The Evolutionary Principles
The ability of the human race to survive itself will be put to the test in the coming century. Any skeptics can simply research for themselves; some scientists claim total resource exhaustion on Earth will come as soon as 2050, and others claim we’ve already passed the Earth’s carrying capacity, meaning that eventual extinction is certain unless a sudden change of mindset across our entire race can be realized. How can a species so capable of brilliance be so intent on personal gain that it accidentally promotes its own destruction? Evolution carries the answer; we are an evolutionary experiment, somewhere between mindless sacks of organic material and omniscient divinity.
What has evolution denied humans? And what are we to do to fill the gaps evolution neglected? Four principles guide the answers.
What has evolution denied humans? And what are we to do to fill the gaps evolution neglected? Four principles guide the answers.
Principle 2: The Individual Consciousness–Mankind’s Unfortunate Adaptation
The single most damaging adaptation of the human race is the individual consciousness, which, much to the dismay of humanity, is capable of such a resolve for survival and advancement that it will subordinate others to achieve what it incorrectly deems its ultimate purpose.
What created the universe? Most would answer “The Big Bang,” but this is a flawed answer, due simply to our definition of a universe, which we consider to mean all matter and space that exists. But then, does the Big Bang Theory not argue that all matter was densely compressed and that through an immense explosion the universe rapidly expanded, and continues to expand? If this is the case, then there existed something at the time of the Big Bang, for, otherwise, there would have been nothing to expand. If something existed, then it is fair to claim, by our current definition of a universe, that this something in fact was the universe, merely different from the universe we know today because of its state of extreme density. Therefore, the universe was not in fact created by the Big Bang, though it is true, perhaps, the universe as we currently know it was. No, matter existed before the Big Bang, and therefore something else must have created that matter (and therefore the universe itself). But is it possible that the universe has always existed? If so, how does one define “always” ? Does it mean “since the beginning of time” ? No, this definition does not suffice. Time can only be measured relative to two points; if I were to ask you: “How long does it take me to run from here to there?”, but I only gave you the time it was when I reached there, you could not possibly respond accurately. Similarly, one cannot say that time has existed forever; time must have a starting point, for without one, time is impossible to perceive, and therefore cannot be. But time is a dependent dimension; if two points in time are to be taken, they must be taken relative to another dimension, namely, space, for what is a point in time if it cannot be related to something tangible? What would 1:00 mean if matter did not exist? If there was no earth to rotate around an axis to produce day and night and give humans reason to divide these periods into measurable increments, not only would 1:00 have no meaning, but it would be inexpressible, for nothing would exist to create the symbols that humans understand to mean “one o’clock.” Thus, one can conclude that time cannot exist without space, and therefore without the universe. Time therefore has no beginning outside of the existence of the universe. I repeat: time has no existence until the existence of the universe. Thus, time cannot have existed before the universe did, and the universe must have either existed before time or come into existence at the exact same instant as time, but the former claim is irrational, since as soon as there is a universe to which time can relate, time had a measurable beginning (measurable if, say, some being with the capacity to measure, perhaps a human, or perhaps not, could have possibly travelled back in time to the very moment of the universe’s creation). Therefore, claiming that the universe has existed since the beginning of time is inaccurate; instead, time has existed since the beginning of the universe, ever since there was matter and space from which points in time could be drawn. So, if time has not always existed, since there must be a beginning to time to make time perceivable, and time has existed since the creation of the universe, since time became perceivable as soon as there existed something to which it could relate, one can conclude that the universe cannot both have always existed and have started existing at the start of time; furthermore, we can simplify this conclusion to mean that the universe, like time, must have had a beginning, and therefore cannot have always existed.
This leaves our question unanswered: what created the universe? We have ruled out the Big Bang. We have ruled out time. We have ruled out the notion that the universe has always existed. We are left with only one remaining option, excluding any impossible-to-scientifically-prove religious or spiritual beliefs: the universe created itself, and it exists so that it can create itself, so that it can exist, so that it can create itself.
How could such a thing be possible? Consider it rationally. The universe encompasses all that exists. Something had to have created the universe, but nothing exists outside of the universe. The only existing thing is the universe. The universe must therefore be its own creator, for nothing else existed, or exists, to create it. This concept provides not only a means but also a reason for the universe’s existence: the universe created itself so that it could exist, and it exists so that it can create itself, ad infinitum.
Perhaps, however, the universe is incapable of solitarily achieving its purpose. Perhaps, in fact, it relies on entities within the universe - namely humans, which I name simply because none other have been proven to inhabit the known universe, though others likely do - to accomplish its creation. How could a human, you may wonder, possibly accomplish as monumental a task as the creation of the universe? True, it seems daunting at present, but such a task may be possible after millions and millions of years of effective evolution of the human species. In perhaps only a few thousand years, it is not implausible, if neither the Earth nor the human race have perished due to the environmental recklessness of the latter, that humans will be able to manipulate all of the energy on the Earth, perhaps being able to control such natural phenomena as weather or even gravity. Terraforming may follow soon after, and before long, humans will have the technological capability to colonize nearby planets by altering their natural characteristics to mimic those of Earth. Eventual control of the universe may appear an unreachable goal, but so did the concept of cellular communication five hundred years ago. Imagine, then, what humans could do with one million years of evolution! Perhaps the possibilities are limited only to our perception. Perhaps a time will arise when not only will perception technically be reality, but it will also be physical reality; perhaps humans will one day be able to alter their perceivable reality with merely manipulation of their minds. One cannot help but speculate...
But such evolution is reliant on one obvious circumstance: human survival. Humanity is a curse, for no human, no matter how moral, is good in relation to its habitat; instead, there is a spectrum of badness into which all humans fall, and those humans that lie towards the "better" end of the spectrum tend to be those that realize their inherent badness, for these are the humans that strive to correct the natural evil they unleash unto their Earth by existing. Our planet suffers under the burden of our existence, and the true source of our environmental evil has root in evolution itself. Evolution has always succeeded by implanting a drive for individual survival in all of its subjects. Indeed, every organism exists with the ultimate purpose of perpetuating its species' survival through reproduction, and its biological instructions are to achieve this purpose by any means necessary. Organisms have no qualms with exploiting other organisms, even of the same species, to achieve success: one example is competition among males, especially among mammalian species, for mating with females, and the resulting confrontations can often be extremely violent. It is unreasonable, based on the claim above illustrated, to believe that organisms consider species-wide survival their primary goal over individual survival and reproduction, and no species illustrates this biological selfishness better than humans. There are infinite examples of humans exploiting other humans for personal gain without any regard for species-wide survival, a few of which are worthy of mention: the process of fracking, for one, while profitable, exhibits blatant disregard for the environment that it poisons; the construction of buildings, for another, could be relatively harmless to the environment if those in charge of the construction were willing to put in enough effort and spend enough money, but the environmentally friendly solutions are seldom considered due to expenses and time consumption; dictators of all shapes and sizes sacrifice nationwide prosperity and happiness for total power and personal economic gain. As long as humans exist with our current mindset, our eventual purpose, whatever it may be, can never be realized. In the same way that negative reinforcement of behavior may accomplish its goal but not without some harm being done, and in the same way that positive reinforcement can achieve that same goal but without the harm done along the way, human selfishness promoting widespread human welfare may be somewhat effective, but not nearly as much as human mental unity, and with far too many casualties along the way, though a certain Adam Smith would likely disagree with this claim. Evolution brought about our consciousness as a means to enhance our chances of survival; now, evolution, pressed on time as humanity threatens to destroy itself sooner than most would believe, must do the Earth one monumental kindness by developing in humans the first ever species-wide universal consciousness.
Indeed, one mind. One immense, nearly omniscient consciousness into which all beings (or, to a smaller and more rational scale, all humans) tap into. This is not to say that all beings become omniscient; merely, all beings derive their knowledge from one database of all total wisdom. If this consciousness could, perhaps, develop in humans a priority for the survival of the human species, rather than survival of the human individual, then humanity would finally be free to advance to its rightful potential. Imagine a world in which humans cared more about the human species than themselves. There would never develop the idea of wealth; no human would have need of any personal possessions unless they believed that those possessions increased the chances of the survival of humanity. There would never develop the concept of greed; rather than want treasure for the self, the human would prefer treasure for all of humanity to share and from which to prosper. There would never develop the brutality of warfare, or murder, or assault; no human would harm another human, unless they believed that human to be hindering the progress of the human species (that would have to be one terrible human indeed). There would be no competing nations; all of humanity would unite under the common goal of species-wide advancement. Every human all over the world would devote their personal time and resources to helping other humans in need, so as to increase humanity's chances of survival; world hunger, underdevelopment, and regional diseases, among other issues, would soon be erased by the surplus of food, industrialism, and medical care coming from various other world regions. Nearly all of the troubles of the modern day would be erased, leaving humans free to strive solely to succeed and advance, at first on Earth, but eventually on other planets, or ever other galaxies, or the entire universe. If only all of human existence had been as above described! If only every human existed for the greater good of others, imagine how far along humans could be! A hundred years ahead of the modern day? A thousand? Imagine the technological advancement, the regard for the environment, which, after all, must be maintained to ensure human survival, and the resolve to universally expand. Of course, there would still be transgressors. There would always be defectors, perhaps defective in their inability to connect to this aspect of the universal consciousness, or perhaps succeeding in knowing their mission of humanity's survival, but failing in realizing how to accomplish that goal, attempting to do so in a way that is counterproductive to their desires. But even then, humanity's prosperity, and, additionally, that of the Earth, would increase tenfold, and perhaps with such an evolutionary innovation humans could one day achieve a higher universal purpose, perhaps, given enough time for evolution to run its course, even so great a purpose as the very creation of the universe, and consequently humanity itself, for it is possible that the universe itself does not exist to create itself, but that instead humans exist so that they can create the universe, so that they universe can create humans, so that humans can create the universe.
Can such a mindset, although naturally denied by evolution, not be manually installed into individual humans, so that eventually, with enough of a species-wide determination for survival, humanity can put aside local, international, and even global disputes, all so comparatively insignificant, to address the question of universal purpose?
What created the universe? Most would answer “The Big Bang,” but this is a flawed answer, due simply to our definition of a universe, which we consider to mean all matter and space that exists. But then, does the Big Bang Theory not argue that all matter was densely compressed and that through an immense explosion the universe rapidly expanded, and continues to expand? If this is the case, then there existed something at the time of the Big Bang, for, otherwise, there would have been nothing to expand. If something existed, then it is fair to claim, by our current definition of a universe, that this something in fact was the universe, merely different from the universe we know today because of its state of extreme density. Therefore, the universe was not in fact created by the Big Bang, though it is true, perhaps, the universe as we currently know it was. No, matter existed before the Big Bang, and therefore something else must have created that matter (and therefore the universe itself). But is it possible that the universe has always existed? If so, how does one define “always” ? Does it mean “since the beginning of time” ? No, this definition does not suffice. Time can only be measured relative to two points; if I were to ask you: “How long does it take me to run from here to there?”, but I only gave you the time it was when I reached there, you could not possibly respond accurately. Similarly, one cannot say that time has existed forever; time must have a starting point, for without one, time is impossible to perceive, and therefore cannot be. But time is a dependent dimension; if two points in time are to be taken, they must be taken relative to another dimension, namely, space, for what is a point in time if it cannot be related to something tangible? What would 1:00 mean if matter did not exist? If there was no earth to rotate around an axis to produce day and night and give humans reason to divide these periods into measurable increments, not only would 1:00 have no meaning, but it would be inexpressible, for nothing would exist to create the symbols that humans understand to mean “one o’clock.” Thus, one can conclude that time cannot exist without space, and therefore without the universe. Time therefore has no beginning outside of the existence of the universe. I repeat: time has no existence until the existence of the universe. Thus, time cannot have existed before the universe did, and the universe must have either existed before time or come into existence at the exact same instant as time, but the former claim is irrational, since as soon as there is a universe to which time can relate, time had a measurable beginning (measurable if, say, some being with the capacity to measure, perhaps a human, or perhaps not, could have possibly travelled back in time to the very moment of the universe’s creation). Therefore, claiming that the universe has existed since the beginning of time is inaccurate; instead, time has existed since the beginning of the universe, ever since there was matter and space from which points in time could be drawn. So, if time has not always existed, since there must be a beginning to time to make time perceivable, and time has existed since the creation of the universe, since time became perceivable as soon as there existed something to which it could relate, one can conclude that the universe cannot both have always existed and have started existing at the start of time; furthermore, we can simplify this conclusion to mean that the universe, like time, must have had a beginning, and therefore cannot have always existed.
This leaves our question unanswered: what created the universe? We have ruled out the Big Bang. We have ruled out time. We have ruled out the notion that the universe has always existed. We are left with only one remaining option, excluding any impossible-to-scientifically-prove religious or spiritual beliefs: the universe created itself, and it exists so that it can create itself, so that it can exist, so that it can create itself.
How could such a thing be possible? Consider it rationally. The universe encompasses all that exists. Something had to have created the universe, but nothing exists outside of the universe. The only existing thing is the universe. The universe must therefore be its own creator, for nothing else existed, or exists, to create it. This concept provides not only a means but also a reason for the universe’s existence: the universe created itself so that it could exist, and it exists so that it can create itself, ad infinitum.
Perhaps, however, the universe is incapable of solitarily achieving its purpose. Perhaps, in fact, it relies on entities within the universe - namely humans, which I name simply because none other have been proven to inhabit the known universe, though others likely do - to accomplish its creation. How could a human, you may wonder, possibly accomplish as monumental a task as the creation of the universe? True, it seems daunting at present, but such a task may be possible after millions and millions of years of effective evolution of the human species. In perhaps only a few thousand years, it is not implausible, if neither the Earth nor the human race have perished due to the environmental recklessness of the latter, that humans will be able to manipulate all of the energy on the Earth, perhaps being able to control such natural phenomena as weather or even gravity. Terraforming may follow soon after, and before long, humans will have the technological capability to colonize nearby planets by altering their natural characteristics to mimic those of Earth. Eventual control of the universe may appear an unreachable goal, but so did the concept of cellular communication five hundred years ago. Imagine, then, what humans could do with one million years of evolution! Perhaps the possibilities are limited only to our perception. Perhaps a time will arise when not only will perception technically be reality, but it will also be physical reality; perhaps humans will one day be able to alter their perceivable reality with merely manipulation of their minds. One cannot help but speculate...
But such evolution is reliant on one obvious circumstance: human survival. Humanity is a curse, for no human, no matter how moral, is good in relation to its habitat; instead, there is a spectrum of badness into which all humans fall, and those humans that lie towards the "better" end of the spectrum tend to be those that realize their inherent badness, for these are the humans that strive to correct the natural evil they unleash unto their Earth by existing. Our planet suffers under the burden of our existence, and the true source of our environmental evil has root in evolution itself. Evolution has always succeeded by implanting a drive for individual survival in all of its subjects. Indeed, every organism exists with the ultimate purpose of perpetuating its species' survival through reproduction, and its biological instructions are to achieve this purpose by any means necessary. Organisms have no qualms with exploiting other organisms, even of the same species, to achieve success: one example is competition among males, especially among mammalian species, for mating with females, and the resulting confrontations can often be extremely violent. It is unreasonable, based on the claim above illustrated, to believe that organisms consider species-wide survival their primary goal over individual survival and reproduction, and no species illustrates this biological selfishness better than humans. There are infinite examples of humans exploiting other humans for personal gain without any regard for species-wide survival, a few of which are worthy of mention: the process of fracking, for one, while profitable, exhibits blatant disregard for the environment that it poisons; the construction of buildings, for another, could be relatively harmless to the environment if those in charge of the construction were willing to put in enough effort and spend enough money, but the environmentally friendly solutions are seldom considered due to expenses and time consumption; dictators of all shapes and sizes sacrifice nationwide prosperity and happiness for total power and personal economic gain. As long as humans exist with our current mindset, our eventual purpose, whatever it may be, can never be realized. In the same way that negative reinforcement of behavior may accomplish its goal but not without some harm being done, and in the same way that positive reinforcement can achieve that same goal but without the harm done along the way, human selfishness promoting widespread human welfare may be somewhat effective, but not nearly as much as human mental unity, and with far too many casualties along the way, though a certain Adam Smith would likely disagree with this claim. Evolution brought about our consciousness as a means to enhance our chances of survival; now, evolution, pressed on time as humanity threatens to destroy itself sooner than most would believe, must do the Earth one monumental kindness by developing in humans the first ever species-wide universal consciousness.
Indeed, one mind. One immense, nearly omniscient consciousness into which all beings (or, to a smaller and more rational scale, all humans) tap into. This is not to say that all beings become omniscient; merely, all beings derive their knowledge from one database of all total wisdom. If this consciousness could, perhaps, develop in humans a priority for the survival of the human species, rather than survival of the human individual, then humanity would finally be free to advance to its rightful potential. Imagine a world in which humans cared more about the human species than themselves. There would never develop the idea of wealth; no human would have need of any personal possessions unless they believed that those possessions increased the chances of the survival of humanity. There would never develop the concept of greed; rather than want treasure for the self, the human would prefer treasure for all of humanity to share and from which to prosper. There would never develop the brutality of warfare, or murder, or assault; no human would harm another human, unless they believed that human to be hindering the progress of the human species (that would have to be one terrible human indeed). There would be no competing nations; all of humanity would unite under the common goal of species-wide advancement. Every human all over the world would devote their personal time and resources to helping other humans in need, so as to increase humanity's chances of survival; world hunger, underdevelopment, and regional diseases, among other issues, would soon be erased by the surplus of food, industrialism, and medical care coming from various other world regions. Nearly all of the troubles of the modern day would be erased, leaving humans free to strive solely to succeed and advance, at first on Earth, but eventually on other planets, or ever other galaxies, or the entire universe. If only all of human existence had been as above described! If only every human existed for the greater good of others, imagine how far along humans could be! A hundred years ahead of the modern day? A thousand? Imagine the technological advancement, the regard for the environment, which, after all, must be maintained to ensure human survival, and the resolve to universally expand. Of course, there would still be transgressors. There would always be defectors, perhaps defective in their inability to connect to this aspect of the universal consciousness, or perhaps succeeding in knowing their mission of humanity's survival, but failing in realizing how to accomplish that goal, attempting to do so in a way that is counterproductive to their desires. But even then, humanity's prosperity, and, additionally, that of the Earth, would increase tenfold, and perhaps with such an evolutionary innovation humans could one day achieve a higher universal purpose, perhaps, given enough time for evolution to run its course, even so great a purpose as the very creation of the universe, and consequently humanity itself, for it is possible that the universe itself does not exist to create itself, but that instead humans exist so that they can create the universe, so that they universe can create humans, so that humans can create the universe.
Can such a mindset, although naturally denied by evolution, not be manually installed into individual humans, so that eventually, with enough of a species-wide determination for survival, humanity can put aside local, international, and even global disputes, all so comparatively insignificant, to address the question of universal purpose?