Societies and the Cultural Zeitgeist can seem large and complex -- and impossible to fathom -- and digest.
However there are "thinking tools" and diagnostic "debugging" approaches that can help.
In the deep dark past, this author was heavy duty scientific data miner, developer and debugger of instrumentation and analysis software. Slowly, various parallels regarding how large software systems behaved -- or not -- began to "look like" various patterns in society and culture. Diagnostic and epistemological tools learned from scientific data analysis have been reformulated -- to "vet" and "zen" some of the social patterns and zeitgeist events -- for alternate and unique "understandings."
This may sound very odd and a significant stretch. Please rest assured, the mental journey will be smoothed by simple diagnostic approaches and backed up with concrete examples. Please stay tuned.
Wednesday, October 14, 2015
Tuesday, October 13, 2015
Back-Folding 20th Century Lessons on 18th Century?
In forensic sciences -- including anthropology, archaeology, epidemiology, etc -- tools and techniques of today are applied to the past to extract new information, perspectives and understandings. PBS uses this "fold-back" with some entertaining success in the Secrets of the Dead TV series.
This also can apply to political & social epistemology -- how we know what we think we know -- about how people behaved -- and thought -- in the past.
In the introduction and chapter one of Jonah Goldberg's 2009 book:
The author "back-folds" various modern "understandings" and lessons from the political trajectories of Mussolini and Hitler onto the 1789-1799 French Revolution. This fold-back is accomplished a little like a modern epidemiologist might use a gas chromatograph and/or a mass spec to "sniff" old ancient bones or clothing to extract new perspectives.
Using this "back-fold" technique -- Mr Goldberg's book makes some surprising -- and convincing -- historical arguments that:
(a) The late 1700s and early 1800s French Revolution created the world's first "modern" Fascist regime. This is not at all clear from other historical perspectives. J.Goldberg "back-folds" attributes and political parallels of Benito Mussolini and Hitler onto the French Revolution -- and develops an interesting comparison and persuasive narrative. And like an epidemiologist, Mr Goldberg compares the social & political disease of the French Revolution -- and how this disease evolved & propagated forward in time to become the social & political diseases of Mussolini fascism and Nazi national socialism.
(b) Shocking and surprising? J.Goldberg also make another interesting case: The 1890s to 1930s "Progressives" -- Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and FDR being the tips of the iceberg -- essentially imposed an 1870s German "Bismarckian" style regulatory-administrative "fascism" upon America -- and the "echos" of this "fascism" rings forward to our current day via the regulatory estate and plantation -- a regulatory "structure" imported from 1870s German academic "social engineering."
The key mystery? Why did imported Bismarckian "fascism" not infect and afflict America the same way fascism infected and afflicted Italy or German? Did WW2 intervened before the disease reached full bloom in America? And the evils observed by veterans help the promoters of American fascism recoil in horror -- and reconsider their ways?
J.Goldberg explains that our "understanding" of fascism is too colored by the Hitler and Mussolini examples -- that fascism is a much more subtle infection of the body politic -- and like tuberculosis -- can take years to decades to fully sicken -- and kill the host country's civil society.
Recall that tuberculosis can take months to decades to kill a human hosts. Tuberculin fascism appears to operate upon the body politic in similar timelines.
Some countries succumb to tuberculin fascism rather quickly -- in just a few years. Some take require decades. And like humans, the difference seems to be the strength of immune system.
For the body politic -- the immune system that seems to thwart and resist the growth of tuberculin fascism are a well developed set of morals and religious traditions -- traditions that give individuals some sense of "worth" and "self" -- and a one-to-one relationship with an omniscience or divine.
Evidence? Action speak loud. All the big "-ism" -- Socialism, Communism, Progressivism, Nazism, Mussolini style Fascism -- all of these (and more) attempt to replace an abstract "God" in heaven with the tangible "god" of the state. Each of the big "-isms" attempt to intervene between the individual and the tradition divine -- and "command" the religious "worship" of the individual. Drawing away the faithful by deceit -- or by force -- or worse.
The French Revolution attempted to draw folks away from their faith in a very heavy handed and coarse manner -- going so far as to kill priest outright as "enemies of the state" and destroy churches. J. Goldberg indirectly seems to make the case that all of the big "-isms" are becoming more skilled and sophisticated at drawing away the faithful -- and to use the language of the bible -- to worship the false prophet of the state.
In spite of the human disasters of the French Revolution, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, the Statists continue to try their hand at becoming "God on earth" -- making "real" what was abstract in traditional Judeo-Christian traditions.
UPSHOT? BigGov is a jealous and petty god. It maybe that an abstract God -- and individual faith in an abstract God -- is necessary to keep the body politic from developing a full blow case of tuberculin fascism. There is something about making "God" tangible in the form of Big Government, that dives a country to self-destruction. Not clear what -- yet history is full of examples.
As the Bard said almost 400 years ago: "All things be ready, if our minds be so."
This also can apply to political & social epistemology -- how we know what we think we know -- about how people behaved -- and thought -- in the past.
In the introduction and chapter one of Jonah Goldberg's 2009 book:
2009 Book (Wiki Details)
Using this "back-fold" technique -- Mr Goldberg's book makes some surprising -- and convincing -- historical arguments that:
(a) The late 1700s and early 1800s French Revolution created the world's first "modern" Fascist regime. This is not at all clear from other historical perspectives. J.Goldberg "back-folds" attributes and political parallels of Benito Mussolini and Hitler onto the French Revolution -- and develops an interesting comparison and persuasive narrative. And like an epidemiologist, Mr Goldberg compares the social & political disease of the French Revolution -- and how this disease evolved & propagated forward in time to become the social & political diseases of Mussolini fascism and Nazi national socialism.
(b) Shocking and surprising? J.Goldberg also make another interesting case: The 1890s to 1930s "Progressives" -- Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and FDR being the tips of the iceberg -- essentially imposed an 1870s German "Bismarckian" style regulatory-administrative "fascism" upon America -- and the "echos" of this "fascism" rings forward to our current day via the regulatory estate and plantation -- a regulatory "structure" imported from 1870s German academic "social engineering."
The key mystery? Why did imported Bismarckian "fascism" not infect and afflict America the same way fascism infected and afflicted Italy or German? Did WW2 intervened before the disease reached full bloom in America? And the evils observed by veterans help the promoters of American fascism recoil in horror -- and reconsider their ways?
J.Goldberg explains that our "understanding" of fascism is too colored by the Hitler and Mussolini examples -- that fascism is a much more subtle infection of the body politic -- and like tuberculosis -- can take years to decades to fully sicken -- and kill the host country's civil society.
Recall that tuberculosis can take months to decades to kill a human hosts. Tuberculin fascism appears to operate upon the body politic in similar timelines.
Some countries succumb to tuberculin fascism rather quickly -- in just a few years. Some take require decades. And like humans, the difference seems to be the strength of immune system.
For the body politic -- the immune system that seems to thwart and resist the growth of tuberculin fascism are a well developed set of morals and religious traditions -- traditions that give individuals some sense of "worth" and "self" -- and a one-to-one relationship with an omniscience or divine.
Evidence? Action speak loud. All the big "-ism" -- Socialism, Communism, Progressivism, Nazism, Mussolini style Fascism -- all of these (and more) attempt to replace an abstract "God" in heaven with the tangible "god" of the state. Each of the big "-isms" attempt to intervene between the individual and the tradition divine -- and "command" the religious "worship" of the individual. Drawing away the faithful by deceit -- or by force -- or worse.
The French Revolution attempted to draw folks away from their faith in a very heavy handed and coarse manner -- going so far as to kill priest outright as "enemies of the state" and destroy churches. J. Goldberg indirectly seems to make the case that all of the big "-isms" are becoming more skilled and sophisticated at drawing away the faithful -- and to use the language of the bible -- to worship the false prophet of the state.
In spite of the human disasters of the French Revolution, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, the Statists continue to try their hand at becoming "God on earth" -- making "real" what was abstract in traditional Judeo-Christian traditions.
UPSHOT? BigGov is a jealous and petty god. It maybe that an abstract God -- and individual faith in an abstract God -- is necessary to keep the body politic from developing a full blow case of tuberculin fascism. There is something about making "God" tangible in the form of Big Government, that dives a country to self-destruction. Not clear what -- yet history is full of examples.
As the Bard said almost 400 years ago: "All things be ready, if our minds be so."
Sunday, October 11, 2015
Intelligentsia, Creativity & the Evangelical Impulse
A tangent thought as we examine the "hive mind" and motivations of the Regulatory estate and plantation -- and the Intelligentsia's need to "social engineer" the society around them with new and novel ideologies. Presumably the Intelligentsia' motivations are driven by "good intentions" -- yet a democide history of the 20th century is much less sanguine and less forgiving.
KEY QUESTION: From where does this incessant need to create new ideologies -- and effect social re-engineering -- originate? Especially via "Big Picture" programs -- and smaller aspects via the regulatory estate?
On possible explanation -- and discussed by an old Communist uncle -- is the alternate filling of the human brain's "god hole" (lower case "god" here, means any deity will do). Filing this "god hole" with alternate ideologies can be a source of intellectual creativity -- and mischief.
Some alternate history: Implied in the first two chapters of this 2009 book:
The European intelligentsia became:
(a) Bored and tired of God, the Western Judeo-Christian traditions and the Catholic church -- sometime before -- and certainly during and after the French Revolution. After the French Revolution -- every intellectual of any stripe felt a need to create -- and to create a new vision for society around them -- fixing, tuning, adjusting and destroying any real or perceived ill and inefficiency of human societies and the human condition. And often without regard to cost or consequences. The intellectual parade is almost endless: Robespierre, Engels, Marx, Lenin, Mussolini, Gramsci, Lukacs, etc.
(b) Idea producers, coupled with the printing press. An intellectual is not an intellectual unless they produce and publish a stream of ideas (publish or perish) -- sometimes small technical shavings off old ideas into smaller new ideas. And sometimes -- to be the primo explorer -- the Big Bwana of ideas -- the intellectual must question whole sweeps of human history, tradition and culture. Questioning is not the problem. The real problems begin with specific social re-engineering that is based on wishful thinking and Utopian dreams -- and not real experience humans and their natures.
Since the 16th and 17th century -- and especially after the late 18th century French Revolution -- Europeans have boiled over with new ideologies -- new, radical "isms" -- for over-turning and socially re-engineering Western traditions. One perspective and epistemological trek is in Linda Kimball's 2007 discussion from the American Thinker.
Many of these radical "-isms" have been -- or are being imported -- into the American experience. The regulatory estate and plantation is no exception -- having been drawn from Bismarckian tenets for "good government."
The upshot is -- during the 20th century -- a parade of European "-isms" and political movements -- which captured the power of the state -- often with religious zeal -- re-engineered many European countries -- often with catastrophic results.
An American Immune Twist?
America has produced it fair share of intellectuals cranking out ideologies of every stripe -- radical and otherwise -- however the popular need for absorption of these new ideologies has been different. Why? How? Perhaps what I call the "Evangelical Relief Valve" and "Smarter Shopping" of ideas.
Consider -- the core European experience for the past 2000 years has been more-or-less Church and State speaking as one. Even today -- in some countries -- and this is almost impossible for Americans to understand -- the local church is so tightly coupled to the local state, the church "shares" in the tax revenue -- tax revenue collected with all the police powers of the state. To an American way of thinking -- this coupling of church and state can only generate annoyance and resentment -- especially if your personal belief system differs from the official orthodoxy.
In America this annoyance and resentment is explicitly allowed to vent -- and be explored -- via the US Constitution's first amendment and religious freedom. Anyone in American -- at any time -- can create a new ideology -- religious or not -- and begin promotion and "sales" of the idea. This was true even before the American revolution -- and this has contributed to two American twists:
(1) Any frustrated intellectual and/or self appointed social re-engineering "expert" can write a book -- yell from a street soap-box -- run a radio or TV show -- start a church, etc -- go on an Evangelical and advertising bender -- and vent his or her viewpoint to the world -- and "test" the population's sympathy -- and potential "buy in" of the intellectual's "great new idea."
(2) Because so many of these ideological ventings are manifest in America -- the American population is drowned in ideas & ideologies (especially commercial ads). This produces an accidental degree of mental "hardening" and ad hoc "smarter shopping" of new ideas and ideologies. This is often expressed via the satirical aphorism "Opinions [ideas] are like assholes, everybody has one."
SUMMARY: Will the American Evangelical relief valve continue to "protect" America from the radical "isms" of the 20th century European experience?
Hard to predict -- as regulatory and judicial systems appear to be doing and "end-run" of this evangelical relief valve: The Regulatory Estate and Judicial circles are rife with social re-engineering ideologies -- big and small -- that masquerade under such "good sounding" and "politically correct" labels as "good for the environment" -- "protecting health" -- "promoting safety" -- "helping the poor" -- "for the children" -- etc.
And more and more -- each of these good sounding "intentions" are backed by police powers of the US Federal government -- and many state and local jurisdictions. As recent examples such as the Oregon baker's fine or the case of Kim Davis for failure to issue a marriage license have shown. These cases manifest a much larger trend of using the regulatory and judicial powers of the state to overcome any and all religious liberty -- and plug up the evangelical relief valve.
The open question becomes: Will the regulatory estate become the new theocracy in America? With regulators and judges as the new priesthood? Are we there, yet? Seems corruption and evils of the Ancien Régime -- so detested during the French Revolution -- are being rebuilt -- in America -- via the Regulatory plantation -- and yet to be defined estates of the realm.
KEY QUESTION: From where does this incessant need to create new ideologies -- and effect social re-engineering -- originate? Especially via "Big Picture" programs -- and smaller aspects via the regulatory estate?
On possible explanation -- and discussed by an old Communist uncle -- is the alternate filling of the human brain's "god hole" (lower case "god" here, means any deity will do). Filing this "god hole" with alternate ideologies can be a source of intellectual creativity -- and mischief.
Some alternate history: Implied in the first two chapters of this 2009 book:
Book: "Liberal Fascism" by J. Goldberg
The European intelligentsia became:
(a) Bored and tired of God, the Western Judeo-Christian traditions and the Catholic church -- sometime before -- and certainly during and after the French Revolution. After the French Revolution -- every intellectual of any stripe felt a need to create -- and to create a new vision for society around them -- fixing, tuning, adjusting and destroying any real or perceived ill and inefficiency of human societies and the human condition. And often without regard to cost or consequences. The intellectual parade is almost endless: Robespierre, Engels, Marx, Lenin, Mussolini, Gramsci, Lukacs, etc.
(b) Idea producers, coupled with the printing press. An intellectual is not an intellectual unless they produce and publish a stream of ideas (publish or perish) -- sometimes small technical shavings off old ideas into smaller new ideas. And sometimes -- to be the primo explorer -- the Big Bwana of ideas -- the intellectual must question whole sweeps of human history, tradition and culture. Questioning is not the problem. The real problems begin with specific social re-engineering that is based on wishful thinking and Utopian dreams -- and not real experience humans and their natures.
Since the 16th and 17th century -- and especially after the late 18th century French Revolution -- Europeans have boiled over with new ideologies -- new, radical "isms" -- for over-turning and socially re-engineering Western traditions. One perspective and epistemological trek is in Linda Kimball's 2007 discussion from the American Thinker.
Many of these radical "-isms" have been -- or are being imported -- into the American experience. The regulatory estate and plantation is no exception -- having been drawn from Bismarckian tenets for "good government."
The upshot is -- during the 20th century -- a parade of European "-isms" and political movements -- which captured the power of the state -- often with religious zeal -- re-engineered many European countries -- often with catastrophic results.
An American Immune Twist?
America has produced it fair share of intellectuals cranking out ideologies of every stripe -- radical and otherwise -- however the popular need for absorption of these new ideologies has been different. Why? How? Perhaps what I call the "Evangelical Relief Valve" and "Smarter Shopping" of ideas.
Consider -- the core European experience for the past 2000 years has been more-or-less Church and State speaking as one. Even today -- in some countries -- and this is almost impossible for Americans to understand -- the local church is so tightly coupled to the local state, the church "shares" in the tax revenue -- tax revenue collected with all the police powers of the state. To an American way of thinking -- this coupling of church and state can only generate annoyance and resentment -- especially if your personal belief system differs from the official orthodoxy.
In America this annoyance and resentment is explicitly allowed to vent -- and be explored -- via the US Constitution's first amendment and religious freedom. Anyone in American -- at any time -- can create a new ideology -- religious or not -- and begin promotion and "sales" of the idea. This was true even before the American revolution -- and this has contributed to two American twists:
(1) Any frustrated intellectual and/or self appointed social re-engineering "expert" can write a book -- yell from a street soap-box -- run a radio or TV show -- start a church, etc -- go on an Evangelical and advertising bender -- and vent his or her viewpoint to the world -- and "test" the population's sympathy -- and potential "buy in" of the intellectual's "great new idea."
(2) Because so many of these ideological ventings are manifest in America -- the American population is drowned in ideas & ideologies (especially commercial ads). This produces an accidental degree of mental "hardening" and ad hoc "smarter shopping" of new ideas and ideologies. This is often expressed via the satirical aphorism "Opinions [ideas] are like assholes, everybody has one."
SUMMARY: Will the American Evangelical relief valve continue to "protect" America from the radical "isms" of the 20th century European experience?
Hard to predict -- as regulatory and judicial systems appear to be doing and "end-run" of this evangelical relief valve: The Regulatory Estate and Judicial circles are rife with social re-engineering ideologies -- big and small -- that masquerade under such "good sounding" and "politically correct" labels as "good for the environment" -- "protecting health" -- "promoting safety" -- "helping the poor" -- "for the children" -- etc.
And more and more -- each of these good sounding "intentions" are backed by police powers of the US Federal government -- and many state and local jurisdictions. As recent examples such as the Oregon baker's fine or the case of Kim Davis for failure to issue a marriage license have shown. These cases manifest a much larger trend of using the regulatory and judicial powers of the state to overcome any and all religious liberty -- and plug up the evangelical relief valve.
The open question becomes: Will the regulatory estate become the new theocracy in America? With regulators and judges as the new priesthood? Are we there, yet? Seems corruption and evils of the Ancien Régime -- so detested during the French Revolution -- are being rebuilt -- in America -- via the Regulatory plantation -- and yet to be defined estates of the realm.
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