Tuesday 10 March 2015

The greatest misuse of the agrarian/ industrial revolution: the systematic destruction of meaning by secular Leftism. (Creativity conceptualized as productivity of meaning)

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The agrarian and industrial revolution was - in the large scheme of things - a great gift to Man; and a gift he has misused.

Increased productivity, more food, better shelter, less work, greater capability... these advantages were supposed to be used in service of higher things; not simply to make more-of-the-same, not to wage more destructive wars, and not to destroy more of the natural world.

But the ultimate crime against the potential of the agrarian and industrial revolution was - philosophical; at the level of what we now call ideology 

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What was distinctive, and unique in the history of the world, in the agrarian and industrial revolutions in England was major and sustained improved economic productivity.

What should have happened, what was meant to happen was that improved economic productivity would support improved meaning productivity - genuine creativity.

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The overall purpose in life (over a timespan of eternity) might tentatively be defined as creativity, in the true-est sense of the word; in the sense that creativity can perhaps be understood as increasing the productivity of meaning.

In other words, making a given, fixed situation more meaningful; or getting more meaning out of the same situation, ingredients, or energy.

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This did not happen, indeed the opposite happened.

Instead of there being more meaning, there was less and less - until after just a few generations many leading thinkers and artists claimed, and did their best to exemplify and demonstrated - that there was no meaning at all.

Given the choice of how to use the productive gains of the agrarian/ industrial revolution, Modern Man decided - en masse, by many millions of individual choices - to destroy first of all the existing sources of meaning; and then to destroy the very possibility of meaning.

The destruction of meaning began almost immediately with creeping atheism; but was rapidly continued with the multiplicity of secular Leftisms which gathered like a snowball: socialism, communism, the varieties of Marxism, progressivism, anarchism, fascism, social democracy, libertarianism, 'Christian socialism', environmentalism, political correctness, neo-reaction...

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Secular Leftism has penetrated the very soul of the West; it is present almost ubiquitously as an assumption behind almost all cultural products and communications - it is a cancer which eats meaning.

This is what Man has done with the greatest power and prosperity in the history of the species!

Instead of using peace, prosperity and capability to sustain a widespread burgeoning meanings in a multitude of human lives; the industrial revolution turned-in-on-itself, to use itself merely to make more of itself.

Man has created a universal cancer of meaning to render one after another things meaningless; and the meaningless world is also a purposeless world, so the whole process is self-destroying.

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What can be done, what needs to be done, all that can be done; is, as individuals to root-out this anti-creative, meaning-destructive cancer of secular Leftism from our own souls.

To recognize that secular Leftism is not a mere political view; not a humanly-flawed but essentially benign and compassionate perspective - but in its potentially and in its effect nothing less than the primary and distinctive basis of evil-triumphant in the modern world (since evil is defined the destruction of good); the subversion of creativity; and the greatest squandering and perversion of opportunity and perversion of potential in the history of Men.

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4 comments:

Faculty X said...

How would you categorize Colin Wilson's work on the potential - though he felt it was inevitable - development of Faculty X?

It is secular on the surface, yet specifically about developing meaning through direct experience.

Anonymous said...

Neoreaction is not a leftism. Aside from that, two thumbs up.

Bruce Charlton said...

@FX - I regard CW as very valuable but partial - in fact he misses out the main thing (Christianity).

@aram - I'm afraid you are still a Leftist. Good work so far, but 'must try harder'!

Mark Minter said...

I read every day. The writing allows me to explain high concepts. Please write or re-write about "meaning".