From: Blanc <blancw@cnw.com>
Date: Tue, 2 Sep 1997 12:14:37 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Re: The End of Politics
Message-ID: <3.0.32.19970901202355.013e23d0@cnw.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Steve Schear wrote:
>			The End of Politics
>
>Every 500 years or so Western history seems to reach a turning point: the
>founding of democracy (Athens, c. 500 B.C.), the death to Christ, the fall
>of the Roman Empire and beginning of the Dark Ages (c. 500 A.D.), the
>ascendancy of the Catholic Church and beginning to the Middle Ages (c. 1000
>A.D.) and the Renaissance (c. 1500 A.D.).
...........................................................


I'm so curious to know what occasioned this burst of insight and historical
perspective from you, Steve?  This is because, just by coincidence, I was
up into the wee hours of this morning and happened to be perusing the MS
Bookshelf Chronology of History.  Looking through the dates on which
certain events occurred - political, scientific, artistic, etc., I also was
noting the changes which took place in 500 yr (or so) measures, just for
comparison.  I was noting when certain changes occurred in civilization
which would mark major points of (to me) "advancement".

The Chronology that I was looking at is a very simplified and limited one,
so my examination was constrained to the list offered.   Depending on which
sector of activity one is looking at, it is possible to note areas of
progress, discovery, or regression.   But in looking at the vocabulary, in
the way which many events are described, I also noted that the terms which
were used to identify things is permeated with the ideas of politics, of
descriptions by reference to relative positions of control in the human
context; then, as more facts about the world beyond the proximate social
schemas are revealed, concepts and ideas are apprehended in a broader
context, to include more extensively the other elements of the Universe,
and the descriptive terms change accordingly, becoming more objective (more
in terms of "things as they are", rather than so much in terms of human
relationships, of comparative positions of social influence).

In considering their understanding of things, it is like the expression,
"to someone with a hammer everything looks like a nail".   To the ancestral
evolving minds, the relationships of each to others, the jockeying for the
more favorable positions over each other, was paramount.   As it becomes
easier to pursue the curiosities of Nature, develop artistic interests, and
achieve practical solutions to Life's problems, the attention transforms
from those earlier concerns to a concentrated pursuit of knowledge and to
an increased, augmented perspective on what is Important and what are the
Real Problems (and what are the actual working solutions).  Existence then
takes on a different perspective - it does not seem as dangerous (other
people don't seem as threatenting) when a person has achieved mastery over
the elements and forces of Nature.  And this difference in understanding is
reflected in the vocabulary.

At least, that is what occurred to me as I was looking at the historical
timeline.

    ..
Blanc