There is a song by a Bengali folk singer Dwij Bhushan, in which he revels about being alive and the great fortune he had of being born in a human form. In the song, called "Hridmajhare Rakhibo", Dwij Bhushan is grateful to life and feels blessed to have the chance to enjoy the beauty and brilliance of this world. Some of the words (roughly translated by yours truly) are as follows:
The sentiments are indeed heartwarming. Every time I sing this song, I can feel the beauty that he speaks of, often leading me to verge of tears. However, in the face of endless war, poverty, disease and ecological crises in this world, I can imagine how this sentiment can feel quite hollow. Not to mention, given the fact that humanity is the source of so much malaise on this planet, one is naturally led to wonder whether Diwj's enthusiasm for the human species has any place in the world today.
If we look at human history and analyze the human species' collective behavior pattern, it can be characterized as a highly intelligent psychopath, with a pathological bent for violence and aggression, and persistent suicidal tendencies. Eckhart Tolle describes the story of humanity as "intelligence in the service of madness". For a rational observer, this is not difficult to agree with. Just the fact that we have been at war for thousands of years demonstrates this pathology. While the number of conflicts have certainly declined (from hundreds of small tribal skirmishes to a handful of major global wars), at the same time our weapons have become deadlier and the scale of casualties have increased manifold. While some scholars like Yuval Harare argue that humanity has become less aggressive over time, others like Eckhart Tolle would disagree with this perspective. I myself do not wish to enter this very specific argument, but only want to make the point that humanity, despite its intelligence and capacity to achieve marvels, is still in the business of slaughtering one another at a global scale. The history of war is intricately tied to the brutal chapters of colonization, slavery, discrimination, trickling down in all aspects of our lives today as poverty, racism, sexism, and other social ills.
Furthermore, the species has now become a tremendous burden on the planet, threatening the very ecological balance of the entire ecosystem. This has occurred in phases of incremental species-wide amnesia, that has caused humanity to forget the womb that it came from. As such, "Mother Earth" no longer exists in our cultural vernacular as a character, let alone being recognized as a conscious living entity. This state of disconnection from the planet is quite contrary to the first 50,000 years of existence of the Homo Sapiens. In comparison to that time, our collective amnesia is only a few hundred years old. And this descent into forgetfulness happened over a short period of time, primarily catalyzed by Western philosophical traditions, beginning with the philosophical rationalism of Descartes, to culminate with Jean Paul Sartre who claimed that "nature is mute". As it stands now, our philosophy, science, technology, politics, and even religions, all align with this amnesiac state of being. At its best, nature is seen to exist as separate from humanity. At its worst, nature is seen to have the singular purpose of being exploited for resources by humanity.
In some ways the ecological crisis and climate change that the planet is facing could be seen as Gaia doing her housecleaning. When the relationship between an organism and its host becomes parasitic, the host inevitably takes actions to expel the parasite from the environment. In a very real sense, that is what is happening on this planet. The only difference here is that, compared to all other host parasite relationships in nature, the human parasite was gifted with intelligence and judgement. So, unlike the lice or weeds, human beings can make choices, to change their behavior and course of action. Therefore, it falls upon humanity to decide what relationship we are to have with the planet, which will then determine whether we survive or not.
If we accept that we still have a choice to bring about our own healing and to ensure our survival, should we still do so? In other words, is there any moral imperative to perpetuate the existence of the human species on this planet? I think the answer to this question is embedded in a different question altogether which is - did humanity come into existence to serve a specific purpose? If the answer is "yes", then there may be reasons to save humanity to allow it to fulfill that purpose. In my understanding, human beings were called into existence to fulfill a biological purpose for nature and a spiritual purpose for the universe.
Our Biological Purpose:
Our place in biology is intricately tied to the teleological progress of nature. This understanding is based upon the idea that nature is a conscious entity, millions of years old, and proceeds in its evolution with purpose. It's important to note here that the idea of nature having a purpose is anathema in the scientific community. The scientific bias against the purpose of nature is an anti-theological hangover from the time of Darwin.
If we let go of the divine touch
Of life that is within us,
We will never get it back again.
So, I will keep this life close to my heart,
I will never let it go.
The sentiments are indeed heartwarming. Every time I sing this song, I can feel the beauty that he speaks of, often leading me to verge of tears. However, in the face of endless war, poverty, disease and ecological crises in this world, I can imagine how this sentiment can feel quite hollow. Not to mention, given the fact that humanity is the source of so much malaise on this planet, one is naturally led to wonder whether Diwj's enthusiasm for the human species has any place in the world today.
If we look at human history and analyze the human species' collective behavior pattern, it can be characterized as a highly intelligent psychopath, with a pathological bent for violence and aggression, and persistent suicidal tendencies. Eckhart Tolle describes the story of humanity as "intelligence in the service of madness". For a rational observer, this is not difficult to agree with. Just the fact that we have been at war for thousands of years demonstrates this pathology. While the number of conflicts have certainly declined (from hundreds of small tribal skirmishes to a handful of major global wars), at the same time our weapons have become deadlier and the scale of casualties have increased manifold. While some scholars like Yuval Harare argue that humanity has become less aggressive over time, others like Eckhart Tolle would disagree with this perspective. I myself do not wish to enter this very specific argument, but only want to make the point that humanity, despite its intelligence and capacity to achieve marvels, is still in the business of slaughtering one another at a global scale. The history of war is intricately tied to the brutal chapters of colonization, slavery, discrimination, trickling down in all aspects of our lives today as poverty, racism, sexism, and other social ills.
Furthermore, the species has now become a tremendous burden on the planet, threatening the very ecological balance of the entire ecosystem. This has occurred in phases of incremental species-wide amnesia, that has caused humanity to forget the womb that it came from. As such, "Mother Earth" no longer exists in our cultural vernacular as a character, let alone being recognized as a conscious living entity. This state of disconnection from the planet is quite contrary to the first 50,000 years of existence of the Homo Sapiens. In comparison to that time, our collective amnesia is only a few hundred years old. And this descent into forgetfulness happened over a short period of time, primarily catalyzed by Western philosophical traditions, beginning with the philosophical rationalism of Descartes, to culminate with Jean Paul Sartre who claimed that "nature is mute". As it stands now, our philosophy, science, technology, politics, and even religions, all align with this amnesiac state of being. At its best, nature is seen to exist as separate from humanity. At its worst, nature is seen to have the singular purpose of being exploited for resources by humanity.
In some ways the ecological crisis and climate change that the planet is facing could be seen as Gaia doing her housecleaning. When the relationship between an organism and its host becomes parasitic, the host inevitably takes actions to expel the parasite from the environment. In a very real sense, that is what is happening on this planet. The only difference here is that, compared to all other host parasite relationships in nature, the human parasite was gifted with intelligence and judgement. So, unlike the lice or weeds, human beings can make choices, to change their behavior and course of action. Therefore, it falls upon humanity to decide what relationship we are to have with the planet, which will then determine whether we survive or not.
If we accept that we still have a choice to bring about our own healing and to ensure our survival, should we still do so? In other words, is there any moral imperative to perpetuate the existence of the human species on this planet? I think the answer to this question is embedded in a different question altogether which is - did humanity come into existence to serve a specific purpose? If the answer is "yes", then there may be reasons to save humanity to allow it to fulfill that purpose. In my understanding, human beings were called into existence to fulfill a biological purpose for nature and a spiritual purpose for the universe.
Our Biological Purpose:
Our place in biology is intricately tied to the teleological progress of nature. This understanding is based upon the idea that nature is a conscious entity, millions of years old, and proceeds in its evolution with purpose. It's important to note here that the idea of nature having a purpose is anathema in the scientific community. The scientific bias against the purpose of nature is an anti-theological hangover from the time of Darwin.
Nonetheless, even a cursory look at the process of evolution of species on this planet, indicate a progressive trend towards complexity, beginning with single celled organisms millions of years ago to arrive at the most complex structure in all of nature, the pre-frontal cortex of the human brain. The result of this process has been the emergence of conscious intelligence on this planet, expressed through the form of Homo Sapiens.
Therefore, as I see it, humanity is nature's gamble with intelligence. A gamble because it can go either way. The intelligence that allows us to create language, poetry, art, spaceships, also equips us to create nuclear warheads with the power to destroy all life on earth. So the question follows - Why did nature take this risk? What is nature's purpose for spawning intelligence?
I find Terence McKenna's response particularly eloquent, albeit quite out of the ordinary. According to him, if we do accept that the biology on this planet is a conscious, intelligent being, with a lifespan of millions of years, we could also assume that nature has an interest in its own survival. McKenna argues that nature spawned intelligence on this planet as a long term insurance policy for itself, operating with the knowledge that in a few billion years the sun will explode. As such, the human experiment is intended to ensure that the biological material of nature has a chance to escape the planet before an inevitable planetary demise. In his own words:
"Imagine in hindsight, the wisdom we would impute to Gaia, if we were to suddenly realize that what is happening on this planet is that, Nature knows that the Sun is going to explode. And what we are is a kind of response to the anticipation of a wounding. That maybe 5 million years ago the geo-heliocentric relationships began to vibrate out of tune. And as a consequence of this a species was called forth that could organize and escape. And we are it......."
If we see the purpose of humanity this way, the future that we are destined to realize (given we do not destroy ourselves) is a future of intergalactic space exploration. Taking ourselves out of our birth vessel, to inhabit other planets, would be fulfilling Gaia's insurance policy, which she paid for by taking a monumental risk with intelligence.
Our Spiritual Purpose:
In the spiritual realm, we must begin by acknowledging that the question itself is a moot one. Because if you really push spirituality to its edge, there is no sense in "should"s or "should not"s, as ultimately all there is in reality is this present moment and the consciousness that is flowing through it. The ultimate spiritual expression is observing reality with objectivity, without judgement of good or bad. In that sense, if the species is indeed going towards destruction, the spiritual reaction to that is to simply observe and accept the reality as it is.
However, if we interject here with the will of a human species that is seeking reasons to save itself, the very emergence of this interjection is a part of this reality as well, and therefore must be observed and allowed to play out as it is. And so, we proceed. In this analogy, the purpose of humanity that we speak of is in the service of the Universal Consciousness. We can look at the question through the lens of a few spiritual truths: These truths are:
Going back to the song, it rejoices in one's own good fortune, that after thousands of rebirths wer are lucky enough to be born a human being. Within this sentiment, lies hidden the essence of the spiritual purpose of humanity. The spiritual traditions view the human form as the only form in which a consciousness can work on its Karmic baggage, to have a chance of transcending its attachments to the world. When a fragmented consciousness within a life comes to end, but still suffers from worldly attachments, it regenerates as another life. On the other hand, if a fragmented consciousness is able to reach a state of liberation or nirvana during a lifetime, it returns to the source consciousness in death, and is not born again.
Therefore, as I see it, humanity is nature's gamble with intelligence. A gamble because it can go either way. The intelligence that allows us to create language, poetry, art, spaceships, also equips us to create nuclear warheads with the power to destroy all life on earth. So the question follows - Why did nature take this risk? What is nature's purpose for spawning intelligence?
I find Terence McKenna's response particularly eloquent, albeit quite out of the ordinary. According to him, if we do accept that the biology on this planet is a conscious, intelligent being, with a lifespan of millions of years, we could also assume that nature has an interest in its own survival. McKenna argues that nature spawned intelligence on this planet as a long term insurance policy for itself, operating with the knowledge that in a few billion years the sun will explode. As such, the human experiment is intended to ensure that the biological material of nature has a chance to escape the planet before an inevitable planetary demise. In his own words:
"Imagine in hindsight, the wisdom we would impute to Gaia, if we were to suddenly realize that what is happening on this planet is that, Nature knows that the Sun is going to explode. And what we are is a kind of response to the anticipation of a wounding. That maybe 5 million years ago the geo-heliocentric relationships began to vibrate out of tune. And as a consequence of this a species was called forth that could organize and escape. And we are it......."
If we see the purpose of humanity this way, the future that we are destined to realize (given we do not destroy ourselves) is a future of intergalactic space exploration. Taking ourselves out of our birth vessel, to inhabit other planets, would be fulfilling Gaia's insurance policy, which she paid for by taking a monumental risk with intelligence.
Our Spiritual Purpose:
In the spiritual realm, we must begin by acknowledging that the question itself is a moot one. Because if you really push spirituality to its edge, there is no sense in "should"s or "should not"s, as ultimately all there is in reality is this present moment and the consciousness that is flowing through it. The ultimate spiritual expression is observing reality with objectivity, without judgement of good or bad. In that sense, if the species is indeed going towards destruction, the spiritual reaction to that is to simply observe and accept the reality as it is.
However, if we interject here with the will of a human species that is seeking reasons to save itself, the very emergence of this interjection is a part of this reality as well, and therefore must be observed and allowed to play out as it is. And so, we proceed. In this analogy, the purpose of humanity that we speak of is in the service of the Universal Consciousness. We can look at the question through the lens of a few spiritual truths: These truths are:
- All existence is essentially an eternal omnipresent consciousness
- Our individual consciousness is a fragmented manifestation of the universal consciousness
- Human beings are spiritual entities experiencing a brief expression in the material realm
This perspective of life, death and consciousness, uncannily repeats itself in various spiritual traditions around the world. You can identify them in Buddhism, Taoism, the narrative around Vipassana meditation, the narrative surrounding Ayahuasca traditions in South America, and of course the teachings of Fakir Lalon Shah (from where the words of Dwij Bhushan emerge). While they cannot be "proven" to be true in any scientific sense, I find veracity in their claims from my own spiritual experiences, and from the fact that over thousands of years, different cultures, at different times, have reached the same conclusions.
Seen this way, the Universal Consciousness does seem to have a vested interest in the existence of the human species. The purpose is two-fold. Firstly, to allow for consciousness to find expression in the material realm, to revel in the beauty of existence and the world. Secondly, to have a chance at reaching Nirvana through a human life, to ultimately allow consciousness to return to its source, thus completing the cycle.
And so, based on the above understanding of human existence and purpose, I am led to conclude that humanity is worth saving from itself. Maybe the reasoning above reads like a ravings of a madman. Maybe this was a foregone conclusion to begin with. Maybe this entire exercise was simply the irrational drive to survive, disguised as rational argumentation. Nonetheless, as the wisdom of the ages say, whatever it may be, it is as it is.
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