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The World Transformation Movement: Addressing Our Human Condition
Last week I looked at an organisation focused on preventing the “human downgrade” through ensuring technology is used and developed in an ethical manner. Obviously AI is just one of the existential threats facing us, and it’s against this backdrop that I want to turn to a different but arguably more important topic: the quest to address and overcome our ‘human condition’ – the inherent psychological conflict within humankind. This ambitious mission defines the work of the World Transformation Movement (WTM), an organisation that asserts that humanity’s future depends on a new understanding of what it means to be human.
Addressing the Source
At the core of the World Transformation Movement is the work of Australian biologist Jeremy Griffith, who argues that the predicaments we face as a species stem from the unresolved nature of the ‘human condition’. Griffith claims:
to fix all the runaway problems we are surrounded by—in fact, to stop the destruction of our world and the disintegration of society that is happening everywhere we look—we have to fix the cause of the problems, which is us humans. We are the problem—our out-of-control egocentric, selfish, competitive and aggressive behaviour.
From Saving Tigers to Examining Humanity
Griffith’s ideas were formulated following an extensive six-year search for the Thylacine (‘Tasmanian Tiger’) deep in the remote wilderness of Tasmania, south of mainland Australia, in an attempt to save it from extinction – a search that ultimately convinced Griffith that, tragically, the Tiger was in fact extinct. Turning his mind to the question of why humans are so destructive, Griffith set out on a journey to understand and explain the root cause of this dark side of our nature.
Griffith’s inductive analysis focused on the human condition – what he terms our species’ extraordinary capacity for ‘good and evil’. He concluded that the human condition is the product of a conflict between two operating systems within our make-up: our pre-established instincts, and our more recently developed rational mind or ‘conscious intellect’. The conscious mind’s experiments in self-management, he says, ran in opposition to our instincts:
When we humans developed a conscious mind some two million years ago, a battle unavoidably developed between it and our already established instincts. Natural selection of genes gives species’ instinctive orientations, such as to a migratory flight path for birds, but a nerve-based conscious mind needs understanding to operate, so when a fully conscious mind emerges and begins experimenting in understanding it unavoidably comes into conflict with the already established instinctive orientations that are in effect intolerant of these deviating experiments in self-management.
He proposes that without the ability to explain the nature of this conflict, our species has, since consciousness emerged, been burdened with an unresolved insecurity, a sense of guilt and shame, and an underlying anger, egocentricity and alienation that defines our species.
The Analogy of ‘Adam Stork’
To communicate his insight into the human condition, Griffith uses a simple analogy: the story of ‘Adam Stork’. He says it’s helpful to understand the conflict between instinct and intellect if we imagine it occurring within another species.
To summarise Griffith’s analogy: imagine a stork named ‘Adam’, who, like all his fellow storks, instinctively migrates north each summer to breed (Griffith draws express parallels with the Genesis story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden). Without conscious thought, the stork follows his instincts. But imagine if Adam was to acquire a large, conscious brain suddenly capable of managing his behaviour. During one migration, for instance, he notices an island of apple trees and chooses to diverge from his naturally selected migratory path to explore the island. This decision, however, is at odds with his ingrained instincts, which resist change and in effect criticise his deviation as ‘bad’.
This inner conflict thrusts Adam into turmoil. His instincts, developed over millennia, drive him to follow a specific path without needing to know ‘why’, whereas his conscious mind seeks reason and exploration. Lacking full self-awareness, Adam doesn’t recognise this clash or understand why he feels guilty for defying his instincts. He’s only beginning his journey toward self-knowledge, which means he’s deeply unsettled by these critical feelings. To cope, Adam defensively shuts out the criticism, becoming increasingly angry and alienated from his instincts.
To escape his unease, Adam’s focus shifts toward defending his actions, becoming ‘ego-centric’. Struggling for self-validation, he competes aggressively for any reinforcement that he’s ‘good’ and worthy. This leads to a preoccupation with proving himself, ultimately resulting in a self-centred, competitive and defensive mindset – the psychological state we recognise as the human condition.
Ripping the Band-Aid Off
Griffith claims that understanding the human condition was the fundamental issue that needed to be resolved to bring a lasting solution to the problems we face. Campaigns like environmentalism – which focus on the symptoms rather than the cause – were nothing better than placing a band-aid on a tumor. He claims they were actually:
a way of avoiding the real issue of ‘self’. It was a way of relieving yourself of the issue of the human condition through finding a cause that made you feel good about yourself.
He argues that the only genuine solution was to confront and explain our ‘dark side’. If our behaviour has been driven by a deep insecurity about our fundamental goodness or worth, and our goodness has now been biologically established, it follows that we no longer have to behave insecurely and selfishly, enabling us to effectively tackle the countless challenges confronting our species.
The Interview that Sparked a Movement
Interest in Griffith’s explanation grew significantly following a 2020 interview with actor/broadcaster Craig Conway, in which Griffith outlined his understanding of the human condition and how it can transform the world.
This interview resonated with listeners worldwide and sparked a global movement, leading to a growing online community, the expansion of WTM Centres around the world, and endorsements for Griffith’s insights from thought leaders across disciplines, with a former president of the Canadian Psychiatric Association, Professor Harry Prosen, labelling it “THE most important interview of all time”, and ecologist Professor Stuart Hurlbert of San Diego State University saying “I am stunned and honored to have lived to see the coming of ‘Darwin II’.”
Losing Ourselves to Find Ourselves
I believe this interest and excitement about Griffith’s insights into the human condition speak of a shared, deep, intuitive awareness in the human psyche, which is that we humans have had to sacrifice becoming corrupted – or as Griffith puts it, ‘psychologically upset’ – as a result of our heroic search for understanding. As the lyrics from the popular song The Impossible Dream (The Quest) describe, we had to:
march into hell for a heavenly cause.
We had to lose ourselves to find ourselves – suffer becoming angry, alienated and egocentric until we found sufficient knowledge to explain ourselves. This relieving understanding redefines our human identity and purpose. As the great poet T.S. Eliot wrote:
We shall not cease from exploration / And the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time.
Criticisms and Challenges
Griffith’s theories challenge established paradigms about human nature and evolutionary history, prompting criticism from those entrenched in conventional views. His core idea – that human behaviour stems from a psychological clash between instincts and intellect – contradicts the long-held belief that selfishness and aggression are instinctive.
Evolutionary biologists like Richard Dawkins argue that humans are “survival machines” driven by selfish genes, while others like E.O. Wilson propose a dual-instinct model, balancing group cooperation with intergroup competition. Similarly, anthropologist Brian Hare attributes cooperative tendencies to self-domestication but links hostility to ‘out-group’ dynamics. Despite their differences, these views assert that aggression and selfishness are instinctive. Griffith counters that this is a convenient excuse while we couldn’t admit the real psychological roots of our condition.
Importantly, with this understanding, Griffith’s argues we can now acknowledge a cooperative and loving past, not a savage one.
Griffith’s use of bonobos (Pan paniscus) as models for this cooperative ancestor has also drawn criticism. Some argue bonobos are not truly cooperative, while others favour the more aggressive chimpanzee as a better ancestor model. Griffith responds that bonobos better match human ancestors due to their physiology, bipedality, intelligence, and reduced canine size – widely recognised as an indicator of reduced aggression. Anthropologist C. Owen Lovejoy supports this view, citing fossil evidence of cooperative behaviour dating back over 5 million years.
The challenge for Griffith is persuading mainstream science that the human condition has been solved. This resistance reflects what physicist Max Planck observed: “Science advances funeral by funeral”, and nowhere is this resistance more entrenched than when dealing with the historically off-limits subject of the human condition. Changing deeply ingrained beliefs takes time, but Griffith’s perspective is gaining traction among those who see its potential for a transformative paradigm shift.
A World Transformed?
In a world increasingly divided by conflict and disillusionment, at a time of impending existential threats, the World Transformation Movement offers a vision of humanity liberated from the psychological burden imposed by the human condition. The WTM presents Griffith’s work as a roadmap toward a world free from suffering, a world where understanding replaces conflict and genuine connection triumphs over division.
Given the current state of the world, ideas like these – unique, bold, and profound – are perhaps more valuable than ever.
