Anthropocene and Technocracy

Recognizing the influence of human activity on the terrestrial ecosystem, geologists are considering formally declaring that the Earth is now in a post-Holocene Age--the Anthropocene.  While there is debate as to the beginning of the latter, it is generally agreed that the emergence of its defining characteristics is accelerated by the Industrial Revolution, circa 1700.  Now, since Industrialization has been peculiar to no specific Political or Economic system, Modern Political Philosophy has been neither illuminating or effective in the formulation of the social organization that best conduces to these most salient and epochal developments in human history.  However, an alternative that is at least akin to such progress, but is rarely taken into consideration by theorists, is what can be called Technocracy, meaning the rule of Know-How, not to be confused with the most usual use of the term, which connotes a mechanistic social order.

Nominalism, Platonism, Reductionism

Nominalism and Platonism are inverses--according to the former, Individuals are real, and Universals are not, and the reverse, according to the latter.  Schopenhauer also inverts Nominalism, but while for Platonists the Universals are Ideas, for Schopenhauer there is one Universal--the Will to Live, e. g. the reproductive drive.  Regardless, he does not resolve the problem that he shares with Platonists--explaining any divergence from the Universal, i. e. appearances, individuals, illusions, etc., even if 'irreal'.  In his case, the divergence is the Principle of Individuation, which, qua Principle, is real, and, hence, can be ascribed only to the Universal, from which it follows that the produced Individuals are real.  But, even if he were to retract Principle status from Individuation, thereby reducing it to mere illusion, the possibility of illusoriness still requires a ground.  So, what the conflicting inverses share is unsuccessful Reductionism, leaving both Universal and Individual intact.

Nominalism and Capitalism

Beginning with Hume's associate Smith, the regular flagrant violation of Nominalism by Capitalism continues to be the conceiving of the 'invisible hand' as anything other than a past repeated association of phenomena projected as obtaining in the future.  A less obvious violation follows from the previously discussed Nominalist analysis of the I.  For, if the latter dissolves into a multiplicity of perceptions, then so, too, does any concept expressed as 'self-interest', and, hence, Egoism does, as well.  So, the vehemence with which Capitalism is frequently defended is not based on any methodological rigor.

Nominalism and the 'I'

Nominalists, for whom the Individual is real, but the species is not, tend to overlook that Hume demonstrates the irreality of the former, as well.  For, if the 'I' is nothing but a bundle of perceptions, then it is a entity in name only.  Now, while Kant rescues the concept from that conclusion, by attributing reality to the 'bundle', and, thus, to the 'I think' that effects the bundling, Schopenhauer denies even that attribution, thereby dissolving the presumed Individual completely.  Thus, his occasional individuation of the Will to Live constitutes a lapse in that skepticism.  Regardless, his anti-Individualism is a reminder of the arbitrariness, if not inconsistency of Nominalism.

Nominalism, Species, History

One of the shortcomings of Nominalism, i. e. Atomist Semantics, is its inadequacy to organisms.  For example, that "forest" signifies a multiplicity of trees, while "tree" does not signify a multiplicity of leaves, branches, etc., is arbitrary.  Furthermore, it cannot represent growth, e. g. the "Jones family" before the birth of the second child not only means something different afterwards, Nominalism cannot connect the two meanings.  So, there is no adequate Nominalist objection to the proposition 'The human species is governed by a principle of Diversification', i. e. the history of the species cannot be reduced to an account of all the individual humans in a time-span.

Individualism and History

Nietzsche's Dionysian anti-Individualism is a continuation of Schopenhauer's quasi-Buddhist undermining of that central tenet of Modern Philosophy.  But, an earlier, alternative, means to that end is implicit in the works of Vico.  For, his hypothesis that human history is constituted by a general pattern entails that the activities of individual members of the race are determined by a force other than self-motivation.  Now, whether or not Schopenhauer is familiar with Vico, he surely is with Kant, and, hence, with the latter's thesis that human history is secretly determined by Nature, from which the illusoriness of individual volition can easily be inferred.  So, though Schopenhauer does not recognize the anti-Individualism that is potential in any concept of History, Nietzsche does.

Camel, History, Redemption

Zarathustra himself becomes the Camel of one of his earlier speeches, when he assumes the burden of the entire human past by affirming it.  He foreshadows that moment while addressing "fragments and limbs of men", characterizing it as "redemption".  The implicit contrasts are clear: Christian salvation of individual souls from the history of the species, secularized in Modern Philosophy as a-temporal Individualism, e. g. the Cartesian Cogito.

Camel, Cogito, Deity

In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, the Camel is an image of the process of assuming a burden in order to master it.  It is thus a counterpoint to Cartesian Doubt.  For, the latter is the method by which Descartes liberates himself from external influences.  From Nietzsche's perspective, the Camel is more powerful than the Cogito, since it can bear the whole world, which the latter can do only with the assistance of a deity.

Mind, Individual, Species

The Meditations is best known for two accomplishments--the establishment of a Certainty, and the detachment of Mind from Body.  But, as the contrast, previously discussed, with Thus Spoke Zarathustra illuminates, a third is Atomization, the product of which is a singularity that requires a proof of the existence of a deity to connect with any other existent.  Thus, that Mind is equivalent to Soul for Descartes is a reminder that the Meditations is at the service of a traditional Theological project--saving the individual Soul from a species that, according to Genesis 3, is cursed.

A Book For No One vs. A Book for Any One

The subtitle of Thus Spoke Zarathustra is translated by Hollingdale as "A Book for Everyone and No One", and by Kaufmann as "A Book for All and None".  The subtle distinction that is perhaps greatly significant is that "no one" more precisely continues the anti-Atomist theme introduced in The Gay Science, in which Zarathustra first appears, than does "none".  It, thus, more precisely establishes a counterpoint to the Meditations, the proto-Atomist book of Modern Philosophy, which can be correspondingly subtitled as a "Book for Any One".  For, while Descartes' protagonist, an anonymous I--someone sitting in a chair in front of a fire, not to be confused with Descartes at a desk, writing--isolates himself from Life, Nietzsche's submerges himself in it, and, overcoming his personal prejudice, affirms fellowship with even mediocre humans.

Book and Dionysian

Though Nietzsche is among the first mainstream Philosophers to express a self-awareness of writing a book, he does not submit the act itself to specific scutiny.  He, thus, offers no classification of the Art as either Dionysian or Apollonian.  Regsrdless, on the one hand, as an individual entity, a book would seem to be the product of an Apollonian process.  But, on the other, the subtitle of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, "A Book for Everyone and No One", signifies a Dionysian perspective.  Furthermore, the phrase alludes to the human species in #1 of The Gay Science.  So, by implication, that his audience is individuated is, while not illusory, superficial with respect to the species content of the work.  Thus illustrated is the model of a social order in which the Atomism that has predominated for centuries is undermined.  Still, to date, even though Freud, among others, has studied the tensions between the established and the nascent, the former still prevails in many places, especially the U. S.

Changing the World and Changing Humans

Easy to overlook in Marx's contrast between interpreting the world and changing the world is their common object--"the world".  Now, it is not clear what exactly he means by the term, but it seems likely that it signifies the environment of humans, and, therefore, something distinct from humans.  But, if so, then his assertion that the point of philosophical activity hitherto is interpreting the world is at least partly false.  For, while among the standard fields, Metaphysics and Physics are studies of the world, Ethics, Psychology, and Politics are not--they are studies of Humankind.  Furthermore, the point of making public any such study is to communicate it to other humans, and, thus, to edify others in some respect.  Now, a theory-practice distinction can be drawn among such edifying subject matter, and Marx's exhortation consists in privileging the latter.  Therefore, his primary purpose is to change not the world, but Humankind.

World, Interpretation, Text

The influence of Gutenberg's invention on Modern Philosophy can be discerned in one of Marx's most famous formulations.  What philosphers, according to him, have done hitherto is not "known" or "understood" the world; rather, they have "interpreted" it.  By implication, therefore, they have treated the world as a text.  Furthermore, as one of the theses on Feuerbach, the general theme of the passage is the shortcomings of Feuerbach's critique of Christianity.  So, implicit in Marx's formulation is that it is for not only Berkeley that the world is a religious text, a divine communication to humans.

Phenomenon and Sign

Berkeley's reduction of all qualities to Secondary eliminates the existence of an 'external world', thereby transforming all the Empiricist foundations of experience from Sense-Data to Phenomena.  However, Phenomenalism is not the final destination of his divergence from Locke's theory.  For, when fully developed by the Bishop, a Phenomenon is becomes a Sign, from his deity, to a specific Mind, and, so, is not to be taken at face value.  Accordingly, his successors in this respect are not Hume, Smith, Kant, Hegel, and Husserl, but Peirce and Jaspers.  Now, the thesis that the events of experience are the manifestations of the will of a deity is hardly new.  But, what is distinctive in Berkeley's theory is their essential linguistic character--they are not effects of a cause, like thunder is an effect of a god's anger, but expressions of a communication, to be interpreted, not merely cognized.  The theory thus fully reflects the means of communication in which it appears.

Psychological Egoism and Immortal Soul

Standard formulations of Psychological Egoism, such as Will to Live, are vulnerable to the following argument: 1. The conatus 'A to B' is meaningful only if B entails something that A lacks.  2.  But, in Will to Live, Will is already living.  3. Thus, Will to Live, and other variations of Psychological Egoism are empty.  However, there is one case which resists the criticism--when A and B are modes of Living, but are distinguished in some other respect.  This obtains in Christian Theology, when A = Temporal Life, and B = Eternal Life, i. e. when a mortal yearns for the immortality of its Soul.  So, Psychological Egoism can be an adequate foundation of Political Individualism only by adopting this concept of the Psyche.  Hobbes' and Locke's versions might do so, but Spinoza's does not--his conatus is in every case the persistence in being of infinite Nature, even if it is inadequately represented as the desire for continued living of a finite Mode.

Individualism, Immortality of the Soul, Psychological Egoism

As has been previously discussed, Modern Political Individualism is an effect of the universalization, via Gutenberg, of access to the Bible.  Thus, another effect is the personalization of religion, i. e. the private reading of scriptures away from the centralized performance of rituals.  Furthermore, a fundamental theme of those books is the Immortality of the Soul, i. e. the offer of 'eternal life' to an apparently mortal being.  In other words, not only Individualism, but the Privatization and the Psychological Egoism, e. g. the Will to Live, that accompany it as fundamental principles of Modern Political Philosophy, can be traced to Gutenberg's invention.

Individuals and the Means of Communication

The 'Individuals' of Modern Political Philosophy may be presented as if they exist in a vacuum, but the presentations themselves do not. They are books that are the products of processes that transpire under concrete historical conditions.  At their root, those conditions are the disintegration of theocratic social orders, the primary cause of which is Gutenberg's invention, which effects the de-centralization of possession of what is considered to be 'divine knowledge'.  In other words, the contents of the works that promote Modern Political Individualism reflect, first and foremost, the medium in which they appear, and its historical context, i. e. its 'Individuals' are products of the medium itself.  Or, put more generally, that Individualism reflects the newly ascending means of communication.

Political Individualism and Psychological Egoism

Modern Political Individualism typically presupposes some Egoistic conatus, Self-Preservation and Self-Interest being the most prominent ones.  Now, one problem with such Psychological principles is that the multiplicity of experiences that they generate lacks any unification, and, hence, they are inadequate to a concept of Individual.  A second is, as has been previously discussed, the difficulty in deriving from them trans-personal Psychological phenomena, such as Sympathy, the reproductive drive, and Genius.  So, Political Individualism is as tenuous as is its Psychological presuppositions.

The Individual and Diversification

The concept of 'the individual' that dominates Modern Political Philosophy is unsound for at least two reasons.  First, unless it connotes 'the immortal individual soul', it corresponds to no actual entity, since a human is not an a-historical given.  Second, it logically entails a contrast with a universal, and, thus, with two main possibilities.  On the one hand, if Universal is interpreted Nominalistically, the possibility of a concept of the Species as a concrete existent is arbitrarily precluded.  On the other, if it is interpreted Realistically, the Species-Member relation is arbitrarily restricted to one of mutual indifference, if not antagonism.  In either case, the tradition is inadequate to the possibility that the Species-Member relation is one of Whole-Part, and to the possibility that a Member is a product of Diversification, not of Individuation, and, hence, to the possibility that both terms are actual, and are neither indifferent nor antagonistic to one another.  On that basis, 'the individual' is exposed as the product of multiple abstractions, and, thus, as unfit to found a concrete endeavor like Political Philosophy.

Species, Nationalism, Cosmopolitanism

Just as the concept of the Species-Member relation as that of Whole-Part transforms the study of the human Psyche, it inverts Modern Political Philosophy well beyond the ambitions of Marx. In opposition to the predominant tradition, the latter derives Spiritualism from Materialism.  However, though they are inherently unstable, the fundamental elements of Dialectical Materialism are still Atoms that are only subsequently totalized.  Hence, he accepts the basic Hobbesian premise that pervades Modern Political Philosophy, with Socialism, accordingly, an unalienated Leviathan.  Instead, beginning with the Species, diversification into distinct polities, and, furthermore, into distinct citizens, are the preconditions of any process of re-unification.  Accordingly, the ultimate aim of the latter can only be a Cosmopolity, with respect to which Nationalism is as obsolete as Civicism and Provincialism.  Similarly, the Internationalism of Marxism is an Atomist approximation to Cosmopolitanism.

Collective Mood, Id, Superid

In Group Psychology and Analysis of the Ego, Freud explains collective Mood as the product of "mutual induction" within a Mass, which he defines as "a temporary entity, consisting of heterogeneous elements that have joined together for a moment".  But, this diagnosis is plainly circular, since both mutual induction presupposes togetherness, and togetherness is created by mutual induction.  This problem is typical of the inadequacy of Atomism to Wholistic phenomena, such as collective Mood.  In Freud's version of Atomism, that inadequacy in the generation of collective Mood, of, for example, not only an angry mob, but an exhilirated theater audience, etc., can be formulated as that of Id to Superid.

Mood and Species

A Mood is a self-contained, homogeneous condition, i. e. when one is in e. g. a happy mood, all of one is in it, no cause is necessarily ascribed to it, and it colors anything that one does.  Now, while a Mood is often attributed to an individual person, it can also apply to a collective e. g. "the mood in the room was somber".  In such a case, the mood of one is part of a more general condition that determines how each interacts with each other.  Similarly, the scope of a Mood can be the entire Species, with the interaction between Members a manifestation of not private motives, but of the general condition.  Thus, for example, Hobbesian universal antagonism can be not a clash of self-interests, but a general miasma.  Thus, Atomist Behaviorist concepts of the Psyche have no capacity to recognize a Mood of any scope, certainly not that of a collective, and not even that of an individual person, though it might endeavor to superimpose a cause on that condition.

Communication, Art, Genius

The immediate aim of any communication is to share some content.  Now, that Genius transcends specific Art forms indicates that common to them is the exhiliration that constitutes the experience of being creative.  Accordingly, the ultimate content of any product of Genius is Genius itself, and it is this Exhiliration that the Artist seeks to share with others.  So, Nietzche's privileging of Music and Tragedy is, fundamently, a recognition of the paradigmatic immediacy of Communication at such events, a sharing that transforms an assemblage of individuals into members of a species, artists as much as audience.

Species, Genius, Communication

According to Kant, one of the defining characteristics of a product of Genius is that it is exemplary.  Thus, the Communicability of a work of Art is due to Genius, regardless his subordination of the latter to Taste in Aesthetic Judgment.  Now, plainly, by Communication, he means a relation to other humans.  So, the source of Genius is not, as he asserts, Nature, but, specifically, the Species.  Thus, insofar as Genius is an animating principle, at least part of the motivation of the affected artist is a Species drive to Communicate.  Accordingly the failure of Freud's reduction of artistic creativity to the Libido is that while it can account for the motivation to produce something new, it cannot explain the motivation to communicate a content to others.

Species and Artistic Genius

Freud conceives artistic creativity as a sublimation of sexuality.  However, the example of the very young Mozart suggests the converse--that sexuality is a special case of a more general creativity.  Kant attributes Art to Genius, the source of which is Spirit, which he characterizes as an "animating" principle.  Furthermore, his characterization of the genius artist as "nature's favorite" implies that Spirit is not a supernatural force, while the products of such Genius are exemplary for other humans.  So, it clearly follows that Genius is an expression of a Species-drive that, as animating the creativity of the artist, reveals the Psyche of the latter as fundamentally grounded in the Species, and, hence, is an expression of a Superid of which Sexuality, i. e. the Species Reproductive drive, is another special case.

Species and Unconscious

Since Freud's concept of the Id, the 'Unconscious' has generally connoted some selfish drive, often sexual.  However, Spinoza offers a more comprehensive model of human motivation that shows that the Unconscious can transcend the individual Psyche.  For, on that model, where there is a distinction between Conscious and Unconscious, the latter is a Cause of which the former is an Inadequate Idea.  Furthermore, such a Cause can originate anywhere in Nature outside of the individual Mode.  Thus, though Spinoza does not specify them, the Unconscious can include any intra-Species drive, as well as any extra-Species influence.  The familiar example of the former is the reproductive drive, while the realm remains otherwise unknown, except possibly for a Will to Evolve.  In any case, Spinoza shows how 'Superid' might better characterize at least some of the Unconscious than 'Id'.

Humankind, Subsistence, Communication

The production of the means of subsistence, which, according to Marx, is what distinguishes Humankind from other species, might have begun as a compensation for a lack of what others possess, e. g. a knife for claws, but has developed into capacities that far surpass those grounded in natural attributes.  The same can be said for the means of communication, i. e. two humans can do what two butterflies, presumably, cannot--communicate virtually instantaneously while one is at the Greenwich Meridian, and the other at the International Date Line.  Since progress in the means to communicate continues even as the means to subsistence is fully successful, it might be the production of the former, not that of the latter, that distinguishes Humankind from its co-inhabitants of the planet.

Humankind and History

The 'history of the human species' has hardly been about the human species per se.  Usually it has been a narrative featuring individual members or groups of members, even economic classes.  Indeed, the perhaps most influential concept of History, if the pervasiveness of its calendar is any indication, is the Christian, the arc of which is an escape of members from the species, i. e. spanning the divine curse on the race in Genesis 3, to the redemption of individual souls.  Likewise, Darwinism explains the origin of the human race, but without any projection of an ascent to some new species, leaving a vacuum that has been filled by the likes of 'Social Darwinism', which is typically invoked to justify the privileged few.  In contrast, as has been previously discussed, a definite concrete pattern of the millennia-old development of the species has emerged--Planetization--the most conspicuous manifestation of which is the Internet, therefore occasioning a reconsideration of many hitherto accepted theses about it.

Humankind, Planetization, Psyche

In the past century, a combination of technological advances, including aeronautical, has produced empirical confirmation of a long-held hypothesis--that the Earth is approximately spherical.  Furthermore, the virtually instantaneous internal connectivity of the human species has recently been actualized by the Internet.  Together, the two developments have made potentially available to each member of the species the concrete awareness of the Planetization of Humankind, abstractly pre-figured by Kant's concept of a Rational being's consciousness of a Universal Law, though not necessarily with the same imperative.  The impact of this new awareness on the Psyche of any member of the species is still in very early stages.

Human Species, Globalization, Planetization

Since 'globalization' commonly connotes a process associated with Capitalism, a less encumbered term to characterize the millennia-long, and ongoing, achievement of circumambience of the Earth by the human species is 'Planetization'.  Indeed, insofar as the basic unit of Capitalism is either an individual human or a nation, 'globalization' is less appropriate for an essentially species process, than is Socialism.  Now, undetermined to date is whether or not the Will to Planetize is the Will to Power.  For, while the latter commonly signifies control, the former can be satisfied by the achievement of a presence that is integrated into the planetary ecosystem, and which of the two constitutes the terrestrial status of the species has yet to be settled.  The heretofore resistance of American Capitalism to Ecological goals is another reason to distinguish 'globalization' and 'Planetization'.

Psyche, Species, Ecosystem

The anti-Atomist argument can apply to a Species as much as to a Member of a Species.  Accordingly, the history of the human race, as well as any correlated principle that is attributed to it, cannot be isolated from the Ecosystem of which it is a part.  In other words, the Globalization achieved thus far by the human species, as well as the Will to Ubiquity, or any alternative, that can be ascribed to it, is only an abstraction from some function that it serves in the system.  To date, knowledge of that function is not only minimal, but the very concept of the species as integrated into what has traditionally been called Nature, is in its infancy, facing both theological and pecuniary obstacles.  Nevertheless, if the Species is a part of the Ecosystem, and a Member of the Species is a part of the Species, insofar as the Psyche of a Member is determined by a Species-principle, it is also determined by an Eco-principle, however obscure its content might be to date.