Consciousness Evolution

The last three months have been a moment of realization for most thinking human beings. The SARS-CoV2 virus has brought us on our knees.  A shock treatment to human hubris and ignorance. None of us have witnessed an event of such a global proportion in our lifetime. A moment where men who knew too much had nothing more to offer than to “keep social distancing”.

Light-colored Peppered moth

Most of us were confined to the four walls of our homes in the past several months. With no schools and playground open, kids vied for parent’s attention. With no restaurants open, we explored the world cuisines ourselves. We got more free time to think about the meaning and purpose of our lives. It made us realized the fragility of our lives. And, hopefully, we realized that the universe could not care less about humans and that we are only a dispensable cog in the machine.

Dark-colored Peppered Moth

Evolution work thought selection bottlenecks. In England, before 1811, a commonly seen moth species was the light-colored peppered moth. The dark-colored variety was only rarely seen. However, towards the end of the century, almost all of the moths were black colored. This shift in the population of moth species overlapped with the period of the industrial revolution in England.  During this time smoke emission and related industrial pollution generated a lot of dark-colored soot that covered the buildings and trees of the industrialized parts of England. This put the light-colored moth varieties at a huge disadvantage. They are now clearly visible in the black backdrop, to birds and other predators. On the other hand, the dark-colored variety could efficiently camouflage in the same environment. The light-colored varieties were all eaten up by birds resulting in a shift in the number of dark-colored variety. This is an excellent example of Darwinian selection in action. This example also illustrated the survival of the fittest in natural selection.

Social and cultural evolution could also operate in a similar way. A revolutionary idea or discoveries can completely change the way we live and operate as a society. Use of fire for cooking, the invention of the wheel, electricity, guns, antibiotics, automobiles, the radio, internet, all of these events marks instances of significant shifts in the socio-cultural outlook of the human race, and the rest of the species.  All such event reshapes the collective consciousness of the society. COVID-19 is such a crisis that most of us have witnessed in our lifetime. Fortunately for us, the virus has a relatively low mortality rate (although it is significantly higher than common flu). For this reason, this virus may not result in a biological selection pressure/evolution. However, it might be driving social/consciousness evolution.

Our outlook on life and social interaction could significantly change after COVID. Major companies might feel that a significant amount of their work could be done remotely, why pay rent? What to do with all the office spaces? Can we convert them to low-cost residences and thus partially solving the housing problems in major cities? What is the role of religion in life? The virus did not show any discrimination towards members of any religious (political, racial, regional) factions. What is the point of fighting over pieces of lands, temple, mosques….? It could all be pointless in a matter of days if a more virulent microbe emerges. What should be our priorities in life? Living a happy, peaceful life, while ensuring the safe survival of the generations to come, or kill each other for non-sensical reasons? What are our responsibilities to our loved ones, family, friends, community, humanity, environment, and all the sentient beings? What is our place in this universe?

I hope that the past few months would motivate us to think deeply to find answers to such deep questions. Maybe after a while,

we might look back to 2020 as a year when humanity came of age to appreciate the marvel of nature that we call, life.