If Extended Consciousness Went Mainstream Tomorrow, How Would the World Change?

Thought it might be interesting to speculate in a "just-for-fun", imaginative way: How would the world change if your preferred model of spirituality, life, the universe, and everything were to be suddenly accepted by mainstream science and society?

Some questions to consider: How would society change? How would arts/entertainment change? How would politics change? On a personal level, how would your work life or career change? How would your relationships change? How would your hobbies change? How would your inner life change? Etc.

(It may be helpful to briefly mention what your preferred model is at the beginning of your speculation.)
 
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http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2015/03/video-lecture-by-john-lennox-explains.html
Andrew Sims, past president of Royal College of Psychiatrists: "The advantageous effect of religious belief and spirituality on mental and physical health is one of the best kept secrets in psychiatry and medicine generally. ... In the majority of studies, religious involvement is correlated with well-being, happiness and life satisfaction; hope and optimism; purpose and meaning in life; higher self-esteem; better adaptation to bereavement; greater social support and less loneliness; lower rates of depression and faster recovery from depression; lower rates of suicide and fewer positive attitudes towards suicide; less anxiety; less psychosis and fewer psychotic tendencies; lower rates of alcohol and drug use and abuse; less delinquency and criminal activity; greater marital stability and satisfaction… We concluded that for the vast majority of people the apparent benefits of devout belief and practice probably outweigh the risks.​



http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2012/09/skepticism-big-lie-activist-skeptics.html
Research shows that belief in the paranormal and religion can be conducive to the health and well being of people. These beliefs can help people cope with grief, divorce, job loss, the fear of death, particularly in the terminally ill, and can deter suicide.
 
http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2015/03/video-lecture-by-john-lennox-explains.html
Andrew Sims, past president of Royal College of Psychiatrists: "The advantageous effect of religious belief and spirituality on mental and physical health is one of the best kept secrets in psychiatry and medicine generally. ... In the majority of studies, religious involvement is correlated with well-being, happiness and life satisfaction; hope and optimism; purpose and meaning in life; higher self-esteem; better adaptation to bereavement; greater social support and less loneliness; lower rates of depression and faster recovery from depression; lower rates of suicide and fewer positive attitudes towards suicide; less anxiety; less psychosis and fewer psychotic tendencies; lower rates of alcohol and drug use and abuse; less delinquency and criminal activity; greater marital stability and satisfaction… We concluded that for the vast majority of people the apparent benefits of devout belief and practice probably outweigh the risks.​



http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2012/09/skepticism-big-lie-activist-skeptics.html
Research shows that belief in the paranormal and religion can be conducive to the health and well being of people. These beliefs can help people cope with grief, divorce, job loss, the fear of death, particularly in the terminally ill, and can deter suicide.
Great answer, Mr. Smith!
 
Thought I would develop a graphic for my blogsite, which describes ignosticism (and my personal derivations therein) and current view of spirituality. It fits to some degree your question Dan.

I have not lived a particularly easy life, and recognize the bars of this prison. But I find (and I will not go into the circumstances) that inner spiritual power grows under this model. That does not serve to make it 'correct', nor does such imply that the world would become instantly better if everyone held to this understanding. Of such knowing I cannot boast.

The Gilded Hell.png
 
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My model of spirituality is at an individual level. Most people would neither get it nor implement it correctly. There is no dogma to be consumed and followed. Thus, I do not think it would be useful for most in society. So society wouldn't change much, if at all.

To me "spirituality" means nothing more or less than focusing on the non-material aspects of our being and learning about those aspects' connections with other non-physical forces and beings.

A satan worshipper is 'spiritual" - I don't agree with the practice at all, but it is a spiritual practice.

The model involves;
1. Making oneself physically and psychologically tough - not hard, cold, cruel, crude - just tough; meaning resistant to self-pity and self-importance (really, self-pity flows from self-importance).
2. Engendering a true sense of humbleness - this flows partly from the elimination of self-importance in item 1, but goes deeper and is the result of being exposed to experiences that build confidence, yet simultaneously demonstrate that every day is a blessing and that but for the grace of god, there go I.
3. Develops a personal code of honor and ethics that are more important than whatever it is that might make a person deviate from said code of honor and ethics. Among the prescribed attitudes and behaviors is respect for other people and all living things. No one/nothing bows to you and you bow to no one/nothing. You may have to fake it to navigate along your way, but you don't mean it (the bowing, that is).
4. A solid education in the humanities combined with a field that causes one to think cleanly and logically.

1,2,3 and 4 occur simultaneously and are iterative/feedback loops. Training is rough and unforgiving, yet a sense of humor is encouraged.

Time in training - approx. 10 years (note: one has never "arrived". It is life long process. 10 years should suffice to move onto the next evolution)

5. Meditation is introduced along with, perhaps, a form of yoga.

References and refinement of 1 - 4 continue

Time in training - approx. 3 years

6. More intense methods are added to meditation. This could be psychedelics and/or spending days gazing at the shadows of things, instead of the things themselves and/or immersion in flotation/isolation tanks, walking backwards for a day a time, etc. - Exercises that will help stop the consensus earth bound reality as it has been habituated and that open one's perception to previously access denied zones of one's consciousness.

Time in training - varies by individual; 1 to 5 years

At this point we approach the goal - to realize the totality of one's being as a spirit. To perceive what is not normally perceived by our day to day ego bound mind. To understand that there is more to us and more to the world/universe than we ever imagined - and that we can experience it. To be free. And to understand that our nature is to be perceptually fluid (ok..maybe there is a little dogma, but it has to be experienced directly - at which point it isn't dogma to the experiencer).

What comes next is the realization that, being free from the conceptual and perceptual bounds of every day ego life on earth, there is no reality except the path we walk; a path of the heart and soul and the knowledge we gain along the way and, perhaps, the love we share as well ( if it is in the individual's nature to be love giving).AND to be able to direct our fluid perceptual capabilities with our will or intent.

So I could see implementing this for small groups of people in something like a shaolin setting/Taoist Warrior/Monk Temple.

I wouldn't want to change society. I think that is dictatorial and takes people as powerless children. That is cruel to do to people, though many think it "spiritual" to treat others as incompetents and victims. Let people decide for themselves what they want and let them live with the fruits of their decisions.

Or maybe implement a lite version of the program I described above for everyone starting in grade school. Of course with all the snow flake crybabies and assorted other weaklings, the program would last about a minute before the protests, lawyers and lawsuits.
 
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But I find (and I will not go into the circumstances) that inner spiritual power grows under this model. That does not serve to make it 'correct', nor does such imply that the world would become instantly better if everyone held to this understanding. Of such knowing I cannot boast.

Thanks, ES. Appreciate your thoughts here.

My model of spirituality is at an individual level. Most people would neither get it nor implement it correctly. There is no dogma to be consumed and followed. Thus, I do not think it would be useful for most in society. So society wouldn't change much, if at all.

To me "spirituality" means nothing more or less than focusing on the non-material aspects of our being and learning about those aspects' connections with other non-physical forces and beings.
Thanks, Eric Newhill. This is an interesting perspective. I hadn't been looking at things like this, but I see where you're coming from.
 
Thanks, ES. Appreciate your thoughts here.


Thanks, Eric Newhill. This is an interesting perspective. I hadn't been looking at things like this, but I see where you're coming from.

Just my outlook. I could be wrong.

If you want to change society, then the conspiracy theorists will see you as an evil genius mastermind behind everything that happens and they will hate you like the "CIA" ;-) - especially if the change was a natural evolution/unintended consequence. Then "woke" people would resist your change.
 
Just my outlook. I could be wrong.

If you want to change society, then the conspiracy theorists will see you as an evil genius mastermind behind everything that happens and they will hate you like the "CIA" ;-) - especially if the change was a natural evolution/unintended consequence. Then "woke" people would resist your change.
Understood. I was thinking of natural evolution/unintended consequences when I wrote up the question.
 
These two quotes by Titus Rivas summarize very well my preferred model of spirituality:

My own conceptualisation of reincarnation is personalistic. I hold that the mind is not some impersonal or collective category, but the life of a constant, substantial self.
AMNESIA: The universality of reincarnation and the preservation of psychological structure

An individualist spirituality is not about collective entities, but about the interests of individuals and their relations with other individuals. Therefore it concentrates on spiritual concepts that put individuals first. Examples of such concepts are personal immortality, personal growth and personal love.
Libertarian Spirituality

On a personal level probably nothing would change, because I already hold this view.

Jim_Smith already mentioned the positive effects of belief in the paranormal and religion. I think that people could cope better with grief and lose the fear of death. At the least the fear of death and the anxiety it causes would be greatly reduced.
 
While people in general would have less fear of death as per the research's suggest, I think it would get gamed pretty quickly to promote a more apathetic public.
 
Thought I would develop a graphic for my blogsite, which describes ignosticism (and my personal derivations therein) and current view of spirituality. It fits to some degree your question Dan.

I have not lived a particularly easy life, and recognize the bars of this prison. But I find (and I will not go into the circumstances) that inner spiritual power grows under this model. That does not serve to make it 'correct', nor does such imply that the world would become instantly better if everyone held to this understanding. Of such knowing I cannot boast.

View attachment 1158
This is nit-picking I suppose, but I would not include anything from modern phsics - p-branes, M-theory, supersymmetry, aany particles that don't live long enough to get clear of the collision that supposedly created them. I'd definitely exclude emergence. None of that stuff is anything more than a mathematical conjecture.

David
 
Thought it might be interesting to speculate in a "just-for-fun", imaginative way: How would the world change if your preferred model of spirituality, life, the universe, and everything were to be suddenly accepted by mainstream science and society?

Some questions to consider: How would society change? How would arts/entertainment change? How would politics change? On a personal level, how would your work life or career change? How would your relationships change? How would your hobbies change? How would your inner life change? Etc.

(It may be helpful to briefly mention what your preferred model is at the beginning of your speculation.)
What an intriguing notion. Just discovered it.

I am an 'aspiring animist', so I imagine how things would be if we were all animists. Very different. Imagine there were no materialists. We would not presume many things we presume now. Our sense of justice would be different. Our sense of value and what it is okay to do to get what you want would be different. We would live and think differently.
 
There was a time when animism was mainstream, globally. But my vision for the future is not going back to how things were in terms of belief - but to bring what we have gained in the past 1400 to 500 years into a new way of knowing that blends 'objective' insight with a maturation of mentality. The essential precepts of animism remain valid, but we have evolved as persons, and in so doing have lost those precepts in a blizzard of self-interest as technology, in particular, has transformed our expectations of physical life. Returning to those enduring valid precepts is a transformative act because it alters our sense of relationship with our reality, and hence our values, then our conduct.
 
This is an interesting thread which I only became aware of today, because someone reported some spam, which I removed from this thread!

I am not totally sure that the change would be that massive, because a lot of people live for their children, who generally outlive them and are in turn outlived by their children. Many other people live for certain causes or ideas, or they create other things that they hope will outlive them.

However, I doubt whether a society that actually knew the truth would make too much sense. Hy impression is that this life can only be appreciated fully if we do not know what follows next - rather as many stories - or even football matches - are spoiled if you know the end ahead of time!

David
 
This is an interesting thread which I only became aware of today, because someone reported some spam, which I removed from this thread!

I am not totally sure that the change would be that massive, because a lot of people live for their children, who generally outlive them and are in turn outlived by their children. Many other people live for certain causes or ideas, or they create other things that they hope will outlive them.

However, I doubt whether a society that actually knew the truth would make too much sense. Hy impression is that this life can only be appreciated fully if we do not know what follows next - rather as many stories - or even football matches - are spoiled if you know the end ahead of time!

David
To some extent, David, humans have had it pretty much right until the advent of Christian theology, and its bastard children, atheism and materialism. But knowing what is 'true' and 'real' is one thing, and how you behave with it is another.

I don't see how know what happens next is an issue. Its how we mostly live our lives. When I get into my car to drive to my office in Lithgow [NSW] I am not going to be pleased if I end up in Scotland - I'd love to go to Scotland - but under conditions other than random geographic relocation. Football matches are meaningful only because there are rules the players and fans know.

Order is where we are. It is spiced with uncertainty, not directed by it.
 
I don't see how know what happens next is an issue.
What if what happens next is oblivion? That seems a fairly widespread view, at least in how things are expressed publicly. Doesn't that reflect in how the present is viewed too? In particular the consequences of how we live today would amount to precisely zero.
 
What if what happens next is oblivion? That seems a fairly widespread view, at least in how things are expressed publicly. Doesn't that reflect in how the present is viewed too? In particular the consequences of how we live today would amount to precisely zero.

It isn't. But we act as if it is one moment and not the next, which is why we are confused. Public policy in most democratic countries is a bastard hybrid of muddled metaphysical presumptions about the nature of human reality. Actual knowledge is possible and has been so for ages. But neither mainstream religion nor mainstream atheism/materialism can abide the prospect of knowledge contrary to their faiths.

But normal humans do not live their lives that way. Mostly we presume a positive spiritual dimension. This is evident in materialist discourse as well - but disguised as secular and sentimental thought - or as high intellectual effort [which is as much philosophical gibberish as is theology]. In short, there is a whole massive pile of elaborate and misleading bollocks uttered with the prime intent to deflect us from our native senses - its called culture. There was a time when culture reinforced the sacred, and now it seeks to negate it [confusing with with religion] or funnel it into secular fantasy. Google the top 100 grossing movies and check out the themes. There's a hunger for the sacred and the metaphysical but it is deflected into secular entertainment.

Imagine a culture that cherished the sacred a nourisher of what is best in us rather than as a predator exploiting what is largely unconscious or not well formed.
 
It isn't. But we act as if it is one moment and not the next, which is why we are confused. Public policy in most democratic countries is a bastard hybrid of muddled metaphysical presumptions about the nature of human reality. Actual knowledge is possible and has been so for ages. But neither mainstream religion nor mainstream atheism/materialism can abide the prospect of knowledge contrary to their faiths.
Spot on!

I was struck by a conversation I had with three friends some years ago. Someone brought up death (not such a taboo subject as some would pretend), and all three said that when you are dead, you are dead. I normally keep quiet about my interest in all things Skeptiko, but I tentatively introduced the subject of NDE's. To my amazement all three then described experiences they had had that closely resembled NDE's. For example, one of them described how, when he was 3 or 4, he went shopping with his grandma. The shop was hot and stuffy, and suddenly he found himself staring down at himself from above. After a few seconds, his grandma clearly became aware that something had happened, and began shouting at him to wake up, at which point he returned to his body!

I was the only one who had not had such an experience!

David
 
Spot on!

I was struck by a conversation I had with three friends some years ago. Someone brought up death (not such a taboo subject as some would pretend), and all three said that when you are dead, you are dead. I normally keep quiet about my interest in all things Skeptiko, but I tentatively introduced the subject of NDE's. To my amazement all three then described experiences they had had that closely resembled NDE's. For example, one of them described how, when he was 3 or 4, he went shopping with his grandma. The shop was hot and stuffy, and suddenly he found himself staring down at himself from above. After a few seconds, his grandma clearly became aware that something had happened, and began shouting at him to wake up, at which point he returned to his body!

I was the only one who had not had such an experience!

David

Interesting story. So often folk toe the standard line because they expect that is what is acceptable. It often take only one nonconformist to open the flood gates.

I had a colleague open up to me a few years ago because of something I said [I am not at all guarded - but I am not insensitive]. She said she had nobody to talk to because she feared being insulted or proselytised. She didn't want intensity, just to be heard with respect, gently. She had an experience she hadn't told her husband about because his POV was plainly made, often apparently. She subsequently broached the subject of her experience with friends and was astounded, and relieved, to discover they harboured similar thoughts and fears.

The fear of intensity seems to be common. Reactions include vehement denial by materialists, utter rejection of validity by religious, or idiot enthusiasm from flakey supporters. My colleague said it was 'amazing' to talk to somebody in a cool and calm manner. We never talked about her experience again - or anything related - after those few initial chats. She just wanted to release the tension her experience had created. Maybe she had ongoing discussions with her friends? Probably not.
 
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