SPIRITUAL COMMON SENSE

- The Foundations of the Spiritual Revolution -

by Brennan E. Foley

Copyright Brennan E. Foley 09/09/02

Promotional Version for Review Only

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION: What are Philosophy and Spirituality?

1. What is Life? ONTOLOGY

2. What is the Universe? COSMOLOGY

3. What is the Plan or the Design of the Universe? TELEOLOGY

4. What am I, Who am I, and Why am I Here? PSYCHOLOGY

5. What is Reality? METAPHYSICS

6. What are Knowledge, Truth and Thinking? EPISTEMOLOGY

7. What are Proper Values? AXIOLOGY

8. What is Good? ETHICS

9. What is Quality? AESTHETICS

10. Is God Dead? THEOLOGY

11. The Spiritual Manifesto ANTHROPOLOGY

Appendix 1: Position Papers POLITICS

Appendix 2: What Can I do? REAL MAGIC

Appendix 3: The Philosophical Age ANTICIPATORY SCIENCE

Appendix 4: Internet Links - Great Works of Wisdom

Appendix 5: About the Author

PREFACE

THIS BOOK IS ABOUT THE SPIRITUAL REVOLUTION - BOTH A PERIOD IN HISTORY AND AN INDIVIDUAL IMPERATIVE!

"Give your ears, hear the sayings,

Give your heart to understand them;

It profits to put them in your heart."

Amenemope, The Instruction of Amenemope, Prologue, 11th Cent BCE, Egypt

We are now at a point in civilization in which for the first time we can look at the whole of human history without the bias of censors or authoritarians, and with the power of information technology at our fingertips. We can review very many different models of how the universe is constructed and make up our own individual minds about which one(s) we like best. We can make some new statements about the human experience of life and how it has developed the way it did. It is also now possible for you to explore your own psychology and existence with tools of introspection and meditation from all over the world. We as individuals have the choice to come to our own personal understanding about our spiritual practices and philosophical beliefs from a veritable cafeteria of belief systems. Following the Industrial Revolution, the era of the Spiritual Revolution is one in which for the first time in history the wisdom of the world's great philosophical and spiritual teachings can be considered together. It is also an era in which the individual is enabled to explore one’s own spirituality. In truth, you must do so to understand why and what you believe. How otherwise can you act confidently based upon your own beliefs? It is also now possible to come to a statement of a few things which are mutual to the human experience of life and which can help you in your growth of understanding.

To achieve an understanding of mutual spiritual values we must attempt a resolution of the burning issues at the very heart of humanity. To accomplish this a common sense explanation of the human condition is needed so that ground for mutual understanding can first be established. If this can be achieved it will be possible to begin the greatest journey the world has witnessed - nothing less than a global integration of human understanding and wisdom.

By pursuing my investigations into the philosophical beliefs of as many living people in as many different walks of life as I possibly could, I noticed that irrespective of culture or other identity there are two basic philosophical questions for the individual person - "what do I believe about the world" and "how do I properly live life?" . I began to realize that the future of humanity hinges on which views of human nature and the environment prevail in our daily lives. This began a very long struggle on my part to come to terms with these issues in my own life. My unfolding experiences became a quest in my attempt at the resolution of these basic conundrums of human existence. I also understand that the only way to approach these burning issues in your own life is by doing it: by trial and error, not through intellectual thinking.

It appears that irrespective of demographic groups the responses to these questions are usually answered by people in one of two ways. People either respond progressively or in a reactionary manner. People line up on one side or another of the river of experience and do it consistently the world over. This is based on an error of perception about life.

There are those whose response to life is based on hierarchy, "higher authority," doctrine, tradition, and policies of individual rulers by the use of appeal to emotion and the use of force. Others respond to the issues of existence through love and personal experience in an attempt to verify for themselves what works for positive improvement.

The progressiveness of common sense spirituality includes the wisdom of humanity so that it can draw on authority beyond personal opinion but depends upon each individual's practice of spiritual beliefs in real time. Many of humanity's leftover old problems could be resolved by common sense and mutual spiritual understanding. This book is an attempt to explain why there is this rift in life perception and point a way towards its resolution.

INTRODUCTION: WHAT ARE PHILOSOPHY AND SPIRITUALITY?

PHILOSOPHY IS THE WISDOM OF LOVE IN ACTION AND SPIRITUALITY IS THE ART OF ENGAGING THE UNIVERSE IN A CONSCIOUS MANNER FOR THE PURPOSES OF GROWING YOUR SOUL

“I have preached the truth without making any distinction between exoteric and esoteric doctrine: for in respect of truths, Ananda, the Tathagata (enlightened being) has no such thing as the closed fist of a teacher, who keeps some things back.”

-Buddha

The Pali Cannon (Sacred scriptures of Theravada Buddhists), Suttapitaka. Dhammapada, Mahaparinibbana-sutra, 2:32

What is the Spiritual and Philosophical Common Sense?

It is apparent that many religious teachers and leaders such as Moses, Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, and Muhammad have been trying to create an enlightened age of wisdom for millennia. Yet positive attempts at improving the lot of humanity and efforts towards the evolution of mutual understanding keep getting hijacked by those who maintain the notion that some humans are more deserving than others. Aldous Huxley described the Perennial Philosophy as one which seems to appear throughout all times and places in history. He maintains that in an enlightened era social and personal decisions are based on love, there is a recognition of mutual understanding, and individual growth is recognized as the key to a life worth living.

My experience has taught me that the true job of the individual is spiritual development. Your spirituality is the art or practice of your philosophical and religious beliefs. Your spirituality is in essence your being and its growth through conscious effort. Your being is the totality of your experience, it is a holistic cumulation of all of your human aspects. The job of spiritual evolution is the growth of the complete human. We are not born with everything we need to live a spiritual life. We each must work at our own spiritual growth. This has been recognized by all of the greatest teachers throughout history.

It is increasingly apparent that a Spiritual Revolution is emerging in the consciousness of humanity. All around the world people are turning away from orthodoxy and established religious institutions and are beginning their own spiritual journeys. We are at a period in history where the focus of attention of many people tired of the glorification of material pursuits is shifting inward - to ask the questions who am I, why am I here, what am I doing, and how do I make a better future? Not only are people developing unique and independent opinions about philosophy and practices of spirituality, but many people are developing understandings from many different traditions. Large numbers of people are discovering that there are mutual wisdoms shared throughout history and are incorporating them into daily life. This is nothing short of a Spiritual Revolution.

It has become apparent in the Western world that the so-called "Enlightenment" in Europe was not complete. Something was left undone. We are discovering that the use of reasoning and logic alone is not enough to fully enjoy life. A real Enlightenment would be a spiritual one occurring both internally and externally - both within individuals and externally in society. In the Eastern world there has always been a strong role for spiritual exploration in society although it has seldom transformed into any positive social action as a result. There is a great yearning in modern societies for answers to questions deeper than those offered by the "Enlightenment" or industrial revolution, and a disappointment at the slow pace at which we translation our ideas into actions.

Humanity is at a critical turning point where we either transform global civilization into a healthier reality, fall back to obsolete ways of life, or dissolve into a chaos of many petty brushfires. There are increasing numbers of people who are becoming sensitive to the fact that we are at a crossroads of human development. There is no more important task than the elevation of human society from the morass out of which it constantly struggles to emerge. The task is imperative, we can no longer sit and wait while things continue on autopilot.

To accomplish a transformation into an 'Age of Wisdom' in the next millennium we must facilitate the Spiritual Revolution which has been attempting to emerge throughout the 20th Century. The challenges facing humanity can be addressed if we comprehend the old historical errors we keep falling into and muster both the individual and social will for change. Social change begins with the individual person. When there are enough people dedicating their lives to the betterment of humanity larger scale social change then becomes possible. A prosperous and healthy world could be just around the corner - humanity already has all of the needed ideas, technologies, people, and resources to make the necessary changes to better ways of living. This is possible now, let's get started!

One of the difficulties in helping the Spiritual Revolution is that although there are many mutual understandings between individuals and their own practice of spirituality there has not until now been an attempt to put in common sense terms some perennial spiritual ideas which can be relatively verified by direct personal observation. This book hopes to point to a few ways in which you can work on your own Spiritual Revolution.

The whole effort of many successive generations has been to create better realities for their children than they had themselves. The nurturing of the future is the true job of humanity. It is no less than the liberation of our individual minds, hearts, bodies, and communities from slavery. There have always been forces opposing this liberation, and at many critical junctures on the way to positive social development all previous societies until now have failed in this quest. Yet there have been messengers of many sorts, examples of which are replete in all civilizations - people who point the way for possible future development. These spiritual teachers and leaders have all asked us to use loving compassion as the driving force in our activities and to create communities based on cooperation, respect, and tolerance for one another. Each successive generation must work at this in its own way. New generations now have many resources coming "on-line" to facilitate yet another attempt at the advancement of our consciousness through self knowledge and spiritual evolution.

The efforts of humanity over its history have been toward increasing liberty and improving community standards of conduct. Enlightened education liberates us individually from ignorance, fear, greed, and hate. 'Civilization' is a development that could ennoble humanity yet now more than ever is a machine for slavery for billions rather than a means to increase freedom. There is widespread confusion at the change of the millennium as to 'where things are headed,' and why we do what we do - unanswered because the big task of explanation is languishing. Like Moses we must open the granaries of the wisdom of the ages of humanity and feed the hungry. The common threads in our cultural wisdom must be revealed to make sense in our daily lives. The way to do this is through communication, education, and activism.

We are at the point where nature will not evolve us further. Evolution means improvement in the conditions of life. Future human evolution for the most of humanity is an impossibility unless there is a major alteration of our destructive and consumptive trends. Our ability to alter our environments to suit our purposes has circumvented the forces of early nature natural selection that shaped our evolution to this point . Any further evolution of our species will come as a direct result of our own individual conscious efforts. We are at the point where we must consciously create our future or fall into chaos. The beings created must become new co-creators. Our future evolution is not the mechanical extension of our already existent functions to become stronger and faster, or to see and hear better. It is in the direction of the deepening of our beings, the growth of our consciousness and consciences, and the transformation of our world views and environments into more positive ones.

Future spiritual evolution involves the individual creation of a global perspective of experience. We must grow beyond our divided selves. To further evolve as individuals we must include all the parts of our psyches in our active lives. Whether you have the corner on the market of wisdom and truth is less important than whether you work on nurturing the growth of your being. Along with all of our other functions humans have a religious, mystical, and magical dimension to our psyches which should not be neglected. Spiritual evolution involves allowing common sense and love to permeate life. Such enlightenment is the foundation for the creation of a human community basing its ethics on mutual values. The future of humanity depends upon the creation of a global community with a tolerant dialogue of religions and belief systems. This will only be possible with spiritual evolution of increasing numbers of people around the world.

With the globalization of society we are having social transformations on a scale unprecedented in history. At the same time never before has the imperative to make the personal and social change to a more enlightened global society been so great. We are at a point where there can be an evolution of consciousness, common sense, conscience, and creativity. Unfortunately the benefits of humanity's successive growth as a whole has only been enjoyed by a small few. Unscrupulous profiteers have been utilizing the developing capacities of humanity to maximize the efficiency of mass exploitation and their own profit generation. We must ask ourselves how we as individuals can act to correct this historical maladjustment. Dorothy Sayers stunningly depicts the state of affairs out of which the Spiritual Revolution struggles to emerge:

"That the Inferno is a picture of human society in a state of sin and corruption, everybody will readily agree. And since we are today fairly well convinced that society is in a bad way and not necessarily evolving in the direction of perfectibility, we find it easy enough to recognize the various stages by which the deep of corruption is reached. Futility; lack of a living faith; the drift into loose morality, greedy consumption, financial irresponsibility, and uncontrolled bad temper; a self-opinionated and obstinate individualism; violence, sterility, and a lack of reverence for life and property including one's own; the exploitation of sex, the debasing of language by advertisement and propaganda, the commercializing of religion, the pandering to superstition and the conditioning of people's minds by mass-hysteria and "spell-binding" of all kinds, venality and string-pulling in public affairs, hypocrisy, dishonesty in material things, intellectual dishonesty, the fomenting of discord (class against class, nation against nation) for what one can get out of it, the falsification and destruction of all the means of communication; the exploitation of the lowest and stupidest mass-emotions; treachery even to the fundamentals of kinship, country, the chosen friend, and the sworn allegiance: these are the all-too-recognizable stages that lead to the cold death of society and the extinguishing of all civilized relations."

Dorothy L. Sayers, Introductory Papers on Dante, London, 1954

It is clear that the only solutions to the problems described by Ms. Sayers are individual ones, that is solutions formulated within ourselves about the ways in which we think and act towards each other. The social problems of today have been repeated over and over and the warnings of the ancient wise echo down the hallways of time for those who have ears to hear. Our struggles are not new, they have been replayed a thousand times at differing scales of human civilization. The most difficult of our challenges in the survival of civilized life is not merely providing for our material well-being, but providing for the social, psychological, and spiritual aspects of life as well. The greatest challenge to the future of civilization is the drama played out in each and every one of our daily lives.

We are at a unique historical opportunity with a global communications revolution. As people from different backgrounds increasingly communicate with each other many perceived boundaries to mutual understanding will begin to fade. It is inevitable that not only will people globally communicate about stock prices, entertainment, and advertising; people will also share their ideas on philosophy, spirituality, religion, and politics. The great dialogue of human experience as expressed through the spiritual ideas of different cultures can begin to establish commonalties and new understanding. The achievement of just such a global dialogue on spiritual synthesis can set the stage for a real enlightenment, a spiritual one.

For the first time in history all of the peoples of our planet are connected through some type of communication. There are more specialists, scientists, and thinkers at this time in history than ever before and yet people are less and less satisfied about their solutions for living life. We are now in a position to re-evaluate all of the myths, world views, and primary assumptions upon which we base our actions. There is now enough historical evidence and scientific information available to say some new things about people and the world in which we live. What is missing is the synthesis of the existent information and knowledge. The synthesis of knowledge must be done by each of us individually and then translated into action in our personal lives. We each must go through a paradigm shift to prepare ourselves for the next millennium by re-evaluating our ideas and actions to plan for the future.

To understand why events are unfolding on planet Earth the way they are we need to attempt a brief inventory of the human experience which has led us to the point in time in which we now exist. This must be not only a brief exploration of human history but also of cosmology and psychology for without all three it is not possible to get a good sense of why things are happening the way they do. If we can first identify a few points of common sense our job of discovering mutual understanding will be much more pleasant.

At each stage in the growth of humanity the same challenges arise again and again. Each person must rise above the baser qualities of human thought and conduct. The battle for human evolution is now amplified in each generation. We are now at a point where if we do not come to terms with our shadows they will overtake us. The price of failure is the pollution and destruction of our planet and therefore our annihilation. The ultimate battle for planetary survival is happening now and the forces of destruction are those which represent ego, fear, and greed - those which ravage the planet, destroy communities, preach intolerance, and base their authority on violence.

The way to change our society is through changing ourselves. Only by individual changes in the way people think, feel, and act will larger scale changes occur. Who else is responsible for the social ills which beset us but each of us individually through our cumulative actions? The only change that can happen to improve the nature of our lives and society in general are the personal decisions we make in our own lives and how we act towards others. It is now necessary to have a spiritual revolution occur individually on large scales in global society. There is no other way for the conditions of life to improve.

For too long we have been appointing or relying on others to do the participation with spirituality and society for us. We have become isolated and despondent in this condition. Our job as people is to be artists that consciously co-create our lives with each other. We are rapidly coming to the point where the technology will be available to us to create and engineer our own environments, genetics, minds, and personal realities.

The question arises as to how we can begin the evolution of our own personal consciousnesses and consciences. We must remember that the human is a creature of the mind. The battle for our imaginations takes place in the arena of vision - that of ourselves and that of the future direction of society. The political future of the nations of the world will turn on what type of vision of human nature takes precedence - that of the enlightened teachers and leaders throughout history and culture or that of the profiteers of culture wars. New methods are necessary from the perspective of the individual to educate people about the stream of unifying human values that exist regardless of time or place. An example of this is the individual conscience - it transcends gender, race, religion, culture, lifestyle, and political ideology.

Only by making conscious the underlying beliefs, attitudes, and world views which operate within us unconsciously can we come to an understanding of what is happening on the planet. The mass confusion which is occurring in many industrial countries and in people's lives is driven by the combination of many mistaken interpretations of history, a huge amount of ancient beliefs and assumptions, and the disconnected mountains of meaningless information provided through modern communications. We must open up the assumptions of the past and the visions of the future and challenge them if we are to create our own meaning in life and fashion decent futures for ourselves.

Organized Religion and Individual Spirituality

There is a major distinction between organized religion and the practice of spirituality. Organized religion encourages conformity, unity of belief structure, and the concentration of wealth and power. Personal spirituality is something you can explore on your own (who else can do it for you?) and use common sense to seek advice from a large number of intelligent sources.

Spirituality and not religion holds the key to our future evolution. Spirituality involves the growth of your self and direct personal experience in connection with a larger picture. It acknowledges that the sacred is within as well as without, and not located somewhere else outside of our frame of reference. The theological basis for a growth oriented spiritual method that incorporates the wisdoms of the great spiritual teachings of the world requires the location of spirituality and sacredness in the individual. The emergence of a perspective acknowledging the sacred in life is a growth of the individual in the unification of experience. When we combine the reasoning and feeling parts of our life we have been working on our spirituality, for this does not occur by mechanical evolution. It is the product of conscious work and psychic integration. The realization of the sacred in experience is an emergent function that is not an automatic process.

Our physical parts all combine in a synergetic emergent field called a mind. However the mind has a number of different facets not brought into synchronous operation without a conscious effort of attention in observing their diverse functions and a practical bringing together of their different voices or wills. The complete human is one who is aware of their parts and functions and works to unify being through whichever spiritual system that works for them. The point is to act rather than to theorize about it. This process is not abstract, it is an actual event and is not theoretical. Spirituality also engenders a necessary sense of conscience and set of ethical understandings. Spiritual beings treat each other in kind, generous, and tolerant manners. Spiritual beings treat each other as they themselves would like to be treated. Such beings consider the feelings, thoughts, and needs of others before their own personal whining and neuroses. When you recognize the sacred in experience not only does an internal unifying process of the integration of your experience take place, but externally observable and consciously directed spiritual behavior emerges.

It is possible for sentient beings to evolve spiritually, this evolution creates a new entity with novel effects that did not exist before; it has been called by some 'growing the soul'. We have the haphazard and mechanical self we are provided with, but we can be much more - we can create a more integrated and conscious self. Since we are an interface between our relations with the rest of our universe and our component parts, our beings are highly malleable. We change over time and can either grow or decay. Whenever a new state of our individual experience occurs the reality of our universe is changed, and our new experience of our universe adds something novel to what was previously constituting reality. Sentient life grows in complexity to support ever increasing consciousness. As consciousness develops, an accordant understanding of and empathy with the mutual aspects of existence, life, and experience develops. As consciousness grows there is a deeper penetration into the underlying unity of being in our universe.

There is currently a yearning in the West for new answers to the old spiritual questions. Any Spiritual Evolution in the West will require individual common sense explanations of serious questions about life which exhibit a degree of plausibility. The practice of dogmatic moralism does not work in our post-industrial environment. The roots of spirituality are in the direct experience of life and the growth of self in our relations with others and the environment.

The History of Philosophy is the History of Ideas About Life

Philosophy is the parent of the sciences and one of the earliest of human endeavors. It is the asking of the question 'why' and the structuring of answers to that question. Ever since the first human looked up at the sun or the night sky and pondered about existence, philosophy has been a critical part of the human experience. Other creatures can communicate, make, tools, and solve problems; but it is uniquely human (within our experience on this planet) to ponder the why of life and the how of the universe. The word philosophy comes from ancient Greece and its translation is: philo=love; sophia=wisdom. Usually philosophy has been taken to mean the love of wisdom. But philosophy is not only that, it is most importantly the wisdom of love.

One can say that 'a philosophy' is the set of beliefs and ideas in a particular world view. Our philosophies about ourselves, others, the universe, and life condition our attitudes and these drive our behavior. Like a psychology, everyone has an operating philosophy behind their interpretation of the world whether it is reasonable or complete or whether they even know about it consciously. You must make the effort to consciously establish philosophy and liberate yourself from the ideas mechanically introduced by others, otherwise, how do you know the reasoning behind why you believe what you do. You can only explain that which you understand.

Any real philosophy will have a mechanism for explaining the workings of the universe and those of the self. It will have both a cosmology and a psychology. Your philosophy is the set of understandings you have developed about yourself, others, and the universe.

I wish to share with you what I feel is the best application of the field of philosophy, and that is the art of consciously growing your soul. The knowledge of how to do this is well established at the core of all of the world's religions. For our purposes we will leave behind the type of modern philosophy which involves mere sophistry (argumentation for its own sake), nihilism (the belief that everything is absurd and meaningless), and deconstructionism (the belief that no real meaning can be established let alone communicated - epitomized by the game of 'whatever you say - I disagree'). Such beliefs are really not worthy of the wonderful history of intellectual and spiritual development as described by the greatest thinkers of humanity.

Philosophy is a tool for liberating us from the accidentally programmed ideas and behavior acquired by us through our lives. This liberation increases our choice and appreciation of life. So for our purposes let us understand philosophy to be a practical tool for self evolution. It is the art of increasing your wisdom (which is essentially good judgment, based on experience and knowledge) and acting in accordance with loving behavior.

By becoming more conscious we free ourselves from mechanical response patterns of behavior. We become able to supplant automatic responses to our environments with choice based and self established understandings. The development of self knowledge frees you from ignorance and provides insight into the nature of others. The more consciously aware we are of our existence the less we fall victim to accidents and the less we fall sway to incomplete ideas and deceptive people.

The knowledge that we are a natural part of a living universe, the purpose of which is to grow consciousness provides an endless source of inspiration to rise above the fleabites of temporal existence.

Why Philosophy Is Relevant To The Modern Person

Philosophy is relevant to me today and every day because my attitudes are a product of my world view. I act the way I do because I act according to what is permissible within my belief system. As my beliefs and attitudes change in relation to the growth of my philosophical understanding my actions change accordingly. My philosophy of life, my world view, affects every aspect of my existence whether I am consciously aware of this and its successive processes within me or not.

I prefer to remain consciously aware of my internal functions while they occur and understand how I digest my impressions of the world into understandings by interpreting my sensory data through my philosophy or world view.

You must remember that this process will happen automatically and be governed by whatever mechanical programming randomly happened to be put into you by others or it can be undertaken consciously by you at every moment. I must tell you that the latter is much more enlightening than the former.

So to be enlightened to any degree beyond the mere awareness of being a collection of random and mechanical environmental programming, practicing the art of philosophy in the here now is very important.

Throughout all of the travails of my existence on Earth so far philosophy has been a constant source of strength and inspiration. It is through the recognition that the great mysteries of existence are common to us all - if we are sincere about our inner thoughts - that encourages me to ever more deeply try to plumb the depths of being. Knowing that I am not alone in my thoughts and that others have tread the same paths I do tells me that the sacrifices you make in pursuing wisdom are worth it and that there are insights that are well worth the effort to obtain.

Your real job is enlightenment as is everyone else's. The universe has put us here not to consume ever increasing amounts of resources or to toil ever increasingly more efficiently for someone else's wealth. We are each here to form a novel understanding of existence which provides the food, or the raw material, for the growth of that part of us which is called the soul. Each one of us has this potential equally. Everyone of us can make the effort to engage the universe more consciously.

We must each individually take on the challenge and potential of our bio systems (the biological machines we call our bodies) to become more than the sum of the parts we were given by the universe . This requires work, not merely wishful thinking nor mindless belief.

The practice of philosophy is an opportunity for creating a meaningful life for a person and is an undertaking which is profound and which should be taken on by each individual in a very personal way. Philosophy is something to be actively engaged with on a moment to moment basis, not merely studied or thought about on occasion. Without a personal immersion in the work for the evolution of your consciousness and attempts at growing your soul daily, the requisite amount of life experience for work memory and the transmutation of your courser parts into finer ones will not be possible.

We are systems which can be self transforming and perfecting, although this does not happen accidentally and is solely the responsibility of each individual to actualize independently. Such work requires effort and patience and as such can only be undertaken consciously.

Without such personal work on enlightenment life would be so much less interesting, and so much more repetitive, empty, and boring. There would be so much less thrill and fun on a daily basis as the smallest detail of life observed at any moment consciously may become a whole new adventure. Without engaging philosophy directly in life you can never be sure of why you are doing what you are doing and whether it is right for you or not. In such a circumstance you can never be sure of the motivations behind your actions and consequently will constantly be merely responding to stimuli in the environment.

You are then in a state in which all of your philosophical beliefs, attitudes, and principles are borrowed incompletely from others and without logical reasoning. Without have a well understood philosophy underpinning one's spiritual beliefs, you can have no true practice of spirituality. In this state you have faith without knowledge, and this is not conscious. Only the conscious practice of your spirituality involves will, and this is the primary difference between ignorant superstitious religion and real religion. If there is no will behind your beliefs and deeds, what good are they for the purposes of growing a soul?

When pressed a person in such a state can never explain why they believe what they do and act as they do; the usual response to questions about ‘why’ goes something like; 'that is what they told me.' This type of banal evil by committee, where no one is responsible, does not work as an excuse for soldiers who commit war crimes and is not an excuse for ignorant religious actions of violence or intolerance. Talking about life, the universe, or philosophy with a person in the state of unexamined existence like talking with someone who is half asleep or two sheets to the wind.

Life is too short and too thrilling to be lived half asleep. I would not want to waste the time of my life (my only real 'possession') because there is no guarantee that we will be reincarnated, recycled, or hanging around again in another trillion years.

You Can Use Philosophy For Many Purposes

Everyone must take the available knowledge about the development and education of their consciousness and fit it together for them self. Take the best and cut and paste it together in a pattern that is useful to you. When you personally engage this effort in your life you may be better able to:

Create new meaning in your life

Develop a practical method of enlightenment for yourself

Better understand the motivations behind your behavior

Become more conscious

Reduce the stress in your life

Find direction and purpose for being alive

Communicate with others

Generate new perspectives for the purposes of creativity

Increase your creativity, insight, intuition, and revelation

Gain new insight into situations, events, and cultures

Develop intuitive skills of interpolation

Better identify planning elements

Design Organizational philosophy

Develop new ideas for writing and planning

Extract the heuristics of other individuals or groups

Transformation of information into knowledge

Invent and evolve new world views

Develop intercultural mechanisms for communication

Create new models of being for inter domain communication

Live life as art

Live life as an adventure

Become socially active

Better understand others through understanding yourself

Help those less fortunate

1. WHAT IS LIFE?

LIFE = SYNERGY : SYNERGY = LIFE

SYNERGY AND AWARENESS OF BEING A LIVING SYSTEM PROVIDE THE POSSIBILITY TO LOVE, LIBERATE ONES' SELF FROM MECHANICAL EXISTENCE, AND CHANGE THE WORLD

"It is wise to listen, not to me but to the Word, and to confess that all things are one."

---Heraclitus On Our Universe, fragment I

"...We are one. From the blind worm in the depths of the ocean to the endless arena of the Galaxy, only one person struggles and is imperiled: You. And within your small and earthen breast only one thing struggles and is imperiled: our universe."

---Nikos Kazantzakis, The Saviors of ''God''

Why should I be interested in coming to an understanding of being?

Not only has the subject of being been a topic that has occupied the lives of many philosophers and spiritual teachers throughout history but we ourselves are beings, and knowing ourselves is useful in many ways! The more a person understands them self, the easier it is to understand others. The more you understand the nature of your being, the easier it is to comprehend the existences of other beings. We live in a world of relations of many different kinds of beings on many different scales. Negotiating the world of relations is much easier when one has self-knowledge and understanding.

Furthermore I have found that coming to my own understanding about the nature of being has been critical in determining for myself what it is that I really believe and why. If we do not merely wish to parrot the beliefs ready made by others, we must establish our own personal philosophy of life through reflection, introspection, experimentation, and observation.

Any construction of one's own philosophy of life must begin with the direct experience of being. Any sufficient system for better understanding life must contain useful knowledge of what existence is and what it involves. Unless one can answer the question of "Do I know myself?" - why I do what I do, why I believe what I believe, and why I do feel the ways I do - one can not be sure that one's actions, thoughts, beliefs, and feelings are necessarily authentic to one's own being.

If we are to truly begin the exploration of common sense philosophy and spirituality we must start with the field of ontology, the study of being, for all things that exist have "being." Existence is a common basis of all things in the universe. What is more miraculous than individuals able to be present with, think in, and discourse about the nature of our universe and our own existence? The existence of something rather than nothing in our universe is a peculiar fact, and a huge philosophical and scientific issue and something that every individual must come to an understanding of individually.

It is increasingly evident from celestial observations through the Hubble space telescope and other observatories that the universe is full of galaxies containing stars with planets. Astronomers have also discovered that our solar system contains vast amounts of ice in comets the size of Mount Everest orbiting beyond Pluto. It is possible that most solar systems have ice belts at their outer boundaries. This would mean that somehow stars wind up producing ice! That suggests a very large frozen ocean out there in space - and we must remember that it appears that anywhere there is liquid water the possibility for life to emerge is present.

The possible discovery of Martian bacterial fossils (the dry riverbeds of Mars indicate the one time presence of water) and water under the icecap on Jupiter's moon Europa could provide the proof that liquid water provides the necessary environment for life. The universe is a huge sea of particles and structures on many scales out of which under the proper circumstances complex self-organizing entities will naturally emerge.

The primary beliefs and underlying assumptions we hold about our universe and our life within it determine a great deal about our attitudes and behaviors towards others and our environment. Only by examining the assumptions behind our views of being can we come to a conscious understanding of why we think and act the way we do. Without such an examination we have no personal verification and certitude; we do not know and cannot explain why we believe and do what we do. This is why we must all reflect upon where it is from which we come first in the attempt to achieve any understandings of life and our place in the universe.

We all instinctively know that our universe comes from something or somewhere. We know that there is life in our universe, as well as consciousness and we know that both are built from the same energy and matter as the rest of our universe. Every being is a distinct entity contained within the mutual field of being of our universe. From this field of being the initial forces of creation of our universe came into existence. All beings share the common ancestor of the 'big bang.' The field of being extends to the limits of timespace itself and includes any existent thing in the universe.

I feel that it is critical to resuscitate the field of the study of the nature of being now before the notion that we have minds becomes a myth! Modern neurology, cognitive science, and fields you have probably never heard of before like psycho-neuro-immunology are leaving psychiatry and psychology in the dust with their increasing numbers of breakthroughs in brain science. Soon they will have a pretty good map of the brain functions and will be able to produce startling novelties such as brain directed computing. With the mapping of the human genome we will have an unprecedented insight into the makeup of the individual human, including particular traits and potential diseases.

This all suggests the idea that we are merely some over complicated form of biological machine and that our minds are merely slow side effects of mechanical processes. I am sorry, but no one can tell me that I don't exist and am merely a part of a part of a part of a bunch of interfacing systems.

The view that we are merely bio machines robs us of some of the most important aspects of being and reduces us to 'cattle'. Humanity has witnessed this type of thinking before. When we can reduce people to side effects of their bodies and pretend that the soul, the self, and the mind are just imaginations, then people may be treated as if they are less than human.

Yes we may be partly machines, but just what kind of machines are we? The very notion that the self is an illusion and that the mind is a side effect eliminates the notion of individuality, self transformation and transcendence, and personal liberty - after all a non-self existent machine does not need rights nor is redeemable from their mechanical programming.

So if we protest this type of approach to the study and treatment of being human we must go back to ontology and ask, "If am not just my body then what am I?" Ontology is necessary for us more than ever when we are entering an era in which information is the driving force in society and in which technology impacts every facet of existence. We must rearticulate a vision of the human being if our special nature as spiritual beings is not to be revoked and ours elves reduced to the status of biological forms of machines. This is a process that each individual must undertake on their own if we wish to generate mutual understanding and a future for humanity which is not grim.

Common Sense Ontology: The Joy of Life

Common sense ontology is using our own faculties of observation directly as we experience life. Using our own good judgment, it should be possible to generate some useful (but not necessarily absolute) understandings of life. The field of ontology is one that is directly engaging by the individual as they are living and as such should be both revealing and entertaining. It is important to take one's investigations with a grain of salt and a dash of humor - existence is surprisingly amusing.

We can say that all things that exist have being in the common field of being we call the universe. It is important to note that all beings in our universe exist in time and space and so become different things over the course of time. So we can also say that a critical aspect of being is becoming - we become different entities over time as we move through space. In essence, being - even at its most basic level - is dynamic.

What can we say about the essence of being that does not restrict or limit the mystery of being? Being is defined as existence, but what is this? What are the critical and defining factors of existence which are common to all beings? We will have to use common sense to approach this matter which is only discernable to a being experiencing life dynamically and not separate from our environment.

Being is existence in timespace. Life as we know it is a product of a combination of many different beings so to understand something about life we must understand something about being. Although we are conscious of our animate life we still share aspects of existence with many other beings which are not. Even though it is easier to start with human being-ness (maybe the only realm of being we will ever truly comprehend) let us begin by trying to say something which would apply to any being whether conscious or not and whether "alive" or not.

There are many different types and sizes of beings. Anything that actually exists can be considered a being. There is a scale of being complexity going all the way from individual sub-atomic particles, to the molecule, to the cell, to the organism, and human being-ness. There may also be many other beings on other scales of which we remain unaware. Even within the human domain there are beings on different scales of complexity.

We are semi-permeable; that is, we are both structured and open. This allows us to remain a stable structure while ingesting and expelling changing elements. We are open and dynamic, we grow, self organize, reproduce, and possibly self-perfect. Of course not all beings can do all of this.

After thousands of years of inspiration, arduous research, meditation, contemplation, and experimentation only a few things have been determined about the great mystery of being:

Being absolutely exists

Being is attractive: Being attracts being

Being can be multiplied but not divided

Self must discover itself in being: This is the realm of real work

Self exists and Otherness exists

To know others is to encounter them existentially

Life reflects many aspects of intelligent organization

The existence of consciousness is an observable fact

There is a distinction between having a body and being a body - we are not just our bodies

The body, its brain, emotions, and mind are interpenetrating

Life is an opportunity for being to transcend itself

Penetrating to the depths of the self is not easy

Humans seem to have a unique and passionate relationship with the issue of existence

The essence of existence is the primary issue of life for us, whether people are aware of it or not

The encounter with the mystery of being is a living participation, not an abstract study or one accomplished removed from the world of human interaction

Life is a Joy - remember the mystery of existence in awe!

One thing we have in common with everything else in the living universe is being. Even rocks and trees have being, as does 'outer space.' There is something rather than nothing. This 'something' is based on dynamic and repeating patterns of complexity on many scales which are constantly unfolding in all systems in our universe. Being is fundamentally synergetic, for anything which exists is more than the some of its parts. Synergy is a primary descriptor of life, and it is possible to say that all things which exist as novel entities are synergetic, are alive to a certain extent. All dynamic systems have animate qualities. That things exist - that is, have being, is a great and profound mystery.

It is important to realize that the only way to study being is by you, a conscious observer in the present, on the fly and by the seat of your pants, so to speak. We recognize that there is a difference between that which you are and what you appear to be. This was an area which the writer Heidegger was greatly concerned.

In Being and Time Heidegger describes how in our direct observation of phenomenon we must experiment with an open mind and only describe what is observed of the phenomena as it show itself. We observe what something appears to be in the hopes that it will reveal some aspect of that which it is in actuality. However the thing in itself will remain unknowable as such and only disclosed in the environment in which it exists. So I guess one could say that things are never what they appear.

It is important to make some basic recognitions of classes of being phenomena. There is a difference between self-ness and thing-ness. We recognize the difference between a being that has a self and one which does not. I believe that this is a matter of degree of organization in scale - and rather than reducing the higher complexity scale to a combination of lesser complexity scale elements, we can say that any of these lesser complexity scale components could serve as parts of a higher complexity system. Nonetheless a thing is a system or element of a system which either does not have an individuality in its self maintenance or is part of an unobservable system in a scale of timespace beyond our immediate observation.

We can also distinguish between having and being. Beings can have objects and qualities but being as a function can only be participated with. I have a body, but it is not my being. My body participates with my being.

There is also an interesting thought from Hindu mysticism describing what is called the Linga Sharira, or the long body of the soul. Call it an implicate pattern over time, or what you will, however it is a fact that our bodies change over time. In fact every atom in our body is replaced over every seven years. I am not made up of the same matter as I was when I was five. I have a continuity of selfness and a particular look that is recognizable as a system over the years, however its components change. This selfness which transcends time is your soul's long time body. Another curious aspect of being which I have noticed is what I call the 'clumpiness' of being. Beings seem to gravitate as if there is some sort of gravity well into which they each fall. A good example of this was depicted on a nature show I saw on TV. The program followed a mangrove branch which had broken off from its tree and fallen into the water. The program followed the branch on its trek across the ocean and at each stage of its journey it was surrounded by life.

At first there were the kinds of fish and creatures found close to shore. For a while a turtle hitchhiked on top of it. As it went further to sea the types of other beings around it changed, but there was always someone hanging around. Seaweed, krill, smaller fish, and at one point a shark all whirled around this floating curiosity. My point is that the branch did not float alone, it was host to a whole party of other beings attracted to it for no other reason than that it was there.

Still another area of investigation into being for the philosophers has involved utility of being. Is the being present, useful, and able? There are many beings which at any given time did not succeed at meeting all three criteria. We can only interlocute and co-experience with beings which have met these criteria.

We must remember that the essence of being is fundamentally a mystery that we encounter in experience. Mysteries are encountered whereas problems may be solved. The "problem" of being, philosophically speaking, will never be "solved" for it is fundamentally a mystery.

Any new entity is different from its source. This is a situation in which you get more than you pay for. Entities, by their very existence in timespace, relate to their environment. Depending on the scale and complexity of an entity, it may even be able to self organize, replicate, or self perfect. The ability for entities to self organize is part of the embedded design of being.

At the most basic level the building blocks of time and space came together and the vitality of nature synergized them into the production of a new entity - our universe, an entity with self organizing abilities to emerge other entities on a wide variety differing scales of complexity. The very existence of our being contains within it the mystery of the origin of our universe.

The fundamental nature of being is synergetic - the emergence of entity. Synergy is at the very root of being. A whole entity is more than the sum of its parts - it is a novel existent. Our universe is built by synergy. It is important to remember that even though we are composed of many smaller systems and a part of many larger systems, we are not just a part of a part of a part of something else. It is true that at a certain scale we become invisible - from the scale of the Earth from space and at the scale of the molecule - that is, we appear to cease to be distinct. Yet at our relational scale or degree of resolution we most certainly are distinct although existing as an interface with many other systems. Each being is novel and distinct at its own level of scale and as such more than the sum of its parts and non reducible or divisible - a half a flower is not really a half a flower: a half a flower is half of a dead flower. The flower itself is distinct in its being and more than the sum of its parts.

What is the Structure of Being?

Just how to we come to understand the nature of being? I maintain that this can only come about individually by reflection upon experiencing. We have to do it for ourselves by conscious awareness of what is going on. Unfortunately not too many philosophers have done a very good job of describing being so we will have to rely on our own direct observation.

I find that the most useful philosophies have descriptions of the processes of being that I can observe and/or modify myself. I will try to give as clear a description as I can about the holism I experience as my being. I will identify the parts, functions, and relations of the experience I call being.

The philosopher George Santayana described our being as composed of essence, matter, truth, and spirit. The connections between essence, matter, and spirit seem to point towards a possibility for observation while experiencing but there is no clearly apparent indication of which is operating when. While this combination of elements is interesting, I have not found it that useful for more easily rendering the operations of my self conscious to my present awareness.

Years ago I decided that the model of being described by Gurdjieff and Ouspensky resembled more my own experience of self than that of Carl Jung, the more popular master psychologist. Jung described being as composed of thinking, feeling, sensing, and intuiting parts of the brain functions. Although this more closely resembles my own experience than the categories described by Santayana, it still comes up short.

As the functions of my bio machine apply to me I would say that for observational purposes Gurdjieff's description of human being as composed of instinctive, sexual, moving, emotional, and intellectual functions are more useful - they also correspond more directly with the physical structure of the brain.

Yet these descriptions of being focus on the human experience of the self in our universe, and in order to get at the nature of being we must start earlier in the process and look at what are the basic constituents of existence itself which give rise to such grand productions as the individual self.

Our human being-ness involves the presence of a physical body, the sensation of living force or spirit, experience of consciousness, and the presence of a self. Yet on a more basic level, and one which we share with other beings, we exist in timespace, and are composed of matter and energy and a degree of awareness.

A working definition of matter is the substance occupying space. Our closest relation to matter is our physical body. We have the experience of being conscious matter. I believe that there is an artificial distinction of the different between organic and inorganic matter. There is a great difference but it is not necessarily absolute - on one hand the universe is dead and on the other it is alive: this is abhorrent to our common sense. The whole universe developed from something smaller than the 'size' of an atom and the tiniest bit of matter has the potential for being part of the manifestation of life. I find it more enlightening to treat the subject of matter as living and aware in the sense of its potential - life can not come from a dead universe.

A working definition of energy is a capacity for doing work or a force of expression. This is a rather tough word to get a handle on, perhaps we should say it is the strength of the tendencies to relate. This description would work well in the realm of atomic particles for these entities are essentially possibilities of interrelation. Potentiality is a big part of energy - the possibilities of combination of elements, and there are many different 'types' of energy: nuclear energy, solar energy, thermal energy, electro-magnetic energy.

A working definition of timespace is the environment in which we find ourselves. According to Einstein time and space must be taken together for our environment is dynamic involving motion of matter through time. Space is actually not empty, it is matter in a form which is very light, like a very thin gas. Yet this light matter of space cannot be taken separately from is existence in time. According to Einstein timespace is multi-dimensional and 'curved.'

A working definition of awareness is the ability to respond to the environment as an individual entity. The individual entity is reacting to its environment as an entity. We find very basic forms of this in the way molecules approach some of the other molecules while avoiding others. On the molecular scale we could say there is a degree (albeit very small) of intelligent behavior for self maintenance. So we can take this notion of awareness as a built in function of a system which increases in capacity with a system's degree of complexity.

I can definitely say that my being is an intersection of matter and energy in timespace interpenetrated by my awareness of existence.

I think that if we look carefully at how each of these components of being relate or interact we find them blending together into a variety of phenomena of which we are also very familiar.

Upon a further exploration of observation I discover that I am alive in the present, I experience an élan vital or life force, an ambience emanating from the combination of energy, matter, and awareness. By direct and immediate observation I recognize my body - a combination of energy and matter through time. I discover that I experience my self- including my mind - this is distinct and is a product of my consciousness of the matter of my body through time. I also have the possibility for consciously evolving my soul - the combination of my mind and energy through timespace.

A working definition of body is the collection of matter at any given time taken to make up my physical system and its environment. Where the body ends and the rest of the universe begins is a tricky thing to ascertain for the distinctions or boundaries of physical space in our scale disappears when we reach the atomic scale. My brain is part of my body, and it is this instrument which enables my conscious awareness of my body as a distinct entity in the environment.

A working definition of spirit is the animate energy through which you live. Your life force, your chi. One's spirit is easily sensed as the feeling of being alive.

A working definition of consciousness is the immediate awareness of existence. This is not simple awareness - it is awareness advanced to the degree where there is not merely a reactive or responsive awareness, but an awareness of the distinctness of one's entity, the processes within it, and one's reactions to the environment around one. Simple awareness is merely a responsive reaction; consciousness is a holistic awareness of entity. There is a scale of consciousness. We share this awareness with many other creatures on the Earth but no one would argue that the human consciousness is the same as that of an alligator. Each entity can have more or less consciousness within their system of being.

A working definition of the mind is the collection of behavioral programming instituted within the thinking, feeling, moving, and instinctive parts of the brain of an individual. Initially all of these functions have been filled with information placed there not by ones' self, but by others in the environment and randomly by individual experience. As one matures one becomes able to rewrite these internal programs. The mind is generally a reactive mechanism based on association and learned response patterns.

A working definition of soul is the conscious individuality each individual may grow out of the random collection of impulses, sensations, ideas, and actions given to them through genetics, parenting, others, and general life experience. Your soul is your conscious, independently evolved Real "I", not the unconscious ego. Your soul is a combination of all of the other aspects of your distinctness as an entity and more than the sum of its parts. I wish to stress that the soul, in this definition, is not something which automatically occurs without effort. It is not something with which we are born, although the embedded potential is with us from birth. Our systems are like a device which must be started. Unless you pull the cord, your lawnmower will not start - it requires effort.

So what are the defining characteristics of being to which we may point that all beings share? We can rule out the soul as such as well as the mind and consciousness, for only very special beings have these capacities. So too the life force or spirit, for not all things have this function as we know it. This leave the body, and although all beings science currently recognizes have a material body we can not be sure that this is a universal criteria. Should we then consider matter to be common to all being? Probably not, for there are particles - for instance photons and neutrinos - which exist but seemingly have no mass as perceived by the current state of the art physics of know matter.

What about timespace? Do all beings share existence in timespace? Well we know that for any thing to be existent it must exist in the present. Whether we see it or not is not a requirement, for many things which we do not see exist, such as other galaxies and subatomic particles. We can say that common sense will tell us that a characteristic of being is existence in the present. Being, by existence in time, undergoes change and thereby has an aging (coming together, growth, dissolution) process. It is probable that all beings share a relation to the greater field of timespace and being called the universe. There may be beings in other universes or outside of our realm of timespace but such entities would be hard to connect with much less recognize. The possibility is there but very hard to relate to our understanding of being.

Does a being necessarily have energy? Well my initial response is to say, think of one that doesn't! It seems that energy must be a constituent of being for everything we are aware of in the universe and the universe itself is composed of energy in some form or other.

Should we consider awareness to be a basic constituent of being? It is very hard to describe the awareness of a system very far removed from our own scale in the universe. Its 'awareness' would of course be quite different from ours. Particles of matter seem to relate which each other on a very fundamental level and with a bit of license we can stretch the definition of awareness to include the behavior of inter systems relations. After all an atom reacts to its environment as its type of atom, not another: a hydrogen atom relates differently than a carbon atom. As far a stars and galactic structures they too probably have an 'awareness' - they respond to their environments as the beings they are and not as some other. Although this still is a very basic form of what we call awareness and may not adequately describe the extent of the awareness of such beings - we can at least extend them this recognition. Who knows what a star ponders?

Matter as we know it does not seem to be a universal in the realm of being, however energy appears to be a part of all things, as does the environment of timespace, and the system's ability for an individual response to it - the being's 'awareness'. From this basic recognition - energy, timespace, and awareness of entity are basic constituents of being - we can go on to further ponder our own existence from the ground up and realize that we too share a part of the great field of being in timespace called the universe.

The Only Future Evolution for Us is Spiritual

"'Superman' if he ever enters scientific thought, is regarded as the product of the evolution of man, although as a rule this term is not used at all and is replaced by the term "a higher type of man." In this connection, evolutionary theories have become the basis of a naive optimistic view of life and of man. It is as though people said to themselves: now that evolution exists and now that science recognizes evolution, it follows that all is well and must in future become still better. In the imagination of the modern man reasoning from the point of view of the ideas of evolution, everything should have a happy ending. It is precisely here that the chief mistake with regard to the ideas of evolution lies. Evolution, however it be understood, is not assured for anyone or anything. The theory of evolution means only that nothing stands still, nothing remains as it was, everything inevitably goes either up or down, but not at all necessarily up; to think that everything necessarily goes up - this is the most fantastic conception of the possibilities of evolution.

All the forms of life we know are either the result of evolution, or the result of degeneration. But we cannot discriminate between these two processes, and we very often mistake the results of degeneration for the results of evolution. Only in one respect we make no mistake: we know that nothing remains as it was. Everything "lives," everything is transformed."

Peter D. Ouspensky

A New Model of our universe, Chapter III, Superman

Mounting evidence indicates that for us as individuals the mechanical evolution of nature is not an option. At the same time the wilder forces of nature that shaped the appearance of man are increasingly controlled and circumvented by us so that the forces that affect the development of humanity are now more the creation of humanity itself than that of nature.

"Nature is trying very hard to make us succeed, but nature does not depend on us. We are not the only experiment."

---R. Buckminster Fuller

Interview in the Minneapolis Tribune April 30, 1978

The being of an individual can only develop so far in its spiritual and material growth before something besides mechanical development over successive generations of entities is required. Although everything external to one is already engaged in activities set in motion by other forces, the addition of your own intent and will can change everything.

The mutual revelation is that we have the power within us to be the co-creators in our local universes, and by combining efforts with each other we can be the co-creators of our mutual destiny on the planet and beyond, avoiding the annihilation of our spirit and species.

The role of the complete human is to become a change agent of human destiny. We all have the ‘Causal Spark’ or ‘Creative Spirit’ within us. Our destiny is to be engineers of the synthesis of human experience - entities that dream and artistically co-create their futures into actual existence. The role of the individual as it always has been is to become a philosopher, a explorer after their own origins and destinies. The duty of the individual is to awaken the spiritual aspect within, by unifying the thinking, feeling, and sensing aspects of being. Only after your psychological parts have become unified can you become a creator of your own destiny and an co-creator of human destiny.

Human awareness produced from this unification of the personal self will go about the synthesis of knowledge from experience and from differing domains of information by the use of insight, intuition, and creativity - the ability to imagine dreams into real existence. This type of activity will actually alter the realities of an individual's existence and being. The ability to do this is rooted in the natural human understanding that the archetypal aspect of the mind is an access to a realm of potential not unlike that of a Platonic idea - an archetype is a morphic field that plays a formative influence in nature itself. In this way our conscious thoughts can influence and modify our bodies, individual realities, and futures, as well as the lives and destinies of others.

We should pay heed to the words of Albert Einstein -

"Concern for man himself and his fate must always form the chief interest of all technical endeavors, concern for the great unsolved problems of the organization of labor and the distribution of goods - in order that the creations of our mind shall be a blessing and not a curse to mankind. Never forget this in the midst of your diagrams and equations."

--Albert Einstein

Address, California Institute of Technology 1931

A key realization is the extreme preciousness of life - not only our lives as humans but life on Earth and even the existence of our universe in general. When we realize that our mechanical, spiritual, and material development can only go so far - at that point we must become the artists of action in our lives - we recognize the need for us to grow ourselves consciously or else our development will become retarded. Not everything is foreordained, there are unpredictable possibilities of construction and destruction, it is up to us to recognize the imperative of the situation of our own spiritual growth.

After all this time and the progression of stages of human growth the widespread emergence of self consciousness began in what we call the modern era. We had provided the material, emotional, and intellectual means for survival for large portions of the population and the recognition slowly took place over the last two centuries that the exercise of reason alone was not enough to lead a full, happy, and self directed life. Fewer people tolerated the bondage of physical slavery and especially in the West many gains in liberation were made.

Yet the profiteers have always been busy at work, trying to figure out how to increase productivity, maximize worker potential, etc. The slaves became workers, it being more profitable to pay wages to the slaves and sell them products than to pay for their food, shelter, health costs, education, and entertainment. Once again the cooperative effort of the people to improve their reality became a new tool for the profiteers. The people in many parts of the world were freed from physical serfdom and bondage only to find themselves wage slaves in company towns. Industrial societies are now experiencing a shift from economies dependent upon physical labor to economies reliant on intellectual labor. Now in what is called an information or a digital age it is claimed that the role of worker insight, intuition, personal knowledge, experience, and creativity are increasing factors in the value and productivity of the worker.

Something different is happening. People with better educations want to lead more meaningful and self-directed lives. There is an increasing interest in teachings about and methods for self-knowledge and evolution. Many "Yuppies" are leaving their jobs and exploring their interests instead of merely working for more money to consume more things. Similarly the terrorist bombings around the world remind us that there is no real security and that there are no guarantees in life. Yet the sideshows of industrial society are not enough to provide a sense of full existence - are TV and shopping or debauchery all that life has to offer? Certainly not, and the widespread understanding of these facts is generating a great deal of anxiety for very many people.

Self-consciousness is what has been developing, albeit slowly, all along. It is this development which is the natural progression of our evolution and not increasing methods for slave management. Now it is up to us to ensure that the evolution of our self-knowledge and consciousness is not also co-opted by the profiteers for their increasing profit. The stakes are high, there is no more mechanical evolution.

2. WHAT IS THE UNIVERSE?

THE UNIVERSE IS A LIVING SYSTEM THAT GENERATES LIFE AND CONSCIOUSNESS

"If we present, for the sake of argument, the theory of evolution in a most scientific formulation, we have to say something like this: "At a certain moment of time the temperature of the Earth was such that it became most favorable for the aggregation of carbon atoms and oxygen with the nitrogen-hydrogen combination, and that from random occurrances of large clusters molecules occurred which were most favorable structured for the coming about of life, and from that point it went on through vast stretches of time, until through processes of natural selection a being finally occurred which is capable of choosing love over hate and justice over injustice, of writing poetry like that of Dante, composing music like that of Mozart, and making drawings like those of Leonardo." Of course, such a view of cosmogenesis is crazy. And I do not at all mean crazy in the sense of slangy invective but rather in the technical meaning of psychotic. Indeed such a view has much in common with certain aspects of schizophrenic thinking."

Karl Stern, The Flight from Woman, Chapter 12 New York, 1965

The Universe is Alive!

What is more miraculous than individuals able to be present with, think in, and discourse about the nature of our universe and our own existence? The existence of something rather than nothing in our universe is a peculiar fact, and a huge philosophical and scientific issue. The field of ontology is the study of being. If we are to truly begin the exploration of common sense spirituality we must start with the field of ontology, for all things which exist have being - being is mutual to all things in the universe.

It is increasingly evident from celestial observations through the Hubble space telescope and other observatories that the universe is full of galaxies containing stars with planets. Astronomers have also discovered that our solar system contains vast amounts of ice in comets the size of Mount Everest orbiting beyond Pluto. The possible discovery of Martian bacteria fossils and water on one of Jupiter's moons could be the clues revealing that wherever there is liquid water (and maybe some places where there isn't) life forms will emerge. The universe is a huge ocean of particles and structures on many scales out of which under the proper circumstances complex self-organizing entities form.

With the sheer number of galaxies with stars and planets and water, it becomes obvious that the emergence and evolution of abundant forms of life is a basic part of the design of the universe - look at the diversity of life on this planet. Life can not be an accidental product of a dead universe. Yet we always try to explain away this mystery of being by giving it titles, labels, categories, and by imposing intellectually conceived structures on top of it. From a common sense point of view we must acknowledge that our universe exists and that we exist within it. Our universe came from somewhere and as a consequence we all share a similar origin.

Our minds naturally seek for connection and meaning between events and ideas. Because of our unique human relationship with our universe and the design of our brains, we look for proof that our universe is based on a more purposive design than accidental and that we have a relation to it.

The greatest miracle and mystery is the creation of our universe and the existence of your life within it. Yet we deny our very existence as a herald of the mystery and a proof of the organization of our universe. All life demonstrates organization in our universe by the obvious fact of its existence. If there was no order in our universe, our very bodies would not hold together over the course of our lives - we would only be a fuzzy mush of atoms. The very order of the universe produces people like us.

Trying to account for and explain this great mystery has generated thousands of ideas and hundreds of religious and scientific institutions -- some beautiful, others horrifying to our common sense human values. The imposition of ideas generated for controlling other individuals' perceptions about the mystery has nothing to do with the fact of the mystery itself.

Strangely, conceptions about the universe have only in the end served the ambitions and agendas of power concentrating individuals. Thus, historically, most religious institutions around the world have done a disservice to the enigma of life by insisting that their particular institution had a monopoly on truth. Sadly, these institutions have appeared concerned only with controlling people's perceptions and behavior - one comes to the mystery by direct personal experience about the wonder of ones' own existence -- through the wonder of life itself and not by the admonitions or intimidations of others.

To make sense of our existence we look for order in the universe and attempt to create meaning in our lives as a reflection of our ability to perceive this order. However even today there are those who argue against the idea that there is a basic evolutionary order of life to the universe. There are several primary beliefs people will articulate when they argue against the presence of a cosmic formula for life.

The most common rebuttal against concepts of order comes from people who are recovering from intolerant religious experiences. They have suffered spiritual violence by having been force fed abusive religious dogma or practices. Such abuse and violence, in the name of love, forces the individual to reject all considerations of value in spiritual systems of perception and belief. This is an error of reasoning that can divorce common sense from all the subtle impressions of life and thereby harden the ego. The error is the belief that since some religious institutions or people may have faults, everything upon which spirituality is based is also faulty.

Then there are those who cannot believe there could be any mystery or ''Gods" or ''Goddesses" and that there can not be any magic to our existence because there is "evil" on Earth. Yet the evil around us is not necessarily found in our universe at large or any ''God'' in specific. Most often it is the product of ambitious and intolerant people who are willing to use any means to achieve their ends. Tragically, these people are often so removed from the damage caused by their actions they consequently do not perceive their guilt in taking a bountiful paradise and making it into a hell on Earth. Just because some people lose control of their humanity and common sense does not mean that we should blame anything else divine or otherwise for the destruction caused by greedy individuals. A flood is not a manifestation of evil when it washes the houses of the poor people living on its banks downstream but leaves the ruling people's house on the bluff unscathed. Such an event is the result of ongoing social processes in the area. All things which we consider evil are directly traceable to the ignorance and hostility of individual people. It is a product of misused choice, not a key component of our universe.

There are also those intellectuals who use modern scientism, rationalism, and deconstructionism to maintain that since they cannot see or feel the source of our arising as beings, any allowance for mystery and magic is foolish. What is really foolish is to believe that there is any objectivity. Science is an art conceived, designed, and practiced by subjective individuals.

Today's science is very often tomorrow's debunked credo. All the intellectual prattle about deconstructionism and the meaningless absurdity of life is really nothing more than uninformed opinion. The belief that there is no order or meaning to existence is simply a belief, and one that over time has less and less observational support.

With the sheer number of galaxies with stars and planets and water, it becomes obvious that the emergence and evolution of abundant forms of life is a basic part of the design of the universe - look at the diversity of life on one planet. Life can not be an accidental product of a dead universe.

Yet we always try to explain away this mystery of being by giving it titles, labels, categories, and by imposing intellectually conceived structures on top of it. From a common sense point of view we must acknowledge that our universe exists and that we exist within it. Our universe came from somewhere and as a consequence we share a similar origin. Our minds naturally seek for connection and meaning between events and ideas. Because of our unique human relationship with our universe and the design of our brains, we look for proof that our universe is based on a more purposive design than accidental and that we have a relation to it.

The primary beliefs and underlying assumptions we hold about our universe and our existence within it determine a great deal of our attitudes and behaviors towards others and our environment. Only by examining the assumptions behind our view of being can we come to a conscious understanding of why we think and act the way we do. Without such an examination we have no certitude; we do not know and cannot explain why we believe and do what we do. This is why we must first of all reflect upon where it is from which we come in the attempt to achieve any mutual understandings of our place in the universe.

We all instinctively know that our universe comes from something or somewhere. We know that there is life in our universe, as well as consciousness and we know that both are built from the same building blocks as the rest of our universe.

All things that exist in our universe have being. All entities are contained within the mutual field of being of our universe. The field of being extends to the limits of time itself and probably beyond. From this field of being the initial forces of creation of our universe came into existence.

Trying to account for and explain this great mystery has generated thousands of ideas and hundreds of religious and scientific institutions -- some beautiful, others horrifying to our common sense human values. The imposition of ideas generated for controlling other individuals' perceptions about the mystery has nothing to do with the fact of the mystery itself.

After thousands of years of inspiration, arduous research, meditation, contemplation, and experimentation only a few things have been determined about the great mystery of being:

1) It absolutely is.

2) It reflects many aspects of intelligent organization.

3) Life and Consciousness naturally emerge from the field of being called the universe

4) Humans seem to have a unique and passionate relationship with it.

4) It seems to be the primary issue of life for most humans.

5) It frequently provokes the most violent behavior in people.

6) It can also bring out the very best in people who are sincere and have a conscience.

Having acknowledged the basic field of being as a mutual phenomenon of life we must now turn our attention to see whether there are some things we can say about the study of our existence in the universe which fall within the realm of common sense.

The Universe is not Hostile to Life!

In short our universe from which we come is exceedingly generous. Our lives, minds, hearts, and bodies are all a gift. A beautiful planet like the Earth is a precious gift beyond duplication by us. The richness of raw materials on our planet is a gift which has enabled the production capacity of the industrial revolution and the exponential growth of the human population. The variety of life on the planet is a gift that kept us supplied for millions of years. It has provided all that we could need as artists in the ongoing process of reality co-creation.

Matter, consciousness, energy, and space-time are all intertwined. From one perspective physical matter does not exist at all - that is, in the atomic and subatomic scales the solids we call bodies do not exist, they are epiphenomenal. Our bodies are, according to the new vision in physics, from the atom's scale, slow motion by-products of atomic interactions. Curiously enough atoms are not really supposed to exist either according to many modern physicists. All known matter from atoms to your body to all of the stars in the Milky Way are the product of strings.

When one changes the perspective of time some patterns disappear while other appear. Our universe is composed of matter easily understood as musical notes or tones that are the combinations of the resonances in the air of the vibrations of strings when plucked.

According to modern physics strings, in dimensions of time and space faster and smaller than we can imagine, are the primary building blocks of the universe. All that we know are slowed down after effects of the patterns of interactions these strings.

According to Einstein's equation Energy = Matter times the Speed of Light2; both matter and energy are convertible. whereas the physical aspect of the universe is like energy slowing down and condensing into matter; the big bang of the universe is matter speeding up and exploding into energy.

We know, as a product of direct observation that both matter and energy exist, and that there is something observing them. All are products of the universe. Verily, even I am a synergetic production of both matter and energy. My brain has physical components like axons, dendrites, and chemicals, as well as components of energy like electricity. To my observation and all of those around me, I exist and am not only these things in a pile, but these things in a special systems organization which enables the synergetic me to emerge. I have a life force that keeps me going as a dynamic system and I have these other components of matter and energy. I am an example of the symbiotic relations of matter, energy., and spirit. Matter is the epiphenomena of energy, and spirit is the epiphenomena of living physical being, or matter.

If you accept this position (which I hope you can observe for your self), that spirit, energy, and matter all exist within our immediate experience, it leads one to the inevitable conclusion that such a product is not only a possibility in the universe but a provable fact - at least to common sense.

The universe produces energy, matter, and spirit and all three together when the conditions are right. If the universe in its vast bounty has decreed that life emerges from hydrogen then life must exist in many places, for most of the universe is made up of hydrogen - the water in you is made from hydrogen produced in the big bang!

Taken together this means that we have a living universe, and one in which the division of organic and inorganic may only apply in some areas, or on our planet. We need to look at the combinations of chemicals, minerals, and atoms in much the same way we look at the systems formed from combinations of cells.

It is my belief that the universe itself is alive in some way in which we do not comprehend and that it too, like all else within it, is more than the sum of its parts.

One of the basic components of being that we regularly observe and interact with is called matter. In "A New Refutation of Time" Borges describes Berkeley's ideas of matter:

"Berkeley denied the existence of matter. This does not mean, one should note, that he denied the existence of colors, odors, tastes, sounds, and tactile sensations; what he denied was that, aside from these perceptions, which make up the external world, there was anything invisible, intangible, called matter. He denied that there were pains that no one feels, colors that no one sees, forms that no one touches. He reasoned that to add matter to our perceptions is to add an inconceivable, superfluous world to the world. He believed in the world of appearances woven by our senses, but understood that the material world is an illusory duplication."

Rudy Rucker in his book The Fourth Dimension goes on to state,

...."It is surprising to learn that such a seemingly perverse world view is embraced by modern physicists. In the words of John Wheeler, one of the grand old men of physics:

"No elementary phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon." By this, Wheeler means that the rise of quantum mechanics has demolished the view that the universe sits "out there" while we sit back and observe it. The kinds of questions one asks - and the order one asks them in - has a profound influence on the answers one gets, and on the world view one builds up."

A reasonable approach to the existence of matter is not assuming matter does not exist, but realizing that our perceptions of things are entirely products of our mind - colors, sights, sounds, smells, and sensations are all products of the brain - the forms into which our impressions are cast. There are, however, things that stimulate us from beyond our body, and this argues in favor the notion that actual things exist outside and independent of one's individual consciousness. The wavelength of light produces impressions upon me which are interpreted as a color. Something exists outside of me to produce the impressions I receive, however the perception of colors may be my mind's construction.

We can look at matter as the condensation of the light and energy emanated in the ray of creation that comes to us from the big bang. Matter has a dynamic quality to it, it has synergetic animate qualities at different levels of concentration. Einstein's famous formula, E = MC2 (Energy = Matter times the square of the speed of light) suggests how matter is energy slowed down, so to speak.

We Do Not Live in an Accidental Universe!

"All is flux, nothing stays still."

Heraclitus, from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers bk. IX

There are those who maintain that we live in an accidental, random, mechanical and purposeless universe devoid of any being, consciousness, life, or reality greater than that which we are able to perceive. This position is just a belief and a belief that has dwindling merit. This belief does not motivate an individual to better them self. Such an approach to life encourages a me-first value system, an attitude that nothing has any meaning, and the belief that no position is better than any other. This is a short-sighted and depressive belief is based on the use of thinking without common sense, the inclusion of individual experience, or love.

One of the areas that has been the subject of a tremendous amount of argumentation and speculation over the millennia is the origin of our universe. This is not an easy area for reasoning because it tends to arouse some of the strongest responses from people who would otherwise consider themselves even tempered. No other area of speculation has as much power to stir the imagination. The conclusions we come to about the place in which we live determine a lot about behaviors we generate. If we view our universe as hostile to life, and existence as a survival of the fittest, we will not be developing life fostering attitudes, philosophies, or social policies. To have a positive outlook on life we must understand a positive vision about the nature of our environment.

The origin of our universe is called alternately the Creation and the Big Bang. These two concepts are not necessarily absolute or contradictory. I will try to clear up some misconceptions that separate the state of the art in scientific theory from the religious and philosophical ideas of antiquity concerning the formation of our universe and how it operates.

We do not live in an accidental universe. Randomness would require dozens of billions if not trillions of years of "monkeys on typewriters" to orchestrate such a magnificently complex universe of such a precise and grand scale by accident. If the production of sentient co-creators of our universe is meaningless and accidental, then our universe is a huge and excessively frivolous waste of energy. If we truly play a role in the evolution of the universe and are not alone in this function then we may be very important not only to the evolution of the universe, but to the overall consciousness of the field of being. We may co-create the very impressions of the creative spirit. If one maintains that we co-creators of reality enhance the experience of our universe by helping to consciously create - then this means that not only do we have an important role to play but something returns to the source of our universe for all of its investment of time and energy in producing us.

We Live in a Musical Universe of Stings and Vibrations!

An understanding of dynamic systems is developed when using rhythm as the basis of the implicate order of a system. Music theory provides the dynamic paradigm through which conceptual systems can be represented. In physical space there is a juxtaposition of objects, which means that no two objects can occupy the same space at the same time. This creates an interesting situation. Ernst Mach asked the question, "Why do three tones form a triad and not a triangle?" As a tone sounds it fills all space, but when another tone sounds with it they sound together. When three tones sound they interpenetrate each other and form a triad, a chord which is a separate thing. The interpenetration of auditory space corresponds with the juxtaposition of objects in physical space. The fact that three tones create a new state called a chord means that there must be structure to auditory space, although an implicate order not requiring juxtaposition.

The fact that a chord appears tells us a great deal about the structure of our perceptive apparatus, which recognizes the synergy of the interference wave pattern called a chord. Our hearing apparatus is tuned to a frequency at which the chord makes sense. Simply perceiving simultaneous sounds will only create noise. Simultaneously sounding tones create the chord which is a product of tonal coexistence. A chord is formed from the mutual interrelations of the tones, they interact with both the observer and themselves in a direct relation in a particular scale.

The best evidence of auditory order is not merely the simultaneity of tones in the chord or motion of tones in scale, but the simultaneity of motions in polyphony. Melodic motion is related to motion from chain of events to chain of events. An excellent example cited by Zuckerkandl is from Verdi's opera Otello in which four simultaneous arias make musical, but not spatial sense. The phonograph needle can make only one movement at one time. Each individual section of ear membrane can only be in vibration at one time, and only one air wave can at any instant have propagated. No matter how many tones or arias are sung into a microphone, only one line will be recorded. Additional tones only result in a differently shaped line. Regarded as physical phenomena, simultaneously sounding tones are treated as simultaneous data not locally separated, coalescing into one. But when the physical event becomes a musical event the single wave on the record reveals a multiplicity of tones or arias and complex interrelations. Mathematical analysis will only explain which individual tones sound together and follow one another, but not how they are related to each other dynamically - that is, chordally and melodically.

The immaterial does not only exist psychically - it does not only come from within. The place of this "inner world" is just as much outside as in; the inner world extends as far as the world itself - the world itself is divided into an inner and an outer. Music brings to expression the mode of existence of the world that is of the same nature as the internal aspect of the psyche. This is the evidence that musical order, the order of auditory space, reflects the order of our perceptive and cognitive apparatus as well as the underlying order of the universe.

We hear a chord because we have the required relation to time and scale of experience. It also suggests that our perceptive and cognitive apparatuses are attuned to something immaterial which actually exists in both internal and external realms. Music is a bridge from the physical realm to the conceptual. Auditory space provides a key to understanding the order of conceptual space, the space of patterns and events that emerge in differing scales of time. Patterns that extend over time, i.e. causal patterns, can be described in terms analogous to auditory space.

If we can accept a notion of a creative spirit unfolding its design of synergy we can use this as a basis for exploring the parts and structure of that design. It is possible to understand that there are things moving within relativity and scale and of course these things are vibrations in different scales or in other words dimensions. The view of the harmonic universe is very natural to the human understanding of events. This is one of the oldest human cosmological understandings and quite possibly one of the best.

New scientific theories today suggest that atoms and their components may not actually be physical things in the way we think of them. Such entities are probabilities of interactions like musical notes which may combine simultaneously to produce a new entity - a chord.

The distinction between the material as the real and the immaterial as the unreal is reduced through an understanding of music theory. The rhythmic view of the universe regains a view of reality in tune with magical and mythical ideas such as the pervasion of nature by immaterial forces, the purely dynamic transcending the physical, space without the distinction of places, time in which past and future coexist with the present, experience of the world in the mode of participation, and the external and internal interpenetrating.

We can see that there are many indications pointing to a rhythmic universe which naturally emerges life - it is not a universe that is hostile to life. The common sense view of an emergent universe leaves open the possibility of a mutual field of being, a bountiful wellspring from which entities arise.

One of the ways to demonstrate the existence of structure in our universe is to inventory what we can observe through common sense about our existence. There are a number of creative forces that are easily identifiable with common sense observation of existence. The following is an exploration of some of the creative forces and aspects of being in our universe:

Creation

At one time all was stillness - a stillness so profound as to be incomprehensible to any existent thing. From out of the innermost depths of this stillness there came a "quantum" movement, a ripple of timespace, an explosion, and light as our universe turned on. The result is the gift of the mysterious source of existence - the energy behind creativity. We live on the edge of a shock wave of timespace (or ray of creation) generated by the original causal spark continually expanding "outward" from the source.

This original ripple generated by the source of our arising is responsible for all we have now. It was the manifestation of the underlying vibratory pattern of ultimate simplicity out of which the ultimate complexity unfolds, containing all the potential of the uncreated universe.

The actual existence of our universe is produced from the initial combination of only a few vibratory emanations to unfold on ever increasing scales of complexity as it reaches toward crescendo from the level the big bang itself to quarks and atoms, molecules and minerals, amino acids and microorganisms, single celled organisms and vegetables, animals and ultimately sentient life forms like humans.

The infinite has condensed to the finite and expands again towards the infinite. We work to co-create the process of our universe by creating reality and thereby altering the actual universe.

The pyramid is not complete without its cap - conscious life is the eye on the top of the pyramid of universe - we are the small that rides on top of the large. By adding meaning to existence, reflection upon being, and the manufacture of conscious reality as a distillation of chemical/electrical synergy the creation looks back upon itself, it is the snake swallowing its own tail.

Our experiences co-create the ongoing creative process of our universe. The basic patterns underlying our universe enable novel possibilities to manifest from the unfolding complexity. Our lives, as they are revealed to us, alter and expand the experience of our universe . Each of us is a refraction of the ray of creation emanating from the invisible sun of the Causal Spark.

We only know that part of the universe that is observable to us from our angle on the big bang. We may only be observing one aspect of a much greater phenomena - there may be other universes and we may only be able to perceive this particular one. We stand downriver from a great lake and do not know whether we are on the banks of the only river emanating from this lake. We only perceive this one river in our scale of existence. Let us borrow a term from G.I. Gurdjieff who called what we can perceive of the creation of the universe, the Ray of Creation. This "Ray" may only be one of many many others.

Our universe is an engine for the creation of sentient life. How do we know? All we must do is to look at what has actually happened! Why is there sentient life? We are continually altering our environments, ideas, cultures, etc. and in this manner we create the way in which things occur, the reason for sentient life is the co-creation of reality.

Our job is to help in a life-fostering manner the unfolding process of the co-creation of our universe. Our only true jobs are seeking enlightenment and practicing kindness.

Cosmology is the study of the parts, structures, and functions of the universe.

I am not going to deal with astrophysics here, merely that which is obvious to the individual perception. There are relative forces on differing levels of the grand scale of the universe. This means that things relate to other things near their own scale of existence. The universe is relative to the galaxy, and the galaxy is relative to our sun, however the sun does not have the same relation to the universe as does the galaxy. The sun is relative to the Earth and Moon. They have relation to organic life on the planet - this in turn is relative to species or type of creature: and this is finally relative to you. You have a relation to your organs that in turn have relation to their cells although your relation to your cells is rather distant. Cells of course are composed of molecules and they are relative to atoms......and so on. Although I may have a relation with you, my relative relation to the universe at large or atoms at small is rather negligible. I have more of a relation to my species - humanity, and my organs. The key point is that I have more of a direct relation to those things that are relative to my place in the scale of size and space-time.

Early views of the creation were that it was instantaneous, complete, and perfect in its design and execution. An observation of our environment will tell us that the universe in which we live is dynamic. It is in a constant state of change. A practical creation is evolutionary and experimental. We live in an unfinished universe. If it were finished or perfect or ideal there would be no reason for us or any other self-organizing entities in such an experiment.

Early cosmologies (models of our universe) were dominated by hierarchy. Very detailed explanations of our universe were combined with elaborate levels of spirits and angels and projected onto our universe to explain the processes of change and creation. Over time the very notion of a 'God' 'out there somewhere' paved the way for science, since a distant 'God' could rule by fiat but something would have to carry out the orders. The early thinkers believed that 'God's orders were carried out by principles in the physical universe and as a result these principles were no longer thought of as deities in a pagan pantheon. By the later 1500's the hierarchical universe eventually was thought to run by clockwork principles which mathematically and geometrically combined to produce phenomena.

Modern scientists now acknowledge that our universe is much more complex than simple clockwork. Only a finished creation in perfect balance could operate like clockwork. Such old models do not work in what we now realize to be an unfinished creation. Because our universe is based on whole entities in dynamic processes being more than the sum of their parts many unpredictable results are produced.

The following are a sampling of some of the major components of the parts and structure of the universe:

Time and Space:

It must be noted that the speed of existence, or the duration of a being has a direct relation to its size. Most tiny particles have an extremely short span of existence relative to our scale of perception. There is also a loose corollary between the size of a living creature and its duration on Earth. However when one explores cosmic scales the relation of time and size becomes quite striking. In good health I may live 80 years but in good health our sun could live for 10 billion! Who knows how long a galaxy or universe can live? The duration of my life from the time scale of the sun probably closely resembles my relation to the lifetime of an atomic particle in my finger. The important thing to remember is that the duration of existence is directly relative to scale of perception in time and space.

Relativity:

The concept of relativity is usually identified with Albert Einstein. According to old theories in physics we can only describe the geometrical form of the universe if matter is conceived of being at rest. In actuality nothing is at rest. Each thing has its own time. The Special Theory of Relativity states that each of two moving systems relative to each other have their own times, perceived and measured by an observer moving with a particular system.

However, since everything in the universe is in motion (whether in time, or cosmologically, or as a result of sub-atomic interactions), the observer's system is in motion also. Pictures, models, or theories of the universe developed from a conceptual position that one can treat the state of the observer's system as being at rest are inaccurate since they will encompass an artificial starting point - a frozen picture model of time-space. Without knowing the motions of the relative observer's system, one can not know the form or geometrical structure of the local universe.

If one said "stop universe" and it did, and a model was constructed, it would resemble a still picture. this is Euclidean geometrical thinking in three dimensions. Relativity says, "stop observer," and creates a model of the universe like a movie. This is a representation of the universe in four dimensions. In a picture individual elements may appear to have interconnection, but always relative to the observer in its scale. In actuality the observer and its system are in motion and the interconnections of elements in local systems move not only in relation to the observer, but in relation to other local systems. This requires at least one more dimension.

A driver in a car is stationary relative to the car and is in motion relative to the Earth. It does not make any difference in modern physics if the car is considered in motion or if the Earth is considered in motion; relative motion occurs. But what is forgotten is that nothing is stationary in universe, and therefore the coordinate system of the car and the Earth is also in motion. Models of the universe made from the car will not include the relative motion of the system which the car, driver, and Earth are moving with. Motion is only perceived relative to other local systems.

All that exists is what it is only within the limits of a certain and very restricted scale. On a different scale it becomes something else. In other words, it is obvious to common sense that every thing and every event has a certain meaning only within the limits of a certain scale, when compared with things and events of proportions not very far removed from its own.

Relativity and Scale

The phrase "everything is relative" is an absolutist statement. Everything is relative to its place in scale in the scheme of our universe. The relation of forces, events, or entities can involve active, passive, and neutral roles in their own scales.

For example the proton, electron, and neutron have relative relations in their dimension in scale but not in our dimension. Likewise our bodies have a relation to Earth's gravity but not the same relation to the gravity of the sun. Our solar system has a relative relation of sun and planets in one scale but the relation of the solar system as a whole to the gravitational center of the galaxy and the stars around which our solar system orbits is much different. Relations change as scale changes. Atoms do have something to do with galaxies but to relate them changes in scale must be applied to the equations of relativity. Scale and relativity combine to create the diversity of entities in our universe.

It must be noted that the speed of existence, or the duration of a being has a direct relation to its size. Most tiny particles have an extremely short span of existence relative to our scale of perception. There is also a loose corollary between the size of a living creature and its duration on Earth. However when one explores cosmic scales the relation of time and size becomes quite striking. In good health I may live 80 years but in good health our sun could live for 10 billion! Who knows how long a galaxy or universe can live? The duration of my life from the time scale of the sun probably closely resembles my relation to the lifetime of an atomic particle in my finger. The important thing to remember is that the duration of existence is directly relative to scale of perception in time and space.

Waves and Particles

According to Fritjof Kapra the temporally tangible forms of phenomena are the products of underlying processes. The only way to have stable systems undergoing processes of change is if rhythmic patterns of interrelation are formed such a fluctuations, oscillations, vibrations, or waves. All perceived ordered structures arise from such rhythmic patterns. Kapra points out that at every level of scale in timespace rhythmic interaction is present - from atoms, to molecules, to living organisms, and galactic phenomena.

The interconnectedness of elements and the dynamic nature of the universe are fundamental to the human observer. Prigogine maintained that fluctuation is the basis for order, but it can be maintained that fluctuation is rhythm in nature, and that the basis for order in a system - its implicate order - is the rhythm of the interconnection and interfunctioning of the system elements in a time transcending formulation.

Kapra suggests that the paradigm shift from the structural view of the universe to a rhythmic view will have extremely important implications for the development of a unified theory of the universe.

Jakob von Uexkull introduced the term "plan" - a type of order for which there is no precedent in the space of places, but which is of decisive significance for the understanding biological processes because the tonal order represents this type of biological thinking. Uexkull defines biology as "the science of the plan factor in all living things.” Chemistry and physics do not know plan as a natural factor...Physics asserts that the natural objects of our environment obey only causality. In opposition to this, biology asserts that, in addition to causality, there is also a second subjective rule, by which we order objects - the principle of plan, which is a necessary complement to our concept of the universe. It is interesting that the biologists who study nature, that is life, are the scientists to have discovered that music provides a model for place-transcending spatial order that suggests a possible way of understanding the creative processes in living things.

The idea of a rhythmic universe full of vibrations has been taken a step further into something called Superstring theory which suggests that the component parts of atoms are like oscillating strings - and it suggests that the big bang came from the oscillation of perhaps just one of these strings. String theory is quite provocative because it treats atoms not as moving particles, but from a multiple dimensional point of view. The atom is an artificial three dimensional construct which is observed, because of our perceptive apparati and the time-space scale we live in, only in its fourth dimensional aspect - a line.

It seems as if the ancient idea of the musical, harmonic universe may make a comeback!

Synergy

"Synergy means behavior of whole systems unpredicted by the behavior of their parts."

R. Buckminster Fuller, What I Have Learned / How Little I Know 1969

The underlying principle behind the creation of entities in the field of being is that of synergy. It is a process in which elements relative to each other come into relation and by so doing create an new entity.

Synergy is a term meaning that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Why is this so? We know it is a fact. The living human being is made of many small parts, but they all add up to one of your best friends. A car and a knowledgeable driver add up to a function that a pile of parts on the side of the road, without a mechanic, never will.

Hyper Dimensionality

As observed by P.D. Ouspensky, there are 4 kinds of related motion in a particular scale of perception. There is the imperceptibly slow, the visible, the fast, and the extremely fast - the invisible, but result producing. The observable universe for humans is constructed upon this scaled division of relative speeds, and the interrelation of these speeds to matter in space-time produce the visible system for the observer.

These four kinds of motion correspond to the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth dimensions. To use the chess paradigm, the third dimension is represented by a pawn. The fourth dimension is represented by a move of the piece on the board. The fifth dimension may be represented as a gambit - a tangled complex of interacting possibilities on the chessboard. In this example the sixth dimension for us is the chess game considered simultaneously. Beyond the dimensions of point, line, plane, and cube there is a period of four relative dimensions of scale in motion and size (for size: the imperceptibly small, the small, the large, and the very large).

As an example of dimensionality, take the paradigm of an ant taking a footstep while a car whizzes by at 120 mph. To the observers in the car in a given second the footstep of an ant will have been invisible. To the ant the car's passing will appear simultaneous - so fast it is invisible, but it can still produce a dramatic effect for the ant. To an observer walking down the road, the car will whiz by, but have perceptible relation, as will an ant's footstep. To an observer on an airplane overhead, the ant's footstep will not even exist at all, nor will the ant. A human may be visible from the plane, as an ant is from a car, but a human footstep will be too slow and small to be perceptible. The relation between ant, human, car and plane illustrate how motions may appear instantaneous or non-existent depending upon the scale (dimension) from which they are viewed. A system has relation to other systems in its dimensional scale.

Ouspensky's model of the universe attempts to correlate problems with infinity and observable scales into one theory. In Ouspensky’s theory Euclidean continua such as a table are instantaneous time solids in relation to their component parts. A table is the sixth dimension to an atom. The existence of the atom is essentially instantaneous to our scale of perception and hence we perceive a table as solid. The sixth dimension for humans is an infinity of interrelating times taken instantaneously. What dimensionality seems to do as a working concept, is allow the observer to transcend space-time limitations through consciousness and imagination so as to be able to come to a practical recognition of our perceptive relation to the rest of the universe

Emergence of Complex Adaptive Systems

Emergence is a term that comes from biological science. When a new species emerges from a previous genetic variation there are new functions. Emergence is about the synergetic unfolding or explication of the implicate order. This is like the growth of a tree from the unfolding of the pattern contained within the seed. The tree emerges from the seed.

The term emergence has recently been used in computer science to designate features of computer programs that take place through the operation of the program, but that were not programmed into it, suggesting novelty. The most common example is that of little computer programs designed to send simulated entities wandering around the computer environment (on the monitor). These are called artificial life or cellular automata. When the programs are run the little entities appear to start moving around the computer screen in patterns like flocks. The programs were each designed to move around the screen - but they were not programmed to flock together. The flocking behavior of the entities is called an emergent function of organization when the movements of the entities are taken as viewed on the next scale of perception. The emergence of patterns such as flocking are readily apparent in the behavior of birds. One minute the birds are sitting in trees and the next minute there may be hundreds of them whirling about in formation.

Emergence is a term used to designate that which has seemingly spontaneously self organized into a dynamic system from resident possibilities that did not predict the emergent event. This produces new behaviors and reveals new patterns in different scales of context - it produces novelty. Our universe is moving towards increasing complexity and diversity This enables the emergence of conscious and sentient beings that can strive towards a commonality of understanding and experience of being. Our universe is emergent and unpredictable because it is a synergetic entity in the process of the creation of novelty. Individual novelty actually affects the actuality of the greater field of being.

Kazantzakis anticipates the idea of emergence in another part of his book, The Saviors of God:

"...My ''God'' struggles on without certainty. Will he conquer? Will he be conquered? Nothing in our universe is certain. He flings himself into uncertainty; he gambles all his destiny at every moment.”

From quark particles to atoms, molecules, stars, planets, minerals, bacteria, plants, animals, and humans, our universe emerges towards increasing complexity, responsiveness, vitality, awareness, and consciousness. In local relative scale the situation emerges from simple relations to more complex ones when the scale of overall processes is taken into account. This again takes on a perspective of simplicity when the complex functions are taken as a novel entity in relation to other entities on its own scale of operation.

Emergence Theory proposes that as our universe is an ongoing dynamic process so too is our universe also a evolving entity. As the entities within the field of being develop into novel formations of unpredictable results so too does the field in which they exist register novelty and it also becomes something different - its existence is altered both in terms of its reality and its actuality. The growth and evolution of the spirit of creativity is dependent upon the emergent evolution of our universe. The energy expended in our universe to create sentient life is on such a vast scale that it suggests that there is an important role for beings that can create truth and meaning and change the nature of reality itself.

The Separation of Mind, Matter, and Spirit is an Illusion

Let me say it again, the separation of the spiritual from the material, of consciousness from the physical is an illusion.

Material and spiritual aspects of entities are merely on differing scales of organization - they are opposite sides of the same coin, just like matter and energy or particles and waves. Our dualistic perceptions are the result of the way we perceive in size and time and our inability to encompass in our consciousness the full scale of dimensions in the universe. We can say that the different types of matter in our universe are like different sized raindrops which have slowed down and condensed from the burst of light (read vibration) of the big bang.

We know that the universe has both internal and external parts - we as individuals exist both internally and externally: we all have an internal space that is part of the external space to someone else. The realm of the spiritual is usually considered part of the internal domain of consciousness, imagination, and the development of creative potential.

The spiritual "side" of existence evolves increasing consciousness and capacities from the simplest toward the most complex. Our spirit / matter ambiance, in short our being, evolves from the simplest to that of the complete human. Whether the patterns of being around which the matter of our bodies orbit evolve toward complete personhood through reincarnation, transmigration, or instantaneity is less important than the situation in which we find ourselves at the present. One thing is certain the evolutionary process of consciousness is not guaranteed, nor it its maintenance - it can be reversed or even obliterated.

This process of mechanical development can only go to the point of individual consciousness, for after that point regardless of origins or processes, it is up to the choice of the conscious entity to complete their creation. However it seems apparent that the creation of new entities will continue and as they cycle through the universe, each by fact of their actual existence will certainly remain part of the larger field of being or become another entity on their journey.

The presence of sentient life enables the process of the creation of increased novelty. The vast size of the known universe and the abundance of materials that support organic life points to the conclusion that our universe must be pregnant with life - even sentient life may be a regularly occurring phenomenon on other planets. The appearance of co-creators of our universe to facilitate the job started but left unfinished heralds a great future participation of beings on grand scales.

Some Key Concepts that Help to Get a Grip on a Bit of the Universe:

A living universe that naturally generates life and consciousness implies that the evolution of consciousness is something that is encouraged by it. The following areas could each require a book to do them any justice, so I will merely list them here at this time as sources of further study for the serious aspirant towards the cutting edge new science of animate, non-linear, and complex adaptive dynamic systems:

Complexity Theory

String Theory, M Theory

General Systems Theory

Symmetry and Supersymmetry Theories

~1/4 of the Universe is Made of Dark Matter and 2/3 is Dark Energy - only ~4% is Physical Matter as We Know it!

Black Holes are at the Centers of Galaxies

Uranium Fission Reactor at Earth’s Core

Scale of SpaceTime: 100 -300 Billion Stars in the Milky Way; 100+ Billion Galaxies

Universal Acceleration

Quantum Foam

Quantum Gravity, Grand Unification Theory

Harmonics, Vibration, and Polyphony

Wave / Particle Duality

5th, 6th, 11th, and ‘N’ Dimensionality

The Kuiper Belt

Hydrothermal Vents

Autocatalytic Synthesis

Methanogens

3. WHAT IS THE PLAN OR DESIGN OF THE UNIVERSE?

IMPLICATE SYNERGY IS A FUNDAMENTAL PATTERN IN THE DESIGN OF THE UNIVERSE

“The very fact that synergy is resident at every level of scale of our observable universe indicates that it is at the heart of every knowable being, whether it be atom, human, or galaxy. The knowledge that synergy is resident in everything observable to

us means that we have a fundamental insight into the nature of the universe itself. The design of the Universe is knowable, and it is based upon SYNERGY!”

- The Author

Where There is Being There is Pattern

One thing we have in common with everything else in the living universe is being. Even rocks and trees have being, as does 'outer space.' There is something rather than nothing. This 'something' is based on dynamic and repeating patterns of complexity on many scales which are constantly unfolding in all systems in our universe. That things exist - that is, have being, is a great and profound mystery.

Everywhere being exists it is dependent upon pattern and structure. Everywhere conscious beings exist they will perceive order in their frame of reference. What these patterns are, where they come from, why they repeat, and whether there is a basic pattern to all of them is of paramount importance in our daily lives.

It is common sense that there is pattern and order behind the appearance of our universe. The evidence of life in our universe argues for underlying order. From a human time perspective our universe may only be two to three times as old as the Earth. Not only has our universe developed life, it has created consciousness in the process of transforming matter and energy.

Beings in our universe evolve from simple states of existence to tremendously complex life forms. The emergence of consciousness in living beings and our ability to self organize and evolve individually are all heralds of the synergy of our universe. I must stress again that complex life forms can not unfold from a dead universe. Life is basic to the field of being.

The experience of love and the perception of beauty both have many levels of quality. Without them our lives would be colorless, dull voids, empty of all meaning. These are the roots of our passion, simple yet profound. For what mystery looms larger than love, and yet what greater proof of the mystery as beauty? How can their existence be accidental in our universe? The stars, the clouds of Jupiter, the rose, the eagle, the child, and our universe all bond in the Mystery of Existence. What cold mathematics or logic can explain the synergy of all this?

Everywhere being exists it is dependent upon pattern and structure. Everywhere conscious beings exist they will perceive order in their frame of reference. What these patterns are, where they come from, why they repeat, and whether there is a basic pattern to all of them is of paramount importance in our daily lives.

Implicate and Explicate Order

David Bohm, a physicist and former protege of Albert Einstein, describes an approach to viewing our universe which departs from the ancient Greek and medieval world views of Aristotle and Descartes. He calls this implicate order; an enfolded pattern of our universe which unfolds through time. An example of this is the potential for a tree contained within a seed. DNA is another example of an implicate order for organic growth which evolves through the uncertainty of the environment.

Implicate is a word which means enfolded, or encapsulated. The very nature of unfolding pattern complexity; for example how DNA gives rise to arguing humans; is essential to recognize in approaching the order behind the mystery of existence. Our universe has unfolded to such great depth and breadth because of the underlying order to being.

“It will be useful in such an exploration to consider some further examples of enfolded or implicate order. Thus, in a television broadcast, the visual image is translated into a time order, which is 'carried' by the radio wave. Points that are near each other in the visual image are not necessarily 'near' in the order of the radio signal. Thus, the radio wave carries the visual image in an implicate order. The function of the receiver is then to explicate this order, i.e., to 'unfold' it in the form of a new visual image.

A more striking example of implicate order can be demonstrated in the laboratory, with a transparent container full of a very viscous fluid, such as treacle, and equipped with a mechanical rotator that can 'stir' the fluid very slowly but very thoroughly. If an insoluble droplet of ink is placed in the fluid and the stirring device is set in motion, the ink drop is gradually transformed into a thread that extends over the whole fluid. The latter now appears to be distributed more or less at 'random' so that it is seen as some shade of gray. But if the mechanical stirring device is now turned in the opposite direction, the transformation is reversed, and the droplet of dye suddenly appears, reconstituted."

David Bohm

Wholeness and the Implicate Order

Ch. 6: Quantum theory as an indication of a new order in physics, Part B: Implicate and explicate order in physical law, 1982

The initial state of our universe, that from which all other knowable existence has sprung, contains the ultimate seed of creation - the implicate order, the underlying pattern, the booting program, the transcendental formula. The path to encountering that program is through your own direct experience. The most complex has unfolded and emerged from the combination of seemingly only a few simple elements. Such a creation is like the sounding of a note that contains every other note as well as every possible rhythm and harmony.

Our universe provides us the implicate order, we are its explicators, the co-creators of reality. Implicate is a word which means enfolded, or encapsulated. The very nature of unfolding pattern complexity; for example how DNA gives rise to arguing humans; is essential to recognize in approaching the mystery of existence. Our universe has unfolded to such great depth and breadth because of the underlying order to being.

Implicate Synergy (is the Design of our Universe in Relativity and Scale)

"Nature has...some sort of arithmetical-geometrical coordinate system, because nature has all kinds of models. What we experience of nature is in models, and all of nature's models are so beautiful. It struck me that nature's system must be a real beauty, because in chemistry we find that the associations are always in beautiful whole numbers - there are no fractions."

---R Buckminster Fuller

In the Outlaw Area; profile by Calvin Tomkins in The New Yorker Jan. 8, 1966

Enfolded into the very essence of the being of all things is a basic design for self organization - an implicate order which is explicated through synergy. An oak seed has the implicate design of the big oak tree and its synergetic relation with its environment unfolds through the process we call growth. The essence of being, the essence of creation and growth is the unfolding of the enfolded self organizing design of synergy. Implicate synergy is self organizing function of being visible at every scale of the universe in which the whole is always more than the sum of its parts.

"If we present, for the sake of argument, the theory of evolution in a most scientific formulation, we have to say something like this: "At a certain moment of time the temperature of the Earth was such that it became most favorable for the aggregation of carbon atoms and oxygen with the nitrogen-hydrogen combination, and that from random occurrences of large clusters molecules occurred which were most favorable structured for the coming about of life, and from that point it went on through vast stretches of time, until through processes of natural selection a being finally occurred which is capable of choosing love over hate and justice over injustice, of writing poetry like that of Dante, composing music like that of Mozart, and making drawings like those of Leonardo." Of course, such a view of cosmogenesis is crazy. And I do not at all mean crazy in the sense of slangy invective but rather in the technical meaning of psychotic. Indeed such a view has much in common with certain aspects of schizophrenic thinking."

----Karl Stern

The Flight from Woman, Chapter 12 New York, 1965

There are those who maintain that we live in an accidental, random, mechanical and purposeless universe devoid of any being, consciousness, life, or reality greater than that which we are able to perceive. This position is just a belief and a belief that has dwindling merit. This belief does not motivate an individual to better themself. Such an approach to life encourages a me-first value system, an attitude that nothing has any meaning, and the belief that no position is better than any other. This is a short-sighted and depressive belief is based on the use of thinking without common sense, the inclusion of individual experience, or love.

One of the areas that has been the subject of a tremendous amount of argumentation and speculation over the millennia is the origin of our universe. This is not an easy area for reasoning because it tends to arouse some of the strongest responses from people who would otherwise consider themselves even tempered. No other area of speculation has as much power to stir the imagination. The conclusions we come to about the place in which we live determine a lot about behaviors we generate. If we view our universe as hostile to life, and existence as a survival of the fittest, we will not be developing life fostering attitudes, philosophies, or social policies. To have a positive outlook on life we must understand a positive vision about the nature of our environment.

The origin of our universe is called alternately the Creation and the Big Bang. These two concepts are not necessarily absolute or contradictory. I will try to clear up some misconceptions that separate the state of the art in scientific theory from the religious and philosophical ideas of antiquity concerning the formation of our universe and how it operates.

"All is flux, nothing stays still."

Heraclitus

from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers bk. IX

Teleology is the study of the design of our universe. Our origins, that out of which life emerges, have a common cosmic nature with that of the universe itself. Having established that being is common to all things in existence and that the nature of that being is essentially alive, let us look at what this "living" nature of the universe constitutes.

An accidental universe cannot create the kinds of complex phenomena that are apparent to us in the short time since the Causal Spark called the big bang. The new sciences of complexity and chaos point to an basic organization of phenomena in our universe. There is growing acknowledgment in the scientific community that there are organizing principles of some sort that suggest an intelligence at work "behind" phenomena in our universe.

The potential for life must be imbedded in our universe, simply because that is what it produced. As in a combination lock, the simple elements of our universe must combine in the proper sequence to open up the complexity we experience as life. When they do, the manifestation of existence is proof that if specific conditions are met within our universe, extremely complex life forms develop. The fact that certain conditions must be met implies an order behind the appearance of our existence. If our universe is playing dice, it may take a great deal of attempts to roll double sixes to get intelligent life forms, but the results are not random because there are still the dice with sixes on them.

We can see that there are many indications pointing to a rhythmic universe which naturally emerges life - it is not a universe that is hostile to life. The view of an emergent universe leaves open the possibility of a mutual field of being, a wellspring from which entities arise.

In short our universe from which we come is exceedingly generous. Our lives, minds, hearts, and bodies are all a gift. A beautiful and bountiful planet like the Earth is a precious gift beyond duplication by us. The richness of raw materials on our planet is a gift which has enabled the production capacity of the industrial revolution and the exponential growth of the human population. The variety of life on the planet is a gift which has kept us fed for millions of years. It has provided all that we could need as artists in the ongoing process of reality co-creation.

Only after having recognized the mutual nature of being and the unfolding synergy which is resident rhythmically from the inside out of all beings can we begin to wonder about the creator of such a "place" as this.

The Vibration of Creation Plays You

The appearance of being or the creation of a new entity requires organizing principles. These principles we can call the creative forces permeating our universe. People have been trying to identify the basic underlying patterns of our universe for a long time. Its elegance is such that a whole universe of complex possibilities unfolded from seemingly one simple source. It is interesting to note the appearance of the idea of a vibration as the basis for the subsequent creation of our universe in the time of ancient Egypt. Hermes Trismegistus writes,

"The Creator, not with hands but by Word, made the whole World (universe) so that conceive of Him thuswise, as of the present and ever being, and having made all things, and One and Only and by His own Will having created the entities. For this is the body of Him; not touchable, nor visible, nor measurable, nor separable, nor like to any other body. For He is neither fire, nor water, nor air, nor Spirit; but all are from Him; for being good He willed to dedicate this to Himself alone, and to adorn the earth."

- The Divine Pymander, Chapter IV

The Egyptians tried to describe this pattern through hieroglyphics and masonry. Pythagoras described it as the musical octave. In India the pattern was considered a vibration and given the name OM. The Kabbalists termed it YHVH and the Christians call it Logos, the Word. Later the speculators of the age of reason tried to develop complex diagrams and symbols to show the patterns behind a mechanical clock work universe; their replacement for a magical one.

Yet our universe does not operate like clockwork. Our universe is relatively mechanistic. If the place in which we live operated like a clock everything would be determined. Then there would be no need for creation or for us. There is unpredictability and flexibility as well as things that are determined and structured in the place in which we live.

Any new entity is different from its source. This is a situation in which you get more than you pay for. Entities, by their very existence, relate to their environment. Depending on the scale and complexity of an entity, it may even be able to self organize, replicate, or self perfect. The ability for entities to self organize is part of the implicate order. At the most basic level the building blocks of time and space came together and the vitality of nature synergized them into the production of a new entity - our universe, an entity with self organizing abilities to emerge other entities on a wide variety differing scales of complexity. The very existence of our being contains within it the mystery of the origin of our universe.

The fundamental nature of being is synergetic - the emergence of entity. Synergy is at the very root of being. A whole entity is more than the sum of its parts - it is a novel existent. Our universe is built by synergy.

Our universe is an engine for the creation of sentient life. How do we know? All we must do is to look at what has actually happened! Why is there sentient life? We are continually altering our environments, ideas, cultures, etc. and in this manner we create the way in which things occur, the reason for sentient life is the co-creation of reality.

Our job is to help in a life fostering manner the unfolding process of the co-creation of our universe.

The separation of the spiritual from the material, of consciousness from the physical is an illusion.

Material and spiritual aspects of entities are merely on differing scales of organization - they are opposite sides of the same coin, just like matter and energy or particles and waves. They are part of a continuum. Our dualistic perceptions are the result of the way we perceive in size and time and our inability to encompass in our consciousness the full scale of dimensions in the universe. We can say that the different types of matter in our universe are like different sized raindrops which have slowed down and condensed from the burst of light (read vibration) of the big bang.

Since the essential nature of the universe is vibratory we can also say that there is a scale of vibrations echoing down the hallways of time which as they slow down condense into scales of perceptible matter. The realm of perceptible matter seems to follow physical laws where no two things can be at the same timespace simultaneously. The realm of unperceptible matter and the realm we call spiritual seem to operate according to the laws of auditory space, that of vibrations, where many things can occupy the same timespace like a grand symphony with many different instruments playing many different notes simultaneously combining to form an overall polyphonic vibration of interrelations.

We know that the universe has both internal and external parts - we as individuals exist both internally and externally: we all have an internal space which is part of the external space to someone else. The realm of the spiritual is usually considered part of the internal domain of consciousness, imagination, and the development of creative potential.

The spiritual "side" of existence evolves increasing consciousness and capacities from the simplest toward the most complex. Our spirit / matter ambiance, in short our being, evolves from the simplest to that of the complete human. Whether the patterns of being around which the matter of our bodies orbit evolve toward complete personhood through reincarnation or transmigration is less important than the situation in which we find ourselves at the present. One thing is certain the evolutionary process of consciousness is not guaranteed, nor it its maintenance - it can be reversed or even obliterated.

This process of mechanical development can only go to the point of individual consciousness, for after that point regardless of origins or processes, it is up to the choice of the conscious entity to complete their creation. However it seems apparent that the creation of new entities will continue and as they cycle through the universe, each by fact of their actual existence will certainly remain part of the larger field of being or become another entity on their journey.

Emergence Theory proposes that as our universe is an ongoing dynamic process so too is our universe also a evolving entity. As the entities within the field of being develop into novel formations of unpredictable results so too does the field in which they exist register novelty and it also becomes something different - its existence is altered both in terms of its reality and its actuality. The growth and evolution of the spirit of creativity is dependent upon the emergent evolution of our universe. The energy expended in our universe to create sentient life is on such a vast scale that it suggests that there is an important role for beings that can create truth and meaning and change the nature of reality itself.

The presence of sentient life enables the process of the creation of increased novelty. The vast size of the known universe and the abundance of materials that support organic life points to the conclusion that our universe must be pregnant with life - even sentient life may be a regularly occurring phenomenon on other planets. The appearance of co-creators of our universe to facilitate the job started but left unfinished heralds a great future participation of beings on grand scales.

If the production of sentient co-creators of our universe is meaningless and accidental, then our universe is a huge and excessively frivolous waste of energy. If we truly play a role in the evolution of the universe and are not alone in this function then we may be very important not only to the evolution of the universe, but to the overall consciousness of the field of being. We may co-create the very impressions of the creative spirit. If one maintains that we co-creators of reality enhance the experience of our universe by helping to consciously create - then this means that not only do we have an important role to play but something returns to the source of our universe for all of its investment of time and energy in producing us.

4. WHAT AM I, WHO AM I, AND WHY AM I HERE?

WE ARE BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS THAT DISTILL AWARENESS OF SELF FROM EXPERIENCE, WE ARE INCOMPLETE BEINGS THAT HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO BECOME ENLIGHTENED, AND OUR ONLY REAL JOBS ARE TO GROW A SOUL AND SHARE ENLIGHTENMENT

"Know Thyself" and "Nothing Too Much"

Inscription at the Delphic Oracle

"Life is Real Only then when I am."

George Gurdjieff

"And so the perennial question of humanity, the only question worth devoting one's life to, is: how are we, how am I, to live fully in the world of "birth and death," the world of organic life on earth, the world of society, responsibility, making and doing - while at the same time fulfilling the immensely higher and greater possibility that is offered to us as human beings?"

Jacob Needleman

Money and the Meaning of Life

"What the superior man seeks is in himself.

What the mean man seeks is in others"

Confucius

Analects 15:20

"He who knows others is wise; He who knows himself is enlightened."

Lao Tzu

Tao Te-Jing

"The life which is unexamined is not worth living."

Socrates - Plato, Apology

“We may be biological machines, our brains may produce our thoughts, feelings, and minds, and we may be asleep to all of this, but we are very special bio-machines that distill consciousness, may create souls, and possibly transcend themselves. We are not merely the epiphenomenal hallucinations of our neural ganglia”

-The Author

HUMAN NATURE IS BASICALLY GOOD

"I refuse to accept the idea that the "isness" of man's present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for the "oughtness" that forever confronts him."

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize

Human nature is essentially good. The hallmark of being human is the ability to choose to consciously evolve our self, a characteristic that we do not share with animals. Human beings alone have the capacity to achieve a higher sense of purpose in existence and a greater pleasure in the pursuit and practice thereof.

The application of mechanistic rules to human spirits is bound to cause misery. People are not mindless, unfeeling automatons that are sub-human robots for enriching the privileged. The poorest have created the world's religions, yet the priests and the profiteers blame the problems of the less advantaged on the poor themselves. Those in orthodoxy and positions of privilege both maintain to their mutual benefit that the less fortunate are unfit for competition, are less intelligent, have bad "karma," or are evil, immoral, and cast out by ''God''. Nothing could be further from the "truth."

Our nature includes both the outer world with which we deal and our inner world. Much emphasis is placed in the West upon the growth of the prosperity of an individual's seeming power over their outer world, but little acknowledgment is paid to the other domain, the "internal" growth of our consciousness and being.

"The very essence of the idea of man that we find at the core of all the great teachings of all times and places is that we human beings are two-natured. I shall soon try to spell out more clearly some of the astonishing implications of this idea. For now, we may take from this idea the following direction: human life has meaning only insofar as we consciously and intentionally occupy two worlds at the same time. One force alone can never being meaning into human life."

Jacob Needleman

Money and the Meaning of Life

The two-natured concept is revealed in the fact that not only are we outwardly directed towards the physical reality of material existence, but we also have the possibility of being inwardly directed towards our individual growth. The ability to consciously choose the evolution of your individual self, spirit, or soul is the unique domain of the human being. This capacity represents the true life's work of the individual. The transformation this journey represents is the inalienable right and true destiny of each individual human being. This freedom must never be infringed upon, for without this freedom, mankind is no more than a rock.

The priests and profiteers of history have succeeded at misleading many people into the following errors:

-The poor are poor by their own mistakes or laziness.

-Essentially the lower classes are sub-human property, are solely responsible for their condition, and only fit for slavery.

-The Divine Right of Kings (or the privileged): Those with material success obviously have a right to a better life than those less fortunate.

-The ruling class has a right and obligation to judge the lives of the people and impose on the people their own interpretations of life.

-Twisting truth, language, and the wisdom of love is allowable to accomplish the ends of class and physical war against the people.

What is human nature? It is the nature of the people. Who are the People? The People are the masses of humanity. The People are the citizens of our societies. They are essentially the ruled, although the rulers are also part of the People. We the People are created equal. Many recite this, but what does it mean? It means that on a human being level, we are equal and more alike than we think. We are all born, live, and die. We all eat, drink, and sleep. We all love, have fears, succeed, and fail. We all have the same range of emotions and bodily functions. We all have the ability to improve ourselves. We all have the right to our own spiritual growth -- the basic principle upon which the United States of America was founded. We all want to be respected and treated fairly.

We are all created equal on a being level with equal possibilities for spiritual evolution even though we are all different in terms of individuality, education, class, culture, opportunity, and knowledge. No advantaged person should look down on someone less advantaged; we all share our humanity. Fairness, good will, and equality to all beings must be the standards upon which we base our sense of humanity.

How is it that those who create the unobservable and behind the scenes causes of the misery of others can fool themselves and others into believing that the less advantaged are that way because of who they are? The masses of humanity are treated as if the reasons that explain their circumstances are not true; and when the less advantaged fail at rising above their conditions, they are considered as little more than animals by the ruling classes. Yet even the disadvantaged do not want to rob the rich so much as to have security in their own existence. People want decent lives. People want a good education and information for their families. People want to own their own home without using their whole life earnings to pay for shelter. People want opportunity and hope that the conditions of their lives and the lives of their children will improve. People want hope and inspiration. There is nothing inherently sinful, evil, or mean in human nature. Humans are by nature idealistic and generous.

The principle myth of orthodox religions and political systems is that the nature of our existence is hostile in a harsh universe. Human nature is bad, people are hostile, and we must compete with one another to survive in the social jungle. Let us remember that spirituality is not built upon negativity.

Many of the world's greatest religious teachers espoused mutual human values. This is quite different from the practice of many modern religious institutions and the propaganda they disseminate. What makes more sense - a ''God'' of hate and vengeance or a ''God'' that creates a whole universe and asks little in return, except that we use our freedoms in a kind and considerate manner with each other? The implications of this question are enormous in terms of the way people conduct their daily lives. Only through your own experience can you reflect upon your individual state and contemplate the answer to the theological question of the goodwill of the creative spirit. Religious institutions cannot bring about our personal evolution, it's up to us individually.

Self Remembering

Self Remembering does not happen accidentally or mechanically. You either do it consciously motivated by your will or it is not done. Gurdjieff taught that we do not properly digest the impressions we receive through our senses because we do not self remember. This exercise is not a theory or idea, it is an actual practice which affects the structure of the brain itself. Ouspensky described self remembering as a dual arrow of attention. While our attention is usually focused externally and we respond to impressions automatically, self remembering focuses the attention internally so that the inner processes of responding, thinking, feeling, and acting are brought to consciousness.

Self remembering builds up a store of impressions of our inner workings and this is the material necessary for the growth of our being. One develops a knowledge base of one’s own interior topography and can thereby begin to reconnect the wires into a less haphazard collection. Most people think that they process their impressions correctly, that it all happens automatically without any effort on their own. No one ever told them that there is something else they must do to be conscious and that their ideas, beliefs, and motivations are not their own. So too do we believe that we think automatically, but real thinking - for example invention or synthesis - requires more than mechanically making associations and recycling the ideas of others. One must be present to self remember, so remaining in the moment instead of drifting away is also very important.

Self remembering involves observing the little impulses or wills which emanate from our different parts. Remember that this exercise is not theoretical and is not simply an abstract idea. Our loose collection of stuff we call our self has not one "I"

but many little ones. The development of a real "I" is something which requires conscious work. We have idea "Is" from our thinking part, feeling "Is" from our emotional part, motion "Is" from our moving part, and sensing "Is" from our instinctive part. There is a great deal of difference between the sense that "I am hungry," the feeling that "I love another," and the thought "I think that there are people on other planets."

When one has experience with self remembering one builds a body of real self knowledge and can better understand where one's impulses come from. Self remembering has also been described as a remembering of all of one's actual self, its parts and functions, and in general all of the knowledge that one has amassed. Self

remembering can be done anywhere and should be done whenever one remembers this.

Self Remembering reveals that we are asleep.

According to Gurdjieff’s school, some of the aspects of sleep include:

Many I’s or Wills

Lying to One’s Self and Others

Belief that One can Do

Falling Prey to Accidents

Keeping Accounts of the ‘Misdeeds’ of Others

Absence of Aim

Absence of Conscience

Psychological Buffers Against Actuality

False Personality

Absence of any Magnetic Center to Being

Absence of an Observing I

Negative Imaginations about Self and Others

Identification of One’s Being with things that it Isn’t

Mechanical Expression of Negative Emotions

Mechanical and Constant Talking

Internally Considering One’s Self

Absence of Externally Considering the Needs or Wishes of Others

Formatory, Black/White, All/Nothing Thinking

Introspection Reveals Your Philosophy

Epistemology is the study of knowledge and its organization. The only really useful epistemological organization of categories of things and events in the environment are those which are directly related to the functioning of your own observation. The structure of the organization of the individual self's knowledge about its environment including itself often functions automatically as a result of being learned by imitation. In order to obtain an understanding of what types of programs are running one's psyche it is necessary to cast the light of observation on the their unconscious operations and determine whether they are useful to growth or not.

Only by introspection and observation can an individual come by ones’ self to an understanding of how one’s internal mechanisms operate. To aid in your effort in the great work of the spiritual evolution of yourself and humanity I am including some questions which any individual should be able to answer. Certain questions which require introspection, that is looking within yourself to find the answers, are indispensable for rendering conscious the attitudes, belief, assumptions, and programs which unconsciously drive behavior.

PHILOSOPHY

What is philosophy?

What are my beliefs?

What are my values?

What is beauty?

What determines value or quality?

What is real authority?

What are proper morals, and ethics?

THE UNIVERSE

Where do I come from?

Why are humanity and our universe here?

How does our universe work?

What is the plan of our universe?

How do I help the plan of our universe?

Does ''God'' exist?

How can I understand ''God''?

What does the existence of ''God'' imply?

Where and what is heaven?

What is evil?

Is there life after death?

What is the end of the world?

Where is the world headed?

What is the future of human evolution?

HUMANITY

Why is spirituality and meaning in life more important now than ever before?

What is my responsibility as a human to the environment and the rest of humanity?

What happens if I am complacent?

Why does negativity seem more powerful than positivity?

How do we make a better world?

Will we ever create an equitable society?

What is the difference between cooperation and competition? Which works better?

Why do we have war?

What went wrong?

How can I play a contributing role in society?

What can I do to help others?

HUMAN NATURE

Who and what am I?

What is a human being?

What is the essence of a human being?

Why do I exist?

What is a life worth living?

What is the most important thing in life?

What is enlightenment?

What is the relationship between mind and body?

What is the difference between actuality and reality?

What is the relationship between free will and determinism?

Why are we mythological beings?

HUMAN FUNCTIONS

What is common sense?

What is creativity?

What is insight?

What is imagination?

What is intuition?

What is magic?

Which is my thinking center?

Which is my emotional center?

Which is my kinetic center?

Which is my instinctive center?

Which is my sex center?

Which are my 'higher functions'?

What are wrong functions of centers?

What is the scale of being?

How do I invoke the creative muses?

LIFE

How can I be happy?

How can I use common sense to improve my life?

How do I become a more loving person?

How do I become a success?

How do I become wise?

How do I create my own philosophy?

How do I evolve myself as a human being?

How do I improve my relations with others?

How do I improve the quality of my life?

How do I improve the quality of life of others around me?

How do I translate my ideas into action?

How should I act?

What do I do to achieve enlightenment?

What should I not do in life?

How do I create meaning in my life?

How do I determine what is valuable to me?

How do I encourage life fostering beliefs in myself and others?

How do I identify that which is meaningful?

What is my message?

SPIRITUAL EVOLUTION

How do I remember myself?

How can I become more creative?

How can I achieve clearer insight?

How can I better control my actions and behavior?

How can I improve my self awareness?

How can I improve my use of imagination?

How can I improve my use of intuition?

How can I learn to focus my attention?

How can I produce more personal energy?

How do I increase my quality of thinking, feeling, action, understanding, and presentation?

LOVE

What is Love?

Are there different types of Love?

If Love is “conditional” is it truly Love?

How can I be more Loving?

How do I learn to consider others’ needs before my own?

What do I need to learn about Love?

What is the Structure of the Self?

The human being is a being quite different from all other known beings even though we are composed of systems which all other beings appear to share. It is important to recognize the commonality of beings - all others appear as experimental prototypes for ours. There are many aspects of the self which are common to the human experience but not in our knowledge to others. Let us look at the parts, functions, processes, and relations of the unique creature, the human being. Through an understanding of our commonalities it becomes possible to do justice to our differences.

Parts

Our physical bodies are the closest connection we have with the realm of matter and are connecting places between many components of the universe. The functions of digestion and attraction in the instinctive center, the desire in the sex center, and the mechanisms for movement in the moving center may all be observed within the physical body. We share this part of our experience with all other creatures.

Beyond the primarily physically oriented parts to the human self are the feelings in the emotional center and the thoughts in the intellectual center. We can each individually verify for ourselves that we experience impressions through and impulses from these distinct parts of the self. It is also possible to use the feeling and thinking parts of the self in "enhanced mode" so to speak - some describe the higher emotional and higher intellectual parts as whole new functions, and some say they are merely using the centers we know properly. In either case it is nice to know that there are still more functions that we can develop!

Processes

The self has its basis in the physical matter of the body and the parts of the brain associated with its processes of ingestion, digestion, excretion, and reproduction. Beyond these sensings and movings and drives of the body we also have feelings and thought processes. We also have the capability of using the experiences of our bodies, feelings, and thoughts to form understandings of how other beings exist and intuitions about the nature of our experience. We also can actualize our "higher parts," or use the ones with which we already are familiar for successfully.

Relations

Our self experiences of existence are not conducted alone. All beings are in relation to other beings, being seems to attract. Our primary or fundamental relation is You and I, or as Martin Buber puts it Ich und Du. By encountering others beings a being comes to understand not only its extents, limitations, boundaries, structure, and singularity; but also the interpenetrating aspect of being, the knowledge that we are not alone, and that the boundaries between ourselves are more apparent than actual.

There is also a further extension of the you and I relation which is we, and then us. The experience of we is one of personal familiarity and described between those who know each other. A sense of 'usness' is more abstract and involves an identification with a larger sense of the similarity of a way of being. The notion of us is exclusive and suggests the notion of them, although this is rather arbitrary and based usually on surface appearances. The most striking example of a them relation is the way we relate to other animal species on the planet.

Functions

There are a number of immediately obvious functions which our selves experience throughout existence. All beings come into existence, self renew, grow, and eventually cease to function. Within our experience as living entities we share many daily processes such as sleeping, eating, relating, seeking and performing sex, working, playing, building, and destroying. As human we have added functions such as talking, planning, or analyzing. The most rare, but curiously available to all, function is the ability to self observe. We are beings which can be aware of our existence consciously remember ourselves and organize our lives according to our own understandings.

Purposes

Furthermore there are easily observable purposes to our existence such as communication, forming relationships, and of course procreation. However the most interest of our built in purposes, although one which can only be actualized by one's individual will and effort is the purpose and function of self transcendence. We contain within ourselves the possibility of becoming more than we are and more than what we were given. We are able to re-program our code, so to speak, consciously, and by our own will.

Exercises:

A friend of mine once said to me while we were sitting outside, "Do you hear the crickets?" I said yes, for at that moment I became consciously aware of their chirping. He said, "If you can hear the crickets you know that you are here now. If you stop

hearing them, you have left." Shortly thereafter I discovered that I resumed hearing the chirping, and I wondered aloud where I had gone so that the noise disappeared. My friend said, “you fell asleep, the usual state of self consciousness. I am glad that you have returned."

Being here now has a special benefit for those who drive cars. This practice can save your life for if you remember to be present while driving instead of associating about yesterday or tomorrow and allow your moving center to drive instead of the emotional or intellectual centers. I avoided having my chest crushed by a rock falling out of the sky on the freeway driving at 65 MPH. My continued existence on this planet is the direct result of letting my moving center handle the incident. I didn’t even have time to think, it was all reflex - and worked properly.

Open Mind, Open Heart

I came across a great book title a while back called Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind.. The title conveys a very important idea. If one remembers to be conscious one takes in the impressions from one's environment as if each thing were new (physics points ou

that everything really is new by the time we perceive it). It is good to strive to engage the world with beginner's mind. A beginner's mind is open to new interpretations of the familiar and attuned to noticing the difference. If we approach life wit

an open mind and an open heart we will notice much more detail in our experience.

Remember to Consciously Notice....

Another exercise which is useful is noticing sights, sounds, smells, sensations, and tastes. when one pays special attention to the elements of sense impressions it reminds one to be conscious and self remember. Our attentions are very weak and it is

en difficult to remember to self remember for a whole minute without drifting away into some other thought, feeling, or sensation. It requires great effort of will to turn the attention inward and hold it there long enough to observe what happens whil

acting in the universe. One notices very soon that our wills are weak, our attention wavers, and our will come and go ceaselessly.

Other Exercises for the Growth of the Soul Include:

Be Here Now

Remember Your Self

Don’t Negatively Emote Mechanically

Heighten Your Conscious Awareness of Life

Observe Your Machine

Don’t Identify Your Self with What it is Not

Don’t Negatively Imagine what is Not

Don’t Lie to Yourself and Others

Practice Introspection

Don’t Consider Yourself First

Do Consider Others First

Be Kind and Generous

Where are you on the scale of human beingness?

PERSON TYPE 1: Instinctive/Moving

Multiple wills - many competing impulses

Instinct and Reaction govern the interpretation of environmental impressions into actions.

PERSON TYPE 2: Emotional

Multiple wills- many competing impulses

Emotion governs the interpretation of impressions from the environment into feelings.

PERSON TYPE 3: Intellectual

Multiple wills - many competing impulses

Intellect governs interpretation of impressions from the environment into thoughts.

PERSON TYPE 4: Self Observing

Observing I - Multiple wills

Occasionally remembers to utilize the proper center for processing the appropriate impressions from the environment.

PERSON TYPE 5: Self Controlling

Semi-permanant I

Uses the physical, emotional, and intellectual functions of the psyche to appropriately distill environmental impressions into consciousness

PERSON TYPE 6: Self Determining

Permanant I

Conscious will works with the impressions from the environment to shape the future.

PERSON TYPE 7: Free

Self Transcending

?

Some Indications of the Presence of Consciousness in an Individual:

Awareness of Centers Operating in Differing States of Consciousness

Conscience

Conscious Spiritual Evolution

Combination of Essence, Personality, and Knowledge

Awareness of Multiple States of Being

Awareness of and Familiarity with the Scale of Being

The Presence of Both Observing and Permanent I

Evidence of Enlightenment is the Ability of Centers to Properly Digest Incoming Impressions

The Ability to Self Remember at Will

5. WHAT IS REALITY?

REALITY IS SUBJECTIVE AND WE CO-CREATE IT WITH EACH OTHER IN THE ACTUAL UNIVERSE

“The Universe Actually Exists, But what We Think and Imagine it to Be in ‘Reality’ is Subjective”

-The Author

We talk about reality. Reality is a subjective mental viewpoint established through perception and memory. Actuality is what really exists. We do not perceive things the way they actually are any place other than relatively through our own being. We cannot see or feel the experience or psyche of our friends, but we do not doubt their actual existence. What something actually is may be less important to us than our functional relation to it. Yet there are actual things with which we have a real relations. Perception rides between the thing in itself, and our reality of it. Our perception is limited by our senses, experience, and imagination. What our universe actually is in itself, we may never know for certain because we are individual entities that only experience our universe within our own scale of being in time and space. You can have a verifiable and actual experience of your own existence but what our universe actually is in itself will probably always remain a great mystery.

Reality is ‘plastic’ because reality is the subjective production of our brains and is different for every being this means that we can better understand the relative nature of our relation to actuality. We realize that reality as such is not fixed and as such is plastic.

You Co-Create Reality

As P.D. Ouspensky states in his book A New Model of the Universe, all questions about the universe boil down to three basic questions dealing with epistemology and cosmology.

These questions are:

What is the structure of the universe?

What constitutes the systems of laws governing the universe?

Is the universe deterministic or indeterministic?

These questions are all epistemological questions, that is, dealing with perception, knowledge, consciousness, and our relation to activities in the universe. We model the form of the universe in our minds from our capacities of observation and imagination.

Perception may be defined as the reception of impressions from the universe in packages. Knowledge is usable information or heuristics which are organized in relation to usefulness to the observer. Consciousness may be defined as the awareness of the totality of one's self in the environment combined with knowledge about the changes in the environment in which the self exists. it is awareness of self in universe or as Webster puts it:

1. The knowledge of what is happening around one; the state of being conscious.

2. The totality of one's thoughts, feelings, and impression, mind.

We discern the laws of the universe to the degree that our consciousness allows.

The number of different senses and their ranges in space, time, and speed of perception will greatly condition and observations of the universe. Any shortcomings in perception can only be transcended by the conscious imagination of the observer.

To understand our models of the universe we first of all must understand ourselves and the reasons why the universe appears as it does. In all of our models of the universe the critical role in the development of any model is played by the conscious capacity of the observer.

The degree of consciousness of the individual modeling the universe is the prime factor in what kinds of models are developed, and the types of elements of which they consist. It is precisely this relation between the consciousness of the observer and the interpretation of what is seen that is the subject of Immanuel Kant's work:

“Kant's ideas of categories of space and time taken as categories of perception and thought have never entered into scientific, i.e. physical thought, in spite of certain later attempts to introduce them into physics. Scientific (physical) thought proceeded apart from philosophical and psychological thought. And scientific thought always took time and space as having an objective existence outside us. And in virtue of this it was always considered possible to express their relations mathematically.”

P.D. Ouspensky, A New Model of the Universe, p. 345

It is important to realize that reality is constructed within your being, within your mind. That which you consider to be reality is a projection of your understanding back onto the actual universe. It is important to distinguish between actuality and reality.

We create reality whether we do it intentionally or not. There is an actual universe of things, but the reality of our experience of it is subjective and relative to the individual. We create our realities either consciously or they happen subconsciously and accidentally. Our job as humans is to make the creation of reality conscious and intentional. There are several key elements that constitute what we may call reality. There is a psychological component including the structure and functions of the self. There is also a cosmological component or paradigm which involves how we structure our world view, our view of our universe. The theological part of our reality involves our own personal spiritual work and our relation to the Creative Spirit.
6. WHAT ARE KNOWLEDGE, TRUTH, AND THINKING?

WHAT IS KNOWLEDGE?

KNOWLEDGE IS A FUNCTION OF BEING; THAT IS, KNOWLEDGE IS HOW-TO ABILITY AND IS RELATIVE TO THE GROWTH OF OUR UNDERSTANDING

"He who knows others is wise; He who knows himself is enlightened."

Lao Tzu, Tao Te-Jin

THERE ARE MANY DIFFERENT KINDS OF THINKING AND THERE IS A SCALE OF TRUTH

'I think therefore I am'

Rene Descartes

Much of What We Consider to be Knowledge is Merely Information

We treat information from books, the Internet, television and others as if it is established knowledge. If I am asked if I know that the Masai tribespeople live in Africa I will probably respond yes, although I only have second hand information about them and I do not actually 'know' anything firsthand about them. I can watch a TV show about Madagascar and get a feeling of familiarity with the environmental devastation going on there but this is virtual and only information. I have no actual or first hand knowledge of what is going on there.

The fact that knowledge is a function of being means that a lot of what we call knowledge is merely information borrowed from others and not a product of experience. The only real knowledge is self knowledge gathered and verified by the individual during the course of life. Of this, the most valuable is the knowledge of how the self works, how it processes impressions from the universe, and how to grow one's soul.

There is much to think about but merely being awake and present and communicating does not mean that you are really thinking. Furthermore not all thinking is of equal value. This has Earthshaking impact for the global communication era. Merely making noise is not communicating esoteric wisdom. Not all forms of thinking are equally useful for every application. One must be able to successfully employ many different types

thinking to be successful at making good decisions in a chaotic information environment, not to mention digesting philosophy and the impressions of self remembering.

What is Common Sense?

Wisdom is good judgment and this depends upon common sense. It is not the simple notion that I don't cross a street when it is busy. It is the general wisdom of living. It includes the experience we all have in life, the commonality of life. Common Sense is composed of two terms, common and sense. What is common is that which is similar between all people. We have common emotions, thoughts, drives, and life experiences. Sense simply put is awareness. Sense also concerns meaning - does it make sense? Common Sense is often associated with 'reason' based on the verification of sense impressions - the 'I'll believe it when I see it' idea. Originally common sense was considered the faculty which united and interpreted the impressions of the five senses. This is our awareness, our consciousness. So we can say that common sense is the consciousness that we all share in regard to the experience of life. This is awareness of what is mutual between us all.

The opinion of the individual, the authority of a person's experience is good only insofar as the individual works to verify their beliefs and knowledge to the best extent of common sense. The middle course between absolute authority and the complete relativity of human experience is common sense. There is much in common in human experience. We also have much in common with the experience of other beings whether human or not. The approach to life of common sense is that even without recourse to maintaining absolute certainty or finality of authority it is possible for individuals to make judgments based on their own experience. Common sense advocates a view of argumentation and reasoning in which the simplest solution is not always the best. The best solution to a challenge is that which improves the situation and the standard and quality of experience of the individuals involved.

One must undertake an investigation of their own underlying assumptions about life to evaluate and/or reconstruct their own world views. There are those who maintain that they have ontological certitude - that is, a belief that their world view rests on rational definitions and that there are rational arguments from absolute and certain truth. These people are absolutely sure they know everything and have an explanation for everything. The absence of certitude leads to relativism on the other side of the matter. This is a situation where the evaluation of competing assumptions is impossible. A common sense view of metaphysics rejects the notions of absolute certainty and total relativism. We are not able to have absolute certainty about any of our beliefs; however not all beliefs or ideas are of equal quality.

The ancient Greeks divided reality into the essentially unchanging versus the accidental and changing. The classical view holds that reality is already complete in essential structure and that our job as humans is merely to discover and imitate it. This view supports an Aristotelian classification structure for viewing our universe imposed on top of perception. Common sense maintains that people make truth and create values. The creation of our universe is in process - this is more than a universe only involving processes. Common sense holds that our universe involves both order and disorder, regularity and chance, stability and unpredictability, determinism and choice.

Our universe is an unfinished creation. The role of conscious beings in our universe is the transformation of reality at its innermost depths. The most significant job of life is the co-creation of the world through the emergence of new ideas, values, events, and entities. In a universe of processes and relations there are no truly independent beings or ones which are permanently unchangeable. Common sense views being as an ongoing continuum - a field within which there are many sub-fields. Common sense also leaves open the possibility that there could be a field composed of all others.

Common Sense rejects the notion that one can occupy the position of Objectivity - a Western belief that we can know reality in itself independent of the observer. It is not possible to know our universe or reality in its whole totality. It is only possible to know our universe through our own subjective experience as an individual. The reality of individual beings is manifest through a variety of subjective relations. Descriptions of entities cannot be made apart from their relations, such as physical, cognitive, personal, social, institutional, and spiritual. This, however, does not mean that the descriptions or the relations are the beings themselves. The acknowledgment of inadequate science for the perception of things in themselves keeps open the possibility of mystery in our universe.

Nihilism is also denied because the absence of absolutes is not a defect of our universe. It is evidence of dynamic vitality in the process of creation. We live in an unfinished world. In such a situation we can still affirm truths and beliefs that we judge best, yet acknowledging that all affirmations, due to the dynamic universe we live in, are tentative. What appeared to be true a century ago may only be partially true now, and false tomorrow. All human ideas, theories, values, practices, symbols, and institutions should be evaluated by their contribution to the quality of life. In this sense experience is transactional - it is neither absolutist or completely relative.

Before investigating how people construct their world views an exploration of truth is necessary. Truth refers to experience with relations that are satisfactory, that is, conducive to life. Truth is participatory and existential rather than abstract and representative. Science is only true insofar as it enables man to participate more fully in life. Truth is created and discovered. Common sense gives a method of verifications of experience rather than absolute theories of truth.

The common sense view maintains that we determine truth by its fruitful consequences. The foundation of truth is imagination, strange as this may seem. Our reality is subjective and the events we participate in are the result of the imposition of meaning onto things by our minds. Our mental interpretations of the sense impressions we receive are produced in the mind and are, as such, subjective. Each given culture has mechanisms of perception and filtering of behavior in the minds of individuals in their group which we call culture. This 'culture' affects the reality of the perception of actual people, events, and ideas. Some events, such as a smashed plate, are relatively straight forward regardless of culture. There are enough shared meanings in most of human experience that the physical events in the accident can be determined factually and also in regard to truth and falsity.

Yet when we get to less obvious areas of determining whether something happened or not, or the truth of what something is, truth becomes much more complex and relational. For example, in the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy, one may be lead to seriously ask if the bottle tossed from the airplane is truly still a coke bottle after it falls on the head of the African villager who found it. Yes it was made by Coca-Cola, but what does the bottle mean to the man who found it other than the meaning projected onto it by his imagination? The coke bottle was not a pop container to the villager, who along with his tribe, found all kinds of different uses for it, totally unaware of its original purpose. In truth, the bottle ceased to be a coke bottle when the reality of Coca-Cola was no longer projected upon it - the coke bottle subsequently "became" something else. The truth of a world view may be ascertained only in a relational sense, not in an absolute one. In a common sense understanding of truth, the primary criteria for its evaluation must be whether it is life fostering and works towards the improvement of the standard and quality of people's lives.

The field of philosophy encircles the whole realm of what constitutes the reality of living as a human on the planet. Philosophy is the Art of Living and Spirituality is its practice. For this reason we will look at common sense slices of the field of philosophy to see if there is something new and useful which we can use to help establish what the core components of the Spiritual Evolution are and what is required of us.

The following is intended to offer some simple suggestions of how to utilize common sense:

SOME ASPECTS OF COMMON SENSE

1. Know that your attitudes produce beliefs and your beliefs produce values.

2. Approach people from a human being level rather than an intellectual perspective.

3. The management of your thoughts is critical. Be aware of how your logic is working and be sure it is not merely cunning in the service of desires.

4. Be aware of your feelings and observe their impact on your thinking. Try to eliminate negative thoughts and do not express negative feelings as truths.

5. Be here and now, pay attention to the environment in which you are without wandering off mentally or emotionally. Focus your attention on whatever activity it is that you are presently engaged in.

6. Try not to make any assumptions about others. Consider others before you consider your own feelings.

7. Think and feel before you act or speak.

8. Ponder what your values really are. Identify what you actually know to be true, and what is only information or beliefs. Articulate your values clearly so that others can understand where you are "coming from" when you act.

9. Make sure that you are paying attention to what you are really communicating to others, put the shoe on the other foot, listen more than talk, always check that others understand what you say in the same way that you meant it, and speak clearly to enable your audience understanding of the meanings between the lines.

10. Find a way to enjoy every day of your life. If you don't, who else will?

SOME SNAPSHOTS OF HOW TO USE COMMON SENSE

1. Common Sense thinking requires the emotions as well as the intellect, feelings as well as reasonings

2. Common Sense feeling is not sentimental

3. Common Sense health reduces stress and increases happiness

4. Common Sense transactions are based on honesty, love, and respect

5. Common Sense social behavior is not conformity, nor is it ego culture

6. Common Sense economics is entrepreneurial cooperation

7. Common Sense politics is advancing the cause of uplifting humanity and knowing what are the real driving forces behind our society, ideas, economics, and politics. It also means don't be fooled by propaganda.

8. Common Sense environmentalism is treating our environment as if it is our own back yard. It is understanding that we are the caretakers of earth.

9. Common Sense individuality is a balance between group responsibilities and individual rights.

10. Common Sense Spirituality is wonder and awe at the profound mystery of existence, thankfulness for our universe, and acting towards others as we would have others treat us.

Eutaxiology is the Study of the primary assumptions and theoretical boundary markers of thought.

Common Sense Truth: Some Truths are More Important than Others...

Always Evaluate Relevance, Accuracy, Adequacy, and Necessity

Change from Reductio ad Absurdum to Meta Logic

Your Mind Works by Analysis, Synthesis, Comparison, and Contrast

Your Memory Works by Association

You can easily tell the Linear from Non-Linear Thinkers

Practicing Philosophy will improve your Creativity, Insight, Intuition, and Revelation

Thinking is about Creative Synthesis, it is Dynamic

Try to Always take into account Truth, Validity, Factuality, Attitudes, World Views

Heuristics are the ‘Rules of Thumb’ Motivating and Conditioning Behavior

Change Reductio Ad Absurdum to Meta Logic

Logic is the organization of factual statements into true or false patterns.

Revelations and Epiphanies occur daily to the Beginner’s Mind

7. WHAT ARE PROPER VALUES?

PROPER VALUES ARE PERENNIAL HUMAN ONES AND THEY DO NOT CHANGE MUCH OVER TIME OR THROUGH CULTURE

"What the superior man seeks is in himself. What the mean man seeks is in others"

Confucius, Analects 15:20

The esoteric core of each of the world's great spiritual teachings are very familiar and do not differ that much from culture to culture and time to time. This means that we should be able to have an unprecedented communion of world spirituality for the first time.

In every culture the enlightenment or development of the individual has been encouraged by the great spiritual teachers and social visionaries. The evolution of the self rests on the belief that you can improve yourself. We can improve the quality of our experience and that of others. We can live better lives and enjoy more of the lives we lead. To evolve yourself it is necessary to remember that self. Who are you? You are a human being with sensings, feelings and thoughts. Your being is based on love and this allows for your spiritual evolution. You have other capacities such as imagination, insight, understanding, conscience, love, kindness, and empathy. So do all people regardless of where they are on the planet. You share the possibility and mechanisms of spiritual evolution with every other human.

Who you are is a human, and who you can be is a kind and loving human. Being such a person means using a type of ethics based on valuing the existence of others. If your values come from your conscience, you can go anywhere and do most anything within the realm of human ethics without breaching humane conduct in any culture. Minor moral differences between cultures and belief systems vanish when you use conscious ethics in your transactions with others. Consciousness and conscience or awareness and empathy create virtue. Conscience is an organic human function found everywhere there are people. You have the freedom of self determination and the responsibility to use your conscience in determining your actions towards others.

Each individual has a responsibility to the community and society in which they exist. We are not islands. Children would never grow up if life were really based on competition and we as a people acted as selfish rugged individualists. Each of us has abilities that we can share freely to benefit others. Many things would not be done if it were not for people volunteering their time. The future of civilization hinges upon whether we can cooperate with each other.

The creation of a global human community is still an ideal, and one which will never be reached unless individual people realize that each of us have a valuable role to play. It is important for people to be able to understand, relate to, and work towards this role.

The individual's role in life is the personal creation of better realities for yourself and others. Without a spiritual dimension to enable the growth of the individual there is no driving reason to improve oneself and no grounding for qualitatively good values and beliefs that can be agreed upon by people in nearly every culture. The first step toward the fostering of increased global understanding is the exploration of our mutual fundamental underlying principles, beliefs, ideas, and assumptions. These foundations of our consciousness come within the scope of philosophy and spirituality, which is where the dialogue of the people will begin. If such dialogue is not possible as a result of intolerance and closed mindedness the future growth of global understanding will be seriously inhibited.

One place such a dialogue can begin is through experiencing personal spirituality rather than dogmatizing. We must frame the dialogue with the perspective of identifying mutual values, experiences, and wisdoms for fostering the growth of the individual and humanity as a whole. The practice of personal spirituality is then a workable common sense approach to learning from others and an alternative to arguing over the morals and dogmas of each belief system.

The development of a mutual spiritual framework will require something that must work for individuals in a wide variety of different belief systems. A new spiritual communion must embrace the best wisdoms of the world's spiritual understandings and restore the role of humans as a players in the growth of our universe.

We need new visions to stir the imagination of what our future is to be. We each need to reconstruct for ourselves what it means to be human and what it is that constitutes humanity. Many of the old wisdoms and archetypes no longer inform and inspire people. Relativity of belief has called into question all the premises upon which our civilizations rest. There is questioning without recourse to common sense and individual experience, this has left us unable to articulate the fundamental principles that we all share as humans. With the proliferation of the means for destruction reaching all time highs, never before has the need for connection between people and our universe been so great and the price of disconnection so high.

We are at the point where humanity must come to terms with its future - the unification of human understanding. The shrinking of our planet through communications technology and increased population no longer allows us to ignore each other. We will not evolve mechanically. In order to progress we must consciously grow both personally and socially.

To deal with the increasing complexity of human experience and our increased awareness of each other, our universe, and ourselves, we need a more coherent form of intelligence available to make meaning out of existence. Each of us has an ever increasing need for a human synthesis of values and meanings out of the disconnected information chaos in which we live. Conscious control of your destiny can only occur when there is an individual unification of brain, heart, and body: of reason, emotion, and sensation. One who has achieved this becomes an agent of synthesis and a creator renewing reality. Analogous to the spiritual development of the individual, the future of humanity is the unification of its experience, understanding, and wisdom.

This new awareness of the future evolution of human understanding can only be facilitated by individuals who themselves have achieved a degree of their own personal unity and not through conscription or mindless uniformity. The future of human evolution is not the creation of supermen but rather complete humans. Supermen are like the ancient Greek Gods - exaggerated caricatures of the beings who invented them. The archetype of superman is not enough to provide us a new mythological basis for the future of humanity - our destiny is much greater.

In this new vision of the growth of human understanding what it means to be human is to be a creative synthesis. We must make efforts to unleash the creative forces in our selves and become our own co-creators of reality. The type of global society possible in the future is that of a society of citizens who are entrepreneurs in the spiritual evolution of their own futures and who are co-creators of better realities.

The price of our individual inaction is high. Individually the price of not evolving is the absence of the personal creativity and the de-generation of the spirit. Socially the cost of individuals shirking their own enlightenment is alienation, apathy, chaos, and even war. The abandonment by individuals of their own growth as people could eventually lead to a poisoning of our societies, nations, and planet to the point of annihilation.

The future of humanity is the growth of a mutual intellectual, emotional, and material understanding of life based on love. The creative forces of our universe have generated us as sentient beings who must unify ourselves individually before we can work to provide the conscious mind the world is evolving towards. To this end I offer some characteristics of mutual human wisdom.

The Perennial Philosophy of Common Sense Spirituality:

The origins of our universe are a mystery of the most profundity

The cosmos is alive, all living systems have ordered design.

The primary difference in all things is the degree of organization.

Our universe is benevolent, it is not hostile or inimical to life

Evil is the product of people not necessarily the will of the Universe or the Gods

There is a time lag between the speed of our lives and that of greater beings like the Earth, Sun, or the Gods

People live faster than the Gods can respond - what is a minute of Gods' time?

Our universe and its organizing principle are not at fault for the insanity of human intolerance and oppression, greedy people with unbalanced minds are.

Reality is a state of mind based on perception and is a product of the imaginations of our mind imposed upon external people, events, places, and ideas; Actuality is what really exists behind the perceived. The only approach to the Actual universe, for an individual, is through your own common sense experience, and how it is applied in your life.

The intrinsic nature of humanity is good.

Respect others': freedom, property, beliefs, lives, and bodies

Acts of hostility to others whether it be by lying, cheating, stealing, hatred, or violence are all products of ignorance, fear, and anger.

Knowledge is a virtue only when it fosters life, this type of knowledge is not theoretical, it is practical. This type of knowledge is not information, it is understanding based upon experience. When one applies their own understanding about life to their existence, knowledge becomes a virtue, for it is no longer just knowledge, it is wisdom.

Love and let Live -- learn to love yourself and love others as yourself.

Kindness begins at home.

Knowledge is a function of being.

Individual Freedom is a divine right, for it is the prerequisite for choice, and choice is the prerequisite for spiritual evolution..

The domain of the sacred includes the hidden patterns of our universe, the mysteries of life, and the beauty of the cosmos.

We are made of the stuff of stars.

Be here now -- the present is usually pleasant

The fundamental truths of human existence are simple and shared by everybody

A Distillation of the World’s Wisdom Teachings

Remember The Universe is Alive

Remember Every Thing has a Spirit

Remember Your Self

Remember Holy Days

Remember Others' Kindness

Remember the Interconnection of All

Remember the Preciousness of Being and Life

Remember the Prophets

Remember to Worship

Remember We are Equals

Remember Your Oneness with Nature

Remember to Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

Remember to ‘Know Thyself’

Remember ‘Nothing Too Much’

Remember to Observe Holy Times

Remember to Give Thanks for Your Existence

Remember to Pray Daily

Remember the Unity of Deities and their Prophets

Remember Graven Images are not the Deity

Remember to Live a Meaningful Life

Remember to Put Others First

Remember to Get Help - You Cannot Achieve Enlightenment Alone

Remember the Kindness of Others

Remember to Recognize Impermanence

Remember to Recognize that all Beings are as Precious as our Mothers

Remember The Disadvantage of Self-Cherishing

Remember The Advantage of Cherishing Others

Remember Bodhichitta - the desire to attain full enlightenment for the sake of all beings

Remember Death and Impermanence - the uncertainty of death and the unsatisfactory nature of this world

Remember Karma - the law of cause and effect

Practice Receptivity and Acceptance - Wandering Without Purpose

Practice Oneness With Nature

Practice Non action

Practice Inwardness

Practice Being Good Natured

Practice Compassion

Practice Equanimity

Practice Good Belief

Practice Good Conduct

Practice Good Effort

Practice Good Knowledge

Practice Good Meditating / Prayer

Practice Good Mindset

Practice Good Seeing

Practice Good Speaking

Practice Good Thinking

Practice Good Deeds

Practice Healthy Lifestyle

Practice Good Meditation

Practice Good Words

Practice Non - Action

Practice Receptivity and Acceptance

Practice Tranquil Abiding - Develop Your Concentration on Higher States of Awareness

Practice Virtuous Living

Practice Pilgrimage

Practice Giving alms to the Poor and be Generous to the needy

Practice Not Profaning the Sacred

Practice Honoring Holy Days

Practice Honoring Your Ancestors

Practice Fostering Life - Harm no Being

Practice Honoring Other’s Relationships

Practice Honoring Other’s Property - Do Not Steal

Practice Speaking the Truth - Do Not Bear False Witness

Practice Non - Attachment - Do not Covet Your Neighbor's Belongings

Practice Relieving Others' Burdens

Practice Respecting Each Other

Practice Seeking Inwardness

Practice Sharing

Practice Speaking the Truth

Practice Transcending Your Ego

Practice Tranquil Abiding - developing advanced stages of concentration )

Practice Superior Seeing - developing emptiness--that is, non-identification with the personal ego

Practice Sharing One's Own Good Fortune with Others

Practice Taking Refuge from Samsara - the cycle of endless grasping and eventual disappointment

Practice Developing Renunciation for Samsara

Practice Developing Equanimity - Accepting, and seeing past, both good and bad experience

Practice Equalizing Self and Others - Realizing that we all want, and deserve, to be happy

Practice Exchanging Self with Others

Practice Developing Great Compassion

See Beyond Beliefs

See Beyond Memory

See Beyond Sensation

See Beyond the Forms of Things

See Beyond the Idols of the Mind

See Beyond Your Present State of Consciousness

Transcend Form

Transcend Sensation

Transcend Memory

Transcend Formation

Transcend Consciousness

Transcend Your Teachers

A Sampling of Some Mutual Human Values

Spiritual Work and Teaching

Social Activism

Environmental Restoration

Social Justice

Fairness

Individual Freedom

Generosity

Cooperation

Democracy

Equality

Health

Hope

Joy

Lifelong Learning

Open Mind, Open Heart

Peace

Security

Self Determination

Straightforwardness

Tolerance

Love, Kindness, and Empathy

Some of the Wisdoms I have Learned from Living Life

THE ULTIMATE MIRACLE IS THE EXISTENCE OF THE UNIVERSE AND YOU WITHIN IT

THE DESIGN OF THE UNIVERSE IS IMPLICATE SYNERGY

THE UNIVERSE IS ALIVE

THE UNIVERSE GENERATES CONSCIOUS BEINGS

ALL GODS COME FROM THE CREATIVE SPIRIT - THE CREATIVE SPIRIT IS DYNAMIC, SYSTEMIC, AND INCORPORATES AFFIRMING, DENYING, AND RECONCILING ASPECTS

THE ESSENCE OF ART IS FOUND IN THE PATTERNS OF THE UNIVERSE

KNOWLEDGE IS A FUNCTION OF BEING

ALL MATTER HAS BEING

ALL CREATURES SHARE AWARENESS OF SELF

HUMAN NATURE IS BASICALLY GOOD

ALL PEOPLE SHARE THEIR HUMANITY

YOUR ONLY JOB IS ENLIGHTENMENT

YOU ARE YOUR OWN GURU - BUT

YOU CANNOT BECOME ENLIGHTENED BY YOURSELF

EQUALITY IS THE PREREQUISITE FOR COMMUNICATION

YOU MUST WORK TO MAKE THE WORLD A BETTER PLACE

THE ESOTERIC CORE OF ALL RELIGIONS IS CONSCIOUS ENLIGHTENMENT OF THE SOUL THROUGH LOVE

CONSTRAIN EXCESSES

ALWAYS BE GENEROUS

APPROACH LIFE AND OTHERS FROM A BEING ORIENTATION

ENTERTAIN MANY PERSPECTIVES

YOU MUST REMEMBER YOURSELF

BE HERE NOW

SURF THE TAO

LEARN HOW TO BE YOUR MULTIPLE SELF AND ONE WITH CREATION

RESPECT OTHER BEINGS AS YOURSELF

REMEMBER THE SACRED

CAPTURE THE ESSENCE

BE CONSCIOUS OF WHAT YOU EXPRESS TO OTHERS

MAKE TIME FOR THE MOST IMPORTANT THINGS IN LIFE

STUDY AND REMEMBER THE PAST

NURTURE LIFE

BE TRUSTWORTHY

RETURN MORE THAN YOU RECEIVE

RESPECT OTHERS' BEINGS, RIGHTS, AND PROPERTY

BE GOOD

NOTHING TOO MUCH

SPREAD PEACE

BE AUTHENTIC IN ALL YOU DO

ENJOY EXISTENCE

FIND A WAY TO ACHIEVE UNITY WITH THE REST OF EXISTENCE

CONSCIOUSLY 'TURN THE CHEEK'

8. WHAT IS GOOD?

IF YOU BASE YOUR ACTIONS ON LOVE THE ETHICS BECOME OBVIOUS

"What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others"

Confucius, Analects 15:23

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"

Jesus

Our True Job is Human Liberation

We are going to shift our attention in the scale of things a little and look at what has happened over recorded human history to bring us to the current condition we find ourselves in. This will help us to understand what the creative spirit is asking us to attempt. Humanity has been wandering the planet like an orphaned child, haphazardly stumbling through all manner of catastrophe and accidental carnage due to a lack of conscious direction on the part of the people. It is my contention that since the time of the earliest civilizations there has been a conspiracy of unconsciousness, of benign neglect - a banal sort of evil which has been fostered by the very leaders of religion, government, and commerce who, operating solely in their own best interest, have stifled the progression of humanity towards greater mutual understanding, cooperation, enlightenment, and liberation from tyranny.

How do we come to have sentient life? What has happened here? We have a universe to live in and minds, hearts, and bodies to contemplate it! This is the most magnificent miracle of all. The very essence of our universe is life and creativity. The creation naturally evolves increasingly complex life forms which eventually develop brains with which to reflect upon experience. The natural state of such beings is spiritual evolution or development, the increase of the powers of being and consciousness.

Yet first must come the securing of the material necessities of human life and so it is natural that first civilization must provide for the physical necessities of existence. It is amazing that so many of us are still trying to accomplish this first task of life after so many thousands of years! The natural organization and cooperation of human labor was taken over by profiteers who, with slight advantage of education or physical power, determined that there would be rulers akin to ''God''s and the rest of the people would be considered sub-human brutes and thereby perfect candidates for slavery. We 'progressed' from free wanderers and beneficiaries of nature's bounty to domesticated cogs in the machinery of civilization.

It is important to look at how we became tools for the enrichment of the concentrators of power and how for millennia people have struggled to breathe free. This battle continues and has colored all of the subsequent recorded history. When we realize that we the people did not start out in slavery it is easy to recognize what has been happening throughout history. Seemingly each generation has to learn it anew. Although the struggle for conscious evolution has been thwarted for a long time it is possible the task of human liberation can again begin.

Ethics Areas Everyone Should Work Upon:

Relationships

Business

Teaching

Spiritual Work

Social Activism

Environmental Restoration

Legal Justice

Personal Fairness

Environmental Preservation

Golden Rule

Non Expression of Negative Emotions

Be Good

Nothing Too Much

10 Commandments Become 5

External Consideration

conscience and Empathy

Golden Rule

Love

Progressive Spirituality

Behaviors Not Based on Love Become Immediately Apparent to Those with Eyes to See...

If your ethics are driven by your natural conscience and love even though you may violate what are shifting morals, you will not transgress common human values and betray your soul thereby. If an action or event qualifies as emotional or physical abuse, it is not a spiritual value regardless of whether it is based on tradition or authority.

There is a great deal of discussion of ethics today in the field of medicine. There are many questions like, "Would it be a good thing to clone Einstein, and if we did, would he grow up to be Einstein?" Would he be Einstein? Probably not, although supposedly he had brain matter where most of us do not and had more inter-neural connections in his brain than most of us. A clone of Einstein would probably be smart, but an exact clone would be impossible for his growth environment would have been different and probably so too his personality.

Is a particular instance of cloning ethically good? If you base your behavior on love and common human values, having empathy for others, and fostering life, then your answer to the question of good cloning becomes answered only individually. Each individual case is its own. If the motivations for cloning are traceable to greed, hate, lust, for power, or some other undesirable source then obviously cloning in such instances would be wrong.

Anyone with even a small degree of consciousness should be able to see that cloning another of oneself to raid for body parts is not something based on love, but rather fear and greed.

Supposedly clones age faster, and this raises the question as to whether it is empathetic, loving, and life nurturing to bring a human into the world under duress in its natural from. I would say this would be unethical and bad. Why would one do this?

For love? I doubt it.

The Good:

As to whether it would be good, or ethical that is, to clone the 'supermen' of history one comes to a very interesting problem. What is good? Is good something like the rain on my field when I need it and on yours when you don't? Is the good to be understood as something which applies universally or only to certain times and places?

Is the good a matter of what is advantageous and disadvantageous for survival? Although it seems good for the hawk to eat, it seems bad for the mouse... Yet neither is universally good or bad, it depends upon your perspective.

The good has nothing to do with dualistic thinking of right/wrong. It is even silly to consider dualistic arguments about the good for they just go around and around in sophistry, leaving everyone confused in the end.

It is really bizarre to watch the medical ethicists trip all over themselves to pontificate about what is good and true and bad and false while they are doing so within a secular humanistic framework. In a philosophy of a relativity of values; one in which

the good is dependent upon the context of the culture and time in which any event occurs then all ethical propositions are equal and none are more worthy than any other. It is hard to tell people what is ethically good when the philosophical groundwork

is based on relative values. Relative values are those which change from religion to religion, culture to culture, and era to era. The truly universal values are common human values and are easily apparent to those who spend the energy to look.

9. WHAT IS QUALITY?

"OBJECTIVE" QUALITY IS THE IMPLICATE ANIMATE BEAUTY THAT DERIVES FROM THE BASIC PATTERNS OF THE UNIVERSE BUT OUR EXPERIENCE OF IT DEPENDS UPON OUR ABILITY TO INCREASE OUR UNDERSTANDING, ELEGANCE, AND BEAUTY IN LIFE.

"And so the perennial question of humanity, the only question worth devoting one's life to, is: how are we, how am I, to live fully in the world of "birth and death," the world of organic life on earth, the world of society, responsibility, making and doing - while at the same time fulfilling the immensely higher and greater possibility that is offered to us as human beings?"

Jacob Needleman, Money and the Meaning of Life

Aesthetics is the study of the Nature of Art and Quality, but Quality is not Merely an Emotional Response!

So much of what we call art today consists of collages of crafts designed to elicit an emotional response. With such a grand tradition of great art from ancient China, India, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Italy, the Impressionists and the Surrealists - how could humanity's sense of art fall to a pin prick aesthetics? Pinching myself lets me know that I am here, but does it make me feel better about it? I feel that the natural world (including the cosmoses) is the greatest inspiration for beauty, elegance, and emotional response. The sacred geometry of nature seems to be at the roots of most great art, such as in the works of the great Renaissance artists - for example Leonardo daVinci.

When you are in the presence of great art you just know it. The harmonies, rhythms, proportions, and patterns of the universe as we know it strike a deep chord within us. The architecture of the universe in both physics and biology contains within it the keys for the most stunning art. Who is not moved by a waterfall, the wonderful richness of life in a jungle, the spiral arms of a galaxy, or a beautiful seashell?

Great Art

Great art requires a definitive combination of technical brilliance and emotional intensity. It communicates in a dialogue of understanding between the artist and the experiencer. I do not consider a work of craft ART if it only conveys the emotion of indignation, or that of horror. However it is important to note that much of art is experimentation, and of course artists should always be free to undertake whatever manner of concoction they choose.

Nor is quality merely a matter of degree of intensity or extension of technical capability. There is always the animate essence of life in great art and it always reaches out from the work and lets me know it is there without even my conscious expectation of such an engagement ahead of time.

Art in Life

So too with life, for I believe that one must live their life as art, one must conceive of one's life as a great sculpture to reveal. Quality applies to the living of life as well as the production of great art. Quality in life is not always about extending my experience or the "best" stuff, or the finest sensory delight. Quality of life is dependent upon many things, all interpenetrating, but some much more important than others. If we look back to the ancients again, I am sure that they would say something like,

"a quality life” is one in which there is more happiness than sorrow. It is a life permeated with love and enriched by the joys of giving. It is a life in which there is time for introspection, to examine one's life. A quality life is one in which the

individual is counted by ones’ self and others as having contributed to the improvement in the lives of those around them. It is a life in which one has the chance to experience many different people, places, and events, and one in which one is free to fashion their own understanding of the universe consciously and without duress or constriction. It is a life that is free, and one that is accountable - a quality life is one in which one has the opportunity, makes the effort, and observes the results of growing a soul.

To create is to bring about the existence of something new. The process of creation is the combination of initial elements of one scale into a coherent unity on another scale. Creation is synergy, where the whole is more than the sum of the parts. Each of the parts may be a whole, but the combination creates a new entity on a different scale. The process of creation is revealed constantly in nature. Each individual tree exists as a unity, but so too does the forest of which it is a part. The forest is an eco-system within itself, a complete entity in the process of interrelated existence. Creation deals with the evolution of being on differing scales of relative relations.

Love and Beauty

The experience of love and the perception of beauty both have many levels of quality. One lies within, the other without, yet both flow from the same source. Without them our lives would be colorless, dull voids, empty of all meaning. These are the roots of our passion, simple yet profound. For what mystery looms larger than love, and yet what greater proof of the mystery of existence as beauty? How can love and beauty be accidental in our universe? The stars, the clouds of Jupiter, the rose, the eagle, the child, and our universe all bond in the mystery of existence. What cold mathematics or logic can explain the synergy of all this?

10. IS GOD DEAD?

THE GODS OF HUMANITY COME FROM THE CREATIVE SPIRIT AND ARE PRESENT FOR THOSE WITH "EYES" TO SEE

“How we describe the ‘Gods’ of humanity reveals more about ourselves than the ‘Gods’”

-The Author

People have speculated a great deal about the nature of 'God' over the millennia. There have been many different models to explain the concept of 'God' and to explain the cause of existence. Early animists believed that many different living spirits were the drivers behind the forces of nature and the cosmos. The idea of a single 'God' came with the advent of civilization. People who became somewhat insulated from the effects of nature began to question the divine nature of the elements.

More complex ideas about the nature of deities were developed. The ancient Greek pantheon was made up of 'Gods' who were originally heroes who performed superman type deeds and became 'Gods'. These 'Gods' became archetypes or icons of experiences in life such as the phenomena of wisdom called Athena or the spirit of Love called Aphrodite. The Hindu pantheon deals with many different and complex characters on the surface but becomes increasingly abstract with study and the 'God's eventually resolve themselves into the aspects of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, and eventually these resolve themselves into the nature of Brahman, the unity of all things.

In the Western hemisphere the influence of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam overcame local pagan animistic belief systems and substituted the notion of a 'God' in Heaven, a 'God' removed from the Creation who ruled in an imperial style through harsh punishments, afflictions, and social control mechanisms directed through the local kings. Such a 'God' inspired fear and was based on the authority of violence. Yet the way people view 'God' says more about them themselves than the nature of 'God.' It is little surprise that during a period of history with empires, kings, religious wars, and inquisitions that the concept of 'God' would be rather harsh - it was a reflection of the world people lived in.

It is interesting to note that the most personally useful concept of 'God' is the one which is so often ignored by clerics. This awareness of 'God' is as a creative spirit of nature. It is the motive force of our universe itself and comes from within and flows without. Creativity is not lorded from without and above. Creativity is love driven and nurturing and unfolds from the inside outwards like the emergence of a flower. The very implicate synergy of the universe, which we share, reveals to us something about the creative spirit directly in our own life.

In an early conception 'God' was considered omnipotent and omniscient - all powerful and all knowing. This early 'God' was conceived to have complete power to intercede in the chains of causality that bring events into action. Such a 'God' was immanent, watching and controlling everything at every moment. One of the strange contradictions of the earlier concepts of 'God' is how something could be removed somewhere out there in Heaven and yet immanently control everything "down here." This would be nothing less than remote micromanagement!

Creativity Comes from Within

The intelligent self organizing and replicating design of being in the universe indicates a type of creative will for the whole to be more than the sum of its parts. Since the nature of our universe is synergy could this be an indication, a reflection in the pond so to speak, of the intent of being on a scale seemingly far removed from that of our own?

The practice of your beliefs about the universe is your spirituality and this is something that is resident within the being of every individual. Even people who believe nothing of Gods, religions, spirituality, or philosophy can be said to have a type of spiritual practice if for example they do a selfless deed - something not rational in a meaningless, accidental, and mechanical universe. It seems as if coming to some relation with the larger aspects of existence is basic to the reality of the human condition and as such is inescapable. The answers you develop to the question of theology, or the nature of the creator, can radically affect the ideas in your philosophy and the practice of your spirituality. There can be no real communion of religion or round table of spiritual sharing unless we can say something about deity that can be acceptable to mutual understanding.

So how can we get a common sense understanding of something as heady as: the nature of God?

We are creatures of consciousness. Our consciousness constructs impressions about the nature of reality, the origins of existence, and each other. Such imaginations operate mythologically and emotionally rather than rationally and empirically. The empirical nature of what we consider to be reality is less important than how we act based upon our ideas. Some ideas are more positive than others. Since they are all based on the imaginations of our consciousnesses we are at liberty to choose and nurture the best.

The main issue each person must come to terms with in their life is the relation of one’s self to the larger field of being. In different periods of history people have developed different explanations of this relation. All of your actions, beliefs, and values are determined by the attitude held towards the resolution of this issue. Primary in fashioning a meaningful relation to life is coming to terms with the origin of the existence we enjoy. Our connection to the sacred in experience, to spirituality, and to the greater field of being revolves around the issue of our attitudes towards the creator. This inevitably leads us to considerations about the nature of what we have called, for lack of a better term, 'God', and the nature of the universe we live in. Any serious exploration of human understanding must begin here.

It will be important to free ourselves from some of the traditional conundrums we run into when dealing with such a topic. The idea of 'God' has often been misused by the careless and unscrupulous and it must be acknowledged that it is difficult to say much that is meaningful about things which are fundamentally mysterious. Yet it is important that we do not simply run away from the mysterious in life - it is just this realm which gives us entree to the use of that part of the mind we call our imagination and creativity.

Without the personal exploration of the meaning of our life we are left unfulfilled, uncertain, and in doubt about our own nature and that of our universe. We are left unable to explain why we believe what we do and why one course of action is better than any other. Without coming to terms with the mystery of our existence we are unable to appreciate the grandeur and subtlety of our universe and the value of being human.

Without some understanding the gift of the creative will behind the appearance of our universe we live in a silly state of accident - a meaningless universe blindly and randomly churning on endlessly with no purpose, goal, or value. When the magical and spiritual aspects of being are reduced to simple byproducts of material processes in the brain this perspective makes us specters, mere ghosts of people in our bio machines. Are we to consider ourselves holographic cartoons? Are we really expected to deny our own common sense observation of our consciousness? In an age in which science seems to be confirming that we are biological forms of machines we must ask the question, "just what sort of machines are we?" We are not merely machines - we are beings capable of transcending ourselves and escaping our more mechanical aspects. The attitude towards people as automatons takes every valuable aspect of human nature away - consciousness, soul, spirit, imagination, being, and equality. Without these we are nothing besides fancy robots.

Because the process of the creation of our universe is ongoing - and all known things associated with our universe are processes - it is likely that any 'God' would also be undergoing creative processes and would be, like the creation, unfinished and mysterious even to itself. This common sense view of 'God' calls for the deity to be a creative artist, continually experimenting and learning. A creative 'God' enables a more personal and direct relation with spiritual experience and invites conscious beings to be co-creators of reality with the creative spirit. A creative 'God' is one that has left its signature everywhere, and the mutual signature between all entities in our universe is the inherent ability to self organize and eventually create. This is like a reflection of the original creative principle contained within everything, unfolding its implicate pattern throughout time.

The concept of 'God' has been transformed from a superstitious understanding of nature spirits, to an anthropomorphic projection of human qualities, to that of an emperor tyrant who exacted bitter punishments for transgressions. Now the theologians have backed off to the idea of a removed 'God' of modern times who is no longer manifest and depends solely upon the faith of the flock for existence. These ideas seem rather awkward when considering a creative spirit that is a partner in the co-creation and not a brutal slave driver or simply a careless lout. How stark a contradistinction are such ideas to the understanding of 'God' as an artist working through synergy, holism, harmony, and wisdom to achieve the evolution of consciousness in the experiment called creation.

The early concepts of 'God' worked wonders for the old kings, lords, and priests. People were threatened by eternal damnation if they questioned the words of the priests or the actions of the aristocracy. "Authorities" maintained that peasants had to work hard in this life because poverty was their 'sinful' lot and without proper subservient behavior and hard work they would not get their reward in heaven. This was a cruel and brutal way to force people into submission and yet it has worked successfully for millennia and is still used in many parts of the world today. A person, culture, or institution that uses religion to scare people into submission is practicing religious violence and as such has no spiritual authority whatsoever. It is hard to scare people into love.

A kind 'God' is a 'God' of tolerance. This suggests a little latitude for exploration and play. The development of spirituality is not an artificially staid situation - it is the culture of Enlightenment, of Renaissance, and renewal. An understanding of changing ethos is also important when considering the evolution of our notions of deity. The early climate of ethics and social justice was one of cheap life. There were divine rights for the privileged few in royalty. Everyone else was viewed as animals, uncontrolled sub-humans fit only for slavery. The royalty and priests felt that the way to control the populace was through the fear of sin and the violence brought upon oneself by the religions and nobles for contradicting authority - they would get you either here in this world or possibly in hell in the next. This type of attitude is repugnant to the notion of spiritual beings with inalienable rights. Spiritual beings want freedom and will seek liberation from slavery. The move towards conscious liberation, both human and spiritual, is the evolutionary path of humanity. The common sense observation of a kind, partner, artist 'God' calls for the empowerment and enlightenment of all individuals through self knowledge and the practice of love.

As our notions of 'God' evolved, the view of what role 'God' plays in the material universe has also changed. 'God' was viewed as separate from the creation, that the created physical realm was evil and hostile, something which must be overcome. We may finally come to understand 'God' as a creative spirit within the universe, and that the material expression of the creation is healthy. What we perceive as a duality of spirit and matter may be realized as opposite ends of the stick - opposite ends of the ray of creation.

Many of the concepts of a variety of Gods are useful in pondering the nature of any being that will be what it will be. We can, for instance, look at Athena as a manifestation of an aspect of God-hood, or likewise Aphrodite, or even Ares. It is true that the encounter with wisdom, love, or war is really an actual part of being-themes that echo throughout experience. Creativity comes in many forms. Instead of feeling compelled to try to compete with or master nature or our universe we might finally come to the point where we can participate in the magic of creation as artists ourselves.

Creativity is the ability to make something new. If the idea that the emergence of a universe with sentient life is a rather awesome act of creativity then we can say a few things about creativity itself.

How do we emulate in our own scale the Creative Spirit, the will or impetus behind the appearance of existence, how do we grow that particular aspect of the Creative Spirit embodied in each of us? What do we do each day to improve our connection with creativity? The work of creativity involves our own personal evolution, the emergence of new means for working with people, and the great work itself of consciously creating our own individual reality in sync with the underlying patterns of our universe.

The activity going on in our universe at every scale is creation and transformation. That is what entities do, they create relations and transform them. Throughout the observable universe there is an imbedded will or energy to create, a natural power of and tendency towards the combination of forces and basic elements in increasingly complex patterns of self organization. It is just such a force which makes your life actually exist.

Our universe is a product of the complex unfolding patterns of this will in different scales of relations. It is not random and accidental, there is order and there are identifiable underlying patterns and principles behind it. Part of this order gives rise to the ongoing creation of entities like atoms, protons, and electrons or stars and planets. Other patterns of order are revealed in the seashells of the nautilus and spiral galaxies.

Such elegant repeating patterns at different levels of scale in our universe demonstrate a high degree of design in our universe: this implies conscious intent. The fact of design implies the practice of artistic creation as well as the produced art. The design reveals through direct and verifiable observation an intent to produce intelligent life. We are actually here!

We can come to know the Creative Spirit by our own direct experience. What makes us better able to think, to speak, to laugh, to write, and live with each other more creatively and qualitatively? The Creative Spirit is nature, it is synergy, it is the underlying life energy which evolves like a seed bursting forth in the big bang to the flowering of our individual consciousnesses. This Creative Spirit permeates all things.

The art of the Creative Spirit is creation, it is creativity itself. Since all beings exist they have relations and thereby create - all manifest the Creative Spirit whether consciously or not. The art of creativity is the science of ''God''. We are all artists of reality. There is creative order everywhere if you observe yourself and your environment. There is much potential for great new works at every moment if we act upon our own observations and understandings. Our universe is a great unfinished canvas upon which we paint our destinies. A person either does this consciously or unconsciously. Make sure you consciously paint yours. Together we can achieve a new way of being with each other in the unity of creativity and thereby provide a positive vision and direction for the future.

Our inner unease at the millennium in this modern world is a product of our own disconnection with the Creative Spirit of life. By establishing a relation with the Creative Spirit rather than imagining an autocratic tyrant we can come to a deeper understanding about the nature of life and our universe itself. Such a belief fosters positive attitudes rather than encouraging hostile feelings, thoughts, or actions. It is high time we recognize that the great gift of conscious life that we have been given is not a product of accident, harshness, or hostility.

If we can accept a notion of a creative spirit unfolding its design of synergy we can use this as a basis for exploring the parts and structure of that design. It is possible to understand that there are things moving within relativity and scale and of course these things are vibrations in different scales or in other words dimensions. The view of the harmonic universe is very natural to the human understanding of events. This is one of the oldest human cosmological understandings and quite possibly one of the best.

God isn’t Dead, the Gods are Mysterious...

Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? Granted our early human conceptions about beings in the rest of the universe seem silly now, although I bet there are creatures a lot wilder than anything the ancients thought about flying around somewhere out

here.

Many people, even scientists, are coming to a recognition that science and magic are not necessarily either/or propositions. Many think that the big bang and the creation may not really be that far apart. Unfortunately for humanity it seems that most of the religious organizations (at least in the West) that quote the words of spiritual teachers have used the limited concept of an cranky, enthroned, old white fellow (who destroys cities through earthquakes and civilizations through floods) to brow beat their flocks into submission for their own increase of profit. The Machiavellian leaders of many of humanity's religious organizations throughout culture and history have been interested in profits, not prophets!

The words of the wise have been twisted again and again to fit the needs of gluttonous individuals almost as they saw fit. Yet God or deities need not be considered as anthropomorphic projections, crazy creatures which fly up into the sky, or miracle workers.

It is confusing when people whose home has been spared in a tornado tell a TV reporter that they thank God for saving them. As if God spared them but decided to kill their next door neighbors for their sins! It is obvious that God neither saved them from the storm nor did he kill their neighbors. Such stuff is silly non-thinking and insensitive to the families of people who have suffered.

We do not have to attribute evil motivations to acts of nature which are part of life on this living planet Earth - if we don't like floods, we shouldn't build in flood planes! Don't get mad at nature or god or devils for your troubles.

We have seen how viewing the concept of deity as creative spirit within an animistic, living universe comes close to some of the new scientific understandings of our day as well as some of the esoteric ancient ideas of humanity. Always remember that the origins and destinies of the universe(s) will always be a mystery, as is the synergy that holds it all together. The whole is always more than the sum of its parts, as is the universe. We live but such a brief time, do we even live long enough lives to have civilizations that last long enough to pass one second in the eye of the time of our sun? Given the grand scales of the universe, which are unimaginable to most of us - who can say with such surety that they have fathomed all of the mysteries of existence? The creative spirit of the universe is all around if you have eyes to see.

11. THE SPIRITUAL MANIFESTO: FROM WHERE HAVE WE COME AND WHERE CAN WE GO?

SELFISH OVERLORDS HAVE STUNTED HUMAN POTENTIAL BUT WE CAN STILL WORK TOWARDS SOCIAL EMPOWERMENT FOR ALL

"The First Real Change - You, a Revolution!”

- Nina Hagen

"I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the 'world.’"

Socrates, From Plutarch, Of Banishment

In every culture the enlightenment or development of the individual has been encouraged by the great spiritual teachers and social visionaries. The evolution of the self rests on the belief that a person can improve one’s self. We can live better lives and enjoy more of the lives we lead. To evolve your self it is necessary to remember that self. Who are you? You are a human being with sensings, feelings and thoughts. Your being is based on love and this allows for your spiritual evolution. You have other capacities such as imagination, insight, understanding, conscience, love, kindness, and empathy. So do all people regardless of where they are on the planet. You share the possibility and mechanisms of spiritual evolution with every other human.

Who you are is a human, and who you can be is a kind and loving human. Being such a person means using a type of ethics based on valuing the existence of others. If your values come from your conscience, you can go anywhere and do most anything within the realm of human ethics without breaching humane conduct in any culture. Minor moral differences between cultures and belief systems vanish when an individual uses conscious ethics in their transactions with others. Consciousness and conscience or awareness and empathy create virtue. Conscience is an organic human function found everywhere there are people. You have the freedom of self determination and the responsibility to use your conscience in determining your actions towards others.

Each individual has a responsibility to the community and society in which they exist. We are not islands. Children would never grow up if life were really based on competition and we as a people acted as selfish rugged individualists. Each of us has abilities that we can share freely to benefit others. Many things would not be done if it were not for people volunteering their time. The future of civilization hinges upon whether we can cooperate with each other.

The creation of a global human community is still an ideal, and one which will never be reached unless individual people realize that they have a valuable role to play. It is important for people to be able to understand, relate to, and work towards this role.

The individual's role in life is the personal creation of better realities for everyone. Without a spiritual dimension to enable the growth of the individual there is no driving reason to improve oneself and no grounding for qualitatively good values and beliefs that can be agreed upon by people in nearly every culture. The first step toward the fostering of increased global understanding is the exploration of our mutual fundamental underlying principles, beliefs, ideas, and assumptions. These foundations of our consciousness come within the scope of philosophy and spirituality, which is where the dialogue of the people will begin. If such dialogue is not possible as a result of intolerance and close mindedness the future growth of global understanding will be seriously inhibited.

One place such a dialogue can begin is through experiencing personal spirituality rather than dogmatizing. We must frame the dialogue with the perspective of identifying mutual values, experiences, and wisdoms for fostering the growth of the individual and humanity as a whole. The practice of personal spirituality is then a workable common sense approach to learning from others and an alternative to arguing over the morals and dogmas of each belief system.

The development of a mutual spiritual framework will require something that must work for individuals in a wide variety of different belief systems. A new spiritual communion must embrace the best wisdoms of the world's spiritual understandings and restore the role of humans as a players in the growth of our universe.

We need new visions to stir the imagination of what our future is to be. We each need to reconstruct for ourselves what it means to be human and what it is that constitutes humanity. Many of the old wisdoms and archetypes no longer inform and inspire people. Relativity of belief has called into question all the premises upon which our civilizations rest. There is questioning without recourse to common sense and individual experience, this has left us unable to articulate the fundamental principles that we all share as humans. With the proliferation of the means for destruction growing by leaps and bounds, never before has the need for connection between people and our universe been so great and the price of disconnection so high.

We are at the point where humanity must come to terms with its future - the unification of human understanding. The shrinking of our planet through communications technology and increased population no longer allows us to ignore each other. We will not evolve mechanically. In order to progress we must consciously grow both personally and socially.

To deal with the increasing complexity of human experience and our increased awareness of each other, our universe, and ourselves, we need a more coherent form of intelligence available to make meaning out of existence. Each of us has an ever increasing need for a human synthesis of values and meanings out of the disconnected information chaos in which we live. Conscious control of your destiny can only occur when there is an individual unification of brain, heart, and body: of reason, emotion, and sensation. One who has achieved this becomes an agent of synthesis and a creator renewing reality. Analogous to the spiritual development of the individual, the future of humanity is the unification of its experience, understanding, and wisdom.

This new awareness of the future evolution of human understanding can only be facilitated by individuals who themselves have achieved a degree of their own personal unity and not through conscription or mindless uniformity. The future of human evolution is not the creation of supermen but rather complete humans. Supermen are like the ancient Greek Gods - exaggerated caricatures of the beings who invented them. The archetype of superman is not enough to provide us a new mythological basis for the future of humanity - our destiny is much greater.

In this new vision of the growth of human understanding what it means to be human is to be a creative synthesis. We must make efforts to unleash the creative forces in our selves and become our own co-creators of reality. The type of global society possible in the future is that of a society of citizens who are entrepreneurs in the spiritual evolution of their own futures and who are co-creators of better realities.

The price of our individual inaction is high. Individually the price of not evolving is the absence of the personal creativity and the de-generation of the spirit. Socially the cost of individuals shirking their own enlightenment is alienation, apathy, chaos, and even war. The abandonment by individuals of their own growth as people could eventually lead to a poisoning of our societies, nations, and planet to the point of annihilation.

The future of humanity is the growth of a mutual intellectual, emotional, and material understanding of life based on love. The creative forces of our universe have emerged sentient beings that must unify themselves individually before they can work to provide the conscious mind the world is working towards. To this end I offer some characteristics of mutual human wisdom.

The Conspiracy of Unconsciousness

Our True Job is Human Liberation

We are going to shift our attention in the scale of things a little and look at what has happened over recorded human history to bring us to the current state of affairs. This will help us to understand what the creative spirit is asking us to attempt. Humanity has been wandering the planet like an orphaned child, haphazardly stumbling through all manner of catastrophe and accidental carnage due to a lack of conscious direction on the part of the people. It is my contention that since the time of the earliest civilizations there has been a conspiracy of unconsciousness, of benign neglect - a banal sort of evil which has been fostered by the very leaders of religion, government, and commerce who, operating solely in their own best interest, have stifled the progression of humanity towards greater mutual understanding, cooperation, enlightenment, and liberation from tyranny.

How do we come to have sentient life? What has happened here? We have a universe to live in and minds, hearts, and bodies to contemplate it! This is the most magnificent miracle of all. The very essence of our universe is life and creativity. The creation naturally evolves increasingly complex life forms which eventually develop brains with which to reflect upon experience. The natural state of such beings is spiritual evolution or development, the increase of the powers of being and consciousness.

Yet first must come the securing of the material necessities of human life and so it is natural that first civilization must provide for the physical necessities of existence. It is amazing that so many of us are still trying to accomplish this first task of life after so many thousands of years! The natural organization and cooperation of human labor was taken over by profiteers who, with slight advantage of education or physical power, determined that there would be rulers akin to ''God''s and the rest of the people would be considered sub-human brutes and thereby perfect candidates for slavery. We 'progressed' from free wanderers and beneficiaries of nature's bounty to domesticated cogs in the machinery of civilization.

It is important to look at how we became tools for the enrichment of the concentrators of power and how for millennia people have struggled to breathe free. This battle continues and has colored all of the subsequent recorded history. When we realize that we the people did not start out in slavery it is easy to recognize what has been happening throughout history. Seemingly each generation has to learn it anew. Although the struggle for conscious evolution has been thwarted for a long time it is possible the task of human liberation can again begin.

The Domestication of Species

The hydrothermal vents on the ocean’s floor spawned the generation of life naturally in the stew that was the early Earth's atmosphere - a normal occurrence in a living universe! The formation of life occurred over three billion years ago. This means that life here is 1/4 as old as our universe itself. For millions of years the food pyramid formed. Out of the dim mists of wild nature emerged Homo Sapiens - a creature that was the crown of creation. No more sophisticated a being or more complicated has arisen here. Finally our Earth's nature had brought forth consciousness by which to reflect upon its existence.

Nomad groups banded together and in their early successes at cooperation they learned how to work together. Through time their interactions became more complex and their methods required new cultural and physical tools. The first stage of civilization developed slowly as the numbers of tribe members grew and movement became less easy. When there were too many in the group to follow herd migrations they started digging in. The cultivation of plants which were easily grown in large amounts helped to increase the population. No longer did they wander in small groups - the bounty of the planet facilitated reproduction and as their numbers swelled quickly as they settled in camps and produced ever increasing amounts of food.

Early Protohominids and later nomads were able to follow their impulses without much restriction - they were relatively free and unregulated in their behavior. As the knowledge of the hunters and gatherers grew they became more self conscious. The curse of the beginning of self consciousness is the formation of self concept, of ego, and awareness of aloneness. This may be referred to as "The Fall." Identification with the things of their existence crept in and the sense of possessiveness manifested. The pursuit of the acquisition of material things is a pursuit that leads to more desire, desire to greed, unfulfilled greed to a type of suffering, and this type of ego suffering to attempts at increasing control and power through violence.

By settling in communities early humans freed themselves from their natural predators and through cooperation developed surpluses beyond the necessities for survival. Soon those who had worked 15 hours a week became the slaves of the tribal society, already an institution that needed to consume increasingly more resources to sustain its existence and growth. When early humans depleted their resources it was easier to raid the labors of a nearby settlement than move everyone. It is easier to burn than build, to steal than to grow.

At every stage of the development of human society the people have worked to cooperate at improving their lives. Every progress in uplifting people has come about through the people's cooperation. Yet a recurrent theme emerges throughout human history. People who lack conscience and wisdom, driven by fear and egotism, appear on the scene and proclaim that the available resources are not a gift at all - they are the rightful property of the profiteers!

The early tribes grew quickly and to provide for their welfare and defense their camps became more permanent. Gathering became agriculture and hunting became war. Protection against raids by other tribes lead to the development of defenses and a concentration of population. This formed the first cities - the oldest know being the city of UR. The freedom from a raid by a neighboring tribe had its price. The growth of the early cities increased the need for resources. Soon the inhabitants turned forests into fields and fields into dustbowls. All that remains of UR is the wall of Gilgamesh surrounding what was the city; the fair town and its fertile fields are both now desert. The ruins of the first known human "modern" city and its countryside stand as a stark warning to our ever increasing thirst for consumption.

The agricultural surpluses of the early cities provided material for the development of hoarding, trading, and experimenting. Fields, warehouses, and breweries necessitated a stable infrastructure so the first managers were born. The early leaders and dividers of resources learned quickly how the fear and greed of the ego worked to polarize and control others. Inventions such as the division and concentration of resources and the organization of labor came into existence. The principle of divide and conquer became a tool for the establishment of civilization and the domestication into slavery of the people to support it. The greatest example of this era was the construction of the pyramids in Egypt by the Pharaohs to immortalize their egos at the expense of whole generations. The desire to be number one, as symbolized by the erection of edifices took root and has to this day utilized the resources of millennia to glorify and immortalize the egos of successive profiteers. Yet is important to remember that the Pyramids are a great testament to the art and efforts of the people who actually built them, much like the Cathedrals in Europe, the temples in Asia, and the Mosques in the Middle East.

The cooperative efforts made by people in the early city states improved the conditions of their lives to a certain extent, freeing them to a degree from predators, neighboring tribes, certain illnesses, and the onslaughts of nature. However at the same time the early leaders used the excess production to fund raiding parties on other cities. The early kings desired to leave a legacy of military conquests to festoon their monuments, thereby hoping to achieve a measure of immortality. The desire to perpetuate the life, memory, or soul of the king created some strange manifestations such as mummification in Egypt and elsewhere. The kings felt like gods and wanted to be remembered as such. The cult of personality was born. Already the pattern of large scale crime was taking shape. The increasing need to out perform other rulers past and present created the necessity of ever larger military campaigns. The game became one of who could rule the greater empire. Huge slave economies developed as a cheap source of labor from conquered lands. With the jump from city states to empires the next phase of human existence was about to unfold - the mass organization of humanity for the enrichment of the profiteers.

Civilized Slavery

The sciences, developed in Ancient Greece for its rulers, enabled the formation of modern society and the successful manipulation of the physical world. The development of Roman society perfected the management of people in organized civilization, paving the way for completing the domestication of the species into slavery.

As the process of city building and population concentration proceeded over millennia the material comforts of many increased at the expense of the freedom of many others. Early experiments in ruling often had quite bloody results. The time available to investigate the world by the privileged in these early societies increased and they became interested in explaining the world around them so as to increase efficiency. In this period humanity rid itself of a complete reliance on superstition and began the investigation of our universe in a structured manner. This is not to say that as societies developed all were freed from predators, superstition, etc., but that some significant portion of the population witnessed a change of perception.

Over many such attempts at civilization, resource concentration, and edifice building there became established the role of professional thinkers. These people would invent methods of explaining the mysteries of existence for the benefit of the rulers and to justify life as it was for the ruled. The shamen took on more professional appearance and eventually changed jobs. This group, small though it was, reached it zenith with the philosophers of the Golden Age of Pericles in Greece. The philosophers had time to ponder and reflect, but they worked in the service of the rulers. The rulers needed ever better methods of organization of resources and so was born modern thinking, reasoning, and logic - the classification of the observed to facilitate its manipulation. The Master of this was Aristotle, whose job as a tutor was to render the known world manageable for Alexander of Macedon, the boy king. Alexander's reliance on information management set the stage for all subsequent rulers.

Our modern methods of rational analysis, vivisectionistic categorization, and logical thinking descend from Alexander's tutor, and have been little improved upon since. The word philosophy can be translated the love of wisdom or the wisdom of love. As the parent of the sciences philosophia owes its existence to the Greek 'Goddesses' Aphrodite and Athena. It seems as if little of the traditions of these 'Goddesses' is left within the field or philosophy's creation, the sciences.

Many scientists and philosophers in the 20th Century forgot that their fields are about liberation and enlightenment. Science and philosophy should be practiced for the greater evolution of humanity and be based on love and wisdom.

Aristotle's ideas support the notion that our universe is a completed creation and that all people have to do is imitate its principles and all will go well. Ancient Greece historically marks the beginning of the world view which has dominated the Western world ever since. The foundations of dualism are easily located in the ideas of the ancient Greeks. Plato held that there are basic "solids" or mathematical principles in a cosmic realm that govern mechanically the activities in the physical realm and which are only imperfectly represented in the material world. They separated the spiritual or mental realm of organizing principles from the realm of physical experience.

Aristotle departed from the speculation about the underlying rules and geometric structures of our universe and instead focused on the classification of the observable world. The primary philosophical question, "why," was left behind as unnecessary for the manipulation of the the material realm. His focus on establishing categories for things in the observable and 'external' world has left a legacy of an obsession with classification as if the categories and labels for things were actually of greater importance than the things themselves. The establishment of standardized definitions and classifications of events and things enables a simple, easy, and repeatable method of demonstrating ideas to others about the content of the world. However it can also relegate the value of individual experience to a less important, subjective status. When this method is applied to people they become objects of study and are subjected to analysis. The individual is de-personalized into an abstract entity. In the era of objective science and reason the subjectivity of the individual experience is not recognized as valid and has become a tertiary nuisance to the efficient "objective" management of facts by reason. This is a strange situation, for what is more empirical than our own observations?

"Behold! human beings living in an underground den...Like ourselves... they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave."

Plato

The Republic Book VII, 515-B

The Romans adopted the legacy of Aristotle, the principles of Gilgamesh, and the edifice complex of the pharaohs. The Romans institutionalized Alexander's dream of empire. The Romans were the first "modern society" and worked to surpass the monuments and territorial achievements of their predecessors. They were managers and engineers par excellence. The mystical, poetic, and philosophical gave way to the practical necessities of creating a society built on conquest. We still live under the spell of Mars, the Roman ''God'' of war. The whole notion of management has its roots in the efficient organization of soldiers and civilians in a community supported by violence and the destruction of other communities. Their society perfected organized production, efficiency, management by objectives, slavery, and even tourist sites and shopping malls.

The rulers of Rome developed large scale public entertainment to appease the masses from their toil and to dissipate their free time. The people were considered dangerous, for most were not in the ruling class. The people were considered to be uneducated, vulgar, and violent; in short a human form of beast. Such beasts would be dangerous if there was too much free time to think about their situation in life and to discuss it with others. Huge monuments like the Coliseum and the Hippodrome were created for great spectacles of entertainment and carnage. The profiteers have always feared evolution, for they know they are criminals, and live in the terror that their crimes will be revealed and they held accountable. The ancient Roman rulers reasoned that revolution would occur if the people had too little food or too much time. The program of panus et circusum - bread and circuses - was designed to give the people something to eat and occupy their time when not laboring. In this way the masses became controllable and organizable. Rome generated great wealth and glory for the few and squalor for the many, albeit with food and entertainment. The cunning ego had its right of passage in Rome and created a type of society we still very much live in today.

In the Name of Love

During the Empire of Rome there was a mixing of many different belief systems. The most notable grew out of the work of Jesus. Jesus preached the values of love, respect, and the ultimate dignity of the individual person. Such ideas flew in the face of conventional social organization and still do today. Those in power perceived a need to side-track such ideas for fear that people would take them seriously and act upon them. One of the biggest spiritual conundrums in history is how Western society slid from the teachings of Jesus to the Inquisition. The enlightened philosophy of the spiritual teachers of the world holds that Love is the most important aspect of life. The emotional development of civilization was at hand all over the world with teachings about liberation from physical, mental, and emotional slavery.

People were recognizing that it is not enough to merely provide the material means for existence - there is more to life. Jesus demonstrated and taught a way of life based on love and understood the despair of the people and their squalor in those early societies. Unfortunately the teaching of love as a way of life became expropriated by a priest class which struck that old devil's bargain with the profiteers. This lead to the opposite of love, the use of philosophy and religion to oppress, exploit, and terrorize the population.

"By the late Middle Ages, the drifting apart of the two aspects of human nature was again taking place on a very broad scale in the monasteries. Again, the monastery tended to become an escape from everyday life - that is, an escape from the lower human nature. Cut off from authentic awareness of the animal and social impulses in himself, the religious aspirant fears these aspects, fears the outer world. The lower nature itself begins to be regarded as evil. The body begins to be regarded as evil; normal human interaction begins to be regarded as evil. But these aspects do not die or recede. Their energy cannot be destroyed, but instead - without a presiding intelligence which they can voluntarily obey - their energy operates in disguise, and wildly.

The well documented degeneration of the monasteries in the late Middle Ages, and the equally well-documented corruptions in the medieval Church, can be understood against this background of ideas about human nature.

“...Reacting to what it saw a the hypocrisy of the Church, Protestantism brought the idea that man could be free from obedience to the laws of any institution: that he could be guided solely by the light of his own reason. The whole arena of life was seen to be man's proper calling, and his role in the world could be as sacred as any priest's. Our modern economic system, as well as the ascendancy of science in our culture, springs in large measure from this view of the world; and our prevailing view of ourselves - including modern psychological categories and our exaltation of the intellectual function - springs largely from this view of the self. As we shall see, both on a broad social scale and on the scale of our individual inner world, the uniquely modern vision of the meaning of human life is reflected tellingly in the changes that have taken place since the Renaissance in the invented device we call money."

Jacob Needleman

Money and the Meaning of Life, New York, 1991

After the fall of the world's first empire there was a lingering memory of organized civilization inspired by the remaining monuments and islands of privileged thought. There arose a conspiracy of sorts between the two old ruling castes - the unholy alliance of the kings and the priests. Without a coherent empire there arose the practice of feudalism to stabilize an aristocracy that in turn advanced and protected the priests who had by now forgotten their mission. The leaders of the new religion organized its teachings for indoctrination to maximize the control of the minds and bodies of the European peasants. This made it the opposite of what its teachings about empowerment and personally embodied spirituality represented. Thus began the Iron Church; an institution who's authority rested on violence; not the love preached by Jesus. You can't bring people to practice love by coercion or higher states of mind by terrorizing them with the threat of damnation in hell. This is using violence as the authority behind religious motivation, which removes any authority whatsoever.

This new religious form and the power concentrators that protected it ruthlessly tried to stamp out any connection between the individual and the sacred. The priests pointed to the realm of the holy or spiritual somewhere "out there," divorced from experience - individual experience no longer had any authority. Yet again another attempt at a positive improvement for uplifting humanity had its efforts turned to profit by the unscrupulous at the people's expense.

The Christian church adopted many of the ideas of the ancient Greeks and especially those of Aristotle. This happened as the ancient Greek texts became available after victories in the Crusades. The capture of Toledo in Spain by the Christian armies revealed a treasure trove of information about the world. The injection of Greek ideas paved the way for the subsequent development of the Renaissance and Enlightenment. Yet before this happened for centuries there was very tight control over ideas. The old dualisms took on new garb in the form of religion removed from spirituality. The church held the spiritual part of religion as a monopoly, considering itself the ultimate authority on wisdom.

The opinion of the priest was the interlocutor between the sacred and the individual. The person was only a passive witness to religious services and spectacles. All independent thought was discouraged and the penalty for challenging the church's status as absolute authority was condemnation as a heretic. The church created an instrument of terror called the Inquisition to enforce its absolute authority and to inflict rigid behavior control systems onto the populace . Its mission was to stamp out any vestiges of earlier belief systems, variations on official church doctrine, or independent thinking. At one time in the Middle Ages anyone other than a priest who could read from the bible was considered a heretic! One of the most egregious examples of the devil's bargain between the priests and the kings was the deal between the Pope and the King of Spain concerning rule over the "New World." The church abdicated all control to the Spanish Crown, even to the extent of placing the King in charge of the clergy in the New World. Incredible brutality was papered over by logical and legalistic rules, regulations, definitions, and bureaucratic institutions.

The need for efficient inquisitorial systems lead to the development of the method of inquiry used in modern abstract reasoning. No doubt the Socratic method came into play. An old interpretation of the book the Meno, in which Socrates leads an illiterate slave through complex questions about the squaring of the circle, has been that the slave knew the answers all along, and that it was simply a matter of remembering what he already knew. According to Plato the individual brings this remembering about by the asking of questions in proper sequence. It is amazing that Plato did not remember that Socrates knew the answer to the question in advance and designed the questions to build upon each other. The only one in the scenario remembering anything was the old fox Socrates who had to mentally construct the process of questioning to achieve the desired effect.

In the inquisitorial system there was no doubt because of the absolute certainty of the authority of the church, the reality of the world view that it promulgated, and the bases for existence that it preached. In the absence of doubt the answers to questions are all known ahead of time - the only problem is the proper execution of the questioning process.

The inquisition developed methods to determine what a constitutes a question, what constitutes an answer, and what constitutes truth. Because every question has a correct answer they thought, all that matters with such foregone conclusions is the manner and process in which the questions are executed. This bureaucratic reasoning formed the basis for subsequent rationalization processes that became operative as the age of reason developed and which are the basis of reasoning today.

The Age of Empire: Manifest Destiny to the Ends of the Earth

Many changes beset the Western world after the crusades and the historic travels of Marco Polo. The development of increasing trade with the rest of the world introduced new ideas and methods. The great trading companies of Europe started bringing back new goods and ideas from the rest of the world. Before Marco Polo, those returning from the Crusades brought translations of ancient Greek writings and mathematical theories back to Europe. Christopher Columbus' and subsequent exploration of the new world generated new wealth and the desire for new naval and military technology. Trade with the new world opened up a new era of ocean travel and conflict. The English rejection of the Pope and their defeat of the Spanish armada also served to facilitate their conquering of the world. The proliferation of printing presses served to help disseminate many new ideas throughout Western Europe in a relatively short time.

There was a flowering of literature and the arts in this period that witnessed the works of Shakespeare and Marlowe in England, the success of Goethe in Germany, the works of Cervantes and El Greco in Spain, the rise of the Italian opera, and the appearance of the Dutch masters all between the late 1400's and early 1700's. Philosophers like Descartes in France started speculating about the nature of human existence, the methods of reasoning, and the laws of the physical universe. The great cosmologists Kepler, Galileo, and Copernicus began investigations of the structure of the cosmos. The heretical ideas espoused by such thinkers included, contrary to church doctrine, the idea that our universe did not revolve around the Earth.

No longer were human concerns at the center of our universe. Human significance paled in the face of the vastness of the heavens as seen through the telescope. Descartes hypothesized that God was a deceiver and Martin Luther maintained that the taking of communion was a symbolic act and not the actual eating of the flesh of Jesus and the drinking of his blood. The suggestion that there was not an actual transubstantiation of the bread and wine in the service attacked the authority of the church as a miracle maker and as a teller of truth. When the Church insisted that an actual transubstantiation was taking place it began a long journey down a road in which it asked its followers to disbelieve what their senses were telling them. Even to this day the church is still in denial about many of the subsequent scientific discoveries that have occurred over the last 500 years.

The emergence of Spain as an international maritime power heralded the beginning of the Age of Empire. The nation states of Europe were struggling to assert themselves in Europe, around the Mediterranean, and in Africa. The resources of Europe were running short of the social needs of the time so a period of great expansion began. The early trading companies were searching for a route to Asia shorter than the circumnavigation of Africa and or India. The development of extensive bureaucratic institutions devoted to managing information and the growth in the numbers of lawyers accompanied what was to become an unparalleled expansion of European empires around the globe. A direct result of the exploration for a new route to Asia was Columbus' discovery of what was to become known as the "New World." Within 50 years after Columbus' discovery of the Caribbean Islands there was a massive Spanish takeover of land and people all throughout Central and South America. Spain profited handsomely from its holdings in "New Spain" - a source of labor, production, and most importantly gold and silver bullion to support the growth of empire.

As Spain grew so too did the other nations around her. France, Germany, and England got into the game of colonialization and this activity persisted well into the Industrial Revolution. Each of these nations developed their own technologies and industries to produce end products from the raw materials of their colonies. The vast distances involved between the colonial nations and their colonies necessitated the creation of large armies and navies. The increased wealth from the colonial nations boosted the wealth of the ruling nations, but it also caused inflation and increased dependence on foreign resources. In this atmosphere the power of political control increasingly shifted away from the Church. A clear example of this was the Papal Bull issued by a Spanish pope in the early 1500's granting the Spanish crown complete control over transportation to the New World, the administration of its government, and the management and financing of its clergy.

The advent of the nation state gave the aristocracy greater independence from the Church and the translation and publication of literature from the ancient world combined to facilitate the next major development - that of the efficient bureaucracy dependent upon reasoning for the management of empire.

Reason: The Heartless Headman

The attempt to free humanity in the Age of Empire by the use of Reason offered the development of the intellectual faculty, although unfortunately at the expense of all of the other human capacities. The works of the rationalist scientists of the Age of Reason rested primarily on the beliefs about the world described by Renee Descartes. His view of the world improved upon the classification schemas of Aristotle and gave us a lifeless universe of clockwork precision which left little possibility for the individual much less humanity to become more than it appears. The profiteers quickly realized the potential of reasoning as a tool for confusing, belittling, and exploiting the masses, and have used it ruthlessly ever since.

"Much learning does not teach understanding"

--Heraclitus

On our universe, fragment 10

Descartes and those who followed him such as Voltaire supplanted the authority of the church and the opinion of the priest with the skepticism of the individual and the authority of reason. In this era man was considered the measure of all things, everything was relative to the individual. The outgrowth of this has become secular humanism, a supposed relativistic moral system without any metaphysical basis.

Descartes maintained that "Those who seek the direct road to truth should not bother with any object of which they cannot have a certainty equal to the demonstrations of arithmetic and geometry." He held that we should only rely on reason in what we believe. E. F. Schumacher in his book, A Guide for the Perplexed, lays out one of the better analyses of Descartes. He points out that the narrow mindedness of Descartes permeated his whole philosophy. Descartes held that we should be "masters and possessors of nature" and that we should only apply our attempts at understanding to those things of which we have an "intuitive cognition" - those things about which there is no doubt. He leaves out any speculation about things themselves and the substantive behind the apparent.

According to Jacques Maritain:

"The mathematical knowledge of nature, for Descartes, is not what it is in reality, a certain interpretation of phenomena...which does not answer questions bearing upon the first principles of things. This knowledge is, for him, the revelation of the very essence of things. These are analyzed exhaustively by geometric extension and local movement. The whole of physics, that is, the whole of the philosophy of nature, is nothing but geometry. Thus Cartesian evidence goes straight to mechanism. It mechanizes nature; it does violence to it; it annihilates everything which causes things to symbolize with the spirit, to partake of the genius of the Creator, to speak to us. Our universe becomes dumb."

In the age of reason people associated reasoning with morality, common sense, and personal freedom. Yet logic is not necessarily fair or good or relevant. It is hard to get a good definition of reason. Usually we consider reasoning to be logical thinking. Often leaders use reasoning as a weapon for control rather than as one of a number of human mental tools for making sense of the world for the people. Many glorify the use of reason over and above individual common sense, experience, feelings, intuition, and instinct. The use of reason was supposed to free people from the power of authoritarian institutions and superstition. Now we face the need to free ourselves from blind logic and reintroduce at a more conscious level the elements of human experience that were abandoned.

Reasoning was a method for devoting knowledge to the development of morality and common sense. Yet the basic amoral nature of reasoning lent it to usage by any vantage point whatsoever. Reasoning seeks clearly identifiable true or false certitude as to the nature of reality and as a result encourages simple absolute answers where there is great complexity.

Furthermore blind reasoning knows no ontological, metaphysical, or axiological master - it and its facts can be argued from any given position and as such is a mercenary device. It is no surprise that the basic amoral nature of abstract reasoning appealed to the growing number of lawyers in the new nation-states - especially in Spain, where the modern legal tradition got its start. The emergence of doubt as a natural part of investigation is irrelevant in systems that demand absolute binary truth or falsity. The obsession with logical proofs and true or false facts obscure the subject matter at hand. Notions of justice, scale, quality, value, and common sense take a back seat to the provability of abstract intellectual constructions. This often blinds people to the actual processes going on around them. Schumacher states,

"The alleged fact that philosophy "had been cultivated for many centuries by the best minds that have ever lived and that nevertheless no single thing is to be found in it which is not a subject of dispute and in consequence is not dubious" led Descartes to what amounted to a "withdrawal from wisdom" and exclusive concentration on knowledge as firm and indubitable as mathematics and geometry. Francis Bacon (1561-1626) had already pleaded in a similar vein. Skepticism, a form of defeatism in philosophy, became the main current of European philosophy, which insisted, not without plausibility, that the reach of the human mind was strictly limited and that there was no point in taking any interest in matters beyond its capacity. While traditional wisdom had considered the human mind as weak but open-ended - that is, capable of reaching beyond itself toward higher and higher levels - the new thinking took it as axiomatic that the mind's reach had fixed and narrow limits, which could be clearly determined, while within these limits it possessed virtually unlimited powers.

From the point of view of philosophical mapmaking, this meant a very great impoverishment: entire regions of human interest, which had engaged the most intense efforts of earlier generations, simply ceased to appear on the maps.”

Reasoning develops self justifying abstractions. Dualism pervades the use of logical reasoning. Descartes considered thinking as something separate from the body, suggesting that reasoning rather than being, experience, or existence was the ground of life. The separation of mind or thinking from organic processes in the body set the stage for the dictatorship of reason, the guillotine of dualism, the separation of the intellect and emotion, and the state of objectivity removed from the common experience of existence. This state of affairs served perfectly the devices of the cunning, the manipulators, and those without conscience.

Eventually the church realized what a tool logical thinking could be in the rationalizations of church doctrine. St. Ignatious Loyola created the Jesuits. They are monks dedicated to educating the populace about church doctrine with reason, replacing inquisitorial torture. The training of the Jesuits was a strict behavior modification approach designed to humiliate the student and stamp out any type of individual thinking. The education system of the Jesuits for the modification of individuality laid the groundwork for subsequent military and management schools. The bureaucratization of reasoning was first accomplished by the Jesuits under Loyola. This signaled the beginning of a period in which both church and state created organizational systems designed to use reason as a moral tool for the rationalization of their positions and as a justification for their actions. The use of reasoning in an organizational structure facilitated the creation of even more structure. Such structures depended heavily on order and stability.

Loyola recognized that language conditions the creation of reality in the mind. Language and persuasion coupled with reason (located in an abstract part of the human being removed from the material world) could actualize what he thought was a "rational society" based on church teachings. The delivery of instruction in a precisely ordered manner to accomplish abstract ends required great efficiency in word and deed.

Efficiency in large abstract organizational systems requires control, and control necessitates centralization of information and secrecy of information management.

The dissociation of reason with the human experience has its roots in the ideas of Plato and the methods of Aristotle. The techniques of the Inquisition developed a methodology for inquiry and the position of Descartes as to the separation of reasoning from the body, as well as his replacement of authority with doubt, and opinion with reason, all further contributed to the vivisection of the human experience. This in no way suggests that the older structures of institutional authority and opinion were better, merely that the transformation of society through reasoning alone is not enough. The subsequent exclusive dependence on the management of facts through logical thinking created a legion of mercenaries of logical efficiency - i.e. the lawyers. The nature of reasoning as a toolbox devoid of context has enabled the use of logical thinking without recourse to common sense or natural human conscience.

One can reason about anything from any position. In a strange way Ronald Reagan was correct when he said that "facts are stupid things" - in a system of rationalism anyone can manipulate them in any logical direction. Rationalism can not pretend to deal with the quality of the premises to an argument or hypothesis, cannot address the relevance of the subject matter to the context of human experience, the accuracy of the data involved, the contribution to quality of experience, or the necessity of the argument in dealing with human situations. The exercise of bureaucratized reasoning separated from individual experience and from real people in real situations resulted in a cynical and manipulative world view on the part of the practitioners of rationalism.

The creation of a global human community and the healing of the divided self require a new approach that empowers the individual experience, supports the relevance of the person to a larger scheme, and the promotion of the individual as an agent of change and a co-creator of reality. At the end of the Age of Reason we have advanced post-industrial societies with ever increasing disaffection and individual confusion. We are in a period of information chaos where there are 500 channels with nothing on.

Perception is considered the reality, the medium of communication the message, and the illusion the actuality. The change from an industrial to a service economy has sapped our ability to continue acting in the same ways. We can no longer simply exist without noticing that things are fraying around the edges. The usual response to this is to work the treadmill harder and to become distracted in ever more outrageous manners.

The dizzying pace and the potential for mind numbing in post industrial society will soon propel us to the point where we will have reached maximal efficiency - there is a limit to how efficient or distracted we can be. Why is one being efficient? Usually it is to make someone else rich. We must ask ourselves where burning ourselves out at our cost and someone else's gain is worth the loss of our time, the loss of quality time, and the numbing of the mind necessary to forget the sacrifice. Unfortunately the very language and techniques for such deep introspection are not readily available or apparent. We need a new and pragmatic approach to the investigation of our lives, the determination of what is worth while doing, what our job as humans is, and what quality of life really indicates.

The Industrial Revolution

The industrial revolution witnessed the development of ever increasing means for the mass consumption of resources to profit the merchants and the industrialist empire builders. Its legacy is packaged food, strip malls, and all manner of pollution on earth, in the air, and in the water. The job of a conscious society is the stewardship of the environment, for it is upon the environment around us that our very lives depend. Yet in this phase of the development of civilization the basis for trade and development has been the creation of an economy based on mass destruction. The industrial revolution was developed by a succession of nations building war machines that were used to conquer foreign territories to steal their resources. Eventually these powers started fighting amongst themselves as the planet grew smaller and there were fewer places to get new resources.

There has been a succession of industrial revolutions, each getting more encompassing. From an agricultural period based first on human and then later animal labor we emerged into one based on gears and engines. The railroads became a key economic driver. Then came a period dominated by huge military machines with battleships, tanks, bombers, and other means of mass destruction. We have passed from this through a period of mass production and the consumer society to one driven by information technology. We are rapidly entering what some call a knowledge age or a digital era in which our ideas, creativity, and personal knowledge will be the prime economic drivers. Whether this new era incorporates wisdom remains to be seen. What use is knowledge without the proper judgment or wisdom to drive it?

An industrial revolution is a transformation of society from one way of life, with all of its accordant ideas, habits, techniques, tools, and forces of change to another, more technically advanced way of life. The process of an industrial revolution involves radical changes in the use of mechanical equipment; the conduct, scale, and scope of business; and the access to goods on the part of the society involved. Knowledge of the history of the "industrial revolution," its impacts on society, and the context in which change has taken place is important for understanding the forces of change which have shaped the present, the trends influencing change now, and the possible ways in which the future can develop.

The 'modern era' is the culmination of the evolution of ideas, communication, trade, and technology from the time of the ancient Greeks. Since the Greeks (in the West) there have been the Roman, 'Christian', Renaissance, Enlightenment, and Industrial eras. Even before the "Industrial Revolution" a variety of technologies and production techniques were used. Technology has been with humankind since civilizations were formed, but only in the last 250 years has the impact of technology on business, politics, and daily life become so great. The end of the millennium heralds the end of the industrial revolution.

We are at a point where a significant shift in the way we live is going to occur as the industrial eras draws to a close. We have been undergoing an exponential growth in the consumption of resources and industrialization. When the U.S. was young it looked East, North, and South and the myth was created that the eventual development of the continent was its destiny. We are now in a period in which the continent has already been carved up. To understand our present situation and what awaits in the future we must review what happened during those halcyon days of the "Industrial Revolution."

The first of the modern industrial revolutions, although manifesting in the latter 1700's and early 1800's, was the result of forces of change developing in the latter 17th to mid 18th centuries. From a mainly agrarian era between the dark ages and the renaissance an unprecedented era of international commerce and imperialism developed with the emergence of the nation state. The increase in global trade beginning after the Crusades and developing into the great trading companies of the Hanseatic League enabled a world wide flow of information. The industrial revolution was made possible by the ideas generated by Renaissance thinkers including Newton, Galileo, Descartes, and Gutenberg profited greatly from translations of the ancient Greek writings made after the Crusades and disseminated widely through the printing press as well as new ideas arriving with the cargoes of the merchant vessels. Other important factors in the development of industrial capacity included the advent of improved rifle technology; the large-scale exploitation of international commerce; the development of colonies and revolutions; the emergence of textile industries; and the growing independence of governments from the Church. This industrial revolution came to fruition by the mid to late 1700's, and was dominated greatly by France.

The second industrial revolution was the beginning of heavy industry, beginning in the early 1800's. Although centering mainly in England, it spread throughout Germany and the US. The driving forces in this age generated industrial changes faster than governments and people had time to address the issues involved, resulting in a work force entirely at the dictates of industry. This paved the way for the Dickensian sooty towns of Manchester and Birmingham, the emergence of the power of the railroads, and the development of the company town. The workers were at the mercy of industry. The vast numbers of unskilled labor poring into these towns created a large pool of easily exploitable workers, There were no safety standards, no compensation for injury, no maximum hours set for work, no minimum wage, and no child labor laws. This is the ideal conservative business situation, to which England recently attempted to return with the elimination of minimum wage, child labor laws, and maximum work hours several years ago.

The third industrial revolution began in the mid to late 1800's, and was driven by Germany's industrial push. It was largely a heavy industry and military revolution. The era of manifest destiny in the U.S. was countered by Europe with the colonialization of vast sections of the rest of the planet. Up to and during World War I Germany was expanding its industrial production, and after the war was re-constructed using the latest available technologies. The climax of this industrial revolution was World War II, the age of the great machines of war in which the military-industrial capacities of the world greatly exceeded in production and social impact all previous periods.

At present we are in the fourth industrial revolution - a consumer goods era in which the crowning jewel is what is called the Information Age - you can order nearly anything over the internet. The focus of factory production after the war shifted from mainly the manufacture of war machines (although defense related industries are larger than ever now) to the mass production of consumer and luxury items. This age has been dominated by the U.S., but has not been of equal impact elsewhere. Although the U.S. re-developed Western Europe and Japan by the Marshall plan, allowing the Europeans to use the latest technologies for re-industrialization, there are still people who can be described as peasants even in Western Europe.

The fourth industrial revolution has generated the computer, and has served as the basis for launching the next wave of change. Presently we are entering the "post-industrial society" of the 5th industrial revolution. This revolution may be more properly characterized as an Information, Knowledge, or Digital Age rather than an industrial one. This is the result of the proliferation of information technologies, the globalization of economics, communication, and culture. In this period an individual's personal creativity, experience, and knowledge could be key factors in creating opportunity and navigating the global information arena called the Internet. In this period manufacturing in most industries will probably relocate to 3rd world nations with slave wages. Even intellectual work will pay less because of the huge numbers of highly educated foreign specialists available globally for a fraction of wages in first world economies.

An immediate impact of the transition into the next industrial revolution is that people are already losing blue and white collar jobs to automation and job exportation. For the first time in U.S. history there are already more white than blue collar workers. As institutions try to incorporate the state of the art into operations and cut costs at the same time, an increasing number of job displacements occur.

As I write we are witnessing the end of the American Dream - the ability for the working person to own a home, have decent transportation, take vacations, and send their children to college. The era of empire building is over and we are returning to a form of feudalism, but on a global scale in the corporate realm. Empires are based on the idea of a large planet with seemingly endless resources. Now that the planet is shrinking in our consciousnesses almost daily and the resources are all located or exploited there is nowhere else to go. The huge empires were created to maximize the profits of the privileged. Now the privileged are carving up territories of land, business, and even virtual or cyberspace into economic kingdoms. It is not unlike the fall of Rome. The end of the Soviet Union ended the cold war - the last era of empire through which the whole planet was managed. Now without a superpower division of resources there is a rush to grab up all the possible political, economic, or territorial kingdoms. We are entering a period in which the rule of empires is over and all the smaller principalities will compete with each other for the remains.

Post-Industrial Angst

"And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest.

And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger."

Moses

The Third Book of Moses, Called Leviticus 19:9 - 10

"Out of this modern civilization economic royalists carved new dynasties...The royalists of the economic order have conceded that political freedom was the business of the Government, but they have maintained that economic slavery was nobody's business."

---Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Speech accepting renomination June 27, 1936

Many of the difficulties and challenges facing the Post - Industrial America of the 5th Industrial Revolution have their roots deep in the history of the Western world. The usage of reason for the maximization of efficiency in industrial systems at the nearly total exclusion of other aspects of human existence has spawned many psychological and behavioral problems for modern people. Individuals feel disconnected and isolated from each other, from their communities, and from humanity. Increasing mobility of people erodes traditional community structures such as the tribal village, the extended family, and now even nuclear family. Many modern people feel a disconnection with nature. Millions of people live and work in environments where nature amounts to only a few potted plants. The institutional settings in which many of us work run by abstract systems in which the consequences of an individual's actions are not visible. The headlong rush towards ever increasing efficiency has curtailed the amount of time available for introspection, 'quality time', play, and indulgence in the creative activities of life.

The mechanization of life and the increasingly abstract nature of human relationships affects everyone in some way. With fewer and fewer people able to claim or maintain a middle class lifestyle, the struggle to hold on to whatever assets people have become increasingly more difficult. The pressure, stress, and physical environments of today's world are so intense that interactions between people become so limited that we often behave as if we are caricatures of ourselves: fake paper cut-out characters in poorly scripted cartoons of superficiality trying at all costs to avoid dealing with real human issues. The degree of circumspection in our public and private lives is not the result of a massive acceptance of minimalism as a way of life. It is the result of the evisceration of the knowledge of living - self knowledge, social skills, the tools of individual empowerment, the language of experience, and general studies into the nature and meaning of life. The pressure to efficiently produce relegates the growth of the individual to an unimportant aspect of human existence, far behind work, entertainment, and specialized education.

Socrates said that an unexamined life is not worth living. A life driven by work and diversion leaves little time to grapple with the big issues of existence - meaning and love. One is kept so busy producing or consuming that reflection upon experience and questioning what makes a life worth living and important to oneself takes last place. The widespread disaffection of so many people in modern society is the product of a deep recognition that living a full life entails more than a mechanized existence. The social program indoctrinates us to be slaves of desire. The Western paradigm of increasing hard work to provide the means for increasing consumption is not enough for a full life. Right now the average consumer of products in the West has more amenities and resources than most royalty had in the not so distant past. Yet advertising encourages us to consume more. Not only must the car run, but its trunk must be air conditioned, and the rear view mirrors must be artificially intelligent!

The individual in post-industrial society is once again a victim of a bargain with the devil between the priests and the profiteers. The priests have abdicated whatever leadership their questionable authority had and the profiteers have taken over the instruments of the will of the people - they have bought the government and are laying the plans for the future of society. Everything we conceive as desirable and happiness producing is at our fingertips: yet there is still discontent. It appears that microwaves, cars, TVs, dishwashers, and telephones do not satisfy all the needs of a complete human. One of the distinguishing characteristics of being human is the ability to make conscious choices about life, the nature of reality, the future, and relationships with others. The real living of life in a full sense has a different price for each of us. However, it is a reward in itself, something more than the simple obsessive work of ants and bees or the compulsive consumption of conditioned laboratory animals.

Many of the problems apparent in society such as greed, violence, crime, waste, abuse, and neglect have their roots in the disconnection of the individual from the rest of human experience. Our systems fail when people apply management techniques to human situations. We as individuals fail when we fall down on the job of improving ourselves and working towards the greater good of humanity. This political greater good is the improving of the standard and quality of life of humanity as a whole on a personal level. The prevalence of schizophrenia and neuroses in the West are a direct result of the systemization of life and the micro management of time to squeeze the utmost efficiency out of work. The price paid is that our heads have become separated from our hearts. Maybe the guillotine is the best symbol of the rational and industrial age we have just passed through. We have lost our common sense and conscience, our natural moral compass. In the process the drive for efficiency has resulted in a tendency towards minimalist simplicity, smoothness, order, homogenization, conformity, and bumper sticker psychology, politics, religion, art, and culture.

This separation of reason from emotion, mind from body, logic from experience, had its birth early in human history. The separation of the mystery, the miraculous, and sacredness of our universe from the individual had its beginning in some of the earliest civilizations. The establishment of a priestly caste in ancient Egypt began the bureaucratization of spirituality and wisdom into organized religion, removing such concerns from the practical lives of individuals. This created the situation where the individual is a powerless entity in an unfathomable and removed universe; helpless and only able to accept the proclamations of those with greater authority about life. Yet who should have greater authority about your life than you yourself? When the minds of the people are divided they are easy to conquer. When people are confused, order and control is made simpler. The division of ourselves against ourselves serves the purposes of those who gain from the misery of others and not from the purposes of people who want to live good, full, and decent lives.

The Spiritual Revolution at the End of Mechanical Evolution

"Superman" if he ever enters scientific thought, is regarded as the product of the evolution of man, although as a rule this term is not used at all and is replaced by the term "a higher type of man." In this connection, evolutionary theories have become the basis of a naive optimistic view of life and of man. It is as though people said to themselves: now that evolution exists and now that science recognizes evolution, it follows that all is well and must in future become still better. In the imagination of the modern man reasoning from the point of view of the ideas of evolution, everything should have a happy ending. It is precisely here that the chief mistake with regard to the ideas of evolution lies. Evolution, however it be understood, is not assured for anyone for anything. The theory of evolution means only that nothing stands still, nothing remains as it was, everything inevitably goes either up or down, but not at all necessarily up; to think that everything necessarily goes up - this is the most fantastic conception of the possibilities of evolution.

All the forms of life we know are either the result of evolution, or the result of degeneration. But we cannot discriminate between these two processes, and we very often mistake the results of degeneration for the results of evolution. Only in one respect we make no mistake: we know that nothing remains as it was. Everything "lives," everything is transformed."

Peter D. Ouspensky

A New Model of the Universe, Chapter III, Superman

Mounting evidence indicates that for us as individuals the mechanical evolution of nature is not an option. At the same time the wilder forces of nature that shaped the appearance of man are increasingly controlled and circumvented by us so that the forces that affect the development of humanity are now more the creation of humanity itself than that of nature.

"Nature is trying very hard to make us succeed, but nature does not depend on us. We are not the only experiment."

---R. Buckminster Fuller

Interview in the Minneapolis Tribune April 30, 1978

The being of an individual can only develop so far in their spiritual and material growth before something besides mechanical development over successive generations of entities is required. Although everything external to one is already engaged in activities set in motion by other forces, the addition of your own intent and will can change everything. The emergence of a positive reaction from other beings in our universe is a prerequisite for our own development as individuals and as a species.

The mutual revelation is that we have the power within us to be the co-creators in our local universes, and by combining efforts with each other we can be the co-creators of our mutual destiny on the planet and beyond, avoiding the annihilation of our spirit and species.

The role of the complete human is to become a change agent of human destiny. We all have the Creative Spirit within us. Our destiny is to be engineers of the synthesis of human experience - entities that dream and artistically co-create their futures into actual existence. The role of the individual, as it always has been, is to become a philosopher, an artist and explorer after their own origins and destinies. The duty of the individual is to awaken the spiritual aspect within, by unifying the thinking, feeling, and sensing aspects of being. Only after your psychological parts have become unified can you become a creator of your own destiny and an co-creator of human destiny.

Human awareness produced from this unification of the personal self will go about the synthesis of knowledge from experience and from differing domains of information by the use of insight, intuition, and creativity - the ability to imagine dreams into real existence. This type of activity will actually alter the realities of an individual's existence and being. The ability to do this is rooted in the natural human understanding that the archetypal aspect of the mind is an access to a realm of potentia not unlike that of a Platonic idea - an archetype is a morphic field that plays a formative influence in nature itself.35 In this way our conscious thoughts can influence and modify our bodies, individual realities, and futures, as well as the lives and destinies of others.

We should pay heed to the words of Albert Einstein,

"Concern for man himself and his fate must always form the chief interest of all technical endeavors, concern for the great unsolved problems of the organization of labor and the distribution of goods - in order that the creations of our mind shall be a blessing and not a curse to mankind. Never forget this in the midst of your diagrams and equations."

--Albert Einstein

Address, California Institute of Technology 1931

A key realization is the extreme preciousness of life - not only our lives as humans but life on Earth and even the existence of our universe in general. When we realize that our mechanical, spiritual, and material development can only go so far - at that point we must become the artists of action in our lives - we recognize the need for us to grow ourselves consciously or else our development will become retarded. Not everything is foreordained, there are unpredictable possibilities of construction and destruction, it is up to us to recognize the imperative of the situation of our own spiritual growth.

After all this time and the progression of stages of human growth the widespread emergence of self consciousness began in what we call the modern era. We had provided the material, emotional, and intellectual means for survival for large portions of the population and the recognition slowly took place over the last two centuries that the exercise of reason alone was not enough to lead a full, happy, and self directed life. Fewer people tolerated the bondage of physical slavery and especially in the West many gains in liberation were made.

Self consciousness is what has been developing, albeit slowly, all along. It is this development which is the natural progression of our evolution and not increasing methods for slave management. Now it is up to us to ensure that the evolution of our self knowledge and consciousness is not also co-opted by the profiteers for their increasing profit. The stakes are high, there is no more mechanical evolution. As the singer Nina Hagen says, "The first real change - you, a revolution!"
APPENDIX 1: POSITION PAPERS FROM THE SPIRITUAL REVOLUTION

Many complain about the malaise besetting people in industrialized countries. It seems as if everything is getting worse and there is no one to blame and worse yet no apparent way out. We no longer understand what makes a society, we have become alienated from each other. We have become disconnected with the environment and from the consequences of our actions upon others. We have forgotten the social covenant between people in a free society that makes living together in cooperation a reality. We have forgotten how interconnected all of our lives and the issues of the day are. If we are to be known as a civilized and progressing society we need to come to a reckoning with ourselves. Each of us need to reflect internally about how we can increase our contribution to society. Our people need an awakening of conscience and an enlightenment of their awareness. We must recognize that none of us are islands and none are true rugged individualists. We must get serious about caring for what happens to each other so that the whole social fabric does not permanently rip. It is not that our governments must change so much, rather it is we ourselves that must change. Our understanding must grow and our attitudes must change. We must again take on our individual responsibilities as citizens of a democracy. This means participation in the society and the political process. It will be difficult, but unless we all begin caring what happens to our families, communities, and nation we will live in a place unrecognizable from the land of the free and the home of the brave.

In an enlightened age the dignity and importance of each individual are paramount in society. In an enlightened age the people do not treat each other as chattel or riff raff. There is no riff raff because an enlightened society provides for the useful engagement of each citizen in the community regardless of ability. Each can contribute to the greater whole and everyone who contributes to the common good is valuable. People not considered slaves by their employers are accorded the dignity and respect a citizen of the realm should have. Being a citizen implies many rights as well as responsibilities. Such rights include a livable wage and the ability to choose one's manner of living. It includes the control one's body free of governmental or corporate intrusion. It also means the right to keep private information about their personal life and the conduct of their affairs. Such individuals are also entitled to the freedom of expression of their views and the right to peaceably assemble. There of course must be an age of majority to protect children from exploitation because of their innocence. There must be strong protections for the vulnerable in society so that they are not abused by the unjust. Consensual non-violent actions must be accepted in a free society if it is to remain free however the key term is consensual and each should be legally protected from intrusive behavior by another. An enlightened society works towards the empowerment of its people, not their slavery and control. If the duty of society is to provide opportunity for its people to succeed in life, it is the responsibility of the individual to participate in that society as well as their own personal life.

Lifelong Universal Education

The price of democracy is an educated electorate. Without good educations a people are unable to make wise choices about their elected officials. The modern educational system, at least in the West is broken. Public education is geared toward the lowest common denominator. Basing school funding on property taxes leaves educational disparities between wealthy and poor neighborhoods. Many of the textbooks in schools have inaccurate historical and scientific information. Students are graduated from high school who cannot read, who have trouble identifying their own country on a world map, and who lack an understanding of history. Public schools are oriented towards homogenizing students to be docile workers in an industrial era and focus on behavior modification and conformity. The dissolution of families and social support for education has eliminated many of the extracurricular necessities of a well rounded education to the schools that are already overburdened. Such trends mean that more and more students show up at school tired, hungry, and angry at the abuse they suffer. Teachers are overwhelmed and urban public schools are becoming warehouses for unwanted children. There are ever increasing distractions from education available in our society. People no longer sit at home and read books in the evening. Our educational system is suffering from a lack of proper investment and misplaced priorities by the politicians, administrators, teachers, and parents.

After World War II the GI bill in the U.S. gave millions of people the expectation that attending college was within the domain of the middle class. We must remember that the greatest public education drive in history was a subsidy for individuals in the hope that they would go on to contribute in significant ways to society. Now we have colleges where loans are increasingly replaced by grants and where the financial aid does not meet all of the needs of the student. Parents do not understand that financial aid only covers half of the anticipated expenses. We are now in a situation where students receive quarterly loans when school expenses are over half.

Not only are these students being forced into poverty to achieve an education, but upon gaining a degree they have hefty long term loans. How can they then go on to buy new houses and cars when owing up to $30,000 for their educations and earning about $10 per hour? In many large universities the majority of students never graduate because the strains of life in such circumstances are so great.

This equation simply does not work. Is it any wonder people fail when they are not allowed the necessary means for success? Universities have become huge self serving bureaucracies which scoff at the notion of providing service in a user friendly manner. The students are there to subsidize corporate research facilities based on grant winning; they are no longer land grant universities with professors dedicated to educating the students.

Anyone who values another human being as a spiritual entity will wish for their growth, increase in understanding, and increased ability to positively contribute to society. It is common sense that a well educated, caring, and materially successful society will have fewer social ills than one without. The starvation of the spirit, the starvation of the mind is the legacy of those who do not believe in the value of the individual to evolve and transform their life. The only hope for positive social futures is the enlightened growth of the people. Those who stand in the way of human spiritual evolution can be motivated by one thing only, their personal greed. The greedy do not want well educated people, for the ignorant are easier to fool, cheat, and control. Any spiritual teaching will acknowledge that the value of education is one of the most important priorities in a civilized society.

The role of public education should be to facilitate the enlightenment of our people. It is from the people's enlightenment that positive change occurs. We need to ensure that all of best education technologies and methods are available to our people. We should be working to teach people methods for evolving and empowering themselves and helping them work toward their enlightenment. We should provide cutting edge, universal, and lifelong learning if we are really serious about educating people in the 21st century.

Universal Health Care

Health care is priced out of the reach of many people on this planet. Denying the citizens of the world access to decent health care is stealing from the elderly, the disabled, and children: it is criminal. People often avoid preventative care in the short run and wind up with more costly care in the end. The citizen can no longer afford to stay well, get sick, or die. Some forecasters believe that within the next 20 years health care costs will take up 100% of the U.S. gross national product. There are several reasons why the health care system is in a crisis. With the increased ability to prolong life often huge efforts are made to prolong the lives of people who would die naturally without prolonged and extreme intervention. Life in such a circumstance is certainly not dignified and the misery these people experience will not improve their condition. Rather than being a humanitarian effort to save life, such exercises in futility are an insult to the dignity of the dying. Another reason for the expense of health care is that there are more people to take care of.

With the aging of the baby boom there will be a huge demographic bulge of elderly people in the first quarter of the 21st century and these people will all need health care, the numbers will only increase. There certainly is price gouging by the hospitals, doctors, pharmaceutical manufacturers, and insurance companies. Without serious control of the medical field these people have a free ride to ever increasing profits. Finally, the lack of proper medical care for the poor exacerbates their medical problems, and when society finally gets around to treating their conditions it is usually late in the process and extremely expensive to deal with. Taken together and without any identifiable change in the near future things will continue to spiral out of control.

One may ask why we should take care of so many people who have few resources and do not generate great wealth, those who cannot afford to even pay their own health care? Why should we help the poor and the sick? These people seemingly contribute nothing and are drains on our productivity. Why not just wheel them down the hall, out of our pocketbooks, and out of our minds? Conservatives want to do just this, they want to triage those who do not produce for them. This type of attitude towards people and approach to problems is outrageous and reprehensible. It is a sneaky way for cowards to get away with killing people. This is simply not acceptable in any spiritual tradition whatsoever. It is totally immoral, insensitive, and inhumane. People who base their values in life on spirituality don't want people to suffer in pain. Decent people recognize the need to accord dignity & respect to the lives of all of people regardless of their material means. Spiritual values are those which work against increased misery. Those who would increase the misery of the least fortunate in our society are the worst kind of murderers, those who stab in the back!

First of all the way to address the problem is not to destroy the mechanisms in place to deal with providing the less fortunate with care. Simply cutting or denying benefits to people with fewer resources will not reduce the long term medical costs, since these people will wind up in the emergency rooms with massive trauma and cost even more to care for than the ongoing preventative care so few seem to think is important. The only way to really deal with the health care problem is to provide universal coverage. In a civilized society people leave no one to die on the street or to languish in pain without recourse to help. Societies which throw away their citizens like this are not civilized, they are barbaric. We must get past the fake arguments of the greedy and concentrate on how we are going to implement universal coverage, not whether it is the right thing to do.

Efforts Towards the Restoration of our Environment

The explosive development of the industrial revolution over the last 250 years has produced many useful products for our lives. This has come at a great price. We came from an agricultural lifestyle in which we built our own houses, grew and made our own food, and traveled little or very slowly. We have moved to a lifestyle in which everything we do is subcontracted, we microwave our food, and we travel a lot by motor. However the drive to a faster paced way of living has come at a heavy price. It is true that things are more convenient for the individual in the Western industrialized world. It is also true that the ever increasing mass consumption of our natural resources has left a legacy of mountains of garbage, lakes of toxic waste, winds of pollution, rivers of sewage, and a planet of increasingly barren earth. The wholesale slaughter of the world around us does not make common sense. How do we live without the rest of our environment? Do we wish to eat, drink, and breathe our own waste? Our sheltering of ourselves from the elements of nature has fooled us into thinking that the natural environment is something out there that does not affect us. This is the behavior of the proverbial ostrich, sticking its head in the ground while the tiger approaches (although even the ostrich does not actually do this).

Much of the legacy of waste from the industrial revolution has been a product of accident and ignorance, although this is a decreasing possibility in the present. The last 250 years of the neglect of our stewardship for the environment has created a situation where we are now living in our own filth. Bad things happen when people drink and eat the products of their excretion. In the past one could always move somewhere else when their place of habitation was spoiled but this is no longer the case. We are beginning to catch up with the consequences of our actions. Examples of this include, among many others: Cryptosporidium in the drinking water of U.S. cities, salmonella and E-coli bacteria in meat, mercurcy and PCB's in seafood, radiation poisoning of towns near old reactors, love canal, Bhopal, Chernobyl, and Persian Gulf Syndrome. Let us not forget that Mad Cow disease came from feeding cattle the remains of other cattle including their own waste.

People who care anything about each other and especially their children recognize interdependence. We are a part of our environment and our actions will follow us. We must become stewards of our environment and preserve the Earth for our descendants. Unless a person feels a part of nature and integrated with they will have problems with understanding why we need a sustainable environment. We need an environmental restoration program to begin cleaning up the messes left over from the industrial revolution. We will never restore the Earth to the state of nature before humans came on the scene. The mass extinction we have a hand in can not be reversed. However we can slow the spoiling of our backyard and work to establish huge wilderness preserves the world over for the health of future generations.

Crime and Punishment

Those in government are there to serve the needs of their clients, the citizens. In the same manner the criminal justice system and the police are instruments of the people designed to protect and serve their communities. The only way to be really tough on crime is to focus the limited resources of law enforcement on incarcerating violent offenders for their full terms. One way to make our communities safer is to eliminate institutional abuse. If we are to truly have a more just society there must be equal protection for all regardless of financial status. Those who are the real criminals that make their livelihoods by cheating the public through lying, swindling, and legal cleverness must realize that they, like the violent offenders who bully people into submission, are the largest sources of contribution to the decay of our societies.

There may be some needy people who cheat in the food stamp program but this surely a drop in the bucket compared to the big frauds carried on in high finance. The real abusers of the system are those who practice corporate welfare fraud. An example of this is the toy company Fisher Price. This company got tax subsidies from the community to locate in Buffalo, NY with the understanding that they would use the funds gained from these subsidies to provide more jobs in the community. Fisher Price then moved over half of their production and labor force from the Buffalo facility out of the U.S. after receiving the tax breaks. They essentially cheated the people of Buffalo into subsidizing the movement of jobs out of the country. The corporation deceived the community by giving them fraudulent promises. It is simply unjustifiable in a democracy to harshly treat the little fish while letting the big fish loot the people's government for orders of magnitudes more money. A real targeting of corporate abusers of the government and justice system, workers, the environment, and consumers must begin to send the message that we the people will no longer tolerate crimes against our communities.

Real National Security is Based on Wisdom

We have forgotten what national security is. We used to be clear about what national security was - it was waging the cold war at home and abroad. The end of the cold war has brought about a strange new reality. Whereas there was more stability in the world with two major superpowers squaring off on every playing field now there are many different individual players. We are leaving the era of empire and going to an era of smaller independent entities, many of which with competing agendas.

National Security for any country is more than simply stockpiling weapons. It runs the gamut from education, to wealth generation for the people, to safety on our streets, to maintaining a clean environment, to ensuring a healthy nation. If we are to have great nations we must work to make them so. We feel the needs for strong militaries simply because we fear those who are jealous or revengeful. We do need to protect ourselves from dictators and terrorists, however the true role of national defense is to guarantee the survival of a nation from within, to promote mutual human values of understanding, to keep one class of people from savaging or brutalizing others, and to counteract the forces of hate, bigotry, and dictatorship.

Empowerment Aid

Many people complain that welfare does not work. They point to others who have been on public assistance for multiple generations as an example of the problem. They say that helping people's health, helping to feed the hungry, and shelter the homeless is a waste of resources spent on people who do not contribute to society. These people raise children, the very children who will grow up and help to determine the future social fabric of our nation. The raising of children is extremely important. Damaging any part of the infrastructure designed to help children amounts to child abuse. No one questions that a parent must invest heavily in a child in order for the child to succeed. How can people expect those with few or no resources to make this considerable investment? Welfare does not work, but not because it was a bad idea from the start. Ever since the notion of public assistance for the needy became public policy the forces against a social safety net have opposed every increase in benefits, every new idea, every possibility of fully funding the project to make it work. When a project is only partially funded and then necessarily fails is there any wonder? People say welfare does not work because it does not lift people out of poverty. Most new jobs will not lit people out of poverty either. Public assistance has, however, provided food to many who would otherwise have starved. It has provided health care to those who would have been sick or might have died. It has provided shelter to those who might have frozen.

People in touch with their spirituality recognize that all people are spiritual beings and therefore inherently valuable. It is obvious that people have valuable gifts to share with the rest of us and that for everyone to be able to share their insights and talents to their fullest ability we must help the disadvantaged become full contributors in society. Welfare as we know it must become Empowerment Aid. This would include all the infrastructural elements necessary to help people make successes of themselves. Our society does not help people become successful. The wealthy agreed to political but not economic freedom for the individual. If we were really serious about getting people off welfare we would provide the support mechanisms necessary to accomplish this. Empowerment Aid includes education, job training, child care, health care, shelter, food, transportation, clothing, and entertainment. Lets get serious - without substantial investment in people you can't expect them to lift themselves up by their bootstraps.
Foreign Policy

The world is getting smaller all of the time with transportation and communications. If the modern industrialized West does not want to lose the moral high ground of freedom and democracy; the very moral authority to which the rest of the world looks for leadership; we must soon recognize that the authority of violence is not enough to persuade the human spirit of what is right and true. It is time we stop trying to pass ourselves off as a bullies who can intervene everywhere like a Mafia boss and instead start the process of making friends with the rest of the world. People in other countries are human beings too and as such are also entitled to every one of the same principles and values we hold dear. We must stop supporting dictatorships which enslave their people, but we must first stop the corporate enslavement of people in our own countries. We should join together with other countries in a common effort of humanity to lift ourselves out of the misery which so many suffer. We have enough resources in the world to feed and educate everyone but the greedy refuse to eliminate hunger as a human reality. Such practices must end and those contributing to the misery of the people should be hunted down by the world community and tried for crimes against humanity. We must let it be known that in this new informated global arena there is nowhere that abusers of human communities can hide. To this end we must actively support and fund democracies. The mandate for the use of the military should be to intervene when democracy is threatened and not only when a few oil robber barons are in jeopardy. To actually walk our talk we should be working to empower the people of the world not merely make them domesticated and safe for capitalism or corporate enslavement. Is it the people who are to be policed or those who are threats to freedom and democracy?

Just Economics

People who have a spiritual basis in their lives don't want other people to starve and will feed someone who is hungry if they can. Common sense will tell us that a strong economy depends upon lots of people buying many different things. This requires a large middle class, the opposite of what the future may hold for many Western industrialized nations. We must shift our priorities from concentrating wealth for the richest in our societies and fulfilling our human covenant of generating resources for all of our citizens.

We need to generate more high skill and high wage jobs for our people and give them the necessary educations to fulfill their duties. An economic system does not define a democracy, rather its inclusion of the citizens into the electoral and policy processes. Capitalism can flourish without Democracy. We must realize that democracy can exist without right wing capitalism but it cannot exist without an educated electorate. The main strength of a nation is the development of a large middle class, and in a global digital knowledge age of democratized science and technology this means the growth of many new entrepreneurial businesses which are based on cooperation and stewardship, not greed and thoughtlessness.

Real Democratic Reform

To truly have government of, by, and for the people a society must put an end to the auction of democracy being held at the expense of the representation of its citizens. The only way things can change is if more of our people participate in the political process. If the citizens really wish to eliminate the huge amounts of money spent on political campaigns for media blitzes and the stranglehold the lobbyists, attorneys, and political action committees have on the political system, we must stop letting them represent our interests and do it ourselves. We should encourage the implementation of democracy in the U.S. This country is not yet a democracy - it is a representational republic. In a democracy the citizens make the decisions, in a representational republic the people elect representatives to make the decisions for them. We should stop being afraid of the rule of the people. As long as a society has constitutional safeguards against tyrannical majorities or minorities, "their is nothing to fear but fear itself."

APPENDIX 2: WHAT CAN I DO? - REAL MAGIC

There are a number of avenues in which the conscious individual can act to help accomplish the Spiritual Revolution. People always say, "Sure I understand the ideas, but what can I do to make a difference?"

I will briefly outline a number of possible ways in which this question may be answered. The study of oneself and works to achieve greater consciousness are only a part of the process. The study part is philosophical and theoretical. The other part is spiritual and involves actions, works in the human world, for this is the only way to apply the ideas and test whether you understand them or not.

*I CAN WORK TO FOSTER SPIRITUAL AWARENESS

When times get difficult people reach for a vision of hope that things can get better. Often, when people are poorly educated they seek simple answers to profound and complex questions, and the area of fundamentalism is ready to offer that comfort. It is difficult for each to us to think carefully about what our beliefs are and determine for ourself what makes sense. Very little in life is so simple and obvious that literal interpretations suffice. It is arguable that anyone could make a literal interpretation of literature written by a different people in a different place and time. It is particularly difficult to take spiritual teachings at their literal appearance because so much of it is allegorical, mythological, and symbolic.

Life today seems so overwhelming and confusing. It is much easier to take simple answers treated literally and taken off the shelf of what already exists. Yet it is essentially the personal responsibility of each individual human to come to terms with their own spirituality on an individual basis. Merely believing what others quote is not enough to make a spiritual belief a living part of a person's existence. Along with fundamentalism there is always the accordant role of "authority." Most often authority is backed up by violence. This is the authority of the barrel of the gun. Yet the use of violence to back up authority points to how little authority the perpetrator has, since if they had the authority of their convictions, the authority of their persuasiveness, the authority of their wisdom and kind deeds, they would not need weapons or threats to convince at all. The enforcing of authority by violence or threats means that the enforcers have no actual spiritual authority whatsoever. The religious form of violence is fear, intimidation, threats of eternal damnation, harsh punishments in the afterworld, intolerance, bigotry, guilt, and shame. Those who use religious violence do not practice spirituality and therefore have no spiritual authority whatsoever. Does one really believe that ''God'' would be so hateful and insane as to treat humans, mere children in the cosmic dance, so badly?

A new spiritual awakening is necessary as humanity grows into young adulthood. Old myths and anthropomorphized visions of ''God'' and theology are no longer adequate. The notion of a harsh, autocratic ''God'' somewhere "out there" seems outlandish today. How could anyone spiritually evolve by force? Spiritual growth occurs by love and nurturing. The notion that ''God'' is somewhere "out there" is being replaced by the understanding that ''God'' is within, and that each individual has the capacity to find and evolve their own spirituality through love. To the extent that you communicate to others the obvious common sense approach to spirituality you are working to foster spiritual awareness.

*I CAN WORK TO ACHIEVE MY OWN SPIRITUAL REVOLUTION

The area of individual development and expression is only given lip service in modern Western society. People are not really encouraged to be individualists and to do their own thing. Throughout the course of the behavior modification programming called our educational system people are encouraged to conform. In the workplace conformity is considered an important quality because too many differences to the personality culture of the boss decreases "efficiency." This papering over of the differences and individualities of people is not only degrading and insulting to the notion of personal dignity but is harmful to people and is used accordingly as a tool to control others. We have become wage slaves, that is slaves who work for a wage. It is cheaper to pay people $5 - 10 per hour than to provide slaves with shelter, food, education and training, health care, and entertainment. Yes we have been politically freed from slavery, but at the price of economic serfdom. It is now ever more largely up to the individual themself, throughout the evaporation of social infrastructure, to make critical decisions about their own quality of life. It is time we each individually start preparing for the difficult times ahead and begin to develop our own networks and social infrastructures so that we can move out of the failed system and set up alternative means for survival and success. It is time that we look within for the solutions to the problems we blame for affecting us from without.

Modern psychology and psychiatry have not been very successful at treating their patients. The modern approach to psychology is the study of pathology which occurs in a reductionist and vivisectionist practice. Modern psychiatry believes that every human mechanism is reducable to neurological functions in the brain. Both perspectives lack holism, context, synergy, and scale. Love is synergetic phenomena.

Although many of the sub-processes of the mind may very well have their roots in the neurological functions of the brain the actual thoughts and feelings we have actually exist at a higher, synergetic, level of functioning. The fact of our materiality in no way invalidates the special nature of the human mind, being, and consciousness. If the human being is viewed as an ungainly mass of neural connections manufacturing hallucinations then we are viewed as less than human, less than spiritual beings. There is then no qualitative difference between rats, dogs, and people except a few more neurons. But if we are viewed as self perfecting entities which have a spiritual dimension to our existence, much more of the actual being we refer to as a human is taken into account. The removed observer of the Freudian couch has been long discredited and yet many in the professions associated with understanding the psyche still insist on a vivisectionistic approach to the analysis and modification of behavior. Since humans are synergetic, more than the sum of our parts, and since we are spiritual beings a participatory approach in mutual experience is much more healthy and rewarding if our mission is to facilitate the spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical evolution of the individual.

By working on your own spiritual evolution you can attempt to treat others as you would like them to treat you even if they do not - as a spiritual being and with love.

*I CAN WORK TO HEAL MY ATOMIZED RELATIONSHIPS

The primary place where the results of the forces of change shaping our lives comes to a head is in our personal relationships. With little time left over from achieving the means of survival people relate with each other less often and through atrophy often less well. There is less time to idly chat with the next door neighbor if you even know them. There is less time to spend with your friends and to develop new ones. There is less time to spend with your relatives and less time with your children. There is also less time to spend with your spouse or significant other. When couples communicate less they will feel, and rightly so, that they truly do not understand the needs and wishes of each other. This is corrosive to the maintenance of long term cooperative relationships. We have as a society withdrawn from each other and usually relate superficially, on the surface of appearances, and with minimal self revealing candor. This minimalist approach to our relationships in life encourages a selfish me-first attitude in the absence of opportunities to demonstrate the rewards of considering the needs of another before one's own. We are too painfully aware of how little of our own needs are being met to have enough emotional energy left over to consider the needs of others first. What this all amounts to is the ultimate pinnacle of the disposable society - the temporary relationship. With such difficulties; such information chaos, challenges to traditional lifestyles and roles, lack of economic opportunity, inability and lack of time to communicate, increasing alienation and isolation, and the resultant constant mobility we have entered a period where many people consider it perfectly acceptable to have temporary relations with each other, without real commitment. In such a situation in relationships they can only be mechanisms for its members to use each other for a while until it inevitably breaks down. You can work to repair the temporary, self-centered, and atomized relations you have with others. If you stop treating people as disposable entities removed from your life you begin the real work of creating healthy relationships based on loving understanding.

*I CAN WORK TO HELP BRING ABOUT A GLOBAL EDUCATIONAL RENAISSANCE

The educational system of a great nation should be able to service the educational needs of all of its citizens. Education is the key for citizens to be knowledgeable about themselves, their world, and technology as well as having the skills to succeed. Education is more important than a technical training for a job. Within the scope of education is the personal satisfaction from learning, the enhanced quality of experience from have a good education, and the increased sensitivity to the complexity of existence and empathy for the difficulties of others. The domain of higher education is becoming increasingly expensive and available only for the few. With only a small number of specialists it is hard to imagine our ability as a nation to meet the needs of our people - the U.S., for example, is much more complex and diverse than a limited technocracy can manage.

Instead of relying on robotic repetition of facts, education should be focused on actual hands on learning, on experimentation, discovery, and individual projects which students design. Instead of having an educational process that is disconnected from life we should be encouraging experience based education so that what is learned in school relates to and translates into life. Instead of lowering educational standards to the lowest common denominator the tools of education should be used for the empowerment of the student, gearing them up to a world class education. Such learning is the right of all citizens and the necessities of the 21st century will require lifelong education. We need to move to an educational system which will in a user friendly way service its customers for life.

You can work to begin a global revolution in education by insisting on world class educational systems in your own environment. Start with what is around you and the rest will follow. Insist on schools which teach philosophy and encourage the common sense exploration of individual psychological evolution.

*I CAN WORK TO ENACT A POLITICAL PARADIGM SHIFT

The auction of democracy in the West is contrary to democratic principles. For too long only the rich or those sponsored by the rich can gain access to what should be the government of the people. The corruption of the political process by the infusion of big money does not serve the purposes of democracy. Now there is a so-called conservative revolution sweeping the world which dismember federal governments, federal regulations, and every social program since World War II which have served, albeit incompletely, the interests of the people. The humanitarian ideals and ideas which drive programs for the needy, economic regulation for the unscrupulous, and environmental regulation for the polluters and demagogues are not bad things. The reason for their incomplete success has been the constant, comprehensive, and long lasting efforts of those profiteers who constantly work towards eliminating any protection for the people against unbridled greed. We are witnessing the end of the era of the New Deal, the end of the Federal Republic, and like retrogressive fools we are moving to splinter societies at the very time people all over the world are trying to work together. I would much rather be a citizen of the world and of the United States than only a citizen of the principality of Minnesota. The elimination of federal oversight, regulations, and standards for behavior and commerce will relegate people to lives in lesser societies - the world risks becoming a mosaic of little nation states with Byzantine customs, practices, and bureaucracies. For each federal service destroyed in the U.S. there will be 50 local ones opened. This is not a formula for reducing government bureaucracy, it is a formula for creating Mediaeval Europe: in which every little town or hamlet is presided over by its feudal lord (now the political demagogue) exacting his will, and extracting his toll for passage through the area.

You can work to replace the current money motivated politics with a down to earth grass roots approach for citizen democracy. The careerism in politics should be replaced with vision, and the morality based personality cults of political parties should be replaced with the new ideas percolating up from the streets of the citystates of the people.

*I CAN WORK TO HELP ACHIEVE SOCIAL EMPOWERMENT FOR ALL

Families have taken a beating throughout the course of the industrial revolution. In the last 250 years there has been a population shift away from largely agrarian communities in which extended families of children, parents, grandparents, and other relatives lived together. The economic opportunities larger population centers made available during the industrial revolution moved most from the country to the city. Often several family members would locate in an area and work together to survive. The ethnic enclaves in New York city are examples of this type of family structure. The increasing mobility and communications in Western society further served to break up the family. People no longer lived in cities with relatives next door and around the corner or in city districts with the same ethnic group. The vanishing nuclear family became the common mode of existence, containing only the children and the parents.

As increased specialization and business relocations took place family members moved to where the economic opportunity was and often this meant moving away from the grandparents and other relatives. With the evaporation of the middle classes it has become ever more difficult to support a family. No longer is it possible in most families for one parent to remain at home taking care of the children. Both parents have to work, and often must locate in areas away from the infrastructure of their families. When both parents must work the children must be educated by others and kept in day care services until they are old enough to go to school. These strains make living as the "traditional" middle class nuclear family an impossibility and the inability to make these situations work has cost the high price of a large divorce rate. The industrial revolution has presided over the destruction of the family from large groups of agricultural relatives to smaller groups of the immediate family to the nuclear family of only parents, and as the support systems for families dissolve, the single parent family. We have to work harder to survive and this comes at the cost of our families.

Without the support of a large family network a strong community is necessary to meet the needs of raising children. Unfortunately most of us in the industrialized world live in neighborhoods in which we do not associate with or even know our neighbors. The transisency of the industrial and increasingly so the post-industrial eras have us moving all over the world and not developing long term social roots. We have also lost our communities in the onward drive for technological progress. Curiously the rationale for technological advance often given is to make our lives easier. One must wonder easier for what? We work more, buy less, and sacrifice our families to make our lives easier? This sounds rather strange. The rush of progress is not designed to make our lives more interesting or to increase quality time, it is primarily designed to increase efficiency of production and increase of consumption. We are working harder to make it more profitable to work and so that we are more efficient in getting to work, working, and spending our money on disposable products of poor quality designed to be replaced in a short time.

You can help work toward social empowerment by philosophically reflecting on what is really important in your life and the lives of those around you. Social empowerment begins with those around you - your grandparents, parents, significant others, children, friends, neighbors, and the poor. If you do not have family members around you form an alternative family of who does exist in your environment. If you are not blind to the conditions of others, if you do not abandon your family relations for the hounds of the marketplace we will build better more stable communities and family units. Evaluate what your priorities are in life and ask whether the price you are paying for your current situation is worth what you get: if not, then change.

*I CAN WORK TO RE-GENERATE PHILOSOPHY

The great hope for social and individual empowerment in the so-called digital age of information is a personal engagement with philosophy. Philosophy rests on common sense and is based on the conscious use of personal knowledge for the betterment of one's self and others. Yet philosophy has never before been used to synthesize the complexity of human experience and render it in a useful fashion for individuals, it has always been used to justify and increase the efficiency of the managers and kings. The very power of philosophy as common sense synthesis has been all but killed in the 20th century. The field has become a history lesson about the thoughts of dead philosophers. It involves the deconstruction of meaning, ripping anything which smacks of meaning to shreds. This is not synthesis, the field is without products, services, methodologies, beliefs, markets, or seemingly a future. All philosophy has had left according to the academics is argumentation and sophistry.

On the other hand the philosophy by its nature of the common sense use of wisdom for human growth has the possibility to stop the headlong thrust into meaningless relativism, despair, apathy, and hopelessness. The philosophy of common sense can help individuals to sort through the information chaos of their lives and make them fuller and more interesting. Philosophy need not be concerned with absolute truth. Philosophy should not be reduced to mere argumentation or the destruction of chains of logic. The philosophy of common sense is about creating meaning in the life of the individual person. It is a practical means for living a better life and is highly personal. It is not abstract and removed from life. It has the potential to facilitate personal and social transformation by providing useful functions and explanations about life which everyone can use to improve their experience.

By helping to bring philosophy back from the dustbin of history you can help to identify and articulate the things that we as people regardless of time or custom hold in common.

*I CAN WORK TO BRING ABOUT A RESTORATION OF THE ENVIRONMENT

The rush to chop down all of the trees over the last two hundred years, combined with the use of all available land for farming has created vast areas in the world which biologically qualify as deserts. Iowa at one time had a great deal of biodiversity. Today the amount of differing plant and animal species in Iowa is equivalent to the biodiversity of a desert. Iowa is not alone. Clear cutting of trees in national forests devastate the ecosystems which those forests were designed to preserve for future generations. It is nothing less than the wholesale squandering of irreplaceable ecosystems for a quick profit. These and many other environmental abuses including the current "conservative" proposals to eliminate environmental regulations on industry should encite national efforts toward the restoration of the environment. National parks should be off limits to logging and all state and governmental wilderness should be frozen from usage for purposes other than recreation. There should also be programs which encourage the purchase of lands adjacent to national wilderness areas with the goal of doubling the amount of land under protection. We should also encourage state and local projects to return land where possible to its original state. To clean up the tens of thousands of toxic waste dumps nations should establish civilian restoration corps to employ individuals to begin the clean up of the pollution which is a legacy of the industrial revolution.

We must find new innovative ways to end the exploitation of the environment and work where possible to restore damaged ecosystems. There must be more concerted effort to end pollution as we know it and shift towards more recycling of durable goods. Instead of viewing our environment as something out there and removed from us we must recognized that we are interconnected with it on very intimate levels. The disconnection from our physical environment is the first step on the path to the disconnection with the lives of other people and eventually our own. As one becomes increasingly isolated from the natural and social world the anxieties and fears of individuals give rise to a rationalistic mentality in which logic replaces love and abstract thoughts replace positive actions. Only when you and others feel your personal responsibility towards environmental stewardship will we see significant environmental improvement.

*I CAN WORK TO PROMOTE ECONOMIC JUSTICE

Since Ronald Reagan was elected the rich in the United States have accumulated the largest concentration of wealth in world history. The economic upper 20% of the population controls the vast amount of the wealth in the country and has become a superclass of wealth, power, and intelligence. The remaining 4/5 of the people struggle to survive as the middle class disappears. Why are we always hearing about mergers, corporate downsizing, government cuts, union busting, and the service economy? Is it because the United States is no longer a great nation, or that the people are ignorant or lazy, or is it because the boom is over and we must settle for less in a post-industrial, post-cold war era? Did the Allies win the war but lose the peace?

The real reason why there are fewer union members, fewer family farms and family owned businesses, why there are fewer high paying jobs and opportunities for economic advancement for the majority is primarily because we have been working so hard to automate and increase the efficiency of the means for the rich to get richer, that fewer of us are needed to do their work. Futurists estimate that out of a current workforce of ~115 million only about half will be necessary within 20 years. Even more compelling is the estimate that within 10 years up to 80% of the population will be working in the service sector. This means working without union representation, working without benefits, working part time, and working without long term job security as we become a captured workforce of temporary workers working in the $5 - $15 per hour wage scale. The rich are not employing people because they are philanthropists. They employ people to make themselves money. The name of the game is How much money can you make. One of the self-serving ways to make money if you really are not interested in the public good, or long term investment, research, and development is to base all decisions on making the maximum amount of money in the minimum amount of time. This type of thinking inevitably leads to the idea that profits are increased by reducing costs. This means reducing the costs of labor, raw materials, management, and packaging/distribution. The highest cost is labor and the evisceration of any organized labor is a prime goal of the profiteers. If labor does not give in, technology makes it possible to relocate operations somewhere people will work very cheaply, and in Taiwan, even for $1 per day.

The result of the trend towards increasing corporate profits at the expense and lives of communities in any nation is neither very patriotic nor conscionable: it is criminal. Many nations are becoming countries of a few haves, and many have nots. The worlds nations are becoming two class societies in which a very few live like super kings, a few live well, and the many experience the downward economic spiral of economic dislocation.

We must develop a more equitable means for the distribution of resources. You can decide not to purchase goods made by slave labor, you can decide to treat your co-workers or employees as spiritual beings deserving of decent financial compensation for their labors, you can realize that the attempt to squeeze every dollar out of a product creation and distribution makes for sick communities and fosters social disintegration. Instead of tolerating master and servant relationships based on competition find new ways to work together as partners in cooperation.
*I CAN WORK TO CHANGE THE CRIMINAL INJUSTICE SYSTEM

The legal profession has festered, languishing in its prison of lucid rationalism, for centuries. Each century it gets worse. We now have a legal system in which some attorneys can make millions of dollars by writing one letter. There are about 1 million attorneys in the U.S. alone handling an ever increasingly litigious society. The legalists, like the medical practitioners, lying in wait for each of us as an adder in the grass awaits the eventual footfall of the unaware traveler. It seems as if the legal profession and the criminal justice system is more interested in executing the letter of the law but not the spirit of justice. Recent court decisions, such as the verdicts in the Rodney King case demonstrate that without proper accountability the justice system even in the U.S. has gone out of control. One can get as much justice as one can buy, and this runs contrary to the notion of equal protection. Often in the rush towards conviction the rights of citizens are trampled. The whole notion of due process involves the right of the individual suspected of a crime to have the full range of constitutional guarantees and protections available. Yet there are double jeopardy penalties for some crimes, search and seizure without probable cause, and forced entries without warrants. The legal system has become a service for the rich and powerful while becoming a punishment for the poor. The problem will not be solved until the stranglehold the legal monopoly has on law enforcement, the courts, the criminal justice system, the government, and the political system itself has been broken.

You can work to change the deplorable state of the spirit of justice in your society by refusing to support or vote for politicians who do not pledge to protect privacy rights, freedom of speech, and the constitution and the bill of rights they swear to uphold.

*I CAN WORK TOWARDS THE DEMOCRITIZATION OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

In the post-industrial era access to technology will be the key determiner in success and maybe even survival. Those who have the access to new technology can learn to use it, and the ability to utilize new technology as it emerges is critical in remaining relevant in the global digital age of the 21st century. New developments in technology are occurring at ever increasing speed. We may risk entering a two tiered world in which the technologically proficient work for the rich and the rest are simply triaged as extra baggage. The gap between the technological skills and those without is widening. At one time the difference was primarily between those who could read and write and those who could not. Over centuries increasing numbers of people have been taught how to read and write so that in most of the industrialized nations the majority of the population can read. It is important to note, however that most high school graduates in the U.S. have difficulty reading a newspaper. If it is true that the price of democracy is an educated electorate, it is even more true now with the electrification of our communication. Not only must we be able to read a newspaper to help in the determination of our political ideas, but the very means of existence in society will be related for most in some way to computers. Even merely being proficient with typing on a word processor is not enough to be technologically skilled. Now we must be able to conduct research on the web and utilize telecommunications.

Rather than focusing technology on the command and control of information for increasing centralized control and efficiency, technology should be used as a means for connecting people and empowering them to succeed. Increasingly decentralized means of processing information are made possible through remote communications and computer technology. Technologies should be used to increase the standard and quality of life for all of our citizens and this requires a commitment to guaranteeing access to the areas that developing technologies open to us. Ultimately technology should be used to facilitate the personal growth and understanding of the individual and to increase the knowledge and capacity of technology users. This is done to increase the pleasure in the experience of one's life and to make it more interesting, not merely to increase material wealth.

APPENDIX 3: THE PHILOSOPHICAL AGE

We are on the verge of a new revolution in human culture. Like the industrial and information revolutions, the philosophical and spiritual revolution will have many unforeseen impacts. However it is certain that for the first time in history a huge numbers of the world's people will be able to work on their own philosophical understandings from their own perspective without the overbearing influence of passion or tradition. People will be encouraged to use the best of human wisdom, the best of science

and the best of their experience to make up their own minds about the nature of existence. a world full of philosophically aware people will surely have a major impact on the way people relate, how information is communicated, how business is conducted

and how politics is practiced. The presence of increasing numbers of philosophically enlightened souls may even have a positive influence on the future survivability of the human race.

We already live in a world where the actions of despots become immediately visible to the whole world. Tolerance for dictatorships will slide as people wish to determine their own futures free from violent suppression of totalitarian religions and governments.

People will have less of an indulgence for intolerant, fear, hate, and violence preaching 'religious' leaders as we come to understand our similarities in the challenge of consciously evolving our selves and cultures, and as people capable of making up

eir own minds fall less prey to unscrupulous hucksters whose greed and intolerance become obviously apparent under the eyes of consciousness.

Foundations of the Philosophical Age

Nothing short of a new "scientific revolution" is emerging through the incorporation of philosophical perspectives, ideas, and techniques in professional and daily life. The vast number of applications of philosophical investigation, speculation, and technological utility are staggering. From the business world, to astrophysics, to the design of intelligent computers and to the individual search for meaning, philosophical tools and ideas are turning up everywhere.

Especially now, after the September 11 tragedies in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC; when all of the previous trends and forecasts are skewed by uncertainty, philosophy will increasingly become a necessary component in successful organizational and personal development.

It is hard to reduce to a few topics the potential for future innovations and insights offered by the use of philosophical techniques. Unfortunately, as of yet philosophy is one of the least known, least used, and least referred to of all of the arts and sciences. Yet its application is universal and useful regardless of culture, historical period, or religious faith.

Philosophy is defined as the love of wisdom; alternately it could be called the wisdom of love. It is the parent of the sciences and the source of the first university - Plato's Academy. Philosophy is the field which encompasses (amongst many other areas) logic, the structure of knowledge and the universe, the essence of being and values, the individual search for enlightenment, and the nature of reality.

Socrates is reputed to have said, "The unexamined life is not worth living." Individually, philosophy is useful in exploring meaning in life and developing personally tailored methods for learning and creativity. The tools of philosophy can be used to better understand one’s own motivations and those of others. Some of the areas of philosophical impact outlined here are recognizable in daily life.

The next major new era for humanity may be considered a philosophical one. There are many indications that a Philosophical Age is emerging. The Information Age gave way to the Knowledge Age. Beyond the era of the manipulation of knowledge is an era in which people are concerned with wisdom and the proper application of knowledge in action. We can see the beginnings of a time in which a primary concern in life, business, and government will be the use of philosophical issues, tools, and ideas. This becomes apparent with increasing numbers of people able to think for themselves, determine their own spiritual beliefs, and use an increasing array of intellectual technologies from all over the world to generate new ideas and communicate with one another. This article will outline some of the basic trends, forces of change, emerging issues, and tools forming the early stages of this new era.

Some of the Most Useful Tools of Philosophy Include:

The field of philosophy has many useful insights built up by people over the millennia. Resident within the study of the nature of knowledge and the self are discoveries which can be applied by people to improve their introspective abilities, analytical capabilities, and sense of conscious awareness. A person’s growth in learning creates an increase in intelligence, usually provides new understandings of situations, events, and cultures.

Most importantly for the individual, a study of the world's philosophies and familiarity with at least some of the many philosophical technologies available to help individuals successfully negotiate through information chaos. This situation appears when people are swamped with data and must struggle to connect the dots, generating relevant information, and usable wisdom. When trying to invent new worldviews, formulate new hypotheses, or recognize non-obvious interconnections over time, space, or culture - philosophy is a prime source for innovation.

As a field that can be used to investigate information, knowledge, and wisdom, philosophy has special relevance to the era alternatively termed the Information, Knowledge, or Digital Age. As a field that includes within it the possibility of the individual growth of intelligence and understanding through a global study of beliefs and cultural heuristics, philosophy is relevant to every person. As a field that can be used to develop novel methods of existence, interaction, transaction, and innovation, philosophy has a relevance to the study and development of culture, and especially the arts of business and politics.

The following are just some of the useful techniques for increasing an individual's connection to creativity, insight, intuition, and revelation.

Paradigm Shifts – A Change in world views, observational platforms

A paradigm is a world view, a particular perspective on the nature of reality. A Paradigm Shift is the circumstance when an individual alters one’s worldview to include other perspectives. When a person is upset with someone else, that person can leave the room. This is an environmental paradigm shift. If a slighted person stays in the room and alters his or her attitude, maybe by trying to understand where the other person is coming from, that personal has undergone an emotional paradigm shift. Non-obvious interconnections of elements in differing data sets emerge when perspective is shifted to include other observational platforms. Such changes in the way things are observed sometimes produce revolutionary results. These are intellectual paradigm shifts. Einstein thought about riding on photons (that is a real big change of perspective!) and generated ideas like special (E=MC2) and general (curvature of timespace) relativity that caused massive re-orientations in the ways people thought about the world and acted upon those ideas. Paradigm shifts come in as many different sizes and shapes as you can imagine.

Multiple Perspective Generation – Seeing things from different points of view simultaneously or successively

Multiple Perspective Generation is the examination of differing viewpoints through a ‘What If” process of questioning to establish new knowledge in areas where one has little information. In this way a person can use the generation of multiple views to produce sets of differing ideas about things of which they may or may not have any direct knowledge or personal experience. If an individual can hold several different worldviews in their mind simultaneously the state called empathy can be achieved. In this state one not only considers one’s own perspective, but that of others as well. This is ‘putting the shoe on the other foot.’

Virtual Knowledge

Wisdom may be defined as good judgment and this relies on using the best knowledge available. Knowledge is personally usable information, generated by experience. Virtual Knowledge is how-to knowledge established conceptually and not through direct experience. This technique greatly helps good decision-making. Virtual Knowledge can fill in missing pieces to a mental puzzle without having to ‘reinvent the wheel.’ A person may know how to use a computer, but have little information on how it actually works. Consequently, a person having little information about how a computer works will have no knowledge about how to actually fix the device if it breaks down. Yet even without prior experience, a clever person may be able to read a manual and imagine how to replace their modem in the computer. This type of knowledge is imaginary, that is, not based on experience, but it is usable nonetheless. In this way one also creates new knowledge.

There are many ways to augment insufficient information or knowledge through the use on one’s imagination. In the absence of direct experience a person may imagine a variety of different scenarios, that is, imagine different paradigms based on sets of data analyzed through different perspectives. One can develop imaginary how-to knowledge about Indonesia even if that person has never been there. By clumping together information from a variety of different sources a person can begin to establish a concept about the object of study and begin to deal with that imaginary concept as if it is how-to knowledge. Virtual Knowledge may also be developed through many other methods including inductive reasoning and extrapolations based on past experience.

Occam's Razor – The simplest explanation that works is the most useful

When dealing with organizational complexity, many overly detailed plans and explanations are developed with little relevance to the actual world. Using Occam’s Razor increases efficiency by reducing the time wasted on over-complexity and information chaos.

Primary Assumption Analysis – Real time reiteration of underlying beliefs, knowledge and attitudes

Many things that individuals expect others to understand are not really shared meanings. Being aware of the real motivations behind action, and re-evaluating core assumptions keeps one on track (collision avoidance), and able to quickly adjust for turbulence (error recovery). Without a constant awareness and re-evaluation of the primary assumptions operative in any organization or individual we act without being sure of why.

Relevancy Analysis (RAAN) – Relevancy, Accuracy, Adequacy, and Necessity Analysis

First of all, the information, knowledge, or wisdom one is working with must be relevant to the situation at hand. Hopeful one is dealing with accurate data that is adequate to the task of analysis, synthesis, or making decisions. Finally the data used must be necessary – that is, it must be important. For example, if someone drops a tray of bolts in a production facility, a cause and a solution must be found. The color of shirt of the person involved with the accident may or may not be relevant. If there was a flash of blinding light, then perhaps a brightly colored shirt reflected it. But is this accurate – and is there enough data to making an informed decision? Do bright colors really reflect flashes, and was the person involved blinded temporarily? Finally is the information necessary to make a judgment? It may be relevant that bright colors could have reflected a flash, but if it was blinding anyway, it is not a necessary component of determining fault. Performing a relevancy analysis, like the use of Occam’s Razor eliminates a great deal of unnecessary processing time in decision making.

Mutual Understanding – The Being Connection

If you want to make a build a relationship, you have to connect with another personal in a visceral way. Likewise, if you want to obtain useful information, knowledge, or wisdom from someone, you must acknowledge their presence, respect their person, and be tolerant of differences. In order to establish the relationship that makes transactions of ideas, information, or even cash, there must be a mutually acknowledged respect of each other’s humanity. This is mutual understanding – it is a visceral connection between beings. It is hard to get someone you do not like, who knows it, and does not like you, to provide information, buy your product, or share ideas. Information sharing in such an environment is nigh impossible. If you wish to go into a Mosque to talk to a Mullah, you had better take off your shoes. To provide a conducive environment for interaction there must be a mechanism on a being level created – this is called mutual understanding.

Wisdom Extraction / Socratic Dialogue

Heuristics are operational rules of thumb and wisdom is good judgment. The cultural heuristics of a society are its suggestions for how to best live life. A key area for any interviewer, seeker of wisdom, expert system computer programmer, or analyst is the identification of heuristic extraction methodologies. How do you get the operational nuggets of wisdom from the source of your information and how do you connect the relevant dots? Questioning and data mining have a lot in common with the dialogic process known as the Socratic Method. Old Socrates had a wonderful knack for asking the proper questions to elicit the answers he required. In the Meno, Socrates leads an ignorant Greek boy through the complexity of the squaring of the circle by route of designing the questions in such a manner that their answers appeared as obvious. So often, the design of the questions shapes the response.

Philosophical Vision Formation

Another important tool is philosophical vision formation. This is the detailing of the who, what, where, when, and why of any action. Without a shared understanding of the fundamental principles, assumptions, values, missions, and goals for activity, it is hard for people to act individually or in unison. Quite often such basic aspects of our activity are not consciously articulated. Not only must these questions be answered individually, but also they must be communicable to others. We can only clearly explain what we understand. Unless we understand why we are acting, such actions become ‘chaotic’ or uncoordinated. Before the development of organizational culture is possible, the definition and communication of philosophical vision is necessary.

Logic, Linguistics, and Cognitive Science

Two of the most commonly recognized tools of philosophy are logic and linguistics. Logic is a system of technical reasoning and linguistics is the study of language. Logic is used for structuring arguments and linguistics is used for critiquing language as a formal structure. Both are used in combination to try to develop consistent systems of knowledge based on clear definitions of basic human concepts.

The philosopher Heidegger once said that metaphysics was finished and that in the future, philosophy would be replaced by linguistics and cognitive science. Cognitive science is a study of the scientific fields related to cognition, the formation of ideas, and psychology. Surely these areas are important parts of the philosophical art. The study of the nature of consciousness, communication, and reasoning are major subjects of inquiry, yet they do not encompass all of the tools made available to us through the field of philosophy. Nonetheless they deserve mention as parts of that toolbox called philosophy.

Some of the Most Notable Areas of Philosophical Impact Include:

Ontology Creation

The most popular use of this field is the development of advanced data structures for computing, used in the development of Artificial Intelligence software. Ontology is the study of being in philosophy and is a particularly interesting field. Ontology Creation can also serve as a field for the creation of novel methods of human interaction. When, for example there are scientists from many different fields from different cultural backgrounds it is necessary to invent common means of communication and work. This requires a social artist, i.e. a philosopher. The development of inter-domain communication is a critical part of the innovation process, and much scientific and technological advance is held back by insufficient systhesis mechanisms for ontology creation.

Ontology creation also includes one of the most spectacular applications of philosophy today. The merging at very abstract levels of philosophical investigation and astrophysics produces ever-newer theories of the nature and origins of the universe. One of the latest is called "M" theory, or "brane" theory. It is the idea that an alternate universe had part of its outer 'membrane' shrivel off, detach, so to speak and bump into the dormant something that was to form our universe. This collision, it is maintained, caused the big bang and everything that we know of as the universe. According to the theory, the alternate or 'parallel' universe exists in the fifth dimension and is unobservable to us where we sit on the edge of the Milky Way. This sounds like philosophy. There is a good article summarizing "M" theory in the 09/22/01 issue of Science News.

Memetics

Memetics is the study of memes. Memes are idea packages. A phrase or term, which contains with it all of the necessary related understandings can be considered a meme. A really good meme creates a scintillating effect, suggesting many other ideas to the recipient. Philosophers can aid in developing optimal methods for delivering meme scintillations - thorough, mind shaking, and life changing ideas. There are even discretely designed memes that could be called Meme Bombs. The first picture of ‘Earthrise’ (the picture of the rising Earth taken from the Moon) could be considered a meme bomb that really encapsulated the idea that our world is one blue marble in vast space, implying that all on Earth are truly interconnected.

Corporate Philosophy

There are so many areas of philosophical relevance to modern business practice that they would at least require a whole book to inventory and describe. Especially in the realm of planning, a philosophical perspective can help executives, forecasters, and analysts identify what they really want to be doing, as distinct from what is actually taking place. Entertaining global perspectives, an understanding of key philosophical issues relevant to people from different cultures, and advice from the greatest thinkers of humanity, all facilitate the generation of ideas.

Important in the emergence of the organizational or corporate philosopher is the view of organizations as living systems. Corporations are not static; they are dynamic, changing systems of interrelations. Increasingly it is the operational knowledge of the interrelations between parts of that system in real time dynamism that is the glue, which holds the organization together. No longer is it only the bricks and mortar of an operation which are the prime determiners of its survival and success.

Critical in the design of corporate cultures is a system for cross-cultural communication. The development of this component is only possible with the inclusion of a philosophical perspective. Increasingly people will gravitate towards organizations that reflect or at least tolerate their beliefs and values (the study of which is another area of philosophy – axiology). In this environment, branding becomes all the more important and so too, the design of the organizational philosophy underpinning that sense of "brand."

Technological Innovations

Philosophy has much to contribute to scientific investigation and technological development. The design of useful hypotheses requires philosophical rumination. The development of new tools for thinking and working requires access to and use of the creative part of the mind - one of the direct connects for which is distilling, pondering, comparing, and contrasting, philosophical ideas.

Qualitative Analysis of Knowledge and Wisdom

Wisdom is good judgment. This is based, among other things, on appropriate knowledge and experience. Being wise and having good intelligence is not only being knowledgeable, but also successful, in analyzing events, situations, ideas, and individuals. The evaluation of facts, i.e. knowing what one is observing (‘connecting the dots’), is dependent upon the underlying worldviews, varieties of perspectives, and primary assumptions. A prime example of this is when Cecilia Payne discovered that scientists had been reading the spectroscope’s results incorrectly when they declared that the sun was made out of iron. She realized that if you read the results a different way, they produce the signature for hydrogen. Her insight was facilitated by the use of Multiple Perspective Generation, Primary Assumption Analysis, and Paradigm Shifts. Cecilia Payne used philosophical technologies to make a quantum leap in the understanding of the nature of our sun.

Facts are generally considered independently, that is, isolated from their frames of reference. Yet facts are dependent on many subjective factors. Facts are context dependent and are not separate from the systems, events, and observers’ perceptions, of which they are a part. Factual information is dynamic. Truths are also dynamic; that is, they can be viewed not as static elements, but as interconnected functions of animate systems undergoing changes in their environments. This means that the things we call facts and truths are elements of synergetic and interactive systems. Using the lenses of Dynamic Truths and Dynamic Facts can develop better tools for analysis and synthesis. What we view as facts and truths change over time with better knowledge. This is an area of philosophy called Epistemology – the study of the structure of knowledge.

Beyond this, synthesizing usable knowledge and formulating plans and strategies requires the use of philosophical skills. Better decision making tools for turning analysis in to meaningful syntheses and translating one’s understandings into strategic decision-making is helped through the use of philosophical technologies. Planning and scheduling require an investigation of causes and effects. So too, good analysis of causes and effects are dependent upon philosophical skills. The field of Teleology is the study of cause and effect, which are also dynamic and interrelated with the systems of which they are apart. The concept of Dynamic Causes and Dynamic Effects is useful in the proactive planning of complex operations in an environment of change.

Gathering and developing good information requires interacting with people from a wide variety of cultures, building relationships, asking questions, and sharing knowledge and wisdom.

A few areas in which philosophy can help with qualitative analysis include:

· Wisdom Systems – Wisdom Command, Control, and Communication

· Socratic Dialogue Pathways for Winning Arguments

· Distillation Systems for Clarity

· Novel Heuristic Extraction and Emulation Systems

· The Development of mechanisms for Ontology Creation and Inter-Domain Communication

· Generation of Reconciliation Systems to Encompass Divergent Views

· Meme Scintillations

· Wisdom Extraction

· The Transformation of Information into Knowledge, Decision Making, and Action Taking

· Data Mining

Forces of Change Affecting the Role of Philosophy in Society

Amongst the many forces of change that will greatly affect our lives, there are a few which most certainly will spawn a great deal of philosophical speculation, innovation, and argumentation. Because there are so many, only the most dramatic will be highlighted here:

Biotechnology

Many of the new developments in science and current events are shaping a world in which philosophical tools become increasingly important components of success. The mapping of the human genome is a benchmark event in the history of humanity. So many complex ethical questions are raised by the possibilities of genetic engineering, cloning, cellular engineering (e.g. T-Cells) and physical augmentation/modification (e.g. the Borg on Star Trek). Arguments will be debated on these topics for decades to come. Science is moving faster than our current ability to process the implications of all the developing technologies. This poses a great challenge to individuals, governments, and religious leaders to analyze the opportunities and threats, moral and ethical considerations, and methods of experimentation involved with advancing technology.

The aging baby boomers may in its own right, be considered a force of change, but it is especially so in regards to health care and biotech. Baby boomers will want to promote innovation in this area, so as to live as long as possible. The incredible wealth amassed by this generation should provide the incentive for the development of every biotechnology possible.

Terrorism

The shocking terrorist acts of Sept. 11 have made us all more security conscious and in need of better intelligence. The resulting economic dislocations of these events, combined with a sour economy will only increase the needs of individuals and organizations to make better sense of their worlds. The likelihood of continuing terrorist attacks will serve as an ongoing force of change, driving constant re-evaluation of prior assumptions and practices for individuals, businesses, and governments.

The Internet

One of the most obvious forces of change on the horizon as well as our ‘backyard’ is the Internet. A revolution in personal communications and the need for better decision making skills is amplified by the ability of individuals and businesses to make connections with people from all over the world and from widely differing viewpoints.

The Elimination of Privacy

The proliferation of information technologies is greatly reducing the ability of individuals to live anonymously. Electronic currency, credit cards, cell phones, and Internet usage all generate recorded data that can follow us around for years. Every business that can is building customer profiles and government agencies develop more and more databases. Financial institutions wish to share collected data amongst themselves and our email survives us. The elimination of our privacy may be a force of change that reveals whether our actions are consistent with our principles. We will have lessening anonymity but perhaps greater security. This area will be a major force of personal change and a source of great debate.

The Discovery of Extra-Terrestrial Life

The verdict is still out on whether the ‘fossils’ found in the now famous Martian meteorite are actually fossils, or byproducts of non-organic processes. The implications of this discovery are breathtaking, however. It is much more likely that we will encounter alien life in the form of bacteria or simple organisms long before any discovery, if ever, of other ‘intelligent life.’ Many scientists now believe that wherever we discover liquid water we will probably find the building blocks of life or life itself. There are a number of possible candidate planetoids in our own solar system where such conditions may be met. Saturn’s moon Titan has been mentioned as a possibility, as have the moons of Jupiter - Europa, Io, and Callisto. It is even possible that we may find evidence of former life on parts of Mars where there is a concentration of ice. There is also the Kuiper Belt, a ring of trillions of ice chunks (ranging in size from small bits to mountains and moons) beyond the orbit of Pluto that may harbor slushy liquid water. The discovery of even microscopic fossils of life on other bodies in the solar system will shake the philosophical foundations of most of our planet’s belief systems and has the potential for being the biggest philosophical force of change in history.

Some Trends Affecting the Role of Philosophy in Society

We are in a period of change that will accelerate some trends and decelerate others. The increased prominence of philosophy and philosophically related ideas will be accelerated by the some of the following trends:

Management Theory, Business Ethics, and Corporate Culture

Peter Drucker revealed in a recent interview in the October 2001 Business 2.0 that he reads Xenophon, the ancient Greek poet and philosopher and Shakespeare! Ideas in books like The Fifth Discipline, and If Aristotle Ran General Motors reveal an interest in ‘systems thinking’ and the nature of truth. Other classic management books like From Good to Great and Only the Paranoid Survive explore the underlying assumptions and heuristics that affect the success of any corporate culture. Such new management thinking indicates a permeation of philosophical concepts into the business world.

Areas like Strategic Planning, Human Resource Development, Change Management, and Business Intelligence all depend heavily on the use of philosophical tools. Business Ethics has, in the past, and will continue to be an area indebted to philosophy. An article entitled “Are Excellent Companies Ethical” by Leyland, Pierre, Prendergast, and Marrinan suggests in the analysis of their study data that there is a strong correlation between corporate excellence and an ethical business environment.

Physics and Philosophy Merge into the New Sciences of Complexity and Animate Systems

In the field of physics the literature sounds increasingly philosophical and has for quite some time. There are many books currently available and published over the last 40 years that freely mix philosophical speculation and theories from physics. This trend is clearly demonstrated by the appearance of books including the Tao of Physics and The Web of Life by Fritjof Capra, The Dancing Wu Li Masters by Gary Zukov, The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot, The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene, Physics and Philosophy by Sir James Jeans, Physics and Philosophy by Werner Heisenberg, The Frontiers of Complexity by Peter Coveney and Roger Highfield, Consilience by Edward Wilson, and The Undivided Universe by David Bohm and B.J. Hiley.

New theories about the formation and nature of the universe like String Theory, M Theory, and Complexity Theory sound increasingly philosophical and rely on the use of creative skills of the imagination to make the conceptual leaps not currently possible through the use of technology alone. Philosophy will continue to play an inspirational role in theoretical physics through the invention of novel explanations for existence.

Information Skills in Daily Life

With tens of millions of people connected to the Internet and millions of available web pages, people in daily life sift through increasing amounts of information. The presence of the Internet in so many people’s lives requires many skills related to philosophy. Good decision making methods are necessary to sort truths from falsehoods and negotiate the labyrinthine World Wide Web. Increasingly people will need to be better educated and be better thinkers to succeed.

Role of Quality in Life

From the concept of quality time, to the shock the world has received from the recent terrorist acts, and increased individual choices made possible through the Internet people are questioning their lives, the way they spend their time, and the locations where they live. It is no longer necessary to merely live a successful life, it now must also be meaningful – or at least that possibility is dangled before us. Quality of childcare, health care, meaningful work, business ethics, and a whole host of other quality of life related issues increasingly affect why, what, how, where, and with whom we work and live. These are all, at root, essentially philosophical issues.

Increased Access to Information / Decreased role of traditional authority

The vast number of differing perspectives on life offered on the Internet are so numerous that it seems as if there is a different web site for each person’s view of the world. The ability for people to present their own ideas and search through those of others is unparalleled in human history. This empowers people to use their thinking skills and make up their own minds about critical issues in life.

Emerging Issues Affecting the Role of Philosophy in Society

Areas of speculative interest that emerge from philosophy are quite numerous. The following are some of the most immediately notable issues that will cause great debate:

Humans Take Over from Natural Evolution

With our increased ability to extend our lives, augment our capacities, and keep those alive that would otherwise die early, we already are circumventing mechanical evolution. The added abilities to genetically determine our future progeny and regenerate our organs will place us in charge of our future evolution as a species. One can add pollution, radiation, and global warming as human factors determining evolution. The future is truly in our hands, there are great potentials for the abuse of technology as well as monumental opportunities for curing disease, extending life, and improving quality of life of everyone on the planet.

Individual Enlightenment Becomes Popular

The advent of the Internet has facilitated the capability of people to express themselves as never before. Each individual can be their own think tank and publishing company on the web. The individual’s increased access to other points of view puts pressure on each person to think for themselves and make up their own mind about what seems reasonable to believe. The vulnerability of life as portrayed by the scenes in NY and Washington is making us focus more on what is important in life and to enjoy every day. The development of alternative religious forms in the days of waning traditional authority puts the burden of figuring out spiritual and religious beliefs into the hands of the individual. Tools, knowledge, and techniques for increasing creativity, enlightenment, and learning will thrive in this environment.

Religious Synthesis Begins

Another aspect of the collision of worldviews on the Internet is a growing recognition that all of the world’s major religious belief systems have wisdom developed through countless ages by human experience with life. The New Age movement is only one example of an attempt to bring together various religious traditions into a digestible form. There are interfaith services in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, and even the Dalai Llama holds sessions on interfaith wisdom. With the increased ability for people from differing traditions and cultures to communicate with each other, there is an emerging trend towards identifying common grounds between belief systems. This development will serve as a threat to entrenched religious bureaucracies as spiritual authority decentralizes and also be an opportunity to individuals to think for themselves.

Human Brains Linked to the Internet

The shrinking of computing devices into the nanometer scale invites the possibility of computers based on organizations of atoms and molecules. Some of these may be organized into biological formats. Micro bio-computing paves the way for an integration of the human brain and computational devices. It is quite possible that we may be able to link up to and surf the Internet merely by thinking about it. There have already been successful experiments at Stanford University with human thoughts moving cursors on a computer screen by a monitoring of brain waves. This technology is no longer science fiction. This linkage may make the Internet ubiquitous in our daily experience, but there will also be those who do not want a genetically engineered bio-chip in their brains.

Philosophy Will Help to Develop Artificial Intelligence

A development of the convergence of bio-computing, brain science, nano-technology, and global communication may be in the area of Artificial Intelligence (AI). The field of philosophy has much to offer the field of AI in the domains of ontology, epistemology, and metaphysics. The study of the nature of being can aid in the development of novel designs for artificial selves, the structure of the personalities of artificial intellegences. After all, how can something think and respond in any way similar to us without a self? The study of the nature of knowledge will aid in the development of knowledge systems, data structures, and fuzzy logic programming. The field of metaphysics (the study of the nature of reality) can aid in the development of lines of inquiry about just what types of problems and solutions may be possible in the field of advance computing.

The Advent of Organizational Philosophers

What do philosophers do for their clients, what services do individual, in-house, or philosophical consultants provide? They can provide necessary constructive criticism and examination of planning and operational issues from many different angles. Philosophers can provide recommendations for on-going relations with customers, employees, partners, and competitors. Now that we live in an era in which organizations are composed of individuals from a wide variety of cultures, ethnicities, and overall value systems, the complexity of interactions requires the input of strategic thinkers able to grasp the entire situation and adapt decisions to fit these intricacies.

To this end a personal or organizational philosopher can:

· Serve as a brainstorming partner to help generate a free flow of ideas

· Provide critical examination of primary assumptions and motivations

· Be a holistic storyteller who can see the big picture and help to integrate individuals and organizations with larger perspectives and novel points of view

· Help to recommend alternative courses of action based on global perspectives

· Provide common sense advice and recommendations for building relationships, planning, forecasting, and grasping holistic systems relations

· Help to prevent you or your organization from acting hastily based on false premises

· Provide constructive criticism and examination of trends, forces of change, emerging issues to formulate new strategies

· Better identify planning elements

· Conduct gap analysis between current and desired future situations

· Help to align objectives and values with partners, clients, and employees

· Conduct philosophical strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threat analyses

CONCLUSION

We are on the verge of a new era in human culture. Like the industrial and information revolutions, a spiritual and philosophical revolution will have many unforeseen impacts. However it is certain that for the first time in history, huge numbers of the world's people will be able to work on their own philosophical understandings from their own perspective without the overbearing influence of passion, tradition or authority.

In a philosophical era, people will be encouraged to use the best of human wisdom, the best of science and the best of their experience to make up their own minds about quality in life. Philosophy may gain a new standing as a practical discipline to help individuals and organizations with their creative, management, political, and cultural concerns. We already live in a world where the actions of despots become immediately visible to the whole world. Tolerance for dictatorships and oppression will slide as people realize the opportunity to create their own futures.

A world full of more philosophically aware people will surely have a major impact on the way we relate, how information is communicated, how business is conducted and how politics is practiced. The presence of increasing numbers of philosophically enlightened people may even have a positive influence on the health of the planet and the future survival and success of humanity.

APPENDIX 4: INTERNET LINKS - GREAT WORKS OF WISDOM

Direct Links Available at The Freethinkers Philosophical Society Website:

https://www.angelfire.com/mn/implicatesynergy

Analects

Aristotle's Works

Autobiography of a Yogi

Avesta

Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson

Bhagavad Gita

Bible

The Chuang-Tzu

Dead Sea Scrolls

Dhammapada

Gnosticism

I Ching

Jainism

Koran

Mahabharata

Nag Hammadi Bible

Sikhism

Tao Te Ching

Plato's Works

Sepher Yetzirah

Shakespeare's Works

Sun-Tzu

Talmud

Tantrism

Torah

Upanishads

U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights

U.S. Declaration of Independence

Vedas

Zen

Rutgers University Virtual Religion Index

APPENDIX 5: ABOUT THE AUTHOR

It was intended by my relatives that I was to become an attorney - coming from a family occupied in politics and the law. Yet as fate would have it, after visiting India as a teenager, my horizons were opened to the possibilities of other pursuits in life. I became interested in mystical, occult, and esoteric philosophies by my return to this country and eventually became disappointed with the treatment of these subjects in academia. I sought deeper understandings than those offered by formal schooling in Western philosophy and went out on my own.

Although I left the University without my degree, I made up for it with a real life exploration of philosophy through meetings with living teachers, discussions with practical philosophers, personal experimentation with a variety of spiritual techniques, and my own study of world philosophical texts. This journey led me into many curious circumstances with remarkable people in unusual environments.

I have always felt that those who love and enjoy life, living it to its fullest extent have more to teach humanity than those who observe from the shadows. I have also always felt that the spiritual and material worlds are only opposite ends of the same stick, and the sacred in experience can be found nearly anywhere in the Here and Now.

To the end of establishing mutual spiritual understanding I discussed values with Christians, Jews, Moslems, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Native American Shamen, Atheists, and Wiccans. I have talked about the nature of existence with futurists, pizza delivery drivers, parking ramp attendants, elected officials, bar tenders, factory workers, writers, small business people, self made millionaires, construction workers, artists, reporters, and drifters. I have shared impressions about the universe with moralists, free spirits, scholars, priests, profligates, monks, poets, scientists, the illiterate, teachers, and the homeless. I have talked with people who are the highest, the lowest, and everywhere in-between in many different lands, about many different philosophical topics.

Having always enjoyed the combination of ideas, cultures, art, and things intellectual with the earthy pursuit of pleasure, I founded a round table discussion group called the Freethinkers Philosophical Society so that a social and entertainment component could be added to the abstract pursuit of mystical wisdom. The group has been popular for over 10 years. I eventually realized through these discussions that a new approach to describing philosophy in a common sense framework with clear language was called for.

It was during this period that my friend George, a philosopher, suggested that I write down some of the observations I have gained from being a "Generation X" American philosopher - observing from the street level issues in spirituality. He convinced me that my perspective as an independent observer without being beholden to any particular organization or religion might be useful in describing philosophical ideas for individuals not in academia. I discovered that there are many similarities in terms of the individual practice of spirituality, yet there has been little of humanity’s wisdom described in common sense terms that real people can use in their daily work. My growing recognition that there is a renaissance in spiritual thinking and investigation on the part of individual people all over the world lead to this book. Not only is The Spiritual Evolution a wake up call, it is my attempt to render useful some common sense understandings of humanity's wisdom for the modern person in the hopes that the philosophical aspect of existence is not forgotten in the headlong rush into the 21st century.