Einstein’s Proposal for Survival
We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive!

The focus of this article is the rapid acceleration of our powers for mass construction … why and how!  It recognizes our present course towards doomsday, why we have it, and proposes the new manner of thinking required for change.  

          We can understand why an expert recently named Edison and the Wright brothers our country’s most important #1 and #2 innovators.¹  Edison empowered us with the godlike ability to think “Let there be light,” and then make it happen with the flip of a switch.  Flight has enabled us to touch our distant relatives and even wander beyond our planet.  Though no one will deny the significance of the contributions of Edison, the Wrights, and many others, I recognize Einstein as #1.  More important than his scientific contributions, he has forewarned us that we are rapidly proceeding on a doomsday course, and, of greatest significance, he has told us what we must do if we choose to alter our direction from self-destruction towards nirvana. 

Everything is changed.  We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive!

In our very lifetime, E = mc²  ignited us into this challenging new and dangerous era.  We now have the power to change the world, for better as well as for worse!  As father of the A-bomb, Einstein prophesied that our world leaders would develop and make commonplace weapons of mass destruction, rapidly accelerating our path towards doomsday.  Whereas creative minds have established light and flight worldwide by their collective energy, Einstein’s most important contribution is just beginning to capture the minds of those who can nourish it.  We have yet to mobilize our collective will and energy to develop and spread the newer manner of thinking that emphasizes our weapons of mass construction! 

          Several billion years were required for the evolution of the gene pool that we call Homo sapiens² (i.e. us).  We’ve been here an estimated half million years.  Contrast this with the mere 66 years it took from the first Kitty Hawk flight to walk on the moon, and the omnipresence of the light bulb from its relatively recent invention.  Through focused effort, it required far less time to wipe clean Nagasaki and Hiroshima.  Would you imagine the outcome of World War II if each participant possessed today’s weapons of mass destruction?  Given the ever-increasing acceleration our best minds are making WMD widespread, how failsafe do you believe is each trigger?  What prediction can we make about the widespread possession and unleashing of WMD?  Do you remain unconvinced of our present course?     

          Due to our rapid strides in science, “r” has been added to evolution to designate the acceleration of our powers for mass destruction.  “Human selection,” i.e. personal responsibility, now accompanies natural selection as master of our fate.  Though our new mega power conveys great danger, we ignore the warnings.  We continue to aggrandize destructive aggression and focus our creativity and resources on war “toys”.  We direct so little of our resources to create weapons of peace and scarcely recognize those creative leaders who are its champions.  We still best know Einstein as father of the bomb more so than a champion of peace.  

          Since humankind’s history is primarily documented by a series of wars, we can confidently predict the same unless we bring about change.  In this new era of mega power and WMD, war can no longer be tolerated; the consequences are unimaginable.  Einstein “discovered” that our predilection for destructive aggression is embedded in our manner of thinking.  He not only forewarned us, he provided a solution.  Our survival requires A Newer Way Of Thinking, ANWOT.  His conclusion becomes apparent when we consider the forces that influence our current manner of thinking. 
 
          Our mental activity is constrained by the software programs available to it!  A comparison of our mind’s function to that of a computer may be helpful.  Would you imagine the constraints imposed on you if your computer contained a marvelous spreadsheet program to “crunch numbers,” and a great drawing program, but contained no word processing program … or contained a very limited one?  Could we expand our creativity by adding a word processing program? musical notation? mathematic equations?  As you understand your computer’s output depends on its software, this is so regarding the software programs by which we process our thinking.    
 
          A brief consideration of the two “thought processing” software programs that dominate our current thinking provides a plausible explanation of why we direct our energy to rapidly spread our weapons of mass destruction and accelerate our course towards doomsday.  Nature, through our genes, initially endows us with the powerful manner of response common to other earth creatures.  It has been developed through trial-and-error learning experiences over billions of years.  We are born “pre-wired” with an amoral response system that favors survival of the fittest. “Fight or flight” is its favored problem-solving mode.  It is virtually automatic or “instinctual.”

          We receive our second thought processing program from our parents and our culture during our first decades.  Our “native language” is passively acquired through imitation, role modeling, and countless repetitions during our first decades.  This “thought processing” program understandably favors blind obedience to authority, dependency, imitation, and action through acquired habit.  Of course, this early manner of thinking is appropriate because we acquire our native language when we are quite helpless, physically undeveloped and mentally immature.  We may thank our early masters for our survival, as our extensive early years of dependency necessarily require such direction and nurturance. 

          Our native language is rich in dichotomous and prescriptive words that convey our dependence on some outside authority.  Dichotomous words constrain our thinking to two “either…or” categories: right/wrong, yes/no³, O.K./not O.K., good/bad, black/white, me/not me, us/them, yours/mine, etc.  Prescriptive words (viz. should, have to, must, etc.) demand obedience to the authority from which they originate.  Compliance is rewarded.  Failure to obey, rebellion, and/or independent thinking commonly result in mental and/or physical harm.  If one does what they shouldn’t do (or doesn’t do what they should do), the prescribed outcome is usually some form of guilt, blaming, withholding of approval and/or aggressive act.  It may be directed to some other or oneself.   Our early well-being requires blind obedience.  Through repetition, such dependency becomes habitual.

          The dichotomous and prescriptive vocabulary words inscribed in our native language have universal features.  They distort reality, limit reason, and promote prejudice, competition and harmful aggression.  Among animals, destructive aggression is a favored means of obtaining food, securing safety and territory, reproduction, and protecting the young.  It is the means of dealing with the here and now.  We can expect our manner of thinking to lead to destructive aggression when it is dominated by our genes “fight for survival” program and/or the prescriptive and dichotomous words “wired” into our native language by our nurturers.  Because we process information using a combination of the programs provided by our genes and nurturers repetitiously over our first decades, our manner of thinking is relatively automatic, what we call “habit.”  Do you get the idea?  We are destined to pursue destructive aggression, engage in competition and wars, and struggles between the haves and the have-nots as long as we continue to think in the manner dictated by our early software programs!    The manner we think as individuals is similarly reflected in our interpersonal, international, and global perspectives.  Predictably, thinking processed using the software programs inherited through our genes and acquired from our currently prevailing nurturers will favor destructive aggression; whatever weapons at our disposal will be used to accommodate their perspective!  Do you recognize the wisdom of Einstein’s prophecy?  Do you see the importance of getting unstuck from this habitual manner of thinking, of creating the newer manner of thinking Einstein envisioned?

          Once we recognize how our thinking is directed by our gene’s inherited “fight/flight” program and the “dichotomous/prescriptive” thinking pattern inherent in our native language, we may progress to an even more important discovery.  The root cause of destructive aggression is universal sameness in the manner we think! 
Irrespective of geography, the “native languages” of people throughout the world (be it English, Chinese, Arabic, Hebraic, and/or others) process data in a similar manner.  The geography of one’s tongue is of limited consequence.  The thought processing program of each native language is necessarily dominated by the early “wiring” of our genes and nurturers, and becomes habit by thousands of repetitions throughout our first decades when we are undeveloped, “a document yet to be written.”  However we resolve our apparent differences (economic, political, religious), our thinking will yet compel us to compete, dominate, cause repetitious acts of inhumanity, create new means of destruction, and fight for our “wants.”  The degree to which our nurturers exert their authority to constrain our thinking and encourage and/or restrict liberation from their worldview is more important than which native thinking language we use. 

          Why are we rushing to doomsday?  Due to our use of symbols, we are motivated by means more so than genes, by greed and creed more so than need!  Genes provide us teeth and fists to directly combat our enemy, one by one.  Our leaders increasingly create and direct impersonal means to conduct war.  Today’s leaders and their kin are not directly present in physical combat.  Carnage is removed from their own sight, sound, and smell.  And the dramatic growth in the destructiveness of our weapons, the effects of which we have not yet experienced, make the danger incomprehensible.  The number of leaders who may initiate war with the utterance of a few words, even the mere push of a button, is growing.  Most persons who engage in war do so because they are so directed by their mental “software,” the “fight or flight” survival response inherited from their genes, and the creeds passively acquired from their nurturers, their leaders, their religion, and/or a combination of such “controllers.”  Persons who fight, in most circumstances, reluctantly kill people they don’t know, people they could and would prefer to relate to in friendship.  The kamikaze bomber of WWII and the suicide bomber best illustrate how we have become directed more so by mental creed than physical need. 

          We pursue our symbols of wealth more so than the bread of survival: fame, money, appearance, status, winning, “rightness,” religious and economic superiority, and eternal survival in a hereafter.  Other earth creatures engage in destructive aggression for short periods to obtain food, for self-protection, reproduction, and protection of their young.  Aggression is limited to need, to “enough.”  Humankind is characterized by dependence on our creed and insatiable greed more so than our need.   The rich work to become richer, often at the expense of the poor; struggle between the “haves” and the “have-nots” is perpetual.  We demand that others accept our assumptive views.  Acts of hatred and genocide dominate expressions of love, competition exceeds sharing, taking more than giving, preaching more than educating.  It has been said we have discovered the missing link between animals and humanity – it is us!  For reasons readily understood and simply explained⁴ we create and sustain resentments, even through generations.  We “guilt” and too regularly suicide ourselves. 

          Do you recognize that the software programs of nature, nurture, and that which we our self create each influence our manner of thinking from a different perspective?
(1) genes:  Its software is based on past experience.  Through billions of years of our collective past, we inherit its trial-and-error “wisdom,” its amoral emphasis favoring destructive aggression and “survival of the fittest.”  Thinking directed by our genes emphasizes “fight or flight,” “might makes right,” “my way or the highway.”  (2) our nurturers:  Our parent’s and culture’s strong suit is the present; we adhere to custom, as is  practical for today’s needs.  Our nurturers emphasize blind obedience and conformity through habit.  Authority is programmed into its dichotomous/prescriptive language through imitation and role modeling.  (3) ANWOT:  The newer manner of thinking must liberate our mind from instinct and habit to wisely predict what may best work for our future, to wisely prepare for what we have not yet experienced!  ANWOT is the instrument of change towards modernity, compatible with self-mastery and “human selection.”  It favors problem-solving by what is called “no-trial learning” or “cognitive rehearsal”.  It emphasizes descriptive and analog words that more objectively reflect reality and promote problem-solving.  We have yet to develop and institutionalize a formal curriculum for the masses that emphasizes “win/win,” cooperation, sharing, “each one teach one,”  “united we stand;” that can direct our creative energy to prevention and spread the weapons of mass construction.  

genes → past; nurturers/culture → present; ANWOT → future.

          The wisdom we passively acquire from our genes and our nurturers does not prepare us to manage WMD.  We require an updated thought processing program, one designed to wisely direct our new mega-power, to add to the means of thinking we inherit and passively acquire.  Current politics, law, and fundamental religion are predominantly expressed in the dichotomous, prescriptive, authoritarian, and institutionalized native language we learn as a child.   Members are favored.  Lack of membership and/or nonconformity commonly result in guilt, shunning, and economic and/or physical harmful aggression.  “Our side” is good, right, favored by God, and must win; “they” are bad, wrong, evil, and deserve punishment.   We shall remain servants of habit, of these early controllers until we create the new manner of thinking that allows us to become our own person.  The opportunity is ours for taking.  

          The remainder of this article proposes what is required to redirect our course to the nirvana that is within our sight.  It is designed to grow through the collective wisdom yet to be provided by creative minds.  The curriculum promotes self-mastery as it frees thinking from instinct and/or habit.  The simple modifications that “rewire” our prevalent manner of thinking will inspire prevention, self-mastery, innovation, and foster cooperation, love, and a win/win perspective. 

THE GOOD NEWS!  Amidst the blaring red-alert sirens, there is good news.  We now have all that we require to create and spread the wisdom to make a difference!  We are just as capable of creating the weapons of mass construction as we have been adept at creating WMD.  Let us heed Einstein’s prophecy.  To all the ingredients, which we now have, we must simply add our collective will.  We can create the needed newer way of thinking.
 
          The steps to attaining a newer way of thinking are relatively simple.  ANWOT requires the efforts of a limited number of people, can be rapidly infectious to the masses, and is inviting because it offers the reward of physical and mental well-being.  Irrespective of whether or not you accept the assumptions that the “big bang” of doomsday is imminent, please consider the practical steps to create ANWOT, our best hope to develop our weapons for mass construction.  

          To humanities’ credit, people of all flavors have already created the bits and pieces for much of the curriculum we require to free our thinking from its dependence on instinct and habit, to teach peace-of-mind, peace-for-humankind.  To sciences’ credit, we now have already created the hardware of mass construction:  computers, the Internet, the means for mass storage of information and its availability in one’s own home at virtually no cost.  Such hardware can support education of our masses with unprecedented speed.  We have abundant documentation of the wisdom of persons past, and we are connected to our creative contemporary minds.  We may pool our collective wisdom to create and expand the curriculum of skills that build weapons of mass construction, to attain the nirvana that is within our imagination.  Yes, we have all the ingredients!  The strands of habit’s web that hold us prisoner are vulnerable to our collective will.  What we must modify is the course of our will power.  Do you see?  We have the ingredients; we have yet to take charge of our will.  Like The Little Engine that Could, strength of will to gather our collective wisdom into an appropriate teaching curriculum suitable for mass education begins with “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!”   Great power resides in “Each one teach one!”   The task of getting ourselves “unstuck” is quite doable.              

          We may begin by “rewiring” our thinking through simple word substitutions.  We may first teach ourselves to use descriptive words (could, may, prefer, I am wise when …, etc.) in the place of prescriptive words.  When possible, we change dichotomous words (either/or, good/bad, right/wrong, us/them, etc.) to analog⁵ words (both/and, pluses and minus, “I consider the positives and the negatives,” this and that, “a” more so than “b”, etc.).  Descriptive words lead to problem-solving more so than blind obedience and punishment.  Analog words more accurately represent reality, sharing, the commonality among people, benefits of cooperation, and peace more so than destructive aggression and war.  Let us not underestimate the importance of the words we use.  Words are the “wiring” of our thinking.  One light switch may seem identical to another, but each result in very different outcomes because of the wiring hidden within the wall.  The “cure” to move on to a more effective new manner of thinking would be quite simple, if not for “habit.”  As creatures of habit, we are prone to stay stuck in the manner of processing information that we passively acquired during the programming of our native language.  

          We have limited choice but to accept our genetic inheritance and early manner of thinking.  However, the great force that has created life has provided humankind our most important resource.  We have a new specialized “freedom organ” within our complex brain, capable of reflective-thinking.⁶  We think about our thinking!  We call this self-consciousness.  This capability is our resource for self-mastery.  Our “self” may now join nature and our nurturers as masters of our destiny.  With nature’s powerful gift, we possess the opportunity and bear the responsibility to add direction to our own destiny!
 
          I hope you will join my optimism that we have all that we need to create rapid change.  Pessimism about our capacity for rapid change can only promote apathy.  Sustained action requires that we first wake-up to the urgent task at hand.  We can take control and alter our present course.
           
          The proposed curriculum is designed to become a self-sustaining growing resource of educational units that teach the preferred new manner of thinking, providing the resources in an appetizing manner, in one’s own residence, at no cost to the consumer.   Chain reactions having global impact begin with the first step and grow one by one by one. 
           

A Curriculum For A  New Way Of  Thinking, ANWOT 

The curriculum I am developing is “in process.”  Its five components are easily taught and easily learned. This curriculum is available on the Internet and/or a computer disk, free of charge, upon your request.⁷   It will later be available in book form. 

1. The ingredients: faith, work, patience, direction, risk-taking
   Creating ANWOT, like making bread, requires certain basic ingredients.  Those needed ingredients not adequately present are readily acquired.
   
   
2. The language of ANWOT; practice the 7 basic ANWOT strens
   The easy substitution of words favoring ANWOT for common words of one’s native language “rewire” the manner information is processed to more productive outcomes.  Simple insertion of descriptive and analog words for the prescriptive and dichotomous words programmed into our acquired language, and made habitual by repetition, can significantly change the way we process information. “I allow” rather than “it makes me” leads to personal responsibility more so than blame.  “I choose” rather than “I should” conveys freedom of choice and wise decision-making more so than blind obedience to authority.  “Each choice has both pluses and minuses” conveys “I may make my choices right” more so than “I have to make the right choice” or I deserve you know what. 
   
   
3. The Mental Response Control Panel (MRCP)
   I have classified the mental choices in processing information that we have available to us into eight possibilities.  Most are easy to learn and apply, especially the blaming choices that result in aggression and the problem-solving sentence⁸ that favors constructive action.  Blaming, resulting in aggression towards others and/or oneself, is a common outcome inherent in every native language.  Problem-solving emphasizing reason, negotiation, compromise, and cooperation is more characteristic of ANWOT.
   
   
4. Strens (strength), the collective “wisdoms” that make a difference.  The ingredients, language, and MRCP provide process; strens more directly address content.  Strens work for the mind as muscles work for the body.  Strens are the practical bits of wisdom others have found that work to get what we want.  The stren collection portion of the curriculum makes good reading and study.  Practical strens provide easy to understand direction.  They state the practical what to do action steps that bring results.  The mentally challenging theory strens stimulate contemplation and understanding of why ANWOT works.   
   
   
5. Values, the universal principals we require to effectively guide our actions.
   Every major religion preaches the moral teaching we require to choose among alternatives.  Unity of purpose can be found in those universally agreed upon values such as “the Golden Rule.”

Skill in ANWOT requires study and practice over time, as with other important skills such as learning the alphabet, playing a musical instrument, and/or acquiring competence in a profession.  Acquiring the new manner of thinking may be enjoyed lifelong, for perfection is a goal strived for more so than attained.  However, reasonable proficiency may be attained quite rapidly.  Realize that you already possess many of the basic skills of self-mastery, of becoming your own person.  Consider the rapid and dramatic change with the addition of a minute amount of thyroid hormone, “B” vitamins, or other substances that may be slightly lacking.  The ANWOT curriculum likely contains important mental vitamins and hormones that will enrich your present thinking skills.

            Please understand that the curriculum provided in the Guide is incomplete.  It is a work in process; a prototype of what I hope will be criticized, improved, and expanded through your wisdom and contributions.  

            The initial curriculum will pleasantly provide immense satisfaction because it first provides the practice that improves skills in self-endorsement.  Becoming one’s best friend is quite teachable and learnable.   Self-endorsement is a prerequisite to the will power for becoming one’s own person.  If you choose to engage in the study of ANWOT, here are my recommendations to quickly attain dramatic results.

☻Faith in yourself: Believe you can make a difference.  If you are yet skeptical, “act as
     if” you can. Go through the motions; practice the script.  Soon the “as if” will be
     replaced by genuine confidence in yourself.
☻When possible, substitute analog words for dichotomous words.  Substitute “both this
     and that” for “this or that”; substitute “both … and” for “either/or”.  [see text]
☻When possible, substitute descriptive words for prescriptive “blaming” words.  I, he, 
     she, it “could” for I, he, she, it “should”.  [see text]  As one therapist urges, “Stop 
     ‘shoulding’ on others and yourself.”
☻Substitute the problem-solving sentence (footnote 8) for blaming others or “guilting”
     your self.
☻Develop and maintain strens that are meaningful to you.  Review one or more on a    
    regular basis; each of the strens may require only a few minutes.  The practical strens
    in the accompanying computer disk may be helpful.
☻Practice the Golden Rule.  Other values will follow.
☻Soon after beginning your studies in self-help, enjoy giving what spills over to others.

Prerequisite to ANWOT:  I believe skills in self-endorsement are a prior requirement to mastery of the ANWOT curriculum.  The curriculum’s preliminary strens are among the most inviting because they offer the skills for becoming one’s own best friend.  Consider that you engage in dialog with yourself more so than all your significant others combined.   You are your lifelong traveling companion!  This is why the first collection of strens offers direction in providing yourself your minimum daily requirement (MDR) of self-endorsement.  The gift of love to others is natural when one’s own cup is overflowing.  Or more widely preached, “Love they neighbor as thyself.”  As I know, most reading this are already accomplished in the prerequisite skills, and I encourage you to enhance this collection by adding your personal wisdom to it.  However, if you remain a “love junkie,” dependent on others for your daily “fix,” mental self-endorsement can be as dramatic as physically restoring a vitamin or hormone that may be lacking.  My growing collection of these strens is contained in this Internet book, or available on CD free by request.⁹   
     
Weapons of Mass Construction (WMC) fostered by ANWOT     
 [please add to, and/or make your own list]

self-endorsement (love): “Love thy neighbor as thyself .”  Self-endorsement is the     
 prerequisite for “love” of others, of the environment, for the experience of gratitude.


faith in our own ability to make a difference


freedom from the constraints of our genes and the native manner of thinking we
acquire when we are physically undeveloped and mentally immature.


education: Can you distinguish education from indoctrination?


technology: the Internet, computers and other mass communication and storage
resources that permit inexpensive rapid education, especially of the masses


science – objective inquiry


reason: “no-trial” learning for problem-solving, for prevention more so than cure;   
Also called “cognitive rehearsal”


moral principles: the ethical teachings common to our great religions that address 
values.  Science and religion are more complementary than contradictory.  Religion   
is a necessary partner of science –  we must act on what we assume, on faith more so 
than facts, because consistent and universal scientific validation is limited, especially
so in matters of  morality.


cooperation: skills in sharing, “competing” where all parties are “winners” 


negotiation: skills in compromise and conflict resolution

Note: these skills are not formally provided in our primary education system.  The 3 R’s, as commonly taught, often miss these skills.

Summary:  We have yet to implement Einstein’s most significant insight, his direction that we require a new manner of thinking if we are to survive.  This article explains why the prevailing software programs that guide our thinking keep us on a rapid course towards doomsday.  More important, it identifies the simple modifications we can make to alter our course.   A beginning curriculum for a new way of thinking is presented.   

I have prepared this SELF-MOTIVATION STREN TO A NEWER WAY OF THINKING.  Try using it and/or make one of your own.

1. Do I strive to become a better lover, first to myself and then to others?  Is my cup sufficiently full that something spills over to others?  When I give a gift, do I get a lift?
2. As my life-long traveling companion, am I my own best friend?  I provide my minimum daily requirement (MDR) of self-endorsement!  I welcome approval from others but don’t depend on it.
3. When possible, do I think using descriptive words (could, prefer, I am wise when…) more so than prescriptive words (should, have to, must)?  Descriptive words “wire” thinking to personal responsibility.  Prescriptive words favor blame to be followed by punishment. 
4. When possible, do I think using analog words (both/and, this and that, this more so than that, the +’s and the –‘s) more so than dichotomous words (either/or, this or that, good/bad, right/wrong, us/them, love/hate)?  Analog words recognize freedom to choose among alternatives and personal responsibility.   Dichotomous words limit thinking, encourage prejudice and “win/lose” action.
5. Do I regularly use the problem-solving sentence¹⁰ to find solutions more so than blaming and/or avoiding?   [Our inherited “fight” response in today’s society seldom leads to physical attack.  It is more expressed in blaming, resentment for others, and/or “guilting” oneself.  Our inherited “flight” response, in today’s society, seldom leads to physical running.  It is more expressed as procrastination, mental withdrawal, abuse of substances.  Fight or flight today favors mental aggression and/or suppression.] 
6. Do I recognize that many persons with wealth, health, position, power, and good looks are miserable while others who lack are quite fulfilled?  There is a way!
7. Am I more likely to “what if”, dwell on the worst, and create inappropriate anxiety more so than think “most likely” and act accordingly?
8. Am I increasingly becoming my own person, more so than remaining dependent on the demands of my genes and remaining blindly obedient to my nurturers?
9. Am I using my best to do my best?  Am I doing my reasonable best to grow and attain greater fulfillment?
10. Do I contribute to the greater system of which I am a part?

I suggest you regularly review this and/or your own ANWOT list?