MODERN CIVILIZATION

Endorsements                                                                        

            Preface to the Second Edition                                 

            Preface to the First Edition                                       

            Acknowledgements                                                   

            List of Figures

1. Introduction

Evolutionary Perspectives

2. Obsolescence in Research: The Biological Analogy
3. New Ideas in Biology

Morphogenetic Fields, Evolution and Consciousness

Morphic Resonance: Some Examples

Implications of Morphic Resonance

Behaviour

Instinct and Learning

Modified Materialism

The Conscious Self

The Creative Universe

Transcendent Reality

4. A Study of the Past and the Concept of Time
5. Learning and Communication

Learning Is Unlearning

What Is True Communication?

Barriers to Learning and Communication

Beyond Barriers

6. The Person: Physical and Social Conditioning

Physical Conditioning

Social Conditioning

7. The Person: Will and Loss of Experience

Does the Person Have a Will?

The Loss of Experience

8. The Dual Nature of Mechanical Thought

The Fragment and the Whole

Dichotomous Thought

The Dual Movement

9. Who Am I?
10. The Pole of Birth and Death
11. Creativity and Self-expression
12. Dimensionless Space as Eternal Silence

            Bibliography                                                                

            Index                                                                            

A study of the past is an attempt to trace human development by recording and interpreting events of human experience in an evolutionary–chronological sequence. But these interpretations of human activity somehow become convincingly real. It is often forgotten that these are only conceptual interpretations of events, known rather fragmentarily or partially; and this, too, limited by specific viewpoints. In being unconscious of such limitations, the outpourings of these studies into the overall educational system continue to reinforce a fragmentary view of human experience. The given area is linked to a deeper examination of the way we know, acquire and interpret knowledge in general. This means, as is well known by philosophers, to look deeply into that epistemology of the knowledge of the past which is governed by one’s perpetual, conceptual and metaphysical notions. History, for example, is commonly believed to be a set of facts which one simply puts in order, by some accepted cannons of knowledge, as if it were an ‘objective’ viewpoint. But is this really so? All perceptions of past events are from the point of view of the existential present. The viewer and what is viewed are inextricably bound to each other. The notion of ‘objective’ or detached history, in fact of any knowledge, especially in the historical and social sciences, is a misleading notion. All ideas are continuously changing in terms of the overall growth of knowledge in general.

Thus, historical knowledge is continuously being rewritten in terms of our present perceptions, of how we want to mould the contemporary society. In fact, this is how a study of the past is frequently used to justify each social group’s or nation’s political and economic demands. A study of the past plays a very crucial role in contemporary society since all ideological–political movements, whether conservative or liberal, use—and more often distort—historical evidence. History thus becomes a kind of contemporary mythology. To give a very simple example, the 1857 event has been variously called; an army ‘mutiny’ if one happens to be British. We leave aside the fact of what actually may have happened since the event itself has many testimonies and evidences which are incorporated variously by histories themselves.

Again, a general notion is that a group of people, whether a small or a large entity as a nation—which itself is a concept—has a single history. But it is obvious that there is no single history since each group tends to view a particular event from its own viewpoint. In fact, even within a single more or less homogeneous group, whether this is a linguistic or social group, the same event is incorporated and interpreted in different ways. The historian may claim that it takes all this into account to produce a composite and objective description. But this arises again from an idea of current state of perceptions of reality in general and historical research methodology which may change at any time—however sound these may appear for the moment. Moreover, these methods are inseparable from a comprehension and interpretation of the past event itself, that is, the past events create the present notions as well. Human perception and human action within the framework of consciousness are inseparable.