Thank you for translating the passages from Habermas into plain English. I agree with what you have written here so far, only I am wondering if maybe there might be more people out there who share these views than we realize. It's true that these ideas are not mainstream, and don't seem to have taken hold in the academic world to any great degree, but maybe the academic world is the wrong place to look. It feels to me that there are many conversations taking place all over the internet that are very much like this one. And there is hope in that.
I wonder about the world of academia, how much it really reflects how people are viewing the world. I think not much. Maybe what is happening here is exactly what needs to happen; maybe these conversations and the many others like them out there are just getting started, and will ultimately surprise us all by bringing about a new cultural paradigm. As I write this, I am picturing expanding fields of smaller groups of people in conversation with each other, and then the edges meet and something occurs there at the edges.
I look forward to each new essay that you publish, and not just the essay but the responses. Something quickens in me as I engage with the conversation. It's very hopeful.
This is kind of what I wanted to say next: it makes a difference when and how ideas surface and become part of communities who can speak the same language and share concepts etc. For instance psychedelics were shut out of the mainstream in the 80s and 90s but once people started talking publicly about their experiences, the collective field changed quite quickly. My first book and magazine Reality Sandwich helped break the silence around it, although people were exploring them still in countercultures. I think at some point we hit a tipping point and suddenly the ideas permeated into the mainstream. But the mistake in retrospect was that the psychedelic movement needed to be integrated with this ontological paradigm shift, because without it, it got assimilated into “scientism”, therapy culture, corporate self optimization, etc.but perhaps that prepares the next phase of this ontological shift, which could have deeply transformative effects beyond what I can express here at the moment.
Yes it is kind of sad how academia seems to have lost its cultural position as being the place for leading edge ideas. Too many bureaucrats and competing forces taking them away from their early idealistic leanings. And access to all knowledge everywhere outside of their libraries gives many the ability to opt out of that particular publish or perish rat race. I love the image of expanding circles of cultural energies finding and merging together. Kind of what Daniel is doing here.
skip the habermas and neitzsche and go straight into the story that monistic idealism suggests. Complexity is out. Nuance got murdered. Give us a Ripping Yarn or give us death! Said even more simply, if so (consciousness=base reality) then what? (how does it help us navigate the polycrisis). This could be my lazy rotted brain talking, but if we're trying to articulate anything with remote mass appeal/memetic stickiness, we're up against QAnon hyperconspiracies and school yard taunts from the most powerful men in the world. We've gotta dumb it way, way, way down...
I think this is part of the problem, there is no story with idealism, no embodied practice or worship, no relationship. It’s hard to feel love from an abstract philosophy.
I don't agree at all. I believe there are translations of this that can go into any venue. Let's write a children's book about it. However it needs to be signaled first with the intellectual vigor that inspires those translations. My 2 sense.
"we're up against QAnon hyperconspiracies and school yard taunts from the most powerful men in the world" and with social media they have the perfect tools to control the masses. Musk says that Trudeau will lose the next elections and he has the propaganda and indoctrination tools to achieve this.
I'm a Canadian. Muck saying Trudeau will lose the next election is like predicting a ball will fall to the ground if you throw it. I don't think a Prime Minister has ever polled so low in our entire history. Even his closest people are stabbing back at him then they can. Think Christina Freeland.
Reading this whole thread of conversations makes me realize the intricacy and complexity of the topic. So many thoughts bubble up in the reading, some which are (at least now) too elusive to clothe with words, others that I will attempt to pin down here in case someone finds them relevant.
In response to Jamie Wheal - The readers of this newsletter (at least the ones who write responses) are a pretty heady crew - I don't think this target audience need any more dumbing down than Daniel has already done with his re-wording of Habermas. What happens after that depends on how the shared ideas land with each individual, how each person is affected and how that affect plays out in their world.
Maybe because what Daniel called Monistic Idealism feels like common sense to me, something about this conversation prompted me to look up Thomas Paine's "Common Sense". (I'm pretty sure I haven't ever actually read it before, but I suddenly I wanted to know what kind of language he used to make his argument, and anyhow, what was his argument?) These words from the pamphlet jumped out at me: "Time makes more Converts than Reason." This seems to me to be another way of saying "Experiences are more powerful than concepts". Concepts are only powerful agents of change if they are able to trigger some kind of experience. I think this is hard to deny. Probably the most powerful way for this to happen is when words are first "grokked" and then converted into deeds. A deed becomes an experience and can easily ripple out into other deeds.
While we depend heavily on words to communicate ideas, they are not the only vehicle for learning, not even the main one. I think this is important to realize. Not everyone spends their days ruminating over concepts like these, though for people like me, who do, it might seem a pity. People mainly learn and evolve as a result of experiences. Ideas have a role to play in this, and we all know that they can certainly serve as a powerful catalyst for experiences, but they aren't the same as experiences, and there is no guarantee that an idea (communicated through words) will translate to experiences. Just as we don't really understand how a baby learns to smile, let alone how a baby learns language, maybe we don't fully understand how a single idea can ripple out into the world, ultimately causing people to experience things differently. I don't think any amount of scientific explaining can explain this inexplicable, everyday miracle to me.
For me a lot of what ails us comes down to how we educate our children. This is a huge and complex topic, and I'm not going attempt to tackle it here other than to suggest that children especially learn from experiences, and we should be seriously questioning the kinds of experiences that our school system provides. As a retired Waldorf teacher I've obviously been strongly influenced (like many other people here) by Rudolf Steiner's thoughts about education, but I think even that excellent educational approach would benefit from an overhaul, keeping in mind that the real crucible for social change has to be in the social realm. Thinking is important and ultimately we have to take action, but first we must connect. What I love about Daniel's Newsletter is the level of connection I can feel is going on here - new threads and new experiences happening at a dizzying rate. Each reader here is connected to a vast network of others, and that single spark of an idea, if it is able to produce a real experience in any one person, can change everything.
Thank you so much for this Daniel, it’s really inspiring to see you fight your way out of the current global political murk and emerge with the first hints of a pathway to the future we deserve. Fantastic work.
The following was sent to nineteen friends who are in various groups that meet once a month to discuss various ideas, perceptions, and experiences. The only requirement being “no bullshit”. One group has been meeting for about twenty years.
Dear Friends,
This morning the following quote began an article by David Price. I read whatever he offers and over the years have frequently forwarded articles and excerpts when the gems he finds or creates are too beautiful not to share.
"In ancient China, the Taoists taught that a constant inner smile to oneself insured health, happiness and longevity. Why? Smiling to oneself is like basking in love: you become your own best friend. Living with an inner smile is to live in harmony with yourself."
Over the last few years in the emptiness and quiet of meditation I have seen this as a possible perspective and have stepped into it occasionally finding within it a welcomed radiant embrace of an expanded inclusive self that includes not only all of you but all life.
The "knowing" does not last long. It easily transforms into flowing tears of grief. I'm not sure of the reasons for the strength and intimacy with this deep well of sorrow which I experience, part was from the shock to my innocence and naivety experienced in Vietnam. I worked hard to see how and why I chose to join in traveling that path. That exploration led to a deeper more objective perspective on our society's lack of mature mores and values. This resulting realization more than any personal war experiences became the greater cause of concern; the recognition that the higher potentials already present in man will remain undeveloped. The magnitude of our human potential will not quickly dissolve into the ether. Cleansing the planet of our toxic creations will require many millennia to weave them back into the web of life. This reality of this probable future seems to be at the core of my regret and sorrow.
I am coming to recognize that the shadow of this concern colors my awareness most mornings. I want to find an honest truthful way out of this predicament. From past experiences I know I need to face and actually embrace reality as it is, without fear. It is like confronting the reality of my death, accepting the inescapable with interest and curiosity. There does seem to be a tiny but growing swell of recognition for an undefined yet very real longing for change, an evolutionary transformation of being. In my life experience this transformation would not eliminate the shadow but would change my relationship to it. The new awareness would embody the strength needed to recognize and naturally flow into ways of being that would embrace the world with reverence and kindness.
I think this practice:
"the Taoists taught that a constant inner smile to oneself insured health, happiness and longevity. Smiling to oneself is like basking in love: you become your own best friend. Living with an inner smile is to live in harmony with yourself."
offers a way to begin. Like finding oneself again, a new seedling planted in welcoming loamy soil mixed with rich fragrant compost, freshly watered, greeting the morning sun.
It’s been about a year, I believe, since I discovered your writings, thanks to the PAUA community and later by subscribing to your newsletter. I want to thank you for providing food for thought amidst the intellectual turmoil we are currently experiencing.
I’m French, and my English doesn’t allow me to write as I’d like. Nevertheless, I’m glad to see this year finally ending on a hopeful note and I deeply resonate with your analysis and, most importantly, your call for an ontological shift.
Thank you again for your work and dedication. Your voice is inspiring to those of us who long for a more coherent, integrative, and emancipatory vision of the world.
Looking forward to reading more from you and contributing, in my own way, to this paradigmatic shift!
"Humanity made the mistake of wanting to attain knowledge too soon of wanting to distinguish between good and evil too soon… this is the difference between a premature birth, and one carried to full term. We continue to commit this original sin / error today"
“Therefore a proof gained by means of thinking will never accord in any way with reality”
“In regard to reality, our thinking is utterly incompetent, it is inconclusive and no judge of what is actually true. “
"Philosophy is no more than a beautiful way of playing with ideas"
What a brilliant and beautifully written perspective weaving a grand narrative to make sense of the chaotic complexity of our modern cultural times. I have also been struggling with finding and articulating these types of principles for decades now and am surprised and relieved at how much convergence there is between our views. A few reflections stimulated by your prose.
I've come to refer to experiential grokking of the cultural embeddedness of truth as a 4th person perspective. Its the post-modern embrace of contextualizing all truths, though unlike the post-moderns that fall into despair and emptiness and relativism, it seems that a 5th person perspective is emerging that save us from that hole. Taking contexts as objects it seems that we can line them up and predict a sequencing that most peoples under most circumstances move through. To me, Clair Graves has the smoothest, most researched, and most practical take on this, call Spiral Dynamics. (Though in my mind his 2nd Tier is still differentiating and defining itself and third Tier has a flag on the ground and so few people talking freely about that experience we don't have a lot of data to know the fine details of those worlds)
What nice about taking contexts as objects and aligning the various "objective truths" of their insides into a progression is that we can see characteristics across those moral and value containers, which Wilber (and I am not sure who he got it from) refers to as having greater breadth and depth then the previous moral containers. This allows us to speculate that we are converging asymptotically towards an underlying universal truth, even if we can never know or perceive it directly. That the universe does contain "truth" and while we will always be living in a delusionary projected relative reality, some realities are closer to this universal truth than others.
This ties into your convergence that we embrace the underlying universality of consciousness being a fundamental principle of the universe, and that "We" seem to be living multiple lifetimes and not dissolving into compost after death. This apparent spiritual belief system converges towards what we know about the defining characteristic of third tier consciousness. (My understanding of this is that) People move into through various witnessing states. Early stages include just being a point of consciousness in a particular spot of space and time, watching the mind construct reality in the same way most people perceive sense data (which is why the Tibetan refer to the mind as a 6th sense). Latter stages allow a being to fluidly shift into a non-dual states, not located anywhere in the arising, not "selfing" the way most do. I think the most advanced stages end with a being that remembers "themselves" across life times, choosing rebirths, and optionally choosing to birth or not in this or other planes. These people are either living right next door to or as part of the God consciousness that all religions have speculated to exist since time Immemorial.
If this is the case then yes there is hope for a universal and unifying perspective, ethos, and morality to emerge that allows humanity to embrace a single philosophical perspective. It may perhaps be clothed somewhat differently depending on the various religious or non-religious traditions of the cultures people belong to, but the cores qualities will be there.
The framework you suggest literally allows a convergence between the Absolute and Relative realities that have always lived across great divides. They may not end up literally touching but they can asymptotically converge into a functional and inspirational container and goal for all of humanity. A common vision to unite mankind in our embodiment here on Earth.
Thanks again for writing what you have and for allowing space to share my enthusiasm in finding such convergence in our views of reality at such a deep level.
Thanks for taking the time to read and. I am pretty saturated in this stuff and may not be as clear as I need to be. I am happy to answer some questions if it can help you understand what I am trying to communicate.
I'll do what I can hopefully sometime today (In my world its really clear).
It does speak to one of my points though - Contexts man, contexts. Its hard to communicate outside the containers we are living in, even when we are all trying to understand each other.
The context generates a structure. The 4th and 5th that you reference come from a developed inquiry and first us to get your context please show us the structure that is shaped around it.
In his Philosophy of Freedom Rudolf Steiner proposes a monism of thought in which thought is defined as being a spiritual activity, this, therefore, can only be a spiritual monism.
"Anthroposophy is needed to bring influences from the higher worlds to humanity in times of approaching chaos, loss of confidence, quietness, and certainty. It balances materialistic thinking and feeling with spiritualized thinking and feeling"
"Amazement, reverence, wisdom filled harmony with the World’s phenomena, acquiescence with the course of the World are stages we must pass through and must run parallel to our thinking and our thinking must “never forsake.” Our relationship with thinking must not make thinking the judge of things but to allow it to be an instrument through which things speak to us."
Overall I appreciate and feel aligned with the direction you are going. I am drawn to comment on your essay using two primary lenses. First on the overall narrative itself. And second on where I think you are going with it.
The narrative. You put forth an enormous landscape to contextualize monistic idealism in a brief essay, and give short attention to your proposed ‘ism’. The context - fortified with selections from and interpretations of Habermas and Nietzsche - seems to romanticize a past state of true democracy that was tragically lost (attributed to Habermas), and an alienation from a more pure state of connection and meaning and descent into nihilism (attributed to Nietzsche). Even with granting the necessary reductionism you faced in your approach to this essay, I came away a bit distracted by the ways in which my read of these thinkers differs from yours (Nietzsche’s writings support libertarianism as much as nihilism in my view, but I digress). I prefer to reflect on the context setting itself, which to me seems to follow the story line of the fall from Eden. A state setting used to evoke a void that needs filling - enter monistic idealism. My alarm bells rang loud. First, with the fallen from grace framing, yes 100% we are in a time of meta crises, no it’s not a fall from grace, it’s the latest in our beautiful horrifying clumsy graceful life destroying life affirming human trajectory. And the amplitude is increasing… the context setting, if necessary, is more simple to me. We have entered a reality which has precedent in historical cycles of institutional breakdown and extreme disparities, and the stakes are now existential. The cracks in the armor create opportunities.
Ascribing an ‘ism’ to your thoughts feels too early. And implies a robust framework.
You eluded to a collective effort - yes, good. With some evoking of a vanguard - reasonable - only this time with instant global connectivity and media conditioning it’s going to be very different from previous such experiences. The process/participants requires its own inquiry and articulation.
With regard to the emergent framework/movement (not ready for an ism, and skeptical of most existing ism’s) - Let’s get to the fundamentals. The vision. the set of assumptions, the guiding principles, and the implications for emergent institutions, social structures, and ways of being.
I am guilty of that which I accuse, focused on context and ran out of time to share more about your proposed embracing of monistic idealism. Will write more later or we can have a call.
But can say that I grew up in a household where we attended Unitarian and Quaker services, and monistic idealism (MI) is consistent with my experience of both traditions. However I don’t think MI provides a complete picture. you celebrate equality among all conscious beings and their inalienable role in the collective consciousness. I see the essence of evolutionary future institutions as supporting ma life affirming dance of soul and spirit in all beings. With spirit being what you call consciousness - universal, and flowing into and through all beings (for me not just humans). Soul to me is not captured by monistic idealism, it’s infinitely unique and emergent from the earth, embodied, of place, and animated by spirit. What do we do with this one miraculous life?
My question. My mission. Is how do we create institutions that bring out the best in human nature? That support us in living in greater harmony with ourselves, each other, and all life?
I start with the idea that human institutions come with a fundamental challenge, how do we build in death and rebirth cycles, so they don’t ossify and/or become cancerous, undead…
A key issue is scale… we fail miserably at creating human institutions at scale that function well
I have done a lot of thinking on both of these challenges.
The emergent direction that i see as hopeful is to elevate governance, social and economic activity at the local level. And as much as possible orient larger scales of governance toward supporting the local. I am appreciative of the reemergence of attention to ideas like bioregionalism. The inherently fractal nature of watersheds - and unavoidable aligned interest and connection to place inherent in watersheds - makes bioregionalism intuitive for many people.
Slowing the flow of water (reshaping our currencies), structuring to enhance the conditions for life. Etc. Etc.
It is almost like MI would be the underlying operating system, the DOS, and then you can build different UIs on top of it like animism, Christianity, Islam as long as you don’t forget they are programs running on the underlying OS, if that makes sense?
How wonderful to read your critique of a shaping (evolving) structural franework on which to build a new unity of human vision.
Togetherness in the Balinese tradition ( which I have immersed myself and married into) is built on a structural understanding of collective practices as the building blocks of stimulating this unified field.
The core of these practices are exchange as offering, pure offering, not giving or taking but being with the Great gift of life in something beyond reciprocity.
We do all breathe. We do all die. This is foundation.
Do we all need the balance of unified consciousness as the center point of an infinite seesaw lever between the abyss of nothjng and the surrender of God consciousness?
Not overtly, but yes we all want to belong. Perhaps we can get on a call Mr Mendelsohn and share our progress.
The Balinese have a structural way of supporting it not only in its spiritual action but in all elements. Concentric rings of influence that ripple from the self to the household to the Banjar and out to the island and eventually the planet.
It is as sound as the circus tent that supports the flying acrobat and ( in the dynamic between the foundational structure and the freedom that arises from it), just as beautiful to behold.
Totally with you and think this is hugely important. I’ve also spent a lot of time and energy creating a deliberative space, grounded in ritual/musuc/social connection for grappling with political questions in a humble, curious, non-judgmental, local way. It was very effective and popular and powerful for all involved, and I would love some collaborators who might help think through ways of refining and resuscitating it, particularly though the lens of this unifying paradigm /contextualuzing the work in this greater awareness, which was always implied but not explicit.
As a practitioner of Gestalt Awareness Practice (GAP), I am intimately familiar with the field of awareness - the generative space from which everything arises and to which everything returns. This field is not separate from us; it is as much a part of us as we are a part of it.
This leaves me wondering: given that humans are narrative creatures and stories serve as our primary bridge - not only to understanding but also to connecting with one another - how do we cohere around a shared experience of the "field of awareness" or love without reducing its immanence to a static concept? In other words, how can we extend these deeply personal and relational experiences into something more universal without losing their essence?
This tension between the ineffable and the need to articulate it is a central challenge in my work with a small community I steward. Together, we are striving to cultivate collective wisdom through difficult yet compassionate conversations, grounded in embodied relationality and trust. However, as we grow, we are finding it increasingly difficult to both include and transcend the initial relational field. While I have a hunch it is possible, the way forward continues to elude us.
I find encouragement and support in your writings, so please keep up the good work, Daniel.
I find Monistic Idealism a difficult term. Rational Materialism immediately makes sense but Monistic Idealism doesn't mean anything to me when I just read it like this.
I’ve asked these questions before but I still have trouble understanding how monistic idealism doesn’t become myopic, how love fits into it via relationality between God and creature, if primordial mind has will and agency. How would it deal with the reality of what is called the Fall?
See my response to Jeff… but also I would question “the reality of the Fall”, as that is a particularly Western idea. You don’t find it in aboriginal societies for instance. I prefer the Buddhist / Tantra ideas that our nature is basic goodness and “Samsara is Nirvana.”
To me the reality of the Fall is clear, I think we all can recognize that if we look at it. Why else would we think things should be a certain way or that we may not be living up to our potential. I idealist terms, why are dissociated from the ontological primitive at all? Why else would there be an is/ought distinction if we are not fallen? Yes we are basically good, but we are sick, that is the fall and that is why we need to be realigned, "saved".
I have just read don Jose Ruiz' book Wisdom of the Shamans. The Toltec wisdom explains human domestication to rules and ideas and redirects to the truth within. The ending eludes to the Theosophical Society's path and links Buddhism to North American shamanism. It's an individual path to enlightenment.
Thank you for translating the passages from Habermas into plain English. I agree with what you have written here so far, only I am wondering if maybe there might be more people out there who share these views than we realize. It's true that these ideas are not mainstream, and don't seem to have taken hold in the academic world to any great degree, but maybe the academic world is the wrong place to look. It feels to me that there are many conversations taking place all over the internet that are very much like this one. And there is hope in that.
I wonder about the world of academia, how much it really reflects how people are viewing the world. I think not much. Maybe what is happening here is exactly what needs to happen; maybe these conversations and the many others like them out there are just getting started, and will ultimately surprise us all by bringing about a new cultural paradigm. As I write this, I am picturing expanding fields of smaller groups of people in conversation with each other, and then the edges meet and something occurs there at the edges.
I look forward to each new essay that you publish, and not just the essay but the responses. Something quickens in me as I engage with the conversation. It's very hopeful.
This is kind of what I wanted to say next: it makes a difference when and how ideas surface and become part of communities who can speak the same language and share concepts etc. For instance psychedelics were shut out of the mainstream in the 80s and 90s but once people started talking publicly about their experiences, the collective field changed quite quickly. My first book and magazine Reality Sandwich helped break the silence around it, although people were exploring them still in countercultures. I think at some point we hit a tipping point and suddenly the ideas permeated into the mainstream. But the mistake in retrospect was that the psychedelic movement needed to be integrated with this ontological paradigm shift, because without it, it got assimilated into “scientism”, therapy culture, corporate self optimization, etc.but perhaps that prepares the next phase of this ontological shift, which could have deeply transformative effects beyond what I can express here at the moment.
Yes it is kind of sad how academia seems to have lost its cultural position as being the place for leading edge ideas. Too many bureaucrats and competing forces taking them away from their early idealistic leanings. And access to all knowledge everywhere outside of their libraries gives many the ability to opt out of that particular publish or perish rat race. I love the image of expanding circles of cultural energies finding and merging together. Kind of what Daniel is doing here.
We are doing it.
"Kind of what Daniel is doing here." Exactly!
skip the habermas and neitzsche and go straight into the story that monistic idealism suggests. Complexity is out. Nuance got murdered. Give us a Ripping Yarn or give us death! Said even more simply, if so (consciousness=base reality) then what? (how does it help us navigate the polycrisis). This could be my lazy rotted brain talking, but if we're trying to articulate anything with remote mass appeal/memetic stickiness, we're up against QAnon hyperconspiracies and school yard taunts from the most powerful men in the world. We've gotta dumb it way, way, way down...
I think this is part of the problem, there is no story with idealism, no embodied practice or worship, no relationship. It’s hard to feel love from an abstract philosophy.
There are many. We are just culled from them by indoctrination. Let's make some.
I hear you
Maybe you can help with this… not sure if I am the best popularizer
I don't agree at all. I believe there are translations of this that can go into any venue. Let's write a children's book about it. However it needs to be signaled first with the intellectual vigor that inspires those translations. My 2 sense.
"we're up against QAnon hyperconspiracies and school yard taunts from the most powerful men in the world" and with social media they have the perfect tools to control the masses. Musk says that Trudeau will lose the next elections and he has the propaganda and indoctrination tools to achieve this.
I'm a Canadian. Muck saying Trudeau will lose the next election is like predicting a ball will fall to the ground if you throw it. I don't think a Prime Minister has ever polled so low in our entire history. Even his closest people are stabbing back at him then they can. Think Christina Freeland.
Reading this whole thread of conversations makes me realize the intricacy and complexity of the topic. So many thoughts bubble up in the reading, some which are (at least now) too elusive to clothe with words, others that I will attempt to pin down here in case someone finds them relevant.
In response to Jamie Wheal - The readers of this newsletter (at least the ones who write responses) are a pretty heady crew - I don't think this target audience need any more dumbing down than Daniel has already done with his re-wording of Habermas. What happens after that depends on how the shared ideas land with each individual, how each person is affected and how that affect plays out in their world.
Maybe because what Daniel called Monistic Idealism feels like common sense to me, something about this conversation prompted me to look up Thomas Paine's "Common Sense". (I'm pretty sure I haven't ever actually read it before, but I suddenly I wanted to know what kind of language he used to make his argument, and anyhow, what was his argument?) These words from the pamphlet jumped out at me: "Time makes more Converts than Reason." This seems to me to be another way of saying "Experiences are more powerful than concepts". Concepts are only powerful agents of change if they are able to trigger some kind of experience. I think this is hard to deny. Probably the most powerful way for this to happen is when words are first "grokked" and then converted into deeds. A deed becomes an experience and can easily ripple out into other deeds.
While we depend heavily on words to communicate ideas, they are not the only vehicle for learning, not even the main one. I think this is important to realize. Not everyone spends their days ruminating over concepts like these, though for people like me, who do, it might seem a pity. People mainly learn and evolve as a result of experiences. Ideas have a role to play in this, and we all know that they can certainly serve as a powerful catalyst for experiences, but they aren't the same as experiences, and there is no guarantee that an idea (communicated through words) will translate to experiences. Just as we don't really understand how a baby learns to smile, let alone how a baby learns language, maybe we don't fully understand how a single idea can ripple out into the world, ultimately causing people to experience things differently. I don't think any amount of scientific explaining can explain this inexplicable, everyday miracle to me.
For me a lot of what ails us comes down to how we educate our children. This is a huge and complex topic, and I'm not going attempt to tackle it here other than to suggest that children especially learn from experiences, and we should be seriously questioning the kinds of experiences that our school system provides. As a retired Waldorf teacher I've obviously been strongly influenced (like many other people here) by Rudolf Steiner's thoughts about education, but I think even that excellent educational approach would benefit from an overhaul, keeping in mind that the real crucible for social change has to be in the social realm. Thinking is important and ultimately we have to take action, but first we must connect. What I love about Daniel's Newsletter is the level of connection I can feel is going on here - new threads and new experiences happening at a dizzying rate. Each reader here is connected to a vast network of others, and that single spark of an idea, if it is able to produce a real experience in any one person, can change everything.
Fabulous comment Lee!
Aho!
Thank you so much for this Daniel, it’s really inspiring to see you fight your way out of the current global political murk and emerge with the first hints of a pathway to the future we deserve. Fantastic work.
The following was sent to nineteen friends who are in various groups that meet once a month to discuss various ideas, perceptions, and experiences. The only requirement being “no bullshit”. One group has been meeting for about twenty years.
Dear Friends,
This morning the following quote began an article by David Price. I read whatever he offers and over the years have frequently forwarded articles and excerpts when the gems he finds or creates are too beautiful not to share.
"In ancient China, the Taoists taught that a constant inner smile to oneself insured health, happiness and longevity. Why? Smiling to oneself is like basking in love: you become your own best friend. Living with an inner smile is to live in harmony with yourself."
Over the last few years in the emptiness and quiet of meditation I have seen this as a possible perspective and have stepped into it occasionally finding within it a welcomed radiant embrace of an expanded inclusive self that includes not only all of you but all life.
The "knowing" does not last long. It easily transforms into flowing tears of grief. I'm not sure of the reasons for the strength and intimacy with this deep well of sorrow which I experience, part was from the shock to my innocence and naivety experienced in Vietnam. I worked hard to see how and why I chose to join in traveling that path. That exploration led to a deeper more objective perspective on our society's lack of mature mores and values. This resulting realization more than any personal war experiences became the greater cause of concern; the recognition that the higher potentials already present in man will remain undeveloped. The magnitude of our human potential will not quickly dissolve into the ether. Cleansing the planet of our toxic creations will require many millennia to weave them back into the web of life. This reality of this probable future seems to be at the core of my regret and sorrow.
I am coming to recognize that the shadow of this concern colors my awareness most mornings. I want to find an honest truthful way out of this predicament. From past experiences I know I need to face and actually embrace reality as it is, without fear. It is like confronting the reality of my death, accepting the inescapable with interest and curiosity. There does seem to be a tiny but growing swell of recognition for an undefined yet very real longing for change, an evolutionary transformation of being. In my life experience this transformation would not eliminate the shadow but would change my relationship to it. The new awareness would embody the strength needed to recognize and naturally flow into ways of being that would embrace the world with reverence and kindness.
I think this practice:
"the Taoists taught that a constant inner smile to oneself insured health, happiness and longevity. Smiling to oneself is like basking in love: you become your own best friend. Living with an inner smile is to live in harmony with yourself."
offers a way to begin. Like finding oneself again, a new seedling planted in welcoming loamy soil mixed with rich fragrant compost, freshly watered, greeting the morning sun.
With love and warm regards, Jack
Dear Daniel,
It’s been about a year, I believe, since I discovered your writings, thanks to the PAUA community and later by subscribing to your newsletter. I want to thank you for providing food for thought amidst the intellectual turmoil we are currently experiencing.
I’m French, and my English doesn’t allow me to write as I’d like. Nevertheless, I’m glad to see this year finally ending on a hopeful note and I deeply resonate with your analysis and, most importantly, your call for an ontological shift.
Thank you again for your work and dedication. Your voice is inspiring to those of us who long for a more coherent, integrative, and emancipatory vision of the world.
Looking forward to reading more from you and contributing, in my own way, to this paradigmatic shift!
"Humanity made the mistake of wanting to attain knowledge too soon of wanting to distinguish between good and evil too soon… this is the difference between a premature birth, and one carried to full term. We continue to commit this original sin / error today"
“Therefore a proof gained by means of thinking will never accord in any way with reality”
“In regard to reality, our thinking is utterly incompetent, it is inconclusive and no judge of what is actually true. “
"Philosophy is no more than a beautiful way of playing with ideas"
'Thinking can be correct but still not true"
Rudolph Steiner
How interesting. In Utero humanity. The Eden myth.
What a brilliant and beautifully written perspective weaving a grand narrative to make sense of the chaotic complexity of our modern cultural times. I have also been struggling with finding and articulating these types of principles for decades now and am surprised and relieved at how much convergence there is between our views. A few reflections stimulated by your prose.
I've come to refer to experiential grokking of the cultural embeddedness of truth as a 4th person perspective. Its the post-modern embrace of contextualizing all truths, though unlike the post-moderns that fall into despair and emptiness and relativism, it seems that a 5th person perspective is emerging that save us from that hole. Taking contexts as objects it seems that we can line them up and predict a sequencing that most peoples under most circumstances move through. To me, Clair Graves has the smoothest, most researched, and most practical take on this, call Spiral Dynamics. (Though in my mind his 2nd Tier is still differentiating and defining itself and third Tier has a flag on the ground and so few people talking freely about that experience we don't have a lot of data to know the fine details of those worlds)
What nice about taking contexts as objects and aligning the various "objective truths" of their insides into a progression is that we can see characteristics across those moral and value containers, which Wilber (and I am not sure who he got it from) refers to as having greater breadth and depth then the previous moral containers. This allows us to speculate that we are converging asymptotically towards an underlying universal truth, even if we can never know or perceive it directly. That the universe does contain "truth" and while we will always be living in a delusionary projected relative reality, some realities are closer to this universal truth than others.
This ties into your convergence that we embrace the underlying universality of consciousness being a fundamental principle of the universe, and that "We" seem to be living multiple lifetimes and not dissolving into compost after death. This apparent spiritual belief system converges towards what we know about the defining characteristic of third tier consciousness. (My understanding of this is that) People move into through various witnessing states. Early stages include just being a point of consciousness in a particular spot of space and time, watching the mind construct reality in the same way most people perceive sense data (which is why the Tibetan refer to the mind as a 6th sense). Latter stages allow a being to fluidly shift into a non-dual states, not located anywhere in the arising, not "selfing" the way most do. I think the most advanced stages end with a being that remembers "themselves" across life times, choosing rebirths, and optionally choosing to birth or not in this or other planes. These people are either living right next door to or as part of the God consciousness that all religions have speculated to exist since time Immemorial.
If this is the case then yes there is hope for a universal and unifying perspective, ethos, and morality to emerge that allows humanity to embrace a single philosophical perspective. It may perhaps be clothed somewhat differently depending on the various religious or non-religious traditions of the cultures people belong to, but the cores qualities will be there.
The framework you suggest literally allows a convergence between the Absolute and Relative realities that have always lived across great divides. They may not end up literally touching but they can asymptotically converge into a functional and inspirational container and goal for all of humanity. A common vision to unite mankind in our embodiment here on Earth.
Thanks again for writing what you have and for allowing space to share my enthusiasm in finding such convergence in our views of reality at such a deep level.
I will have to read this several times.
Thanks for taking the time to read and. I am pretty saturated in this stuff and may not be as clear as I need to be. I am happy to answer some questions if it can help you understand what I am trying to communicate.
Yes if you could rewrite this in a clearer way, it would be easier to respond to it.
I'll do what I can hopefully sometime today (In my world its really clear).
It does speak to one of my points though - Contexts man, contexts. Its hard to communicate outside the containers we are living in, even when we are all trying to understand each other.
The context generates a structure. The 4th and 5th that you reference come from a developed inquiry and first us to get your context please show us the structure that is shaped around it.
In his Philosophy of Freedom Rudolf Steiner proposes a monism of thought in which thought is defined as being a spiritual activity, this, therefore, can only be a spiritual monism.
"Anthroposophy is needed to bring influences from the higher worlds to humanity in times of approaching chaos, loss of confidence, quietness, and certainty. It balances materialistic thinking and feeling with spiritualized thinking and feeling"
"Amazement, reverence, wisdom filled harmony with the World’s phenomena, acquiescence with the course of the World are stages we must pass through and must run parallel to our thinking and our thinking must “never forsake.” Our relationship with thinking must not make thinking the judge of things but to allow it to be an instrument through which things speak to us."
Rudolf Steiner
Overall I appreciate and feel aligned with the direction you are going. I am drawn to comment on your essay using two primary lenses. First on the overall narrative itself. And second on where I think you are going with it.
The narrative. You put forth an enormous landscape to contextualize monistic idealism in a brief essay, and give short attention to your proposed ‘ism’. The context - fortified with selections from and interpretations of Habermas and Nietzsche - seems to romanticize a past state of true democracy that was tragically lost (attributed to Habermas), and an alienation from a more pure state of connection and meaning and descent into nihilism (attributed to Nietzsche). Even with granting the necessary reductionism you faced in your approach to this essay, I came away a bit distracted by the ways in which my read of these thinkers differs from yours (Nietzsche’s writings support libertarianism as much as nihilism in my view, but I digress). I prefer to reflect on the context setting itself, which to me seems to follow the story line of the fall from Eden. A state setting used to evoke a void that needs filling - enter monistic idealism. My alarm bells rang loud. First, with the fallen from grace framing, yes 100% we are in a time of meta crises, no it’s not a fall from grace, it’s the latest in our beautiful horrifying clumsy graceful life destroying life affirming human trajectory. And the amplitude is increasing… the context setting, if necessary, is more simple to me. We have entered a reality which has precedent in historical cycles of institutional breakdown and extreme disparities, and the stakes are now existential. The cracks in the armor create opportunities.
Ascribing an ‘ism’ to your thoughts feels too early. And implies a robust framework.
You eluded to a collective effort - yes, good. With some evoking of a vanguard - reasonable - only this time with instant global connectivity and media conditioning it’s going to be very different from previous such experiences. The process/participants requires its own inquiry and articulation.
With regard to the emergent framework/movement (not ready for an ism, and skeptical of most existing ism’s) - Let’s get to the fundamentals. The vision. the set of assumptions, the guiding principles, and the implications for emergent institutions, social structures, and ways of being.
I am guilty of that which I accuse, focused on context and ran out of time to share more about your proposed embracing of monistic idealism. Will write more later or we can have a call.
But can say that I grew up in a household where we attended Unitarian and Quaker services, and monistic idealism (MI) is consistent with my experience of both traditions. However I don’t think MI provides a complete picture. you celebrate equality among all conscious beings and their inalienable role in the collective consciousness. I see the essence of evolutionary future institutions as supporting ma life affirming dance of soul and spirit in all beings. With spirit being what you call consciousness - universal, and flowing into and through all beings (for me not just humans). Soul to me is not captured by monistic idealism, it’s infinitely unique and emergent from the earth, embodied, of place, and animated by spirit. What do we do with this one miraculous life?
My question. My mission. Is how do we create institutions that bring out the best in human nature? That support us in living in greater harmony with ourselves, each other, and all life?
I start with the idea that human institutions come with a fundamental challenge, how do we build in death and rebirth cycles, so they don’t ossify and/or become cancerous, undead…
A key issue is scale… we fail miserably at creating human institutions at scale that function well
I have done a lot of thinking on both of these challenges.
The emergent direction that i see as hopeful is to elevate governance, social and economic activity at the local level. And as much as possible orient larger scales of governance toward supporting the local. I am appreciative of the reemergence of attention to ideas like bioregionalism. The inherently fractal nature of watersheds - and unavoidable aligned interest and connection to place inherent in watersheds - makes bioregionalism intuitive for many people.
Slowing the flow of water (reshaping our currencies), structuring to enhance the conditions for life. Etc. Etc.
I don’t think defining soul and spirit as separate if intermeshed aspects contradicts monistic idealism… I wrote about soul here: https://danielpinchbeck.substack.com/p/what-is-soul-what-is-spirit
It is almost like MI would be the underlying operating system, the DOS, and then you can build different UIs on top of it like animism, Christianity, Islam as long as you don’t forget they are programs running on the underlying OS, if that makes sense?
How wonderful to read your critique of a shaping (evolving) structural franework on which to build a new unity of human vision.
Togetherness in the Balinese tradition ( which I have immersed myself and married into) is built on a structural understanding of collective practices as the building blocks of stimulating this unified field.
The core of these practices are exchange as offering, pure offering, not giving or taking but being with the Great gift of life in something beyond reciprocity.
We do all breathe. We do all die. This is foundation.
Do we all need the balance of unified consciousness as the center point of an infinite seesaw lever between the abyss of nothjng and the surrender of God consciousness?
Not overtly, but yes we all want to belong. Perhaps we can get on a call Mr Mendelsohn and share our progress.
The Balinese have a structural way of supporting it not only in its spiritual action but in all elements. Concentric rings of influence that ripple from the self to the household to the Banjar and out to the island and eventually the planet.
It is as sound as the circus tent that supports the flying acrobat and ( in the dynamic between the foundational structure and the freedom that arises from it), just as beautiful to behold.
Totally with you and think this is hugely important. I’ve also spent a lot of time and energy creating a deliberative space, grounded in ritual/musuc/social connection for grappling with political questions in a humble, curious, non-judgmental, local way. It was very effective and popular and powerful for all involved, and I would love some collaborators who might help think through ways of refining and resuscitating it, particularly though the lens of this unifying paradigm /contextualuzing the work in this greater awareness, which was always implied but not explicit.
Thanks for another thought provoking post. Mars sucks. This video should go viral! https://youtu.be/MdwZTTgD7HY?si=3iePT784zlKJQxps
As a practitioner of Gestalt Awareness Practice (GAP), I am intimately familiar with the field of awareness - the generative space from which everything arises and to which everything returns. This field is not separate from us; it is as much a part of us as we are a part of it.
This leaves me wondering: given that humans are narrative creatures and stories serve as our primary bridge - not only to understanding but also to connecting with one another - how do we cohere around a shared experience of the "field of awareness" or love without reducing its immanence to a static concept? In other words, how can we extend these deeply personal and relational experiences into something more universal without losing their essence?
This tension between the ineffable and the need to articulate it is a central challenge in my work with a small community I steward. Together, we are striving to cultivate collective wisdom through difficult yet compassionate conversations, grounded in embodied relationality and trust. However, as we grow, we are finding it increasingly difficult to both include and transcend the initial relational field. While I have a hunch it is possible, the way forward continues to elude us.
I find encouragement and support in your writings, so please keep up the good work, Daniel.
I find Monistic Idealism a difficult term. Rational Materialism immediately makes sense but Monistic Idealism doesn't mean anything to me when I just read it like this.
I’ve asked these questions before but I still have trouble understanding how monistic idealism doesn’t become myopic, how love fits into it via relationality between God and creature, if primordial mind has will and agency. How would it deal with the reality of what is called the Fall?
See my response to Jeff… but also I would question “the reality of the Fall”, as that is a particularly Western idea. You don’t find it in aboriginal societies for instance. I prefer the Buddhist / Tantra ideas that our nature is basic goodness and “Samsara is Nirvana.”
To me the reality of the Fall is clear, I think we all can recognize that if we look at it. Why else would we think things should be a certain way or that we may not be living up to our potential. I idealist terms, why are dissociated from the ontological primitive at all? Why else would there be an is/ought distinction if we are not fallen? Yes we are basically good, but we are sick, that is the fall and that is why we need to be realigned, "saved".
I have just read don Jose Ruiz' book Wisdom of the Shamans. The Toltec wisdom explains human domestication to rules and ideas and redirects to the truth within. The ending eludes to the Theosophical Society's path and links Buddhism to North American shamanism. It's an individual path to enlightenment.