The Culture of Most Harm [Scope]

Sometimes, an idea pops into your head so suddenly that you wonder if someone didn't put it there.  We call these thoughts epiphanies, and they have led to some of the greatest discoveries of all time.  It's as if our instincts, when coupled to a conscious motivation in a specific and delicate manner can form new ways of thinking without our direct input.

The whole concept is pretty bizarre, but perhaps more bizarre is what I just experienced while reading Beyond Civilization by Daniel Quinn (Yes, I'm on a Quinn kick this week).  Some of Quinn's ideas are of that perfect, epiphany-esque quality and must have given him great joy and exhilaration during their creation.  What's more amazing is how perfectly these ideas resonate in my own brain.  In this case, someone HAS put this idea in my head, very directly via the written word, and it feels as if I've been thinking it for years and years.

The Rise and Fall of... [Scope]

If the world is saved, it will not be by old minds with new programs but by new minds with no programs at all.

-Daniel Quinn, Beyond Civilization

Today on the train I had a bizarre moment where I burst out laughing, burgeoning with energy over the clear reality that our society is much further gone than we think it is.  The irony of this thought as I rode to a 40-hour-week job was just too much.  The excitement I experienced was in reaction to the confirmation of a feeling I've had for some time now, that our society is ultimately unsustainable, and continues to worsen.  Mondays can do that to a person, huh?

For those of you who have read his other books, the above quote from Daniel Quinn (Ishmael, The Story of B, My Ishmael) is somewhat old-hat.  For those of you who have not, it may not make a whole lot of sense, so let's break it down quickly:

Quinn's M.O. is the salvation of humanity through a radical paradigm shift away from civilization as we know it and towards something more resembling tribalism (don't knock it until you've read it!).  Here he is describing the difference between vision (unified cultural memes that we look back at and declare, "there's no other way that history could have gone!") and programs (solutions that work to change the flow of vision by impeding its progress or diverting resources).

What he's saying here is that programs, while helpful in a way similar to the paramedic at the scene of an accident, are no replacement for a unified cultural infrastructure (analogy:  hospital with its resources and doctors and nurses and so forth).  What we need to "change the world" is a new Vision, a unified idea of what it means to be Humanity, NOT a series of better-funded or more-radical programs whose stated goal is to fix social ills.  Another way of saying it is, we need to create a new future, not fix an old one.

That's actually not ALL that radical an idea, but Quinn is entirely correct, we will need new minds, or at least changed minds.