David Quinn wrote:Diebert van Rhijn wrote:Kevin Solway wrote:.... I value freedom of thought and freedom of expression.
Quintessential progressive values, as David would admit. Which shows also his problem casting this as something progressive vs backwards. There's no indication that many supporters of Trump are
not supporting these things wholeheartedly.
They give every indication that they don’t want left-wing academics, feminists and SJWs to express themselves.
But wait a minute, most conservative critique I heard on the left-wing academics, feminists and SJWs was about
their attempts to silence what was branded "insane" or "damaging" beyond just expressing themselves in their own bubbles. It's about that they then often claim some kind
universality of values, declare it sanity and move to brand everything opposing it as equal to terrorism or something to defund, filter or publicly ridicule with hyperbolic re-interpretations.
And in the past I'd have found these kind of descriptions to be exaggerated but last years I've seen it in action a few times. It's extremely ugly and irrational. Kevin Solway was right to challenge it where he came across it. It's really a growing problem and a real threat to future public wisdom discussions and the challenging of ignorance. Actually I'm surprised the Genius Forum never was pressured to close by left-wing academics, feminists and SJWs. It must have slipped under the radar. Perhaps you are not realizing these growing dangers
against progress under the guise of some moral but always quite militant "enlightenment"?
but we are still a young species and the progressive journey is still in its infancy.
As we were 3000 years ago and still will be in 1000 years. Which makes it a bit meaningless as argument for or against anything happening in this modern age.
There are signs that it is occurring nonetheless. Thanks to the influence of science, for example, the human race has indeed inched a little closer to wisdom over the past three hundred years. In general, people have become more educated and broad-minded; many of the traditional superstitions and myths have been debunked; understanding of the basic principles of logic has become more widespread; the belief in metaphysical delusions, such as a personal God, has diminished; and so on. Okay, we are still a long way from becoming a society of fully-enlightened Buddhas, but it’s still progress nonetheless.
Wisdom has peaked at least a few times before those last three centuries. Just based on that, we could speculate just as easily that it wasn't just scientific progress, technology or diminished influence of organized religions which made the big difference. How to measure the amount of wisdom in the world anyway? It looks like a possible materialistic delusion from the start.
Fast forward to now and we can see that this long and steady progression has hit a major hurdle. The progression has scared people to such an extent that three major societal reactions have emerged over the past few decades, all of them driven by a deep hatred of truth - namely, (a) the conservative backlash (which is now reaching its peak in the Trump/Republican movement), (b) the rise of postmodernism, feminism, political correctness, etc (which reaches its peak in the extreme left), and (c) the slide into banality (which runs through the whole of society).
So, in the end, perhaps not that wonderful, all that lovely progress we had for centuries? It cuts both ways.
The salient fact here is that so few sages have emerged over the course of human history. The individuals you list here were largely left to fend on their own. They broke through into wisdom in spite of their societies, not because of them. Who knows how many more sages could have emerged had societal conditions been more favorable?
That might also suggest just as easily that sages emerge especially when individuals are left to fend on their own, born in a sea of cow like indifference and confusion. First they need to become the fierce resistance fighter, a true lion before the innocent child is born. It could be argued that "favorable" conditions are never favoring the bold and wise, as to
become bold and wise.
Nietzsche already noticed "everything outstanding is by its nature rare" but here's William James with a related view:
- Sporadic great men come everywhere. But for a community to get vibrating through and through with intensely active life, many geniuses coming together and in rapid succession are required. This is why great epochs are so rare, - why the sudden bloom of a Greece, an early Rome, a Renaissance, is such a mystery. Blow must follow blow so fast that no cooling can occur in the intervals. Then the mass of the nation glows incandescent, and may continue to glow by pure inertia long after the originators of its internal movement have passed away. We often hear surprise expressed that in these high tides of human affairs not only the people should be filled with stronger life, but that individual geniuses should seem so exceptionally abundant. This mystery is just about as deep as the time-honored conundrum as to why great rivers flow by great towns. It is true that great public fermentations awaken and adopt many geniuses who in more torpid times would have had no chance to work. But over and above this there must be an exceptional concourse of genius about a time, to make the fermentation begin at all. The unlikeliness of the concourse is far greater than the unlikeliness of any particular genius; hence the rarity of these periods and the exceptional aspect which they always wear. -- William James
The above quote implies that a great period would
start with true genius while not keep necessary "producing" more of them or greater ones in succession. This is worked out by Nietzsche in his concept of decadence, this decline of "old" culture and societies which as idea is generally compatible more with the new right or conservative thought, without in any way, dismissing any progress of science, medication or education.
This very forum is an example. It has been a society which has been conducive for wisdom to prosper. Granted, we are few in number and our influence is very limited at the moment, but it is easy enough to imagine a similar dynamic occurring on a larger scale.
One could reason, based on what has been argued above, that it started with a few actions of genius, at the right time and right place to do the right thing and all handled with a wise touch. And I personally see the Genius discourse as such. As for the fermentation process, if it indeed will inspire actual changes also in society and culture, remains the question here. To your surprise perhaps but the discussions on this forum are not very compatible with any typical "left" and rarely you'd find someone here involved in these topics who is much supportive of globalism, the EU, UN, humanitarian wars, more federal state influence into citizen affairs, endless extreme promotion of equality -- in other words, generally "left" politics.