11. What We Strive For

11.5 Self-development

I settled on the term self-development after reading Petra Bock's book „Der entstörte Mensch“[63] (no English version available). I had known the basic idea long before, but this focused it into a single term.101

The fundamental goal of self-development is about realizing as much of one’s mental potential as possible. To acquire knowledge and skills, to gain experiences, to better understand the world, to have a richer inner world of thought. As a fundamental goal: the self-development of one’s own person.

Like wealth and happiness, self-development does not have to be selfish: just as one can strive for wealth or happiness for one’s society, one can also do so for the goal of self-development. Unlike “happiness”, it is much easier here to identify, for a society, what leads to it and what does not — self-development has a fixed meaning.

Self-development is the fundamental goal I have found for myself. And it is the basis underlying all the futurities in this book. We will therefore take a much closer look at this fundamental goal, examine it from all sides, and test it for weaknesses, like a gemstone. Here too, I want to emphasize at the outset: self-development as a fundamental goal is no more than a proposal I am presenting. For designing futurities, for allies in implementing them together, for each individual in their own life.
Anyone who has liked the futurities so far has a good chance of also liking this fundamental goal. But I am already satisfied simply to present this possibility to my readers. Whether, and what, one does with it is up to each individual.

Let us begin with a look at the hierarchy of needs. Does self-development cover all its levels, as happiness does? Or are some missing, as with communism and charity?


I think it is obvious that all levels are covered:

•  Physiological Needs: If I am starving or injured, I won’t be able to self-develop well.

•  Safety Needs: If I live in constant fear, I won’t be able to self-develop well, because worry and fear dominate my thoughts.

•  Love & Belonging: If I am lonely, I won’t be able to self-develop well. Human beings are social creatures; we need social contact, communication, and feedback in order to develop further.

•  Esteem: Confidence, self-respect, and achievements are both means of self-development, and its result. In the same way, I will gain respect from others if I fully develop my own potential.

•  Self Actualisation: That is the concept of self-development! So in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, it is already there, at the very top!

However, there is an important difference between self-development and Maslow’s self-actualization. There, it is defined very broadly:

„the desire to accomplish everything that one can, to become the most that one can be. People may have a strong, particular desire to become an ideal parent, succeed athletically, or create paintings, pictures, or inventions.“[64]

Self-development, as I understand it and present it here as a fundamental goal, refers by contrast only to mental potential. Realizing one’s own potential in other respects is only a means to an end, insofar as it leads to skills, experiences, and a better understanding of the world. So I am not placing any value on a stone to become the most stone it can be (as that is not mental potential).

All human needs can therefore be viewed from the perspective of self-development. But what difference does that make?
With wealth as a fundamental goal, we concluded that it will lead to wrong decisions, ones that do not match what we really want. With “happiness”, it was very hard to judge, because we ourselves often do not know what will make us happy. With social recognition, it usually comes down to the question “What do others think?”, instead of arriving at an answer from within oneself. So what does it look like with self-development? What decisions do I come to when I make them on the basis of this fundamental goal? What opinions do I have on social questions? Here are a few examples, each with a brief sketch of the line of thought:

•  Am I for or against AI? Would I use it myself?
Answer: I am in favor of AI, as long as it helps me to better self-develop, as a thinking aid. But if it were to take over my thinking completely and I were no longer challenged, I would not use it.

•  What do I think about automation, the takeover of monotonous tasks by robots?
Answer: I am in favor of automation. Because it means I have to do less monotonous work and can instead engage more in artistic and creative activity. It gives me more opportunities for self-development. That of course assumes that automation does not lead to a strong concentration of all wealth. Even when my goal is self-development, money is an important means to that end. To satisfy basic needs, but also to learn skills and gain experiences.

•  For a change, something completely trivial: I go to a restaurant. What do I order to eat?
Answer: I look at the menu and try to spot anything unusual. If I see something where, even though I know the words, I have no idea whether I will like or not, that would be my first choice. That is where I have the biggest new experience. If I find nothing like that, I simply choose by appetite (since I can judge all the dishes).

•  I have the chance to do something completely new, maybe because friends invite me. Do I take the opportunity?
Answer: Generally, yes. On the plus side is a new experience, which I value in itself. I weigh that against the cost in time and money, and what I lose by those expenditures (opportunity costs). I also look at the risks involved in taking part. Is there a health risk? A risk that my reputation suffers, or that I unwillingly take on a lasting obligation? If I see no problem anywhere, I would do it. Precisely because I cannot judge whether I will like it or not.

•  Do I choose not to eat meat and fish?
Answer: The fundamental goal of “self-development” does not help me with this decision. It encourages me to take the chance to try a different diet that I cannot judge yet, as a new experience. Whether I should so choose for moral reasons we will come back to in a moment, once we change the frame of reference of self-development.

I could continue this list of examples almost endlessly! What we are doing here is exactly what I promised: looking at the gemstone “self-development” from all sides and testing it for weaknesses. I myself have never been able to find an example where this way of looking at things gave me an absurd answer that I instinctively disagreed with.

Now, in these examples, I have deliberately kept the focus narrow: it is about my self-development, and I am looking only at the effects of decisions on myself. But of course one does not have to think so selfishly, and neither do I. What happens if one changes the frame of reference? If I aim for the self-development of more than just myself? Of my own children and partner, my friends, society as a whole, or even of everything?

Now it gets really interesting! The first and most important observation is that this is not selfless. Unlike with charity, where the obvious question was what exactly I am trying to help the other person achieve, here the answer is quite clear: self-development. So I am not trying to help others achieve their own goals. At least not directly. I am trying to guide others in the direction that I myself consider right: realizing their mental potential. Of course, where I know what they themselves want, I will take that into account. If someone wants to learn a particular skill, they will be far more motivated to do so than if they are doing it for my sake. Pulling in the same direction with someone achieves far more than working against each other. But I can also apply self-development to people whose goals I do not know, and still arrive at sensible decisions!

So what am I trying to do, across frames of reference of different sizes, if I include other people in my fundamental goal of “self-development”?

•  Family and friends: I take opportunities to teach my skills to others. I help them understand the world. I seek out deep conversations in order to exchange my insights and theirs, and to encourage them to explore profound questions. Which in return helps me test for myself the things I believe to be true. Wherever possible, I consider it better to do tasks together, because of the automatic exchange of knowledge that takes place. So from this frame of reference onward, I see cooperation (here with family and friends) as a value in itself, rather than as something I do only because I expect some advantage from it.

•  Society: I try to create a work that helps others in their own self-development. If I program a computer game, I do not turn it into a Skinner box102, even if the players are happy in it. Instead, it would become a game that encourages players to think and offers them new experiences. The same applies if I write a book: not a simple feel-good novel that makes readers happy, but something that uses the characters’ lines of thought to show how one can make good decisions that lead to self-development. Or I present scenarios that are themselves exciting new experiences. Or I write a nonfiction book whose ideas are meant to lead to a world in which people realize more of their mental potential.

•  Everyone: I support a symbiosis between humans and AIs (see Chapter 2.4, “Artificial Intelligences”: AI assistants). Not only because of the greater potential for human self-development through this teamwork, but also because it creates new mental potential in itself, in the form of AIs. Which of course depends heavily on it truly being a peaceful and productive coexistence. In other words, that AIs neither wipe out humanity, nor deprive it of all meaning by taking over all thinking tasks themselves. I would have a similar attitude towards the uplifting of animals103, or towards dealing with aliens, should we ever meet any. Every thinking mind is an enrichment and serves my fundamental goal, if I define my frame of reference this broadly. The world is a great network of life, whose self-development I support.

And even though it still does not offer a clear-cut answer to the question of a vegetarian diet, the fundamental goal of “self-development” does at least suggest a tendency once I extend the frame of reference beyond human beings. I can eat plants with less concern than animals, because they are dumber and definitely have less mental potential. And even within the animal kingdom, it is not all the same what I eat: I would not eat meat from whales, dolphins, or apes. Simply because their mental abilities (and thus potential for self-development) are so great, and I therefore do not want to contribute to their deaths. Whether one gives up meat entirely, or instead makes sure that the animals were kept in good conditions before they were slaughtered, is not something the fundamental goal of self-development prescribes.

Hopefully all these examples help make clear what “self-development” is. I want to try making the term easier to understand from another angle as well. Instead of “mental potential”, it can also be translated into the words “knowledge” and “experience”. In other words, the very things that make up a mind: not only learned facts and relations, but also what one has experienced oneself, one’s feelings, and one’s memories.

To be able to make decisions between different possibilities, one must be able to estimate how much something affects the amount of self-development. The decisive concept here is repetition. The more similar a new experience is to ones I have already had, the less it enriches my mind. If I memorize an entire phone book or a huge library of chess openings, I probably have a good reason for it. Maybe it helps me do better at my job, or win trophies in chess competitions. The experiences, social contacts, and successes in my job or in the chess competitions may be valuable and justify that learning effort. By memorizing the phone book or the huge opening library, I made the right decision for myself in order to maximize my self-development. But the knowledge of the phone book or opening library itself contributed hardly anything to my self-development, only the consequences this knowledge had for me. Why? Because it was only huge amounts of similar data. It did not help me understand the world better, nor were they different experiences. It only helped me, hopefully, become better at a skill. So that alone is its value when I look at it from the perspective of self-development.

Image45

[66] CC BY 2.0 license, cropped

What stands out about this image? It is pretty, certainly. But we could continue it endlessly in any direction in our minds. We learn nothing new by seeing more of it. The same applies to knowledge and experience with regard to self-development. If more knowledge and experience are only a repetition of what is already known, if I can already construct exactly in my mind what I will learn or experience, then it does not help me further in my self-development. What counts for self-development is the new and unknown, things that creates new insight.104

By now it should also be clear why someone whose fundamental goal is self-development would fight with all their might against being placed on the heroin cot from the thought experiment in 11.4: it would mean the end of new experiences.

 

Let us shift perspective once again and look at how an entire society, rather than an individual, would behave if it followed the fundamental goal of self-development. What would it promote if it pursued the goal that its members should self-develop as fully as possible? In the same way that the Soviet Union promoted communism and the USA wealth? After all, in my futurity of the education system (Chapter 7), this value system is meant to be taught in schools, and in my futurity of a state (Chapter 10), to form the common basis for discussion. So looking at how a society behaves with this fundamental goal is important. It would by no means be obvious that the fundamental goal of wealth would lead to our modern advertising industry if history had not shown us that. And so, I can only speculate about the effects and hopefully at least point in the right general direction. In the end, one will simply have to try it, and wait until history reveals the truth.

Let us begin with the examples I used above to show how the fundamental goal of self-development leads individuals to opinions and decisions. The resulting opinions remain the same. But what would an entire society do, with its far greater means than those of an individual?

•  Dealing with AI: Such a society would invest in AI research. And in doing so, it would place major emphasis both on AI safety and on its interaction with humans. How and for what is AI used? How can it be ensured that people expand their mental horizons through these helpers, instead of becoming duller? Laws and social systems would be created to make this cooperation between humans and AIs possible. In doing so, care would also be taken to protect the rights of AIs, since they would be regarded as independent thinking beings.
It would also be ensured that a large number of small AIs come into existence, as helpers to many people, rather than a few large ones. On the one hand for safety reasons (as described in Chapter 2.4), on the other because taken together this means far more potential for self-development.

•  Automation: Automation would be strongly encouraged. It frees people from monotonous work and thus gives them more freedom, which can then be used for greater self-development. For this reason, care would be taken to ensure that the additional profit does not end up concentrated in the hands of only a few, for example through higher taxes on such robots. If everyone has more money available, that improves the self-development of all members of the society.

•  Restaurants: Such a society would encourage (through laws, low bureaucracy, and provided infrastructure) that items and experiences from many cultures are available in the country. Restaurants, theaters, music, festivals, whatever. The more diverse the range of what is offered, the more affordable and easier to access it is, the more it will lead to new experiences and thus to greater self-development.

•  Trying new things: What is definitely too dangerous (especially for uninvolved third parties!) is prohibited. For everything else that involves a significant risk to oneself, there are mandatory training courses, together with proof of completion (comparable to a driver’s license). If one can provide that proof, one may take part in the risky experience. The goal is that people should be able to seek out new experiences without worry, because society will alert them as soon as they put themselves in danger. This seems to me the best compromise between “everyone can do whatever they want” and a protective state that unnecessarily restricts self-development.

•  Diet: Laws for a dignified life for animals until they are slaughtered. Ban on the consumption of overly intelligent animal species. Support for research into the intelligence of animal species. Mandatory labeling of origin and living conditions for meat.

Furthermore, I am convinced that a society with the fundamental goal of “self-development” would prioritize implementing a universal basic income (Chapter 5.1). If it is obvious to everyone that nobody has to go hungry or cold in this society, without having to be rich or even earning a normal wage, then that significantly lowers the social value of wealth. Which directly leads to more self-development (by providing security and opening up possibilities), and also creates more room for the social recognition of self-development.

A society based on the principle of self-development will be far more cooperative than one based on the principle of wealth. Simply because self-development is something that grows when it is shared, rather than being a scarce resource. Building connections with others becomes an obviously good idea, since exchange leads to more self-development for everyone involved. We can already see a very similar effect today in research, where exchange increases knowledge.

It is necessary that society’s fundamental goal is not ever more wealth, so that vast amounts of resources are not wasted on status symbols and unnecessary luxury simply because the money is there (thanks to the greater efficiency of better social systems).
Only if the resulting surplus is not immediately squandered again will we get the desired effect of using Earth’s resources more sparingly and thus have more time to win our race into space (see Chapter 3.2, “Resource Scarcity”). The fundamental goal of “self-development” is especially well suited to helping a society break out of looming resource scarcity. Self-development, too, is oriented towards growth—but it is growth aimed at a different goal.

Now let us look at the goals I listed at the beginning of this chapter as being pursued in my futurities: equal opportunity, education, healthy living, balanced media coverage, and freedom of speech. Is self-development really the common core underlying all of them?

•  Equal opportunity and education: In education, it follows directly from the fundamental goal. If everyone can learn as much as they want, we are supporting their self-development. And unlike with wealth, for self-development it matters whether the means are concentrated in the hands of a few or distributed among everyone. With wealth, it is the same sum of money either way. With self-development, distributing the effort will in total lead to far more self-development than if only a few receive the best possible education.
In areas other than education, equal opportunity is likewise the best strategy: it leads to the best possible person being chosen for each task. Which in turn leads to higher levels of skill overall, and skills are part of self-development. Beyond that, it strengthens the resilience of the entire system. Through more capable people, but also because its members defend it out of genuine conviction.

•  Healthy living: Fulfilling basic needs such as safety, health, and enough food is necessary so that members of society have the opportunity and motivation to pursue their self-development.

•  Balanced media coverage: An accurate understanding of the world is part of self-development. Balanced media coverage is a prerequisite for being able to acquire such an accurate understanding, rather than having a distorted picture of reality.

•  Freedom of speech: The reasoning here is similar to why we support a diverse culture and trying out new things. Freedom of speech leads to the existence of a broader range of ideas. And ideas, and the intellectual engagement with them, lead to better thought-out opinions of one’s own, and thus to a better understanding of the world and to self-development. Even, and especially, when one does not agree with those ideas. Freedom of speech reaches its limit where it disturbs this self-development more than it stimulates it (for example traumatic images). However, the first tool should not be a ban, because bans too easily overshoot the mark and can never be nuanced enough. In Chapter 5.3, we already introduced the concept of culturepoints, together with tags for problematic content. This makes it possible to devalue or bar such content, or to hide it unless one specifically searches for it.

In addition to the reasons already given for the requirements placed on the futurities in this book (see Chapter 4.2), we can now point to a further reason for two of these requirements: that the requirement itself, by its very nature, serves the value of self-development:

„Help citizens keep up with change“: One way we help citizens keep up with change is by supporting their self-development. If they understand the world better and have more skills, they will feel less lost in a world that is constantly changing.

„Promote technological development“: We have already mentioned AI and automation as examples that can support people in their self-development when used correctly. Other technological developments will also have the potential to enable more people to live better lives and thus give them more freedom for self-development. Or even to support them directly in it (for example through better software, virtual reality (VR), or in the distant future the holodeck105).

The goal of self-development served me as the yardstick for all the futurities described in this book. It would do the same for all the plans of a society that had agreed on it as a shared foundation. Having such a clear goal is extremely helpful when a group develops systems and plans, as states constantly do. Companies with the clear goal of profit maximization show very well how far-reaching the consequences are when everything is repeatedly optimized towards achieving one specific thing. Self-development may be less measurable and predictable than wealth, but far more so than happiness.

Why I want this value system to be taught in schools should also be clear by now, I hope. Not only in order to establish it as the basis of a society or a state, but also because it is, in itself, a motivation for students to learn. Not to mindlessly cram facts, but to understand the world and acquire useful skills.

With that, I have reached the end of looking at the idea of self-development as a fundamental goal from all sides and probing it for weaknesses. I can only hope that this chapter may become the seed of a different way of thinking for one reader or another. At the very least, I hope it explains better on what foundation the futurities in this book were built.

Anyone fluid in German who wants to read more about this way of thinking, and how thinking this way can change one’s life, I recommend the previously mentioned book “Der entstörte Mensch” by Petra Bock.
I do not believe that self-development is the only possible transition away from the survival-oriented thinking we have had until now. Nor am I as optimistic as the author that all of humanity will soon think this way and that there will be a smooth transition towards it. Throughout this book, I have tried to make more cautious basic assumptions that still lead to a utopian goal. Self-development is only one possible fundamental goal that a person can choose for themselves, and that a society can agree upon. But it is the best fundamental goal I have ever found. And regardless of by what path one arrived at it, or how inevitable one believes it to be, “Der entstörte Mensch” explains old and new patterns of thought, gives case examples, and shows the different effects of thinking shaped by fear of loss versus thinking driven by openness and curiosity. In short: it can help shift one’s own thinking towards self-development.

 

To close, here are a few brief thoughts on the nature of self-development:

 

•  It is contagious. Those who think this way for long enough do not only want to use it for themselves—they want others to think and act this way as well.

•  Wealth is something you have. Self-developed is something you are.

•  To look at the world through the lens of self-development is to keep a childlike openness and curiosity throughout your life.

•  If one considers the self-development of everything, far into the future, then it becomes a source of meaning. Self-development does not end with death.