There is currently a burgeoning literature on our life support system-the biosphere. Moreover, it is coming at a time when we are being alerted to an eco-apocalyptic countdown but with little understanding of how and when a global tipping point will impact on our very survival. For the first time in our history, we can now draw on a compendium of scientific research that not only warns of this impending crisis, but which also tells us how to deal with it. Yet political inertia coupled with limited understanding of the biophysical limits to our life support systems puts a massive obstacle in the way.
Tom Oliver, an Ecologist at Reading University explores this issue in a new book –The Self Delusion-and explains why we need to grasp that we are part of this eco system and not independent individuals. The idea of the self as a relatively closed system is a delusion that has often conferred advantage but is now a dangerous trap. Moving through advances in science with valuable clarity, Oliver tells us why.
Bacteria and fungi inhabit our bodies, their 38tn cells outnumbering ours. A human mouth contains over a thousand species. Genes pass between them. New species invade. Many are part of the functioning of our bodies. Even inside our cells there are mitochondria, energy-generating organs inherited from bacteria that fused with our single-celled ancestors two billion years ago. Even feelings and actions, which we might think define our identity, are not necessarily simply our own. Bacteria make a difference to moods and depression. Alarmingly, there are parasites that assist their own life cycles by modifying their hosts’ behaviour, for example toxoplasma, which makes rats behave recklessly and expose themselves to predation. People who carry this organism are more likely to be involved in traffic accidents.
Oliver argues persuasively that science now demands this change but is a little less convincing on how we transform our current belief systems. Many of which are currently deeply dependent on the consumerist idea of self. An idea spread via the dominant western capitalist ideology across the globe. Advertising presents consumers with visions of their selves enhanced by the possession of each new commodity or ability. The structures that reinforce this kind of self are formidable; nevertheless, Oliver hopes that we may be approaching a tipping point. The science that finds the outside world at work in all our components of selfhood is pulling us that way, as is the immensity of the ecological crisis.
Oliver however seems somewhat exasperated that humanity seems incapable of falling into line with the science. To Oliver, initially, this stubbornness resembles that of the flat-earthers who refused to accept the Copernican revolution.
This individualistic idea of self has had great advantages, in both evolutionary and moral terms; care for the self is a primal motive for ingenuity in finding food, shelter and reproductive success. But Oliver calls it a white lie, an adaptive delusion. This also reflects some of the cognitive science studies which are now beginning to influence our understanding of human behaviour.
We are facing an existential crisis; a pending Armageddon which threatens our very existence on planet earth because of our unsustainable lifestyles. And, yet humanity has so far failed to respond to this threat at scale and with urgency. Rolf Jucker’s recent book- Time to Live Complexity: Reflections on science, self-illusions, religion, democracy, and education for the future.
frames this issue from the standpoint of future proofing our education systems. Its premise originates from the fact that intelligence and rationality are far from perfectly correlated. This cognitive dissonance between intelligence and rational beliefs and action is a major issue for how we perceive the world. Our education systems need to develop our understanding of how intelligence can be a tool for both propaganda and truth-seeking based on the ground-breaking work of Kahneman (2011). Cognitive scientists like Kahneman divide our thinking into two categories: system 1: intuitive, automatic, fast thinking that may be prey to unconscious biases; and system 2: slow, more analytical, deliberative thinking. According to this view, called dual-process theory, many of our irrational decisions come when we rely too heavily on system 1 thinking, allowing unconscious biases to cloud our judgment. Studies by the Canadian psychologist Keith Stanovich (1993) have elucidated that these cognitive biases are often more prevalent in those with higher intelligence quotients than those with lower ones. Stanovich calls this dysrationalia: this raises some fundamental issues about our conceptions of intelligence and helps explain the huge divides in our opinions and beliefs on climate change and our inchoate relationship with the deteriorating biosphere. As Harold Glasser(2018) has concluded:
The upshot is that as a species, we tend to overestimate our own rationality and vastly underestimate the role of chance . When System 1 is well suited to the environment this marriage between the two systems generally functions symbiotically. When this is not the case, as when the Dominant Guiding Metaphors do not fit the current state of the planet or our highest aspirations, the relationship can be toxic or even antibiotic.
As Gandhi presciently noted, “The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems.” Meeting these exalted goals for our species, however, requires learning more about how we think, learn, and make decisions.
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