Survival of the Fit

Why does the question of evil have to boil down to "either" "or"?

Why can't evil exist both "out there" as well as "in here"?

That is to say that we each have a shadowy aspect to our nature that we deny or ignore to our own extreme peril.

If we can not perceive the "evil that lurks within" then we can not do anything to wrangle it into submission.

And we also run the risk of falling into the pit of Pride, imagining ourselves to be somehow better or more pure than others. From such a falsely lofty perch, all manner of bad things fall and worse consequences flow.

Similarly, if we deny that evil can exist in the "other", and we blind ourselves with the mask of naïveté, then we become willing dupes to that which would do us harm.

So I don't think one need take a Manichean view of the universe to acknowledge that evil lurks in the hearts of men, and in other places where men or other beings may lurk, as well.

But what is the antidote?

I do not subscribe to the theory that "cosmic consciousness" is the best or only antidote to evil.

That is a falsely lofty perch from which all manner of bad consequences fall and flow. Nor would I say that human nature per se, is at the root of our current problems. Indeed, I will make the case that the best or only antidote to evil is not necessarily cosmic consciousness, but more simply common sense, that vaunted bastion of avowed fools such as myself.

How can common sense work quite well to counter evil?

While I wholeheartedly agree with the premise that a generally expanded consciousness would be a boon to mankind, and that the alleged scarcity of natural resources vis a vis the earth’s carrying capacities is a lie, I think we can be misled into terribly erroneous conclusions about the solution to the problem of human survival, and just what it will take for our species to flourish in a saner, and a more humane and just world at some point in the future. The Malthusian "solution" of population reduction can be dismissed out of hand as a moral abomination. But what about the thesis that we need to acquire some kind of “enlightenment” in order to make it as a species?

There is no argument that cosmic consciousness is a good thing. The experiential insights of the oneness of all and the inescapability of moral consequences either in the form of instant karma in the here and now, or in some other, subtle, less readily apparent forms, I take to be self-evident truths, based on a lifetime of experiences. These have come in many ways: spontaneously, by grace alone, while doing everyday things from walking to sweeping to driving; in mandala or portalling states while simply sitting or quietly laying on my side; in the form of unsought lucid dreams; as the result of strenuous ascetic disciplines; through repeated prayer: and, yes, also on occasion via the ingestion of psychedelic substances.

So I do not hesitate to endorse the value of the even higher insights offered to us by far better men and women than I, and such as Richard Bucke wrote about, or might have written about in his seminal volume Cosmic Consciousness, like Mother Theresa, Martin Luther King, Jalalu’ddin Rumi, Sister Niguma (Milarepa’s teacher), Buddha, Jesus, or Muhammad.

And although the teachings of people such as these represent some of the noblest achievements of our species, they are not, strictly speaking, necessary to our survival.

Integrating these essential truths that such people have helped to reveal, however, will make this a far more just, sane, and fruitful world in which to live, but, counter-intuitive as it may seem, the lack of the application of these timeless truths is NOT at the root of our current dilemma.

Here’s why I think so:

The only order of higher life forms on this planet which seem to organize themselves along some of the principles of cosmic consciousness, as least insofar as we can project our limited understanding onto them, is Order Cetacea: dolphins and whales.

Dolphins and whales have not been observed to kill one another to any regular extent. They compete peacefully and playfully in a sea, thus far at least, with natural resources abundant to their needs. They have not destroyed it. They are in ecological balance with their surroundings and they band together to fend off their natural predators.

Quite significantly, they exhibit altruism within their own species, and also across species, even to the point of their own individual deaths. Accounts of dolphins’ “lifting behavior” for distressed individuals are not limited to other dolphins. Tales of drowning sailors having been carried to shore by exhausted dolphins, which then die, exist in the literature as far back as the ancient Greeks. This latter degree of conscious altruism is found elsewhere only in Homo sapiens. So there is something for us to aspire to.

But humans have made it this far in evolution without cosmic consciousness being necessitated as a universal state or trait. It has been restricted, whether by design, chance, or what have you, to a limited number of extraordinary individuals. And its relative lack of abundance has not prevented the human race from surviving and expanding, nor does that lack chiefly threaten our survival now.

What does?

Why, the lesser and most base human traits, of course: Greed, Gluttony, Envy, Hatred, Sloth, Lust, and Pride. And where are these Deadly Sins most evident?

In those lives most preoccupied with and emblematic of conspicuous consumption, wealthy first-worlders and even more particularly in those of the elite and super-elite.

I agree that “social Darwinism” per se is an addled-brain materialist philosophy, but I do not for one second believe that it is the dominant philosophy of the powers that be.One can certainly interpret their actions in light of such simplistic and raptor-like a modus operandi, but I think that this is just carnivorous window dressing for the masses.

It is that philosophy which, exactly because it is so easy, cheap, and seductive (hmm, what does that sound like?), very much appeals to the masses and readily serves to corrupt their/our behavior. It is a down and dirty, dog eat dog, or fish eat fish replacement for our formerly held religious morals, or just social ethics like honoring one's word, that used to be considered part of at least our overt, rather than covert, Western traditions and heritage.

And yes, the modern world has brought us further and further away from the physical reality of the beautiful earth, and what it takes to survive on it, and what it will take for the earth to survive as a viable habitat for the diversity of life forms, human included.

But it ain't Darwinism that has taken us away from that reality.

It is clear that the powers that be clearly have some pretty abstruse and convoluted ways of thinking and doing things, that make mere social Darwinism look like infant's pabulum by comparison.

The Secret Wisdom of the Qabalah by British Major General J.F.C. Fuller provides some pretty compelling, and harrowing, reading on the subject of “illuminism.” This is close to the mark of what I think many, if certainly not all, of the so-called "elites" hew to.

It is the occult mumbo jumbo of "illuminism" that inverts good and evil, and the Cabbalist mythos that humans create Reality and direct the cosmos that has put our 'civilization', such as it is, in a near agonal crisis.

The occultists among the elite, who I personally believe actually hold more of the reins of power on this run amok elephant of the post-modern world, don't really care if it survives. In fact, they are counting on its destruction to magically recreate their version of utopia, probably your and my idea of a dystopia, phoenix-like, out of the ashes of our lovely little world once they have succeeded in destroying it.

As far as such dogmas go, in my assessment anyway, nothing else could be further from the truth.

In fact, I think we may be seeing the beginnings of a major rift forming between those elites who follow such stuff, and those who just went along with that stuff for the power and money ride.

I think the social Darwinists among the elites may in fact be our best hope for survival in the present circumstances. That is because they want to survive, and they want the world to survive.

So, personally, I'd rather take my chances with the social Darwinists who want this physical world we inhabit to survive along with them, their children, and grandchildren.

But we, the masses, are not blameless in this mess either. We have also fallen for the sucker’s ploy of “aspiring” to be like the elite, of coveting the lifestyles of the rich and famous.

Mesmerized by People magazine, or Entertainment Tonight, or American Idol, or the 15 minutes of fame or infame from contrived psyops like Survivor or Big Brother, et alii ad nauseum, we have been sucked into the devilish maelstrom of a fabricated worldview based on the most base human failings. These very big lies go against our more natural, most basic, truly survival-oriented, human behavioral tendencies. We have been mind-fucked into acting like ‘barbarians’ rather then human beings.

This barbarity is NOT our essential nature, anymore than we are all born to be Jesus or Buddha or Muhammad.

But at least we can aspire to the latter, while in the meantime we remember simply how to act like human beings.

And, yes, it is almost certainly correct that the myth of scarcity, the lie of earth’s purportedly limited “carrying capacity”, is one of the prime tools of fear used to cow the masses, along with the phony “war on terror”.

But it is not some fault of our basic human nature which is behind this dilemma. I believe we are basically born good. Our essential natures are harmonious and attuned to life and survival.

If this is not the case, then we would have never made it this far, since we began standing upright about 40,000 years ago.

So what went wrong?

Well, somewhere along the line there developed a tendency among elites to conscript the labor and wealth of the mass of men and women not for the greater common good, but for the greater glory, wealth, and power of the ruling elite only. And this form of psychopathy has bred itself generation after generation to stay in power. And it uses all manner of techniques, from the mundanely mechanical to the ritualized and mythological, to crush and control the greater mass of humanity, both physically and spiritually, in order to serve only its own pathological ends.

But we as a human race, taken together, are much better than that.

At the moment, it is not cosmic consciousness that we need to survive: it is COMMON SENSE, the awareness of our inextricably shared destiny.

Our failure, if we were to succumb to the mind fuck, would not be from a lack of enlightenment, but rather from a lack of basic, evolutionarily honed survival tendencies.

We have to remember that we are members of the same species, even before we aspire to yet higher states of being. We need a good dose of species consciousness before we can benefit from cosmic consciousness.

And surely as the day flows from the night, intelligent species consciousness will lead to earth consciousness. And from there, it’s a few more steps to cosmic consciousness.

But we have to start where we are.

As has been said elsewhere, we need the wisdom of the earth and to revive our own wisdom of the body. That is to say we need to give up those anti-survival habits which we have allowed to be foisted upon us by our sedentary lives of consumption and media indoctrination. We need to wise up fast, and give up gluttony, hatred, sloth, greed, envy, lust, and pride. These are the enemies of survival.

These things do not constitute our basic nature, they represent our failings. We are better than that. And we must be.

We don’t have to develop cosmic, or even cetacean consciousness to survive, though it would certainly be a boon. We first need to reclaim our human birthright as intelligent, evolutionary beings and stop allowing ourselves to be abased by other members of our group who exploit us by pushing us headlong towards an abyss we have allowed ourselves to be enslaved into digging out of our own lesser traits.

So I will throw in my lot with those, merely evolutionarily guided, folks who are struggling decently for survival in the general, intra-species manner of live and let live, rather than with psychopathic elite occultists who believe in the meme of a nuclear forest fire to wipe the slate clean, that they might scribble their own unnatural designs madly on it, after they emerge from their bunkers.

No thank you very much.

Just a thought for the day.

And the future.

According to physicist David Bohm, "In a universe in which all things are infinitely interconnected, all consciousnesses are also interconnected. Despite appearances, we are beings without borders. Deep down the consciousness of mankind is one."

I completely agree with Bohm on this point.

All I'm saying is that we are so far from there as a human race, and we are in desperate straits now. We have found ourselves in an ever deepening hole and we need to stop digging, right now.

We need to climb out of the hole we are in with the means readily at hand. Then we can think about scaling the mountain.

If you tell a man in a ditch that he needs to climb a mountain he can't even see, he'll either call you crazy, or curse you and give up.

That won't help.

Let's get out of the ditch first.

Then, once we're all on up on the surface, we can join each other on that mountain.