What's Going On?

It's hard to look at what's happening in the world today without wondering what the heck is going on.

To take just the latest example...America's financial system appears to be spinning out of control, and nobody can agree on what caused the current problems or how we should deal with them. Any solution proposed is broadly met with skepticism because no one believes the government or the business community has either the ability or the integrity to develop a proper and workable solution. Meanwhile, as we're attempting to deal with this problem, its effects ripple out through the rest of the world's financial systems.

As we're dealing with all this, we're confronted with similar problems in many other areas: the environment is stressed, personal integrity and ethics seem to be irrelevant in today's society, and people of different cultures, tribes or religions seem to be at each other's throats.

When people view such problems, they seem to react in one of three ways: they deny there's a problem, they try to force their solutions on everyone/everything else around them, or they throw up their hands and say it's hopeless and nothing can be done.

As if that isn't enough, there appears to be a general abandonment of common sense. If we had looked rationally at the housing bubble, we would have had to admit it couldn't last forever. If we had looked rationally at the cultural dynamics of the Middle East, we would have realized invading Iraq was not likely to be a "piece of cake." And if we looked rationally at all the junk being dumped into the environment around the world, we would have to acknowledge that we've been gradually making our world uninhabitable.

What's going on?

And what are we to do?

I believe we are going through a period of great change. This change is a product of the many new technologies that have been made possible by modern science. These technologies, in turn, are rooted in the ways science has come to redefine our understanding of our world.

I believe that if we draw on principles discovered by modern science, we will be able to develop a new form of common sense - a "quantum sense," if you will - that can give us new ways of seeing our world and new approaches to solving its problems.

Today many people are doing exactly that - drawing on lessons from modern science to propose new solutions. As I come across examples of this, I'll present them here. I'll also comment on issues from time to time, drawing on what I call "eight facets of the quantum world." You can get a rundown on those facets, as well as my general ideas on this subject, at my web site "Quantum Age."

Meanwhile, I welcome any leads on other cases where someone has used ideas from modern science to develop a new approach to a seemingly intractable problem. And I hope you'll join me as we strive to achieve "quantum sense."

Thanks for stopping by!