It seems evident to many that our world is in crisis and that that crisis continues to deepen in spite of the valiant efforts of a few and the gradual recognition of some of the more progressive established organisations. But crisis needs to be understood as the ancient Chinese perceived it when they formed the character for it in their written language by combining the character for danger and the character for opportunity.
A prominent factor in this growing tension of crisis is that of increasing complexity leading to confusion and feelings of despair arising out of a sense of disempowerment. There is increasing availability of information on what is happening, and growing understanding of how our world functions, as well as ever increasing technological capability. Non-the-less the growing cycles of disturbance and breakdown of familiar securities is manifesting growing awareness of a world heading for increasing trauma.
Governments, the dominating commercial interests and even the preeminent international body, the United Nations seem unable to seriously address the 'writing on the wall'. Information that we have become so clever at generating has become itself a cause of dis-ease known popularly as information overload the cause of a disability known as analysis paralysis. That which we would clearly seem to need to address the crises, becomes a stumbling block to any resolution of the problems, often resulting in endless factional arguments regarding the way ahead.
It seems as if humanity is caught in a headlong rush to an inevitable catastrophic correction to inappropriate environmental, social and economic practices because we seem unable to dismount the tiger of the old paradigm that once seemed to be the way to the abundance of a golden future.
Caught up in our cleverness we are apparently unable to grasp the import of Einstein's statement that "no problem can be solved by the same consciousness that created it."
We cling to the old patterns of thinking even though the evidence
is there before us in the findings of the new science, the post
Newtonian view of quantum physics. This new understanding of the
workings of our universe holds within it the seeds for developing
a new sociopolitical paradigm a new pattern upon which to
redesign our social and political processes.
There is however a new approach now emerging, perhaps the beginning of future social decision-making, that of looking within society to the populace at large as the critical resource for determining future directions. The growing use of the term participatory democracy indicates the readiness in some quarters to take this crucial step towards liberation. It is becoming evident that we must engage the creativity that exists everywhere in our society and avoid the time wasting disorder of competition politics. This we must do if we are to be sufficiently innovative and adequately comprehensive to address the complexity and novelty of the disorder we find ourselves in. If we can successfully achieve this engagement and effectively disseminate the radically different understanding of reality that the new science affords us, then the capability of the human species to determine the future of our evolving world will be greatly enhanced.
Margaret Wheatley in her book, Leadership and the New Science, succinctly expresses the relevance of new science thinking when she writes, "The new physics cogently explains that there is no objective reality out there waiting to reveal its secrets. There are no recipes or formulas, no checklists or expert advice that describe 'reality'. If context is as crucial as the (new) science explains, then nothing really transfers; everything is always new and different and unique to each of us. We must engage with each other, experiment to find what works for us, and support one another as the true inventors that we are."
In 1981, I published an article in the 'Green Alliance Newsletter', entitled 'Participatory Democracy', an extract of which follows.
"Rapid population growth, advances in technology, communications and transport combine to produce a massive impact on our environment and upon our social services, economic structures and human relationships."
All of this means that our social organisation and governmental
procedures must be able to respond flexibly, efficiently and sensitively
to rapidly changing needs. The political and governmental processes
we have inherited are just not adequate to meet these demands.
Large structures and institutions and centralised bureaucracies
lack the necessary sensitivity and flexibility and are slow and
difficult to adapt and modify.
For some time now, people in positions of power in our society
have paid lip service to the importance of decentralising power,
but still we see the power of making decisions affecting our lives
resting in the hands of a
minority of individuals and interest groups. Our objective must
be to improve access to the parliamentary processes and decision-making,
for the many citizen groups concerned with raising community awareness
and responsibility regarding the crucial issues of our time ñ
an end to the arms race, the protection of human and civil rights
and the quality of the environment, responsible resource development
policies, and the rights of Aboriginals and minority groups.
It is vital that recognition and support is given to groups involved in research and in promoting understanding and awareness of viable alternatives for the future of our society, in such areas as renewable energy, transport, housing, agriculture, health, education and lifestyles.
Survival in the twenty-first century will be conditional on such changes in the political process occurring, so that governmental decision making may be informed by the expertise, experience and goodwill available within these many community groups. The success of democracy depends upon full and constant access of the people to the decision-making process; and in the world of today the very survival of society, mankind and Nature itself, calls for the full and responsible participation of all.
That which we together conceive as possible, we create. We the people must accept our responsibility (our ability to respond). Our world continues as it does, if we allow it.
The Byron Shire in northern NSW has committed itself to participatory democracy, it has a community participation policy and is in the process of implementing formal mechanisms and facilities to enable a truly informed bottom-up approach to local government. The intent is for a genuine working partnership between local government and the community. What is needed now is the development of new technology that is able to manage the information overload that will be produced by engaging the full participation, with their thoughts, feelings and aspirations, of the public at large.
The rapid development of computerised management of information overload in the field of bioinformatics, combined with the new fractal logic and based on creative physics principles, holds out the promise of just such a supra-technology that would enable the essential quantum leap needed in social self determination.
But commitment of a significant research effort into technologies for such a purpose is only likely if those who see the need for broad public participation in government also understand the potential of the rapid evolution of science and technology to provide the crucial support that will be needed.
Unfortunately very few people, even in the developed world societies have the time and opportunity to familiarize themselves with and understand the bewildering array of new technical terms, the new view of reality that recent discoveries in science present; Nor can they appraise the rapidly accelerating evolution in technologies such as artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing and neuroscience. For most of us the technology of the world around us seems ever more incomprehensible while the future of our society increasingly appears to be unsustainable. Complexity, disparities in access to knowledge, power and wealth and threats to the life supporting environment and biodiversity, appear to be an accumulating dark cloud over the way ahead. Feelings of un-empowerment and desperation are inevitable and lead to denial, irresponsibility and all too often to self-destruction.
Clearly, there is an urgent need for this confusing and unmanageable world to be made comprehensible for the general public and for the rampant charge of technological development to be reined in and directed to address the needs and aspiration of the masses of ordinary people and the urgent need to preserve biodiversity and threatened life forms.
Immediate steps could be taken to ensure that the outcome of our accelerating technological capability, resulting from artificial intelligence, artificial life, nanotechnology, bioinformatics and quantum computing, will not be a further escalation in the pace of the present headlong rush. A rush driven by commercial interests that it seems could be taking us towards what could be the most catastrophic cascade of species extinctions this planet has seen in its turbulent evolutionary past. We must instead manage to direct our scientific and technological effort towards the achievable creation of a future world in which wealth and health exists for all in a global democracy. A true democracy that actually allows for all people of the world to participate with equality in the decision making processes that govern their lives. Certainly, for most people today this seems an unattainable utopian dream; but is it?
When we understand the evidence now available to us through the latest findings of science's exploration of the sub-atomic dimension and the rediscovered creative physics, we begin to appreciate the new possibilities. This new scientific awareness shows us that all life forms are informed by the intelligence of the total environment surrounding them, that the apparently 'out there world' we call our reality is in fact inseparable from our own state of mind and that there is a, as yet unexplained, natural ordering process that can cause beauty and harmony to emerge from chaos.
In an essay by Jonathan Banks entitled, 'For the People by the People of the World' he says "Every living thing is a complex adaptive system, so is every species as a whole and every ecology of species, as well as the entire ecology of the planet. It turns out that our civilization as a whole is a complex adaptive system as are its sub-systems like communities, businesses, companies, governments, bureaucracies, stock markets and economies." He goes on to say that John Holland who was awarded one of the first American PhDs in computer sciences, has "pointed out that complexity theory, has demonstrated there are natural laws that govern the way complex, adaptive systems evolve and operate and that human systems operate according to these laws."
All this tells us that we must set priorities in the application of our growing technological ability to manage vast quantities of information. Priority must be given to enabling as many people as possible access to knowledge and to contributing their insights, concerns, feelings and ideas into a unifying process for the self-determination of human affairs. In this way we can create a true global democracy that is inclusive, equitable, transparent and effective; a democracy that draws on the full potential of the human species in guiding world development towards the highest potential for further evolution. And this will also require that our choices are in harmony with the negentropic law of cosmic creation that ultimately drives the cosmic evolutionary processes.
Recent understandings of creative physics, fractal logic or holographic thinking and resonance can be incorporated into the development of artificial intelligence and bioinformatics such that the input of ideas and feelings of human populations can be digested and harmonized to the patterns of nature and infinite evolution.
We stand at the dawn of a new millennium with the potential this has to focus humanity on now as a time for new beginnings, a chance to evolve our social patterns, to restructure our socioeconomic and sociopolitical models as appropriate to a new age of justice, equality and sustainability. Interestingly, the social scientist Jan Hutton of the University of Hawaii's Research Center for Future Studies, through his studies in Evolution Systems Theory says, that we are now in the fourth stage of an evolutionary cycle, the last stage before what is called a bifurcation, a quantum shift into one of two possible new states or directions. This may well be a last window of opportunity, a unique focus bringing us to our senses. This could release the full creative potential of a unified and vastly empowered humanity, initiating a potential super-species evolving consciously in harmony with the creative forces of the evolving universe to which all in it clearly belong.
The evidence is that it is possible to develop the technology
that would enable the full creative potential of the vast human
populations to contribute in a coherent and collective manner,
democratically guiding the evolutionary process through this critical
nexus into an unimaginably prosperous future. But this can only
be if sufficient will is focused on it for the good of the whole;
and if not there can only be ill for all. Is this the moment in
time when the human race can be won and the realization of its
true potential more than make up for the damage caused in its
process of awakening?
AKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
I wish to thank Robert Pope for his outstanding commitment to ethics, democracy and to the revelation of the importance of creative physics. He has already made a major contribution to the delopment of the essential technology referred to in this essay. I appreciate the inspiration and encouragement that he has given me to publish the above.
I also wish to aknowledge the importance of Jonathon Robert Banks' essay, 'For the People by the People of the World' in elucidating how understanding of the new science sets the stage for the development of a technology to support participatory democracy.