FINDING OUR PURPOSE - PART 6

Beyond individual purpose, we also form collective purpose, which arises out of the gestalt formed by our collective consciousness. Could we but see the outcome of combining our various individual trains of thought, we might see how individual desires, seemingly good, can generate a public will which pollutes, enslaves, or lays waste vast parts of the world. Individual desires are not a sufficient basis for harnessing the juggernaut of human organization, whether governmental or corporate, in a common cause whose outcome cannot always be predicted at the larger scale of endeavor.

Our desire for a good life, individually, translates very well into the scale of a family. We wish comfort, security, and abundance for our loved ones. We want to be well fed, clothed, housed and entertained. This is all well and good, and appears to be a valid purpose. But multiplied to a continental scale it has proven harmful to the environment, and attempts to translate it to world scale have been frightening. To imagine the multitudes of China or India driving several cars per family, on concrete or asphalt freeways, is to imagine both pollution and possible starvation on a massive scale.

Our individual desires must be re-translated if globalization is to bring us to a world of common prosperity. Not to do so implies a new imperialism, by which disparity becomes institutionalized on a global scale. History has shown that this could not obtain in the past, when global linkages were much slower and looser than today.

When ships took weeks between continents, and television and internet were not even dreamt of, great disparity could potentially exist without triggering great levels of resentment among the masses of people. Today, all people, virtually everywhere, are able to see what may be missing from their lifestyle. Today’s masses know how the other half lives, and cultural differences aside, they want similar levels of fulfillment.