Keynote by Prof. Dr. Michael von Brück

Keynote by Prof. Dr. Michael von Brück

Climate change, the loss of so many species, polluted air and water and so on… All these environmental changes and disasters are not any more conclusions drawn from experiments in laboratories on the basis of data and computations only, but they are being experienced directly by more and more people and societies.

We know, but we do not act. Why? And who is "we" in this case? We expect politicians and leaders in the economy to act, but who are "they", and what are their options and constraints to act? How do human beings make decisions after all? How are individual decision making and institutional conditions interrelated, and how do these conditions in politics, economy, law, education, religion, art etc. overlap or contradict each other?

To raise these and similar questions is crucial to understand the dynamics in modern industrial societies in order to find strategies for action of transformation. With regard to individual behavior we may change our life style, slow down in exaggerated consumption, save energy and eat vegetarian food as contribution to better environmental conditions. Some of us succeed in this way, some do not or less. No doubt, all this is an important contribution for a slow change, and such kind of behavioral change on the basis of a heightened awareness is necessary and helpful. Yet, the billions of dollars on the international financial markets that flow into investments with the biggest promise for quantitative growth, the strategies of companies and governments being in competition for capital and consent of the people (at least in countries where elections determine the political and sometimes economic future of decision makers) seem to be the dominant factors in the economic and political spheres. All these different institutional clusters form their own rationalities and discourses. Economic interests naturally coerce the players to make profit, political interests naturally coerce the competitors to make it in the next elections, actors in civil society make their different points and also have quite diverse vested interests, but all these groups need to come together to translate their concerns into the language of the other so that common interests and rationalities to enact them with benefit for these divers groups in our societies can be found. The fundamental question then is: How do we institutionalize platforms for this discourse, so that competitors and perhaps even enemies become partners? In all our differences we are one interdependent society, after all. So, different perspectives must be evaluated by different interest groups coming together. On the agenda there are the following and much more questions:

How can we envisage value change and ecological transformation which is based on an analysis and on a sober design for realistic procedures and rules? How do we come to decisions which do not curb but foster creativity in all the respected areas? How do we overcome fear so as to engage in building patterns of living which are based both on holistic vision and scientific rationality?

These days more and more people are deluded by fear and anguish, apocalyptic phantasies and/or cynicism. At least so in industrialized societies in the West. Is this the case in other cultures as well? If so, what does it mean? If not, what is the reason? Do we have perhaps other cultural resources for decision making which we do not see or do not yet sufficiently take into consideration? How do we need to condition ourselves in order to live a life in dignity and in mutuality with all life on earth?

Our online Winter School is not really an appropriate substitute for a Winter School in Yangon. Our experience of the last years in offering Winter Schools there on the spot proofs clearly: We do need personal exchange, debates and informal gatherings in order to develop creative ideas and networks of cooperation. However, under all present circumstances our online meetings shall strengthen our insights and commitments in a rather complex situation. For it is "we" who are the "we" whom we addressed above. And this "we" needs to be strengthened, intellectually as well as emotionally. Because decision making depends not only on rationally given reasons, but also on emotion and intuition, we want to strengthen our human network in order to establish eventually a University for Life and Peace which will operate on transcultural and interdisciplinary terms, and most of all in a combination of training our mental-emotional capabilities by meditation and training our mental-rational capabilities by science in order to make the much needed contribution for the future.