originated many of the basic tenets of the religion as now practiced by vast numbers of people around the world. In asserting the mortality of the Buddha, the religion grounds trust in the processes he symbolizes. If we characterize Buddhism using the social ecosystem model that we discussed in Chapter 5, we would suggest that it incorporates congruent trust and policy infrastructures. In essence, trust derives from a process that, having first established trust, can then be engaged for the derivation of policy grounded in that trust. The process involved is one of contemplation based in meditation. Given our prior discussions of physiology and cognitive functions, we recognize contemplation as being the ritualistic exploration of the contexts derived from our sensori-motor system. From this exploration comes the metaphorical understanding found within these contexts. In turn, we view meditation as the establishment of an altered, or as some would say, enhanced state of consciousness through which trust can be derived from the contemplative process. The term ritualistic emphasizes that contemplation is a form of deep thought that is highly structured. It has something of the characteristics of a protocol to it, and hence we view it as an almost formally defined process. Considering various aspects of its ritual practice, we note that meditation may occur repetitively at a fixed time of day; perhaps in the early morning shortly after arising from sleep. It might, in concert be routinely performed at a fixed location, perhaps in a garden or a set room of the home. Contemplation can often be enhanced by assuming a set position of the body; perhaps a relaxed position that induces a feeling of tranquility. Its practice can entail the use of other sensory input; perhaps the scent from burning incense or the sound of ritual music or chants. Through these various mechanisms, the meditative process induces a state of ecstasy within the mind. We believe that within this state of ecstasy, the mind imbues the resulting thought with an enhanced level of trust and hence a willingness to utilize these thoughts as a basis for future action or interaction. Thus, we see derivation of policy as well as the establishment of trust regarding the subsequent implementation of that policy.

This is all, of course, at best but a crude caricature of Buddhist practices or of any process-oriented trust and policy infrastructures. Our goal at this point is simply to illustrate the distinction between deriving trust from the causality of creation that typifies theistic religions, and instead deriving trust through the considerations of a ritualistic process that tends toward a purely philosophical basis. In essence, “I derive trust in the concept of a personal moral code and then I derive the individual tenets of that trusted moral code.” We view the former mechanism as related to deriving trust relative to computer-enabled interactions from the hardware architecture of computer systems. Likewise, we view the latter mechanism as related to deriving trust relative to computer-based interactions from the trust we place in the functioning of the software that controls the processing of computers. In the former case, trust has a seminal point of creation that may be significantly distinct from any policy infrastructures that derive from it. In the latter case, trust and policy are essentially derived recursively through the same process. In the abstract, Buddhism provides us with a guiding example of trust derived through process. Current social systems, however, suggest a considerably more pragmatic approach to trust through process. This example involves the derivation of trust from a confluence of information. Let us consider an example from a typical social ecosystem in which trust derives in this manner. The process is one widely used in current social order, and is particularly used in Web-based interaction systems.

The basic premise of the mechanism is that over a long period of time, people who act in a consistent and legal manner as they are involved in various interactions within their social ecosystem build up a transaction history that can subsequently be used to validate their involvement in future interactions. The approach presupposes that duplicitous individuals will in general tend to act in the short term, thus making it highly unlikely that they will build up a fraudulent series of ostensibly legal transaction records over a long period. The types of transactions that we refer to are those that generate credentials attesting to a personal history. Such

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