You may not feel that we are on the brink of Doomsday, but according to the keepers of the Doomsday Clock (members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Science and Security Board), recent events have brought us terrifyingly closer to global annihilation. In the opening days of 2018, they advanced the Doomsday Clock to just two minutes before the midnight of a very-high-probability man-made global catastrophe. The only previous time when, in the estimation of this esteemed body of scientists, we were at this level of risk of global annihilation was in 1953 when the US tested the first hydrogen bomb, and the clock was set at two minutes to midnight.

But nuclear threat is not the only cause for alarm. In November 2017 more than 15,000 scientists from 184 countries signed a “Warning to Humanity” that was published in the Oxford University Press journal, Bioscience. It focused on the global crisis we are facing related to freshwater availability, marine life depletion, ocean dead zones, forest loss, biodiversity destruction, climate change, and the implications these things have for the sustainability of life on earth.1 Predictably, some have responded to this warning with charges of scaremongering. But prophets have always delivered unwelcome messages, and we ignore their warnings at not just our own peril but in this case, the peril of the Earth.

However, you don’t need the opinion of scientists to sense that we are currently living in very troubled times. For many, the world just seems to be getting crazier every day. Consider, for example:

The attack on the basic moral value of truthfulness by those in power who believe that saying something makes it true, then further eroding any meaningful concept of truth by talk of “alternate facts”;
The seemingly unstoppable and ever-increasing gap between the richest 1% of the world and the remaining 99%;
The rapid decline of liberal democracies and rise of fundamentalist movements and authoritarian governments led by divisive strong-men thugs, whose real concerns do not extend beyond the advancement of their personal interests;
The continuing presence of terrorism, mass murder and other forms of violence that, even when considered apart from formally declared wars, take the lives of more than 1.6 million people globally each year and leave millions more traumatized and deeply damaged;
The rising tide of hatred, xenophobia, white supremacy movements, racism, and religious intolerance; and,
The increasing polarization of societies into groups that hate and mistrust each other, crippling governments and depriving public life of even the façade of civility that has for decades characterized domestic and international relations.

A growing disorientation, shock, and sense of doom pervades much of the West as we join the rest of the developing world in life on the edge. Some fear that not only is civilization in a state of retreat, human consciousness itself seems to be in a period of rapid regress. How could this have happened so quickly? How are we to come to terms with a future that suddenly feels much darker and more precarious than many of us have known in our lifetimes?

Wisdom in an Age of Unreason

In the midst of this, I often find myself talking with people about wisdom. Usually this emerges in the context of conversations about current events, and when this begins to lurch toward despair I find myself commenting on what I feel is the urgent need for wisdom. Sometimes this shifts our focus from the current affairs to the nature of wisdom and the question of how it can be cultivated. But at many other times, the possibilities of wisdom in an age of unreason seem too slim to withstand the onslaught of despair and hopelessness.

So, what is the path of wisdom in the face of the global problems facing us in the early twenty-first century? And perhaps even more basically, what would wisdom look like in the face of these sorts of global challenges?

Many who talk with me about wisdom seem to understand it as something like common sense. To them, honesty and truthfulness need no justification, and upholding these values just seems like common sense. It also seems like common sense to take seriously anything like a strong consensus of scientists or other specialists when they offer warnings or advice, and to take concrete steps to attempt to reduce poverty, address the conditions that fuel global terrorism, and take better care of our planet.

But obviously, common sense doesn’t get us past the instinctive way in which we humans seek to protect self-interests and preserve the status quo. Nor can we assume that we are wired to do the sensible thing. The evidence suggests that our capacity for irrationality is at least as great as our capacity for rationality; one person’s common sense seems often to be another’s total lack of sense.

Others who talk with me about wisdom don’t assume a base of common sense. They believe that education is the answer – or, at the very least, that education can go a long way toward teaching shared values that can facilitate life together and a sustainable future. Values education strives to shape thinking and behavior in ways that prepare people for living together as responsible global citizens, and many people are hopeful about the possibilities these sorts of programs have for the cultivation of wisdom.

But wisdom is not simply knowledge or even understanding. Many of the people who have been most responsible for getting us into the problems we currently face have been highly intelligent, educated, and knowledgeable. But they haven’t been wise.

Wisdom is sometimes defined as the ability to use knowledge in ways that support the common good. Clearly, the world is only better for all when it is best for everyone – including the marginalized, voiceless, and oppressed, and earth itself. But is education up to the task of overcoming self-interest? Can we really count on it to carry the freight of getting people past entrenched blind spots, self-delusions, rationalizations, and other expressions of egocentricity and fundamental dishonesty? Speaking personally, I do not think we can.

Awakening and Transformation

No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. We cannot deal with present global realities by employing the tools that created them. We need to approach them with new minds and new hearts. We need to approach them with a new level of consciousness.

Wisdom comes through seeing and engaging life from a new, larger perspective. Education might, at its best, facilitate this, but seldom, if ever, does it go deep enough. Nothing less than a change of consciousness will help us deal with the realities we face as global neighbours in lifeboat earth.

I do not believe that the path through the troubling present realities that lead many to lose hope is a return to some perceived-to-be glorious past. That is simply the rhetoric of populist politicians. The only way through these developments that truly transcends them rather than simply reacts to them is the path of wisdom.

Nothing could be more important for the future of the world and for our own personal lives than humans learning to access and live the wisdom we desperately need to deal with the world’s most pressing geo-political challenges. It is the hope for our world – and beyond it, for the cosmos.

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