Jack Alpert

SKIL notes use a current event to focus the reader's attention on cognition based solutions to global problems. The notes show scarcity, conflict, and environmental destruction are caused by the collection of 6 billion sets of personal behaviors.

Current institutional or technological efforts to prevent global problems cannot be successful in the face of these collective behaviours. Efforts, powerful enough to solve these problems, must create a future generation, consisting of individuals who are able to gather, process, and value present information better then we do and thus behave better than we do.

Note Archives	Brief description
Original invitation	April 2004
Note 1 ==> Peace seekers have no plan for enduring peace	Making a peace is more than stopping existing hostilities. It requires reversing the forces toward conflict that are created by the benign behaviors of 6 billion people just creating and taking care of their families.
Note 2 ==> Footprint versus Freedom	When we change the human footprint we change our freedoms. The connection seems to be missing from calculations that control footprint-determining behaviors.
Note 3 ==> Six billion Against Tony Blair	Six billion sets of personal family creating and supporting behaviors have more power to determine the future than any leader.
Note 4 ==> Demographics -- The 500 Pound Gorilla	All efforts to reverse our trend toward human conflict are impotent in the face of demographics driven by the temporally blind.
Note 5 ==> Viewing the Present From the Future	Many of us have expectations of a bad future. Can we use them to get a clearer view of the present and to find behaviors to create a new destination?
Note 6 ==> You have to pay for peace	If you were offered a peaceful nation based on one child per family would you pay this price to live there?
Note 7==> Social Vectors and Individual Behavior	Social trends have destinations. What if the collection of individual behaviors controls social trends?
Note 8 ==> Sustainability - Doublings, Halvings, and Footprint	While rapid increases in per capita consumption facilitate social stability rapid population declines facilitate reduced footprint and sustainability
Note 9 ==> Terrorism and the Ostrich	Growing terrorism is a much bigger problem than we realize. This is caused by a defect in our cognition, that we should strive to fix.
Note 10 ==> Temporal Social Fundamentals	Temporal social fundamentals predict the destination no one wants == a social conflict greased slide to subsistence.
Note 11 ==> Bush and Kerry Have No Plan for Graceful Survival	While each of us can see benefits to either Bush or Kerry, neither man has a plan to address the biggest problem facing humankind - graceful survival.
Note 12 ==> Indians did not see their destination - do we?	The destination of our society does not seem to be clear to us. At least it is not influencing the behaviors that could change it.
Note 13 ==> Cognitive Evolution and the Human Predicament	The human predicament can be resolved by an upgrade in cognitive abilities which change procreative behavior. We know enough about the limitations of our cognitive abilities and the cognitive evolutionary process,to be pushing for an advance that would would accomplish this change in behavior.
Note 14 ==> Graceful Survival Revisited	Each of us has a partial view of human craziness. Incomplete as it is, we have to work to understand and fix it.
Note 15 ==> Social Fundamentals Revisited	Our animal instincts, combined with our existing cognitive abilities, are a deadly mix. We have to universally enhance human cognition or suffer a terrible end game.
Note 16 ==> National Problem Referendum	If we create a way for the constituency to understand and elect a future, they can be more than spectators in their institution's struggle with the present.
Note 17 ==> Do you like to give Flowers?	When normal benign behavior creates scarcity, conflict, and environmental destruction, it's time to find out how to keep the system in balance.
Note 18 ==> Who controls Humankind's future?	We have great faith that powerful leaders control our future. However, this may be a cultural myth. Creation of our global problems maybe distributed among 6 billion people.
Note 19 ==> "Just Muddling Through" -- Still doesn't work	How SKIL sees the human condition - our assumptions and the situation that follows from them.
Note 20 ==> Thinking About the Unthinkable	If we fully appreciated the tragedy of our present conditions, we might think again about accepting behaviors we have always rejected.
Note 21 ==> Is "population down" the opposite of "population up?"	If the upward trend in population appears to create problems, why does the downward trend not appear as their resolution?
Note 22 ==> The "Overlap trend" Controls the "Conflict Trend"	The hidden linkage that makes benevolent parents into warmongers.
Note 23 ==> Huntsville Rocket Scientists	Even rocket scientists haven't figured out how to get humankind to fly right.
Note 24 ==> We must be on SOMA	In Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" the population all took a drug called "Soma," It made each person think everything was just fine. Is this generation on such a drug?
Note 25 ==> Our Next Round of Insanity	People are focusing on China's rising military power. But they still don't have a clear picture of the human journey.
Note 26 ==> "The Alpert Alternative"	A believable prediction of the future and a behavior to change it.
Note 27 ==> "What Can I Do? "	If you concur with" the Alpert alternative" that the human destination is unwanted and rapid population decline is the only way to change it, you have to break peoples' fantasy that RPD is unnecessary.
Note 28 ==> For Peace -- Rapid Population Decline Now -- Not Later	We should not wait until all other solutions fail to produce peace before we implement "rapid population decline."
SKIL Note 29 ==> Implementation of Rapid Population Decline	Most people think that RPD is unnecessary, how are you going to get them to change their minds.
SKIL Note 30==> Distractions Cause Civilizations to fail	Our immediate problems distract us from seeing and solving the problems that cause civilizations to fail.
SKIL Note 31==> A Mechanism of Civilization Collapse	When a civilization approaches its environmental constraints, and a block of its citizens realize their downward movement from their attained “wellbeing,” this block’s behavior causes the civilization’s collapse
SKIL Note 32==> Experienced at Burning Man -- Life without scarcity	A little artificially created taste of life without scarcity.
SKIL Note 33 ==> Should We Strike Weapons of Mass Destruction Builders - From Dilemma to Solution:	When both "Strike" and "Not Strike" are bad choices, then it is time to find and change what's causing the builders to build.
SKIL Note 34 ==> Peace -- We will have to invent it	Alan Kay said, "The best way to predict the future is to invent it." SKIL invents ways to create ever-increasing peace. SKIL for Nobel Peace Prize.
SKIL Note 35 ==>  Sustainability  -- When Everyone Affected Gets a Vote:	Giving the unborn the vote might produce a sustainable society.
SKIL Note 36 ==> Your View Shapes Your Behavior	A father and son view the same conditions, see different problems and thus differ on resolving behaviors.
SKIL Note 37 ==> Elevated Intellect Required	The wellbeing of our global community requires constituents that can both understand what behavior has to be taken and motivate themselves to take it.
SKIL Note 38 ==> Higher Intellect Required (a movie)	The wellbeing of our global community requires billions of constituents that can understand the human predicament enough to behave differently than today's common man. Our goal should be to create a whole generation of these more capable thinkers.
SKIL Note 39 ==>Think Better or Perform Genocide	Our current thinking processes lead to a place where we will have to choose between survival and genocide.
SKIL Note 40 ==>Sustainability --- One-child-per-family or genocide	Sustainability will require one-child-per-family or genocide behaviors and maybe both.
SKIL Note 41 ==> Humankind's Viability Is Preceded by Rapid Population Decline	How do we know this? How do we implement it? This is the introduction to the "SKIL Rapid Population Decline Contagion Project."
SKIL Note 42 ==> Belief Consensus" Makes Rapid Population Decline Possible	An individual's act of restraint, personally choosing one child per family, is not as powerful in creating rapid population decline as an act to build an RPD "belief consensus."
SKIL Note 43 ==> Civilization's Perfect Storm	Global problems that we see are big. However, their integration is bigger than anything we can imagine.
SKIL Note 44 ==> Will having a second child become Taboo?	As humankind expands filling every space and sharing every resource, some acceptable behaviors will become taboo.
SKIL Note 45 ==> Ethical Coercion and OCPF Implementation	Is it ethical for a democracy to coerce one child per family behaviors.
SKIL Note 46 ==> What's a SKIL Dinner?	The introduction to a SKIL Dinner 1/18/08
SKIL Note 47 ==> How Many People Will I KILL?	Who is responsible for global starvation and civilization collapse?
SKIL Note 48 ==> Finding and Implementing "Course-changing-Behavior."	The people who understand the future have to explain it to the people who can behave to change it.
SKIL Note 49 ==> Converting Involuntary Manslaughter to Murder	help individuals change their view of births from benign acts, to involuntary manslaughter, to murder.
SKIL Note 50 ==> Which Information Describes the Human Predicament?	Saving your kids from a nasty future starts with using the most important information to describe our predicament.
SKIL Note 51 ==> Converting Involuntary Manslaughter to Murder -- Revisited	This change in perception of one's personal procreative acts is the first step in addressing the human predicament.
SKIL Note 52 ==> What is NOT too little too late?	Helping people see "THE" personal behavior that changes humankind's course from progressively worse to progressively better.
SKIL Note 53 ==> Forming a constituency is a solution to our predicament	The human predicament addressed rather than defined.
SKIL Note 54 ==> While we were sleeping the correct behavior changed	From 2 to "none or one" children per family - rapidly decreasing (rather than constant) population makes us more viable
SKIL Note 55 ==>. Does Your Addition See the Future Clearly?	Simple addition should show that billions of people will starve to death in the next century because their labor value will not exceed the cost of food, and all alternative means of producing food will be beyond their reach.
SKIL Note 56 ==> Technology Can Save Us If We Can Keep Civilization Together	Technological miracles happen only as long as civilization facilitates them.
SKIL Note 57 ==> Rapid population decline --- Not an Impossible dream	Helping recruiters create a constituency of people who think rapid population decline is necessary to solve the human predicament.
SKIL Note 58 ==> Morality of implementing RPD laws	RPD laws sound immoral until you include all the impacts of not having RPD laws
SKIL Note 59 == Implementing Rapid Population Decline with a Vote	The path humankind is on creates genocide. RPD laws are an alternative. The next step is to create a constituency that implements RPD laws.
SKIL Note 60 ==> Happy New Year Wishes -- SKIL Plan for 2009	Year end summary-- new objectives -- and plan for 2009
SKIL Note 61 ==> The path forward	What do we do to resolve the human predicament.
SKIL Note 62 ==> Why do we need rapid population decline	Only rapid population decline can handle the large increases in total human footprint caused by increases in wellbeing.
SKIL Note 63 ==> How Fast Can Lower Birthrates Reduce Population?	Model shows population vs time of birthrates below 1
SKIL Note 64 ==> How To Implement Birthrates Below One Child Per Woman?	Economic process to generate very low birthrates.
SKIL Note 65 ==> Survival -- Eagles and Humans	Hard times are ahead for both -- or neither
SKIL Note 66 ==> Social conflict trips civilization collapse	We are focused on smaller problems because ever increasing "social conflict" and its impact on our global civilization remains invisible
SKIL Note 67 ==> The earth's sustainable population is below 100 million	How to calculate a sustainable population. Based on social justice, resources, and opportunity to advance wellbeing.
SKIL Note 68 ==> The earth's sustainable population is below 100 million The movie	How to calculate a sustainable population. Based on social justice, resources, and opportunity to advance wellbeing.
SKIL Note 69 ==> What does IQ have to do with human viability?	Even the way we evaluate an individuals thinking interferes with our ability to create a viable human experiment.
SKIL Note 70 ==>  Half Truths of Overpopulation View 1	More aggressive solutions to the human predicament depend on a view of a bigger problem.
SKIL Note 71 ==> Half Truths of Overpopulation View 2	What is being left out?
SKIL Note 72 ==> Half Truths of Overpopulation View 3	Mechanics of missing truth.
SKIL Note 73 ==> Half Truths of Overpopulation View 4	The whole truth is too painful to talk about.
SKIL Note 80 ==> 100 times Too Many People	Too many people and what can be done about it.
SKIL Note 81 ==> Today's "Dropping Fertility" is Meaningless and Harmful in Establishing Sustainability.	It is futile to adjust human nature up or down on number of children. Let civil law determine the population that is sustainable.
SKIL Note 82 ==> When people have rain coats they are not afraid of the rain	The liabilities of the human predicament just don't seem very significant.
SKIL Note 83 ==> Sustainability-- Crawling Back Into Our Niche	The solutions to the human predicament have little to do with stopping growth and everything to do with contraction of footprint.
SKIL Note 84 ==> Unwinding the human predicament - not that complicated	There are some behaviors that unwind the human predicament. But they cut into personal freedoms. They are probably worth it.
SKIL Note 85 ==> Overshoot Liability Determines Behavior	The overshoot liability is measured using sustainable civilization as a reference.
SKIL Note 86 ==> Plans for a Sustainable Population	Getting to a desirable population destination before tragedy overtakes us, while not overshooting the goal.
SKIL Note 87 ==> What is a Sustainable Global Population?    50 to 100 million	Show your calculations.
SKIL Note 88 ==>Two Forms of Overconsumption	1) collective consumption too big for the niche 2) one individual's consumption creates conflict.
SKIL Note 89 ==> Communication that makes a difference	Learning enough to advocate and vote differently
SKIL Note 90 ==> Fundamental Concepts for Changing our Kid's Future	Pathway to a good future
SKIL Note 91 ==> Spatial Temporal Boundaries in decision-making	Shouldn’t we be using temporal elements in any discussion?
SKIL Note 92 ==> 21st Century Injury - Our Choice or Nature's	There will be injures from population reduction in the 21st century. What process minimizes them.
SKIL Note 93 ==> Humankind's Option - Crawling Back Into Our Niche	Humankind has a chance to prevent civilization collapse if it can reduce its size to fit into a contracting niche.
SKIL Note 94 ==> Unwinding The Human Predicament	The collective is in control of the future -- not the 1%
SKIL Note 95 ==> Wisdom's role in "Change the Course"	wisdom's role in unwinding the human predicament.
SKIL Note 96 ==> Changing the Course - Government's Role	public will cause governments to make civil laws to implement change
SKIL Note 97 ==> Fundraising letter - SKIL works to prevent Civilization Collapse s	Help us keep you kids from being cannibals or worse eaten.
SKIL Note 98 ==> Change the Course Check list	How do you know if you convinced another person to help change the course?
SKIL Note 99 ==> The Social Contract Needs an Upgrade	Nice social behavior is now dysfunctional and needs to be changed.
SKIL Note 100 ==> A Sustainable Civilization	What does a sustainable civilization look like.
SKIL Note 101 ==> Morality 101	Describing immorality at the fringes is a distraction for the immorality at our core.
SKIL Note 102 ==> Unwinding Our Predicament	Implementing mutual coercion mutually agreed upon
SKIL Note 103 ==> Sustainability -- Overshoot -- and Collapse	Overshoot - the parameter that determines collapse
SKIL Note 104 ==> Stopping growth is not a solution to the world's problems	Resolution to the world's problems begins with knowing what is a sustainable population.
SKIL Note 105 ==> What is the human Predicament	Maybe it is the biggest injury we can think of this century
SKIL Note 106 ==> What Will the Renewable Future Look Like	50 million people global using only hydro electric power until 2400
SKIL Note 107 ==> Obtaining and Maintaining a Sustainable Population	Derivation of actions to reduce population to sustainable and then maintain it there.
SKIL Note 108 ==> Submissions to BioPhysical Economics US society of Ecological economics 2015	New agendas for sustainability research
SKIL Note 109 ==> Injuries exist on our civilization's path that are worth avoiding	Part 1 of Unwinding the human predicament
SKIL Note 110 ==> Injuries exist on our civilization's path that are worth avoiding	Part 2 of Unwinding the human predicament
SKIL Note 113 ==> Forces exist that produce and maintain a sustainable civilization	Part 3 of Unwinding the human predicament
SKIL Note 114 ==> Energy use per average American	96,000 Kwh per person or 318 million BTU
SKIL Note 115 ==> Energy delivered in US 2100	2.53 quadrillion BTU's per year
SKIL Note 116 ==> Earth’s Sustainable Population 2100	50 million
SKIL Note 117 ==> 98% of Earth natural because of energy limits	Energy Density causes 98% of earth's land area to revert to natural environment