John Renesch: Exploring the Better Future

A Potentially Fatal Fallacy

You’ve heard of the “fatal flaw,” sometimes called the “tragic flaw?” It is the one thing people either ignored or forgot about when they set about to achieve something and failed. It is what the forensics people might determine as the primary “cause of death” of the ideal, the project, whatever. Aristotle might have called it hamartia which could connote a failure of morals, or character, or hubris. YourDictionary.com defines this flaw “as pride, in the character of the protagonist of a tragedy… leads to that protagonist's downfall.”

Fallacy on the other hand is “aptness to mislead…deceptive or delusive quality” as in “the fallacy of the senses.” It is a false or mistaken idea or opinion. YourDictionary.com defines is as “an error in reasoning; flaw or defect in argument; an argument which does not conform to the rules of logic, esp. one that appears to be sound.”

Now this seems so befitting to the paradigm of thought so widespread in our Western industrialized society, the misleading “fallacy of the senses” that tells us we are separate from one another, Nature’s resources are unlimited and conflict can be resolved with exacerbation rather than reconciliation. When we start examining this fallacy, it no longer becomes an interesting study of a fallen emperor’s chink, a Waterloo-like decision that brought an end to a regime or even a product launch that ruined a corporation. A fallacious worldview today can lead to extinctions like it does in Nature and collapses like what occurred to regionally isolated societies of the past. 

There’s no such thing as “regionally isolated societies” any more, at least not any modern societies. It might be argued if Western society’s current worldview continues to serve as its basis for relating with one another, continues to “not conform to the rules of logic, especially one that appears to be sound,” who’s “false and mistaken idea or opinion” continues to go unchallenged, a social collapse of unprecedented proportions could result. This would be the fatal fallacy of thought, the flawed thinking that was left unchecked until the evidence was so overwhelming it was too late to do anything but cry.

What do we tell our children? Our grandchildren? Their children? “Sorry, kids, we were too busy to notice.” Or, “Oops, I hope your generation does better than we did.” Well, guess what? Those conversations are already happening! Did you catch the 12 year old girl admonishing a large conference in South America last year on TV? Have you heard of thousands of conversations between parents and their teenage children at dinner tables everywhere? Thank God some of these young men and women possess enough awareness to start thinking differently, at least about environmental matters.

It would be different if changing mindsets were a very expensive proposition. Unlike many of the world’s problems, this challenge is not financial. All it takes is a willingness to think differently, to venture into inquiries that could challenge our beliefs, challenge our assumptions, push against our stubborn attachments to the way things have to be. The price for this change is not monetary. It is not material. It is largely a matter of ego.

Why do we continue living and working within an outmoded paradigm when it has been demonstrated how outmoded our exiting paradigms of thought really are? What a mistake it is to continue operating from their premises. Unimaginable possibilities await us if we dare to embrace new paradigms. So why do we persist in this fallacious thinking? If you answer “because we don’t know any better” that would be a lie given we’ve had people telling us this for almost a century so we could “know better” if we were interested in learning anything.

If your answer is “because we’re set in our ways” then shame on us for continuing a practice knowing it could be leading us to extinction. Sounds completely stupid? So does smoking cigarettes when you know if isn’t good for you. What about “it is too hard”? If this has any merit we must admit to being so addicted to the way we think we won’t consider changing even when it appears life-threatening. Like the alcoholic who often wants to stop and can’t, this third explanation may be the most valid. If this is so, then I propose, we tell it like it is and admit it!

We are left with the truth: we’re simply hooked on our way of thinking and either aren’t willing or don’t want to change. If this is the end game for humanity then at least we can go out in a blaze of glory like Butch and Sundance. Doesn’t sound particularly mature to me but, hey…. Party! Party! Party!

Are We Zombies Or Just Sleepwalking?

I had the pleasure to host social activist and environmentalist Van Jones as my guest yesterday for the Howard Thurman Forum Series. The format is similar to “Inside Actors Studio” which airs on the Bravo TV Network in which host James Lipton interviews a well-known actor with an audience of students at New York’s Actors Studio.

A sizable group of young people, mostly students, were in the audience to hear Van. Their presence definitely influenced the tone of the interview and the comments which followed. By the end of the Forum, it was fairly clear to most of us that we have been a disengaged citizenry for a couple of generations and that for any meaningful change to occur in the U.S., the new generation has to get more involved in the political process. Left to the people in Washington, even with the anticipated changes in the White House with the upcoming elections, things will only get worse. The systems is broken and no heroic figure is going to make much difference unless the system changes. It is also clear where this scale of change is going to come from: we the people.

We the people have abdicated our responsibility as citizens. Our forefathers and mothers made great sacrifices to create a country that could function effectively with checks and balances to maintain order and freedom. Many made huge sacrifices for their country. Nowadays, if we vote every few years we consider ourselves good citizens (the half of us who do vote). The rest is rhetoric – discussing candidates or issues along the way toward voting. Very few of us do any service for the nation such as Peace Corps or the military or even connecting with our elected officials. Most of us are disengaged, busying ourselves with relatively trivial matters like television reality shows, tabloid TV or radio, and fascination with our technologies. Regarding engaged citizenship we have essentially quit. We act as if we are asleep, impervious to the fact that we have the governments we deserve.

Van helped us see yesterday that many of us have been sleepwalking through our lives when it comes to our role as citizens in a democracy. He made an excellent point for the benefit of the younger audience members that they have a sacred responsibility to engage in the politics if anything new is going to occur, no matters who is elected to the White House in November.

The question we have to ask ourselves: can we wake up? Are we merely somnambulating (sleepwalking) or has something died inside us making us zombies, the “living dead” who are beyond recessitating?

These are questions we of the older generations need to ask ourselves now, while there is still hope for real change to occur with the upcoming elections. As Van so eloquently pointed our yesterday, any new President will fail at making real changes without an engaged electorate standing behind them – an electorate determined to fix the system, reform the way politics is done, even reinventing government if that is what it takes.

Whether you are an American or live elsewhere in the world, we are the change we’ve been hoping for. Like the U.S., our world has become too complex for any one person to be a hero and fix things. It will require many of us to get things working again, and that includes me, Van, those young students and you…yes, you the person who is reading this. Yes, you.

My Emails with Iran

In this past week, I connected with two Iranian futurists based in Tehran who are fellow members in Shaping Tomorrow’s Foresight Network. In our first year we have grown to nearly 1,300 members, mostly professional futurists from all over the world.

I invited these two men to engage in a conversation with me given the posturing of our two governments in recent years and the growing tension and talk of invasion by the U.S. I found myself deeply touched when I learned last week they were familiar with my work. I’m known in Iran? I suspect my surprise was largely due to a complete misunderstanding of what the people and the country are like. After all, I have never been there and have only known FORMER citizens of Iran, or Persia as it was called in its past incarnation, and a relative handful at that. As an example of my ignorance, I hadn’t realized Iran is not a Arab country. They speak Farsi and English.

The conversation has just begun, only a couple of days now, but I can already see we have much to learn from one another. One of the men sent me two documents yesterday; one was a 2002 open letter to Americans which he translated for a student-friend of his. It pleads for a creative, conscious and wise approach to resolving conflict rather than the saber-rattling and blustery rhetoric by both governments. Here is a link to the Letter.

The other document was a white paper created by Israeli intelligence on the subject of Iranian cultural values, self-image and negotiation style. He thought that while Israelis may be most critical and judgmental of Iran, I would still find their assessment interesting and informative. Indeed, I did.

I have invited each of them to post here if they so choose and invite anyone else to comment on this entry for the month of May. 

One World, Indivisible

[I am posting my editorial from my July newsletter - FutureShapers Monthly - because I think the subject is important and there is urgency in addressing this. - JR]

The phrase “one nation, indivisible” is very familiar to Americans of my generation who have learned “The Pledge of Allegiance” to their country’s flag in their early school years. Ironically, the pledge was written in the late 1800s for a flag seller as part of an advertising campaign. More recently the words “under God” were inserted between “nation” and “indivisible” but I still recall the original version which I must have repeated hundreds if not thousands of times as a child and young adult. 

                                                                      American schoolchildren pledging allegiance to the flag circa late 1930s

Abraham Lincoln’s famous 1858 speech emphasized "a house divided against itself cannot stand” – words that also come to mind as I was pondering the excess divisiveness so prevalent in my country today. We are presently building silos of ideologies, isolating ourselves into factions and preaching to our choirs about the faults and defects of “the other.” Each silo is suffering from “groupthink” – reinforcing its own dogma and avoiding any feedback that disagrees with the party line. This simply builds the walls dividing us higher and higher, making reconciliation more difficult.

In my mind, there is no doubt that we are well along the way of irreparably dividing ourselves here in the U.S.  I get emails every week, from liberal friends and conservative friends, some calling themselves libertarians, some progressives, that shock me with their vitriol, the mean-spirited nature of their commentaries or, in lieu of their own compositions, the texts they are forwarding which contain such sarcasm and dismissive characterizations of people with whom they disagree. It is as if many people, friends of mine included, are sacrificing relationships in order to be right, subordinating community to their righteousness and, in some cases, putting their opinions ahead of friendships and family. Technology is allowing us to go beyond the limits of common decency because we don’t have “the other” facing us; we can hide behind the shield of technology and hurl our insults from the safety of our computers.

We are taking our opinions far too seriously when we put our prejudices and ideologies ahead of people. There is nothing wrong or unhealthy with contention, debate and even argument as long as it is in the context of respect and relationship with the other person. Successful people realize the benefits of contentiousness and debate. It often improves the outcome as both sides sometimes see value in the other’s position and, usually, a better result emerges. George Washington saw this in our nation’s founding. A strong advocate of opposing sides on issues engaging in debate, he recognized how this could lead to optimal outcomes. However, he was also wary of partisanship that could lead to concretized positions and less than optimum results, often a compromise to the lowest common denominator.

Healthy differences of opinion have helped America grow and prosper. Respectful contentiousness comes with citizenship in a democracy! The diversity of ideas and cultures has proven incredibly valuable in our nation’s history. After the contentiousness the opposing players can laugh together, have a beer and leave with good natured feelings for all concerned. But vitriolic, cruel and dismissive sarcasm and meanness leads to rifts that may prove permanently damaging to others – people, perhaps even friends and family members. Like war without explosions, it leads to deep wounds that cannot be healed with a beer or a laugh.

What effect does this “dissing” (disrespectful and dismissive behavior) of each other have in the rest of the world? How many culture wars are going on, above the surface and below, where the opposing parties harbor hate and disrespect for the other side. America, once a model for the power of a diverse democracy, has now become a model of separation, “us versus them” which reflects in our domestic politics (which is reported around the world every day) and our hegemonious foreign policy. The world is becoming more divided in stark contrast to the 1945 U.S.-sponsored vision for a united world (the United Nations). The United States is now engaged in a new “civil war;” instead of blue versus grey it is red versus blue..

We are creating a “divisble” nation and a “divisble” world. Can the nation still stand if it is divided? Was Lincoln wrong? Or will it fall apart as ideological factions take precedence over relationships with fellow citizens?

Borders on maps are human constructs which are artificial anyway so the world won’t really be divided – only the people will. States and nations are also artificial so they may go extinct but not the continents on which they once stood. The planet will survive our divisiveness but will our civilizations? 

Do you know the story of the collapse of the Easter Island civilization?  They could build 80-ton statues 33 feet high which remain there today as evidence of their civilization. And they could drag them 12 miles where they arranged them in a pattern, a seemingly impossible task given their lack of technology. They could navigate the Pacific Ocean, reaching the most remote islands in the world. However, to do this they could also cut down their rich rain forest, ultimately dooming themselves to extinction.  With no trees left for fishing canoes, the Easter Islanders turned to finding more and more reasons to hate one another, eventually resorting to cannibalism and devouring each other. The population fell by 90% in a few years and neither the society nor the island ecology have recovered in the 300 years since.

How can people be so dumb, you might ask? Evolutionary biologist Jared Diamond says that sometimes it's a failure to perceive a problem, especially if it comes on very slowly, like climate change. Often it's a matter of conflicting interests with no resolution at a higher level than the interests --- warring clans, greedy industries. Or there may be a failure to examine and understand the past.

Unless more people start insisting on respectful communications about their ideologies – their “interests” - and encourage dialogue rather than war as a means of reconciling their different interests, our species will continue to divide and fragmentize. Will our incivility toward one another degenerate into some modern version of cannibalism? Unless we cease this warring – domestically with each other and internationally through our foreign policy – we just might continue to perceive the problem until it is too late. 

We are better than this! We can do much better in getting along with one another. So let’s use technology to bring us closer together, not further separate us. Let’s stand for a higher road in reconciling our differences. If we insist on perpetuating this divisiveness, humans could be added to the endangered species list.

Recorded history has been consistent regarding the lifecycle of empires. All the ones with which we are familiar – Mongolian, Spanish, Portuguese, Roman, British, Soviet and Ottoman to name a few – have not been overturned by another power. All of them have imploded, weighted down by their own hubris, much like Easter Island. Let us walk a different path and cease this divisiveness before we ruin this great country. Let us start the essential self-reflection we have so stalwartly avoided.

Join me in ending the cycles of incivility, negativity, disrespect and sarcasm. Take a stand by refusing to engage in conversations or email exchanges that perpetuate these cycles that take us all down to lower and lower levels of human relationship. Stop listening to it; stop repeating it; stop encouraging this pattern of divisiveness. Instead of opposing what we don’t like, let’s start proposing what we do want. Instead of spouting our opinions and preaching to those in our silo, let’s reach out to those who have different viewpoints. Nothing will change unless we do.

Conscious Futures

This is my first experience at blogging so my rookie eyes and mind can be easily surprised, I suppose. I just heard there have been 150 visits to my last post of mine and I'm surprised there hasn't been at least one posting. So...since somebody is actually reading these, here's another thought fresh from my afternoon walkabout along the streets of San Francisco.

Envision a future where almost everyone makes each choice with consciousness and full attention on what they were doing. Think of the world we could have!

Look at how we got this far in our survival of the fittest evolution. Most people through the ages have been well-intentioned, passionate, caring folks who were doing the best they could with what they had and knew. A few gifted people did magnificent things with their passions and skills, inventing, discovering, creating art and literature, leading movements and serving humanity. And civilization as we know it has evolved pretty positively despite a relative few dark individuals who were more infatuated with hate and power over others than love for their fellow human beings - as most were.

Considering there has been almost no consciousness in play through the millennia, we've done all right so far! But now, for the first time in history we have a new ability...we can destroy ourselves, annihilate the human race. One person can destroy millions of us thanks to our technological advances.

With great power comes responsiubility say sages through the ages. With this significant increase in our ability to do great harm,  comes a need to be a bit more mature in the choices we make, recognizing the long term impact of our actions and converting all the wealth of information we have available to us to practical wisdom.

If we evolved this far without thinking much about it, merely following invention after invention, discovery after discovery, cure after cure, think of what an exciting, sustainable, peaceful and compassionate future we could have if we stayed awake all the time.