Other Implications of DarwinPlus (D+)
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Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one
Albert Einstein
Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like
Lao Tzu
Medicine
Fifty (a hundred?) years from now, the Materialism vs Idealism debate will be explored by every medical student, then by every science sixth former.
§ …and ultimately, in suitably simplified form, by every school pupil.
On the practical level, ‘death’ will be treated more realistically, as a natural condition, and not as an awful failure of medicine. No longer will dying people be forced to endure the indignities of invasive treatment. The doctor, or a specialised assistant, will become a ‘facilitator of transition’ or ‘friend in passing’, ready to explain and comfort, when recovery is impossible. The patient’s wishes will become paramount.
We may also see a shift in cost analysis. It costs many thousands of pounds a week to keep a terminally ill patient in a hospital bed (2019). Might that money be more ‘effectively’ spent on treating healable people? That is the hospital staff’s constant dilemma. ‘D+’ may one day be factored into their considerations. And perhaps the colour of Christian mourning will shift from the black of negativity to the positivity of white; or maybe to the multi-coloured and festive, which would make a lot of sense to the D+ way of thinking. Many other changes will occur, in recognition of the power of Mind on body. The placebo effect will be intelligently set to use;
§ In Thirteen Things that Don’t Make Sense, Michael Brooks states that in 2003 the anti-anxiety drug diazepam (Valium) was shown via a carefully designed trial to be no more than a placebo. In 1978 alone 2.3 billion doses of Valium (‘mother’s little helper’) were prescribed in the USA alone. Sugar pills may well have had the same effect.
hypnotism and cellular memory will be properly investigated, instead of avoided; homeopathy and acupuncture will get honest and un-Skepticised examination; ‘time spent’ will take precedence over ‘pills dispensed’;
§ It is well-known in the medical world that many pills (not just Valium) are no more than placebos. A consultant in psychological medicine at Guy’s Hospital, London is sure that half the people treated with Prozac for depression (and who are not helped at all by the pills) are actually not ‘depressed’ at all, but are lost and bewildered as a result of our current near-global ‘philosophy’, loudly supported by Materialist Science, which claims that humans are nothing but a ‘biological accident with no purpose or goals’.
As far back as the 1980’s Victor Frankl found that some 30% of people seeking therapy at Stanford University complained of meaninglessness (existential void).
The World Health Organisation estimated that depression would be the greatest source of ill-health in the world by 2020.
We can blame Materialist nihilism for much of this misery. In 2023 suicide is the greatest cause of death in young men in the UK.
the various forms of massage (including its equivalent at the various levels of Aura) will be examined as cellular memory is explored; and talking cures will replace many of the chemicals used in current psychiatry.
§ In the 1950’s (when Science was going to solve everything for us) psychiatrists predicted the end of mental illness by the year 2000, thanks to the new psychotropic drugs. (This living object is a chemical machine, so we can fix it with more chemicals.)
The splendidly-named ‘psychoneuroimmunology’, which links emotional states with changes in the immune system, will become the basis for psychosomatic healing, already being developed via various cognitive therapies. And problems like Multiple Personality Disorder, schizophrenia, and psychosis (and maybe even neurosis) will be at least considered in terms of obsession or possession.
§ Wilson Van Dusen, the eminent clinical psychologist, would support this direction. See the chapter on ‘Hallucinations’ in his The Natural Depth in Man.
§ Further work on epigenetics will eventually back psychosomatic healing too. Psychiatrist Norman Doidge is clear that ‘..even talking therapies and imagination can change our brains’ (a remarkable example of Mind over Matter, termed ‘neuroplasticity’: see ND’s The Brain that Changes Itself) and we can be pretty sure that we are indeed in for a huge change in medicine one day… but only after we have ditched Materialism for good
Even ‘miracle cures’ will be considered as less ‘miraculous’ than ’caused by some form of mental input’, be it determination, prayer, absent healing, or supernormal (but unmiraculous) intervention.
The findings of the CIA agent Cleve Backster, that plants can sense the pain suffered by animals, will be integrated into medical diagnosis one day, as will the work of Kirlian photographers and their predecessors (see Chapters 17 and 18). Auras will be scanned, for diagnostic purposes. Light itself has already been used in healing processes. Its use will expand, along with other forms of vibe and the principle of resonance.
Researchers will begin to turn to the ancient texts again to see what light they cast upon the mysteries of healing. Is all healing ultimately self-healing? For example:
‘Every human being is the author of his own health or disease.’ Buddha
This claim is purest nonsense to a Materialist, but to a thoughtful Idealist there is something here to follow up.
We will also see meditation being prescribed. Already medical researchers claim it can reduce blood pressure by ten or even twenty points.
§ I have a small wad of newspaper reports of medical research that shows meditation can help treat depression, hyperactivity, attention-deficit disorder, chronic pain and many other conditions: it can even help to regress cancers. Health professionals have calculated that prescribed meditation could save the NHS billions of pounds in depression treatment. Meditation works largely by reducing stress, and encouraging people to be in the moment, the Now, where Reality takes place, rather than fretting about the past or future. We may even see Happiness Centres being established one day.
What is meditation? It is the act of stilling the incessant Lower mental chunter so that whispers from the Higher might get through. It calms, relaxes and recharges us. There are scores of books on how to do it, but all you really need is to sit quietly somewhere for fifteen minutes, then stop thinking and hold onto an alert sense of positive receptivity (not a zonked out blankness). Easy, eh? Maybe not. First of all just finding somewhere quiet for fifteen minutes can be difficult. And then, the chunterer hates being told to shut up. Don’t struggle. Just smile and say ‘No more chuntering just now thankyou’, and go back to sitting quietly. It helps to have a focus of some sort: perhaps a mantra (a word to keep in mind, but not to mindlessly chant) or yantra (an abstract image to gaze lightly upon) or an icon, or a prayer, or a candle, or a kind thought…. Or just a word with uplifting significance to you. Just keep it in mind… let it arise and fade if it wants to…. But let it gently replace that pointless chuntering whenever it arises. Gradually, your mind will calm, and gradually you will find the benefits. It may take a while, or even a long while.. months or years…. But patience is a natural virtue in a timeless universe. And every expert in the field says that no practice, however small, is ever wasted.
Advanced Yogis (‘rishis’) say that after a suitable period of meditation you actually experience the reality of Life in the Higher, 4d, plane. Hence their Knowledge (as opposed to Believing, or even Understanding) of Higher realms. ‘Maharishis’ may access even Higher realms and dimensions, ‘beyond the veil’. Yogi Ramacharaka’s books are a good introduction.
§ I do not recommend forcing any of this stuff. Read.. think…. But do not practise anything you do not thoroughly understand. Your aim must always be an ethical one and not sensational. Meditation must be aimed towards some state of being, or a Being, which you consider to be of a superior spiritual quality.
There is much more to be said about future medicine, but space is short. If Mind is king… what then?
If it bothers you that medicine might be interfering with a person’s well-deserved karmic suffering, then bear in mind that the Golden Rule is paramount at all times. The Laws of Karma are complex but will resolve themselves, somehow, somewhen. Your Law is simple… be the kindest you possibly can, physically, emotionally and mentally. ‘Kindness’ might sometimes include ‘tough love’ of course. Judgements.. choices… but all made with the well-being of the other person in mind. Intention is all.
Ecology
If the transition from Materialism to D+ is rapid enough, we will be able to save the planet. Man will realise his role and purpose in the world and will act responsibly towards his sustaining environment. Man often already acts surprisingly responsibly even when Materialism constantly tells him that Life is pointless, so when he finally has a rational philosophy, he may do great things. Education, as ever, is the key. Get the basic paradigm/premiss right and all else will follow.
Education
Once Materialism has gone and Man finds Purpose… then he will tell his children all about it as soon as possible. Kids with a sense of proper purpose will become a gigantic force for good.
Syllabuses will be re-organised so that every child will study The Philosophy (or ‘The Religion’ if in a faith school). This will not be a mess of turgid sophistry, but a simple explanation of the key points. And ‘understanding’ will always be the aim, not ‘brainwashing’.
This book is based on the simplest logic imaginable… but most people have never been told what logic is and how it works… so they are confused, and don’t know how to react when faced with an idea that seems to threaten their Churchy or Sciency ‘certainties’. We can fix that, and very rapidly. A competent teacher could teach a class of ten year olds the basics of logic in a week. Teenagers would need a day (or a month, depending). Kids will also be taught how to separate emotional loading from fact, and how to degrease slippery language. There is a lot of Materialist gook to practise on.
The spin-off from this will be enormous. We might see a few advertising agencies going out of business, and kids knowing how to resist the sleazy and nihilistic ‘values’ that magazines, the pop and fashion world, television, adverts and Hollywood pump at them.
Economics
This is a long shot… but as we eventually discover that ‘morality’ is not for suckers, but for Life, I’m sure we’ll see more co-operative and people-based models of commerce and economics springing up. The pioneering work of Muhammad Yunus and his Grameen Bank is a good example.
§ The John Lewis Partnership and Waitrose are already the envy of the commercial world, as they consistently perform well. Their staff are all partners in the firm, and consequently loyalty and involvement is very high. I think we will also see the return of ‘mutuals’ and ‘credit unions’ following the grotesque failure of Thatcherist ‘deregulation’.
The creed of ‘Greed is Good’ unleashed in the 1980’s was welcomed by materialists with a small ‘m’, but its fall-out has been ghastly. Poverty, homelessness, rich-poor gap accelerating, pollution, and the collapse of the entire banking system, as avarice came to dominate what little sense extremely clever bankers appear to have. I’ve seen it claimed that the ‘top’ 400 Americans own as much wealth as the bottom 50% of the population. The greed culture is mainly down to Thatcher and Reagan, who got it via an economist who was convinced that people only work for material bribes: a most cynical Materialist view. Teachers and nurses don’t work for bribes; neither do most other people. Only a few greedy people like bankers do, backed up by economists.
The person behind this bleak view of Mankind was a mathematician called John Nash, who worked on ‘game theory’: a reductionist maths-based view of how people behave in games: ie in strictly competitive circumstances. ‘Social’ game theory assumed that everybody, in all circumstances, is out only for number one: a premiss that is simply not true. Game theory was taken up by economists, unsurprisingly, and no fewer than eight of them have won Nobel Prizes for Economics.
When the Nash-based theories were tested, the only two demographic groups which approved of them were economists and psychopaths.
Social game theory claims that Man is solely a competitive being (according to the perverted ‘social darwinist’ creed of ‘survival of the one with the sharpest elbows’), who constantly seeks more rewards (meaning to an economist ‘more stuff’). Give them more stuff, or make them compete for more stuff, and you can exploit them. The advertisers will be your close allies in this, as will any commercial medium like tv or the press. Make them want more stuff, because after all it’s only making and consuming more stuff that matters to a materialist. It matters more than looking after the planet, or our health or our wisdom or happiness. Ask any economist…
§ ..or politician, alas. This aggressive attitude towards human motivation is a logical extension of extreme left-brain dominance, as witnessed in people whose jobs require classifying and abstract linear thinking: scientists and economists, for example. ‘Selfishness-as-normal’ derives from this, as ’empathy’ is an alien concept to the leftbrain. (See The Master and His Emissary by Iain McGilchrist.) The ‘selfish gene’ mode of thought applies here too, as does the selfish view of human nature required by standard (Materialist) evolutionary theory, whereby all acts and attitudes are directed solely to aid one’s own personal/selfish advantage and survival.
D+ claims that Man is not a competitive animal (in an aggressive sense), but a more or less rational and caring being, doing his best to cope with trying circumstances. For most, competition arises when cooperation fails (often because of the destabilising greed of a few others). And the reward most people seek is not ‘stuff’ but happiness. And people run their lives as if they matter, not as any sort of ‘game’.
The tragedy is that Materialism has even hi-jacked the concept of ‘happiness’, and nobody has noticed.
Surely economics is a branch of psychology, and is thus not reducible to mathematical analysis? People have failed for decades to draw up mathematical formulae to predict the next move of the stock market. D+ sees all such attempts as doomed, as every micro-movement is the result of an individual human choice based upon a myriad of factors.
It’s a ‘chaos’ system en masse, and ‘rational’ only at the fundamental micro level where individual choices are made.
Once the implications of D+ have trickled down even to economists, we will look back upon the economic models of the 1980’s (and continuing) with shame, and perhaps begin to recall the fact that money, like fire or a scientific Theory, is a tool: a power in potential. A good servant but a terrible master.
§ Is it true then that ‘The love of money the root of all evil’ (see Timothy 1 6:10)? I would say ‘no’: Our problem is the fearfulness and yearning for security that gives rise to that greed which manifests as the love of money. It’s all ‘fear’, in the end. We can choose to set ourselves free from this fear by adopting the rational explanations of D+. ‘Collective security’ is the only sort there is.
History
This might look like an odd entry, but I think that the new paradigm of D+ is so radical that it will affect every aspect of our lives. History is always written from a point of view, and the current point of view is generally based upon material progress. This is not surprising, as ‘progress’ is a manmade condition, and one of which he is justifiably proud, even if he finds it hard to define. Is throwing away a billion plastic bags a day ‘progress’? ‘Disposable’ clothing? Bigger traffic jams? Is more and more everything, at any cost to the environment, progress? From the point of view of The Higher, ‘progress’ makes no sense, unless it is for the benefit of all and to the detriment of none, including the planet, as per the Golden Rule.
What does make sense to The Higher is the mental/moral evolution of each individual being, and its effect upon the groups of which s/he is a member.
§ D+ suggests that material progress and undogmatised (Idealist) science is fine; and will be even finer once allied with The Philosophy, and a sense of genuine collective purpose is accepted.
You might say that ‘history’, like the stock exchange and the weather, is a ‘chaotic system’, being made up of googolplexes of tiny individual choices, which play with and against each other, until some of them coalesce into moods or movements, which might eventually erupt into world-altering acts, like a Reformation or a war.
I can see some histories one day being written from this slightly different perspective. Some authors like James Michener and Edward Rutherfurd seem to be already playing with this.
The Arts
I’ve been dreading this bit. The older I get the more pointless ‘The Arts’ seem to have become. Once (under The Church) Art was created for the greater glory of God, although, frankly, I’m not sure what that means.
§ It often seems to mean ‘For the greater glory of The Church’, as God surely does not need gold leaf and marble everywhere. But I can see the possible value of the bling, nevertheless, perhaps as ‘focus’, or even in terms of ‘sacrifice’…. motive is all, in this as in all things.
Since Materialism took over, God and Ultimate Purpose are out, and greed and fear, (the bull and the bear: the only logical alternatives, if you think about it) are in. Art, with no proper sense of purpose, has degenerated into a world of signatures and labels, beloved by the manipulative fashion/sex industry. A BBC presenter once ‘jointly’ drew a skull with Damien Hirst. ‘Whose work is it?’ the presenter asked. DH signed it. It is now worth £1,000,000. ‘And it is hideous’, the presenter said, knowing that if he had signed it instead it would be worth £5, and only to some poor lost soul who actually wanted to have something ugly on his wall.
The movie world turns out a lot of grisly schlockfests, often dressed up as grittily significant for a post-‘apocalyptic’ world, but with lots of orange flames and destruction guaranteed. Materialist nihilism is very obvious. I’ve not read a novel for years. Again… nihilism and misery seem to be de rigueur, along with lots of ritualised and pointless sex. There was even a genre in the 2000’s called ‘mis(ery)-lit’. There is currently a Bad Sex Award, which says more about the state of literature than it thinks.
Modern music’s thumps and squawks and tinkles don’t impress me either. What does impress me is the quality of music that was written by people who had a deep reason for writing it.. which almost always seems to have been a spiritual reason. Palestrina, Byrd, Tallis, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven… and an increasing number of modern singer-songwriters.
How will D+ affect the Arts? Literature might be the quickest to see the point and explore its implications. ‘Art’ won’t, as everyone from ‘artist’ to gallery owner has too much to lose in its trillion dollar back-log.
§ ‘Art is anything you can get away with’. As clear a statement of Materialist pointlessness as you are likely to find, so resonant that it is attributed to at least three people: Andy Warhol, John Cage and Marshall McLuhan.
But one day, someone will notice that that drippy daub really is ugly… and pointless, despite all the gook the dealers and critics come out with. I look forward to the day when art once more relies on skill and vision and has something uplifting and truthful to say. And maybe even beautiful. Remember ‘beautiful’? And it will happen one day, I’m sure. But not as long as Materio-nihilism is our sad little god.
The Paranormal
‘Weirdo Studies’ will become a hot subject once the (mainly very old) ideas in D+ have been digested by the scientific world and the Establishment that science informs. People will get grants for ESP research at last. Telepathy will be impartially investigated, and mediums will again be rigorously examined, as they once were by brave and principled men like Crookes and Wallace. Spooks and ghosties will be contacted and helped (as they already are by ‘rescue mediums’) rather than bullied, or exploited as tourist attractions, just as the mad and demented used to be in asylums, and animals used to be for ‘sport’. Near Death Experiences (NDE’s) and Out of the Body Experiences (OOBE’s) will join lucid dreaming and channelling as ways of investigating ‘beyond the veil’. Eventually ‘the paranormal’ will be included in ‘the normal’, where it has always belonged.
The Quest
There is a recurring theme in literature of Man Seeking Redemption. Cowboy films are full of it, adventure stories… even a lot of gritty movies like Things Exploding in Orange Flames XVII!; and, of course, many love stories. The theme is of unhappy Man (and sometimes Woman) who finds Happiness after trials and despair. Star Wars.. Indiana Jones…. This theme is often called The Hero’s Journey, and it is the mainstay of computer games, although a lot of these seem to confuse rapacity and ruin with redemption, as per the Materialist ‘ethic’.
The theme also turns up in dreams, as we are faced with challenges to resolve. In our ordinary daily lives, our karma insists on us facing up to things we would rather not deal with. We make ourselves heroes by our choices to be brave.
The pilgrimage to Rome or Glastonbury, or the Hajj to Mecca, all reflect the need for dedication and effort in order to reach a worthy goal.
If taken to a higher level, the Hero’s Journey is called The Quest. The Pilgrim’s Progress, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the Arthurian legends… are all concerned with Man striving to reach the Truth of the Higher World. This may be represented by the Holy Grail (the cup of righteousness and wisdom which will fill and fulfil you). Perfection is the goal, and is perceived in transcendental terms. A Buddhist would call The Quest the Path towards Enlightenment. An Esotericist might call it the Pilgrimage towards Christhood. A Gnostic, for whom This world is a cruel illusion, would see it as a striving for the Reality which lies beyond the veil. I believe Wagner’s Parsifal fits in here too.
§ I can’t say for sure as I’ve never felt the urge to hear it in full. Wagner held some esoteric views: ‘…time and space are merely our way of perceiving things, but otherwise have no reality…’ (In a letter to Mathilde Wesendonck, in August 1860). And apparently the film The Matrix is partially based upon Parsifal.
Ancient myths of all cultures have their own versions. The Labours of Hercules is an example. Jason and the Argonauts is another (the golden fleece representing.. guess what?)
All the legends of dragon-slaying heroes tell the same tale again, with the monstrous dragon representing the Lower Self. Some fairy tales and pantomime plots (eg Rapunzel; Jack and the Beanstalk) are also parables to guide us towards the path of what used to be called ‘salvation’, but which DarwinPlus would call ‘mental evolution’… the path from Belief to Understanding and beyond, to Direct Knowledge or Gnosis: the Way, the Tao, Dhammapada: the path of the Seeker.
Even the humble maze began as a metaphor for Man’s Quest, and has roots in all the major religions. And snakes and ladders started life as an ancient Indian game called ‘Salvation or Rebirth’. (Note the ‘or’.)
We also see The Quest under the banner of ‘crusader’, ‘pilgrim’ or ‘jihadi’, or the American shamanic version of ‘warrior’, as in the Toltec tradition and in the books of Carlos Castaneda. In the Hindu Bhagavad Gita, the warrior-quest of Arjuna is spelled out as a physical battle between symbolic armies.
§ Castaneda allegedly spent many years learning Native American sorcery from a local practitioner. His books The Teachings of Don Juan, and A Separate Reality (and others) are very readable. You might like to check out how D+ relates to them.
These are all variations on the theme of Man’s need to become a Hero by ‘fighting the good fight’ and ‘doing battle’ with his Lower weaknesses, and rejecting them, by his own choice and effort, in favour of Higher attitudes and Higher Mind in general.
Unfortunately, ‘crusade’ and ‘jihad’ have often both been distorted to mean ‘murder committed in the name of greed, and/or self-righteous dogma’. From High Mind to Low Behaviour… just like that.
§ Things are never that easy, of course. For a medieval peasant a crusade would be seen as an chance to join The Quest/Pilgrimage. Jerusalem was the Holy City, the city of Christ. It would take sacrifice to get there, which he thought would stand him in good stead when he died, and to be in such Holy Land would automatically mean being closer to God. En route there would be prayers and periods of contemplation at shrines. Eventually he would have the opportunity of cleansing the Sacred Place of the evil and heathen Saracens. Good stuff all round. Obviously there would be opportunities for a bit of rape and pillage en route, and why not? Fair’s fair…
Not surprisingly, the Muslims saw the crusaders as the heathens, not least because of at least one well-documented case of mass slaughter (by King Richard I) and occasional acts of cannibalism that they committed.
As the ideas (re-)proposed as ‘DarwinPlus’ slowly percolate around the world, this perversion will gradually fade. But it will take time. Fanaticism and shouting are more fun than sharing, especially if you get to fire an AK47 into the air a lot and don’t have to pay for the bullets.
The principles behind D+ will gradually infiltrate into The Arts. We can expect to see nihilism fade as hope returns, via the logic of The Philosophy. Once science accepts D+, things will really start to rattle along. Fifty years, I would say… Maybe a hundred. Exciting times. Stay tuned…
§ Some literary tales are clearly karmic in theme. The most obvious one is Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. I think this story is eternally popular as it reinforces what people have always suspected intuitively: the inevitability of karmic justice, backed by the very positive message that you can always choose to alter your ways and begin your personal growth/mental evolution and thereby achieve your own redemption and happiness. Maybe D+ will encourage writing on more overtly karmic themes, perhaps suggesting that Man has four stages of Consciousness: first, the Unconscious state of infancy (plant-like); then Consciousness of external things (animal-like); thirdly, the Self-Conscious stage (‘normal’ – human); and then.. Super-Consciousness (‘Super-man!’ Fully human: up up and away!).
A final thought: St Augustine’s notion of ‘original sin’ has made a lot of people very miserable over the centuries. We might think in terms of ‘individual karmic debt’ instead, but maybe ‘original sin’ is another term for the ‘global karma’ that we all share in, down the generations until it is finally paid off.
>>> Read Chapter 27a on 15th May >>>
The Price We’re Paying
Every delusion is a poison. There are, therefore, no harmless delusions
Schopenhauer
If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail
Abraham Maslow
We’re nearly at the end. Just two points remain.
First, I would like to take a look at the depth of the Materialist morass we are currently mired in; and then how we came to get there.
After that, I’d like to finish the book with a few cheery predictions, because I am optimistic about our future.
>>> Read Chapter 27a on 15th May >>>
If you find these ideas of interest, so will many other people. Please pass the ideas or link on…. Thanks.