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Future of Man

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"The Future of Man is a magnificent introduction to the thoughts and writings of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, one of the few figures in the history of the Catholic Church to achieve renown as both a scientist and a theologian. Trained as a paleontologist and ordained as a Jesuit priest, Teilhard de Chardin devoted himself to establishing the intimate, interdependent connection between science--particularly the theory of evolution--and the basic tenets of the Christian faith. At the center of his philosophy was the belief that the human species is evolving spiritually, progressing from a simple faith to higher and higher forms of consciousness, including a consciousness of God, and culminating in the ultimate understanding of humankind's place and purpose in the universe. The Church, which would not condone his philosophical writings, refused to allow their publication during his lifetime. Written over a period of thirty years and presented here in chronological order, the essays cover the wide-ranging interests and inquiries that engaged Teilhard de Chardin throughout his life: intellectual and social evolution; the coming of ultra-humanity; the integral place of faith in God in the advancement of science; and the impact of scientific discoveries on traditional religious dogma. Less formal than The Phenomenon of Man and The Divine Milieu, Teilhard de Chardin's most renowned works, The Future of Man offers a complete, fully accessible look at the genesis of ideas that continue to reverberate in both the scientific and the religious communities."

Teilhard de Chardin was a distinguished paleontologist and a Catholic thinker of great scope and depth. His vision of Mankind grew out of his scientific researches and his religious faith and is essentially a synthesis of both . Chardin pictures the universe evoloving toward Man, and then with the coming into being of Man evolving in a new way in what he called the Noosphere.The evolution of Consciousness which could be conscious of itself was a vast upward moving process .In his words, "One may say that until the coming of Man it was natural selection that set the course of morphogenesis and cerebration, but that after Man it is the power of invention that begins to grasp the evolutionary reins.A wholly inward change, having no direct effect on anatomy: but a change, as we now know, entailing two decisive consequences for the future. The first is an unlimited increase in the aura of influence radiating from every living being; the second ,even more radical, the prospect afforded to a growing number of individuals of being joined together and ever more closely unanimised in the inextinguishable fire of research pursued in common"pp.307-8 As de Chardin envisages Mankind's Evolution is moving toward some kind of ' single consciousness' He asks , " May we not imagine that at that moment a truly and totally human act will be effected for the first time, in a final option- the yes, or no answer to God ,pronounced individually by beings in each one of whom the sense of human freedom and responsibility will have reached its full development? " p. 321
I am not sure what this ' vision' is, and how this ' end of mankind ' in consciousness of God will manifest itself. The vision by the way seems to me to parallel to one I am personally connected with that of the great Jewish thinker of evolutionary redemptive development Rabbi Abraham Yitzchak Ha- Kohen Kook. I would too make one point about my own reading of the ' end of mankind'. I would ask of what good it is for all of us to be absorbed in some great vision if this does not mean that the ones we love, their personalities and lives do not individually live ?
But that is my question, and for those interested in a grand Catholic religious vision of the development of Mankind this book certainly is an answer.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) was a French theologian, Jesuit priest, and paleontologist/geologist who took part in the discovery of Peking Man, and was later unjustly accused by Stephen Jay Gould of participating in the Peking Man fraud (see Gould's book The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History, and see Charles Blinderman's book The Piltdown Inquest for a refutation). Teilhard was forbidden to publish his writings during his lifetime, the 1950 encyclical 'Humani Generis' condemned several of his opinions, and in 1962, the Holy Office issued a 'Monitum' or warning that his books contained ambiguities' and 'serious errors,' that offended Catholic doctrine. But more recently, Pope John Paul II cited Teilhard approvingly, as has Benedict XVI. This book contains essays written by Teilhard over a period of thirty years, and (like his masterwork The Phenomenon of Man) was first published posthumously.

Here are some representative quotations from the book:

"Confronted by the phenomenon of 'socialisation' in which Mankind is irresistably involved, do we seek to know how to act that we may better conform to the secret processes of the world of which we are a part? Then of the alternatives that are offered we must choose the one which seems best able to develop and preserve in us the highest degree of consciousness. If we turn out to have been wrong in this, then the Universe has no less gone astray."
"But is it not in itself a consolation and a source of strength to know that Life has an objective; and that the objective is a summit; and that the summit, towards which all our striving must be directed, can only be attained by our drawing together, all of us more and more closely and in every sense---individually, socially, nationally and racially?"
"The basic characteristic of Man, the root of all his perfections, is his gift of consciousness... But this power of reflection, when restricted to the individual, is only partial and rudimentary... Reflection can only be developed in communion with others. It is essentially a social phenomenon."
"In exploding the atom we took our first bite at the fruit of the great discovery, and this was enough for a taste to enter our mouths that can never be washed away: the taste for super-creativeness."
"(B)iological purposiveness ... is not everywhere apparent in the living world, but that it only shows itself above a certain level... Below this critical point everything happens (perhaps?) as though the rise of Life were automatic. But above it the forces of free choice and inner direction come to light, and from this moment it is they that tend to take charge."