Chapter 16.                   Part C 

It is also worth noting here that as we think about how Science and its methods work, we realize, as Nicholas Maxwell has stressed many times, that it contains one more implicit assumption. This second implicit assumption is that human minds can figure out the laws of this difficult and confusing place, i.e. that we're not kidding ourselves about how smart we are. But all the evidence of the history of Science, and of humanity more generally, suggests that we can figure those laws out. We're pretty smart. Therefore, I choose to gamble again, this time on the power of human minds, sometimes alone, sometimes in cooperation with other human minds, to see through the layers of irrelevant, trivial events and to spot the patterns that underlie their larger movements. Then we can test and revise and gradually arrive at models and natural law statements that really do explain the world, and so we gradually come to master the knowledge that empowers us to design – and engage in – focused, strategic actions that get survival-favoring results.

Again, the majority of the citizens of the West see this choice-gamble as the only rational one to take. The alternative to believing in the power of human minds, individually or in cooperating groups, to figure out the laws that underlie reality is to abandon reason in favor of beliefs founded on something other than observable, replicable, material facts. To trust old books and theocrats. But once again, we have the evidence of centuries of human history to look back on. All of the evidence that we have about what life was like for the superstitious, cowed tribes of the past suggests that their lives were – as Hobbes puts it – nasty, brutish, and short. People who were willing to think, analyze, experiment, and learn made this society that we enjoy; even the vast majority of Luddite cynics who claim to despise modernity won’t go two days without a shower.  

My first main point or conscious realization on the road to the theistic view, then, is that these beliefs in the consistency of the laws of the universe and in the power of the human mind to figure them out, when added together, amount to a kind of faith. To atheists and skeptics, this very belief system, they feel, can't properly be called a "faith" at all. It certainly doesn’t lead them to a belief in God. It simply enables scientists, skeptic and theistic alike, to keep doing Science and to share ideas about Science with anyone else who is interested. More than that, atheists say, it does not entail.

But, now let's add some other powerful ideas. If we truly believe in Science, then we are committed to trying to integrate into our thinking all well-supported theories in any of the branches of Science. In this twenty-first century, what that means is that we must now try to integrate uncertainty, quantum and non-quantum, into our worldview. Earlier we saw that extrapolating from the quantum model led us to conclude that the values that we call "freedom" and "love" are real, i.e. that our believing in these values and living under the worldview that they entail, leads to survival-oriented, real-world consequences.

              

                                     

                                                                                  Erwin Schrodinger

            However, quantum theory, once it's accepted, also comes with some other startling corollaries and experimental findings attached. Quantum entanglement implies that the universe feels itself, all over, all at once. The universe is not, as pre-quantum science pictured it, cool, local, and aloof. It is capable of what Einstein called "spooky action at a distance", and in fact, it functions that way all of the time. (5.) Our best twenty-first century model of the universe is telling us that all of the parts of the universe are in touch, instantly, with all of the other parts, all of the time. Schrodinger put it this way: "There seems to be no way of stopping [entanglement] until the whole universe is part of a stupendous entanglement state." (6.)

            If distant parts of an entity are in touch with each other - in the case of the physical universe, instantly - then, it is entirely reasonable to postulate that there must be a controller of some kind connecting the "stimulus", of a spin reversal of one particle and the "response", of another particle in some distant location reversing its spin, by postulating a controller of some kind in between.   

            This way of seeing the universe as being a kind of aware is my second big idea. It is well known to scientistic atheists. It is a way that they admit is getting a tiny bit closer to saying that there is a possibility of a sort of a God.  

      

                

                                                                              Murray Gell-Mann

But, according to the science-minded atheists, all of these ideas about how the universe stays consistent and how it seems to be a kind of aware, even taken together, add up to a "trivial" belief. Nobel Prize-winning physicist Murray Gell-Mann went so far as to derisively call this whole way of thinking "quantum flapdoodle". (7.)  

               

            In other words, we may have deep feelings of wonder when we see how huge and amazing the universe really is – far more amazing, by the way, than any science or religion of past societies made it seem. We may even have intuitions that tell us that in order for information to go instantaneously from one particle in one part of the universe to another particle in another vastly separated part suggest, there must be a controlling consciousness of some kind joining the two. But these feelings, the atheists say, don't change anything. The God that theists describe and claim to believe in - even if, under the scientistic worldview we agree to accept that the concept might be worth discussing - by all of the evidence, doesn't answer prayer, doesn't give us some other existence after we die, doesn't do miracles, and doesn't “care” one way or the other about us or how we behave.

               Chapter 16.                 Part B 

         But as David Hume famously proved, the logic that the scientific method is built on is not perfect. Any natural law that we try to state as a way of describing our observations of reality is a gamble, one that may seem to summarize, and bring order to, whole files of experiences, but a gamble nonetheless. A natural law is a (gambling) scientist's claim about what he thinks is going to happen in specific future circumstances. But every natural law that we may propose is taking for granted a deep first assumption about the real world. That assumption is that events in the future will keep steadily following the patterns that we have been able to spot in the flows of events in the past. Our problem is that we haven't been to the future. We simply can't ever know whether this assumption is true. At any time, we may come on new data that stymie our best theories.

                                          

                                                 

            In short, Science is still open to making mistakes. For scientists themselves, a shocking example of such a mistake was the "mistake" in Newtonian physics. Newton's models of how gravity and acceleration worked were excellent, but they weren't telling the whole story of what goes on in the world. After two centuries of taking Newton's models and equations as gospel, physicists were stunned by the experiment done by Albert Michelson and Edward Morley in 1887. It essentially showed that Newton's laws were not adequate to explain all of what was really going on. Einstein's thinking on these new data is what led him to the Theory of Relativity. But first came Michelson and Morley's experiment, which showed that the scientific method, and Newton, were not infallible.

            Newton was not proved totally wrong, of course, but his laws were shown to be mere rough approximations, accurate only for smaller masses and at slower speeds. As the masses and speeds that we are looking at get larger, Newton's laws become less and less useful for predicting what is going to happen next.    

               

            Nevertheless, we should note, it was a scientist (Einstein) doing science who found the limitations of the laws and models specified by an earlier scientist. Newton was not amended by a clergyman or a reading from an ancient holy text. Thus, from the personal standpoint, I have always believed, I still believe, and I am confident that I always will believe, that the universe is consistent, that it runs by laws which - even though we don't understand all of them very well yet - will be the same in 2525 as they are now. Relativity theory described how the stars moved in the year 100,000,000 B.C. exactly as accurately as it describes the stars’ movements now, and, in that era, living things reproduced and changed by the process that we call "evolution" just as reliably as living things do now. I believe that, for living things, genetic variation and natural selection are constants.

But I can’t prove beyond any doubt that the universe runs by one consistent set of laws; I can only choose to take a Bayesian kind of gamble and decide to gamble on the foundational belief that this is so. I prefer this belief as a starting point over any alternative beliefs that portray the universe as being run under laws that are capricious and unpredictable. Science has had so many shining successes that, even if I can't be assured that its findings and theories are infallible, I choose to heed what scientists have to say. That choice, for me, is just a smart Bayesian gamble, preferable to any of the superstitious alternatives. Or as Robert Frost said:  

                                  Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

                                  I took the one less traveled by,
                                  And that has made all the difference. 

                  

         

There is even evidence which tells us that the superstitious tribes of the past knew of the inductive method and gained knowledge by it. (2.) (3.) (4.) They only turned to their gods when they couldn’t figure out how some natural process worked. One of the big effects of Science has been to gradually dispel more and more superstitions as better insights into the workings of physical reality are acquired. In fact, most people today, at least in the West, concede almost automatically that superstitions do need to be dispelled. Plagues aren’t caused by evil spirits or God's punishment, and they don’t go away if we burn an incense stick or chant for days at a time. But if we control the rats, we can control bubonic plague. And, in another example, if we selectively breed our livestock, then our chickens, cows, sheep, and pigs keep giving more eggs, milk, wool, and meat. In short, humans everywhere and for a long time have been gradually becoming more and more rational.   

My model of cultural evolution further showed me why it is that some superstitious beliefs hang on for generations before they are dispelled. But in the end, as old thinkers are replaced by more enlightened ones, the method of human learning, whether it is individual or tribal, is an inductive one. We get ideas about the material world and we test them. With giant ones like worldviews or moral systems, we sometimes test them over generations and what we learn is absorbed by the whole tribe over generations, rather than cognized by any one individual. But our knowledge keeps growing, as it must if we are to survive. We are the only concept-driven species that we have, so far, encountered. The knowledge-building, social way of surviving is the human way. Our genetically acquired assets (speed, strength, etc.) are trivial by comparison. We live by learning or we die.

          Chapter 16                      The Theistic Bottom Line                       Part A

            The three large principles summed up in the previous chapter are enough. With them established, we have enough to conclude that there is a higher power or consciousness in the material universe in which we live. Or rather, as was promised in the introduction, we have enough to conclude that belief in God is a rational choice for a thinking, informed, modern human being to make.

            And that is the whole point. Belief in God is a choice. It is simply a more rational choice than its alternatives. It is also worth re-iterating three other points here: first, we must have a moral program in our heads to function at all; second, the one we've inherited from the past is dangerously out-of-date; and third, whatever new one we devise, it will have to be turned from a cerebral code into a personal one. A moral code must be felt and lived as personal or else it isn't really a moral code at all.     

          

            This final chapter gives the more informal explanation and interpretation of the pieces that have been assembled so far, and adds some other, better known pieces whose significance in this discussion will now be explained as we go. Along the way, it also tries to answer some of the most likely reactions to this book. My promise was that at the end of this book, we would be able to assemble a strong case for theism, i.e. belief in God. We're almost there. We shall begin this last chapter by revisiting, in a more personal way, a vexing problem in Philosophy mentioned in an earlier chapter, a problem that is three hundred years old. The solution to this vexing problem drives home our first main point on the final stretch of the thinking process that leads to theism.  

                              

                                                   photo representing popular image of a scientist

            Many scientists claim that their branch of human knowledge, unlike all of the ones that came before the rise of Science, does not have any basic assumptions at its foundation and that it is instead built from the ground up on merely observing reality, hypothesizing, designing and doing research, checking results against one's hypothesis, and then doing more hypothesizing, research, etc. Under this view, Science has no need of unprovable foundational assumptions in the way that, say, Philosophy or Euclidean Geometry do. Science is founded only on hard fact, they claim. But in this claim, as has been pointed out by thinkers like Nicholas Maxwell, those scientists are wrong. (1.)

               

            Over the last four centuries, the scientific way of thinking, Bacon’s “new instrument”, has made possible the amazing progress in human knowledge and technology that today we associate with Science. But in the meantime, at least for philosophers, it has come in for some tougher analysis.

                                                      

                                     

                                                     cover of early copy of "Novum Organum" 

            The heart of the matter, then, is the inductive method that is normally associated with Science. The way in which scientists can come upon a phenomenon that they cannot explain with any of the models that they currently have, then devise a new theory that tries to explain the phenomenon, then test the theory by doing experiments in the material world, then keep going back and forth from theory to experiment, adjusting and refining – this is the way of gaining knowledge that is called the "scientific method". It has led us to so many powerful new insights and technologies. It really was an amazing breakthrough when Francis Bacon – whether we credit him with originating it or merely expressing what many in his era were already thinking – saw and explained what he called his “new instrument” (Novum Organum). We owe him more than more than all could pay.

            Chapter 15.                       Part C 

         Why we should want to devise a more rational, modern, and yet also personally felt values system for our society is, perhaps, also worth reiterating. The reason for our seeking a new values system is very simple, and the case for it was made early on in this book: we can't go on as we, for so long, have. In the past, as a species, we have always chosen between competing values systems, and the cultures they drive, by war. Incompatible values systems and the nations who adhered to them always fought to establish which would dominate and which submit, i.e. which culture would rule.

            But we can't keep using that way of resolving disputes between nations, i.e. of testing cultural codes against each other. Our weapons have grown too big. Therefore, it is rational to gamble on the view of the universe which portrays it as being aware as long as, first, we accept that the old ways are obsolete, second, remember that the choice was a conscious one that can be reversed if we see it taking us toward dangerous consequences, and, third, the model that arises out of our belief in a kind of universal awareness appears to be steering us toward discernibly positive results.

            Thus, it is rational to see the universe as both coherent and a kind of conscious. But is this enough to justify a choice to embark on a personal path toward a personal theism?    

The third big idea in this analysis of our background assumptions is the one that this book has labored long to establish. It is the one which says that there is a kind of moral order in this universe, a moral order that is real, "real” in the sense that scientists mean. Observably, empirically real.  

The universe runs by laws that produce patterns in the flows of events, and our culturally acquired moral values guide us, as tribes, to navigate through those patterns. These values were learned through trial and error by millions of people over thousands of years. People learned that certain very general ideas called “values” – ideas like courage, wisdom, freedom, and love – work. In theory, many varied cultures can evolve that incorporate these values into a viable way of life in many different and distinct ways. But the general giant directions of all cultures are discernible, if we are honest enough to study hard. And if we go where these giant values point, we get useful results. The people who live by these values survive. Those who don’t, don’t. That physically observable effect of values in human behavior qualifies values as "real". As real as gravity and magnetism.  

Again we can ask about our third idea in this line of thinking: “As opposed to what?” The usual opposing idea to moral realism in modern times is “moral relativism”. By it, moral values are mere tastes, and right and wrong depend on where you are. What is right in Rome in the first century of the modern era is not morally right today; what is right in East Africa is not right in Western Europe and vice-versa. Under the moral relativists’ thinking, there is no peaceful way to resolve disputes between different cultures because there is no common ground on which to even begin the negotiations. 

There are lots of forms of moral relativism being espoused in the twenty-first century. Some even claim, in convoluted arguments, to offer us ways to establish common definitions of "good" and to resolve disputes peacefully. But for the purposes of this book, moral relativism as just described will suffice. Moral relativism takes the position that moral values are not founded in any scientifically specifiable, physical world phenomena. (5.) This book says we can't live like that and don't have to even pretend to do so.  

            The view of moral realism offered in this book says of the relativists' position that nothing could be further from the truth. Material reality is the common ground, and if we understand what our species’ history is telling us about values, we can infer that values are based in what is real and all of our disputes, at least in theory, are resolvable. The things stopping us from creating and maintaining world peace are the anti-morals: cowardice, willful ignorance, laziness, and bigotry.

The infuriating thing about the moral relativists, for me, is that they simply don’t live their own lives by such mushy principles. Academics, for example, follow a set of moral guidelines even in how they do their work, a set that is rational and coherent. Academia proceeds, in its cumulative, coherent way, because the people in it live by principles of freedom and honesty. Freedom to explore, test, publish, and discuss. Honesty in saying what they really think and, when they use another's ideas, giving credit where it is due. These morés are axioms in the academic world.

So let us now close in on our long anticipated main point. 

If, as a modern human being, in touch with at least the basics of what Science in all of its forms is telling me, I believe that the universe is one coherent thing – even if we don’t understand all of its laws yet – and I further believe that it is conscious – even if its consciousness is of a type so vast and so simultaneous that it can’t be cognized by a human mind – and I further believe that it is morally responsive – even if its moral quality is only discernible in the flows of millions of people over thousands of years - if I believe these three claims are true, then, yes, I do believe in a kind of a God.

What?

That’s it?

Yes, my patient reader. But now, in a personal response to the logic presented so far, let me try to show you that this case is more than enough. And “personal” is the most honest way to describe my final chapter. It has to be so. Or, to be exact, it has to make the personal, universal and the universal, personal, as we shall see. 

Notes 

1.http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/18/science/18law.html? pagewanted=all&_r=0

2. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/6130/6130-h/6130-h.html#fig120 (p. 91) 

3. Maxwell, Nicholas;"From Knowledge To Wisdom: A Revolution For Science and the   

    Humanities" (pp. 107-109); Pentire Press; 1984.  

4.http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_reality_tests/P1/

5. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-relativism/

Chapter 15.                   Part B 

In the modern view, under Science, we assume that the strong force, the weak force, and the laws of electromagnetism, and gravity apply everywhere and always have done so. It is true that we have not yet found a way to translate our model of gravity into the system of ideas and equations that describes the other three, but we are confident that a unified field theory does exist. Ours is a single coherent universe, we assume.

            Do I, and do most people today, truly believe the universe is a single, coherent system? That is what Science is about. The alternative - superstition - is simply not palatable for most people in the West today. Whatever the flaws in the current scientific worldview - and it is not logically airtight, as we have seen - we, nevertheless, have seen it achieve far too many successes for us to gamble on any of the superstitious alternatives. People today, by and large, do not turn a sick child over to a shaman for treatment. Who today would try to fix his vehicle by casting pennies or lighting incense sticks or chanting? In today's world, for better or worse, we, in the West especially, are citizens of the Age of Science. The evidence says that is a solid Bayesian choice, therefore, a fully rational one.

Let’s keep this first implicit assumption of Science in mind. All is connected to all else in a coherent, systematic way. (Nicholas Maxwell discusses this view and its problems at length in his book "From Knowledge To Wisdom", pp. 107 to 109.) (3.)

                         

                       

                                                 artist's impression of entangled particles

However, and in the second place, we also know today that this universe is a kind of aware in the sense that small changes in one part of the universe can sometimes cause subtle changes in another, distant part - instantly. Particles in all corners of the universe are, as the physicists call it, "entangled". Quantum theory experiments have proved that such is the case as surely as Newton’s laws of motion and of gravity have been shown by generations of engineers to be accurate, human-scale approximations of relativistic mechanics.    

Particles found in matched pairs in the sub-atomic world can be separated and steered apart as they travel. But if we then do something to reverse the spin of one of the two particles, its former partner – unacted upon by us in any way – will undergo a complementary, mirror-image change of its own. And the signal by which the first tells the second to reverse its spin travels from one to the other instantly, i.e. in no time, which is a violation of Einstein’s Relativity Theory, and thus of all of our pre-quantum-theory models. (Roebke sums up well in an article published in 2008.) (4.)  

            Can we then call the coherent system of particles and forces "self-aware"? Quantum entanglement theory tells us that particles are connected in some way we do not understand yet, and the evidence supporting the theory indicates that the connection between them is instantaneous. Not super-luminary, but instantaneous. 

            It is worth re-iterating that here again, we must make a choice, a cognitive choice on which model to use as we interpret the most recent data from Physics. In light of all of the evidence and reasoning currently available, belief in the quantum model appears to be our most rational choice.

            But belief in this model further implies that the universe is a kind of aware. This view too is a choice. So why would we choose to think, even provisionally, that the universe is a kind of aware? There are at least four good reasons.

            In the first place, if we touch a living entity in one part and we then detect a simultaneous or near-simultaneous reaction in another part, a reaction that can be replicated and studied over and over, we describe that entity as being aware. Even amoeba can move away from strong light. Even the seeds of plants, as they germinate, send a shoot upward, away from gravity, and a root downward, toward gravity. Higher organisms in which a stimulus occurs at one location and the response is seen somewhere else are assumed in Biology to have a controller of some sort between the two sites. The entanglement of particles in the universe fits this basic model of "awareness".

            In the second place, the choice to view the universe as a kind of aware also makes more scientific sense than choosing to view the universe as an unfeeling machine, as Laplace did, because the idea of an aware universe enables us, at least in part, to account for the synchronous behaviors found in the movements of schools of fish and flocks of birds, and the flashes in swarms of fireflies. Presently, how the individual animals in these collectives know what their fellows are about has defied explanation by the best modeling and experimentation of the best scientists in several specialized branches of both Physics and Biology. But in their research, the scientists keep observing that synchonous movement in those collectives of separate organisms over and over again. It's real. 

            In the third place, seeing the universe as an aware entity fosters in us an inclination to engage with whatever moral conclusions our worldview then entails in a way that is personal and heartfelt. Stand up for your values. The universe is always watching. And judging. History has shown us repeatedly that only a moral code that is heartfelt can stand up to the kinds of pressures that tyrants bring to bear on the citizens in their societies. Moral codes that are only cerebral don't motivate their adherents. Purely cerebral morals can be rationalized and pushed in any direction that a tyrant desires. (Even the scientists in Nazi Germany and the former Soviet Union were co-opted.) A worldview that sees the universe as aware rules out our very human tendency to rationalize our way into moral laziness. An aware universe is watching us, and judging us, second by second.   

            Finally, in the fourth place, taking a larger, more global view, seeing the universe as quantum theory models it, rather than as the Newtonian paradigm models it, commits us to the concept of free will. If, as we flow into the future, there are many possible paths before us, rather than only one that is inescapable, then we can, by cleverly chosen actions, influence the probabilities of which path will happen, around us and to us. We have a degree of free will. In other words, the quantum view feels like life. Life the way we live it. I do hold people responsible for their actions. In fact, no one I know lives daily life as if the cars around her in traffic are particles driven by unchangeable forces toward inescapable outcomes. Those cars contain drivers who are aware, thinking, responsible human beings. If they aren't, they shouldn't be driving. If your car cuts mine off in traffic and almost causes it to swerve into a lane of oncoming cars, I'm going to be mad at you, not your car. Similarly, I reject outright any moral code that excuses rapists, pedophiles, and murderers, and in my experience, so does any other citizen I have ever met. Quantum theory fits how life feels: we have free will; we can be held responsible, in a fair degree, for at least some of the events in which we are involved

Chapter 15          A Summing Up Of The Case So Far                            Part A

At this stage of my argument, then, let me sum up for a while before I attempt to move on. In order to finish the argument, I am going to have to go backward and look more carefully at some of the assumptions that are implicit in any argument that is based on Science before I can go on and bring all of the threads together.

What are we committing to if we agree with the points argued so far and especially with what the whole argument assumes and builds on? There are three ideas that are essential.

                                 Martian sunset (as photographed by NASA probe, Spirit Rover) 

In the first place, a basic assumption – for many modern thinkers, an implicit assumption that they are not consciously aware of and do not examine -  is that the universe is a single, integrated system. All of its parts connect to all of its other parts: one set of laws that are all consistent with each other rules the universe. We don’t understand the whole system of natural laws yet, but in doing Science, we implicitly believe that the laws of Science apply on Mars and Gliese 581g just as precisely as those laws apply here on Earth. (Dennis Overbye sums up the debate in a 2007 New York Times article.) (1.)

To some readers this assumption may seem so self-evident as to make any stating of it silly. But such a reaction is a hasty, careless one. Accepting this basic assumption of Science – in conjunction with a few of the other conclusions argued so far in this book – has implications for all that we think and do.

To be even plainer, let's consider this idea that our universe is all one system in comparison to the idea’s alternatives. In short, let's ask: “As opposed to what?”

                                                    artist's conception of the Gliese 581 system 

The alternative view of our universe sees it as being made up of areas or dimensions or epochs in which different sets of rules apply or once did apply. This was the view of many of our forbears. They saw the universe as being run by many varied and mutually hostile gods, each with his or her own realm. For example, for the ancient Greeks, Poseidon ruled the sea. He could make storms at will and bring them down on any group of luckless mariners. Hades ruled the underworld, Zeus, the skies. Hades took Persephone down to his realm, and even Zeus could only negotiate to get her back for half the year. From this quarrel came the seasons. Two bellicose brats, who happened to be supernatural beings, and who could not get along. A universe run by caprice, lust, cruelty, and revenge.  

          

The classical Greeks also accepted, implicitly, that their ancestors had been much stronger than they were. Over and over in "The Iliad", heroes hoist rocks that "no man today could lift", and they do it with ease. (2.) In such a universe, which systems of ideas are right in one area or era might be quite different from what was right (in both senses of "right") in some other distant land or era.

Chapter 14.                               Part F 

We tend to change grudgingly and obstinately when it comes to changing our values, morés, and patterns of behavior, but we can learn. We can change. We can learn a non-violent style of cultural evolution.

Once we accept the view that there is a pattern in time itself along which our values and their attached behavior patterns, over generations, tribally, physically steer us, we are accepting the view that values are real, in the sense that they connect us to physical reality. Then, we must conclude that only certain values, ones derived from our best worldview – i.e. Science – will be the most rational to choose to guide humanity to greater and greater health and vigor in the future. We all must live and survive in this same physical universe.

The courage-wisdom meme complex, along with the behavior patterns that it entails, is the human response to entropy; the love-freedom meme complex is our long term response to quantum uncertainty. The optimal balance of them all is called names like "virtue", or "the tao". And it is always subtly shifting its path. We must, especially in these nuclear-armed and climate-threatened times, see those shifts and respond appropriately. Or die. 

                                                                       Lao Tzu 

The Tao Te Ching says: "The tao that can be spoken is not the tao." Lao Tsu was only telling his disciples not to ever get confident that they have life figured out and can now become complacent about their capacity to handle events around them; complacency is the harbinger of disaster. The way of all ways, the tao, is always evolving. To live – as individuals but far more importantly as nations – we must stay resourceful, nimble, and sharp, individually and communally.

But values themselves, we can now see, are just our best guides to where the survival path, through the present and on into the future, lies.

Notes

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convergent_evolution

2. Hofstadter, Douglas R. and Daniel C. Dennett; "The Mind's Eye: Fantasies And Reflections On Self And Soul"; Basic Books; 1981.

3. MacIntyre, Alasdair; "Beyond Virtue"; p. 78; Bloomsbury Academic; 2013.