Both change and staying the same in a vacuum mean death.
You need to have a bit of both. We need to adopt changes that will make life better or allow us to continue to survive in changing circumstances, but we also need to remember our traditions didn't come about out of malice, but because they are lessons our great great grandparents wanted to pass on because they thought those ideas were the ones that kept them alive and allowed them to have good lives.
Our DNA does the same thing -- It's just coming to light now just how much of our behavior comes entirely from the way our brains are structured not due to external stimuli but due to our DNA. Certain things we're scared of, that's not because we learned to fear them but because our DNA has certain primal fears written into them by the people who survived the past where we would die childless and bloodlines would end.
A huge thing we need to do is listen to the lessons of the past without letting those lessons cripple us. When I was trying to find a woman after I got out of college, I had to learn that my fear of being rejected by women was normal and sensible, but I had to overcome it because if I didn't take that risk then I had a much greater risk of being alone for good, and that's in some ways a fate worse than death.
The problem right now is that change is presently the orthodoxy. It's just accepted as fact that all the structures we inherited are wrong and evil, and that's just not true. We're changing things that are good and that work because that's what we've always done. In this sense, leftism is conservatism, and that's not good. We need to realize that the past holds a lot of wisdom for us and we need to carry that with us in addition to being willing to bend when the future doesn't match with the past or the past had problems to solve.
Without the conservatism to keep good things, you don't get any successes for the changes you make because you just change good things anyway. Instead of an evolutionary method where we keep good things and change bad things and move forward, society just becomes like static on a TV -- random noise that's completely incoherent.
You need to have a bit of both. We need to adopt changes that will make life better or allow us to continue to survive in changing circumstances, but we also need to remember our traditions didn't come about out of malice, but because they are lessons our great great grandparents wanted to pass on because they thought those ideas were the ones that kept them alive and allowed them to have good lives.
Our DNA does the same thing -- It's just coming to light now just how much of our behavior comes entirely from the way our brains are structured not due to external stimuli but due to our DNA. Certain things we're scared of, that's not because we learned to fear them but because our DNA has certain primal fears written into them by the people who survived the past where we would die childless and bloodlines would end.
A huge thing we need to do is listen to the lessons of the past without letting those lessons cripple us. When I was trying to find a woman after I got out of college, I had to learn that my fear of being rejected by women was normal and sensible, but I had to overcome it because if I didn't take that risk then I had a much greater risk of being alone for good, and that's in some ways a fate worse than death.
The problem right now is that change is presently the orthodoxy. It's just accepted as fact that all the structures we inherited are wrong and evil, and that's just not true. We're changing things that are good and that work because that's what we've always done. In this sense, leftism is conservatism, and that's not good. We need to realize that the past holds a lot of wisdom for us and we need to carry that with us in addition to being willing to bend when the future doesn't match with the past or the past had problems to solve.
Without the conservatism to keep good things, you don't get any successes for the changes you make because you just change good things anyway. Instead of an evolutionary method where we keep good things and change bad things and move forward, society just becomes like static on a TV -- random noise that's completely incoherent.
That's a good point too -- Can you call something that's been implemented in places longer than any of us have been alive new or different?
"We need to once again try to implement this 200 year old book like we've been trying to do for 150 years but THIS TIME it'll work"
"We need to once again try to implement this 200 year old book like we've been trying to do for 150 years but THIS TIME it'll work"
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The most successful society in history was a meritocracy that came from a tiny island surrounded by salt water and came to have an empire so large the sun was always shining on one piece of it.
Meritocracy is egalitarian in the sense that people from any walk of life can rise up, but it is the opposite in the sense that most people aren't exceptional and so there's a clear and ordered hierarchy.
Meritocracy is egalitarian in the sense that people from any walk of life can rise up, but it is the opposite in the sense that most people aren't exceptional and so there's a clear and ordered hierarchy.
Merit and quality seem to me to be synonymous. You'd say "people of merit should be in charge" or synonymously "people of quality should be in charge". It seems to me that your specific gripe with meritocracy may just be what a specific meritocracy's definition of merit entails.
Hierarchy is innate, but those hierarchies aren't formed magically. People (or animals, or crustaceans) end up dominant for a reason. Does that hierarchy form from competence, or social standing, or brute force, or through chosen bloodlines?
Depending on the answer of how a hierarchy is formed, completely different people end up at the bottom and the top.
Hierarchy is innate, but those hierarchies aren't formed magically. People (or animals, or crustaceans) end up dominant for a reason. Does that hierarchy form from competence, or social standing, or brute force, or through chosen bloodlines?
Depending on the answer of how a hierarchy is formed, completely different people end up at the bottom and the top.
Why does merit refer to that? I don't think it's more meritorious to jump through hoops than to be a virtuous person who has accomplished much.
Besides that, I'd definitely argue against the idea that all hierarchy emerges as a demonstration of competence.
King Charles (Carlos) II of Spain was at the top of the hierarchy in Spain in 1665, despite many factors. At the time he was four years old. The king was unable to chew his food. Charles II’s tongue was so huge he could barely speak. He was not allowed to walk until he was almost fully grown and his family didn’t bother to educate him. The king was illiterate and totally dependent on those around him.
He was at the top of the hierarchy because someone long ago happened to be in charge, so their kids were and their kids were and their kid were, and the only reason why his kids weren't also in charge is that he was so inbred he was totally impotent.
Besides that, I'd definitely argue against the idea that all hierarchy emerges as a demonstration of competence.
King Charles (Carlos) II of Spain was at the top of the hierarchy in Spain in 1665, despite many factors. At the time he was four years old. The king was unable to chew his food. Charles II’s tongue was so huge he could barely speak. He was not allowed to walk until he was almost fully grown and his family didn’t bother to educate him. The king was illiterate and totally dependent on those around him.
He was at the top of the hierarchy because someone long ago happened to be in charge, so their kids were and their kids were and their kid were, and the only reason why his kids weren't also in charge is that he was so inbred he was totally impotent.
When you're talking about humans, humans *are* nature. The topic is infinitely broad, so I don't know what else to say than that.