Socio-cultural change/was Re: [extropy-chat] letter concerning presidential growth

[Technotranscendence]

On Thursday, December 15, 2005 12:59 AM spike spike66 at comcast.net wrote:
>>Spike is down under?
>
>> Also, Alan's view seems to smack of an everywhere similar,
>> constant socio-cultural evolution. In fact, the opposite seems
>> true: different patterns and rates of change all over the
>> place.  Regards, Dan
>
> No, still a yank, thanks.  {8-]

Thought so.

> I was responding to what appeared to be a suggestion that
> we have a political free-for-all.  I proposed we do that, but
> limit it to about a week, and be civil about it.  Those who
> have no interest can wait until the furor dies down, then we
> return to our regularly scheduled program.  Sound fair?

Sounds fair.  I just wanted to get away from serious
oversimplifications, such as looking at Europe as pacific and as
hundreds of years ahead of the US is socio-cultural evolution.  It might
be accurate to say the US is merely the Western-most part of Europe -- 
that European culture extends from Warsaw to San Francisco, as Ralph
Raico would opine.

Also, even if one wants to consider modern Europe as separate from the
US -- for whatever reason -- then judging both societies along their
maturity and inclination to warfare...  Well, while the US is very
warlike, I think this has little to do with the US being a younger
society.  In fact, if we turned back the clock just a few decades,
Europe was busy slugging it out in total war -- in fact, two total wars
during the first half of the 20th century.  Doesn't sound all that
un-warlike to me.  Europe's more pacific recent years are, IMHO, less
the result of European culture than of Cold War and post-Cold War
realities.  Specifically, the fact that Europe was an arena of
superpower conflict during the former and then of American domination
during the latter has made for this relatively conflict free period.

Getting back to socio-cultural evolution, I think Alan simplifies this
to an extreme.  Not only do his statements make it seem he thinks it's
linear and constant everywhere, but also that it's always a progress.  I
think it's far to say the future is an open issue and that any gains
made today can be lost tomorrow.  (On a political note: the failure to
see this is probably why some people are willing to trade hard won
freedoms, such as the right to property or freedom of expression, for
things they judge as progressive, such as the Prussian welfare state of
wealth redistribution and nationalized healthcare that sadly has
captured the imagination of elites on both sides of the Atlantic since
1900.)

Regards,

Dan
http://uweb1.superlink.net/~neptune/