Sex Ecologyand Spirituality

Could the author (of the review) please move it to http://bookshelved.org ?

Sex, Ecology and Spirituality a book by KenWilber ISBN 1-57062-072-5

[Is this different from Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution, ISBN 1570627444 ?]

That one is the softcover second edition and costs less. I don't have it so I can't tell you if he made any changes, but they'd be slight. And I didn't give you the subtitle. Sorry.

Since when has Wiki become the place to push dubious new age-ish voodoo ?

PleaseMoveThisToTheAdjunct

KenWilber traces the course of evolution from matter to life to mind. In each case, evolution has a "direction," a tendency to produce more highly organized patterns. The "spirit of evolution" lies in its directionality: order out of chaos.

There's no need for such devices as spirits, directions, and so on. EvolutionAndEnthalpy explains the mechanism quite well. For another counterargument, see StephenJayGould's Full House [ISBN 0609801406 ]. When we look at the evolution of species over time, we invariably look only at the most complex example from each generation. Hence we select only those data which support the point we want to demonstrate, which is that evolution has a drive to more complexity. However, when we consider the whole range of offspring, the purported drive to complexity is revealed as an illusion. Less complex descendants can in fact prosper alongside, or indeed supplant, their ancestors. Evolution is about adaptation to the current environment, not complexity. (Pardon the poor summary of Gould's ideas.)

After arriving at the emergence of mind, Wilber traces the evolution of human consciousness through its major stages of development, pointing out that at each stage there is the "dialectic of progress" - every increase in consciousness is bought at a price: new freedom also means new license to choose destruction. He particularly focuses on the rise of modernity and post-modernity - what they mean, how they relate to gender issues, to psychotherapy, to ecological concerns, and to various liberation movements. Most important, he asks: Can spiritual concerns be integrated with massive developments of the modern world?

Only if you can reduce spirit to mechanism. Otherwise you may as well go study religion.

What is it doing on a wiki for programmers? Software developers are very concerned with DesignPatterns, which are their Archetypes (says me). Ken treats Archetypes broadly and deeply, explaining that they must be understood well to be extended, transcended and included.

The answer may perhaps and partially also be in http://www.cs.wcupa.edu/~epstein/soulcs.html. -- jmh

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