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, PhD. is a member of the scientific council of the Alternative Planetary Futures Institute (Ap-Fi)
