I am obliged to respect Descartes for his mathematical innovations (Cartesian co-ordinates allowing the marriage of geometry and algebra, index representation of powers, and others), and of course, "I think, therefore I am" is an important step in the philosophies of identity and epistemology (although I'm not sure everyone who refers to it knows how it's intended). His philosophical discourse in this book is one of those that spends a lot of time trying to reconcile notions of God, heaven, the soul etc., with logical sense. On this account, I think it fails - however, it is quite delightful to read the writings of such a pompous and arrogant man. He is so preoccupied with hes greatness, quite oblivious to the ridiculous impression he makes. I guess there's something typically French about it, which makes it entertaining rather than boring - he reminds me of the cousin in the BBC pride and prejudice, Mr. Collins (hopefully more charismatic... dressed up in his 17th century fashionable French attire).
An interesting side-note of this book is that Descartes self-censored some of his ideas, given the controversy surrounding Galileo in the preceding years. Galileo's ridiculous idea that the Earth might revolve around the Sun earned him a spot on the Heretics for Burning List, and some of Descartes ideas about the origins of mind and knowledge could have landed him in similar strife.
Monday, March 15, 2004
Tuesday, March 2, 2004
A brave new unconscious civilisation
I read John Ralston Saul's Unconscious Civilisation when I was trying to get into politics. I'd recently purchased the Oxford Companion to World Politics in order to better understand the US election process, and my brother-in-law recommended Unconscious Civilisation because it was about where he stood. Since then I have seen Ralston Saul give a lecture on his book The Collapse of Globalism, and he's quite an interesting speaker.
He comes from an economics background, and has ideas that are probably centre-left - which is good because it's progressive but realistic. It's one of those books (indeed, he's one of those writers/speakers) that looks at conventions of today and questions their necessity. Of note, intellectual property laws that stopped a condom maker from making "Stealth Condoms" because the shape of the stealth bomber is patented, and the elitist culture where leaders drive public interest rather than respond to it as per democracy. Obviously there's some room for debate here - perhaps one of the reasons most of us have hope in Obama is that he's likely to orient the public toward "better" interests, but when stakeholders and the elite get together things can go wrong.
A most interesting line in this book is his mention of 1984 and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Huxley's book I think came out in the 30s, a decade or so before 1984, but I guess they are roughly written around the same time in our unconscious - what Ralston Saul points out is that we have been so preoccupied with warning against the bleak 1984 future, and virtually no mention is made of Brave New World - even though it's much closer to where our society is headed and probably far more dangerous.
Brave New World manufactures 5 classes of citizens by adding a little alcohol to the test-tube babies in different doses, and inculcating the societal roles from a young age. Sex is no longer needed to reproduce, so partnership becomes redundant and indicative of an unhealthy lifestyle. Once again, the point isn't to predict "hey, we might become this test-tube society - isn't that strange and terrible?", but rather every aspect of the society is somehow related to our own. We are brought up culturally to recognise tiers of society, keep to our own limitations and not try to upset the order, and we get plenty of messages from government and advertising companies that reinforce this, even if we don't really think it should be the case.
Oh yeah, plus the THC drug in it, rad stuff.
He comes from an economics background, and has ideas that are probably centre-left - which is good because it's progressive but realistic. It's one of those books (indeed, he's one of those writers/speakers) that looks at conventions of today and questions their necessity. Of note, intellectual property laws that stopped a condom maker from making "Stealth Condoms" because the shape of the stealth bomber is patented, and the elitist culture where leaders drive public interest rather than respond to it as per democracy. Obviously there's some room for debate here - perhaps one of the reasons most of us have hope in Obama is that he's likely to orient the public toward "better" interests, but when stakeholders and the elite get together things can go wrong.
A most interesting line in this book is his mention of 1984 and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Huxley's book I think came out in the 30s, a decade or so before 1984, but I guess they are roughly written around the same time in our unconscious - what Ralston Saul points out is that we have been so preoccupied with warning against the bleak 1984 future, and virtually no mention is made of Brave New World - even though it's much closer to where our society is headed and probably far more dangerous.
Brave New World manufactures 5 classes of citizens by adding a little alcohol to the test-tube babies in different doses, and inculcating the societal roles from a young age. Sex is no longer needed to reproduce, so partnership becomes redundant and indicative of an unhealthy lifestyle. Once again, the point isn't to predict "hey, we might become this test-tube society - isn't that strange and terrible?", but rather every aspect of the society is somehow related to our own. We are brought up culturally to recognise tiers of society, keep to our own limitations and not try to upset the order, and we get plenty of messages from government and advertising companies that reinforce this, even if we don't really think it should be the case.
Oh yeah, plus the THC drug in it, rad stuff.
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