Humankind Advancing, Vol.10, No.4 October 1999

THEME: Reaching Out to Each Other

CONTENTS

Preamble:
Editorial
Quotes from Sperry and from Loye
Quotes from Russell and from Abbatucci
Anti-Millennium Fever Medication
The Y2K problem taken seriously

INTEGRITY, EMPATHY, COOPERATION
A Review of Pat Duffy Hutcheon's Building Character and Culture
Quote from Robert Muller

THE SACRIFICE OF CHARACTER AND CULTURE
Andrew Clark

COOPERATION, EMPATHY, INTEGRITY
A Review of Sally Goerner, Clockwerk Universe
William Wimsatt
Quotes from Wallis and from Richet

VISIONS OF RESPONSIBILITY
Robert Muller
Quotes from Kouzes & Posner, Nanus, Theobald and Moore

THOUGHT IN ACTION
E-mail from Calgary
E-mail from Halifax

Reflections

Acknowledgments and References


Editorial: The core idea of the present issue is condensed on pages 12 and 13, which contain a discussion of Wimsatt's concept of "identification," the step-by step approach toward an identical point of view from two different perspectives. I happened to discover steps toward this process while reading two excellent books (by Dr. Hutcheon and Dr. Goerner respectively), which reminded me of Wimsatt's discourse I had encountered many years ago. Right! Upon going back to it, I knew that these books were far more valuable than their content alone implies. In addition to their official reviews, the books will be further compared and discussed under "Reflections" at the end of this issue. Both of them present a beacon of hope for our civilization. Both of them pursue the goal of creating a more cooperative and peaceful world, based on the values of integrity, empathy, and responsibility."

* * * * *
Cerebration, essentially, serves to bring into motor behavior additional refinement, increased direction toward distant, future goals, and greater over-all adaptiveness and survival value. The evolutionary increase in man's capacity for perception, feeling, ideation, imagination, and the like, may be regarded not so much as an end in itself, but as something that has enabled us to behave and to act more wisely and efficiently.

R. W. Sperry, Neuroscientist

The older and more involved I become in the world and in the need for more adequate therapies for the healing of cultures as well as individuals, the more I encounter the need for self-education in the natural sciences that I wish I had recognized earlier.

David Loye, Social Psychologist

The good life is based on love guided by reason.

Bertrand Russell

[Il fait] de reconnaître notre rôle avec assez de modestie pour garder la prudence, le respect et le sens de la mesure nécessaires et pourtant aussi avec assez de conviction pour ne pas laissez s'éteindre la flamme qui nous pousse depuis les origines toujours plus loin et toujours plus haut. ([We have] to recognize our role [as human beings] with enough modesty to observe the necessary caution, respect, and sense of moderation, and yet with enough conviction to never let the flame extinguish that carried us forward and upward since our beginning.)

Docteur Jacques Séverin Abbatucci Place de l'Homme Dans l'Évolution

Anti-Millennium-Fever Medication:

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."

Thomas Watson Chairman of IBM, 1943

* * * * *

The Y2K Problem Taken Seriously

To those who are not familiar with it: Y = Year, K = 1000; the Y2K problem concerns the possibility that computers, programmed only with the last two digits of the year, will malfunction during the switch-over from 1999 to 2000 with widespread major breakdowns of all networks depending upon it (electricity, banks, grocery distributors, etc.), resulting in unprecedented national and global catastrophes.

The Y2K problem itself will very likely be only minimal, because everyone is aware of it and preparing for it. What has to be feared, however, is the panic induced, either deliberately or involuntarily, by its exaggeration. Irresponsible schemers, for instance, might encourage panic buying and hording of fuel, food, and water, causing prices to skyrock and large amounts of money to flow into their pockets. There are also other motivations.

The Spring 1999 issue of Humanist in Canada, for instance, writes on p.4: "Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson are enthusiastically spreading hysteria, suggesting societal chaos in 2000 thanks to the Y2K computer problem. Critics suggest that these two men are unnecessarily frightening people and spreading misinformation. Falwell and Robertson may have personal motives for their scare tactics. Falwell is selling his new video, "A Christian's Guide to the Millennium Bug," for $28 over the World Wide Web, and Robertson's video, "Preparing for the Millennium: A CBN News Special Report," is available from his Christian Broadcasting Network (Church and State, January 1999)."

The personal motives of Falwell and Robertson are certainly not video-payments, but the desire to save Humankind. That desire is well founded, as the following pages attest. But it will not be achieved by their videos, and certainly not by the year 2000. Not hysteria, but calm, clear long-range thinking will be our salvation.


INTEGRITY, EMPATHY, COOPERATION

Review by Erika Erdmann of
Building Character and Culture
by Pat Duffy Hutcheon

Praeger/Greenwood. Price $24.95, Paperback (ISBN 0-275-96469-8); $69.50 Hardcover (0-275-96381-0). 304 Pages, February 1999.

As if a veil of fog is being drawn away and we perceive for the first time a clear, striking view of the landscape through which we walk -- a view, both frightening and hopeful -- that is the impression gained when reading Dr. Hutcheon's book.

The most outstanding aspects of the author's work are its clarity and its courage, together with an astonishing amount of knowledge and insight into the development of character, both in young children from the first day onward, and through a person's entire lifetime. The importance of character and culture for the functioning of our species within an ever larger and more complex web of interrelations is undeniable. Unless haphazard approaches and aggressive and ego-centred role models are discarded in exchange for conscientious selection of methods that take consequences into account, little hope for the future exists.

The influence of the mass media cannot be underrated. Appendix B summarizes 175 research projects, all of them documenting the influence of media violence and/or pornography on eagerly absorbing children. (Hutcheon calls them "little sponges.") The more violence is shown, the less exciting it becomes, and the more is needed to thrill. Control-group children viewing non-violent films complained about having to watch "this lousy tame" show (p.273). -- It is this skilful targeting of young and unformed minds which creates attitudes that overwhelm the influence of even the best-intended and most conscientious parents. It may be possible to select and regulate programs for very young children to a certain extent, but peer pressure, starting at school age, is an all-powerful counterforce. The combination of media-influence itself and media directed and orchestrated peer pressure is nearly irresistible.

The predicament is especially desperate in the culture of poverty. Dr. Hutcheon differentiates between a "situation of poverty," in which honest and law-abiding citizens try their best to retain integrity, empathy, and cooperation, and a "culture of poverty," in which drug-addiction, crime, violence and callousness are perceived as admirable in-group characteristics. Anyone having the misfortune to grow up in such a culture will be at a serious disadvantage throughout his or her life. There is also a "culture of affluence" that attempts to combine the ideal of absolute freedom with that of absolute equality -- which is impossible and results in haphazard policies that widen the gap between rich and poor. Working parents with small children suffer, while callous egoism is rewarded. "Decision-makers at all levels of government seem oblivious to the fact that their policies are reinforcing a zero-sum game: one in which the power of winners -- especially the exclusive in-group of winners among winners -- is pushing the lower middle class and working poor ever closer to the brink" (p.164).

Fear of absorption into either of these two cultures reinforces the habit of minority groups to cling tightly to their own customs, and to live a life in separation from the main-stream. That, however, Hutcheon explains, if extended beyond family celebrations and enshrined into the constitution -- leading, e.g. to different school systems -- ends only in mutual misunderstanding and ethnic tension. Every group of newcomers should, instead, contribute the best its culture has to offer to add to, and reinvigorate, the morals of a common national and global community, while discarding cruel and undesirable habits -- and there is much immigrants have to offer in any society. (In Canada, both founding nations, the English and the French, are considered home cultures.)

The last chapter, as well as appendix A, which describes step-by-step suggestions on how to build desirable character-traits in children, are perhaps somewhat too pedagogical. Although most toddlers are little egoists, many are not, and much beauty and individuality might be needlessly destroyed by too much conscious effort. Major emphasis is placed on the formation of character in contrast to the beautiful task of discovering innate predispositions, encouraging those that enhance the quality of our society, and allowing those which reduce it to whither away due to non-reward -- all in a casual, matter-of-fact manner, without (as Hutcheon herself insists) the over-indulgence that creates little, and later big, tyrants. All in all, the knowledge and experience gathered during the author's lifetime is of immense benefit. It forms a scaffold or framework that allows freedom but prevents aimlessness, anarchy, and disregard of community values. -- Thoughtful readers will agree that the book belongs in the hands of every parent, of every teacher, and of everyone concerned with the future of civilization.

-----------------------
The book can be ordered from the publisher by using their Toll Free Number: 1-800-225-5800. -- Professor Pat Duffy Hutcheon (author of "Leaving the Cave") is an educator, sociologist, and writer, living in Vancouver, B.C., Canada.

* * * * *
When outer space beings someday will visit planet Earth they will wonder how the human species became extinct. Their research will reveal that humans invented money as a means of exchange. It did wonders for many centuries, but then it became the objective of life and it was the end of that species.

Robert Muller, May 1, 1999 Former Assistant General Secretary of the United Nations

THE SACRIFICE OF CHARACTER AND CULTURE

The article "How Teens Got The Power" by Andrew Clark (Maclean's, March 22, 1999, pp. 42-46) with the subheading "Never before have advertisers pitched so much to so many who are so young" describes not only the lavish spending habits of that age group and the sophisticated methods of those who prey on them, it also asks and answers the question where and how the kids get the money.

Advertisers and marketeers start to target children already as young as age 9. The age-group from 9-14, called "tweens," of which there are 2.4 million in Canada, have $1.5 billion to spend, according to a Creative Research International Inc. survey (commissioned by the cable channel YTV). 17% of them have ATM bank cards. -- The older group, 15-19 years, is, of course, even more well-heeled and independent. Statistics Canada counts 2.5 million teens between 12 and 17 years with an average disposable income of $500.-/month (as estimated by Youth Culture Inc.'s Butler). -- Peer pressure is cleverly orchestrated, and the sophisticated control of unformed minds is of such success that a professor of marketing describes it as "the gold rush" (p.42).

And how do the kids get the money? The vast majority of it does not come from after-school jobs but from parents, grandparents, and often step-parents, each of them trying to outdo the other. "Family money gets divided into bigger chunks by fewer siblings, since Canadians are having smaller families (on average 1.7 children each)" and "indulgent parents sometimes trade cash for calm," (p.44) with the result that "pestering parents" becomes a lucrative habit, which increases with each reward. -- There are, of course, exceptions. "More teens than ever are volunteering in hospitals and community centers" (P.42), but the article points to the need to replace the involuntary frugality and self-restraint due to family size with rational assessment of the long-range consequences of over-indulgence.


COOPERATION, EMPATHY, INTEGRITY

Review by Erika Erdmann of

After the Clockwerk Universe
The Science and Culture of the Emerging Integral Age

by Sally J. Goerner

Edinburgh: Floris Publishers. Price 14.99 Pounds (Paperback). 480 Pages. May 1999.

First and foremost, the book is a joy to read. Although it deals in part with quite abstract material, everything is brought within reach of our senses not only with the help of concrete examples, but also with clarifying drawings, most of them by the author herself. The drawings alone are delightful. If it is possible to put human warmth into pictures explaining abstract principles, then Sally Goerner succeeded in doing it.

That the book is also of great importance comes through as an involuntary, but powerful awareness. The author's message is that we must progress beyond the conception of the universe as a predictable machine toward that of a complex interrelated web in which many feedback loops tie all aspects of our experience into a tightly integrated whole. But neither analytical science nor regard for facts are rejected, they merely become integrated into a more comprehensive understanding of reality in which innumerable causes and effects interact with each other, many of them neither expected nor understood. Most fascinating are the explanations how many of these tangled interrelationships, which were formerly inaccessible to science, can now be treated by the new scientific methods of chaos and complexity theories, in which the author is an expert. For instance in 1892 the French mathematician Henri Poincare showed that the "three-body problem" (the effect of three gravitational pulls on each other), which had occupied the best mathematicians for over 100 years, cannot be solved by traditional analytical methods. Breaking things down did not simplify the task. It took 70 more years, the invention of the computer, chaos theory, and fractals to describe the "delicate dance" of "balanced tension" which occurs among competing pulls [pp.2-8, 2-9 in the pre-publication manuscript I read].

That phenomenon, as well as the extreme sensitivity in a state of chaos which sends trajectories into opposite directions at the slightest nudge, such that events become unpredictable -- as well as the repetition of the same patterns at ever smaller levels -- become surprisingly understandable and can be easily visualized (pp.2-12, 2-13). -- The argument that most systems in the world -- the nervous system, societies and civilizations, even the universe itself -- constitute complex webs rather than predictable machines, and that cause-effect relationships we can trace and calculate are exceptions -- becomes utterly convincing.

However, Goerner admits that many enthusiasts for the new science simply run away with it and use it to prove occult and paranormal phenomena of the most unbelievable kind, thus tainting this promising new worldview severely and opening the door to misunderstanding and rejection. Much of the book is dedicated to the clearing up of such misconceptions. For instance, in chapter 5 [of another condensed follow-up pre-publication manuscript I read] "the enigma of mind" is described as a completely natural evolutionary event, beginning with cells which "don't think and aren't self-conscious, but begin responding to information in a functional way." To survive and multiply, they must be sensitive to "little energy blibs from outside" which trigger locomotion toward food [pp.5-2, 5-3, new version]. -- This passage and the following description of the evolution of the mind moved me deeply and reinforced my conviction that reaching out toward each other from different disciplines and different realms of understanding will achieve the wonders that are necessary for the transformation and survival of our species.

Many readers might find it desirable, however, that a book which makes cooperation its top priority, which emphasizes throughout all its pages that either/or attitudes have to be transformed into both/and attitudes, and which rejects sharp dividing lines between different disciplines and areas of knowledge in favour of fuzzy borders with considerable interaction, would set an example and reject Darwin, competition, and the survival of the fittest, as well as the role of chance and coincidence in evolution with less vehemence. Surely, all these elements took part in evolution, and their dismissal paints just as one-sided a picture as the dismissal of cooperation, love, and altruism by extremists on the other side. Completely understood, those who speak of chance and those who speak of internal guidance by interacting events and phenomena upon one another (as Goerner does) mean exactly the same process, though different words are used to explain it. There is no such thing as pure chance (except perhaps in quantum theory, but even that is not generally accepted). What is usually called chance is the action of innumerable causes, most of them unknown to us, upon one another. I had a very fruitful e-mail exchange with Dr. Goerner on that and other matters, which left me convinced that frank and open discourse with honesty and good-will on both sides is the most promising way to remove dividing lines that were created by misunderstanding and are deepened by mistrust.

Even without the opportunity for such discourse, however, Goerner's book leaves the impression of reaching out from an emphatically held position -- by way of lucid descriptions and explanations -- toward persons with other points of view, to bring our world closer to the ideal we all desire.

The book's distributor is: Scottish Book Source, 137 Dundee Street, Edinburgh EH11 1BG; phone: 0131-229 6800, e-mail: scotbook@globalnet.co.uk -- Dr. Sally Goerner is Director of the TRIANGLE CENTER for the Study of Complex Systems, 374 Wesley Court, Chapel Hill, NC 27516, USA.

* * * * *
Of much relevance to the effort of finding common ground from different starting positions is the work of the philosopher

William Wimsatt.
I am quoting here from a discussion of his work in Beyond a World Divided by Erdmann and Stover:

"Wimsatt suggests using a procedure he calls identification. Through a series of approximations a closer and closer fit of two theories at two different organizational levels would ensue. At the outset we would have two different perspectives which explain the same phenomenon. We would slowly adjust these perspectives, first one, then the other, until an identical middle position is reached. Identification does not try to reduce the upper level to the lower one, nor does it advocate a preoccupation with the upper level at the expense of the lower. Instead, both the upper-level perspective and the lower level-perspective contribute to the achievement of a realistic middle position.

"An excellent example is the fight, raging during the second half of the last century, between the pioneer of bacteriology, Nobel Laureate Robert Koch, and the medical authority Rodolf Virchow. At its height the battle involved almost every medical institute on all continents. The two sides approached the problem from much different perspectives. Koch and his disciples remained glued to the microscope and discovered bacterial causes of disease after disease. Virchow, on the other hand, was convinced that diseases were caused by poverty and neglect. He had cleaned up the slums of Berlin and transformed the city from one of the dirtiest in the world to one of the cleanest in only two decades. Pointing to the drastic reduction in illness his measures had produced, he rejected Koch's evidence. So deeply ingrained was his conviction that either bacteria alone or poverty alone was the cause of the disease that he -- the man considered the world's leader in his field, the man for whom an entire institute had been built in the city of Berlin -- forbade the study of bacteriology in his institute. He approached the problem from a different level, one in which bacteria had no place. So adamant was his conviction that he still refused to change his mind even when bacteriology became an accepted course in all major medical institutes. Finally, confronted with the choice of either permitting courses on bacteriology or resigning, Virchow resigned.

"At some point someone asked the question: Under which conditions do bacteria thrive best? That question led to a step-by-step approach to a superior middle position: poverty and neglect cause diseases because bacteria proliferate in unsanitary slum conditions, and because poverty and neglect lower resistance against them. Today, it is hard to understand how such self-evident solution could have been missed at the outset, and how the contrast of viewpoints could have led to such violent fights." (Pp.131-132)

* * * * *
"Find common ground by moving to higher ground."

J. Wallis, Founder of the Sojourners community in Washington, D.C.

- - - - -
L'avenir est préparé par les rêveurs, les utopists, par ceux qui osent concevoir plus et mieux que la misérable réalité d'aujoud'hui.

(The future is prepared by dreamers, by utopists, by those who dare to conceive of something better than the inadequate reality of today.)

Professeur Charles Richet

VISIONS OF RESPONSIBILITY

Elements of a Strategy for Concern for the Future
Submitted to the members of the Advisory Council
of the Foundation for the Future
by Robert Muller, April 1999

Objective: how is the future dealt with and treated by those who govern, guide or deeply influence the future of the world and humanity? These are:

national governments
heads of states
Parliaments
business, especially big business, the multinationals
and world corporations
the military, strategists of the future par excellence
scientists, mostly employed by governments, business, the
military and Universities
Universities and education
the media and advertisement
religions, many international, with millions of
followers and cosmic views
international organizations
world organizations
continental organizations (e.g. the European Union)
regional organizations
non-governmental organizations

A major project would be to survey to what extent and how the future is being considered and dealt with or not by these main actors. It would be a vast project, but it seems essential to consider it. Examples: The UN University or the UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) could be asked to produce a non-existing survey of how the future is dealt with in the United Nations system with its 32 specialized agencies and world programs, and its regional Commissions. The Union of International Associations in Brussels which keeps track of non-governmental associations and organizations (28,000 of them registered with the Union) could make a survey of which deal specifically with the future and how the future is considered in others. The United Religions Organization to come into existence in 2000 could be asked to make a survey of how the future is treated in the world's religions. A survey could be made of how the future is dealt with in Universities. Projects like that could be financed with grants from the Foundation.

A very practical and very helpful result would be that some of these actor's minds would be opened to the necessity to deal more properly with the future and would take organizational steps to that effect. For example I recommend that the UN should create a main world commission on the Future as part of the General Assembly, or a World Council of the Future or an entire new specialized agency of the UN. Only two governments in the world have Ministries of the Future and only two Universities have Departments of the Future. The US Vice Presidency for Global Affairs could become a Vice Presidency for Global Affairs and the Future, an example to be followed by other countries. One major regional organization, the European Union, has a Commissioner for the Future, an example to be followed by other regional organizations (more than twenty in existence or in formation).

The result would be a quantum leap into concern with the future and might save us from major disasters. It would be an enormous contribution by the Foundation.

* * * * *
The most important role of visions...is to give focus to human energy. Visions are like lenses that focus unrefracted rays of light.

J.M. Kouzes and B.Z. Posner

The right vision is an idea so powerful that it literally jump starts the future by calling forth the energies, talents, and resources to make things happen. A visionary leader is one who has the ability to formulate a compelling vision for the future...gain commitment to it, and translate that vision into reality.

Burt Nanus

Given today's realities, change agents spend much too much time aiming to convince people that change is needed. They should be working to show people that change is possible.

Robert Theobald

There is no essential conflict between enchanted living and practical, productive activity; they can serve each other: one delighting the spirit of ambition, the other comforting the heart.

Thomas Moore

THOUGHT IN ACTION

E-mail from Calgary

....Our car was leased, when the lease came up, we just didn't bother getting another one (that was back in November of 1998), and we haven't missed it a bit. In fact, besides the lack of payments to be made, we also have a lot less worries -- will it start after sitting in the parking lot, unused for three months (typical usage pattern for us, everything we want or need is within walking or bus/train distance from our apartment)....Will it get broken into? will it get run into? -- Alberta/Calgary drivers have got to be the worst in Canada!!! Every day there are at least two newsworthy accidents to report and an average of one to two vehicle related deaths just in the Calgary area each week. It's much cheaper and safer to take Calgary's excellent public transit system. There are three to six buses going by, less than a block from our apartment, within any half-hour time period. Besides, using public transit, in areas where it's available, causes a lot less pollution than everybody running around with just one or two people in individual cars, and I love to walk, doing so even when a bus is available. The grocery/supermarket is only six blocks away and we have a folding, wheeled cart we take with us.

We will be going via Greyhound to visit Matthew [a son, living in Kelowna], it's only about twice the cost of gas, even if we had our own car, and both of us can fully enjoy the beautiful scenery through the Rockies, without having to worry about things like brakes, overheating, or crazy drivers who are driving oversized underpowered campers through the mountains for the first time in their lives. (The fact that the buses are air-conditioned and have toilets isn't a bad thing either.)....

Hans G. Erdmann
Computer Specialist
Calgary, 6/28/99


E-mail from Halifax

Just a short note to let you know that I'm back from my biking and camping trip; we had a wonderful time. I biked all 350 miles without too much struggle. It was interesting to see the logistics of 3,200 people (families with young children as well as people in their late 70s) all living in tents and moving from village to village (about 50 miles a day for 7 days) together. It was called America's largest moving city. Four huge transport trucks carried our luggage each day. We had to get up at 5 am to get most of the biking done before the worst heat of the day. Ralph and I did the 50 miles in about 6 hours (6 am to 12 noon -- including at least 1.5 hours of rest. lunch, bathroom, and refreshment stops) but many people spent the whole day doing the trip. Some days were as high as 90 degrees Fahrenheit, but the evenings and mornings were always cool and comfortable. Everything was well organized.

The participants were wonderful people, very interested in nature and conservation -- no one dropped any litter. Everyone was helpful and friendly, helping each other set up tents, lining up respectfully for toilets and showers, making no noise after 9 pm, etc. Not one thing was stolen, either from the tents or from the bikes during the whole trip -- we left our bikes unlocked in towns and villages and at the campsites. Local people welcomed us with open arms. Many farms offered free lemonade, Kool-aid, water, etc. as we passed. The group was called GOBA (Great Ohio Bicycle Adventure) and there were Welcome Goba signs everywhere along the route. The purpose of GOBA was to offer healthy and inexpensive family recreational opportunities and to promote bicycle awareness as a method of transportation. In some towns hundreds of children lined up on the sidewalks and shouted "Welcome to... (their town name)." Because everyone left at their own preferred time and pedalled at their own preferred speed, there was no crowding on the road. We usually biked single file or 2 people wide. For anyone watching us, it was a steady stream of bikers from 5 am until 7 pm (when the last few strugglers arrived in camp)....

Eva M. Phillips
Pharmaceutical Executive and Former University Professor
Halifax, 6/29/99

Both e-mail senders are very good friends of mine. (They also happen to be my children.)


REFLECTIONS

If one reads, as I did, the book by Dr. Hutcheon and the book by Dr. Goerner simultaneously -- one chapter in each alternately -- one cannot help being struck by the overlap of identical convictions, though the books are written from opposing perspectives. True, the core messages are still far apart. Dr. Hutcheon emphasizes the need to socialize children to function in the present civilization, Dr. Goerner the need to discard our civilization and way of thinking to achieve a better one. But the goals are the same: Cooperation, empathy, integrity.

Likewise, the remarkable element of reaching out toward each other can only be discovered if one knows the background context from which each author writes. Dr. Hutcheon is a major contributor to the Humanist in Canada, which, like every Humanist paper I know, has a strong anti-religious bias, opposing all aspects of religion, occasionally in a biting, sarcastic manner. In contrast, Dr. Hutcheon differentiates between clinging to beliefs in magic and irrational superstitions, which she rejects, and the guiding function of morals and ethics expressing perennial wisdom, which she values. Nevertheless, she insists that even the most hallowed and most successful guidelines of the ancients must be conceived not as eternal commands of a God, but as manmade, so that they can be changed if altered circumstances render them dangerous to the survival of our species. Her fair, evenhanded, and well-reasoned contributions tend to open opponents' minds rather than closing them.

Similarly, Dr. Sally Goerner stands out from other promoters of an integral society by the clarity of her thinking. When she attacks Darwinism, it isn't the actual mechanism of selection she disagrees with, but a distortion of it, that leaves out symbiosis, mutual help, and cooperation and thus provides an incomplete conception of reality, which is admittedly widely used to justify ruthless competition. To my surprise, she even endorses capitalism, but only the kind that opens the door to personal creativity, which improves living conditions for everyone -- not the kind that callously funnels millions into the pockets of the already privileged at the expense of the majority.

Her arguments here, as in many other places, bear an astonishing similarity to those of Dr. Hutcheon; in fact, I sometimes looked at the title to make sure I had the right book in my hands. But only after I had read past the middle of each book did I get the idea to place special marks on instances of similar thinking. A small selection of thoughts that could have been written by either author will be quoted here:

"Ultimately, the concept of God or Divinity throughout the ages has symbolized humanity's noblest and most universal ideals. However, new realities emerge as science expands possibilities, and these present new challenges to be faced by human beings. From time to time we are made painfully aware that traditional answers are no longer sufficient or even workable in radically altered circumstances, and that the current ethical leaders assigned the task of re-interpretation and re-application may not necessarily be wise and trustworthy. Where, then, can fallible human beings look for certain guidance?

"The honest answer to all this is that we must learn not to expect certainty in morality -- anymore than we can expect it in knowledge." (Hutcheon, p.97)

"Perhaps, I should say that today it is possible to see the physical paths by which the Ineffable Force works." (Goerner, C-7, last version)

"One might argue that the foremost inalienable right shared by all of us is to participate in the joint task of making society function for the good of all." (Hutcheon, p.146)

"We are every bit as cooperative and playful as we are vicious, competitive and destructive....Nurture plays a tremendous role in ability." (Goerner, B-2, last version)

"Because we are all implicated in the web of organic life and social interaction it will take all of us to redirect a process gone so sadly wrong." (Hutcheon, p.220)

"Life is a natural outcome of an intertwined world." (Goerner, A-1, Last version)

[Describing desired learning outcomes] ..."To acquire the capacity to sympathize with the suffering of all people, everywhere, and to feel a desire to alleviate it." (Hutcheon, p.233)

"Utopia eludes us, but each time we move a notch forward. Our ancestors have been here before and they faced much worse. They are the ones who died to bring us the Enlightenment dream -- the democracy, the universal education, the belief in humane treatment -- which, even today, is still becoming real." (Goerner, 10-8, last version)

"Only the collective (itself created in the course of history by previous members) can establish sanctions, rules and goals for current members. It is these moral patterns in the culture that give meaning and value to existence." (Hutcheon, p.107)

"Welfare has been a disaster largely because it was designed like a placation of a discontented faction. Like all good placations it built dependency and stultification, not empowered citizens involved in an intricate social web. Hence, regardless of intent, welfare functioned like an opiate for the masses, not a way out....Good intentions and noble visions are not enough to build a sound society....We depend on our brethren and on their integrity." (Goerner, 10-7, new version)

But how can this new world of integrity, empathy, and cooperation be brought about? Here, the two authors differ. Dr. Hutcheon sees it in the importance of early childhood education and the removal of damaging role models, a method that would obviously be of great benefit. -- Dr. Goerner, however, recommends to discard the model of the universe as a predictable clockwork and exchange it for that of an intricate web, in which both physical and mental aspects, and discoveries from all disciplines, are tightly interrelated, and which is of such complexity that its working cannot be foreseen. Although the latter is certainly a better description of reality, it is difficult to fathom how it, alone, can lead to a better world. What is needed in addition is an evolutionary perspective, that shows not the pre-existence, but the emergence from energy interactions alone, of our longing for empathy and decency, and the dependence of our species' survival on that emergence.


Acknowledgments:

I wish to thank the Greenwood Publishing Group for sending me a review copy of P.D.Hutcheon's book, Dr. Robert Muller for sharing his valuable ideas with me, E.B.Holden and R.Theobald for stimulating reports and group conversations, Jane and Bob Coe for excerpts from Moore's "Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life," and my children Eva and Hans for their e-mails. Furthermore, I am grateful to Dr. J.C. Abbatucci for sending me his paper "Place de l'Homme Dans l'Évolution" and for waiting patiently for over four years without reminding me once to use the promised quote from it, but most of all to S. Goerner for sending me, after years of silence between us, the two final manuscripts of her book which document her reaching out toward a superior understanding.


REFERENCES

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Clark, A., with Shanda Deziel, Susan Mcclelland and Susan OH -- How Teens got the Power. Maclean's, March 22, 1999, pp.42-46.

Erdmann, E. and Stover, D. -- Beyond a World Divided. Boston: Shambhala, 1991.

Goerner, S. -- After the Clockwork Universe: The Science and Culture of the Emerging Integral Age. Edinburgh: Floris Publishers. 1999

Hutcheon, P.D. -- Building Character and Culture. Westport: Praeger. 1999.

Kouzes, J.M. and Posner, B.Z. -- Envisioning your Future. The Futurist, 30 (3) May-June 1996, pp.14-19.

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Moore, T. -- The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.

Muller, R. -- Elements of a Strategy for Concerns for the Future. Submitted to the members of the Advisory Board of the Foundation for the Future. Dated: April 1999

Muller, R. -- Private Communication. -- Sample of his daily idea collection, dated May 1.1999.

Nanus, B. -- Leading the Vision Team. The Futurist, 30 (3) May-June 1996, pp. 21-23.

Richet, C. -- Quoted in L'Unité Humaine, No.12 (Oct.-Dec.94), p.1.

Russell, B. -- Quoted in Humanist in Canada, No.129, Summer 1999, p.5.

Sperry, R.W. -- Neurology and the Mind-Brain Problem. American Scientist, 40, (1952) pp.291-312. [P.299.]

Theobald, R. -- Contribution to the Cooperatives and Community Section of the New Action Linkage Network, April 1999, p. 41.Coordinator: E.B. (Bill) Holden, Jr., Box 1692, Bellflower, CA 90707-1692.)

Wallis, J. -- Quoted by Rob Young & Grant Power in "Emerging Paths of Transformation." In Context, No.40, Spring 1995, p.32.

Watson, T. -- Essays on the 2000 Millennium "Brave New Epoque" by Allan R. Gregg. Maclean's, April 6, 1998,pp.56-60. (Inset on p.60.)

Wimsatt, W. -- "Reductionism, Levels of Organization, and the Mind- Body Problem" in G.G.Globus, G.Maxwell and I. Savodnik (eds.), Consciousness and the Brain. New York: Plenum. 1976.