Collaborative Planetary Development
In the second installment of the Alien franchise, interplanetary colonists are overwhelmed by an outbreak of a hostile species, halting their work to transform a desolate wasteland into a habitable world for life as we know it. The Hebrew Bible begins with a description of early Earth, calling it "Tohu wa-bohu"-- wild and waste. In the following chapters, we see YHWH developing this wild and waste-- plants, ocean life, land creatures and finally humans. Today, humanity has matured to the point we are beginning to understand our capacity to transform the planetary environment in the same way, and aspiring to do this on other worlds.
One thing stands in our way-- cults. Consider the following from a Google search of the "etymology of cult":
The word "cult" comes from the French word culte, which comes from the Latin word cultus, meaning "care, cultivation, worship". Cultus is also a noun that can mean "tilling, cultivation", "training or education", or "adoration". The word "cult" first appeared in English in 1617, and the first sense of "cult" referred to formal religious veneration or worship. Since 1829, the word "cult" has also come to mean "devotion to a person or thing"
Cults are so ubiquitous in modern times we no longer recognize our nation states, professional associates or even our aptly named cult-ures as such, instead reserving the term for microscopic groups of religious fanatics. The Biblical idea of the Kingdom of God doesn't necessarily do away with cultures, but does eliminate the more nefarious aspects of cultic behavior. At NTARI we hope to develop a culture that supports the idealism of the Kingdom of God's foundational purpose, through Collaborative Planetary Development.
We define CPD as:
Care and cultivation of the natural world,
of humanity,
and human nature
We develop CPD through the design of virtual choice arenas-- mobile applications that facilitate fluid participation of users through the internet. Our networks are proximity based to develop local resolution and distributed open-source to allow them to evolve as communications platforms wherever humans take them.
In Frank Herbert's Dune saga, we see humanity developing civilization across the universe. Theme throughout the series is inter-cultic war, messianic faith and the trouble with centralized organization. At NTARI we believe CPD can help mankind avoid a future where our great-great grand children split the solar system with senseless war. We prefer the future Herbert hoped for, but didn't tell us how to achieve.
Collaborative Planetary Development
Understanding CPD
