And tribes/bands of foragers have been around for far longer than that. As Robin Hanson likes to point out, recent technological changes have made a “forager” lifestyle and ethic a lot more viable than it used to be—possibly more so nowadays than the “farmer” prototype that was previously favored.
Yes, a century from now we may have discarded the Enlightenment as we’ve discarded so many other things. We may replace it with feudal monarchies, or (as you say) foraging tribes, or tyrranical empires, or rule by philosopher-kings, or obedience to futures markets, or entirely unregulated capitalism, or a thousand other things.
There are lots of “non-Enlightenment” styles of life; to pay particular attention to one such way of life may be justified, but if so it seems like it has to be justified on some grounds other than “the Enlightenment isn’t uniquely stable.”
I think that NRx can be disaggregated into two relatively independent parts—the critique of the current Western political arrangements and the normative this-should-be-so part. It may make sense to discuss them separately.
The problem with that is doing so implicitly encourages those who espouse the this-should-be-so parts every time they are reinforced by seeing the other bits discussed. I REALLY wish there were a way around this, because criticism of democracy and trying to figure out ways around its bad points is a very interesting subject.
First, I don’t see implicit encouragement as a problem. You’re thinking in supply-the-enemy-tribe-with-attention terms which aren’t particularly useful.
Second, the critical part of NRx doesn’t like much more than just democracy. Cathedral is vast and its filaments burrow deep...
And tribes/bands of foragers have been around for far longer than that. As Robin Hanson likes to point out, recent technological changes have made a “forager” lifestyle and ethic a lot more viable than it used to be—possibly more so nowadays than the “farmer” prototype that was previously favored.
Right, this is the kind of thing I have in mind.
Yes, a century from now we may have discarded the Enlightenment as we’ve discarded so many other things. We may replace it with feudal monarchies, or (as you say) foraging tribes, or tyrranical empires, or rule by philosopher-kings, or obedience to futures markets, or entirely unregulated capitalism, or a thousand other things.
There are lots of “non-Enlightenment” styles of life; to pay particular attention to one such way of life may be justified, but if so it seems like it has to be justified on some grounds other than “the Enlightenment isn’t uniquely stable.”
I think that NRx can be disaggregated into two relatively independent parts—the critique of the current Western political arrangements and the normative this-should-be-so part. It may make sense to discuss them separately.
The problem with that is doing so implicitly encourages those who espouse the this-should-be-so parts every time they are reinforced by seeing the other bits discussed. I REALLY wish there were a way around this, because criticism of democracy and trying to figure out ways around its bad points is a very interesting subject.
First, I don’t see implicit encouragement as a problem. You’re thinking in supply-the-enemy-tribe-with-attention terms which aren’t particularly useful.
Second, the critical part of NRx doesn’t like much more than just democracy. Cathedral is vast and its filaments burrow deep...