About N55:

N55 works with art etc. as a part of everyday life.
N55 is a platform for persons who wants to work together, share places to live, economy, and means of production. N55 is based both in Copenhagen, and in LAND.(http://n55.dk/MANUALS/LAND/land.html).
N55 has its own means of production and distribution.
Manuals for N55 things are published at http://N55.dk and in the N55 periodical. Furthermore, N55 things are implemented in various situations around the world, initiated by N55 or in collaboration with different persons and institutions. All N55 works are Open Source provided under the rules of Creative Commons. Read more about N55 at N55.dk. The necessary time for designing and producing the following text was funded by earnings from the N55 Open Source system XYZ SPACEFRAME VEHICLES. XYZ SPACEFRAME VEHICLES enables persons to build their own vehicles for transporting persons or goods. XYZ SPACEFRAME VEHICLES are based on a low cost, light weight, highly durable construction requiring only simple hand-held, non-specialized tools to produce.

Intro:

At the same moment as mankind designed and produced our first tools, we consciously changed the situation we were in. Instead of waiting for natural selection throughout generations of individuals to develop adaptations of our body, that would allow us for example to fell trees, we designed and produced the stone axe. Later we wanted to fly like the birds and designed and produced airplanes. Tools, machines or man-made things are extensions of the human body. We have extended our body, our nervous system, our brain. Machines have become part of our body and part of our evolution. We are designing and producing new living organisms in the field of genetic engineering. We are designing our own societies. We are designing anything from housing to political systems. We have now reached a point where we have designed and produced weapons so destructive that we are capable of destroying most of life´s habitats on earth in an instance. Even if we don’t use those weapons, the planets environment is being destroyed at a slightly slower pace by overpopulation and pollution.

N55 proposes that maybe its time to become consciously aware that designing and producing is not just about creating a nice piece of art, a new car model, making a new coffee cup or a new mobile platform app, designing a house, a bridge, a nice front page of a magazine or some new fancy clothes:
In our everyday life we all shape our surroundings with our actions and things. We make decisions and hereby design and produce our social environment together as well as the things that constitutes the man-made environment in general: We are all designers To design and produce is to change the world. We can make a conscious decision to try to change the world into a better and more fair place to be.
We are all designers and we have the power to design and produce a better world:


RECLAIM PRODUCTION

Large concentrations of power dominate our society. Concentrations of power do not always respect the rights of persons1. If one denies this fact one gets: Concentrations of power always respect the rights of persons. This does not correspond with our experiences. Concentrations of power characterize our society. Concentrations of power force persons to concentrate on participating in competition and power games, in order to create a social position for themselves. When concentrations of power dominate our conscious mind and are decisive to our personal situations, the significance of our fellow humans diminishes. Our own significance is characterized by the significance we have for concentrations of power, the growth of concentrations of power, and the conflicts of concentrations of power.
It is clear that persons should be consciously aware of the rights of persons and therefore must seek to organize the smallest concentrations of power possible In other words we ought to design and produce improved social, political and economical systems, based on as small concentrations of power as possible, that first and foremost respect the rights of persons. Furthermore: Persons who design and produce should try to respect the rights of persons. If we deny this postulate we get: Persons who design and produce should not try to respect the rights of persons. This does not make sense: Designing or producing will always involve persons and we know that persons should be treated as persons and therefore as having rights. ( please see note no. 1). Whenever we refer to designing or producing we must always refer to persons meaningful behavior with other persons and things in concrete situations. There is a logical relation2 between designing or producing and persons. Can we imagine design that has nothing to do with persons? Or products which have nothing to do with persons?
If we understand the necessity to design and produce in a way that respects the rights of persons, we can learn that we must also design and produce in a way where we look after the natural resources and the environment. Simply because it makes no sense to talk about persons rights if they are dead because there are no more resources to sustain their existence or no place for them to exist because of an environment destroyed by pollution and waste Large concentrations of power control the production of food in most places in the world. Without consideration for the consequences for the environment or local inhabitants, huge areas are used to produce genetically modified crops patented by a few companies. Land is taken over by foreign states in poor areas of the world with no consideration for the rights of the persons living there. Industrial farming is turning enormous areas into deserts of monoculture with no room for wild animals, plants or persons. Industrial farming are exploiting water resources for irrigation purposes, and lakes and rivers are dried out. Salinization processes due to artificial irrigation destroys precious soil. The waste from industrial keeping of animals pollutes our rivers, lakes and costal environments. Pesticides are used in a way that pollutes the environment as well as the consumer. Large concentrations of power control fishing vessels in most places in the world. Overfishing with no consideration for local populations with huge highly efficient factory vessels has a devastating effect on our long term access to food from the seas.
Furthermore large concentrations of power control the production and distribution of energy and the harvesting and distribution of raw materials and access to natural resources used by persons in their everyday lives Large concentrations of power have taken over the means of production and control the design of things, needed by persons in their everyday life. By deliberately lowering the quality, things are produced to last only for a short while. This is not only to diminish production costs and hereby increase the profits, but also to make sure that consumers buy new things and hereby secure the continued production. Large concentrations of power aim not only to make a profit on producing the same things over and over again, but also to grow bigger and increase their power. To produce more and more. Regardless of the needs of persons. Regardless of the consequences for the environment. Regardless of the misuse of the natural resources. Economic growth is considered to be the only way to progress not only by large corporations, but also by states. Even by democratic states.
This system is apparently supported and promoted by all politicians3, regardless of their ideological background. It is considered to be a fact that we cannot improve our society without economic growth. This results in expanding corporations and repeated production of the same things over and over again. This is utterly stupid, but nonetheless the basis of all economical policies at present times. To keep the costs low and to maximize profits, things are produced in the lowest income areas in the world without any considerations for persons, natural resources or the pollution of the environment. Unscrupulous governments profit from this situation to gain power over its own people as well as the rest of the worlds population A few rich persons, corporations and states are allowed to earn money on economic transactions, shares and financial speculation in general, without doing any productive work themselves. These parasites are far away from the exploitation of other persons and can pretend that it has nothing to do with them. They never have to meet the persons they exploit and suppress. Weapon producers, polluting companies, dictatorial states etc are just something that persons and companies can invest in and make a profit on.
Persons ought to use the existing democracies and global institutions to stop corporations from expanding, divide them into small entities that are under the government of direct democracy and reform the financial system to ban non-productive profiting on other persons and their life. In order to distribute power, Persons also ought to set a limit on how much wealth a company or a person are allowed to accumulate. Concentrations of power are nourished by the illusion that competition is better than collaboration. It is necessary to collaborate and share means of production if we want to organize ourselves in as small concentrations of power as possible.

What if we all really insisted on producing food locally?

What if we all really insisted on only using things in our everyday life that would last and could be repaired if they broke?

What if we all really insisted on building houses that would last, produce energy and were affordable (because nobody could speculate in our basic human needs)
What if we all really insisted on transporting ourselves and goods in non-polluting ways?

What if we all really distributed our power and our knowledge to an extend that living conditions for even the poorest were so good, that they did not need to give birth to numerous children to secure their retirement, and hereby stopped overpopulation?

What if we really started to distribute the world's raw materials and resources in a fair way?

What if we designed and produced friendly machines that would take care of our daily needs without polluting and misusing the planet's scarce resources, and free our time to be nice to each other, think and play?

To save the environment and to save ourselves, Its increasingly important that we all realize how much our behavior and the decisions we make in our everyday life matters. It is a matter of survival for us and planet earth

N55 propose that we concentrate on designing and producing improved social, political, and economical systems, that are based on as small concentrations of power as possible, and first and foremost respects the rights of persons rather than concentrating on finding ways to produce economic growth. We propose that we design and produce in a way that respect the rights of persons, the resources and the environment that persons are depending on to survive.


LET US DESIGN A BETTER WORLD!

Notes:

1)
Persons

A person can be described in an infinite number of ways. None of these descriptions can be completely adequate. We therefore can not describe precisely what a person is. Whichever way we describe a person, we do however have the possibility to point out necessary relations between persons and other factors. We have to respect these relations and factors in order not to contradict ourselves and in order to be able to talk about persons in a meaningful way One necessary relation is the logical relation2 between persons and bodies. It makes no sense to refer to a person without referring to a body. If we for example say: here we have a person, but he or she does not have a body, it does not make sense. Furthermore, there are necessary relations between persons and the rights of persons. Persons should be treated as persons and therefore as having rights. If we deny this assertion it goes wrong: here is a person, but this person should not be treated as a person, or: here is a person, who should be treated as a person, but not as having rights. Therefore we can only talk about persons in a way that makes sense if we know that persons have rights.

2)
Logic

Most of our thinking and our discussions are conducted on a level where we repeat and repeat our habitual conceptions to each other. We assume that there are no other conditions to decide whether something is right or wrong, except that one does not contradict oneself nor is inconsistent with facts. Beyond this there exists only more or less thoroughly grounded subjective opinions. However, there is a level so basic that it normally does not appear in our conscious mind, where everything does not revolve around subjective opinions. At this level things are simply right or wrong.
Logical relations are the most basic and most overlooked phenomenon we know. Nothing of which we can talk rationally can exist, can be identified or referred to, except through its logical relations to other things. Logic is necessary relations between different factors, and factors are what exist by the force of those relations. The decisive thing about logical relations is that they can not be reasoned. Nevertheless, they do constitute conditions necessary for any description, because they can not be denied without rejecting the factors of the relations. Persons are, for example, totally different from their bodies. Persons can go for a walk and they can make decisions. Bodies can not do that. Nevertheless, we can not refer to persons without referring to their bodies. If we say: here we have a person, but he or she unfortunately is lacking a body, it does not make sense. Persons are totally different from the concrete situations they are in. Nevertheless, we can not refer to persons without referring to the situations they are in. If we say: here we have a person, but this person has never been in a concrete situation, it does not make sense. Language is totally different from reality. Nevertheless, we have to perceive language as something that can be used to talk about reality. If we say: here we have a language, but this language can not be used to talk about reality, it does not make sense. Logical relations have decisive significance. The absence of logical relations would mean that nothing could be of decisive significance: as long as one does not contradict oneself nor is inconsistent with facts, any point of view may be as good as the next, one can say and mean anything. Logical relations are conditions for talking rationally together. The part of the world we can talk rationally about, can thus be defined as the part we can talk about using logical relations. But we do not have any reason to assume that the world is identical with what we can talk rationally about. Logic is something more basic than language. Logical relations are what makes language a language and what assigns meaning to words. Therefore, it is impossible to learn a language, without learning to respect logical relations. But as we grow up and learn to master language, logical relations are not present on a conscious level. If we are conscious of logical relations, it is possible for us to decide whether something is right or wrong and not to allow ourselves to be ruled by for example habitual conceptions and subjective opinions.

3)
Politics

The fundamental purpose of politics is to protect the rights of persons. If we deny this assertion we get: the fundamental purpose of politics is not to protect the rights of persons. This suggests that one of the basic tasks of politicians could be, for example, to renounce the rights of themselves and of others. This has no meaning. Or that there is a more important purpose to politics which does not have anything to do with persons and therefore also has nothing to do with the rights of persons. That is plain nonsense. Therefore, we now know that the basic purpose of politics is to protect the rights of persons. In other words we can not talk about politics in a way that makes sense without the assumption that the fundamental purpose of politics is to protect the rights of persons. Concentrations of power do not always respect the rights of persons. If one denies this fact one gets: concentrations of power always respect the rights of persons. This does not correspond with our experiences. It is obvious that if we want to protect the rights of persons we have to organize in as small concentrations of power as possible. Since the fundamental purpose of politics is to protect the rights of persons it is of decisive importance to politics that we seek to organize in as small concentrations of power as possible. It is clear that we can not leave it to others to protect the rights of persons. The notion that it is possible to elect a small number of people to protect the rights of a vast number of people is absurd, because here we are by definition talking about concentration of power, and thus about a concentration of power. And we know that concentrations of power do not always respect the rights of persons. It is clear that if one is conscious of persons and the rights of persons one must be concerned with politics. It is clear that if one is a person and thus concerned with politics and conscious of the rights of persons, it becomes of decisive importance to organize in as small concentrations of power as possible. It becomes of decisive importance to find ways to live and behave which correspond to our knowledge of persons, the rights of persons, etc. It is clear that this is our most important task as our whole existence is threatened.

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