ABSTRACT

Believing that all humanity is connected and acting in a cooperative spirit are giant advances over the worldview that we are all separate and, therefore, need to engage in win/lose, competitive clashes. It is not, however, the end of the journey. Willis Harman's metaphysical model points to the next change in our evolution. The M-1 stage, it may be recalled, assumes that everything arises out of matter. At the M-2 stage, both matter-energy stuff and mind-spirit stuff coexist as equal but fundamentally different aspects of reality. Humanity, in general, is now beginning to think in terms of a M-3 cosmology in which all things are united. 1 From this perspective, the only thing that exists is consciousness. All matter—animal, vegetable or mineral—has some degree of awareness. An M-3 mind-set accepts the view that we are not only superficially connected but, in fact, an integral part of an infinite, eternal consciousness. Plato expressed this idea quite eloquently when he wrote:

The ruler of the universe has ordered all things with a view to the excellence and preservation of the whole, and each part, as far as may be, has an action and passion appropriate to it. Over these, down to the least fraction of them, ministers have been 70appointed to preside, who have wrought out their perfection with infinitesimal exactness. And one of these portions of the universe is thine own, unhappy man, which, however little, contributes to the whole; and you do not seem to be aware that this and every other creation is for the sake of the whole, and in order that the life of the whole may be blessed; and that you are created for the sake of the whole, and not the whole for the sake of you. 2