1970 Geloof en Wetenschap : Orgaan van de Christelijke vereeniging van natuur- en geneeskundigen in Nederland - pagina 123

A. H. ESSER

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to new truths, ie., those conceptualizations which give us increasing freedom of action and thereby broaden the mind. The creative process is exhilarating but can undo itself; often the creator forgets the limitations of other minds, threatening their existence which is precariously based on the fixed features of their environment. Threatening other minds often results in extinction, be it physical death or the inviability of the innovation. Because of this, all important progress in spiritual life must be promoted by its conservative counterpart which delimits the freedom obtained. As we have seen, the danger begins when the successors to the innovator forget the spirit and live by the law alone. Is is those crystallizing and restrictive sequellae to the original mood of freedom, once they become traditionally rigid, which lead to the pollution in thought, actions and social life. 6. Conclusion We can now return to answer the question in the title: Yes, in constantly redesigning our environments, changing, combining and undoing the dim images from our early evolution, we necessarily pollute our living space, literally and abstractly. In creating and altering given physical and social environments, we cannot avoid bringing about inviable („bad") together with viable („good") alternatives. We realize now that any dehberate intervention will have repercussions in the physical, biological and social spheres (6). If mankind is to overcome the unprecedented physical pollution of today and survives physically by avoiding the consequencss of our contemporary large-scale social pollutions — atomwar, overpopulation, and the discrepancies in the lives of the haves and the have-nots — I opt for its development into the compassionate-systems stage (2), lest we undergo a form of enforced social engineering. Fortunately, one of the consequences of the latter, described in the Orwellian obedience to authority, with the accent on a passive organizational roleplaying, has already become unlikely in view of today's social unrest all over the world. Orwell's „1984" is still possible if we hold fast to the limited framework of a technological society and the continuation of our current educational system. However, the deliberate drive of education to instill ideology and control - be it in schools, churches, or orther institutions - often achieves the opposite purpose: a youth rebellion.

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