of.
- Erasmus Wilson (1878) Professor at Oxford University

"Man will not fly for a thousand years".
- New York Times Editorial on the foolishness of pursuing manned flight, December 1903.

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction".
- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

What use could this company make of an electrical toy?
- Western Union president William Orton, responding to an offer from Alexander Graham Bell to sell his telephone company to Western Union for $100,000.

"I would sooner believe that two Yankee professors lied, than that stones fell from the sky"
- Thomas Jefferson, after hearing reports of meteorites.

"Such startling announcements as these should be deprecated as being unworthy of science and mischievous to its true progress."
- Sir William Siemens, 1880, on Edison's announcement of a successful light bulb.

"We are probably nearing the limit of all we can know about astronomy."
- Simon Newcomb, astronomer, 1888

The abolishment of pain in surgery is a chimera. It is absurd to go on seeking it. . . . Knife and pain are two words in surgery that must forever be associated in the consciousness of the patient.
- Dr. Alfred Velpeau (1839) French surgeon

The foolish idea of shooting at the moon is an example of the absurd length to which vicious specialization will carry scientists working in thought-tight compartments.
- A.W. Bickerton (1926) Professor of Physics and Chemistry, Canterbury College, New Zealand

"That the automobile has practically reached the limit of its development is suggested by the fact that during the past year no improvements of a radical nature have been introduced. "
- Scientific American, Jan. 2, 1909

There is a young madman proposing to light the streets of London—with what do you suppose—with smoke!
- Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) [On a proposal to light cities with gaslight.]

The Kölonische Zeitung [Köln, Germany, 28 March 1819] listed six grave reasons against street lighting, including these:

1. Theological: It is an intervention in God's order, which makes nights dark...
2. Medical: It will be easier for people to be in the streets at night, afflicting them with colds...
3. Philosophical-moral: Morality deteriorates through street lighting. Artificial lighting drives out fear of the dark, which keeps the weak from sinning...

They will never try to steal the phonograph because it has no `commercial value.'
- Thomas Edison (1847-1931). (He later revised that opinion.)

A new source of power... called gasoline has been produced by a Boston engineer. Instead of burning the fuel under a boiler, it is exploded inside the cylinder of an engine.

The dangers are obvious. Stores of gasoline in the hands of people interested primarily in profit would constitute a fire and explosive hazard of the first rank. Horseless carriages propelled by gasoline might attain speeds of 14 or even 20 miles per hour. The menace to our people of vehicles of this type hurtling through our streets and along our roads and poisoning the atmosphere would call for prompt legislative action even if the military and economic implications were not so overwhelming... [T]he cost of producing [gasoline] is far beyond the financial capacity of private industry... In addition the development of this new power may displace the use of horses, which would wreck our agriculture.
- U. S. Congressional Record, 1875.

There is not in sight any source of energy that would be a fair start toward that which would be necessary to get us beyond the gravitative control of the earth.
- Forest Ray Moulton (1872-1952), astronomer, 1935.

To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth--all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances.
- Lee deForest (1873-1961) (American radio pioneer and inventor of the vacuum tube.) Feb 25, 1957.

I'm not sure how easily it could be done to try and condense such a radical idea to a single line without it becoming a gigantic run-on. Why would one bother to try?

Your take doesn't include something about sustainable management of the Earth's resources for use by all and to be available for future generations. That is probably the most important goal. I'm not an official spokesman for TVP though. I'm just a guy who believes future generations deserve a planet in at least as good shape as the one we have today, and the path we're currently on can't be fixed enough to give it to them.

Part of life is realizing that you are going to be wrong sometimes. Should the people you've quoted have never expressed their thoughts because they might have turned out wrong? Perhaps I am wrong about everything I know and someday you will be able to add me to that list. But right now I think I am right about certain things I believe, that is why I believe them, and I'm not going to shut my mouth out of fear of being wrong. Besides for every one of the quotes above, there was someone else pointing out to someone that he couldn't fly by strapping wings to his arms and jumping of a cliff.

> Part of life is realizing that you are going to be wrong sometimes.

Usually a lot in the beginning, until you learn, and then its still a constant learning process as you often improve ideas and solutions with little tweaks here or there, or sometimes big changes when you find out a particular avenue wasn't really as good as it first looked.

Finding out what parts are wrong, is I reckon key to improvement, and as such, finding people who can spot and voice these aspects are invaluable to ones solutions!

Yesman are not so useful like that..

OMFG not the quotes to prove how Jacque is going to create a utopia out of thin air.

Never mind the fact that his claims are full of holes, anecdotal and have no scientific backing whatsoever, never mind the reality lets just use inane examples of things people said before to prove Jacques plan will work.

This is not even intellectually clever its just something a dummy would do.

Oh Jacque your RBE has numerous problems, he replies as a defense well other people seem to think it will work look at all these people talking about other things that worked.

Hows about proving it will work with science facts and practical real world examples of his work and his claims? No lets just copy and paste a load of quotes from history other people said about other topics thats good enough !!!

Lame Lame Lame

I'll be glad when RBE becomes a coherent philosophy, if for no other reason than it will be easier to prove wrong.

bkyle
New Poster
Posts: 4

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Well, I now understand his enthusiasm.

It seems that Fresco has more confidence in his ability to draw cities than to build them.

Maybe he thinks they're impossible?

Doesn't Fresco himself say something like "This is just my view of how it might be" and "Its up to the rest of us to make it happen, whatever it is".

As such, I find it puzzling how on the one hand Fresco is quite flexible, but PJM seems quite inflexible and appears to encourage solutions oppersite what Fresco has actually said at times. (Eg. Fresco appears to say, go and build things, PJ seems to say, build things if you want, but don't make use of any offical help to do so..)

Thats a bit like having a father whose a builder saying "Go on son, build yourself a home, but don't expect me to help, your on your own son!"

When I think RBE, about the closest at the moment to a working solution that mimics many of parts of it is to be found in China today, Huaxi village:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/may/10/china.jonathanwatts</p>

They managed it, I'm sure we could copy it and manage it too, only improve on it as well..

To me, that is an example of what is achievable, and I can see it being an improvement on what was there before, so I repeatedly ask TZM members, why are we not building something like this, if its proven already to work ?

@Nanos

Fresco appears to say, go and build things, PJ seems to say, build things if you want, but don't make use of any offical help to do so.

On making self-sustaining communes right now, both are against. I haven't heard anything about research centers though...

so I repeatedly ask TZM members, why are we not building something like this, if its proven already to work ?

Did you ask your closest Chapter? You don't need TZM permission to make your own Venus, Florida for research and advertisement of TVP/RBE on weekends. Most members, including those going there, could donate to it. No one would live there while being parasitic on those other members that give donations.

@Matt

So basically all we need is a ruthless, totalitarian regime to create the safety that would allow an RBE to function.

You mean like killing people that go against RBE? That won't work since relatives won't be too happy about that. Kill them too? Then where does that end.
I don't hear people saying "West bastards pushed us in EU.", because that was our choice. I do however hear people shouting, when Latvia joined USSR after an election, in which there was one party and it received more votes, than there were citizens able to vote. (Did I mention that USSR told their soldiers that the Baltic states were poor with no food, while in reality we had one of the leading outputs of food before the occupation?)

Then you must ask yourself. How can I be communist if I can't stand the lies USSR while I only lived there for 1 year. I'm not. Even though there were pluses in USSR(free education, free medical care, cheap and poor cars.. whups) it doesn't outweigh the minuses(Extremely hard to leave USSR, need permit to travel to other USSR states, food shortages, can't sustain regime without imperialism, professions that don't help society itself(feeds from it), exaggerating production output on purpose).

Here is a quick version of "How communism in USSR would work if they ever achieved it?". After everyday work you would be given a card with which you could get everything you need, since if everyone does their work just for the card, there would be no money. (you need food for every day)
Now comes a problem. What denies anyone to stockpile stuff so to not need to work for some days? Supervisors - Guards - Government (One of the reasons why it failed since those don't really contribute to society)

RBE can't be achieved by conquest or silencing. Forced reeducation? Also won't work - "I'll play along, then kick the shit out of them. That will be my revenge."

@bkyle:

Regarding the argument you are clearly trying to make with the OP.

It is true that people have been wrong throughout time, however you are forgetting all the times people have been right. Also, if we look at your argument here how does that follow to give credence to the Venus Project? It seems to me that you could argue the same point about free energy, homeopathy, astrology and psychic's. Does that mean we should give credence to that for the same reason? There is very good reasons to think free energy cant work and homeopathy and astrology is superstitious mumbojumbo and we have very good reasons to think that the Venus Project woudnt work either,

The Venus Project relies on a system where all parts have to be in place at exactly the same time working perfectly worldwide. The reason they have no sensible transition plan is because if you try and come up with one to get you to there you will fail.

Its a little ironic that if they could socially get everyone out there in a well paid job, there would be more than enough money to pay to have someone else build the city they want!

Lets see, 400,000 members, earning say minimum wage (£10k in the UK.) paying half their income towards city building would equal roughly £2 billion a year.. and Masdar City is estimated to cost £14 billion, so 7 years..

Though they say Madar will only house around 50,000 people, so the other 350,000 folk would be out of luck..

But, if people got better jobs, and you built a cheaper city, I reckon it would be doable within 10 years to build homes for all 400,000 people..

"They use it to convince themselves and other non-critical thinkers."

Yeah I've even seen this same list of quotes used by religious sites to show that "them scientists don't know everything".

Some naysayers were wrong in the past.
TZM has naysayers.
Therefore TZM's naysayers are wrong.

Duh

@Matt

You just admitted that abundance will not achieve it, as there will be hoarding and those who exploit the abundance.

On how USSR wanted to achieve it, yes, on how RBE would, no.
Since in RBE you would take what you need, without having the need to work to earn it. There is no reason to stockpile, because it just takes more space in your house and food will rot.
You mean you don't see this as a difference between Communism and RBE?

@Nanos

Its a little ironic that if they could socially get everyone out there in a well paid job, there would be more than enough money to pay to have someone else build the city they want!

I am for research and advertisement city, but not a self-sustaining commune.

You think that a government will allow you to make a commune that doesn't pay taxes? Sure go to your uninhabited island, we will meeet you in World War III. Want to avoid both? Then maybe build an underwater city like in Bioshock and hope that submarines won't notice it. Well there is also space though.

"The Beach" movie was a nice example. You can't make a self-sustaining commune not relying on outer sources.