Vad är rättvist?

En bekant sa nyligen till mig att det är orättvist att alla människor i världen inte har ungefär lika mycket, att alla inte har det ungefär lika gott ställt materiellt. Jag var i situationen oförmögen att ge något särskilt bra svar - låt se om jag lyckas bättre nu. Det finns för många hopplösa, välmenande men förvirrade premisser bakom utsagan för att den ska få tillåtas stå oemotsagd.

Ponera följande: ett gift par skaffar två barn, ett annat skaffar tio. De har båda lika mycket egendom och inkomster. Den första familjen kan därför leva mindre trångt och med högre materiell standard än den andra. När barnen blir vuxna kommer de med all sannolikhet att gå olika öden till mötes. Den lilla familjen kan betala för utbildning och bostad åt sina barn och låta dem ärva egendom, till exempel hus eller jordbruksmark. I den stora familjen blir det ett betydligt mindre arv per person och föräldrarna kommer inte kunna ge lika mycket tid eller resurser till alla sina barn utan tvingas kanske satsa på ett eller två. Medan den första familjen kan förmera eller åtminstone bibehålla sin egendom och inkomst per capita så är risken stor (i de flesta samhällen) att tiobarnsfamiljen blir allt fattigare.  Snart hyr barnen från den stora familjen ut sin arbetskraft till barnen från den lilla familjen bara för att få det att gå ihop, och klassamhället är ett faktum.

Var någonstans har en orättvisa begåtts? Om vi är överens om att orättvisor inte får tillskrivas naturen eller Allsmäktig Gud så återstår möjligen föräldrarna till den andra familjen, som var "orättvisa" mot sina första barn genom att skaffa ännu fler barn senare. Men så är det sällan någon som tänker, troligtvis inte de berörda barnen heller; agget riktas mot dem som har det bättre än du själv. Min bekant föreslog i varje fall att full rättvisa endast kan realiseras om de som har delar med sig villkorslöst med dem som inte har. Exemplet ovan demonstrerar - hoppas jag - absurditeten, faktiskt orättvisan, i en sådan princip. Om de båda familjerna i det här fallet skulle tvingas dela på allt de hade så skulle den andra familjen sluta med tre fjärdedelar av välståndet (12 personer mot 4 personer) enbart i kraft av numerär överlägsenhet.

Därmed inte sagt att världen är rättvis - men klasskillnader behöver inte vara orättvisa i sig. Och även om de inte är det så kan de förstås vara problematiska i sina långsiktiga konsekvenser. 

För rolig för att inte dela

Framstegets obönhörliga fortgång

Vad är progressivt? Inte socialism i alla fall, menar en skribent för det relativt nya partiet Medborgerlig Samling.

Medborgerlig Samling (MED) är ett intressant parti om inte annat för att de andas progressivism samtidigt som de står tydligt till höger - de kallar sig liberal-konservativa och även "blågröna". De profilerar sig i frågor som identitetspolitik (som de vill ha mindre av), fördjupad demokrati, reformerad grundskola (större fokus på kunskap, tidigare betyg etc), begränsad migration, satsningar på försvaret och på polisen. De kallar sig kulturellt konservativa, men tar samtidigt strid mot hedersförtryck och upprör sig över försäljning av burkinis på sportbutiker. Kanske ett exempel på den oklarhet som råder på temat konservatism kopplat till kön (det har inte alltid varit legio med bikini i Västvärlden för den som glömt det: https://www.svd.se/badklader-som-upprort-genom-tiderna).

Vad gäller den historiska sexualupplysaren Elise Ottesen-Jensen då - var hon progressiv? Frågan infinner sig eftersom SVT sänder en dokumentär om henne just ikväll. Och det slår mig att svaret på frågan är ja, om inte annat så för att historien gav henne rätt - de höga herrarna som försökte förbjuda allt tal om kondomer har idag förpassats till historiens avskrädeshög, medan hennes gärning lever vidare. Och RFSU som betraktar sig själva som hennes arvtagare hyllar henne gärna, med undantag för hennes omfamnande av tvångssteriliseringar, som de beklagar. Och ändå får man väl förmoda att hon såg även detta som ett led i det mänskliga framstegets obönhörliga fortgång, alltså att hon själv betraktade det som progressivt.

Och hur är det med Xi Jinping, ledaren för folkrepubliken Kina? "Folkrepublik" låter ju progressivt, och om det var någon som inbillade sig att karln inte är marxist så får ni nog tänka om. Och Kina leder ju världens utveckling nu, inte sant? Världsledande inte bara i ekonomisk tillväxt och fattigdomsbekämpning utan också i internationell handel, tvångsinternering av uigurer ("omskolning"), klimatåtgärder och kolkraft. När Västvärlden inte längre har så många nyheter att erbjuda bortsett från skränande populister så omformar Kina världen efter en helt ny samhällsvision, inklusive det här med att alla medborgare i framtiden kommer att kunna poängsättas beroende på hur väl de sköter sig och så kommer deras möjligheter i det kinesiska samhället att påverkas därefter - det låter väl modernt och innovativt (progressivt)?

Som någon skrev: är du pessimistisk om Kina, så är du också pessimistisk om världen.

Och kanske även om själva Framsteget och dess hisnande slutstation.

Jupiter in Scorpio, Jordan Peterson and the Me too-movement

So Jupiter was in the sign of Scorpio between October 10th last year and November 8th a week ago. It has since moved on to Sagittarius, whereby many astrologers are now predicting plenty of good luck and spiritual and personal growth. Me, I just started studying transits, so I don't feel especially inclined to join the argument - but let's have a look at the past position of Jupiter in Scorpio, shall we? A couple of things do strike me as fitting here: the rise of Jordan Peterson and the Me too-movement.

First, let's have a look at what this astrologer writes:

On the edge of Jupiter’s ingress into Scorpio, on the morning of October 5th Harvey Weinstein’s sexual harassment story was published in the New York Times [i]. Over the following days more actresses came forward to speak of their experiences of Weinstein’s predatory behavior.

On the heels of this story came the social media hashtag #MeToo that women are using to self-identify as victims of sexual harassment and making consciousness [ii]. Scrolling down the #MeToo page my heart ached and I wanted to hug each woman, look her in the eye and say, “I know, me too”.The widespread culture of male abuse of power and serial sexual misconduct and abuse has been outed.

[...]

There is an astrological correspondence or coincidence of Jupiter moving into Scorpio and the exposing of these issues of power and sex in our culture. These stories of sexual harassment may be understood as the opening gambit of Jupiter in Scorpio. 

ASTROLOGICAL OPENINGS AND INSIGHTS

Scorpio has to do with the taboo subjects of power, sex and shared resources (other people’s money and how we use it).Jupiter is the planetary archetype related to the principles of expansion, growth, increase. Jupiter magnifies and illumines. When things grow, they become more obvious. Jupiter in Scorpio exposes what has been hidden. The shadow of male power has been outed.

Interesting, no? Granted, one should not simply google around until one finds something that concurs with one's own beliefs. It is bad methodology. So let me move ahead to a suggestion that is entirely my own, and see if I can back it up with some solid astrological literature: 2018 was the year that Jordan Peterson, the much-hyped, loved and hated Canadian psychologist released his book 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. 

Two questions: 1) What is this book about? 2) How does it relate to Jupiter in Scorpio?

1) For those of you who haven't read it, 12 Rules for Life is a work that tries to offer spiritual guidelines for how to lead a meaningful life, while avoiding the pitfalls of simplistic ideology. Peterson does not attempt to great a totalizing vision for how society should be changed - the horrors of the 20th century are fresh in his mind - but rather scales down to the individual, the family, the immediate society. So you will not be surprised that the titles to one of his chapters (sadly, the shortest one) reads Put Your House in Perfect Order Before You Criticize The World. We are many from my own generation who would have needed that advice just a little bit sooner. Some other rules (one per chapter) are Don't Let Your Children Do Things That Makes You Dislike Them, Treat Yourself As a Person Worthy of Helping and Pet a Cat When You Encounter One On The Street. Peterson attempts to navigate the narrow waters between postmodern nihilism and modernist ideology, and in this I believe he succeeds fairly well. That being said, his critique of "postmodernism" is simplistic and his depiction of environmentalists as "anti-human" is to a large extent unfair. Sure, there is a vulgar kind of environmentalism that does paint humanity as the problem, but many of the real activists I have met would never do that: being passionate leftists, they blame the system, the wealthy, capitalism, but never the poor, never the Global South, never "humanity".

But it is equally unfair to accuse Peterson of political extremism. The Swedish commentator Joel Halldorf put it neatly: While Peterson as a culture warrior is accused of fascism, Peterson as a moral philosopher is disregarded as banal. Neither is true, and I quote:

The modern university [...] detests each claim to normativity. This means that academics today are not trained to discuss Peterson's ambitious ethical program - nor even less offer any alternatives. The consequence is that we do not have a discussion about worldviews and their moral consequences, but rather a debate characterized by mockery. This is a part of what is called the Crisis of the Humanities: the inability to discuss normative ethical and religious claims sadly makes the field irrelevant.

But I digress.

In summary, Peterson's world is a harsh one, and you better toughen up, stand straight with your shoulders back, claim your place in this world or people will use you and abuse you. Humanity has a terrible capacity for evil, and - you guessed it - the Christian heritage, the original sin and the fallen state of Man hangs heavily over Peterson's exposition.

2) So how does this all tie in with Jupiter's transit through Scorpio? My basic astrological knowledge tells me the following: Jupiter is the planet of expansion, philosophy, wisdom and self-betterment, while Scorpio is a sign of power, suspicion, existential themes (life, death, sex), the awakening of occult (literally hidden) powers as well as the ability to discriminate and cut off the sick branch in order to save the tree. To a large extent, Peterson's really is a philosophy of Scorpio.* 

*It seems that he does not have any natal planets in Scorpio though except for Neptune. It also would seem that astrologers are struggling to get their hands on his exact birth time - ascendant in Scorpio? Aries? Any 8th house placements? I rest my case.

Karaktär och intention

Kära läsare,

Jag kommer nu med all sannolikhet sätta den här bloggen på paus under överskådlig framtid. Den begynnande höstterminen ger mig fullt upp med studier, arbete och annat som gör att bloggen måste sättas på undantag. Detta är egentligen ingen förlust - låt oss hoppas att jag gör något vettigare av min tid istället och så småningom kommer tillbaka med nya perspektiv!

För tillfället vill jag bara dela med mig av en kort reflektion angående det svenska valet. Jag har själv inte bestämt mig för något särskilt parti att rösta på, men jag har märkt något om politiska ställningstaganden: När du tar ställning politiskt i ett offentligt sammanhang så kommer din karaktär till uttryck, vare sig du vill det eller ej, och om du är uppriktig så märker du snart om dina intentioner är rena eller inte, liksom andra troligtvis kommer att märka det - och på detta sätt kan du ibland komma fram till att en ståndpunkt som företräds av dig själv eller av någon annan inte är hållbar. På detta sätt kan skillnaden i karaktär mellan opponenterna i vissa politiska debatter vara alldeles uppenbar. Det kanske inte är vanligt, men det förekommer att den enes moraliska överlägsenhet och andliga resning gentemot den andre framträder med sådan kraft att segern är given oavsett sakfrågornas innehåll. På detta sätt kan vi ibland se spillror av sanning reflekteras i en annan människas personliga uttryck, och om vi är uppmärksamma så kanske vi kan urskilja dessa spillror i det allmänna pladdret och ta fasta på dem.

Tack för mig.

The Age of Aquarius? Signs of the Zodiac as Archetypes of the Ages

I am not going to delve heavily into astrology in this post. If you think astrology is just some ridiculous pseudo-science, that is fine. It could even be a healthy attitude to some extent. Nevertheless, according to plenty of New Agers, we are now just entering/having entered the Age of Aquarius, leaving behind the Age of Pisces. As I am concerned with the question of how to periodize world history, this is most interesting to me. Periodization, after all, cannot be done objectively: history is divided into periods based on what "makes sense", no more scientific than that. It is a question of the perception and interpretation of patterns.

Oh, by the way - astronomical ages are a bit more objective. As the Earth wobbles round its axis, the sky above us slowly drifts. It takes the Earth roughly 26,000 years to complete one wobbling movement, known as precession. Divided by twelve, this gives on average slightly more than 2,000 years per Zodiac sign. As the visible sky above changes, the Pole Star will not, for instance, be aligned with the North Pole in the future. Other things that change concern the sun: during the spring and autumn equinoxes, as during the summer and winter solstices, the sun will be in some other Zodiac signs than today. For some reason, astrologers have singled out the spring (vernal) equinox as being of special importance. The sign of the sun during the vernal equinox is supposed to mark the age we are presently in.

This video illustrates the movements of the Earth with regard to the celestial sphere in the long run. It shows that we have now just entered the Age of Aquarius - except we haven't.

Reality isn't as neat as described in the video. Some signs are larger than others, Pisces being one of them. An astronomer would tell you that the spring equinox still occurs in Pisces, and will continue to do so until roughly the year 2600 AD, depending on where exactly you posit the boundaries between the signs.

The sun' s position during the spring equinox, years marked in red

Why astrologers frequently ignore astronomy is puzzling to say the least. There is at least one astrologer who has a long-winding argument for why the Age of Aquarius really began as early as 1433, right in line with the dawn of the modern age. But other than that, well, in the musical Hair they sang some fifty years ago that the Age of Aquarius was dawning. Then various people picked up on this, including Yogi Bhajan who suggested that the transition from the Age of Pisces to the Age of Aquarius would be completed in 2012 (one can only suspect that he was well aware of the end date for the Maya calendar). Whatever the case may be, we proceed to ask: What are the supposed differences between the Age of Pisces and the Age of Aquarius? And why do I, skeptical as I might be, consider this periodization to be a most striking one?

You may read up on typical characterizations of the Pisces and Aquarius signs anwhere on the web. Pisces is dreamy, drifting, understanding, connected with deep devotion, intuition and self-sacrifice. It is Pisces who says: "I shall do as my Lord commands", the Lord in this case being a transcendent being of some sort. Pisces is prone to delirium, illusions and possession: for an extreme charicature, picture the protagonist of The Shadow over Innsmouth by H.P. Lovecraft: A man arrives at a distant town where the inhabitants bear strange, fish-like features. Soon his very dreams are invaded by visions of the dark sea-monster Cthulhu, and in the end, well aware that he is losing his sanity, he only longs to be united with his master, to worship him beneath the waves in eternal bondage. Granted, this is much too dark and destructive for Pisces generally (and supposedly Lovecraft did have Piscean Neptune in the 8th house in his natal horoscope - the house of the occult). Nevertheless, it can hardly be denied that the world from roughly the time of Christ (who was also associated with fish) was, for a long time, dominated by transcendent religions focused on the worship of the One. Mahayana Buddhism also emerged around this time, and Christianity itself grew up in an environment of Late Antique mystery religions such as Mithraism, with which it shared certain features. Salvation religions had already begun to emerge, that much is true: but originally both Buddhism and Jainism, belonging to the martial Age or Aries, taught that the individual must save himself - no exterior deities were ultimately called for. It is only around the Age of Pisces that grace starts to become a factor. And now, supposedly, God is dead (or in any case forgotten) and we are in the Age of Aquarius.

The Aquarian is cut from a different cloth than the Piscean. Some recurring descriptions are (and I quote):

Aquarius in balance: Unique, objective, charismatic, inventive, fair, cosmopolitan, friendly, broadminded, interesting, unusual, creative, ingenious, idealistic, humanitarian, pioneering, socially conscious, activist, modern, awake, ecumenical, unbiased, visionary, open-minded, calm, patient, steady, gregarious, intuitive, alert, loyal, innovative, liberal, tolerant, communal, experimental, revolutionary, remarkable, rational, galvanizing. 

Aquarius out of balance: Dissociated, non-conforming, rebellious, anarchistic, anti, alienated, bizarre, unstable, belligerent, psychopathic, cruel, cold, sociopathic, aloof, impersonal, unsympathetic, fanatical, inflexible, immovable, cynical, disbelieving, skeptical, disparaging, erratic, overtalkative, anxious, ungrounded, inefficient, vacillating, noncommittal, impractical, spacy, unfocused, avoiding, peace-at-any-price, bewildered. 

Abraham Lincoln is a famous example of an Aquarian. Another person who captures some of the Aquarian spirit at its best is Socrates the way he is described in Plato's dialogues. Also, Karl Marx is said among astrologers to have been born during a Solar eclipse with his ascendant in Aquarius (with Sun and Moon in materialistic Taurus).

Now for the meaty part. It goes without saying that the last two hundred years or so have seemed a lot more Aquarian than Piscean in terms of the development of the world. Innovation has started to take on a stunning pace; the rights revolution has seen the emancipation of slaves, serfs, women, children, homosexuals and to some extent animals (although the majority of farm animals are probably worse off today than in the distant past). Electricity, atomic power, democracy, socialism, feminism and philanthropic capitalism: all these things are in the spirit of Aquarius. God is quickly fading from view, and the idea of submitting to a higher power seems evermore parochial and obscure. New Agers do not ask God for anything, they ask the Universe, as a friend and without submitting to it. Now, astrologers tend to say that Aquarians are driven by a quest for collective consciousness - that is, they are certainly spiritual, but their spirituality is of a different kind from Pisceans. But what does this mean? Why does this non-conformist individualist want to blend with others into some form of higher, collective consciousness?

Consider Socrates. Through his broad-minded, universalist logic he produces an "essence of truth" and then makes it visible to his adversary. The end result is that they both "see the truth" right before their eyes in exactly the same way. But this does not have to be a matter of scholastic debate, not at all: the methods may differ between Aquarians, but the quintessential Aquarian always strives for just this: to achieve a harmony of vision between people. That way, their minds become instances of a higher, universal mind.

There are of course other, more concrete examples of this. Marx posited that workers suffered from "false consciousness" so long as they did not realize their true, objective interests. Many feminist and other political groups frequently hold workshops to "raise consciousness". Yet the New Agers do not want to raise consciousness politically, but spiritually, through music, mantras, yoga and the like. In the tradition of above-mentioned Yogi Bhajan, here is a wonderful example of such a practice with music.

The Piscean morality is built around faith, devotion and submission. The Aquarian morality is built on Reason with a capital R. Pisces may be surprised that Aquarius can be moral without resorting to a higher power, but for Aquarius Reason constitues a kind of higher power, only you do not submit to it, you participate in it!

Now it only remains to be seen whether Aquarian man can keep serving humanity without trampling the natural world in the process; whether he can tame the machines he has created in the service of the greater good.

Political Correctness Has Always Been A Thing

Do not whine about "PC culture". Realize that all societies have taboos on what is considered decent to say in public. Would you really like it to be otherwise? Rather, if you are unhappy with the status quo, you are most likely trying to shift the window of political correctness in another direction. Excepting the most childish Neoliberals, most everyone who cares for the well-being of society understands that it needs boundaries, including boundaries on public expression of opinions.

If you do want to change the window of public expression, start in private. Discuss with close friends and confidantes such issues that you would be afraid to raise in public. In some cases, it may turn out that you simply needed to ventilate something and, having done so, you realize that it did sound kind of stupid after all. No harm done so long as you do it with a trusted friend. We simply need to express an opinion before we fully know if we believe in it, in some cases. We need to taste it, hear what it sounds like after it has left the world of ideas and become manifest as speech. The problem with political correctness - whatever form it may take - is not that it puts up boundaries for public speech, but that it can stifle thought itself. Circumvent this problem through private discussions, and you will also get a better understanding of where the boundaries are. You may, in private, occassionally cross such as boundary - make sure you notice when you do! If you never cross this boundary, if you prefer to stay safe and never even approach it, your boundaries for thought will shrink much more than necessary, or you may suddenly find yourself crossing the boundary in a drastic and crude manner.

It is sometimes puzzling to observe when a populist politician crosses such a boundary without having the slightest understanding of doing so. Last year in Sweden, for instance, the politician Martin Strid from the Sweden Democrats held a speech where he described how all people exist on a scale from being 100 % human/humane or 100 % Muhammedan (creating a pun in Swedish), because Islam at its core constitutes some kind of fanatic death-cult - a view which in itself is rather fanatic, we might add. Only later did it occur to Strid that his political career was now over, thank you very much and goodbye. One newspaper later summarized his excuse (translation mine): 

"It was very unfortunate, I expressed myself very crudely. I apologize for that," says Strid and claims that he had been stressed due to short speaking time.

One may well wonder what on Earth was going through this man's head as he entered the podium to deliver this career-ending speech. Probably he had convinced himself that what he was about to say sounded perfectly reasonable - it sounded outlandish and appalling. A benevolent interpretation would have it that Strid did not at all mean to say "Muslims are not humans", but simply "Muslims are indoctrinated in a way that inhibits their humanity." But 21th century Mass Media does not thrive on nuances, which he should have been well aware of (and for clarity, I care nothing for this latter interpretation of his position either).

In India there is a saying: "When in public, be a Vaishnava. When among friends, be a Shaiva. But in private, always be a Shakta." What does this mean? First a clarification: a Vaishnava is a devotee of the benign Vishnu, Lord of Preservation; a Shaiva is a follower of Lord Shiva, Destroyer of Worlds as well as the limited ego. A Shakta is a devotee of Shakti, the divine feminine power, the Goddess - variously associated with grace, the world as beauty, primordial womb, darkness and mystery. So in public, one behaves as a pious Vaishnava, observing all exoteric rites and rules of propriety, never transgressing against any law, never associating with impure foods, practices or people. When among friends, spiritual seekers celebrate the intoxicating power of Shiva and possibly compete with each other for his favor. They may even push each other to the limit, occassionally engaging in things that would not be appropriate in public. Finally, when one private, the adept retreats even from the bluster and combativeness of his Shaivite friends and basks in the grace of the Divine Mother, the most intimate and serene mystery. This, at least, is my understanding of what the saying means, although I readily confess that I have never had it explained to me.

What this teaches us is that there are various levels of speech, interaction and action - everything is not appropriate at all levels. Establish clear boundaries between your intimate sphere, your private sphere and your public sphere, and know what activities belong where. Perhaps you will even find, ultimately, that there is no need to try to bring certain things into the public sphere, whether opinions, attitudes or transgressive social practices.

Harappans and Aryans

Who were the Aryans? Most people know that the German National Socialists under Hitler called their master race Aryans, comprising Germans and North Europeans broadly speaking (though excluding the eastern Slavs). Less well-known among people in general is from where the idea of an Aryan race was picked up. The historical Aryans were the descendants of a group of nomadic pastoralists that had emigrated from their Urheimat (original homeland) in the Pontic-Caspian steppe (roughly Ukraine) and founded a culture along the southern tip of the Ural mountains known as the Sintashta culture. This culture is known for its development of chariot technology and pioneering of copper working. There are also traces in the burial practices of religious beliefs that would later find themselves into the Vedic hymns of Hinduism. Whereas the Ukrainian nomads spoke Proto-Indo-European - the mother of all Indo-European languages today - the Sintashta culture is associated with Indo-Iranian, a branch derived from the original language. At a later stage, these Indo-Iranians migrated southwards into Central Asia and eventually split up, one branch moving into Iran and the Middle East (and eventually expanding all the way back to the Ukraine), another moving into India. The linguistic branches that now formed are termed Iranian and Indo-Aryan, respectively. But on both sides of the divide, the people called themselves "Arya" - the noble ones.

The Indian Aryans - Indo-Aryans - now began to compose a collection of hymns known as the Veda. This was around 1300 BC, and the language they now spoke was Sanskrit, though a more archaic form than the classical Sanskrit of India today. Through the Veda we know not only what they called themselves, but also how they lived and what they valued. They petitioned with various deities for success in worldly endeavours, ranging from the protection of livestock, to the attainment of sons, to victory in battle. Above all this was a culture of heroic warfare, where the thunder-god Indra played a particular role accompanying fast-flying warriors into battle.

Fast forward to the 18th century, when European contact with and colonization of India began to open up a new field of linguistics to European scholars. One of these was Sir William Jones, who served as a judge in British Bengal during much of the 1780s and 1790s. Jones was not the first one to notice similarities between Sanskrit and European languages, but nevertheless the following paragraph of his has become famous:

The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists; there is a similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that both the Gothic and the Celtic, though blended with a very different idiom, had the same origin with the Sanscrit; and the old Persian might be added to the same family.

Jones also suggested that an Aryan invasion of India had established the "racial divide" between light-skinned and dark-skinned people in India, and in this suggestion he seems to have been the first. This would spur ideas among white supremacists in Europe that the Aryans had been bringers of civilization to India, and that the caste system had been established to preserve the purity of the Aryan stock. Nevertheless, after many generations the Aryans had mixed so much with the natives that their culture degenerated and Indian civilization began to stagnate and decline. Ultimately, when this package of ideas has been picked up by Adolf Hitler, the concept Aryan had begun to denote the first speakers of the original Indo-European language - proto-Indo-European - and their role in spreading civilization had been dramatically expanded. The Aryan homeland was variously cited as Germany or Iran among other places. Today the label Aryan is usually reserved for the Vedic Aryans, speakers of ancient Sanskrit, while the Urheimat of the proto-Indo-Europeans has been shown convincingly in The Horse, the Wheel and Language to have been the aforementioned Pontic-Caspian steppe.

Beginning in the 1920s, a new discovery complicated the picture of ancient India. Ancient, planned cities began to be excavated in Punjab and along the Indus river in present-day Pakistan. This ancient civilization, spanning from around 3300 BC to 1300 BC, has been termed the Indus valley civilization, due to its center around the Indus river valley; it is also called the Harappan civilization, Harappa being one of the earliest points of excavation, which conveniently allows us to call the inhabitants Harappans. Who were these Harappans, then, and what was their relation to the Indo-Aryans?

One theory which seems very straightforward is that the Aryans destroyed the Harappan civilization. The Veda, after all, cherishes warfare and describes the god Indra as a destroyer of forts. (As famously put by Sir Mortimer Wheeler: "Upon circumstantial evidence, Indra stands accused.") Another theory, popular among Indian nationalists, is that the Aryans and the Harappans were one and the same. As for the first theory, I shall content myself with stating that scholars today do not believe this to be the case. No evidence has been found for a destructive invasion, and by the time of the Aryan arrival in Punjab (ca 1500 BC) the Harappan cities had already began to decline due to changes in monsoon patterns in the area. Regarding the second theory, it seems to have been rather strongly refuted just now.

At the Harappan site of Rakhigarhi, a genetic study of ancient remains has now concluded that the inhabitants were "Ancestral South Indian" with some degree of "Iranian farmer" ancestry. This means that they were closely related to South Indian people today, which - given the appearance of the Harappan "dancing girl" statuette - hardly comes as a surprise. They had no ancestry from the Eurasian steppe, i.e. no relation to Aryans.



The problem of course is that this is a very sensitive issue in India itself. If the Aryans were not somehow indigenous, then the foundations of the supposedly eternal Vedic religion are trembling. As an outsider, I am naive enough to suggest that since the Vedas were after all composed within India, they are in a sense indigenous and that Hindu nationalists therefore should not feel threatened by this. On the other hand, if one insists on the historicity of the Hindu epic Ramayana which is said to have taken place during the Treta Yuga - about one million years ago or so - then I can appreciate where the problem lies.


Edit: According to Razib Khan at the Gene Expression blog, some pre-Aryan paternal lineages found their way into the (Aryan) Brahmin community, including from the Indus Valley Civilization.

Earth Overshoot and the Liberal Illusion of Social Equality

The first of August was Earth Overshoot Day, according to the Global Footprint Network, meaning that for the rest of the year humanity as a whole will consume resources faster than the Earth can replenish them. According to the website www.overshootday.org we are now "using 1,7 Earths. We use more ecological resources and services than nature can regenerate through overfishing, overharvesting forests, and emitting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than ecosystems can absorb." The countries most responsible for this rampant overconsumption are pointed out in a diagram:

The United States and the Gulf states are among the worst sinners according to their data. Most educated people are probably not surprised by this; but some may be surprised that the oh-so-progressive Nordic countries are all in the top ten (except for Norway which is strangely absent). Many Swedes too would be surprised by this, because - dear foreigners - Sweden is a country where we tell ourselves that we are ahead in transitioning to a sustainable economy. Swedish politicians frequently speak of the need for Sweden to "lead by example" on environmental issues. I believe the above picture sufficiently shows how utterly absurd this worldview is.

The question is: what would happen to the liberal, egalitarian, individualistic culture of a country like Sweden if consumption rates could not be maintained at present levels? The welfare state and the world market have together made many Swedes into truly autonomous individuals, not needing to rely directly on any other human being. Of course, the goods that you buy at the supermarket (or increasingly online) were produced by real people, but these are not people that you have to meet in person, thus the illusion of social equality can be maintained within the country's borders. Or take a more concrete example from another north European country:

In Bhilwara district, in the northern Indian state of Rajasthan, sandstone slabs form a makeshift fence around a field, marking the boundaries of a temporary worksite. In the centre, *Seema, a tall young woman, lifts sandstone cobbles into large wooden crates. 

A firm in Jaipur, the state capital, has ordered the stones for export to Britain, where they will be used to pave streets and build sea defences. 

Employed by a contractor on piece-rate wages, Seema has no idea where the stones will end up. She arrives for work at 8am, after cooking and cleaning for her family, and works through the peak afternoon heat, her thumb bandaged from recurring cuts. She will be paid 60 rupees (66p) for each crate she fills.

Would Britain be able to import this cobblestone if the women working in these mines had British wages? Be the answer yes or no, it is merely one example of where the wealth and liberty of modern countries and individuals rests on the backs of the super-exploited poor. This has little to do with "capitalism" per se - exploitation such as this is arguably less severe today than in past eras. Nor do I want to fall into the Marxist trap of thinking that "inequality" is the problem here which must be uprooted. Any complex societies must have hierarchies - there are simply no examples of the opposite being true. Rather, what I find rather devious is the collective illusion held in certain wealthy countries that "we are all equals", an illusion that is built on an invisible division of labor between the "core" and the "periphery" in the world system. This illusion allows for a culture to develop within a country where titles are abolished, where social etiquette is no longer required, where everything is just "casual" and "funny" and a little bit childish. Imagine instead if the entire world was one country, where extreme wealth and poverty co-existed door to door (which is of course the case in many dysfunctional states). In such a world, the well-off could not afford to be casual liberals; they would have to fight tooth and claw to maintain their property and privileges, and in the process they would have to explain to themselves and others why they should be entitled to such privilege. Perhaps they are fundamentally different from the poor? Perhaps they have a divine origin or something? Thus backward in time from the illusion of equality to various illusions of inequality. 

Brocialists

Will "the patriarchy" ever go away? Perhaps that depends on your view of human - and masculine - nature. If men and women are "essentially the same", then there is no reason why it could not go away, given the right circumstances. In fact, some would argue that it already has gone away, more or less, in a great number or countries. And yet, it keeps reappearing all the time - fashionably put, "the power structure keeps reproducing itself", despite social reforms intent on eradicating differences in power and indeed behavior between the sexes. Just as socialism could not eradiacte class inequality (although for a time it seemed to be succeeding), feminism does not seem able to get rid of gender roles, aspiring patriarchs or anti-feminist women.

In this article, Apoorva Sripathi identifies the "Brocialist" as a specimen of man who, outwardly progressive, behaves as a jerk toward women in private. Harvey Weinstein is one example. In a Swedish context, Fredrik Virtanen is another: a self-proclaimed feminist journalist who stands accused of rape and sexual assaults. A third one (also Swedish) would be the comedian Soran Ismail, also accused of rape during the MeToo campaign, since aquitted, but still judged since "everyone knows" that he is guilty. Whatever the case, he has publicly made highly disrespectful ("sexist" in modern parlance) jokes towards women, which in itself is enough to include him in the category. Thus he once commented during a gala on a duo of young female artists (Rebecca & Fiona): "They are favorites of mine, partly because I love their music, and partly because I have a fantasy about a three-way with Rebecca and anyone." Seemingly, the reason why he can say this is because a) he is a feminist, which means that he automatically respects women, and b) since he basically does respect women, and because men and women are supposed to be truly equal now, why could he not make such a joke? After all, a woman could (in theory) make such a joke without being labelled a sexist, couldn't she? Therefore, in the worldview of the Brocialist, men and women are essentially the same, and a joke about a threeway directed at a vulnerable, young woman is merely friendly. We are all just friends now, right? Nevertheless, below this public worldview lies another one, where Ismail and his likes understand deeply that a) there are differences, and b) in this being-different-from-men, they do not respect women in the least. They can (sometimes) respect women as friends, but not as women.

Yet perhaps that is precisely what is needed, regardless of how "reactionary" it will be deemed by some. Men need to respect women as women, as mothers, sisters, daughters and in a sense as goddesses. Let every man who automatically classifies women into "available" and "unavailable" shift his focus from the earthly womanliness of a particular woman to the divine femininity of all.

Judaism: The Chosen Few

With my last post in mind, let me first of all clarify that I am by no means a supporter of Israeli occupation policies - it's just that I am no fervent anti-Zionist either. Israel is a curious phenomenon, with its special relationship to the US particularly in mind. Somehow or other it often appears as the face of the American world order: a place where so many of the world's fears and expectations converge and become visible; a place where the guardians of this order will continue to defend their brand of imperialism with any means necessary. It is easy to condemn a great many things about Israel, but it is perhaps more worthwhile to hold back judgment and observe the unfolding of things before one definitely takes a stand.

A more fruitful attempt to understand the history of the Jews and Judaism than Shahak's is - I believe - the book The Chosen Few by Botticini and Eckstein. For no matter how mysterious Judaism and Jewish success in the modern world appear to some, it can to a great degree be explained through the economic theory of rational choice.

The main argument of the book goes as follows: in ancient times, the Israelite religion had been based on two pillars: first, the temple, which was originally built around 1000 BC, later destroyed by the Babylonians but rebuilt; and second, the Torah, which was in place at least a few hundred years BC although its history is more obscure. In the first century CE, several things happened: Judaism had become splintered into various sects, of which Christianity was ultimately going to be the most successful. The other two most influential sects were the Sadducees, keepers of the temple cult, and the Pharisees, teachers of Torah who, unlike the old-school Sadducees, had started to believe in a life after death. Now, in 64 CE the Pharisee Yehoshua ben Gamla was appointed as high priest of the temple. During his short office, he instituted a rule requiring all Jewish parents to ensure that their boys learn to read the Torah. Shortly therafter, a Jewish uprising against Roman rule took place throughout Judea. The Romans massacred the inhabitants of Jerusalem and destroyed the second temple. With the fall of the temple, the Sadducees disappeared as a faction within Judaism. It remained to the Pharisees to define what a post-templar, post-independence Judaism was going to look like. This they did by - slowly over the centuries - beginning to establish the rule on public education for boys throughout the Jewish community.

This had several consequences. First, many Jews, being farmers and pastoralists, had little use for literacy, and as the cost for remaining inside the Jewish community increased, they increasingly opted out and converted to other faiths: Christianity in many cases, and later also Islam. Over time, this led to a sharp decrease in the number of Jews relative to non-Jews living in the Middle East and elsewhere. At the same time, those who remained within the Jewish fold increasingly began to adopt urban occupations, not least involving trade, but also other kinds of professions that required literacy, numeracy, the ability to communicate by mail, the power to keep and enforce contracts, among other things. Universal male literacy allowed Jews to establish themselves in lucrative, urban niche professions, while also maintaining a network with other Jews abroad. By the Middle Ages, and especially after the rise of urbanisation under Islam, Jews spread widely across the world and started to mark themselves out as educated, affluent and urban.

Thus Judaism had embarked on a great transformation from ancient times; the Pharisees, of course, became the rabbis of Rabbinical Judaism. As for the illiterate Jewish men, trying to stay as part of the Jewish community was usually not an option. They became increasingly marginalized and, since they could not take their bar mitzvah (during which they are supposed to read aloud from the Torah), they could not officially enter Jewish manhood, and so the rabbis advised others against marrying their daughters to such men. Much better then to enter into the fold of the dominant creed, where even the poor and illiterate were welcomed with open arms, and where - at least in Christianity - the ritual demands made on the devotee were much more relaxed than in Judaism.

In line with this pattern, Jews tended to concentrate in urbanized societies: Abbasid Mesopotamia, Iberia under Muslim rule and, later, the Christian polities in Italy and northern Europe. When urbanization took hold of Europe, Jews started to appear in its cities; and when the Mongols wrecked the infrastructure of the Middle East, the Jewish share of the population collapsed drastically, even though they were not targeted by the Mongols, as the Sunni Muslims were. "Can Judaism survive when trade and urban economies collapse?" the authors ask, and the answer is a decisive "No".

By the Early Modern period, a great share of European Jews specialized in money-lending. This was simply the most profitable activity available to them, and one in which they had the comparative advantage of education, so why should they have refused it? Later still, the Jewish tradition of education would pay dividends as new occupational fields opened up from the 19th century onwards.



Botticini and Eckstein overturn many conventional wisdoms regarding Jewish history, perhaps a topic for another time. For now I merely want to say that it is rather frustrating when standard histories of Judaism leave out the decision by Yehoshua ben Gamla about universal education for boys. There is no doubt that this ruling together with the destruction of the temple (only a few years later, oddly enough) constitute a decisive breaking point in the history of the Jewish religion.

Judaism: What I know and what I don't

Judaism is a very interesting religion. Having survived for over 2000 years (depending on how you count) and transformed itself in the process, it often seems to be - or "the Jews" seem to be - at the heart of historical developments. Not so much during the Middle Ages, granted, but increasingly so today. In fact, one could rather easily write an entire Judeocentric history of the world, and I suppose that may already have been done, at least so far as they teach children History in Israel.

As a student of History of Religions, I often lamented the fact that it was difficult to get a first-hand experience of Judaism, simply because one did not usually meet a lot of religious Jews. (There are supposed to exist some 20,000 Jews in Sweden, many of whom are not religious.) At the same time, I was never really attracted to Judaism in the same way that I was attracted to other faiths - it is simply not a religion you are attracted to from the outside when looking for spiritual nourishment. At the same time, I do wish I had a better understanding of it from the outside. At some point, I should read up on it a bit more thoroughly.

Just now, however, I read a piece titled American Pravda: Oddities of the Jewish Religion over at The Unz Review. Ron Unz is an interesting author and intellectual who often has an alternative perspective on things, running a rather fringe website while somehow managing to preserve his respectability public-wise (as far as I can tell from across the Atlantic). It is my impression that many of the articles appearing on his site are not of the finest quality, but his pieces usually stand out as being both thoughtful and well researched. This time I suspect that he has fallen over the cliff though. He cites the book Jewish History, Jewish Religion by Israel Shahak, and he takes it in a rather far-off direction. Having read the book myself, I should like to make a few comments on the article.

In the book, Shahak (himself a secular Jew), exposes the nature of Judaism as one of intolerance, hatred for non-Jews, magic, occultism and "lack of Monotheism" in case of the teachings of the Kabbalah. Many of the things Shahak describes - such as a Jewish man who refused to help a dying non-Jew on the Sabbath out of piety - are certainly alarming. There is also no doubt that many Orthodox Jews see themselves as set against the world, and among some Jews there are teachings saying that non-Jews do not have souls, highly disturbing of course (yet admittedly a rather fascinating form of piety). My main issues with Unz' article (and thus with Shahak) are the following:

• According to Kabbalistic teachings, God reveals himself through ten successive emanations, one for each level of creation. This is presented by Shahak (and Unz) as if there was a question of fundamentally different gods. Thus Shahak concludes that Judaism is not Monotheistic (unless the same can be said for Hinduism). My problem with this statement is both that it is presented in a sensationalist manner, but more importantly that Shahak does not give any sources for this claim, despite an endless number of sources stressing the inherent Monotheism of Judaism. I have not found any support for his position, either in academic literature or on relevant websites. 

• Orthodox Jews are supposedly taught to worship both God and Satan. But this claim does not make any sense as Jews generally do not believe in an omnimalevolent being. Satan in a Rabbinical Jewish context is God's servant; like the adversary in the Book of Job, he does not act on his own. His role is closer to that of the Quranic Iblis, being permitted by God to tempt mankind (though the latter is of course fallen), than to a Christian devil that tries to struggle against God for supremacy (even though he surely loses). So whatever "worship of Satan" could mean for some Jews (I personally have no clue), it is nothing like a Christian worshipping the devil.

• As for Jewish hostility towards non-Jews, this is of course troubling when it occurs, but let's be honest here: it is hardly a phenomenon unique to Judaism. I personally still have relatives who believe - doctrinally if not at heart - that all who are not Christian in just the right way will suffer eternal damnation in hell. That is a rather worse prospect than simply being killed off or remain as a servant to the Chosen People. Again, I dislike the sensationalist streak that I find with both Shahak and Unz, because it tends to undermine the will to understand something on its own terms in all its complexity in exchange for mere shock value.

Shahak, despite his Jewish background, and whatever his other merits, was not a scholar of Judaism. Neither am I - which is why I try to rely on those who are. Also, anyone knowledgeable about Judaism is very welcome to comment on this post, if you have something to contribute to the issues at hand.

There sometimes seems to be an unspoken choice that people have to make as right-wing intellectuals: either you have a problem with Islam, in which case Israel is an ally; or you are hostile to Judaism in which case you say nothing of Islam. I do not see the need for this. Both Judaism and Islam are highly complex traditions with plenty of diversity, featuring both some good and some truly horrid people, all drawing on their respective traditions for a great variety of ends.

The Ascent of Woman

I just watched the first part of the documentary The Ascent of Woman by Dr. Amanda Foreman (whoever "Morgan" in the description is is not clear, it does not seem to be wholly related). A most interesting documentary, and I would even say an eye-opener in some ways. One must concede that women have been erased from history to an extent - I personally thought I was aware of this already, but I did not know, for instance, that the first named author in world history was Enheduanna, high priestess of Assyria, daughter of Sargon of Akkad.

I was also not aware that Genghis Khan's empire was ruled to a significant degree by his daughters and step-daughters. Apparently the main source of Genghis Khan's life, The Secret History of the Mongols, was edited after the great Khan's death to hide the embarrassing fact that he had appointed many women to chief positions. This book seeks to redress the problem.

Having watched The Ascent of Woman, part 1, two things strike me the most. Firstly, gender hierarchies and social stratification in general seem to go hand in hand. This is perhaps not surprising, but not obvious either. Foreman takes the ancient archeological site of Çatalhöyük as an example of this: a city that existed well before civilization as such, thousands of years before the dawn of Sumer and Egypt, where social equity would supposedly have been the norm.

But what really made me curious was the way she described the ancient Greek culture. While women became, in time, relatively suppressed in many Middle Eastern countries, they were more autonomous among the steppe nomads in Central Asia and north of the Black Sea - but nowhere were they more restricted than in Greece, or at least in democratic Athens. The Greeks had many goddesses in their Pantheon, but no women in public life. They also had mythical enemies to fight off: the centaurs, similar to the horsemen they knew from the east and, significantly, the Amazons (supposedly from the ancient Persian word hamazan, warrior) denoting Scythian or Sarmatian warrior women. It would seem that the Greek men were scandalized by the existence of such women, and that this played a significant role in the shaping of Greek identity. The Greeks would have none of this confusion of social roles: they instituted a gender regime comparable to that of the Taliban (as noted in the documentary by the author of this book) and, with women out of the way, went on to lay the foundation for "civilization" in the grand sense of the word. So once again we see the recurring pattern where men are connected with culture and women with nature - a distinction that Foreman actually promotes, if tacitly so. For civilization has indeed been the story of the grand ambitions of men, and now that we are beginning to doubt its very sustainability, it is perhaps only natural that women should have their revenge. 

Can virtues change?

Do virtues differ across societies and time-periods, or are they universal? If you want to make yourself into a better person, a better man, how do you know what direction to move in? For instance, is piety a virtue? Is patience, elegance, humility? Magnanimity, gentlemanlyness, wisdom... obedience, filial piety, fear of God? Or are some of these virtues now hopelessly outdated, ill-suited to a world which moves at breakneck pace, too lofty and idealistic in a world that is all about the material? What can we truly learn, for instance, about living in the world when we read a classic work on ethics and manners like the Confucian Analects? How relevant are these ancient discourses today? Why should anyone read about the ideal of how a "noble man" (the superior gentleman, junzi) should behave, when such an ideal would be exceedingly difficult to implement in practice?

On a few occassions at least I have tried to break out of the slacker mentality that characterizes many of my peers - or should I say, characterizes all of us when we get together: a mildly cynical, disinterested group consciousness that scoffs at pretention and high-minded idealism. In these situations I have usually found that it is near-impossible too break out of such social patterns and try to establish something new. Most people do not seem at all interested, and if my attempt has at all been noticed it has on occassion been met with reactions ranging from sniggering to outright laughter. On such occassions I have quickly corrected myself; this is not an idealistic century, and when the reality of Heaven has been denied altogether, it begins to seem ludicrous when somebody tries to reach it.

There is one saying from the Analects that I particularly like:

See a person's means (of getting things). Observe his motives. Examine that in which he rests. How can a person conceal his character?

And the following one:

If a man has no humaneness what can his propriety be like? If a man has no humaneness what can his happiness be like?

 These sayings are so lofty in character - and needless to say, androcentric - that they are "culturally impossible" today, at least in countries like Sweden.

If the first saying seems obscure to you, it is (I believe) essentially the same as Jesus' saying in Matthew 7:20: By their fruits ye shall know them. Just as a bad tree does not bear good fruits, a person's character is known through his actions.

Mikael Kurkiala: Kvalitet och kvantitet

Det återstår att se om den här bloggen kommer att skrivas mestadels på engelska eller svenska. Jag vill skriva på engelska för att kunna nå en bred läsekrets, men samtidigt skriver jag en hel del om specifikt svenska författare och företeelser. Den här gången vill jag referera till en svensk bok och då faller det sig naturligt att också skriva på svenska.

(It remains to be seen how much of the blog will be written in English. This time around I want to discuss a book only available in Swedish.)

Datafiering och digitalisering är nära besläktat med vad den franska traditionalisten René Guenon kallat för The Reign of Quantity - kvantitetens herravälde. Tiden styckas upp i exakta enheter. Moderna, digitala bilder kan reduceras till pixlar i olika färger (färgkoder). Allting ska göras mätbart, standardiserat, objektifierat. Den moderna materialistiska vetenskapen bygger ju på premissen att det går en skarp skiljelinje mellan subjekt och objekt, och att subjektet kan studera objektet utan att påverka det. Empati och intuition får ge vika för en knivskarp, granskande blick som mäter och preciserar. Kommunikation mellan subjekt och objekt är omöjligt, eller åtminstone inte önskvärt. Att närma sig sitt studium som något levande (till exempel en religiös tradition) som kan berätta något för en är inte ett vetenskapligt förhållningssätt.

Bortsett från den materialistiska vetenskapen så är det också marknadens osynliga hand och statens krav på likriktning som kvantifierar, standardiserar och förytligar världen. Pengarna gör att alla ting blir sinsemellan utbytbara. Vi kan om vi vill (och vi gör det ständigt) "byta regnskog mot Coca-Cola", för att citera Alf Hornborg. Eller som Oscar Wilde skulle ha uttryckt det: "We know the price of everything, but the value of nothing."

Jag är ingen kännare av René Guenon, men det finns en svensk (svensk-finsk) tänkare som har skrivit just om skillnaden mellan kvalitet och kvantitet på ett mycket bra och lättillgängligt sätt. Jag talar om Mikael Kurkiala, författare till boken I varje trumslag jordens puls: Om vår tids rädsla för skillnader. Denna bok är idag svår att komma över annat än via bibliotek. Själv hade jag en gång i tiden äran att ha Kurkiala som lärare i kulturantropologi i Uppsala, men det var innan jag hade fått ordning på mitt eget tänkande, och jag läste hans bok först långt senare. Kurkiala har sedan dess slutat som forskare så vitt jag vet och tagit tjänst inom Svenska Kyrkan.

Kurkiala skriver så bra om kvalitet och kvantitet att det bästa jag kan göra är att citera honom rakt av:

Pengar och andra former av abstraktioner skapar "översättbarhet" mellan olika typer av värden och fenomen. De reducerar kvalitativa skillnader till kvantitativa. Kvalitativa skillnader är skillnader på djupet medan kvantitativa skillnader är skillnader på ytan. De förra skillnaderna handlar om art, de senare om omfång eller antal. Moderniteten som helhet förytligar världen genom att beröva den dess kvalitet. (s. 70)

Detta är bara ett litet utdrag, och det är svårt att på något mer djupgående sätt göra boken rättvisa utan att citera hela kapitel. Här ryms också mer specifika berättelser om hedersmordet på Fadime Sahindal och inte minst författarens egna upplevelser som antropolog hos lakotaindianer i Nordamerika. Jag låter boken tala för sig själv med några andra valda citat, ifall någon skulle få för sig att läsa den. Här finns också en gammal recension av boken.

Varför bejakar vi skillnader på ytan, på teckennivån, men inte på djupet, på den nivå som teckenvärlden skulle kunna peka mot? (s. 24)

 Jag efterlyser ett seende där vi tillåter oss att växla mellan analysens absoluta behov av att kategorisera och dra skiljelinjer mellan människor och ett moraliskt behov av att se likheter ytskillnaderna till trots. Denna dubbla hållning är inte ett tecken på schizofreni utan på en förmåga att växla mellan analys och empati, mellan ett jag-du-förhållande och ett jag-det-förhållande till världen. (s. 29)

 Den enda sociala enhet vars livslängd idag ökar är den enskilda individen. Evigheten har förpassats till vår tanketraditions arkiv, nationer framstår idag som alltmer konstruerade och instabila, företagen är kortlivade, och partierna och folkrörelserna förlorar sin attraktionskraft. Livets mening kan allt mindre knytas till något utanför individen själv. Det är här, under den korta tid som blivit mig utmätt, som all mening ska förverkligas. (s. 53)

 Liksom människan under hela den moderna eran funnit det oacceptabelt att sakna kontroll eller att överlåta kontrollen till en instans utanför den mänskliga sfären, till exempel Gud eller natur, så finner vi det idag i det närmaste oacceptabelt att vi själva inte skulle ha kontroll över vilka vi är och kan bli. I det offentliga samtalet är åberopandet av något prediskursivt eller förkulturellt – som kropp eller natur – som i åtminstone i viss bemärkelse formande vilka vi är, i det närmaste skandalöst. Denna motvilja mot att förankra människans identitet utanför det sociala och kulturella ses allmänt som emanciperande och progressivt. Detta tänkande är en logisk förlängning av den nu månghundraåriga ambitionen att förjaga eller härska över det som vi känner oss hotade av. Det må sedan vara ”vilden”, naturen, kroppen eller könet. I grunden är alltså detta tänkande besläktat med det koloniala. (s. 60-61)

 Pengar avspeglar alltså inte en varas värde. Varan föregår inte prissättningen, snarare är det tvärtom: prissättningen skapar tingen och fenomenen som just varor. (s. 63) 

 Den kvantitativa tiden skär sig kontinuerligt mot människors subjektiva erfarenhet av tiden. Vi ”vet” alla att vissa dagar är längre än andra och att tiden ibland bara rusar iväg. Men denna erfarenhet, liksom allt fler av våra erfarenheter, underordnas och underkuvas de mätinstrument och experter som vi överlåtit kontrollen åt. Att vara modern är inte bara att lita till expertsystem, det är också att upphöra att lita till sig själv, till sin egen erfarenhet. (s. 69)

Sommarprat: framtiden är ljus

För den reaktionäre pessimisten (såsom delvis jag själv) vill jag rekommendera följande sommarprat med Mouna Ezmaeilzadeh. Ta in vad hon säger och låt dig översköljas av hennes perspektiv. Om du noterar en instinkt att kritisera eller säga emot henne vid någon punkt, fråga dig varifrån du vill kritisera henne. Är det från en position av cynism, bitterhet, missunnsamhet eller moralism? Isåfall, kära läsare, har du redan förlorat. 

Apocalypse and Transhumanism

Yuval Noah Harari is a historian and philosopher who had his breakthrough with the book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. Grand and sweeping in scope and at the same time very easy to follow, this is a book that I will probably have the opportunity to revisit many times on this blog. But not too long ago Harari released a follow-up: Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow. In this latest title (which translates to "Divine Man" in Greek) Harari suggests, in his easily accessible, pedagogical style, that humanity has largely overcome the three great problems of the past: war, famine and disease, thus having achieved, on the whole, peace, reliable access to food and good health. Whether or not these achievements will stand the test of time, Harari suggests that there are today three other ambitions that will shape human action in the 21th century: the achievement of happiness, non-mortality and divinity. The first one is hardly controversial; as for the second one, non-mortality simply means the possibility of living forever, rather than being unable to die (immortality). This would be achieved by "curing" aging, or at least significantly halting it. The third ambition, divinity, would consist in human enhancement through some combination of genetic engineering and cyborg technologies to transform (some) human beings into post-human demigods.

This brings me back to my last post, where Rushkoff (as in my quoting him) noted that the desire of the super-wealthy for escape havens concurs, at least in the example he gives, with a desire to transcend human limitations altogether. After all, if temperatures rise by 6 C or more, where's the fun going to be in remaining as a human being in this world, whether you are among the poor, starving masses trying to get into a lifeboat or a privileged individual beating anyone trying to enter your lifeboat in the head with a paddle? The world is starting to seem old, and the whole concept of "humankind" is starting to be seen as a burden to be handled, a problem to be reined in and rendered relatively harmless by some future technofix. I am not saying that transhumanism only, or even primarily, owes its existence due to such sentiments; yet such sentiments would seem to bring water to the transhumanist mill, particularly if the vision of a transhumanist future can be conceptualized as an individual rather than a collective matter. A couple of more quotes from Rushkoff's article can perhaps be sufficient for summary:

There’s nothing wrong with madly optimistic appraisals of how technology might benefit human society. But the current drive for a post-human utopia is something else. It’s less a vision for the wholesale migration of humanity to a new a state of being than a quest to transcend all that is human: the body, interdependence, compassion, vulnerability, and complexity. As technology philosophers have been pointing out for years, now, the transhumanist vision too easily reduces all of reality to data, concluding that “humans are nothing but information-processing objects.”

The idea that everything can be reduced to databits is also something raised by Harari in Homo Deus: he calls it a religion and terms it "dataism". Finally:

Ultimately, according to the technosolutionist orthodoxy, the human future climaxes by uploading our consciousness to a computer or, perhaps better, accepting that technology itself is our evolutionary successor. Like members of a gnostic cult, we long to enter the next transcendent phase of our development, shedding our bodies and leaving them behind, along with our sins and troubles.

Thus onwards, ever onwards, until we have achieved the complete and utter quantification of everything. Some utopia!

Apocalypse and Elite Consciousness

Silvio Berlusconi supposedly did not want his children to watch his dumbed-down television programs. Steve Jobs did not allow his children to use iPads. The consumption of mass media was meant for the masses, but not for their own children who they wished well. What this reminds us, except that businessmen can be cynical, is that the people who have real power frequently are those who position themselves above society in some sense - above the system. Steve Jobs understood the addictiveness of smartphone technology far earlier than others and Berlusconi seems to have thought regarding his children that they, like he, should be "above" the crude entertainment that he was offering the Italian people. (I am not up-to-date as to what has been going on lately with Berlusconi's media empire, so I content myself with writing in the past tense.) Another example would be Rupert Murdoch: the media mogul par excellence, whose empire of the mind scrutinizes everything while Murdoch himself can choose to remain in the shadows.

I am reminded of this because of a group of articles I recently stumbled upon. The theme was known to me before but it still struck a cord with me more gravely this time. It is the story of how the superrich are building bunkers or buying property in far away countries like New Zealand in order to be able to protect themselves after "the event" - essentially, the apocalypse.

The author of this article, Douglas Rushkoff, describes it all very well. He was invited to speak about "the future of technology" before a group of wealthy businessmen

Which region will be less impacted by the coming climate crisis: New Zealand or Alaska? Is Google really building Ray Kurzweil a home for his brain, and will his consciousness live through the transition, or will it die and be reborn as a whole new one? Finally, the CEO of a brokerage house explained that he had nearly completed building his own underground bunker system and asked, “How do I maintain authority over my security force after the event?” 

The Event. That was their euphemism for the environmental collapse, social unrest, nuclear explosion, unstoppable virus, or Mr. Robot hack that takes everything down.

This single question occupied us for the rest of the hour. They knew armed guards would be required to protect their compounds from the angry mobs. But how would they pay the guards once money was worthless? What would stop the guards from choosing their own leader? The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers — if that technology could be developed in time. 

That’s when it hit me: At least as far as these gentlemen were concerned, this was a talk about the future of technology. Taking their cue from Elon Musk colonizing Mars, Peter Thiel reversing the aging process, or Sam Altman and Ray Kurzweil uploading their minds into supercomputers, they were preparing for a digital future that had a whole lot less to do with making the world a better place than it did with transcending the human condition altogether and insulating themselves from a very real and present danger of climate change, rising sea levels, mass migrations, global pandemics, nativist panic, and resource depletion. For them, the future of technology is really about just one thing: escape. 

The super-wealthy cannot afford to live in commercial or political propaganda bubbles. Instead, they form realistic worldviews that can help them to evaluate real-world trends and potential futures. And they know that we are in deep waters. Granted, rich people can be irrational, while some may not really expect an apocalypse but choose to prepare for it anyway, at relatively low cost to them.

See also the following article regarding doomsday prepping in Silicon Valley, among other places. Key quote:

Sometimes the topic emerges in unexpected ways. Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn and a prominent investor, recalls telling a friend that he was thinking of visiting New Zealand. “Oh, are you going to get apocalypse insurance?” the friend asked. “I’m, like, Huh?” Hoffman told me. New Zealand, he discovered, is a favored refuge in the event of a cataclysm. Hoffman said, “Saying you’re ‘buying a house in New Zealand’ is kind of a wink, wink, say no more. Once you’ve done the Masonic handshake, they’ll be, like, ‘Oh, you know, I have a broker who sells old ICBM silos, and they’re nuclear-hardened, and they kind of look like they would be interesting to live in.’ ”

To be continued.

On hierarchies

How ironic that I am focusing largely on Swedish intellectuals, some of whom are largely unknown, when I'm keeping the blog in English. Yet most Swedes know English and the potential extra audience that understands English is too large to be ignored.

It struck me when I revisited Hornborg that one of the problems I have with his thinking is the way he makes hierarchical relations seem inherently unjust and problematic. This may sound like a provocative standpoint for some, so let me explain.

Power is dangerous, power often corrupts, and hierarchies lead to accumulation of power. That much is true. Yet in no system of living beings that I am aware of - ecosystems, human civilizations - is there an absence of hierarchies and power relations. The core-periphery dichotomy that Hornborg and other critical theorists employ is found all over nature. The tree is a core absorbing water, nutrients and carbon dioxide from its periphery, and so exploiting its surroundings. The herbivore exploits plants for its sustenance; the carnivore in turn preys on the herbivore. Humans prey on most of the natural world. All these beings also compete and sometimes prey on each other, and all leave some kind of waste after them that does not in any way repay their environment for what they had previously absorbed. Thus plants, herbivores, carnivores and humans all engage in systems of "unequal exchange", as Hornborg would term it, and this is at heart entirely natural. Some things revolve around other things - that is simply the way of the world.

Now, being a humanist, I do not question Hornborg's indignation about humans exploiting other humans. In fact, I would also add the exploitation of large animals (at least) to that list. Injustice and unrighteousness should be fought wherever it is found. At the same time, though, we must be able to keep two thoughts going simultaneously. Hierarchies can be oppressive, but they can also be truly enabling. A people can choose its leader, and a periphery can be content - even proud - to serve a particular core. Surely it does not have to be destructive if many people are devoted to serving a particular core and doing so willingly? This can be in the form of a leader, an institution or some sort of great project such as the construction of the Pyramid of Giza (whose workers, by the way, were not slaves) or the International Space Station. Such projects require large-scale cooperation, but they also require a hierarchical division of labour. Without such hierarchies, humans would have been able to accomplish precious little over the course of history.

This topic may resurface later. 

Rosling again

One positive thing about keeping a blog is that it forces me to evaluate what I write and to make sure that my reasoning is sound and well-intentioned. Thus having written a short note on Hans Rosling I was forced to admit to myself that I have not looked at all closely at his book Factfulness, and that I should therefore be careful with making statements about him or even his audience. I have now read through it a bit more earnestly and I can hardly underline enough what a positive influence his thinking can have on me. As may already be obvious I tend towards pessimism, whereas Rosling calls himself a "possibilist"; he does not like the word optimism, which can lead to the complacency I mentioned before, but he simply asks: if we have achieved this much by today, why could we not achieve even more in the future? Why should we not, for instance, be able to exterminate extreme poverty within 20 years? I am still cautious about such prospects, but at the same time, why should we not want to eliminate poverty or at least sharply reduce it? Only the cynicism and the bitterness in me would be skeptical of such a goal. And these are two really great flaws of character that I do not wish to have.

On the other side of this debate, we find lone voices such as the human ecologist Alf Hornborg, who I have been paying attention to more in the past, because his rather more pessimistic outlook on the workings of the world align more closely with my natural inclinations. Essentially, Hornborg argues that machine technology is the embodiment of zero-sum game of unequal exchange, where time and space is saved in the capitalist core at the expense of the exploited periphery. For instance, a cotton factory can only work because enough people can be found who will grow raw cotton and sell it rather than refine it themselves. Most of the land and labor (and water) required in this process is concentrated in the first part of the production chain, producing the raw material, while the profits tend to accrue in the refinement of cotton into desirable textiles. Thus the industrialist wins and the cotton farmers lose out, relatively speaking. Supposedly then, the reason why much of the world has still seen an enormous growth in wealth lately is because of the free energy deriving from fossil fuels.

Rosling believes that new technology will help us combat environmental problems and still keep lifiting people out of poverty; Hornborg generally does not. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in-between, as it often does. As for Hornborg, he has clearly made his calculations, and I believe his perspective his very valuable, but I am also wary - now more than previously - of what I see as a kind of "eco-Marxism" in his thinking. His analysis tends towards materialistic reductionism - I am not sure he would agree about that, but at least it is the impression and the spirit that I got out of his writings. Such a reductionism can be truly bad for your character, if nothing else, and can easily lead to a denial of spiritual realities altogether.

Thus have we come full circle from questions about the environment to the more essential question of self-cultivation. :)