Change The WorldWritten by Clive Taylor
Change WorldIt is becoming clear that way a country or society is, kind of “psyche” it has, depends on way people relate to each other one-to-one, at day-to-day level of life. At this one-to-one level there are very simple “Rules” of behaving. It is these Rules that determine how things happen at large scale of society, no matter how much people try to impose outcomes from “above” – this can only distort outcome. This creation of large scale by small scale is one of fundamental understandings of new field of study called “Emergence Theory”. This may seem simplistic, but there is increasing evidence that much of what happens in life comes about in this “Emergence” way. (Biology, Mind, Ecologies, Universe, Internet, etc). The rules that a majority of our current society seem to have unconsciously agreed to act on are: 1.Get as much as you can for yourself from those you have anything to do with in your day-to-day world. 2.Make sure you don’t take so much from those you deal with and relate to, that they won’t have anything to do with you anymore. It is suggested, that if we would like a more enriching and supportive world, we can create this by putting in place and acting on, a new set of simple Emergence rules: 1.Every time you have any dealings with someone, make sure that you create an outcome that is of highest good for both of you.
| | Drugs and Commerce: A HistoryWritten by David F. Duncan
In his book, Forces of Habit: Drugs and Making of Modern World, David Courtwright, Professor of History at University of North Florida, tells "the story of psychoactive commerce." It is Courtwright's theme that psychoactive drugs - both legal and illegal - are commodities, like bread or cloth. They are manufactured, packaged, distributed, marketed and used much like any other commodity. They go in and out of public favor and new and improved products are constantly being introduced. Throughout human history, governments had generally treated drugs like any other commodities. Prior to Twentieth Century opium, coca, and cannabis were all legally available in form of patent medicines that were widely and casualty used in both United States and Britain.Courtwright divides his book into three sections, with some overlap in content between sections. The first (titled "The Confluence of Psychoactive Resources") describes way drugs, having originally been geographically confined, entered stream of global commerce. He compares history of drugs to history of infectious diseases in that travel and transport were variables that influenced spread of both. Alcohol, tobacco and caffeine (the "big three") and opium, cannabis, and coca ("the little three") all owed their success, he claims, to expansion of oceangoing commerce. In second section ("Drugs and Commerce") Courtwright takes up issue of drugs as medical and recreational products. Section three ("Drugs and Power") discusses pressures and developments that influenced governments to discard centuries old policy of a taxed, legal drug commerce in favor of restriction and, in some cases, even prohibition. Not surprisingly, he concludes that this happened "because it served interests of wealthy and powerful," but he seems to largely overlook important role that racism played in motivating prohibition.
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