INNOCENCE OF THE CRETINS WHEN THEY PRAY AS A HERD?
The really optimistic bask in bad news, the erroneously pessimistic cling to daddy, that is Father Christmas, Christ, God, Muhammad, Huitzilopochtli. Is daddy all what the superstitious cling to? Or is the clinging to infantile superstition part of the vertiginous intoxication of the herd with erroneous mental strategies, most favorable to those inclined to rule, and the cruel brutes in their service? Yes to all! Even bacteria have found those tricks.
Many are the reasons to be opposed to superstitious religions. Today I will focus on just one.
The respect, love, and tolerance of ignorance, excuses all, even the greatest crimes. It’s intrinsic to superstition. And enough to nail the Christian moral system:
“Forgive Them, Because They Know Not What They Do. Most Convenient Excuse Ever.”
Aztec philosophers told the Conquistadores that brandishing torture to death as the symbol of their religion of proclaimed love was outrageous. The conquistadores agreed. They removed the squirming Christ from the crosses of Mexico.
***
Ignorance is the perfect justification for murder. If a brute wants to commit a great crime, an unjust war, he can be a Christian, hide in the Bush, and join the Legate of the Pope proclaiming:“Tuez-les tous, Dieu reconnaitra les siens.” “Kill them all, God will recognize his own.”
The occasion for this all encompassing, fundamentally Christian declaration was the crusade against the mighty County of Toulouse (1209-1255 CE). Toulouse was a Roman Republic in all but name. The Pope could only hate a secular Republic that admitted one could NOT tell on which side of the devil the Catholic church was.
That particular crusade against the original Protestants killed one million innocent French victims. Crusades were not just something to kill Jews and Orientals with, and steal their riches. Crusades was something plutocrats did to whoever they could do it to. (In the end the Crusades backfired: the church came out of them fighting with itself, and so many nobles died, they were washed out by history next.)
On the internet nowadays the feeble minded herd is in full evidence, warts and all. Its ugly stampeding nature resonates all over. Anonimity allows the greatest cheating. There are actually companies making false reviews (they typically dispatch their employees to make false comments from cyber cafes, so that’s untraceable). That is punished by law in some countries (Suisse).
A strident woman claimed that Obama’s ambassador in Libya was killed because he, Obama, was in the process of invading this peaceful land.
I pointed out that the truth was dramatically the other way around. She then hurled at me in public the intriguing theory that I was, obviously, a woman who had suffered abuse in my childhood. Living in denial of Obama’s ongoing invasion of Africa had led her to discover who I was. On the way, she boasted that she had been herself abused, it took one to know one. Narcissism and exhibitionism are strong Internet medecines.
Here is another example of Internet infantilism. Someone insinuated that World War One happened because: …”The government faced two choices: ban the use of coal or impose further restrictions. And then, by a curious set of circumstances, World War I happened, and people had something more urgent to think about. After the dust had settled, the pollution question seemed to have been forgotten… Again: coincidence?”
The real truth is more sobering. There was a true conspiracy, but not about coal pollution. That was fully documented in several ways. I commented about what really happened:
“War was decided, in December 1912, by four Prussian Staff generals, the top guys, and very reluctantly agreed by the two top admirals. Then the American presidency pushed, very secretly, the Kaiser to war in May 1914. France and Britain did not see the war coming.”[Note 1]
An anonymous Don Quixote named “Lionel” snapped: @ Patrice Ayme: “France and Britain did not see it coming etc!
And your sources to back up that astonishing bit of information are….? Suddenly a flat earth seems more probable.”
The Internet is all about quoting “sources“. Bacteria, individually are weak, and stupid, but they form bacterial mats or film, full of channels, and then they are hard to destroy, even with antibiotics. They are still stupid, but very strong as a mass.
Much of the Internet consists into morons linked to each other like bacterial films. Not only do Islamists networks and American neocretins organize themselves that way. In 2012 Wikipedia told Philip Roth that he was no authority on… Philip Roth; if he wanted to be taken seriously, about Philip Roth, he, Roth Philip, would have to quote sources on Philip Roth. It’s all about sources, not basic facts and elementary logic. It’s all about quoting those who, most often, have a perverse interest to spread disinformation.
The madness of the crowds is well known. The nastiness of crowds, even more striking, is a close relative. “Lionel” apparently subscribes to the well known disinformation that war was intrinsic to imperialism in general, and also to France, Britain, Germany. In other words World War One was not about a fascist Prussian plutocracy attacking democracy, it was about something else, whatever it is, denied by morons like me. Anything but the truth.
Indeed it’s rather inconvenient to observe that, in the most literate country, a fascist plutocracy could be so much in command of men’s hearts, that it could launch a world war as if it were a weekend excursion. And an entire nation would goose step behind. I replied this to his brutishness:
@ Lionel: Why do you need to insult me? I am a physicist, not a flat earth person.
That France and Britain did not see the attack of August 1914 coming is a historical fact. If they had seen it coming, they would have been more ready. That you do not know that they did not expect war does not make it less so, and does not give you a right to assault those who know, when you do not, by calling them morons.
Verily, the French Republic and Great Britain did not see the First World War coming. To wit:
Britain had “no army”. Lord Kitchener, recalled precipitously from Egypt, confirmed this in a famous joke, after being named Secretary for War. As he contemplated the seven British divisions. [Note 2.]
Great Britain was all into Irish problems, up to the end of July. Reading the British press of the times shows this. The entire British army in Europe, or in the world, consisted of the equivalent of just one French army corps.
France was expecting a war so little in the summer of 1914, that the entire French government was out on vacation. When it was clear the Prussians had ordered a full mobilization, and were going to attack, the under-secretary of agriculture in Paris had to decide, on his own, to order General Mobilization. Most of the French government was on a boat, incommunicado.
When the Prussians attacked, the surprise was so great that the Grande Duchesse du Luxembourg, not too clear about what was going on, put her large limousine across a bridge in a determined attempt to stop the Teutonic horde.
Even the Austrians were surprised when Berlin ordered them to declare war to the democracies. Vienna, horrified, resisted for several days the pressure from the Prussian General Staff (so much for the Sarajevo assassination being the direct cause of WWI; its role was mostly indirect, as the Austro-Hungarian heir was the closest friend to the Kaiser, and determined to keep the peace no matter what; once he was dead the greatest obstacle to Prussian militarism was gone).
It is not a strange thing when people who are completely ignorant hide their ignorance below insult and offense. Ignorance is one of the sins the Bible does not recognize. An unrecognized sin is a healthy sin, it can keep on devouring the spirit.
The failure to recognize ignorance for the sin it is makes the Christian moral system quaint, obsolete. Christianity makes ignorance into an innocence. It should not be, as Christ famously said while rubbing his behind: “Forgive them father, because they know not what they do!”
But it should be, now and thereafter: “Forgive them NOT, for protecting their crass ignorance below furious aggressivity, and leveraging their lack of knowledge into personal abuse.”
I am used to critters insulting me because their (lack of) knowledge, a precious flower they are cultivating, and that rose can only be defended by equating facticity to flat earth.
One should stop just searching for authority, and a hyperlink to it, instead of thinking by oneself. What’s my source for 1 +1 =2? I am sure some will ask malignantly. They got me there, I must confess my ignorance. I cannot provide with the “sources”. Sorry, it’s just something I know.
Anybody can access the British press archives of July 1914. Look at the front page of the Times of London, seven days before Earl Grey went to the House of Commons to request a war declaration against the fascist Reich.
A week earlier, the front page of the Times of London was all about Ireland (by then the fascist generals in Berlin had closed their trap, their plans were unfolding like clockwork. They had even sent the Kaiser away in vacation incommunicado, under false pretense, because they were afraid that His Majesty would stop them, after He realized the enormity of what was going to happen, namely a deliberate world war, and against the empire His own grandmother he admired so much, Queen Victoria, reigned over so long).
Yes, France and Britain did not see World War One coming, and it was a sneak deliberate attack. [Note 3 on Asia.]
Malevolent ignorant brutes are worse than malevolent knowledgeable brutes. Why? Because the ignorant ones think they are righteous, whereas the knowledgeable ones at least know that they are in the wrong. I also know that there are two types of ignorance: the one from happenstance, and the one from a willful cover-up, when ignorance itself is viewed as power, something to be desired that is deliberately cultivated, as the Little Prince does with his rose.
Why is ignorance so desired? Because the herd is ignorant, and welcomes only those so endowed. low mental power is cheap and comfortable. It just does not tolerate interruptions. A bonus is that those who stampede with the herd are mighty.
So far, though, real history, made of real facts, always won, in the end. All what’s left of the efforts of morons is that their little cover-ups and non sequiturs become themselves part of history.
So who invented the myth that the two democracies, France and Britain caused World War One, just as much the fascist Reich? Well, the same malevolent ones who created the myth that the Versailles Treaty caused Nazism… The same ones who are finding fascism superior to democracy, the same ones who much prefer plutocracy to our better angels. The same ones who feel that cruelty is how to get even, or even how to get ahead. The spiritual equivalent of bacterial film: strong, stupid, and nothing human about it.
Saint Paul and company were careful to incorporate the “Logos” within the core of Christianism. It’s also known as the “Verb” and “Holy Spirit”. They had too, lest the resistance of the Neo-Platonists to their fascist friendly superstition would be too great. But speech without knowledge is pure intellectual fascism. (And the fascist side is what seduced the Roman emperors in the version of Christianism they imposed.)
Verily, the essence of humanity is the generous striving for the truth. The Will to Truth is the core of the evolutionary morality hard wired into us, and no superstition can claim to be fully moral without it. [Note 4.]
***
Patrice Ayme
***
Note 1: Why was the Prussian General staff and German plutocracy so desirous of war? Their explicit reasoning was that time was working against Prussian fascism, when the ever more powerful French Republic was helping the quick democratization and industrialization of Russia. The admirals were against the war, because they knew the Royal Navy, especially with the French “Royale”, could not be defeated.
Note 2: Lord Kitchener, upon being named Secretary of War, August 1914: “No one can say my colleagues in the Cabinet are not courageous. They have no Army and they declared war against the mightiest military nation in the world.” Kitchener told a startled cabinet that the war would last at least three years, and that Britain needed to rise immediately a million man army. Kitchener died in combat, 22 months later, when his ship sank off Orkney after hitting a German mine.
Note 3: In the same vein, if some incident occurs in Asia, and a war starts, it will be because of the deliberate policy of China in search of a Lebensraum at sea. It will not be a bout whatever tiny incident will be construed as of great significance. And that, the Lebensraum, aggressivity-towards-others in turn will a repetition of the fascist plutocratic mental syndrome, in the German Second Reich style. I have long held to that theory, and I was pleased to see The Economist rolling it out on its front cover in September 2012. Complete with how little Chinese minds are molded into hatred. Same as little German minds, a century ago.
Note 4: Do I know what morality means? Yes. The word was coined by the (lawyer-Consul) courageous philosopher Cicero (later assassinated by one of Cleopatra’s boyfriends), from the Latin mos (gen. moris) “one’s disposition”. Certainly hundreds of millions of years of evolution have engraved our disposition.
Tags: Herd, Ignorance, Stampeding
October 2, 2012 at 5:34 pm |
My lack of comments should not be construed as a lack of interest in the post! Again, read it through a number of times and conscious that this aged brain is still formulating a reply!
October 2, 2012 at 6:03 pm |
Dear Paul: Sophocles wrote, in his nineties, works that are still played today. It was a general phenomenon with the Athenians of that age. However, a century later, having switched to a Macedonian style diet, Athenians lived shorter and more senile lives. Some scientists are now suggesting 9to great screams of their opposition!) that Alzheimer ought to be viewed as Diabetes III.
Anyway, don’t try too hard to think, whatever you say, your angle, even when flawed, is always interestingly provocative. I noticed that my usual commenters have disappeared ever since I engaged in a cruel and racist attacks against Carthage’s religion, explaining how that intolerable superstitious primitivism led to the undoing of that great civilization.
One (elder) Senegalese, Abou Diouf (A Senegalese Muslim, ex-president of Senegal and present Sec. of Francophonie) was saying, speaking of Islamists:”Ces gens la n’ont pas la meme religion que moi!” (Those kind of people don’t have the same religion as me!”)
So, anyway, don’t hesitate to say whatever… (I have a comment on that particular post from a commenter that I did not release as it is embarrassing for him, BTW… Something I occasionally do that, when I know the commenter…)… And watch your diet…
PA
October 2, 2012 at 5:52 pm |
Very little comment from me: I am not intimidated by people of faith; I do not subscribe to facile arguments such as to blame religion for all that is wrong in the World; and I am not impressed by those who feel the need to aggressively market their atheism either.
October 2, 2012 at 6:10 pm |
Martin: A pointed philosophical argument, namely the place of cognition in the Christian moral system, has nothing to do with “atheism” and “market“. Let alone “aggressivity”.
It’s aggressive to accuse those who think of “aggressivity”, just because they think aloud. It is also the oldest angle to attack intellectuals, already found in Confucius. That angle preserves oligarchies from critique on the ground that thinking threatens the established order.
I recognize some positive aspects to Father Xmass (much older than the Jew Jesus), and I love mosques, cathedrals, and the Taj Mahal. I have been known to go in my local, 1,000 year old church, and meditate.
Long live Huitzilopochtli in the common mind!
And thanks for the grain of salt! Much appreciated.
PA
October 3, 2012 at 11:18 am |
I am not attacking you Patrice (although I can see why you might think that)… I am just telling you that I am very tired of your “thinking aloud” (and what seems to be an almost pathological need to mock religions). If you want to do so, that is your choice. But why conflate this mockery into a piece discussing 20th Century history? In doing so, I suspect you not only lost my interest but also that of your fellow atheist Lionel (whom I think you also misinterpreted as attacking you).
October 3, 2012 at 7:47 pm |
The lemmings squeak, the caravan moves on…
October 4, 2012 at 7:28 am |
With regret, Patrice, I am forced to conclude that you lack both self-awareness and humility; and thus you don’t know when to apologise to someone. Do not be surprised, therefore, if Lionel ignores you too.
October 4, 2012 at 7:47 am
What do I have to apologize about? Huitzilopochtli? Moloch? Obama? I agree that after Obama’s lamentable, but not surprising, debate performance (although the word “performance” does not fit that shipwreck), I should apologize…
!
With deep regrets for my abysmal lack of awareness, I will go to the closest highest cliff above the furious ocean, and sing of my inchoating glory to the swimming lemmings struggling in the formidable surf below! They do what they can, poor little critters…Let the best win!
October 4, 2012 at 8:54 am
1. Your anger towards Lionel for using the phrase “flat earth” was entirely disproportionate to any offence (although I do not see that any was intended).
2. The preamble to this post suggests to me that, rather than just answer Lionel’s question about history, you felt it necessary to go into a lengthy diatribe against religion (much of which Lionel would probably agree with).
3. You therefore failed to understand your audience and potentially wasted both your own time and that of your audience.
October 4, 2012 at 6:13 pm
I am not into “understanding my audience” (except in the cases when a commenter brings up interesting points, and that has happened a lot). I am into ideas. I also beg forgiveness for forgetting that, in Christian Fundamentalism, “flat earth” is a compliment, a code word of mutual appreciation. As you have a past of Fundamentalist (or so you wrote all over the Internet!), it was a grave misunderstanding on my part that, to honor you properly, I should have glorified in the “flat earth” qualificative!
Montaigne said in the 20 lines preamble of his Essays that the work was personal, and that those who are not interested in him should stop reading, and he bid them goodbye, telling them they had better things to do. So even Montaigne, five centuries ago, was careful to point out that he was not trying to seduce, and, a fortiori, “understand” an “audience”. And it’s more than that, it’s a moral law.
Montaigne set the standards for the modern intellectual. Verily, bending over backwards to seduce morons is the deepest trap for the mentally advanced. This behavior forgets that many morons are morons by choice. And of course, the popularity race on the Internet rests on that will to seduction of the uneducated herd.
(By the way I am flattered that some hear voices in their heads when trying to understand some of the ideas here; I thought I had only a readership! but it turns out even modern Jeanne d’Arcs are out there, listening to me in their heads!)
“Lenghty diatribe” against superstition? No, not really. But argument against a particular moral authorization Christianism gives: claim ignorance, be forgiven! The pseudo crucified Himself supposedly said it between two orgasms induced by his oozing masochism! Huitzilopochtli, we got rid of, as an object of adoration (but not wonder!) The Abrahamists will follow the Aztecs, be it just because, at least in the case of Christians (not Muslims), the myth of ignorance as all forgiving is central.
I harbor zero anger towards Lionel. He reminded me of a chipmunk offering battle on a trail to a powerful mountain runner. I always savor those moments, they allow me to muscle up. I actually thank him for his misinformed aggressivity, it gave me the occasion of telling a few truths. Several readers had the kindness to inform me, they liked those truths very much. Lionel was a gift, but the ship of ideas moves on, as the lemmings paddle in the vast stormy sea, squeaking away… Let me explain to the mentally challenged, that the ship is NOT angry.
Anger should not be an obsession.
PA
October 3, 2012 at 7:53 pm |
Sorry Martin! That should have been:
The lemmings squeak, in the ocean, the ship moves on, among the stars.
PA
October 4, 2012 at 6:27 pm |
These days, I am much more of an agnostic than a Christian; and I have zero respect for flat earthers and young earth creationists alike. I therefore do not understand what you are going on about; and I care even less to know, so please don’t waste anymore of your time trying to explain it to me.
October 4, 2012 at 11:22 pm |
Martin: Congratulation for your evolution towards agnoticism, skepticism and cynicism! I hope I helped with my feeble means… The ship goes through the night, in the mysterious stormy ocean. Only the captain knows, and even then…
PA
October 5, 2012 at 9:08 am |
I am glad to report that you had absolutely nothing to do with it; as the transition occurred about 5 years ago. These days, as I feel I have said many times now (because you don’t seem to [want to?] understand me), I mainly just defend the right of people of faith from ideologues who insist that religion is at best pointless and at worst harmful.
October 5, 2012 at 4:01 pm
Martin: People are ideology machines. Only mussels do not have ideologies. The spectrum of religions can also extent from the admirable and indispensable, to the cruel, vicious and tyranical.
For further reference about the greatness of extreme organized superstitions, please spend 2 days in Syria, and watch various Abrahamists sects having it wih each other.
Republicanism and Secularism are religions, they are far from pointless, so I am not opposed to religions.
I do not have the bandwith to understand all people who appear (& promptly disappear!) on the Internet. However, I have lots of time to refine my ideas, and that implies responding to criticism constructively.
PA
October 5, 2012 at 7:07 pm |
” I have lots of time to refine my ideas, and that implies responding to criticism constructively”
We can but hope that one day you will do it!
October 2, 2012 at 10:41 pm |
OK, just returned from taking a sick dog to the vet and, for whatever reason, was thinking about your essay. (The dog is fine! The owner perhaps less so!).
I seem to have found an opinion or two! Before I start, a warning that I’m not especially qualified to say what I am about to say, apart from a general observation of the world around me over the last 60-odd years.
It strikes me that superstition is as old as man. I can recall visiting, over 40 years ago, the Aboriginal settlements deep in the heart of Australia, especially those around Ayres Rock, and remember how countless aspects of the rocks, trees, caves, fissures and crevices were endowed with spiritual meanings.
Even people who claim they do not believe in or have no superstitions are likely to do a few things they cannot explain. One might define a superstition as a behavior that has no rational basis or history but then the list of things that people do that is not rational is huge! Even a simple saying such as “Wish me luck” is utterly devoid of any rational motive.
So whether one is a believer or not in a religion, formal or otherwise, and all that goes with the ‘structure’ of that belief is, more or less, besides the point. Religion, superstition, fairies at the bottom of the garden seem to be an irrevocable part of the consciousness of modern man. (Interpret ‘modern’ as you will!)
Moving on to the concept of truth is, of course, a different matter. Truth is obvious! Or is it? Daniel Goleman in his book Vital Lies, Simple Truths demonstrates the ways in which we deceive our-selves. In fact, he argues that self-deception is an ancient “means of psychic self-preservation, the currency of survival in which an entire society colludes.” So it appears as though fooling ourselves is central to our psychological existence.
But, of course, we all know that I could be accused of being too clever by half! Mathematics is an absolute truth. A myriad of facts about how this world functions are 99.9999 (forever)% true. Space exploration, to name but one, relies on the truth of the physics, (or is that mathematics?), of the planets and solar system.
And, also, a very long way from my philosophical and metaphorical musings is the truth of how the 1% of mankind are killing us all, so recently exposed by the case brought by the New York Attorney General against JPMorgan Chase for allegedly defrauding investors of more than $20bn (£12bn) on mortgage-backed securities.
So do I have a conclusion? Don’t know the truth of that! Need to consult the local witch-doctor!
October 3, 2012 at 5:44 pm |
Further to my 1% ‘killing us all’, an item on yesterday’s Bloomberg.com reads, Top 1% Got 93% of Income Growth as Rich-Poor Gap Widened. Link to article is here http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-02/top-1-got-93-of-income-growth-as-rich-poor-gap-widened.html
October 3, 2012 at 6:26 pm |
Dear Paul: Sorry about the slow reply, I was off the Internet with human and family activities. Whatever Martin may believe, I did not self drop at the vet. I do agree that superstition is central to man.
But there are two aspects to it:
1) General superstition, where all the lemmings believe in prophet-lemming, martyr-lemming and god-lemming allows to proceed with a closed logical system instead of an open one. It is not necessary, but it can be reassuring, as it reconstitute the psychological relationship to parents when one is a toddler, and it is encouraged by oligarchies which reign over lemmings by manipulating what they believe.
2) Superstition as part of the meta process, or the abstraction process. This goes to the core of the engines of mental creation.
Super-stition means “standing-above”. “Standing above” what? What can be seen, what can be touched, felt, heard. “Standing above” is the act that allows the brain to go where neurology had not been before.
Abstraction is at the core of mathematics. And of course speech. A British mathematician, Alonso Church tried to define abstraction very rigorously, and rebuild math, using it. It took enormous efforts to prove 1+1=2…
In practice, abstraction is done through the meta process, in a loose way. When physicists and mathematicians want to speak of that, they call the argument “heuristic“. much modern physics was founded on heuristic arguments, that led to equations, themselves abstractions, which, in turn, were experimentally verified.
Another method is to turn the abstraction, the fruit of the superstition approach, into a definition. That, again, is at the core of math (or physics).
These remarks are disparate, but we touch here on subjects that are at the core of imagination, thinking, and understanding what objects or concepts truth itself tries to relate.
The way you finish, with the 1% exploiting, seems to me related to superstition and fables.
An example: naive ecologists believe that the powers that be do not get it about “global warming”. But quite the opposite, they get it. They see profits in it, and they see little fables people are made to believe into as the way to focus their minds on red herrings.
Similarly the top Christians, throughout the Middle Ages made a giant show of believing in Christ and other ridiculous tales about people who did not even exist (there is no trace of Jesus’ existence and execution, but plenty of several similar characters, thoroughly documented). But a look at the historical record shows it was not really so at all. Even from the likes of the sadistic Saint Louis. Crusaders roasted children when they were hungry, in a blatant mockery of the supposedly sacred Scripture. I did not start this line of observation. Nietzsche, studying just the texts, arrived, very loudly to that conclusion 130 years ago. However, I focus on facts. God worship allows the violence of elites that speak in its name.
Indeed who are these critters who exert violence in the name of divine omnipotence? Obviously divine omnipotence does not need their help. So they are helping themselves.
PA
October 3, 2012 at 7:35 pm |
Wow, even your reply is going to take a couple of ‘coatings of thought’! But I think I’m slowly getting it!
October 3, 2012 at 11:38 am |
Dear Patrice. Great article, i never priced you before, but here it is. I wonder sometime, what are you? A philosopher, historian, eco-biologist? Probably not an economist, in this field i feel more confident and find from time to time some misconceptions in your theories.
As to the European history. In last millennium there were 3 major wars, the thirty year war that ended with defragmentation of the Holly Roman Empire to hundreds of non imperial fractions. Then we have the hundred years war that started with William the Conqueror winning by accident a very improbable victory at 1066, and ended with the “Entente Cordiale” peace treaty, signed between France and Great Brittany at 1904. This would make this war rather a thousand than hundred years war. After all what were the eighteen century colonial wars between England and French, if not part of the same event at 1066, and luckily ended with establishment of United States of America, or the Napoleon wars in not continuation of the same war? And then we have the eighty years war what started as the Great War, than changed its name to WWI after the WWII came to existence, and continued practically uninterrupted until the disassembling of the Soviet empire at 1992. I now it lasted only 78 year, but lets drop this detail.
You are probably right about the conspiracy of the Prussian generals, but even they couldn’t do what they have done, if the two Caesars did not have a great problem with their political legitimacy. After all, during their long reign, (In Franz Josef’s case it was 66 years and Wilhelm 55 years at the eve of the Great War), the countries they ruled want thru major changes. The most important is the rapid industrialization, that created huge growth of urban population, that happened to learn lately to read newspapers, after the basic education became obligatory. Fables and fairy tales ceased to be good enough to give legitimacy to these rulers. As to the Czar, in his case the problem was not the over literacy of the population, but rather the literacy of the Czar himself, who believed in the fables and fairy tales on which he based the legitimacy of his rule. Non of these three clowns thought for a moment, about having problem of their legitimacy. Who did understand the problem of legitimacy, was Franz Ferdinand, The Poor Ferdinand, who was killed while working on finding solution to the problem of legitimacy of the Habsburg anachronism.
Pity, if not killed, probably Russia would have become major economic power of the continent within 20 years, being in balance only with Great Brittany and France. Germany would probably shrink into today’s size plus some more portal cities in the Baltic See (Konigsberg for example). Russia would probably under pretext of Slavophilism and orthodox church philism kick out the Turks from Europe and northern Anatolian, and the Ottoman empire, would shrink to small Turkey, Kurdistan and Arabia, and being neglected by others in their backwardness, ignorance and rigour religiousness until someone would discover the oil reserves in the Arab desert.
Conclusion, my alternative History thesis just proves the historical determinisms, since more or less this is what happened anyway, just in the way were murdered at least 100 million Europeans and only God knows how many non Europeans, if we count the Communistic murderers of Asia as part of the story.
October 3, 2012 at 7:46 pm |
Dear Eugen: Thanks enormously for the appreciation and re-blogging my post.
Please do not hesitate to correct what you view as my errors in economy, or just express disapproval, in whichever way, even if you cannot precisely point at what you feel is wrong.I do not claim to have it all figured out, like Jesus did before he got nailed on the cross, and started to whine.
I am interested in producing, in this, as in other matters, the most correct theory. That is where my partisan corner lays. For this I have to know what the right ideas can be. They can be all over the place. Many of my enemies in systems of ideas have (had) actually sometimes excellent ideas in particular areas, or spot. This is actually the case with ALL famous systems of ideas, and the same extends to moods… Why ALL? Because otherwise they would have had no merits whatsover, so will never have been worth examining by those who became their followers…
PA
October 3, 2012 at 10:35 pm |
That is a most profound position to adopt. I might ‘borrow’ the stance you take in connection with a post I am writing for next week.
October 3, 2012 at 10:57 pm |
Paul: I am such an abyssal, not to say abysmal, creature, that I can only wonder which depth you are profoundly sounding here… Anyway, “borrow” away, ideas are made to be borrowed…
Borrowing turns into theft only when people refuse to track, to their deliberate advantage, how propriety was transferred, and claim it for themselves uniquely… So it requires deliberate maliciousness. As the present financial crisis demonstrate; the public money extended to the banksters was laundered (so called “Quantitative Easing”) in such a way that the governments could deny it was just a gift to bankers… And the bankers claimed it was theirs’ all along, instead of admitting it was just public money they built their mansions with.
A famous example is the gravitational attraction law, that led to a fierce fight between Newton and Hooke, and others. Newton pointed out, in the end, that the real discoverer of the law was a French churchman (!!!) who got it by analogy with light.
I will be looking for that post.
!
PA
October 4, 2012 at 7:40 pm |
The Quantitative Easing is the necessary result of much bigger problem. Dysfunction of the whole Market Economy system, called Capitalism and with it the Democratic political system.
Here are some explanation to the dysfunction. (draft of my book);
The price system disruption is caused by some graceless political intervention of legislators, who represent particular interests and not the general interest. This kind of connection between a dominant economic entity in the society and a political leadership creates a plutocracy, where the ruling elite of the oligarchs become disconnected from the rest of the society. This oligarchy if doesn’t change its attitude from time to time, will be at the end disposed and annihilated.
The other reason for market economy disruption is the legal structures of the publically owned economic entities, its ownership is widely dispersed, the real owners have no managerial power to influence the happening in the firms. The real managers of these companies are not necessarily, the major shareholders, but rather nominated representatives of the real owners. The very vague connection between the share ownership and the company management is major systematic problem. The usual majority owner of publicly traded shared company is either a holder of relatively small stake of shares, or an investment or pension fund manager, that is also an external manager, who has no direct connection to the depositors. The real owner in pension fund is employed private person, who saved some share of his income, as security for his old age. It can be also a private person depositing his savings in a commercial bank, a small investor who entrusted his savings in an investment fund, or an owner of a life insurance policy, whose payments were accumulated in the insurance funds. All this small lifelong savings were entrusted into the hands of “professionals”, who invested it in publicly traded share companies. Some of the managers of these investment funds, insurance companies, banks, etc. called the financial institutions, then on behalf of institutions they represent, that run on the money deposited in them by all these small private investors, become the directors of the publicly owned companies and nominate their management. But the publicly owned share companies are usually also the biggest clients of the financial institutions as well, and as such, they are nominated to become directors of the financial institutions themselves. And here we have a closed circle of self nominated managers, disconnected from the real owners, who nominate each other, and advance their personal self-interest rather than the interest of the owners of the entities they supposedly represent.
October 4, 2012 at 11:29 pm |
Dear Eugen: I agree with all you say. The only thing I would whine about is that the phenomena you describe are only part of the problem. They used to be most of it, but we have moved on. A major bank, 22 years ago, did not know what derivatives were (except for Goldman, which was rolling them out). 7 years ago, some major banks made more than half of their profits from credit derivatives… Just an example.
Some have hypothesized in Physics that gravity leaks from a higher dimensional universe. What we have here in finace and economics is leakage in reverse: most created money leaks into the derivatives’ universe.
PA
October 3, 2012 at 3:15 pm |
Reblogged this on EugenR Lowy עוגן רודן.
October 5, 2012 at 12:17 am |
Bending over backwards to seduce morons is the deepest & most naive trap for the mentally advanced. Verily, many are morons by choice.
PA
October 5, 2012 at 12:18 am |
That created a funny image in my imagination. LOL
October 5, 2012 at 8:30 pm |
For those whose pain motivate them to think. That monkeys can ponder unfairness, suffer from it, & react to it, has been demonstrated experimentally, years ago. With marmosets.
October 5, 2012 at 8:33 pm |
And in Yosemite.
October 5, 2012 at 8:38 pm |
The higher the monkey climbs, the more it shows its behind. And the more it does it, the more probable it is that the sky will fall on its head.
October 5, 2012 at 8:34 pm |
That makes monkeys superior to politicians then.
October 5, 2012 at 8:38 pm |
Politicians are inferior in a superior way.
The very nature of the present political process attracts unsavory characters, or encourages unsavory methods. It is a major problem in representative democracy. A way out has to be found, not clear which one. Although the Internet, properly done, could/should help.
October 8, 2012 at 3:29 am |
We need MASS voting on individual issues, as in Switzerland but more. This is now perfectly possible with modern technology.
Mass voting already takes place in many newspapers. This is how I know that most of my views are not off the wall but actually shared by the majority. Of course, politicians would only concede this over their dead bodies because A) They know best and they have to retain power in OUR best interests (does this sound like Sadaam Hussein, Gaddafi and Assad?) and B) their power and above all control of OUR MONEY would be destroyed.
As for A), it is hilarious. It is not the PLEBS who got us into this shambles, but those who “know best”.
October 8, 2012 at 3:56 am |
Chris: Surfacing here, sorry I am so slow. After another essay written and a Smartphone, purchased (my first). Now I will have an excuse to write 6 words thoughts with bad spelling… I agree 100% with what you say. Switzerland should be imitated. I do not see why France could not work with a Swiss system. Same USA, or whatever. There are fewer differences between Obama and Romney than any two members of the Swiss Federal Council, by a factor of 100. Or more.
PA
October 8, 2012 at 6:41 pm |
Great stuff. Democracy must evolve, or it will become discredited. Information technology has changed everything. That’s one reason why I want all governments’ hands off the internet, but they are bastards and will seize every opportunity to control and tax us. I note that Germany wants the EU to “have its own budget.” This will be worse than the pox.
October 8, 2012 at 6:43 pm |
Chris: Well the EU Federal budget is now only 1% of EU GDP. Yes, F E D E R A L. In the USA, it’s about 17% of GDP. Right now most of the EU budget is (ridiculously, and a lot thanks to France) in agriculture. But the EU also finances many pan-European projects (such as Erasmus, or multi-national transportation projects), that would not get otherwise financed. My (French) nephew is studying biology in Scotland, thanks to Erasmus, and no doubt will master the (third) language of Richard Coeur de Lion…
There is no doubt that one should hesitate to augment the EU Federal budget, when defined needs with high returns (such as Erasmus) can be determined. That does not mean the F1 circuit in the Pennopolese, though. An immediate need is to augment the means of the ECB, so that it can, not just build skyscrappers in Frankfurt, but supervise a pan-European bank insurance system (a European FDIC).
Certainly the gov should stay off the Internet, if we want progress. Internet control by gov would be bring back intellectual fascism in force.
PA