Bill Clinton apparently knew about and read the books of Ken Wilber

[Husseinisdoingfine]

Skip to the 6:30 part of the video below, where he mentions Bill Clinton.

.

The rabbit hole gets deeper from here.

Quote

"If ordinary people don't perceive that our grand ideas are working in their lives then they can't develop the higher level of consciousness, to use a term that American philosopher Ken Wilber wrote a whole book about. He said, you know, the problem is the world needs to be more integrated, but it requires a consciousness that's way up here, and an ability to see beyond the differences among us."

-- President Bill Clinton

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/who-the-hell-is-ken-wilbe_b_4673036

 

Quote

“This guy is brilliant.”
               ~Bill Clinton, speaking about Ken Wilber

https://www.kenwilberfund.org/praise-for-ken-wilber/

 

Quote

I was influenced by Ken Wilber’s book A Theory of Everything, because he tries to point out that throughout history we get connected to people who are different from us before our heads get around the implications of that, and then as soon as they do there is a parallel level of interconnectivity and we have to get our heads around that. All of the public intellectuals in the world need to be thinking quite a bit about this question of identity and need to recognize that in view of the findings of the human genome about the similarities of all of us, even the husband and wife who at the minimum are 99.5 percent the same — it’s pretty spooky, isn’t it?

https://foreignpolicy.com/2009/11/30/bill-clintons-world/

 

Here's also a video where Bill speaks very similarly to Leo in the conscious politics series, where he directly mentions the words "consciousness", and "integrated".

 

Even Al Gore was a fan of Ken Wilber!

Edited Wednesday at 01:55 PM by Husseinisdoingfine
Reason for edit: typo

[Leo Gura]

Yup. Doesn't mean Clinton can embody it.

Edited Wednesday at 02:35 AM by Leo Gura

[Princess Arabia]

And The Donald follows the Law of Attraction.

 

[aurum]

Doesn't mean much.

I doubt Clinton really understood Wilber. It mostly seems like he just used it to reinforce his liberal POV.

[Husseinisdoingfine]

This just makes me think about how hard America lost because of the past election results. As a progressive, I can now definitely see how my rabid Socialism and Progressivism has turned me into a political retard. 

I wasn't old enough to vote in the 2016 election, but if I was, given my past arrogance, I would have probably voted for the third [green] party candidate. 

It was people like me who cost this country some seriously good leadership. If the third party people put their arrogance aside in 2016, then we could have had a first gentleman (husband of woman president) who knew about SDi and Ken Wilber. Same thing in 2000, because apparently Al Gore knew about SDi.

I think I've demonized Blue Dog Democrats way too much in the past, they're a lot smarter than I've made them out to be. Though they do have their serious problems. But still they weren't so bad. It was Clinton's conservative deficit hawking that made it so under his presidency, America was in a budget surplus and actually began to pay off its national debt. 

Edited Wednesday at 05:04 PM by Husseinisdoingfine

[martins name]

Integral is great at justifying centrism. That's what happens when analysing values and culture takes priority over analysing economics and class dynamics.  In America, the economic analysis is that people aren't invested in nearly enough. The class analysis is that super wealthy people control the government and rig everything in their favor.

[Twentyfirst]

 

[Breakingthewall]

The problem is that if you go to Epstein's island a lot, you lose credibility. Maybe he says those things because he thinks he's going to seem advanced, modern, smart. Maybe his advisor told him: Look, you have to quote this guy, don't quote the classics, that's dead. Talk about interconnectedness, recite this phrase. Try not to be too drunk and remember it all.

Edited Wednesday at 08:25 PM by Breakingthewall

[Hojo]

@Breakingthewall Thats victorious to the people that see their actions as victorious and God says for sure. There are people that do and people that complain about the people that do. What if God made you a billionaire then presented you to epsteins island? You gunna say no to God? Are you better than God?

Imagine you died and went to heaven and it was Epsteins island. You say no God says this is what you wanted. That is spiritual confrontation right there. There is going to be a moment in time where you have to have sex with a child 100 %. How long you demonize yourself?2000 years or 15 seconds.

Edited Wednesday at 09:52 PM by Hojo

[Leo Gura]

7 hours ago, martins name said:

Integral is great at justifying centrism.

Crucial point.

[Breakingthewall]

15 hours ago, Hojo said:

@Breakingthewall Thats victorious to the people that see their actions as victorious and God says for sure. There are people that do and people that complain about the people that do. What if God made you a billionaire then presented you to epsteins island? You gunna say no to God? Are you better than God?

Imagine you died and went to heaven and it was Epsteins island. You say no God says this is what you wanted. That is spiritual confrontation right there. There is going to be a moment in time where you have to have sex with a child 100 %. How long you demonize yourself?2000 years or 15 seconds.

Of course, everything is possible, probably he thought: so...this is the connection that guy was talking about...now I get it! Thanks Epstein!

[Carl-Richard]

On 26.3.2025 at 5:08 AM, aurum said:

Doesn't mean much.

I doubt Clinton really understood Wilber.

And you do?

[aurum]

42 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

And you do?

I have a good understanding of the more essential bits, yes.

[Carl-Richard]

4 minutes ago, aurum said:

I have a good understanding of the more essential bits, yes.

What makes you different from Bill Clinton?

[aurum]

24 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

What makes you different from Bill Clinton?

10+ years of actualized.org, mostly.

[Carl-Richard]

58 minutes ago, aurum said:

10+ years of actualized.org, mostly.

And how do we know you "understand" Leo? Maybe you just "read Leo", just like Bill "read Wilber". Besides, Leo just "read Wilber". That's all we really do here — read stuff. Or where are your integral daily activities? What is your integral occupation?

I would hesitate to draw inferences based on what a person does in the world (e.g. as a politician) to what they "understand" about a philosopher. If you had looked at what I do on a daily basis (occupationally), and if you had heard me say "I think Wilber is brilliant", you would probably think I'm not much different from Bill. And I believe I "understand" Wilber.

And why does Bill think Wilber is brilliant? What made him say that? Is it really that unlikely that he deeply resonated with his ideas the same way you do when you say Wilber is brilliant? What about Michael Brooks (RIP) from the Majority Report? Did he really "understand" Wilber, or did he just view him through his leftist lunatic lens?

Edited 12 hours ago by Carl-Richard

[aurum]

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

And how do we know you "understand" Leo?

Your best option is to consistently read my posts over time. Then come to your own conclusion.

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

Besides, Leo just "read Wilber". That's all we really do here — read stuff.

Are you being deliberately dense?

 You know this work is about far more than reading.

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

Or where are your integral daily activities? What is your integral occupation?

"Integral daily activities" would essentially be all the development work we talk about here.

I'm not interested in discussing my occupation at this time. Maybe eventually.

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

I would hesitate to draw inferences based on what a person does in the world (e.g. as a politician) to what they "understand" about a philosopher. If you had looked at what I do on a daily basis (occupationally), and if you had heard me say "I think Wilber is brilliant", you would probably think I'm not much different from Bill. And I believe I "understand" Wilber.

Occupation is certainly not the full picture and could be misleading.

But also, different occupations require different levels of consciousness and development. So occupation is a factor to consider.

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

And why does Bill think Wilber is brilliant? What made him say that? Is it really that unlikely that he deeply resonated with his ideas the same way you do when you say Wilber is brilliant?

Why does any spiritual teacher have people who worship them but can't understand them?

I don't know for sure what's the deal with Bill.  But given that speech he made in the video, it certainly seems like his understanding of Wilber is pretty superficial. 

You could argue he's playing 4D Integral chess and watering down his understanding to make it more palatable for the crowd. But I think the more likely case is he's just an average politician. What you see is what you get.

I'm open to changing my mind about this.

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, aurum said:

Your best option is to consistently read my posts over time. Then come to your own conclusion.

Do you think Michael Brooks from the Majority Report understood Wilber?

 

1 hour ago, aurum said:

Are you being deliberately dense?

You know this work is about far more than reading.

Quantitatively speaking, judging by people's actual behavior, I'm afraid not. Maybe you are in the minority.

 

1 hour ago, aurum said:

Why does any spiritual teacher have people who worship them but can't understand them?

What does Bill Clinton not understand about Wilber?

 

1 hour ago, aurum said:

I don't know for sure what's the deal with Bill.  But given that speech he made in the video, it certainly seems like his understanding of Wilber is pretty superficial. 

You could argue he's playing 4D Integral chess and watering down his understanding to make it more palatable for the crowd. But I think the more likely case is he's just an average politician. What you see is what you get.

I'm open to changing my mind about this.

Consider that this is the entire job of a politician: to make their message palatable to their audience.

I just think we on this forum ran into some ideas, and now because we do some self-development on the side, suddenly we think we are intellectually and cognitively superior to other people. When in reality, if you meet other people, you find the same ideas, the same thoughts, the same ways of thinking.

Edited 7 hours ago by Carl-Richard

[aurum]

10 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Do you think Michael Brooks from the Majority Report understood Wilber? Why or why not?

I don't know who that is or what their position is.

I only know Sam and Emma.

10 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

What do they not understand? What does Bill Clinton not understand about Wilber?

I think Bill is likely using Wilber to reinforce his liberal, Green worldview. He paints Wilber's work as being about "overcoming differences". This is watered down to the max.

I think he does not understand that the whole point of Wilber's work is to lead you to God. Or even what that means.

10 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

I just think we on this forum ran into some ideas, and now because we do some self-development on the side, suddenly we think we are intellectually and cognitively superior to other people. When in reality, if you meet other people, you find the same ideas, the same thoughts, the same ways of thinking.

No.

People have very different levels of consciousness / development. And their thinking can vary by orders of magnitude. 

One of the powerful things about Integral Theory is to see this. You see some of the spectrum of thinking that is available, which prevents excessive homogenization.

It's certainly possible to develop a kind of self-development arrogance. But it's not correct to then make the move to assuming everyone's thinking is essentially the same. I would separate this.

 

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, aurum said:

I don't know who that is or what their position is.

I only know Sam and Emma.

Well, birds of a feather flock together, roughly speaking: would Sam and Emma be able to understand Wilber?

 

1 hour ago, aurum said:

No.

People have very different levels of consciousness / development. And their thinking can vary by orders of magnitude. 

One of the powerful things about Integral Theory is to see this. You see some of the spectrum of thinking that is available, which prevents excessive homogenization.

It's certainly possible to develop a kind of self-development arrogance. But it's not correct to then make the move to assuming everyone's thinking is essentially the same. I would separate this.

That's exactly my point. You don't need to be very developed to spout some of Ken Wilber's ideas. That's the power of downward assimilation, of adopting cultural symbols above your level of development. Those that are really developed and that are truly able to grasp the ideas down to their bones, are able to produce similar ideas (original ideas) at a similar level. Now, if you take a look around, most people can barely construct a coherent sentence. Forget a meta-systematic or meta-paradigmatic theory.

Edited 6 hours ago by Carl-Richard