Monthly Archives: February 2025

February 27, 2025 – Seeing Human Evolution Through Global Data

   How can a look at the human use of fuel illustrate Teilhard’s projections for human evolution?

Today’s Post

Last week we identified the “tornado of statistics” that Johan Norberg assembles in his book, “Progress” as substantiating Teilhard’s optimistic view of human evolution.  In doing so, it would also offer the ‘cogent experimental grounds’ that Teilhard saw as needed to firm up our faith in the future.

This week we will take a first step by applying this approach to the subject of ‘fuel’.

 Example: A Brief History of Fuel

Few issues are closer to our everyday lives than that of fuel.  Every person on this planet uses fuel every day for such things as heating or cooling their homes, cooking their meals, transporting themselves and communicating.   As the issue of fuel is so ubiquitous, its history provides an excellent metric for putting our evolution into an objective perspective.

The discovery of fire a few hundred thousand years ago was a monumental moment in human history.  The availability of cooked, rather than raw, food led to improved health, and the ability to heat habitats led to an increase in habitable area.  It is obvious that both led to general improvements in human life.

Following the many thousands of years in which wood was the only fuel, coal began to take its place, increasing in use as the Bronze age led to the Iron age, and continuing a key role to this day.

Today other types of fuel, principally gas but including nuclear, wind and solar extraction, provide fuel for the many applications of the modern era.  Newer, cleaner sources, such as Hydrogen, are on the horizon.

While fuel offers an example of how human evolution can be seen to continue, how can it be seen to serve as an example of ‘cogent experimental grounds’ needed by humans if we are to see evidence of and have confidence in evolution in our species?  Applying Teilhard’s ‘lens of evolution’ to ‘fuel’, eight insights can be seen.

From Teilhard’s Perspective

The first is that of Human Invention.  The history of fuel offers an articulation of the steps of human evolution:  first ‘discovery’, then ‘extraction’, then ‘application’ and finally ‘dissemination’.  Some early humans discovered that certain stones would burn, and over time developed methods of extraction and dissemination that made it possible to use coal as an improved method of heat (more BTU per volume). This required improved methods of extraction and dissemination, such as mining coal vs gathering wood.

The second is that of the Human Psychism.  Each of these steps required an increase in complexity not only of the technology but more importantly an increasing development of what Teilhard refers to as ‘human psychisms’.  By this he is referring to the aspects of human society which are the core of the Inner Pull of compression addressed last weekBy psychism Teilhard refers to the human groups which effect the

“.. increase in mental interiority and hence of inventive power”

required to find and employ

“.. new ways of arranging its elements in the way that is most economical of energy and space.”

This does not only pertain to the management of fuel, but to the exponential rise in the uses of fuel: from cooking and heating to such things as the smelting of ores and the powering of engines.  Each such step required yet another ‘new way’ of thinking, an increase in the organization and the depth of knowledge of the ‘psychism’ and the need to draw on the resources of the noosphere (such as education) for their success.

The third insight can be seen in the dissemination of the resulting “new ways” over the face of planet.  While coal, for example, was ‘discovered’ in China approximately in 4000 BC, it wasn’t until the advent of expanding empires before, for example, the discoveries of the Romans could spread far and wide. The third example can be seen in Globalization.

The fourth of Teilhard’s insights is his observation that compression of the noosphere not only results in globalization, but also in the increase in the speed of the spread of invention.   Hundreds of thousands of years of wood burning, followed by a few thousand years of coal dependency followed by a few hundred years of transition to other sources of fuel.  Not only can evolution be seen to rise, but to converge, and the increasing convergence can be seen to stimulate its increasing speed.

The fifth Teilhard insight is the Timeliness of Invention, the recognition that humans invent as necessary to insure their continuing evolution.  Had humans not discovered the advantages of coal, the dependency upon wood would have left our planet by now denuded and bereft of oxygen.  We would be extinct.  Had not new sources of fuel come available in the Eighteenth century, the exclusive use of coal would have doomed us to asphyxiation, choking on the effluvia of civilization.  (A poignant example can be seen in the ‘Great Smog’ of London which killed over twelve thousand people in 1952.)

The sixth Teilhard insight is the recognition of the failure of forecasts that do not consider the six above phenomena.  Such an example is Thomas Malthus, whose dire predictions from the early 1800s are still read today.  Malthus depended on historical data for his end-of-times predictions (increase in population outstripping production of resources) but failed to recognize the basic human capability of invention, by which production would rise exponentially and unwanted side effects mitigated.  Malthus provides an example of the failure of any forecast which uses the past to predict the future without taking human invention into account.

The seventh insight is that of Change of State.  As Teilhard notes, the journey of cosmic evolution from the big bang is not a linear one.  At key points, not only does the “stuff of the universe” change, but it changes radically.  The transition from energy to matter, from simple to complex atoms, from molecules to cells and from neurons to conscious entities, are profound.  Further, the energies on which they depend are profoundly different as well.  In our simple example of ‘fuel’, this can be seen to be happening literally before our eyes.  The result of each step from wood to coal to gas and onto future sources could not have been predicted from evidence of the past.  The changes are highly nonlinear.

The eighth and last Teilhard insight is that of Risk.  Human evolution is not guaranteed to continue.  Continued innovation and invention, deepening insight into the structure of the noosphere provided by new human ‘psychisms’ and improvements in globalization which tighten communications all require closer cooperation.  None of these will happen unless humans continue to have faith in their future.

The Next Post

This week we began to use Teilhard’s ‘lens’ to focus a two-pronged look at how evolution can be seen to continue through the human species:  The first of which is to look objectively at what we know about our history so far, and the second to see how in this view such data bears out Teilhard’s insights into human evolution.  This week we looked at a rather simple example, ‘fuel’ to illustrate this approach.

Next week we will begin a much more detailed look at the data from Norberg’s book, “Progress” to see how its statistics substantiate Teilhard’s optimistic worldview while providing the ‘cogent experimental grounds’ necessary for our faith in the future.

February 20, 2025 – How Can We Tell We’re Evolving?

Are there “cogent experimental grounds’ which support Teilhard’s optimistic vision of evolution?

Today’s Post

Over the past several weeks we have been looking into Teilhard’s optimistic assessment of the future of human evolution.  We have also seen how conventional wisdom, well harvested from the weedy fields of daily news, suggests a much more dystopian human future.

As we have applied Teilhard’s ‘lens of evolution’ to human history, despite writing in a time at which our future was anything but rosy, he managed a world view which was quite opposite from that prevalent at the time.  Having seen how his audaciously optimistic (and counter-intuitive) conclusions have been formed, we can now use the astonishing volumes of data available today to look into how they are being playing out in human evolution.

Last week we boiled down Teilhard’s observations and projections of the noosphere, into six characteristics that constitute the ‘structure of the noosphere’.

This week we will begin a survey of this noosphere as it appears today to see how contemporary objective data, Teilhard’s ‘cogent experimental grounds’, can be brought to bear on his insights.  As we will see, quantifiable data from reliable sources not only strongly substantiates his case for optimism it does so stronger today than at any time in the whole of human history.

Human Evolution Metrics

How do we go about quantifying human evolution?  One very relevant approach can be found in “Progress”, a book by Johan Norberg, which seeks to show:

“..the amazing accomplishments that resulted from the slow, steady, spontaneous development of millions of people who were given the freedom to improve their own lives, and in doing so improved the world.”

   In doing so he alludes to a causality quite consistent with Teilhard’s ‘energy of evolution’:

“It is a kind of progress that no leader or institution or government can impose from the top down.”

   Norberg doesn’t reference Teilhard or cite religious beliefs.  Instead, he refers to findings from public surveys, government data, international media and global institutions such as the World Health Organization, UNICEF, World Bank, UNESCO, OECD, and UNAIDS.

His approach is to parse the ‘metrics of human evolution’ into nine categories.  They are:

Food                                                      Sanitation

Life Expectancy                                 Poverty

Violence                                              The Environment

Literacy                                                Freedom

Equality

For each of these categories he provides, as the international news magazine The Economist notes, “a tornado of evidence” for the “slow, steady, spontaneous development” of the human species.  He compares these statistics across the planet, from Western societies, to near- and mid- Eastern Asia, to China and India, and to super-and sub-Saharan Africa.  And, to the extent possible, he extends trends from antiquity to the current day.

Norberg is well aware that his findings, all showing improvements in the areas of human life listed above, are profoundly contrary to conventional wisdom, and he acknowledges the human tendency toward pessimism.  He quotes Franklin Pierce Adams on one source of this skepticism:

“Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory.”

   His prodigious statistics clearly, and to considerable depth, offer a look quite different from the nostalgic, sepia-tinged memories the ‘good old days’.

As Jeanette Walworth wrote:

“My grandpa notes the world’s worn cogs
And says we are going to the dogs!

The cave man in his queer skin togs
Said things were going to the dogs.
But this is what I wish to state
The dogs have had an awful wait.”

Seeing The Data Through Teilhard’s ‘Lens’

Over the next few weeks, we will address three of Norberg’s nine categories, summarize his key statistics, and show how they provide the ‘cogent experimental grounds’ that Teilhard saw as needed for us

“.. to be quite certain ..that the sort of temporo-spatial dome into which (our) destiny is leading is not a blind alley where the earth’s life flow will shatter and stifle itself.”

  This objective and verifiable historical data will serve to put Teilhard’s highly optimistic vision of the future to the test.  Does the data show that we humans are continuing to evolve?  If so, in what ways, how quickly, and is the trend positive or negative?

This week we will take a simple example, one not listed by Norberg but simple enough to illustrate our process:  that of ‘fuel’

The Next Post

This week we began to address Teilhard’s need for ‘cogent experimental grounds’ that would support our recognition that human evolution is proceeding in human life.  We identified the statistics that Johan Norberg has assembled on the increase in human welfare as examples of these grounds.

Beginning next week, we will provide examples of how such data can be seen to support Teilhard’s optimistic projections.

 

February 13, 2025 – Using Teilhard’s ‘Lens’ to See ‘Compression’ as an Evolutionary Step

How does Teilhard see the process of global compression as enabling human evolution?

This Week

Last week we saw how Teilhard recognizes a ‘cohesion’ which counters the ‘compression’ of the human species which underlies the action of his ‘convergent spiral’ as it spills over into human evolution.

This week we will apply his ‘lens of evolution’ to take a closer look at how it plays out in the ‘compression’ phase of human history.

   Compression, Evolution, and The Human Person

There’s much to be concerned about in the compression phase of our evolution on this planet.  The anxiety which seems so prevalent in our society today is surely not misplaced as we cautiously tread upon the bridge to the future while we are building it. Teilhard acknowledges the anxiety that arises as we move from expansion to compression:

“Surely the basic cause of our distress must be sought precisely in the change of curve which is suddenly obliging us to move from a universe in which … divergence… still seemed the most important feature, into another type of universe which .. is rapidly folding-in upon itself.”

   At the same time, Teilhard asserts, if we know how to see it, the very compression that causes such concern can be seen as an agency necessary to our continued evolution.

Teilhard can make this seemingly counterintuitive assertion based on his six observations of the ‘noosphere’, the layer of human influence on our planet:

  1. We are the latest products of evolution, and certainly subject to the same rise of complexity seen by our precedents.  Therefore, we can expect to see in ourselves the continuation of the energy of evolution that we saw at work in the previous products.  Put simply: the agency of evolution as increased ‘complexification’ will continue to find ways to assert itself in us as it had in our evolutionary precedents.
  2. Just as the ‘laws’ that worked so well for these precedents in each of their evolutionary stages were not replaced, but expanded in each new stage, this trend can be expected to continue in the ‘human stage’.
  3. Therefore, the inevitable compression in the human stage must contain some means of moving us forward. ‘New laws’ must be discovered.  As Teilhard puts it, humanity is

“…vitally forced to find continually new ways of arranging its elements in the way that is most economical of energy and space.”

  1. Thus the ‘outer push’ of compression must somehow be accompanied by an ‘inner pull’ which occurs if the human elements are to find new ways to connect which expand their ‘personness’ and become more of what they are capable of becoming. This transition from an external force which pushes us ever closer, to an internal force which pulls us together by freeing us from our limited possession of ourselves, allows compression to effect complexification. In this way Teilhard understands love as the latest manifestation of the basic force of evolution:  the only energy capable of not only uniting us by what is most unique in us but in doing so increasing our uniqueness.
  2. Human ‘invention’ is a manifestation of ‘finding new laws’ (# 3 above). John McHale, in his book, The Future of the Future, echoes Teilhard when he notes

At this point, then, where man’s affairs reach the scale of potential disruption of the global ecosystem, he invents precisely those conceptual and physical technologies that may enable him to deal with the magnitude of a complex planetary society.”

  1. Teilhard does not underestimate the risk, stressing the importance of choice, which requires the existence of faith:

“At this decisive moment when, for the first time, man… is becoming scientifically aware of the general pattern of his future on earth, what he needs before anything else, perhaps, is to be quite certain, on cogent experimental grounds, that the sort of temporo-spatial dome into which his destiny is leading is not a blind alley where the earth’s life flow will shatter and stifle itself.”

   Teilhard sees the need for “cogent experimental grounds” for us to have faith in the evolutionary process in which we are enmeshed.  The problem of course is that neither traditional science nor religion have thus far developed a clear picture of how evolution proceeds through the human, much less the ‘cogent experimental grounds’ which would articulate it.  In many cases, both often question the concept that it may do so at all.

It’s been some eighty years since Teilhard made his case for optimism about the evolutionary future of the human species.  Since then, human society has become ever more proficient at gathering data; we are drowning in it today.  With all the facts at our hand, is it possible to find some ‘cogent experimental grounds’ in this data to meet the need that Teilhard identifies?

The Next Post

This week we turned from using Teilhard’s ‘lens of evolution’ from seeing ourselves as moving from expansion to compression to a more detailed look at how he sees this transition manifesting itself in the ‘noosphere’, the layer of human-induced changes to our world.  We noted his identification of both the risks that are present in this transition, as well as the need for faith in the fourteen billion year rising tide of evolution that will usher in a new phase in which compression brings complexity in the form of ‘personization’.  We noted that with all the data generated in today’s ‘dataorcacy’, is it possible to see examples of such a counterintuitive process occurring?   Next week we will begin to overview how examples of such ‘personization’ can be seen in today’s events.

 

February 6, 2025 – Teilhard and the Positive Side of Planetary Compression

   How does Teilhard’s ‘lens’ help us to see the benefits hidden in human compression?

This Week

Last week we saw how human history presents the development of the human species as an ever-increasing compression as we fill up the globe, but how the application of Teilhard’s ‘lens’ helps to uncover its potential benefits.

This week we will use his ‘lens’ to recognize the continued rise of evolution’s fourteen billion march toward ‘fuller being’.

A Second Look at Compression

As mentioned above, the idea of ‘compression’ continues to have negative overtones today.  In the past few hundred years, humanity has experienced many examples of ‘compression’ which degrade human life.  In 1800, Thomas Malthus, citing such examples, predicted that future population increases would doom humans to extinction in a very short time.  Mao Zedong demonstrated that the deliberate political compression of society would lead to the deaths of millions.
Teilhard, however, takes a different view of ‘compression’.

“…the more mankind is compressed upon itself by the effect of growth, the more, if it is to find room for itself, it is vitally forced to find continually new ways of arranging its elements in the way that is most economical of energy and space.”

   From his viewpoint, the external forces of ‘compression’ must be countered by ‘inner’ tactics of ‘cohesion’ if human evolution is to continue.

“…what appeared at first no more than a mechanical tension and a quasi-geometrical re-arrangement imposed on the human mass ..” must “.. now take the form of a rise in interiority and liberty within a whole made up of reflective particles that are now more harmoniously interrelated.”

   The obvious question to one caught up in the compression of society is, how can our ‘rise in interiority and liberty’ take place in a ‘whole made up of reflective particles’?  Further, how can these reflective particles (human persons) become more ‘harmoniously interrelated’?

Part of Teilhard’s answer falls into his identification of a positive aspect of societal compression.  He relates ‘compression’ to human evolution when he states that compression

“…simultaneously and inevitably increases each human element’s radius of action and power in penetration in relation to all the others; and in proportion as it does so, it has as its direct effect a super-compression itself of the noosphere.  This super-compression, in turn, automatically produces a super-organization, and that again a super-‘consciousisation’: that in turn is followed by super-super-compression and so the process continues.”

   This assertion is quite a mouthful, but points back to his ‘convergent spiral’ and four levels of human evolution.  The phenomenon of ‘compression’ is very real and can be seen daily in the plethora of news which engulfs us.  He suggests, however, that the compression itself, since it pushes us closer together, unleashes a new phenomenon, that of ‘super-consciousisation’.  Effectively, by coming closer together, our individual ‘radius of action’ is extended, and those more economical ‘arrangements of elements’ can spread more quickly and efficiently.  While beneficial to the ‘monad’ and ‘dyad’ levels of human evolution, it is of immense value to the ‘psychism’ and ‘noosphere’ levels.

This reflects Richard Dawkins grasp of the advancement of human evolution by the spread of ‘memes’ (units of insight) transmitted through the ‘vehicle’ of human culture.  The tighter the fabric of human society is woven, the greater the opportunity for transmission of those insights which will most benefit it.

Once again, this reflects Teilhard’s ‘convergent spiral” and shows the recursive influence of each of his four levels.

   At the ‘monad’ level, the individual person becomes ‘fuller’ by assimilation of the cultural values available in the noosphere.

   At the ‘dyad’ level, his insights, and hence his maturity, are enhanced by the close relationship afforded by love.

   At the ‘psychism’ level, this fullness is increased by the extension of this dyadic energy to a wider group.

   At the level of the ‘noosphere’, the collective insights from the individual’s enrichment from the noosphere, through enhancements afforded by his relationships, are refined and added to the noosphere.

   Thus, the ‘super-compression’ speeds up and intensifies this recurring activity, leading not only to its ‘convergence’ but to an ever-increasing enrichment of not only the individual, but the pairs, the groups and ultimately to the noosphere.

One of Teilhard’s familiar insights can be seen anew in this ontological dance.

“Fuller being from closer union and closer union from fuller being.”

   To return to our fears of increased compression, this recurring action also illustrates the ‘cohesion’ phenomenon precisely required to offset the ‘compression’ and therefore insure our continued evolution.

Next Week

This week we saw examples of how Teilhard’s four levels of human evolution, from the ‘monad’ to the ‘noosphere’ serve as the ‘inner pull’ which counters the ‘external force’ of compression as universal evolution spills over into the milieu of human life.

Next week we will refocus our look at the compression of evolution through Teilhard’s ‘lens’.