Consciousness for the Twenty-First Century

Abstract. Human action and experience are the outcome of genes and memes. Not only are both of these represented in consciousness, but consciousness mediates their claims and thus governs our choices. Hence it is important how consciousness is ordered and where it is directed. Sorokin's typolog...

Full description

Saved in:  
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Zygon
Main Author: Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Journals Online & Print:
Drawer...
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Published: Wiley-Blackwell 1991
In: Zygon
Year: 1991, Volume: 26, Issue: 1, Pages: 7-25
Further subjects:B Spirituality
B sensate
B Cultural Evolution
B psychological selection
B “beinghood”
B ideational
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Parallel Edition:Non-electronic
Description
Summary:Abstract. Human action and experience are the outcome of genes and memes. Not only are both of these represented in consciousness, but consciousness mediates their claims and thus governs our choices. Hence it is important how consciousness is ordered and where it is directed. Sorokin's typology of the sensate and the ideational (“spiritual”), and the dialectic between them, is relevant to this issue. In our period of history, the sensate factors of materialism and secularism need to be dialectically counterbalanced by the reinforcement of memes that value the spiritual intimations of the realm beyond the senses. As we approach the twenty-first century, the memes that will undergird our spirituality will be those that resacralize nature and emphasize our unity as humans with all of universal reality, in an idea of common “beinghood.” Spiritual systems that accord with this trend in evolution will have to respect three conditions. They will (1) integrate the sensate and the ideational; (2) reflect the importance of the “flow” state of optimal experience, which matches ever-complexifying skills with comparable challenges; and (3) move the fulcrum of their worldview from the human being to the network of beings and its evolution.
ISSN:1467-9744
Contains:Enthalten in: Zygon
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9744.1991.tb00801.x