The essays for the Unenlightened Wisdom Project feature “Words of Wisdom” provided as a synopsis for each section. Over the ten years of the project this page will feature those words as they are made available to the public. The citations include the essay and section of origin.
FROM THE WHITE PAPER (freely available to subscribers of this website)
Section A. Hikers on Haystack
We navigate life through some combination of our own autonomy and/or guidance from authorities.
Section B. The Journey of Life
A way of life is like a journey.
Journeys pursue a purpose within a context.
A humanitarian journey seeks to: “Love kindness. Build community. Believe in humanity.”
Civilization adds the increased complexity, chaos and confusion of mass societies to the context of journeys.
Section C. Virtues and Vices
Our society has health issues that compromise our life journeys.
Our life journey depends first and foremost upon our brains.
Practical virtues benefit both brain health and humanity.
Civilized abnormalities create vices bad for brain health and wrong for humanity.
Greatness and good health are different destinations that lie in different directions.
Section D. Enlightened Reasoning
The biased reasoning of Enlightenment philosophy reflects the lack of experience and wisdom of scholars regarding early nomads and neuroscience.
Limited experiences reinforce bias; diverse experiences enhance wisdom.
Our social natures lead us to live up or down to the self-fulfilling prophecy of our society.
Enlightenment and NeoEnlightenment scholars conform to civilized groupthink.
Section E. Civilized Biases
Depending on which authorities you choose to trust, the more educated you become the more you might be misinformed by selection bias.
Dialectic reasoning cannot arrive at truth when all sides share the same bias.
History presents the selection bias of mass societies. Historical bias often misinforms, “educates” and indoctrinates humanity towards civilized abnormalities.
Biases favoring materialism and individualism often contradict humanitarian goals.
The selection biases of authorities favors the conformity of groupthink towards their views.
Section F. Paternalism and Groupthink
The complexity, chaos and confusion of mass societies create dependence upon authorities and conformity to groups.
We are paternally misinformed and misdirected only by the authorities we trust, while resist being informed by the authorities we distrust.
Interest groups combine the influences of paternalism and group conformity.
The dialectic reasoning of opposing interest groups resorts to hyperbole, false narratives and other dubious means of creating groupthink.
Section G. Personal Responsibility
The ultimate responsibility for any journey of life lies with the journeyer, not with paternal authorities, not with civilization.
Section H. Unenlightened Practicalities
The practicality of being uncivilized provides optimal behaviors for brain health.
The practicality of being unenlightened provides optimal beliefs for humanity to improve civilization.
The practicality of autonomy provides optimal responsibility for helping each other attain healthy and humanitarian goals.
The practicality of public servants provides optimal means for the humanitarian flow of information in a diverse society.
The practicality of enabling the people’s will provides optimal means for a humanitarian democracy that limits corrupting power and wealth.
A grassroots sequence of practicalities starting with brain health is more feasible than a top down approach starting with democracy.