My question is, when does a person become B? Is there a fundamental amount of knowledge one must have? Or can one be a B with any amount of knowledge as long as the ‘spirit’ (an admittedly inaccurate word) of the message is understood? …of course being perhaps less effective than those with more knowledge to provide more complete answers?

This is a good and valid question, and you’re not too far off in your own attempts to answer it. B is someone who “gets it,” who understands that it is six billion of us pursuing the Taker vision (“the world was made for man, and man was made to conquer and rule it”) who are destroying the world. It isn’t technology, it isn’t big business, it isn’t capitalism, it isn’t some mysterious flaw in humanity. It is six billion people pursuing a destructive and unsustainable vision. B understands that the “cure” for this situation isn’t programs (“sticks stuck in the river of vision to impede its flow”). The cure is changing the vision of these six billion people from one that is destructive and unsustainable to one that is life-fostering for the whole community of life. B understands that the way to effect this cure is to get people to spread the “virus” of this new understanding. So that Ishmael tells his pupil: Reach a hundred with what I’ve taught you and encourage them to reach a hundred. And I add to this, Reach ten if you can’t reach a hundred and reach one if you can’t reach ten— because you never know when that one will reach a million. And you’re right—the more you know—the more thoroughly you understand “how things came to be this way”—the more effective you will be in reaching people. (Answering your question in even greater detail is the work of my book titled: Beyond Civilization.)

DATE: 20 Feb 1998
UPDATE: 11 Nov 1998
ID: 184