The Canadian National Newspaper: A Financial Crisis arises when ‘Not By Bread Alone’ is Forgotten: Part I

The matter "bread", as the root feature of this title, is a borrowed focus. It comes from a biblical source with which many people are familiar. It comes from the “temptations” to which Jesus Christ was reported to have been subjected, prior to the beginning of his active ministry. At that time, the other protagonist, Satan, out there in the Judean desert, was reported to have communicated to Jesus something in the matter of the following: “If you are the ‘big kahoona’; the ‘big cheese’; this ‘hot shot’ that you say that you are; Why don’t you go ahead and ‘make a splash’? Seeing how people are, in terms of what they want, Why don’t you show them that you can turn all of these stones into bread”?

The response that “Man does not live by bread alone”, was what Satan was reported to have got, to his insinuations.

Meanwhile, my aim herein, is to emphasize that in today’s world, that response to “our friend” Satan, is something which we should also bear in mind, and that we forget, at our peril. Furthermore, because we are familiar with the story out of which that response arose, that familiarity does not provide us with an excuse, which allows us to overlook the MESSAGE in the response.

The substantive message in the response that is being made, may be presented as follows: If we (respectively) think that our own lives represent more than an accident/incident in biology, we should sit up, and ask ourselves exactly what it is, that our own living is all about.

For example, we need to ensure that we are not in the position of being like the proverbial donkey that is going full speed ahead, with the intention of catching and consuming the carrot that is just there in front of its nose. However, that donkey does not know that the carrot which is there in front of it, is being held out there on a stick, by the rider which is sitting on its back.

Yet, when we energetically respond, in a socialization that systematically conditions us to commit our time and energies to chasing after money and other financial-equivalent results, (we are similarly chasing after a “carrot” which is being held in front of us). In the process of executing that chasing after financial results response, we have allowed ourselves to forget that “Man Does not Live by Bread Alone”. Essentially, therefore, the socialization which leads us to chase after the acquisition of money, is essentially conditioning us to become like that ridden donkey, rather than to progress as responsible mind-guided humans.

Indeed, the emphasis on “bread” production, that appears to guide the management priorities in the bulk of today’s settled societies, is no accident. Rather, that societal emphasis on having people chase after financial results, appears to be in service to the regressive human evolutionary priorities, into which a parasitizing hideous alien exploitive consciousness which is behind capitalism, wants to steer human awareness and progress (Please see John Lash's accounts in metahistory.org, in reference to Gnostic insights).

That "bread"-chasing management concentration to the resource management operations into which humans enter, accompanies the capitalist norm. It aims to seduce people to concentrate primarily on the commitment of their efforts toward the generation of net results that are measured in monetary terms. Capitalists promote among humans, the adoption of private self servicing greed, as a behaviour-directing stimulus. Within it, people are led to concentrate on directing their efforts at the private net acquisition of “bread”, (in the form of achievable net financial-equivalent results).

Because the societal management context of capitalism concentrates on the generation of profit from commerce, it overlooks recognition of the need to practice stewardship to prevailing reality and its natural resource complement, so as to preserve the cradle of our material survival.

That capitalist focus on the level of outcome from commercial equivalent operations, therefore neglects to emphasize how humans, as sentient, conscious, mind-guided, technology-evolving entities, are being impacted by resource management choices. Instead, this apparently alien-directed social management context of capitalism, treats the complement of prevailing reality, as being no more than mixes of resources and commodities, that are to be managed in behalf of enhancing the achievement of financial-equivalent profit.

In the capitalist socialization, people are distracted from recognizing, or from servicing the essence of the sentient mind-guided nobility, that is their humanity. Instead, the capitalist tendency in recent years, has been to socialize people in their respective societies, to see themselves as being biological profit-supportive implements (human capital). The result is that, in societies which are managed within the rubric of capitalism, an evolved pervading contra-human educational and socialization system (described as human capital formation) has been deployed.

That prevailing educational system, aims to condition persons to concentrate on selfishness, and on being more effective money making machines. People are socialized to concentrate on making more efficient market-centred self-servicing choices. They are not socialized to focus on the execution of mutuality with each other, and with the prevailing natural environment (as complementary operations in a domain of sentience support).

Because of its oversight of priorities in respect of human mind-guided survival, the prevailing “bread”-centred capitalist-supervised system of education, should be unhesitatingly deplored. The tactic of the prevailing capitalist-sponsored educational system, is to condition members of the populace to accept, and to rely on a particularly disingenuous truth.

That featured capitalist “truth”, looks upon humans, as being implements. It overlooks the fact that persons are about the business of giving substance to themselves (as mind-guided entities). Instead, the capitalist focus submits that, the principal scientific indicator of the economic success of persons in the management of their time and their resources, is revealed in a market, rather than in a living-centred context. It imputes that effort and resource management success is revealed by the level of the increments in money-equivalent, that is forthcoming from the mixes of activities into which persons commit their efforts and resources.

Yet, it happens that substantively, many persons have also become sensitive about how what they do, fits into the plane of existence. In the process, they have come to recognize that there is an evolutionary path, as a time-linked existential placement of themselves, that accompanies their choices of resource management activities.

Persons who become so aware, therefore see themselves as also essentially making existential choices, as they use time and resource management activities to pursue their opportunity for living. If these time and effort management choices that persons make, are neither accidental nor coerced, they end up seeing living, as being comprised of a collection of mind-guided operations, in the utilization of the time with which they have been bestowed; (or which they have captured).

Meanwhile, in a technologically complex society where division of labour is the norm, persons have to trade for the components which they need in order to survive. Therefore, the capacity of private persons to make purchases, is an important part of their opportunity to survive. However, (in testimonial to the “Not By Bread Alone” reality, in which Conscious persons live), human economic agents are also budgeters of their time, among the survival-centred targets at which they respectively aim.

Essentially, therefore, even though capitalists use the access of individuals to money, to ration the access of persons to services that they need to satisfy the consumption components of their survival, analysts of human effort and time commitments need to also recognize that more than cash-centred trading issues are involved. In pursuit of their survival, human economic agents, as conscious mind-guided entities, aim to be successful in their accommodation to an autonomously functioning natural environment. Conscious human economic agents, therefore also aim their economizing strategies of knowledge-guided time and effort and resource commitments, at the survival-centred environmental accommodation that they associate with their reasons for being.

Accordingly, the pursuit of “bread”, is but one, among other activity plans, that Conscious mind-guided persons need to execute. Conscious human economic agents are therefore challenged to ensure that they (and their cohorts), are not seduced into continuing blind acceptance of the financially-centred capitalist performance appraisal norm.

An additional feature is that, Conscious persons, see the natural environment as being a source of survival support, as well as being a teaching system. The challenge for these persons, is that they need to protect themselves from being seduced into being comfortable with the recommendations and practices regarding the natural environment, that are guided by the capitalist doctrine. There, the natural environment is treated as being merely a source of commodities and of resources, that are available to be principally used in commerce, for the technical generation of financial-equivalent “bread”.

Horace Carby-Samuels is an Economist. He is the author of the book entitled Quality-of-Living and Human Development, that is published by Agora Publishing Consortium. Review this book at your local bookstore or library. Agora is a not-for-profit book publisher in support of critical public education, human rights, and social justice.

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