Yet our civilization is neither just nor equitable nor sustainable. Furthermore, we aren´t even moving in that direction. Instead we seem to be heading for a future filled with nationalist and/or religious driven bloodshed, environmental disasters and social decline that´s nonetheless safe for the trade and profits of large multi-national corporations. Critical knowledge about ourselves and our history that would lead us in the direction of a sane future is activally supressed and rejected. An accurate and coherent understanding of ourselves, which is vital for our survival and progress, is in fact all too rare. Using knowledge available at the time, our ancestors created myths and religions and ideologies for themselves that formed a coherent picture of how the world and society worked. We are burdened by many of these views and ideologies to this day. Resistance to new ideas that conflicted with the old ways of thinking and viewing the world was often strong. Some religions have resistance to alternative thinking as an integeral part of their doctrines. Today, as in the past, old ideas are championed by those in positions of wealth or power to insure that they remain in those positions. The process of attaining new knowledge and ideas has been both slow and fitful, but the knowledge has been gained. The problem now is the dissemination of that information in the face of powerful resistance.
Humans have evolved past our ape ancestors primarily because we have moved beyond the genetic component of evolution; that is passing on traits and behaviors that ensured our survival through our genes, to the quantum leap of passing cultural information on to our fellow humans extra-genetically. Along the way we have evolved characteristics and behaviors that made this process of cultural transmission of knowledge easier. From direct imitation to oral tradition to the written word and finally to computers and global communications our ability to transfer knowledge has grown by leaps and bounds. Our progress as a species, at a rate that far exceeds the rate of genetic evolution, is directly related to this fantastic ability. Now, however, it seems that we have reached a barrier that threatens our very survival. As the amount of knowledge is exploding the core messages and understandings that this knowledge has afforded are being lost in the din. Because of the glut of information and the dearth of understanding many return to the old ideas and ideologies.
As we survey the human condition we can compare our collective human history in the terms of the growth and development of a child. From our multi-stepped birth in Africa, our grasp of tool use and language, our taming of fire and finally our invention of agriculture and writing, humans have made some dramatic changes in a relatively short period of time. Many of these changes hold the hope for an improvement in the lives of millions and millions of people who are living a marginal existance. Amidst these changes, however, certain aspects of the human condition have not changed dramatically in the 10,000 years since the agricultural revolution. In fact some have become worse. Our experimentation with civilization as we know it is a fairly recent event in human history. As with any new social experiment thare are bound to be problems. Perhaps these problems are similar to the growing pains of adolescence that we are all familiar with. We have been searching in the dark for our collective identity and purpose, can the light of our present understanding help us redefine ourselves or will the ideologies and traditions of the past doom our future?
Humankind is at a critical juncture, we who live in western civilization would like to think of our way of life as secure but this is a dangerous illusion. In many ways we have come quite far as a species but the same forces and traits that got us here may prevent us from advancing further or even surviving at all. As we enter the next millennia we need to seriously look at these issues and ourselves. We need to examine ourselves not in the light of ancient religous ideas but with a understanding of our real history. We need to assess our strengths and weaknesses as a species with the knowledge of our evolutionary past. We need to rethink the structure of our society using the knowledge of past and present societies other than our own. Hopefully we can overcome the flaws in the human mind that favor dangerous and self defeating religious and political ideas with understanding and corrective measures. Inaction is not an option if we are to survive the following 1000 years. Our survival depends on an unprecedented effort at education including an understanding of our real evolutionary history and of the forces at work to suppress it. Only an outright rejection of old ways of thinking can overcome our evolutionary baggage and lead us to a sustainable and peaceful future.
Copyright 1996.Send comments via Email: 