Reproduced from Psychreg
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Psychreg’s 22 April 2026 article ‘Fix the World: How One Biological Explanation of the Human Condition Could Resolve the Mental Health Epidemic’:
We live in an age of unprecedented mental health challenges.
Pioneering psychologist Arthur Janov captured the urgency a generation ago when he wrote: ‘The world is having a nervous breakdown. People are irritable, aggressive, tense, and anxious. Neurosis is on the march. It is galloping ahead at full speed and no one seems to know what is going on or why. Above all, no one seems to know how to stop this inexorable march to destruction. Year after year there is more illness, more suicide, more violence, more alcoholism and drug addiction. The world is coming apart at the seams’ (The New Primal Scream, 1990, p. 3).
Decades later, the crisis is especially acute among young people. A major Lancet Commission on adolescent health and wellbeing has warned that ‘young people are showing warning signs of a world in serious trouble’, underscoring the scale of psychological distress now facing an entire generation. Depression, anxiety, burnout, personality disorders, and a host of other psychological conditions affect hundreds of millions worldwide.
Therapists researchers, and individuals alike continue to describe this same breakdown as an almost infinite variety of struggles: genetic predispositions, childhood trauma, cultural expectations, social media pressures, interpersonal conflicts, and deeply personal life circumstances. Each story feels unique. Each pathology seems distinct.
Is there one root cause behind the infinite mental health problems?
Yet what if, beneath all this variety, there is a single underlying cause? Australian biologist Jeremy Griffith argues precisely that in his major treatise FREEDOM: The End Of The Human Condition, the foundational text of the Fix The World movement. His work, which has drawn praise from psychiatrists, psychologists, anthropologists, and other thought leaders, posits that the root of humanity’s psychological distress is not fragmented or endlessly varied; but universal. In doing so, it offers genuine pathway toward fixing the world.
It is the “human condition” itself: the deeply insecure, angry, egocentric, and alienated state that has afflicted every human since the emergence of conscious thought.
Griffith’s biological explanation of the human condition
Jeremy Griffith’s explanation is disarmingly straightforward and biological. For millions of years, our pre-human ancestors lived in an instinct-driven state. Then, around two million years ago (a timeframe the skull fossil record identifies as a period of dramatic increase in the brain’s association cortex) the nerve-based intellect evolved and became powerful enough to take over management from the gene-based instincts.
The conscious mind needed to experiment, to reason, to search for understanding. But those instincts criticized and opposed this new “takeover”. The intellect, in turn, had no choice but to defy the instincts in order to continue its search for knowledge. This defiance produced the psychological upset we now call the human condition: anger (the frustration of being criticized), egocentrism (the need to prove we are good despite the criticism), and alienation (the psychological retreat from the unbearable criticism).
The result? A profoundly insecure species that is capable of cruelty, selfishness, and self-destruction, yet whose underlying upset can now be biologically understood and resolved. Griffith argues that every individual mental health issue (whether depression, narcissism, addiction, or interpersonal breakdown) flows from this same underlying insecurity. His insight is that the “infinite” variety of problems is, in reality, countless expressions of one original psychological fracture that has propagated and compounded over two million years of human existence; and that this understanding is the key to fixing the world.
The heroic defiance
Critically, Griffith’s model reframes these defensive attributes (anger, egocentricity, and alienation) not as “bad” or “evil” flaws, but as necessary, even heroic, responses to an impossible situation. For two million years, since the dramatic expansion of the association cortex, the intellect was forced to defy the instincts to continue its search for knowledge. This defiance was a courageous persistence in the face of an uncomprehending genetic criticism.
But now that the underlying conflict is understood, Griffith argues those artificial defences are made redundant. He says we no longer need to prove we are good; we can finally know we are. By providing the real defence for why we challenged our instincts, the need for anger, egocentricity and alienation is superseded, allowing for a future free of the psychological upset that has defined human existence for millennia: a future in which the world is finally able to be fixed.
Healing starts at the macro level
This transition from artificial to real defence offers a profound shift for mental health. As Professor Harry Prosen (former President of the Canadian Psychiatric Association) explains, the healing begins by addressing the universal shame of the human condition itself:
‘The beauty of Griffith’s treatise is that the healing starts at the macro level of the universal human condition; the healing of the shame and blame that the whole human race has suffered from, which is non-personal and thus more easily confronted, absorbed and accepted. It brings the greater context and love to all human psychosis and suffering, and then, from under the umbrella of that safe position, everyone can gradually work inwards to their particular experience of all the imperfections in human life that have now, finally, been made sense of.’
Professor Prosen’s insight perfectly captures why Fix the World is gaining strong support among mental health professionals.
What Thought leaders are saying about Griffith’s work
The reception of Griffith’s major treatise, FREEDOM: The End Of The Human Condition, within the scientific community suggests a growing recognition of its transformative potential. While the therapeutic implications for individuals are significant, Professor Prosen argues that its impact is even larger: ‘This book… presents the 11th hour breakthrough biological explanation of the human condition necessary for the psychological rehabilitation and transformation of our species!’
Prosen’s endorsement is echoed by a diverse array of global thought leaders who view the “instinct-versus-intellect” model as a long-awaited unifying principle:
Professor Scott D. Churchill, the former Chair of the Psychology Department at the University of Dallas, states that it is the book ‘all humans need to read for our collective wellbeing’.
Professor David Chivers, a University of Cambridge anthropologist, described the sequence of discussion in FREEDOM as ‘so logical and sensible’. He noted it provides the ‘necessary breakthrough in the critical issue of needing to understand ourselves’.
Tim Macartney-Snape, a biologist and twice-honoured Order of Australia recipient, described the work as ‘an island of sanity in a sea of madness’.
Professor Alejo Vidal-Quadras, a nuclear physicist and former vice-president of the European Parliament, praised the work as a ‘really significant contribution to science, providing fundamental answers’.
Professor Yonas Adaye Adeto, an associate professor of Peace Studies at Addis Ababa University, recommends the work to PhD students as essential reading that ‘makes sense of and ends the moral corruption we are all facing across the world today’.
Professor Stuart Hurlbert, professor emeritus of biology at San Diego State University, called Griffith ‘Darwin II’ for solving the dilemma of the human condition.
And Professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the world’s leading researcher on positive psychology, suggested the work might ‘help bring about a paradigm shift in the self-image of humanity’.
The fix the world solution: A practical path forward for mental health
Griffith’s framework does not replace professional therapy, medication, or personal work; that remains critical. But it purports to supply the missing “why” that makes all those approaches vastly more effective. By first addressing the universal shame and blame at the macro level, individuals can finally approach their personal histories without the crushing weight of feeling fundamentally defective.
The result, according to advocates of the Fix The World movement (the not-for-profit initiative built around Griffith’s work), is not merely symptom relief but genuine rehabilitation and transformation; both for individuals and, ultimately, for society.
Emeritus professor of psychology at California’s National University, Maureen O’Hara, captured the stakes perfectly when she warned: ‘Humanity is either standing on the brink of a quantum leap in human psychological capabilities or heading for a global nervous breakdown.’
In a world desperate for solutions to its escalating mental health crisis, Griffith’s biological explanation stands out as the rare integrative insight capable of bridging science, psychology, and the deeper human search for meaning. It may well be the ‘quantum leap in human psychological capabilities’ that O’Hara spoke of—the sort of leap necessary to actually fix the world.
Readers can explore FREEDOM and related materials for free at www.humancondition.com, the home of Fix The World. For those working at the front lines of mental health (clinicians, researchers, or individuals seeking context) this may be the breakthrough perspective the world has been waiting for.
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Robert Haynes, a psychology graduate from the University of Hertfordshire, has a keen interest in the fields of mental health, wellness, and lifestyle.
