


The
BLOODLESS 
REVOLUTION

by

Robert Podolsky & Gregory Sulliger


Despite growing insecurity about the future of humanity and widespread distrust and skepticism of government, we have found a source of substantial optimism in the conviction that ethical principles appropriately applied to government and law would beneficially transform our society's institutions.  In the hopes of identifying a societal strategy for the long range success of the human species we have asked ourselves the following question:

	"Suppose a hypothetical leader of great wisdom and insight were to set down a brief set of ethical definitions and principles which were then adopted as the ultimate touchstone of valid law...a kind of Bill of Ethics that would eventually become the principal means of formulating and evaluating laws and actions.  And suppose too that the adoption of such a measure had the effect of transforming the direction in which our species is evolving socially, in such a way that our long term future success as a species would be assured.  What then would this Bill of Ethics have to contain?"

It seems to us that the minimum information that such a bill must contain is comprised of an adequate set of criteria to enable anyone to make high quality value judgments...that is to discern "good" from "bad" in a meaningful and consistent way that is acceptable to most people's instinctive values.  Our optimism is further based on the belief that the absence of such a foundation in our laws is the principal cause of most of the world's problems.

Hard Times

Surely we live today in "hard times".  How else can we perceive widespread drug abuse, street gang violence, the failure of the Soviet Union, the hole in the ozone layer, the AIDS epidemic, the war with Iraq, the exponential population growth, the economic crises both here and abroad, and the utter inability of any government anywhere to significantly alleviate any of these problems.  It's obvious that the leaders of the world are failing to deal with the challenges that we all face collectively. 

How do they do it?  How do these political leaders get us to keep elevating them to positions of such dangerous authority?  What blinds us to the fatal myopia of their vision...the deadly flaws in their characters?  And more important: What can we do to change human destiny for the better?  Is such dramatic transformation possible?  Do the resources for its achievement exist...or is it a case of "Too little...too late...too bad!"?

Can We Change?...What Will It Take?

For years we have wrestled with these questions.  Between the bureaucratic effects of the "system", the immoral profit principle of the "vested interests", and the sheer inertial homeostasis of the "masses" it often seems unlikely that useful answers can be found....except for one fact.  The fact is that there are individuals and groups that are succeeding...by any reasonable criteria you care to name.  If a group of individuals...not necessarily even a group of human beings...can function in a stable cooperative manner...and still grow and evolve without stagnating and becoming rigid...then it is possible in principle to derive a powerful model from the observation of such success.

Even more useful; since several seemingly distinct groups have evolved different ways of achieving the same success...their common denominators, the features they all share, are the model for that success.  We decided to apply such modeling to find a practical answer to the question, "How can the human species overcome its current lethal difficulties and go on to thrive throughout the foreseeable future?"   The results we see unfolding are fascinating!

To derive our model we first established criteria to recognize the success of individuals and groups. In this we have included both money and happiness, both productivity and leisure time, relations with spouses, children, co-workers, and friends, both emotional growth and spiritual. We then examined the organizations that appear successful...especially the ones that grow and thrive even when their competitors are failing. Then we have looked at the lives of a substantial number of individual people who have overcome major handicaps to become successful.    

Finally we have examined the interactive dynamics by which the components of a complex organism are cooperatively organized in nature. Of particular interest is the way cells form tissues, tissues form organs, and organs form the organism.  Here we see the most elegant examples of cooperative organization, capable of flexible adaptive intelligent behavior leading to purposeful outcomes.  

The principal conclusions that we have tentatively drawn from these observations are:

	1)  Humanity possesses ample resources and knowledge for the achievement of a successful future...yet it lacks the proper organization to realize this potential;

	2)  Some businesses...a small percentage...are more successfully organized than are the majority of businesses...and vastly more so than the most successful of governments.

	3)  The one feature...hence the model...that all successful entities seem to share, be they corporations, plants, animals, or people is a particular set of values and "beliefs".    

	A "value" is a criterion for discriminating "good" from "bad" together with the definition of a sensory based operational test to determine whether a particular item meets or fails to meet the criterion.  Values concerning good and bad in general comprise a subset of awareness that is usually referred to as "ethics".   A "belief", in the context in which we are using the word, is an idea which links a value to a behavior.  A belief is valuable only to the extent that it is useful in predicting whether a particular behavior will result in a positively valued consequence.  So the belief,  "I will be rewarded if I am kind to others" connects the value of being rewarded with the act of being kind. 

	4)  We call the specific set of values and "beliefs" relevant to our model of organizational success "Ethics"...a distinct subset of "ethics".  We have put quotes around "beliefs" above to call attention to the fact that plants and animals have something analogous to what we normally call beliefs.  For instance a plant that values sunlight, as most do, operates on the "belief" that certain kinds of responses to the presence of sunlight...orienting the leaves perpendicular to the sun's rays...will increase the plant's access to the light resource.  While a plant's awareness is very limited, this "belief"...coded genetically in what passes for the plant's "mind"...serves as a very useful "belief" in the life of the plant.  

	5)  So, in the end we conclude that behavior congruent with the "Ethics" leads to success...indeed to a large extant is success.  That in fact those entities thrive the best that are committed to the most ethical choices.  If broadly enough defined the same principles apply whether we are discussing the health of a potted plant, the ability of a person to thrive, or the survival of the human species.  

Our agenda is to establish a more rational set of values and beliefs to guide societal development...one that leads to a more desirable destiny.  Our study, research, and personal experience tell us that this is the only way likely to head off our species' impending doom.  Though the outcome is still very uncertain, we think "the game is well worth the candle".  Besides, we believe that to not make the attempt would be unethical.

The Role of Ethics

The process of deriving a model for success leads us as we have seen to the conclusion that the Ethics is not incidental to success...not an optional or stylistic feature thereof.  Rather it is an inescapable necessity for the achievement of a substantial and sustainable success in any domain.  

Apparent examples to the contrary always prove illusory upon closer examination.  Heartless tycoons fall victim to heart attacks, ulcers, cancer, or divorce.  The serial killer who claims to enjoy his crimes often asks to be executed when he is finally apprehended.  Such counter-counter-examples are legion...as numerous as the counter-examples from which they derive.


On the personal level an understanding of the Ethics allows one to align the direction in which one strives to progress (one's destiny of choice) with that which leads toward the success of humanity as a whole.  This makes many decisions easy which might otherwise seem difficult; like swimming with the current rather than against it.

By defining the Ethics we define the optimal relationship between any two people as one that is mutually beneficial.  Using such a relationship as a "building block" we can then see how to form ethically optimal organizations ...which maximize their overall success by maximizing that of all their constituent members.  While the ethical organization concept is compellingly attractive for use in business settings, we find it overwhelmingly persuasive in application to government ...because it reverses the tendency to eliminate corrective feedback which is the defining feature of bureaucracy.  

Understand, please, that the belief system by which we link our definition of the Ethics to the lifestyle characteristics that we label, "success" is not comprised merely of our personal opinions.  It is rather a matter of verifiable observation...like the law of gravity.  If you study the lives of very successful people, those who have more than just money enriching their lives, you will eventually draw the same conclusions as we about what are the essential attitudes that cause that success.

Advanced Ethics for Beginners

In some ways ethics is a very simple subject...an examination of values, quality discrimination criteria, and their accompanying belief systems.  We all need some means of distinguishing "good" from "bad", "right" from "wrong", "just" from "unjust".

It is, of course, "second nature" to make many such decisions on a day-to-day basis according to what we feel.  This kind of personal ethic is of very limited utility, however, because so many of our subjective responses are the direct result of early childhood conditioning.  Parents, for example, who feel it is "right" to beat their children invariably were victims of such abuse in their own childhoods.

Another temptation in establishing a set of ethical guidelines is to create "absolute" ethical standards.  We often see this weakness in the form of various kinds of dogma.  The barbarism of the crusades of the middle ages, the oppression of the spanish inquisition, and the injustices of the McCarthy era in the fifties are all examples of evils perpetrated in the name of ethical dogma.  

The basic error of dogmatic canon is that it prejudges all acts with inadequate regard for the contexts in which they occur. To avoid this error means realizing that all ethical judgement is imperfect...and all prescriptions for ethical judgement are limited by our inability to anticipate all possible contexts in which a given act may occur.  What we hope to do instead is to establish a process by which an act may be evaluated...as much as its context can be known.

Another common misconception about ethics is the belief that it is simply comprised of a set of rules, regulations, and codes established by "professionals" ...ostensibly, for the protection of these individuals' clients. Too often, we note, many of these rules have the effect of protecting members of the profession from financial encroachment upon their "turf" by non-members.  In some cases these rules are very unethical...in that they harm more than they help.  This is not what we mean by ethics. These "ethics" are as dogmatic and fallible as religious canons...for much the same reasons.


Getting Started with Ethics

The remainder of this article is comprised of an explanation of the Ethics  which we believe could be an instrumental model in restructuring our species' organizations in the hopes of surviving the current crisis and thriving in the future.  As such the Ethics might serve as a first step in developing the hypothetical Bill of Ethics to which we referred in the preceding. 

Formulation of the Ethics

It is necessary to admit for any rational discussion of ethics that the foundation of ethics is arbitrary.  Just as the development of any mathematical concept starts with "self evident" assumptions...or axioms...we begin our development of ethics with certain arbitrary definitions which satisfy our intuitive values, and expect the value of their application to prove their ultimate validity...just as in mathematics.  Having done so we derive the application principles of ethics logically...without introducing any further assumptions...an important point to keep in mind.  Though we do not include all the steps of the derivation in this article, we assert that any person who is knowledgeable about scientific logic can prove that the application principles must be correct if one agrees with the definitions assumed.  So if you don't like some of our principles you must either challenge our defining assumptions, find a flaw in our logic, or discover an inherent conflict between what you believe is "reasonable" and what you "like".  In fact most of us do not like to let reason govern our behavior...no matter how much we give lip service to the value of doing so.

"Good" for our purposes is synonymous with "just" and "ethical".  "Persons" are neither good nor bad...only their actions are subject to such ethical discriminations.  A "person" is a being having awareness of its own awareness...so we don't apply ethics to the behavior of beings that lack this attribute.  
Also by definition: All acts by persons are good which meet both of the following criteria:

	A.  Someone's access to objective truth is increased, augmented, or enhanced by means of the act...and

	B.  Nobody's access to objective truth is limited or reduced thereby.

By objective truth we mean truth which is verifiable in the scientific sense... that is to say that it is operationally defined and has been properly verified by multiple observers using the same operational methodology.

In addition, acts which limit or reduce someone's access to objective truth are good if they are those minimally required to prevent that person from acting unethically upon someone else...as in the case of self-defense.  

It is easy to prove that any act which increases a person's awareness, growth, creativity, access to energy, freedom, love, comfort, pleasure, convenience, security, or degree of personal evolution must also in general increase that person's access to objective truth.  So for definition purposes these resources, and probably many others, are logical equivalents of objective truth.

Principles

We can now go on to infer from the definitions above that to consistently act ethically people must do their utmost to maximize objective truth and its equivalents; that only actions which increase objective truth are ethical; that any act which decreases objective truth for any person is unethical except in the special instance mentioned above.  Two very important additional conclusions that can readily be derived from the definitions are: (A) Unethical means can never achieve ethical ends...and (B) Unethical means always produce unethical results (ends).  A closely related conclusion is that Means which are not ethical ends in themselves are never ethical.  

Furthermore, we conclude that because it is ethical to learn it is unethical to be absolutely certain (a state of mind that precludes further learning by forbidding the assimilation of any new information) and ethical to doubt (a state of mind that leads to curiosity...and further learning).  

And finally, it is unethical not to act, if by acting we can ethically eliminate or reduce the harm done by someone or something that would otherwise limit or reduce a person's access to objective truth.

All of these principles are inherent in the preceding definitions...so we leave their proof to you for now as a student exercise.  

Applications to the Law

Rather than seeing law as the ultimate authority responsible for the stability of civilization, we see ethics as the touchstone of choice...and law as its logical servant.  The difficulty with law is the fact that it is easy to pass "bad" laws...laws that are harmful to people rather than beneficial.  And what is more, it is very difficult to mount a courtroom defense against prosecution under an unethical law.

A good example of this situation is seen in our attempts to prevent the harm done by drugs to the people who take them.  Most attempts to solve this problem legally have been in the form of various prohibitions against the possession and sale of some of the drugs that are in common use.  Systematic studies of this phenomenon by independent researchers over the years have revealed the following consistent results:

1.	The drugs which are causing the most harm to their users are alcohol and tobacco.  More people die from taking these drugs than all the others combined.

2.	While alcohol and tobacco remain legal their use is diminishing due to intense efforts to educate the public about the dangers inherent in their use.

3.	The possession of marijuana, cocaine, crack, heroin, methamphetamine, mescaline, psilocybin, LSD, MDA, MDM, and various prescription drugs is now forbidden by law in most places (except as sanctioned by the medical profession).  The use of many of these and the illicit traffic in them has increased ever since they were outlawed.

4.	Accelerating efforts to enforce the prohibition of these outlawed drugs at enormous cost to the taxpaying public has been totally unsuccessful.  
5.	Secondary problems created solely by the prohibition and its enforcement include: 

	A.  The black market pricing of illicit drugs at levels hundreds of times higher than open market pricing would call for;

	B.  The consequent prosperity and influence of the elements of organized crime that procure and market illicit drugs;

	C.  The killing and maiming of law enforcement personnel, drug dealers, and innocent bystanders that results from the violent attempts to suppress the drug market;

	D.  The criminalization of thousands of individuals who have been caught in possession of drugs and the radically increased demand for courts, lawyers, jails, prisons, and all the ancillary expenses associated with the judicial and corrections systems.

6.	These results are totally consistent with findings by similar studies of the former prohibition of alcohol and the attendant ascendancy of the mafia's wealth, power, and influence that resulted.

7.	Related studies of the incidence of firearm homicide show no increase in such killings in the absence of prohibition; but demonstrate a very strong correlation (increase) in proportion to the efforts to enforce alcohol prohibition in the past and drug prohibition now.

The findings described above demonstrate clearly to any rational observer that the current attempt to solve the drug problem by prohibiting the possession and sale of drugs is doomed to fail.  They even suggest the possibility that the drug dealers themselves may be underwriting the lobbying that prevents the legalization of drugs in order to maintain prices at their present exorbitant levels.  In the light of these findings  present drug prohibition laws are clearly unethical.  Failure of our lawmakers and political leaders to repeal these laws is the perpetuation of a great injustice.

With the Ethics surmounting law, a judge cognizant of the above findings would be ethically bound to dismiss all drug cases...in spite of the laws to the contrary.  Before a morally committed judge or jury a defense attorney would have ample evidence to defend someone charged with drug sale or possession, merely needing to show that enforcement of prohibition laws is unethical. Lacking the ascendancy of ethics, millions of people continue to suffer unnecessarily the many consequences of a government staunchly committed to irresponsible law.

With the Ethics defining the underlying purpose of law a judgement about a particular act may recognize that the act is generally illegal yet condone it because it was ethical in the context in which it occurred. This decision could be made by a judge or jury at the original trial without requiring an elaborate and expensive appeal.  Or it could even be made by a prosecutor who sees that the act in question was ethical in the context in which it occurred.

An interesting and worthwhile exercise is to name an act that you consider ethical.  Now describe a set of circumstances in which the act would be unethical.  Next describe a second set of circumstances in which the act would be ethical even if the previous set of circumstances were to apply.  Can you reverse the judgement again with a third set of circumstances? ...And so on...

Benefits to Society

There are basically three major categories of benefits to be derived from adoption of the Ethics as the raison d'etre of law.  

First, the Ethics will focus public attention on the characteristics of an ethical relationship between two people, thus paving the way for many social and economic advances.  Second the Ethics will catalyze the acceleration of societal evolution in many other ways.  And finally, the Ethics will provide all of us with new sources of hope as opportunities for heightened creativity become increasingly available.

The Ethical Relationship

The most general, powerful, and pervasive consequence of the adoption of the Ethics as our society's "guiding light" will probably be the resulting education of the public about the nature of the ethical relationship and its importance to all members of our society.  The relationship model we are most familiar with in our current state of awareness is the hierarchic model...or, as it is sometimes called, the authoritarian model.  We first encounter this model in our homes when we have insecure parents who relate to us tyrannically.  Next we encounter it in school, where we are trained to do what our teachers tell us to do...even though some of them had tyrannical parents and have adopted their ways.  Later we see this model in operation in the workplace...at the hands of bosses, managers, or supervisors who grew up in authoritarian families.  Naturally our laws and public institutions reflect the same familiar model.

The Ethics requires us as a society to replace the hierarchic or authoritarian organizational model with one that is based on mutual benefit through cooperation and which is therefor more ethical and humane.  Several such models already have proven successful.  One is based on a partner-partner concept and another is based on a mentor-protege building-block.  Mastery of such organizational models may well lead our society to the point where it could assimilate an organic or evolutionary model that resembles the way cells, tissues, and organs cooperate in the formation of living organisms.  Such societal evolution might eventually allow us to create organizational institutions that are more intelligent, more ethical, more creative, and more effective than any of the individuals comprising them.

Other Societal Evolution

Consider the possibilities.  Under the influence of the Ethics we might expect to see schools evolve into institutions that exist specifically for the benefit of the attending students...rather than for the convenience of employers or busy parents.  Proper family life and child rearing could be taught and demonstrated in such schools, where teachers are required to master the knack of living ethically and to both teach such principles and act as effective role models for them.  

Law
In a society committed to the Ethics we might see the practice of law become the noble calling that it has the potential to be...by eliminating from the field those attorneys who regard the law as a private turf that exists for their psychopathic aggrandizement.

Business

In the business world we could see the ethical relationship laws that result from the adoption of the Ethics produce a new kind of business environment...one in which employers actively seek to realize their employees dreams rather than just their own.  Such a transformation could provide true financial security and vastly more adequate retirement plans for business employees by creating opportunities to earn residual income, which is to say ongoing financial rewards for work that yields ongoing benefits to others.  This would restore at the personal level the vitality inherent in the free enterprise system.  Can you imagine being excited about going to work each morning?...no longer fearing the boss?...liking what you do?  The Japanese are ahead of us when it comes to participatory management, but they needn't be for long.  The concept they employ was invented by an American named W. Edwards Deming...who found a more willing audience in Japanese industry than in ours when he started trying to teach his ideas.

Government

How about government?  Can you imagine what it will mean to live in a society that regards government merely as a business that serves the taxpayer and is subservient to the Ethics?  For starters, the nature of taxation will have to change.  Taxation as we know it is coercive.  But the Ethics clearly states that coercion is only ethical when it is used minimally to prevent someone from acting unethically toward another.  Since this does not apply to taxation it follows that coercive taxation is unethical and must therefor be superseded under the Ethics by a more ethical means of funding projects for the public good.  A system which guaranteed that each taxpayer's money was spent for purposes of which that individual taxpayer approved would comprise a major advance in this direction.  Such a system would not be hard to devise if we made it a priority.

With such changes in place, and others that will follow, we might expect to see objective truth and its concomitant creativity rewarded in government...instead of penalized as it is now.  Perhaps the truly intelligent, moral, competent people in government will finally become influential...instead of being constantly frustrated.  If we start having government leaders who solicit and respond to corrective feedback we may actually see government evolve one day into a non-bureaucratic institution that we all love and respect...instead of the corrupt self-serving clique that it is today.

Hope at Last

If these changes begin to take place we will have achieved another important outcome as well.  We will restore for all time a reality-based sense of hope to all our lives. This is absolutely necessary if the despair, cynicism, and irresponsible destructiveness that characterize human society today are ever to be overcome.











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