CIVILIZED BRAZIL – CIVILIZED WORLD

“Noronhense Insular Consciousness” in order to save the planet

After a boat tour, I had lunch at a local restaurant and went back to the pousada (Brazilian kind of bed and breakfast), as I reach the room I realized that I forgot my wallet in the restaurant. If it were in any other major city in Brazil or in the world I would be concerned, but in Fernando de Noronha is different. Half an hour later a girl rang the bell of pousada to give me back the wallet INTACT. A look of perplexed astonishment washed across my mobile face - "Here nobody steals" said the pousada administrator as he gently closed the door to the girl.

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Nowadays we are fully aware that many attitudes of the human population have become pathogenic in regard to our survival and well being (pathogenic - literally means someone who or something that causes suffering "πάθος pathos" suffering, passion "and -γενής - genes" cause ") in both interpersonal relations and the way we fail in taking care of our own planet. Human population grew indiscriminately, we are constantly destroying the environment in which we evolved, we occupy and dominate all the major ecosystems by expelling other life forms from there. In short, we are no longer a few bands of inconsequential primates roving the grasslands of East Africa as we were three million years ago.

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It is well known that the islanders tend to consciously use the scarce resources, collaborate each other and establish a relationship of respect and harmony with the community - otherwise - they themselves put their own survival at risk.

The hope that comes from this small island off the coast of Brazil. Recognized by UNESCO as a World Natural Heritage Site, Fernando de Noronha, 390km to the Brazilian coast, has much to teach about civilization to Brazil and to the rest of the world.

This isolation cannot only determine the peculiarities about the fauna, flora and ecosystems, as well as people who live there. Differentiating them from everything that happens on the continent, this whole process and all the interrelationships in the archipelago are supported by a fragile balance that, when exposed to a lighter intervention, can be broken. Now we begin to understand that on a global scale, the planet Earth has the same fragility of such island, except that if the planet Earth deteriorates, we have no other place to flee.

"This great care is easy to be taken because it is a small island, but it became different when trying to apply it to the rest of Brazil."

Spinner dolphin (Stenella longirostris) following our ship

I used to go around and saying that, "There is no Brazilian city that has not an open sewer without treatment." Fortunately this formidable island reserved another good surprise to me again.

The Noronhense is as Brazilian as each one of us Brazilians, he just has the so-called "insular consciousness", which paradoxically leads him to better live together in order to manage the fragile planetary balance.

Below, I highlight some of the initiatives that come from “Noronhense Insular Consciousness”.

ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION

Navi Project - 3m x 2m, large lens, which enables underwater viewing

The Noronhense learn about ecology from young age, at home and at school, but tourists can count on the Navi Project, which aims to make a "Scientific Expedition Tour" by joining entertainment with information. The hidronave is a boat with Russian military technology, developed during the Cold War. Navi was manufactured in the city of Yaroslav, and has a 3m x 2m, large lens, which enables underwater viewing. There were already more than 500 expeditions, and in most cases, tourists saw several fish and even sharks and dolphins.

A certified instructor works as expedition guide, scientifically describing the underwater environment and explaining the delicate ecological balance of the region.

ENERGY

Since 1989 the Thermoelectric Plant of ‘TUBARÃO’, managed by CELPE, supplies power with diesel generators (not ecological at all), but recently the Federal University of Pernambuco, in partnership with the government of Denmark, started the implementation of wind turbines, reducing in its first stage 10% of consumption form its usual 80,000 liters/month of diesel.

In another green boost, it was inaugurated in 2012 the first solar photovoltaic power plant in the archipelago, situated in the Air Force Command, in an area of 5,000 m², the Solar Plant Noronha I have installed capacity of 400 kWp (kilowatt peak), resulting the estimated generation of 600 MWh / year, about 4% of the island's consumption.

The forecast is that by 2018 the island will be 100% supplied with solar and wind energy.

Sea ginger, a species of colonial fire coral - Millepora alcicornis seen trough the huge lens of Navi

ICMBIO

The Fernando de Noronha archipelago consists of 21 islands, islets and rocks. Most of them turned territory of Fernando de Noronha National Park, under the responsibility of ICMBio (Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation) a Brazilian agency of the Ministry of Environment and integrated into the National Environmental System (Sisnama).

IBAMA

Luiz Pagano and the Hidronave - Fernando de Noronha

The IBAMA (Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources) was particularly concerned with fishermen, giving alternative activities or enabling the non-predatory fish, so that they do not feel the impact of preservation project drastically. In fact, since the preservation of certain areas begins, the number of marine animals tends to rise, which only benefits the quality of fishing without environmental destruction. The fishermen came to see the importance of preserving in their own pocket.

Comfort and environmental education in Fernando de Noronha

PERMANENCE FEE

An expensive fee for Brazilian patterns, but that is absolutely necessary for the good maintenance of this sustainable development system. The limited number of visitors in Noronha also has benefits: it is easier to manage human typical problems, such as water consumption and electricity, generation of waste, and also allows a certain "isolation" that gives tourists in some places that liberating feeling of being in a deserted Island.

MABUYAS AND CAFUÇUS OF THE WORLD

Everyone who first steps on the island go through a curious process reeducation, similar to a detox that a former smoker realizes the days resulting from his decision to quit smoking. The benefits appear obviously stronger on the first day, are very noticeable a week later and for those who make the decision to become Mabuias ♀ and ♂ Cafuçus (affectionate nickname by which the islanders call women and men who choose to inhabit on the island) the period of ten years is crucial, both from the point of view of mental adjustments necessary to fit the realities of the island, and to get the legal right to inhabit it.

Knowing that is impossible to demonstrate the real importance of this "insular consciousness" without ever having been in Fernando de Noronha, I invite you to be a little more Cafuçus and Mabuias, and to treat our world like an island without any close continent around, with fragile ecological interconnections, worthy of great love, care and respect.

Mabuya (kind of Skink) - Mabuya atlantica or since 2009 Trachylepis atlantica -  affectionate nickname given by the islanders to women who were not born on the island, is also the name of a species of endemic lizard of Fernando de Noronha

Change Brazil through extreme methods...

You can change the way of conducting your country, by painting the people according to your own taste
If you could choose your salaryit would very high - We can not let the public office holders establish their own gains - Changes should start by severe punishment for social offenses at all levels of positions.

What if in 50 years I could increase GDP Brazil's per capita of US $ 11,208 in for more than $ 110,000, reduce crime at the level of almost zero, greatly improving the education of our people, give really good conditions for our elderly, end corruption, end the open sewers in all the cities, clean up our waters, etc.

"That is impossible!!! changing Brazil? - Nobody can do it", you probably weighed.

Lee Kuan Yew did it!

Lee Kuan Yew was one of the few people who managed to realize the dream of born in a country, identify its problems, change them, and live in his own utopia.

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To achieve an effective change, it is necessary that we stop being repetitive in meaningless tasks, we should re-assess our strategy and then, depart for the action.

Extreme ways

"We have to do differently! Or else we will not survive". This was the recurring appeal of Lee Kuan Yew for the people of Singapore during the first years of its independence.

Adherent to the discipline, Lee advocated severe punishment for social offenses, including physical punishment, theorizing without inhibition on the pedagogical power of example to influence collective behaviour, forbidding them to spit on the ground, making little noise in their own homes, strongly combating vandalism of public goods and hence the crime.

Last March 23, 2015 we have lost the protagonist of one of the great economic success stories in the world, Singapore owes much of its prosperity to a record of honest and pragmatic government, the legacy of Lee Kuan Yew, who has died aged 91. He retired as prime minister in 1990 but his influence shaped government policy until his death, and will continue to do so beyond.

In an emotional televised address, his son Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong paid tribute to him.

"He fought for our independence, built a nation where there was none, and made us proud to be Singaporeans. We won't see another man like him."
Mr Lee oversaw Singapore's independence from Britain and separation from Malaysia. His death was announced early on Monday. He had been in hospital for several weeks with pneumonia and was on life support.

Why LKY was able to make it:

1) Most (political) leaders are too self-serving and power-hungry (and even if they don’t start out that way, the winner effect has a tendency to warp their brains over time). That may be what happened to Napoleon;

2) Few people have the raw intelligence and rational ability required;

3) How many people have the strength of character to give up their entire lives to building a corporation or a country?

4) Most countries are too culturally and ideologically messed-up by popular opinion to accept the notion of a benevolent dictatorship;

5) Most (larger) countries have too many vested interests of different sorts, and corruption already runs too deep.

Adherent of the discipline, Lee advocated severe punishment for social offenses

Some Lessons of Wisdom to Learn from LKY

#1 The Importance of incentives

Putting the right incentives in place is THE single most important factor determining the long-term success of an organization, corporation, or a country. It is the leadership’s role to assume that people will game the system ruthlessly, and therefore make it as hard as humanly possible to do that.

Unlike many other countries–such as Sweden, where most politicians are incompetent–LKY, like Napoleon, Caesar, and the Founding Fathers, understood that government must be meritocratic.

#2 The importance of prevention: Be ruthless with wrongdoers

LKY, like many other intelligent people, understands the importance of prevention.

Mistakes should never have to be fixed, they should be prevented.

Most problems stem from incompetence or negative psychology (bad habits and lack of discipline), and as such they have a strong tendency to repeat themselves, especially on a countrywide level. It is nearly impossible to fix a problem once it has become culturally rooted.

The problem is that most people are not able to think long-term and deal with incremental change.

Instead, they make the mistake of allowing problems to grow like cancer, until they cannot be stopped. Only then does the media start reporting on it – in a not-so-constructive way, asking: “Who is to blame!?”

Playing the blame game is for children.

Grown-ups think in terms of prevention.

#3 The importance of public perception

Not only did LKY put in the right financial incentives, thereby attracting the most competent ministers, but he also increased the respect and status by which the Singaporean politicians and statesmen are treated with.

LKY set a strict policy of non-acceptance against satire, crude jokes, or caricatures of himself and the leadership:
“If you keep on mocking your leader, poking fun at him, everyday, and he has no right to reply, it is very difficult for him to command your respect”.

#4 Human beings are not equal–and never will be!

Only a person with a strong character can speak the truth, especially when his position in life depends on it. Fortunately, LKY was such an individual, and he dared to dish out ‘harsh truths’:

The human being is an unequal creature. This is a fact.

All great religions, all great movements, all great political ideologies start off saying ‘let’s make the human being as equal as possible’. In fact, he is NOT equal–never will be.

True to his word, in an interview during 2013 at Shell’s 120th anniversary, LKY was asked “what is the meaning of life?”, and answered the following:

Life is what you make of it. You’re dealt a pack of cards, your DNA is fixed by your mother and your father. . . Your job is to do the best of the cards you were dealt.

#5 Do not trust or follow mainstream media, popular culture, and set your own course

I have never been overconcerned or obsessed with opinion polls or popularity polls. I think a leader who is, is a weak leader.

In many countries, like the U.S, elections are based on polling and popular media. It’s called populism. Politics has become similar to entertainment TV and reality shows. LKY wouldn’t have that, and (rightly so) put his foot down.

Besides, opinion polls and focus groups are not to be trusted. People lie or answer under a pretence of political correctness.

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Should we create the party LKY, the "People's Action Party" (PAP, in English: People's Action Party, Simplified Chinese 人民 行动 党 pinyin: Rénmín Xíngdòngdǎng) here in Brazil? Would we succeed in having the ideology and methods in full use here?

The forces of nature show that Chaos is the antagonist of cosmos, in the same way the waves are preceded by undertows, that left parties intercalates power with to right party. Thus, after the disorder we must surely have the long awaited order – I just don’t know how it will come.