After listening to a fair amount of the Republicrat's venting and angst last week, and now the Democans pretty abstractions - trying to paint a new face on a tired progressive philosophy, I've come to the conclusion that we ought to do something.  Soon.

The real problems - climate change, hair-trigger nuclear holocaust, new plagues, aging, massive corruption, 1 billion people on the edge of starvation, looming massive unemployment due to robotics, intellectual property used for trillions of dollars in theft - are not being addressed at a level anywhere near what is needed for our survival and success as a species.

I'm not picking sides here.  Like most of the electorate, I'm not happy with either option.  So, what if we fixed both of them?*

*Actually, I heard the Libertarian candidate (Gary Johnson) on NPR recently. What he had to say and his answers to the interviewer sounded remarkably sane and well thought out.  If I bother to vote, I'll probably vote for him.

What about an ongoing Chautauqua?  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chautauqua 

I've discussed here and elsewhere the "algebraic" method of problem analysis.  In brief, you may recall from algebra 1 that if you have n variables, then you need n independent equations to specify a single point solution - if there is one.  Applying this to the real world, let's say that the issue is whether to build a new dam.  To make that decision rationally, we have to bring in analyses from politics, economics, ecology, engineering, etc.  Leaving any of these and other dimensions out could easily turn a good idea into a massive boondoggle.

So, Mark Zuckerberg, how can we build a platform that brings in multiple perspectives on the critical problems to identify possible solution spaces, and does it in a way that encourages public participation?  We need to be able to visually depict how things connect, and then run something like the program my doctor uses to check for drug interactions to spot possible conflicts.

If both Hillary and Donald got on board, this could turn a rather venomous election into an ongoing solution fest, with recognition and rewards, a social olympics, if you will, that could go viral. And including the Libertarian candidate would force the other two to behave like normal humans - or at least to try.

As a possible starting paradigm, please check out the site for the recent Swiss referendum on their "basic income:"  

 http://www.basicincome2016.org/

and my blog on the same subject from 2012:

http://philosborn.joeuser.com/article/450215/A_General_Solution_to_Poverty