Huxley’s Human Potentialities, Part 4: The Way to Realise Our Potential (3).

Huxley says that we should find new ways to stretch the kind psychophysical skills which, for example, we might use once we have learned to drive a car instinctually. Mechanisation has meant less opportunities for us to develop our capacities in this area, and to compensate for that society must begin educating ‘…on the non-verbal level of first-order psychophysical experience’: 'What is needed, if more of the potentialities of more people are to be actualized, is a training on the non-verbal levels of our whole being as systematic as the training now given to children and adults on the verbal level.'

When he wrote, in 1961, Huxley thought that studying from sciences to humanities was confined to the symbol-using mind, and we cannot say much has changed since then. Huxley would still say today that we need to awaken of purer forms of non-verbal experience and perception, ‘…with the fewest possible notional preconceptions’. After all, we cannot fulfil our potential for thinking and feeling, or for willing and acting, without our first perceiving accurately and discriminately.

Huxley even suggests that enhanced non-verbal perceptions might allow us exercise our potential for ‘higher insights’. Ancient tantric “philosopher-psychologists” of India, who believed that efforts to achieve perception ‘beyond names and descriptions’ was a preparation for living life fully, or for enlightenment. Yet Huxley is aware that modern times we tend be less concerned with enlightenment than with maintaining, or restoring mental health. He cites psychologists and psychotherapists – ‘Gestalt’ practitioners, for example – who at the start of the 1960s were finding that they could liberate patients by helping attend to their present, ‘here-and-now’ experiences. Some abandoned the Freudian focus on past trauma and the unconscious. Instead, mental health – of a sort that supports the realisation of potential – could be characterised by the breaking out of a ‘…prison of symbols and memories … by becoming aware, in a state of pure receptivity…’.

Further, Huxley suggests that higher levels of enjoyment follow from accurate perceptions; from perceptions less limited the “symbolic grime” of language – that is, a residue of notions about what things “really” or ”merely” are: '…when we understand that words stand only for the similarities between first-order experience, each one of which is unique, when we learn to pass at will from the stale ‘oldness of the letter’ (the world of symbols) to the fresh ‘newness of the spirit’ (the world of first-order experiences), then and only then will our potentialities for enjoyment be actualised.'

Huxley’s Human Potentialities, Part 3: The Way to Realise Our Potential (2).

Those of us who, following Huxley, wish establish an environment that favours the actualisation of in-born potentialities face an uphill struggle. This is because the societies we inhabit not oriented toward that end, and are instead preoccupied by the maintenance and extension of their wealth. So as things stand we can only do what we can with what there is.

One tool we do have is language, a resource for ‘automatically converting the bewildering profusion of first-order experiences into manageable symbols’. Although language can be misused to bolster the status quo’s misguided aspirations (for more consumption and national aggrandisement), it can also be used to encourage realistic thinking and appropriate thinking, so that we can formulate better science, literature, philosophy, and ethics. Language can enable appropriate education, which in turn can support the realisation of potentialities. Specifically education, mediated by language, has the power to promote two principles which are vital to the realisation of human potential: the ‘…understanding of the nature and limitations of language and the … fact of human variability.’

Language is made up of symbols that never truly represent ‘reality’, or at the least only represent ‘reality’ by degrees. If education is directed towards helping people to recognise this it shows them, at the same time, that truth is constantly in question. They become less vulnerable to the sort of persuasive power – of advertising, nationalism, ideology, and religion – which is based on a zealous and seemingly exciting misuse of language: “To what extent would it help boys and girls to actualise potentialities which, if they had not received this kind of training, would be been buried under unexamined preconceptions and traditional notions of smothered by uncritically accepted propaganda?”

As for variability, Huxley advocates a ‘genetic realism’; an admission that our freedom to choose what will make us happy or fulfilled is to some extent constrained or determined by unique genetic predispositions or potentialities. Education in human variability, Huxley says, can prevent forms of ignorance that foster prejudice; it can prevent the truly tragic suppression of rich diversity and innovation; it can also help us extend our perception beyond our culture’s ‘arbitrary chose norm of right-mindedness and good behaviour’, and it can benefit communities: “For the sake of the community (for no community can afford to waste its most precious asset, the gifts, the fully actualised potentialities, of all its members) ... the enormous spread of human diversity should be recognised, respected and systematically made the most of.”

Huxley’s Human Potentialities, Part 2: The Way to Realise Our Potential (1).

To be meaningful, hope must be attainable. In ‘Human Potentialities’ Aldous Huxley says that we really can establish a future for humanity in which we ‘…actualise the many and great potentialities which in most individuals still remain latent’. We can do so, first of all, by establishing the right environmental conditions. As a Humanist Huxley believes that people have a natural desire, or even need, to strive towards the realisation of their potential. Nevertheless, we cannot trust that they will do so until their more basic requirements are met.

Describing Abraham Maslow’s concept of a ‘hierarchy of needs’, Huxley says that our physical needs (for food, and safety) and certain psychological needs (for belonging, and esteem) must be satisfied before we can realise the ‘most specifically human of our needs’; that is, before we can satisfy our need of knowledge, meaning, ‘self-expression through the manipulation of symbols’, and our need of ‘self-transcending development’.

It is necessary to concede that there are exceptions: some people realise potentialities in spite of, or even because of, isolation and a lack of love. In one song, I Found Out, John Lennon had this to say of his parents: “They didn’t want me, so they made me a star”. And yet in defence of Huxley’s argument, tortured geniuses like Lennon tend not to fulfil their potential in terms of being happy, or being happy with themselves.

So, the satisfaction of people's needs is a necessary first step, and a prerequite for their going on to fulfil their promise in multiple areas of their lives. But there are further ways and means to consider beyond that, as I will show in coming posts.

Huxley’s Human Potentialities, Part 1: Hope and a Direction for the Future Without Faith.

I admire Aldous Huxley, and all his work. His earlier, satirical and dystopian work tore down all hypocrisies and inequalities with piercing intelligence and wit. The novel Brave New World famously shows the possible dehumanising consequences of advancing science, and of advancing the fortunes of only a genetically ‘superior’ few. In that world dominant powers act like the religions and totalitarian regimes we know: they do not allow people to accept or respect difference – the quality of difference that we all share ¬– and they attempt to make everyone to follow the one same path to fulfilment whether they like it or not. But Huxley didn’t simply take the easy route of one who only criticises others, without offering positive alternatives; he didn’t simply show us an impending road to hell, without suggesting an alternative route.

After years of preparation Huxley wrote Island, a novel published the year before his passing in 1962. He sought to show how a community can choose to adopt practical and pragmatic systems in order to prioritise happiness, deeper present moment awareness, and love; he tried to describe a system which enables individuals to cultivate their own unique gifts, perspectives, and paths to happiness, to the benefit everyone. Equally, in an essay called ‘Human Potentialities’ (1961), which I will focus on here, Huxley outlined a positive direction for the future. He offered us something to strive for now, and an alternative to locating our hope in the consolations of an afterlife. In ‘Human Potentialities’ he criticises wealthy nations, where they envisage their futures in terms of more military might and more consumption. Rather, we should orient ourselves toward meeting everyone’s basic human needs, so that we might create a world in which everyone will have a chance to actualise their desirable potentialities. If we will it, or if we choose it and aspire to it, says Huxley, we do have the capacity to share our resources so that every human being will be nourished, secure, and valued; so that every human being will then be in a position to develop their capacities for intelligence, creativity, contentment, and love.

Aldous’ ‘Human Potentialities’ appears in a volume called ‘The Humanist Frame’ (1961), which was edited his elder brother Julian. Julian Huxley was a biologist, Humanist, and he had been the first director-general of UNESCO – his preface is worthy of mention. It is preface which centres on ‘Evolutionary Humanism’, as a way of giving humanism a set of principles and a ‘movement in a certain definable direction’. This ‘Evolutionary Humanism’ gives us hope and meaning, when it relates every kind of human activity to evolutionary movement. Evolution, Julian Huxley says, is not simply a biological process, but a psychosocial process which – particularly now, following recent strides in our knowledge and technologies – we can and should direct: "Today, in twentieth-century man, the evolutionary process is at last becoming conscious of itself and is beginning to study itself with a view to directing its future course. Human knowledge worked over by human imagination is seen as the basis of human understanding and belief, and the ultimate guide to human progress."

Linking in to his brother’s piece, Julian describes ‘Evolutionary Humanism’ as an aim for human species ‘…in the shape of greater fulfilment through the realisation of potentialities.’ In my next post I will show how Aldous Huxley thought we might practically go about realising human potentialities.

If homosexuality is natural, Christianity is wrong.

Please consider the following extract from a recent post on A Penitent Atheist (see links). In the context of the theme of my own blog (Shared Difference) I will just add this: although we may all share a capacity for love, we all require the freedom to pursue in the way we choose and with whom we choose (provided we do not cause unjustifiable harm). If one man finds love and happiness with a consenting thin female, so be it; if another man finds love and happiness with a consenting large male, so be it! Too often a terrible wrong has been perpetrated, when people have been forced, whether overtly or more incideously, to suppress their natural impulses for love and relationships...

"The title of my blog, A Penitent Atheist, indicates a degree of regret, even remorse, that exists in me because of the things I taught and preached as a Christian minister. One of the things I regret the most is my persecution of homosexuals.

When anyone attempts to find that Christianity is tolerant of homosexuals, they must choose to admit that certain parts of the Bible are wrong. Because the Bible is unequivocally anti-homosexual. And therefore, as a preacher, so was I.

As it turned out, the issue of homosexuality, among others, helped me see that the Bible, and Christianity, were false. It is very simple, really. If homosexuality is not a choice, then Christianity is wrong. And it is patently clear that homosexuality is not a choice; it is no more a choice than is heterosexuality."

Why Religion Still Makes Me Cross, Part 10: Go In Peace to Love and Serve...?

Anglican congregations rise to close their services with a hymn, and so they are already standing tall – perhaps invigorated by the imminent prospect of coffee and then Sunday lunch – when the Reverend exhorts them to “Go in peace, to love and serve the Lord”. But I feel obliged to exclaim “by Jove, isn’t that rather a lot to ask?”, having established (see parts II, VII, and VIII) that the Lord of the Bible - in His transcendence - cannot be anything other than unknown in every strict or verifiable sense. Good luck to individuals who undertake to guess what kind of “service” He wants, especially if they hope to come up with an answer and achieve a consensus; pity them, given the persistent inability to agree (ranging from petty bickering to out-and-out discord) which explains why religion makes religious people cross!

So then, with no solution, no resolution, and therefore with no clear Way to serve Him in sight, why do Christian solders march on? They’re hampered to the point of being ineffectual – incapable of coming together to choose between a frontal assault and a pincer movement, or even agree on which hill to take in the first place – so why don’t they demob? Well, perhaps that’s mostly because there is a security that comes with the expectation of a pending capital-T Truth; that can appear to outweigh the insecurity associated with the inability to define that Truth now, or agree on the Way to realise it. Unless… it could be that all the schisms and long-winded disputes conceal a hidden purpose: the Anglican Communion alone − without even needing to enlist other sects, or make anything of their divergences − may one day create enough hot air to fill a giant balloon so that they can float to Heaven. Why else sit there in General Synod and, straight faced, situate antagonised arguments about the “problem” of homosexuality alongside moral debates concerning poverty and climate change?

Another thing, the Godhead doesn’t need serving, or praising, or prayer. He’s ok, up there being sung to sleep every night by heavenly hosts. Surely He’s big enough to take care of Himself, and I see no reason to single Him out for special treatment just because He’s rumoured to be Older, Wiser, and more Powerful than the rest of us. (The that Humans are ‘lesser beings makes “Humanist” start to sound like a form of discrimination, like “sexist” or “racist”! Are Christian’s “Humanist” in that sense?) No, if we are to serve at all lets stay focussed on helping one another, because life isn't easy for us mortals. (Not that we can care for each other without also caring for ourselves, for no one would be happy and all our efforts would be wasted if everyone were to confuse “goodness” with misery and self-sacrifice!)

Of course the mystery of God is still there – distracting, perplexing, and generally getting in the way – somehow secure within a cultural milieu which politely accepts long-standing fallacies. Clearly I don’t like it, and yet you know, for now I do myself some favours if I can accept and come to terms with it, rather than become angry or demoralized (and as such ineffectual). Life goes on, even though we cannot be sure that life will offer us what we want, or anything at all: we cannot be sure that life will always give us secularism any more than health, money, or status, just as Christians certainly cannot be sure of God or Heaven. But I say to you: there is still always meaning in what you can give or offer – through your attitudes and actions – and in the love that you (uniquely, like no other) can feel or create even if the harshest and most hopeless circumstances. That’s everything, and that’s enough.

Why Religion Still Makes Me Cross, Part 9: Why Religion Doesn't Always Make Me Cross.

I’ve sought to explain and justify my persistent vexatious feelings about religion, but now I’ve said enough. Lets move on because, well, I’ve moved on. I’m positive, excited about the future, confident that claims to exclusive religious truth will fade in time, like an empty, irrelevant, and potentially divisive rumour. It’ll happen when it finally becomes clear even to religious people that the symbols that make up our languages and texts cannot really contain or express truth – religious or otherwise. Nevertheless, for now religion remains an inescapable ‘reality’, and I chose not to remain angry or demoralised about it. I wish to avoid the kind of excessive bile which could skew my perceptions, or distort my arguments. I am striving to be fair-minded, even handed, and capable of acknowledging the provisional and limited nature of my own words and hypotheses.

In that spirit, let me concede I like some aspects of religion (just as I might like some aspects of the American government’s activity in Israel or Africa, without being fond of American foreign policy as a whole): Despite myself I still like old Church buildings, and Anglican hymns whose words I learned by heart as a young choirboy: such familiar sights and sounds reliably counteract a kind of empty “home sick” feeling, whenever my surroundings seem ‘alien’ or threatening somehow. I also like kindly old ladies who bake for Church functions and spoil little children. I enjoy Christmas carols, and for me Taizé music can be ‘heavenly’. I even have affection for parts of the Bible – notably parables like ‘The Good Samaritan’ (Luke 10), and the one with the widow who gives away her last two copper coins while no one is looking (Mark 12). Further, if I were ever truly in desperate need, I think I might go to a priest or an imam, a church or a mosque – places where I know well-meaning individuals tend to congregate.

Religious or not, people tend to grow on me, once I get passed my preconceptions and appreciate their rounded individuality. In particular, I have a lot of time for religious people who honestly ‘don’t know’. These are open people who, it seems to me, gain much from not being sure about what they believe: they’re humble, and they don’t indoctrinate or force their beliefs on others. They are spiritual people whose spirituality performs a very real function in their lives; they tend to find solace in ceremony and constancy in the services, rituals, and festivals that break up their year. Hanging onto some kind of “open belief” can provide an avenue for genuine reflection, as well as relaxation and personal development – vital aspects of a life well lived, which many of us have lost. For others, notably “non-practicing” individuals who were brought up in the faith, God remains an important notion: few of these read or attempt to defend the Bible, and, for my own part, I’m disinclined to disapprove of them. We can’t all be philosophers, and people who are happy and harmless can’t all be expected to halt their daily lives in order to critically assess their unseen assumptions.

Clearly I’m making an effort to be kind here, and as a final gesture I’d like to mention two very important words – “love” and “forgiveness”. I’ll allow those words stand there alone, because they are strong expressive words that do not need to be borne up by philosophical explication or religious structure. Love and forgiveness have been working for a long time now, occasionally loudly or publicly, but perhaps more often quietly and privately. It appears Jesus and/or the gospel writers, like Gautama and Lao-tze, chose to use these words, and for that at least lets give them a nod. And spare a bow for people down the ages who may have read the whole Bible, but have nevertheless singled out and acted upon these two words. As Victor Frankl (author of ‘Man’s Search For Meaning’) discovered in Auschwitz, love allows us rise high, far above physical life and suffering – it is our salvation.