Is Human Consciousness on the Rise?

As suggested in the meme here, does a mechanism exist that enables “a higher consciousness of people to fill the Earth?”

Though this might sound like science fiction, such a thing must exist, otherwise there would be no way to account for the amazing accomplishments of ancient Greece and Rome, the Renaissance, the European Enlightenment / Age of Reason, the French Revolution, the U.S. Constitution, the transcendentalists, women’s suffrage, and the Civil Rights movement.

Right now, we sure could use a fresh blast of whatever that is.