Ownership

Cars.Why should we own them.What good does it do in owning such machines whose sole purpose is to act only as a means to ends (literally).

And look what happens when this specific concept of ownership prevails in society. Instead of providing an environment which helps man to bring out his virtuous nature from within him and free him to dedicate his energy towards certain other noble causes (self-development, art,loving the loved ones, caring for the strange ones), the opposite is released in terms of greed,jealousy etc besides the endless pursuit to try and accumulate as much of a particular type of commodity (money) to use this for another commodity (these machines).Talk about getting involved in futile and viscious distractions.

Let's see if we can think of yet another type of system where we can try and free ourselves from this specific bondage and also what may be the incidental benefits that we can hope to achieve. Admittedly,ofcourse, I cannot claim this to be absolutely fool proof. But I'm sure with some positive feedback and constructive criticism, gaps in the system can be worked out.

Imagine if nobody (different from - 'everybody') owned cars. Considering the number of vehicles that are already present in the world today, consider a system where all these are distributed on all the roads,alleys,bylanes with designated drivers (benefit one - source of employment). All that is required by anybody is to walk right out of his home, with some sort of identitification system in place, either pay a nominal fee to use the service of the vehicle with the designated driver or a slightly higher fee if you would like to drive by yourself to have quality time alone or with your family (benefit 2 and 3- not infringing on anybody's right to privacy and respecting the emotions of the people who find pleasure in driving).

Dont confuse this with the call - taxi system, because this is not that system.This is a system analogus with doing nothing more than going upto your garage to fetch your car. And it doesnt matter if you are travelling an occasional short distance, a routine daily commute (possibility for car pooling and reduced fee] or travelling long distance. These machines are just there, anywhere and everywhere - omnipresent. Not too difficult to imagine, because these are all omnipresent in our present day as well. It is just that they are sitting idle and vegetating most of the time.

Now, lest it be seen that I'm talking about communism, let it suffice to say that I'm no proponent of this ideology. Infact, it seems pretty ridiculous that men go about their lives blindly following particular idealogies when they should only be receptive (if not formulating their own) in imbiding the good of absolutely all idealogies and make their own decisions as rational human beings subject to their circumstances. Decisions which allow different types of men to live in harmony amongst themselves and most importantly, in harmony with nature.

Coming back, I said nominal fees ( benefit 4 - reducing the importance of money in society), as atleast with this distraction to own gone ,people will realise there could possibly be other such systems for other aspects of life as well. And if such solutions are implemented then wealth, after a certain thresold, would cease to have any further utility.

Sorry, coming back again.Now where does all this money go. Can we say that this would go into a pool from where all car manufactuters who are able to prove through their protoypes how they can further build better vehicles, will be allowed to use these funds. Although such a system may negatively impact the brutal businessmen who want to squeeze out maximum profits even at the cost of subjecting their consumers to mediocrity, the innovative man will still benefit (which is benefit number 5) because for him his achievement and worth will be measured in excellence rather than by his bank account alone. And so as we promote innovation and excellence, as it is with life and death, better and more nature friendly vehicles will replace the old and the antiquated.

Now if one were to argue that this is just some kind of utopia and impossible to implement, I can only counter argue that at some stage of man's history some brown man may have conceived an idea to have a caste system and some white man may have had his own conceived idea of a slavery system and if they were able to actually implement their systems, what stops man from implementing this system, which, unless refuted seems a pretty workable model.

Our history shows that from the time man has conquered the land and the sea with machines, how much damage has been done to nature. Surely as we know that man is trying to conquer the sky soon (with privately owned machines) and if this same concept of ownership remains and having more and more of it prevails, the souls of all these extinct land and see animals will be telling their brothers and sisters in the sky, you will be joining us soon, because the damn man is indulging again.