eurodale on Nostr: My highlights from the Sovereign Individual (1997). Worth your time, trust me š¤ ...
My highlights from the Sovereign Individual (1997).
Worth your time, trust me š¤
"The Don Quixote of the twenty-first century will not be a knight-errant struggling to revive the glories of feudalism but a bureaucrat in a brown suit, a tax collector yearning for a citizen to audit."
"Every social order incorporates among its key taboos the notion that people living in it should not think about how it will end and what rules may prevail in the new system that takes its place."
"The more apparent it is that a system is nearing an end, the more reluctant people will be to adhere to its laws. Any social organization will therefore tend to discourage or play down analyses that anticipate its demise."
"Yet the tendency will be to downplay the inevitability of these changes, or to argue about their desirability as if it were within the fiat of industrial institutions to determine how history evolves."
"Although it may not be obvious, this is equivalent to saying that feudalism might have survived if everyone had rededicated himself to chivalry. No one in a court of the late fifteenth century would have objected to such a sentiment. Indeed, it would have been heresy to do so. But it also would have been entirely misleading, an example of the snake trying to fit the future into its old skin."
"Only in cases of medical problems affecting a few people do we see arbitrary fluctuations in mood that appear entirely divorced from any objective cause."
"Far from being the product of human desire, decisive historic changes more often than not confound the wish of most people for stability. When change occurs, it typically causes widespread disorientation, especially among those who lose income or social status."
āMachinery is aggressive. The weaver becomes a web, the machinist a machine. If you do not use tools, they use you."
āAn impoverished local priesthood seemed to offer a poor service for the money it demanded; much of what was levied effectively ādisappearedā into enclosed monasteries or the arcane areas of higher education or administration. In spite of gifts prodigally given to some sectors of the Church, the institution as a whole managed to appear simultaneously impoverished, grasping, and extravagant.ā It would be hard to deny the parallel with late-twentieth-century government."
"For this reason, it is to be expected that one or more nation-states will undertake covert action to subvert the appeal of transience. Travel could be effectively discouraged by biological warfare, such as the outbreak of a deadly epidemic. š This could not only discourage the desire to travel, it could also give jurisdictions throughout the globe an excuse to seal their borders and limit immigration."
"If the past is a guide, the most violent of the terrorists of the early decades of the new millennium will not be homeless paupers but displaced workers who formerly enjoyed middle-class incomes and status."
"The end of an era is usually a period of intense corruption. As the bonds of the old system dissolve, the social ethos dissolves with it, creating an environment in which people in high places may combine public purposes with private criminal activity."
"Unfortunately, you will not be able to depend upon normal information channels to give you an accurate and timely understanding of the decay of the nation-state. āPersistent make-believeā of the kind that disguised the fall of the Roman Empire is probably a typical feature of the decomposition of large political entities. It now disguises and masks the collapse of the nation-state."
"For a variety of reasons, the news media cannot always be depended upon to tell you the truth. Many are conservative in the sense that they represent the party of the past. Some are blinded by anachronistic ideological commitments to socialism and the nation-state. Some will be afraid for more tangible reasons to reveal the corruption that is likely to loom ever larger in a decaying system. Some will lack physical courage that might be required for such a task. Others will fear for their jobs or be shy of other retribution for speaking up. And, of course, there is no reason to suspect that reporters and editors are any less prone to corrupt consideration than building inspectors or Italian paving contractors."
"To a larger extent than you might expect, important organs of information that appear to be keen to report anything and everything may prove to be less dependable information sources than is commonly supposed. Many will have other motivations, including shoring up support for a faltering system, that they will place ahead of honestly informing you. They will see little and explain less."
Thank you for reading! Give me a zap and follow if you found it valuable š
Worth your time, trust me š¤
"The Don Quixote of the twenty-first century will not be a knight-errant struggling to revive the glories of feudalism but a bureaucrat in a brown suit, a tax collector yearning for a citizen to audit."
"Every social order incorporates among its key taboos the notion that people living in it should not think about how it will end and what rules may prevail in the new system that takes its place."
"The more apparent it is that a system is nearing an end, the more reluctant people will be to adhere to its laws. Any social organization will therefore tend to discourage or play down analyses that anticipate its demise."
"Yet the tendency will be to downplay the inevitability of these changes, or to argue about their desirability as if it were within the fiat of industrial institutions to determine how history evolves."
"Although it may not be obvious, this is equivalent to saying that feudalism might have survived if everyone had rededicated himself to chivalry. No one in a court of the late fifteenth century would have objected to such a sentiment. Indeed, it would have been heresy to do so. But it also would have been entirely misleading, an example of the snake trying to fit the future into its old skin."
"Only in cases of medical problems affecting a few people do we see arbitrary fluctuations in mood that appear entirely divorced from any objective cause."
"Far from being the product of human desire, decisive historic changes more often than not confound the wish of most people for stability. When change occurs, it typically causes widespread disorientation, especially among those who lose income or social status."
āMachinery is aggressive. The weaver becomes a web, the machinist a machine. If you do not use tools, they use you."
āAn impoverished local priesthood seemed to offer a poor service for the money it demanded; much of what was levied effectively ādisappearedā into enclosed monasteries or the arcane areas of higher education or administration. In spite of gifts prodigally given to some sectors of the Church, the institution as a whole managed to appear simultaneously impoverished, grasping, and extravagant.ā It would be hard to deny the parallel with late-twentieth-century government."
"For this reason, it is to be expected that one or more nation-states will undertake covert action to subvert the appeal of transience. Travel could be effectively discouraged by biological warfare, such as the outbreak of a deadly epidemic. š This could not only discourage the desire to travel, it could also give jurisdictions throughout the globe an excuse to seal their borders and limit immigration."
"If the past is a guide, the most violent of the terrorists of the early decades of the new millennium will not be homeless paupers but displaced workers who formerly enjoyed middle-class incomes and status."
"The end of an era is usually a period of intense corruption. As the bonds of the old system dissolve, the social ethos dissolves with it, creating an environment in which people in high places may combine public purposes with private criminal activity."
"Unfortunately, you will not be able to depend upon normal information channels to give you an accurate and timely understanding of the decay of the nation-state. āPersistent make-believeā of the kind that disguised the fall of the Roman Empire is probably a typical feature of the decomposition of large political entities. It now disguises and masks the collapse of the nation-state."
"For a variety of reasons, the news media cannot always be depended upon to tell you the truth. Many are conservative in the sense that they represent the party of the past. Some are blinded by anachronistic ideological commitments to socialism and the nation-state. Some will be afraid for more tangible reasons to reveal the corruption that is likely to loom ever larger in a decaying system. Some will lack physical courage that might be required for such a task. Others will fear for their jobs or be shy of other retribution for speaking up. And, of course, there is no reason to suspect that reporters and editors are any less prone to corrupt consideration than building inspectors or Italian paving contractors."
"To a larger extent than you might expect, important organs of information that appear to be keen to report anything and everything may prove to be less dependable information sources than is commonly supposed. Many will have other motivations, including shoring up support for a faltering system, that they will place ahead of honestly informing you. They will see little and explain less."
Thank you for reading! Give me a zap and follow if you found it valuable š