How We Evolve

How We Evolve

by Benjamin Phelan

When the previous generation of life scientists was coming up through the academy, there was a widespread assumption, not always articulated by professors, that human evolution had all but stopped. It had certainly shaped our prehuman ancestors — Auralopithecus, Paranthropus, and the rest of the ape-men and man-apes in our bushy lineage — but once Homo sapiens developed agriculture and language, it was thought, we stopped changing. It was as though, having achieved its aim by the seventh day, evolution rested. "That was the stereotype that I learned," says population geneticist and anthropologist Henry Harpending. "We showed up 45,000 years ago and haven't changed since then."

The idea makes a rough-and-ready kind of sense. Natural selection derives its power to transform from the survival of some and the demise of others, and from differential reproductive success. But we nurse our sick back to health, and mating is no longer a privilege that males beat each other senseless to secure. As a result, even the less fit get to pass on their genes. Promiscuity and sperm competition have given way to spiritual love; the fittest and the unfit are treated as equals, and equally flourish. With the advent of culture and our fine sensibilities, the assumption was, natural selection went by the board.

Moreover, evolution had never been observed in humans, except in a few odd cases, so the conclusion was drawn that it wasn't happening. One can't fault the logic. The most famous case of adaptive change in humans, that of sickle cell trait as an evolutionary response to malaria, seemed to prove the point that human evolution must be rare: Even in as dire and malaria-stricken an environment as West Africa, the only response evolution has been able to come up with is an imperfect defense that can cause serious health problems along with its solitary benefit. Selection pressures as strong as those brought about by endemic malaria are uncommon, and civilization was thought to wash out those less powerful.

But since the turn of the millennium, genomics has undergone a revolution. With the completion of such landmark studies as the Human Genome Project and the publication of HapMap, scientists finally have access to the particles of evolution. They can inspect vast stretches of DNA from people of all ethnicities, and the colossal amount of information suddenly available has spurred a revision of the old static picture that will render it unrecognizable. Harpending and a host of researchers have discovered in our DNA evidence that culture, far from halting evolution, appears to accelerate it.

Read More: Here

Human Natures

Cognitive Evolution and the Definition of Human Nature

By Merlin Donald, PhD.

Our society's collective definition of human nature provides a conceptual foundation for our ideas of human rights, individual responsibility, and personal freedom. Western society has traditionally derived its ideas in this regard from the liberal Humanities, which are the secular modern descendants of our earlier religious and philosophical traditions. They are the conceptual foundation of most of our laws and constitutional protections.

However, since Darwin, there have been many attempts to develop a scientific approach to defining human nature, and to deriving a new natural law based largely on the theory of evolution.

Read More (PDF): Here

Planetary Survival and Consciousness Evolution

Planetary Survival and Consciousness Evolution: Psychological Roots of Human Violence and Greed
By Stanislav Grof, M.D

The two most powerful psychological forces in human history have been without doubt violence and greed. However, the current global situation has amplified the consequences involved. More people were killed in the last hundred years than have existed from the dawn of humanity up to the last century. We have the dubious privilege of being the first species in natural history that has achieved the capacity to eradicate itself and destroy in the process all life on this planet. Yet the current global crisis is of a psychospiritual nature, and it cannot be resolved without a radical inner transformation of humanity on a large scale.

While this would seem a hopeless task, the recent theoretical concepts and practical approaches from a number of new-paradigm sources offer promising new strategies, which fall into the following five categories: development of a new image of the Universe and of a more comprehensive understanding of human nature and of the psyche; new understanding of the roots of malignant aggression and human violence; new insights into the nature of insatiable greed; experiential approaches facilitating positive personal transformation and consciousness evolution; and transpersonal psychology, consciousness research, and the global crisis.

It has become increasingly clear that consciousness is not a product of the physiological processes in the brain but is a primary attribute of existence. In the last analysis, the individual psyche of each of us is commensurate with the totality of existence; the deepest nature of humanity is not bestial, but divine.

Malignant aggression does not reflect true human nature; it is connected with a domain of unconscious, perinatal dynamics that separates us from our deeper identity. Those who initiate war activities and violence in general are typically substituting external targets for elements in their own psyches, which should properly be faced in personal self-exploration. The circumstances of birth play an important role in creating a disposition to violence and self-destructive tendencies or to loving behavior and healthy interpersonal relationships; thus changing birth practices to kinder and gentler ones would have a huge impact on the degree of violence acted out in the world.

Perinatal sources of greed lie in a feeling of dissatisfaction and discomfort with the present situation, whatever it might be. Like the child stuck in the birth canal, the individual feels the need to get to a better situation that seems to lie ahead, resulting in a "rat-race" strategy of existence which is incapable of delivering happiness. Transpersonal sources of greed lie in our separation from our true identity with the Divine, resulting in a craving for substitute satisfactions or surrogates—Atman projects.

However, hope lies in deep experiential approaches that facilitate personal transformation through psychospiritual death/rebirth and connection with the memories of positive postnatal or prenatal memories. Such approaches have consistently resulted in the emergence of deep spirituality of a universal and all-encompassing nature and a corresponding development of deep humanitarian and ecological concerns in individuals.

The current global situation has exteriorized many of the essential themes of the perinatal dynamics. If we continue to act out the problematic destructive and self-destructive tendencies originating in the depths of the unconscious, we will undoubtedly destroy ourselves and the life on this planet. However, if we succeed in internalizing this process on a large enough scale, it might result in an evolutionary progress that can take us as far beyond our present condition as we now are from primates. Thus, it is essential to spread the information about these possibilities for transformation and consciousness evolution and get enough people personally interested in pursuing them. We seem to be involved in a dramatic race for time that has no precedent in the entire history of humanity.

Read More: Here

Exploring the Technium - Part 2

From Integral Life:

Spiritual Machines
A dialogue between Kevin Kelly and Ken Wilber

In the second installation of this extraordinary dialogue, Kevin Kelly and Ken Wilber discuss the nature of evolutionary emergence—the mysterious process by which new wholes manifest in the universe, each greater than the sum of their parts. They speak about humanity’s role in this evolutionary process, especially in the creation of new types of intelligences: living, breathing, thinking machines.

Listen: Here

Public Dialogue on Creating Healthy Cities

The University Women’s Club of Vancouver is hosting a Public Dialogue on Creating Healthy Cities with Dr. Marilyn Hamilton.

Dr. Marilyn Hamilton is a “meshworker” and Founder of Integral City. Join us for an engaging and interactive evening. Listen to Marilyn’s presentation based on her new book, Integral City. Explore what happens when courageous dialogue surfaces differences and makes new connections, opens new pathways, brings hope, and creates city learning. Healthy cities evolve best when many different types of intelligences are integrated from diverse sources in a whole systems approach. Marilyn’s presentation outlines a big picture framework that offers new proactive options for complex issues such as housing and homelessness.

Marilyn’s newest book, Integral City: Evolutionary Intelligences for the Human Hive, will be published by New Society Publishers, October 2008 and available at the event for sale and book signing.

Wed. Nov. 5 7:00-9:30 pm Hycroft 1489 McRae Ave. Vancouver (Granville & 16th Ave.)
Cost: By donation at the door.
Limited seating. Register by Oct. 30.
Call 604 731-4661 or email rosie@uwcvancouver.ca

Learn More: Here

Psychological Evolution

Future Psychological Evolution

by John E. Stewart

Humans are able to construct mental representations and models of possible interactions with their environment. They can use these mental models to identify actions that will enable them to achieve their adaptive goals. But humans do not use this capacity to identify and implement the actions that would contribute most to the evolutionary success of humanity. In general, humans do not find motivation or satisfaction in doing so, no matter how effective such actions might be in evolutionary terms. From an evolutionary perspective, this is a significant limitation in the psychological adaptability of humans.

This paper sets out to identify the new psychological capacity that would be needed to overcome this limitation and how the new capacity might be acquired. Humans that develop this capacity will become self-evolving organisms - organisms that are able to adapt in whatever ways are necessary for future evolutionary success, largely unfettered by their biological and social past.

Read More: Here

Wilber on Meditative Maps

Check out this new interview with Ken Wilber on meditative states and maps by Vincent Horn and Ryan Oelke at Buddhist Geeks.

From Buddhist Geeks:

Ken Wilber on the Meditative Maps

Philosopher and long-time Buddhist practitioner, Ken Wilber, shares with us a 10,000 foot view of the terrain of meditative experience. He describes several of the most common Buddhist maps and their progression, including the one presented in the Visuddhimagga (one of the most prevalent in the Theravada tradition), the 10 ox herding pictures in the Zen tradition, and the Anuttara Tantra from the Tibetan tradition.

He also gives an overview of the very difficult stages of practice called the Dark Nights. These are periods where after being plunged into a whole new experience of reality we have it stripped from us and feel like we have lost what was once discovered. Another meaning of the dark night has to do with dis-identifying with previous levels of consciousness, and the difficult journey of releasing our grasping and addiction to these lower levels.

This is part 1 of a two-part series.

Listen: Here

What Science Offers the Humanities

What Science Offers the Humanities: Integrating Body and Culture

By Edward G. Slingerland

Amazon.Com Product Description:

What Science Offers the Humanities examines some of the deep problems facing current approaches to the study of culture. It focuses especially on the excesses of postmodernism, but also acknowledges serious problems with postmodernism's harshest critics.

In short, Edward Slingerland argues that in order for the humanities to progress, its scholars need to take seriously contributions from the natural sciences-and particular research on human cognition-which demonstrate that any separation of the mind and the body is entirely untenable.

The author provides suggestions for how humanists might begin to utilize these scientific discoveries without conceding that science has the last word on morality, religion, art, and literature. Calling into question such deeply entrenched dogmas as the "blank slate" theory of nature, strong social constructivism, and the ideal of disembodied reason, What Science Offers the Humanities replaces the human-sciences divide with a more integrated approach to the study of culture.

Preview the Book: Here

[ Also Check Out: Slingerland’s fascinating lecture ‘Enlightenment 2.0’ ]

Integral Politics, Perspective and Change

From Integral Life:

Integral Politics: Change You Can Breathe Into

As the US Presidential election rapidly approaches, it's easy to feel overwhelmed and confused about what might be the most important electoral choice of our lifetimes. But how can we rise above the noise, stay engaged, and bring some much-needed sanity to our lives and to our world?

We would like to suggest the following Integral Life offerings, all of which can help revitalize our sense of hope, clarity, and stability in these trying times:

A Tale of Four Americas: A Brief Summary of an Integral Approach to Politics

A Tale of Four Americas takes a look at the political dynamics and cultural perspectives that influence every part of the Republican and Democratic parties. It explores the ideological divides that exist within each party, and offers a simple map to help make sense of these seemingly conflicting beliefs.

Obama and McCain: Seeing Through the Talking Points

Obama and McCain: Seeing Through the Talking Points lets you watch the Integral political map emerge in real time in the acceptance speeches of Senators McCain and Obama. What is each candidate really saying, and to whom are they speaking?

Sleeping With Your So-Called Enemy: A Practice of Empathy and Perspective-Taking

Sleeping With Your So-Called Enemy is a practice that suggests a way to step outside of your own political views and into those of to your “other,” allowing you to expand your own perspective, be as inclusive as possible, and make the most compassionate decisions in your own life.

Learn More: Here

Notes from the Field

Reflections on the Integral Theory Conference (2008) from Integral Leadership Review:

Russ Volckmann: A highlight of the conference for me was meeting Mark Edwards. I found him not only to be predictably brilliant, but warm and very present. His paper, Of Elephants and Butterflies: An Integral Metatheory for Organisational Transformation, is available on the conference CD. I do not know if there are plans to publish it elsewhere. Following some graphic humor of caterpillar transformation, Mark discussed the nature of metatheory and integral as a metatheory: “i) a metatheory for the study of organisational transformation, ii) a general method for performing metatheory building research, and iii) some evaluative comments on the metatheory building resource used in this research Ken Wilber’s AQAL framework.” But there are other metatheories to consider, as well, including some we are discussing in our dialogue for the last two years in Integral Leadership Review. Examples are social mediation and the work of Vgotsky (which he notes has never been addressed by Wilber), Bandura’s work on learning, systems dynamics and autopoiesis, alignment, stakeholder, decentering, evolution and the governance holarchy.

Edward Kelly: …while the conference was conducted in a very supportive manner, this did not preclude integral from being under the critical spotlight. This might have come as a surprise to some delegates butmayreflect the change from a small cult to a broader movement (as discussed by Roger Walsh). There was also a sense that this conference signaled that integral was developing two distinct strands: integral research on the one hand and integral life on the other. Integral research is spearheaded by Sean Esbjorn-Hargens and integral life by Robb Smith and the integral institute. Both are complimentary, but both are also different. The integral theory conference was primarily about the former, although Robb Smith used the conference as an opportunity to re-launch integral life.

Finally, sitting on the plane (getting some high altitude perspective) I wonder whether I will return for the second biannual integral theory conference in two years time and whether I would encourage others to do likewise? Given all things being equal I will return in 2010 and in the meantime would encourage others interested in integral research to consider doing likewise. Overall the quality of the papers was very high, the presentations very engaging and the welcome and hospitality of the organisers (including all the staff at JFKU and volunteers) was wonderful.

Gayle Karen Young: It is undeniable that seeds bore many fruits in this conference. The intellectual horsepower was awe-inspiring. Behind the papers, the rigor, the numbers, and the abstracts were the stories of love—love of truth, love of beauty, love of people and the more-than-human world. We move through these multiple worlds, and frequently other worlds get reduced to the merely tangible. While papers, posters, panels, and presentations formed much of the tangible structural spine for the conference, they also formed windows into personal and then collective stories of tenacity and courage, of descents into the ambiguous and into uncharted territories.

Read More: Here

The Depth of the Exteriors - Part 3

The Depth of the Exteriors

Part 3: Cooley and Mead and the Social Behaviorist View of Development in the Exterior Quadrants

By Mark Edwards

In any detailed discussion of Integral Theory principles relating to the AQAL framework, it becomes quickly apparent just how vague are the definition of many of its fundamental concepts. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the case of "The Exteriors".

But does this mean that when a mystical experience is described (or even remembered) in third-person terms that it becomes an exterior phenomenon. Does it mean that my behaviour should be regarded by me as a third-person "it"? Does it mean that the interiors and exteriors refer to the same holon or do they refer to different holons or does the context continually alter depending on one's perspective? Does ken's definition of the "exterior" mean that the Left Hand paths refer to first-person holons and the Right Hand paths refer to third-person holons or do they both refer to third-person maps or knowledge quests? Does it mean that these exteriors are flat material objects or do they have some type of exterior developmental depth. Do the basic holonic tenets and structures that Integral Theory applies to the interiors have exactly the same application to the exteriors? Are we to think that the term exterior refers to the objective world of scientific research and abstract knowledge or to the real world of eating, meeting friends, watching TV and going to school? I could go on, but I am sure that you get my message.

The answers to such questions might, in part, be buried within Ken's existing writings but even if they are they are not immediately accessible. The clarification of these issues is absolutely essential for the clear definition of many Integral theory concepts. In any event, these very basic issues have still not been widely debated within Integral theory or an integrally informed community of thinkers and consequently, in my opinion, some of the current ways of presenting and applying the AQAL model are highly debateable.

In writing this series on exteriors I hope to expose some of these shortcomings and confusions problems and to bring to light other models of the exteriors that also pose interesting problems for the way Integral Theory currently divides reality.

In this last essay on exteriors I will have a brief look at the American behavioural sociologists – Cooley, Mead and Blumer. These theorists present a strong challenge to Ken's current way of defining the exteriors. These American sociologists were some of the greatest pioneers of the behavioural and social worlds and, interestingly, they each propose developmental models that explain the worlds of consciousness and interiority in terms of exterior developmental dynamics. They were "flatlanders" who acknowledged the existence of interior consciousness and proposed models that saw interiors as the result of exterior depth! Now there's a challenge to test the non-exclusionary capacity of Integral theory IMP.

Read More: Here

[Check Out: Part I: Wilber's Flatland / Part II: Piaget, Vygotsky, Harre]

The Depth of the Exteriors - Part 2

The Depth of the Exteriors
Part 2: Piaget, Vygotsky, Harre and the Social Mediation of Development

By Mark Edwards

In the first part of this series I presented Ken Wilber's view that all exteriors are "material" and that all exterior development is the layered complexification of matter in sensori-motor space. Ken sees the Right Hand exterior quadrants of behavioural and social development as a Flatland of "surfaces" that can be "registered with the senses" and which is "all empiricism, all monological gaze, all behaviourism, all shiny surfaces and monochrome objects" and which contain "no depth". As Ken puts it, "the Right-Hand quadrants are all material".

In the sections that follow I investigate some alternative views of the behavioural and social exteriors. Views that, while recognising the reality of interiors and subjective consciousness, nonetheless provide very different understandings of the Right Hand quadrants and the part that they play in human development.

In contrast to Wilber's interpretation of the Right Hand quadrants, I propose that a truly Integral understanding of the exteriors recognises their qualitative depth, their causal and developmental equivalence to the interiors, and their richness and profundity in terms of unfolding ontological complexity. I am arguing that, in a more balanced statement of Integral Theory, the Right Hand is not a Flatland any more than the Left Hand is. We not only need to include all quadrants in the explanation of human behaviour but we nee to have a valid understanding of what each of those quadrants represents and how they relate to each other.

I am suggesting that Ken sometimes misinterprets the developmental relationship between the interior and the exterior quadrants and that he has neglected several very important schools of developmental thought that focus on exterior aspects of evolution and personal growth.

This second part of the series will take a look at some of these schools, and in particular the sociological tradition of Cooley and Mead, the cultural-historical tradition of Vygotskian developmental studies and the Activity Theory approach to human development.

Read More: Here

The Depth of the Exteriors - Part 1

The Depth of the Exteriors
Part 1: Wilber's Flatland

By Mark Edwards

This is the first part in a series of essays on Integral theory's treatment of the Right Hand exteriors of behavioral and social development. As always my intention in working through the following issues is to strengthen the internal consistency and overall validity of Integral Theory. Often my essays focus on rather minor aspects of the model, but sometimes they do look at central features of the Integral framework that have broad implications for its theoretical development and practical application. And this is particularly true for the present topic of the exteriors of development.

Ken Wilber, of course, has been the driving force behind all of the development of the Integral model thus far, and his works have always and continue to be an inspiration for me. To this point (to my knowledge) Ken is still the sole Integral thinker who focuses on the development of the theoretical framework of the model. As a consequence, my aim of critically clarifying and offering alternative views necessarily involves the specific critique of Wilber's writings. The ongoing targeting of critical comment towards Wilber's writings (always constructive though I hope) can become rather tiresome for me as I am sure it can for those who read these essays. But there seems no way around this issue, if my purpose in offering alternative ways of interpreting Integral Theory is to be pursued. If there were other Integral thinkers working on the theory side of the model (as opposed to its applied utilization in various fields, of which there are many), I would include their work in these critical essays as much as Wilber's. But, unfortunately, this isn't the case.

Those who do offer critiques of Wilber's writings, such as the contributors to the "Ken Wilber in Dialogue" book, Kirk Schneider, Albert Ellis, Andy Smith, and Jeff Meyerhoff (see Fischer, 1997 for an excellent, if rather out of date review article) almost always do so from outside of the model. These authors have their own theoretical models that they work from to comment on Wilber's ideas. However, I take a very different approach to these critics in that I work from within the Integral theory framework itself. I utilize Integral Theory concepts to consider the internal coherency of the Integral framework itself. I not only identify problematic aspects of the theory but I also try to show, as Michael Zimmerman puts it, "how integral theory has the resources needed to address the problems".

Typically, I try to reveal some aspect of the model I find unclear or problematic, trace this back to some interpretive inconsistency and offer alternative constructive suggestions for improving the coherency of the theory that is in accord with, what I believe to be, its definitive principles. And so it is with this present issue of exteriority and Wilber's treatment of the behavioral and social aspects of reality. This area of exteriority, behavior and social development is one of the most fundamental aspects of any over-arching model of reality. It has also been for me the topic where Wilber has articulated some of his most puzzling statements.

In this opening essay of this series on exteriors I will try to identify problematic aspects of Wilber's definition and conceptualization of holonic exteriors and of the Right Hand side of the AQAL model in general. In the following installments I will look at other depth models of the exteriors and finish with a alternative suggestion on how Integral Theory can better conceptualize the behavioral and social domains of existence.

Read More: Here

See Also: Part 2 / Part 3

Biology, Phenomenology and the Sciences of Mind

Is human consciousness continuous with Life? Can more sophisticated phenomenology improve our scientific understanding of consciousness and cognition? In the elegant and thought-provoking book, Mind in Life (2007), philosopher Evan Thompson explores an integral vision of psychology and life that traces a path from simple cellular organizations all the way to consciousness, intersubjectivity, and culture.

The book takes the reader on a wonderful and important journey through the important philosophical and scientific debates of our time, and concludes that an understanding human consciousness can be grounded and enriched by a more nuanced consideration of bodies, brains and the social environments from which we come.

Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind

by Evan Thompson

Product Description from Amazon.Com:

How is life related to the mind? The question has long confounded philosophers and scientists, and it is this so-called explanatory gap between biological life and consciousness that Evan Thompson explores in Mind in Life.

Thompson draws upon sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to argue that mind and life are more continuous than has previously been accepted, and that current explanations do not adequately address the myriad facets of the biology and phenomenology of mind. Where there is life, Thompson argues, there is mind: life and mind share common principles of self-organization, and the self-organizing features of mind are an enriched version of the self-organizing features of life. Rather than trying to close the explanatory gap, Thompson marshals philosophical and scientific analyses to bring unprecedented insight to the nature of life and consciousness.

This synthesis of phenomenology and biology helps make Mind in Life a vital and long-awaited addition to his landmark volume The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience (coauthored with Eleanor Rosch and Francisco Varela).

Peer Reviews:

Evan Thompson has emerged as a major presence in the science of the mind. His new book is quite wonderful to read, and I found it impossible to put down. In particular, his discussion of Husserl's phenomenology is a revelation, as are his reasons for reversing his former criticisms of Husserl. His discussion of one of the central issues driving modern cognitive neuroscience, the binding problem, is particularly valuable and should compel a major reexamination of experiments being carried out in this field. Evan Thompson is doing important work in re-framing the very questions that define cognitive science. --Merlin Donald, Case Western Reserve University

Neurophenomenology is the majestic method we naturalists have been seeking to blend experience, behavior, and the brain. This long-awaited book will open up the discussion of what experience is and where it is, and how we explain the connection between the objective world of physical activity and that of pain, love, and imagining. Thompson enacts the method he espouses, neurophenomenology, in each chapter with in-depth examples that mind scientists will find compelling. A tour de force! --Owen Flanagan

Order the Book: Here

Between Social and Cognitive Developments

Integral theory posits the underlying interconnection of all developmental processes. From cognition to culture, and ecosystems to brain function, humans exist within a continuum of life and dynamic process.

An essential task of all practical integral theorizing must also include rigorous attempts to better understand 'how' and in what way all these things hang together. That is, researchers and lay people interested in an integral approach must be comprehensive in their investigations, innovative in their interpretations, and selective in their associations - while remaining sensitive to different forms of validity and analytical complexity underlying all possible synthesis.

As a result, Integral Praxis seeks to promote the public understanding of mainstream empirical research and complex ideas through accessible and readable articles, interviews and blog posts, often presented by the experts in their own respective fields.

In the blog post below Chris Chatham looks at recent research on the relationship between cognitive development and social factors which might influence and impact such development. Understanding more about how people come to ‘know and ‘think’, and the factors which influence this can help all of us live more conscious and flexible lives:

From Developing Intelligence:

Social vs. Cognitive Development: Social Factors or Small Sample Sizes?

By Chris Chatham

My friend Geoff once said that "all cognition is social." Smugly, I reminded myself that the conclusions of cognitive psychologists are drawn on evidence where social cues are kept constant. But even in the absence of confounding social cues, perhaps the underlying cognitive processes themselves are caused by social factors.

A great example of this comes from today's issue of Science, in which Topal et al describe how a well known "cognitive" phenomenon - perseveration - may be dramatically influenced by social cues.

Read More: Here

Chris Chatham is a grad student at the University of Colorado, Boulder. His blog Developing Intelligence is updated daily and topics range from developmental psychology and computational cognitive neuroscience, to comparative psychology, psychometrics and artificial intelligence. His posts frequently deal with the most recent research in a his scientific field.

[see also: Cultural Influences on Neural Substrates ]

Integral Research in the 21st Century

The Integral Institute and John F. Kennedy University have collaborated to found the Integral Research Center. The IRC will be dedicated to conducting original trans-disciplinary research and the promotion of mixed-methodologies in science and academia.

Visit the Integral Research Center online.

From the Website:

Integral Research (IR) is an emerging approach to mixed methods that is explicitly grounded in Integral Theory and makes use of its post-metaphysical position and its practice of Integral Methodological Pluralism to provide a multi-method approach that weaves together 1st-person, 2nd-person, and 3rd-person methods. IR makes use of multiple methods (qualitative and quantitative) as a way of exploring the multi-faceted and multi-dimensional nature of complex phenomena.

Freedom, Ethics and the U.S Financial Crisis

Hazel Henderson is an Advisory Board Member for Kosmos Journal, author of Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy (2007) and president of Ethical Markets Media which takes an integral approach to market research and business consulting.

Here is her recent essay on the current U.S and global financial crisis:

Trendspotting: Chicago Boys Curse Comes Home to Wall Street

By Hazel Henderson

The famous school of economics at the University of Chicago led by the late Milton Friedman spread its market fundamentalism worldwide. Greed, selfishness, individualism and short-termism were conflated with freedom and democracy and elevated to the status of moral philosophy. The fatal flaws of this ideology fueled the reckless risk-taking, greed and arrogance that led to Wall Street’s downfall.

The Chicago Boys and their clones stormed through Latin America in the 1950s, led the triumphant forces of capitalism to victory in the Cold War and sparked the Reagan and Thatcher era and the Washington Consensus of deregulation, privatization driving today’s form of economic globalization. The roots of market fundamentalism, which stem from Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations (1776) while ignoring his Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759, 1790) and from the Austrian School of Ludwig Von Mises, Friedrich Hayek and others, became the ideological basis of US libertarianism and the neoconservatives’ revival in the George W. Bush administration.

Elevating individual freedom and free markets to a higher moral status than community responsibility and the role of government helped destroy the excesses of communism and Stalinism. Yet, this lure of “rugged individualism,” making money in markets free of regulation, also drove the narrow calculus of Milton Friedman’s famous single bottom line: the only purpose of private enterprise and corporations is to make as much money as possible for shareholders. Academics created “free market” curricula, and business schools reaped grants from corporations and from conservative and gullible liberal foundations. Media joined in promoting the “animal spirits” of individual entrepreneurs, the glorification of business leaders and the “wealth” of Wall Street raiders, hedge fund titans and private equity kings. Money was seen as the only form of wealth.

Read More: Here