Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment

[acd]

I found this very long essay posted on an internet forum.

The link between Mind and Social / Environmental-Issues.

The fast-paced, consumerist lifestyle of Industrial Society is causing exponential rise in psychological problems besides destroying the environment. All issues are interlinked. Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds. Our Minds cannot be peaceful if we destroy Nature.

Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment.

Subject : In a fast society slow emotions become extinct.
Subject : A thinking mind cannot feel.
Subject : Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys the planet.
Subject : Environment can never be saved as long as cities exist.


Emotion is what we experience during gaps in our thinking.

If there are no gaps there is no emotion.

Today people are thinking all the time and are mistaking thought (words/ language) for emotion.


When society switches-over from physical work (agriculture) to mental work (scientific/ industrial/ financial/ fast visuals/ fast words ) the speed of thinking keeps on accelerating and the gaps between thinking go on decreasing.

There comes a time when there are almost no gaps.

People become incapable of experiencing/ tolerating gaps.

Emotion ends.

Man becomes machine.


A society that speeds up mentally experiences every mental slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.

A ( travelling )society that speeds up physically experiences every physical slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.

A society that entertains itself daily experiences every non-entertaining moment as Depression / Anxiety.


Fast visuals/ words make slow emotions extinct.

Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys emotional circuits.

A fast (large) society cannot feel pain / remorse / empathy.

A fast (large) society will always be cruel to Animals/ Trees/ Air/ Water/ Land and to Itself.


I am trying to get the following experiment conducted in a psychophysiology/ bio-chemistry laboratory.

There is a link between visual / verbal speed ( in perception, memory,
imagery ) and the bio-chemical state of the brain and the body.

Emotion can intensify / sustain only when visual and verbal processing
associated with the emotion slows down ( stops / freezes ).

The degree of difficulty of an emotion depends upon the degree of
freezing (of visuals and words ) required to intensify and sustain that
particular emotion.


Experiment:

Subjects (preferably actors specialising in tragedy / tragic roles )
will be asked to watch a silent video film showing any of the
following:-

(1) Human suffering.
(2) Animal suffering.
(3) Suffering ( Destruction ) of Air / Water / Land / Trees.

Subjects will be asked to intensify and sustain the subjective feeling of pain/ grief for the sufferer.

The chemical changes associated with the emotion in the body(blood) would be measured by appropriate methods.

The silent video film will be shown at different speeds :
(1) 125% of actual speed.
(2) Actual/real speed.
(3) 75% of actual speed.
(4) 50% of actual speed.
(5) 25% of actual speed.


Results :

(1) Intensity of emotion increases with the decrease in visual speed.
(2) Intensity of emotion is maximum when visual speed is minimum (25%
of actual speed)
(3) The amount of chemical change associated with the emotion in the
body(blood) will be found to increase with the decrease in visual speed.
(4) The chemical change is maximum when visual speed is minimum.
(5) The amount of chemical change will increase with the decrease in
breathing rate. Breathing becomes so slow and non-rhythmic that it stops
for some time at the inhalation/ exhalation stages.

The above co-relations will be valid for all subjects -even for those who cannot feel pain/ grief. Such subjects will experience emotion associated with boredom/ discomfort/ restlessness/ irritability/ uneasiness. The chemicals released will be different but the co-relation between visual speed and amount of chemical will be same( the breathing rates will be different/ fast). All subjects will experience some kind of emotion.

[If scientists can discover 4000 different chemicals in cigarette-smoke then they can certainly detect the few chemicals released in blood when weexperience higher-level emotions like pain, empathy, compassion, remorse etc

 

[Roger]

Man become machines, that means he will no longer able to achieve any kind of success. I don't think, without feeling you can achieve anything.

So may happen success level can reduce. Emotions/feeling are important part of human life. Without it looks like body without soul.

 

[acd]

I like the idea that the faster we're made to think, the less we feel and the more we lose touch with the natural world--and so the more destructive and self-destructive we become.
I can see how that would be.


I originally looked up this article because I was talking to someone who feels absolutely hopeless about life--not wanting to participate in this society but feeling compelled to.. After talking to them, I was thinking about how first world nations have higher rates of suicide than third world nations.. And then I came across this article..

 

[Quinlan]

Wow a huge Fi rant against Te, my fast mind ran out of steam about a quarter of the way through, they have some good points but also are quite wrong on other points.

 

[acd]

Wow a huge Fi rant against Te, my fast mind ran out of steam about a quarter of the way through, they have some good points but also are quite wrong on other points.

You're right. It is a huge Fi rant. Probably why I was so fascinated with it when I read it..What do you disagree with?

 

[Quinlan]

I don't agree that everyone is telling us to be positive, I think everyone is telling us the sky is falling, I don't think antibioitics are a disaster etc.

 

[Introspiritual]

I agree with the article's main thrust.

Industrial civilization is based upon the separation of humans from their environment - convincing us all that we're not part of a giant living system, but something separate from it. Once it's separate, it can be objectified and viewed as something beneath us. And it rolls downhill from there.

Humanity is facing a myriad of problems of its own making right now. Given the past track record, I'm not looking forward to how we're going to fix things (or how things will be fixed for us).

 

[acd]

Ha. How we fix things? By creating problems to solve problems.

 

[enfp can be shy]

Science must serve humanity, not the opposite.


I firmly believe in that, and I think there are solutions. It doesn't have to be like it is now. This dichotomy shouldn't exist.

Actually, the improvements in science should allow people to return to their brightest and most natural humanity. To return to the woods, the seas, the mountains, the rivers. To love their children tenderly. No baby should be fed with chemicals, unless the mother is unable to breast-feed them - which is often the result of stress and unhealthy life. There are a whole lot of consequences later. If I were to ask for only one thing this world, it would be: please allow all parents to love their children. Most other things would fix themselves naturally.