Isolated Amazonian Tribe

From the TED Blog:

"One of the World's Last Uncontacted Tribes "

If you've seen Wade Davis's unforgettable 2004 TED Talk -- where he evokes the magic of the world's cultural diversity, and speaks so eloquently about the alarming rate with which cultures and languages are dying -- then you might find this photo as heart-stopping as I did... The photo shows members of one of the world’s last uncontacted tribes, who were spotted and photographed from the air in a remote corner of the Amazon rainforest near the Brazil-Peru border.

Survival International, an advocacy group for tribal people, released the photos on their website and quotes Jose Carlos dos Reis Meirelles Junior, who works for the Brazilian government’s Indian affairs department: "We did the overflight to show their houses, to show they are there, to show they exist ...This is very important because there are some who doubt their existence."

More: Here

Investigating Global Health

Democracy Now interviews Dr. Paul Farmer about his research, projects and the challenges of pursuing healthcare within a social justice perspective:

Dr. Paul Farmer Challenges Profit-Driven Medical System While Bringing Healthcare to Poor Communities Worldwide

'Paul Farmer is not your ordinary doctor. In going to the poorest places on earth, he is not only treating patients, but challenging whole healthcare systems. More than twenty year ago, Dr. Farmer co-founded the charity Partners in Health to provide free medical care in central Haiti. Today, Partners In Health provides healthcare for people with HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and other conditions in Haiti and eight other countries around the world.'

Listen and Watch: Here

Integral "Third Way" Politics

This new video is showing up everywhere on the internet, but we thought we had to post it after watching it closely ourselves - as Ken Wilber's passion for major political issues, and the clarity with which he deploys applied integral theory (at least in terms of AQAL) is something to behold.

Whatever your opinion of this integral-type theorizing (and jargon), this 30 minute video demonstrates just how accurate and useful a calibrated integral framework can be when we attempt to understand the broad currents of cultural and development change.

Towards an Understanding of Hierarchy in Natural Systems

Social scientists have known for years how increased complexity in human habitation has historically shifted towards hierarchical organization. For example, in her pioneering research on ancient cultures, scholar Raine Eisler helped elucidate the key role of hierarchical structures in human societies - and the critical difference between ‘dominating hierarchies’ and ‘growth hierarchies’.

Recent integral theory has further elaborated on the distinctions between hierarchical systems, making considerable use of the term ‘holarchies’ to describe the complex relationship between parts and wholes.

Now, scientists are beginning to understand more clearly how hierarchy (in various forms) is actually a defining feature of most complex and adaptive systems. Here is Roland Piquepaille blogging on the most recent research on the structure of complex networks:

Extracting the structure of networks

Networks are used to represent the structure of complex systems, including the Internet or social networks, but often these descriptions are biased or incomplete. Now, researchers at the Santa Fe Institute have shown that it's possible to extract automatically the hierarchical structure of networks. The researchers say their results 'suggest that hierarchy is a central organizing principle of complex networks, capable of offering insight into many network phenomena.' They also think that their algorithms can be applied to almost every kind of networks, from biochemical networks (protein interaction networks, metabolic networks or genetic regulatory networks) to communities in social networks.

Read More>>>

Recent human imaging studies have also identified brain circuitry associated with social status and hierarchy, according to researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) of the National Institutes of Health. They found that important brain areas are activated when a person moves up or down in a pecking order - or simply views perceived social superiors or inferiors.

From the principle researchers:

“Our position in social hierarchies strongly influences motivation as well as physical and mental health. This first glimpse into how the brain processes that information advances our understanding of an important factor that can impact public health.”

Read More: Here

Also check out a succinct opinion piece on the related topic of ‘Hierarchy and Peer to Peer” from Michael Bauwens: Here

Evolving the Network: Politics, Culture and Consciousness

‘On March 28, 2008 Reality Sandwich/Evolver sponsored a panel discussion on the capacity of digital technology to transform our reality. As moderator Ken Jordan put it, “What’s going to emerge from this digital soup?”

The panelists were Laura Dawn, cultural director of MoveOn; Paul D. Miller aka DJ Spooky, musician, writer, and filmmaker; Daniel Pinchbeck, author and editorial director of Reality Sandwich, and Peter Koechley, former managing editor of the Onion, now with MoveOn.’

Watch the full Video: Here

Social Work as an Integral Profession

By Heather Larkin

‘This article introduces the reader to the profession of social work and its evolution over time. By simultaneously attending to both the person and the environment, social work has been a more comprehensive profession. Yet, although social work has been inherently striving for a more integrative approach from the beginning, it has lacked a meta-theory that could address people, their environments, and integrate previously competing theories. Integral Theory is that meta-theory. Social workers are invited to consider this meta-theoretical approach to the service they provide.’

Read More (PDF): Here

The Girl Who Shocked the United Nations

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.”

—Shunryu Suzuki

Born and raised in Vancouver, Canada, Severn Cullis-Suzuki has been working on environmental and social justice issues since kindergarten. At age 9, she and some friends started the Environmental Children's Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues.

In 1992 they raised their own money and traveled to the UN Earth Summit, in Brazil where then 12 year-old Severn gave the following powerful speech that deeply affected (and silenced) some of the most prominent world leaders. The speech had such an impact that she has become a frequent invitee to speak at important U.N. conferences.

Her words and passion are as relevant today - perhaps even more so - as they were 16 years ago.

Born to writer Tara Elizabeth Cullis and Canadian geneticist and environmental activist David Suzuki, Severn Cullis-Suzuki received a B.Sc. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Yale University in 2002. She continues to speak out around the world about environmental issues, urging listeners to define their values, act with the future in mind, and take individual responsibility.

Scientists Uncover Cosmic Web

Missing Matter Of Universe Found

'Although the universe contains billions of galaxies, only a small amount of its matter is locked up in these behemoths. Most of the universe's matter that was cooked up during and just after the Big Bang must be found elsewhere. Now, in an extensive search of the relatively recent, local universe, astronomers said they have definitively found about half of the missing normal matter, called baryons, in the spaces between the galaxies.'

Read More: Here

A Cross-paradigmatic Study of Social Evolution

As knowledge and methods become globally available, the human sciences are becoming positioned to provide unprecedented innovations in theory and application. However, the realization of a critical and integrative analysis of human social evolution is often hampered by continuous academic specialization and parochial adherence to traditional practices and discourses.

One of the main objectives of the Integral Research Group is to make theoretical and practical contributions to a more integrative understanding of human life. As such, we continue to provide opportunities and information that both challenges and advances the broader ‘integral approach’.

In the following study, anthropologist Ben Fitzhugh goes against the current academic pressures and attempts a critical rethinking and synthesis of the extensive research done on social evolution, the development of power dynamics and inequality in human civilization:

Thoughts on the Evolution of Social Inequality: A Paradigmatic Analysis - by Ben Fitzhugh

"The decision to reject one paradigm is always simultaneously the decision to accept another, and the judgment leading to that decision involves the comparison of both paradigms with nature and with each other." (Kuhn 1970:77)

'This paper seeks to challenge disciplinary entrenchment through a logical critique of several competing paradigms. To make this problem tractable, I will focus specifically on the issue of the social evolution of hunter-gatherer societies and compare models from the theoretical paradigms of cultural ecology, Marxism, practice theory, and evolutionary ecology. Because the empirical data for testing alternative models of social evolution is necessarily time transgressive, the focus of this paper is primarily archaeological.'

Read the full paper: Here

An Integral Philosophy and Definition of Nursing

Implications for a Unifying Meta-Theory of Nursing

By Olga F. Jarrin

A unifying meta-theory of nursing is suggested, building from the foundation of Ken Wilber’s AQAL (integral) framework. A definition of nursing as situated caring is presented. Historical discussion of contemporary nursing epistemology and theory are provided for context. Implications for practice, education, and research are discussed.

A unifying meta-theory of nursing is needed to most benefit from the diversity in nursing education, practice, theory and research. A unifying meta-theory will enable nurses at both the practical and academic levels to appreciate the complexity and simplicity of nursing, allowing them to articulate confidently what we do and why we do it.

Read More: Here

[see also: Integral Holistic Nursing]

The Emerging Moral Psychology

By Dan Jones

'Experimental results are beginning to shed light on the psychological foundations of our moral beliefs. Long thought to be a topic of enquiry within the humanities, the nature of human morality is increasingly being scrutinized by the natural sciences. This shift is now beginning to provide impressive intellectual returns on investment.

Philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, economists, primatologists and anthropologists, all borrowing liberally from each others’ insights, are putting together a novel picture of morality—a trend that University of Virginia psychologist Jonathan Haidt has described as the “new synthesis in moral psychology.” The picture emerging shows the moral sense to be the product of biologically evolved and culturally sensitive brain systems that together make up the human “moral faculty.”'

Read the Entire Article: Here

Conscious Media

Seeking out sources for more conscious media is difficult in a world full of reality T.V, slick sound-bytes and stylish melodramas. Besides the occasional public cable special or corporate sponsored feel-good projects, where can we look for the kinds of programs and media that inspire and educate the very best in the human character?

Naropa University and it’s partners (including Gaiam) recently announced it’s third annual Gaia Film Festival. The festival features some of today’s best and most inspiring filmmakers and artists, and will showcase the best in narrative features, full length documentaries, narrative shorts, animated works, children's films or experimental art films.

From the festival website:

A Gaia Film is a movie that inspires us, lifts our spirit, or transforms our lives. A Gaia Film makes us feel more hopeful, more thankful, more connected, more passionate, and better about life in general. We identify with a Gaia Film's characters on a deep, emotional level, and are motivated by their stories to pursue positive change in our own lives. A Gaia film honors the belief that simple choices can change the world and inspires us to make a difference.

Learn more: Here

Running concurrently with the Gaia Film Fest is the Conscious Media Insititute's Awakening the Visionary Film Artist weeklong intensive summer film and screenwriting program running June 18–24, 2008 in Boulder, Colorado.

From the program website:

Dear Filmmaker:

You’ve dreamed of making a difference with your films, of tapping into your deepest inspiration. The Conscious Media Institute (CMI) utilizes screenwriting workshops and contemplative creativity exercises to make those dreams a reality. Held adjacent to the Gaia Film Festival, CMI is also a forum within which filmmaking professionals can exchange wisdom from both sides of the camera.

The program costs $900 and includes an All-Access Two-Day Pass to the Gaia Film Festival.

Love to Listen

"The first duty of love is to listen". -Paul Tillich"

The effectiveness of the spoken word," say Ralph G. Nichols and Leonard A. Stevens, "hinges not so much on how people talk but mostly on how they listen." In an article in the Harvard Business Review called 'Listening to People' Nichols and Stevens analyze the practical importance of communicative reception – as ‘being with’ someone in dialogical exchange. Authentically ‘listening’ to another person is a very different activity from talking or reading and requires several different skills.

Get the research paper: Here

There have been several attempts by scholars to explain the process of communication. Depending on their background and objectives, different scholars have viewed the process of communication differently and have developed different models. But, regardless of our formal definitions, we are left with the fact that communication pervades everything we do and everything we are - strongly influencing all human activity. From war and peace among nations to whether a marriage works, from political action to personal friendship, success in work, school, or life communication and exchange are a kosmological constant.

Living in such a ‘communicative world’ thus makes good communication and listening skills vitally important to fostering positive relations and sustaining healthy forms of life.

Whether you are strengthening a relationship, resolving a conflict, or offering support in a facing a crisis, good listening skills help facilitate understanding and peace.

Learn More: Here

From CommunicationPractices.Org:

Building a Communication-Skills Movement

Imagine a personal discipline for learning communication and cooperation skills, using the routines and errands of everyday life as our classroom. It's all free because it's outside the money system entirely. But it can help us make a living, avoid trouble, improve personal relationships, and work together for a better world. In an age of arrogant and abusive institutions, we can learn skills to take back more control of our lives.

Building your own skills and practices for more full-spectrum communications (verbal, biological, physical and symbolic) between individuals and among groups will enhance your capacity for individual transformation, while also expanding the capacity of the evolving universe for love and mutual understanding. Let us know what you think...

“It is through this creative process that we at once love and are loved”

- Brenda Ueland (The Art of Listening)

The Power of Play

“We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” -- George Bernard Shaw

According to a study by Sandra Hofferth, from 1997 to 2003, North American children spent 50 percent less time outdoors. And, alarmingly, over the last two decades, more than 30,000 schools in the United States have eliminated recess to make more time for academics.

However, decades of research has shown that play is crucial to physical, intellectual, and social-emotional development at all ages. This is especially true of the purest form of play: the self-motivated, imaginative, independent kind, where people create their own games.

In a recent article, Tufts University psychologist David Elkind explored how we can build a new culture of play. Here are some excerpts:

A large body of research evidence also supports the value and importance of particular types of play. For example, Israeli psychologist Sara Smilansky’s classic studies of sociodramatic play, where two or more children participate in shared make believe, demonstrate the value of this play for academic, social, and emotional learning. "Sociodramatic play activates resources that stimulate social and intellectual growth in the child, which in turn affects the child's success in school," concludes Smilansky in a 1990 study that compared American and Israeli children. "For example, problem solving in most school subjects requires a great deal of make believe, visualizing how the Eskimos live, reading stories, imagining a story and writing it down, solving arithmetic problems, and determining what will come next…

The decline of children's free, self-initiated play is the result of a perfect storm of technological innovation, rapid social change, and economic globalization…

When we adults unite play, love, and work in our lives, we set an example that our children can follow. That just might be the best way to bring play back into the lives of our children—and build a more playful culture…

Read the entire article: Here

As social change workers we often take our work and ourselves too seriously. In our quest to make the world a better place we become caught in the busyness and with our deeply committed passion for changing the world – inadvertently forsaking our own mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health “for the cause.”

It is important to take some time to move beyond our habitual life and do something absolutely outrageous, spontaneous and fun. Play helps us maintain compassion, intelligence - and often rejuvenates our mental, physical and communicative powers. Play also provides individuals with tons of fulfillment and relaxation, getting us through these deeply challenging political times.

Integrating deep play into our lives helps us foster the willingness to participate in the things that matter most – inevitably helping us open up to a richer, more satisfying way of being in the world.

[See also: Harnessing the Power of Play: Stories of Hope in Sub-Saharan Africa]

Let us know what you think!

Integral Sustainability Case Studies

Integral Applications: Précis of Integral Sustainability Case Studies - By Will Varey

"The abstracts of the case studies below are short summary statements of Integral Applications completed between September 2003 and September 2007. They follow a similar format and describe, using a quadrivium analysis: the intention of the integral intervention in terms of the sustainability problem identified and the ultimate benefit desired (I), the objective parameters of the situational context (IT), the form of collective intervention enacted within the social holon (WE); and the systemic changes and artifacts that ultimately resulted (ITS). It is hoped that these may be of use (or inspiration) to other practitioners engaging in similar Integral sustainability projects elsewhere in the world."

Read the full article (PDF): Here