Today, driven by the acceleration of technological change, violence, big money (1), wars, corruption, confusion and climate changes, individuals find themselves living in a general crisis.
For decades, the driving force of history, which carries the intentionality of consciousness— has become temporarily stalled, while an abyss has opened between two worlds. One world that corresponds to the remnants of an unprincipled pragmatism and the decaying myths of peace and prosperity of the Western world and this other world that corresponds to a new way of being in the world, which is emerging through the widespread crisis and the paradoxes of our time.
As the general crisis grows, it is colliding with established structure and the formative experience (2) of generations born before 1996.
Moreover, as the crisis is growing in all fields of human activities, many have the assumption it’s impossible to do anything to change the direction of the increasing violence in society. In fact, they don’t understand that it’s our belief system that’s in crisis, mainly because it is based on a past moment in human history and on the belief of the passivity of the human consciousness (3).
Over time, this perspective on the human consciousness has become a way of life for most generations in societies and serves the people in power. But today this way of life has become out of phase with the necessity of billions of people in this changing world.
But through the advance of the widespread and global crisis, a future and a tropism is emerging among the new generations.
A new future is awakening
Today over half the world’s population is younger than 30. A large number of young people under the age of 25 are living in the Middle-East and on the Asian and African continents. Whereas in the countries in the northern hemisphere, there is a high number of people over 30 and 40 years.
Youth is the future of humanity. The young people actively want to shape the future but, in many countries they live in fragile contexts such as wars, increasing violence, employment, poverty, dictatorship, corruption and climate change disasters.
Jonathan Haidt, author of the book The Anxious Generation and professor of social psychology at New York University, explains how the formative landscape of new generations has led to an epidemic of mental illness among many people born after 1996. He emphasizes how these younger generations experience a form of anxiety.
Haidt suggests that young people suffer from a weakened psychological immune system. He explains how a child today’s ability to manage, process, and overcome the frustrations, minor accidents, teasing, exclusion, and injustices they perceive around the world has greatly diminished compared to previous generations.
According to the researcher, this psychological immunosuppression experienced by young people leads them to develop inner turmoil.
On the other hand, the researcher does not address the issue of sensitivity, which differs from one generation to the next. Moreover, he makes no mention of the activity of consciousness which also differs from one generation to another.
Perhaps it is the previous generations who suffer from a kind of insensitivity and have a flawed perspective when addressing issues of increasing violence, climate changes, wars and corruption.
Perhaps the generations in power believe they are setting an example to follow while supporting and financing bloody wars of revenge, where tens of thousands of women and children are murdered and starved around the world ?
Perhaps these generations believe they are making the best decisions while contributing to climate change by financing large oil and gas corporations generating billions of tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs) or by using public funds to finance their territorial wars instead of investing taxpayers’ money in quality education and healthcare services ?
Out of phase behaviour
When we look more closely at the generational variability it seems that one of the most important factors delaying change to a better world is precisely the formative experience of the generations born before 1996, as their behavior becomes out of phase in rapid changing time.
In some ways, it’s ironic to see many older generations under the assumption that it’s the youth that have an issue with social adaptation of the current time. Well, it’s precisely the older generations that have a problem of appreciation of the present situation and the general crisis.
Generation Z and the new generations are currently shaping a formative landscape (4) that bear little resemblance with the older generations born before 1996. The older generation will not help the youth by assuming they have problems or by pumping psychotropic drugs, according to criteria that correspond to another era. Older generations must try to recognize the younger generations have ways of doing things and thinking that correspond to the changing time.
What I am trying to say is that the spatiotemporal events in which young people are formed and developed today unfold at a different speed, intensity, and degree than the events in which older generations were formed and developed. In other words, the psyche —the sensory apparatus, memory apparatus, and current apparatus of registers (5) of the young person—is not attuned to the same rhythm as that of an individual from another generation.
Furthermore, the Z (born between 1996 and 2010) is the first generation to have grown up with digital devices connected to virtual environments worldwide during their formative years.
Generation Z have encoded personal and social behaviors based on interactive technical features (interactive device systems of socialization)
The generations preceding Generation Z acquired a passive social behavior in front of technological social mediation systems. We called this passive behavior: the spectator’s behavior. The spectator doesn’t directly interact with the technical device. He doesn’t actively interact with the images appearing on the screen – or any other form of stimuli. The spectator cannot criticize, oppose or give his opinion to others through the technical device. He remains seated in silence during the projection of images, watching the images and listening to the sounds emanating from the specific technical equipment.
Per say, at school the older generations were like spectators, they were passive agents remaining in silence assimilating knowledge and know-how – this type of passive behavior is precisely what mass education is all about. In fact, they were socialized and educated through a unidirectional system, mainly because education is based on the belief of the passivity of the human consciousness.
Unlike Generation Z, who were socialized through an interactive system where the intentionality of the consciousness (6) of the user is constantly maintained through the interactive features of a technical system to other users in a worldwide virtual environments. The new generation are socially formed through a bidirectional interactive technical system. They learned to be active agent that transform virtual objects.
In fact, without knowing it, the new generations participated actively in the development of several applications and even served as guinea pigs for most social media platforms. Per say, if the Big Tech such as Meta and Instagram would have a business model that paid the users who help them develop their platforms through the interactivity functionalities, young people would receive significant dividends.
Studying the users interaction and their sensation
By studying the experiences of children and youth as they socialize and interact in virtual environments, researcher Ann Farrell was able to better understand consciousness and its mechanisms.
This study provides an interesting perspective on why the children and young people experience adaptation problems in today’s educational system which is essentially unidirectional, rigid and most all is based on the passivity of the consciousness in the process of learning, in the act of thinking, evoking and doing, etc.
Cognitive and behavioural development of Generation Z
In her study produced in 2008 Farrell discovered how the intentionality of consciousness formalizes and structures the bidirectional relationship between the psychophysical structure of young users, the other users and the virtual functionalities of a technical network system. Farrell study the formalization of the sensation of immersion, presence and copresence by the psyche of the users when interacting in the virtual environment.
She found that the sensation of immersion is created by shifting attention from the limit of the space of representation (6) as attention is focused on the movement of the gaze. According to Farrell the movement of the gaze creates the sensation of being transported elsewhere.
Furthermore, the researcher assumes that the state of internal presence in the virtual environment is evoked once the user is experiencing the sensation of immersion, which is maintained by the intentionality of consciousness. Consequently, as the user interacts with others through the activation of interactive features of a technical device he experiences the sensation of perceiving externalized images, which in fact is the perspective of his own gaze.
When an experienced user – who was born with a technical device in his hand – navigates in a virtual environment his attention is maintains on the movement of the gaze – and it’s at that moment that we discover a conscious mechanism which is the intentionality of consciousness. In fact, if the user can shift his attention on the senses in movement while maintaining the act of representation within the field of perception thanks to the intentionality of consciousness.
The researchers’ theoretical framework was developed from the concepts of Humanism universalist psychology, which distinguishes two fields of attention: the field of presence and of co-presence (7). The field of presence includes perception and representation. While in the field of co-presence capture the object with detailed precision such as the relationships with other objects which are not present in the field of presence but are linked to the object.
Thus, when the users activate the interactive features of the virtual environment, they adopt an attitude of perception accompanied by the act of representation within the field of presence. As attention moves within the field of presence, it remains constantly connected to the user’s space representation; consequently, the mechanism of attention shifts according to the interest of consciousness in the field of the co-presence.
The researcher emphasizes on the theoretical importance of the space of representation, since in this way of emplacing the activity of consciousness in the world allows us to understand how the intentionality of consciousness is directed toward the so-called internal and external environments—and consequently, toward the virtual world.
This shift of behavior from being passive agent to active agent between new generations and older generations matters especially in contexts where the world is under a general crisis which is intensifying day by day.
For example, unlike the previous generation who obeys to hierarchies, even when the action or measure in question creates problematic situations for people. Generation Z aspires to a more horizontal organization of society and questions the hierarchies and institutions. In fact, for many young people, hierarchical norms often lack understandable justifications.
The young people want to be actively involved and are not afraid to mobilize themselves when they notice inconsistencies from the hierarchies and institutions leading to more personal and social problems.
Helping older generation out of phase to become active agent of change
Since generations do not exist side by side, separate and part each other like most sociologists would want us to believe. Rather generations co-exist, interact and transform each other. Generations are dynamic structures and make changes possible because they are the history in motion.
According to José Ortega y Gasset, each generation has a unique way of life (beliefs, ideas, etc.) and at any given time, multiple generations coexist and transform their way of living and consequently transform society. Orega explained that without these dynamic structures civilization would fall into a natural state, losing the characteristic of a society.
Through the co-existing structure and dynamic link between generations, it’s possible that in the near future the older generations will change and adopt new behaviors. Then, people will recognize that consciousness is an intentional activity which can contribute to the rehabilitating image of the human being – an intentional being that transform the world and himself
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References work
Ammann, Luis, 2004, Self-Liberation: Theory and Practice, Paris: 320 p.
Farrell, A. 2008, L’étude des sensations d’immersion, de présence et de coprésence chez les jeunes qui interagissent dans l’espace virtuel, Université du Québec à Montréal, 2008, 150 p.
Farrell, A. 2015, The spatiality of the image and user impressions in virtual environments, 15 p.
Silo. 2011, Notes of Psychology, Paris: Éditions Références, 347 p.
Notes
The young people interact with content that are not always appropriate and can generate a form of addiction. Indeed, instead of censoring young people, leaders and governments should stand up and have the courage to sanction the Big Tech who allow the dissemination of inappropriate contents.
Big money: The expression “Big money influence” refers to the significant impact that large financial resources can have on various aspects of society, politics, and economic decisions. Big money can shape policies, decisions, and societal norms, often leading to disproportionate influence in decision-making processes.
Formative experience: Learned and codified behaviors and tactics are shaped by a person’s biography and formed during childhood and adolescence.shared between a group of young people born during a certain well-defined historical period.
Human consciousness: we define consciousness as 1) the recording made by the apparatus that coordinates and structures, by working with sensations, images, and memories. This apparatus must have a constitution that gives it unity, despite its mobility, because the activities it records are also mobile. This apparatus is not constituted at birth, but it seems to take shape as the body’s sensations are constructed. This apparatus of registers of sensations, images, and memories is located in the body and, in turn, is linked to bodily sensations. This apparatus sometimes identifies with the self, and this identification occurs as bodily sensations are added and modified in the field of memory. 2) We define consciousness as the system of coordination and recording carried out by the human psyche. We refer to the same device, by virtue of the different functions it performs: if it coordinates, we call it a coordinator,if it records, we call it a “recording device”
Formative landscape Learned and codified behaviors and tactics are shaped by a person’s biography and formed during childhood and adolescence. We call the entirety of these recordings, which form the biographical substrate upon which habits and essential personality traits are built, the “developmental landscape.” The formation of this landscape begins at birth. The fundamental structured recordings involve not only a system of memories but also affective tones, which we call climates. (Silo, Notes on Psychology, p. 100)
Apparatus of registers the apparatus of registers of sensations, images, and memories is located in the body and, in turn, is linked to bodily sensations. This apparatus sometimes identifies with the self, and this identification occurs as bodily sensations are added and modified in the field of memory. 2) We define consciousness as the system of coordination and recording carried out by the human psyche. We refer to the same device, by virtue of the different functions it performs: if it coordinates, we call it a coordinator,if it records, we call it a “recording device”
Intentionality of consciousness Intentionality: the fundamental mechanism of consciousness, by means of which it maintains its structure by linking actions to objects. This link is not permanent, and this is what allows for the dynamism of consciousness, since actions are always in search of objects. This intentionality, always directed toward the future, is registered as a searching tension.
Passivity of human consciousness Old prejudices about human nature and the passivity of consciousness still permeate the views of social, political, and cultural institutions. This perspective imposes limitations on the transformative capacities of human beings and on the phenomenon of human consciousness. This way of representing human beings presupposes a being closed off from itself and its psychic functioning. This view of consciousness and the human mind, as presented primarily by science and traditional psychology, is a complete failure and does not support the process of evolution and adaptation of the human species.
Space of representation: It is a kind of mental screen onto which images, formed from sensory stimuli, memory stimuli, and conscious activity, are projected. In addition to serving as a screen, it is formed by the entirety of internal representations of the kinesthetic sense. The space of representation possesses landmarks, a volume, and a depth that allow us to determine, based on the image’s location, whether the phenomena originate from the internal or external world. (source: Amman, 2004, p. 281)
Subject-consciousness-world: psychophysical structure of the human being, consciousness, and the environment form a structure that we call the world.
Field of presence and co-presence are fields of attention functions through motivation, through something that, in a certain way, impresses consciousness and provides a record. The stimulus that awakens interest can remain in the central field of attention, which we call the field of presence and which is related to perception. Everything that does not seem strictly linked to the central object is diluted in attention, accompanying the presence of the object by means of associative relations with other objects that are not present but are related to it. This phenomenon of attention is called the field of co-presence and is related to memory. Co-presence allows us to structure the new data, and we say: by paying attention to an object, what is evident becomes present, and what is not evident acts in a co-present way.Consciousness thus acts on perception and always structures more than what it perceives, going beyond the observed object. In summary, we say the co-present, is the retention updated and superimposed on the perception, in which way the consciousness infers more than it perceives, and this phenomenon we see in action the most elementary function of belief.
Look: is a complex, active act that organizes landscapes, not simply a passive act of receiving external information (data that reaches the external or internal senses, i.e., sensations of my own body, memories, and perceptions). The mutual implications of look and landscapes interact between various groups, people and generations.
