The benefit and importance of a big-picture worldview

While reading an article on the current controversy in Australia over a proposed new mining tax, it occurred to me how much we are swayed by local interest groups, at the expense of our own long-term wellbeing.

Recent surveys reveal that the incumbent government has become highly unpopular with calls for it to not pursue their 'great big new tax' (as the political opposition keep calling it). By watching events unfold it becomes clear that those who seek financial gain (the mining industry) are not particularly concerned about whether their behaviours are fair and just, or serve the benefit of the communities upon which they are reliant.

All of this underscores the importance of having a clearer, more inclusive and comprehensive world-view, one that directs our behaviour towards creating and maintaining long-term viable policies, laws and systems. In many respects it's as if we're on the deck of the Titanic, arguing over who gets the best deck chairs, all the while ignoring the bigger, and more important 'world-view' that has deep significance and relevance to all.

The concept is simple. When we have a small or dated world-view, our attitudes, beliefs and social systems will reflect that small world-view. We'll find justification for the rules and laws we enact, even though with greater perspective we would not enact such laws.

And presently, within Western societies in particular the over-riding story that has gained most traction is that we're merely complex biological machines, who live within a clock-work universe. This 'man-as-machine' model dates back to the era of Isaac Newton, and earlier (all the way back to Plato and Ancient Greek times). Having that as our root-level world-view sees many silly ideas being discussed and promoted - that we're basically driven by selfish genes and our primary focus and purpose is to compete in order to reproduce and get our genes into the next generation. It's interesting to observe that no one has suggested a purpose for the self-propagation of the species, beyond circular reasoning that such self-propagation is to further ensure self-propagation.

A big-picture world-view however would see the error in that belief. And were we to see the error of that belief, we'd have far-reaching and radically-different approaches to medicine, health, governance, politics ... to basically all aspects of personal and social life.