Biometric ID And Citizenship Solutions

Every human being has a right to being a citizen of this or that country. Statelessness is a human rights violation.

At one end the claim is being made that this bill will affect about 32,000 people who have sought asylum. But the protests point at something entirely different. There are a lot of illiterate citizens in India who have lived in the country for generations who do not have any kind of paperwork. Because in India's informal economy, no paperwork is necessary. The Muslims are disproportionately poor and are less likely to have paperwork despite having no other country. India is the only country they know. This bill along with the national effort to create a registry of all citizens can be used in ways so as to render tens of millions stateless at the stroke of a pen. That is the fear. And it is combustible.

That religious minorities face persecution in Pakistan, or Afghanistan or Bangladesh is not a reason why they should also face persecution in India. This is not about Pakistan, or Afghanistan, or Bangladesh. This is about the fundamental character of India.

You start with the biometric ID. You don't ask for paperwork. You give them paperwork based on their biometric IDs. That should be the Indian way.

India is in a good position to take a political lead on this and make it a global issue to be tackled at many regional forums, and at the United Nations. The Indian national government should not embarrass itself by ill-thought measures that do not stand the shine of its own constitution.

India's Contentious Citizenship Amendment Bill
Has India Gone Crazy?

JUST IN | "Any decision on CAB will be taken after court gives verdict on its constitutional validity" says @OfficeofUT

— The Hindu (@the_hindu) December 15, 2019

A Truly Global Universal Basic Income

The global GDP stands at around 90 trillion dollars. The total wealth in the world stands at 280 trillion. There are eight billion people in the world.

If you were to install a Universal Basic Income for every person on earth of $100 per month, the cost comes to 800 billion dollars per month or almost 10 trillion per year. That is not a small sum. A 3% wealth tax would pay for it. Considering much of that 10 trillion would be spent, that would lead to a rise in GDP, wealth and income. The rich might harvest it all back. So the 3% tax would be a great investment.

But this would require a world government, a biometric ID for everyone on earth, fast broadband everywhere on earth, and universal access to digital money.

The US should also follow Modi's lead and announce demonetization. That would bankrupt numerous illicit organizations.

This 3% wealth tax is of existential importance. Too much inequality is like climate change. It will lead to collapse.

A Truly Global Universal Basic Income https://t.co/W6q6BD0c1Q @KamalaHarris @BetoORourke @AndrewYang @TulsiGabbard @AOC @PeteButtigieg @PrashantKishor @kanhaiyakumar

— Paramendra Kumar Bhagat (@paramendra) April 8, 2019

China And The Next Thousand Years

China And The Next Thousand Years

The Chinese think in terms of a thousand years. As do the Jews. The Hindus are not mad at Muslims for no reason. Individual births and deaths are not that big of a deal, if you think about it. But the future is not always in the past. Maybe it never is. There ought to be a freshness to looking at the future.

To ask, does God exist, is like asking, do you believe in the Sun? It’s there. What’s there to believe? And the sun has nothing on God. Look up the YouTube video on 10 dimensions. A four dimension creature should perhaps approach the larger dimensions with some humility.

What if it is genetic? Speciation is genetic. We became a species only a few hundred thousand years ago. How did it happen? Did it start with one birth? Obviously the process did not stop. Every birth is a step forward in evolution. Was there only one beginning? And even if there was, by the time you end up with large numbers of people, is it possible that there is genetic variation? All human organs have genetic roots. The brain is no different. Is it possible that there is slight variation? For example, are the Jews genetically predisposed as a people to read more books than everyone else? I don’t know. I am only asking. Are the Karnataka people genetically predisposed to not fear death? To die in battle is no big deal, it is not even a consideration. How much do we know about genes?

Knowledge changes things. There is no artificial. A skyscraper is as much a part of nature as a tree in the Amazon. Because the human brain, the human limb, they are very much part of nature. How much do we know? How much can we know? How much can we hope to know? How much can we collaborate?

In 500 years we might become a multi-planetary species. I don’t know at what point, but there is a dollar figure to it. Maybe it is 10,000 trillion dollars. The global economy will have to move from 60 to 10,000, and then it is Star Wars time. There doesn’t have to be war, by the way. But if human history is any guide, be prepared for anything.

500 years is a blip. Perhaps the Homo Sapiens will forge one common identity, internal variations allowed, desirably allowed.

Maybe the human rights charter is too long. We just need two points. One, free speech. You may express thoughts, and you will not be bothered for it, not by the state. Two, zero tolerance for violence. Countries will not be allowed to go to war with each other. Civil wars are not allowed. Individuals may not kill or assault each other, except Putin throwing people around for sport. We could have a really small government, if those are the only two things that the government needs to do. The rest of the time we could focus on getting to that 10,000 trillion dollar figure fast. Because maybe we want to travel.

We have now the option to create a borderless world, thanks to biometric IDs and facial recognition technology, the policing part need not be expensive. Once we attain a world government and a species level identity, there is no room for talk of whose century it is, and who is the superpower now. All that goes by the wayside. Just like we laugh at the little kingdoms that were in our countries a long time ago. Every fort was a country. A city country.

The Chinese, once the leader in science, are great engineers. They think the British messed up with them because the British were great engineers, and the Japanese messed up through universal high school education. The Chinese have learned the lesson a little too well. They are great engineers. But there is this mention of a people in the Bible who were great engineers but did not believe in God. They did not do well. The Chinese need the Dalai Lama more than they realize. Buddhism is custom made for their atheistic tastes. And they are already half way there on their own. The Chinese did not abandon communism, they did not pick up capitalism. They got organized and they engaged in evidence based decision making. Communism made sense then, capitalism makes sense now. What has stayed constant is evidence based decision making. They have not changed in their ways. It is the evidence and the conclusions that have changed. Capitalism gives you the motorbike. Buddhism gives you the helmet. The Chinese just might end up with the best of both worlds: a capitalism that is subservient to the political process (fire versus forest fire) and Buddhism as the crown jewel. The material and the immaterial. Buddhism is practically science.

It is not possible the Chinese are atheists if the Chinese are Buddhists. Evidence based decision making is the most direct path yet to God, more so than philosophical surmising, crusades, superstition, witchcraft, and everything in between.

Building a road everywhere where there is a need to build a road, building a bridge every place where there is a need for a bridge: who will do it? Who is best equipped?

Parking money is a bad idea. That is admission that you don’t know what you are doing. The ocean currents are not supposed to stop. The money is supposed to keep flowing. That is what is best for both the money owners and the world.

We used to have gold coins. Then we used paper money and kept equivalent amounts of gold in a safe place. Then we realized gold is not necessary. Money floats on trust. Occasionally we become very good at losing that trust, but that is another story. Now is the time to lose the paper altogether. We have to go 100% digital and 100% global with the money. If every transaction can be recorded, we can let it loose. Blockchain technology allows us to move money globally like email, for free and instantly. And every transaction stays in the books. Money has to go where the need is the greatest. Every infrastructure project in every poor country can give you a 10% annual return easy. So if you have 10 trillion dollars just sitting there doing a 0%, something is very wrong in the picture. It is a primitive arrangement, quite literally. You are avoiding people you don’t like. You are not driven by self-interest. If all money can go 100% digital, and 100% global, and can reside 100% on the blockchain, forget leveraging to the tune of 30, which is where the markets crashed in 2008. We could easily leverage to 1,000. We could have plentiful money. Economic activity globally could hit new heights.

The market did not crash because one dollar got leveraged to 30. One dollar can safely be leveraged to 1,000. But when you park money, that is negative leveraging. One dollar gets turned to zero. A dollar out of circulation is a dollar that has been vaporized, as far as the economic system is concerned. Parked money is not neutral, it has a negative pull.

So why did the market crash?

To leverage to 1,000, you have to apply the Kumbha Mela concept. The largest gathering of humanity sees zero chaos.

While Mike Bloomberg is having his Arjuna doubts, and Barack Obama is plotting retirement (foundation and paid speeches) instead of a world government, the Chinese are engineering the hell out of it.

A global, digital 911 would have several community elements. You will ring up your neighbor for the most part. No matter where on earth, you could not get lost. Your biometric ID would allow you to check in with any police officer.

What is artificial is scarcity. Abundance is natural. Human beings are the only species that starves. Because there is not enough coordination.

Finance
Race

Right To Privacy Is Important

The right to privacy is important. There is a reason why it is listed as one of the fundamental human rights, like free speech. Just because technology makes privacy invasion possible does not mean it is okay to go ahead and do it. You could destroy or disorient a person's sense of well-being by mauling their privacy.

Mass surveillance gone awry is like just because America has atom bombs, it is going to let them explode. Human lives were lost, but then the technological possibility just showed up. Tech: handle with care. Right to free speech perhaps is not as important as right to life, but one should not have to choose.

And that is a challenge. Because there is so much that can be done fast with the right use of this new technology. Say face recognition. Or biometric ID. That would be a great way to give every human being an ID and perhaps something like a credit history, fast. This could also be put to security use. We would be less anxious about people moving around globally if we were more sure about who they were. People could be seamlessly checking in at all major mass transit points.

Gmail does it well. It can not serve you ads, unless it is reading all your emails. But no human being is reading. It is machine reading. So you don't feel like your privacy is being invaded.

I guess in the case of ID, you would also need a proper governing authority, like a world government.  Done right we could actually afford to let people move around as freely as goods and capital. I am putting a five trillion value on that. As in, all else equal, if people can move around freely, that would add five trillion dollars to the global economy almost immediately.