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>and for thousands of years it has been at least widely believed that devoting yourself to specialization runs counter to those goals. Well no, civilizations l

>and for thousands of years it has been at least widely believed that devoting yourself to specialization runs counter to those goals. Well no, civilizations like the Maori are the exception, not the norm. Rigid class roles and specialization have featured prominently in essentially every Eurasian civilization from Egypt to Han China, which held the bulk of humanity and uts developments. Nor did questions of individual happiness matter, what concerned people at the times were questions of martial duty or religious worship.

kragen 1y ago
The Māori weren't civilized (they didn't have cities at the time) and were far from the exception; cities didn't hold the bulk of humanity until 11 years ago. We remember Middle Kingdom Egypt and (1500 years later) Han China because they were civilizations and consequently were literate. But throughout almost all of human history, only a small fraction of the population has lived in the civilizations we see looking back. Even in Eurasian civilizations, until the Industrial Revolution, 90+% of the population were relatively unspecialized peasants with skills nearly as broad-based as Laura Ingalls Wilder's parents. It's easy to forget about them because they weren't literate and so can't speak to us from beyond the grave like Epicurus, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, Sima Tan, or Marcus Aurelius. And most people lived outside civilization entirely. They had very diverse lifestyles, but we can make some generalizations. Even when they didnt leave diaries for us to read, we can infer that they had much less specialization, both from economic principles and from archaeological evidence. It's certainly true that people in civilizations are, and have always been, focused on martial duty, and everyone everywhere is concerned with religious worship, though they may call it something else for social reasons. But people have always been strongly interested in individual happiness, even in civilizations. The Buddha founded one of the most important religions 2500 years ago on the basis of individual happiness, to the point that after he died, one of the most contentious issues among his followers was whether holy people had any duty to help other people achieve happiness as well, the origin of the Mahayana bodhisattva vows. Epicurus's philosophy and Marcus Aurelius's writings are also centered on the pursuit of individual happiness, as is much of Plato and of course the Mohists. Even religions and philosophies that preached lifelong duty and sacrifice above all else, like Christianity and Islam, offer it as a path to individual happiness in the afterlife.

kragen 1y ago

The Māori weren't civilized (they didn't have cities at the time) and were far from the exception; cities didn't hold the bulk of humanity until 11 years ago. We remember Middle Kingdom Egypt and (1500 years later) Han China because they were civilizations and consequently were literate. But throughout almost all of human history, only a small fraction of the population has lived in the civilizations we see looking back. Even in Eurasian civilizations, until the Industrial Revolution, 90+% of the population were relatively unspecialized peasants with skills nearly as broad-based as Laura Ingalls Wilder's parents. It's easy to forget about them because they weren't literate and so can't speak to us from beyond the grave like Epicurus, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, Sima Tan, or Marcus Aurelius. And most people lived outside civilization entirely. They had very diverse lifestyles, but we can make some generalizations. Even when they didnt leave diaries for us to read, we can infer that they had much less specialization, both from economic principles and from archaeological evidence. It's certainly true that people in civilizations are, and have always been, focused on martial duty, and everyone everywhere is concerned with religious worship, though they may call it something else for social reasons. But people have always been strongly interested in individual happiness, even in civilizations. The Buddha founded one of the most important religions 2500 years ago on the basis of individual happiness, to the point that after he died, one of the most contentious issues among his followers was whether holy people had any duty to help other people achieve happiness as well, the origin of the Mahayana bodhisattva vows. Epicurus's philosophy and Marcus Aurelius's writings are also centered on the pursuit of individual happiness, as is much of Plato and of course the Mohists. Even religions and philosophies that preached lifelong duty and sacrifice above all else, like Christianity and Islam, offer it as a path to individual happiness in the afterlife.