Global Education: Towards a Quantum Model of Environmental Education

Abstract

In this paper I overview different interpretations of global education before proceeding to explore the "quantum worldview" that has profoundly influenced global education of the transformative variety. Quantum research has overturned the 17th century mechanistic paradigm of "world as machine" within which phenomena are to be understood by reducing them to their parts. Instead, a world of radical interconnectedness is revealedÑof parts and wholes deeply embedded within each other and in dynamic and unfolding relationship. I present a four-dimensional model of transformative global education inspired by the "quantum worldview." Some of the principal benefits of applying such a quantum model of education to environmental education, a field where the mechanistic paradigm still has some hold, are then elaborated.