Throughout the winter months, there will be a series of posts on oneness. The focus of the series is an investigation into how we can improve our decisions with the use of oneness as a problem solving tool. Other topics may be posted as well but the series can be identified by the title: Oneness I, Oneness II, Oneness III, etc.

The format presents the outline first, and then follows with an expansion of the outline in paragraph form. At the end of each post, a general question will be offered for your perusal. The mariner will not answer this question.

The first series is the Preface. It begins below. No question follows.

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PREFACE

Oneness has a bad reputation. It suffers from association with many religions, is perceived to be weakness in business, a phenomenon in mystic pseudo-sciences, misinterpreted as togetherness, and is associated with cuddliness and romance. Truth be told, you and I would not exist except for our dependence on oneness. Mammals would not exist except for oneness. Oneness is not a social term subject to romance or derision. It is a genetically embedded requirement for survival of Homo sapiens.

Language and writing would not have emerged were it not for oneness. Human skills like invention and discovery would not have emerged without oneness. Families, tribes and nations would not exist without oneness. Fairness, truth, justice, and morality would not exist without oneness. If humans existed otherwise, life would be barbaric at best and murderous violence would have no restraint. Under these conditions, it would not be long before humans were extinct.

Even cattle have a sense of oneness. It is an instinctual oneness but the herd instinct has enabled cattle to survive millions of years. Except that an unnatural predator wiped out the American Bison to make hats and coats, the bison would have survived into the ages. The presence of seven billion humans, soon to grow to twelve billion, is in itself destructive and stupid. The author will leave the issues of excessive humans to another author, Elizabeth Kolbert, in her book The Sixth Extinction, An Unnatural History. The book is a necessary volume in every individual’s library.

In his book, Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life, Dacher Keltner makes the case that empathy is a firmly placed factor in mammalian genes (see post ‘Evolution of Faith’, May 2013). It takes empathy to nurture offspring until the young one can deal with the world on its own. Empathy is a critical element of oneness. The flip side, the action verb, is compassion. While empathy helps the species survive, it is acts of compassion that enable the world to survive as a healthy, nurturing environment. Kindness creates a powerful enhancement to manifest the destiny of a moral, thinking species like Homo sapiens. Yet, the power to be compassionate, to generate oneness, is a perpetual battle against those who choose not to be compassionate. Given knowledge of passing time and self awareness, the power to choose separates humans from other mammals. The power to choose oneness or pejorative abuse is the soap opera of human history. This discussion is presented in the hope that soap opera will diminish and oneness will increase.

Ancient Mariner