First, thanks to Brian McAndrews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Havel's speech is very long but relevant to recent postings.
That speech was very inspiring!
The following was passed to me from a friend - also relevant to recent
postings..
>Don,
>A clip from Ken Wilbur - I think it catches extremely well what strikes
>me as the major problem with your group's thinking.
>chris
Chris was commenting on our gaiapc list. I think, though, the problem is
universal.
I don't know who Ken Wilbur is addressing.
*******
Thank you for your generous comments about my work in general and about
A Brief History in particular. Your central question involved this: You
first quote Brief History: "Gaia's main problems are not
industrialization, ozone depletion, overpopulation, or resource
depletion. Gaia's main problem is the lack of mutual understanding and
mutual agreement in the noosphere about how to proceed with these
problems." You follow that quote with your objection: "While that is an
important point and philosophically correct, it seems insufficient given
the crisis level we're at.... Our house is burning down. If we wait for
that [mutual agreement] to unfold before taking action, it will be too
late. Am I missing something?"
Well, let's assume that our house in indeed burning down, in terms of an
ecological crisis. The crucial question is, Why have we still not taken
action? And the answer is: Because we have not been able to reach mutual
understanding and mutual agreement about this crisis. And until we do
that, the crisis will continue, guaranteed.
You see, there are generally two ways that human beings deal with
genuine crisis situations. They either foresee it, and take action now
to prevent it; or-much more often-they wait until the nightmare actually
occurs, which forces them to face the issue-much too late-and then spend
their time cleaning up the massive casualties.
So far, we (us humans) are following the second course. A collective
humanity will not act on this crisis until they actually and
collectively perceive it to be a crisis. And the only way they will
perceive a global crisis is if they themselves possess a global
perspective, which alone is capable of seeing the problem.
So my point is that, given the crisis, we will either: work for ways to
change perception, or we will have to wait for the disaster to actually
and massively strike, at which point people will then agree we have a
huge problem. The only other approach is for world governments to force
their citizens to take dramatic action, and-given the democratic nature
of the one hundred or so industrial nations-this is very unlikely.
Morevoer, it would involve various forms of fascist governance, which,
no matter how noble the cause, always get into horrendous problems.
Notice that I said, in the original quote you gave, that "Gaia's main
problem" is the lack of mutual agreement on how to proceed with the
crisis. I did not say, "Gaia's only problem." Once we reach a
collective, democratic, consensual agreement on the nature and degree of
the crisis (the major problem), then a thousand other things need to be
done (from regulation to education). But most ecophilosophers focus on
the thousand other things that need to be done, and utterly ignore the
major and first problem: how to get people to see the other problems and
agree on a course of action.
And the only way we can do that is by developmental evolution of
consciousness from egocentric to sociocentric to worldcentric (or
global) modes. From that global perspective, the crisis can much more
easily be seen, and thus a consensus on emergency action will start to
form around that collective and mutually-agreed-upon perception.
So I'm not ignoring or denying the thousand other things that need to be
done; I'm simply highlighting the single most important agenda that true
ecologists everywhere ought to be engaged in, namely: the growth and
evolution and development of interior consciousness itself.
To the extent that ecologists ignore the interior (Left Hand) path, then
to that extent they make the other course of action absolutely
inevitable: a worldwide crisis of nightmarish proportions that will
force people to think globally, while all around them will lie millions
of casualties and untold suffering. So I am suggesting a balance: let us
work for environmental action now, but let us also work just as hard for
a culture of encouragement that places at least as much emphasis on
interior, transcendental, consciousness development, which alone can
prevent the nightmare.
Very best,
Ken, January 8, 1997
