Jacque Fresco - Ideas

Ideas

Fresco himself cites several theorists and authors for contributing to his ideas, such as Jacques Loeb, who established the Mechanistic Conception of Life; Edward Bellamy, who wrote the extremely influential book, Looking Backward; Thorstein Veblen, who influenced the Technocracy movement and Howard Scott, who popularized it; Alfred Korzybski, who originated General Semantics; H. G. Wells, and many others.

Fresco's ideas has formed as the culmination of many disciplines and schools of thought. The majority of Fresco's ideas and concepts have not been categorized or classified by scholars in academia. However, the dominant features of it have been compared to earlier thinkers from as early as the nineteenth century. Titles such as The Paradise within the Reach of all Men without Labor by Powers of Nature and Machinery, Emigration to the Tropical World for the Melioration of All Classes of People of All Nations, and The New World or Mechanical System were written in the 1800s by John Adolphus Etzler who has been described by independent scholar, Anna Notaro, as an early forerunner to Fresco's ideas. Likewise, Ebenezer Howard and his book Garden Cities of Tomorrow, as well as the Garden City Movement during the early 1900s has been described, by Morten Grønborg of CIFS, as another predecessor. Fresco's proposed economy removes the mechanics of modern economics and his view toward modern economics has been compared to Thorstein Veblen's concept of "the predatory phase in human development," according to an article in the journal of Society and Business Review. Grønborg has labeled other facets of Fresco's ideology have been labeled a "tabula rasa approach."

Values and natural forces often undergo emphasis in Fresco's conceptions. Jack Catran provides a succinct summary of the significance for these two factors,

According to Fresco, the scientist of today is involved in a conflict between two value systems: 1. The orderly world of scientific methodology; 2. The non-scientific culture (and language) which surrounds him on all sides, but in which is embodied the embryo of the future. It is difficult, says Fresco, for non-scientific man to grasp the full implications of science because of the limitations imposed on him by his social environment. New forces, inherent in the framework of his present culture, are continually acting upon him, forces which are by their very nature unidirectional and irreversible, and tending always toward higher technical and social achievement.

Also noted by synergetics theorist, Arthur Coulter, is the organic nature of Fresco's city designs and the evolutionary (rather than revolutionary) development he expects them to take. Evolving Ideas host, Elaine Smitha, compares the relationship and functions between city facilities and humans to the relationships and functions of organismic bodies. Coulter posits such cities as the answer to Walter B. Cannon's idea of achieving homeostasis for society.