The belief held by some people that humanity, or at least some significant portion of it, is undergoing a paradigmatic shift in consciousness will serve as the launching point for this evening’s discussion. We will examine the notions of evolution, progress, consciousness, collective consciousness, complexity, and why they matter, and we will explore the hope that this hypothetical shift in our collective consciousness will save Civilization from its predicament—that is, the twinned crises of ecology and economy, which many of us interpret to be the consequences of civilization’s dominant worldview. We also want to explore the approaches that have been suggested for facilitating the raising of awareness, both individually and collectively, and the numerous obstacles that have presented themselves along the way.

PRODUCER: Carleton Schade

For about a decade now I have been researching the many facets of the ecological crisis and the human predicament. In 2010, I co-authored a paper with Dr. Pimentel of Cornell University in the journal Environment, Development and Sustainability, entitled Population Crash: Prospects for Famine in the Twenty-First Century (find attached). This was pulled from the second chapter of a book project entitled Dieback: the Science and Soul of the Coming Collapse. The March talk at the Integral Salon comes mostly from its sixth chapter, where the savior potential of the evolution of consciousness is analyzed.