Several times in human history, a great civilization has flourished, made great technological, political, and other advances, and then collapsed into a Dark Age. These dark ages seem to last for 800 to 1000 years, whereupon a completely different civilization, often with dim memories of the old one, may arise. The two archetypical examples are the fall of Mycenae in around 1177 BC and the rise of Greece and its inheritor Rome, about 1000 years later, followed by the fall of Rome in 476 and the Renaissance, which began in around 1300.
What is a dark age? Mostly, it is dark in comparison to what came before. During civilization, the value of civilization seems obvious. Trade is relatively unencumbered by banditry, roads are built, technological advances come frequently and spread fast. Authority is relatively stable and widely respected. Cities don't need to have walls. During a dark age, travel is dangerous and banditry is expected. There is little or no agreed authority and people and groups vying for power are constantly trying to kill each other. Cities and the homes of wealthy people are strongly guarded, with walls and soldiers and those defenses are frequently tested. Invention is still happening, but they tend to be isolated and advances spread relatively slowly.
Dark ages are never completely dark. Writing was invented around the time of the fall of Mycenae and was constantly developed and improved during the ensuing dark age. Much of the strength of the books that survive from those times is precisely that the newly literate peoples had a dim memory of the ancients, carried by oral traditions, and had enlarged and exaggerated the greatness of those old stories, until by the point they are written down, Achilles, Gilgamesh, Beowolf, David, King Arthur, and many others are impossibly great warriors with magical powers and frequent interactions with the gods. Once they are written down, it's impossible for real people to match the great deeds, and during the dark age, the old civilization can only be conceived of as impossibly wonderful. This hero worship tends to infect the dark age and makes it more difficult for the new civilization to emerge.
What causes dark ages? Sometimes, there is an active decapitation: after 1492, Europeans made their first successful footholds in the Americas. They brought with them new types of weapons and tools, horses, and most significantly, new diseases which the natives didn't have defenses for, the most important of which was smallpox. Less than 30 years after Columbus, Mexico was so devastated that Cortez was able to capture it and impose Spain's peculiar brand of fundamentalism, and 130 years later, the Pilgrims arrived in Massachusetts to discover cleared but empty fields and groups of natives too small to eke out a living on them and willing to teach the new settlers how to grow native crops in the new fields. The native cultures were systematically destroyed. Smallpox did most of the work, but the survivors were made slaves and for the most part not allowed to participate in the new civilization unless they completely abandoned the old one. The places that remain substantially native: the reservations in the US and the countless villages in Latin America, especially those which had Spanish fundamentalism imposed on them, are indistinguishable from their counterparts in dark age Europe.
Far more common is the local rise of religious fundamentalism. Rome had been very multicultural and tolerant, and this was central to their success, but 100 years after they embraced Christianity, they began persecuting other religions and even small deviations from what Christian leadership determined was "correct" Christianity were persecuted. There were other causes too, but the great historian Edward Gibbon argues persuasively that Christian Fundamentalism so weakened Roman culture that it could not survive.
Not long after Rome collapsed and not too far away, another great civilization was rising. It was powered by Islamic expansionism but in a few places, most importantly Baghdad and Cordoba, great centers of learning were being established. Like all great centers of learning, they embraced other cultures and religions enthusiastically and made many advances in many fields--mathematics, astronomy, metallurgy and many others. They collected as much as they could of their recently deceased neighbor. But they too collapsed because of religious fundamentalism, and much of their world continues to be held back by it--by the Wahabbi Saud family, by the Ayatollahs, the Taliban, and so forth.
The Renaissance arose where and when it did because dark age traders, mostly from Florence and Venice, were interested in Islamic cultures and traded with them--commercial products mostly, but also books. Cosimo de Medici, one of the greatest bankers to ever live (he invented double entry bookkeeping) and the richest man in Italy that was not the pope, collected every book he could--bought it if possible, had it transcribed if he couldn't, and his heirs continued this legacy. Many of the books were Arabic translations of Roman and Greek books whose originals had been lost or intentionally destroyed by the Christian fundamentalists. That this was happening just as Islamic fundamentalism was arising and so soon after the crusades gave the fundamentalists a target for their anger.
Western European culture that began with the Renaissance and expanded to North America appears to be embracing another round of fundamentalism and anti-multiculturalism. It is being helped along by Russian trolls no doubt, but there would be no traction were there not a fertile opportunity, Fundamentalism is the civilization killer.
Showing posts with label philosophy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label philosophy. Show all posts
09 September 2018
13 November 2014
The Most Harmful Philosopher
I've read the works of quite a few philosophers and people who think of themselves as philosophers. All, I think, mean well, but quite a few had ideas which can be taken to justify people doing really harmful things, often flatly contradicting the intent of the philosopher themselves.
Socrates, Aristotle, Hobbes, Leibnitz, Kant and the other ontological philosophers really don't rate as harmful. Socrates objection to elective democracy has been borne out by the corruption of the western countries in the last few decades. His suggested improvement was benevolent dictators. A few dictators have been benevolent but mostly not. Many of the others wrote about politics too, but their ideas have been predominantly used for good, with a few exceptions.
Locke and his heirs are responsible for the ideology that led to the American political system that worked so well for two centuries.
Descartes, Berkeley, Hegel, Sartre and the other epistemological philosophers are even less harmful. They're interested in how we understand things. Their direct effect on the world is pretty minor, although the consequences on how we think about things can be profound. Newton, for example, figured out what we call the Scientific Method, which is an approach to proof and elimination of confirmation bias. Heidegger was a big booster of the Nazis, but his own philosophical ideas were irrelevant to their project.
Finally we come to the political and religious philosophers. There are surprisingly few important ones. The Abrahamic arc includes Moses, Jesus, Paul, Augustine, Mohammed, etc. The modern political arc starts with Locke and includes many of his disciples, such as Jefferson, as well as other thinkers, such as Nietzsche. The economic arc includes Smith, Marx, Keynes, Hayek, Rand.
Moses and Jesus were very much men of their time, recognizing what was wrong and advocating ways to improve it. Both stood against religious institutions being exploited for profit, and were wholly well intentioned and it's hard to find positions in their thought which were directly used for evil. But their subsequent disciples incorporate some bad thinking...Paul's silliness with the afterlife, and Augustine's with universal conformity--by force if necessary--led to many of the worst atrocities of all time. The inquisition, the crusades, and much more, including the Nazi horror to some extent, stem directly from Augustine.
Locke, I think, was wholly well intentioned and most of his disciples were too. American political theory almost entirely stems from his thought, and while there has been lots of corruption, I think it is the opposite of stemming from his or his disciples thought.
Nietzsche is interesting. Like Socrates, he's an elitist. Like Socrates, he's deeply interested in the welfare of society, even to the cost of some of its members, including eugenics and a number of other controversial ideas. Hitler used the germ of his thinking to rationalize his eugenic programs, but he didn't really understand Nietzsche, and Hitler's elites were what Nietzsche would have regarded as lowbrow thugs. An imaginary version of Nietzsche played a role in the Nazi origin fantasy, no more real than Siegfried or the Valkyries or other heroic Germanic fantasies.
Smith and Keynes were scientists, and with Marx and Newton, the only ones on this list. They figured out how a lot of the economy works and came up with the beginnings of a system to make it work better. Smith was opposed to laissez faire--he understood that a too-free market will promptly be corrupted. Something similar is the case with Marx: he was primarily a sociologist but he came to a new understanding of the social dynamics of the forces at work in the economy. One of his lesser ideas has been taken to be the mainstream of his thought and many societies have purportedly been based on it. It's not really fair to tar Marx with the harm that the ideology derived from this has caused, but Augustine didn't mean ill either.
Friedrich von Hayek was considered an economist by a lot of people, including many bankers and political conservatives. He was a pretty bad one though...in the face of lots of empirical data, his theories have pretty much flunked. He wrote an influential book called "The Road to Serfdom" which suggests that political liberalism will lead inevitably to government control of everything and ultimately the enserfment of almost everybody, and that the unregulated free market is the only solution. As Smith pointed out, the unregulated free market leads only to corruption and monopoly--a much more direct path to serfdom than via liberalism.
Hayek's contemporary Ayn Rand wrote a series of fantasy novels which have been taken as economic gospel by an amazing number of people, especially on the far right. Their appeal is mainly to teenagers, desperate to break from parental and societal control. Alan Greenspan was a particularly devoted admirer and through dishonesty, corruption and a great deal of schmoozing, was one of the major causes of the economic crisis of 2008. Rand's world has no particular bearing on reality and the characters are totally unrealistic. In particular, in her world, Gresham's Law does not hold and the Efficient Markets Hypothesis does--the opposite of reality.
My ranking:
Nietzsche's ideas were a tiny part of the Fascist horror that killed tens of millions--but being incredibly generous I can only give him 5% credit or so, so he ranks in a distant 4th place.
Ayn Rand and Hayek have killed tens of millions so far and have ruined the lives of hundreds of millions and will kill lots more before they are done. I give them a solid third place with a real chance to move up. It's important to recognize that their followers are applying their ideas as they were intended, which is wholly different than what's going on with Nietzsche and Marx.
Marx was only a small part of the communist ideology that's killed about 100 million, and more appropriately applied in Sweden and Cuba and other places, those same ideas have saved millions. But places like North Korea, and Cuba to a lesser extent are still misapplying his ideas and will kill plenty more before they are through.
St Augustine's ideas have been behind over half of the religious wars that have occurred since his lifetime, 1600 years ago. He's in effect killed hundreds of millions, in the hands people following a fairly literal version of his ideology. Lots of others--Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist fanatics, have behaved in ways that fit his ideas. The Augustinian Heresy: that you must believe as some authority demands or die, is easily the most harmful idea. Augustine himself would have been horrified, and I'm sure would have reversed course had he comprehended.
Socrates, Aristotle, Hobbes, Leibnitz, Kant and the other ontological philosophers really don't rate as harmful. Socrates objection to elective democracy has been borne out by the corruption of the western countries in the last few decades. His suggested improvement was benevolent dictators. A few dictators have been benevolent but mostly not. Many of the others wrote about politics too, but their ideas have been predominantly used for good, with a few exceptions.
Locke and his heirs are responsible for the ideology that led to the American political system that worked so well for two centuries.
Descartes, Berkeley, Hegel, Sartre and the other epistemological philosophers are even less harmful. They're interested in how we understand things. Their direct effect on the world is pretty minor, although the consequences on how we think about things can be profound. Newton, for example, figured out what we call the Scientific Method, which is an approach to proof and elimination of confirmation bias. Heidegger was a big booster of the Nazis, but his own philosophical ideas were irrelevant to their project.
Finally we come to the political and religious philosophers. There are surprisingly few important ones. The Abrahamic arc includes Moses, Jesus, Paul, Augustine, Mohammed, etc. The modern political arc starts with Locke and includes many of his disciples, such as Jefferson, as well as other thinkers, such as Nietzsche. The economic arc includes Smith, Marx, Keynes, Hayek, Rand.
Moses and Jesus were very much men of their time, recognizing what was wrong and advocating ways to improve it. Both stood against religious institutions being exploited for profit, and were wholly well intentioned and it's hard to find positions in their thought which were directly used for evil. But their subsequent disciples incorporate some bad thinking...Paul's silliness with the afterlife, and Augustine's with universal conformity--by force if necessary--led to many of the worst atrocities of all time. The inquisition, the crusades, and much more, including the Nazi horror to some extent, stem directly from Augustine.
Locke, I think, was wholly well intentioned and most of his disciples were too. American political theory almost entirely stems from his thought, and while there has been lots of corruption, I think it is the opposite of stemming from his or his disciples thought.
Nietzsche is interesting. Like Socrates, he's an elitist. Like Socrates, he's deeply interested in the welfare of society, even to the cost of some of its members, including eugenics and a number of other controversial ideas. Hitler used the germ of his thinking to rationalize his eugenic programs, but he didn't really understand Nietzsche, and Hitler's elites were what Nietzsche would have regarded as lowbrow thugs. An imaginary version of Nietzsche played a role in the Nazi origin fantasy, no more real than Siegfried or the Valkyries or other heroic Germanic fantasies.
Smith and Keynes were scientists, and with Marx and Newton, the only ones on this list. They figured out how a lot of the economy works and came up with the beginnings of a system to make it work better. Smith was opposed to laissez faire--he understood that a too-free market will promptly be corrupted. Something similar is the case with Marx: he was primarily a sociologist but he came to a new understanding of the social dynamics of the forces at work in the economy. One of his lesser ideas has been taken to be the mainstream of his thought and many societies have purportedly been based on it. It's not really fair to tar Marx with the harm that the ideology derived from this has caused, but Augustine didn't mean ill either.
Friedrich von Hayek was considered an economist by a lot of people, including many bankers and political conservatives. He was a pretty bad one though...in the face of lots of empirical data, his theories have pretty much flunked. He wrote an influential book called "The Road to Serfdom" which suggests that political liberalism will lead inevitably to government control of everything and ultimately the enserfment of almost everybody, and that the unregulated free market is the only solution. As Smith pointed out, the unregulated free market leads only to corruption and monopoly--a much more direct path to serfdom than via liberalism.
Hayek's contemporary Ayn Rand wrote a series of fantasy novels which have been taken as economic gospel by an amazing number of people, especially on the far right. Their appeal is mainly to teenagers, desperate to break from parental and societal control. Alan Greenspan was a particularly devoted admirer and through dishonesty, corruption and a great deal of schmoozing, was one of the major causes of the economic crisis of 2008. Rand's world has no particular bearing on reality and the characters are totally unrealistic. In particular, in her world, Gresham's Law does not hold and the Efficient Markets Hypothesis does--the opposite of reality.
My ranking:
Nietzsche's ideas were a tiny part of the Fascist horror that killed tens of millions--but being incredibly generous I can only give him 5% credit or so, so he ranks in a distant 4th place.
Ayn Rand and Hayek have killed tens of millions so far and have ruined the lives of hundreds of millions and will kill lots more before they are done. I give them a solid third place with a real chance to move up. It's important to recognize that their followers are applying their ideas as they were intended, which is wholly different than what's going on with Nietzsche and Marx.
Marx was only a small part of the communist ideology that's killed about 100 million, and more appropriately applied in Sweden and Cuba and other places, those same ideas have saved millions. But places like North Korea, and Cuba to a lesser extent are still misapplying his ideas and will kill plenty more before they are through.
St Augustine's ideas have been behind over half of the religious wars that have occurred since his lifetime, 1600 years ago. He's in effect killed hundreds of millions, in the hands people following a fairly literal version of his ideology. Lots of others--Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist fanatics, have behaved in ways that fit his ideas. The Augustinian Heresy: that you must believe as some authority demands or die, is easily the most harmful idea. Augustine himself would have been horrified, and I'm sure would have reversed course had he comprehended.
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