Monday, October 20, 2008

Saving the Mind and Mental Existence from Science and Liberating them from Religion

Mental problems are the most serious and fundamental issue we face today. They affect all of us, and they affect everything we do and we engage in. Mental problems affect how we understand and manage existence and development. They affect how individually we manage and conduct ourselves, how we connect, communicate and cooperate with each other, and how we relate and interact with the world around us, with nature and the natural environment. Mental problems are at the root of all the problems we face today -- cultural, religious, political, social, economic-financial and environmental problems, difficulties and crises, conflicts and confrontations.

How we understand and manage ourselves, how we connect, communicate and cooperate with each other, how we relate and interact with the world around us, with nature and the natural environment are defined and governed by what takes place and what we do in the mind and mental existence, by our mental behaviour and actions. Mental problems, problems and difficulties in mental behaviour and actions lead to problems in physical behaviour and actions, in how we conduct ourselves, relate and interact with each other and the world around us, causing problems and difficulties for the individual, for others, society, nature and the natural environment. The traditional approach of psychology, psychiatry and psychiatric medication has not been able to get at the roots of the problem, beyond treating symptoms and consequences, leading to dependence and addiction. Neither has religion, the religious view and approach of dealing with the mind and mental existence been able to address the issue.

Mental problems in their essence are difficulties understanding and managing the mind and mental existence. They are difficulties understanding and managing the role and responsibility in the mind and mental existence that by nature are individually ours to understand and manage. The difficulties are not rooted in repressed memories or the biological foundation of the mind and mental existence, the neurological structure and workings of the brain, or our genetic make up. Neither are they rooted in evil forces impressing themselves on, or infesting our mind. The difficulties lie in the intangible, elusive and non-material nature, demands and challenges of the mind and mental existence, and our role and responsibility in them. They are not as self-evident and obvious, and they are not as easily understood and managed as our physical existence and reality. They require more focus and concentration, mental work and effort. The difficulties moreover lie in acting at the level of feelings and emotions, first impressions and instant reactions, and not acting at the level of clarity of mind and understanding, about our experience, the perceptions, sensations and feelings that enter the mind and awareness, the conditions that lie behind them and how to deal with them. (For a detailed discussion of mental problems, nature and causes, results and consequences, and how to deal with them, go to http://www.ihcmd.org/mentalproblems, a free public service website dealing with mental problems through active individual engagement, individual mental work and effort, understanding and managing the mind and mental existence from the inside.)

What is required is a different approach, an approach that addresses the roots of the problem. De-stigmatizing mental problems and demystifying the mind and mental existence through active individual engagement, individual mental work and effort, understanding and managing the mind and mental existence from the inside. Understanding and managing from the inside what takes place, what we do and what we need to do in the mind and mental existence. We need to save the mind and mental existence from science and liberate them from religion. Science is reducing the mind and mental existence to a biological information-processing mechanism, the neurological structure and workings of the brain or the human genetic makeup and genetic evolution. Religion views the mind and mental existence as the human sole and spirit, our connection to a supernatural-spiritual world.

We need to understand and manage the mind and mental existence as the place where we consciously exist and act, where we experience, become aware and where we must consider the conditions of existence and the world around us, and how to deal with them. The mind and mental existence is where individually we are in charge and in control, where we must actively be engaged and take responsibility for what takes place and what we do. It is where we make choices and decisions, where we define aims, goals and objectives, and where we must consider, plan, organize and manage our behaviour and actions. Problems and difficulties, errors and mistakes, success and failure have their roots and beginnings in the mind and mental existence, and it is where answers and solutions must start. (For a more detailed discussion of the mind and mental existence, how to understand and manage them from the inside, go to http://www.ihcmd.org/mentalexistence.htm. You find a lecture presentation, Inside the Mind: Understanding and Managing the Mind and Mental Existence from the Inside, available both in PowerPoint and Acrobat PDF format.)

What is required are education, study and training in conceptual and mental development and growth. Developing at the level of the individual with every individual the conceptual foundation and mental capacity to understand and manage the mind and mental existence from the inside. Developing, exercising and practicing the necessary understanding, the natural mental faculties and potential, the natural mental powers and abilities, necessary mental skills and practices, and engage in the required mental work and effort. Establishing the necessary internal mental conditions, clarity of mind and understanding, in everything we do and we engage in, before engaging and dealing with external conditions, with each other, the world around us, with nature and the natural environment. Dealing with, responding and adjusting to change, changing conditions, demands and challenges when only a minimum in mental work, effort and adjustment are required and before they develop into larger problems and difficulties. Engaging in a process of continuous, life-long conceptual and mental self-development and growth. Constantly reconsidering, updating, correcting, expanding and improving individual understanding, mental powers and abilities, mental skills and practices in light of change and changing conditions. Reconsidering, updating, correcting, expanding and improving whenever necessary and required the understanding, mental powers and abilities, mental skills and practices we develop, on which we rely, how we develop and use them. The choices and decisions we make and how we make them, the aims, goals and objectives we pursue and how we define them. Reconsidering, updating, correcting, expanding and improving the mental behaviour and actions, mental work and effort in which we engage and how we plan, organize and manage them. (For a discussion of education and training in conceptual and mental development you can go to http://www.ihcmd.org/studyandtraining.htm. You will find a lecture presentation, Education and Training in Conceptual and Mental Development: Education and Training for a Sustainable Future, both in PowerPoint and Acrobat PDF format.)

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Beyond Evolution versus Creation, Science versus Religion

There is much debate about science versus religion, evolution versus creation, whether evolution or creation should be taught in schools. It is the wrong debate and a false dichotomy. The fundamental issue or question of our time is not science or religion, evolution or creation. The real issue is to understand and manage where we consciously exist and act, the mind and mental existence. The real dichotomy is between science and religion on the one hand, and understanding and managing the mind and mental existence as the place where consciously we exist and act on the other. The issue is saving the mind and mental existence from science and liberating them from religion.

The mind and mental existence is where we consciously exist and act, where we experience, become aware and must consider the conditions of existence, the world around us and how to deal with them. It is where individually we are in charge and in control, where we must actively be engaged and take responsibility for what takes place and what we do. The mind and mental existence is where we make choices and decisions, where we define aims, goals and objectives, and where we must consider, plan, organize and manage our behaviour and actions. It is in the mind and mental existence where we decide and govern how individually we understand, manage and conduct ourselves, how we relate and interact with each other, with the world around us, with nature and the natural environment. Problems and difficulties, errors and mistakes have their roots and beginnings in the mind and mental existence, and it is where answers and solutions must start and where change must begin.

It is a mute point whether we human beings are the product of creation or evolution. Either way we do not come with a manufacture's warranty. There will be no recall for a faulty product. There is no exchange for anything we do not like about ourselves or the world around us. The issue and question is how we manage what we have, how we manage ourselves within existing reality, regardless of how this reality came about, whether the result of creation or evolution.

The problems, difficulties and crises, conflicts and confrontations we face today as individuals, as societies and as a species are the results and consequences of what we do, how we understand and manage ourselves. They are the results and consequences of failings, errors and mistakes we make in understanding and managing ourselves within existing reality. They are the results and consequences of contradicting, conflicting with and falling short of the conditions, demands and challenges of existence and the world around us.

When we fail, make errors or mistakes, when we behave and act in harmful, counterproductive and destructive ways it is not the result of evil, evil forces or the devil, neither is it the result of selfish genes or faulty neurological wirings or workings of the brain forcing our hand. It is the result of failing to do the best with what we have, understanding and managing ourselves in meaningful, constructive and beneficial ways within existing and changing reality. It is the result of behaving and acting, understanding and managing ourselves in ways that contradicts, conflicts with and falls short of the conditions, demands and challenges of existence and the world around us. It is the result of failing to understand and manage the role and responsibility in our existence and development that are individually ours to understand and manage. Failing to understand and manage in the first instance where consciously we exist and act, where individually we are in charge and in control, where we must actively be engaged and take responsibility, the mind and mental existence.

For millennia as a species we have been looking for someone or something externally beyond ourselves, beyond where consciously we exist and act, to take responsibility for what we do and what we fail to do in the mind and mental existence. The problems, difficulties and crises, conflicts and confrontations we face are the results and consequences of abrogating responsibility for ourselves, for what we do and engage in, our behaviour and actions, for how we understand and manage ourselves within the reality, the conditions, demands and challenges of existence and the world around us. Trying to change the reality of the conditions, demands and challenges of our existence instead of managing ourselves within them.

The socio-cultural, political, economic-financial and human development problems, difficulties and crises, conflicts and confrontations of today are not the results of a failure of the promise of the Enlightenment to materialize, nor are they the consequences of disconnecting science from religion. They are the results and consequences of failing to take responsibility for ourselves, for what we do, for our behaviour and actions, for how we understand and manage ourselves. They are the results and consequences of failing to understand and manage where consciously we exist and act. Failing to be in charge, take control, be actively engaged and take responsibility for what takes place and what we do in the mind and mental existence.

The promise of the Enlightenment was only about better, more detailed knowledge and understanding and the ability to manage and manipulate the reality of our existence, the world around us, nature and the natural environment. It was to create the ideal external conditions of an ordered, stable, secure and predictable world around us of easy material abundance. It was not about understanding and managing where consciously we exist and act, the mind and mental existence. Reconnecting science and religion also does not lead to an understanding of the mind and mental existence.

Neither science nor religion offers a way to understand and manage the mind and mental existence. Knowledge and understanding of a supernatural-spiritual world does not provide an understanding of the mind and mental existence or how to manage them. Knowledge and understanding of the structure and workings of nature, natural forces, processes and developments also do not provide an understanding of what takes place, what we do and need to do, what we must establish, develop and maintain in the mind and mental existence and how to manage them. The mind and mental existence need to be understood and managed from the inside, from where we consciously exist and act, as reflected in our experience.

Within this context, whether we are the product of evolution or creation is a mute and rather irrelevant point. The debate about whether we should teach evolution, creation or a combination of both in our schools misses the point of what is required in education and training. What is missing in education and training is developing in the individual the knowledge and understanding, the abilities, skills and practices to understand and manage the mind and mental existence, where we consciously exist and act, where we are in charge and in control, where we experience and become aware of the conditions of existence, where we must actively be engaged and take responsibility.