#FieldNotes001: World War III & the Collapse of Values
Why the collapse of values underlies humanity's existential threat
This is perhaps an unusual topic to be discussed on The Sufi Gardener but I wanted to share some reflections on the growing regional conflict in the Middle East. On Saturday, April 13th, Iran launched a retaliatory strike on Israel. Though the United States is trying to downplay the conflict, it’s becoming increasingly clear that regional war is a very likely scenario, if not already underway.1 Amidst increasing calls from the international community for a ceasefire, Israel is not going to budge from asserting its control on the Gaza Strip. Perhaps, the final nail on the coffin of universal human rights.
In The Metacrisis Epoch, I spoke about our civilization’s existential threat. Since WWII, humanity uncovered a power to annihilate itself by splitting the atom. During the Cold War, the nuclear threat hung above the hearts of man. Thankfully, the threat of mutual assured destruction created enough moral restraint to prove effective enough to save us from all out nuclear war. I’m afraid this is no longer the case. With increasingly complicated societies, rogue players, and a new AI arms race, I don’t think this threat is going to serve as a guardrail to nuclear war. We are at the brink of World War III.
I’ve been struggling to come to terms with a proper response to the growing conflict. Witnessing a genocide rightfully instills anger and outrage, as it should. But the collatoral damage of modern warfare annihilates the eye for an eye moral code. At the same time, thinking of peace is just wishful thinking at this point. Where does this leave us? Nihilism? I hope not. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I recently picked up David J. Temple’s (Marc Gafni, Zachary Stein) First Principles and First Values: Forty-Two Propositions on CosmoErotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come. The authors argue that there is an urgent need to overcome the nihilism of our age. The metacrisis is a collapse of value, and only by bringing forth global First Principles and First Values, those values and principles that are what the authors call Anthro-Ontological, can we attempt to heal. This perspective reminds me of one of the underlying purposes of the Sufi path, as described by Kabir Helminsky:
“We live in a culture that has been described as materialistic, alienating, neurotically individualistic, narcissistic, and yet ridden with anxiety, shame, and guilt. From the Sufi point of view, humanity today is suffering under the greatest tyranny, the tyranny of the ego. We worship innumerable false idols, but all of them are forms of the ego.
There are many ways for the human ego to usurp even the purest spiritual values. The true Sufi is the one who makes no personal claims to virtue or truth, but who lives a life of presence and selfless love. More important than what we believe is how we live. If certain beliefs lead to exclusiveness, self-righteousness, and fanaticism, it is the vanity of the believer that is the problem. If the remedy increases the sickness, an even more basic remedy is called for.
The idea of presence with love may be the most basic remedy for the prevailing materialism, selfishness, and unconsciousness of our age. In our obsession with our false selves, in turning our backs on God, we have also lost our essential Self, our own divine spark. In forgetting God, we have forgotten ourselves. Remembering God is the beginning of remembering ourselves.”2
At a time when the survival of our human civilization in the hands of fanatics, how do we, as humanity, undo our beliefs that gave power to such fanaticism? A potential starting point, which I alluded to in the Metacrisis Epoch, are the links between the collapse of value and the increasing existential risk. The authors of First Principles and First Values present these links as essential to understanding the metacrisis and a way forward, beyond beliefs that lead to exclusiveness, self-righteousness, and fanaticism.
Marc Gafni and Zachary Stein share seven links between the collapse of value and humanity’s existential threat. Given that I am grounded in the Islamic tradition, these seven links both resonate and challenge some of my own assumptions.
Let’s unpack them.
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