Back to Nature #5 Consciousness for Sustainabiltiy January 27, 2008
Posted by Graham in : Human Ecology, Overshoot, Permaculture, Science and Rationaltiy , trackbackConsciousness for Sustainability
The discussion of the “Back to Nature” series has been looking at developmental models of human behaviour, with a view to seeing what light, of any, such approaches can shed on the perplexing question:
Why do so many people seem to be in denial, or to be unable to grasp the reality that the human ecological footprint has far exceeded the carrying capacity of the earth, and that energy depletion, climate change and general environmental degradation will inevitably result in the end of our current way of life?
In this concluding part of the series we will have a look at some of the general implications of this model for achieving sustainabiltiy and try to find an answer to the question: Can we really go Back to nature?
The Dawn of Global Consciousness
To actually perceive as central to ones own fate that of the entire planet is not something we are born doing, but rather something we must evolve into.
For most of human history, the fate of the Earth as a whole has not been of immediate concern to people. Much more important have been to daily tasks of feeding and nurturing within the tribe or community. Often this will have involved competition for survival with both the natural world and other human societies.
In todays’ world, the uneven stratification of groups and individuals displaying different values ensures that, even with sufficient material means to do so, not every one will care enough, or understand enough, the human impact on the planet to do anything about it. Our brains have evolved to deal with the well-being of kith and kin, short-term goals, local, parochial concerns and “traditional” values which, by definition have been held for the longest in human history.
In modern times, many of these values have been swept away with the rapid change in lifestyle caused by the massive influx of cheap fossil energy in the west.
One of the bi-products of this oil age has been the availability of enough surplus wealth to allow millions of people to pursue knowledge. This and the extraordinary new insights brought us by science- the most important being evolution and quantum theory- has opened the doorway to new ways of thinking, new perceptions of the universe and our place in it that had not previously been possible.
What the developmental model shows us is that it is unlikely that everyone in any given culture will share this ecological consciousness, because it represents a novel and highly developed stage. There will always of necessity be people at the earlier stages.
In the early part of the 21st Century, just as we have evolved a consciousness capable of understanding the systemic nature of the earth and the biosphere and how we are intimately connected to this system, so did our awareness that we are in fact destroying the ability of the earth to sustain life- including our own.
But as this reality dawned, so the next stage was already in the making- the understanding of the evolution of this understanding. If we want to understand hoe to respond to the state of the external world of Gaia- the whole Planet System which includes humanity and our impact on it- we will have to understand the inner processes of conscious development. From this standpoint, the question becomes not, “How can we heal the Planet?” but “How can we create the conditions for development so that a greater proportion of the population have the inner motivation to care about the Planet?”
The Rising Sun of Integral Consciousness?
“The ego-centric and the ethno-centric stages of awareness could not care less about the global commons because they do not themselves possess a global awareness. And that means that Gaia’s main problem is not toxic waste dumps, the ozone hole or global warming. Gaia’s main problem is that not enough human beings have evolved from ego-centric to ethnocentric to world-centric levels of consciousness, yes?” -Wilber, Boomeritis
Whereas all the earlier stages of human consciousness tend to compete with each other and identify with their own beliefs which they hold t be the most appropriate, a dramatic transformation occurs at Yellow, which is the first “meme” to recognize that its perception of the world is a result of a developmental process. It is not just that world views are relative and contextual as is held by the post-modern Green stage, but that they are sequential, each new stage transcending but including the previous ones.
Yellow holds its views less tightly, recognizing that there may be yet deeper stages ahead, that the evolutionary process is not yet finished. Uniquely amongst the memes, Yellow recognizes the importance of all the stages and works to meet the psychological needs of each stage.
Traditionalist (Blue) give priority to family, traditional values, the community, religion. While very resistant to change, sustainability will become an issue for this stage when it sees environmental issues impacting on the health and well-being of its community structures.
Modernists- Orange- are driven more by individualistic priorities of competition and materialism, and may also be swayed by environmental issues if they are perceived to be a threat to those goals;
Post-modernists – Green- very often represent political movements towards sustainability, but often are perceived as a threat to Blue traditions or Orange economic order while at the same time failing to acknowledge that Green Values can only emerge from those two previous stages.
What values do we need to evolve for a Sustainable Future?
One of Wilber’s great insights which I still find useful is ihis conception of the pre/trans fallacy. This refers to the common New Age belief that pre-rational beliefs are in somehow “superior” to post-rational beliefs; that somehow science and rationality are causing the destruction of the world. The confusion arises because, to the post-modern mind, anything “non-rational” can look better than the simplistic, mechanistic application of science that is driving the modern world. Wilber claims however that it is not rationality that is to blame but materialism- the base, primitive obsession with material goods and well-being that continues long after our basic needs have been met. Instead, he urges us to consider the inner world of our own consciousness- the psychological realm, which is the starting point for any motivation for change. What we have seen however that it is the moral stage of development that determines behaviour; “science” is a tool which can be used for good or evil.
“We have become like technological giants and moral pygmies” Einstein.
The difficulty is, science has created a technology which in the wrong hands can be highly destructive; and yet if we want to move on, one thing we will need to take with us is the scientific understanding of the world.
Science and the benefits of science are so taken for granted in todays’ world that it is hard to understand how differently things must have looked in the past.
Carl Sagan has suggested that when the ancient Greeks first flirted with the rationalist method of inquiry, it didn’t have the power to become more influential because they did not know enough- there was not the ability to undergo the research and discoveries that the modern world has achieved at that time; while nowadays, science is misunderstood and treated with suspicion by many of its beneficiaries because we know to much. A lot of the insights of science are complex and seem far removed from our everyday experience.
The role that science has played in consciousness development cannot be underestimated; its revelations are of most significance because they are in many cases counter-intuitive.
Our intuition tells us the sun goes around the earth, that the earth is flat, but science has revealed that theses things are not so. Beyond the perceptions of the senses and of our emotional interpretation of them, science has revealed- particularly through the lenses of evolution and quantum theory- a universe far more bizarre and mysterious that the imagination born by any superstition or religion. In the scientific method, we have a method to inquire into the nature of reality, and to check our perceptions against our own fallibility.
Science has also given us an extraordinarily intricate view of the world and the systems that sustain life. In particular, the recent contribution that climate science has made to understanding earth systems and ecological processes will not be something we should consider leaving behind. We will need to take this understanding with us into a sustainable future.
In addition, we will need to understand a longer timescale than that of our own lifetimes. Understanding our place in space and time through the telling of the universe Story may be one of the important educational devices to help us understand this.
We will also, as Dr. Albert Bartlett has explained, come to comprehend the exponential function: how change can take place and processes be set in motion that may turn our world upside down before we even have had a chance to notice.
Fundamentally, we will need to understand the primary role of energy in driving natural systems, human economies and even human consciousness. While Wilber has given me many valuable insights, he seems to have almost completely missed the primary role that energy has to play in this story. Orange, Green and Yellow values (if they are to emerge) could not have had the influence they have had without the recent period of cheap fossil energy.
To understand the primacy of energy we must turn to Howard Odum, who writings formed one of the precursors to Holmgren’s work and permaculture.
“Only when sources of energy are newly available and rich do people feel free to do what they want as individuals. The freedom to make many choices exists during only a brief period. After that, competition among people and methods limits choices to those that make use of energy most effectively. Americans, along with the rest of the world, are coming out of a century when there was an excess of energy and much freedom of choice was possible. We are moving into a period characterized by less energy” Odum,H.- Energy Basis for Man and Nature 1976
We are left now with an interesting question: will the new forms of consciousness that the oil age have created become influential enough for us to safely navigate the downward curve of energy descent?
What will happen to consciousness as energy becomes scarcer? Will we find new forms of consciousness to help us deal with a low-energy world based on Odum’s understanding? Or will we regress into earlier forms of consciousness based on tribal rivalries and superstition?
One thing is for sure: this new, ecological and scientific understanding of humans and nature demonstrate that we cannot go back to nature. In fact, the very idea is redundant, for we have never separated from the essential energy transactions of nature in the first place. Just like the classic study of hares and lynx’s populations rising and falling in tandem with each other as predator and prey, our populations and behaviours are also determined to a large extent by energy availability.
We are in this fundamental respect no different from any other species. The separation from nature is illusory. Like bacteria in a Petri dish, given enough energy we will keep consuming until demand exceeds supply.
Uniquely amongst species we have developed evolutionary advantages- opposable thumbs and the neo-cortex- that have permitted us to out-compete everything else and enter a state of unprecedented overshoot.
In this respect, the reality of our place in nature becomes clear. We are not destroying the environment because of some separation from nature; rather, we are destroying it because we are a part of nature. Given the same evolutionary advantages, any other species would most likely behave in the same way.
It is this fundamental reality that is what being part of nature really means. The only question is, will our consciousness evolution- our unique ability to understand theses larger processes- be sufficient to lead us into a sustainable future?
Comments»
This seems like an awful lot of words to say that we need more people to think about the planet as a whole if we are going to survive. Granted I’m missing some subtle stuff but that seemed to be the gist of it. The model is interesting but what real use it it?
What I’m interested in is what happens once people care - long-term global approaches or piecemeal geographical/sector-specific attacks on the problem. Local stuff in your town. Stuff in your house. I just can’t see where this consciousness stuff gets us.
Hi Graham,
I’ve been following this series with great interest.
You’ve clarified many things for me and put them into a framework that makes sense of much, and in particular that “perplexing question” (“Why do so many people seem to be in denial….result in the end of our current way of life?”).
Evolving into yellow involves, as you say, a willingness to hold one’s views less tighly. Personally, this has left me vulnerable to being swayed by many different voices.
Green said: ‘We humans are the problem. After the great die-off the earth will find it’s own balance.’
Orange said: ‘Can’t you see how muchTechnology has achieved? It has got us into this mess, and it will also get us out of this mess.’
Blue said: ‘You want to change things for the better? Get a good education, a job, join a political organisation. You can only change the system if you’re a part of it.
You can’t just hang around and dream of sustainability. And: How dare you be so ungrateful for all we provided for you!’
Red said: ‘Leave me alone, you and your gloom and doom! I have a right to live my life the way I want to live it.’
Purple said: ‘Your actions are too much dominated by your brain. Be more intuitive, go back to nature, and all you wish for will come to pass!’
… And my own poor little ‘Beige’? ‘I want to survive, but…. Its all getting a bit complicated!!!
Thank you for shedding light on the origins of these voices and their limitations.
Evolving into ‘Yellow’ is only possible if we stop fighting and blaming these voices. We need to acknowledge that they are part of our human heritage.
We also need to be strong enough to transcend them, even if many around us (and just about all those in positions of power) are not ready to do so yet.
I think it would be interesting to examine what gives humans the motivation and strength to evolve into ‘Yellow’.
I feel that those people who are ‘living the solutions’ - those who are planting the trees, building the cob houses, harvesting the permaculture gardens - have a huge role to play in inspiring people to move towards yellow.
Best wishes,
Anna
I found this whole series to be right on the mark for the times we inhabit and the choices now immediately before us. If we lack the critical mass to step over to the next lily pad, then the human experiment, and quite possibly much of remaining life on Earth, will end and the Fifth World will begin without us. That appears to be the default option on our current line of progression.
Alternatively, we still have a choice — one involving consciousness, transcendence, and epiphany. What lies behind that door is truly wonderful.
There are those among us already through the door, pulling others to join them, and there are those trying hard to slam the door shut and bar it. We have the burden of our own evolution from slime and fang, and yet we also have a biological platform presumedly up to the task. To quote Nate Hagens, “Optimism leads to increased frontal cortical activity which itself is a strong predictor of idea generation, positive emotion and overall liveliness of thought. Similarly, sadness is marked by decreased activity in the frontal cortex, which has the negative side affect of reducing the number of overall thoughts and ideas produced.” Optimists can be realists, even now.
What lies just ahead is a severe dislocation. Its psychological foreshocks are now washing over us, creating anxiety, insecurity, self-doubt, and negative reactions. Overcoming that with affirming, positive, hopeful visions is more than merely spiritual, it is essential to our survival. It is easy to say (or deny) we have screwed the pooch, find some rock to sit on, and watch it all collapse. But we have to get up, make soil, de-consume, and save the planet. That takes a consciousness shift.
So grateful and exited re these ideas! Yes, siene (sorry key after b out) v. important: the operinian revolution huge, took hundreds of years & was an immense liberation. We don’t have that muh time now, yet we do have the internet. I was thrilled to understand (Jaynes, “The Origin of onsiousness in the Breakdown of the Biameral Mind;” Jung on primitive soieties without individual egos: his arheologial thoughts on how individuals invested all “ego” into their opulently outfitted heifs or kings, whom they loved to glorify and praise just as we love to do the same for our own egos today! also Kunstler, the Mexio ity part of “The ity in Mind;” Tarnas, “Psyhe and osmos”) From these I learned that onsiousness has indeed evolved a lot in history and so may be poised to do so again. (!) This time it will be rapid beause now we are a new “animal” –a global network. (See Barabasi, “Linked”) Yes, evolution and quantum mehanis the most important things in siene (also networks) beause for the first time we study wholes.This is itself an evolution.
Your remarks on inner rather than outer tweaking reminded me of the last sentene in Diana Leaf hristian’s “Finding ommunity,” her hapter headed, “The Longest, Most Expensive Personal Growth Workshop You Will Ever Take:” “We set out to hange our world and now ommunity is hanging us.”
I say this is a time not only of Peak Oil, but also of Peak Ego. I like to exuse humanity of any blame for this by thinking of it as a natural suessional stage of onsiousness. Love the idea that yellow must satisfy the needs of all prior olors –so more nurturant than judgement or opposition! It is like the need to “eat” the shadow side of oneself to grow, ie enompass the duality of our bad and good by seeing and approving both at one time. Loosening “resistane” in this same way (allowing energy flow) also being thought of as the route to wellness from disease.
The onditions for development of the awareness and motivation (morality) you speak of may generate naturally as the result of shok therapy if groups have to fend for themselves in risis…
I had the awed awareness that, as you say, We Are Nature, when Darren Doherty passionately desribed his vision of how keylining (espeially that beause it is a broad-sale effort) and permaulture will, with rainwater alone, rapidly build soils and ponds, reating lush pasture, then forest belts, then linking these to form wildlife orridors, then evolving on, utterly reforming his terribly beleaguered land, Australia; whereas it is too late for nature, without us, to do this in a human time frame: in a moral time frame.