human mind and all the new potentials for action into society in an intelligent,
argument-based, and ethically coherent manner? I have
sketched some ideas, but I am not preaching any truths. I have my ideas
about what a valuable state of consciousness could be, and you have
your own. On normative issues, there is no such thing as expert knowledge.
Philosophers are not holy men or priests who can claim direct insight
into what is morally good. There is no hotline we can call for help.
We must all do this together. The public debates that have now become
necessary must include everyone, not just scientists and philosophers. Philosophers can help by initiating and structuring the debates and illuminating
the logical structure of ethical arguments and the history of
the problems to be discussed. Ultimately, however, society must create a
new cultural context for itself. If it should fail to do so, it risks being
overwhelmed by the technological consequences and the psychosocial
costs of the Consciousness Revolution.
Some general points can already be made. First, we must admit that
the prospects for open and free democratic discussion on a global scale
are dim. The populations of authoritarian societies with poor educational
systems are growing much faster than those of the democratic
countries, in some of which populations are actually declining due to
low birthrates. Moreover, the major global players increasingly are no
longer governments but multinational corporations, which tend to be
authoritarian—and as Haim Harari, former president of the Weizmann
Institute of Science, has remarked, these corporations are, by and large,
managed better than most democratic nation-states.We must strive to
protect open societies from irrationalism and fundamentalism—from
all those who desperately seek emotional security and espouse closed
worldviews because they cannot bear the naturalistic turn in the image
of humankind. The best way to do this may be by creating a consciousness
culture: a flexible attitude, a general approach that whenever possible
maximizes the autonomy of the individual citizen and adopts a
“principle of phenomenal liberty” as a guideline. We must be aware that
the decisions a society makes affect the individual’s brain and the individual’s
phenomenal-state space. Unless the interests of others are directly
threatened, people ought to be free to explore their own minds
and design their own conscious reality-models according to their
wishes, needs, and beliefs.
Developing a consciousness culture has nothing to do with establishing
a religion or a particular political agenda. On the contrary, a true
consciousness culture will always be subversive, by encouraging individuals
to take responsibility for their own lives. The current lack of a genuine
consciousness culture is a social expression of the fact that the
philosophical project of enlightenment has become stuck: What we lack
is not faith but knowledge. What we lack is not metaphysics but critical rationality—not grand theoretical visions but a new practicality in the
way we use our brains. The crucial question is how to make use of the
progress in the empirical mind sciences in order to increase the autonomy
of the individual and protect it from the increasing possibilities of
manipulation. Can we ride the tiger? If we demystify consciousness, do
we automatically lose our sense of human solidarity at the same time?
If rational neuroanthropology shows us the positive aspects of what
it means to be a human being, we can systematically cultivate those aspects
of ourselves. Here I have considered only two of the positive aspects
that should be nurtured and cultivated, but there may be many
more. If we are naturally evolved cognitive subjects, rational thinkers of
thoughts and makers of theories, then we should continue to foster and
optimize exactly this feature of ourselves. If neuroanthropology draws
our attention to the vastness of our phenomenal space of possibilities,
we should consider this a strength and begin systematically to explore
our experiential space, in all its depth. Developing a consciousness culture
will mean expanding the Ego Tunnel and exploring the space of altered
states of consciousness in ways from which we all can profit. The
interplay of virtual-reality technology, new psychoactive substances, ancient
psychological techniques such as meditation, and future neurotechnology
will introduce us to a universe of self-exploration barely
imaginable today.
How can we achieve cross-fertilization between the two strong sides
of the human mind? Can neurophenomenological refinement help us
optimize critical scientific rationality? Could scientists be better scientists
if they were well-traveled, say, if they learned to have lucid dreams?
Could rigorous, reductionist cognitive neuroscience develop a form of
turbo-meditation, helping monks to be better monks and mystics to be
better mystics? Does deep meditation perhaps also have an influence on
thinking for yourself, taking your life into your own hands, and becoming
a politically mature citizen? Could we find a way to selectively stimulate
the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex during dream phases in order to
make lucid dreams available to everybody? If we manage to generate artificial
out-of-body experiences safely and in a controlled setting, might
this help dancers or athletes improve their training? What about fully paralyzed patients? Could a ruthlessly materialist investigation into the
way the mirror system develops in the young human brain help us cultivate
empathy and intuitive attunement in our children in ways nobody
thought possible? If we don’t try, we will never find out.
Many fear that through the naturalistic turn in the image of mind, we
will lose our dignity. “Dignity” is a term that is notoriously hard to define—
and usually it appears exactly when its proponents have run out of
arguments. However, there is one clear sense, which has to do with respecting
oneself and others—namely the unconditional will to selfknowledge,
veracity, and facing the facts. Dignity is the refusal to
humiliate oneself by simply looking the other way or escaping to some
metaphysical Disneyland. If we do have something like dignity, we can
demonstrate this fact by the way we confront the challenges to come,
some of which have been sketched in this book. We could face the historical
transition in our image of ourselves creatively and with a will to
clarity. It is also clear how we could lose our dignity: by clinging to the
past, by developing a culture of denial, and by sliding back into the various
forms of irrationalism and fundamentalism. The working concepts
of “consciousness ethics” and “consciousness culture” are exactly about
not losing our dignity—by taking it to new levels of autonomy in dealing
with our conscious minds. We must not lose our self-respect, but we
must also stay realistic and not indulge in utopian illusions; the chances
for successfully riding the tiger, at least on a large scale, are not very
high. But if we manage, then a new consciousness culture could fill the
vacuum that emerges as the Consciousness Revolution unfolds at increasing
speed. There are practical challenges and there are theoretical
challenges. The greatest practical challenge lies in implementing the results
of ensuing ethical debates. The greatest theoretical challenge may
consist in the questions of whether and how, given our new situation,
intellectual honesty and spirituality can ever be reconciled. But that is
another story.
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