of the
cosmos in our bodies and our consciousness.
The next step in our evolution is driven on the one hand by increasing crises with accompanying
unrest and turbulence, and on the other by a deepening and ever more evident unsustainability
in the world. The economic, social and political crises of our time are clear and objective evidence
that the kind of thinking dominating our world is flawed. Its fragmentation into I/you, we/world,
man/nature dualities cannot ensure the survival of the seven billion humans of the global family. It creates polarization in society and gaps between humanity and nature.
Einstein was right: we cannot solve the significant problems of our time with
the same kind of thinking that gave rise to them. We need new thinking.
Young people, and all people young in spirit, realize that to confront the problems of our time we
need something radically and fundamentally new. We need a new culture. Culture is not a luxury,
the exclusive province of the privileged; it is the essence of how we see the world, and ourselves
in the world. It is the ground of our values and the warrant of our aspirations.
The new culture we seek must offer an embracing view of the human being, of society, and of
the web of life on the planet. It must suggest a pragmatic ethic for life in a globally extended,
interacting and intercommunicating world. And it must enable us to transcend the fragmented
and ever more dysfunctional culture that still dominates the contemporary world.
Ervin Laszlo
…