Thinking big intelligently

The absence of organic thinking is placing the very survival of our species in jeopardy. And the suitability and quality of the organising ideas that humanity operates from is the reason. All the trends outlined so far — the increase in mental illness and drug addiction, rise in family breakdown, poor schooling, the alienation people feel towards the institutions of law and government, centralisation, and the harmful effects of using ever more sophisticated technology to stimulate greed in people for commercial gain — all relate to that. The materialistic achievements and success of the Western world were based upon straight-line thinking, on a model of reality that presumes that we can always have access to massive amounts of energy, minerals, and other sources of wealth such as pure air and water and fertile soil. It is clear to scientists around the world, however, that the planet's resources are finite — undeniably limited.[60] It is also clear that the rate at which these resources are being used up is rapidly accelerating because other parts of the world are now copying the Western way of generating wealth.[61]

The Western model for wealth generation is based upon innate, and therefore natural, animal selfishness — that we can take (grab or steal) from the earth whatever we need, or want. When we first evolved our situation was such that this didn't matter much. It is by such behaviour that all mammals find a niche in which to survive. But as we advanced our impact on the landscape and the planet's resources did start to matter, even though, for a while (since the most rapacious modern technologies took a while to spread), the dangers weren't obvious, except to the most farsighted of individuals. Now, as populations have increased and technology has advanced exponentially, everything has changed. One doesn't have to be a pessimist to sense the problems piling up. The speed at which second and third world countries can now develop and become advanced technological cultures is a fraction of the hundred years it took America. Now that the billions of previously poor are getting in on the act and rapidly developing their technology, they are becoming greed-based market economies too. And, as this can happen in a decade or less, it is placing a rapidly rising demand on the planet's limited resources.

The tensions that this is already generating will undoubtedly result in a major crisis for the economic model which, up until now, has served our Western society and culture pretty well. But, just as when an individual can no longer get their needs met and their model of reality fragments and they become mentally ill, so large populations can become emotionally aroused and behave in insane ways. The crisis will occur before resources actually begin to run out. Signs appear long before, just as in mental illness. In the case of our economy, the pressure will mount and the pretext for economic bullying, theft on a vast scale and war will increasingly be focused on those parts of the world where diminishing resources still exist.

Because the Western economic model is dependent upon economically weaker countries providing it with cheap natural resources and labour, it doesn't matter specifically where this modus operandi first starts to fragment. The economies of all countries are now so interdependent that the pressures will impact upon them all. If we carry on as we are, with greed predominating over cooperation, we will see a collapse into chaos. And this is likely to happen sooner rather than later.

The bottom line is that our economic crises will be largely due to the autistic thinking style of modern governments. This has a strong tendency to blindly assume that all problems can be solved in impulsive random ways or ways that worked in the past, or by imposing on people more and more social and financial control mechanisms, or by ignoring problems altogether and leaving them for future generations to solve. Governments are also drawn to unrealistic fantasies that a new development in technology or new cheap energy source will come to the rescue and save everything,[62] which is analogous to an individual buying lottery tickets in the hope of averting a financial crisis.

One has to be realistic about (without being overwhelmed by) the many problems facing us. There is a long list of them, it is true. The greenhouse effect is currently causing concern.[63] Starvation and poverty are increasing for millions of people.[64] Diseases that are to a large extent containable are not being contained because of economic greed.[65] Our overuse of antibiotics is setting us up for ever more virulent virus infections, leading scientists in many countries to predict massive death tolls from major epidemics.[66] We degrade the environment, poison soils around the world and are speeding up erosion.[67] Pollution is contaminating our food supply, whether harvested from the seas or the land, and making it less nutritious.[68] Rubbish is ubiquitous. And so on ...

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