-Nature indeed abhors a vacuum. Thus, nothing exists in isolation – this concept is becoming more widely recognised due to findings in quantum physics and the notion of non-locality. Everything – it seems – is connected. Everything is in communion. This may be fine for those philosophically minded who recognise that consciousness can be ‘everywhere’: as Willis Harman said – ‘If consciousness is anywhere – it is everywhere’. Yet what if we push this idea towards terrestrial contexts: eg. Can human societies have non-local connection?

The answer due to modern technologies is – yes. Beginning with the Internet we are moving towards wireless connectivity: we can carry the World Wide Web around with us. Once we were only contactable – or found! – by mobile phone. Now we are contactable by video chat and by access to Net information wherever we may be. This leads us to ask – is human intelligence connected and what are the emergent properties of this? Will this lead to a collective global intelligence – or evolve into a collective consciousness? (see Peter Russell).

The question – when does non-local connectivity become conscious of itself? When does connectivity become intelligent? If information increasingly self-organises into greater arrangements of complexification – doesn’t this manifest an intelligence? And if so – what is the goal of such global connectivity in terms of species and social evolution? We are indeed at the edge of a significant leap in the human condition: the trouble is, if we don’t leap far enough, the abyss awaits below.