TRANSLATE THIS ARTICLE
Integral World: Exploring Theories of Everything
An independent forum for a critical discussion of the integral philosophy of Ken Wilber
Giorgio Piacenza is a sociologist student in the Certificate program leading to a Master's degree in Integral Theory at JFK University.
SEE MORE ESSAYS WRITTEN BY GIORGIO PIACENZA The Evolution of Human Consciousness re-VisitedGiorgio Piacenza Cabrera The "Evolution of human consciousness" is an idea that has to be clarified.
The "EVOLUTION OF HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS" IS AN IDEA THAT HAS TO BE CLARIFIED. It is about how our consciousness can take mental perspectives which are more inclusive; how consciousness can be possessed by a smaller degree of intolerant duality. It is our capacity for greater levels of perspective-taking also ABLE TO OVERRIDE OUR SURVIVAL-BASED PHYSICAL INSTINCTS associated to our bodies in the physical world under (local, classical) causal laws largely based upon practical, exterior, violent competition. I know that there also is cooperation as biologist Lynn Margulis shows (also showing that there's a connection with a deeper form of interrelated life more associated with the non-local and the Subtle) but the instincts of short-term benefits and to seek status and to hoard power and goods, social respect and influence is what leads most humans in economic and political power to establish the social legal economic system as it is. but we must understand that there are two ways of experiencing reality which contradict each other; one is deeper, more spiritual, more integral, holistic and the other is based on physical instincts needed to survive in a classical (local) world. What "evolves" in human consciousness is that capacity to perceive the world from its base in deeper roots or upon a higher-deeper level of reality in which scarcity and constant dangers from nature and from other people (who are also experiencing scarcity) is less of a challenge (in the Subtle Realm, exteriors participate with subjective creations instantly and co-causally in equal manner and we are -generally speaking- less constrained). The possibility of our "transformation in human consciousness" ultimately relies upon other forms of adaptive instincts related to our experience with subtle bodies functioning under Subtle Realm laws of experience (which under a specified, restricted version, also creates the Physical Realm experience). As long as we reject Subtle Realm issues as "non-relevant" or even non-integral issues, we'll not really come to understand where our holistic and integral impulses and models originate from. Even the Integral Theory Model derives from the co-equal, Interior-Exterior/Individual-Plural SUBTLE REALM "dimensions." Non-dual mysticism is a step up but misses a whole intermediate range of experiential causal laws that transcend and include the Physical Realm. The ethical values promoted by religions and incorporated into our legal systems (such as the sanctity of human life and of animal life in some cases) also is a step forward toward a humane (and less crudely physicalist civilization) but also misses that intermediate range of causes, ways of organizing energies and instinctually-related motivations which are more related (for instance, through quantum information connections) to the generation of the physical world. Again, the recognition of the importance of our live also as Subtle Realm beings and how that realm has sets of laws that transcend and include Physical Realm laws is crucial to behave in a way that is not purely dominated by short term, win-lose, violent, physical instincts. we need to recognize and then more easily connect with the subtle instincts that accompany our subtle bodies. These subtle instincts are more relational and inclusive. They use a more "BOTH-AND" operational logic suitable to our Second Tier hopes for creating an integral civilization. Exopolitical contact situations, IONS research into presentiment, the Observer's Effect, non-locality, consciousness in general is filled with situations in which we experience phenomena corresponding with Subtle Realm causal laws interacting with regular, classical physical phenomena. The growth of holistic and integral thinking and sensibilities/sentiment/self-transcending motivations are also linked with the knowing that is natural to Subtle Realm life. How many more excuses we need to find to give ourselves permission to recognize the Subtle Realm's importance in our current life? An integral civilization may not rise unless integral leaders recognize the importance of fulcrums relating with the Subtle Realm as something vital, real, and determining. "Vanilla" interest in both-and integrative thinking without recognizing the Subtle Realm importance are insufficient. The very origin of the "quadrants" as defined simultaneously arising perspectives is possible due to their "dimensions" (Interior-Exterior, Individual-Plural) existing in the Subtle Realm relational both-and level. They simultaneously arise as distinct because they are mutually defined in a higher/deeper level which as consciousnesses we can also enact and interpret constructively and don't have to (as some seem to say) be considered as “fixed” pre-givens. Besides supporting our physical reality, they can also interact with physics in a give-and-take mode. Understanding as “either-or” (exclusively) defined physical worlds; as “both-and” (equally relational) subtle worlds and as “neither-nor” (immanent subjectivity-reinforcing) causal worlds are three ways in which NON DUALITY manifests and inspires our understanding. There are grades of Non Duality in form under the three realms and then there's Turiyatitta. This Turiyatitta absolute, non-dual state leads us to embrace all forms of relative (contingent or situated) expressions of Non-Duality and Integral Theory is part of a growing recognition gradually leading to a living knowledge of the Subtle Realm even if our senses are primarily invested in the Physical.
|