Expert consensus is currently a loose standard for establishing "what is known" in the field of evolutionary spirituality at a given time.
Selected experts [see note below] in evolutionary science, spirituality and social vision are asked to discuss a specific topic for a specific period and challenged to agree on a statement that summarizes the "state of the art" knowledge for that topic. That summary may involve not only clearly stating what is agreed on, but also agreeing on and articulating remaining areas of disagreement across the spectrum of opinion on that topic.
When the experts arrive at their consensus statement, the resulting document is posted elsewhere on the web in a more permanent non-wiki environment. For expert consensus statements coming from the Great Story perspective, that website is EvolutionarySpirituality.org. People coming from other perspectives can use their own websites to post expert consensus statements (or other favorite wikipage versions) they wish to preserve.
It is desirable and likely that an expert consensus will evolve over time, either through small obvious edits by individual experts with access to the permanent website(s), or by a new convening of diverse experts in the wiki environment to establish a new consensus.
- The intention of this innovation is to satisfy both those who want to have some sort of authoritative source on this subject and those who want to co-create the field in a more freewheeling fashion. The expert consensus provides a snapshot of a high-quality moment in the history of an evolving wiki page -- until (what is perceived to be) a better snapshot comes along.
- Note: Current arbiters of Great Story experts -- and organizers of expert consensus dialogues to produce pages for EvolutionarySpirituality.org -- are Michael Dowd, Connie Barlow, and Tom Atlee