This is written for myself to better bring together the story told by my books. They need a final re-write and this is needed to bring their story together better. Humanity is like a teenager. Sometimes smart, sometimes less so, sometimes really dumb. We are in between childhood and adulthood. We really must grow up. Some will want to if given direction. Some will only grow up if forced to. Some will not. We are going to be forced to though, by a few things. We would be smart to do it willingly and gracefully. So, what direction can be offered? We have the tools to act like adults. We just must know what they are and what they mean. It will also make a lot of problems go away, more than it will create. That is what this essay describes in overview of my four books that describe it in detail. This essay though is also to describe where the story told in those books leads. They describe the problems we face and how to solve them by adapting to another ecology we can create for long term survival. They avoid talking about what we might become in that new ecology though, as that is considered mostly unpredictable and not essential to survival. The problem is that without a direction or goal to aim for, it is very hard to achieve much. You are always much stronger with a goal. So let me tell you something about what the future of humanity could be. I think it would be a great goal for us.

Why:
  Become more than animals, man in nature. Humans have to grow up.
  Change between stable ecologies, but must be in moral framework.
  De novo mutations.
  Genetic Adaptation.
  Become more than animals, man in nature... below...
How:
  Genetics - Artificial selection.
  OS - Basic Philosophy.
  Strategy.
What that leads to:
  Health
  Beauty
  Brains

  A healthy Earth ecology.
  Space, because it is hard

Why

Humans have to grow up.

This story has always been about how we could survive by adapting genetically and strategically. This is about why we want to. This is about the doors it will open for us. This is about the aspirations of ancient philosophers of many cultures. The wanted humanity to be more than animals. They could see man in nature outside their city gates and it was not a pretty sight.

Change between stable ecologies.

Humans are undergoing perhaps the biggest ecological change that any species has ever attempted as we leave the tribal world for civilization, an ecology that does not exist in nature. This story is about how humans can genetically and strategically adapt to that change. All times of change are uncomfortable, challenging, and dangerous. We must develop a long-term stable ecology to survive and develop in. How to do that is the core of this story. A species without that ecology, is extinct. This analysis uses ecology as an organizational system for describing this change. It is a great tool for describing a species and their survival needs. The largest underlying problem we face is a change in ecology, but there is more to it. Ecology is the best tool for describing our situation and survival requirements. At the same time, this must be described in moral terms. It is how we think. It is the combination of our strong but slowly adapting moral instincts, combined with our more responsive moral systems Soviet astronomer Nikolai Kardashev proposed a scale for measuring a civilization's technological advancement based on its energy use. A biologist would be more likely to make a scale based on the species’ ability to control its own destiny. In that sense, a protozoan would have no control and be a system of complicated chemical responses. Call that Type 1 life. Plants compete behaviorally and reproductively, but rather simply, so call that Type 2. Most vertebrates have fairly complicated behavior including behaviors to optimize their genetics over time, such as status competition. Call that Type 3. Humans have long added a conscious component to that, intentionally breeding for desired traits in domestic animals, as well in themselves. Call that Type 4. A Type 5 species would be one that uses artificial selection and strategic breeding to manage their genetics. Their survival strategy would be based on an objective analysis of their historic strategies, their instincts and what their science can tell them. That is what this story is supposed to describe. One must wonder if this is the answer to the Fermi Paradox of why we have not met alien life. The "Zoo Hypothesis" says we would not be contacted until we have reached a certain level of development. Perhaps it is when a species controls its genetic and strategic destiny.

Genetic Adaptation.

There is another level of change. There are random mutations each generation. They are referred to as "de novo", meaning "fresh' in Latin. Mutations that their parents did not have. Being random, most of these are not good. Random changes may break the functioning of genes that took great time and natural selection to evolve. This will create a "genetic load" of broken genes that no species can survive. It is made worse by things like medicine, that we call human progress, but are the removal of natural selection. Older parents have more broken genes as well. This is already being detected in the UK Bio-Bank. To survive, we will have to husband our genes to replace natural selection that we have removed. That changes everything, because natural selection is a blunt, often random effect that can only remove "bad" genes. It can never select for good genes. Using artificial selection, we can select for the best genes of both parents. Everyone could have "superior" health, beauty and brains. The value of that would be amazing, but we are going to need that to survive into an unknown future that none of us are adapted to. The ethnic variation of humanity will be our greatest wealth, because human progress has always been the coming together of peoples, genetically and culturally. We have the genes we need. Maybe we will make new genes one day, but the safest route is to stay conservative, like biology is and the key to safety is in always keeping a balance. There is far more that is described in the genetics book, but the interesting part here is that while some people may embrace the idea of humanity's maturity and adaptation to a new ecology, most will not care. It is just how humans are. We do not think about the future. This though would be economical and easy. It would have huge, short term benefits of health, so it would likely be embraced for that reason. It would appeal to our instinct for status, which has a large genetic base. There is another huge benefit that could allow it to be embraced within a generation. This is all described in detail in the book "Genetics For A New Human Ecology".

Disease.

Originally, this story was started because of a concern about the natural danger of disease. In evolution, it is a huge selective effect. With so many people as potential hosts, and common international travel to spread it, the danger of disease looks obvious. At the same time, it appears that medical technology can make us relatively safe from disease. That is almost certainly an illusion. Disease is the ancient, universal enemy. A primary reason for considering genetic husbandry was because of its potential for making people more healthy in general and so then able to better survive diseases. Unfortunately, it will be hard to improve the genetics of immune system very much, because the dangers of disease has made evolution greatly improve the immune system already. Also, the natural strategy of immunity moities (like blood types) to survive disease (described by Robert Trivers) suggests that beating diseases is always a challenge that may not be won. We need to plan for that.

Strategic Adaptation.

Strategic Adaptation to this new ecology breaks into two parts, perhaps a more basic part like a common operating system, and more advanced parts that are like applications that will be more personal choices and needs. Different people will use different strategies of survival.

The Operating System - Basic Philosophy and Science.

There are many ways to think, some better than others. A person with the skills of critical thinking can function, but not nearly as well as a person that has them. From basic philosophy and science, we have what we need to make a very effective operating system for the human mind. We just need to know its nature, and how to teach it explicitly and as part of our culture. That is described in the first strategy book called "Philosophy For A New Human Ecology". It is the most basic parts of philosophy which include how to think more than what to think. All philosophies that have stood the test of time contribute important parts to this, including the natural way to teach it by maxims. What gets repeated through history shows the important principles we need to know, such as balance, friendship and overcoming fears------. At the next level are "Mental Models", many from sciences, that are how we can understand and to make useful predictions about our world we exist in. Note that "advanced" sciences and philosophy are like applications, and do not effect us in the same ways as the basics do. We are biological creatures, so some of the understanding we need is about biology, including how we naturally think.

A Survival Strategy For A New Ecology

"Transition To A New Ecology" is supposed to bring this all together. It was the first book written, but often you cannot really tell the beginning of a story until you know its ending. That has been hard to figure out and has been the journey through all these books. When I wrote that, I did not know the ending. I think I do now. It will take a lot of rewriting. It is not just about humans, but also about the ecology we create and that is our life support system. We depend on our knowledge, our tools and what we build. We must be able to exist in two systems, a civilization with its order, and when the civilization gets broken, as it will. This book covers a number of topics that have been mentioned in religion, philosophy, and other topics, but without our current knowledge of biology and other sciences. A layer needs to be added to the thinking of the past. We now know that some ideas commonly believed in history, were wrong, deceptive, or need more extended descriptions. Time and science have added much that has not been integrated into older knowledge that is the foundation of current science. Things that had to be logically guessed at can now be described with far better facts to work with. That book will also mention some of the possibilities for humans in the future, that this essay is supposed to touch on.

Cognition and Intelligence.

Partly on a challenge, I wrote a book on Cognition and Intelligence. It is a very misunderstood subject, probably because most processes of intelligence are non-verbal. That and other reasons make them difficult to describe. It is though much of what got us here and it is what will take us to the future. I called the book "When Barbara Explained Genius", but when I revisit it, I plan to rename it "Cognition For A New Ecology". It uses a dialog to describe intelligence as a neural net (long before AI was popular). It describes why it can be difficult to use, it is non-verbal, and how to use it most effectively. As a neural net, it is compared to vision, which is much easier to understand.

What that leads to. That was the point.

This mentioned that genetic husbandry could offer everyone superior health, beauty, and brains to everyone. Any doctor can tell you that the most expensive chronic diseases are genetically based. Many cancers are. There are long lists of diseases and their genetic basis. Genetic research suggests that genetic cures for many of the worst mental diseases may actually be low hanging fruit. Mental retardation is the most expensive disability and commonly caused by de novo mutations. Genetic husbandry could not just remove diseases but also offer long lasting health to a person. More pragmatically, nations measure their health care expenses as part of their GDP, often around 15%. Sometimes we avoid the topic, but when honest we admit to the great value of beauty in our culture. It has always been important in evolution, so using genetic husbandry, it should be something that could be made common.

A Healthy Earth Ecology.

There are many possible natural disasters that could endanger humanity, but in ways that is less of a problem than disasters that disrupt our ecology, in our case, civilization. A major natural disaster is likely to kill many people, but the damage from that will radiate far further. Most humans do not think very far into the future. That is natural and uderstandable, but we need some people to do that as well as many people thinking in terms of first responders in emergencies. It is not just people that will need triage and healing. It is out ecology, our civilization, that is our life support system. Covid, a fairly minor disease, showed us how fragile our supply chain could be. I have said that a major reason for genetic husbandry was to stregnthen humans for the inevitable future diseases. Hopefully it will work the same way for natural disasters. In some places, even minor global climate change is already raising temperatures to the point that humans cannot function. Natural selection has not left weaklings, but we can become stronger and more adaptable. We are going to need to. On another note about unpredictable future scenerios. Automation is going to increase and a major factor is that for better or worse, that will replace much human labor, as well as adding available labor. Humans have abused the world environment enough that, even though it recovers well naturally, it will need help recovering. Some of that added labor should be available for that purpose. It goes further. The world is a pretty neat, beautiful place, but this is another case where conscious, considered human intervention could not just repair damage, but be improved both ecologically as well as artistically. We see examples of nature that exist in art, but not in the real world. If humans get their acts together, we will and it will be amazing.

Space, because it is hard

Humanity has left our previous tribal world and are well along to developing the skills and strategies we need to thrive in the new world we are creating. This essay is to describe that world, perhaps to offer people a goal. In ways, it is what I have worked for, though I have mostly worked on solving problems that seemed to threaten survival. Rather than solving problems, this is about what we can create and become.

I have said that we need to adapt genetically and strategically to solve our problems. I have also said that those solutions we need would also open new doors for us.  we have to d

This story of human ecological transition was started as a description of the great genetic danger coming from removing natural selection as part of what we call human progress. I also mentioned though, that that would offer us incredible potentials to husband our genes far more effectively than natural selection could. Everyone could have excellent health, beauty, and brains. We're going to need it in the world we are heading for. The human world of the future is going to be challenging. It was intelligence that brought us the potential to create this new world and it will be one of our most important potentials in the future. Two more of the books of the story tell us about that intelligence, about how to train it, and how to use it. The last book of this transition story, Transition to a New Human Ecology, is to describe some of the parts of a survival strategy that can take us to this new ecology and allow us to thrive there. More will be needed. Much more will be needed, but most of that can be developed in the time after we reach that new ecology and can slow down from the changes we need to make. A species in a stable ecology does not need to change so much. Humanity will have time then to think more about the future and what we want to do about it. 
The point of this essay is to consider what that might look like, to offer a goal for humanity. I have always avoided speculating about the future, perhaps because so many people like to do that or maybe because I am unlikely to be right. Still, there is value to describing a worthy goal. It could greatly help with human survival.
To some, I hope it will be an interesting idea., but I hope to others it will be a goal or perhaps even a small inspiration. I see the potential for an amazingly bright future for humanity.


Humanity is a bit we have problems. I’ve spent a lot of time exploring the problems. We have that where we are transitioning from the tribal ecology to new ecology. Agriculture has been one step in that. It’s a little like the last time humans changed psychology. We had existed in an ecology in the trees for millions of years. About 3 million years ago, we made the transition to the hunter gather ecology on land tribal, where we thrive and developed for about 3 million years. Now we need a new ecology where we can develop and thrive. That’s the goal. The humanity needs. If you look at early Greek philosophy, what they wanted was for, was to be able to become more than man in nature. They could see him outside the city gate and it was not a pretty site. In my previous books, I described how we could solve the genetic problem. Progress has been the removal of natural selection while at the same time, older parents has met that there has been more random mutations each generation. Those mutations are mostly not good. It will add up to a genetic load Than natural selection is supposed to remove. No species can survive that genetic low. I described the way to solve it is ethical and economical, and will help us adapt to this new ecology. For strategic adaptation, we need a few things for that. We have them available. Much of what we need to survive long-term is actually described by very basic philosophy. A lot more of what we need have been provided by science. Is basically described as the energetic and productive habits of a species. Basically, that is what we need in the way of resources to survive and How we use those resources to reproduce and survive. We’ve been developing new resource strategies to replace the hunter gathering and scavenging we used to do. We have new resource supplies and very complicated resource demands. Humans do require a lot of resources to survive, including education. Most of philosophy is About surviving in some form of an agricultural feudal society. I’ve tried to add some of what we were missing beyond that for the next psychology, especially what we have learned from biology. The next ecology we will exist in is called civilization, and it is not it is an ecology that does not exist naturally in nature a major aspect of our survival will be creating and maintaining and protecting that ecology. Beyond philosophy, there are other strategies that we will need in order to survive. Humans are complicated.
Discussing these ideas with people, generally, they are very well received has been very good ideas. What I’ve learned though is they are not compelling ideas. People just don’t think that way. We do not think about the future, and we do not think about changing. The genetic problem we face of reduce natural selection while we’re still having mutations will force us to. Change. Luckily, it’s not a difficult change. Again we can do it fairly economically and ethically we can husband our genes. It’s a great idea, but more importantly we’re going to be forced into it. At the same time it’s a good enough idea. A lot of people will embrace the idea just because The pay off is very high. We can gain many of the strengths that are genetic can offer us while removing many of the weaknesses. Those who aren’t inspired by that idea, will officially be forced to embrace the idea and practice where they won’t survive. Not that it matter as a lot, because if if they do have children, their children will probably embrace the idea. There is so much advantage to it That it is offered as an easy solution and danger of not embracing it is clear, it will be embraced.
We are already seen the dangers we face strategically. We are in a time where our civilization and very species is threatened by conflict and war. We have fights over racial differences and differences of belief. Again, those are problems with that can be solved based upon what I’m working on. Based upon what I described in the previous books on genetics and strategy. Well, that all may solve a lot of problems, some will remain, but the important ones will have been solved. Still like the team we need more than to solve problems. We need a goal in human terms we need a vision or an inspiration to aspire to just like the ancient wanted to be more than animals in nature. If we follow this path and protect our civilization so that we have time to develop, we can achieve all of human aspirations if we want to. We can achieve things we have never dreamed of yet. We are pretty primitive, barely out of our infancy civilized. Science medicine, economics, are all new, politics, psychology, history,. Most of human development is in front of us. In one sense, I leave it for people existing in the next ecology to make judgments about what humanity should become, and what we can become, but it is best if we have some realistic aspirations as a goal right now. This is what individuals can hope to achieve. Genetic husband will offer us all health beauty and Bray. Psychology. Our basic knowledge of biology can tell us about what we need in order to survive. Knowledge of psychology can help us adapt to a challenging world. Basic philosophy that we have can teach us how to think, and offers us. An operating system for our brain. Institutions can show us how to organize our society, much of what philosophy in the past has been about.

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