“Woman’s Consciousness” as an Antidote to the AI-Linked Transhumanism Movement ()
1. Introduction
This article supposes that there are different ways and methods of knowing about reality, which can or need not point to the mystery (however we wish to name it) behind existence; the main being philosophy, science, and inner exploration (contemplative meditation). However, this author contests that there is another much older way of knowing about reality, which she refers to as “Woman’s consciousness”. During the Paleolithic age, Lindhard (2021) argues some women would have used inductive reasoning based on observance of correspondence between events in their bodies and occurrences of a cosmic nature and used representative images as a didactic tool to ground and communicate their insights about the nature of reality (Lindhard, 2021) . Here, I expand on the nature of women’s consciousness, and, as background material, I provide more information about the other methods of knowing about the world. Finally, I suggest that woman’s consciousness is a possible antidote to the AI-linked Transhumanism Movement as it grounds us in nature of which we are a part, thus offering an alternative to the view that we must dominate nature and embrace self-directed human evolution using technology to transcend their current natural state and limitations, i.e., disease, ageing, fertility problems and even death.
2. Background
Humans (and maybe to a certain extent animals) have a thinking mind, which Western man has developed into an intellectual mind through educational training (Arka, 2013) . He has predominately contemplated reality through this faculty and can be considered the ground from which Western philosophy has arisen. Descartes, for example, sought to answer these philosophical questions: “How does the human mind acquire knowledge? What is the mark of truth? What is the actual nature of reality? How are our experiences related to our bodies and brains? Is there a benevolent God, and if so, how can we reconcile his existence with the facts of illness, error, and immoral actions?” (Hatfield, 2014, Sect. 3A)
To a large extent, the approach adopted by Western philosophers (but not necessarily originally) is through contemplation of ideas already held by others, especially earlier philosophers of the Greek tradition and then building on or contradicting their standpoint. Due to this shaky basis, Descartes was inspired “to reform all knowledge, starting with philosophy as it was from this all sciences were derived” (Hatfield, 2014, Sect. 1.2. para. 3) .
Scientific inquiry grew out of this philosophical endeavour, and it too is concerned with wanting to know the nature of reality and its different laws. Science developed set methods as a way of testing hypotheses which lead to a certain level of predictability but not necessarily to the “truth”. In a way, science proceeds in the same way as philosophy but through hypotheses that lead to testing; with the results either building on or contradicting prior research. Sometimes there is a paradigm shift (Kuhn, 1962) ; a novel theory leads scientists in a new direction based on a better or new explanatory way of considering the topic under investigation with the hypothesis giving rise to a new round of extensive testing by scientists.
Although many disciplines still hold the Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm of mechanistic science that stripped the original view of Newton and Darwin of their belief in divine intelligence underpinning all of creation and replaced it with one of radical philosophical materialism (Grof, 1985) , quantum-relativistic physics has transcended the concept of solid, indestructible matter and separate objects, and shows “the universe as a complex web of events and relations” where everything in the cosmos is derived from pure consciousness, which represents the supreme principle of existence and the ultimate reality (Grof, 1985: pp. 21-22) .
In her thesis, Lindhard (2016) suggests scientific inquiry is not so different from spirituality in that both want to know the nature of life or reality, and they both pose similar questions to that of Descartes. Nevertheless, the way they go about it is traditionally very different. Western scientists study the nature of the outside world using their senses or extensions of them and by applying specific methods, whereas the inner scientists of India, who later became known as yogis, philosophers, seers, and rishis, turned their attention inward to study, explore, and discover the nature of their inner Self, based on the premise that if they came to know their own nature, they would know the nature of the universe (Arka, 2003, 2013) . For Arka (2013: p. 29) , the term meditation entails “serious self-pondering [which involves] the process of making profound inquiry into the depth of the soul about… [our] existence or how the Universe was created or the laws that governed living and non-living matter”. By going below “thinking mind consciousness”, the yogi or “inner scientist” connects with the intelligence below their intellectual mind to get guidance regarding their area of enquiry. This level of consciousness is feeling-based and gives rise to intuition (Arka, 2013) . Like science, it is also “research-based,” but gives rise to intuitive insights on any topic that interests the practitioner, including our nature and the nature of life and reality. The practioner can also go above their thinking mind, but this method of meditation is slightly more complicated (Arka, 2013) .
The questions posed by the Western philosopher, the scientist and the Eastern inner scientist are similar or at least overlap, but the methods for obtaining information in these three cases are different.
Western Philosophy and science have traditionally been male-dominated affairs, and many women scientists work within the paradigms set by male scientists (Manassero Mas & Vázquez, 2003a; 2003b; López-Navajas, 2014; Solsona, 2015) . Although women are making inroads, “men continue to obtain a higher proportion of undergraduate and graduate degrees in the physical sciences, mathematics, computer science, and engineering than women do” (U.S National Center for Education Statistics 2010 in Carli et al., 2016 ) and women remain underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) occupations (Carli et al., 2016) .
3. Woman’s Consciousness
Being born into a female body, I have long realized that we women have another way of obtaining information about the nature of reality, which is related to our way of being in the world connected to the “workings” of our body. However, it was only while researching into the artwork of Paleolithic women and ancient symbolism that I comprehended women’s traditional way of understanding reality comes from an entirely different epistemological perspective to those mentioned previously (Lindhard, 2022a) .
Through our bodies, women become aware there is a correspondence between happenings in them and events of a cosmic nature; an insight that gives rise to a unique way of “knowing about” reality. Before people used electric light at night, “women temporarily synchronize(d) their menstrual cycles with the luminance and gravimetric cycles of the Moon” (Helfrich-Förster et al., 2021) , which gives her a direct experience of a cosmic relationship between what is happening in her body and the cycles of the moon. Notwithstanding, the title of Helfrich-Förster et al.’s paper gives the wrong impression because women are not the doers! Forces in nature enable this synchronization, and she is aware of these forces acting through her.
In a study done in 1980 on female university students, the reproductive biologist Winnifred B. Cutler (1980) found a locking between the menstrual cycle and the moon. She found that women whose “menstrual cycle duration approaches the cycle duration of the earth’s moon (29.5 days), tend(ed) to ovulate in the dark phase of the lunar period” (Introduction, para 1). She posits that “a natural rhythm of electromagnetic radiation has its origin in the lunar cycle and may be reflected in phase-locking of the human menstrual cycle” (abstract).
But it seems there are various menstrual patterns as many women ovulate at the full moon and menstruate two weeks later with the new moon: a pattern known as the white moon; a cycle that mirrors the traditional cycle of the moon and Mother Earth. As the earth’s most fertile time coincides with the full moon, the energies of a woman who coincides with this cycle, are aligned and magnified and she is said to be in the Mother phase of her life. Here, Mother also refers to nurturing others, including the men and children in their life, an outward-going energetic position much favoured in patriarchal societies (Jay, n.d.) .
The reverse pattern where women menstruate with the full moon and become fertile with the new moon is known as the red moon (Grey, 2009) . These women focused their energies inward, and, in olden times, they became priestesses, healers, witches, and medicine women.
Many women will experience these different possibilities depending on the life phases they are experiencing; there are also variations to these two major cycles, known as the rose and purple moon, involving transitions, but in different directions (Jay, n.d.) . The menstrual cycle, also traditionally known as the “moon cycle”, is the most basic, earthy cycle we women experience through mirroring in our bodies the macrocosmic cycles of nature manifesting in the waxing and waning, the ebb and flow of the tides and the changes of the seasons. Many cultures viewed the menstrual cycle as sacred (Northrup, n.d. para. 1) where blood was considered the connection to the archetypal feminine.
According to Rose (2009) , the lunar cycle directly impacts our emotions and “energizes the collective unconscious.” Although the moon does not cause the waves on Earth’s oceans, it causes tides and thus indirectly affects waves, which are caused by wind (air friction on the surface of the water). The effect of tides rising is also dependent on location as the depth of water alters as it moves over a different ocean floor (Owen, n.d.) . Though the connection between the moon cycles and humans, particularly women, has not attracted the attention it deserves from scientists, Hartman (1966) has shown there is a connection between the flow of fluids (ocean tides as well as individual body fluids) which affects the unconscious mind and dreams.
The moon cycle impacts every aspect of a woman’s life, including her sexuality and fertility. “Women have been looking to the sky for cues about their fertility for hundreds of thousands of years, and it’s even believed that the first calendars were created as a result of charting ovulation and menstruation” (Yogimani, n.d. para 2) . The moon affects women emotionally, mentally and physically and on a more psychic level, it affects their creativity. “The menstrual cycle governs the flow not only of fluids but of information and creativity. We receive and process information differently at different times in our cycles” (Northrup, n.d, Menstrual Cycle: Wisdom and Creative Flow, para 1) .
But beyond our bodily connection with cyclical lunar time, women often tap into a greater experimental way of knowing about reality when they are pregnant; a stance I suggest in my paper on Paleolithic Women’s Spirituality and its Relevance to us Today (Lindhard, 2021) . When pregnant, a woman does not say or feel she is making a baby, or even that the person who impregnated her is making the baby; she is fully aware of a force operating through her body that moves and even repositions bones. It is completely independent of her will or desires. It runs the show… This can be frightening for the first-time mother unless supported by others who have gone through the experience. This force, or living mystery, is alive and active in her in an embodied way; this becomes obvious to her during pregnancy. Some traditions call this energy Shakti; others the Holy Spirit. Some people might argue that a fetus is produced when sperm enters the egg at conception, but we must remember that sperm was first observed through the microscope in 1677, the ovum in 1827, and it was only in 1843 that Martin Berry discovered the process of conception involving the sperm entering the ovum ( CBC News, 2007 in Lindhard, 2021 ). Before this, speculation into the nature of pregnancy was most likely in mystical terms, and maybe we are the losers for having a scientific explanation that removes us from a mystery at the heart of all creation. Without a greater intelligence operating, fertilization of the ovum will not proceed. Both the ovum and the sperm must be living cells, and as life is a property of the soul or Spirit, creation can’t take place without it, even though modern-day man can manipulate genetic programs and undertake both IUI (Intrauterine insemination) and IVF (In-Vitro Fertilization). Although these techniques have helped many women conceive, this author feels we need to question their ethics, especially women who start specifying their desires like blue eyes and the sex of their future child. Are these procedures, in reality, bringing us closer to the happiness most people desire or a deeper understanding of reality?
3.1. Are We Here to Dominate Nature, or Work in Harmony with “Her”?
The transhumanism movement rests on the premise that humans should embrace self-directed human evolution using technology to transcend their current natural state and limitations, i.e. disease, ageing, fertility problems and even death. People promoting this agenda feel that the NBI technologies-nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology and cognitive science are the tools that can enable humans to enjoy greater “morphological freedom”—in other words, people may take on new forms through prosthetics or genetic engineering, select their sexuality, or advance their cognitive capacities, and I have heard, even replace women’s role as biological mothers through artificial wombs. It is further speculated that brain-computer interfaces could link humans to advanced artificial intelligence (AI) (Thomas, 2017) . This “sales talk” captivates some, but to understand the motivations behind transhumanism, we need to go into the history of the concept.
3.2. History of Transhumanism
Transhumanism was a concept coined by Julian Huxley, an evolutionary Biologist and an active member of the British Eugenics Society being its President from 1959 to 1962. He was the first director of UNESCO 1946-1948; his term was cut short, probably based on his left-wing tendencies and “humanism”, which for him involved restraining population growth through birth control which, at the time, was an anathema to both the Catholic Church and the Comintern/Cominform. Huxley (J) was a signatory to the Humanist Manifesto II, which one needs to read carefully to understand its full significance. People were encouraged to sign even if they did not agree with all the clauses, and, as some of the clauses are acceptable to most people, a manifesto has slipped through even though the other clauses are not generally supported. It, for example, absolutely rejects theism, deism and belief in any afterlife. One of the oft-quoted lines from this manifesto is, “No deity will save us; we must save ourselves,” which also sounds reasonable; even on a spiritual path the person has to actively transform their habits and ways of being so they can discover their true Self, but this is not what the signatures were referring to but self-directed human evolution using technology to transcend their current natural state and limitations.
Another aspect which most people would agree with is the political stand of opposing racism, weapons of mass destruction, supporting human rights and a proposition on an international court. Where things get sticky is the right to unrestricted contraception, abortion, divorce and death with dignity e.g. euthanasia and suicide. One thing is the right to choose, and another is the pushing of, for example, contraception pills on women who have not solicited them. The Gates Foundation has provided funding for contraceptive use by 120 million women worldwide, particularly in developing countries, that was not even solicited or even wanted by many women. Together with the Rockefellers, and the Rothschilds, the Gates are dynastic bloodlines that have supported a similar worldview over several generations. The Rockefellers and Gates families have been involved in population control schemes mainly through their tax-exempt Foundations, which, on the outside, appear to be philanthropic (Lindhard & Ramirez, 2022) . In its early days, Gates Senior served on the board of Planned Parenthood which grew out of the American Eugenics Society and served as “a blueprint for a new era of philanthropy activities that remain to this day” (Spencer, 2022, 4.2. para 1) . This organization wanted to install “a genetic hierarchy laws to ‘preserve’ humanity and who sought to ‘beautify’ countries by stopping the ‘unfit’ from reproducing”. The Rockefeller Foundation has been concerned with the population and food policies of the US government since the early 1970s. In 2010, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation revealed its not-so-innocuous interest in eradicating disease and feeding the world’s poor, when it bought up half a million shares in Monsanto, valued at more than $23 mil. Monsanto is known for its development and patenting of Roundup, a broad-spectrum glyphosate-based herbicide and the production of genetically engineered seeds tolerant to glyphosate. The International Agency for Research on Cancer, a unit of the World Health Organization, classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen in 2015 (Cressey, 2015) . The WHO, the United Nations and other globalist organizations are controlled by the World Economic Forum, which influences world leaders in politics, finance, business, governments, and healthcare and is now one of the leading entities behind total control of the world. It gathers thousands of billionaires and millionaires under its wings and convinces them to go along with its agenda (Sorenson, 2022) . Exactly how this forum is linked to the richest dynasties is beyond the scope of this paper, as is their hand in the transhumanism movement (Lindhard, 2023) .
But despite saying this, we must understand eugenics is a reality and as Black (2003/2012) points out in his book War against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race “hundreds of thousands of Americans and an untold number of others were not permitted to continue their families by reproducing. Selected because of their ancestry, national origin, race or religion, they were forcibly sterilized, wrongly committed to mental institutions where they died in great numbers… In America, this battle was fought not by armies with guns nor by hate sects at the margins. Rather, this pernicious, white-gloved war was prosecuted by esteemed professors, elite universities, wealthy industrialists, and government officials colluding in a racist, pseudoscientific movement called eugenics. The purpose: create a superior Nordic race”. Their ideas, concocted on Long Island at the Carnegie Institution’s eugenic enterprise at Cold Spring Harbor (Black, 2003/2012, p.iv) , were practised in America before the Holocaust and World War II. After a bad name was given to the eugenics movement after being “perfected” by Hitler who outdid the American movement in velocity and ferocity, the “remnant eugenics movement reinvented itself and helped establish the modern, enlightened human genetic revolution” (Black, 2003/2012, p. xvii) . According to Black, this movement could not be sustained without the big “corporate philanthropic largess” (p. xvii) and the names of the eugenic institutions in America were changed “from eugenics to genetics” (p. xvii).
Bearing this in mind, can we expect the AI-linked transhumanism movement with its link to eugenics to benefit all human beings or are more sinister objectives part of its objectives? If it is, how can we get out of this postmodern transhumanism movement aimed at destroying humanity as we know it? Before attempting to answer this question, let us look more fully into the consciousness of prehistorical women.
4. Paleolithic Women and Their Society
Based on the stencilled handprints found in many of the caves in Spain, and the discovery that in women, the 2nd and 4th fingers are the same length, Prof Dean Snow (2006) has determined that 75 per cent of upper Paleolithic artists were women. In talking about the rupestrian art of Africa, Davis (1984) suggests rock art functions as “a medium of communication in three principal contexts: an extended network of ritual acts and beliefs, to out-of-the-ordinary perception and knowledge, and to adaptively significant local information” (abstract). If we think of their drawings as hieroglyphics, using the etymological origin of this term meaning “sacred carving” (Brunner & Dorman, 2022) , we also can consider their art, or at least some of it, as attempts of these ancient women to “translate their own inner experiences and insights cataphatically, and thereby reconcile the tension between the image-less I experience of ineffable transcendence using didactic expression grounded in images” (Lindhard, 2021, abstract) . In the 16th Century, the Spanish mystic Santa Teresa used this method to describe the mystery which for her was not an abstract mystery but one that needs to be related to personally as it is alive and vibrates through us animating every cell in our body. For her, we are an embodiment of this living mystery (Tsoukatos 2011) . She did not arrive at this insight through pregnancy but through mental prayer, and she expressed this insight through images that were meaningful to the people of her time. I contend that the women artists in the Paleolithic era did the same, and their artwork can be regarded as pointers to this “entity” or mystery, which is both immanent in creation and, at the same time, is beyond duality and all definitions (Lindhard, 2021, abstract) .
The societies in which Santa Teresa and Paleolithic women lived were vastly different. Spain, in the early part of the sixteenth Century, was patriarchal and Santa Teresa spoke of the mystery as God or father, which was normal for that society at that time. On the other hand, the social structure in Paleolithic times was matrilineal, i.e. the ancestral lineage is through the woman and matrifocused or matricentered where the society is organized around the mother. Ninety per cent of the early culture of our species was matristic and it was a period when we were still deeply connected with nature. These hunter-gatherers lived in small autonomous clans of about 25 - 30 members. This period predates written laws and is prehistorical in the sense there is no written history. According to Garcia Ledger (2017) , it is the maternal basis of matristic societies that provides the genesis of human culture (Garcia Ledger, 2017) . As there was no agriculture, having children was not tied to food production; these early women were hunter-gathers. Birthing and bringing up children was, therefore, an act of generosity that sought no gain for the self. Conditions at that time in Europe were also harsh as they were coming out of the ice age. For Bachofen (in Garcia Ledger 2017) , it is the magic of maternity and a woman’s caring nature that the principle of “divine love, unity and peace manifests (itself)” and it is a woman before a man, who develops her capacity to love beyond the limits of her being. This caring nature is also found in other animals, such as the lioness, but it is only humans who have developed a culture around it. In matrilineal Paleolithic society, no gender role was tied to fertilization. Sex was spontaneous and termed promiscuous; it was the mother’s brother who helped rear her children. There was also “little structural inequity between the sexes, for reasons including significant levels of female participation in subsistence production (the capacity to both generate and distribute resources), minimal public/private separation, and the relative rareness of war” (Nicolson, 2008: p. 43) . It is more than probable that women talked of this mystery as Mother, Great Mother or Universal Mother, but let’s look at what their art can tell us.
4.1. The Art of Paleolithic Women
Whether one contemplates the alternating cyclical pattern of nature or the force that one experiences in one’s body especially when pregnant, one realizes there is something invisible behind visible nature. “We may consider this the spiritual, or non-visible dimension. Just like today, we have no way of fully portraying this spiritual dimension that is giving rise to or ‘birthing’ all of visible nature.” (Lindhard, 2021) However, it seems these preliterate women found a way through comparison with their bodies; for them, the vulva or vaginal opening was the gateway to the mystery, or “origin of life” (Garcia Ledger, 2017: p. 48) . These ancient women did not highlight the sexual dimension linked to the vulva; rather their art portrays the link between the vulva and the uterus, the cave, darkness, the womb, and giving rise to new life or birthing. (For a fuller account see my 2021 paper and Garcia Leger’, 2017 ). In many of the caves, which are themselves a symbol, we find the symbol V or V with a line through it. Gimbutas (2001) and Garcia Leger (2017) suggest his hieroglyphic is related to the shape of a woman’s pubic area as a V or a V with a line through it that probably represents the creases formed by her legs and the opening to the womb or the “dark cave”. Gimbutas (2001) based on her extensive study of Old Europe, feels this sign represents the feminine as Mother Goddess; however, I, like Garcia Leger (2017) feel that in Paleolithic times women were not thought of as a god, an idol, nor a queen, nor the mother of a god (p. 40). As I point out in my 2021 paper, I feel that “their capacity to give birth helped them draw a parallel or analogy between themselves and the creative power behind the manifest Universe, which would also have been perceived as Mother. For them, the ineffable was not an abstract ground of being, but an entity that could create and give birth to a natural world that was dualistic or polar but was also manifesting through them and all creation. This relationship to the mystery as Mother seems to be at the heart of their spirituality. Embodied spirituality comes naturally to women, as demonstrated by Santa Teresa many thousands of years later, even though she related to the mystery as God” (Lindhard, 2021, abstract) .
4.2. The Three Forces in Nature
From this perspective presented, we can consider Paleolithic women’s artwork as a pointer to this ‘entity,’ or mystery that is both imminent in creation and, at the same time, is beyond duality and all definitions. However, certain funeral rites suggest that they might have expanded the creative aspect of the Great, Cosmic or Universal Mother to include the destructive aspects of nature represented by death as a necessary part of rebirth. In addition, by working backwards from what is known about Celtic tradition, it is possible that even in Paleolithic times they also celebrated the 4 minor and 4 major festivals, with the 4 minor festivals falling on the equinoxes and the summer and winter solstice and the mayor festivals 40 days later (Garcia Ledger, 2017) . This would mean that possible they also honoured the maintaining or ordering aspect of nature or the Great Mother.
In India, the three aspects of Brahman, perceived as eternal, conscious, irreducible, infinite, omnipresent, and the spiritual core of the universe of finiteness and change, are known as Brahma Vishnu and Shiva, the creative, the maintaining and the destructive forces in Nature. Equally, in biology anabolism, metabolism and catabolism are recognized as the forces or principles which keep a living body in continuous flux (Bhakti Niskama Shama, 2015: e1085138-8) .
4.3. The Goose as the Female Totem
But the parallels between the understanding of Paleolithic women and Indian metaphysics and other societies do not stop here. Through association with the vulva, the goose’s capacity to produce eggs, its ability to travel by water, land and air as well as its’ distinctive V-shaped footprint with a line in the middle, probably made it the totem or emblematic animal not only Paleolithic women from Spain but possibly a candidate for the creative force behind the manifest world (Garcia Ledger, unpublished private talk).
4.4. Parallels in Other Cultures
In the pre-Sumerian relief known as “Queen of the Night” (Mesopotamia 3500BC) the pubic area (V) is clearly visible and her feet are that of a goose. The other symbols are also associated with the night (owls) and she is standing on the back of a lioness (caring).
In India Aditi was the original celestial mother of every existing form and being, making her the female form of Brahma. Aditi is a somewhat forgotten ‘goddess’ in the Indian Parthenon and is referred to as the mother of many gods or forces.
She is seen as boundless or innocent and is the goddess of the earth and sky, the future and fertility. She is also seen as the celestial mother of every existing form and being, making her the female form of Brahma (The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica n.d.) . She is depicted without a head, but her vulva as a representation of her reproductive capacity is visible, and she is in a traditional birthing position. The interesting thing is the goose, and the swan is grouped in the same subfamily Anserinae, where the swan forms the tribe Cygnini. In India Brahma, the creating aspect of the trinity is riding on a hamsa which can be translated as a swan or goose, implying Brahma has a female root. The vehicle of Gayatri, Sarasvarti and Vishvakarma is also the goose or swan (Cush, 2008) . Interestingly, in Indian iconography, the symbol for Brahman, the absolute spiritual core of the universe of finiteness and change, the transcendent/Atman (individual soul or Self), is also the hamsa or swan. In Indian mythology, a hamsa is said to have discriminate powers, it eats pearls and can separate milk from water (Myers, 1999) , a much-needed ability for anyone who wants to be liberated from samsara and obtain moksha (freedom).
4.5. Our Connection to Invisible Nature
In summary, Paleolithic women’s art tells a story… it communicates with us even today, reminding us of our connection to the invisible nature or the mystery. It is a nature-based perspective not arising through questioning but through experiencing the correspondence between the living female body and its cyclical nature and natural cosmic cycles. Its imagery talks more than a thousand words, and it leads us to contemplate how this perspective can help us find our way again so we can once again live in harmony with nature of which we are a part.
4.6. What Inspiration Can We Receive from the Consciousness of Paleolithic Women?
First and foremost, it seems they had spiritual inclinations which included understanding how the mystery behind creation functions and expresses itself through creation in a cyclical way. The recognition of this cosmic principle probably led to a deep respect for all living creatures and the earth which would also have been seen as “mother”.
Contrary to what some sociologists claim the public sphere was not gender-based as thought by “nineteenth and twentieth-century social theorists such as Spencer, Durkheim, Tonnies, Simmel, and Weber, who assumed that public sphere production was a male (and male-only) affair since the beginning of time” (see: Chafetz 2006, McPhillips 1995, Sydie 1987 in Nicholson, 2008: p. 75) . Also, women were never stay-at-home mums; being hunter-gathers they had no home. This questions the historical narrative of Wilber (1995; 1996; 1998), who, influenced by Habermas, starts with a gender system in place from the outset separating the social labourer (male) from the domestic nurturer (female). It is also probable that these ancient women were most likely early “tool makers” as the division of labour was not strict and they would have needed to fashion natural objects to help them excavate roots. They were also “chemists” The dominant two colours used in their paintings are red (which tends to be iron oxide: natural hematite or heated goethite) and black (charcoal or manganese oxides). And as artists, they were communicators (Lindhard, 2022b) .
They also had their children out of love, not for any financial gain. They elevated their female caring nature into the basis of culture as we know it. A quality also found in pre-Neanderthal humans as revealed by the touching story of “Benjamina” (Sanchez Romero, 2020) whose fossil remains (minimum date about 530,000 years ago) found in Burgos Spain indicate that the whole tribe would have needed to look after her due to her severe motor incapacity (Garcia et al., 2010, abstract) .
It is also likely they were the inventors of an early calendar system based on the link between their menstruating bodies and the moon cycles. This realization of this repeatable cosmic principle expressing itself throughout all of nature, gives rise to an embodied spirituality; not an abstract way of conceiving the fundamental nature of the universe. Intelligence, according to Perry Marshal (2022) is the ability to form beliefs about the outside world. Women take inductive reasoning to a new height as their insights are based on observance of correspondence between events in their bodies and events of a cosmic nature where the microcosm can be seen as reflecting the macrocosm.
5. Closing Remarks
Women cannot deny the connection between themselves and nature; it is a lived reality. Once we recognize this consciously, we can tune into nature and learn to live in harmony with her once again. Regaining the vision of Paleolithic woman who upholds that everything is interconnected, a view now also endorsed by quantum-relativistic physics can take us a long way in creating a new way forward for all humanity and all living beings. This understanding also involves stepping into our role as guardians of life and becoming “fierce mothers” to protect life, not as bullies but as people who deeply care about the nature of which humanity including the young, the old, and the infirm, are a part. Once we women assume our role, men too will more easily be able to assume their role as supporting partners who also protect life and all of nature. The fear that there is not enough for all of us is based on a lack of trust in Nature and her bountiful nature. It is based on the perceived need to control nature and not the deep wisdom we acquire when we listen to her wisdom and learn to live in harmony with her. Modern society is crumbling, we have destroyed so many species, polluted forests, seas and even the skies, and some are attempting to play God by deciding who should live and who should die or reproduce. It is time we say enough of this inhuman way of living and together look for a new way forward based on respect for all beings; the direct involvement of women who care is vital for the next evolutionary stage of our development on this planet.
Acknowledgements
My heartfelt thanks go to DoñaMarianna Garcia Legar who opened my eyes to the spiritual root of the Spanish people. Spain has been my adoptive home for many years.