Future horizons: moral learning and the socially embedded synaptic self

During the 40-year time-span of the JME, four leading meta-narratives concerned with who we are and our place in the natural scheme of things have increasingly run up against their own inherent limitations; even as the planet is being pushed beyond sustainability. Indeed, we seem to be on the verge of another ?Copernican revolution? that will challenge many cherished ideas, including that of the moral self and its cultivation. The paper will argue that ?reductionist science?, ?supernatural religion?, ?democracy? and ?morality as a uniquely human characteristic? need to be abandoned. This claim will be interwoven with an account of how the author has personally grappled with these contentious ideas. Human beings, he believes, will increasingly be viewed as socially embedded synaptic selves, but as he looks to the next 40 years he sees potentially new horizons that reposition the human self in relation to the planet and to one another