By Steve Kantor*
In a world speeding toward hyper-digitization and disconnection, we need not only new technologies—but new rituals. Rituals that reawaken our connection to nature, the cosmos, and each other. This is exactly what we’re beginning to cultivate through an initiative called BushidoMoon—an experiment in planetary consciousness, seasonal celebration, and bold human connection.
The inspiration began with the visionary ideas presented in the book Planetary Foresight and Ethics, which calls us to reimagine the future of humanity by re-aligning with the rhythms of the Earth and cosmos. The book urges us to embrace celestial observations, seasonal celebrations, and nature-connected practices as powerful ways to regenerate human meaning and solidarity in a time of planetary crisis.
After reading the book and connecting with its author, I suggested the use of the term Terran—as a poetic yet powerful way to emphasize our shared identity as beings of this planet. But the next question was immediate and practical: how do we find more Terrans? How do we build not just the thought leadership, but the action network for this emerging planetary culture?
As someone with an entrepreneurial mindset, I realized the need for more grassroots, embodied, and joyful expressions of the book’s deeper vision. That's when I proposed something deceptively simple: a full moon gathering, small at first, playful yet meaningful, rooted in nature and inspired by the ancient warrior code of Bushido.
BushidoMoon was born.
We alpha- and beta-tested the idea in tiny groups. But it was on our third try—at the Strawberry Moon in June 2025—that the magic really happened. Fourteen individuals, from a wildly diverse range of backgrounds, joined us under the moonlight in Bishop Garden, one of the most scenic and sacred-feeling places in Washington, DC.
We shared a potluck dinner amid blooming flowers, green grass, and a warm spring breeze. We laughed. We made toasts. We talked about nature, ethics, the cosmos—and the kinds of futures we want to live. The author of Planetary Foresight and Ethics joined us and shared how the book presents an alternative to globalization: a planetary vision that prioritizes human flourishing over economic competition, and cosmic connectedness over digital distraction.
We ended the evening with a Human Connection Circle. Each person spoke one word to describe how they felt at that moment. Then, spontaneously and joyfully—we howled at the moon. Why? Because this wasn’t about solemn ceremonies or rigid beliefs. It was about celebrating life boldly, together, in the spirit of play.
And that, too, is a vital insight from Planetary Foresight and Ethics: that creative play, including with technology and AI, is not frivolous. It is central to the preferred futures of humanity. As automation liberates us from traditional labor, we are called to explore creative complexity, to blur the lines between reality and virtuality, and to experiment with new ways of being human.
BushidoMoon is one such experiment.
It’s an invitation to reconnect—with yourself, with others, with nature, with the cosmos. It is tech-facilitated but grounded in in-person humanity. It is bold, weird, warm, and wildly needed.
So here’s your call to action:
If you’d like to start a BushidoMoon in your city or country, or if you want to join a virtual circle, I would love to connect with you. Just send a note to the Contact Us button on this blog. Let’s gather under the next moon, wherever you are on Earth.
* Steve Kantor is a member of the scientific council of the Alternative Planetary Futures Institute.
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Thursday, June 12, 2025
Wednesday, April 23, 2025
Walter Truett Anderson on Culture, Evolution, Technology, Globalization, and Enlightenment
by Thomas Lombardo*
“One species on the planet, and one species only, has reached the point of being able to have an impact on the evolutionary fortunes of all other species and upon the functioning of all ecosystems. We also have, in a way that is not true for any other species, a relationship to the planet as a whole and to the future. We live with all life.”
“The new polarization is a split between different kinds of belief, not between different beliefs. It divides those who believe from those who have beliefs. It pits fundamentalists—who may be fundamentalists of religion, science, ideology, or cultural tradition—against an opposition called relativists here, secular humanists there, religious liberals somewhere else.”
“If there is anything we have plenty of, it is belief systems.”
Walter Truett Anderson
Walter Truett Anderson, in a series of books over roughly a fifteen year period, developed a multi-faceted and relatively comprehensive theoretical analysis of contemporary trends and potential future directions for humanity. In his books, he has examined and synthesized such diverse topics as human belief systems, values, and culture; biotechnology and information technology; evolution and ecology; human psychology; society and globalization; Eastern and Western philosophy; and the past and potential future evolution of enlightenment. His most noteworthy books over this period include, Reality Isn’t What It Used To Be: Theatrical Politics, Ready-to-Wear Religion, Global Myths, Primitive Chic, and Other Wonders of the Postmodern World (1990), Evolution Isn’t What it Used to Be: The Augmented Animal and the Whole Wired World (1996), The Future of the Self: Inventing the Postmodern Person (1997), All Connected Now: Life in the First Global Civilization (2001), and The Next Enlightenment: Integrating East and West in a New Vision of Human Evolution (2003)
In Reality Isn’t What it Used to Be, Anderson presents the argument that in contemporary times there is a fundamental conflict and disagreement between absolutists and relativists regarding the nature of human knowledge and human values. The former believe that human knowledge and values are grounded in absolute and objective principles and facts; the relativists believe that knowledge and values are historically, culturally, and psychologically relative (or subjective). In essence, this is the conflict between fundamentalists (the absolutists) and Postmodernists (the relativists), though we could also include as absolutists those who believe that science provides objective and certain knowledge about reality. Anderson, in this book and later writings, clearly seems to side with the Postmodernists, at least to a degree. He does believe though, contrary to many Postmodernists, that there can be progress in the growth of knowledge.
In Evolution Isn’t What it Used to Be, Anderson argues that evolution is evolving and becoming purposeful with the introduction of biotechnology and information technology into the “augmentation” and enhancement of our species. In fact, he sees technology as permeating out into all aspects and dimensions of nature, including the monitoring and control of our environment. There can be no return to a pure or unspoiled nature. Biotechnology and information technology are increasingly intertwined and, following a similar line of thinking to Kevin Kelly, Rodney Brooks, and Andy Clark, Anderson sees a general blurring of the separation of life and technology. The whole wide world is becoming the “whole wired world.”
In The Future of the Self, Anderson picks up the Postmodern theme again, and presents the argument that the human self is a social construction, situational specific, and pluralistic, rather than singular and absolute. Anderson argues that given the complexity and rush of change in our contemporary world, a new type of self is emerging – one that is pluralistic and much more fluid. Anderson ties together human psychology, advances in the sciences, trends in culture and society, and the impact of technology on human life and the human mind, in creating a Postmodern vision of the self.
In an effort to be comprehensive regarding the nature of globalization, Walter Truett Anderson outlines a multi-dimensional theory in his book All Connected Now. Globalization is a multi-faceted phenomenon. Anderson not only discusses economic globalization, but also includes in his book treatments of cultural and political globalization; biological and ecological factors connected with globalization; the significance of the information network in the creation of a global society; the rise of global consciousness, increased human mobility and migration; and the huge growth in numbers of human organizations, and especially, international organizations. Anderson sees “a world of open systems” as the general theme running through all these dimensions of globalization. Anderson also highlights the strong technological dimension to globalization – a theme he carries forth from his earlier book on evolution. We are being wired together - the environment is being wired together as well. Anderson also reinforces and further develops his emphasis on the pluralistic and multicultural quality of our times – a theme he introduced in his earlier books on Reality and the Self. Although there is resistance to globalization, where some cultures and organizations wish to remain closed, according to Anderson, the overall world-wide trend is toward increasing openness and interactivity. In this respect, his view is similar to Friedman’s books on globalization.
Some of Anderson’s main arguments and hypotheses include: There is a general ongoing trend toward multiculturalism, in spite of efforts to preserve integrated pure cultures; the twentieth-century discovery of ecology and the interdependence of the earth, life, and humanity has intensified global consciousness; there has been a significant rise in international corporations and a reciprocal rise in global governance to control and monitor these corporations; there has been a globalization of human rights and human laws; the global society is an “open society” that emphasizes individual responsibility and choice rather than dictatorial rule; a “cosmopolitan citizen” has emerged who does not identify with any particular nation; and the global society is multi-centric with many centers of power. Anderson predicts a series of global societies in the future, as the human community struggles with the challenges and inherent conflicts brought on by globalization. In the coming century, the big issue is going to be globalization itself – its pros and cons.
One theme that runs through Anderson’s books is evolution; nature and human society is dynamic, changing, and developmental. Globalization has had a history which he traces in All Connected Now and in The Future of the Self, Anderson looks at the history and evolutionary development of the self. In fact, for Anderson, evolution is itself changing as conscious purpose and technology become increasingly important in human growth and change (See Evolution Isn’t What It Used To Be). In The Next Enlightenment, Anderson recounts the historical development of enlightenment in both Western and Eastern cultures. Evolution is perhaps the central theme in this last book, for Anderson believes that enlightenment is “an evolutionary project” – an expression of the dynamic and growth-oriented dimension of reality. And a key element in the state of enlightenment is seeing that all is flow – that all being is becoming.
For Anderson, enlightenment involves a liberation from the egocentric constraints of viewing ourselves as a singular and absolute, unchanging self. In The Future of the Self, Anderson critiques this limiting idea of the self. In The Next Enlightenment, Anderson goes further in arguing that the most important problem of our times is overcoming this constraining view of self-identity. War, conflict, indifference, and cruelty, all arise out of conceptualizing our identity, both individually and culturally, as bounded and singular entities. Within this mindset, we fail to see the “oneness” of all humanity and the “oneness” of ourselves and the universe; instead cultures and individuals segregate and oppose each other and humanity separates itself from nature. Enlightenment involves, as a central insight, the understanding and experience of oneness. In All Connected Now, Anderson highlights the importance of a growing sense of global consciousness and the theory of open systems (the interconnectivity of all things). In The Next Enlightenment Anderson discusses the idea of “cosmic consciousness” as an essential feature of enlightenment. It is important to see that enlightenment means freedom for Anderson. In his history of enlightenment, provided in the first part of his book, he reviews efforts through the ages to free the human mind from the cultural and psychological forces and assumptions that enslave and suppress us.
Anderson synthesizes a variety of ideas in his theory of enlightenment. He pulls together ideas from both the East and West. He sees a thematic connection between the Buddhist ideas of oneness and flow and the Western ideas of interdependency, interconnectivity, and evolution. He discusses “flow” and “transcendence” in the context of both the western psychology of Csikszentmihalyi and Eastern meditative practices. He sees the value of both rationality and intuition as paths to enlightenment. He supports the openness of New Age spirituality, but critiques the lack of epistemological standards in this movement. He rejects the professed certainty of fundamentalism and argues instead that a key feature of enlightenment is the courageous embrace of mystery and uncertainty in human existence. Identifying a series of “liberation movements” within human history, which include the European Enlightenment, Darwinian evolutionary theory, Freudian psychology, and the Human Potential movement of the 1960s, Anderson believes that enlightenment is a higher level of consciousness, enveloping and transcending earlier stages in the growth of the human mind, that was achieved by at least some people in the past. He anticipates increasingly more people achieving this state of consciousness and mentality in the future as an expression of the evolutionary development of humanity.
“One species on the planet, and one species only, has reached the point of being able to have an impact on the evolutionary fortunes of all other species and upon the functioning of all ecosystems. We also have, in a way that is not true for any other species, a relationship to the planet as a whole and to the future. We live with all life.”
“The new polarization is a split between different kinds of belief, not between different beliefs. It divides those who believe from those who have beliefs. It pits fundamentalists—who may be fundamentalists of religion, science, ideology, or cultural tradition—against an opposition called relativists here, secular humanists there, religious liberals somewhere else.”
“If there is anything we have plenty of, it is belief systems.”
Walter Truett Anderson
Walter Truett Anderson, in a series of books over roughly a fifteen year period, developed a multi-faceted and relatively comprehensive theoretical analysis of contemporary trends and potential future directions for humanity. In his books, he has examined and synthesized such diverse topics as human belief systems, values, and culture; biotechnology and information technology; evolution and ecology; human psychology; society and globalization; Eastern and Western philosophy; and the past and potential future evolution of enlightenment. His most noteworthy books over this period include, Reality Isn’t What It Used To Be: Theatrical Politics, Ready-to-Wear Religion, Global Myths, Primitive Chic, and Other Wonders of the Postmodern World (1990), Evolution Isn’t What it Used to Be: The Augmented Animal and the Whole Wired World (1996), The Future of the Self: Inventing the Postmodern Person (1997), All Connected Now: Life in the First Global Civilization (2001), and The Next Enlightenment: Integrating East and West in a New Vision of Human Evolution (2003)
In Reality Isn’t What it Used to Be, Anderson presents the argument that in contemporary times there is a fundamental conflict and disagreement between absolutists and relativists regarding the nature of human knowledge and human values. The former believe that human knowledge and values are grounded in absolute and objective principles and facts; the relativists believe that knowledge and values are historically, culturally, and psychologically relative (or subjective). In essence, this is the conflict between fundamentalists (the absolutists) and Postmodernists (the relativists), though we could also include as absolutists those who believe that science provides objective and certain knowledge about reality. Anderson, in this book and later writings, clearly seems to side with the Postmodernists, at least to a degree. He does believe though, contrary to many Postmodernists, that there can be progress in the growth of knowledge.
In Evolution Isn’t What it Used to Be, Anderson argues that evolution is evolving and becoming purposeful with the introduction of biotechnology and information technology into the “augmentation” and enhancement of our species. In fact, he sees technology as permeating out into all aspects and dimensions of nature, including the monitoring and control of our environment. There can be no return to a pure or unspoiled nature. Biotechnology and information technology are increasingly intertwined and, following a similar line of thinking to Kevin Kelly, Rodney Brooks, and Andy Clark, Anderson sees a general blurring of the separation of life and technology. The whole wide world is becoming the “whole wired world.”
In The Future of the Self, Anderson picks up the Postmodern theme again, and presents the argument that the human self is a social construction, situational specific, and pluralistic, rather than singular and absolute. Anderson argues that given the complexity and rush of change in our contemporary world, a new type of self is emerging – one that is pluralistic and much more fluid. Anderson ties together human psychology, advances in the sciences, trends in culture and society, and the impact of technology on human life and the human mind, in creating a Postmodern vision of the self.
In an effort to be comprehensive regarding the nature of globalization, Walter Truett Anderson outlines a multi-dimensional theory in his book All Connected Now. Globalization is a multi-faceted phenomenon. Anderson not only discusses economic globalization, but also includes in his book treatments of cultural and political globalization; biological and ecological factors connected with globalization; the significance of the information network in the creation of a global society; the rise of global consciousness, increased human mobility and migration; and the huge growth in numbers of human organizations, and especially, international organizations. Anderson sees “a world of open systems” as the general theme running through all these dimensions of globalization. Anderson also highlights the strong technological dimension to globalization – a theme he carries forth from his earlier book on evolution. We are being wired together - the environment is being wired together as well. Anderson also reinforces and further develops his emphasis on the pluralistic and multicultural quality of our times – a theme he introduced in his earlier books on Reality and the Self. Although there is resistance to globalization, where some cultures and organizations wish to remain closed, according to Anderson, the overall world-wide trend is toward increasing openness and interactivity. In this respect, his view is similar to Friedman’s books on globalization.
Some of Anderson’s main arguments and hypotheses include: There is a general ongoing trend toward multiculturalism, in spite of efforts to preserve integrated pure cultures; the twentieth-century discovery of ecology and the interdependence of the earth, life, and humanity has intensified global consciousness; there has been a significant rise in international corporations and a reciprocal rise in global governance to control and monitor these corporations; there has been a globalization of human rights and human laws; the global society is an “open society” that emphasizes individual responsibility and choice rather than dictatorial rule; a “cosmopolitan citizen” has emerged who does not identify with any particular nation; and the global society is multi-centric with many centers of power. Anderson predicts a series of global societies in the future, as the human community struggles with the challenges and inherent conflicts brought on by globalization. In the coming century, the big issue is going to be globalization itself – its pros and cons.
One theme that runs through Anderson’s books is evolution; nature and human society is dynamic, changing, and developmental. Globalization has had a history which he traces in All Connected Now and in The Future of the Self, Anderson looks at the history and evolutionary development of the self. In fact, for Anderson, evolution is itself changing as conscious purpose and technology become increasingly important in human growth and change (See Evolution Isn’t What It Used To Be). In The Next Enlightenment, Anderson recounts the historical development of enlightenment in both Western and Eastern cultures. Evolution is perhaps the central theme in this last book, for Anderson believes that enlightenment is “an evolutionary project” – an expression of the dynamic and growth-oriented dimension of reality. And a key element in the state of enlightenment is seeing that all is flow – that all being is becoming.
For Anderson, enlightenment involves a liberation from the egocentric constraints of viewing ourselves as a singular and absolute, unchanging self. In The Future of the Self, Anderson critiques this limiting idea of the self. In The Next Enlightenment, Anderson goes further in arguing that the most important problem of our times is overcoming this constraining view of self-identity. War, conflict, indifference, and cruelty, all arise out of conceptualizing our identity, both individually and culturally, as bounded and singular entities. Within this mindset, we fail to see the “oneness” of all humanity and the “oneness” of ourselves and the universe; instead cultures and individuals segregate and oppose each other and humanity separates itself from nature. Enlightenment involves, as a central insight, the understanding and experience of oneness. In All Connected Now, Anderson highlights the importance of a growing sense of global consciousness and the theory of open systems (the interconnectivity of all things). In The Next Enlightenment Anderson discusses the idea of “cosmic consciousness” as an essential feature of enlightenment. It is important to see that enlightenment means freedom for Anderson. In his history of enlightenment, provided in the first part of his book, he reviews efforts through the ages to free the human mind from the cultural and psychological forces and assumptions that enslave and suppress us.
Anderson synthesizes a variety of ideas in his theory of enlightenment. He pulls together ideas from both the East and West. He sees a thematic connection between the Buddhist ideas of oneness and flow and the Western ideas of interdependency, interconnectivity, and evolution. He discusses “flow” and “transcendence” in the context of both the western psychology of Csikszentmihalyi and Eastern meditative practices. He sees the value of both rationality and intuition as paths to enlightenment. He supports the openness of New Age spirituality, but critiques the lack of epistemological standards in this movement. He rejects the professed certainty of fundamentalism and argues instead that a key feature of enlightenment is the courageous embrace of mystery and uncertainty in human existence. Identifying a series of “liberation movements” within human history, which include the European Enlightenment, Darwinian evolutionary theory, Freudian psychology, and the Human Potential movement of the 1960s, Anderson believes that enlightenment is a higher level of consciousness, enveloping and transcending earlier stages in the growth of the human mind, that was achieved by at least some people in the past. He anticipates increasingly more people achieving this state of consciousness and mentality in the future as an expression of the evolutionary development of humanity.
* Thomas Lombardo is a member of the scientific council of the Alternative Planetary Futures Institute.
Wednesday, January 22, 2025
The Global Brain
By Thomas Lombardo *
In his book The Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century (2001) Howard Bloom presents the theory that life on earth has evolved as a collective global whole. He sees two fundamental processes at work in evolution. One process is integration, generating conformity and unity, and the other process is differentiation, generating diversity and individuality. Although these two processes are oppositional, integration and differentiation also work in tandem, mutually stimulating each other, and producing increasing complexity as a result. The two processes, in Bloom’s mind, work toward the benefit of the whole. Integration produces coordination and order, while differentiation produces variability, which is necessary for creative experimentation in the evolutionary process. The rich and varied, yet equally interdependent network of living forms on the earth is a result of these two processes. For Bloom, a complex and intricate global brain has been evolving on the earth since the beginnings of life.
Humanity is part of this multi-species network, requiring the presence and utilization of many other living forms. According to Bloom, it is a mistake and an illusion to see humans as “isolated entities.” Further, human history is filled with examples of both “conformity enforcers” and “diversity generators,” and he sees our modern day philosophies of individuality and freedom versus unity and order as simply intellectual expressions of these two opposing tendencies within us and all of life.
The contemporary conflict between rigid fundamentalist groups and multicultural modernized nations is also a reflection of these two forces within us. The great cultural mixing of the last century, due to multiple waves of migration and global communication and exchange, brought with it new freedom and opportunities and a sense of hope, but it also instigated counter-reactions out of fear, for the stability and security of the past seemed threatened by the Postmodern world. For Bloom, both Muslim and Christian fundamentalism are paradigm examples of “conformity enforcers” that wish to bring order and homogeneity through authoritarian control. He calls them the “new Spartans.”
Bloom believes, though, that a balance needs to be struck between integration and diversification. A police state that produces a regimented paradise would sap the inventiveness out of humanity. According to Bloom, the solution to our present problems and challenges involves a combination of self-control and social freedom. Bloom feels that the fundamentalist strategy is to control the other rather than the self and, in his mind, this approach will not work. Hence, although Bloom sees all of life and humanity as a collective whole, he believes that the further evolution of this collective whole, following the dialectic pattern of the past, is to balance conformity and diversity. He sees fundamentalism as a significant threat to this balance as well as a threat to human freedom and creativity.
Bloom describes living forms as “complex adaptive systems” and the whole global network of life as one vast “complex adaptive system” that learns and evolves. He particularly emphasizes that bacteria and microbial life, since early on in the history of the earth, integrated into a global adaptive system. With the development of human civilization and modern globalization, a new global mind, coordinated by humans and human technology, is emerging on the earth. Bloom foresees the greatest future challenge facing humanity as finding ways to more cooperatively work together with the primordial global brain of bacteria. Although he sees humans as “evolution incarnate,” Bloom argues that humans should see themselves as the “neurons of an interspecies mind” that will involve the participation of all living forms, and especially the bacterial underpinnings of all earthly life.
* Thomas Lombardo is a member of the scientific council of the Alternative Planetary Futures Institute.
In his book The Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century (2001) Howard Bloom presents the theory that life on earth has evolved as a collective global whole. He sees two fundamental processes at work in evolution. One process is integration, generating conformity and unity, and the other process is differentiation, generating diversity and individuality. Although these two processes are oppositional, integration and differentiation also work in tandem, mutually stimulating each other, and producing increasing complexity as a result. The two processes, in Bloom’s mind, work toward the benefit of the whole. Integration produces coordination and order, while differentiation produces variability, which is necessary for creative experimentation in the evolutionary process. The rich and varied, yet equally interdependent network of living forms on the earth is a result of these two processes. For Bloom, a complex and intricate global brain has been evolving on the earth since the beginnings of life.
Humanity is part of this multi-species network, requiring the presence and utilization of many other living forms. According to Bloom, it is a mistake and an illusion to see humans as “isolated entities.” Further, human history is filled with examples of both “conformity enforcers” and “diversity generators,” and he sees our modern day philosophies of individuality and freedom versus unity and order as simply intellectual expressions of these two opposing tendencies within us and all of life.
The contemporary conflict between rigid fundamentalist groups and multicultural modernized nations is also a reflection of these two forces within us. The great cultural mixing of the last century, due to multiple waves of migration and global communication and exchange, brought with it new freedom and opportunities and a sense of hope, but it also instigated counter-reactions out of fear, for the stability and security of the past seemed threatened by the Postmodern world. For Bloom, both Muslim and Christian fundamentalism are paradigm examples of “conformity enforcers” that wish to bring order and homogeneity through authoritarian control. He calls them the “new Spartans.”
Bloom believes, though, that a balance needs to be struck between integration and diversification. A police state that produces a regimented paradise would sap the inventiveness out of humanity. According to Bloom, the solution to our present problems and challenges involves a combination of self-control and social freedom. Bloom feels that the fundamentalist strategy is to control the other rather than the self and, in his mind, this approach will not work. Hence, although Bloom sees all of life and humanity as a collective whole, he believes that the further evolution of this collective whole, following the dialectic pattern of the past, is to balance conformity and diversity. He sees fundamentalism as a significant threat to this balance as well as a threat to human freedom and creativity.
Bloom describes living forms as “complex adaptive systems” and the whole global network of life as one vast “complex adaptive system” that learns and evolves. He particularly emphasizes that bacteria and microbial life, since early on in the history of the earth, integrated into a global adaptive system. With the development of human civilization and modern globalization, a new global mind, coordinated by humans and human technology, is emerging on the earth. Bloom foresees the greatest future challenge facing humanity as finding ways to more cooperatively work together with the primordial global brain of bacteria. Although he sees humans as “evolution incarnate,” Bloom argues that humans should see themselves as the “neurons of an interspecies mind” that will involve the participation of all living forms, and especially the bacterial underpinnings of all earthly life.
* Thomas Lombardo is a member of the scientific council of the Alternative Planetary Futures Institute.
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