"We talk about civilization as though it's a static state. There are no civilized people yet, it's a process that's constantly going on... As long as you have war, police, prisons, crime, you are in the early stages of civilization."

 

"Earth is abundant with plentiful resources. Our practice of rationing resources through monetary control is no longer relevant and is counter-productive to our survival." - Jacque Fresco 

 

You can either have one guy lifting a billion pounds by himself, and it takes many years of planning and preparation - or you can have a billion people, each lifting one pound, and it takes a mere moment. This is the power of unity. ~ Jacque Fresco

 

You cannot approach people who think differently with reason and logic if they don't know what that means.  First, you have to appeal to their values to start with.  If you attack them, you lose them.  ~ Jacque Fresco

 

"Politics was good a hundred years ago. Today, politicians have no ability to solve any problems because they are not students of behavior. They are not students of agriculture, oceanography, they know nothing about the factors that operate the world. So, they say things that people like to hear. And that gets them elected.  Now scientists on the other hand are not concerned with public approval. What they do, even if everybody on earth believe the earth was flat, they would say: 'You're wrong, this is the evidence we have to support the fact that the earth is round' but they don't say: 'it's a little round and a little flat' - that's politicians." ~ Jacque Fresco

 

"At the beginning of World War II the U.S. had a mere 600 or so first-class fighting aircraft. We rapidly overcame this short supply by turning out more than 90,000 planes a year. The question at the start of World War II was: Do we have enough funds to produce the required implements of war? The answer was No, we did not have enough money, nor did we have enough gold; but we did have more than enough resources. It was the available resources that enabled the US to achieve the high production and efficiency required to win the war. Unfortunately this is only considered in times of war." ~ Jacque Fresco

 

"The uncreative mind can spot the wrong answers, but it takes a very creative mind to spot the wrong questions" The question has never been: Do we have the money? The question has always been: Do we have the resources? ~ Jacque Fresco

 

"We are not taught to be thinkers, but reflectors of our culture. Let's teach our children to be thinkers." -Jacque Fresco

 

"If you think we can’t change the world, It just means you're not one of those that will" - Jacque Fresco

 

“Democracy is a con game. It’s a word invented to placate people to make them accept a given institution. All institutions sing, ‘We are free.’ The minute you hear ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’, watch out… because in a truly free nation, no one has to tell you you’re free.” - Jacque Fresco

 

"Conditions of misery, suffering, war, and war profiteering were the incentive and inspiration for my work. I was also motivated by the seeming incompetence of governments, the academic world, and a lack of solutions from scientists. Many fail as generalists because of their over-specialization on limited aspects of social problems. Scientists, politicians, and academicians see problems from inside the system they’re in, which is what’s responsible for the problems in the first place. I am disappointed with those who worry about terra-forming other planets while our own is still full of war, poverty, hunger, and environmental neglect." ~ Jacque Fresco

 

The only hope for developing a new civilization is to accept responsibility for improving our lives through knowledge, understanding, and a deeper comprehension of humanity’s relationship to natural processes of evolution. Our future is determined by effort we put forth to achieve this transition.  - Jacque Fresco

 

During the thousands of years of monetary system, most workers have been paid just enough to make it necessary that they return to work, even when higher wages have been possible. How else can the wage-payer keep the workers coming back? - Jacque Fresco

 

"Living through the 1929 Great Depression helped shape my social conscience. During this time, I realized the earth was still the same place, manufacturing plants were still intact, and resources were still there, but people didn’t have money to buy the products. I felt the rules of the game we play by were outmoded and damaging. This began a life-long quest resulting in the conclusions and designs presented in The Venus Project." - Jacque Fresco

 

"To be human is to care for your fellow human beings and protecting the environment." - Jacque Fresco

 

"Capitalism, Socialism, Fascism, Communism, the Free-Market .... What good are these approaches for? These attempts are made by men who are cerebral insufficient. I'm trying to give you back your brain, which they took away from you in schools and in your upbringing. I'm trying to show you how the world works. So if you want a better world, you have to get up off your ass and make it better" -Jacque Fresco-

 

"What kind of competition is there in your body? Suppose your brain said ' I'm the most important organ, and the liver said 'I am, and I want to go in a free enterprise-system.'  You would rot away in a month, if every organ of your body, were out for itself."  - Jacque Fresco

 

"The government means industry, if you know what I mean." - Jacque Fresco

 

"Our society cannot be maintained by this type of incompetency." Jacque Fresco

 

Take off all the mask, manners, fancy clothes, all the devices you use and be the most honest person you can be with yourself, then whatever love you get then is real. All the false approaches, like trying to be a player, only bring false results... - Jacque Fresco

 

Whatever happens in the world is real, what one thinks should have happened is projection. We suffer more from our fictitious illusion and expectations of reality.  - Jacque Fresco

 

"You know that you can't go out there and change the world tomorrow morning. It just takes time, and the realization of that does not produce frustration. What produces frustration, is when you expect the world to join with your cause it's so reasonable. It is not reasonable to unreasonable people." - Jacque Fresco

 

"And you can't find "love" because in order to find "love" you have to be capable of dishing it out. In order to be capable of giving "love", your own life has to be in harmony with everything else, and that's not attainable..."   - Jacque Fresco

 

"All people are brought up by cultures and every culture says 'You live in the greatest country in the world' 'I'm American and proud of it', 'I'm Canadian. I'm proud of it' That separates people.  Now, if you were brought up in Ireland, you'd say, 'The Irish people are fine, there's a fine Irish lad sitting there'. Well, even your dialect, your facial expressions, you pick up from your country or the area you come from.  If you still don't understand that, if you were brought up in Australia, you'd say, 'How are ya, Mate? Yeah Yeah Yeah'. That's normal in Australia. If a Filipino baby was brought up in Australia, that's the way it speaks' - Jacque Fresco

 

"We're running into a lot of new problems today because of what we emphasize in this culture. The word 'success' to the average person means earning a lot of money and having a home, two cars, children in college. Success to me is entirely different to what success is to the average person.  Success is being a successful human being in terms of pursuing what you believe in. If you believe in making paintings, writing poetry, writing music. If this is what you really want, you're successful to yourself. But to be successful to your culture means to sell yourself short of what you really want" - Jacque Fresco

 

"If you want your children to relate to the culture you live in, if you want to train them outside of the general system, you have to tell your children that ordinary children tend to say things like 'I can run faster than you; I can draw better than you; I know things you don't know'. You have to tell them what normal children are like. Normal children are messed up and you have to tell them about that. But if you instruct your child in high correlation with the physical world, they won't be able to relate with normal children. Normal means mixed up as I use the word." - Jacque Fresco

 

"We live in a world where our social system is old, our language is old, the way we acquire goods and services is outdated, our cities are detrimental to our health, chaotic and a tremendous waste of resource, and most of all our politics and values no longer serve us."

- Introduction Lecture,  The Venus Project World Tour 2010

 

"So, "normal" is really what society dictates as normal and if we're born in that world, we would see that as normal. But if you think about it for a second, is it really?" - Jacque Fresco

 

"LOVE is to stop making demands on people and give them room to grow." - Jacque Fresco

 

"If you had a free society you couldn't get people to go to war, if you had an intelligent type of upbringing in ones children. They would say; There must be many other ways of solving problems other then killing people." - Jacque Fresco

 

"The only limitations are those which we impose upon ourselves." - Jacque Fresco

 

"They take the children and ask them; What is the greatest country in the world? The kid say's; I haven't the slightest idea. They say; This country! This is the greatest country in the world! And God is on our side. So you get a bunch of pin heads all over the world, responding to these mechanisms of control." - Jacque Fresco

 

"Truly free people do not need to be told they are free." - Jacque Fresco

 

"If you took the profit out of war, there would be no war. What the hell do you think war is? You think we go to another country to bring democracy? We go there 'cause there's oil, resources or something we need." - Jacque Fresco

 

To better understand a Resource Based Economy consider this: if all the money in the world suddenly disappeared, but topsoil, factories, and other resources were left intact, we could build anything we chose to build and fulfill any human need. It is not money that people need, but access to the necessities of life without having to appeal to a government bureaucracy or any other agency. In a Resource Based Economy money is irrelevant. What's required are the resources and manufacturing and distribution of the products.  In a monetary system, purchasing power is not related to the capacity to produce goods and service. For example, in a recession there are computers in store windows and automobiles in car lots; but people do not have the purchasing power to buy them. The rules of the monetary system are obsolete and create needless strife, deprivation, and human suffering.

In today’s culture of profit we do not grow foods based on demand, nor do we practice medicine solely to cure diseases. Industry's major motivation is profit.  - Jacque Fresco

 

"Self-centeredness will bring on the destruction of our world. National pride separates people. All people need the same thing. When you really get down to it, you'll find that all people need good food, clean water, clean air, and a decent environment, meaning education as to how to relate to one another and to avoid conflict, how to accept the differences where different people draw different conclusions." - Jacque Fresco

 

"The Venus Project is not about new cities or new architecture. It's about a way of thinking" - Jacque Fresco

 

"Everything that you've learned: 'Make a lot of money, have a nice house'. But they never teach you at school how to relate, how to communicate with others, how to share values with others. ...They teach you how to make a living. You become an optometrist, he becomes a physicist, she becomes a structural engineer, he's an architect.  In the future, none of that. Everybody is trained to be a generalist, so they understand different cultures, different values, how we get to be the way we are. So no-one can ever use you for war or killing anybody or hurting anybody" - Jacque Fresco

 

So your having trouble with your partner. Well ask yourself, if you were in a relationship with a replica of yourself how long would it last? - Jacque Fresco

 

About transition: I am sorry to tell you this, guys, but it is not going to be easy. - Jacque Fresco

 

"We owe so much to so many nations. The separation of nations is dangerous, wrong, and the failure of nations to work together. That's what war is. War is a supreme failure of bridging the difference between nations. T...here'll be no military in the future. There'll be people who learn. See, soldiers are killing machines. You teach them to kill and the other nations teaches its soldiers to kill.  What I would do is teach soldiers, send them back to school free of charge to learn to become problem solvers. 'How do you bridge the difference between Saudi Arabia and this country?' 'How do you bridge the difference between Venezuela and this country?' That's what's needed. Science applied to government.  So far, we have opinions from politicians that know nothing about ecology, safety, engineering, increasing the agricultural yield. They're totally incapable. The children of the future will look back and say, 'Couldn't you see that the money system had people paid off? Couldn't you see what is obvious to you?' You would say, 'No, we were brought up that way. We didn't know the difference'. Kids will not understand that in the future." - Jacque Fresco

 

War is the supreme failure of bridging the differences between nations - Jacque Fresco

 

"If you were raised by the head hunters of the Amazon as a baby, if you saw nothing else, you'd be a head hunter. If you were raised in Nazi Germany where all you see is 'Heil Hitler'... you'd be a [Nazi]. So I think all people are perfectly well adjusted where they're coming from. There's no such thing as good or bad people. You're taught to hate certain people, but where they're coming from, it's normal. If you're brought up in the South, uneducated region, you might become a member of the Ku Klux Klan, you speak with a Southern accent. Where do you get that from? The environment. Where do you get, 'I'm gonna get me a nigger and kick his ass'. You get that from the environment.  It's not that people are good or bad. They're raised in an aberrated or twisted environment." ( Jacque Fresco)

 

"You live in a false society" - Jacque Fresco

 

"Population control is dependent upon education. We feel, an educated population needs no control."  - Jacque Fresco

 

The future does not depend on our present-day beliefs or social customs, but will

continue to evolve a set of values unique to its own time. The very notion of "Utopia" is static. The paths that we choose will ultimately determine whether or not there is intelligent life on earth.  - Jacque Fresco

 

"The future is our responsibility, but change will not take place until the majority lose confidence in their dictator’s and elected officials’ ability to solve problems. It will likely take an economic catastrophe resulting in enormous human suffering to bring about true social change." - Jacque Fresco

 

"Let me tell you how to educate children. We do not order them to do exercise. We have a big lake in the city. We have an island in the middle of the lake. 200 feet up with a craft shop ready to make anything, free. To get there, you have to row a boat, you have to climb a hill. So let's design it in our environment. So you go to the library, you have to climb a hill, walk through a forest. That's the way to do it. You don't order kids to stand like that. If you hate exercise, you poison yourself. You know that? So kids would have the motivation to go to the craft shop. You build it in. That's how nature works." - Jacque Fresco

 

"There was a hurricane in Southern Florida that wiped out hundreds of houses, so I designed a clinical shaped building, like an inverted cone. No hurricane or whirlwind can suck the roof off. On top, I put a turbine so the hurricane whirls around: keeps the refrigerators going and the lights" - Jacque Fresco

 

"There are no negro problems, or Polish problems, or Jewish problems, or Greek problems, or women's problems, there are HUMAN PROBLEMS". - Jacque Fresco

 

People today speak to win approval, they say things people like to hear, you know...like: ’everything is gonna work out all right’; people love that. You, you don't speak for approval, speak to inform people and educate them, if you speak for approval, that's self center, do you know what I mean? - Jacque Fresco

 

"Learning to be flexible in values takes a very long time...Of course I felt a little uncomfortable during questioning the concept of God, but then reading about the history and evolution of Gods. There were many different Gods: the God of war, the God of peace, the God of love, which was more like the people that invented them. They behaved, they got angry, they made sacrifices, they created floods when they didn't like the way things are going. This didn't come through as superior intelligence."  - Jacque Fresco

 

"[A Resource-Based Economy] is in the application of the methods of science with human concern and environmental concern.  If we used the scientific method throughout the world, the probability of war drops to zero. The probability of human suffering disappears. Deprivation, poverty, crime - all those things tend to disappear because there's no basis.  I'm strictly concerned with the environment that people are raised in and if that environment is altered, so will behaviors be altered." - Jacque Fresco

 

 

The differences between a priest, a thief, and a banker (although I find very little difference between them) are not found in their genes, but instead reflect their environment. - The Venus Project Lecture 2010

 

"In a society where every man works for himself, individual incentive, working for one's self. If people worked for one's self, there wouldn't be the electric light, there wouldn't be engines and powered vehicles, there wouldn't be electrification and reservoirs and water purification.  These are processes that help all people. And processes that help single people is a very primitive value system carried into this century, which is really not necessary." - Jacque Fresco

 

"In our search for more, we have blinded ourselves to our personal responsibility for challenging these absurdities. A resource-based society considers us all equal shareholders of Earth. We are responsible both for the planet and for our relationship with each other." - Jacque Fresco

 

"When they say all men are created equal, that bothers me. I told you some are thin, some are heavy, some have better eyesight than others. I don't know what that means. I think they're trying to talk about equal opportunity and I know that doesn't exist. If you don't have the money to go to college, the word 'equal opportunities' mean nothing" - Jacque Fresco

 

"If you really wish to put an end to war, poverty, hunger, territorial disputes, you must utilize all the world's resources as the common heritage of all the world's people. Anything less than that will remain with the same problems that you've had continuously for centuries.  Now you have to consider what I'm saying. The reason nations invade other nations is because of scarcity. When a few nations control most of the earth's resources, you've got to have territorial disputes. No matter how many treaties you sign or laws you make. If you don't declare all the earth's resources as the common heritage of all the world's people and bring all the separate nations together in one unified system, there is no solution other than that.  That is why we recommend the Resource Based Economy." - Jacque Fresco

 

"Another factor encouraging my positive attitude about problem solving was World War II when the U.S. spent billions of dollars for weapons of mass destruction in the Manhattan Project. Cost was no object and it was one of the largest and best-financed projects undertaken to that date. I realized the same energies that went into the Manhattan Project could be channeled to improve and update our way of life, and to achieve and maintain the optimal symbiotic relationship between nature and humankind. If we are willing to spend that amount of money, resources, and human lives in times of war, we must ask why we don’t commit equal resources to improving the lives of everyone and anticipating humane needs for the future in times of peace.  When scientists were called upon to solve problems of a military nature, the answers were immediately forthcoming. This demonstrated to me the ability of science and technology to solve problems when properly organized and funded, but it is shameful that these methods are not applied to solving social problems on a global scale. 

 

In my work I am not attempting to predict the future. I am only pointing out what is possible with the intelligent application and humane use of science and technology. This does not call for scientists to manage society. What I suggest is applying the methods of science to the social system for the benefit of human kind and the environment." - Jacque Fresco

 

"We must get away from this limited *I did this and I did that* and the self-centeredness, that dominates our society Today. It must be a privilege to serve members of society. Not that we want rewards or medals or honor for what we do, because it is just an honor to do it, if you cannot work for that, than you missed the boat. You don’t understand the teachings of the wisest men ever lived." - Jacque Fresco

 

We have the technology to build a global paradise on earth, and at the same time we have the power to end life as we know it. I am a futurist. I cannot predict the actual future--only what it can be if we manage the earth and its resources intelligently. - Jacque Fresco

 

People say that the monetary system produces incentive this may be true in limited areas but it also produces greed, embezzlement, corruption, pollution, jealousy, anger, crime, war, poverty, tremendous scarcity, and unnecessary human suffering. You have to look at the entire picture.  Introduction Lecture - The Venus Project World Tour 2010

 

“I have no notions of a perfect society, I don’t know what that means. I know we can do much better than what we’ve got, I’m no utopian, I’m not a humanist that would like to see everybody living in warmth and harmony: I know that if we don’t live that way, we’ll kill each other and destroy the Earth.” - Jacque Fresco

 

"If all things keep changing, how can you become sane? We can become sane-er, but never sane. Sane meaning the most upward behavior to fit a given set of circumstances. . . Wiser, never wise. Smarter, never smart. When somebody asks, "What's the answer to all of these questions?" that's absurd. There is no answer, there are answers, along the way." - Jacque Fresco

 

"You have to take in the whole picture, and ask, "What is it you want? What kind of world do you want?" So, I have drawings of different cities. Those cities have an end goal; they're not just cities. The end goal of those cities is to make things relevant to people that they respond to. There's no other way." - Jacque Fresco

 

“Lack of education turns soldiers into killing machines.” - Jacque Fresco

 

“Notions of Good and Evil depend entirely on social context. It is not that people are good or bad, they are raised in an aberrant or twisted environment.” - Jacque Fresco

 

"The entire money structure and materialistic society is a false society..." - Jacque Fresco

 

Money is only important in a society when certain resources for survival must be rationed and the people accept money as an exchange medium for the scarce resources. Money is a social convention, an agreement if you will. It is neither a natural resource nor does it represent one. It is not necessary for survival unless we have been conditioned to accept it as such.

 

The Venus Project is neither Utopian nor Orwellian, nor does it reflect the dreams of impractical idealists. Instead, it presents attainable goals requiring only the intelligent application of what we already know. The only limitations are those which we impose upon ourselves. - Jacque Fresco

 

''War is the most inappropriate way of solving the differences. That's why I'm against the pentagon and the military, because they should be concerned with how to bridge the difference and bring nations together towards a common purpose, namely taking care of the environment one another and restoring the damaged environment. That's what I'd like to see in military systems. I would like to see instead of training millions of soldiers to be killing machines, I'd rather train them to be problem solvers, send them back to school, teach them social science, social psychology, sociology, so they can add to the culture, not be destructive.'' - Jacque Fresco

 

"We are all victims of culture." - Jacque Fresco

 

“War, poverty, corruption, hunger, misery, human suffering will not change in a monetary system. That is, there will be very little significant change. It’s going to take the redesign of our culture and values.” - Jacque Fresco

 

"They are elected to keep things as they are." - Jacque Fresco

 

"All the world's people should share all the world's resources." - Jacque Fresco