The Platinum People — The Gray Treasures of this Planet

The essential wealth of this planet is our collective wisdom, our diverse cultures, science, arts, and intelligence — including the public debate in search of answers for the future. 

Article by Rik Raats

—Although often represented in academic and political circles, we still overlook what is lively present in the minds and skills of the elderly around us. Their mental worlds span over multiple generations and combine unique qualities. Research has demonstrated the remarkable characteristics of crystalized intelligence at advanced ages. 

             When we think about our planet's intelligentsia, we often look at academic institutions, universities, labs, research & development, libraries, and digital resources. 

By doing this we often forget the massive gray treasures that surround us. 

Science, nutrition, improved quality of life, and medical care have extended this volume through the highest life expectancy ever. But so far, we've only succeeded on a limited basis to tap into this wealth of human experience and wisdom. 

There's No Safety Backup for this Platinum Wealth

These first-hand witnesses of history are rather scarcely consulted, and what they take along when they leave the planet physically after death, we will never be able to recover or recreate. Their thinking, their very specific perspectives. There's no backup of the gray servers of authenticity. Indeed, the majority are no writers, artists, or recorded performers. So, every single day there's a capital of valuable witnesses and answers for tomorrow that we let slip away. This, while anthropology has taught us that their mentorship has always been like a compass for the tribe.

We're unaware of the fact that we're not using the available assets of the ones that walked the same paths that we did and made often the same mistakes. Although circumstances changed dramatically, the basic intrinsic principles and needs of human beings are still the same. We face the same challenges on various levels. 

Since the earliest days of humankind, so far no generation ever succeeded in establishing stable peace on a global scale. Although with less crude techniques people still kill each other for greed, passion, religion, and other same reasons as before. We poison ourselves with addictions and we all still think that the grass is greener on the other side of the hill (until you have to mow it). Just to give some examples.

Multi-Generational Collaborations

Besides the enrichment of multi-generational collaborations, we also instill happiness if we open up opportunities for the need to share. The elderly from their end feel called to tell their life stories. This gift is part of the human DNA, indeed the elders as the mentors of the tribe. 

If you take the effort to talk and work with the elderly, you might conclude that we all have been painfully neglectful. It's embedded in our culture; progress is exclusively reserved for the young, while in reality elders are just as young — and sometimes even younger in spirit — but aging impacts appearance, expression, and movement.

Elderly people often have an interesting perspective that comes with aging. Some of the intellectual strengths are enriched emotional intelligence, patience, historical and cultural context, Increased empathy and insights that serve resilience.

Unique Brain Qualities of the Elderly

It has been demonstrated that crystallized intelligence at advanced ages has remarkable qualities. Although fluid intelligence may deteriorate over the years (day-to-day, adapting to new situations, technology, etc. ) the intellectual qualities that are achieved through experience and long-term focus, skill etc. are unique in people of age. People of age who have solved problems and navigated through challenges in life are still capable of sharing the capacity of problem-solving. Because they experienced the eventual longer-term positive outcome through re-grouping, re-thinking and even learning to live with consequences and downsides can be of important emotional value for younger generations. They have another perception of time through the years and lived in circumstances that required a different interaction with time. Their observations often discern other aspects that younger generations overlook.

History in the Flesh

Although nostalgia, vintage, and costume dramas are very popular, history as a social science has a continuous need for 'accurate camera positions'. All history is recorded from a specific point of view, not only dates and facts but how people perceived a specific period. The sound, smell, expectations, and interpretations are crucial to develop cultural-historical insights. 

Even the most expensive historical movies fail dramatically — we can't recreate the size of the human being or the actual appearance of their domesticated animals for example. Elders are extremely valuable in expanding our perception of history and evolution. They are indispensable in peace education. They've been closer to the horrors of world wars than today's teachers and academics. We, people, tend to romanticize. Viking wars look exciting ten centuries after they occurred, while their raids were the Gotterdammerung of the moment. Medieval torture is joyfully consumed on YouTube. This sounds confronting, but it's in our nature to digest our hells of the past with some romantic and even humoristic seasoning. it's a kind of healing. But if we don't pay attention one day the holocaust may become a computer game in 3-D. 

The elderly are crucial in helping the next generations develop an instinctive capacity to detect the threats of conflict and to understand its unfathomable destruction and collective suffering for generations. When shared firsthand by elders, later generations will tend to pass a kind of moral conscience to their children.

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Let's activate the gray treasures of this planet. At the very least it's a highly inspiring journey.

Rik Raats

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I am working on a new publication and lecture about this topic. In case of interest send an e-mail to platinum@raats.com