Patterns of Spirituality

My Theoretical Bias on Human Evolution

As an indication of my theoretical bias on matters of evolution, it takes this shape : lets assume that mankind has evolved over a period of perhaps millions of years. Initially, he was quite primitive and very close to nature, like the animals. In this scenario, he would have had some psychic ability (for example, extra-sensory perception), in the same way that most animals have some degree of psychic ability. So he would live in a world that blended the physical with the psychic. In this situation he would have little fear of death (except perhaps in the actual moment of dying) since he felt he belonged in a larger reality.

As he evolved, he began to loosen his dependence on nature, by learning to control his environment. As he began to separate from nature, his psychic abilities waned and gradually ceased. He lost the feeling of belonging to a wider reality, and so the fear of death was born.

To get back to the feeling of being part of a wider reality, religions were created as signposts to follow.

Hand-in-hand with this approach is my understanding of the mind. The mind is the aspect of consciousness that uses the brain as its means to connect to the physical world. I think of the brain as a filter that adapts and shapes the mind to make it a tool that we can handle. The brain has two basic divisions, those of the feeling-intuitive half (right brain) and the rational-intellectual half (left brain). The right brain functions on pattern thinking, whilst the left brain functions on step-by-step thinking. Primitive mankind was basically intuitive and had only a very limited intellect. This set-up allowed him to be psychic (since psychic ability depends on intuitive ability). As he evolved his intellectual abilities, so simultaneously he downgraded the intuitive half of the mind. As he ceased to rely on intuition, so correspondingly his psychic abilities waned.

Interestingly, very few scientists are both psychic and intellectual. I am intellectual and intuitive, but not psychic as such. So I consider that I have an ability to balance my thinking that few other thinkers have. I use the whole of my brain when I am engaged in profound thinking, whilst most scientists use only half their brain, the left half. In fact, most scientists fear intuition, since they believe that it will make them irrational. If a scientist is considered to be irrational, it is likely to finish his scientific career. The irony is that all scientific and philosophical breakthroughs depend on intuition, on the ability to see patterns that link together previously-unrelated facts and ideas.

Copyright © 2002 Ian Heath
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