3 ms·

I'm curious as to why you think the world is moving towards liberalism.

vinceguidry 10y ago
Ultimately it's because of the Internet. Sharing of ideas, remixing them, iterating on them, that's all the province of liberalism. Holding on to tradition, resisting modernization, that's conservatism. Liberalism is the rising tide raising all boats. It's always happening, everywhere, behind the scenes, in people's minds. Even the most conservative person has liberal ideas. Liberalism is imperative, conservatism only impairs. You can have individuals, groups, communities, industries, cities, provinces, countries, even whole blocs of countries espousing conservatism, but the natural trend is towards idea evolution and that's liberalism. It might take a long, circuitous route to get there, but when you take the totality of the whole world, and the logic of ideation, that's where it's going.
- pault 10y ago
  > the rising tide raising all boats. FYI, usually this rhetoric is used by rich people when they are trying to screw you.
  - vinceguidry 10y ago
    Lol, in my defense it's a more of a philosophical point than an economic or political one.
- RyanZAG 10y ago
  So Liberalism is good and improves things, and therefore everyone will choose it? Assuming the first part is true, just becomes something is better does not mean it will be chosen, so I don't think that argument works.
  - vinceguidry 10y ago
    Well, no, I'm talking about how things evolve. There's this big myth in history about technological, economic and social decline. That it's been up and down for 2000 years, fits and starts. It's not the case, things slowly and continuously evolve, you just only notice it happening in fits and starts. Also the mind is designed to focus on negative things, so we assign more weight to the negative than we would if we were being more rational.
    - RyanZAG 10y ago
      How do you explain the fall of Athens and Rome, and the very long centuries of dark ages in Europe and West Asia?
      - vinceguidry 10y ago
        The dark ages are a myth. This is becoming more accepted amongst historians. It's an artifact of our imaginations, not a valid narrative. Athens and Rome are only two of countless agrarian kingdoms / empires of the day. When Rome fell, the rest of Europe mostly just went on without imperial control. More wars were fought but warfare of the day was exceedingly resource-constrained and not like the total wars we see today. Kingdoms and empires rose and fall all the time, we just focus on those two because their culture survived while the other ones' didn't. The terminology "dark ages" more refers to the loss of Christian leadership than it does of technological or economic loss. Christians love to frame things apocalyptically and that's what's responsible for the common pejorative view of that time period. A more valid comparison would be the Napoleanic wars, but there too, you can see that really the wars were only possible because economic advancement allowed nations much more resources to devote to war. Europe had to learn how to civilize warfare three times. Each time happened after massive economic advancements.
        RyanZAG 10y ago
        Interesting, but it seems you're coming from the position of having already concluded what the answer is, and then going back and fitting everything to that precondition.

Ultimately it's because of the Internet. Sharing of ideas, remixing them, iterating on them, that's all the province of liberalism. Holding on to tradition, resisting modernization, that's conservatism. Liberalism is the rising tide raising all boats. It's always happening, everywhere, behind the scenes, in people's minds. Even the most conservative person has liberal ideas. Liberalism is imperative, conservatism only impairs. You can have individuals, groups, communities, industries, cities, provinces, countries, even whole blocs of countries espousing conservatism, but the natural trend is towards idea evolution and that's liberalism. It might take a long, circuitous route to get there, but when you take the totality of the whole world, and the logic of ideation, that's where it's going.

pault 10y ago
> the rising tide raising all boats. FYI, usually this rhetoric is used by rich people when they are trying to screw you.
- vinceguidry 10y ago
  Lol, in my defense it's a more of a philosophical point than an economic or political one.
RyanZAG 10y ago
So Liberalism is good and improves things, and therefore everyone will choose it? Assuming the first part is true, just becomes something is better does not mean it will be chosen, so I don't think that argument works.
- vinceguidry 10y ago
  Well, no, I'm talking about how things evolve. There's this big myth in history about technological, economic and social decline. That it's been up and down for 2000 years, fits and starts. It's not the case, things slowly and continuously evolve, you just only notice it happening in fits and starts. Also the mind is designed to focus on negative things, so we assign more weight to the negative than we would if we were being more rational.
  - RyanZAG 10y ago
    How do you explain the fall of Athens and Rome, and the very long centuries of dark ages in Europe and West Asia?
    - vinceguidry 10y ago
      The dark ages are a myth. This is becoming more accepted amongst historians. It's an artifact of our imaginations, not a valid narrative. Athens and Rome are only two of countless agrarian kingdoms / empires of the day. When Rome fell, the rest of Europe mostly just went on without imperial control. More wars were fought but warfare of the day was exceedingly resource-constrained and not like the total wars we see today. Kingdoms and empires rose and fall all the time, we just focus on those two because their culture survived while the other ones' didn't. The terminology "dark ages" more refers to the loss of Christian leadership than it does of technological or economic loss. Christians love to frame things apocalyptically and that's what's responsible for the common pejorative view of that time period. A more valid comparison would be the Napoleanic wars, but there too, you can see that really the wars were only possible because economic advancement allowed nations much more resources to devote to war. Europe had to learn how to civilize warfare three times. Each time happened after massive economic advancements.
      - RyanZAG 10y ago
        Interesting, but it seems you're coming from the position of having already concluded what the answer is, and then going back and fitting everything to that precondition.