| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 9:35:57 AM | Presupposing the existence of a Utopian state (in order to not focus on what might bring one into being), what would Utopia do to bring the human condition to a state where self-actualization became a norm instead of the exception? Can we see a world whose population is predominantly made up of Einsteins, Gandhis, Schweitzers, Dalai Lamas, Buddha's & Christs? How would this affect Utopia?
It is my view that if the state could be "actualized" to a Utopia, the human race would soon follow suit, but there remains some question with regard to the dependence of one to the other. We already know that to spite the relatively primitive forms of state we have always enjoyed(?), self-actualized people have appeared to take the stage in the play we call life. The common thread uniting such people appears to be a sort of Über-compassion (I just love that umlaut!) for all of humanity. Any fully actualized man or woman seems to have accomplished great things for humanity and to spite the fact that they seem as rare as hens' teeth, the simple truth is that their contributions were gigantic. What a shame that their greatest recommendation seems largely ignored, (probably out of fear) by those in positions of power, whose intent seems to be to confine the human condition to the lower levels of Maslow's pyramid... But I digress...
I suspect a utopian society would be one in which the lower needs would be automatically met, which would allow people in general to move toward self-actualization and in many cases achieve it. As the percentage of Buddhas, Christs, & Gandhis (or Übermenschen as I now like to think of them) increases in the population, their contributions to an already Utopian society would probably engender changes that can only be guessed at this point, as the society would find itself in a perpetual transition of "becoming" (in my opinion always becoming something "better"). However, such explorations would really be fantasies at this point and probably a bit of a waste of time to discuss (though I like to think about them just the same).
It is my intent that this thread be an exploration (taking a utopian state as a given, or already existing) of the form that Utopian state might take, such that it would allow most of the human race to become "self-actualized."
I could post my own views, but I think many of you already know(or suspect) them, so I won't yet bore you with my personal views. I'm much more interested in hearing yours. Meanwhile, I'm goin' out for some beer. See you later... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 9:58:49 AM | | I don't think it's possible for a self-actualized state could happen in advance of self-actualized humans. Despite the level of our civilization, too many of us carry the baggage of a warlike tribalistic personality -- the kind of grabasstic, me-first-screw-you individualism that will doom any utopian society before it starts. Sorry. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 10:03:13 AM | | The purpose of this thread is not whether or not the cart or horse should come first, or to discuss whether or not such a thing could happen, but to assume that it has, consider what it might be like and how it would affect the human condition. I don't mean to be critical, but I think your response has "missed the boat" regarding the question. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 10:37:19 AM | You are posing a very difficult idea here. Something that is unrealistic, and goes against human nature.
You ask what a Utopia would be like, if it was possible to achieve.
I believe it would be a place of harsh laws, and strict regulations. Many would get bored of being in the Utopian “Zone,” and would grow restless. Said restlessness would have to be controlled.
I am trying to imagine it, but the idea is so “out there,” there I simply cannot.
I think the whole idea would make Ayn Rand, crawl out of her grave. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 10:48:07 AM | Quickly, as I'm very short on time...but, for me, the relevant text from a philosophical standpoint is Plato's Republic...if you take it as an extended exercise in demonstrating how nightmarish a result any utopian vision issues in...which has not been the typical reading mind you...
But in the Republic you have a powerful allegorical rejoinder against any such tendency as possibly the worst impediment to human flourishing by foisting pure equality or equity and so on as if human beings are uniform...As I'm sure people on the forums are sick of hearing me say...utopia comes from the Greek utopos...literally no place...it is not something to be aspired to or realized it is a nightmare to be avoided. I know that you want to start the discussion with this part all presupposed but to be honest...I don't see how one can! | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 10:51:27 AM |
I believe it would be a place of harsh laws, and strict regulations. Many would get bored of being in the Utopian “Zone,” and would grow restless. Said restlessness would have to be controlled.
This is utopia?...Sounds more like what we have now. How would the society you envision foster self -actualization of people? It seems to me that being a lot like our existing society, it wouldn't.
I think the whole idea would make Ayn Rand, crawl out of her grave.
I hope so...I have little but contempt for her philosophy. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 10:57:14 AM |
I know that you want to start the discussion with this part all presupposed but to be honest...I don't see how one can!
All I can say at this point is that you may be right, or you may be wrong, but I will operate on the latter assumption and see how this thread develops. At the risk of sounding kinda trite, I feel humanity is locked in a loop of uncreative thinking and I'm trying to find the "reset" button. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 11:07:11 AM | | Maybe that's the problem...thinking that there's a reset button...that we can organize everything from the centre that there is an ideal model which will eradicate all difficulty or conflict... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 11:25:16 AM | Considering the state of the human condition today, I refuse to believe a reset button doesn't exist. Such fatalism would only resign us to eventual (and well-deserved) extinction. I think humanity is only misguided. It really shouldn't take much to increase the incidence of self-actualization in society. Once that is done, the world will change.
<div class='quote'>that we can organize everything from the centre that there is an ideal model
It CANNOT be centrally organized!...The ideal model would be one based more in chaos than order.
However, the model I envision is not a topic of this discussion. I'm more interested in hearing models that others may propose. I find your comments thus far to be counterproductive in that regard and I'm sure you can do better, should you feel like it. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 11:40:43 AM | Just offering an opinion mate! Counterproductive would surely involve not giving enough of a toss to bother commenting!
I actually agree with the idea that there cannot be a centralized organizing force...but I think you would be better served by going down that route...not by looking for utopian visions...that certainly would fly in the face of everything we discussed concerning Nietzsche's overman. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 11:58:26 AM | you would be better served by going down that route...not by looking for utopian visions
I'm not going "down that route"; I'm not trying to foist a personal Utopian ideal on anyone. It is my contention that in allowing the "anarchy" of self rule, the cooperative society inevitably resulting from that (organized around an unwritten natural law which determines everyone's rights & obligations under those principes) would be truly chaotic in the sense that individuals would have much personal freedom, but organized around what might be called the central attractor of rule by law, not by men. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 12:28:55 PM | o in what sense would that be "utopian"?
In the sense that any individual wishes to perceive it. Given the freedom to pursue their lives as they see fit could be considered "Utopian" by the people allowed to do so. If everyone was allowed to do just that, how could that NOT be considered Utopian?
We are diverging from the intent of this thread and turning it into a "chat" thread. I would ask that we both try to make a better effort to address the topic and also to invite the comments of others (partly out of fear that this could be seen by the mods as a chat thread & then deleted). | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 12:36:39 PM | Don't you see the inevitability of conflict between desires of individuals...resolved by the rule of law you mention?
...as soon as you try and instantiate that it can no longer function as a radical uptopia of self-realizing unfetterd arbitrary autonomy but involves the frustration of the desires of certain individuals or groups...and thus is no longer the uptopian dream but the insitutionalized nightmare that thinkers like Plato warned against... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 12:47:39 PM | utopia comes from the Greek utopos...literally no place
This is true. Utopos literally translates as "no place". That is because Utopia is the "idea" of a perfect place, therefore subjective, and everyone's "perfect ideal" is different. Therefore comes the experience that it doesn't exist , therefore "An impractical, idealistic concept for social and political reform." -from the The American Heritage Dictionary.
And yes, I know you are from Limerick. This is a subtle attempt at levity. And believe me I see the irony...
However, the O.P.'s question, (as interpreted, please correct me if I am wrong) was "What would a community look like, if the community members were self-actualized, and self-actualization was in, and of itself a value?"
A provocative question, which has the possibilities of the engagement and integration (a communal effort?) of a lot beliefs.
I am going to go and think on this...
I will say this...it has been my experience, that conflict is not counterproductive, it is actually very productive, since it heightens one's awareness of one's use of words (especially in groups), and often may lead to creative thinking and conflict resolution.
I agree with the decentralization of governmental rule...this, in itself, is an anarchistic path... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 12:58:21 PM |
Don't you see the inevitability of conflict between desires of individuals...resolved by the rule of law you mention?
That's exactly what I see...Very perceptive of you.
Have one on me... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 12:59:02 PM | Last interjection and then I'm gone...the point for thinkers like Plato was that utopos/no place was NOT an ideal...it was something that could not and should not exist...that was the point of The Republic...there's a salutary lesson in that alone!
You're thinking of the word utopia as used milennia later by Thomas More, and the steady degeneration of the word then as it is used today to mean something we might even aspire to...
anyways...good night all!
p.s. Limerick is the closest city to me but I live even further away from "no place" in County Clare:) | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 1:00:03 PM | My two cents: Self-actualization has many definitions. It is not one thing. It is composed of a number of different psychological constructs. It was originally created to mean a person who has acheived ALL of his potential. That is not possible. There is always more they could acheive.
Another definition is that the person has discovered his/her inner self and thus has no charactor flaws. This is also not possible, because believing you have no charactor flaws is itself a charactor flaw.
If we want to speak theoretically, the closest we could even theoretically come to a Utopia, would be a community where each person lived in his own perfect reality, regardless of whether it corresponded to the reality of his neighbor. Yet somehow they could interact with each other in a meaningful way. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 1:17:16 PM |
If we want to speak theoretically, the closest we could even theoretically come to a Utopia, would be a community where each person lived in his own perfect reality, regardless of whether it corresponded to the reality of his neighbor. Yet somehow they could interact with each other in a meaningful way.
good point greg. i once attended a lecture by Timothy Leary in which he described a utopia of this fashion. Of course in Timothy Leary's mind this utopia was to be realized through LSD.... so perhaps not such a great idea.
the point for thinkers like Plato was that utopos/no place was NOT an ideal...it was something that could not and should not exist
i think Plato had it right | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 1:24:23 PM | the closest we could even theoretically come to a Utopia, would be a community where each person lived in his own perfect reality, regardless of whether it corresponded to the reality of his neighbor. Yet somehow they could interact with each other in a meaningful way.
It sort of depends on what you mean by "perfect reality." Nothing is truly perfect, however, I believe it is not only theoretically poossible, but possible in the real and practical sense of creating something close to it. I suggest you read a bit more about Maslow's "self-actualization" and the sort of people he saw as fully actualized. Look at the commonalities between them and look at what they almost universally recommended for Man.
I wouldn't worry too much what Plato had in mind, I merely stole the word as a good approximation of what I feel can be achieved. In fact In the Platonic sense I already live in Utopia...I just wish everybody else did too.
I'm off to get a beer out of the fridge.... | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 1:52:18 PM | got ya dukky, I think i was getting hung up on the word utopia. But if what you are actually referring to is an "ideal" (perfect) society that man could indeed achieve, i think you described it best in you OP;
I suspect a utopian society would be one in which the lower needs would be automatically met, which would allow people in general to move toward self-actualization and in many cases achieve it. As the percentage of Buddhas, Christs, & Gandhis (or Übermenschen as I now like to think of them) increases in the population, their contributions to an already Utopian society would probably engender changes that can only be guessed at this point, as the society would find itself in a perpetual transition of "becoming"
to obtain this on a worldwide scale there would need to be an extremely profound event that would have to occur, and i suspect there would be far less people living in this "ideal" society than what walks the earth today (a bit of a cleansing if you will). And this wonderful quilt would be sewn together with the thread you referred to in your OP. I have seen glimpses of this ideal .... but they pass far too quickly. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 2:23:37 PM |
I suggest you read a bit more about Maslow's "self-actualization"
yes, the old heirarchy, its well known. But it has nothing to do with perfection. What Maslow (not the guy you always try to locate in books wearing a red and white striped shirt...thats Waldo) set up was a heirarchy which, if your environment met certain conditions, then you are more able to focus on your inner qualities. Nothing really profound here. Its hardly a state of perfection. Its just a state of attempting to fulfill your potentials. The key word is attempting. You can never fulfill all your potentials. If you did, there would be nothing more to do. | |
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| Utopia and self-actualization...an actualized state?
Posted: 8/13/2009 2:33:54 PM | Its just a state of attempting to fulfill your potentials. The key word is attempting. You can never fulfill all your potentials. If you did, there would be nothing more to do.
Can you picture for instance Gandhi, or Martin Luther King, or Einstein, or Schweitzer all sitting around with nothing to do? Can you see self-actualization not as a pyramid with a top, but as an ongoing, transitional process of always becoming more than you were? | |
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