The research into self-organizing complexity of human dynamics
illuminates a new framework for ecological studies: the framework of
wholsome ecology.
The term “ecology” is rooted in the Greek word oekos meaning
“house”. In the same way as the house provides a shelter for people to
live, the universe provides a 'shelter' for the infinite manifold of
unanimated and animated forms to exist and evolve together. The
house - oekus - is a place where its inhabitants relate to
one another and dynamically interact. Is it possible for these
interrelationships and interactions to be healthy both for the humans
and for the rest of the nature in the oekus which we share
together? This is a question asked by wholesome ecology - a vital
qiestion. If we cannot answer this question, the chance for our survival
as human species on this planet diminishes. Environmental crises,
disasters, and cataclysms emerging in result of our unhealthy
relationships with nature will continue to contribute in the spread of
uncurable diseases among us and the other living forms. Wars, conflicts,
and oppression emerging in result of our unhealthy relationships with
one another will continue to accelerate the processes of life
destruction.
At the focus of wholesome ecology is the unique web of life- and
health-supporting interactions at all levels of their self-organizing
emergence - intrapersonal and interpersonal; between the individuals
and the environment, as well as between the individuals and society;
between society and natue, as well as between society and the whole
evolving universe.
The existing medical practices are primarily concern how to fight with
diseases; the diseases are considered as 'enemies' for people. People
must be prevented for being invaded by these enemies; once invaded,
people become 'patients' from whom the diseases must be removed so that
they can be cured. ‘Cured’ is the key term in the medical model used in
our days; there is not much discussion about health in this model.
The medical model absorbs most of the money in health expenditure, its
prestige is almost unchallenged, especially in developed nations, but
contemporary thinkers about health are increasingly aware that this
model is limited, inadequate and often dangerous. The largest part of
the medical interventions become ever more complex and costly, and
produce unwanted side effects which produce litigation, which raises the
costs of the treatment and reduces its availability in a vicious circle.
Many people today look for alternative approaches based on holistic
methods of healing rooted in the wisdom of the ancients. ‘Heal’ comes
from the same root as ‘whole’ and ‘holistic’: restoring wholeness,
restoring health, which has nothing to do with fighting with or removing
disease.
In the medical model, practitioners cure patients of diseases. In the
healing model, a range of agents can heal the patient, who is always a
dynamic part of the process. This crucial part of the process can be
understood as self-healing.
The model of wholesome ecology is centred at one of the main conceptual
roots of the complexity paradigm - self-organization. When projected on
health, self-organization refers to self-healing, that is, the
self-sustaining or self-restoring - ability of nature, which has been
passed to all living creatures.
We can either strengthen and realize our natural self-healing
potential, or weaken and destroy it, depending on our culture. Death in
the wholesome ecology model is an inevitable manifestation of
transitoriness of the physical bodies of the living forms. The
occurrence of the moment of death in humans is often accelerated by
various traumas, including diseases that emerge as a result of living
consciously or unconsciously under conditions that are destructive to
health and impede the ways of realizing our self-healing potential.
These conditions are deeply rooted in the culture of our society, which
involves also the predominant attitudes and dispositions of people.
Unfortunately, many of the dominant cultural patterns in the world today
value competition and the accumulation of profit and power. Such
'cultural' behaviours increase the chance of severe ecological disasters
in nature, intensify stress at individual and social scales, inducing
feelings of hostility and worthlessness in life, and therefore they act
against our health.
The start of the new millennium (with horrible acts of terrorism and
war in response to those acts) is marked by a contemporary culture that
strongly opposes harmony in nature and thus endangers both the human and
environmental health, as they are two sides of one and the same coin.
The researc into complexity of human dynamics offers a repertoire of
models which can be used to explore different aspects of the turbulent
space of human existence in which health and 'unhealth' interact with
each other and with other aspects of human experience and the natural
world.
The drive to restore and maintain conditions of wholeness and
integrity, completeness and balance in the integrated ecological space
(IES) – the space of space of complexly interwoven relationships
between living beings and their environment - can be seen as a
fundamental emergent property of the whole dynamic web, a property that
underlies the holistic concept of wholesome ecology.
In the paradigm of complexity, the potential for self-healing is seen
as an inherent self-organizing urge of each living entity towards
states of integrity and harmony, both at an internal level (related to
the functioning of the constituents of this entity) and at external
levels (related to the functioning of the whole dynamic web in IES).
In the model of wholesome ecology, disease is not a self-contained,
isolated pathological event with a set of causes acting in a linear way.
A predisposition to disease occurs when integrity breaks, either at the
level of an entity or at the level of the whole web of relationships in
IES. The broken integrity may create obstacles that impede the
self-healing ability of the living entities. In human beings, these
obstacles can be rooted in different aspects of their culture:
physiological, ecological, social, and psychological (mental,
emotions-based, or/and spiritual).
Solé and Goodwin, biologists from Santa-Fe Institute of
Complexity, use the concept of ‘dynamic attractor’ to understand
the surprising and paradoxical phenomenon of self healing: "health is
the typical or natural condition of an organism; it is the dynamic
attractor to which the self-healing organism tends to return
spontaneously" (Solé and Goodwin, 2000).
The integrity of the whole web of interrelationships is responsible for
sustaining dynamic attractor of health. At the same time, the
self-healing dynamics supported by this attractor play a crucial role
in sustaining the integrity of the whole dynamic web of
interrelationships in IES.
Because of this vital interdependence, anything in IES that destroys
the web of relationships, anything that divides, separates or excludes,
appears as an obstacle for realization of the self-healing potential of
the living entities.
In terms of the medical model, persons who suffer a headache take a
medicine aimed to treat headaches. Many such medicines have negative
side-effects on other organs of the body, say the stomach or heart.
Headaches have a complex meaning because they can indicate many
different conditions, from stress to brain tumours. To ‘solve’ a health
problem by taking a pill is to neglect the vital interdependence of the
attractor of health and IES. Let us imagine that instead of taking a
pill, one uses the approach of the wholesome ecology: goes for a long
walk in the nearest park, takes a couple of deep breaths, or
consciously relaxes for a while. This approach would stimulate the
realization of the self-healing potential of the organism as a living
entity inseparably embedded in IES, and therefore it is open to the
influence of a multitude of factors supporting the dynamic attractor of
health. In our example, the health-supporting factors are: walking,
breathing, enjoying the scenery, listening to birds, smelling the
fragrance of the flowers, relaxing, etc. Even if the headache were to
prove to be due to a tumour, a positive attitude will still be
beneficial in coping with this serious condition. Moreover, there are
many examples of cancer remission due to a conscious strengthening of
the spiritual dimension of the individual self-healing potential.
The realization of the self-healing potential of each living entity
depends on the interplay of many factors in IES. Some of these factors
emerge out of the dynamic web of relationships between the entities,
the rest of them appear as a result of the interaction between the
entities and their environment. In order to capture the wholeness of
the dynamic interplay of interrelationships under conditions of high
energy, it is illuminating to model it as characteristically taking a
vortical form, similar to that of a whirlpool or tornado, able to
produce powerful self-organizing forces.
Our hypothesis is that these vortical forms of interactions between the
multitude of factors in IES may be responsible both for sustaining the
self-healing potential of each entity and for activating it into a
powerful urge towards integrity and harmonious dynamic relations with
the environment, and therefore towards better health. We refer to these
vortical forms as vortices of health.
While living at the vortex of health, an entity feels empowered to
realize its self-healing potential. Living outside the vortex, its
self-healing ability may diminish and disappear; various diseases may
emerge or take a more severe form, and death comes closer. Conceivably,
human beings can learn how consciously to energize the vortices of
health and thus facilitate and support the self-healing forces which
emerge out of them. These forces keep the dynamics in IES at the
attractor of health, a metaphor for the 'healthy area' in IES. The key
role for wholesome ecology is to explain people how to 'fire' the
vortices of health and thus sustain their lives and the life of nature
at the attractor of health.
In chaos theory the occurrence of bifurcations marks transition from
order to chaos in the dynamic model of the population growth in
biology. In the model of wholesome ecology, ‘bifurcations’ can be used
to describe the transition form health to unhealth occurring within IES
at individual, social, or/and environmental levels.
One can consider the emergence of the ozone hole, the green house
effect, disappearance of certain kinds of species, soil degradation, and
so forth as manifestations of bifurcations occurring in the dynamics of
nature. The collapse of health of a drug (or alcohol, or nicotine)
addict reveals the emergence of bifurcations in the form of qualitative
changes in individual dynamics that may be irreversible. An
irreversible change is signaled by a chronic disorder that is likely to
be accompanied by a decrease in the self-healing potential of the
individual.
At minor scales, breaks and restorations in IES occur continuously.
Their interplay leads to ‘the edge of chaos’, a concept used in the
complexity paradigm to explain dynamic behaviour at the intermediate
level between order and chaos. When applied to wholesome ecology, the
edge of chaos refers to a region in IES where the living entities need
to balance themselves so as not to drift into too much disorder on the
one hand, and too much order on the other hand. Such balancing requires
a high level of self-organizing ability of the living entities, that is,
ability for co-adaptation and co-evolution (Kaufman, 1993).
As far as the self-organizing ability of the species, which reaches its
highest level at the edge-of-chaos regions in IES, manifests through
their self-healing potential, and the latter is maximised when the
species dwell at the vortex of health, we can conclude that the vortices
of health exist at the edge of chaos. Both the orderly and disorderly
patterns of individual dynamics are equally dangerous for health; the
former leads to repetitive behavioural patterns, stereotypes, and
addiction, the latter leads to disharmony and break of one's
connectedness with the environment. It is the 'edge of chaos' that
facilitates the emergence and sustenance of the vortices of health.
The medical model is linear: X causes or contributes to disease D, Y
alleviates or cures it. The experience of being or becoming well or ill
often shows a more complex pattern of causality, requiring other ways
of representing causality. One of these that comes from the complexity
paradigm is the idea of harmonious resonance (Dimitrov, 2001). If
being healthy means to be in a state of integrity and harmony, a living
entity may be in such a state if it functions in harmonious resonance within
its own (internal) network of 'agents' and with the larger (external)
whole of the environment. And it is within the areas at the edge of
chaos in the IES where this two-fold harmony manifests through the
vortices of health.
If the agents (organs, cells, systems) of a living organism resonate
harmoniously with each other as an inseparable whole and with
their environment, the organism is more likely to be healthy. When
harmony and integrity are destroyed and agents within the organism
'speak' separately to each other and to the environment, then a kind of
disease or illness is under way.
If the influences between the internal agents of the individual
organism, and those between the latter and its environment are
reciprocal, as is assumed in holistic models of health, then resonance
needs to be understood accordingly as a kind of double harmonious
resonance, that is, a resonance that is both internal and
external.
Is this kind or resonance possible? Yes, it is, as it occurs in IES,
where the species and their environment are considered inseparably
connected. So, harmony in functions of the internal organs of a living
entity reflects the harmony of its relationship with the environment,
and vice versa: the harmonious relationship of the living entity
with its environment is an outward projection of its inner harmony. In
the case of human being, the notion of inner harmony has much richer
meaning than simply a harmonious functioning of the organs and systems
of the human body.
When an entity functions under conditions of double harmonious
resonance, it dwells at the vortex of health.
The vortex of health of an individual can be imagined as an energy
pattern emerging out of the individual’s dynamics; it cannot be
borrowed from other individuals or implanted from outside of one's inner
nature. No doctor in the world, no matter how competent, can make it
whirl; the individual alone is responsible for the functioning of their
vortex of health. In order to understand this functioning and to
support it wisely, we need the help of our consciousness, of our
experience, and of our inner impetus to live and know.
Through studying how to concentrate and relax the mind and the body,
through practicing techniques that help us acquire inner peace and
harmony, the flow of energy coming from the natural environment can be
consciously directed inward and used to activate the vortices of health.
Otherwise, our self-healing capacity remains in a dormant state and we
need to rely upon help from outside when feeling sick. By doing this,
we substitute the holistic effect of the realisation of our
self-healing potential with short-term partial effects produced by the
use of various chemical medicines.
The more intensively we use medicines (and one cannot help but keep
using them, as the effect of each dose is only temporal), the more
addicted we become and the stronger the numbing effect that the
'curative' chemical substances exert on our self-healing potential.
Eventually, the addiction results in losing self-healing capacity.
Many people in the world die as victims of the great delusion of our
days that the help for our health comes from outside! The society
continues to amplify this delusion, because strong economic forces are
behind it. The global pharmaceutical corporations make unbelievable
amount of money on this delusion; a great number of medical
practitioners keep this delusion powerful.
In the context of wholesome ecology, there is an explanation of the
ever-increasing massive use of medicines in today's society. The more
polluted the natural environment, that is, the more saturated with
health-threatening chemicals, the less efficient the realisation of our
individual self-healing potential, as the latter crucially depends on
the support of such basic natural resources like air, water, sunshine,
plantation, etc.
* The efficiency of our self-healing capacity goes down, and we look
for the use of medicines to help us while the following also happens:
* The air is full of carbon dioxides produced by our cars and the
industrial complexes spread all over the world.
* Dangerous chemical wastes, including nuclear, continue to be released
in monstrous amounts.
* The soil and the water are irreversibly contaminated.
* The process of deforestation and extinguishing natural species goes
with an ever-increasing tempo.
* The ozone holes make the sunshine spread cancer in our bodies instead
of healing them.
* The rains are acid and the fruits and vegies eaten are full of
chemicals (or 'genetically engineered') to look commercially attractive,
but detrimental for our health.
So we are entrained in a kind of health-damaging vicious circle: we
continue to pollute nature with one kind of chemicals and at the same
time fight the effects of this pollution on us by using another kind of
chemicals. The more we pollute nature with the first (technological)
kind of chemicals and thus gradually convert it into a source of new
emergent illnesses, the more we use the second (medical) kind of
chemicals to fight the illnesses and thus become gradually addicted. In
the both cases, the result is one the same: serious destruction of our
health.
Is there any way to go out of this vicious circle? Wholesome ecology
can reveal such a way: Only if we take care about the natural
environment and help it restore its own self-healing capacity. This
will facilitate the increase of our self-healing potential (as we are
'children' of nature and our health totally relies upon its support)
and help ourselves reduce our dependence on medicines.
One essential aspect of the multi-faced mission of wholesome ecology is
to show the fatal danger of the reliance on the help of medicines,
while neglecting the vital factor for our health. thatis, our potenyal
for self-healing. Nature has endowed us with this potential at the
moment when we emerged out of her womb, and it is a grievous failure
not to develop and use it to the full. Nature is the main supporter of
the self-healing potential. It is her generous and free supply of
energy - her sun and air, water and soil, flora and fauna, harmony and
beauty - that help the vortices of the human health move and generate
their healing forces.
Self-healing is a holistic phenomenon - an expression of the
self-organizing ability of the individual as a whole, and there is only
one way to stimulate it: through holistic means. Such are the means of
nature! Thousands of years ago, this was fully understood by the
creators of Ayurveda, the ancient Indian system of health ('ayur' means
life and 'veda' means knowledge in Sanskrit), according to which no
single agent by itself can bring health. Ayurveda views the person as a
composite of the same primary forces: air (force of expansion), water
(force of adhesion) and fire (force of transformation), which compose
nature as well. When these forces act harmoniously in the individual,
that is, in the way as they act in nature, they fulfil three functions:
digestion (generating inner energies), absorption (sustaining the inner
energies) and elimination (release of worked-off energies). These
functions when considered holistically, that is, in their simultaneously
physical, emotional, mental and spiritual realisations, create health.
Ayurveda defines health as soundness of three inseparable wholes: body
('shrira'), mind ('manas') and soul ('atman') (John, 2001).
The earlier in life we understand the wisdom of the ancients about the
vital role of nature in the conscious developing and strengthening of
our self-healing capacity (which is in abundance when the organism is
young and full of vigour), the more efficient the realisation of this
capacity.
So, another aspect of the mission of wholesome ecology relates to the
health education of the young people; this kind of education is a key
factor in promoting health.
Nature embraces the whirling complexity of dynamics (forces, energies,
substances, forms and processes) that create, sustain, change, or
destroy all animate and inanimate forms. These dynamics support the
self-organizing potential of nature.
"Everything in nature tends towards fulfilment of its potential"
wrote Aristotle, who called this property of nature 'entelechy' (from
Greek en telecheia - “be in fulfilment” or “completion”).
Examples of entelechy are the capacity of a seed to unfold its
potential to grow when appropriate conditions arise, and the capacity
of an organism to heal itself. These processes are inexplicable in
terms of mechanistic causality, but it is evident that they happen all
the time in biological life, including human existence.
Through its urge to move and self-realize, nature represents an
all-embracing wholeness where no thing and no being exists in itself or
for itself but only in dynamic relationship with other things and beings.
This is a basic premises in the paradigm of complexity, which directly
relates to the integrity of existence considered as a complex of
dynamics, whose creative, sustaining, or destructive powers are
constantly demonstrated in nature. It is through these dynamics that
everything that exists, emerges, moves, changes and transforms from an
elementary particle to a gigantic galaxy, becomes connected in an
inseparable web of mutually dependent, intricately interwoven and
co-evolving relationships. It is at the same time something that can
only be grasped and thought about with an appropriate kind of fuzziness;
fuzziology, the study of fuzziness imbedded in human knowing, reveals
the secrets of understanding the meaning of complex holistic concepts
like health, harmony, rhythm, self-organization, and nature (Dimitrov,
2002a; Dimitrov and Hodge, 2002).
The rhythm of nature beats through us. The closer our connection with
the natural environment and the more aware we are about its forces and
life-supporting energies, the clearer is our perception of its rhythm.
From the digesting activity of our intestines to the firing of the
neurons in the brain, every single function of the organs and cells in
our bodies reflects the beat which mirrors the rhythm of nature. The
state of our health: physical, emotional, and mental is entirely
dependent on this rhythm. When the rhythm stops beating through the
vital trinity of each individual's nature: body, mind, and soul, the
individual dies.
The health of the natural environment, with all its variety of animated
and non-animated entities is entirely rhythm-dependent. The rhythm of
nature maps into its fractal geometry, discovered by Benoit Mandelbrot
(Mandelbrot, 1983) and its self-organized criticality, firstly described
by PerBak (Bak, 1993); both fractals and criticality can be
characterized by power law distributions. In this sense, the power laws
describe mathematically the rhythm of 'how nature works'.
The rhythm of natural environment mirrors the rhythm of Gaya, our
living planet (Lovelock, 1995); the rhythm of Gaya mirrors the rhythm
of the galaxy, and thy rhythm of the galaxy mirrors the rhythm of the
whole universe, because Gaya and the galaxy and the universe are only
different scales, or fractal levels, of one and the same dynamic
existential wholeness.
Rhythm is an inherent characteristic of the self-organizing dynamics of
nature. The way nature self-organizes, unfolds and evolves, is through
rhythmic patterns. The vortices of health discussed above reflect these
rhythmic patterns.
The self-organizing capacity of nature's dynamics is sustained through
the constant interactions of the astonishing variety of the living
creatures and their environment. What is crucial to be underlined in the
context of wholesomee ecology is that every single entity existing in
nature, be this entity animate or non-animate, is equally important for
the realization of the dynamic interactions of the living creatures and
their environment, and therefore for the support of the self-organizing
urge of nature and its all-pervading rhythm.
Every single entity in nature is endowed with equal right to exist,
interact, and evolve, and thus to contribute in its overall
self-organization and rhythm. And vice versa, the
self-organizing urge of nature and its rhythm manifest through the
motion, interaction, and evolutionary potential of every existing
entity, without assigning ranks of priorities among them; they all are
equally open for this urge to make them move, interact, and
evolve in synchrony.
If some entities were favoured by nature at the expense of others, the
integrity of nature: its unity, wholeness, and interconnectedness would
be immediately destroyed and this would destroy its rhythm. Nature can
never act against its integrity, as far as the latter is sine qua non
for its existence, but we can, when our minds immerse in selfish
pursuits and forget that our natural environment and we are inseparably
connected through the rhythm of the universe. When the finite in the
form of our ego-centred thinking clings to existence for its own sake,
without reflecting the infinite, it carries seeds of destruction,
disease and death within itself.
Although we are able to reflect the rhythm of nature, we are able also
to act against it. This happens, when we do not focus our awareness on
the natural rhythm, as if it does not deserve any consciously directed
attention and 'works' only automatically until it destroys because of a
disease or death. It also happens when we are aware of the rhythm, and
yet do not care about providing conditions to support its constant
'work' through the body-mind-soul integrity of our human nature.
In the first case, we usually become aware of the rhythm when it is
destroyed, often irreversibly. For example, a sudden heart attack can
loudly announce that the rhythm has been destroyed. Usually, we hurry to
'fix' it by using medical drugs. As far as the rhythm is a holistic
characteristic of our natural self-organizing ability rooted in the
body-mind-soul integrity, it can hardly be fixed by an artificially made
chemical drug. Any drug acts in isolation and directs its effect upon a
certain organ or a function only; but the rhythm is essentially
holistic, it cannot be restore by a partial intervention.
In the second case, the physical body simply follows what the mind
pushes it to do. As far as our minds are preoccupied with much more
'important'thoughts than listening to the natural rhythm - thoughts how
to earn more money, to exercise more power, to pursue achievements and
higher social status, and to indulge in all kinds of pleasures, we are
usually able to notice that the rhythm goes wrong when it is too late to
restore it.
When looking back in history, we see that nations and states follow
periods of development and downfalls. Both the periods of economic
growth and the periods of crises are inherent in the capitalist system.
These periods have little to do with the rhythm of nature. Their
underlying causes remain in the fundamental contradictions on which any
process of exercising political or/and economic power in human society
is based. "The crises are never more than momentary, violent solutions
for the existing contradictions, violent eruptions that re-establish
the disturbed balance for the time being" (Marx, 1981).
Chaos theory or stochastic analysis might help the experts to build
chaotic attractors or long and short-term economic cycles, which can
mathematically map the chaotic or stochastic dynamics of a selected set
of economic and social indicators, but their 'rhythm' is entirely
different than the rhythm of nature. For example, the frantic ups and
downs of today's market economy are reflections of the pressure of the
largest financial corporations and their aggressive striving to
establish global economic power
According to Hardt and Negri, the establishment of global economic
power means emergence of a global empire: "a decentred and
deterritorializing apparatus of rule that progressively incorporates
the entire global realm within its open, expanding frontiers" (Hardt
and Negri, 2000). The 'rhythm' of the social dynamics in the empire
becomes nothing but a "pure exercise of command, without any
proportionate or adequate reference to the world of life".
While the world of life must reflect the rhythm of nature and the
universe in order to exist and reproduce, the global order in the empire
recognizes only one kind of rhythm: the rhythm of the financial
transactions directed to increase the wealth of the economic giants.
The distribution of power in society has become so drastically unequal
and the gap between the powerful corporate minority and the majority of
people existing in hard-to-bear economic conditions has become so big
that the humans belonging to these two polar parts of society started to
resemble two different kinds of species.
The high power differential in society impedes the self-organizing
capacity of human society. The latter can manifest only if the social
interactions are between individuals, each with an equally open space of
opportunities for self-realization. In the global empire, this is
impossible.
The rhythm of social self-organization can be sustained only in
societies where the power differential tends to zero.
This proposition relates to the social dimensions of wholesome ecology
and is analogous to the proposition about the rhythm of nature; the
rhythm of any process of self-organization of the all-embracing web of
interrelated and dynamically interacting agents in nature and in
society requires both recognition and realization of their equity. When
human species strives to dominate in nature, and the richest strive to
dominate in society, the rhythm of natural and social self-organization
becomes distorted. Then ecological and social disasters emerge with
negative effects on the human health, on the health of the society, and
on the health of the whole planet.
Culture in general use refers to patterns of behaviour peculiar to
humans, not to bacteria, but in its deeper sense it can still refer to
both. Culture is the set of attitudes and behaviours expressed in the
normal functioning of a society, human or other. These patterns create
the harmonious set of self-organized forms we admire in nature, where
plants and animals follow their natural drives to create the intricate
and functional systems of nature.
The culture we humans have developed seems to be a second nature
opposed to nature itself, responsible for the continuous worsening of
the ecological conditions on the planet today. Our scientific and
technological inventions create serious ecological problems impeding the
process of self-organization in nature. And as far as we are product of
this process and vitally depend on it for our survival as a species,
the obstacles rooted in our culture at the same time obstruct
the unfolding of our lives and our potential.
Like all other animals, we use resources of nature to sustain our
physical existence, but these resources are incomparably less than the
resources utilised for establishing power over nature and in society.
An ego-centred human mind is obsessed with the idea of exercising power
everywhere. The highest realisations of the human intellect were and
continue to be directed towards accumulation and realisation of
military, economic, and political power in society: creating advanced
tools to kill each other, to exploit each other, to make those with
less power follow the will of the strongest, and if they resist, to
teach them lessons, seek revenge and eventually extinguish them.
How can health, as an expression of harmony and integrity of nature, be
sustained within a culture that wills to power? In the developed
capitalist world, the will to power is often masked by charismatic
political speeches about democracy, freedom, and equal rights for
everybody. At the same time a vast propaganda machine keeps the
consumption drive in society at its highest possible level and thus
reinforces the establishment of a hard-to-oppose global economic order.
Besides the obsession with power and its destructive social and
ecological consequences, wholesome ecology points to other serious
obstacles in our culture that impede the fulfilment of human potential.
The hardest obstacles to remove relate to addiction, to all kind of
unhealthy habits, prejudices and dogmas, as well as to activities
centred mainly in individual selfishness (like avarice, greed, craving
for luxury, self-praising, gluttony, envy, jealousy, lust, hatred,
evil-doings to others, and revenge). While showing tendency to
self-propel and grow in magnitude, these obstacles absorb enormous
amount of our physical, mental and emotional energy. Day after day our
self-organizing capacity is wasted in 'cultural' attractors, which have
very little to do with the growth of our intelligence, with the urge to
understand the secrets of our inner nature, expand our consciousness
and open our spiritual potential.
To open your spiritual potential means to remove the obstacles on its
path. If you remove hate, love starts flowing. You are not to create
love, nobody can create love. If you were to create love then it would
be impossible. Love is already in you; you just remove the hate with the
power of your heart and you will see love streaming. Remove the
unconsciousness with the power of your awareness, and you will see your
capacity to know arising in you. Remove the negative with the power of
your mindfulness and the positive starts unfolding itself. It is almost
as if a rock is blocking a tiny little stream of pure water; you remove
the rock and the stream starts moving. When the rock blocking its path,
it may not ever be possible for the stream to come. We are carrying many
rocks within our culture - call them blocks in your energy - and those
blocks have to be dissolved and removed, if you want to let the tiny
little stream of your spiritual endeavour come. Then nourish and care
for it with all your love and all your knowing until it becomes a
mighty river hurrying to unite with the ocean...
So speaks the spiritual master to those disciples who are thirsty to
know.
The ancient wisdom provides powerful hints for dealing with enigmas and
paradoxes of human existence. "There was a time when, in a small strip
of the worldís land surface, man achieved an almost total
equilibrium with his environment and created a society as near perfect
as he has so far been able even to dream about..." (Rice, 1991).
Greatest philosophers of Ancient Greek like Pythagoras, Plato,
Hippocrates, Thales of Milet, Galen, and Homer visited Egypt in search
of Wisdom.
The life and work of Pythagoras, perhaps the most famous ancient
philosopher of all, who spent more than 20 years in the sanctuaries of
Egypt, provides an important clue if we wish to get insight from the
Egyptian Wisdom. Pythagoras established a doctrine of unity, which
encompassed the physical and the spiritual. He shows us a holistic
ehilosophy - an essentially Egyptian perspective.
The variety, complexity and multiplicity which we see never implied
separation; unity was ever present. Life in the heavens and life on
earth were considered to be one, an indivisible unity. Human beings
considered themselves indistinguishable from their environment, products
of the same forces of nature responsible for creation of the heavens
and the earth. To learn and acquire knowledge was to observe these
forces at work. In the great Egyptian temples all branches of learning
were housed under the same roof, regarded as aspects of the single
wisdom. All diverse branches were encapsulated within this sacred
wisdom. It is in it where people looked for insights to deal with
enigmas and paradoxes of their lives. The essential preoccupation of
the Egyptian thought was to know the origin and matter of existence.
In our fragmented world, knowledge has become also fragmented. Our
society has become insulated from nature. When discussing
sustainability, for example, we speak about environment as something
separated from us, something 'over there' with which we need to
establish friendly relationship. We say that the cars pollute the air
outside of us, forgetting that it is the same air inside of us without
which we simply cannot survive. We speak about waters somewhere there
around us, totally neglecting the fact that water is essential
ingredient of our cells.
So far from us is the idea of unity, a central idea of all ancient
wisdom, that even such a simple and transparent truth that the same
forces which work at the universe work in us seem strange for us. Can we
use this truth to make money out of it? No? Then forget it! Think about
something more serious, for instance, think about sustainability: how
to continue exploiting the environment, and at the same time live
healthy and happily? Or how to continue current predatory processes led
by us in nature and society and at the same time to preach about
governmental and citizen-based mechanisms designed to ensure greater
accountability of business and industry? Before organizing citizen-based
mechanisms we must have those citizens. Does somebody teach us how to
be citizen? Without understanding the concept of unity and living with
it, we can not be citizens. Do we have governments which are honest
stewards of the public interest related to contemporary environmental
issues? One of the pathologies of our fragmented social reality is that
in their efforts to hold on to power, politicians and political parties
rely on crucial financial support from wealthy corporations which are
not environment-friendly when making money.
We can talk a lot about precautionary principles, preventative
approaches, extended producer responsibilities, clean production,
corporate accountability, national public hearings, community
participation, and many other issues related to sustainability, but the
effect of all these talks willbe insignificant unless we are able to
grasp to idea of unity and work with it in our every day life. The
society needs education in this regard, at schools and universities, in
local communities, and global corporation. The simple message from the
ancient wisdom is the message that unity can save us from
self-destruction. Or at least make it not so painful.
One of the endeavours of wholesome ecology is to spread the message of
unity; there is no health out of IES, in which the humans and nature are
linked forever.
In a search for justice it seems clear that existing levels of
inequality are unhealthy, yet nor is it the case that equality is
possible or even desirable. Something else is needed which is not as
precise and definite as equality, but nonetheless meets the human
craving for balance; a key concept here is harmony (Dimitrov,
1989). This was a key concept for the Greeks, a conjunction of three
strands of meaning. Its root meaning was aro, join, so
“harmonia” was what joined. Another meaning was proportion, the balance
of things that allowed an easy fit. The quality of joining and
proportion then came to be seen in music and other arts.
The precondition for harmony for the Greeks was expressed in the phrase
“nothing too much”. It also had a mysterious positive quality, which
became the object of enquiry of their finest minds. Thinkers such as
Pythagoras sought to capture the mystery of harmony as something both
inexpressible yet also illuminated by mathematics. The mathematics of
harmony explored by the ancient Greeks is still an inspiring model for
contemporary scientists. Crucial to it is their discovery of its
quantitative expression in astonishing diversity and complexity of
nature through the golden mean (golden ratio), (phi):
,
which is approximately equal to 1.318. It is described by Euclid in
book five of his Elements : "A straight line is said to have
been cut in extreme and mean ratio when, as the whole line is to the
greater, so is the greater to the less". Any quantity Q can be
divided in golden ratio, if its greater part Qg is chosen in
such a way that it relates to the smaller part Qs exactly in the
same proportion as the whole quantity Q relates to its greater
part Qg , that is,
As later scientists have discovered, pervades both animate and
inanimate forms in nature, from galactic spirals to chromosome threads.
Leonardo da Vinci characterised as a “divine proportion” and used
its aesthetic appeal in his consummate masterpieces. While natural
forms undergo permanent changes, is preserved in their topology.
For example, the unfolding of the galactic spiral preserves in
its geometry; the growth of the human body preserves the golden ratio
in placing the organs; the dynamics of the arrangements of leaves,
seeds and petals also follow .
The Golden Mean as an image of harmony can be applied as a
ratio, which is itself mathematically precise, although it may not be
clear what precise quantities are involved or how those quantities
could be determined in practice. In this form it will express in a
precise and clear form an idea of harmony which is in other respects
indeterminate, to produce insights which are clarifying and enabling
and can be translated into practice. We will illustrate this with
reference to the theme of energy.
Our planet is like a huge collector, producer and reservoir of energy.
Partly this energy comes from outside the planet, from the sun and
other cosmic sources, and partly from sources of energy accumulated in
the depths of the Earth and on its surface. The so-called 'energy
crisis' is bound up with the many other crises facing the planet,
seemingly presenting insuperable obstacles on the path to health, for
individuals, nations and the planet. It is another situation where we
can look to the wisdom of as image of harmony.
Let E denote the whole amount of energy available to our planet
at an arbitrary moment t. The planet needs this energy not only
for supporting the natural drift (co-evolving) of all living forms of
its biosphere, but for supporting also an enormously complex
physico-chemical ‘metabolism’. Because of this gigantic metabolism,
James Lovelock referred to Earth as a living entity called Gaia, the
ancient Greeks’ name for the goddess of Earth (Lovelock, 1995).
Part of E is used by animate and non-animate nature to keep
going the processes of emergence, sustenance, evolution and destruction
of the living forms on the Earth. Let us denote this energy by E(n),
where n stands for nature.
Being an inseparable part of nature, we, the human species, also use
this energy, which is essential for our survival. It is this energy that
supports the dynamic attractors and vortices of health discussed in the
previous chapters. Much more intensively, however, we use energy for
purposes which have nothing to do with our health. On the contrary,
some of those purposes are directly opposed to the sustenance of life.
For example, an incredibly huge amount of energy goes to support
military-industrial complexes on the planet. This includes highly energy
consuming production of more and more sophisticated weapons, rockets,
planes, and bombs, more and more sophisticated military technologies to
demonstrate power and exert control. Huge amounts of energy support
satellite espionage activities and cosmic experiments of the
industrially developed countries. Ever increasing supplies of energy go
to produce ecologically disastrous chemicals, to support huge
air-conditioning areas, and to satisfy continuously growing desires for
luxury and comfort, to amass wealth and fame.
Let E(h) denote the flow of energy used by humans for purposes
like the purposes indicated above, where h stands for human,
although it would be more appropriate to use ah (standing for
'anti-human') for this kind of monstrous energy expenditure.
As human existence strongly depends on the energy flow supporting the
life on the planet, E(n) must be greater than E(h) otherwise
the biological survival and the sustenance of health of the species,
including people, would not be possible. We assume that the energy flows
responsible for the dynamics of Earth as an inseparable living entity
in the solar system, naturally tend to self-organize in such a way as
to preserve the Golden Mean in their relations to each other, which
implies
Consequently, E(n) is equal to E divided by and E(h)
is equal to E divided to squared. With 1.32 as an
approximate value for , the following expressions are valid:
E(n) = 0.32 E
E(h) = 0.38 E
The principle of harmony in human drift (co-evolving) with nature
requires that for human existence to be in harmony with nature, the
energy E(h) used by human society is less than 40% of the whole
amount of energy E available for supporting the gigantic 'metabolism'
of our planet as an inseparable entity in the solar system.
The larger part of E, that is, more than 30%, is needed for
supporting life on Earth.
Natural drift of species, including humans, is under a threat of
destruction every time the energy available to nature E(n) falls
below the critical value of 30% of E, or equivalently, when the
energy used by human society becomes greater than 40% of E.
Harmony as a fuzzy concept and has mathematical and non-mathematical
dimensions. There is enough evidence in life today that the harmony of
people's co-existence with nature has being destroyed. Mass extinctions
of species, expansion of the ozone-hole, rapidly increasing pollution
of air and water on the planet, frequent occurrence of large scale
natural disasters and emergence of new severe diseases caused
byenvironmental problems are but a few manifestations of an ever
growing disharmony in nature-human co-existence.
In pursuit of technological advancements our society does not care
about the energy supply of other than human living forms. Whether E(h)
is higher or lower than 40% of E, who cares? Everybody knows
there are no 'objective' ways for measuring energy E, and
therefore no scientific method can be used to raise the alarm when E(h)
reaches a critical value. Moreover, many people continue to think that
our planet has an unlimited supply of energy, that the use of solar
energy and energy contained in the atoms' nuclei will provide people
with never ending energy flow. Unfortunately, the energy capable of
supporting the natural metabolism of our planet is limited.
The human drive for technological development cannot be stopped, so E(h)
will permanently increase, and therefore, humanity will move further and
further away from what the principle of harmony requires. If this is the
case, why do we bother to speak about harmonious co-existence, divine
proportions, and wholesome ecology? Is it not better to learn how to
adapt to ever-deeper disharmony of human life?
Unfortunately, living forms cannot adapt to ecological catastrophes and
disasters. If disasters occur, species die. And in our days, ecological
disasters clearly demonstrate a tendency to increase in number and
magnitude.
We know that we are inseparably connected with nature. We are its
products. We know that when we destroy nature, we destroy ourselves -
our health and survival - at the same moment. When we pollute its air
and water, its plants and animals, we pollute the air, the water and the
food sustaining the integrity of our physical, emotional, and mental
lives. Nature is not over there, while we are staying here. It is in us
as much as we are in it.
To preserve nature means to preserve all its forms of life including
our human form. And vice versa, to preserve our human form
means to preserve nature. This is the way of co-drifting with nature in
accordance with the principle of harmony. This is the way of life, the
way of harmony, the way of health. All other ways breathe diseases and
death. We cannot divide among us and nature the air, water, sunshine,
and so forth in the 'divine proportion'. But we can share these
precious natural gifts with each other and with the other species. We
all are Nature. What matters are the acts of sharing, sharing with
other people not only material goods, knowledge, skill, experience, but
also humanness: goodwill, warmth, respect, and love.
The wisdom of the ancient Vedas reminds us that everything that we try
to hold on to, be it air or food, possession or knowledge, turns into
poison not only for our physical health, but also for the health of our
mind and soul, for the health of nature.
Every act of sharing with others is an acknowledgment of our
interdependence and inseparability, from each other and from nature.
Every act of sharing has a strong spiritual connotation. The more we
share, the more united we feel with each other and with the spiritual
essence of the universe. When the acts of sharing are in accordance with
the principle of harmony, they have an immense transformative power.
They change us from ego-centred to eco-centred, from ill to healthy,
from destroyers to co-creators of the whole evolving ecological
universe.
And to help for the realisation of this transformation is the main
mission of wholesome ecology.
Acknowledgments: The author acknowledges the help of
Prof. Bob Hodge in the preparation of this chapter, and particularly in
the work on the second section.
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