Quantum Politics:
What Trump’s Election is about and what it Means to the Future of Democracy
By Amit Goswami, PhD
The political pundits of America have the first part of the question all figured out and, I think, more or less correctly. 2016 is the year of the comeback for the tribal mind-set of humanity. They have declared that Hilary lost because she tried to appeal to the higher mind of American people during the all-important last month of this election cycle: “Trump is a bad guy. I am the only descent candidate you have, so vote for me.” Trump won because he more correctly guessed at what is going on around the world: a huge backlash against reshaping the world according to a new world order where science dominates, nationalism gives way to internationalism fostered by multinational corporations, trade, and the Internet. The reason for the backlash is simple: the majority of the American people are not able to keep up with the sophistication required to reap the benefits from the new world order.
The same thing led to Brexit. The average Brit does not have the technological expertize, so the corporations encourage immigration to fill these jobs. But the perception is that the average Joe is losing jobs to immigrants from elsewhere in Europe.
Similarly, the average high school educated guy in America thinks that he is losing his job to trade deals and outsourcing. He does not realize that the choice of who will do the routine job in a high tech factory is between a robot and a real low-paid worker that exists only in underdeveloped economies.
This much the pundits in America agree with. What they cannot see is the broad picture behind it.
The Broad Picture
The mainstream science and technology today in America and elsewhere are all based on a worldview called scientific materialism—all phenomena are material; matter moving in space and time under material interactions. Accordingly, humans are gene/brain machines wired for negative emotions that bring pain as well as pleasure circuits that bring happiness. Avoid pain and pursue pleasure is the underlying recipe for living according to this worldview. The morality of past generations still believed by some sixty percent of “religious” Americans has no scientific basis and can be safely discarded. Moreover, the leaders of the moral majority in America are hypocrites; they don’t follow the values they preach. The materialists maintain that they believe that humans, through machines, must practice humanistic existential values because according to Darwin’s theory of evolution, they, although relative, help survival. To make sure this is the case, they even try to legalize some of these values or try social pressure through media including the Internet. Political correctness is an example of the latter.
So Hilary tried to expose Trump’s moral duplicity and succeeded but lost the election anyway. Go figure! It is important. The truth is, political correctness does not change people’s character. The fight against blatant racism, sexism, and homophobia has been won—the laws enacted by the liberal materialists have not been overturned—not because people got over their racism and sexism and homophobia but because these things, when blanketly practiced, are not economical. The social change in America that we see today is not reflective of a real change of mindset of the American people. Trump tuned into the not-so-hidden racism, sexism, and homophobia of the American people and exploited it. Hilary was blinded by her own political correctness.
The truth is this. There is a real crisis of morality in America and elsewhere. Materialists truly believe that morality is not compulsory except for its survival value and that is adequately taken care of via legality and political correctness. The religionists are ambiguous. There is enough materialist science taught even at the high school level to suggest that God and morality may very well be humbug. On the other hand, a religious upbringing and church going does suggest rewards for moral values within the clan, within the hordes of people one regularly interacts with. It is just that religionists seem unable to extend these values to people outside the clan; and they get confused.
Trump’s sexist behavior did not shock his followers because to American men women are outside of their clans. And his racist behavior legitimized the racism of his followers, and they rewarded him for it. Hilary fell into Trump’s trap by trying to expose him.
So clannishness! Why are people clannish? Clannishness is contrary to scientific materialism because all people are equal—machines wired the same way. Even after repeated trials, genes refuse to show any racism and so do the brains. Clannishness is of course totally contrary to the religious belief that God is colorblind.
Quantum Worldview: Why are we Clannish?
The irony of this worldview battle and resulting polarization that is occurring should not be missed. Scientific materialism has two main pillars of support: Newtonian deterministic physics and Darwin’s theory of evolution. Newton’s physics has been replaced by quantum physics for almost a hundred years. And in recent years, Darwin’s theory is showing huge cracks in its foundational data. The new quantum worldview that is slowly but surely replacing scientific materialism is actually integrating science and spirituality. In other words, quantum physics leads to a worldview that is scientific and yet upholds spiritual values. Religions should be able to live with that if moral values are their principal concerns. Scientist should also welcome this because quantum science is better science—theoretically and experimentally—than Newtonian science.
The problem for religionists is that God in the new science is not an individual that curries favors. Instead, God is depicted as instantaneous interconnectedness called nonlocality in quantum physics. If an entity is instantly interconnected, then no signals are needed for it to mediate communication between its parts. Thus, this can also be depicted as a “Oneness.” Since in space and time, all communication requires signals, this oneness must be an existence outside space and time; this domain is called the domain of potentiality in quantum physics where all objects are waves of possibility or potentiality.
The problem for materialists with the new worldview is that values are not wishy-washy—useful only if survival is threatened. Values are part of the spiritual oneness of all humans. So the permissive pleasure-centered attitude of humanists is challenged and most materialists would like to preserve the freedom—sexual freedom, for example—which they have gained from the religious tyranny of previous eras.
But as I said, the new worldview is inevitable. Quantum physics agrees with experimental data to such an extent that it is foolhardy not to accept its dicta and accept also generalizations based on them because such is the way of science. Everyone should be delighted that the new worldview is promising to be inclusive. All problems of polarization can be solved with its help.
So, what is the reason for clannishness? Does the new worldview have an answer? You bet. The oneness is a potentiality in us; it has to be actualized before “I” am really one with “you.” And that actualization requires that I regularly interact with you via local signals. If I go to the same church with you, or if I interact with you in a singles bar or workplace or even the Internet, it makes no difference. Our oneness is actualized; we are part of the same clan.
Remember school bussing or the move towards fair-housing practices? Some old-fashioned liberals (I bet you that they were not materialists!) had the right idea about how to remove clannishness from a society!
I am not proposing bringing back school bussing. Its time has come and gone forever with polarization the way it is now. Yet how will we ever get rid of clannishness? Am I saying that even with the quantum worldview, clannishness will remain?
Implementation of the Quantum Worldview
There is another antidote to clannishness—it is called transformation. But transformation means goody-goody saintly behavior to many people—religionists and materialists alike. It’s just not fun! Never fear! The concept of transformation is different in a scientific approach. In the new worldview, the science of transformation is also a science of happiness or wholeness. And what is super-assuring is that love plays a major role in it and so can sex as a built-in entry point to the exploration of love. Now who is against love?
I have written four books about how the new worldview will come about by proving itself useful. The materialist worldview came about the same way by showing its usefulness first with the industrial revolution and then again with high tech. The first book I will mention is about methodology—the how of transformation. It is called Quantum Creativity. The second is about the application of creativity to health and healing. This one is called The Quantum Doctor. The third one is called Quantum Economics. It is about replacing Adam Smith style capitalism, which only rewards the selfish individual—homo economicus—by a quantum capitalism, which rewards not only homo economicus but also a homo communus—our oneness consciousness.
The fourth book—my latest, written in collaboration with psychotherapist Sunita Pattani, and yet to be published—is called Quantum Psychology. It is an application of creativity to mental health and personal growth.
You can follow the ideas in any of these books to achieve a personal transformation. If you also engage in social transformation while attending to the personal, in my book, you are a quantum activist. I am one myself.
The Future of Democracy
Scientific materialism has swept through the world and has threatened to change many cultures because of the simplicity of its essential message: eat, drink, sleep, and fornicate; above all, you are what you are, you can’t change. We are subject to conditioning, and like material bodies, we have a tendency towards inertia, not to change. The permissive ideas of materialism were indeed breaths of fresh air after the repressive morality imposed by the religionists. No denying that.
But now that it is clear what the exclusivity of scientific materialism does to human cultures, seeking meaning, purpose, and values that give us access to subtler forms of happiness is back in business, and the revival of conservative politics in the world is part of that backlash.
A very important thing to notice is also this: scientific materialism cannot do anything about the elitism of the religious/aristocrat of the feudal era. It also produces elitism albeit of a different kind: meritocracy. College educated is pitted against the non-college educated. The latter group is not going to tolerate losing because it is easy to see that today’s college education guided by scientific materialism does not make you a better human being, only a more sophisticated one able to do jobs that pay more.
The future of democracy crucially depends upon how we get rid of elitism in our society, elitism of both genres. Only the quantum worldview where education comes with transformation can do it, remove elitism from society, that is. When you transform, you become humble. Instead of dominating people for gains, your prerogative becomes to love and serve them, and, if you are in a leadership position, to empower them.
In this way, the quantum worldview can give all the answers we need to save democracy. And not only that, it has the answers to the questions you most seek—life, love, death, the universe, and God. If you don’t mind me mentioning still another book that I have written, I make this point in The Everything Answer Book, to appear in publication in April 2017.
