Summary
Neuroscience can help us to achieve peace in the world. Consider the neuroscience of empathy and compassion. Take time to practice and you will be able to develop empathy and compassion. Let’s work towards peace in the world in 2025.
Neuroscience and Peace in 2025
There is a neurobiological basis to achieving peace in our world. I ended my last post with a tall order for 2025: Peace in our world. Neuroscience and Peace in 2025 is the topic. So, let’s explore the neuroscientific basis of brokering peace in 2025.
Conflict Resolution Requires Neuroscience
Brokering peace requires the use of diplomatic skills with a special attention to understanding conflict. But, without an awareness of the neurobiology of human interactions and human reactions, we will not achieve peace if we only employ the skills of a bureaucrat engaging in “tasks” for conflict resolution. We must be knowledgeable in neuroscience and the application of the neuroscientific principles to engagement in conflict resolution.
Firstly, consider the brain. During a 2024 panel discussion hosted by the Berghof Foundation, Dr. Michael Niconchuk aptly emphasized the importance of the brain in context. The brain exists in the context of our bodies; in the context of the environment; in the context of politics and culture; in the context of life experiences; in the context of a culture’s experience; and in the context of the experience of ancestors and family members. The brain, which impacts how we experience the world by interpretation and by reaction, does not exist as a lone warrior of one person. The brain operates in the context of many variables.
Imagine a person who is suffering, a victim of circumstances. Imagine their descendants who must make peace with their past, their families’ past, and the current environment. How is this possible?
Empathy and Compassion: Tools for Peace
Empathy and compassion can be harnessed in the peace brokering process.
Compassion tendencies are linked to the extent to which a person with a history of trauma will develop of post-traumatic stress disorder.
Empathy allows us to negotiate our interactions with the world.
Empathy is deemed to be sharing the pain of another person which figures in the neurocircuitry associated with pain experience.
Compassion in the brain is linked to reward areas of the brain.
Both empathy and compassion allow us to engage in prosocial activities, which means exactly as it sounds. Prosocial actions are behaviours that help another person or a group of people.
Are you seeing how we can harness empathy and compassion to achieve peace in the world?
The Data: Brokering Peace
Research indicates that dangling a proverbial carrot is not a means to achieve peace. Basically, you cannot buy people into peace.
Data from brain scans of persons supports the qualitative data that waving a stick (threatening adverse outcomes) and dangling a carrot (offering foreign aid and other material benefits) do not succeed in motivating people to work towards peace.
But, leveraging the social links between people promotes peace building. Do not believe me; listen to the data presented by Dr. Nafees Hamid in the Berghof Foundation panel discussion cited below.
Developing Empathy and Compassion
Empathy and compassion are like muscles we can activate and build. There may be some persons who are incapable of being empathetic: that is a characteristic to certain persons such as those diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder. In general, we can exercise the empathy muscles.
On the Calm website, there is a concise posting about developing empathy:
https://www.calm.com/fr/blog/how-to-be-more-empathetic
Dr. Stan Steindl speaks of being inspired by his daughter to understand compassion. Take a listen:
Compassion: Lessons from my daughter. TEDxUQ
December 20, 2023.
What Not To Do for Peace in 2025
Very simple.
We must learn not to objectify the other person. If the other person is an “OBJECT” and not a “Human”, it is very easy for us not to embrace an empathetic and compassionate approach to the other person. Think of the bloody “OTHERISMS” that we, as a human race, have invested time and energy and money into creating.
We co-created our own damnation by focusing on the “otherism”. We created war.
Let’s flip the switch and create peace. Let’s use neuroscience for peace in 2025.
Warm your heart with the harmonies of Cantus:
https://www.cantussings.org/video/
Or the harmonies of Chanticleer:
Both Sides Now (Joni Mitchell, arranged by Vince Peterson)
Break out into a song of peace for the world.
Take-aways: Neuroscience for Peace in 2025
Take the time to build the skills of compassion and empathy. Compassion and empathy are tools we can hone.
Remember to consider self-compassion. When you notice that you are passing judgement on someone else, step back and observe the conflicting emotions inside of you. Allow yourself to feel those emotions, each like a wave passing over you. The waves cannot sweep you away unless you grant them the power to do so. Stand firm as the waves move beyond. Then decide how you will respond to a situation using cognition and not just emotion.
Keep your eye on the prize: Peace in the world.
If Abu Aziz Sarah and Maoz Inon can engage in civil discourse and collaborate to achieve peace, why can’t each of us embark on the same path? Listen to them and learn:
A Palestinian and an Israeli, Face to Face: Aziz Abu Sarah and Maoz Inon. TEDTalks, April 17, 2024.
Peace to all of you. Peace to our world.
Happy New Year 2025.
Selected References:
Berhof Foundation. (January 18, 2024). The brain and peace: How can insights from neuroscience advance peacebuilding? Berghof Foundation. Accessed online on December 28, 2024, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCoAdnbrrTk
Disclaimer: This post is not meant to substitute for a consultation with your mental health professional team.
If you are having thoughts to hurt yourself or someone else, please call 9-1-1; call 9-8-8; or go the nearest emergency.
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