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A Brief History of Mind and Civilization
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CADMUS, Volume 2, No.6, May 2016, 71-110
A Brief History of Mind and Civilization

Garry Jacobs
Chief Executive Officer, World Academy of Art & Science;
Vice President, The Mother’s Service Society, India
Abstract
The rational mind is the highest evolved status of human consciousness. The evolution of
mind and civilization has proceeded hand in hand for millennia. The development of new
capacities of mind made possible the development of tools, language, agriculture, permanent
settlements, towns, cities, religion, trade, transportation, communication, government, law,
money, literature and the arts, education, nation states, scientific and technological research.
So too, each stage in the development of civilization has shaped the evolution of the human
mind and its faculties and the way they are applied in life. The limits to our knowledge and
accomplishment reflect limits to our rationality and the utilization of our mental potential.
Our knowledge consists of fragmented, piecemeal, compartmentalized theories, when the
reality we seek to understand is inclusive, complex and integrated. Our conceptions are
based on mechanistic, static, inflexible equilibrium models, whereas the world we live in
is alive, dynamic, organic, conscious, responsive, creative and continuously evolving.
Our science assumes the poise of an impartial observer of objective reality, whereas all
knowledge without exception is colored by the subjective perspective of the observer. Our
science strives to be neutral and value-free, whereas the knowledge we need should help
us realize universal values. We need to evolve ways of thinking that reunite the objective
and subjective dimensions of reality and reflect the integrality, dynamism and vibrancy of
evolutionary nature. That is the challenge and adventure before us.
1. The Paradox
The advance of knowledge over the past two centuries has been awe-inspiring. Our
understanding of the physical universe and our own evolutionary past now extends millions
of light years across the universe and billions of years back in time. Our capacity to measure
and process data, transmit and disseminate facts, formulate new concepts and ideas, discover
and invent, organize and educate, create and imagine, and harness the forces of Nature for
human ends has multiplied exponentially.
Knowledge is power and never before has humanity known so much about the world in
which we live. Yet never before have we faced challenges of such unparalleled magnitude
and complexity, which defy solution by existing knowledge. Our progress has had unintended
consequences. Efforts to develop a truly global civilization on the foundations of science and
technology have been accompanied by rising levels of economic insecurity, political turmoil,
social unrest, displaced populations and environmental instability. Our economic system
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CADMUS Volume 2 - Issue 6, May 2016
leaves billions in poverty and promotes widening inequalities.

Our mechanical inventions displace, alienate and dehumanize us. “Social power
We are dominated and oppressed by the monetary system intended
to enhance human security. Our inability to establish effective
refers to the cu
instruments for democratic global governance leaves us powerless to mulative capac
address the existential threats posed by nuclear weapons and climate ity of society
change. Our way of life ravages the Earth. In spite of ever increasing
knowledge, our sense of uncertainty and insecurity is increasing. In
to accomplish
spite of ever greater power of control and mastery over the forces whatever goals
of physical nature, there is an increasing sense of powerlessness to it aspires for.”
control the forces we have unleashed and the future course of our
own evolution.
Concerted efforts are being made at the national and global levels to address each
of the political, economic, social and ecological threats confronting humanity in the 21st
century. New policies have been applied to enhance control. New institutions have been
created to improve coordination. Yet these efforts have been largely ineffectual and often
counterproductive. A quarter century after the end of the Cold War, political tensions are on
the rise and nuclear weapons continue to proliferate. The recent flood of refugees into Europe
threatens to undermine decades of progress toward European unity. In spite of unprecedented
inter-governmental coordination, global financial markets remain unpredictable, unstable
and uncontrollable, and multinational corporations increasingly operate beyond the reach
of national governments. In spite of institutional and policy initiatives at the national and
international levels, all of these problems appear to be growing. No effective solutions are in
sight to counter the rising number of unemployed youth and displaced migrants, the spread
of nuclear weapons, depletion of soil and water, the drug trade, cultural conflicts, terrorism,
and climate instability.
The World Academy of Art & Science has traced the roots of these multiple challenges
to a common set of underlying factors. They are all global in nature and defy solution at
the national level. They are all interrelated and defy solution by fragmented, piecemeal
sectoral strategies. They are all the result of rapid globalization in the absence of effective
institutions for global governance. They are all impacted by the increasing difference in the
pace of technological innovation and cultural evolution. They are all perpetuated by outdated
social institutions. As Canadian mathematician William Byers insightfully summarized it,
“What looks like a series of disparate crises is really one crisis that manifests itself in various
ways—one all-encompassing crisis that arises from inner contradictions that are inherent in
modern culture.”1
Research by the Academy has led to the conclusion that these multiple crises are the result
of three deeper root causes. First, they all reflect the limitations of prevailing knowledge
in the social sciences. The failures of policy measures and institutional reform reflect the
insufficiency of our understanding about how human society grows, develops and evolves.
This has led WAAS to conclude that a radically new paradigm in thought is needed to support
a new institutional and policy framework founded on the values of human welfare and well-
72
A Brief History of Mind and Civilization Garry Jacobs
being.2 For the past five years WAAS has been promoting initiatives to foster new thinking on
human-centered economic theory, on a conceptual framework for a comprehensive paradigm
for human development encompassing all dimensions of social existence, on basic principles
of a transdisciplinary, integrated, value-based science of society, and on the unique catalytic
role of the individual in social development.3,*
The second conclusion from this research is that the present crises are a result of the
current distribution of social power in the world. Theoretical knowledge of society is
incomplete so long as it fails to comprehend the way in which social power is generated and
distributed. Social power refers to the cumulative capacity of society to accomplish whatever
goals it aspires for. Never before has humanity possessed so much power—power to interact,
communicate, exchange, transport, produce, discover, invent, educate, experiment, prolong
life, entertain and enjoy. Yet never before has the distribution of social power and its fruits
been as uneven and inequitable as it is today. At a time when society possesses more than
sufficient capacity to ensure sufficient food, clothing, housing, education and health care to
meet the needs of all human beings, billions of people still struggle for bare survival. Existing
social institutions and policies have failed to remedy the situation and existing economic and
political theories largely ignore this underlying problem. This has led WAAS to initiate an
inquiry into the theoretical and historical origins and determinants of social power.4
Third, and most importantly, this research has led to the conclusion that all these causes
are themselves founded on a more fundamental cause arising from the way modern society
has developed the faculties of the human mind. The crises confronting civilization today are
rooted in the way we use our minds—in the way we think.5,6,7
2. Mind
The basic premise of this paper is that the course of human civilization has been the
result of fundamental evolutionary advances in development of the human mind, its faculties
and powers for knowledge and conscious action. The central thesis is that the dilemma
confronting civilization in the 21st century reflects inherent limitations in the specific way in
which modern civilization utilizes the powers of mind; namely, that the present combination
of analytic and systems thinking in concert with mathematics and the scientific method
is inadequate to comprehend and effectively deal with the root causes and complexity of
the challenges we face. Moreover, the institutional and social authority presiding over the
present intellectual framework has itself become a major impediment to the formulation of
more effective knowledge, particularly in the human sciences. The central conclusion of the
paper is that we need to consciously strive to enhance our understanding of the characteristic
ways in which we think, to increase our awareness of the inherent limitations and blind
spots generated by those characteristics, and to develop the capacity to think creatively in a
more comprehensive and integrated manner outside the confines of the existing conceptual
framework.
* See World Academy of Art & Science project site on New Paradigm http://www.worldacademy.org/new-paradigm?quicktabs_new_paradigm_
main=0#quicktabs-new_paradigm_main
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2.1. Mind, the Instrument

Mind is humanity’s most developed instrument for knowledge of self and world. Like every
other instrument, mind has certain capacities and is subject to certain limitations. Science has
expanded our knowledge of the world around us by developing the microscope, telescope,
X-rays, chronometer, spectrometer, computer and an endless variety of other tools. In each
case it has discovered both the utility and the limitations of these tools, the range of their
effectiveness, the distorting factors that influence their accuracy and the inherent limitations
to their power. Knowledge about the characteristics of each instrument is essential for using it
appropriately. Modern civilization is founded on the primacy of scientific discovery. Minute
attention is focused on the procedures and processes for validating scientific hypotheses
and developing new instruments to extend the reach of our senses and the computational
capabilities of mind, yet very little attention is devoted to learning more about the creative
processes of mind itself, which are the source of great scientific discoveries. Having utilized
mind as our principal instrument of knowledge for thousands of years, it seems ironic that
there is so much about the nature, functioning, and limits of the mind and its faculties that we
have yet to understand.
Our preoccupation with using the instrumentation of mind has nearly eclipsed serious
inquiry into the nature and operation of mind itself. Neuroscience has recently made significant
strides in understanding the structure and functioning of the human brain and its relationship
to memory, sensory and motor functions. Computer science and artificial intelligence have
discovered how to mimic certain mental capacities, such as memory and computation. But
our understanding of fundamental processes of conscious awareness and knowing, self-
consciousness, thinking, reasoning, insight, creativity, willing and decision-making remains
rudimentary. Indeed, we still lack even a clear definition or conception of what mind is, the
myriad faculties it possesses, the various types of thinking that characterize human cognition,
and the other processes it consciously utilizes for knowing and willing. Consciousness
determines power. We cannot have mastery over that of which we are not conscious.
This paper examines the relationship between the way we utilize our mental faculties,
most particularly our faculties for thinking, and the course of development of civilization.
This brief history of mind and civilization traces some important stages in the evolution
of our capacity for thinking and its impact on the type of knowledge we have acquired and the
development of civilization. It covers the broad sweep of human history in an impressionistic,
anecdotal manner, highlighting landmarks central to the argument and ignoring others that
are not central to the thesis being developed. An effort is made to draw particular attention
to aspects that seem most relevant to the present and likely future stages of our mental and
civilizational development.
Mind excels in a linear, step-wise, chronological analysis of unidimensional processes
in the physical world. However, it is unlikely that the process we are attempting to trace is
linear in its development. For it occurs on multiple levels of our existence, involves complex
interactions between innumerable factors, alternating between progressive and regressive
movements. The actual evolutionary process is far more complex than any description of
74
it. A major source of this complexity is the fact that our existence contains both objective
and subjective dimensions—the world around us and the world of conscious awareness
and activity within ourselves. These two complementary dimensions sometimes develop in
tandem and sometimes in apparent opposition to one another—subjective belief claiming
sovereignty over our knowledge of the material world or apparent material fact dictating
the terms of reality for our psychological self-experience. The history of civilization seems
to fluctuate between these extremes, reacting periodically to restore the balance. Thus, a
narrative of mind and civilization is a dance between our inner and outer worlds.
Another complicating factor is that we live and act on three planes of existence. Apart
from sensations, actions and events that occur in the physical plane, human beings are
aware and act simultaneously in life or vital plane in which we perceive, relate, interact
and react nervously and emotionally with our environment and with other people. We also
exist in a mental plane of facts, thoughts, opinions and ideas in which we observe, conceive,
understand, create and decide. The evolution of mind occurs simultaneously in all these three
planes. As civilization transits through different stages or phases of development, it also
undergoes shifts in the relative emphasis it places on each of them. Ancient Indian culture
organized its thought and life around spiritual truths. Hellenic culture centered on the mind
and its conceptual ideas. Modern society is preoccupied with the application of mind to the
physical world and society by means of technology. Humanity’s understanding of its place
in the universe, of our relations with one another, of our own psychological processes and
capacities for knowledge are continuously evolving. This historical narrative will examine
significant developments in relation to all three planes and the interactions between them.
The application of mind for the development of civilization has occurred in four major
spheres of social activity that are expressions of four interrelated components of the human
mentality—the capacity for conceptual thinking and logical reasoning; the capacity for ethical
thinking and moral discrimination; the capacity for aesthetic creativity and appreciation; and
the capacity for physical design, practical organization and efficient application for execution
of activities in space and time. Philosophy, religion, the arts, science and technology are
civilizational products of these capacities.
3. The Conscious Thinking Animal

Mind is a faculty of consciousness. Human beings are distinguished from other animals
by the development and progressive emergence of conscious mentality. Lower order species
possess to a limited extent many of the characteristics that we associate with conscious
mentality, including language, purposeful actions, specialization of function, organization,
and development of tools. But the mental capacities and ‘knowledge’ other species possess
are mostly in the form of subconscious instinctive behaviors driven by biological urges,
rather than conscious learning processes and conscious volition. The language of animals
appears rudimentary in comparison to the extraordinary diversity, complexity, versatility
and richness of human speech. Other animals seem to lack the mental capacity for self-
awareness and reflection on their own existence which is characteristic of human beings. Do
apes ever wonder why they were born or what it would be like to be human? Animals learn
75
but seem to lack the capacity to consciously pass on learning from one generation to another.
Animal behavior and social existence remain relatively unchanged from one generation and
one millennium to the next, whereas human beings have continued to evolve higher forms of
knowledge and new forms of civilization.
The principal faculties of mind include conscious awareness, self-awareness, perception,
observation, memory, symbol formation, thinking, judgment, imagination and decision-
making. Each of these faculties can be further subdivided in innumerable ways. This paper
focuses primarily on the faculty of thinking, and the characteristics of the various types of
thinking human beings have developed for the pursuit of knowledge, and the relationship
between the ways we think and development of human civilization.
Thinking in earliest times seems to have been narrowly focused on specific actions
designed to meet specific physical needs and interactions with the physical environment.
The capacity of human beings to conceive of and fashion tools and instruments represents
a rudimentary form of thinking. The earliest known stone axes were made 2.7 million years
ago. Evidence of campfires are about 790,000 years old. Constructed dwelling places date
back to 350,000 BC. Blades, needles, grindstones, paints, fish hooks, spear points, harpoons
and mining instruments appeared in succession before 50,000 BC. The needle is of particular
significance because it made possible fashioning of tightly fitting warm fur garments that in
combination with fire enabled early Homo sapiens to survive in very cold northern climates
such as Siberia, which eventually became the land bridge for the peopling of the Americas
about 25,000 years ago.8 These inventions demonstrate that early man had the capacity to
translate conscious thoughts into action by a process referred to as decision or will. The
development and spread of tools are indicative of what Merlin Donald calls mimetic thinking.
Early man learned to cooperate and coordinate their activities as members of social groups.
They learned from one another by example before the advent of spoken language facilitated
oral communication and transmission of knowledge.9
Apart from these physical preoccupations, no evidence is available to determine at what
stage early human beings began to reflect on the factors that differentiated them from other
animals, the reason for the changes of season, the morality of their actions, their own mental
and psychological reactions, or the purpose of their lives on earth. These higher forms of
reflection required the prior development of language with a sophisticated vocabulary,
concepts and ideas.
3.1. Symbolic Thinking
Mind has the capacity for pure self-awareness. We know that we exist without the inter-
mediacy of senses or even of thought. But the faculty we call thinking is a form of indirect
knowledge. Our mind receives sensory data about the world around it, interprets that data
and derives knowledge from it. It hears a loud cry, identifies it as an animal, and analyzes it
to determine whether it is that of a prey or a predator. The data of the senses is distinct from
the objects of sensation and the knowledge derived is distinct from the data. It is indirect
knowledge. “Mind can only have the direct consciousness of self in the moment of its present
being; it can only have some half-direct perception of things as they are offered to it in the
76
present moment of time and the immediate field of space and seized by the senses. It makes
up for its deficiency by memory, imagination, thought, idea-symbols of various kinds.”10 We
try to identify and judge the subjective intentions, mood, and capabilities of another human
being by their behavior, expressions and gestures. We have no direct capacity to perceive
their subjective state.
Thinking is also a separative form of knowledge. The thinking mind does not directly
perceive reality. It perceives thought-forms and formulates thought-symbols representing
reality but separate from it. Physical sensation and experience impact on mind in the form
of mental energy. The loud cry of an animal generates a mental sensation that activates the
mind to full alertness. But until the mind interprets the sensation and identifies it as friend or
foe, it does not possess knowledge. As soon as it recognizes the sound as the roar of a lion,
it converts the energy into a mental form, a thought expressing the danger of an approaching
lion. Then and only then does it also possess the capacity to transmit that knowledge to other
minds in the form of symbols, signs or words. All symbolic, theoretical, conceptual, scientific
knowledge is separative knowledge. It is knowledge of symbols that represent reality, not
reality itself. Relativity and Quantum Theory, medical diagnoses of disease and econometric
model of markets are conceptual representations of reality, not reality itself.
Thinking is a symbolic form of indirect, separative knowledge. It may begin with the
primitive symbolic representation of the forces of nature as images or sounds or gestures.
Cave art dating back 30,000 years confirms the development of symbolic thinking long
before the emergence of complex languages. Evidence from this period of the widespread
worship of the mother goddess most probably signified belief in the unique power of women
for procreation. This suggests that man had not yet realized the relationship between sexual
intercourse and the act of child birth nine months later. The symbol of the mother goddess
reflected the sense of wonder and power associated with the act of procreation.
Primitive man shook with fear at the occurrence of a solar eclipse or an inauspicious
configuration of the planets because he took these events as powerful symbols relevant
to his own life. Symbols became the means for the creation and perpetuation of powerful
superstitions. Superstition is the subconscious formation of a relationship between two or
more things based on the perception or imagination that they are related with one another.
Symbolic thinking ushered in a transition from utilitarian thought focused on gratifying
immediate needs to cosmological speculation regarding the nature of reality. Merlin Donald
terms this as the transition to the stage of mythic culture in which language was first used to
create conceptual models of the universe, grand unifying syntheses.11 The German historian
Karl Gotthard Lamprecht and the Indian philosopher Sri Aurobindo both describe a symbolic
stage of psychological development in which man felt a great Reality behind all life which he
sought through symbols and symbolic thinking which pervaded primitive society’s thought,
customs and institutions.12
These symbols were often laden with immense power. Historian Peter Watson identifies
the idea of God as one of the three most significant acts of cognition in the long evolution
77
of civilization.13 Thus, numbers acquired mystical significance in many ancient societies as

symbols of fundamental truths of existence, long before the rational mind had developed
either the understanding or the linguistic capacity to render these truths into words. In Vedic
India, intuitive knowledge of human consciousness and the universe was rendered into myths
and symbols of profound insight, remarkable beauty and power, unintelligible to the modern
intellect trained in analytic discourse. It seems likely that they were the result of intuitive
faculties of mind that are no longer well developed or may one day yet become far more
prevalent, as the capacity to read, write and calculate was at one time a rare endowment and
considered a sign of genius. The brilliant Indian early 20th century mathematician Srinivasa
Ramanujan regarded zero as the symbol of God, the apparent nothingness and unmanifest
potential from which all emerges, and infinity as the deployment of that potential in creation.
In the period of the Upanishads, symbolic images developed into symbolic words born of
intuition, rather than rational thought. They sought to depict truths of existence rather than to
describe and explain them in rational terms.
In fact, all words are symbols. All thoughts, concepts, theories and models are symbols.
They are mental forms or images utilized by mind to represent reality, never reality itself.
Today we utilize the same symbolic capacity of mind to infuse power into a currency note,
a wedding ring, a policeman’s badge, a scientific hypothesis and a doctoral degree. As early
man came to accept the symbol as the reality, today we often mistake modern scientific
theories for truth rather than abstract representations of truth and constructed mathematical
or conceptual models of reality for reality itself. The sophisticated scientific theories,
philosophical systems and theological doctrines that have influenced the development of
knowledge and the evolution of society are all attempts to represent truths of existence in
symbolic form accessible to human thought and communication.
3.2. Causality & Invention
Thoughts are a means of relating things with one another. The capacity to relate two or more
things is a basic characteristic of thinking. But correlation is distinct from causation. Symbolic
thinking attributes significance and power to things, but does not necessarily represent causal
relationships. The capacity to relate cause with effect is a more advanced power of thinking,
and one essential for the development of civilization.
One may wonder why it took so long for primitive human beings to learn how to imitate
natural processes occurring right before their eyes. The invention of agriculture took place
around 10,000 years ago and met an essential precondition for the evolution of human
civilizations. We can only speculate now regarding the mental processes that led to the
invention of agriculture. The discovery of which plants, fruits, leaves, roots and flowers were
edible and nutritious must have been a labor of many tens of millennia. The observation
of where they grew and when they flowered and ripened must have taken even longer. But
understanding these relationships was not sufficient to give rise to agriculture. Without
language, these observations could not be communicated. Without written language, they
could only be preserved by oral transmission from generation to generation.
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It was also necessary for early man to closely observe the relationship between crops,
soil types, rain, sunlight, temperature and the changing of the seasons. A long slow process
of subconscious observation eventually must have led to the first conscious realization that
human beings could replicate and even improve on the natural process. Instead of roaming
the earth to find food, human communities learned how to imitate Nature. It fostered the
development of sophisticated cognitive skills for planning, organization, specialization of
function, and timely execution of complex sequences of activities. It led to the concepts
of land as property and principles governing ownership. Agricultural surpluses spurred the
development of trade and the advent of money, as a symbolic form of social power. The field
of human productivity shifted from the land to the marketplace, from toiling on the soil to
mutually beneficial interactions with other people. It spurred the rise of commercial centers,
towns, cities, kingdoms, and overseas empires.
3.3. Early Civilizations
Archeologists associate the emergence of early civilizations with four important social
developments: the invention of written language, the creation of cities with monumental
architecture, specialization of work, and organized religion.14 Organization is a characteristic
power and action of mind. Mind organizes objects, ideas, beliefs, people, activities, events
and countless other things. Civilization represents the outward organization of the life of the
collective. It is made possible by the further development of a range of mental faculties and
cognitive abilities.
The development of written language around 5000 years ago required a sophisticated
capacity for precise definition, organization of thought and expression, and formulation of
grammatical rules. The development of cities involved the orderly physical arrangement of
structures, a division and categorization of activities, a hierarchical arrangement of authority
and decision-making. Specialization of function required the capacity to break down complex
activities into their parts, to arrange the sequence of steps and coordinate the relationship
between multiple activities.
The development of religious symbolism and ritual long preceded the emergence of
organized religion, which combines a mental construction of beliefs and ethical rules of
conduct, a hierarchical organization of authority, social organization of the community and
physical organization of events. The close and structured association between larger groups
of people in cities was a catalyst for rapid advances in law, formal systems of weights and
measures, trade, development of money, public administration, participative governance and
education. These capacities in combination necessitated the systematic application of mental
faculties at three levels—mental, social and physical.
3.4. Dividing Mind
Definition, categorization, organization, specialization, coordination and hierarchy are
complex human endowments founded on the mind’s capacity to differentiate aspects of
reality, compare and contrast them, and express their relationships with one another in terms
of space, time, characteristics, function, authority, action, and causality. These capacities
derive from the power of mind for division and aggregation.
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Mind is primarily and quintessentially an instrument of division. In its pursuit of

knowledge, the characteristic action of mind is to divide reality into parts and deal with
each of the parts as an independent whole. It distinguishes and categorizes these parts by
comparison and contrast.15 The earth is an undivided whole, but mind perceives it piecemeal,
dividing it into geographic, geological and climatic regions, each with its own characteristics.
All human beings share common characteristics, but they can be distinguished and sorted
by size, sex, age, familial relationship, place of origin, skills, etc. The identification of
differences is the basis for the mental faculty of definition, the delineation of characteristics,
properties, qualities, categories, territories, social position, occupation, powers, privileges,
varieties of behavior, personality traits, species of plants and animals, types of minerals, etc.
There are innumerable ways in which the elements of any whole can be distinguished from
one another. Therefore, there are an unlimited number of ways in which reality can be divided
and subdivided. Thus, Wikipedia lists 27 types of snow and the Eskimos of Scandinavia have
more than 200 words to describe different varieties of snow and ice.
Division is the origin of the mind’s capacity for analytic thinking. The more it divides,
the more it distinguishes, separates, compares and contrasts things with one another. It comes
to consider each thing as a separate object of reality distinct from all others. Division also
leads to abstraction of objects from their context. Thus we observe a ripe mango fruit as
something separate and distinct from an unripened fruit, the inedible leaves, branches and
trunk of the tree on which it grows, the soil in which the tree is planted, the sunlight and
rain by which it is nourished, and the season in which it ripens. Similarly, mind divides us
from one another and from the world around us. It separates the pursuit and dissemination
of knowledge through science and education from the life of the community. It even divides
our own inner psychological existence into thoughts, opinions, beliefs, sentiments, emotions,
feelings, urges, desires, impulses and sensations. The mind’s capacity for division is the
origin of foundational concepts of modern science—the Cartesian divide between mind and
body, the independence of the observer and object, and the distinction between objective and
subjective forms of experience.
Mind also has a complementary capacity to aggregate the elements of reality it has divided
in order to construct some conception of the greater whole of which they are the parts. Mind
synthesizes the parts generated by analysis to create greater wholes. As the division of reality
into parts is always based on a specific set of characteristics and differences, the aggregation
of the elements to form a whole also depends on the characteristics used to reassemble them.
Modern science has identified a diverse range of micronutrients known as vitamins, which
are derived from a wide variety of very different sources and support the entire gamut of
physiological functions, yet are grouped together to constitute a whole. In this case, the
very small quantity required is the common factor between them that serves as the basis for
combining otherwise very dissimilar substances. The whole can never be fully represented
by an assembly of its parts, any more than the living human body can be represented by the
sum of all the minerals, molecules, types of cells, anatomical organs, physiological functions
and systems of which it is constituted. Thus, the whole is more than the sum of its parts,
as Aristotle said. Analysis and synthesis, the capacity of the mind to divide and aggregate
80
reality, lie at the root of all mental knowledge, the languages mind has evolved to formulate
and express that knowledge, and the civilizations that have resulted from these developments.
3.5. Birth of Reason
What is described above is a simplistic rendering of the primordial stages of mental evolution
in prehistoric times leading up to the creation of written language and the founding of
civilizations. The capacity of the mind for acute physical observation, symbol and language
formation, definition, categorization, correlation, organization and causation evolved
gradually over very long periods of time in different places and grew through contact,
exchange and imitation between early civilizations.
Thinking is primordial. The formulation of principles for valid reasoning was a later
invention. The symbolic and intuitive knowledge of ancient India became in ancient Greece
conceptual knowledge based on rational thinking and gave rise to the development of formal
logic. They pondered the nature of definition and sought to identify the principles of effective
reasoning. The Greeks sought to render reality into terms intelligible to the rational thinking
mind. The Egyptians were concerned with the practical application of geometry. The Greeks
transformed the practical tools of geometry developed in ancient Egypt into principles
validated by formal proof based on logical reasoning. Greece lived in a world of ideas that
were considered valuable in themselves, not merely for their practical utility.
Greece marked the transition from practically effective knowledge to ideative truth
affirmed by rational mental processes. The combination and correlation of thoughts led to
the development of complex abstract ideas and theories of knowledge. The birth of logic
vastly augmented the mind’s capacity for analysis by clarifying definitions and refining
thought processes. The development of logic coincided with the conception that the universe
is essentially a rational place that can be explained in rational terms.16 The Greeks established
science as the pursuit of knowledge of a rational universe knowable by observation and reason.
Their science was wide and borderless, not confined to narrow conceptual boundaries or cut
off from other forms of knowledge. It encompassed both natural science and philosophy.
They developed democracy, mathematics, education, formalized the role of hypothesis and
evidence in law, and based medicine on observation of symptoms and rational diagnosis.
The Hellenic period was remarkable for its development of rules for discernment by
reason and logic and rules for communication through rhetoric and dialectic in quest of
metaphysical and scientific truth. But it also applied analytic thinking to questions of justice,
right and wrong, ethics and morality, which are at the core of organized religion and social
thought. Nor did its rationalism prevent Plato, Aristotle and others from extolling the virtue of
intuition in their mystical quest to realize transcendent spiritual truths.17 The ancient Greeks
also excelled in the application of the mind’s aesthetic powers for the creation, appreciation
and enjoyment in literature, architecture and sculpture. They invented a wide variety of
expressive literary forms—historic, epic, philosophic, tragedy and comedy, pastoral and
lyric, oratory and didactic. Reason, discrimination, judgment, imagination and intuition all
contributed to the efflorescence of Hellenic civilization.
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Hellenic civilization was extraordinary in one other way. It affirmed the value of
individuality and individual uniqueness. Ancient Greeks never allowed strict rules of logic
or mechanical laws of nature to infringe on the place of independent thinking, free will and
creative imagination. They revered mathematics but would have scorned the indiscriminate
application of statistical probability when applied to conscious human beings.
What is most impressive about Hellenic culture is its inclusiveness, sense of proportion,
balance and harmony. Perhaps unique in history, the Greeks simultaneously pursued
knowledge in all fields and by all means—in philosophy, metaphysics, polity, religion, the
arts and applied science. They affirmed intuition and logic, aesthetic sensibility, mathematical
precision and ethical conscience. They embraced the objective and subjective dimensions of
reality. They applied the analytic powers of mind with great depth and precision, yet never
lost sight of the larger reality which is eclipsed by the focus on minute particulars. They
accomplished this by a remarkable tolerance and respect for diversity of perspective. While
individual thinkers may have proclaimed with insistence the sole reality of the physical, their
assertion was not permitted to overshadow or obscure contrary points of view. This sense of
inclusiveness and proportion might well be the finest contribution of Hellenism to humanity.
It appears all the more precious in the current age of exclusive concentration on the objective
and the physical. Ancient Greece was able to aggregate an impressive range of perspectives,
but it could not truly synthesize and integrate them to form a comprehensive conception of
reality.
Rome inherited the Greek reverence for the powers of mind. But while in Greece, the
principal field of application was mental knowledge and the creative arts, the mind of Rome
was concentrated on social organization. Rome harnessed the powers of mind to organize
the life of the polity, law, the military, economy, education, civil administration and civic
life. It developed a written body of law and a theory of jurisprudence. It organized education,
establishing a widespread system of schools with a standardized curriculum. Greece gave
birth to the modern mind. Rome gave birth to modern social institutions. Greece developed
the intellectual and aesthetic faculties of mind to rare heights. Rome gave birth to the modern
state founded on a culture of duty and discipline and based on development of the ethical
faculty. The Greeks worshipped beauty. The Romans worshipped character.
4. Rise of Empirical Science

The evolution of mind in Europe was submerged for centuries during the Middle Ages
by the collapse of the Roman Empire, the reversion to a feudal social structure, and the
weight of church doctrine. Important developments during this period prepared the way for
the explosive outburst of mentality that characterized the Renaissance, Reformation and
Enlightenment.
4.1. Quantification of Reality
Quantification is an inherent power of the analytic faculty of mind that divides reality
into smaller and smaller parts. The full development of the analytic mentality required the
development of symbols, concepts and logical principles governing the use of numbers. The
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ancient Greeks gave emphasis to the geometric application of numbers for measurement, as
in the fields of architectural engineering and astronomy. Indians made important advances
with the development of the Hindu numerals and applications of trigonometry to astronomy
at the end of the 5th century AD. With the perfection of the decimal system and solution to
indeterminate equations and the addition of the zero symbol in the late 9th century, a decimal
based system of positional notation was fully in place. The introduction of the Hindu numerals
and algebra into Europe from Arabia gradually supplanted the Roman numerals. Precise
quantification was extended to many fields of life. The use of letters in place of numbers in
mathematics was introduced in the 13th century. The operational symbols in arithmetic were
devised in the 14th. This was accompanied by a significant change in written notations. The
order of subject, verb and object, the separation of individual letters into words, sentences,
and paragraphs, the adoption of punctuation, chapter headings, headlines, cross references
and alphabetization as an organizing principle were major advances. In combination, they
facilitated the spread of literacy and the use of numbers. The spread of mechanical clocks
from the late 13th century enhanced the consciousness of time. The development of musical
notation combined symbols and mathematical concepts to denote both octave and tempo.
The introduction of double entry resulting in the separation of assets and liabilities, debits
and credits greatly facilitated the development of commerce and banking.
4.2. Return to Nature
While Greece focused on the application of mind to ideas and Rome focused on the organizing
power of mind in society, the modern period began with intensive concentration of the
powers of mind on the physical world. The power of the analytic mind turned its attention to
the physical world of Nature. It gave rise to methods of inquiry that replaced the authority of
Church doctrine with validation by physical observations.
A brief survey cannot do justice to the many stages through which modern science has
developed or the complex array of civilizational advances that influenced that development.
The founding of universities, spread of learning, and rediscovery of the Greek classical legacy
gradually restored the preeminent authority of logical reasoning and empirical experience.
It led to the development of inductive and systematic testing in the 12th century and the
reemergence of mathematics, philosophy and metaphysics in the 13th century. A commercial
revolution led to important innovations in agricultural production, manufacturing,
entrepreneurship, trade, shipping, banking and insurance. This in turn gave rise to a
bourgeoisie of unprecedented wealth and sense of independence, which spurred a radical
reorganization of society with increasing freedom and independence from feudal and church
authority. The revival of Platonic philosophy legitimized the pursuit of metaphysical truth
through number, geometry and intuition, laying the intellectual groundwork for the emergence
of rational, secular humanism and individualism in the 15th century.18 The invention of the
printing press facilitated that rapid reproduction and inexpensive dissemination of ideas. An
efflorescence of originality in the arts coupled with the rise of individualism gave birth to the
concept of genius, an idea unknown in the medieval world-view.19 The Reformation brought
with it a more tolerant and more secularly intellectual atmosphere for considering alternative
viewpoints in the 16th century. The founding of learned societies and scientific journals in the
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17th century established an ‘invisible college’ of independent thinkers to challenge orthodoxy,

exchange new ideas and explore new discoveries and inventions. During the same period a
new type of combinatorial mathematics developed based on analysis of gambling situations
which ultimately gave rise to the inductive method of statistical probability. The spread of
democratic ideas during the 18th century promoted freedom of thought and expression. The
spread of education increased the population that could engage in and benefit from new ideas
and scientific discoveries. All these factors gained far greater significance when the Industrial
Revolution demonstrated the enormous power of science for generating wealth and military
power during the 19th century. Although most of the early inventions of this period were
developed by skilled mechanics rather than trained scientists, it soon became evident that
a systematic study of scientific principles could vastly enhance the process of innovation.
The marriage of science, technology and economy spurred the development of technical
education in engineering, agriculture and medicine.
The remarkable achievements of science over the past four centuries are too vast and
self-evident to be given adequate treatment in this paper. The focus here is on the profound
impact the rise of empirical science and the scientific revolution has had on our conception of
knowledge and the way we utilize the powers of mind to discover it. If inordinate attention
seems to be placed on the limitations and unintended consequences of science as a pursuit
of knowledge, it is with the hope that a greater understanding of these limitations and
consequences will provide insight into the need and potential for evolving more effective
instruments of knowledge and more successful forms of civilization in the 21st century.
4.3. Mind and the Scientific Method
Our primary concern is the relationship between these developments and our approach
to understanding the world. Physical observation, measurement, analytic thinking and
experimentation formed the foundations of modern science. Minutely detailed and careful
observation of physical phenomena that could be independently verified by other observers
was the starting point. Scientific instruments were developed to extend the reach of the senses
and improve their accuracy. But the real power of modern science issued from a marriage of
observation and measurement with analytic thinking.
The Copernican Revolution dramatized the limitations of sensory data as the basis for
knowledge. From ancient times it had been known that sense impressions could distort reality.
Copernicus applied logic and precise mathematics to refute the notion that all heavenly
bodies move around the earth. Galileo confirmed this heretical view by using a telescope to
observe four moons orbiting around Jupiter. Copernicus’ discovery led to the formulation
of a radically different world view that contradicted both the evidence of the senses and the
prevalent conception. It ushered in what Kuhn calls a scientific revolution, based on a new
conceptual system and a new method of knowing reality.20
Newton combined acute observation, precise measurement, reflective analytic thinking
and mathematics to change the way science viewed the world for three centuries. His
discovery of universal laws of nature and the invisible force of gravitation had profound
impact on our conception of reality and knowledge. Newton applied new concepts and a new
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mathematics to arrive at a more precise understanding of the physical world. The concept
of immutable laws of governing an orderly, machine-like universe became a conception in
science. His work spurred advances in mathematics as a field of knowledge in its own right
and as an instrument of knowledge applicable to all fields of existence. As a consequence,
modern science has come to identify valid knowledge with mathematical proof and to search
for knowledge in places where the light of mathematics can shine brightly.
4.4. Intellectual Impact & Cultural Consequences
The rise of modern science altered the course of global civilization, the evolution of the
human mind and the development of our conception of knowledge in fundamental ways.
1. Physicalism: It led to the materialization of knowledge. The exclusive focus on
knowledge of physical nature eventually led to the implicit premise or explicit belief
that the physical is the sole plane of reality, a conclusion which Newton and other
early scientists would have vigorously rejected. This premise is now pervasive even
in the social sciences, where genetics and neuroscience seek to unveil the mechanisms
governing psychology and even conscious mentality.
2. Deterministic Mechanism: The scientific revolution led to the conception of knowledge
as a set of immutable, universal laws determining the functioning of a static, mechanical
universe. Knowledge of reality became synonymous with certainty and predictability
until challenged by the discoveries of quantum mechanics nearly three centuries later.
Outside Physics this premise remains largely unchallenged. The Newtonian quest for
immutable, universal laws of Nature was later extended to identify universal laws
governing polity, economy and society. For the past two centuries economists have
attempted to reduce human behavior and interaction to external factors and mechanistic
processes governed by universal principles. The study of general principles has obscured
the unique role of the individual in social development, innovation, discovery and
creativity. The mechanical view of reality has led to the rejection of human free will as
an appearance and neglect of individual uniqueness.
3. Specialization: Mind’s capacity for division and analytic thinking inevitably led to a
proliferation of separate disciplines, to specialization, and compartmentalization of
knowledge with immense consequences. Over the last five centuries, the number
of intellectual disciplines has multiplied from five to around 1000 disciplines and
sub-disciplines. As the study of reality is divided up into smaller and smaller pieces,
specialization has led to increasing fragmentation of knowledge. Viewing each field
independently has generated precise knowledge of the parts, but obscured the complex
interactions and relationships between elements that are essential for knowledge of the
whole.
4. Quantification of Knowledge: It led also to the quantification of reality—the confusion
of data and information with real knowledge and the misconception that mathematical
models and statistical probability are true and accurate representations of the real
world. Mathematics is an extremely powerful tool for the discovery and validation of
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knowledge. But increasingly it has come to be regarded as knowledge itself. In String

Theory, mathematical consistency has become a substitute for measurable, verifiable
evidence. The awarding of two Nobel Prizes in economics for development of computer
algorithms that model the functioning of financial markets is only an extreme example
of a widely prevalent phenomenon. Its consequences during the financial crises of 1998
and 2008 underline the extreme danger of mistaking models for reality and mathematical
formulas for knowledge.
5. Measurement of Randomness and Uncertainty: An unintended consequence of the
Scientific Revolution has been to redefine the notion of chance. The conception of the
universe as a giant mechanism subject to universal laws of causation made it possible
to also postulate its very opposite, a complete absence of causality, pure randomness.21
The development of probability theory originally aimed at obtaining knowledge about
complex causal processes, but later was applied to situations assumed to be characterized
by a total absence of causality. The merger of probability and statistics in the early 20th
century resulted in the new hybrid field of mathematical statistics. Under the influence
of positivism the philosophical dimension of causality was dropped and probability
came to be viewed purely in mathematical terms as an expression of randomness.22
The application of a posteriori induction to ascertain the likelihood of future events
dramatically broadened the application of mathematics to the human sciences, with
profound consequences.23 The concepts of uncertainty and randomness were inadvertently
elevated from philosophical questions to the status of objective scientific fact.
6. Dominance of the Objective: Modern science commenced with an exclusive focus on the
study of observable external phenomena in the material world which lent themselves to
measurement, verification and experimentation. This led to the rise of the philosophy of
positivism, founded on the premise that information derived from sensory experience,
interpreted through reason and logic, forms the exclusive basis for all authoritative
knowledge. Only knowledge that can be independently verified can be considered
authentic. Thus, knowledge of the objective world and knowledge acquired by objective
methods alone is valid. The study of subjective phenomena and subjective forms of
evidence became inadmissible and invalid. Introspective and intuitive knowledge were
rejected. In the 20th century logical positivism rejected metaphysics as pure speculation
and attempted to reduce statements and propositions to pure logic.
The contributions of modern science to the march of civilization are immeasurable.

Even its tendency toward exclusive concentration on physicality, the objective world, the
measurable, quantitative, and universal has had salutary effects of great value. Materialism
has wiped away much that was merely superstitious or speculative. Its irreverent questioning
of acknowledged truths has unleashed an insatiable curiosity and spirit of adventure. Its
ruthless rejection of unfounded opinion and prejudice has helped discipline the thinking
mind to challenge opinions, shed preferences and prejudices, question conventional beliefs
and challenge established authority. Even its atheism has helped cleanse religion of pious
posturing and vacuous moralizing. It has served as a basis for the democratization of our
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lives as well as our minds, at least within the boundaries of the world as science perceives
and understands them.
Each of these characteristics has contributed positively to the advance of scientific
knowledge and is partly responsible for its collective achievements over the past five
centuries. At the same time, each of them has imposed arbitrary limits on the development
of knowledge. After reigning victorious for four centuries, today we see the weaknesses and
insufficiencies of modern science rising to the surface, staring at us with its unvarnished
flaws and glaring inadequacies. Byers used the term ‘blind spots’ for intrinsic limitations to
what can be known through science.24 It behooves us to generously recognize its enormous
contribution, and yet equally to acknowledge and inquire into its errors, omissions, blind
spots, prejudices, pompous presumptions, superstitions and intolerances—the very
characteristics against which it first arose in rebellion and has since fought for centuries to
eliminate. An impartial consideration of their role will help us understand both the strengths
and weaknesses of science today and reveal opportunities for the further advance of both
knowledge and civilization.
4.5. Objectivity & Subjectivity
The initial concentration of modern science on physical nature was justified as a logical
choice and practical necessity. The rise of positivism converted practical necessity into
philosophical dogma with profound implications for the development of science and the
further evolution of mind. The transition was abetted by confusion regarding the ambiguity
of the terms objectivity and subjectivity, each of which has a double meaning. The study of
physical nature is the study of inanimate objects and subconscious life forms which can only
be observed objectively (“observe as object”) in the external environment, since we have
no access to their subjective intentions or self-experience. Descartes’ body-mind dualism
encouraged the idea of the scientist as an objective (“impartial”) witness standing outside
of nature, rather than as an involved participant in the world he observes. Gradually, the
notion of objectivity as the study of external objects without impartiality merged with the
very different notion of objectivity as the absence of ‘distorting personal preferences’ of
the subject and came to be regarded as one and the same thing. This led eventually to the
philosophical premise that reality consists solely of objects that can be studied objectively
and by extension that all subjective phenomena are secondary results of objective causes.
The word subjectivity also has two meanings which have gradually become conjoined
and confused with one another. Subjectivity (“experience as subject”) is the psychological
field of conscious human experience that is not directly accessible to external observation.
Only its behavioral expressions can be observed by others. But it is also used to connate
subjective (“personally biased and preferential”) factors contributed by the observer, such
as preconceived notions and prejudices, the legacy of traditional beliefs and superstitions
prevalent at the time.25 In its quest for impartial knowledge of physical objects in the world
around, emphasis was naturally placed on eliminating this distorting influence. So the idea of
subjectivity as the psychological experience of a conscious individual came to be regarded as
an unscientific and invalid form of evidence and to some extent an invalid form of experience.
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As in the anecdote of the man who lost his keys on a dark street and searched for them down
the block under a street light where there was better light, science sought to discover ultimate
knowledge by the exclusive study of physical factors that could be observed by the physical
senses and measured by material instruments. In the process the entire subjective dimension
of reality, the dimension which distinguishes human beings from all other species, was
subordinated to the objective dimension observable by the senses. Eventually it resulted in
philosophical and scientific efforts to reduce all non-physical phenomena solely to physical
causes.
The course of science exerted a subtle influence on the development of mental faculties
and concepts of truth, knowledge and logic. It displaced the Greek conception of truth as
that which could be known in the form of pure ideas accessible to logical reasoning, but not
necessarily to physical observation or measurement. Rationality itself came to be narrowly
associated only with that which can be perceived and verified physically. The old adage that
I will believe it when I see it acquired the status of scientific dogma, even when applied to
aspects of reality beyond the reach of the senses. This phenomenon might be termed the
materialization of knowledge.
4.6. Fragmentation of Reality
Divide and subdivide reality ever so much and we still arrive at some smaller portion of
reality that eludes our grasp. The infinitesimal is infinite. The dominant role of the analytic
intellect in modern science resulted in the dissection of knowledge into smaller and smaller
fragments resulting in the proliferation of specialized fields of study. Analysis is an extremely
powerful instrument. It harnesses the dividing power of mind to separate reality into smaller
and smaller parts. By so doing, we acquire more precise, detailed knowledge of the part and
are enticed to drill down to ever deeper levels of minuteness. As its focus narrows to laser-like
precision, the surrounding fields and interconnected aspects of reality grow proportionately
out of focus and obscure. The more we know the part, the less we know about the integrality
of the whole.
Physical science has compensated for this divisive tendency by aggregating knowledge
from different specialized fields to form a remarkably cohesive and coherent conception of
the physical universe. It has successfully incorporated the fundamental principles of physics
into chemistry and the principles of both into astronomy, geology, the material sciences,
climatology, oceanography, soil science and innumerable other disciplines. While the same
fundamental principles are consistently applied, the interactions between subsidiary fields
founded on these principles have been less effectively related and integrated. Partly, this
is due to the complexity arising from these multiple interactions, but also partly because
research and theorization have largely proceeded in a compartmentalized manner. Raging
controversies regarding climate change are partly attributable to the fact that for so long
the complex array of phenomena that influence climate have been studied piecemeal,
independently from one another.
The consequences of compartmentalization and fragmentation become more evident
when we look at the life sciences. Here the effort to overcome compartmental barriers is far
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less advanced. Interdisciplinary and cross disciplinary research have become more common,
but the fundamental principles applied in different fields remain largely autonomous. For
decades, evolutionary biology remained preoccupied with the exclusive role of random
mutation in the evolution of species, ignoring important biological and environmental factors
that impact on the chemistry and biology of genetic materials.
In medicine, specialization has led to remarkable progress in our understanding of specific
pathologies, but it has taught us relatively little about the overall concept of health. Moreover,
the piecemeal treatment of specific illnesses often has consequences quite detrimental to
the overall health of the patient. In allopathic medicine health is conceived primarily in
negative terms as the absence of disease; whereas in traditional systems of medicine such
as Ayurveda, developed by reliance on more synthetic and integrative mental processes,
health is conceived in positive terms as the property of a balanced and harmonious living
organism. This becomes even more evident when we take into account psycho-somatic
phenomena. Research on the ‘placebo effect’ dramatically demonstrates the impact of the
patient’s attitude and expectations on treatment outcomes and general health. Indeed, recent
findings indicate that the placebo effect is increasing over time. This and other phenomena
directly connecting physiological and psychological processes testify to the need for a much
more synthetic conception and approach.
5. Naturalization of the Social Sciences

The six characteristics of empirical science discussed above have each had profound
impact on the development of mind, knowledge and modern civilization. Re-examining the
implicit and explicit premises underlying modern science is vitally needed to further the
advance of knowledge in all fields. But the limitations of the prevailing approach are most
apparent in precisely the fields of knowledge closely associated with the challenges humanity
confronts in coping with rapid and radical global social, economic, political, intellectual,
technological and cultural evolution. Therefore, it is especially necessary to consider whether
the application of the analytic methods of the natural sciences to the social sciences is itself
one of the root causes of the current problems confronting humanity today.
A comparison of the natural and social sciences needs to take into account the significant
differences between these two bodies of knowledge. The most obvious is the fact that
systematic study of physical and biological phenomena began several centuries before
the systematic application of the scientific method to the study of society. By comparison
the social sciences are still in a very early stage of development. Furthermore, there is an
enormous difference in the intricacy and complexity of the phenomena being studied in
the two realms. Living organisms are far more complex than inanimate material objects. In
addition to possessing all the attributes of material things, they also superimpose on their
physical base structural and functional characteristics and environmental interactions not
found in inorganic forms. This adds enormously to the complexity of living things.
The same is even more true of the phenomena studied by the human sciences. To
the complexity of physics, chemistry, biology, genetics and earth sciences, is added the
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complexity of conscious, self-aware purposeful human beings living in complex social and
cultural environments, interacting with myriad social institutions and organized activities,
utilizing a vast array of tools and instruments, and influenced by the cumulative knowledge
and experience of countless generations of humanity. Moreover, the level of individuation,
complexity and uniqueness observed in human beings is far greater than that found in other
life forms. The behavior of every electron, every atom of hydrogen and every red blood cell
may be identical, but the behavior of every individual human being is characterized by a
very large degree of variation and uniqueness. The range of factors influencing behavior and
outcomes defies numeration. Physical and biological factors apply, but social, cultural and
psychological factors play a determinative role. Individuality may safely be ignored in the
study of physical and biological phenomena, but it is central to the knowledge of conscious
human beings.
5.1. Fragmentation in the Social Sciences
The problem of compartmentalization of knowledge in the social sciences becomes evident
when we consider that each discipline has developed its own set of fundamental principles
and applies them relatively independently from the rest. Different concepts and hypotheses
regarding human behavior are routinely adopted by political scientists, economists,
sociologists, anthropologists, lawyers, and management scientists, yet all with application
to the same subject—individuals and groups of individual human beings. No universally
accepted principles are uniformly applied across fields.
The consequences of this fragmentation are apparent in the problems we confront related
to environmental degradation, unemployment, political instability, social alienation, crime,
drugs, and psychological disorders. For two centuries Economic theory developed without
giving serious consideration to the impact of human economic behavior on the physical
environment. Similarly, the development and application of technologies for economic
purposes have been done without regard for their impact on employment, social stability,
human welfare and well-being. Many economic theorists ignore the central role of political
regulation in the successful operation of free and competitive markets. Legal theory has
become increasingly divorced from political principles, social aspirations and human rights.
The humanitarian rights of humanity are rejected on the basis of legal principles that recognize
only the rights of sovereign nations, not of their citizens.
The same fragmentation of knowledge occurs within disciplines supporting an increasing
divorce between different aspects of our social existence. Backed by fragmented theoretical
conceptions, financial markets have become divorced from the real economy and the economic
welfare of people which they were originally intended to support. A similar fragmentation
has led to the treatment of a wide range of psychological problems as if they are simply
physical in origin.
The Cartesian divide also isolates and insulates social science from society and the social
consequences of its theories. Theorists assume no responsibility for the failures arising from
application of their flawed conceptions, as exemplified by the global crisis of 2008. Scientists
in leading universities refuse to acknowledge or apply the findings of educational researchers
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in the same institution about the most effective pedagogy to promote learning. Medical
doctors are licensed without receiving any training in managing patient and family relations.
The list of gaps and short-circuits is endless.
“Human evolution is a complex conscious process involving

continuous interaction among the objective and subjective
dimensions, physical facts and mental conceptions, natural forces
and human aspirations, creative individuals and social groups.”
5.2. Legitimacy of the Subjective

The phenomenal success of the natural sciences spurred efforts by early social scientists
to imitate and replicate the same approach. The discovery of immutable universal laws
governing the physical universe led to a search for similar principles applicable to society.
The extension of the concept of law to conscious human behavior, individual and social,
has been the source of endless confusion and error. The governance of political systems
and the functioning of our economies are not determined by natural law. They are the result
of conscious choices made by individuals and groups in the past, which have undergone a
continuous process of evolution over the centuries and are always subject to modification by
conscious choice. The resistance posed to social and psychological change by established
habits, beliefs, self-interests and inertia may indeed be formidable, but no social arrangement
is unchanging or inevitable.
In the field of Economics, the enunciation of principles and the construction of mathematical
models similar to those in Physics have fostered a basic misconception regarding the factors
that govern economic systems and the scope for altering their outcomes. For nearly two
centuries the Newtonian concept of equilibrium in a static universe that dissipates energy and
tends toward the lowest possible energy state prevailed almost unchallenged in Economics.
The theory of perfect, instantaneous equilibrium is inapplicable to social systems that function
far from equilibrium, adjust gradually, organize energy and continuously evolve higher
levels of orderliness.26 The extension of the principle of scientific laws has fostered passivity
and resignation before social injustices, political oppression, economic inequality, and other
social ills. The vastly disproportionate distribution of the world’s wealth, the displacement of
human beings by machines, the subordination of women, the political influence of the rich,
and the social exclusion of minorities are the results of human choice, not natural law.
Similarly, the Darwinian concept of the evolution of subconscious biological forms
narrowly viewed as competition and survival of the fittest was inaptly applied and later rejected
with respect to conscious social systems. Society evolves by processes that are conscious
and subjective. Aspiration, curiosity, observation, thinking, creativity and imagination
are more fundamental than external forces in human social evolution. Competition takes
place within a wider and more fundamental framework of cooperation. As this narrative
affirms, human evolution is a complex conscious process involving continuous interaction
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among the objective and subjective dimensions, physical facts and

mental conceptions, natural forces and human aspirations, creative “In denying the
individuals and social groups. Analogies between the natural and
human world may provide useful insights into similarities and
validity of sub
parallels between the two domains. But the automatic extension of jective forms
physical principles to conscious living beings conceals more than it of knowledge,
reveals, obscures rich complexity by overly simplistic assumptions,
and reduces the profound creative complexity of human existence to
science invali
rudimentary mechanical models and quantitative equations. dates itself.”
The consequences of the conflation of objectivity with reality and
subjectivity with unreality as discussed earlier are most evident in the study of humanity’s
conscious social and psychological existence. It is here that the confusion regarding
impartiality and reality has imposed the most serious obstacles to the progress of knowledge.
The identification of knowledge with objective fact has erected a serious barrier to the
progress of knowledge. The sciences of society and psychology are concerned with the
actions of conscious human beings. Those actions include not only the physical movements
of our bodies, but also our mental actions of observation, thought, will, imagination and
creativity. They also encompass our vital actions of perceiving, feeling, emoting, aspiring,
fearing, desiring, loving, enjoying, playing, and so forth. The effort to discount, dismiss,
or delegitimize our subjective experience is to reject all that is most truly human about us,
simply because it does not lend itself to observation and measurement in physical terms.
The effort to compress, reduce or reinterpret all subjective experience solely in terms of
neurophysiology is akin to looking for lost keys under the street light, because that is the only
place our eyes can see.
It seems reasonable that the physical scientist studying matter assumes the position of
an observer mind witnessing an independent physical reality. Yet the same premise does
not equally apply to a psychologist examining a subject’s conscious and unconscious mind.
Self-experience is the most vividly real and tangible experience of which human beings are
capable. Indeed, we can never experience anything else so directly and intensely. When we
impartially examine the supporting evidence, we realize that the reduction of all subjective
experience arises from the initial premise of physical science rather than from either rational or
evidential justification. The fact that there are neurophysiological correlates to our conscious
experience no more proves that our thoughts and feelings are the result of neurophysiological
phenomena than the fact that adjusting the dials on a television proves that the program being
broadcast originates from the TV.
Nevertheless, the pursuit of extreme hypotheses such as this one and the presumption
that human intelligence and machine intelligence are the same may serve an evolutionary
purpose. Indeed, it can help us understand the mental and social processes by which
both mind and civilization have advanced up to the present stage. Undoubtedly there are
correlations between our mental and physiological processes. An impartial observation of
both the similarities and differences between them may generate valuable insights. But this
requires that we remain conscious of the hypothesis we are testing.
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The problem of objectivity goes still deeper. In regarding reason as an impartial judge
and witness of reality, we overlook the implicit biases that colors all rational thought. Reason
has a pronounced tendency to concentrate on facts and ideas consistent with its premises
and to ignore or differently interpret those that contradict it. Science is itself a subjective
discipline for generating knowledge governed and framed by philosophical conceptions that
are themselves inherently ‘unscientific’ because they cannot be validated by the scientific
method. The effort to exclude philosophy from science suppresses open discussion, but can
never eliminate its subjectivity. In denying the validity of subjective forms of knowledge,
science invalidates itself.
5.3. Quantifying Humanness
The application of statistics to social problems has brought to the front inherent problems
with the quantification of human experience. Nassim Taleb argues in The Black Swan that
for over a century social scientists “have been operating under the false belief that their
tools could measure uncertainty.”27 The enormous power of quantitative methods has
progressively obscured the important contribution of qualitative components of reality and
individual differences in the social sciences. Taleb seeks to challenge a blind or misguided
sense of confidence in the reliability of political and economic decisions based on statistics.
He concludes that the problem lies in the structure of our minds.28 On the other hand,
Weisberg argues that precious qualitative information relating to individual differences is
being consciously suppressed or neglected in clinical fields such as medicine and psychology
by what he terms ‘willful ignorance’.29 Both these viewpoints reinforce the need to reexamine
fundamental philosophical issues with respect to the application of quantitative methods to
the social sciences.
The point here is not to criticize either science or social science. It is rather to emphasize
the inherent limitations and untoward consequences that arise from a partial, one-sided and
unbalanced development and application of our mental faculties. The knowledge we need
is very unlikely to be discovered by objective analytic methods, quantitative measurements
or experimental neuroscience. It lies in our conscious experience and can be most directly
accessed by reflecting on our own mode of functioning as scientists, rather than hunting
for answers through mountains of clinical experiments. Mind has been the instrument of
all humanity’s achievements and it lies at the root of the problems confronting civilization
today. No other field of scientific inquiry has so much to offer.
6. Synthesis
Long before the development of logic, the ancients discovered the profound truth that
reality is one and indivisible. What mind infinitely divides for the purpose of analysis remains
at all times a unified, integrated whole. Mind’s capacity for analysis and its capacity for
synthesis are in constant tension. The more we divide reality for the purpose of understanding
its component parts, the more we lose sight of the interconnections, relationships and
interdependencies that reflect its underlying unity. Division and aggregation present
complementary perspectives of reality. The microscope and the telescope are instruments
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fashioned by these compensatory needs to zero in on a specific target and zoom out to see
the big picture.
The inherent limitations and inadequacy of the knowledge generated by extreme
specialization, compartmentalization and fragmentation became increasingly apparent in the
20th century and inevitably gave rise to efforts to reunite that which had been torn asunder
into tiny fragments. Compartmentalized universities introduced interdisciplinary, cross-
disciplinary and multi-disciplinary studies and research, which sought to bring a variety of
different perspectives to bear on problematic issues. But the inherent limitations of these
efforts soon became evident. Each brought to the problem a different set of concepts, theories
and evidential data to talk about the same problem, without any shared conceptual framework
indicating the relationship between these disparate perspectives, their interdependencies or
the unifying factors underlying their different expressions.
6.1. Systems Thinking
The limitations of aggregating multiple sets of data based on different theoretical frameworks
gave rise to efforts to conceptualize the relationships between all the parts by viewing the whole
as a complex interconnected system. Cybernetics evolved as the study of control systems in
the early 20th century in the fields of electric network theory, mechanical engineering, logic
modeling, evolutionary biology and neuroscience. Its insights contributed to the theory of
complex systems. It stimulated transdisciplinary research in information theory, artificial
intelligence, robotics, medical science, economic systems, biology, cognitive science,
management, sociology, and the earth sciences. The systematic application of mind’s capacity
for synthesis led to practical applications of immense importance in computer science and
communications. A similar approach has been adopted to build systemic theories and models
of global financial markets and the global economy, as well as to comprehend the complex
array of forces that govern the climate of the earth and on the impact of human behavior on
the planet.
Systems theory has helped compensate for the extreme fragmentation of knowledge
resulting from specialization. It has restored a vision of the totality of existence within specific
fields and with relation to specific problems. The significance of this change in thinking is
most dramatically reflected in the development of the Internet and World Wide Web over the
past few decades, giving rise to the world’s first truly global social system. Conversely, the
practical development of cyberspace has provided a tangible example, symbol and metaphor
for systemic thinking and has been a catalyst for the development of more comprehensive,
inclusive thinking in all walks of life.
But the development of core complex systems theory extends beyond the mind’s capacity
for aggregation and synthesis. At a more fundamental level it seeks to identify universal
principles that underlie and govern the behavior of complex adaptive systems in a very
wide range of applications, such as network effects, emergence, self-organization, and
self-reproduction (autopoiesis). It represents a serious effort to move from the aggregation
of specialized knowledge through multi-disciplinarity to the search for unifying trans-
disciplinary principles.
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6.2. Barriers to Systems Thinking

In spite of these momentous developments, the advance of knowledge remains encumbered
by several other characteristics of the Scientific Revolution which have yet to be seriously
challenged. The first and most obvious of these is the mechanization of reality. The perception
and conception of reality in mechanical terms still dominate scientific thinking, even with
regard to living beings and conscious individuals. The idea of a simple clockwork universe has
given place to more complex network models, but the models remain very largely mechanical
and mechanistic. Science still tends to perceive all phenomena, even life, consciousness
and society, in physical terms, and to reduce them to theirs lowest identifiable physical
denominators. Our physical conceptions have become more complex and sophisticated,
but the underlying materialistic mechanistic thinking remains. Computerized modeling of
financial markets and economic systems remains the primary instrument for both theorizing
and policy-making. Neurological models of human behavior that have proven effective
for the tracing of sensory pathways and muscular responses seek to reduce all conscious
human experience to chemical and electrical events, resulting in a dramatic increase in use
of drugs for the treatment of conditions with obvious psychological and social origins, such
as attention deficit disorder.
The second limitation of the current approach is the persistent emphasis on the universal
aspects of behavior. Science is the quest for knowledge. It began with the study of fields
in which the type predominates and individual variation is of little or no significance.
The physical elements readily lend themselves into categorization on the Periodic Table.
The known subatomic particles come in a few discrete varieties. The laws of motion and
thermodynamics apply uniformly within broad boundaries as do the principles of relativity
and quantum mechanics. Plants and animals lend themselves to classification in terms of
phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species. The tendency to view reality in terms
of categories and types has been extraordinarily effective in advancing knowledge in the
natural sciences. It is inevitable that the same approach would be extended to the study of
individual and collective human behavior. The classification of similarities and differences
has led to important advances in the social sciences, but it has also imposed serious barriers
to knowledge of human beings. Comparison of types inevitably results in suppression of
individual differences. Uniformity of type is characteristic of the inanimate and subconscious
ranges of reality, but the most significant attributes of human consciousness are individuality,
innovation, creativity and uniqueness. The human sciences remain grounded in the bias of
natural science for viewing reality in terms of similarities and differences and ignoring the
single most momentous development in the history of the universe—the evolution of conscious
individuality. This bias is programmed into the way we use our minds and imprinted in our
very conception of reason and logical thinking. Our very notions of rationality and logic, the
rules by which our minds seek knowledge, are based on implicit biases and limitations that
retard the development of knowledge.
The third major limitation of modern systems thinking inherited from natural science is
the suppression of the subjective dimension of reality. Indeed, most complex systems are
an attempt to define and represent all subjective experience in physical terms and to reduce
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conscious experience to automatic subconscious processes. The collapse of the subjective

into the objective dimension is dramatically illustrated by prevailing economic models of
society. The assumption that human beings make rational decisions is only another way
of saying that individual decision-making can be modelled in mechanistic terms without
recourse to consciousness, just the way we say that plants lean toward the sun and their
roots reach out for water. The obvious fallacy in this assumption has compelled economists
to introduce terms such as irrational exuberance to explain the extreme fluctuations in the
behavior of markets under extraordinary circumstances, while leaving intact the underlying
premise for normal applications. Economic behavior is characterized by myriad subjective
factors—aspirations, attitudes, preferences, the search for status, fear, insecurity, ambition,
interest, curiosity, attraction, ideas, misconceptions, superstitions, prejudices, opinions,
beliefs, ideals, values,—that vary markedly from person to person, moment to moment.
The consequences of the near exclusive emphasis of economics and other social sciences
on the objective dimension of human behavior are apparent in the inability to comprehend
and manage the increasingly complex social world in which we live. The effort to reduce
complexity so we can manage it can only be successful in the measure our conception
embraces the full scope of that reality.
Fourth and as a consequence of the other three, the efficacy of systems thinking is impacted
by inherent limitations in the concept of randomness and the measurement of uncertainty as
applied to human systems. As Byers has argued, randomness and uncertainty are ambiguous
concepts. The appearance of randomness may result from the real absence of causation or
from a lack of information, effective measurement and valid knowledge. Black swans may
surprise and overwhelm us because a phenomenon is truly random or simply because our
concepts, models and measures are grossly inadequate to represent what is really going on.
They are likely to become increasingly prevalent, so long as our study of human behavior
neglects subjective factors, individual uniqueness and conscious human choice.
7. Integration and Unification

All knowledge seeks unity. The greatest discoveries in natural science have been
those that led to the unification of phenomena that had hitherto appeared to be unrelated
to one another. Thus, Newton unified inertia and motion. Maxwell unified electricity and
magnetism. Einstein unified space and time, gravity and acceleration. WAAS Fellow Abdus
Salam unified the electromagnetic and weak nuclear forces.30
The capacity to identify relationships between apparently unconnected or contradictory
phenomena is one of the defining characteristics of genius. The quest for unification in
Physics has spurred efforts to formulate a Grand Unifying Theory reconciling the physical
macrocosm and microcosm. Should it ever succeed based on the present premises, it could
only apply to the plane of inanimate matter and energy. A Grand Unifying Theory of Life or
of Mind or an integrated theory encompassing all three would remain elusive.
A mere aggregation of variables to encompass the totality of phenomena is not sufficient
to achieve true integration and unification. Synthesis can combine and relate the parts, but it
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cannot arrive at true integration. Although the word is widely used in a more limited sense
as synonym for totality, comprehensiveness, holism and interdependence, true integration
that is the basis for unification is something more fundamental. It may be best described in
the words of the Upanishads as all is in each, each is in all, all is in all. Integration is a state
in which each element in a totality is not only related to the totality but also to every other
individual element in the totality.
The struggle of climate scientists to construct accurate and effective theories and models
of climate change is compounded by the fact that the entire earth with its myriad zones,
geographic and geological characteristics is in constant interaction with the life forms that
inhabit it and the conscious and subconscious activities they carry out. Climate is impacted
not only by physical factors, but also by the biological functioning of living things and the
conscious and subconscious actions of human beings. Our capacity for analysis and synthesis
is poorly suited to manage complexity of this sort.
The remarkable integrality of the human body is an excellent example and analogy.
Medical science has created an abstract conceptual framework to represent the functioning
of the body. It is divided into anatomical structures and physiological functions. The
structures include cells, tissues, organs and systems. The functions include respiration,
digestion, circulation, reproduction, and so forth. But both of these classifications are
themselves abstractions. There really is no such system as the circulatory system distinct
and independent of the skeletal, muscular, nervous, lymphatic and other cells, tissues, organs
and systems. Each cell, tissue and organ forms an integral component of the overall body.
But the functioning of each type is also integrated with the functioning of other types. Thus,
a prick of the surface tissue of the finger may evoke a response from the skin, capillaries,
blood cells, heart, brain, glands, circulatory, nervous and lymphatic systems. Moreover, as
the Placebo Effect and other well-documented neurological, psychological and sociological
phenomena amply testify, the body’s physiological functioning is also seamlessly integrated
with a host of other factors—nutritional intake, physical environment, type and amount of
physical activity, the endless flow of sensations, impulses and emotion occurring consciously
and subconsciously, mental conceptions, opinions, attitudes, beliefs and aspirations of each
individual, as well as the ever-changing physical, emotional and mental interaction between
the individual and the physical, social, and psychological context in which it is situated. The
limitations in prevailing conceptual models of reality severely hamper efforts to pass beyond
an aggregation of physical parts and functions to a truly comprehensive integral conception
of human health.
The conclusion that present knowledge is inadequate to guide the further evolution of
human civilization is not an indictment of the vast body of specialized knowledge of society
generated by science up to now. It is rather a realization that more of the same will not
suffice. Relativity Theory did not invalidate the principles of Newtonian Physics. Rather
it placed them in a wider context, in which their limits became evident. Today, there is a
need to venture beyond the limits of the present conceptual system in search of one that is
more inclusive and effective in reconciling our knowledge of the world with the persistent
failures and recurring problems that stand in contradiction. The first step in the evolution of
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a new conceptual system is to acknowledge and embrace these contradictions and willingly
reexamine the premises which constitute the foundations of the present conceptual system.31
7.1. Integration in the Social Sciences
The need for transcending the limits of both analytic and synthetic thinking is most apparent
in the social sciences where compartmentalized, fragmented knowledge persists as the
dominant pursuit and each field is founded on a discipline-specific set of principles with
little relevance beyond the narrow borders of specialized applications. This approach has
generated a condition resembling the psychological syndrome of multiple disconnected
personalities known as dissociative identity disorder. In both instances it is symptomatic
of deeper disorder. In an effort to arrive at rational, scientifically valid knowledge, we have
fallen prey to the natural tendency of the thinking mind to separate itself from the objects
of study in a static universe and regard them from a detached perspective objectively and
impersonally. In doing so, our sciences of living human beings have become mechanical,
materialistic, value-free and lifeless. They lack the vibrancy characteristic of living things.
They lack the depth and insight needed to plumb the rich complexity of the individual psyche
and collective soul. “Classical, deterministic science is a science of stasis. It misses the
essence of life”.32
This realization has been the driving force behind the efforts of the World Academy of
Art & Science and World University Consortium in partnership with other organizations to
advocate the need for a new paradigm in human development, a human-centered economic
theory, and a transdisciplinary science of society. Our work has identified critical respects in
which the new conceptual framework needs to transcend the limits of the present one. The
new paradigm should be value-based rather than value-free. It should be transdisciplinary
rather than discipline specific or merely multi-disciplinary, which means it should seek to
discover the underlying principles governing human behavior in all fields of social existence.
It should embrace and reunite the objective and subjective dimensions of reality, recognizing
the central role of human consciousness and human aspiration in human affairs. It should
be founded on the creative process governing the interaction between the individual and the
collective. It should rise beyond the mechanistic, materialistic models of natural science to
establish knowledge based on the dynamic living process by which human beings release their
energies, consciously and purposefully direct them, channel those energies through formal
organizational and informal institutional structures and systems, and express them through
skilled action to accomplish results. And as a foundation and central pillar of this work, it
should strive to advance our understanding of the human mind and thought processes, the
sources and obstacles to creativity and their relationship to the evolution of civilization.33
Preliminary work has been done by members of the Academy on many elements of a
new approach, but the real purpose of the project is to influence the general direction and
course of our collective intellectual progress. Decades ago Former WAAS President Harold
Lasswell made a profound contribution to the study of law by liberating it from the narrow
confines of legislatures and judiciaries and viewing it in the context of evolving social and
political processes and the affirmation of values by individuals and institutions in society.34
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In a remarkable contribution to rethinking economics, Orio Giarini strove to break down

the arbitrary conceptual barriers imprisoning contemporary economic theory. He expanded
economics to encompass the non-monetarized sector, introduced the concept of negative
value to account for economically detrimental activities, emphasized that in a modern service
economy value must take into account the entire utilization time from conception through
final disposal, replaced the classical notion of equilibrium with one of continuous evolution,
and affirmed the principle of uncertainty as central to all economic activity.35 Building
on his seminal contributions, WAAS is engaged with other institutions and scholars in a
collaborative effort to frame new economic theory.36,* A fuller exploration of these findings
lies beyond the scope of this paper, but it may be helpful to briefly examine a few of its
central tenets.
“Values are the governing principles of human evolution, just as

natural laws are the governing principles in physical nature.”
7.2. Value-based Science

Popper warned against the tendency of the social sciences toward ‘misguided naturalism’.37
The effort to free the study of the natural world from religious doctrine rejected the
imposition of human values on the natural world. The role of the natural scientist is to observe
dispassionately and reflect rationally. Freedom from prejudice is essential for discovering
knowledge. With respect to physical nature, this implies not imposing human values on the
behavior of lower life forms. We cannot accuse the lion of evil because it instinctively hunts
other species for food. But the social sciences involve the study of conscious human beings
living together. The discovery of universal values governing conscious human evolution
is the social equivalent of the universal laws governing physical evolution. The purpose of
social science is not merely to impartially understand but also to consciously intervene to
enhance the effectiveness of social systems to realize the aspirations and values of humanity.
It must necessarily be value-explicit rather than value-free.
Values are not merely prejudicial judgments. They are a form of knowledge and a powerful
determinant of human evolution. To strip our study of society of all values is akin to viewing
the material world as random, chaotic, directionless meanderings of chance stripped of all
insight into the forces influencing it. Values are the governing principles of human evolution,
just as natural laws are the governing principles in physical nature. Universal values such
as freedom, equality, peace, security, tolerance, trust, integrity, goodwill, organization,
cooperation, collaboration, fraternity, self-giving, harmony and truthfulness represent the
quintessence of knowledge and wisdom humanity has derived from millennia of experience.
Values are knowledge of the process of human accomplishment and evolution. They are
central to the practice of science as they are to every other field of civilized human activity.
* For information on the partners and working papers, see www.neweconomictheory.org
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7.3. Principles of Society

As already mentioned, the development of economic science has been strongly influenced
by the success of the quantitative physical sciences, most especially Physics. It has taken the
form of a quest for universal laws or principles of economy and mechanistic, quantitative
models to represent the workings of economic systems. The economy we have today is the
result of choices made in the past, of a long evolutionary process founded on ideas, values,
beliefs, and social institutions established for the benefit of specific sections of the population
and preserved by force of social influence. If it is not able to equitably meet the needs of all
human beings, we have the power to change it.
The rejection of immutable laws of economy does not mean that there are no principles
governing the development of economy and society. But it does suggest that these principles
are more fundamental than what commonly passes for economic principle, as the principles
governing chemical interactions are founded on a more fundamental set of physical
principles. Economy is a subset of society. An understanding of the principles governing the
development and operation of economy needs to be founded on principles applicable to the
development and evolution of the wider society of which economy is a part.
The success of organizational theory and systems theory in identifying principles
applicable to a wider range of human and non-human activities marks a first step toward
development of truly transdisciplinary social science. Organization is a unifying principle
found at all levels of existence—the structure of physical matter, the dynamic systems of life,
and the conscious organization of ideas, activities and things characteristic of mind. Energy
is another unifying principle—the physical energy of material systems, the vitality and
social energy characteristic of living systems, and the conscious mental energy expressing
as curiosity, imagination and creativity in mind. Conscious awareness, aspiration, values,
evolution, self-multiplication, authority, hierarchy, networks and conceptual frameworks are
fundamental principles common to all human activity. Transdisciplinary science founded on
principles such as these would mark a significant advance toward a new conceptual system
for the social sciences. It should shift the perspective of society from inanimate, mechanistic
organization to conscious living organism, from a perspective that focuses exclusively on
objective, superficial processes to one that encompasses both the subjective and objective
dimensions of reality, from an emphasis on general patterns confirmed by statistics to one
founded on the complex creative interaction between creative individuals and the conforming
social collective.
8. Deep Thinking
8.1. Changing Conceptual Frameworks
If mind starts from division and possesses only constructed understanding of unity, the
question naturally arises as to what mental faculty is needed to achieve true integration and
unification. As Sri Aurobindo observes, mind “thinks, sees, wills, feels, senses with division
as a starting point and has only constructed understanding of unity.”38 If the analytic and
synthetic faculties of the thinking mind are not sufficient, what alternative is left?
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Mathematician William Byers uses the term deep thinking to describe creative intellectual
processes that transcend the conceptual limits of existing thought and the rules of logic. He
observes that all thinking occurs within a conceptual system. The system may be explicit
and implicit, conscious or subconscious. The definition of every word is a conceptual
system determined by prevailing cultural norms, social context and individual psychological
experience. Every theoretical concept is defined, populated and delineated by defining and
limiting perspectives. The boundaries and tenets of any conceptual system are supported
and reinforced by forces that resist any assault. Among these forces is the sense of security
derived from existing knowledge, the inertial resistance to a major reconsideration of beliefs
on which so much has been invested, the egoistic identification with a particular viewpoint,
and unconscious bias for elements that conform to its existing premises and rejection of those
that undermine or contradict it. Logic and mathematics are conceptual systems. Science itself
is a conceptual system. This paper identifies some of the pillars on which science is based that
are implicitly accepted as valid, but rarely subject to examination.
Byers argues that all major intellectual breakthroughs involve a breaking out of the existing
conceptual system. Since the boundaries of the system are often implicit and unconscious,
they are not easily accessible to identification or scrutiny. Therefore, the creative process
of transcending the existing system usually begins with the contemplation of questions that
are not easily addressed within the existing context. These questions often take the form
of conflicting viewpoints, contradictory facts or unresolved ambiguities, which the current
framework is unable to assimilate and reconcile within existing premises. The willingness
to recognize and embrace the tension of ambiguity, contradictions and paradox releases
energy and generates the force needed to breach the boundaries or challenge the fundamental
premises of the existing system. The Copernican Revolution and the other major intellectual
advances referred to by Thomas Kuhn as paradigm shifts are classical instances of this
process.
The process of deep thinking and the obstacles to it are illustrated in Arthur Conan
Doyle’s stories of Sherlock Holmes. In many cases the police arrive at a conclusion regarding
the facts of a crime and the guilty party by carefully constructing a plausible hypothesis
that either consciously or inadvertently overlooks apparently insignificant contradictory
evidence. In “Silver Blaze” the police develop an airtight theory of how a race horse was
stolen and its trainer murdered by the thief and they make an arrest of a suspect with both
motive and opportunity to have been responsible. Holmes alone is bothered by apparently
insignificant questions. Why didn’t the watch dog bark during the theft? By what coincidence
was the stable boy served a dinner that was sufficiently spicy to mask the flavor of an opiate?
Embracing the implied contradiction which the police chose to ignore, he constructed an
alternative hypothesis that led to an entirely different conclusion. The trainer was actually
killed by the horse while attempting to maim its ankle muscles so it would lose the race. The
deep and lasting appeal of Doyle’s fictional character derives from the fact that he points the
way to a higher evolutionary pathway.
Viewed in this manner, the possibility of consciously fostering the process of creative
thinking is stripped of its mystical shroud. The process requires a willingness to question
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implicit assumptions and established tenets and the strength to embrace rather than reject
or ignore conflicting points of view. There is no guarantee that stepping outside the secure
boundaries of an existing conceptual system will necessarily lead to fruitful creativity. It may
be just as likely lead to a loss of certainty and confusion. Stepping out is a necessary, but not
sufficient condition for mental creativity. But without taking that risk, real creative thinking
is extremely unlikely. Byers argues that we have all had the experience of transcending an
existing conceptual system in the process of learning about new ideas. As students we learn
to make the leap already made by others before us. Creative thinking requires the ability to
make the leap for ourselves. But either way the process is the same.
8.2. Intuitive Knowledge
The instances of scientific discoveries in Physics cited above demonstrate that integration
and unification are indeed possible, but they appear to be the work of rare geniuses whose
processes we neither understand nor have the capacity to emulate. The testimony of great
scientists themselves attributes such discoveries to sudden bursts of insight or leaps of thought
rather than linear, systematic rational thought processes. Popper argues that “There is no such
thing as a logical method of having new ideas or a logical reconstruction of this process…
every discovery contains ‘an irrational element’, or ‘a creative intuition’ in Bergson’s sense.”
Einstein speaks in a similar vein with regard to the discovery of universal laws. He refers to an
intuitive experience that leads to psychological identification with the object of experience.
“There is no logical path leading to these…laws. They can only be reached by intuition,
based upon something like an intellectual love of the object of experience.”39 During his brief
lifetime, Srinivasa Ramanujan compiled nearly 3,900 mathematical identities and equations,
of which nearly all have now been proven correct. The Ramanujan prime and the Ramanujan
theta function have inspired a vast amount of further research. When his notebooks were first
scrutinized by leading British mathematicians, they responded with skepticism, suspicion
and extreme disbelief, for he had arrived at original findings of unparalleled complexity
without passing through the traditional process of mathematical proof. When questioned,
Ramanujan explained that he saw the theorems in his mind.
Thomas Kuhn regards intuitive thinking as an essential condition for the type of radical
change in paradigm associated with scientific revolutions. “Paradigms are not corrigible by
normal science at all... normal science ultimately leads only to the recognition of anomalies
and to crises. And these are terminated, not by deliberations and interpretation, but by a
relatively sudden and unstructured event like the gestalt switch. Scientists then often speak of
the ‘scales falling from the eyes’ or of the ‘lightning flash’ that ‘inundates’ a previously obscure
puzzle. On other occasions the relevant illumination comes in sleep. No ordinary sense of the
term ‘interpretation’ fits these flashes of intuition through which a new paradigm is borne.”40
Our understanding of intuitive processes is quite limited, in spite of the fact that throughout
history insight and intuition have been cited as the source of new discoveries and new
knowledge. We live in times characterized by an unquestioned faith in the power of rational
thought, systematic training in logical argument in formal education, and supreme regard
for orderly argument based on factual evidence and logical reasoning in judging the validity
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of any proposition. It is very likely that this extreme reliance on the analytic and synthetic
modes of thought impedes the development and exercise of these faculties in our times.
The philosophy and methodology of modern science focus almost exclusively on the
tenets of the scientific method to validate hypotheses. So great is the identification of science
with analytic and synthetic modes of thinking, that it devotes almost no attention to the
creative process of discovery on which its greatest achievements are actually based. One
reason for this reluctance to focus on the intuitive process of scientific creativity is the
mystique associated with artistic creativity and mystical experiences. If so, then rationality
and logic dictate that science should strive to learn as much as possible from these other
modes of thinking.
Intuition may be far more common than we think. Today we recognize it only when it is
associated with outstanding discoveries recognized by the whole world and in circumstances
when it is associated with a number of other traits conducive to high intellectual achievement—
high intelligence, the courage to challenge prevailing ideas, an unconditioned mind capable
of independent thinking, and intense aspiration that generates the energy and effort for
unstinting application and perseverance. It is very likely that the capacity itself is far more
prevalent and expressing as creative insight at different levels of society in many fields that
go unnoticed. There was a time when the ability to read, write or calculate was considered a
sign of genius. Since then humanity has evolved, our minds have evolved and our civilization
has evolved so that what was once extraordinary has become the norm. Today the idea of
learning to think intuitively may sound outlandish. But it may well be that once we pierce
the veil of superstition surrounding it, we will discover means to consciously develop it
on a large scale. The first essential step is to remove the stigma or scientific skepticism
surrounding ways of knowing that transcend logic and rationality.
9. Limits to Rationality
The term ‘limits to rationality’ is inherently ambiguous as well as unsettling, even
disturbing. It is ambiguous in the sense that it can be used to imply both limits to the extent
to which rationality is being applied in the pursuit of knowledge and also to suggest that
rationality is itself subject to inherent limits in its capacity to arrive at certain knowledge. For
both these reasons the term is also unsettling and disturbing. It is unsettling because we human
beings possess or are possessed by such a strong aspiration to arrive at certain knowledge. It
is disturbing because it suggests that the mental instruments so far developed and utilized by
us in quest of that certainty are subject to inherent limits both in their application and in their
powers of discernment.
This historical narrative on the evolution of mind and civilization supports these
conclusions. It confirms that even our most sincere, scrupulous, impartial and disinterested
seeking for knowledge is subject to limitations imposed by conscious and subconscious
perceptions, conceptions, assumptions and perspectives through which we seek for reliable
knowledge. As Byers emphasizes, the very nature of a conceptual system is that it is self-
limiting. For regardless of how broad and open its premises, it is a construction built and
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viewed from inside itself and is unable from the vantage point to fully perceive the foundations
on which it is constructed. In setting forth the principles on which his geometry is based,
Euclid never conceived of a context in which two parallel lines could meet. That conception
belonged to a different conceptual framework that was only discovered 2000 years later. So
too, when Newton presented his laws of motion, he never qualified the limits within which
these laws held true. He naturally assumed that space and time were invariable constants.
The new paradigm conceived by Einstein challenged assumptions that were so basic they had
never before been questioned. Quantum Theory challenged notions so fundamental that even
Einstein rejected them as implausible.
Our resistance to entertaining premises that contradict established viewpoints arises not
only out of an inability to imagine or conceive something different, but also out of a marked
preference for justifying the existing system. So strong is this tendency that our reason
carefully selects for its attention ideas and evidence in support of its viewpoint and ignores or
discounts that which contradicts it.41 Science has made great advances in establishing criteria
for falsifying hypotheses, but it possesses no remedy to the urge of the scientific collective
to admire the clothes of the reigning emperor of scientific authority. A greater awareness of
the social and psychological barriers to a truly impartial exercise of reason would be a major
contribution.
10. Deep Learning

The perspective that emerges from a historical examination of mind and civilization
has important implications for education. This paper argues that the principal challenge
confronting humanity today is not to fine-tune the incremental progress of knowledge
acquisition, but rather to consciously support and accelerate the development of radically
different, more synthetic and integrated ways of thinking and knowing.
History confirms that a change in the way we think is unlikely to be made by those
already in the middle or later years of life. Most seminal changes in society occur only with
the passing of generations raised in and conditioned by the past and with the coming of new
generations unconditioned by earlier experience. Education is the principal means developed
by humanity to foster conscious social evolution. Therefore, it must necessarily constitute the
core of any strategy to accelerate the development of our mental faculties.42
One clear implication is that an exclusive preoccupation with imparting more knowledge
content is not sufficient and may even be counter-productive, because it only goes to reinforce
the existing conceptual framework and analytic skills, and divert energy from the creative
enterprise of enhancing our mental capacities.
A few tentative suggestions can be made regarding how future education should differ in
method and content from the prevailing.
1. Balancing Analysis, Synthesis and Integration: Reality is multi-dimensional and
integrated. Consequently, so should effective knowledge of that reality be. It is always
shaped by a multitude of aspects, perspectives, forces. The tendency to condense and
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compress reality into simplistic formulas is a form of willful ignorance that facilitates
transfer of knowledge and multiple choice examinations, but conditions the mind to
think simplistically and suppress important dimensions of reality. No single statement,
no single theoretical perspective can ever be comprehensive. Therefore, the approach to
education in all fields should emphasize the multi-dimensional, many-sided character of
reality and our knowledge of it. Education in all subjects should stress the complexity
of knowledge rather than reduce it to simple formulas to be memorized. It should
encourage young minds to examine contrary, opposing and contradictory perspectives.
Precise mental knowledge of the totality is never possible, most especially with respect
to the complexity of human experience. Therefore, a precise analytic knowledge of
the individual contributing elements should be balanced by a holistic vision of their
harmonious integral relationship to and within the whole. The capacity of the mind for
differentiation and delimitation must be transcended by also fostering an intuitive faculty
for integration and unification.
2. Reuniting the Surface and Depth, Objective and Subjective Dimensions: As there
are multiple dimensions to reality, there are also multiple levels or depths. Effective
education should simultaneously cultivate observation, perception and perspective at
multiple levels of reality. These levels are represented in the natural sciences by the
physical, chemical, biological, genetic, metabolic, neurological and other processes
present in the functioning of all living beings. The discoveries of Copernicus, Einstein
and Heisenberg arose from a willingness to reexamine fundamental premises. In the
human sciences, reality is governed by myriad mental, emotional, vital, social, cultural,
technological, organizational and environmental factors that provide the foundation and
context for all social phenomena. A comprehensive study of the factors leading to the
Italian Renaissance, abolition of slavery, the Great Depression, the two world wars, the
end of colonialism, the founding of the UN, the beginning and end of the Cold War,
the hippy movement, the birth of the European Union and the Internet, climate change,
the 2008 financial crisis, Occupy Wall Street, and the European refugee crisis would
be illustrative. In each case comprehensive knowledge must necessarily include an
understanding of prevailing ideas, intellectual atmosphere, beliefs, aspirations, anxieties,
threats, emerging evolutionary social forces and values, opposing vested interests and
reactionary forces, and emotional sensibilities. It should include a view of surface
movements, distinct and separate elements, oppositions, conflict of forces, fine shades of
variation and individuality. It should also include a perspective based on the underlying
oneness, inner unity, harmony in law of movement or being, greater reconciliation, the
center from which all aspects emanate and to which they return.
3. Reconciling Contradictions: As Niels Bohr said, “It is the hallmark of any deep truth
that its negation is also a deep truth.”43 In each area of observation, education should
cultivate a sense of the complementarity between difference and oneness, subjective and
objective, individual uniqueness and collective type. Rather than categorizing reality in
terms of simple polar opposites, education should develop varying perspectives arising
from different viewpoints and different levels of consciousness and experience. What
105
appear as contradictions at one level and from one perspective represent complementary
aspects of reality from a wider or deeper perspective. Studying things from the differing
perspective of the mental, vital-social, and physical planes will foster a capacity to
clearly distinguish these movements, separate and better control them.
The approach will naturally vary and is too complex to be dealt with in this paper. One
example may suffice to illustrate some of these aspects. In March 1933 Franklin D. Roosevelt
become President of the United States in the midst of the most severe banking crisis the
country had ever faced. Since the Great Crash in 1929, more than 6000 US banks had failed
and closed. Daily millions of Americans were lining up at the remaining banks to withdraw
their savings before their bank also declared bankruptcy. During the previous three years
every economic policy initiative thought to be relevant had been applied, but failed to stem
collapse of the system. FDR knew that the principles of economics he had studied at Harvard
were inadequate to stem the crisis. He understood that the collapse of the system was the
result of subjective factors that could not be readily addressed at the institutional or policy
level. So he addressed the American people on radio in the first of what became known as
his fireside chats. He explained to them that all the objective factors that had made America
prosperous were still present—the rich natural resources, hard-working people, huge
industrial infrastructure and continental market. He diagnosed and told them that the real
problem was not any objective factor. It was rather their own loss of self-confidence and faith
in America. He appealed to their courage and national pride. In immortal words, he told them
that the only thing they had to fear was fear itself. During that week legislation was passed
instituting insurance on bank deposits and other safeguards. He asked the people to return
to their banks on the following Monday and redeposit their hard earned savings. Once again
long lines grew in front of the banks, but this time most of the people had come to redeposit
their money and the bank crisis subsided.
This famous event illustrates several important aspects of the change needed. First, it
illustrates that economy, politics, society, and culture are inseparable dimensions of a single
integrated reality. The perennial public debate over the role of government in regulating
markets is misplaced. There are no markets without government regulation. Without an
infrastructure of law to protect property and contract rights, without a judicial system to
enforce those rights, without public institutions to prevent collusion and monopoly control,
no market can be free and functional. So too, any economy is dependent on the prevailing
social norms, values, educational system, and a host of other social factors. Development of
a real science of economy will only be possible when economics is viewed as a subset and
integral aspect of the larger society of which it is a part.
Second, this event illustrates the equal or greater importance of underlying subjective
factors in the effective functioning of society. Every economics student is taught that the
economic system is founded on trust and confidence. Without it money has no value and
financial institutions cannot function. But although it is recognized as a necessity, it rarely
figures in the prevailing conceptual framework of economy, because economic theory is so
strongly grounded in objective, material factors. Like every social institution and activity,
106
economic performance is the result of conscious choices of countless conscious individuals.

Those choices depend not only on their confidence in the system but also on their theoretical
understanding of how it works. Money is commonly regarded as an objective reality, a thing
in itself. In fact, money is merely a convention adopted by human beings as a symbol of social
power. Money has no value outside of a social context, e.g. on a desert island. Like language,
it is a networking tool to facilitate interactions between people. The value of money depends
on the overall productive capacity of the society which is founded on the knowledge, skills
and values of its individual members.44
Third, this event dramatically illustrates the role of the individual in social development.
Mainstream economics and social science deal with broad generalities and statistical
averages. The individual is just a number. But in reality, the individual is the source of
all creativity and innovation in society. As education is the instrument for conscious social
evolution, the individual is the catalyst for the evolutionary process. History documents the
fact that a single individual thinker, leader, inventor or entrepreneur has the power to change
the world. Indeed, as Margaret Mead once said, all significant changes in human history have
been the result of actions by small groups of individuals.45
This incident also illustrates the fundamental paradox that crises are opportunities.
FDR’s remedy for the banking crisis of 1933 led to measures which provided for the stable
development of the American financial system for more than six decades until the protective
measures were systematically withdrawn in the 1990s, resulting in the 2008 financial crisis.
So too, history confirms that virtually every tragic event has had positive consequences.
The Black Death in Europe led to the collapse of feudalism, paving the way for the rise of
democracy. Two horrendous world wars led to the founding of the UN and the international
charter of universal human rights. This brief narrative is only intended to illustrate that
every known fact, event and concept acquires greater significance when viewed from a more
comprehensive, integral perspective.
11. Evolution of Knowing

This narrative traces broad developments in the history of mind, its faculties and the
quest for knowledge. It highlights some of the relationships between the evolution of our
subjective faculties for self-awareness and knowledge and the evolution of the external facets
of human civilization. The historical record reveals a one to one correspondence between
inner and outer. The development of mental faculties and mental conceptions has led to the
progressive development of our collective social existence. It also reveals the dependence
of that mental development on the openness, tolerance and active support that society offers
to the exploration, dissemination and application of new knowledge. This interplay between
inner and outer, mind and civilization, the individual and society, human consciousness and
the institutions we create has been a central determinant of the course of human evolution.
Today humanity confronts intractable existential challenges. Given our history, it seems
plausible to assume that the problems we face correspond to limitations in the ways we are
employing our mental faculties. Given the extraordinary developments that have taken place
107
in the past, it seems equally reasonable to assume that we have not yet exhausted the limits
of human consciousness, individually or collectively. Challenges are opportunities. Crises
are a spur to evolution.
Mind has a remarkable capacity for adaptation and development. But it also reveals a
tendency to tenaciously cling to its past achievements, adamantly persist in its present line
of activity, resist evolutionary departures and circle around for long periods in repetitive
affirmation of what it already knows and believes. Our current preoccupation with physical,
technological and organizational solutions to problems is an instance of that repetitive
tendency. The perspective of history reveals larger movements and longer cycles that vary
from age to age, civilization to civilization. It may well be that we are approaching the end
of one of those cycles and need to prepare for a more significant reframing of the basis for
knowledge and civilization in the age to come.
11.1. Science, Philosophy and Religion
Symbolism, intuitive insight, metaphysical intellect and experiment science have all made
important contributions to the evolution of civilization. Stages can be identified in which
each of them has played a dominate role in deciphering and representing reality. The
profound truths of existence arrived at by the great religious traditions were the result of
direct spiritual experience which could not be rendered into logical discourse or confirmed
by the experimental methods of modern science. So too in great periods of philosophy, the
rational mind sought for answers to questions that still and in all likelihood will always lie
beyond the purview of experimental science. Science in turn has uncovered patterns, laws
and formulas in the mysteries of physical nature that generate a sense of wonder as profound
as the visions of mystics and logos of sages.
All three have contributed to the collective quest of humanity for knowledge. At different
periods of history, each has attempted to dominate the other two, even to the extent of nearly
or completely eclipsing their role. Science and philosophy developed side by side in ancient
Greece and during the enlightenment. The breakdown of dialogue between them acquired
the character of a divorce only in the second half of the 20th century.46 Today intellectual
discussion regarding fundamental questions of nature has very largely been supplanted by
experimentation and data-based analysis within existing conceptual framework of modern
science.
Experimental science, philosophic speculation and spiritual experience represent
developments of three different and complementary powers. They only appear contradictory
from the narrow vantage of any one perspective. That explains why even in our advanced
scientific culture, great scientists point to intuition as the source of their greatest creative
contributions to the progress of knowledge. Thus, the cryptic formula in the Upanishads “One
indivisible that is pure existence” and in the Bhagavad Gita “Indivisible, but as if divided
in things”, were rendered into intellectual statements about oneness, unity, and union by the
classical Greek philosophers more than a thousand years later and confirmed by science in
the discoveries of physicists two thousand years after that.*
* Chhandogya Upanishad translated and quoted by Sri Aurobindo in The Life Divine, p.70, 159,231.
108
The persistent intellectual and practical problems humanity confronts today are an
opportunity to recall that our powers of knowing as well as our body of knowledge are
evolving simultaneously. The apparent limitation of present knowledge is a reminder that
the progress of knowledge depends on expanding our field of vision to encompass wider
ranges of reality and deepening our perception from the observation of external appearances
to integrate and unify the objective and subjective dimensions of reality.
Author Contact Information

Email: [email protected]
Notes
1. William Byers, The Blind Spot: Science and the Crisis of Uncertainty (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011.
2. Garry Jacobs, “New Paradigm: the Necessity and the Opportunity,” Cadmus2, no.2 (2014): 09-23.
3. Ivo Šlaus and Garry Jacobs, “In Search of a New Paradigm for Global Development,” Cadmus 1, no.6 (2013):1-7.
4. Janani Harish, “Society and Social Power,” Cadmus 2, no.3(2014):37-49.
5. Garry Jacobs, “Uncorking the Future: Transitions to a New Paradigm,” Cadmus 2, no.4 (2015): 69-82.
6. Garry Jacobs, “Ways of Knowing,” Eruditio 1, no.4(2014):9-30.
7. Garry Jacobs, “Limits to Rationality and the Boundaries of Perception,” Eruditio 1, no.2 (2013):108-118.
8. Peter Watson, Ideas: A History of Thought and Invention from Fire to Freud (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2005), 47.
9. Merlin Donald, A Mind so Rare (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2001), 260
10. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1955), 507.
11. Donald, A Mind so Rare, 262.
12. Sri Aurobindo, The Human Cycle (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1962), 7.
13. Watson, Ideas, 6.
14. Watson, Ideas,52.
15. “Mind is an instrument of analysis and synthesis, but not of essential knowledge. Its function is to cut out something vaguely
from the unknown Thing in itself and call this measurement or delimitation of it the whole, and again to analyse the whole into
its parts which it regards as separate mental objects.” Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 127.
16. Watson, Ideas, 8.
17. Watson, Ideas, 160
20. William Byers, Deep Thinking (Hackensack: World Scientific, 2015)
21. Herbert Weisberg, Willful Ignorance: The Measure of Uncertainty (Hoboken: Wiley, 2014)
22. Weisberg, Willful Ignorance.
23. Although, as Popper points out, probability statements are neither verifiable nor falsifiable, they came to occupy a central place
in the practice of science. Karl Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery (New York: Routledge, 2002), 183.
24. Byers, Blind Spot.
25. Byers, Blind Spot, 103-104.
26. Orio Giarini, “Science and Economics: The Case of Uncertainty & Disequilibrium,” Cadmus 1, no.2(2011): 25-34.
27. Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbably (New York: Random House, 2010), xxii.
28. Taleb, Black Swan, xxvi.
29. Weisberg, Willful Ignorance.
30. Garry Jacobs and Ivo Šlaus, “Recognizing Unrecognized Genius,” Cadmus I, no.5(2012):1-5.
31. Byers, Deep Thinking.
109
32. Byers, The Blind Spot.

33. Garry Jacobs, Winston Nagan and Alberto Zucconi, “Unification in the Social Sciences: Search for a Science of
Society,”Cadmus 2, no.3 (2014): 1-22
34. Winston Nagan & Garry Jacobs, “New Paradigm for Global Rule of Law,” Cadmus 1, no. 4 (2012): 130-146.
35. Garry Jacobs & Ivo Slaus, “From Limits to Growth to Limitless Growth: A Revolutionary’s Vision of Wealth and Welfare,”
Cadmus 1, no.4 (2012): 59-76.
36. Garry Jacobs, “Need for a New Paradigm in Economics,” Review of Keynesian Economics 3, no.1(2015):2-8.
37. Popper, The Logic of The Social Sciences, 90
38. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine 965.
39. Popper, Logic of the social sciences, 8.
40. Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970),122-123
41. “Reason, on the contrary, proceeds by analysis and division and assembles its facts to form a whole; but in the assemblage so
formed there are opposites, anomalies, logical incompatibilities, and the natural tendency of Reason is to affirm some and to
negate others which conflict with its chosen conclusions so that it may form a flawlessly logical system.” Sri Aurobindo, The
Life Divine, 69.
42. Garry Jacobs, “Overcoming the Educational Time Warp: Anticipating a Different Future,” Cadmus 2, no.5 (2015):.1-13.
43. Max Delbrück, Mind from Matter: An Essay on Evolutionary Epistemology (Oxford: Blackwell Scientific Publications,
1986),167.
44. Garry Jacobs and Ivo Šlaus, “The Power of Money,” Cadmus 1, no.5(2012): 68-73.
45. Garry Jacobs, “The Emerging Individual,” Eruditio 1, no.1 (2012): 9-30.
46. Popper comments on the efforts of Positivism to overthrow and annihilate metaphysics. Popper, The Logic of Science, 13.
110
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A Brief History of Mind and Civilization

Article · March 2016

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A Brief History of Mind and Civilization

leaves billions in poverty and promotes widening inequalities.

2.1. Mind, the Instrument

3. The Conscious Thinking Animal

of civilization.13 Thus, numbers acquired mystical significance in many ancient societies as

Mind is primarily and quintessentially an instrument of division. In its pursuit of

4. Rise of Empirical Science

17th century established an ‘invisible college’ of independent thinkers to challenge orthodoxy,

knowledge. But increasingly it has come to be regarded as knowledge itself. In String

The contributions of modern science to the march of civilization are immeasurable.

5. Naturalization of the Social Sciences

“Human evolution is a complex conscious process involving

5.2. Legitimacy of the Subjective

among the objective and subjective dimensions, physical facts and

6.2. Barriers to Systems Thinking

conscious experience to automatic subconscious processes. The collapse of the subjective

7. Integration and Unification

In a remarkable contribution to rethinking economics, Orio Giarini strove to break down

“Values are the governing principles of human evolution, just as

7.2. Value-based Science

* For information on the partners and working papers, see www.neweconomictheory.org

7.3. Principles of Society

10. Deep Learning

economic performance is the result of conscious choices of countless conscious individuals.

11. Evolution of Knowing

Author Contact Information

32. Byers, The Blind Spot.

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