HUMAN NATURE

John Scales Avery

July 13, 2020

 INTRODUCTION1
Human nature as a central theme of philosophy
What is human nature? Are we humans good or evil? To what extent is the
character of a person produced by heredity, and to what extent by environ-
ment? Is competition more central to our existence than cooperation, or is
it the other way around? How can a happy, peaceful and stable society be
created? Are humans essentially the same as other animals, or are we funda-
mentally different? Should humans dominate and control nature, or should
we be the custodians of nature? These questions are central to philosophy,
and they will be discussed in this book. Conflicting answers have been given
by philosophers, scientists and religious leaders offer the centuries, from ear-
liest times until the present. These answers will be reviewed and discussed.

The chemistry and physiology of emotions

Human emotions have a long evolutionary history. We share many emotions
with our animal relatives - for example, mother love, fear and anger. Modern
science has given us an insight into the chemistry and physiology of emotions.
In our human brains, and in those of animals, there are billions of chemi-
cally moderated connections between neurons. These are called synapses.
Whether or not a synapse “fires” and transmits its message to the next
neuron depends on the chemical environment of the synapse, and this en-
vironment changes under the influence of hormones released by our glands,
which are in turn influenced by our emotions.

Ethology: the science of inherited behavior patterns

Charles Darwin’s book The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals
(1871) shows that he was aware that behavior patterns are just as reliably
inherited as physical characteristics, and that they are similar within related
groups of animals. For example, all members of the cat family show similar
car-like behavior. Because of this pioneering book, Darwin is considered to
be the founder of the science of ethology, the study of inherited behavior
patterns.
1
This book makes heavy use of my previously published chapters in various books, but
a considerable amount of new material has also been added
 More recently, in 1973, Karl von Frisch (1886-1982), Nikolaas Tinbergen
(1907-1988), and Konrad Lorenz (1903-1989), shared a Nobel Prize in Phys-
iology or Medicine. Karl von Frisch won his share of the prize for his studies
of the waggle dance by which bees transmit information to their hive-mates.
Tinbergen, who is famous for his studies of the instincts of birds, has pointed
out that no modern ethologist would debate the question of whether heredity
or environment plays a greater role in forming the character of an individual,
since all learning is built upon a base of genetic predisposition without which
it would be impossible.
The third 1973 laureate, Konrad Lorenz, is most controversial, but also
the most interesting of the three, since his famous book On Aggression casts
light on why humans are so susceptible to militarism.

The dark side of human nature

Are humans good or evil? We can find evidence for both sides of human
nature. It seems that humans can behave in both ways, depending on the
circumstances in which they find themselves. In this book, a chapter is
devoted to Neoliberalism, Racism and Neo-Fascism, where we see in detail
the dark side of human nature. In the recent killing of George Floyd, we see
both sides of human nature. The brutal killing, and Donald Trumps reaction
show the dark side, while the worldwide anti-racist protests show human
nature at its compassionate best.

Our collective shortsightedness: The climate emergency

There is a remarkable contrast in the way that governments around the world
have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic and the way that they have re-
sponded to the climate emergency. The pandemic, which indeed represents
an extremely grave danger to humanity, has produced a massive global re-
sponse. Borders have been closed, airlines have become virtually inoperative,
industries, restaurants and entertainments have been closed, sporting events
have been cancelled or postponed, people have been asked to stay at home
and practice social distancing, and the everyday life of citizens around the
world has been drastically changed.
By contrast, let us consider the threat that if immediate action is not
taken to halt the extraction and use of fossil fuels, irreversible feedback loops
will be initiated which will make catastrophic climate change inevitable de-
spite human any human efforts to prevent it.
This threat is even more serious than the COVID-19 pandemic. Climate
change could make much of the earth too hot for human life. It could produce
a famine involving billions of people, rather than millions. And yet the world
has hardly reacted at all.
A minority, for example the Scandinavian countries, have taken appropri-
ate action. Most governments pay lip service to the emergency, but do not
take effective action; and a few countries, such as the United States under
Donald Trump, Bolsonaro’s Brazil, and Saudi Arabia, deny that there is a
climate emergency and actively sabotage action.
The world’s net response has been totally inadequate. The Keeling Curve,
which measures CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere, continues to rise, and
the rate of rising is even increasing. What is the reason for this remarkable
contrast between our strong reaction to the pandemic and our neglect of the
climate crisis? Is it because we see clearly what is near to us and neglect
whatever is far away? Or are powerful financial forces at work, controlling
the mass media?

Sex and overconsumption

If we are to have a chance of avoiding catastrophic climate change, each
of us must reduce his or her carbon footprint. Particularly in the wealthy
parts of the world, we must simplify our lives and renounce overconsumption.
Humans must stop using material goods as a means of social competition.

Human nature is best suited to sharing societies

What kind of society will make us happy and safe? What kind of society is
sustainable? What kind of society is most in harmony with human nature?
Our emotions have not changed much since the time when humans were
hunter-gatherers, living in egalitarian groups that shared food whenever they
were able to find it. There is much evidence that also today sharing and
egalitarian societies are more happy than those with excessive individualism
and competition.
Contents

1 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE 9

1.1 Plato and Aristotle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.2 Abrahamic religions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.3 Confucius . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.4 Gautama Buddha . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.5 Native American ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
1.6 Jean Jacques Rousseau . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
1.7 John Locke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
1.8 The Marquis de Condorcet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
1.9 William Godwin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
1.10 Charles Darwin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
1.11 Peter Kropotkin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
1.12 Sigmund Freud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
1.13 Bertrand Russell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
1.14 Noam Chomsky . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

2 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS 69

2.1 Darwin’s book on emotions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
2.2 Brain chemistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
2.3 Nervous systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
2.4 Chemical synapses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
2.5 Neurotransmitters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
2.6 Oxytocin, the “love hormone” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
2.7 Mother love and rage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
2.8 Nervous systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

3 ETHOLOGY 97
3.1 The science of inherited behavior patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.2 Population genetics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
3.3 Hope for the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
3.4 Religion and ethnic identity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
3.5 Tribal markings; ethnicity; pseudospeciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
3.6 Searching for human nature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

5
6 CONTENTS

3.7 The evolution of cooperation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

4 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM 133

4.1 Nationalism in Europe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
4.2 The two world wars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
4.3 Lessons from the First World War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
4.4 What is to be done? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

5 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM AND NEO-FASCISM 161

5.1 Genocides in the Americas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
5.2 Modern weapons and colonialism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
5.3 Persistent effects of colonialism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
5.4 Racism, colonialism and exceptionalism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
5.5 Leopold II and Atrocities in Belgian Congo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
5.6 The Kaiser’s genocide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
5.7 The racism of Cecil Rhodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
5.8 Friedrich Nietzsche . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
5.9 Nazi atrocities and genocides . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
5.10 Ayn Rand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
5.11 Revival of Nazi ideology after World War II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
5.12 Alt-right . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
5.13 The Klu Klux Klan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
5.14 Proud Boys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
5.15 Evangelicals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
5.16 The El Paso mass murders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
5.17 The murder of George Floyd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
5.18 Right-wing parties in Europe and elsewhere. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
5.19 Trump copies Hitler’s rhetoric . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

6 WE SEE ONLY WHAT IS NEAR TO US 233

6.1 Contrasting responses to the pandemic and the climate crisis . . . . . . . . 233
6.2 Under-reporting of the climate emergency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
6.3 Recovery from the pandemic offers climate action opportunities . . . . . . 235
6.4 Quick action is needed to save the long-term future . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
6.5 Is the transition to 100% renewable energy possible? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
6.6 Renewables are now much cheaper than fossil fuels! . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
6.7 An economic tipping point . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
6.8 An unprecedented investment opportunity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
6.9 For creating jobs, renewables beat fossil fuels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
6.10 The Stern Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
6.11 Major producers of fossil fuels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
6.12 Blood for oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
6.13 Fossil fuel extraction must stop! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
CONTENTS 7

6.14 Extinction events and feedback loops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258

6.15 A warning from the World Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
6.16 Permian-Triassic extinction event . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
6.17 The Holocene (Anthropocene) extinction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
6.18 Global warming and atmospheric water vapor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
6.19 The albedo effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
6.20 The methane hydrate feedback loop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
6.21 A feedback loop from warming of soils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
6.22 Drying of forests and forest fires . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
6.23 Tipping points and feedback loops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
6.24 Greta Thunberg’s TED talk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
6.25 Only immediate climate action can save the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
6.26 Worldwide school strike, 15 March, 2019 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
6.27 The World Meteorological Organization’s report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
6.28 Only 12 years left to limit climate change catastrophe . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
6.29 COP24, the climate summit in Poland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
6.30 The UK declares a climate emergency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
6.31 Understatement of existential climate risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
6.32 The 2018 IPCC report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301

7 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION 315

7.1 Charles Darwin’s theory of sexual selection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
7.2 We must stop using material goods as a means of social competition . . . . 319
7.3 Thoreau: a pioneer of simple living . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
7.4 Veblen; economics as anthropology; conspicuous consumption . . . . . . . . 326
7.5 Gandhi as an economist; merit and goods are not connected . . . . . . . . 329
7.6 The counter-culture; stepping off the treadmill . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334

8 OUR ROOTS IN SHARING SOCIETIES 339

8.1 The San people of the Kalahari Desert . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
8.2 Sharing in Inuit societies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
8.3 Sharing in early Christian communities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
8.4 Trading in primitive societies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
8.5 Interdependence in modern human society . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
8.6 Benefits of equality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
8.7 Two sides of human nature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344

9 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT 345

9.1 Caring for the future of our children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
9.2 We must achieve a steady-state economic system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
9.3 We must restore democracy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
9.4 We must decrease economic inequality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
9.5 We must break the power of corporate greed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
8 CONTENTS

9.6 We must leave fossil fuels in the ground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352

9.7 We must stabilize, and ultimately reduce, global population . . . . . . . . 354
9.8 We must eliminate the institution of war . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
9.9 Educational reforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
9.10 Culture, education and human solidarity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360
9.11 Construction versus destruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
9.12 New ethics to match new technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363

10 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE 371

10.1 Some goals for the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371
10.2 The ethics of Mahatma Gandhi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373
10.3 The ethics of Albert Einstein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
10.4 The ethics of Saint Francis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382
10.5 The ethics of Pope Francis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
10.6 All humans are brothers and sisters! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
10.7 The ethics of Henry David Thoreau . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
10.8 The message of Bertha von Suttner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 391
10.9 Helen Keller’s message . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
10.10 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
10.11 The voice of Martin Luther King, Jr. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 400
10.12 ICAN wins the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
10.13 Compassion versus greed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 406
10.14 The fragility of our complex civilization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413
10.15 Looking towards the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 416
10.16 Chaplin’s speech: Hope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420
Chapter 1

PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN

NATURE

“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan;

The proper study of mankind is man.
Plac’d on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise, and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the stoic’s pride,
He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a god, or beast;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reas’ning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such,
Whether he thinks too little, or too much:
Chaos of thought and passion, all confus’d;
Still by himself abus’d, or disabus’d;
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl’d:
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!”

(from Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man, 1733),

What is human nature?

What is human nature? Are we humans good or evil? To what extent is the character
of a person produced by heredity, and to what extent by environment? Is competition
more central to our existence than cooperation, or is it the other way around? How can a
happy, peaceful and stable society be created? Are humans essentially the same as other

9
10 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

animals, or are we fundamentally different? Should humans dominate and control nature,
or should we be the custodians of nature? These questions are central to philosophy, and
the opinions of some famous philosophers, religious leaders and scientists are given below.

1.1 Plato and Aristotle

Plato
Plato (427 B.C. - 317 B.C.) was an Athenian aristocrat, descended from the early kings of
Athens. His real name was Aristocles, but he was called by his nickname, Platon (meaning
“broad”) because of his broad shoulders. After the death of Socrates, Plato left Athens,
saying that the troubles of the city would never end until a philosopher became king. (He
may have had himself in mind!) He travelled to Italy and studied under the Pythagoreans.
In 387 he returned to Athens and founded a school, which was called the Academy because
it stood on ground which had once belonged to a Greek named Academus.
Plato developed a philosophy which was based on the idealism of the Pythagoreans.
In Pythagorean philosophy, a clear distinction was made between mathematical ideas and
their physical expression. For example, geometry was considered to deal, not with real
physical objects, but with idealized figures, constructed from lines of perfect straightness
and infinite thinness. Plato developed and exaggerated the idealism of Pythagoras. In
Plato’s philosophy, the real world is corruptible and base, but the world of ideas is divine
and eternal. A real table, for example, is an imperfect expression of the idea of a table.
Therefore we ought to turn our eyes away from the real world and live in the world of
ideas.
Plato’s philosophy was just what the Athenians wanted! All around them, their world
was crumbling. They gladly turned their backs on the unpleasantness of the real world,
and accepted Plato’s invitation to live in the world of ideas, where nothing decays and
where the golden laws of mathematics rule eternally.
By all accounts, Plato was an excellent mathematician, and through his influence math-
ematics obtained a permanent place in education.

Aristotle
Plato’s favorite student was a young man from Macedon named Aristotle. Plato called him
“the intelligence of the school”. He was born in 381 B.C., the son of the court physician of
the king of Macedon, and at the age of seventeen he went to Athens to study. He joined
Plato’s Academy and worked there for twenty years until Plato died. Aristotle then left
the Academy, saying that he disapproved of the emphasis on mathematics and theory and
the decline of natural science.
Aristotle traveled throughout the Greek world and married the sister of the ruler of
one of the cities which he visited. In 312 B.C., Philip II, who had just become king of
Macedon, sent for Aristotle and asked him to become the tutor of his fourteen-year-old
1.1. PLATO AND ARISTOTLE 11

Figure 1.1: Plato and Aristotle by Raphael. According to Wikipedia, “The

human soul in the works of Plato and Aristotle has a nature that is divided in
a specifically human way. One part is specifically human and rational, being
further divided into (1) a part which is rational on its own; and (2) a spirited
part which can understand reason. Other parts of the soul are home to desires
or passions similar to those found in animals.”
12 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

son, Alexander. Aristotle accepted this post and continued in it for a number of years.
During this period, the Macedonians, under Philip, conquered most of the Greek city-
states. Philip then planned to lead a joint Macedonian and Greek force in an attack on
the Persian Empire. However, in 336 B.C., before he could begin his invasion of Persia, he
was murdered (probably by an agent of his wife, Olympia, who was jealous because Philip
had taken a second wife). Alexander then succeeded to his father’s throne, and, at the
head of the Macedonian and Greek army, he invaded Persia.
Aristotle, no longer needed as a royal tutor, returned to Athens and founded a school
of his own called the Lyceum. At the Lyceum he built up a collection of manuscripts which
resembled the library of a modern university.
Aristotle was a very great organizer of knowledge, and his writings almost form a one-
man encyclopedia. His best work was in biology, where he studied and classified more than
five hundred animal species, many of which he also dissected. In Aristotle’s classification of
living things, he shows an awareness of the interrelatedness of species. This interrelatedness
was later brought forward by Darwin as evidence for the theory of evolution. One cannot
really say that Aristotle proposed a theory of evolution, but he was groping towards the
idea. In his history of animals, he writes:
“Nature proceeds little by little from lifeless things to animal life, so that it is impos-
sible to determine either the exact line of demarcation, or on which side of the line an
intermediate form should lie. Thus, next after lifeless things in the upward scale comes the
plant. Of plants, one will differ from another as to its apparent amount of vitality. In a
word, the whole plant kingdom, whilst devoid of life as compared with the animal, is yet
endowed with life as compared with other corporeal entities. Indeed, there is observed in
plants a continuous scale of ascent towards the animal.”
Aristotle’s classification of living things, starting at the bottom of the scale and going
upward, is as follows: Inanimate matter, lower plants and sponges, higher plants, jellyfish,
zoophytes and ascidians, molluscs, insects, jointed shellfish, octopuses and squids, fish and
reptiles, whales, land mammals and man. The acuteness of Aristotle’s observation and
analysis can be seen from the fact that he classified whales and dolphins as mammals
(where they belong) rather than as fish (where they superficially seem to belong).
One of Aristotle’s important biological studies was his embryological investigation of
the developing chick. Ever since his time, the chick has been the classical object for em-
bryological studies. He also studied the four-chambered stomach of the ruminants and the
detailed anatomy of the mammalian reproductive system. He used diagrams to illustrate
complex anatomical relationships - an important innovation in teaching technique.
Aristotle’s physics and astronomy were far less successful than his biology. In these
fields, he did not contribute with his own observations. On the whole, he merely repeated
the often-mistaken ideas of his teacher, Plato.
Besides writing on biology, physics and astronomy, Aristotle also discussed ethics, poli-
tics and literary criticism, and he made a great contribution to western thought by inventing
a formal theory of logic. His writings on logic were made popular by St. Thomas Aquinas
(1225-1274), and during the period between Aquinas and the Renaissance, Aristotle’s logic
dominated theology and philosophy. In fact, through his work on logic, Aristotle became
1.2. ABRAHAMIC RELIGIONS 13

so important to scholastic philosophy that his opinions on other subjects were accepted as
absolute authority. Unfortunately, Aristotle’s magnificent work in biology was forgotten,
and it was his misguided writings on physics and astronomy which were influential. Thus,
for the experimental scientists of the 16th and 17th centuries, Aristotle eventually became
the symbol of wrongness, and many of their struggles and victories have to do with the
overthrow of Aristotle’s doctrines.
Even after it had lost every vestige of political power, Athens continued to be a uni-
versity town, like Oxford or Cambridge. Plato’s Academy continued to teach students for
almost a thousand years. It was finally closed in 529 A.D. by the Emperor Justinian, who
feared its influence as a stronghold of “pagan philosophy”.
Aristotle’s Lyceum continued for some time as an active institution, but it soon declined,
because although Athens remained a center of moral philosophy, the center of scientific
activity had shifted to Alexandria. The collection of manuscripts which Aristotle had built
up at the Lyceum became the nucleus of the great library at Alexandria.
The books of Plato and Aristotle survived better than the books of other ancient
philosophers, perhaps because Plato and Aristotle founded schools. Plato’s authenticated
dialogues form a book as long as the Bible, covering all fields of knowledge. Aristotle’s
lectures were collected into 150 volumes. (Of course, each individual volume was not as
long as a modern printed book.) Of these, 50 have survived. Some of them were found
in a pit in Asia Minor by soldiers of the Roman general Sulla in 80 A.D., and they were
brought to Rome to be recopied.
Some of the works of Aristotle were lost in the West, but survived during the dark ages
in Arabic translations. In the 12th and 13th centuries, these works were translated into
Latin by European scholars who were in contact with the Arab civilization. Through these
translations, Europe enthusiastically rediscovered Aristotle, and until the 17th century, he
replaced Plato as the philosopher.
The influence of Plato and Aristotle was very great (perhaps greater than they de-
served), because of their literary skill, because so many of their books survived, because
of the schools which they founded, and because Plato and Aristotle wrote about all of
knowledge and wrapped it up so neatly that they seemed to have said the last word.

1.2 Abrahamic religions

Some stories from the Bible
The Old Testament is the common heritage of the three Abrahamic religions, Christianity,
Judaism and Islam. Some of the stories which it contains can be seen as attempts to
explain the paradoxes of human emotional nature: Why are we born with emotions that
drive us to commit the seven deadly sins? Why are pride, envy, wrath, gluttony, lust,
sloth and greed so much a part of human nature? The story of Adam and Eve and the
Garden of Eden attempts to answer this question, as do stories about the role of Satan in
the world.
14 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.2: The garden of Eden.

According to the biblical account, Adam and Eve ate apples from the Tree of Knowledge
and were therefore expelled from the Garden of Eden. This story can be seen as containing
elements of historical truth. Humans were originally hunter-gatherers. Populations were
so sparse that gathering roots, berries and fruits from their environment gave them enough
to eat. Occasionally they obtained additional protein from the meat of animals that they
were able to kill. Then agriculture was invented. Populations rapidly became so dense that
humans were no longer able to live simply by gathering fruit from the Garden of Eden.
Expelled from the garden, they were henceforth forced to sweat for their daily bread.
What about “original sin” and the role of the Devil in the world? In the Bible, the
Devil, or Satan, appears as a fallen angel who tempts humans to commit sins, i.e to break
the rules of their societies. The existence of Satan is the biblical explanation of the presence
of evil in the world. An alternative explanation is given by the doctrine of “original sin”,
which maintains that humans are born with a sinful nature. Like the story of the Garden of
Eden, these biblical concepts may also chronicle true historical events in human evolution.
A sinful human is sometimes described as “behaving like an animal”. In fact. what is
regarded a sin in humans can be a necessary survival trait in an animal. It would be
ridiculous to say “Thou shalt not steal” to a mouse or “Thou shalt not kill” to a tiger.
Our emotions have an extremely long evolutionary history. Both lust and rage are
emotions that we share with many animals. However, with the rapid advance of human
cultural evolution, our ancestors began to live together in progressively larger groups, and
in these new societies, our inherited emotional nature was often inappropriate. What once
was a survival trait became a sin which needed to be suppressed by morality and law.
1.3. CONFUCIUS 15

Figure 1.3: Satan.

Today we live in a world that is entirely different from the one into which our species
was born. We face the problems of the 21st century: exploding populations, vanishing
resources, and the twin threats of catastrophic climate change and thermonuclear war. We
face these severe problems with our poor cave-man’s brain, with an emotional nature that
has not changed much since our ancestors lived in small tribes, competing for territory on
the grasslands of Africa.

1.3 Confucius
After the fall of Rome in the 5th century A.D., Europe became a culturally backward area.
However, the great civilizations of Asia and the Middle East continued to flourish, and it
was through contact with these civilizations that science was reborn in the west.
During the dark ages of Europe, a particularly high level of civilization existed in China.
The art of working in bronze was developed in China during the Shang dynasty (1,500 B.C.
- 1,100 B.C.) and it reached a high pitch of excellence in the Chou dynasty (1,100 B.C. -
250 B.C.). “ In the Chou period, many of the cultural characteristics which we recognize
as particularly Chinese were developed. During this period, the Chinese evolved a code
of behavior based on politeness and ethics. Much of this code of behavior is derived from
the teachings of K’ung Fu-tzu (Confucius), a philosopher and government official who
lived between 551 B.C. and 479 B.C.. In his writings about ethics and politics, K’ung
Fu-tzu advocated respect for tradition and authority, and the effect of his teaching was
to strengthen the conservative tendencies in Chinese civilization. He was not a religious
leader, but a moral and political philosopher, like the philosophers of ancient Greece. He
is traditionally given credit for the compilation of the Five Classics of Chinese Literature,
which include books of history, philosophy and poetry, together with rules for religious
16 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

ceremonies.

Some sayings of Confucius

By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest;
Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the
bitterest.

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart.

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.

If you make a mistake and do not correct it, this is called a mistake.

The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.

The funniest people are the saddest ones.

Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.

To be wronged is nothing, unless you continue to remember it.

Respect yourself and others will respect you.

Silence is a true friend who never betrays.

You cannot open a book without learning something.

When you see a good person, think of becoming like her/him. When you see
someone not so good, reflect on your own weak points.

Attack the evil that is within yourself, rather than attacking the evil that is in
others.

The man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not ask
is a fool for life.

What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in
others.
1.3. CONFUCIUS 17

I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.

Music produces a kind of pleasure which human nature cannot do without.

The hardest thing of all is to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there
is no cat.

It is not the failure of others to appreciate your abilities that should trouble
you, but rather your failure to appreciate theirs.

The man of wisdom is never of two minds; the man of benevolence never wor-
ries; the man of courage is never afraid.

The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfected without trials.

Give a bowl of rice to a man and you will feed him for a day. Teach him how
to grow his own rice and you will save his life.

Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.

It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them.

Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.

And remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.

If what one has to say is not better than silence, then one should keep silent.

Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses.

When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals,
adjust the action steps.

Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.

To put the world in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the
nation in order, we must first put the family in order; to put the family in
order; we must first cultivate our personal life; we must first set our hearts
right.
18 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.4: Confucius

A lion chased me up a tree, and I greatly enjoyed the view from the top.

To be wealthy and honored in an unjust society is a disgrace.

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a coun-

try badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.

If your plan is for one year plant rice. If your plan is for ten years plant trees.
If your plan is for one hundred years educate children.

Don’t do unto others what you don’t want done unto you.

Education breeds confidence. Confidence breeds hope. Hope breeds peace.

To see what is right and not do it is the worst cowardice.

Time flows away like the water in the river.

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.
1.4. GAUTAMA BUDDHA 19

1.4 Gautama Buddha

Evidence of a very early river-valley civilization in India has been found at a site called
Mohenjo-Daro. However, in about 2,500 B.C., this early civilization was destroyed by
some great disaster, perhaps a series of floods; and for the next thousand years, little is
known about the history of India. During this dark period between 2,500 B.C. and 1,500
B.C., India was invaded by the Indo-Aryans, who spoke Sanskrit, a language related to
Greek. The Indo-Aryans partly drove out and partly enslaved the smaller and darker native
Dravidians. However, there was much intermarriage between the groups, and to prevent
further intermarriage, the Indo-Aryans introduced a caste system sanctioned by religion.
According to Hindu religious belief, the soul of a person who has died is reborn in
another body. If, throughout his life, the person has faithfully performed the duties of his
caste, then his or her soul may be reborn into a higher caste. Finally, after existing as a
Brahman, the soul may be so purified that it can be released from the cycle of death and
rebirth.
In the 6th century B.C., Gautama Buddha founded a new religion in India. Gautama
Buddha was convinced that all the troubles of humankind spring from attachment to
earthly things. He felt that the only escape from sorrow is through the renunciation of
earthly desires. He also urged his disciples to follow a high ethical code, the Eightfold Way.
Among the sayings of Buddha are the following:
“Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time; hatred ceases by love.”
“Let a man overcome anger by love; let him overcome evil by good.”
“All men tremble at punishment. All men love life. Remember that you are like them,
and do not cause slaughter.”
One of the early converts to Buddhism was the emperor Ashoka Maurya, who reigned
in India between 273 B.C. and 232 B.C.. During one of his wars of conquest, Ashoka
Maurya became so sickened by the slaughter that he resolved never again to use war as an
instrument of policy. He became one of the most humane rulers in history, and he also did
much to promote the spread of Buddhism throughout Asia.
Under the Mauryan dynasty (322 B.C. - 184 B.C.), the Gupta dynasty (320 B.C. - 500
A.D.) and also under the rajah Harsha (606 A.D. - 647 A.D.), India had periods of unity,
peace and prosperity. At other times, the country was divided and upset by internal wars.
The Gupta period especially is regarded as the golden age of India’s classical past. During
this period, India led the world in such fields as medicine and mathematics.
The Guptas established both universities and hospitals. According to the Chinese
Buddhist pilgrim, Fa-Hsien, who visited India in 405 A.D., “The nobles and householders
have founded hospitals within the city to which the poor of all countries, the destitute,
crippled and diseased may go. They receive every kind of help without payment.”
Indian doctors were trained in cleansing wounds, in using ointments and in surgery.
They also developed antidotes for poisons and for snakebite, and they knew some techniques
for the prevention of disease through vaccination.
When they had completed their training, medical students in India took an oath, which
resembled the Hippocratic oath: “Not for yourself, not for the fulfillment of any earthly
20 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.5: Gautama Buddha

desire or gain, but solely for the good of suffering humanity should you treat your patients.”
In Indian mathematics, algebra and trigonometry were especially highly developed. For
example, the astronomer Brahmagupta (598 A.D. - 660 A.D.) applied algebraic methods
to astronomical problems. The notation for zero and the decimal system were invented in
India, probably during the 8th or 9th century A.D.. These mathematical techniques were
later transmitted to Europe by the Arabs.
Many Indian techniques of manufacture were also transmitted to the west by the Arabs.
Textile manufacture in particular was highly developed in India, and the Arabs, who were
the middlemen in the trade with the west, learned to duplicate some of the most famous
kinds of cloth. One kind of textile which they copied was called “quttan” by the Arabs,
a word which in English has become “cotton”. Other Indian textiles included cashmere
(Kashmir), chintz and calico (from Calcutta, which was once called Calicut). Muslin
derives its name from Mosul, an Arab city where it was manufactured, while damask was
made in Damascus.
Indian mining and metallurgy were also highly developed. The Europeans of the middle
ages prized fine laminated steel from Damascus; but it was not in Damascus that the
technique of making steel originated. The Arabs learned steelmaking from the Persians,
and Persia learned it from India.

The Noble Eightfold Path

1. Right understanding. And what is right understanding? There are fruits, and
results of good and bad actions. There is this world and the next world. There is
mother and father. There are spontaneously reborn beings; there are contemplatives
and Brahmans who faring rightly and practicing rightly, proclaim this world and the
next after having directly known and realized it for themselves.’ This is the right view
with effluents, siding with merit, resulting in acquisitions
1.4. GAUTAMA BUDDHA 21

2. Right resolve. And what is right resolve? Being resolved on renunciation, on

freedom from ill will, on harmlessness: This is called right resolve.

3. Right speech. And what is right speech? Abstaining from lying, from divisive
speech, from abusive speech, and from idle chatter: This is called right speech.

4. Right action. And what is right action? Abstaining from killing, abstaining from
stealing, abstaining from sexual misconduct. This is called right action.

5. Right livelihood. And what is right livelihood? Not possessing more than is strictly
necessary. Avoiding causing suffering to sentient beings by cheating them, or harming
or killing them in any way.

6. Right effort. And what is right effort? Here the monk arouses his will, puts forth
effort, generates energy, exerts his mind, and strives to prevent the arising of evil
and unwholesome mental states that have not yet arisen. He arouses his will... and
strives to eliminate evil and unwholesome mental states that have already arisen, to
keep them free of delusion, to develop, increase, cultivate, and perfect them. This is
called right effort.

7. Right mindfulness. And what is right mindfulness? Here the monk remains con-
templating the body as body, resolute, aware and mindful, having put aside worldly
desire and sadness; he remains contemplating feelings as feelings; he remains con-
templating mental states as mental states; he remains contemplating mental objects
as mental objects, resolute, aware and mindful, having put aside worldly desire and
sadness; This is called right mindfulness.

8. Right concentration. And what is right concentration? [i] Here, the monk, de-
tached from sense-desires, detached from unwholesome states, enters and remains in
the first jhana (level of concentration, in which there is applied and sustained think-
ing, together with joy and pleasure born of detachment; [ii] And through the subsiding
of applied and sustained thinking, with the gaining of inner stillness and oneness of
mind, he enters and remains in the second jhana, which is without applied and sus-
tained thinking, and in which there are joy and pleasure born of concentration; [iii]
And through the fading of joy, he remains equanimous, mindful and aware, and he ex-
periences in his body the pleasure of which the Noble Ones say: “equanimous, mindful
and dwelling in pleasure”, and thus he enters and remains in the third jhana; [iv] And
through the giving up of pleasure and pain, and through the previous disappearance of
happiness and sadness, he enters and remains in the fourth jhana, which is without
pleasure and pain, and in which there is pure equanimity and mindfulness. This is
called right concentration.
22 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Some of the sayings of Gautama Buddha

In the end, only three things matter: How much you loved, how gently you
lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.

Buddha was asked, “What have you gained from mediation?” He replied NOTH-
ING! However let me tell you what i have lost: anger, anxiety, depression,
insecurity, fear of old age and death.

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

The less you respond to negative people, the more peaceful your life will be-
come.

Health is the greatest gift, contentment is the greatest wealth, A trusted friend
is the best relative, liberated mind is the greatest bliss.

The thought manifests as the word: the word manifests as the deed: the deed
develops into character. So watch the thought and its ways with care, and let
it spring from love born out of concern for all beings.

Do not learn how to react learn how to respond.

If your compassion does not include yourself, It is incomplete.

Everything that has a beginning has an ending. Make your peace with that
and all will be well.

If anything is worth doing, do it with all your heart.

Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own unguarded thoughts.

The root of suffering is attachment.

Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to
die.

All that we are is the result of what we have thought.

Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on
the present moment.

What you think you become, what you feel, you attract. what you imagine,
1.4. GAUTAMA BUDDHA 23

you create.

nothing can harm you as much as your own thoughts unguarded.

The trouble is you think you have time.

Your work is to discover your world and then with all your heart give yourself
to it.

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if
i have said it. Unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common
sense.

On the long journey of human life, Faith is the best of companions.

To understand everything is to forgive everything.

No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must
walk the past.

There is no path to happiness: Happiness is the path.

No matter how hard the past, you can always begin again.

If you want to fly, give up everything that weighs you down.

You only lose what you cling to.

When we meet real tragedy in life, we can react in two ways- Either by losing
hope and falling into self-destructive habits or by using the challenge to find
our inner strength.

Don’t rush anything. When the time is right, it will happen.

The whole secret of existence is to have no fear.

Be kind to all creatures; this is the true religion.

Those who are free of resentful thoughts surely find peace.

It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light
24 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Quiet the mind, and the soul will speak.

Each morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.

A man who conquers himself is greater than one who conquers a thousand men
in a battle.

All human unhappiness comes from not facing reality squarely, exactly as it is.

It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.

He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your
words.

You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger.

Whatever befalls you, walk on untouched, unattached.

1.5 Native American ethics

Luther Standing Bear (1868-1939) was a native American Lakota chief. He spanned both
his native traditions and the white culture, having received an education at the Carlisle
Industrial School. He became the author of many books, for example My People, The
Soux, My Indian Boyhood, and Land of the Spotted Eagle.

Some quotations from Luther Standing Bear

The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart away from nature becomes
hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack
of respect for humans, too.

Out of the Indian approach to life there came a great freedom, an intense and
absorbing respect for life, enriching faith in a Supreme Power, and principles
of truth, honesty, generosity, equity and brotherhood as a guide to mundane
relations.

As a child I understood how to give, I have forgotten this grace since I have
become civilized.

There is a road in the hearts of all of us, hidden and seldom traveled, which
leads to an unknown, secret place. The old people came literally to love the
1.5. NATIVE AMERICAN ETHICS 25

soil, and they sat or reclined on the ground with a feeling of being close to
a mothering power. Their teepees were built upon the earth and their altars
were made of earth. The soul was soothing, strengthening, cleansing, and heal-
ing. That is why the old Indian still sits upon the earth instead of propping
himself up and away from its life giving forces. For him, to sit or lie upon the
ground is to be able to think more deeply and to feel more keenly. He can see
more clearly into the mysteries of life and come closer in kinship to other lives
about him.

Hollow Horn Bear knew that to be leader and adviser of his people he must
be honest and reliable, and that his word once given in promise must never be
taken back. He knew that he must be a man of will-power, standing for the
right no matter what happened to him personally; that he must have strength
of purpose, allowing no influence to turn him from doing what was best for the
tribe. He must be willing to serve his people without thought of pay. He must
be utterly unselfish and kind-hearted to the old and poor and stand ready to
give to those in need. Above all, he must be unafraid to deal equal justice to all.

Generosity is a mark of bravery, so all Sioux boys were taught to be generous.

The Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart, away from nature, becomes
hard; he knew that a lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to a
lack of respect for humans, too.

Wherever forests have not been mowed down, wherever the animal is recessed
in their quiet protection, wherever the earth is not bereft of four-footed life
- that to the white man is an ’unbroken wilderness.’ But for us there was
no wilderness, nature was not dangerous but hospitable, not forbidding but
friendly. Our faith sought the harmony of man with his surroundings; the
other sought the dominance of surroundings. For us, the world was full of
beauty; for the other, it was a place to be endured until he went to another
world. But we were wise. We knew that man’s heart, away from nature, be-
comes hard.

Kinship with all creatures of the earth, sky, and water was a real and active
principle. In the animal and bird world there existed a brotherly feeling that
kept us safe among them... The animals had rights - the right of man’s protec-
tion, the right to live, the right to multiply, the right to freedom, and the right
to man’s indebtedness. This concept of life and its relations filled us with the
joy and mystery of living; it gave us reverence for all life; it made a place for
all things in the scheme of existence with equal importance to all.

And here I find the great distinction between the faith of the Indian and the
26 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.6: Chief Luther Standing Bear (1868-1939), author and philosopher.
In one of his books, he wrote: “I find [a] great distinction between the faith of
the Indian and the white man. Indian faith sought the harmony of man with
his surroundings, the other sought the dominance of surroundings.”

white man. Indian faith sought the harmony of man with his surroundings,
the other sought the dominance of surroundings.

1.6 Jean Jacques Rousseau

In 1754 Rousseau wrote: “The first man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said ‘This
is mine’, and found people naı̈ve enough to believe him, that man was the true founder
of civil society. From how many crimes, wars, and murders, from how many horrors and
misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up
the ditch, and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if
1.6. JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU 27

Figure 1.7: Unlike Voltaire, Rousseau was not an advocate of science, but in-
stead believed in the importance of emotions. He believed that civilization has
corrupted humans rather than making them better. Rousseau was a pioneer
of the romantic movement. His book, The Social Contract, remains influential
today.
28 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody.”

Later, he began his influential book The Social Contract, published in 1752, with the
dramatic words: “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. Those who think
themselves the masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they.” Rousseau concludes
Chapter 3 of this book with the words: “Let us then admit that force does not create right,
and that we are obliged to obey only legitimate powers”. In other words, the ability to
coerce is not a legitimate power, and there is no rightful duty to submit to it. A state has
no right to enslave a conquered people.
These ideas, and those of John Locke, were reaffirmed in 1776 by the American Decla-
ration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created
equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inaliable rights, and the among
these are the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; and that to pursue these
rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent
of the governed.”
Today, in an era of government tyranny and subversion of democracy, we need to
remember that the just powers of any government are not derived from the government’s
ability to use of force, but exclusively from the consent of the governed.

1.7 John Locke

Political philosophy of the Enlightenment
The 16th, 17th and 18th centuries have been called the “Age of Discovery”, and the “Age
of Reason”, but they might equally well be called the “Age of Observation”. On every
side, new worlds were opening up to the human mind. The great voyages of discovery
had revealed new continents, whose peoples demonstrated alternative ways of life. The
telescopic exploration of the heavens revealed enormous depths of space, containing myriads
of previously unknown stars; and explorations with the microscope revealed a new and
marvelously intricate world of the infinitesimally small.
In the science of this period, the emphasis was on careful observation. This same
emphasis on observation can be seen in the Dutch and English painters of the period. The
great Dutch masters, such as Jan Vermeer (1632-1675), Frans Hals (1580-1666), Pieter
de Hooch (1629-1678) and Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), achieved a careful realism
in their paintings and drawings which was the artistic counterpart of the observations of
the pioneers of microscopy, Anton van Leeuwenhoek and Robert Hooke. These artists
were supported by the patronage of the middle class, which had become prominent and
powerful both in England and in the Netherlands because of the extensive world trade in
which these two nations were engaged.
Members of the commercial middle class needed a clear and realistic view of the world
in order to succeed with their enterprises. (An aristocrat of the period, on the other hand,
might have been more comfortable with a somewhat romanticized and out-of-focus vision,
1.7. JOHN LOCKE 29

which would allow him to overlook the suffering and injustice upon which his privileges
were based.) The rise of the commercial middle class, with its virtues of industriousness,
common sense and realism, went hand in hand with the rise of experimental science, which
required the same virtues for its success.
In England, the House of Commons (which reflected the interests of the middle class),
had achieved political power, and had demonstrated (in the Puritan Rebellion of 1640 and
the Glorious Revolution of 1688) that Parliament could execute or depose any monarch
who tried to rule without its consent. In France, however, the situation was very different.

After passing through a period of disorder and civil war, the French tried to achieve
order and stability by making their monarchy more absolute. The movement towards
absolute monarchy in France culminated in the long reign of Louis XIV, who became king
in 1643 and who ruled until he died in 1715.
The historical scene which we have just sketched was the background against which
the news of Newton’s scientific triumph was received. The news was received by a Europe
which was tired of religious wars; and in France, it was received by a middle class which
was searching for an ideology in its struggle against the ancien régime.
To the intellectuals of the 18th century, the orderly Newtonian cosmos, with its planets
circling the sun in obedience to natural law, became an imaginative symbol representing
rationality. In their search for a society more in accordance with human nature, 18th
century Europeans were greatly encouraged by the triumphs of science. Reason had shown
itself to be an adequate guide in natural philosophy. Could not reason and natural law
also be made the basis of moral and political philosophy? In attempting to carry out
this program, the philosophers of the Enlightenment laid the foundations of psychology,
anthropology, social science, political science and economics.
One of the earliest and most influential of these philosophers was John Locke (1632-
1705), a contemporary and friend of Newton. In his Second Treatise on Government,
published in 1690, John Locke’s aim was to refute the doctrine that kings rule by divine
right, and to replace that doctrine by an alternative theory of government, derived by
reason from the laws of nature. According to Locke’s theory, men originally lived together
without formal government:
“Men living together according to reason,” he wrote, “without a common superior on
earth with authority to judge between them, is properly the state of nature... A state
also of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one having more
than another; there being nothing more evident than that creatures of the same species,
promiscuously born to all the same advantages of nature and the use of the same facilities,
should also be equal amongst one another without subordination or subjection...”
“But though this be a state of liberty, yet it is not a state of licence... The state of
nature has a law to govern it, which obliges every one; and reason, which is that law,
teaches all mankind who will but consult it, that being equal and independent, no one
ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.”
In Locke’s view, a government is set up by means of a social contract. The government
is given its powers by the consent of the citizens in return for the services which it renders
30 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

to them, such as the protection of their lives and property. If a government fails to render
these services, or if it becomes tyrannical, then the contract has been broken, and the
citizens must set up a new government.
Locke’s influence on 18th century thought was very great. His influence can be seen,
for example, in the wording of the American Declaration of Independence. In England,
Locke’s political philosophy was accepted by almost everyone. In fact, he was only codifying
ideas which were already in wide circulation and justifying a revolution which had already
occurred. In France, on the other hand, Locke’s writings had a revolutionary impact.
Credit for bringing the ideas of both Newton and Locke to France, and making them
fashionable, belongs to Francois Marie Arouet (1694-1778), better known as “Voltaire”.
Besides persuading his mistress, Madame de Chatelet, to translate Newton’s Principia
into French, Voltaire wrote an extremely readable commentary on the book; and as a
result, Newton’s ideas became highly fashionable among French intellectuals. Voltaire
lived with Madame du Chatelet until she died, producing the books which established him
as the leading writer of Europe, a prophet of the Age of Reason, and an enemy of injustice,
feudalism and superstition.
The Enlightenment in France is considered to have begun with Voltaire’s return from
England in 1729; and it reached its high point with the publication of of the Encyclopedia
between 1751 and 1780. Many authors contributed to the Encyclopedia, which was an
enormous work, designed to sum up the state of human knowledge.
Turgot and Montesquieu wrote on politics and history; Rousseau wrote on music, and
Buffon on natural history; Quesnay contributed articles on agriculture, while the Baron
d’Holbach discussed chemistry. Other articles were contributed by Condorcet, Voltaire
and d’Alembert. The whole enterprise was directed and inspired by the passionate faith
of Denis Diderot (1713-1784). The men who took part in this movement called themselves
“philosophes”. Their creed was a faith in reason, and an optimistic belief in the perfectibil-
ity of human nature and society by means of education, political reforms, and the scientific
method.
The philosophes of the Enlightenment visualized history as a long progression towards
the discovery of the scientific method. Once discovered, this method could never be lost;
and it would lead inevitably (they believed) to both the material and moral improvement
of society. The philosophes believed that science, reason, and education, together with the
principles of political liberty and equality, would inevitably lead humanity forward to a
new era of happiness. These ideas were the faith of the Enlightenment; they influenced the
French and American revolutions; and they are still the basis of liberal political belief.
1.7. JOHN LOCKE 31

Figure 1.8: John Locke (1632-1705): “Men living together according to reason,
without a common superior on earth with authority to judge between them, is
properly the state of nature... A state also of equality, wherein all the power and
jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one having more than another; there being nothing
more evident than that creatures of the same species, promiscuously born to
all the same advantages of nature and the use of the same facilities, should also
be equal amongst one another without subordination or subjugation...” In his
Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke maintained that the human
mind, at birth, is like a sheet of blank paper (tabula rasa).
32 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

1.8 The Marquis de Condorcet

A vision of human progress
In France the Marquis de Condorcet had written an equally optimistic book, Esquisse d’un
Tableau Historique des Progrès de l’Esprit Humain. Condorcet’s optimism was unaffected
even by the fact that at the time when he was writing he was in hiding, under sentence
of death by Robespierre’s government. Like Godwin’s Political Justice, this book offers
an optimistic vision of of how human society can be improved. Together, the two books
provoked Malthus to write his book on population.

Condorcet becomes a mathematician

Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet, was born in 1743 in the town
of Ribemont in southern France. He was born into an ancient and noble family of the
principality of Orange but there was nothing in his background to suggest that he might
one day become a famous scientist and social philosopher. In fact, for several generations
before, most of the men in the family had followed military or ecclesiastical careers and
none were scholars.
After an initial education received at home from his mother, Condorcet was sent to
his uncle, the Bishop of Lisieux, who provided a Jesuit tutor for the boy. In 1758 Con-
dorcet continued his studies with the Jesuits at the College of Navarre. After he graduated
from the College, Condorcet’s powerful and independent intelligence suddenly asserted it-
self. He announced that he intended to study mathematics. His family was unanimously
and violently opposed to this idea. The privileges of the nobility were based on heredi-
tary power and on a static society. Science, with its emphasis on individual talent and
on progress, undermined both these principles. The opposition of Condorcet’s family is
therefore understandable but he persisted until they gave in.
From 1765 to 1774, Condorcet focused on science. In 1765, he published his first work
on mathematics entitled Essai sur le calcul intégral, which was well received, launching his
career as a mathematician. He would go on to publish many more papers, and in 1769, at
the age of 26, he was elected to the Academie royale des Sciences (French Royal Academy
of Sciences)
Condorcet worked with Leonhard Euler and Benjamin Franklin. He soon became an
honorary member of many foreign academies and philosophic societies including the Royal
Swedish Academy of Sciences (1785), Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy
of Arts and Sciences (1792), and also in Prussia and Russia.

Human rights and scientific sociology

In 1774, at the age of 31, Condorcet was appointed Inspector-General of the Paris Mint by
his friend, the economist Turgot. From this point on, Condorcet shifted his focus from the
purely mathematical to philosophy and political matters. In the following years, he took up
1.8. THE MARQUIS DE CONDORCET 33

Figure 1.9: The Marquis Nicolas de Condorcet (1743-1794). He pointed out that
the long human childhood, a biological phenomenon, has lead to the concept
of the sanctity of the family, a moral precept, and in this way evolution and
ethics are connected.

the defense of human rights in general, and of women’s and blacks’ rights in particular (an
abolitionist, he became active in the Society of the Friends of the Blacks in the 1780s). He
supported the ideals embodied by the newly formed United States, and proposed projects
of political, administrative and economic reforms intended to transform France.
The year 1785 saw the publication of Condorcet’s highly original mathematical work,
Essai sur l’application de l’analyse à la probabilité des décisions rendues à la pluralité
des voix, in which he pioneered the application of the theory of probability in the social
sciences. A later, much enlarged, edition of this book extended the applications to games
of chance. Through these highly original works, Condorcet became a pioneer of scientific
sociology.
In 1786, Condorcet married one of the most beautiful women of the time, Sophie de
Grouchy (1764-1822). Condorcet’s position as Inspector-General of the Mint meant that
they lived at the Hotel des Monnaies. Mme Condorcet’s salon there was famous.

The French Revolution

Ever since the age of 17, Condorcet had thought about questions of justice and virtue and
especially about how it is in our own interest to be both just and virtuous. Very early in
his life he had been occupied with the idea of human perfectibility. He was convinced that
34 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

the primary duty of every person is to contribute as much as possible to the development
of mankind, and that by making such a contribution, one can also achieve the greatest
possible personal happiness. When the French Revolution broke out in 1789 he saw it as
an unprecedented opportunity to do his part in the cause of progress and he entered the
arena wholeheartedly.
Condorcet was first elected as a member of the Municipality of Paris; and then, in
1791, he became one of the six Commissioners of the Treasury. Soon afterwards he was
elected to the Legislative Assembly, of which he became first the Secretary and finally the
President. In 1792, Condorcet proposed to the Assembly that all patents of nobility should
be burned. The motion was carried unanimously; and on 19 June his own documents were
thrown on a fire with the others at the foot of a statue of Louis XIV.
Condorcet was one of the chief authors of the proclamation which declared France to
be a republic and which summoned a National Convention. As he remained above the
personal political quarrels that were raging at the time, Condorcet was elected to the
National Convention by five different constituencies. When the Convention brought Louis
XVI to trial, Condorcet maintained that, according to the constitution, the monarch was
inviolable and that the Convention therefore had no legal right to try the King. When the
King was tried despite these protests, Condorcet voted in favor of an appeal to the people.

Drafting a new constitution for France

In October 1792, when the Convention set up a Committee of Nine to draft a new consti-
tution for France, Condorcet sat on this committee as did the Englishman, Thomas Paine.
Under sentence of death in England for publishing his pamphlet The Rights of Man, Paine
had fled to France and had become a French citizen. He and Condorcet were the chief
authors of a moderate (Gerondist) draft of the constitution. However, the Jacobin leader,
Robespierre, bitterly resented being excluded from the Committee of Nine and, when the
Convention then gave the responsibility for drafting the new constitution to the Committee
for Public Safety, which was enlarged for this purpose by five additional members. The
result was a hastily produced document with many glaring defects. When it was presented
to the Convention, however, it was accepted almost without discussion. This was too
much for Condorcet to stomach and he published anonymously a letter entitled Advice
to the French on the New Constitution, in which he exposed the defects of the Jacobin
constitution and urged all Frenchmen to reject it.

Hiding from Robespierre’s Terror

Condorcet’s authorship of this letter was discovered and treated as an act of treason. On
8 July 1793, Condorcet was denounced in the Convention; and an order was sent out for
his arrest. The officers tried to find him, first at his town house and then at his house in
the country but, warned by a friend, Condorcet had gone into hiding.
1.8. THE MARQUIS DE CONDORCET 35

The house where Condorcet took refuge was at Rue Servandoni, a small street in Paris
leading down to the Luxembourg Gardens, and it was owned by Madame Vernet, the
widow of a sculptor. Madame Vernet, who sometimes kept lodgings for students, had been
asked by Condorcet’s friends whether she would be willing to shelter a proscribed man. ‘Is
he a good man?’, she had asked; and when assured that this was the case, she had said,
‘Then let him come at once. You can tell me his name later. Don’t waste even a moment.
While we are speaking, he may be arrested.’ She did not hesitate, although she knew that
she risked death, the penalty imposed by the Convention for sheltering a proscribed man.

Condorcet writes the Esquisse

Although Robespierre’s agents had been unable to arrest him, Condorcet was sentenced
to the guillotine in absentia. He knew that in all probability he had only a few weeks
or months to live and he began to write his last thoughts, racing against time. Hidden
in the house at Rue Servandoni, and cared for by Madame Vernet, Condorcet returned
to a project which he had begun in 1772, a history of the progress of human thought,
stretching from the remote past to the distant future. Guessing that he would not have
time to complete the full-scale work he had once planned, he began a sketch or outline:
Esquisse d’un Tableau Historique des progrés de l’Esprit Humain.
Condorcet’s Esquisse, is an enthusiastic endorsement of the idea of infinite human per-
fectibility which was current among the philosophers of the 18th century, and in this book,
Condorcet anticipated many of the evolutionary ideas of Charles Darwin. He compared
humans with animals, and found many common traits. Condorcet believed that animals
are able to think, and even to think rationally, although their thoughts are extremely sim-
ple compared with those of humans. He also asserted that humans historically began their
existence on the same level as animals and gradually developed to their present state.
Since this evolution took place historically, he reasoned, it is probable, or even in-
evitable, that a similar evolution in the future will bring mankind to a level of physical,
mental and moral development which will be as superior to our own present state as we
are now superior to animals.
In his Esquisse, Condorcet called attention to the unusually long period of dependency
which characterize the growth and education of human offspring. This prolonged childhood
is unique among living beings. It is needed for the high level of mental development of the
human species; but it requires a stable family structure to protect the young during their
long upbringing. Thus, according to Condorcet, biological evolution brought into existence
a moral precept, the sanctity of the family.
Similarly, Condorcet maintained, larger associations of humans would have been impos-
sible without some degree of altruism and sensitivity to the suffering of others incorporated
into human behavior, either as instincts or as moral precepts or both; and thus the evolu-
tion of organized society entailed the development of sensibility and morality.
Condorcet believed that ignorance and error are responsible for vice; and he listed what
he regarded as the main mistakes of civilization: hereditary transmission of power, inequal-
ity between men and women, religious bigotry, disease, war, slavery, economic inequality,
36 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

and the division of humanity into mutually exclusive linguistic groups.

Condorcet believed the hereditary transmission of power to be the source of much of
the tyranny under which humans suffer; and he looked forward to an era when republican
governments would be established throughout the world. Turning to the inequality between
men and women, Condorcet wrote that he could see no moral, physical or intellectual basis
for it. He called for complete social, legal, and educational equality between the sexes.
Condorcet predicted that the progress of medical science would free humans from the
worst ravages of disease. Furthermore, he maintained that since perfectibility (i.e. evolu-
tion) operates throughout the biological world, there is no reason why mankind’s physical
structure might not gradually improve, with the result that human life in the remote future
could be greatly prolonged. Condorcet believed that the intellectual and moral facilities of
man are capable of continuous and steady improvement; and he thought that one of the
most important results of this improvement will be the abolition of war.
At the end of his Esquisse, Condorcet said that any person who has contributed to the
progress of mankind to the best of his ability becomes immune to personal disaster and
suffering. He knows that human progress is inevitable and can take comfort and courage
from his inner picture of the epic march of mankind, through history, towards a better
future.
Shortly after Condorcet completed the Esquisse, he received a mysterious warning that
soldiers of the Convention were on their way to inspect Madame Vernet’s house. Wishing
to spare his generous hostess from danger, he disguised himself as well as he could and
slipped past the portress. However, Condorcet had only gone a few steps outside the house
when he was recognized by Madame Verdet’s cousin, who risked his life to guide Condorcet
past the sentinels at the gates of Paris, and into the open country beyond.
Condorcet wandered for several days without food or shelter, hiding himself in quarries
and thickets. Finally, on 27 March 1794, hunger forced him to enter a tavern at the village
of Clamart, where he ordered an omelette. When asked how many eggs it should contain,
the exhausted and starving philosopher replied without thinking, ‘twelve’. This reply,
together with his appearance, excited suspicion. He was asked for his papers and, when it
was found that he had none, soldiers were sent for and he was arrested. He was taken to a
prison at Bourg-la-Reine, but he was so weak that he was unable to walk there, and had
to be carried in a cart. The next morning, Condorcet was found dead on the floor of his
cell. The cause of his death is not known with certainty. It was listed in official documents
as congestion sanguine, congestion of the blood but the real cause may have been cold,
hunger, exhaustion or poison. Many historians believe that Condorcet was murdered by
Robespierre’s agents, since he was so popular that a public execution would have been
impossible.
After Condorcet’s death the currents of revolutionary politics shifted direction. Robe-
spierre, the leader of the Terror, was himself soon arrested. The execution of Robespierre
took place on 25 July 1794, only a few months after the death of Condorcet.
Condorcet’s Esquisse d’un Tableau Historique des Progrès de l’Esprit Humain was pub-
lished posthumously in 1795. In the post-Thermidor reconstruction, the Convention voted
funds to have it printed in a large edition and distributed throughout France, thus adopt-
1.9. WILLIAM GODWIN 37

ing the Esquisse as its official manifesto. Condorcet’s name will always be linked with this
small prophetic book. It was destined to establish the form in which the eighteenth-century
idea of progress was incorporated into Western thought, and (as we shall see) it provoked
Robert Malthus to write An Essay on the Principle of Population.

1.9 William Godwin

Political Justice
In 1793 the English novelist and philosopher William Godwin published an enormously
optimistic book, Political Justice. As the eighteenth century neared its end, this book
became the focus of hopes for political reform and the center of the debate on human
progress. Godwin was lifted briefly to enormous heights of fame and adulation, from
which he plunged, a few years later, into relative obscurity.
In Political Justice, Godwin predicted a future society where scientific progress would
liberate humans from material want. Godwin predicted that in the future, with the in-
stitution of war abolished, with a more equal distribution of property, and with the help
of scientific improvements in agriculture and industry, much less labor would be needed
to support life. Luxuries are at present used to maintain artificial distinctions between
the classes of society, Godwin wrote, but in the future values will change; humans will
live more simply, and their efforts will be devoted to self-fulfillment and to intellectual
and moral improvement, rather than to material possessions. With the help of automated
agriculture, the citizens of a future society will need only a few hours a day to earn their
bread.
Godwin went on to say, “The spirit of oppression, the spirit of servility and the spirit
of fraud - these are the immediate growth of the established administration of property.
They are alike hostile to intellectual improvement. The other vices of envy , malice, and
revenge are their inseparable companions. In a state of society where men lived in the
midst of plenty, and where all shared alike the bounties of nature, these sentiments would
inevitably expire. The narrow principle of selfishness would vanish. No man being obliged
to guard his little store, or provide with anxiety and pain for his restless wants, each would
lose his own individual existence in the thought of the general good. No man would be
the enemy of his neighbor, for they would have nothing to contend; and of consequence
philanthropy would resume the empire which reason assigns her. Mind would be delivered
from her perpetual anxiety about corporal support, and free to expatiate in the field of
thought which is congenial to her. Each man would assist the inquiries of all.”
Godwin insisted that there is an indissoluble link between politics, ethics and knowl-
edge. Political Justice is an enthusiastic vision of what humans could be like at some
future period when the trend towards moral and intellectual improvement has lifted men
and women above their their present state of ignorance and vice. Much of the savage
structure of the penal system would then be unnecessary, Godwin believed. (At the time
38 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.10: William Godwin in a painting by James Northcote. He believed

that the development of an individual’s character is very strongly influenced
by environment.
1.9. WILLIAM GODWIN 39

when he was writing, there were more than a hundred capital offenses in England, and
this number had soon increased to almost two hundred. The theft of any object of greater
value than ten shillings was punishable by hanging.)
In its present state, Godwin wrote, society decrees that the majority of its citizens
“should be kept in abject penury, rendered stupid with ignorance and disgustful with vice,
perpetuated in nakedness and hunger, goaded to the commission of crimes, and made
victims to the merciless laws which the rich have instituted to oppress them”. But human
behavior is produced by environment and education, Godwin pointed out. If the conditions
of upbringing were improved, behavior would also improve. In fact, Godwin believed that
men and women are subject to natural laws no less than the planets of Newton’s solar
system. “In the life of every human”, Godwin wrote, “there is a chain of causes, generated
in that eternity which preceded his birth, and going on in regular procession through the
whole period of his existence, in consequence of which it was impossible for him to act in
any instance otherwise than he has acted.”
The chain of causality in human affairs implies that vice and crime should be regarded
with the same attitude with which we regard disease. The causes of poverty, ignorance,
vice and crime should be removed. Human failings should be cured rather than punished.
With this in mind, Godwin wrote, “our disapprobation of vice will be of the same nature
as our disapprobation of an infectious distemper.”
With improved environment and education, humans will reach a higher moral level.
But what is morality? Here Godwin draws heavily on his Christian background, especially
on the moral principles of the Dissenting community. The Parable of the Good Samaritan
illustrates the central principle of Christian ethics: We must love our neighbor as much as
we love ourselves; but our neighbor is not necessarily a member of our immediate circle.
He or she may be distant from us, in culture, in ethnic background or in geographical
distance. Nevertheless, that person is still our neighbor, a member of the human family,
and our duty to him or her is no less than our duty to those who are closest to us. It
follows that narrow loyalties must be replaced or supplemented by loyalty to the interests
of humanity as a whole.
Judging the benevolence of our actions is the responsibility of each individual con-
science, Godwin says, not the responsibility of the State, and the individual must follow
his or her conscience even if it conflicts with the dictates of the State. Each individual case
should be judged by itself. If our institutions and laws meet the criteria of benevolence,
justice and truth, we should give them our enthusiastic support; if not, we should struggle
to change them. In giving personal judgement such a dominant role, Godwin anticipates
the ideas of Thoreau, Tolstoy and Gandhi.
The exercise of individual judgement requires great honesty and objectivity. In order
for the power of truth and reason to overcome prejudice and error, Godwin says, it is
necessary for each person always to speak and act with complete sincerity. Even the
degree of insincerity necessary for elegant manners is wrong in Godwin’s opinion.
Starting with these ethical principles, Godwin proceeds with almost mathematical logic
to deduce the consequences, intoxicated by his enthusiasm and not stopping even when
the conclusions to which he is driven conflict with conventional wisdom and intuitio.n. For
40 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

example, he denies that humans have rights and maintains that they only have duties.
Regarding the right to dispose of private property as one chooses, Godwin says: “To
whom does any article, suppose a loaf of bread, justly belong? I have an hundred loaves in
my possession, and in the next street there is a poor man expiring with hunger, to whom
one of these loaves would be a means of preserving his life. If I withhold this loaf from
him, am I not unjust? If I impart it, am I not complying with what justice demands?”
In other words, according to Godwin, our duty to act for the benefit of humanity implies
a sacrifice of our private rights as individuals. Private property is not really our own, to
be used as we wish; it is held in trust, to be used where it will do the greatest amount of
good for humanity as a whole.
Godwin also denies that several commonly admired virtues really are virtues. Keeping
promises, he says, is not a virtue because at any given moment we have a duty to do the
greatest possible good through our actions. If an act is good, we should do it because we
believe it to be good, not because we have promised to do it; and a promise should not
force us to perform an act which we believe to be bad. A virtuous person therefore does
not make promises. Similarly, Godwin maintains that gratitude is a vice since it distorts
our judgement of the benevolence of our actions. When he heard of Godwin’s doctrine on
gratitude, Edmund Burke remarked “I would save him from that vice by not doing him
any service!”
Godwin saw the system of promises, loyalty, and gratitude as a means by which indi-
vidual judgement can be suspended and tyranny maintained. People can be forced to act
against their consciences because of promises which they have made or services which they
have received. An example of this is the suspension of private ethical judgement which
follows a soldier’s induction into an army. We should perform an act, Godwin maintains,
not because of fear of punishment or hope of reward or in return for favors that we have
received, but rather because we believe the act to be of the highest benefit to humanity as
a whole.
Many of our political institutions may be needed now, Godwin said, because of mankind’s
present faults; but in the future, when humanity has reached a higher level of perfection,
they will be needed less and less. The system of nation states might then be replaced by a
loose federation of small communities, within each of which problems could be resolved by
face-to-face discussion. Regarding this future ideal system, Godwin writes: “It is earnestly
to be desired that each man was wise enough to govern himself without the interference
of any compulsory restraint; and since government in its best state is an evil, the object
principally to be aimed at is, that we should have as little of it as the general peace of
human society will permit.”
Political Justice is a vision or prophesy of what human life might be like, not in the
world as it is but in an ideal world of the future. As Godwin’s disciple, Percy Bysshe
Shelley, later expressed it in his verse-drama Prometheus Unbound,

The loathsome mask has fallen, the man remains

Sceptreless, free, uncircumscribed, but man
Equal, unclassed, tribeless, and nationless,
1.9. WILLIAM GODWIN 41

Exempt from awe, worship, degree, the king

Over himself; just, gentle, wise...

Enormous instant fame; The New Philosophy

The quarto edition of Political Justice was a best seller and the book was soon republished
in a less expensive octavo edition which sold equally well. It was pirated in Ireland,
Scotland, and America and hundreds of groups of workers who could not afford to buy
the book individually bought joint copies, which then circulated among the subscribers or
were read aloud to groups. The doctrines advocated in Political Justice were soon being
called the “New Philosophy”.
Godwin became famous overnight: “I was nowhere a stranger’, he wrote later, “...I was
everywhere received with curiosity and kindness. If temporary fame ever was an object
worthy to be coveted by the human mind, I certainly obtained it in a degree that has
seldom been exceeded.”
Godwin’s friend, the essayist William Hazlitt, described this sudden burst of fame in
the following words: “... he blazed as a sun in the firmament of reputation; no-one was
more talked of, more looked up to, more sought after, and wherever liberty, truth, justice
was the theme, his name was not far off”.
William Wordsworth read Political Justice in 1794 and was greatly influenced by it.
Between February and August 1795, Wordsworth met Godwin seven times for long private
discussions. Much of Wordsworth’s writing from the Great Decade shows the mark of
Godwin’s ideas, as can be seen, for example in the following lines from The PreludeS:

How glorious! in self-knowledge and self-rule,

To look through all the frailties of the world,
And, with a resolute mastery shaking off
Infirmities of nature, time and place,
Build social upon personal Liberty,
Which, to the blind restraints of general laws
Superior, magisterially adopts
One guide, the light of circumstances, flashed
Upon an independent intellect

Things as they are

On 26 May 1794, Godwin added to his already great reputation by publishing a powerful
and original psychological novel, Things as They Are, later renamed Caleb Williams. God-
win’s purpose in writing this novel was to illustrate some of the themes of Political Justice
and to bring his ideas to readers who might not be directly interested in philosophy.
42 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

In Caleb Williams, Godwin makes several literary innovations which were to influence
such writers as Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Dickens, Balzac, and Victor Hugo. Caleb Williams
is, in fact, the ancestor of the modern thriller and detective story.

1.10 Charles Darwin

Linnaeus, Lamarck and E. Darwin
During the 17th and 18th centuries, naturalists had been gathering information on thou-
sands of species of plants and animals. This huge, undigested heap of information was
put into some order by the great Swedish naturalist, Carl von Linné (1707-1778), who is
usually called by his Latin name, Carolus Linnaeus.
Linnaeus reclassified all living things, and he introduced a binomial nomenclature, so
that each plant or animal became known by two names - the name of its genus, and the
name of its species. In the classification of Linnaeus, the species within a given genus
resemble each other very closely. Linnaeus also grouped related genera into classes, and
related classes into orders. Later, the French anatomist, Cuvier (1769-1832), grouped
related orders into phyla.
In France, the Chevalier J.B. de Lamarck (1744-1829), was struck by the close relation-
ships between various animal species; and in 1809 he published a book entitled Philosophie
Zoologique, in which he tried to explain this interrelatedness in terms of a theory of evo-
lution. Lamarck explained the close similarity of the species within a genus by supposing
these species to have evolved from a common ancestor. However, the mechanism of evolu-
tion which he postulated was seriously wrong, since he believed that acquired characteristics
could be inherited.
Lamarck believed, for example, that giraffes stretched their necks slightly by reaching
upward to eat the leaves of high trees. He believed that these slightly-stretched necks
could be inherited; and in this way, Lamarck thought, the necks of giraffes have gradually
become longer over many generations. Although his belief in the inheritability of acquired
characteristics was a serious mistake, Lamarck deserves much credit for correctly main-
taining that the close similarity between the species of a genus is due to their descent from
a common ancestral species.
Meanwhile, in England, the brilliant physician-poet, Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802), who
was considered by Coleridge to have “...a greater range of knowledge than any other man
in Europe”, had published The Botanic Garden and Zoonomia (1794). Darwin’s first book,
The Botanic Garden, was written in verse, and in the preface he stated that his purpose
was “...to inlist imagination under the banner of science..” and to call the reader’s attention
to “the immortal works of the celebrated Swedish naturalist, Linnaeus”. This book was
immensely popular during Darwin’s lifetime, but modern readers might find themselves
wishing that he had used prose instead of poetry.
Darwin’s second book, Zoonomia, is more interesting, since it contains a clear statement
of the theory of evolution:
1.10. CHARLES DARWIN 43

“...When we think over the great changes introduced into various animals”, Darwin
wrote, “as in horses, which we have exercised for different purposes of strength and swift-
ness, carrying burthens or in running races; or in dogs, which have been cultivated for
strength and courage, as the bull-dog; or for acuteness of his sense of smell, as in the
hound and spaniel; or for the swiftness of his feet, as the greyhound; or for his swimming
in the water, or for drawing snow-sledges, as the rough-haired dogs of the north... and
add to these the great change of shape and colour which we daily see produced in smaller
animals from our domestication of them, as rabbits or pigeons;... when we revolve in our
minds the great similarity of structure which obtains in all the warm-blooded animals, as
well as quadrupeds, birds and amphibious animals, as in mankind, from the mouse and the
bat to the elephant and whale; we are led to conclude that they have alike been produced
from a similar living filament.”
Erasmus Darwin’s son, Robert, married Suzannah Wedgwood, the pretty and talented
daughter of the famous potter, Josiah Wedgwood; and in 1809, (the same year in which
Lamarck published his Philosophie Zoologique), she became the mother of Charles Darwin.

Charles Darwin
As a boy, Charles Darwin was fond of collecting and hunting, but he showed no special
ability in school. His father, disappointed by his mediocre performance, once said to him:
“You care for nothing but shooting, dogs and rat-catching; and you will be a disgrace to
yourself, and to all your family.”
Robert Darwin was determined that his son should not turn into an idle, sporting man,
as he seemed to be doing, and when Charles was sixteen, he was sent to the University of
Edinburgh to study medicine. However, Charles Darwin had such a sensitive and gentle
disposition that he could not stand to see operations (performed, in those days, without
chloroform). Besides, he had found out that his father planned to leave him enough money
to live on comfortably; and consequently he didn’t take his medical studies very seriously.
However, some of his friends were scientists,and through them, Darwin became interested
in geology and zoology.
Robert Darwin realized that his son did not want to become a physician, and, as an
alternative, he sent Charles to Cambridge to prepare for the clergy. At Cambridge, Charles
Darwin was very popular because of his cheerful, kind and honest character; but he was
not a very serious student. Among his many friends, however, there were a few scientists,
and they had a strong influence on him. The most important of Darwin’s scientific friends
were John Stevens Henslow, the Professor of Botany at Cambridge, and Adam Sedgwick,
the Professor of Geology.
Remembering the things which influenced him at that time, Darwin wrote:
“During my last year at Cambridge, I read with care and profound interest Humboldt’s
Personal Narritive of Travels to the Equinoctal Regions of America. This work, and Sir J.
Hirschel’s Introduction to the Study of Natural Philosophy, stirred up in me a burning desire
to add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of Natural Science. No
one of a dozen books influenced me nearly so much as these. I copied out from Humboldt
44 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

long passages about Teneriffe, and read them aloud to Henslow, Ramsay and Dawes...
and some of the party declared that they would endeavour to go there; but I think they
were only half in earnest. I was, however, quite in earnest, and got an introduction to a
merchant in London to enquire about ships.”
During the summer of 1831, Charles Darwin went to Wales to help Professor Sedgwick,
who was studying the extremely ancient rock formations found there. When he returned
to his father’s house after this geological expedition, he found a letter from Henslow. This
letter offered Darwin the post of unpaid naturalist on the Beagle, a small brig which was
being sent by the British government to survey the coast of South America and to carry a
chain of chronological measurements around the world.
Darwin was delighted and thrilled by this offer. He had a burning desire both to visit
the glorious, almost-unknown regions described by his hero, Alexander von Humboldt,
and to “add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of Natural Science”.
His hopes and plans were blocked, however, by the opposition of his father, who felt that
Charles was once again changing his vocation and drifting towards a life of sport and
idleness. “If you can find any man of common sense who advises you to go”, Robert
Darwin told his son, “I will give my consent”.
Deeply depressed by his father’s words, Charles Darwin went to visit the estate of his
uncle, Josiah Wedgwood, at Maer, where he always felt more comfortable than he did at
home. In Darwin’s words what happened next was the following:
“...My uncle sent for me, offering to drive me over to Shrewsbury and talk with my
father, as my uncle thought that it would be wise in me to accept the offer. My father
always maintained that my uncle was one of the most sensible men in the world, and he
at once consented in the kindest possible manner. I had been rather extravagant while at
Cambridge, and to console my father, I said that ‘I should be deuced clever to spend more
than my allowance whilst on board the Beagle’, but he answered with a smile, ‘But they
tell me you are very clever!’.”
Thus, on December 27, 1831, Charles Darwin started on a five-year voyage around
the world. Not only was this voyage destined to change Darwin’s life, but also, more
importantly, it was destined to change man’s view of his place in nature.

Lyell’s hypothesis
As the Beagle sailed out of Devonport in gloomy winter weather, Darwin lay in his ham-
mock, 22 years old, miserably seasick and homesick, knowing that he would not see his
family and friends for many years. To take his mind away from his troubles, Darwin read
a new book, which Henslow had recommended: Sir Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology.
“Read it by all means”, Henslow had written, “for it is very interesting; but do not pay
any attention to it except in regard to facts, for it is altogether wild as far as theory goes.”
Reading Lyell’s book with increasing excitement and absorption, Darwin could easily
see what Henslow found objectionable: Lyell, a follower of the great Scottish geologist,
James Hutton (1726-1797), introduced a revolutionary hypothesis into geology. According
to Lyell, “No causes whatever have, from the earliest times to which we can look back, to
1.10. CHARLES DARWIN 45

the present, ever acted, but those now acting; and they have never acted with different
degrees of energy from those which they now exert”.
This idea seemed dangerous and heretical to deeply religious men like Henslow and
Sedgwick. They believed that the earth’s geology had been shaped by Noah’s flood, and
perhaps by other floods and catastrophes which had occurred before the time of Noah.
The great geological features of the earth, its mountains, valleys and planes, they viewed
as marks left behind by the various catastrophes through which the earth had passed.
All this was now denied by Lyell. He believed the earth to be enormously old - thousands
of millions of years old. Over this vast period of time, Lyell believed, the long-continued
action of slow forces had produced the geological features of the earth. Great valleys had
been carved out by glaciers and by the slow action of rain and frost; and gradual changes
in the level of the land, continued over enormous periods of time, had built up towering
mountain ranges.
Lyell’s belief in the immense age of the earth, based on geological evidence, made
the evolutionary theories of Darwin’s grandfather suddenly seem more plausible. Given
such vast quantities of time, the long-continued action of small forces might produce great
changes in biology as well as in geology!
By the time the Beagle had reached San Thiago in the Cape Verde Islands, Darwin had
thoroughly digested Lyell’s book, with its dizzying prospects. Looking at the geology of
San Thiago, he realized “the wonderful superiority of Lyell’s manner of treating geology”.
Features of the island which would have been incomprehensible on the basis of the usual
Catastrophist theories were clearly understandable on the basis of Lyell’s hypothesis.
As the Beagle slowly made its way southward along the South American coast, Darwin
went on several expeditions to explore the interior. On one of these trips, he discovered
some fossil bones in the red mud of a river bed. He carefully excavated the area around
them, and found the remains of nine huge extinct quadrupeds. Some of them were as large
as elephants, and yet in structure they seemed closely related to living South American
species. For example, one of the extinct animals which Darwin discovered resembled an
armadillo except for its gigantic size.
The Beagle rounded Cape Horn, lashed by freezing waves so huge that it almost floun-
dered. After the storm, when the brig was anchored safely in the channel of Tierra del
Fuego, Darwin noticed how a Fuegan woman stood for hours and watched the ship, while
sleet fell and melted on her naked breast, and on the new-born baby she was nursing. He
was struck by the remarkable degree to which the Fuegans had adapted to their frigid
environment, so that they were able to survive with almost no shelter, and with no clothes
except a few stiff animal skins, which hardly covered them, in weather which would have
killed ordinary people.
In 1835, as the Beagle made its way slowly northward, Darwin had many chances
to explore the Chilean coast - a spectacularly beautiful country, shadowed by towering
ranges of the Andes. One day, near Concepcion Bay, he experienced the shocks of a severe
earthquake.
“It came on suddenly, and lasted two minutes”, Darwin wrote, “The town of Concepcion
is now nothing more than piles and lines of bricks, tiles and timbers.”
46 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Measurements which Darwin made showed him that the shoreline near Concepcion had
risen at least three feet during the quake; and thirty miles away, Fitzroy, the captain of
the Beagle, discovered banks of mussels ten feet above the new high-water mark. This was
dramatic confirmation of Lyell’s theories! After having seen how much the level of the
land was changed by a single earthquake, it was easy for Darwin to imagine that similar
events, in the course of many millions of years, could have raised the huge wall of the Andes
mountains.
In September, 1835, the Beagle sailed westward to the Galapagos Islands, a group of
small rocky volcanic islands off the coast of Peru. On these islands, Darwin found new
species of plants and animals which did not exist anywhere else in the world. In fact, he
discovered that each of the islands had its own species, similar to the species found on the
other islands, but different enough to be classified separately.
The Galapagos Islands contained thirteen species of finches, found nowhere else in the
world, all basically alike in appearance, but differing in certain features especially related to
their habits and diet. As he turned these facts over in his mind, it seemed to Darwin that
the only explanation was that the thirteen species of Galapagos finches were descended
from a single species, a few members of which had been carried to the islands by strong
winds blowing from the South American mainland.
“Seeing this gradation and diversity of structure in one small, intimately related group
of birds”, Darwin wrote, “one might really fancy that from an original paucity of birds in
this archipelago, one species had been taken and modified for different ends... Facts such
as these might well undermine the stability of species.”
As Darwin closely examined the plants and animals of the Galapagos Islands, he could
see that although they were not quite the same as the corresponding South American
species, they were so strongly similar that it seemed most likely that all the Galapagos
plants and animals had reached the islands from the South American mainland, and had
since been modified to their present form.
The idea of the gradual modification of species could also explain the fact, observed by
Darwin, that the fossil animals of South America were more closely related to African and
Eurasian animals than were the living South American species. In other words, the fossil
animals of South America formed a link between the living South American species and
the corresponding animals of Europe, Asia and Africa. The most likely explanation for
this was that the animals had crossed to America on a land bridge which had since been
lost, and that they had afterwards been modified.
The Beagle continued its voyage westward, and Darwin had a chance to study the
plants and animals of the Pacific Islands. He noticed that there were no mammals on these
islands, except bats and a few mammals brought by sailors. It seemed likely to Darwin
that all the species of the Pacific Islands had reached them by crossing large stretches
of water after the volcanic islands had risen from the ocean floor; and this accounted for
the fact that so many classes were missing. The fact that each group of islands had its
own particular species, found nowhere else in the world, seemed to Darwin to be strong
evidence that the species had been modified after their arrival. The strange marsupials of
the isolated Australian continent also made a deep impression on Darwin.
1.10. CHARLES DARWIN 47

The Origin of Species

Darwin had left England on the Beagle in 1831, an immature young man of 22, with no
real idea of what he wanted to do with his life. He returned from the five-year voyage in
1836, a mature man, confirmed in his dedication to science, and with formidable powers
of observation, deduction and generalization. Writing of the voyage, Darwin says:
“I have always felt that I owe to the voyage the first real education of my mind...
Everything about which I thought or read was made to bear directly on what I had seen,
or was likely to see, and this habit was continued during the five years of the voyage. I feel
sure that it was this training which has enabled me to do whatever I have done in science.”
Darwin returned to England convinced by what he had seen on the voyage that plant
and animal species had not been independently and miraculously created, but that they
had been gradually modified to their present form over millions of years of geological time.
Darwin was delighted to be home and to see his family and friends once again. To his
uncle, Josiah Wedgwood, he wrote:
“My head is quite confused from so much delight, but I cannot allow my sister to tell
you first how happy I am to see all my dear friends again... I am most anxious once again
to see Maer and all its inhabitants.”
In a letter to Henslow, he said:
“My dear Henslow, I do long to see you. You have been the kindest friend to me that
ever man possessed. I can write no more, for I am giddy with joy and confusion.”
In 1837, Darwin took lodgings at Great Marlborough Street in London, where he could
work on his geological and fossil collections. He was helped in his work by Sir Charles Lyell,
who became Darwin’s close friend. In 1837 Darwin also began a notebook on Transmutation
of Species. His Journal of researches into the geology and natural history of the various
countries visited by the H.M.S. Beagle was published in 1839, and it quickly became a best-
seller. It is one of the most interesting travel books ever written, and since its publication
it has been reissued more than a hundred times.
These were very productive years for Darwin, but he was homesick, both for his father’s
home at the Mount and for his uncle’s nearby estate at Maer, with its galaxy of attractive
daughters. Remembering his many happy visits to Maer, he wrote:
“In the summer, the whole family used often to sit on the steps of the old portico, with
the flower-garden in front, and with the steep, wooded bank opposite the house reflected
in the lake, with here and there a fish rising, or a water-bird paddling about. Nothing has
left a more vivid picture in my mind than these evenings at Maer.”
In the summer of 1838, tired of his bachelor life in London, Darwin wrote in his diary:
“My God, it is intolerable to think of spending one’s whole life like a neuter bee,
working, working, and nothing after all! Imagine living all one’s days in smoky, dirty
London! Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with a good fire, and books and
music perhaps.. Marry! Marry! Marry! Q.E.D.”
Having made this decision, Darwin went straight to Maer and proposed to his pretty
cousin, Emma Wedgwood, who accepted him at once, to the joy of both families. Charles
and Emma Darwin bought a large and pleasant country house at Down, fifteen miles south
48 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.11: A young Charles Darwin after the Beagle voyage, in a portrate by
George Richmond. By this time, he had already joined the scientific elite.
1.10. CHARLES DARWIN 49

of London; and there, in December, 1839, the first of their ten children was born.
Darwin chose this somewhat isolated place for his home because he was beginning to
show signs of a chronic illness, from which he suffered for the rest of his life. His strength
was very limited, and he saved it for his work by avoiding social obligations. His illness was
never accurately diagnosed during his own lifetime, but the best guess of modern doctors
is that he had Chagas’ disease, a trypanasome infection transmitted by the bite of a South
American blood-sucking bug.
Darwin was already convinced that species had changed over long periods of time, but
what were the forces which caused this change? In 1838 he found the answer:
“I happened to read for amusement Malthus on Population”, he wrote, “and being
well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long-
continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under
these circumstances favorable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavorable ones
destroyed. The result would be the formation of new species”
“Here, then, I had at last got a theory by which to work; but I was so anxious to avoid
prejudice that I determined not for some time to write down even the briefest sketch of it.
In June, 1842, I first allowed myself the satisfaction of writing a very brief abstract of my
theory in pencil in 33 pages; and this was enlarged during the summer of 1844 into one of
230 pages”.
All of Darwin’s revolutionary ideas were contained in the 1844 abstract, but he did not
publish it! Instead, in an incredible Copernicus-like procrastination, he began a massive
treatise on barnacles, which took him eight years to finish! Probably Darwin had a premo-
nition of the furious storm of hatred and bigotry which would be caused by the publication
of his heretical ideas.
Finally, in 1854, he wrote to his friend, Sir Joseph Hooker (the director of Kew Botanical
Gardens), to say that he was at last resuming his work on the origin of species. Both Hooker
and Lyell knew of Darwin’s work on evolution, and for many years they had been urging
him to publish it. By 1835, he had written eleven chapters of a book on the origin of
species through natural selection; but he had begun writing on such a vast scale that the
book might have run to four or five heavy volumes, which could have taken Darwin the
rest of his life to complete.
Fortunately, this was prevented by the arrival at Down House of a bombshell in the
form of a letter from a young naturalist named Alfred Russell Wallace. Like Darwin,
Wallace had read Malthus’ book On Population, and in a flash of insight during a period
of fever in Malaya, he had arrived at a theory of evolution through natural selection which
was precisely the same as the theory on which Darwin had been working for twenty years!
Wallace enclosed with his letter a short paper entitled On the Tendency of Varieties to
Depart Indefinitely From the Original Type. It was a perfect summary of Darwin’s theory
of evolution!
“I never saw a more striking coincidence”, the stunned Darwin wrote to Lyell, “If
Wallace had my MS. sketch, written in 1842, he could not have made a better short
abstract! Even his terms now stand as heads of my chapters... I should be extremely glad
now to publish a sketch of my general views in about a dozen pages or so; but I cannot
50 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

persuade myself that I can do so honourably... I would far rather burn my whole book
than that he or any other man should think that I have behaved in a paltry spirit.”
Both Lyell and Hooker acted quickly and firmly to prevent Darwin from suppressing
his own work, as he was inclined to do. In the end, they found a happy solution: Wallace’s
paper was read to the Linnean Society together with a short abstract of Darwin’s work, and
the two papers were published together in the proceedings of the society. The members
of the Society listened in stunned silence. As Hooker wrote to Darwin the next day,
the subject was “too novel and too ominous for the old school to enter the lists before
armouring.”
Lyell and Hooker then persuaded Darwin to write a book of moderate size on evolution
through natural selection. As a result, in 1859, he published The Origin of Species, which
ranks, together with Newton’s Principia as one of the two greatest scientific books of
all time. What Newton did for physics, Darwin did for biology: He discovered the basic
theoretical principle which brings together all the experimentally-observed facts and makes
them comprehensible; and he showed in detail how this basic principle can account for the
facts in a very large number of applications.
Darwin’s Origin of Species can still be read with enjoyment and fascination by a modern
reader. His style is vivid and easy to read, and almost all of his conclusions are still believed
to be true. He begins by discussing the variation of plants and animals under domestication,
and he points out that the key to the changes produced by breeders is selection: If we want
to breed fast horses, we select the fastest in each generation, and use them as parents for
the next generation.
Darwin then points out that a closely similar process occurs in nature: Every plant or
animal species produces so many offspring that if all of them survived and reproduced, the
population would soon reach astronomical numbers. This cannot happen, since the space
and food supply are limited; and therefore, in nature there is always a struggle for survival.
Accidental variations which increase an organism’s chance of survival are more likely to
be propagated to subsequent generations than are harmful variations. By this mechanism,
which Darwin called “natural selection”, changes in plants and animals occur in nature
just as they do under domestication.
If we imagine a volcanic island, pushed up from the ocean floor and completely un-
inhabited, we can ask what will happen as plants and animals begin to arrive. Suppose,
for example, that a single species of bird arrives on the island. The population will first
increase until the environment cannot support larger numbers, and it will then remain
constant at this level. Over a long period of time, however, variations may accidentally
occur in the bird population which allow the variant individuals to make use of new types
of food; and thus, through variation, the population may be further increased. In this way,
a single species “radiates” into a number of sub-species which fill every available ecolog-
ical niche. The new species produced in this way will be similar to the original ancestor
species, although they may be greatly modified in features which are related to their new
diet and habits. Thus, for example, whales, otters and seals retain the general structure
of land-going mammals, although they are greatly modified in features which are related
to their aquatic way of life. This is the reason, according to Darwin, why vestigial organs
1.10. CHARLES DARWIN 51

Figure 1.12: A statue of Charles Darwin, “the Newton of biology”, in the Natural
History Museum, London. Darwin’s theory of evolution gives us an alternative
explanation of the tendency of humans to sin. Our emotions are very similar to
those of our remote ancestors, but cultural evolution has led to drastic changes
in the socities in which we live. Our inherited emotions drive us to behave in
ways that are no longer appropriate.

are so useful in the classification of plant and animal species.

The classification of species is seen by Darwin as a genealogical classification. All
living organisms are seen, in his theory, as branches of a single family tree! This is a
truly remarkable assertion, since the common ancestors of all living things must have
been extremely simple and primitive; and it follows that the marvelous structures of the
higher animals and plants, whose complexity and elegance utterly surpasses the products
of human intelligence, were all produced, over thousands of millions of years, by random
variation and natural selection!
Each structure and attribute of a living creature can therefore be seen as having a
long history; and a knowledge of the evolutionary history of the organs and attributes of
living creatures can contribute much to our understanding of them. For instance, studies
of the evolutionary history of the brain and of instincts can contribute greatly to our
understanding of psychology, as Darwin pointed out.
Among the many striking observations presented by Darwin to support his theory, are
facts related to morphology and embryology. For example, Darwin includes the following
quotation from the naturalist, von Baer:
“In my possession are two little embryos in spirit, whose names I have omitted to
attach, and at present I am quite unable to say to what class they belong. They may
be lizards or small birds, or very young mammalia, so complete is the similarity in the
mode of formation of the head and trunk in these animals. The extremities, however, are
52 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

still absent in these embryos. But even if they had existed in the earliest stage of their
development, we should learn nothing, for the feet of lizards and mammals, the wings and
feet of birds, no less than the hands and feet of man, all arise from the same fundamental
form.”
Darwin also quotes the following passage from G.H. Lewis:
“The tadpole of the common Salamander has gills, and passes its existence in the water;
but the Salamandra atra, which lives high up in the mountains, brings forth its young full-
formed. This animal never lives in the water. Yet if we open a gravid female, we find
tadpoles inside her with exquisitely feathered gills; and when placed in water, they swim
about like the tadpoles of the common Salamander or water-newt. Obviously this aquatic
organization has no reference to the future life of the animal, nor has it any adaption to
its embryonic condition; it has solely reference to ancestral adaptations; it repeats a phase
in the development of its progenitors.”
Darwin points out that, “...As the embryo often shows us more or less plainly the
structure of the less modified and ancient progenitor of the group, we can see why ancient
and extinct forms so often resemble in their adult state the embryos of existing species.”
No abstract of Darwin’s book can do justice to it. One must read it in the original.
He brings forward an overwhelming body of evidence to support his theory of evolution
through natural selection; and he closes with the following words:
“It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many plants of many dif-
ferent kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with
worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed
forms, so different from each other, and dependant upon each other in so complex a man-
ner, have all been produced by laws acting around us... There is grandeur in this view
of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few
forms or into one; and that whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed
law of gravity, from so simple a beginning, endless forms most beautiful and wonderful
have been and are being evolved.”

1.11 Peter Kropotkin

The activist, writer, revolutionary, scientist, economist, sociologist, historian, essayist,
researcher, political scientist, biologist, geographer and philosophe Prince Peter Kropotkin
(1842-1921) was born into an ancient dynasty that had ruled Russia before the Romanoffs
came to power. However, at the age of 12 he renounced his princely title, and rebuked his
friends when they used it.
He was arrested for his revolutionary views, both in Russia and in France, but finally
found refuge in England. Returning to Russia after the 1917 Russian Revolution, he was
welcomed by cheering crowds numbering 10,000 or more, and offered the post of Minister
of Education. He refused this post, however, and he criticized the dictatorial government
that had come to power.
As a biologist, Kropotkin believed that cooperation is a more important evolutionary
1.11. PETER KROPOTKIN 53

force than competition. In his book, Mutual Aid: A Factor in Evolution, he wrote:
“In the animal world we have seen that the vast majority of species live in
societies, and that they find in association the best arms for the struggle for
life: understood, of course, in its wide Darwinian sense - not as a struggle for
the sheer means of existence, but as a struggle against all natural conditions
unfavourable to the species. The animal species... in which individual struggle
has been reduced to its narrowest limits[...] and the practice of mutual aid
has attained the greatest development... are invariably the most numerous,
the most prosperous, and the most open to further progress. The mutual
protection which is obtained in this case, the possibility of attaining old age
and of accumulating experience, the higher intellectual development, and the
further growth of sociable habits, secure the maintenance of the species, its
extension, and its further progressive evolution. The unsociable species, on
the contrary, are doomed to decay.”

Peter Kropotkin’s books

• In Russian and French Prisons, London: Ward and Downey; 1887.
• The Conquest of Bread (Paris, 1892) Project Gutenberg e-text, Project LibriVox
audiobook
• The Great French Revolution, 1789-1793 (French original: Paris, 1893; English trans-
lation: London, 1909). e-text (in French), Anarchist Library e-text (in English)
• The Terror in Russia, 1909, RevoltLib e-text Words of a Rebel, 1885,
• Fields, Factories and Workshops (London and New York, 1898).
• Memoirs of a Revolutionist, London : Smith, Elder; 1899. Anarchist Library e-text,
Anarchy Archives e-text
• Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (London, 1902) Project Gutenberg e-text, Project
LibriVox audiobook Russian Literature: Ideals and Realities (New York: A. A.
Knopf, 1905). Anarchy Archives e-text
• The State: Its Historic Role, published 1946, Ethics: Origin and Development (un-
finished). Included as first part of Origen y evolución de la moral (Spanish e-text)
• Modern Science and Anarchism, 1930,
54 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.13: Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921). He was a prince of an anncient Rus-

sian dynasty by birth, but renounced his title. In Kropotkin’s view, coopera-
tion is more important than competition as an evolutionary force, and human
nature is best suited to societies based on sharing rather than competitive
individualism.
1.12. SIGMUND FREUD 55

1.12 Sigmund Freud

Freud’s family and education

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) was born to Jewish parents in Moravia, which was then a part
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He received a medical education at the University of Vi-
enna, qualifying as a doctor in 1881. In 1885, he was appointed a docent in neuropathology
and became an affiliated professor in 1902.
Starting in 1886, Freud set up a clinical practice in Vienna, treating patients with his
radically new methids of psychoanalysis, free association and analysis of dreams. Freud
considered dreams to be “...a royal road to the unconscious mind”.

The id, the ego and the superego

The id, the ego and the superego were new concepts introduced by Freud.

According to Wikipedia,
“...the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual desires; the super-ego plays
the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic agent
that mediates, between the instinctual desires of the id and the critical super-
ego.”

Freud explained the relationship between the ego and the id as follows:
“The functional importance of the ego is manifested in the fact that, nor-
mally, control over the approaches to motility devolves upon it. Thus, in its
relation to the id, [the ego] is like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check
the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to
do so with his own strength, while the ego uses borrowed forces. The analogy
may be carried a little further. Often, a rider, if he is not to be parted from
his horse, is obliged to guide [the horse] where it wants to go; so, in the same
way, the ego is in the habit of transforming the id’s will into action, as if it
were its own.”
“...nor must it be forgotten that a child has a different estimate of his parents
at different periods of his life. At the time at which the Oedipus complex gives
place to the super-ego they are something quite magnificent; but later, they
lose much of this. Identifications then come about with these later parents as
well, and indeed they regularly make important contributions to the formation
of character; but in that case they only affect the ego, they no longer influence
the super-ego, which has been determined by the earliest parental images.”
56 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.14: Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) in a 1921 photograph by Max Halber-

stadt. Freud and his family were forced to flee from Austria in 1938 because of
Nazi persecution of Jews. They found refuge in England, where Freud died in
1939 of a cancer, which was probably caused by his habit of heavy smoking. In
Freud’s view, human nature is like an iceberg, only a small part of which, the
conscious mind, is visible. The much larger part, the unconscious, is hidden
below the surface, but it may be accessed through the analysis of dreams.
1.12. SIGMUND FREUD 57

Some quotations from Sigmund Freud

One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beau-
tiful.

Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth
later in uglier ways.

Human beings are funny. They long to be with the person they love but refuse
to admit openly. Some are afraid to show even the slightest sign of affection
because of fear. Fear that their feelings may not be recognized, or even worst,
returned. But one thing about human beings puzzles me the most is their
conscious effort to be connected with the object of their affection even if it
kills them slowly within.

In the small matters trust the mind, in the large ones the heart.

Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibil-
ity, and most people are frightened of responsibility.

Out of your vulnerabilities will come your strength.

We are what we are because we have been what we have been.

All family life is organized around the most damaged person in it.

Words have a magical power. They can bring either the greatest happiness or
deepest despair; they can transfer knowledge from teacher to student; words
enable the orator to sway his audience and dictate its decisions. Words are
capable of arousing the strongest emotions and prompting all men’s actions.

Love is a state of temporary psychosis.

The aim of psychoanalysis is to relieve people of their neurotic unhappiness so

that they can be normally unhappy.

History is just new people making old mistakes.

The mind is like an iceberg, it floats with one-seventh of its bulk above water.

Life, as we find it, is too hard for us; it brings us too many pains, disap-
pointments and impossible tasks. In order to bear it we cannot dispense with
palliative measures... There are perhaps three such measures: powerful deflec-
58 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

tions, which cause us to make light of our misery; substitutive satisfactions,

which diminish it; and intoxicating substances, which make us insensible to it.

The paranoid is never entirely mistaken.

When inspiration does not come to me, I go halfway to meet it.

I became aware of my destiny: to belong to the critical minority as opposed to

the unquestioning majority.

1.13 Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS, (1872-1970), was born into
a wealthy and influential English family, whose members had been active in politics since
the time of the Tudors. Bertrand Russell’s grandfather, Lord John Russell, the third son
of the Duke of Bedford and 1st Earl Russell, had twice served as Prime Minister during
Queen Victoria’s reign.
Because of the early death of his parents (Viscount and Viscountess Amberly) Bertrand
Russell was brought up by his grandparents, Lord John Russell and Lady Russell, who lived
at Pembroke Lodge near Richmond Park, about fifteen miles west of London. Bertrand
Russell’s grandfather soon died too, and his grandmother became the dominant influence
on the boy’s early life. Although she was a religious conservative, Russell’s grandmother
nevertheless believed in independence of thought, accepted Darwinism, and supporter Irish
Home Rule. She also had the motto (taken from the Bible) “Thou shalt not follow a
multitude to do evil.”
Bertrand Russell and his elder brother Frank were educated at home by tutors, and
they had rather lonely and unhappy childhoods in the emotionally repressed atmosphere
of Pembroke Lodge. However, when Bertrand was eleven years old, Frank introduced him
to the work of Euclid. Bertrand Russell later described this event in his autobiography as
“one of the great events of my life, as dazzling as first love”. It is interesting that Albert
Einstein had similar feelings when he encountered the works of Euclid at almost the same
age.
During these early years Russell also discovered the writings of the poet Shelley, and
he later wrote:“I spent all my spare time reading him, and learning him by heart, knowing
no one to whom I could speak of what I thought or felt, I used to reflect how wonderful it
would have been to know Shelley, and to wonder whether I should meet any live human
being with whom I should feel so much sympathy”.
In 1890, when Bertrand Russell was 18, he started his studies in mathematics at Trinity
College, Cambridge University. He graduated with distinction, but because of his agnostic
religious beliefs, he encountered difficulties. Nevertheless he continued to teach at Cam-
bridge University, his most notable student being the Austrian-British philosopher Ludwig
1.13. BERTRAND RUSSELL 59

Wittgenstein (1889-1951).
During the years 1910-1913, Russell collaborated with his former teacher. Alfred North
Whitehead (1861-1947) to write a 3-volume treatise entitled Principia Mathematica, which
dealt with the logical foundations of mathematics and languages. At the end of the huge
effort which he had devoted to writing this enormous work, Russell underwent a sudden
conversion, during which all the aims of his life changed completely. Observing the terrible
isolation of Whitehead’s wife while she suffered an attack of angina, he had a sudden
insight into the isolation of each human being and the need for better communication to
break this isolation. As a result of this moment of intuition, Bertrand Russell resolved to
abandon mathematics, and instead devote his life to making human existence happier and
better.
Russell’s idealism, honesty and humor shine from the pages of the enormous number of
books, articles and letters that he wrote during the remainder of his life. His wide-ranging
and influential writing won him not only great fame, but also the 1950 Nobel Prize in
Literature.
Bertrand Russell was the author of the Russell-Einstein Declaration of 1955, the found-
ing document of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, an organization which
won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995. Russell devoted much of the last part of his life to
working for the complete abolition of nuclear weapons.

Here are a few things that Bertrand Russell said:

War does not determine who is right, but only who is left.

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to become
sharper.

Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education.

To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear life are already three parts dead.

The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation.

The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure, and the intelligent
are full of doubt.

Love is something more than desire for sexual intercourse; it is the principle
means of escape from the loneliness which afflicts men and women throughout
the greater part of their lives.

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.

60 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Those who have never known the deep intimacy and the intense companionship
of mutual love have missed the best thing that life has to give.

Science is what you know, philosophy is what you don’t know.

I would never die for my beliefs, because I might be wrong.

Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.

To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it
is not utterly absurd.

I have made an odd discovery. Every time I talk with a savant, I am convinced
that happiness is no longer possible. Yet when I talk with my gardener, I’m
convinced of the opposite.

Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.

Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the
longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering
of mankind.

There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge,

and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our
quarrels? We appeal, as human beings, to human beings: Remember your
humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new
Paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.
1.13. BERTRAND RUSSELL 61

Figure 1.15: Pembroke Lodge, near Richmond Park, Bertrand Russell’s child-
hood home.

Figure 1.16: Russell at the age of four.

62 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.17: Russell at Trinity College Cambridge in 1893.

1.13. BERTRAND RUSSELL 63

Figure 1.18: Russell with two of his children, John and Kate. His second son,
Conrad (1937-2004, not shown here) became the 5th Earl Russell, and had a
very distinguished career as a liberal parliamentarian and historian. Bertrand
Russell believed that the lives of humans can be made very much happier by
reforming our educational systems.
64 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.19: The world-famous linguist, Professor Noam Chomsky, believes that
human languages are qualitatively different from animal languages. He has
discovered evidence that humans are born with an inbuilt gramatical systen
pre-wired in their brains. This contradicts John Locke’s “blank paper” model
of the human mind at birth.
1.14. NOAM CHOMSKY 65

1.14 Noam Chomsky

Institute Professor Noam Chomsky of MIT, and more recently the University of Arizona,
was born in 1928 in Philadelphia. Today he is considered to be the world’s greatest public
intellectual, and is famed as a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social
critic, and political activist. The author of more than 100 books, Prof. Chomsky has been
called “the father of modern linguistics”.
Noam Chomsky began studies at the University of Pennsylvania at the age of 16. His
courses there included linguistics, mathematics, and philosophy.
The Wikipedia article on Prof. Chomsky states that “From 1951 to 1955 he was
appointed to Harvard University’s Society of Fellows, where he developed the theory of
transformational grammar for which he was awarded his doctorate in 1955. That year he
began teaching at MIT, in 1957 emerging as a significant figure in the field of linguistics for
his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which remodeled the scientific study of language,
while from 1958 to 1959 he was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for
Advanced Study. He is credited as the creator or co-creator of the universal grammar the-
ory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program.

“Since the 1960s, Chomsky has maintained that syntactic knowledge is at least par-
tially inborn, implying that children need only learn certain parochial features of their
native languages. Chomsky based his argument on observations about human language
acquisition, noting that there is an enormous gap between the linguistic stimuli to which
children are exposed and the rich linguistic knowledge they attain (see: ‘poverty of the
stimulus’ argument). For example, although children are exposed to only a finite subset
of the allowable syntactic variants within their first language, they somehow acquire the
ability to understand and produce an infinite number of sentences, including ones that
have never before been uttered.
“To explain this, Chomsky reasoned that the primary linguistic data (PLD) must be
supplemented by an innate linguistic capacity. Furthermore, while a human baby and a
kitten are both capable of inductive reasoning, if they are exposed to exactly the same
linguistic data, the human will always acquire the ability to understand and produce lan-
guage, while the kitten will never acquire either ability.
“Chomsky labeled whatever relevant capacity the human has that the cat lacks as the
language acquisition device (LAD), and he suggested that one of the tasks for linguistics
should be to determine what the LAD is and what constraints it imposes on the range of
possible human languages. The universal features that would result from these constraints
constitute ‘universal grammar’.”
66 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE

Figure 1.20: The Chomsky hierarchy. In the formal languages of computer science and lin-
guistics, the Chomsky hierarchy is a containment hierarchy of classes of formal grammars.
This hierarchy of grammars was described by Noam Chomsky in 1956. It is sometimes
also called the Chomsky-Schützenberger hierarchy after Marcel-Paul Schützenberger, who
played a crucial role in the development of the theory of formal languages.

Suggestions for further reading

1. Phillip Bricker and R.I.G. Hughs, Philosophical Perspectives on Newtonian Science,
M.I.T. Press, Cambridge, Mass., (1990).
2. Zev Bechler, Newton’s Physics and the Conceptual Structure of the Scientific Revo-
lution, Kluwer, Dordrecht, (1991).
3. Zev Bechler, Contemporary Newtonian Research, Reidel, Dordrecht, (1982).
4. I. Bernard Cohen, The Newtonian Revolution, Cambridge University Press, (1980).
5. B.J.T. Dobbs, The Janus Face of Genius; The Role of Alchemy in Newton’s Thought,
Cambridge University Press, (1991).
6. Paul B. Scheurer and G. Debrock, Newton’s Scientific and Philosophical Legacy,
Kluwer, Dordrecht, (1988).
7. A. Rupert Hall, Isaac Newton, Adventurer in Thought, Blackwell, Oxford, (1992).
8. Frank Durham and Robert D. Purrington, Some Truer Method; Reflections on the
Heritage of Newton, Columbia University Press, New York, (1990).
9. John Fauvel, Let Newton Be, Oxford University Press, (1989).
10. René Taton and Curtis Wilson, Planetary Astronomy from the Renaissance to the
Rise of Astrophysics, Cambridge University Press, (1989).
11. Brian Vickers, English Science, Bacon to Newton, Cambridge University Press, (1989).
12. John G. Burke, The Uses of Science in the Age of Newton, University of California
Press, (1983).
13. A.I. Sabra, Theories of Light from Descartes to Newton, Cambridge University Press,
(1991).
14. E.N. da Costa Andrade, Isaac Newton, Folcroft Library Editions, (1979).
15. Gideon Freudenthal, Atom and Individual in the Age of Newton, Reidel, Dordrecht,
(1986).
16. Henry Guerlac, Newton on the Continent, Cornell University Press, (1981).
1.14. NOAM CHOMSKY 67

17. A.R. Hall, Philosophers at War; the Quarrel Between Newton and Leibnitz, Cam-
bridge University Press, (1980).
18. Gale E. Christianson, In the Presence of the Creator; Isaac Newton and his Times,
Free Press, New York, (1984).
19. Lesley Murdin, Under Newton’s Shadow; Astronomical Practices in the Seventeenth
Century, Hilger, Bristol, (1985).
20. H.D. Anthony, Sir Isaac Newton, Collier, New York (1961).
21. Sir Oliver Lodge, Pioneers of Science, Dover, New York (1960).
22. Sir Julian Huxley and H.B.D. Kettlewell, Charles Darwin and his World, Thames
and Hudson, London (1965).
23. Allan Moorehead, Darwin and the Beagle, Penguin Books Ltd. (1971).
24. Francis Darwin (editor), The Autobiography of Charles Darwin and Selected Letters,
Dover, New York (1958).
25. Charles Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle, J.M. Dent and Sons Ltd., London (1975).
26. Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species, Collier MacMillan, London (1974).
27. Charles Darwin, The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, The University
of Chicago Press (1965).
28. D.W. Forest, Francis Galton, The Life and Work of a Victorian Genius, Paul Elek,
London (1974).
29. Ruth Moore, Evolution, Time-Life Books (1962).
68 PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE
Chapter 2

THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

2.1 Darwin’s book on emotions

In The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin devoted a chapter to the evolution of instincts,
and he later published a separate book on The Expression of the Emotions in Man and
Animals. Because of these pioneering studies, Darwin is considered to be the founder of
ethology.
Behind Darwin’s work in this field is the observation that instinctive behavior patterns
are just as reliably inherited as morphological characteristics. Darwin was also impressed by
the fact that within a given species, behavior patterns have some degree of uniformity, and
the fact that the different species within a family are related by similarities of instinctive
behavior, just as they are related by similarities of bodily form. For example, certain
elements of cat-like behavior can be found among all members of the cat family; and
certain elements of dog-like or wolf-like behavior can be found among all members of the
dog family. On the other hand, there are small variations in instinct among the members
of a given species. For example, not all domestic dogs behave in the same way.
“Let us look at the familiar case of breeds of dogs”, Darwin wrote in The Origin of
Species, “It cannot be doubted that young pointers will sometimes point and even back
other dogs the very first time they are taken out; retrieving is certainly in some degree
inherited by retrievers; and a tendency to run round, instead of at, a flock of sheep by
shepherd dogs. I cannot see that these actions, performed without experience by the
young, and in nearly the same manner by each individual, and without the end being
known - for the young pointer can no more know that he points to aid his master than the
white butterfly knows why she lays her eggs on the leaf of the cabbage - I cannot see that
these actions differ essentially from true instincts...”
“How strongly these domestic instincts habits and dispositions are inherited, and how
curiously they become mingled, is well shown when different breeds of dogs are crossed.
Thus it is known that a cross with a bulldog has affected for many generations the courage
and obstinacy of greyhounds; and a cross with a greyhound has given to a whole family of
shepherd dogs a tendency to hunt hares...”

69
70 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Darwin believed that in nature, desirable variations of instinct are propagated by nat-
ural selection, just as in the domestication of animals, favorable variations of instinct
are selected and propagated by kennelmen and stock breeders. In this way, according
to Darwin, complex and highly developed instincts, such as the comb-making instinct of
honey-bees, have evolved by natural selection from simpler instincts, such as the instinct
by which bumble bees use their old cocoons to hold honey and sometimes add a short wax
tube.
In the introduction of his book, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,
Darwin says “I thought it very important to ascertain whether the same expressions and
gestures prevail, as has often been asserted without much evidence, with all the races of
mankind, especially with those who have associated but little with Europeans. Whenever
the same movements of the features or body express the same emotions in several distinct
races of man, we may infer with much probability, that such expressions are true ones, -
that is, are innate or instinctive.”
To gather evidence on this point, Darwin sent a printed questionnaire on the expression
of human emotions and sent it to missionaries and colonial administrators in many parts
of the world. There were 16 questions to be answered:
1. Is astonishment expressed by the eyes and mouth being opened wide, and by the
eyebrows being raised?
2. Does shame excite a blush when the colour of the skin allows it to be visible? and
especially how low down on the body does the blush extend?
3. When a man is indignant or defiant does he frown, hold his body and head erect,
square his shoulders and clench his fists?
4. When considering deeply on any subject, or trying to understand any puzzle, does he
frown, or wrinkle the skin beneath the lower eyelids?
and so on.
Darwin received 36 replies to his questionnaire, many coming from people who were
in contact with extremely distinct and isolated groups of humans. The results convinced
him that our emotions and the means by which they are expressed are to a very large
extent innate, rather than culturally determined, since the answers to his questionnaire
were so uniform and so independent of both culture and race. In preparation for his
book, he also closely observed the emotions and their expression in very young babies and
children, hoping to see inherited characteristics in subjects too young to have been greatly
influenced by culture. Darwin’s observations convinced him that in humans, just as in
other mammals, the emotions and their expression are to a very large extent inherited
universal characteristics of the species.
The study of inherited behavior patterns in animals (and humans) was continued in
the 20th century by such researchers as Karl von Frisch (1886-1982), Nikolaas Tinbergen
(1907-1988), and Konrad Lorenz (1903-1989), three scientists who shared a Nobel Prize in
Medicine and Physiology in 1973.
2.1. DARWIN’S BOOK ON EMOTIONS 71

Karl von Frisch, the first of the three ethologists who shared the 1973 prize, is famous
for his studies of the waggle-dance of honeybees. Bees guide each other to sources of food
by a genetically programmed signaling method - the famous waggle dance, deciphered in
1945 by von Frisch. When a worker bee has found a promising food source, she returns to
the hive and performs a complex dance, the pattern of which indicates both the direction
and distance of the food. The dancer moves repeatedly in a pattern resembling the Greek
letter Θ. If the food-discoverer is able to perform her dance on a horizontal flat surface in
view of the sun, the line in the center of the pattern points in the direction of the food.
However, if the dance is performed in the interior of the hive on a vertical surface, gravity
takes the place of the sun, and the angle between the central line and the vertical represents
the angle between the food source and the sun.
The central part of the dance is, in a way, a re-enactment of the excited forager’s flight
to the food. As she traverses the central portion of the pattern, she buzzes her wings and
waggles her abdomen rapidly, the number of waggles indicating the approximate distance
to the food 1 . After this central portion of the dance, she turns alternately to the left or
to the right, following one or the other of the semicircles, and repeats the performance.
Studies of the accuracy with which her hive-mates follow these instructions show that the
waggle dance is able to convey approximately 7 bits of information - 3 bits concerning
distance and 4 bits concerning direction. After making his initial discovery of the meaning
of the dance, von Frisch studied the waggle dance in many species of bees. He was able
to distinguish species-specific dialects, and to establish a plausible explanation for the
evolution of the dance.
Among the achievements for which Tinbergen is famous are his classic studies of instinct
in herring gulls. He noticed that the newly-hatched chick of a herring gull pecks at the beak
of its parent, and this signal causes the parent gull to regurgitate food into the gaping beak
of the chick. Tinbergen wondered what signal causes the chick to initiate this response by
pecking at the beak of the parent gull. Therefore he constructed a series of models of the
parent in which certain features of the adult gull were realistically represented while other
features were crudely represented or left out entirely. He found by trial and error that
the essential signal to which the chick responds is the red spot on the tip of its parent’s
beak. Models which lacked the red spot produced almost no response from the young chick,
although in other respects they were realistic models; and the red spot on an otherwise
crude model would make the chick peck with great regularity.
In other experiments, Tinbergen explored the response of newly-hatched chicks of the
common domestic hen to models representing a hawk. Since the chicks were able to rec-
ognize a hawk immediately after hatching, he knew that the response must be genetically
programmed. Just as he had done in his experiments with herring gulls, Tinbergen ex-
perimented with various models, trying to determine the crucial characteristic that was
recognized by the chicks, causing them to run for cover. He discovered that a crude model
in the shape of the letter T invariable caused the response if pulled across the sky with the
1
The number of waggles is largest when the source of food is near, and for extremely nearby food, the
bees use another dance, the “round dance”.
72 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Figure 2.1: Charles Darwin discussed inherited behaviour patterns in The Origin
of Species. He later published a separate book on this subject entitled The
Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals.

wings first and tail last. (Pulled backwards, the T shape caused no response.)
In the case of a newly-hatched herring gull chick pecking at the red spot on the beak
of its parent, the program in the chick’s brain must be entirely genetically determined,
without any environmental component at all. Learning cannot play a part in this behav-
ioral pattern, since the pattern is present in the young chick from the very moment when
it breaks out of the egg. On the other hand (Tinbergen pointed out) many behavioral
patterns in animals and in man have both an hereditary component and an environmen-
tal component. Learning is often very important, but learning seems to be built on a
foundation of genetic predisposition.
To illustrate this point, Tinbergen called attention to the case of sheep-dogs, whose
remote ancestors were wolves. These dogs, Tinbergen tells us, can easily be trained to
drive a flock of sheep towards the shepherd. However, it is difficult to train them to drive
the sheep away from their master. Tinbergen explained this by saying that the sheep-dogs
regard the shepherd as their “pack leader”; and since driving the prey towards the pack
leader is part of the hunting instinct of wolves, it is easy to teach the dogs this maneuver.
However, driving the prey away from the pack leader would not make sense for wolves
hunting in a pack; it is not part of the instinctive makeup of wolves, nor is it a natural
pattern of behavior for their remote descendants, the sheep-dogs.
As a further example of the fact that learning is usually built on a foundation of genetic
predisposition, Tinbergen mentions the ease with which human babies learn languages. The
language learned is determined by the baby’s environment; but the astonishing ease with
which a human baby learns to speak and understand implies a large degree of genetic
predisposition.
2.1. DARWIN’S BOOK ON EMOTIONS 73

Figure 2.2: A baby crying, one of the illustrations in The Expression of Emo-
tions in Man and Animals.
74 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Figure 2.3: Another illustration in Darwin’s book, The Expression of Emotions

in Man and Animals shows an expression of horror on the face of a man.
This expression was induced by an electrical shock, showing the human facial
musculature is capable of forming the expression of horror automatically, if
properly induced.

Figure 2.4: Another illustration in Darwin’s book shows a dog’s face expressing
threat when confronting an enemy.
2.1. DARWIN’S BOOK ON EMOTIONS 75

Figure 2.5: An ape expressing affection.

Figure 2.6: The same animal expressing threat. Both drawings are illustrations
from Darwin’s book.
76 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

2.2 Brain chemistry

Emotions in humans and in animals have an extremely long evolutionary history. Chem-
icals that affect behaviour are present in even the most primitive forms of multicellular
organisms, even in slime molds, which are at the exact borderline between single-celled
multicellular organisms. Cyclic AMP has been shown to be the molecule that expresses
slime mold unhappiness!
Not only do cells communicate by touching each other and recognizing each other’s cell
surface antigens - they also communicate by secreting and absorbing transmitter molecules.
For example, the group behavior of slime mold cells is coordinated by the cyclic adenosine
monophosphate molecules, which the cells secrete when distressed.
Within most multicellular organisms, cooperative behavior of cells is coordinated by
molecules such as hormones - chemical messengers. These are recognized by “receptors”,
the mechanism of recognition once again depending on complementarity of charge distri-
butions and shape. Receptors on the surfaces of cells are often membrane-bound proteins
which reach from the exterior of the membrane to the interior. When an external trans-
mitter molecule is bound to a receptor site on the outside part of the protein, it causes a
conformational change which releases a bound molecule of a different type from a site on
the inside part of the protein, thus carrying the signal to the cell’s interior. In other cases
the messenger molecule passes through the cell membrane.
In this way the individual cell in a society of cells (a multicellular organism) is told when
to divide and when to stop dividing, and what its special role will be in the economy of the
cell society (differentiation). For example, in humans, follicle-stimulating hormone, lut-
enizing hormone, prolactin, estrogen and progesterone are among the chemical messengers
which cause the cell differentiation needed to create the secondary sexual characteristics
of females.
Another role of chemical messengers in multicellular organisms is to maintain a reason-
ably constant internal environment in spite of drastic changes in the external environment
of individual cells or of the organism as a whole (homeostasis). An example of such a
homeostatic chemical messenger is the hormone insulin, which is found in humans and
other mammals. The rate of its release by secretory cells in the pancreas is increased by
high concentrations of glucose in the blood. Insulin carries the news of high glucose levels
to target cells in the liver, where the glucose is converted to glycogen, and to other target
cells in the muscles, where the glucose is burned.

2.3 Nervous systems

Hormones require a considerable amount of time to diffuse from the cells where they
originate to their target cells; but animals often need to act very quickly, in fractions of
seconds, to avoid danger or to obtain food. Because of the need for quick responses, a
second system of communication has evolved - the system of neurons.
Neurons have a cell bodies, nuclei, mitochondria and other usual features of eukaryotic
2.4. CHEMICAL SYNAPSES 77

cells, but in addition they possess extremely long and thin tubelike extensions called axons
and dendrites. The axons function as informational output channels, while the dendrites
are inputs. These very long extensions of neurons connect them with other neurons which
can be at distant sites, to which they are able to transmit electrical signals. The complex
network of neurons within a multicellular organism, its nervous system, is divided into
three parts. A sensory or input part brings in signals from the organism’s interior or from
its external environment. An effector or output part produces a response to the input
signal, for example by initiating muscular contraction.
Between the sensory and effector parts of the nervous system is a message-processing
(internuncial) part, whose complexity is not great in the jellyfish or the leech. However,
the complexity of the internuncial part of the nervous system increases dramatically as one
goes upward in the evolutionary order of animals, and in humans it is truly astonishing.

2.4 Chemical synapses

The small button-like connections between neurons are called synapses. When an electrical
signal propagating along an axon reaches a synapse, it releases a chemical transmitter
substance into the tiny volume between the synapse and the next neuron (the post-synaptic
cleft). Depending on the nature of the synapse, this chemical messenger may either cause
the next neuron to “fire” (i.e., to produce an electrical pulse along its axon) or it may
inhibit the firing of the neuron. Furthermore, the question of Neuron whether a neuron
will or will not fire depends on the past history of its synapses. Because of this feature,
the internuncial part of an animal’s nervous system is able to learn. There many kinds of
synapses and many kinds of neurotransmitters, and the response of synapses is sensitive to
the concentration of various molecules in the blood, a fact which helps to give the nervous
systems of higher animals extraordinary subtlety and complexity.

2.5 Neurotransmitters
The first known neurotransmitter molecule, acetylcholine, was discovered jointly by Sir
Henry Dale in England and by Otto Loewi in Germany. In 1921 Loewi was able to show
that nerve endings transmit information to muscles by means of this substance.
The idea for the critical experiment occurred to him in a dream at 3 am. Otto Loewi
woke up and wrote down the idea; but in the morning he could not read what he had
written. Luckily he had the same dream the following night. This time he took no chances.
He got up, drank some coffee, and spent the whole night working in his laboratory. By
morning he had shown that nerve cells separated from the muscle of a frog’s heart secrete a
chemical substance when stimulated, and that this substance is able to cause contractions
of the heart of another frog.
Sir Henry Dale later showed that Otto Loewi’s transmitter molecule was identical to
acetylcholine, which Dale had isolated from the ergot fungus in 1910. The two men shared
78 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

a Nobel Prize in 1936. Since that time, a large variety of neurotransmitter molecules have
been isolated. Among the excitatory neurotransmitters (in addition to acetylcholine) are
noradrenalin, norepinephrine, serotonin, dopamine, and glutamate, while gamma-amino-
butyric acid is an example of an inhibitory neurotransmitter.

Some important neurotransmitters

• Glutamate: This is the most abundant neurotransmitter in humans, used by about
half of the neurons in the human brain. It is the primary excitatory transmitter in
the central nervous system. One of its functions is to help form memories.

• GABA: The name GABA is an acronym for Gamma-aminobutyric acid. GABA is

the primary inhibitory transmitter in the vertebrate brain. It helps to control anxiety,
and it is sometimes used medically to treat anxiety and the associated sleeplessness.

• Glycine: This neurotransmitter is a single amino acid. It is the main inhibitory

neurotransmitter in the vertebrate spinal cord. Glycine is important in the central
nervous system, especially in the spinal cord, brainstem, and retina.

• Acetylcholine: An ester (the organic analogue of a salt) formed from the reaction
between choline and acetic acid, acetylcholine stimulates muscles, functions in the
autonomic nervous system and sensory neurons, and is associated with REM sleep.
Alzheimer’s disease is associated with a significant drop in acetylcholine levels.

• Norepinepherine: Also known as noradrenaline, norepinephorine increases heart

rate and blood pressure. It is part of the body’s “fight or flight” system. Nore-
pinephrine is also needed to form memories. Stress depletes stores of this neuro-
transmitter.

• Dopamine: Dopamine is also synthesized in plants and most animals. It is an in-

hibitory transmitter associated with the reward center of the brain. Low dopamine
levels are associated with social anxiety and Parkinson’s disease, while excess dopamine
is related to schizophrenia. The brain includes several distinct dopamine pathways,
one of which plays a major role in reward-motivated behavior. Most types of re-
wards increase the level of dopamine in the brain, and many addictive drugs increase
dopamine neuronal activity.

• Serotonin: Biochemically derived from the amino acid tryptophanis, serotonin an

inhibitory neurotransmitter involved in mood, emotion, and perception. Low sero-
tonin levels can lead to depression, suicidal tendencies, anger management issues,
difficulty sleeping, migraines, and an increased craving for carbohydrates. It’s func-
tions include the regulation of mood, appetite, and sleep. Serotonin also has some
cognitive functions, including memory and learning.
2.6. OXYTOCIN, THE “LOVE HORMONE” 79

• Endorphins: The name of this class of neurotransmitters means “a class of a

morphine-like substance originating from within the body”. are a class of molecules
similar to opioids (e.g., morphine, heroin) in terms of structure and function. The
word “endorphin” is short for “endogenous morphine.” Endorphins are inhibitory
transmitters associated with pleasure and pain relief. In other animals, these chem-
icals slow metabolism and permit hibernation. The treatment of pain by means of
acupuncture functions by releasing endorphines.

Pleasure versus happiness

Pleasure is fleeting. Happiness lasts. Pleasure is addictive, but happiness is not. Pleasure
craves more and more of everything. Happiness can be content with very little. These char-
acteristics make happiness a better goal than pleasure. Interestingly, the neurotransmitter
dopamine is associated with pleasure, while serotonin is associated with happiness.2

2.6 Oxytocin, the “love hormone”

Besides discovering acetylcholine, Sir Henry Dale also discovered, in 1906. the peptide
hormone Oxytocin, which has sometimes been called the “love hormone”. Oxytocin plays
a role in social bonding and sexual reproduction in both sexes. During childbirth, Oxytocin
is released into the bloodstream of women in response to stretching of the curvex and uterus
during labour, and also in response to breastfeeding. The hormone then facilitates the
bonding between mother and child. Oxytocin is also present in men and its concentration
in their bloodstream increases in response to romantic attachments and social bonding.
A very similar hormone, with similar functions, is also present in other mammals besides
humans.

2
See, for example, https://gobeyondlifestyle.com/happiness-vs-pleasure-root-addiction/

Figure 2.7: An artist’s impression of the structure of oxytocin

80 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

2.7 Mother love and rage

We can recognize many of our own emotions in other mammals. Among these are mother
love and rage. Interestingly these two emotions are associated respectively with oxytocin
and testosterone.
One of the most beautiful emotions is the love that women exhibit towards their chil-
dren. We must all be grateful that women are willing to undergo the danger and pain
of childbirth. We must be grateful for the devotion that they show to their children and
families.
Both humans and most other animals compete for dominance and mating rights. In
humans, mating displays and struggles for dominance lead to what the economist Thorstein
Veblen called “conspicuous consumption”. Overconsumption in industrialized nations is
one of the factors driving the world towards an ecological catastrophe.
2.7. MOTHER LOVE AND RAGE 81

Figure 2.8: Mother love: One of the most beautiful emotions.

Figure 2.9: Mother love.

82 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Figure 2.10: Mother love

Figure 2.11: Mother love:

2.7. MOTHER LOVE AND RAGE 83

Figure 2.12: Mother love

Figure 2.13: Mother love

84 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Figure 2.14: Mother love

Figure 2.15: Mother love: Although we recognize the emotions of mammals most
clearly as being similar to our own, animals less closely related to ourselves also
exhibit emotions that we can recognize. For example, birds are devoted to their
young and make great sacrifices to help and protect them.
2.7. MOTHER LOVE AND RAGE 85

Figure 2.16: Male animals fighting for dominance and mating rights

Figure 2.17: Testosterone is a hormone present in large quantities in males and

much smaller amounts in females. It is involved in rank-determining fights and
mating.

Figure 2.18: Male lions fighting for dominance and mating rights.
86 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

Figure 2.19: In Shakespeare’s poetic tragedy, Romeo and Juliet, we see many
human emotions on display: males fighting for dominance and mating rights
(testosterone), romantic attachment (oxytocin), and tribalism (Montagues ver-
sus Capulets). The dangers of tribalism in an age of genocidal and potentially
omnicidal thermonuclear weapons will be discussed in another chapter.
2.8. NERVOUS SYSTEMS 87

2.8 Nervous systems

Hormones require a considerable amount of time to diffuse from the cells where they
originate to their target cells; but animals often need to act very quickly, in fractions of
seconds, to avoid danger or to obtain food. Because of the need for quick responses, a
second system of communication has evolved - the system of neurons.
Neurons have a cell bodies, nuclei, mitochondria and other usual features of eukaryotic
cells, but in addition they possess extremely long and thin tubelike extensions called axons
and dendrites. The axons function as informational output channels, while the dendrites
are inputs. These very long extensions of neurons connect them with other neurons which
can be at distant sites, to which they are able to transmit electrical signals. The complex
network of neurons within a multicellular organism, its nervous system, is divided into
three parts. A sensory or input part brings in signals from the organism’s interior or from
its external environment. An effector or output part produces a response to the input
signal, for example by initiating muscular contraction. Between the sensory and effector
parts of the nervous system is a message-processing (internuncial) part, whose complexity
is not great in the jellyfish or the leech. However, the complexity of the internuncial part
of the nervous system increases dramatically as one goes upward in the evolutionary order
of animals, and in humans it is truly astonishing.
The small button-like connections between neurons are called synapses. When an elec-
trical signal propagating along an axon reaches a synapse, it releases a chemical transmitter
substance into the tiny volume between the synapse and the next neuron (the post-synaptic
cleft). Depending on the nature of the synapse, this chemical messenger may either cause
the next neuron to “fire” (i.e., to produce an electrical pulse along its axon) or it may
inhibit the firing of the neuron. Furthermore, the question of whether a neuron will or will
not fire depends on the past history of its synapses. Because of this feature, the internun-
cial part of an animal’s nervous system is able to learn. There many kinds of synapses and
many kinds of neurotransmitters, and the response of synapses is sensitive to the concen-
tration of various molecules in the blood, a fact which helps to give the nervous systems
of higher animals extraordinary subtlety and complexity.
The first known neurotransmitter molecule, acetylcholine, was discovered jointly by Sir
Henry Dale in England and by Otto Loewi in Germany. In 1921 Loewi was able to show
that nerve endings transmit information to muscles by means of this substance. The idea
for the critical experiment occurred to him in a dream at 3 am. Otto Loewi woke up and
wrote down the idea; but in the morning he could not read what he had written. Luckily
he had the same dream the following night. This time he took no chances. He got up,
drank some coffee, and spent the whole night working in his laboratory. By morning he
had shown that nerve cells separated from the muscle of a frog’s heart secrete a chemical
substance when stimulated, and that this substance is able to cause contractions of the
heart of another frog. Sir Henry Dale later showed that Otto Loewi’s transmitter molecule
was identical to acetylcholine, which Dale had isolated from the ergot fungus in 1910. The
two men shared a Nobel Prize in 1936. Since that time, a large variety of neurotransmitter
molecules have been isolated. Among the excitatory neurotransmitters (in addition to
88 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

acetylcholine) are noradrenalin, norepinephrine, serotonin, dopamine, and glutamate, while

gamma-amino-butyric acid is an example of an inhibitory neurotransmitter.
The mechanism by which electrical impulses propagate along nerve ax- ons was clarified
by the English physiologists Alan Lloyd Hodgkin and Andrew Fielding Huxley (a grandson
of Darwin’s defender, Thomas Henry Huxley). In 1952, working with the giant axon of
the squid (which can be as large as a millimeter in diameter), they demonstrated that the
electrical impulse propagating along a nerve is in no way similar to an electrical current in
a conducting wire, but is more closely analogous to a row of dominoes knocking each other
down. The nerve fiber, they showed, is like a long thin tube, within which there is a fluid
containing K+ , and Na+ ions, as well as anions. Inside a resting nerve, the concentration
of K+ is higher than in the normal body fluids outside, and the concentration of Na+ is
lower. These abnormal concentrations are maintained by an “ion pump”, which uses the
Gibbs free energy of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) to bring potassium ions into the nerve
and to expel sodium ions.
The membrane surrounding the neural axon is more permeable to potassium ions than
to sodium, and the positively charged potassium ions tend to leak out of the resting nerve,
producing a small difference in potential between the inside and outside. This “resting
potential” helps to hold the molecules of the membrane in an orderly layer, so that the
membrane’s permeability to ions is low.
Hodgkin and Huxley showed that when a neuron fires, the whole situation changes
dramatically. Triggered by the effects of excitatory neurotransmitter molecules, sodium
ions begin to flow into the axon, destroying the electrical potential which maintained order
in the membrane. A wave of depolarization passes along the axon. Like a row of dominoes
falling, the disturbance propagates from one section to the next: Sodium ions flow in,
the order-maintaining electrical potential disappears, the next small section of the nerve
membrane becomes permeable, and so on. Thus, Hodgkin and Huxley showed that when
a neuron fires, a quick pulse-like electrical and chemical disturbance is transmitted along
the axon.
In 1953, Stephen W. Kuffler, working at Johns Hopkins University, made a series of
discoveries which yielded much insight into the mechanisms by which the internuncial part
of mammalian nervous systems processes information. Kuffler’s studies showed that some
degree of abstraction of patterns already takes place in the retina of the mammalian eye,
before signals are passed on through the optic nerve to the visual cortex of the brain. In
the mammalian retina, about 100 million light-sensitive primary light-receptor cells are
connected through bipolar neurons to approximately a million retinal neurons of another
type, called ganglions. Kuffler’s first discovery (made using microelectrodes) was that even
in total darkness, the retinal ganglions continue to fire steadily at the rate of about thirty
pulses per second. He also found that diffuse light illuminating the entire retina does not
change this steady rate of firing.
Kuffler’s next discovery was that each ganglion is connected to an array of about 100
primary receptor cells, arranged in an inner circle surrounded by an outer ring. Kuffler
found the arrays to be of two types, which he called “on center arrays” and “off center
arrays”. In the “on center arrays”, a tiny spot of light, illuminating only the inner circle,
2.8. NERVOUS SYSTEMS 89

Figure 2.20: A schematic diagram of a neuron.

90 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

produces a burst of frequent firing of the associated ganglion, provided that cells in the
outer ring of the array remain in darkness. However, if the cells in the outer ring are also
illuminated, there is a cancellation, and there is no net effect. Exactly the opposite proved
to be the case for the “off center arrays”. As before, uniform illumination of both the
inner circle and outer ring of these arrays produces a cancellation and hence no net effect
on the steady background rate of ganglion firing. However, if the central circle by itself
is illuminated by a tiny spot of light, the ganglion firing is inhibited, whereas if the outer
ring alone is illuminated, the firing is enhanced. Thus Kuffler found that both types of
arrays give no response to uniform illumination, and that both types of arrays measure, in
different ways, the degree of contrast in the light falling on closely neighboring regions of
the retina.
Kuffler’s research was continued by his two associates, David H. Hubel and Torsten N.
Wessel, at the Harvard Medical School, to which Kuffler had moved. In the late 1950’s,
they found that when the signals sent through the optic nerves reach the visual cortex of the
brain, a further abstraction of patterns takes place through the arrangement of connections
between two successive layers of neurons. Hubbel and Wessel called the cells in these two
pattern-abstracting layers “simple” and “complex”. The retinal ganglions were found to
be connected to the “simple” neurons in such a way that a “simple” cell responds to a line
of contrasting illumination of the retina. For such a cell to respond, the line has to be at
a particular position and has to have a particular direction. However, the “complex” cells
in the next layer were found to be connected to the “simple” cells in such a way that they
respond to a line in a particular direction, even when it is displaced parallel to itself3 .
In analyzing their results, Kuffler, Hubel and Wessel concluded that pattern abstraction
in the mammalian retina and visual cortex takes place through the selective destruction
of information. This conclusion agrees with what we know in general about abstractions:
They are always simpler than the thing which they represent.

3
Interestingly, at about the same time, the English physiologist J.Z. Young came to closely analogous
conclusions regarding the mechanism of pattern abstraction in the visual cortex of the octopus brain.
However, the similarity between the image-forming eye of the octopus and the image-forming vertebrate
eye and the rough similarity between the mechanisms for pattern abstraction in the two cases must both
be regarded as instances of convergent evolution, since the mollusc eye and the vertebrate eye have evolved
independently.
2.8. NERVOUS SYSTEMS 91

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92 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

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2.8. NERVOUS SYSTEMS 93

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94 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS

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Haven, CT, (1958).
105. N.J. Smelser, The Theory of Collective Behavior, Free Press, New York, (1963).
106. R. Trivers, Social Evolution, Benjamin/Cummings, Menlo Park, CA, (1985).
107. W. Weiser, Konrad Lorenz und seine Kritiker, Piper, Munich, (1976).
108. W. Wickler, Biologie der 10 Gebote, Piper, Munich, (1971).
109. J. Galtung, A structural theory of aggression, Journal of Peace Research, 1, 95-119,
(1964).
2.8. NERVOUS SYSTEMS 95

110. G.E. Kang, Exogamy and peace relations of social units: A cross-cultural test, Ethol-
ogy, 18, 85-99, (1979).
111. A. Montagu, Man and Aggression, Oxford University Press, New York, (1968).
112. W.A. Nesbitt, Human Nature and War, State Education Department of New York,
Albany, (1973).
113. W. Suttles, Subhuman and human fighting, Anthropologica, 3, 148-163, (1961).
114. V. Vale and Andrea Juno, editors, Modern Primitives: An Investigation of Contem-
porary Adornment and Ritual, San Francisco Research, (1990).
115. P.P.G. Bateson and R.A. Hinde, editors, Growing Points in Ethology: Based on a
Conference Sponsored by St. John’s College and King’s College, Cambridge, Cam-
bridge University Press, (1976).
116. P. Bateson, editor, The Development and Integration of Behaviour: Essays in Honour
of Robert Hinde, Cambridge University Press, (1991).
117. C. Darwin, The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, The University of
Chicago Press (1965).
118. P. Kropotkin, Mutual Aid, A Factor in Evolution, Walter Heinemann, London,
(1902).
119. R.A. Fischer, The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection, Clarendon, Oxford, (1930).
120. J.B.S. Haldane, Population genetics, New Biology 18, 34-51, (1955).
121. L. Margulis, Symbiosis as a Source of Evolutionary Innovation: Speciation and Mor-
phogenesis, The MIT Press, (1991).
122. L. Margulis, Symbiosis in Cell Evolution: Microbial Communities in the Archean and
Proterozoic Eons, W.H. Freeman, (1992).
96 THE CHEMISTRY OF EMOTIONS
Chapter 3

ETHOLOGY

3.1 The science of inherited behavior patterns

In the long run, because of the terrible weapons that have already been produced through
the misuse of science, and because of the even more terrible weapons that are likely to be
invented in the future, the only way in which we can ensure the survival of civilization is
to abolish the institution of war. But is this possible? Or are the emotions that make
war possible so much a part of human nature that we cannot stop humans from fighting
any more than we can stop cats and dogs from fighting? Can biological science throw any
light on the problem of why our supposedly rational species seems intent on choosing war,
pain and death instead of peace, happiness and life? To answer this question, we need to
turn to the science of ethology - the study of inherited emotional tendencies and behavior
patterns in animals and humans.
In The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin devoted a chapter to the evolution of instincts,
and he later published a separate book on The Expression of the Emotions in Man and
Animals. Because of these pioneering studies, Darwin is considered to be the founder of
ethology.
The study of inherited behavior patterns in animals (and humans) was continued in
the 20th century by such researchers as Karl von Frisch (1886-1982), Nikolaas Tinbergen
(1907-1988), and Konrad Lorenz (1903-1989), three scientists who shared a Nobel Prize in
Medicine and Physiology in 1973.
The third of the 1973 prizewinners, Konrad Lorenz, is controversial, but at the same
time very interesting in the context of studies of the causes of war and discussions of how
war may be avoided. As a young boy, he was very fond of animals, and his tolerant parents
allowed him to build up a large menagerie in their house in Altenberg, Austria. Even as
a child, he became an expert on waterfowl behavior, and he discovered the phenomenon
of imprinting. He was given a one day old duckling, and found, to his intense joy, that
it transferred its following response to his person. As Lorenz discovered, young waterfowl
have a short period immediately after being hatched, when they identify as their “mother”
whomever they see first. In later life, Lorenz continued his studies of imprinting, and there

97
98 ETHOLOGY

Figure 3.1: Because of Charles Darwin’s book “The Expression of Emotions in

Man and Animals”, he is considered to be the founder of the field of Ethology,
the study of inherited behavior patterns.
3.1. THE SCIENCE OF INHERITED BEHAVIOR PATTERNS 99

Figure 3.2: Nikolaas Tinbergen (1907-1988) on the left, with Konrad Lorenz
(1903-1989). Together with Karl von Frisch (1886-1982) they shared the 1973
Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine for their pioneering work in Ethology.

Figure 3.3: Konrad Lorenz with geese who consider him to be their mother.
100 ETHOLOGY

exists a touching photograph of him, with his white beard, standing waist-deep in a pond,
surrounded by an adoring group of goslings who believe him to be their mother. Lorenz
also studied bonding behavior in waterfowl.
It is, however, for his controversial book On Aggression that Konrad Lorenz is best
known. In this book, Lorenz makes a distinction between intergroup aggression and in-
tragroup aggression. Among animals, he points out, rank-determining fights are seldom
fatal. Thus, for example, the fights that determine leadership within a wolf pack end when
the loser makes a gesture of submission. By contrast, fights between groups of animals
are often fights to the death, examples being wars between ant colonies, or of bees against
intruders, or the defense of a rat pack against strange rats.
Many animals, humans included, seem willing to kill or be killed in defense of the
communities to which they belong. Lorenz calls this behavioral tendency a “communal
defense response”. He points out that the “holy shiver” - the tingling of the spine that
humans experience when performing a heroic act in defense of their communities - is related
to the prehuman reflex for raising the hair on the back of an animal as it confronts an enemy
- a reflex that makes the animal seem larger than it really is.
In his book On Aggression, Konrad Lorenz gives the following description of the emo-
tions of a hero preparing to risk his life for the sake of the group:
“In reality, militant enthusiasm is a specialized form of communal aggression, clearly
distinct from and yet functionally related to the more primitive forms of individual ag-
gression. Every man of normally strong emotions knows, from his own experience, the
subjective phenomena that go hand in hand with the response of militant enthusiasm. A
shiver runs down the back and, as more exact observation shows, along the outside of both
arms. One soars elated, above all the ties of everyday life, one is ready to abandon all for
the call of what, in the moment of this specific emotion, seems to be a sacred duty. All
obstacles in its path become unimportant; the instinctive inhibitions against hurting or
killing one’s fellows lose, unfortunately, much of their power. Rational considerations, crit-
icisms, and all reasonable arguments against the behavior dictated by militant enthusiasm
are silenced by an amazing reversal of all values, making them appear not only untenable,
but base and dishonorable.
Men may enjoy the feeling of absolute righteousness even while they commit atrocities.
Conceptual thought and moral responsibility are at their lowest ebb. As the Ukrainian
proverb says: ‘When the banner is unfurled, all reason is in the trumpet’.”
“The subjective experiences just described are correlated with the following objectively
demonstrable phenomena. The tone of the striated musculature is raised, the carriage is
stiffened, the arms are raised from the sides and slightly rotated inward, so that the elbows
point outward. The head is proudly raised, the chin stuck out, and the facial muscles
mime the ‘hero face’ familiar from the films. On the back and along the outer surface of
the arms, the hair stands on end. This is the objectively observed aspect of the shiver!”
“Anybody who has ever seen the corresponding behavior of the male chimpanzee de-
fending his band or family with self-sacrificing courage will doubt the purely spiritual
character of human enthusiasm. The chimp, too, sticks out his chin, stiffens his body, and
raises his elbows; his hair stands on end, producing a terrifying magnification of his body
3.1. THE SCIENCE OF INHERITED BEHAVIOR PATTERNS 101

contours as seen from the front. The inward rotation of the arms obviously has the purpose
of turning the longest-haired side outward to enhance the effect. The whole combination
of body attitude and hair-raising constitutes a bluff. This is also seen when a cat humps
its back, and is calculated to make the animal appear bigger and more dangerous than it
really is. Our shiver, which in German poetry is called a ‘heiliger Schauer’, a ‘holy’ shiver,
turns out to be the vestige of a prehuman vegetative response for making a fur bristle which
we no longer have. To the humble seeker for biological truth, there cannot be the slightest
doubt that human militant enthusiasm evolved out of a communal defense response of our
prehuman ancestor.”
Lorenz goes on to say, “An impartial visitor from another planet, looking at man as
he is today - in his hand the atom bomb, the product of his intelligence - in his heart
the aggression drive, inherited from his anthropoid ancestors, which the same intelligence
cannot control - such a visitor would not give mankind much chance of survival.”
In an essay entitled The Urge to Self-Destruction 1 , Arthur Koestler says:
“Even a cursory glance at history should convince one that individual crimes, committed
for selfish motives, play a quite insignificant role in the human tragedy compared with the
numbers massacred in unselfish love of one’s tribe, nation, dynasty, church or ideology...
Wars are not fought for personal gain, but out of loyalty and devotion to king, country or
cause...”
“We have seen on the screen the radiant love of the Führer on the faces of the Hitler
Youth... They are transfixed with love, like monks in ecstasy on religious paintings. The
sound of the nation’s anthem, the sight of its proud flag, makes you feel part of a wonder-
fully loving community. The fanatic is prepared to lay down his life for the object of his
worship, as the lover is prepared to die for his idol. He is, alas, also prepared to kill anybody
who represents a supposed threat to the idol.” The emotion described here by Koestler
is the same as the communal defense mechanism (“militant enthusiasm”) described in
biological terms by Lorenz.
Generations of schoolboys have learned the Latin motto: “Dulce et decorum est pro
patria mori” - it is both sweet and noble to die for one’s country. Even in today’s world,
death in battle in defense of country and religion is still praised by nationalists. However,
because of the development of weapons of mass destruction, both nationalism and narrow
patriotism have become dangerous anachronisms.
In thinking of violence and war, we must be extremely careful not to confuse the behav-
ioral patterns that lead to wife-beating or bar-room brawls with those that lead to episodes
like the trench warfare of the First World War, or to the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki. The first type of aggression is similar to the rank-determining fights of ani-
mals, while the second is more akin to the team-spirit exhibited by a football side. Heroic
behavior in defense of one’s community has been praised throughout the ages, but the
tendency to such behavior has now become a threat to the survival of civilization, since
tribalism makes war possible, and war with thermonuclear weapons threatens civilization
1
in The Place of Value in a World of Facts, A. Tiselius and S. Nielsson editors, Wiley, New York,
(1970)
102 ETHOLOGY

with catastrophe.
Warfare involves not only a high degree of aggression, but also an extremely high degree
of altruism. Soldiers kill, but they also sacrifice their own lives. Thus patriotism and duty
are as essential to war as the willingness to kill. As Arthur Koestler points out, “Wars are
not fought for personal gain, but out of loyalty and devotion to king, country or cause...”
Tribalism involves passionate attachment to one’s own group, self-sacrifice for the sake
of the group, willingness both to die and to kill if necessary to defend the group from its
enemies, and belief that in case of a conflict, one’s own group is always in the right.

3.2 Population genetics

If we examine altruism and aggression in humans, we notice that members of our species
exhibit great altruism towards their own children. Kindness towards close relatives is also
characteristic of human behavior, and the closer the biological relationship is between
two humans, the greater is the altruism they tend to show towards each other. This
profile of altruism is easy to explain on the basis of Darwinian natural selection since two
closely related individuals share many genes and, if they cooperate, the genes will be more
effectively propagated.
To explain from an evolutionary point of view the communal defense mechanism dis-
cussed by Lorenz - the willingness of humans to kill and be killed in defense of their
communities - we have only to imagine that our ancestors lived in small tribes and that
marriage was likely to take place within a tribe rather than across tribal boundaries. Un-
der these circumstances, each tribe would tend to consist of genetically similar individuals.
The tribe itself, rather than the individual, would be the unit on which the evolutionary
forces of natural selection would act. The idea of group selection in evolution was proposed
in the 1930’s by J.B.S. Haldane and R.A. Fisher, and more recently it has been discussed
by W.D. Hamilton and E.O. Wilson.
According to the group selection model, a tribe whose members showed altruism to-
wards each other would be more likely to survive than a tribe whose members cooperated
less effectively. Since several tribes might be in competition for the same territory, in-
tertribal aggression might, under some circumstances, increase the chances for survival of
one’s own tribe. Thus, on the basis of the group selection model, one would expect hu-
mans to be kind and cooperative towards members of their own group, but at the same
time to sometimes exhibit aggression towards members of other groups, especially in con-
flicts over territory. One would also expect intergroup conflicts to be most severe in cases
where the boundaries between groups are sharpest - where marriage is forbidden across
the boundaries.
3.2. POPULATION GENETICS 103

Figure 3.4: Sir Ronald Aylmer Fischer (1890-1962). Together with J.B.S Hal-
dane he pioneered the theory of population genetics. Recent contributions to
this theory have been made by W.D. Hamilton and E.O. Wilson.
104 ETHOLOGY

3.3 Hope for the future

Although humans originally lived in small, genetically homogeneous tribes, the social and
political groups of the modern world are much larger, and are often multiracial and mul-
tiethnic.
There are a number of large countries that are remarkable for their diversity, for example
Brazil, Argentina and the United States. Nevertheless it has been possible to establish
social cohesion and group identity within each of these enormous nations. India and China
too, are mosaics of diverse peoples, but nevertheless, they function as coherent societies.
Thus we see that group identity is a social construction, in which artificial “tribal markings”
define the boundaries of the group. These tribal markings will be discussed in more detail
below.
One gains hope for the future by observing how it has been possible to produce both
internal peace and social cohesion over very large areas of the globe - areas that contain
extremely diverse populations. The difference between making large, ethnically diverse
countries function as coherent sociopolitical units and making the entire world function as
a unit is not very great.
Since group identity is a social construction, it is not an impossible goal to think of
enlarging the already-large groups of the modern world to include all of humanity.

3.4 Religion and ethnic identity

An acceleration of human cultural development seems to have begun approximately 70,000
years ago. The first art objects date from that period, as do migrations that ultimately
took modern man across the Bering Strait to the western hemisphere. A land bridge
extending from Siberia to Alaska is thought to have been formed approximately 70,000
years ago, disappearing again roughly 10,000 years before the present. Cultural and genetic
studies indicate that migrations from Asia to North America took place during this period.
Shamanism,2 which is found both in Asia and the new world, as well as among the Sami
(Lapps) of northern Scandinavia, is an example of the cultural links between the hunting
societies of these regions.
Before the acceleration of human cultural development just mentioned, genetic change
and cultural change went hand in hand, but during the last 70,000 years, the constantly
accelerating rate of information-accumulation and cultural evolution has increasingly out-
distanced the rate of genetic change in humans. Genetically we are almost identical with
our hunter-gatherer ancestors of 70,000 years ago, but cultural evolution has changed our
way of life beyond recognition.
Humans are capable of cultural evolution because it is so easy to overwrite and modify
our instinctive behavior patterns with learned behavior. Within the animal kingdom,
2
A shaman is a special member of a hunting society who, while in a trance, is thought to be able
pass between the upper world, the present world, and the lower world, to cure illnesses, and to insure the
success of a hunt.
3.5. TRIBAL MARKINGS; ETHNICITY; PSEUDOSPECIATION 105

humans are undoubtedly the champions in this respect. No other species is so good at
learning as we are. During the early stages of cultural evolution, the tendency of humans
to be religious may have facilitated the overwriting of instinctive behavior with the culture
of the tribe. Since religions, like languages, are closely associated with particular cultures,
they serve as marks of ethnic identity.

3.5 Tribal markings; ethnicity; pseudospeciation

In biology, a species is defined to be a group of mutually fertile organisms. Thus all humans
form a single species, since mixed marriages between all known races will produce children,
and subsequent generations in mixed marriages are also fertile. However, although there is
never a biological barrier to marriages across ethnic and racial boundaries, there are often
very severe cultural barriers.
Irenäus Eibl-Ebesfeldt, a student of Konrad Lorenz, introduced the word pseudospecia-
tion to denote cases where cultural barriers between two groups of humans are so strongly
marked that marriages across the boundary are difficult and infrequent. In such cases, he
pointed out, the two groups function as though they were separate species, although from
a biological standpoint this is nonsense. When two such groups are competing for the same
land, the same water, the same resources, and the same jobs, the conflicts between them
can become very bitter indeed. Each group regards the other as being “not truly human”.

In his book The Biology of War and Peace, Eibl-Eibesfeldt discusses the “tribal mark-
ings” used by groups of humans to underline their own identity and to clearly mark the
boundary between themselves and other groups. One of the illustrations in the book shows
the marks left by ritual scarification on the faces of the members of certain African tribes.
These scars would be hard to counterfeit, and they help to establish and strengthen tribal
identity. Seeing a photograph of the marks left by ritual scarification on the faces of
African tribesmen, it is impossible not to be reminded of the dueling scars that Prussian
army officers once used to distinguish their caste from outsiders.
Surveying the human scene, one can find endless examples of signs that mark the bearer
as a member of a particular group - signs that can be thought of as “tribal markings”:
tattoos; piercing; bones through the nose or ears; elongated necks or ears; filed teeth;
Chinese binding of feet; circumcision, both male and female; unique hair styles; decorations
of the tongue, nose, or naval; peculiarities of dress, fashions, veils, chadors, and headdresses;
caste markings in India; use or nonuse of perfumes; codes of honor and value systems;
traditions of hospitality and manners; peculiarities of diet (certain foods forbidden, others
preferred); giving traditional names to children; knowledge of dances and songs; knowledge
of recipes; knowledge of common stories, literature, myths, poetry or common history;
festivals, ceremonies, and rituals; burial customs, treatment of the dead and ancestor
worship; methods of building and decorating homes; games and sports peculiar to a culture;
relationship to animals, knowledge of horses and ability to ride; nonrational systems of
belief. Even a baseball hat worn backwards or the professed ability to enjoy atonal music
106 ETHOLOGY

Figure 3.5: Scars help to establish tribal identity

can mark a person as a member of a special “tribe”. Undoubtedly there many people in
New York who would never think of marrying someone who could not appreciate the the
paintings of Jasper Johns, and many in London who would consider anyone had not read
all the books of Virginia Wolfe to be entirely outside the bounds of civilization.
By far the most important mark of ethnic identity is language, and within a particular
language, dialect and accent. If the only purpose of language were communication, it would
be logical for the people of a small country like Denmark to stop speaking Danish and go
over to a more universally-understood international language such as English. However,
language has another function in addition to communication: It is also a mark of identity.
It establishes the boundary of the group.
Within a particular language, dialects and accents mark the boundaries of subgroups.
For example, in England, great social significance is attached to accents and diction, a
tendency that George Bernard Shaw satirized in his play, Pygmalion, which later gained
greater fame as the musical comedy, My Fair Lady. This being the case, we can ask why
all citizens of England do not follow the example of Eliza Doolittle in Shaw’s play, and
improve their social positions by acquiring Oxford accents. However, to do so would be
to run the risk of being laughed at by one’s peers and regarded as a traitor to one’s own
local community and friends. School children everywhere can be very cruel to any child
who does not fit into the local pattern. At Eton, an Oxford accent is compulsory; but in
a Yorkshire school, a child with an Oxford accent would suffer for it.
3.5. TRIBAL MARKINGS; ETHNICITY; PSEUDOSPECIATION 107

Figure 3.6: An example of the dueling scars that Prussian army officers once
used to distinguish their caste from outsiders.
108 ETHOLOGY

Next after language, the most important “tribal marking” is religion. As mentioned
above, it seems probable that in the early history of our hunter-gatherer ancestors, religion
evolved as a mechanism for perpetuating tribal traditions and culture. Like language, and
like the innate facial expressions studied by Darwin, religion is a universal characteristic
of all human societies. All known races and cultures practice some sort of religion. Thus
a tendency to be religious seems to be built into human nature, or at any rate, the needs
that religion satisfies seem to be a part of our inherited makeup. Otherwise, religion would
not be so universal as it is.
Religion is often strongly associated with ethnicity and nationalism, that is to say, it
is associated with the demarcation of a particular group of people by its culture or race.
For example, the Jewish religion is associated with Zionism and with Jewish nationalism.
Similarly Islam is strongly associated with Arab nationalism. Christianity too has played
an important role in in many aggressive wars, for example in the Crusades, in the European
conquest of the New World, in European colonial conquests in Africa and Asia, and in the
wars between Catholics and Protestants within Europe. We shall see in a later chapter
how the originators of the German nationalist movement (the precursors of the Nazis),
used quasi-religious psychological methods.
Human history seems to be saturated with blood. It would be impossible to enumer-
ate the conflicts with which the story of humankind is stained. Many of the atrocities
of history have involved what Irenäus Eibl-Eibesfeldt called “pseudospeciation”, that is
to say, they were committed in conflicts involving groups between which sharply marked
cultural barriers have made intermarriage difficult and infrequent. Examples include the
present conflict between Israelis and Palestinians; “racial cleansing” in Kosovo; the devas-
tating wars between Catholics and Protestants in Europe; the Lebanese civil war; genocide
committed against Jews and Gypsies during World War II; recent genocide in Rwanda;
current intertribal massacres in the Ituri Provence of Congo; use of poison gas against Kur-
dish civilians by Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq; the massacre of Armenians by Turks;
massacres of Hindus by Muslims and of Muslims by Hindus in post-independence India;
massacres of Native Americans by white conquerors and settlers in all parts of the New
World; and massacres committed during the Crusades. The list seems almost endless.
Religion often contributes to conflicts by sharpening the boundaries between ethnic
groups and by making marriage across those boundaries difficult and infrequent. However,
this negative role is balanced by a positive one, whenever religion is the source of ethical
principles, especially the principle of universal human brotherhood.
The religious leaders of today’s world have the opportunity to contribute importantly
to the solution of the problem of war. They have the opportunity to powerfully support
the concept of universal human brotherhood, to build bridges between religious groups, to
make intermarriage across ethnic boundaries easier, and to soften the distinctions between
communities. Our political leaders have the duty to move away from nationalism and
militarism. If they fail to do this, they will have failed humankind at a time of great
danger and crisis.
3.6. SEARCHING FOR HUMAN NATURE 109

3.6 Searching for human nature

A drop of good sense in a sea of emotion
Today, human greed and folly are destroying the global environment. As if this were not
enough, there is a great threat to civilization and the biosphere from an all-destroying
thermonuclear war. Both of these severe existential threats are due to faults our inherited
emotional nature.
From the standpoint of evolutionary theory, this is a paradox. As a species, we are
well on the road to committing collective suicide, driven by the flaws in human nature.
But isn’t natural selection supposed to produce traits that lead to survival? Today, our
emotions are not leading us towards survival, but instead driving us towards extinction.
What is the reason for this paradox?
Our emotions have an extremely long evolutionary history. However, with the rapid
advance of human cultural evolution, our ancestors began to live together in progressively
larger groups, and in these new societies, our inherited emotional nature was often inap-
propriate. What once was a survival trait became a sin which needed to be suppressed
by morality and law. Today we live in a world that is entirely different from the one
into which our species was born. We face the problems of the 21st century: exploding
populations, vanishing resources, and the twin threats of catastrophic climate change and
thermonuclear war. We face these severe problems with our poor cave-man’s brain, with
an emotional nature that has not changed much since our ancestors lived in small tribes,
competing for territory on the grasslands of Africa.
Many of the great ethical teachers of history lived at a time when cultural evolution was
changing humans from hunter-gatherers and pastoral peoples to farmers and city dwellers.
To live and cooperate in larger groups, humans needed to overwrite their instinctive be-
havior patterns with culturally determined behavior involving a wider range of cooperation
than previously.
This period of change is marked by the lives and ideas of a number of great ethical
teachers - Moses, Buddha, Lao Tse, Confucius, Socrates, Aristotle, Jesus, and Saint Paul.
Mohammed lived at a slightly later period, but it was still a period of transition for the
Arab peoples, a period during which their range cooperation needed to be enlarged.
Most of the widely practiced religions of today contain the principle of universal human
brotherhood. This is contained, for example, in Christianity, in the Sermon on the Mount
and in the Parable of the Good Samaritan. The Sermon on the Mount tells us that
we must love our neighbor as much as we love ourselves. When asked “But who is my
neighbor?”, Jesus replied with the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which says that our
neighbor may belong to a different ethnic group than ourselves, or may be separated from
us by geographical distance. Nevertheless, he is still our neighbor and he still deserves our
love and assistance. To this, Christianity adds that we must love and forgive our enemy,
and do good to those who persecute us, a principle that would make war impossible if it
were only followed. Not only in Christianity, but also in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam,
the principles of compassion and universal human brotherhood hold a high place.
110 ETHOLOGY

Figure 3.7: An illustration from Darwin’s book, “The Expression of Emotions

in Man and Animals”. Here a cat raises its back and fur when confronting an
enemy to make itself seem larger and more dangerous. This reflex was later
discussed by the ethologist Konrad Lorenz.
3.6. SEARCHING FOR HUMAN NATURE 111

Figure 3.8: Professor E.O. Wilson of Harvard is famous for his books on Socio-
biology.
112 ETHOLOGY

Figure 3.9: Professor Richard Dawkins of Oxford, controversial author of “The

Selfish Gene” and many other books. He has contributed much to the debate
on relationships between science, religion, aggression and altruism.
3.6. SEARCHING FOR HUMAN NATURE 113

Figure 3.10: William Donald Hamilton was a Royal Society Research Professor
at Oxford University until his death in 2000. He contributed importantly to
our understanding of altruism from the standpoint of genetics.
114 ETHOLOGY

3.7 The evolution of cooperation

The success of humans as a species is due to our genius for cooperation. Cultural evolution,
a new form of evolution, in which information is passed between generations in the form
of linguistic symbols rather than genetically, has been the key to human success. Cultural
evolution depends on the sharing of knowledge, and humans have developed remarkable
linguistic and cooperative abilities.
At the same time, human nature also has a darker side, inherited from our ancestors
who were hunter-gatherers, living in small genetically homogeneous tribes, competing for
territory, on the grasslands of Africa. The pattern of intra-tribal altruism and inter-tribal
aggression, which humans have inherited from their remote ancestors, has been explained
by the theories of population genetics and group selection put forward in the 1930’s by
R.A. Fischer and J.B.S Haldane, and discussed more recently by W.D. Hamilton and E.O.
Wilson. In this picture, the tribe itself, rather than the individual, is the unit on which
evolutionary forces acted.
We will now try to show that symbiosis and cooperation have been responsible for all
of the great upward steps in evolution, including the development of the first prokareotic
cells, the first eukaryotes, the first multi-cellular organisms, and the first cooperative groups
of multicellular organisms. The views of T.H. Huxley, who stressed competition as an
evolutionary force, will be contrasted with the ideas of Charles Darwin, Peter Kropotkin
and Lynn Margulis and others, who fully understood the importance of symbiosis and
cooperation in evolution.

The explosion of human knowledge

Cultural evolution depends on the non-genetic storage, transmission, diffusion and uti-
lization of information. The development of human speech, the invention of writing, the
development of paper and printing, and finally in modern times, mass media, computers
and the Internet - all these have been crucial steps in society’s explosive accumulation of in-
formation and knowledge. Human cultural evolution proceeds at a constantly-accelerating
speed, so great in fact that it threatens to shake society to pieces.
Every species changes gradually through genetic evolution; but with humans, cultural
evolution has rushed ahead with such a speed that it has completely outstripped the slow
rate of genetic change. Genetically we are quite similar to our neolithic ancestors, but
their world has been replaced by a world of quantum theory, relativity, supercomputers,
antibiotics, genetic engineering and space telescopes - unfortunately also a world of nuclear
weapons and nerve gas.
Because of the slowness of genetic evolution in comparison to the rapid and constantly-
accelerating rate of cultural change, our bodies and emotions (as Malthus put it, the
“passions of mankind”) are not completely adapted to our new way of life. They still
reflect the way of life of our hunter-gatherer ancestors.
Within rapidly-moving cultural evolution, we can observe that technical change now
moves with such astonishing rapidity that neither social institutions, nor political struc-
3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 115

tures, nor education, nor public opinion can keep pace. The lightning-like pace of tech-
nical progress has made many of our ideas and institutions obsolete. For example, the
absolutely-sovereign nation-state and the institution of war have both become dangerous
anachronisms in an era of instantaneous communication, global interdependence and all-
destroying weapons.
In many respects, human cultural evolution can be regarded as an enormous success.
However, at the start of the 21st century, most thoughtful observers agree that civilization
is entering a period of crisis. As all curves move exponentially upward - population, pro-
duction, consumption, rates of scientific discovery, and so on - one can observe signs of in-
creasing environmental stress, while the continued existence and spread of nuclear weapons
threatens civilization with destruction. Thus while the explosive growth of knowledge has
brought many benefits, the problem of achieving a stable, peaceful and sustainable world
remains serious, challenging and unsolved.

Tribal emotions and nationalism

In discussing conflicts, we must be very careful to distinguish between two distinct types
of aggression exhibited by both humans and animals. The first is intra-group aggression,
which is often seen in rank-determining struggles, for example when two wolves fight for
pack leadership, or when males fight for the privilege of mating with females. Another,
completely different, type of aggression is seen when a group is threatened by outsiders.
Most animals, including humans, then exhibit a communal defense response - self-sacrificing
and heroic combat against whatever is perceived to be an external threat. It is this second
type of aggression that makes war possible.
Arthur Koestler has described inter-group aggression in an essay entitled The Urge to
Self-Destruction 3 , where he writes: “Even a cursory glance at history should convince
one that individual crimes, committed for selfish motives, play a quite insignificant role in
the human tragedy compared with the numbers massacred in unselfish love of one’s tribe,
nation, dynasty, church or ideology... Wars are not fought for personal gain, but out of
loyalty and devotion to king, country or cause...”
“We have seen on the screen the radiant love of the Führer on the faces of the Hitler
Youth... They are transfixed with love, like monks in ecstasy on religious paintings. The
sound of the nation’s anthem, the sight of its proud flag, makes you feel part of a won-
derfully loving community. The fanatic is prepared to lay down his life for the object of
his worship, as the lover is prepared to die for his idol. He is, alas, also prepared to kill
anybody who represents a supposed threat to the idol.”
Members of tribe-like groups are bound together by strong bonds of altruism and loyalty.
Echos of these bonds can be seen in present-day family groups, in team sports, in the
fellowship of religious congregations, and in the bonds that link soldiers to their army
comrades and to their nation.
3
in The Place of Value in a World of Facts, A. Tiselius and S. Nielsson editors, Wiley, New York,
(1970)
116 ETHOLOGY

Warfare involves not only a high degree of aggression, but also an extremely high degree
of altruism. Soldiers kill, but they also sacrifice their own lives. Thus patriotism and duty
are as essential to war as the willingness to kill.
Tribalism involves passionate attachment to one’s own group, self-sacrifice for the sake
of the group, willingness both to die and to kill if necessary to defend the group from
its enemies, and belief that in case of a conflict, one’s own group is always in the right.
Unfortunately these emotions make war possible; and today a Third World War might lead
to the destruction of civilization.

Fisher, Haldane and Hamilton

The idea of group selection in evolution was proposed in the 1930’s by J.B.S. Haldane and
R.A. Fischer, and more recently it has been discussed by W.D. Hamilton.
If we examine altruism and aggression in humans, we notice that members of our species
exhibit great altruism towards their own children. Kindness towards close relatives is also
characteristic of human behavior, and the closer the biological relationship is between
two humans, the greater is the altruism they tend to show towards each other. This
profile of altruism is easy to explain on the basis of Darwinian natural selection since two
closely related individuals share many genes and, if they cooperate, the genes will be more
effectively propagated.
To explain from an evolutionary point of view the communal defense mechanism - the
willingness of humans to kill and be killed in defense of their communities - we have only to
imagine that our ancestors lived in small tribes and that marriage was likely to take place
within a tribe rather than across tribal boundaries. Under these circumstances, each tribe
would tend to consist of genetically similar individuals. The tribe itself, rather than the
individual, would be the unit on which the evolutionary forces of natural selection would
act.
According to the group selection model, a tribe whose members showed altruism to-
wards each other would be more likely to survive than a tribe whose members cooperated
less effectively. Since several tribes might be in competition for the same territory, suc-
cessful aggression against a neighboring group could increase the chances for survival of
one’s own tribe. Thus, on the basis of the group selection model, one would expect hu-
mans to be kind and cooperative towards members of their own group, but at the same
time to sometimes exhibit aggression towards members of other groups, especially in con-
flicts over territory. One would also expect intergroup conflicts to be most severe in cases
where the boundaries between groups are sharpest - where marriage is forbidden across
the boundaries.

The social insects

The social insects, ants, bees, wasps and termites, exhibit nearly perfect altruism towards
members of their own group. This extreme form of altruism towards near relations (kin
altruism) is closely connected with the peculiar method of reproduction of the social insects.
3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 117

The workers are sterile or nearly sterile, while the queen is the only reproductive female.
The result of this special method of reproduction is that very nearly perfect altruism is
possible within a hive or nest, since genetic changes favoring antisocial behavior would
be detrimental to the hive or nest as a whole. The hive or nest can, in some sense, be
regarded as a superorganism, with the individuals cooperating totally in much the same way
that cells cooperate within a multicellular organism. The social insects exhibit aggression
towards members of their own species from other hives or nests, and can be said to engage
in wars. Interestingly a similar method of reproduction, associated with extreme intra-
group altruism has evolved among mammals, but is represented by only two species: the
naked mole rat and Damaraland mole rat.

From Thomas Huxley to Lynn Margulis and symbiosis

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) was acutely aware of close and mutually beneficial relation-
ships between organisms. For example, in his work on the fertilization of flowers, he studied
the ways in which insects and plants can become exquisitely adapted to each other’s needs.
On the other hand Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895), although he was a strong sup-
porter of Darwin, saw competition as the main mechanism of evolution. In his essay
Struggle for Existence and its Bearing Upon Man Huxley wrote: “From the point of view
of the moralist, the animal world is about on the same level as a gladiators’ show. The
creatures are fairly well treated and set to fight; hereby the strongest, the swiftest, and the
cunningest live to fight another day. The spectator has no need to turn his thumbs down,
as no quarter is granted.”
Prince Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921) argued strongly against Huxley’s point of view in
his book Mutual Aid; A Factor of Evolution. “If we ask Nature”, Kropotkin wrote, “’who
are the fittest: those who are continually at war with each other, or those who support
one another?’, we at once see that those animals that acquire habits of mutual aid are
undoubtedly the fittest. They have more chances to survive, and they attain, in their
respective classes, the highest development of intelligence and bodily organization.”
Today, the insights of modern biology show that although competition plays an im-
portant role, most of the great upward steps in evolution have involved cooperation. The
biologist Lynn Margulis (1938-2011) has been one of the pioneers of the modern viewpoint
which recognizes symbiosis as a central mechanism in evolution.

One-celled organisms seen as examples of cooperation

The first small bacterial cells (prokareotic cells) can be thought of as cooperative commu-
nities in which autocatalytic molecules thrived better together than they had previously
done separately.
The next great upward step in evolution, the development of large and complex (eu-
karyotic) cells, also involved cooperation: Many of their components, for example mito-
chondria (small granular structures that are needed for respiration) and chloroplasts (the
118 ETHOLOGY

Figure 3.11: Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895), charicatured in Vanity Fair.

Huxley was a strong supporter of Darwin, but he placed much more emphasis
on competition in evolution than Darwin did. In fact, Darwin himself was
strongly aware of the great role that cooperation plays.
3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 119

Figure 3.12: The biologist Lynn Margulis argued strongly that eukaryotic cells
should be regarded as cooperative communities of simpler organisms that once
lived independently. At first she was almost alone in this view, but today it is
generally accepted. Most of the great upward steps in evolution have involved
cooperation.
120 ETHOLOGY

photosynthetic units of higher plants) are believed to have begun their existence as free-
living prokareotic cells. They now have become components of complex cells, cooperating
biochemically with the other subcellular structures. Both mitochondria and chloroplasts
possess their own DNA, which shows that they were once free-living bacteria-like organ-
isms, but they have survived better in a cooperative relationship.

Cooperation between cells; multicellular organisms

Multicellular organisms evolved from cooperative communities of eukaryotic cells. Some
insights into how this happened can be gained from examples which are just on the border-
line between the multicellular organisms and single-celled ones. The cooperative behavior
of a genus of unicellular eukaryotes called slime molds is particularly interesting because it
gives us a glimpse of how multicellular organisms may have originated. The name of the
slime molds is misleading, since they are not fungi, but are similar to amoebae.
Under ordinary circumstances, the individual cells wander about independently search-
ing for food, which they draw into their interiors and digest. However, when food is scarce,
they send out a chemical signal of distress. (Researchers have analyzed the molecule which
expresses slime mold unhappiness, and they have found it to be cyclic adenosine monophos-
phate.) At this signal, the cells congregate and the mass of cells begins to crawl, leaving
a slimy trail. At it crawls, the community of cells gradually develops into a tall stalk,
surmounted by a sphere - the “fruiting body”. Inside the sphere, spores are produced by a
sexual process. If a small animal, for example a mouse, passes by, the spores may adhere
to its coat; and in this way they may be transported to another part of the forest where
food is more plentiful.
Slime molds represent a sort of missing link between unicellular and multicellular or
organisms. Normally the cells behave as individualists, wandering about independently,
but when challenged by a shortage of food, the slime mold cells join together into an entity
which closely resembles a multicellular organism.
The cells even seem to exhibit altruism, since those forming the stalk have little chance
of survival, and yet they are willing to perform their duty, holding up the sphere at the
top so that the spores will survive and carry the genes of the community into the future.
Multicellular organisms often live in a symbiotic relationship with other species. For
example, in both animals and humans, bacteria are essential for the digestion of food.
Fungi on the roots of plants aid their absorption of water and nutrients. Communities of
bacteria and other organisms living in the soil are essential for the recycling of nutrients.
Insects are essential to many plants for pollination.

Cooperation in groups of animals and human groups

The social behavior of groups of animals, flocks of birds and communities of social insects
involves cooperation as well as rudimentary forms of language. Various forms of language,
including chemical signals, postures and vocal signals, are important tools for orchestrating
cooperative behavior.
3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 121

Figure 3.13: A photo showing several types of sponges. Sponges and slime
molds are on the borderline between single celled organisms and multicellular
ones. The single cells of these species can live independently, but they can also
function as members of a cooperating colony. (Public domain)
122 ETHOLOGY

The highly developed language of humans made possible an entirely new form of evolu-
tion. In cultural evolution (as opposed to genetic evolution), information is passed between
generations not in the form of a genetic code, but in the form of linguistic symbols. With
the invention of writing, and later the invention of printing, the speed of human cultural
evolution greatly increased. Cooperation is central to this new form of evolution. Cultural
advances can be shared by all humans.

Gracilization and decreasing sexual dimorphism

Early ancestors of modern humans had a relatively heavy (robust) bone structure in rela-
tion to their height. This robust bone structure seems to have been favored by frequent
combat. During their evolution, modern humans became less robust and more gracile. In
other words, their skeletons became lighter in relation to their height. Simultaneously the
height and weight of males became less different from the height and weight of females.
These trends are generally interpreted as indicating that combat became less important as
present-day humans evolved.

Ethics and growth of the social unit

Early religions tended to be centered on particular tribes, and the ethics associated with
them were usually tribal in nature. However, the more cosmopolitan societies that began
to form after the Neolithic agricultural revolution required a more universal code of ethics.
It is interesting to notice that many of the great ethical teachers of human history, for
example Moses, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Buddha, and Jesus, lived
at the time when the change to larger social units was taking place. Tribalism was no
longer appropriate. A wider ethic was needed.
Today the size of the social unit is again being enlarged, this time enlarged to include
the entire world. Narrow loyalties have become inappropriate and there is an urgent need
for a new ethic - a global ethic. Loyalty to one’s nation needs to be supplemented by a
higher loyalty to humanity as a whole.

Interdependence in modern human society

All of the great upward steps in the evolution of life on earth have involved coopera-
tion: Prokaryotes, the first living cells, can be thought of as cooperative communities of
autocatylists; large, complex eukaryote cells are now believed to have evolved as cooper-
ative communities of prokaryotes; multicellular organisms are cooperative communities of
eukaryotes; multicellular organisms cooperate to form societies; and different species co-
operate to form ecosystems. Indeed, James Lovelock has pointed out that the earth as a
whole is a complex interacting system that can be regarded as a huge organism.
The enormous success of humans as a species is due to their genius for cooperation.
The success of humans is a success of cultural evolution, a new form of evolution in which
information is passed between generations, not in the form of DNA sequences but in the
3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 123

form of speech, writing, printing and finally electronic signals. Cultural evolution is built
on cooperation, and has reached great heights of success as the cooperating community
has become larger and larger, ultimately including the entire world.
Without large-scale cooperation, modern science would never have evolved. It devel-
oped as a consequence of the invention of printing, which allowed painfully gained detailed
knowledge to be widely shared. Science derives its great power from concentration. At-
tention and resources are brought to bear on a limited problem until all aspects of it are
understood. It would make no sense to proceed in this way if knowledge were not perma-
nent, and if the results of scientific research were not widely shared. But today the printed
word and the electronic word spread the results of research freely to the entire world. The
whole human community is the repository of shared knowledge.
The achievements of modern society are achievements of cooperation. We can fly, but no
one builds an airplane alone. We can cure diseases, but only through the cooperative efforts
of researchers, doctors and medicinal firms. We can photograph and understand distant
galaxies, but the ability to do so is built on the efforts of many cooperating individuals.
An isolated sponge cell can survive, but an isolated human could hardly do so. Like
an isolated bee, a human would quickly die without the support of the community. The
comfort and well-being that we experience depends on far-away friendly hands and minds,
since trade is global, and the exchange of ideas is also global.
Finally, we should be conscious of our cooperative relationships with other species.
We could not live without the bacteria that help us to digest our food. We could not
live without the complex communities of organisms in the soil that convert dead plant
matter into fertile topsoil. We could not live without plants at the base of the food chain,
but plants require pollination, and pollination frequently requires insects. An intricate
cooperative network of inter-species relationships is necessary for human life, and indeed
necessary for all life. Competition plays a role in evolution, but the role of cooperation is
greater.

Two sides of human nature

Looking at human nature, both from the standpoint of evolution and from that of everyday
experience, we see the two faces of Janus; one face shines radiantly; the other is dark
and menacing. Two souls occupy the human breast, one warm and friendly, the other
murderous. Humans have developed a genius for cooperation, the basis for culture and
civilization; but they are also capable of genocide; they were capable of massacres during
the Crusades, capable of genocidal wars against the Amerinds, capable of the Holocaust,
of Hiroshima, of the killing-fields of Cambodia, of Rwanda, and of Darfur
As an example of the two sides of human nature, we can think of Scandinavia. The
Vikings were once feared throughout Europe. The Book of Common Prayer in England
contains the phrase “Protect us from the fury of the Northmen!”. Today the same people
are so peaceful and law-abiding that they can be taken as an example for how we would
like a future world to look. Human nature has the possibility for both kinds of behavior
depending on the circumstances. This being so, there are strong reasons to enlist the help
124 ETHOLOGY

of education and religion to make the bright side of human nature win over the dark side.
Today, the mass media are an important component of education, and thus the mass media
have a great responsibility for encouraging the cooperative and constructive side of human
nature rather than the dark and destructive side.

Some concluding remarks

We started this chapter by saying that human nature is an evolutionary paradox because
natural selection is supposed to produce traits that lead to survival, but today our emo-
tions are driving humanity towards destruction. The explanation for this paradox is the
enormous and constantly accelerating speed of cultural evolution, especially scientific and
technological advances. Genetic evolution is completely unable to keep up with this as-
tonishing rate of change, which might be called an information explosion. Fortunately,
human behavior is very maliable, and we can hope that it will be possible to adapt to the
rapidly changing conditions of life if proper use is made of our almost miraculous modern
communications technologies.

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3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 125

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126 ETHOLOGY

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3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 127

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128 ETHOLOGY

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3.7. THE EVOLUTION OF COOPERATION 129

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132 ETHOLOGY
Chapter 4

FROM TRIBALISM TO
NATIONALISM

70,000 years ago, our hunter-gatherer ancestors lived in tribes. Loyalty to the tribe was
natural for our ancestors, as was collective work on tribal projects. Today, at the start of
the 21st century, we live in nation-states to which we feel emotions of loyalty very similar
to the tribal emotions of our ancestors.
The enlargement of the fundamental political and social unit has been made necessary
and possible by improved transportation and communication, and by changes in the tech-
niques of warfare. In Europe, for example, the introduction of canons in warfare made
it possible to destroy castles, and thus the power of central monarchs was increased at
the expense of feudal barons. At the same time, improved roads made merchants wish to
trade freely over larger areas. Printing allowed larger groups of people to read the same
books and newspapers, and thus to experience the same emotions. Therefore the size of
the geographical unit over which it was possible to establish social and political cohesion
became enlarged.
The tragedy of our present situation is that the same forces that made the nation-state
replace the tribe as the fundamental political and social unit have continued to operate
with constantly-increasing intensity. For this reason, the totally sovereign nation-state
has become a dangerous anachronism. Although the world now functions as a single unit
because of modern technology, its political structure is based on fragments, on absolutely-
sovereign nation states - large compared to tribes, but too small for present-day technology,
since they do not include all of mankind. Gross injustices mar today’s global economic
interdependence, and because of the development of thermonuclear weapons, the continued
existence of civilization is threatened by the anarchy that exists today at the international
level.
In this chapter, we will discuss nationalism in Europe, and especially the conflicts
between absolutely sovereign nation-states that led to the two World Wars. However, it is
important to remember that parallel to this story, run others, equally tragic - conflicts in
the Middle East, the Vietnam War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, conflicts between India and
Pakistan, the Korean War, the two Gulf Wars, and so on. In all of these tragedies, the

133
134 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

root the trouble is that international interdependence exists in practice because of modern
technology, but our political institutions, emotions and outlook are at the stunted level
of the absolutely sovereign nation-state. Although we focus here on German nationalism
as an example, and although historically it had terrible consequences, it is not a danger
today. Germany is now one of the world’s most peaceful and responsible countries, and
the threats to world peace now come from nationalism outside Europe.

4.1 Nationalism in Europe

There is no doubt that the founders of nationalism in Europe were idealists; but the
movement that they created has already killed more than sixty million people in two world
wars, and today it contributes to the threat of a catastrophic third world war.
Nationalism in Europe is an outgrowth of the Enlightenment, the French Revolution,
and the Romantic Movement. According to the philosophy of the Enlightenment and the
ideas of the French Revolution, no government is legitimate unless it derives its power from
the will of the people. Speaking to the Convention of 1792, Danton proclaimed that “by
sending us here as deputies, the French Nation has brought into being a grand committee
for the general insurrection of peoples.”
Since all political power was now believed to be vested in the “nation”, the question of
national identity suddenly became acutely important. France itself was a conglomeration
of peoples - Normans, Bretons, Provencaux, Burgundians, Flemings, Germans, Basques,
and Catalans - but these peoples had been united under a strong central government since
the middle ages, and by the time of the French Revolution it was easy for them to think
of themselves as a “nation”. However, what we now call Germany did not exist. There
was only a collection of small feudal principalities, in some of which the most common
language was German.
The early political unity of France enabled French culture to dominate Europe during
the 17th and 18th centuries. Frederick the Great of Prussia and his court spoke and wrote
in French. Frederick himself regarded German as a language of ignorant peasants, and
on the rare occasions when he tried to speak or write in German, the result was almost
incomprehensible. The same was true in the courts of Brandenburg, Saxony, Pomerania,
etc. Each of them was a small-scale Versailles. Below the French-speaking aristocracy was
a German-speaking middle class and a German or Slavic-speaking peasantry.
The creators of the nationalist movement in Germany were young middle-class German-
speaking students and theologians who felt frustrated and stifled by the narrow kleinstädtisch
provincial atmosphere of the small principalities in which they lived. They also felt frus-
trated because their talents were completely ignored by the French-speaking aristocracy.
This was the situation when the armies of Napoleon marched across Europe, easily de-
feating and humiliating both Prussia and Austria. The young German-speaking students
asked themselves what it was that the French had that they did not have.
The answer was not hard to find. What the French had was a sense of national identity.
In fact, the French Revolution had unleashed long-dormant tribal instincts in the common
4.1. NATIONALISM IN EUROPE 135

Figure 4.1: A portrait of Napoleon (as he liked to see himself ).

people of France. It was the fanatical support of the Marseillaise-singing masses that made
the French armies invincible. The founders of the German nationalist movement concluded
that if they were ever to have a chance of defeating France, they would have to inspire the
same fanaticism in their own peoples. They would have to touch the same almost-forgotten
cord of human nature that the French Revolution had touched.
The common soldiers who fought in the wars of Europe in the first part of the 18th
century were not emotionally involved. They were recruited from the lowest ranks of
society, and they joined the army of a king or prince for the sake of money. All this was
changed by the French Revolution. In June, 1792, the French Legislative Assembly decreed
that a Fatherland Alter be erected in each commune with the inscription, “The citizen is
born, lives and dies for la patrie.” The idea of a “Fatherland Alter” clearly demonstrates
the quasi-religious nature of French nationalism.
The soldiers in Napoleon’s army were not fighting for the sake of money, but for an
ideal that they felt to be larger and more important than themselves - Republicanism and
the glory of France. The masses, who for so long had been outside of the politics of a larger
world, and who had been emotionally involved only in the affairs of their own village, were
now fully aroused to large-scale political action. The surge of nationalist feeling in France
was tribalism on an enormous scale - tribalism amplified and orchestrated by new means
136 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

Figure 4.2: A romantic figure representing Germany

of mass communication.
This was the phenomenon with which the German nationalists felt they had to contend.
One of the founders of the German nationalist movement was Johan Gottlieb Fichte
(1762-1814), a follower of the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). Besides rejecting
objective criteria for morality, Fichte denied the value of the individual. According to him,
the individual is nothing and the state is everything. Denying the value of the individual,
Fichte compared the state to an organism of which the individual is a part:
“In a product of nature”, Fichte wrote, “no part is what it is but through its relation
to the whole, and it would absolutely not be what it is apart from this relation; more, if
it had no organic relation at all, it would be absolutely nothing, since without reciprocity
in action between organic forces maintaining one another in equilibrium, no form would
subsist... Similarly, man obtains a determinate position in the scheme of things and a fixity
in nature only through his civil association... Between the isolated man and the citizen
there is the same relation as between raw and organized matter... In an organized body,
each part continuously maintains the whole, and in maintaining it, maintains itself also.
Similarly the citizen with regard to the State.”
Another post-Kantian, Adam Müller (1779-1829) wrote that “the state is the intimate
association of all physical and spiritual needs of the whole nation into one great, energetic,
infinitely active and living whole... the totality of human affairs... If we exclude for ever
from this association even the most unimportant part of a human being, if we separate
private life from public life even at one point, then we no longer perceive the State as a
phenomenon of life and as an idea.”
4.1. NATIONALISM IN EUROPE 137

The doctrine that Adam Müller sets forth in this passage is what we now call Totali-
tarianism, i.e. the belief that the state ought to encompass “the totality of human affairs”.
This doctrine is the opposite of the Liberal belief that the individual is all-important and
that the role of the state ought to be as small as possible.
Fichte maintains that “a State which constantly seeks to increase its internal strength
is forced to desire the gradual abolition of all favoritisms, and the establishment of equal
rights for all citizens, in order that it, the State itself, may enter upon its own true right -
to apply the whole surplus power of all its citizens without exception to the furtherance of
its own purposes... Internal peace, and the condition of affairs in which everyone may by
diligence earn his daily bread... is only a means, a condition and framework for what love
of Fatherland really wants to bring about, namely that the Eternal and the Divine may
blossom in the world and never cease to become more pure, perfect and excellent.”
Fichte proposed a new system of education which would abolish the individual will and
teach individuals to become subservient to the will of the state. “The new education must
consist essentially in this”, Fichte wrote, “that it completely destroys the will in the soil
that it undertakes to cultivate... If you want to influence a man at all, you must do more
than merely talk to him; you must fashion him, and fashion him, and fashion him in such
a way that he simply cannot will otherwise than you wish him to will.”
Fichte and Herder (1744-1803) developed the idea that language is the key to national
identity. They believed that the German language is superior to French because it is an
“original” language, not derived from Latin. In a poem that is obviously a protest against
the French culture of Frederick’s court in Prussia, Herder wrote:

“Look at other nationalities!

Do they wander about
So that nowhere in the world they are strangers
Except to themselves?
They regard foreign countries with proud disdain.
And you, German, alone, returning from abroad,
Wouldst greet your mother in French?
Oh spew it out before your door!
Spew out the ugly slime of the Seine!
Speak German, O you German!

Another poem, “The German Fatherland”, by Ernst Moritz Arndt (1769-1860), ex-
presses a similar sentiment:
138 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

“What is the Fatherland of the German?

Name me the great country!
Where the German tongue sounds
And sings Lieder in God’s praise,
That’s what it ought to be
Call that thine, valiant German!
That is the Fatherland of the German,
Where anger roots out foreign nonsense,
Where every Frenchman is called enemy,
Where every German is called friend,
That’s what it ought to be!
It ought to be the whole of Germany!”

It must be remembered that when these poems were written, the German nation did not
exist except in the minds of the nationalists. Groups of people speaking various dialects
of German were scattered throughout central and eastern Europe. In many places, the
German-speaking population was a minority. To bring together these scattered German-
speaking groups would require, in many cases, the conquest and subjugation of Slavic
majorities; but the quasi-religious fervor of the nationalists was such that aggression took
on the appearance of a “holy war”. Fichte believed that war between states introduces
“a living and progressive principle into history”. By war he did not mean a decorous
limited war of the type fought in the 18th century, but “...a true and proper war - a war
of subjugation!”
The German nationalist movement was not only quasi-religious in its tone; it also
borrowed psychological techniques from religion. It aroused the emotions of the masses to
large-scale political activity by the use of semi-religious political liturgy, involving myth,
symbolism, and festivals. In his book “German Society” (1814), Arndt advocated the
celebration of “holy festivals”. For example, he thought that the celebration of the pagan
festival of the summer solstice could be combined with a celebration of the victory over
Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig.
Arndt believed that special attention should be given to commemoration of the “noble
dead” of Germany’s wars for, as he said, “...here history enters life, and life becomes part of
history”. Arndt advocated a combination of Christian and pagan symbolism. The festivals
should begin with prayers and a church service; but in addition, the Oak leaves and the
sacred flame of ancient pagan tradition were to play a part.
In 1815, many of Arndt’s suggestions were followed in the celebration of the anniversary
of the Battle of Leipzig. This festival clearly exhibited a mixing of secular and Christian
elements to form a national cult. Men and women decorated with oak leaves made pilgrim-
ages to the tops of mountains, where they were addressed by priests speaking in front of
alters on which burned “the sacred flame of Germany’s salvation”. This borrowing of psy-
chological techniques from religion was deliberate, and it was retained by the Nazi Party
when the latter adopted the methods of the early German nationalists. The Nazi mass
rallies retained the order and form of Protestant liturgy, including hymns, confessions of
4.1. NATIONALISM IN EUROPE 139

Figure 4.3: Celebration of the “German May” at Hambrach Castle

faith, and responses between the leader and the congregation.1

In 1832, the first mass meeting in German history took place, when 32,000 men and
women gathered to celebrate the “German May”. Singing songs, wearing black, red, and
gold emblems, and carrying flags, they marched to Hambrach Castle, where they were
addressed by their leaders.
By the 1860’s the festivals celebrating the cult of nationalism had acquired a definite
form. Processions through a town, involving elaborate national symbolism, were followed
by unison singing by men’s choirs, patriotic plays, displays by gymnasts and sharp-shooters,
and sporting events. The male choirs, gymnasts and sharp-shooters were required to wear
uniforms; and the others attending the festivals wore oak leaves in their caps. The cohesion
of the crowd was achieved not only by uniformity of dress, but also by the space in which the
crowd was contained. Arndt advocated the use of a “sacred space” for mass meetings. The
idea of the “sacred space” was taken from Stonehenge, which was seen by the nationalists
as a typical ancient Germanic meeting place. The Nazi art historian Hubert Schrade wrote:
“The space which urges us to join the community of the Volk is of greater importance than
the figure which is meant to represent the Fatherland.”
Dramas were also used to promote a feeling of cohesion and national identity. An
example of this type of propagandist drama is Kleist’s play, “Hermann’s Battle”, (1808).
The play deals with a Germanic chieftain who, in order to rally the tribes against the
Romans, sends his own men, disguised as Roman soldiers, to commit atrocities in the
neighboring German villages. At one point in the play, Hermann is told of a Roman soldier
1
The Nazi sacred symbols and the concept of the swastika or “gamma cross”, the eagle, the
red/black/white color scheme, the ancient Nordic runes (one of which became the symbol of the SS),
were all adopted from esoteric traditions going back centuries, shared by Brahmins, Scottish Masons,
Rosicrutians, the Knights Templars and other esoteric societies.
140 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

who risked his own life to save a German child in a burning house. Hearing this report,
Hermann exclaims, “May he be cursed if he has done this! He has for a moment made my
heart disloyal; he has made me for a moment betray the august cause of Germany!... I was
counting, by all the gods of revenge, on fire, loot, violence, murder, and all the horrors of
unbridled war! What need have I of Latins who use me well?”
At another point in the play, Hermann’s wife, Thusnelda, tempts a Roman Legate into a
romantic meeting in a garden. Instead of finding Thusnelda, the Legate finds himself locked
in the garden with a starved and savage she-bear. Standing outside the gate, Thusnelda
urges the Legate to make love to the she-bear, and, as the bear tears him to pieces, she
faints with pleasure.
Richard Wagner’s dramas were also part of the nationalist movement. They were
designed to create “an unending dream of sacred völkisch revelation”. No applause was
permitted, since this would disturb the reverential atmosphere of the cult. A new type of
choral theater was developed which “...no longer represented the fate of the individual to
the audience, but that which concerns the community, the Volk... Thus, in contrast to the
bourgeois theater, private persons are no longer represented, but only types.”
We have primarily been discussing the growth of German nationalism, but very similar
movements developed in other countries throughout Europe and throughout the world.
Characteristic for all these movements was the growth of state power, and the development
of a reverential, quasi-religious, attitude towards the state. Patriotism became “a sacred
duty.” According to Georg Wilhelm Fredrich Hegel, “The existence of the State is the
movement of God in the world. It is the ultimate power on earth; it is its own end and
object. It is an ultimate end that has absolute rights against the individual.”
Nationalism in England (as in Germany) was to a large extent a defensive response
against French nationalism. At the end of the 18th century, the liberal ideas of the En-
lightenment were widespread in England. There was much sympathy in England with the
aims of the French Revolution, and a similar revolution almost took place in England.
However, when Napoleon landed an army in Ireland and threatened to invade England,
there was a strong reaction towards national self-defense. The war against France gave
impetus to nationalism in England, and military heros like Wellington and Nelson became
objects of quasi-religious worship. British nationalism later found an outlet in colonialism.

Italy, like Germany, had been a collection of small principalities, but as a reaction to
the other nationalist movements sweeping across Europe, a movement for a united Italy
developed. The conflicts between the various nationalist movements of Europe produced
the frightful world wars of the 20th century. Indeed, the shot that signaled the outbreak
of World War I was fired by a Serbian nationalist.
War did not seem especially evil to the 18th and 19th century nationalists because
technology had not yet given humanity the terrible weapons of the 20th century. In the
19th century, the fatal combination of space-age science and stone-age politics still lay
in the future. However, even in 1834, the German writer Heinrich Heine was perceptive
enough to see the threat:
“There will be”, Heine wrote, “Kantians forthcoming who, in the world to come, will
4.1. NATIONALISM IN EUROPE 141

Figure 4.4: Wagner’s dramas were part of the quasi-religious cult of German
nationalism
142 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

know nothing of reverence for aught, and who will ravage without mercy, and riot with
sword and axe through the soil of all European life to dig out the last root of the past.
There will be well-weaponed Fichtians upon the ground, who in the fanaticism of the Will
are not restrained by fear or self-advantage, for they live in the Spirit.”

4.2 The two world wars

In 1870, the fiercely nationalistic Prussian Chancellor, Otto von Bismark, won revenge for
the humiliations which his country had suffered under Napoleon Bonaparte. In a lightning
campaign, Prussia’s modern army overran France and took Emperor Napoleon III prisoner.
The victorious Prussians demanded from France not only the payment of a huge sum of
money - five billion francs - but also the annexation of the French provinces of Alsace and
Lorraine. In 1871, Kaiser Wilhelm I was proclaimed Emperor of all Germany in the Hall
of Mirrors at Versailles. The dreams of the German nationalists had been realized! The
small German-speaking states of central Europe were now united into a powerful nation
dominated by Prussia.
Bismark had provoked a number of wars in order to achieve his aim - the unification of
Germany under Prussia; but after 1871 he strove for peace, fearing that war would harm
his new creation. “I am bored”, Bismark remarked to his friends, “The great things are
done. The German Reich is made.”
In order to preserve the status quo in Europe, Bismark now made alliances not only with
Austria-Hungary and Italy, but also with Russia. To make alliances with both Austria-
Hungary and Russia required considerable diplomatic skill, since the two empires were en-
emies - rivals for influence in the Balkan Peninsula. Several small Balkan states had broken
away from the decaying Turkish Empire. Both the Hapsburg Emperors and the Romanoff
Czars were anxious to dominate these small states. However, nationalist emotions were
even more frenzied in the Balkans than they were elsewhere in Europe. Nationalism was
a cause for which 19th century Europeans were willing to kill each other, just as three
centuries earlier they had been willing to kill each other over their religious differences.
Serbia was an independent state, but the fanatical Serbian nationalists were far from
satisfied. Their real aim was to create an independent Pan-Serbia (or Yugoslavia) which
would include all the Slavic parts of Austria-Hungary. Thus, at the turn of the century,
the Balkans were a trouble spot, much as the Middle East is a trouble spot today.
Kaiser Wilhelm I was a stable monarch, but in 1888 he died and the German throne
passed to his son, Frederick III, who was incurably ill with cancer of the throat. After
reigning only 90 days, Frederick also died, and his 29 year old son became the new German
Emperor - Kaiser Wilhelm II. Wilhelm II had been born with a withered arm, and as a
boy he had been constantly told that he must become a great warrior. His adult behavior
sometimes showed tendencies towards both paranoia and megalomania.
In 1890, Wilhelm dismissed Otto von Bismark (“dropping the pilot”). Bismark was
now on the side of peace, and he might have guided Germany safely through the troubled
waters of European politics if he had been allowed to continue; but Wilhelm wanted to
4.2. THE TWO WORLD WARS 143

Figure 4.5: Otto von Bismark

play Bismark himself.

Wilhelm’s first act was to break off Germany’s alliance with Russia. Czar Alexander
III, against his principles, then formed an alliance with republican France. Realizing that
he had blundered, Wilhelm tried to patch up relations with the Czar, but it was too late.
Europe was now divided into two armed camps - Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy,
opposed by Russia and France.
Wilhelm’s government then began to build a huge modern navy, much to the conster-
nation of the English. The government of England felt that it was necessary for their
country to have control of the sea, since England was a densely-populated island, depen-
dent on imports of food. It was not only with respect to naval power that England felt
threatened: After being united in 1871, Germany had undergone an industrial revolution;
and German industries were pouring out steel and high-quality manufactured goods that
threatened England’s dominance of world trade. Commercial and naval competition with
the rising German Empire drove England into an informal alliance with Russia and France
- the Triple Entente.
Meanwhile the situation in the Balkans became increasingly troubled, and at the end
of July, 1914, the Austrian Foreign Minister, Count Brechtold, used the assassination of
Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his wife as a pretext for crushing the Serbian Pan-Slavic
movement. Russia mobilized against Austria in defense of the Serbs, and the Austrian
government interpreted the mobilization as a declaration of war. Germany was linked to
Austria by an alliance, while France was linked to Russia. In this way, both France and
144 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

Russia were drawn into the conflict.

On August 2, Wilhelm demanded free passage of German troops through Belgium.
The Belgians refused. They gave warning that an invasion would be resisted, and they
appealed to England for support of their country’s neutrality. On August 4, Britain sent
an ultimatum to the Kaiser: Unless he halted the invasion of Belgium, Britain would enter
the war. The invasion of Belgium rolled on. It was now too late to stop the great death-
machine, and as it gained momentum, Sir Edward Grey spoke the sad and prophetic words.
“The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.”

None of the people who started the First World War had the slightest idea what it
would be like. The armies of Europe were dominated by the old feudal landowning class,
whose warlike traditions were rooted in the Middle Ages. The counts and barons who
still ruled Europe’s diplomatic and military establishments knew how to drink champaign,
dance elegantly, ride horses, and seduce women. They pranced off to war in high spirits, the
gold on their colorful uniforms glittering in the sunshine, full of expectations of romantic
cavalry charges, kisses stolen from pretty girls in captured villages, decorations, glory and
promotion, like characters in “The Chocolate Soldier” or “Die Fledermaus”. The romantic
dreams of glory of every small boy who ever played with toy soldiers were about to become
a thrilling reality!
But the war, when it came, was not like that. Technology had taken over. The railroads,
the telegraph, high explosives and the machine gun had changed everything. The opposing
armies, called up by means of the telegraph and massed by means of the railroads, were
the largest ever assembled up to that time in the history of the world. In France alone,
between August 2 and August 18, 1914, the railway system transported 3,781,000 people
under military orders. Across Europe, the railways hurled more than six million highly
armed men into collision with each other. Nothing on that scale had ever happened before,
and no one had any idea of what it would be like.
At first the Schlieffen Plan seemed to be working perfectly. When Kaiser Wilhelm had
sent his troops into battle, he had told them: “You will be home before the leaves are
off the trees”, and at first it seemed that his prediction would be fulfilled. However, the
machine gun had changed the character of war. Attacking infantry could be cut down in
heaps by defending machine gunners. The war came to a stalemate, since defense had an
advantage over attack.
On the western front, the opposing armies dug lines of trenches stretching from the
Atlantic to the Swiss border. The two lines of trenches were separated by a tangled mass
of barbed wire. Periodically the generals on one side or the other would order their armies
to break through the opposing line. They would bring forward several thousand artillery
pieces, fire a million or so high explosive shells to cut the barbed wire and to kill as many as
possible of the defenders, and then order their men to attack. The soldiers had to climb out
of the trenches and struggle forward into the smoke. There was nothing else for them to do.
If they disobeyed orders, they would be court-marshalled and shot as deserters. They were
driven forward and slaughtered in futile attacks, none of which gained anything. Their
leaders had failed them. Civilization had failed them. There was nothing for them to do
4.2. THE TWO WORLD WARS 145

but to die, to be driven forward into the poison gas and barbed wire and to be scythed
down by machine gun fire, for nothing, for the ambition, vanity and stupidity of their
rulers.
At the battle of Verdun, 700,000 young men were butchered in this way, and at the
battle of Somme, 1,100,000 young lives were wasted. On the German side, the soldiers
sang “Lili Marlein” - “She waits for a boy who’s far away...” and on the other side, British
and American soldiers sang:

“There’s a long long trail a-winding

into the land of my dreams
where the nightingale is singing
and the pale moon beams.
There’s a long long night of waiting
until my dreams all come true,
’til the day that I’ll be going
down that long long trail with you.”

For millions of Europe’s young men, the long, long trail lead only to death in the mud
and smoke; and for millions of mothers and sweethearts waiting at home, dreams of the
future were shattered by a telegram announcing the death of the boy for whom they were
waiting.
When the war ended four years later, ten million young men had been killed and
twenty million wounded, of whom six million were crippled for life. The war had cost
350,000,000,000 1919 dollars. This was a calculable cost; but the cost in human suffering
and brutalization of values was incalculable. It hardly mattered whose fault the catastrophe
had been. Perhaps the Austrian government had been more to blame than any other. But
146 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

Figure 4.6: The fate of conscientious objectors.

4.2. THE TWO WORLD WARS 147

Figure 4.7: World War I casualties.

148 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

blame for the war certainly did not rest with the Austrian people nor with the young
Austrians who had been forced to fight. However, the tragedy of the First World War was
that it created long-lasting hatred between the nations involved; and in this way it lead,
only twenty years later, to an even more catastrophic global war.
The First World War brought about the downfall of four emperors: the Russian Czar,
the Turkish Sultan, the Austro-Hungarian Emperor and the German Kaiser. The decaying
and unjust Czarist government had for several years been threatened by revolution; and
the horrors of the war into which the Czar had led his people were enough to turn them
decisively against his government. During 1915 alone, Russia lost more than two million
men, either killed or captured. Finally the Russian soldiers refused to be driven into battle
and began to shoot their officers. In February, 1917, the Czar abdicated; and on December
5, 1917, the new communist government of Russia signed an armistice with Germany.
The German Chief of Staff, General Ludendorff, then shifted all his troops to the
west in an all-out offensive. In March, 1918, he threw his entire army into a gigantic
offensive which he called “the Emperor’s Battle”. The German army drove forward, and
by June they were again on the Marne, only 50 miles from Paris. However, the Allies
counterattacked, strengthened by the first American troops, and using, for the first time,
large numbers of tanks. The Germans fell back, and by September they had lost more than
a million men in six months. Morale in the retreating German army was falling rapidly, and
fresh American troops were landing in France at the rate of 250,000 per month. Ludendorff
realized that the German cause was hopeless and that if peace were not made quickly, a
communist revolution would take place in Germany just as it had in Russia.
The old feudal Prussian military caste, having led Germany into disaster, now unloaded
responsibility onto the liberals. Ludendorff advised the Kaiser to abdicate, and a liberal
leader, Prince Max of Baden, was found to head the new government. On November 9,
1918, Germany was proclaimed a republic. Two days later, an armistice was signed and
the fighting stopped.
During the last years of the war the world, weary of the politics of power and nationalist
greed, had looked with hope towards the idealism of the American President, Woodrow
Wilson. He had proposed a “peace without victory” based on his famous Fourteen Points”.
Wilson himself considered that the most important of his Fourteen Points was the last one,
which specified that “A general association of nations must be formed... for the purpose
of affording mutual guaranties of political independence and territorial integrity of great
and small states alike.”
When Wilson arrived in Europe to attend the peace conference in Paris, he was wildly
cheered by crowds of ordinary people, who saw in his idealism new hope for the world.
Unfortunately, the hatred produced by four years of horrible warfare was now too great
to be overcome. At the peace conference, the aged nationalist Georges Clemenceau was
unswerving in his deep hatred of Germany. France had suffered greatly during the war.
Half of all French males who had been between the ages of 20 and 32 in 1914 had been
killed; much of the French countryside had been devastated; and the retreating German
armies had destroyed the French coal mines. Clemenceau was determined to extract both
revenge and financial compensation from the Germans.
4.2. THE TWO WORLD WARS 149

In the end, the peace treaty was a compromise. Wilson was given his dream, the League
of Nations; and Clemenceau was given the extremely harsh terms which he insisted should
be imposed on Germany. By signing the treaty, Germany would be forced to acknowledge
sole responsibility for having caused the war; it would be forced to hand over the Kaiser
and other leaders to be tried as war criminals; to pay for all civilian damage during the war;
to agree to internationalization of all German rivers and the Kiel Canal; to give France,
Belgium and Italy 25 million tons of coal annually as part of the reparations payments;
to surrender the coal mines in Alsace-Lorraine to France; to give up all foreign colonies;
to lose all property owned by Germans abroad; and to agree to Allied occupation of the
Rhineland for fifteen years.
The loss of coal, in particular, was a death-blow aimed at German industry. Reading
the terms of the treaty, the German Chancellor cried: “May the hand wither that signs
such a peace!” The German Foreign Minister, Count Ulrich von Brockendorff-Rantzau,
refused to sign, and the German government made public the terms of the treaty which it
had been offered.
French newspapers picked up the information, and at 4 a.m. one morning, a messenger
knocked at the door of the Paris hotel room where Herbert Hoover (the American war relief
administrator) was staying, and handed him a copy of the terms. Hoover was so upset that
he could sleep no more that night. He dressed and went out into the almost deserted Paris
streets, pacing up and down, trying to calm himself. “It seemed to me”, Hoover wrote
later, “that the economic consequences alone would pull down all Europe and thus injure
the United States.” By chance, Hoover met the British economist, John Maynard Keynes,
who was walking with General Jan Smuts in the pre-dawn Paris streets. Both of them had
received transcripts of the terms offered to Germany, and both were similarly upset. “We
agreed that it was terrible”, Hoover wrote later, “and we agreed that we would do what
we could... to make the dangers clear.”
In the end, continuation of the blockade forced the Germans to sign the treaty; but
they did so with deeply-felt bitterness. Describing the signing of the Versailles treaty on
June 28, 1919, a member of the American delegation wrote: “It was not unlike when in
olden times the conqueror dragged the conquered at his chariot wheel.”
While he participated in the peace negotiations, Wilson had been absent from the
United States for six months. During that time, Wilson’s Democratic Party had been
without its leader, and his Republican opponents made the most of the opportunity. Re-
publican majorities had been returned in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.
When Wilson placed the peace treaty before the Senate, the Senate refused to ratify it.
Wilson desperately wanted America to join the League of Nations, and he took his case to
the American people. He traveled 8,000 miles and delivered 36 major speeches, together
with scores of informal talks urging support for the League. Suddenly, in the middle of
this campaign, he was struck with a cerebral thrombosis from which he never recovered.
Without Wilson’s leadership, the campaign collapsed. The American Senate for a
second time rejected the peace treaty, and with it the League of Nations. Without American
participation, the League was greatly handicapped. It had many successes, especially in
cultural and humanitarian projects and in settling disputes between small nations; but
150 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

Figure 4.8: Hitler addresses a rally at Dortmund in 1932

it soon became clear that the League of Nations was not able to settle disputes between
major powers.
Postwar Germany was in a state of chaos - its economy in ruins. The nation was now a
republic, with its capital in Weimar, but this first experiment in German democracy was
not running smoothly. Many parts of the country, especially Bavaria, were swarming with
secret societies led by former officers of the German army. They blamed the republican
government for the economic chaos and for signing a disgraceful peace treaty. The “war
guilt” clause of the treaty especially offended the German sense of honor.
In 1920 a group of nationalist and monarchist army officers led by General Ludendorff
staged an army revolt or “Putsch”. They forcibly replaced the elected officials of the
Weimar Republic by a puppet head of state named Dr. Kapp. However, the republic was
saved by the workers of Berlin, who turned off the public utilities.
After the failure of the “Kapp Putsch”, Ludendorff went to Bavaria, where he met
Adolf Hitler, a member of a small secret society called the National Socialist German
Workers Party. (The name was abbreviated as “Nazi” after the German pronunciation
of the first two syllables of “National”). Together, Ludendorff and Hitler began to plot
another “Putsch”.
In 1921, the Reparations Commission fixed the amount that Germany would have to
pay at 135,000,000,000 gold marks. Various western economists realized that this amount
was far more than Germany would be able to pay; and in fact, French efforts to collect
it proved futile. Therefore France sent army units to occupy industrial areas of the Ruhr
in order to extract payment in kind. The German workers responded by sitting down
at their jobs. Their salaries were paid by the Weimar government, which printed more
and more paper money. The printing presses ran day and night, flooding Germany with
worthless currency. By 1923, inflation had reached such ruinous proportions that baskets
full of money were required to buy a loaf of bread. At one point, four trillion paper marks
4.2. THE TWO WORLD WARS 151

Figure 4.9: A portrait of Adolf Hitler

were equal to one dollar. This catastrophic inflation reduced the German middle class to
poverty and destroyed its faith in the orderly working of society.
The Nazi Party had only seven members when Adolf Hitler joined it in 1919. By 1923,
because of the desperation caused by economic chaos, it had grown to 70,000 members. On
November 8, 1923, there was a meeting of nationalists and monarchists at the Bürgerbräw
beer hall in Munich. The Bavarian State Commissioner, Dr. Gustav von Kahr, gave a
speech denouncing the Weimar Republic. He added, however, that the time was not yet
ripe for armed revolt.
In the middle of Kahr’s speech, Adolf Hitler leaped to the podium. Firing two revolver
bullets into the ceiling Hitler screamed that the revolution was on - it would begin imme-
diately! He ordered his armed troopers to bar the exits, and he went from one Bavarian
leader to the other, weeping with excitement, a beer stein in one hand and a revolver
in the other, pleading with them to support the revolution. At this point, the figure of
152 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

General Ludendorff suddenly appeared. In full uniform, and wearing all his medals, he
added his pleading to that of Hitler. The Bavarian leaders appeared to yield to Hitler and
Ludendorff; and that night the Nazis went into action. Wild disorder reigned in Munich.
Republican newspapers and trade union offices were smashed, Jewish homes were raided,
and an attempt was made to seize the railway station and the post office. However, units of
policemen and soldiers were forming to resist the Nazis. Hitler realized that the Bavarian
government officials under Kahr had only pretended to go along with the revolution in
order to escape from the armed troopers in the beer hall.
At dawn, Hitler grouped his followers together for a parade to show their strength
and to intimidate opposition. With swastika flags flying, the Nazis marched to the main
square of Munich. There they met troops of Bavarian government soldiers and policemen
massed in force. A volley of shots rang out, and 18 Nazis fell dead. Many other Nazis were
wounded, and the remainder scattered. Hitler broke his shoulder diving for the pavement.
Only General Ludendorff remained standing where he was. The half-demented old soldier,
who had exercised almost dictatorial power over Germany during the last years of the war,
marched straight for the Bavarian government troops. They stepped aside and let him
pass.
Adolf Hitler was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison. After serving less than
a year of his sentence, he was released. He had used the time in prison to write a book,
Mein Kampf.

4.3 Lessons from the First World War

We have recently marked the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the First World War.
It is important for society to look back at this catastrophic event, which still casts a dark
shadow over the future of human civilization. We must learn the bitter lessons which it
has to teach us, in order to avoid a repetition of the disaster.
As we have seen, World War I had its roots in the fanatical and quasi-religious na-
tionalist movements that developed in Europe during the 19th century. Nationalism is
still a potent force in todays world, but in an era of all-destroying weapons, instantaneous
worldwide communication, and global economic interdependence, fanatical nationalism has
become a dangerous anachronism. Of course, we should continue to be loyal to our families,
our local groups and our nations. But this must be supplemented by a wider loyalty to
the human race as a whole.
Hearing Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, with Schiller’s words, most of us experience a
feeling that resembles patriotism, but is broader: “All men are brothers!” Not just some,
but all. The choral movement of the symphony is like a national anthem of humanity. All
humans are brothers and sisters! All!
All nations and races have contributed to the great monument of human civilization.
It is a treasure that we all hold in common. We must join hands and work together for
our common future. Human unity has become more and more essential, because of the
serious problems that we are facing, for example climate change, vanishing resources, and
4.3. LESSONS FROM THE FIRST WORLD WAR 153

threats to food security. The problems are soluble, but only within a framework of peace
and cooperation.
Secondly, we can remember that the First World War started as a small operation by the
Austrian government to punish the Serbian nationalists; but it escalated uncontrollably
into a global disaster. Today, there are many parallel situations, where uncontrollable
escalation might produce a world-destroying conflagration.
Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu has frequently stated that, with or with-
out US backing, Israel intends to bomb Iran, an act that would be not only criminal but
also insane. Why criminal? Because it would violate both the UN Charter and and the
Nuremberg Principles. Why insane? Because the Middle East is already a deeply troubled
region, and a military attack on Iran could escalate uncontrollably into a general war in
the Middle East. Perhaps it could even escalate into World War III. Netanyahu has told
the people of Israel that the attack would involve only about 500 Israeli deaths and that
it would be over in a month. One is reminded of Kaiser Wilhelm’s words to his departing
troops: “You will be home before the leaves are off the trees!
In general, aggressive interventions, in Syria, Ukraine, the Korean Peninsula and else-
where, all present dangers for uncontrollable escalation into large and disastrous conflicts,
which might potentially threaten the survival of human civilization.
Another lesson from the history of World War I comes from the fact that none of the
people who started it had the slightest idea of what it would be like. Science and technology
had changed the character of war. The politicians and military figures of the time ought to
have known this, but they didn’t. They ought to have known it from the million casualties
produced by the use of the breach-loading rifle in the American Civil War. They ought to
have known it from the deadly effectiveness of the Maxim machine gun against the native
populations of Africa, but the effects of the machine gun in a European war caught them
by surprise.
Today, science and technology have again changed the character of war beyond all
recognition. In the words of the Nobel Laureate biochemist, Albert Szent-Györgyi, “The
story of man consists of two parts, divided by the appearance of modern science.... In
the first period, man lived in the world in which his species was born and to which his
senses were adapted. In the second, man stepped into a new, cosmic world to which he
was a complete stranger....The forces at man’s disposal were no longer terrestrial forces,
of human dimension, but were cosmic forces, the forces which shaped the universe. The
few hundred Fahrenheit degrees of our flimsy terrestrial fires were exchanged for the ten
million degrees of the atomic reactions which heat the sun....Man lives in a new cosmic
world for which he was not made. His survival depends on how well and how fast he can
adapt himself to it, rebuilding all his ideas, all his social and political institutions.”
Few politicians or military figures today have any imaginative understanding of what a
war with thermonuclear weapons would be like. Recent studies have shown that in a nuclear
war, the smoke from firestorms in burning cities would rise to the stratosphere where it
would remain for a decade, spreading throughout the world, blocking sunlight, blocking the
hydrological cycle and destroying the ozone layer. The effect on global agriculture would
be devastating, and the billion people who are chronically undernourished today would be
154 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

at risk. Furthermore, the tragedies of Chernobyl and Fukushima remind us that a nuclear
war would make large areas of the world permanently uninhabitable because of radioactive
contamination. A full-scale thermonuclear war would destroy human civilization and much
of the biosphere.
Finally, we must remember the role of the arms race in the origin of World War I, and
ask what parallels we can find in today’s world. England was the first nation to complete
the first stages of the Industrial Revolution. Industrialism and colonialism are linked, and
consequently England obtained an extensive colonial empire. In Germany, the Industrial
Revolution occurred somewhat later. However, by the late 19th century, Germany had
surpassed England in steel production, and, particularly at the huge Krupp plants in
Essen, Germany was turning to weapons production. The Germans felt frustrated because
by that time there were fewer opportunities for the acquisition of colonies.
According to the historian David Stevensen (1954 -), writing on the causes of World
War I, “A self-reinforcing cycle of heightened military preparedness... was an essential
element in the conjuncture that led to disaster... The armaments race... was a necessary
precondition for the outbreak of hostilities.”
Today, the seemingly endless conflicts that threaten to destroy our beautiful world are
driven by what has been called “The Devil’s Dynamo”. In many of the larger nations of
the world a military-industrial complex seems to have enormous power. Each year the
world spends roughly 1,700,000,000.000 US dollars on armaments, almost 2 trillion. This
vast river of money, almost too large to be imagined, pours into the pockets of weapons
manufacturers, and is used by them to control governments. This is the reason for the
seemingly endless cycle of threats to peace with which the ordinary people of the world
are confronted. Threats are needed to justify the diversion of such enormous quantities of
money from urgently needed social projects into the bottomless pit of war.

4.4 What is to be done?

No single person can achieve the changes that we need, but together we can do it. The
problem of building a stable, just, and war-free world is difficult, but it is not impossible.
The large regions of our present-day world within which war has been eliminated can serve
as models. There are a number of large countries with heterogeneous populations within
which it has been possible to achieve internal peace and social cohesion, and if this is
possible within such extremely large regions, it must also be possible globally.
In the long run, the survival of human civilization can only be ensured by abolition of
the institution of war.

Suggestions for further reading

1. E.J. Hobsbawn, The Age of Empire, 1875-1914, Vintage Books, (1989).
2. L. James, The Rise and Fall of the British Empire, St Martin’s Press, (1997).
4.4. WHAT IS TO BE DONE? 155

3. N. Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the
Lessons for Global Power, Basic Books, (2003).
4. S. Schama, The Fate of Empire, 1776-2000, Miramax, (2002).
5. A.P. Thorton, The Imperial Idea and Its Enemies: A Study in British Power, Pal-
grave Macmillan, (1985).
6. H. Mejcher, Imperial Quest for Oil: Iraq, 1910-1928, Ithaca Books, London, (1976).
7. P. Sluglett, Britain in Iraq, 1914-1932, Ithaca Press, London, (1976).
8. D.E. Omissi, British Air Power and Colonial Control in Iraq, 1920-1925, Manchester
University Press, Manchester, (1990).
9. V.G. Kiernan, Colonial Empires and Armies, 1815-1960, Sutton, Stroud, (1998).
10. R. Solh, Britain’s 2 Wars With Iraq, Ithaca Press, Reading, (1996).
11. D. Hiro, The Longest War: The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict, Routledge, New York,
(1991).
12. T.E. Lawrence, A Report on Mesopotamia by T.E. Lawrence, Sunday Times, August
22, (1920).
13. D. Fromkin, A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the
Creation of the Modern Middle East, Owl Books, (2001).
14. T. Rajamoorthy, Deceit and Duplicity: Some Reflections on Western Intervention in
Iraq, Third World Resurgence, March-April, (2003).
15. P. Knightley and C. Simpson, The Secret Lives of Lawrence of Arabia, Nelson, Lon-
don, (1969).
16. G. Lenczowski, The Middle East in World Affairs, Cornell University Press, (1962).
17. John A. Hobson, Imperialism; A Study, (1902).
18. P. Cain and T. Hopkins, British Imperialism, 1688-200, Longman, (2000).
19. N. Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the
Lessons for Global Power, Basic Books, (2003).
20. G. Kolko, Another Century of War, New Press, (2002).
21. G. Kolko, Confronting the Third World: United States Foreign Policy, 1945-1980,
Pantheon Books, (1988).
22. M.T. Klare, Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict, Owl Books
reprint edition, New York, (2002).
23. Y. Nakash, The Shi’is of Iraq, Princeton University Press, (1994).
24. D. Fromkin, A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the
Creation of the Modern Middle East, Owl Books, (2001).
25. S.K. Aburish, Saddam Hussein: The Politics of Revenge, Bloomsbury, London,
(2001).
26. M. Muffti, Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Order in Syria and Iraq,
Cornell University Press, (1996).
27. C. Clover, Lessons of the 1920 Revolt Lost on Bremer, Financial Times, November
17, (2003).
28. J. Kifner, Britain Tried First. Iraq Was No Picnic Then, New York Times, July 20,
(2003).
156 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

29. J. Feffer, B. Egrenreich and M.T. Klare, Power Trip: US Unilateralism and Global
Strategy After September 11, Seven Stories Press, (2003).
30. J.D. Rockefeller, Random Reminiscences of Men and Events, Doubleday, New York,
(1909).
31. M.B. Stoff, Oil, War and American Security: The Search for a National Policy on
Oil, 1941-1947, Yale University Press, New Haven, (1980).
32. W.D. Muscable, George F. Kennan and the Making of American Foreign Policy,
Princeton University Press, Princeton, (1992).
33. J. Stork, Middle East Oil and the Energy Crisis, Monthly Review, New York, (1976).
34. F. Benn, Oil Diplomacy in the Twentieth Century, St. Martin’s Press, New York,
(1986).
35. R. Sale, Saddam Key in Early CIA Plot, United Press International, April 10, (2003).
36. K. Roosevelt, Countercoup: The Struggle for the Control of Iran, McGraw-Hill, New
York, (1979).
37. J. Fitchett and D. Ignatius, Lengthy Elf Inquiry Nears Explosive Finish, International
Herald Tribune, February 1, (2002).
38. M.T. Klare, Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict, Owl Books
reprint edition, New York, (2002).
39. M. Klare, Bush-Cheney Energy Strategy: Procuring the Rest of the World’s Oil, For-
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47. E. Vulliamy, P. Webster and N.P. Walsh, Scramble to Carve Up Iraqi Oil Reserves
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68. G.H.W. Bush and B. Scowcroft, Why We Didn’t Remove Saddam, Time, 2 March,
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20, (2003).
71. R.J. Barnet, Intervention and Revolution: The United States in the Third World,
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158 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

77. L. Meyer, The Power of One, (World Press Review), Reforma, Mexico City, August
5, (1999).
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79. I. Ramonet, Servile States, Le Monde diplomatique, Fromkin Paris, October (2002),
World Press Review, December, (2002).
80. J.K. Galbraith, The Unbearable Costs of Empire, American Prospect magazine,
November, (2002).
81. G. Monbiot, The Logic of Empire, The Guardian, August 6, (2002), World Press
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82. W.R. Pitt, The Greatest Sedition is Silence, Pluto Press, (2003).
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84. W.B. Gallie, Understanding War: Points of Conflict, Routledge, London, (1991).
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86. J.D. Clarkson and T.C. Cochran, eds., War as a Social Institution, Colombia Uni-
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88. H. Mejcher, Imperial Quest for Oil: Iraq, 1910-1928, Ithaca Books, London, (1976).
89. D. Hiro, The Longest War: The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict, Routledge, New York,
(1991).
90. M. Klare, Bush-Cheney Energy Strategy: Procuring the Rest of the World’s Oil, For-
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92. T. Rajamoorthy, Deceit and Duplicity: Some Reflections on Western Intervention in
Iraq, Third World Resurgence, March-April, (2003).
93. P. Knightley and C. Simpson, The Secret Lives of Lawrence of Arabia, Nelson, Lon-
don, (1969).
94. G. Lenczowski, The Middle East in World Affairs, Cornell University Press, (1962).
95. D. Rose, Bush and Blair Made Secret Pact for Iraq War, Observer, April 4, (2004).
96. B. Gellman, Allied Air War Struck Broadly in Iraq; Officials Acknowledge Strategy
Went Beyond Purely Military Targets, Washington Post, June 23, (1991).
97. M. Fletcher and M. Theodoulou, Baker Says Sanctions Must Stay as Long as Saddam
Holds Power, Times, May 23, (1991).
98. J. Pienaar and L. Doyle, UK Maintains Tough Line on Sanctions Against Iraq, In-
dependent, May 11, (1991).
99. B. Blum (translator), Ex-National Security Chief Brzezinski Admits: Afghan Is-
lamism Was Made in Washington, Nouvel Observateur, January 15, (1998).
100. G. Vidal, Dreaming War: Blood for Oil and the Bush-Cheney Junta, Thunder’s
Mouth Press, (2002).
4.4. WHAT IS TO BE DONE? 159

101. H. Thomas, Preventive War Sets Serious Precedent, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, March
20, (2003).
102. C. Johnson, The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Repub-
lic, Henry Hold and Company, New York, (2004).
103. C. Johnson, Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, Henry
Hold and Company, New York, (2000).
104. M. Parenti, Against Empire: The Brutal Realities of U.S. Global Domination, City
Lights Books, 261 Columbus Avenue, San Francisco, CA94133, (1995).
105. E. Ahmad, Confronting Empire, South End Press, (2000).
106. W. Greider, Fortress America, Public Affairs Press, (1998).
107. J. Pilger, Hidden Agendas, The New Press, (1998).
108. S.R. Shalom, Imperial Alibis, South End Press, (1993).
109. C. Boggs (editor), Masters of War: Militarism and Blowback in the Era of American
Empire, Routledge, (2003).
110. J. Pilger, The New Rulers of the World, Verso, (2992).
111. G. Vidal, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace: How We Got To Be So Hated, Thun-
der’s Mouth Press, (2002).
112. W. Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower, Common Courage
Press, (2000).
113. M. Parenti, The Sword and the Dollar, St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New
York, NY 10010, (1989).
114. T. Bodenheimer and R. Gould, Rollback: Right-wing Power in U.S. Foreign Policy,
South End Press, (1989).
115. G. Guma, Uneasy Empire: Repression, Globalization, and What We Can Do, Toward
Freedom, (2003).
116. W. Blum, A Brief History of U.S. Interventions: 1945 to the Present, Z magazine,
June, (1999).
117. W. Blum, Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Intervention Since World War II
118. J.M. Cypher, The Iron Triangle: The New Military Buildup, Dollars and Sense mag-
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121. W. Hartung, F. Berrigan and M. Ciarrocca, Operation Endless Deployment: The
War With Iraq Is Part of a Larger Plan for Global Military Dominance, The Nation
magazine, October 21, (2002).
122. C. Johnson, The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Repub-
lic, Henry Hold and Company, New York, (2004).
123. C. Johnson, Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, Henry
Hold and Company, New York, (2000).
124. I. Ramonet, Servile States, Le Monde diplomatique, Paris, October (2002), World
Press Review, December, (2002).
160 FROM TRIBALISM TO NATIONALISM

125. J.K. Galbraith, The Unbearable Costs of Empire, American Prospect magazine,
November, (2002).
126. G. Monbiot, The Logic of Empire, The Guardian, August 6, (2002), World Press
Review, October, (2002).
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World?, The American Prospect magazine, April, (2003).
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11th Crisis, Olive Branch Press, (2002).
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Publishers, (2004).
136. A.J. Bacevich, American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy,
Harvard University Press, (2002).
137. D.R. Francis, Hidden Defense Costs Add Up to Double Trouble, Christian Science
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138. A. Sampson, The Seven Sisters: The Great Oil Companies of the World and How
They Were Made, Hodder and Staughton, London, (1988).
139. D. Yergin, The Prize, Simon and Schuster, New York, (1991).
140. E. Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions, Princeton University Press, Prince-
ton, (1982).
Chapter 5

NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM AND

NEO-FASCISM

5.1 Genocides in the Americas

Instances of genocide stain much of human history. Readers of Charles Darwin’s book
describing “The Voyage of the Beagle” will remember his horrifying account of General
Rosas’ genocidal war against the Amerind population of Argentina. Similar genocidal vio-
lence has been experienced by indigenous peoples throughout South and Central America,
and indeed throughout the world.
In general, the cultures of indigenous peoples require much land, and greed for this
land is the motive for violence against them. However, the genetic and cultural heritage
of indigenous peoples can potentially be of enormous value to humanity, and great efforts
should be made to protect them.
In North America, we can recall that military commanders, such as Lord Jeffrey
Amherst, deliberately inoculated the Indians with smallpox by giving them blankets from
smallpox hospitals. Amherst wrote to his associate, Colonel Henry Bouquet “You will do
well to try to inoculate the Indians, by means of blankets, as well as to try every other
method that can serve to extirpate this execrable race.” This is clearly an instance of
genocide, as well as being an example of the use of biological weapons.
The website of the Holocaust Museum Houston states that “Civil war existed in Guatemala
since the early 1960s due to inequalities existing in the economic and political life. In the
1970s, the Maya began participating in protests against the repressive government, de-
manding greater equality and inclusion of the Mayan language and culture. In 1980, the
Guatemalan army instituted “Operation Sophia,” which aimed at ending insurgent guer-
rilla warfare by destroying the civilian base in which they hid. This program specifically
targeted the Mayan population, who were believed to be supporting the guerilla movement.
Over the next three years, the army destroyed 626 villages, killed or ‘disappeared’ more
than 200,000 people and displaced an additional 1.5 million, while more than 150,000 were
driven to seek refuge in Mexico. Forced disappearance policies included secretly arresting

161
162 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.1: The atrocities they committed by the “conquistadors” over the
course of three centuries are far too many to be listed here, but there are
some that stand out. In the Caribbean, most of the native populations were
completely wiped out due to Spanish rapine and diseases. In Mexico, Hernan
Cortes and Pedro de Alvarado ordered the Cholula Massacre and the Temple
Massacre respectively, killing thousands of unarmed men, women and children.
In Peru, Francisco Pizarro captured Emperor Atahualpa in the midst of an un-
provoked bloodbath at Cajamarca. Wherever the conquistadors went, death
and misery for the natives followed.

or abducting people, who were often killed and buried in unmarked graves.”

5.2 Modern weapons and colonialism

In the 18th and 19th centuries, the continually accelerating development of science and
science-based industry began to affect the whole world. As the factories of Europe poured
out cheap manufactured goods, a change took place in the patterns of world trade: Before
the Industrial Revolution, trade routes to Asia had brought Asian spices, textiles and
luxury goods to Europe. For example, cotton cloth and fine textiles, woven in India, were
imported to England. With the invention of spinning and weaving machines, the trade
was reversed. Cheap cotton cloth, manufactured in England, began to be sold in India,
and the Indian textile industry withered, just as the hand-loom industry in England itself
had done a century before.
The rapid development of technology in the west also opened an enormous gap in
military strength between the industrialized nations and the rest of the world. Taking
advantage of their superior weaponry, the advanced industrial nations rapidly carved the
5.2. MODERN WEAPONS AND COLONIALISM 163

remainder of the world into colonies, which acted as sources of raw materials and food,
and as markets for manufactured goods.
Throughout the American continent, the native Indian population had proved vulner-
able to European diseases, such as smallpox, and large numbers of them had died. The
remaining Indians were driven westward by streams of immigrants arriving from Europe.
Often the industrialized nations made their will felt by means of naval bombardments:
In 1854, Commodore Perry forced Japan to accept foreign traders by threatening to bom-
bard Tokyo. In 1856, British warships bombarded Canton in China to punish acts of
violence against Europeans living in the city. In 1864, a force of European and Ameri-
can warships bombarded Choshu in Japan, causing a revolution. In 1882, Alexandria was
bombarded, and in 1896, Zanzibar.
Much that was beautiful and valuable was lost, as mature traditional cultures col-
lapsed, overcome by the power and temptations of modern industrial civilization. For the
Europeans and Americans of the late 19th century and early 20th century, progress was a
religion, and imperialism was its crusade.
Between 1800 and 1875, the percentage of the earth’s surface under European rule
increased from 35 percent to 67 percent. In the period between 1875 and 1914, there
was a new wave of colonial expansion, and the fraction of the earth’s surface under the
domination of colonial powers (Europe, the United States and Japan) increased to 85
percent, if former colonies are included. The unequal (and unfair) contest between the
industrialized countries, armed with modern weapons, and the traditional cultures with
their much more primitive arms, was summarized by the English poet Hilaire Belloc in a
sardonic couplet: 1
Whatever happens, we have got
The Maxim gun, and they have not.
During the period between 1880 and 1914, British industrial and colonial dominance
began to be challenged. Industrialism had spread from Britain to Belgium, Germany
and the United States, and, to a lesser extent, to France, Italy, Russia and Japan. By
1914, Germany was producing twice as much steel as Britain, and the United States was
producing four times as much. .
New techniques in weaponry were introduced, and a naval armaments race began among
the major industrial powers. The English found that their old navy was obsolete, and they
had to rebuild. Thus, the period of colonial expansion between 1880 and 1914 was filled
with tensions, as the industrial powers raced to arm themselves in competition with each
other, and raced to seize as much as possible of the rest of the world. Industrial and
colonial rivalry contributed to the outbreak of the First World War, to which the Second
World War can be seen as a sequel.
1
The Maxim gun was one of the world’s first automatic machine guns. It was invented in the United
States in 1884 by Hiram S. Maxim. The explorer and colonialist Henry Morton Stanley (1841-1904) was
extremely enthusiastic about Maxim’s machine gun, and during a visit to the inventor he tried firing it,
demonstrating that it really could fire 600 rounds per minute. Stanley commented that the machine gun
would be “a valuable tool in helping civilization to overcome barbarism”.
164 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

With the founding of the United Nations at the end of the Second World War, a system
of international law was set up to replace the rule of military force. Law is a mechanism
for equality. Under law, the weak and the powerful are in principle equal. One of the basic
purposes of the United Nations is to make war illegal, and if war is illegal, the powerful
and weak are on equal footing, much to the chagrin of the powerful. How can one can one
construct or maintain an empire if war is not allowed? It is only natural that powerful
nations should be opposed to international law, since it is a curb on their power. However,
despite opposition, the United Nations has been largely successful in ending the era of
colonialism, perhaps because of the balance of power between East and West during the
Cold War. One by one, former colonies have regained their independence.

5.3 Persistent effects of colonialism

Part of the extreme economic inequality that exists in today’s world is due to colonial and
neocolonial wars.
The English economist and Fabian, John Atkinson Hobson (1858-1940), offered a fa-
mous explanation of the colonial era in his book “Imperialism: A Study” (1902). According
to Hobson, the basic problem that led to colonial expansion was an excessively unequal
distribution of incomes in the industrialized countries. The result of this unequal distribu-
tion was that neither the rich nor the poor could buy back the total output of their society.
The incomes of the poor were insufficient, and rich were too few in number. The rich had
finite needs, and tended to reinvest their money. As Hobson pointed out, reinvestment in
new factories only made the situation worse by increasing output.
Hobson had been sent as a reporter by the Manchester Guardian to cover the Second
Boer War. His experiences had convinced him that colonial wars have an economic motive.
Such wars are fought, he believed, to facilitate investment of the excess money of the rich
in African or Asian plantations and mines, and to make possible the overseas sale of excess
5.4. RACISM, COLONIALISM AND EXCEPTIONALISM 165

manufactured goods. Hobson believed imperialism to be immoral, since it entails suffering

both among colonial peoples and among the poor of the industrial nations. The cure that
he recommended was a more equal distribution of incomes in the manufacturing countries.

5.4 Racism, colonialism and exceptionalism

It seems to be possible for nations, and the majority of their citizens, to commit the worst
imaginable atrocities, including torture, murder and genocide, while feeling that what they
are doing is both noble and good. Some understanding of how this is possible can be gained
by watching the 3-part BBC documentary, “The History of Racism”.2
The series was broadcast by BBC Four in March 2007, and videos of the broadcasts
are available on the Internet. Watching this eye-opening documentary can give us much
insight into the link between racism and colonialism. We can also begin to see how both
racism and colonialism are linked to US exceptionalism and neocolonialism.

5.5 Leopold II and Atrocities in Belgian Congo

Looking at the BBC documentary we can see how often in human history economic greed
and colonial exploitation have been justified by racist theories. The documentary describes
almost unbelievable cruelties committed against the peoples of the Americas and Africa by
Europeans. For example, in the Congo, a vast region which King Leopold II of Belgium
claimed as his private property, the women of villages were held as hostages while the men
were forced to gather rubber in the forests. Since neither the men nor the women could
produce food under these circumstances, starvation was the result.
Leopold’s private army of 90,000 men were issued ammunition, and to make sure that
they used it in the proper way, the army was ordered to cut off the hands of their victims
and send them back as proof that the bullets had not been wasted. Human hands became
a kind of currency, and hands were cut off from men, women and children when rubber
quotas were not fulfilled. Sometimes more than a thousand human hands were gathered in
a single day. During the rule of Leopold, roughly 10,000,000 Congolese were killed, which
was approximately half the population of the region.
According to the racist theories that supported these atrocities, it was the duty of
philanthropic Europeans like Leopold to bring civilization and the Christian religion to
Africa. Similar theories were used to justify the genocides committed by Europeans against
the native inhabitants of the Americas.
Racist theories were also used to justify enormous cruelties committed by the British
colonial government in India. For example, during the great famine of 1876-1878, in which
2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efI6T8lovqY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdBDRbjx9jo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCJHJWaNL-g
166 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.2: Half of the population of Belgian Congo died during the rule of
Leopold II.

ten million people died, the Viceroy, Lord Lytton, oversaw the export to England of a
record 6.4 million hundredweight of wheat.
Meanwhile, in Europe, almost everyone was proud of the role which they were playing
in the world. All that they read in newspapers and in books or heard from the pulpits of
their churches supported the idea that they were serving the non-Europeans by bringing
them the benefits of civilization and Christianity. On the whole, the mood of Europe
during this orgy of external cruelty and exploitation, was self-congratulatory.
Can we not see a parallel with the self-congratulatory mood of the American people and
their allies, who export violence, murder, torture and neocolonialism to the whole world,
and who justify it by thinking of themselves as ”exceptional”?
5.5. LEOPOLD II AND ATROCITIES IN BELGIAN CONGO 167

Figure 5.3: Joseph Conrad’s famous book was written against the background
of Leopold’s atrocities.
168 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.4: Heart of Darkness: An illustration for Joseph Conrad’s book.

Figure 5.5: Heart of Darkness: Another illustration for Conrad’s book.

Figure 5.6: Heart of Darkness: Joseph Conrad.

5.5. LEOPOLD II AND ATROCITIES IN BELGIAN CONGO 169

Figure 5.7: Heart of Darkness: King Leopold II of Belgium and some of his
victims.

Figure 5.8: Heart of Darkness: A drawing used in the campaign to end Leopold’s
personal ownership of the Congo.
170 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.9: Heart of Darkness: In Leopold’s Congo, human hands became a

currency.

Figure 5.10: Heart of Darkness: Part of a palace built by Leopold II to glorify

his “humanitarian” activities in the Congo.
5.5. LEOPOLD II AND ATROCITIES IN BELGIAN CONGO 171

Figure 5.11: Heart of Darkness. A statue of Leopold II.

Figure 5.12: Bones left by the German Kaiser’s African genocide.

172 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

5.6 The Kaiser’s genocide

A book entitled The Kaiser’s Holocaust: Germany’s Forgotten Genocide and the Colo-
nial Roots of Nazism, by David Olusoga and Caspar W. Erichsen describes Germany’s
involvement in an African genocide. Here is Amazon’s synopsis of the book: “On 12 May
1883, the German flag was raised on the coast of South-West Africa, modern Namibia -
the beginnings of Germany’s African Empire. As colonial forces moved in , their ruthless
punitive raids became an open war of extermination. Thousands of the indigenous people
were killed or driven out into the desert to die. By 1905, the survivors were interned in
concentration camps, and systematically starved and worked to death. Years later, the
people and ideas that drove the ethnic cleansing of German South West Africa would in-
fluence the formation of the Nazi Party. The Kaiser’s Holocaust uncovers extraordinary
links between the two regimes: their ideologies, personnel, even symbols and uniform. The
Herero and Nama genocide was deliberately concealed for almost a century. Today, as
the graves of the victims are uncovered, its re-emergence challenges the belief that Nazism
was an aberration in European history. The Kaiser’s Holocaust passionately narrates this
harrowing story and explores one of the defining episodes of the twentieth century from a
new angle. Moving, powerful and unforgettable, it is a story that needs to be told.”

5.7 The racism of Cecil Rhodes

Cecil Rhodes, who was born in Bishop’s Stortford in Hertfordshire, came to South Africa
in the late 1800s and made his fortune in the country’s diamond mines before moving into
politics. He served as prime minister of the Cape Colony and later founded the southern
African territory of Rhodesia, which would later become independent Zimbabwe. He was
the architect of South Africa’s notorious apartheid system, and a rabid advocate of British
imperialism. Social Darwinism and the eugenics movement may have contributed to the
racism and imperialism of Cecil Rhodes.
In a December 2015 article in The Telegraph, Dalia Gebrial wrote: “Cecil Rhodes was
a man responsible for untold, unending devastation and violence. An architect of South
African apartheid, he explicitly believed in the existence of an Anglo-Saxon master race -
an ideology that drove him to not only steal approximately one [square] million miles of
South African land, but to facilitate the deaths of hundreds of thousands of black South
Africans.
“His establishment of a paramilitary private army, the British South Africa Company’s
Police (BSACP) resulted in the systematic murder of approximately 60,000 people; his
amendment of the Masters and Servants Act (1890) reintroduced conditions of torture for
black labourers; his infamous racist ‘land grabs’ set up a system in which the unlawful and
illegitimate acquisition of land through armed force was routine.
“ In 1887 he told the House of Assembly in Cape Town: ‘The native is to be treated as a
child and denied the franchise. We must adopt a system of despotism in our relations with
the barbarians of South Africa.’ His 1892 Franchise and Ballot Act effectively eliminated
5.8. FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE 173

African voting rights. He repeatedly reminded his colleagues of the ‘extreme caution’ they
must exercise when it comes to ‘granting the franchise to coloured people.
Rhodes wanted to create an international movement to extend British influence. He
once said: “Why should we not form a secret society with but one object, the furtherance of
the British Empire and the bringing of the whole world under British rule, for the recovery
of the United States, for making the Anglo-Saxon race but one Empire?”
Rhodes did, in fact, establish this secret society, and it remains very influential today.
According to G. Edward Griffin3 , “Financed by Nathan Rothschild and the Bank of Eng-
land, he [Rhodes] established a monopoly over the diamond output of South Africa and
most of the gold as well. He formed a secret society which included many of the top leaders
of British government. Their elitist goal was nothing less than world domination and the
establishment of a modern feudalist society controlled by themselves through the world’s
central banks. In America, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) was an outgrowth of
that group.”

5.8 Friedrich Nietzsche

The extremely influential German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), began his
career as a classical philologist. At the age of 24, he became the youngest ever to hold
the Chair of Classical Philology at the University of Basel. However, ten years later he
was forced to resign from this position because of health problems. During the following
decade, cared for by his mother, Nietzsche completed most of his writing. At the age of
44, he suffered a breakdown and the complete loss of his mental facilities. He died in 1900
at the age of 55.
Wikipedia states that “Nietzsche defined master morality as the morality of the strong-
willed. Nietzsche criticizes the view, which he identifies with contemporary British ideology,
that good is everything that is helpful, and bad is everything that is harmful. He argues
proponents of this view have forgotten the origins of its values, and is based merely on a
non-critical acceptance of habit: what is useful has always been defined as good, therefore
usefulness is goodness as a value. He continues explaining, that in the prehistoric state,
‘the value or non-value of an action was derived from its consequences,’ but ultimately,
‘There are no moral phenomena at all, only moral interpretations of phenomena.’ For
strong-willed men, the ‘good’ is the noble, strong, and powerful, while the ‘bad’ is the
weak, cowardly, timid, and petty.”
Nietzsche states that “The noble type of man experiences itself as determining values; it
does not need approval; it judges, ‘what is harmful to me is harmful in itself’; it knows itself
to be that which first accords honor to things; it is value-creating.” In this sense, the master
morality is the full recognition that oneself is the measure of all moral truths. Insofar as
something is helpful to the strong-willed man, it is like what he values in himself; therefore,
the strong-willed man values such things as good, because they aid him in a lifelong process
of self-actualization through the will to power.
3
in his book, The Creature from Jeckyll Island
174 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.13: Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900). The posthumous editions of his

works, edited by his racist sister, made his ideas even worse than they were in
his original publications.

By contrast Nietzsche describes slave morality as follows: “Slave morality does not aim
at exerting one’s will by strength but by careful subversion. It does not seek to transcend
the masters, but to make them slaves as well. The essence of slave morality is utility:[4] the
good is what is most useful for the whole community, not the strong. Nietzsche saw this as
a contradiction. Since the powerful are few in number compared to the masses of the weak,
the weak gain power by corrupting the strong into believing that the causes of slavery (viz.,
the will to power) are ‘evil’, as are the qualities they originally could not choose because of
their weakness. By saying humility is voluntary, slave morality avoids admitting that their
humility was in the beginning forced upon them by a master. Biblical principles of turning
the other cheek, humility, charity, and pity are the result of universalizing the plight of
the slave onto all humankind, and thus enslaving the masters as well. ‘The democratic
movement is the heir to Christianity.’ - the political manifestation of slave morality because
of its obsession with freedom and equality.”
Nazi atrocities, wars and genocides were inspired by Nietzsche’s ideas, as well as those
of the Eugenics and Social Darwinist movements.

5.9 Nazi atrocities and genocides

The Eugenics movement and the ideas of Nietzsche, Galton and Spengler must bear at least
part of the blame for Nazi atrocities and genocides. During the World War II Holocaust,
six million Jews were systematically murdered. This amounted to two thirds of the Jewish
5.9. NAZI ATROCITIES AND GENOCIDES 175

Figure 5.14: Nazi genocides: A pile of corpses in the Buchenwald extermination

camp.

population of Europe. A broader definition of the Holocaust includes the murder of the
Roma and the “incurably sick”. as well as ethnic Poles, other Slavic groups, Soviet citi-
zens and prisoners of war, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, black people, and political
opponents.
At least three million Soviet prisoners of war died in German custody, but this figure is
small compared with the total number of lives lost in the Soviet Union during World War
II. Depending on which historian you believe, the USSR lost at least 11,000,000 soldiers
(killed and missing) as well as somewhere between 7,000,000 and 20,000,000 million of its
civilians. The total number of people killed in World War II is approximately 60,000,000. If
deaths from war-related disease and famine are included, this figure becomes an estimated
80,000,000.
176 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.15: The idea of the superiority of one race over another was at the root
of Nazi atrocities.

Figure 5.16: Nazi racism was built on the idea that Aryans are superior to all
other races. But who is to decide? Will not each ethnic group or nation
always decide that they themselves are the “chosen people”, loved by God and
superior to all others?
5.10. AYN RAND 177

Figure 5.17: Baba Yar.

5.10 Ayn Rand

Alisa Zinov’yevna Rosenbaum, who later renamed herself “Ayn Rand”, was born in St.
Petersburg in 1905. After her education in Russia, she moved to the United States in 1926.

Two of her early novels were unsuccessful in the United States, but in 1943 she achieved
fame with her third novel, The Fountainhead. Later, in 1957, she published another highly
successful novel, Atlas Struggled. After these two novels, Rand abandoned fiction and began
to publish a magazine to promote her personal philosophy. She also published collections
of essays until her death in 1982.
The philosophy which she promoted in her books, magazine and essays is close to the
“Will To Power” ideas of Nietzsche, which lie behind Nazi ideology and genocides. Rand’s
ideas are also closely related to the neoliberal philosophy of military world dominance that
we see in the Project for a New American Century.
The hero of The Fountainhead, is an individualistic young architect named Howard
Roark, who designs uncompromisingly modernistic buildings despite the opposition of the
majority of architects, who are unwilling to accept innovation. Rand presents her hero as
the embodiment of the ideal man. He personifies her belief that individualism is superior
to collectivism.
In Atlas Struggled, which Ayn Rand regarded as her magnum opus, she presents us
with a picture of a dystopian American society in which the efficiency of private businesses
is undermined by government regulations and by “looting”. As the novel ends, a new
hyper-capitalist society is being planned.
Three films based on Atlas Struggled were produced as a series, Part I in 2011, Part
II in 2012, and Part III in 2014, but they achieved neither critical nor box-office success.
By contrast, the novel itself was translated into many languages, and by 1984 its sales
had exceeded 5 million copies. The book continues to sell very well, especially in times of
financial crisis. In 2011 it sold 445,000 copies.
178 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.18: Ayn Rand’s version of the ”Great Man Theory” has many followers
today.
5.10. AYN RAND 179

Figure 5.19: Neoliberalism: Economic inequality is increasing today, both within

nations and between nations. One of the worst consequences is the control of
governments by small oligarchies and the decay of true democracy.

Figure 5.20: Neoliberalism: A map of the world.

180 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

5.11 Revival of Nazi ideology after World War II

According to Wikipedia, “Neo-Nazism consists of post-World War II militant social or
political movements seeking to revive and implement the ideology of Nazism. Neo-Nazis
seek to employ their ideology to promote hatred and attack minorities, or in some cases to
create a fascist political state. It is a global phenomenon, with organized representation
in many countries and international networks. It borrows elements from Nazi doctrine,
including ultranationalism, racism, xenophobia, ableism, homophobia, anti-Romanyism,
antisemitism, anti-communism and initiating the Fourth Reich. Holocaust denial is a
common feature, as is the incorporation of Nazi symbols and admiration of Adolf Hitler.

“In some European and Latin American countries, laws prohibit the expression of pro-
Nazi, racist, anti-Semitic, or homophobic views. Many Nazi-related symbols are banned
in many European countries - in particular Germany and Austria - in an effort to curtail
neo-Nazism.
“Following the defeat of Nazi Germany, the political ideology of the ruling party,
Nazism, was in complete disarray. However, conspiracy theories emerged about Hitler
himself, that he had secretly survived the war and fled to South America or elsewhere.
“The Allied Control Council officially dissolved the NSDAP on 10 October 1945, mark-
ing the end of ”Old” National Socialism. A process of denazification began, and the
Nuremberg trials took place, where many major leaders and ideologues were condemned
to death by October 1946, others committed suicide. Otto Ernst Remer, leader of the
postwar Socialist Reich Party.
“In both the East and West, surviving ex-party members and military veterans assim-
ilated to the new reality and had no interest in constructing a ”neo-Nazism.” However,
during the 1949 elections a number of National Socialist advocates such as Fritz Rössler
had infiltrated the national conservative Deutsche Rechtspartei, which had 5 members
elected. Rössler and others left to found the more radical Socialist Reich Party under Otto
Ernst Remer. At the onset of the Cold War, the SRP favoured the Soviet Union over the
United States.”
5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 181

Figure 5.21: Otto Ernst Remer, leader of the postwar Socialist Reich Party.
182 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.22: Otto Strasser, leader of the German Social Union, returned from
exile to Germany in the mid-1950s.
5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 183

Figure 5.23: George Lincoln Rockwell, founder of the American Nazi Party and
progenitor of subsequent uniformed neo-Nazi groups.
184 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.24: The Italian group Ordine Nuovo, banned in 1974, drew influence
from the Waffen-SS and Guénonian Traditionalism via Julius Evola.

Figure 5.25: The radicalisation of Flemish activist group the Vlaamse Militanten
Orde in the 1970s, energized international neo-Nazism.
5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 185

Figure 5.26: Serrano identified Aryan-Hyperborean blood as the “light of the

Black Sun”, a symbol found at SS-cult site Wewelsburg Castle.

Figure 5.27: Members of the National Bolshevik Party. ”Nazbols” tailor ultra-
nationalist themes to a native Russian environment while still employing Na-
tional Socialist aesthetics.
186 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.28: The nearest Italy came to returning to fascism was the 1970 Golpe
Borghese of commando veteran Junio Valerio Borghese.
5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 187

Figure 5.29: French neo-fascist groups adopted the Celtic cross as an ambiguous
“Christian and pagan” symbol since the 1940s.

Figure 5.30: Young boy wearing a shirt with a Black Legion sign at a Thompson
concert in Croatia.
188 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.31: “Hungaria Skins” with a flag evoking the Arrow Cross in 1997.

Figure 5.32: Protesters with neo-Nazi symbols - SS-Volunteer Division “Galicia”

and Patriot of Ukraine flags.
5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 189

Figure 5.33: Ukrainian volunteer battalion members with neo-Nazi Wolfsangel

symbol, 24 July 2014.

Figure 5.34: Neo-Nazi skinheads in Spain.

190 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.35: Neo-Nazi demonstration in Leipzig, Germany in October 2009.

Figure 5.36: Flag of the Golden Dawn (Greece).

5.11. REVIVAL OF NAZI IDEOLOGY AFTER WORLD WAR II 191

Figure 5.37: ONR march in Poznań in November 2015.

192 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.38: Neo-Nazism in Russia: The photograph was taken at an anti-gay

demonstration in Moscow in October 2010.
5.12. ALT-RIGHT 193

5.12 Alt-right
The Associated Press gives the following definition of the alt-right movement:
“The ’alt-right’ or ’alternative right’ is a name currently embraced by some white
supremacists and white nationalists to refer to themselves and their ideology, which em-
phasizes preserving and protecting the white race in the United States in addition to, or
over, other traditional conservative positions such as limited government, low taxes and
strict law-and-order. The movement has been described as a mix of racism, white nation-
alism and populism ... criticizes ‘multiculturalism’ and more rights for non-whites, women,
Jews, Muslims, gays, immigrants and other minorities. Its members reject the American
democratic ideal that all should have equality under the law regardless of creed, gender,
ethnic origin or race.”
Wikipedia states that “The alt-right, an abbreviation of alternative right, is a loosely
connected far-right, white supremacist, white nationalist, white separatist, anti-immigration
and sometimes antisemitic movement based in the United States. A largely online phe-
nomenon, the alt-right originated in the U.S. during the 2010s although it has since estab-
lished a presence in various other countries. The term is ill-defined, having been used in
different ways by various self-described ‘alt-rightists’, media commentators, and academics.
“In 2010, the American white nationalist Richard B. Spencer launched The Alterna-
tive Right webzine to disseminate his ideas. Spencer’s ‘alternative right’ was influenced
by earlier forms of American white nationalism, as well as paleoconservatism, the Dark
Enlightenment, and the Nouvelle Droite. Critics charged it with being a rebranding of
white supremacism. His term was shortened to ”alt-right” and popularized by far-right
participants of /pol/, the politics board of web forum 4chan. It came to be associated with
other white nationalist websites and groups, including Andrew Anglin’s Daily Stormer,
Brad Griffin’s Occidental Dissent, and Matthew Heimbach’s Traditionalist Worker Party...

“The alt-right is a white nationalist, biologically racist movement. Part of its mem-
bership supports anti-immigrationist policies to ensure a continued white majority in the
United States. Others call for the breakup of the country to form a white separatist
ethno-state in North America. Some alt-rightists seek to make white nationalism socially
respectable in the U.S., while others - known as the ‘1488’ scene - adopt openly white
supremacist and neo-Nazi stances. Some alt-rightists are anti-semitic, promoting a con-
spiracy theory that there is a Jewish plot to bring about white genocide; other alt-rightists
view most Jews as members of the white race. The alt-right is anti-feminist, advocates
for a more patriarchal society, and intersects with the men’s rights movement and other
sectors of the online manosphere...
“Membership was overwhelmingly white and male, with academic and anti-fascist ob-
servers linking its growth to deteriorating living standards and prospects, anxieties about
the place of white masculinity, and anger at increasingly visible left-wing forms of identity
politics like the Black Lives Matter movement. Constituent groups using the ”alt-right”
label have been characterized as hate groups,[2][3] while alt-right material has been a con-
tributing factor in the radicalisation of young white men responsible for a range of far-right
194 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.39: Prominent alt-rightists were instrumental in organizing the ”Unite

the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017. Here, rally par-
ticipants carry Confederate battle flags, Gadsden flags and a Nazi flag.

murders and terrorist attacks in the U.S. since 2014.”

5.12. ALT-RIGHT 195

Figure 5.40: Heather Heyer was murdered in 2017 by a white nationalist rally
participant in Charlottesville. Since then, mass shootings in Poway, Gilroy,
and El Paso and elsewhere have been each linked to white nationalist beliefs.
196 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.41: Breitbart News amplified and popularized alt-right ideas under the
editorship of “alt-lite” figure Steve Bannon.

Figure 5.42: The alt-right largely rallied behind the presidential candidacy of
Donald Trump, although he later distanced himself from the movement.
5.12. ALT-RIGHT 197

Figure 5.43: A participant at the Unite the Right rally giving a Nazi salute in
front of counter-protesters.

Figure 5.44: The alt-rightist was then punched in an altercation with counter-
protesters.
198 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.45: Protestors at the 2017 Unite the Right rally, which was promoted
by the alt-right. One man carries the logo of Vanguard America, and another
has a t-shirt praising German Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

Figure 5.46: An attendee at the Unite the Right rally carrying a firearm and
wearing a Confederate Battle Flag T-shirt.
5.12. ALT-RIGHT 199

Figure 5.47: “Trump is Alt-Right with Us.” Anti-Trump protesters highlight

what they regard as his links to the alt-right and to historical fascism by dress-
ing as Hitler and Mussolini.
200 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

5.13 The Klu Klux Klan

Following the defeat of the Confederate states in the US Civil War, the original Klu Klux
Klan was established in the south to overthrow northern rule, and to terrorize freed slaves
who were thought to be a threat to white womanhood. Large numbers of black people and
their sympathizers were lynched and murdered by the original KKK. The organization was
outlawed in 1871.
The Klu Klux Klan was revived in 1915, inspired by D.W. Griffith’s influential but
controversial film The Birth of a Nation, which depicted the original Klan in a positive
light. In this second incarnation which lasted until until the mid-1920’s, the KKK sought
to maintain Protestant white supremacy, and opposed both Roman Catholicism and the
influence of Jews.
The third incarnation of the Klu Klux Klan came in the 1950’s. Local groups have
opposed civil rights activists, and murdered many of them. The KKK is classified as a
hate group by the Anti-Defamation League.
Wikipedia states that “The second and third incarnations of the Ku Klux Klan made
frequent references to America’s ‘Anglo-Saxon’ blood, hearkening back to 19th-century
nativism. Although members of the KKK swear to uphold Christian morality, virtually
every Christian denomination has officially denounced the KKK”.
5.13. THE KLU KLUX KLAN 201

Figure 5.48: KKK rally in Chicago, c. 1920.

Figure 5.49: Three Klu Klux Klan members at a 1922 parade. Trump’s father
was a well-known Klansman in New York and New Jersey in his hey days.
202 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.50: Cross burning was introduced by William J. Simmons, the founder
of the second Klan in 1915.

Figure 5.51: Klu Klux Klan members at a cross burning in 2005.

5.13. THE KLU KLUX KLAN 203

Figure 5.52: Sheet music to “We Are All Loyal Klansmen”, 1923.
204 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.53: Klu Klux Klan members march down Pennsylvania Avenue in Wash-
ington, D.C. in 1928.

Figure 5.54: Historically, the Klu Klux Klan has been responsible for innumer-
able lynchings.
5.14. PROUD BOYS 205

5.14 Proud Boys

Wikipedia states that “The Proud Boys is a far-right neo-fascist organization which admits
only men as members and promotes political violence. It is based in the United States and
has a presence in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom. The group was started in
2016 by Vice Media co-founder and former commentator Gavin McInnes, taking its name
from the song ‘Proud of Your Boy’ from the Disney film Aladdin. Proud Boys emerged
as part of the alt-right, but in early 2017, McInnes began distancing himself from the
alt-right, saying the alt-right’s focus is race while his focus is what he defines as ‘Western
values’. This re-branding effort intensified after the Unite the Right Rally 4 .
“The group sees men - especially white men - and Western culture as under siege; their
views have elements of white genocide conspiracy theory. While the group claims it does
not support white supremacist views, its members often participate in racist rallies, events,
and organizations. The organization glorifies violence, and members engage in violence at
events it attends; the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has called it an ‘alt-right fight
club’.
“The organization has been described as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law
Center and NPR’s The Takeaway, and Spencer, McInnes, and the Proud Boys have been
described as hipster racists by Vox and Media Matters for America. McInnes says victim
mentality of women and other historically oppressed groups is unhealthy: ‘There is an
incentive to be a victim. It is cool to be a victim.’ He sees white men and Western culture
as ‘under siege’ and described criticism of his ideas as ”victim blaming”. Their views have
elements of white genocide conspiracy theory. The group is part of the ‘alt lite’ and it is
‘overtly Islamophobic’...
“The organization glorifies political violence against leftists, re-enacting political assas-
sinations, wearing shirts that praise Augusto Pinochet’s murders of leftists, and partici-
pating directly in political violence. McInnes has said ‘I want violence, I want punching
in the face. I’m disappointed in Trump supporters for not punching enough.’ He stated,
‘We don’t start fights [...] but we will finish them.’ Heidi Beirich, the Intelligence Project
director for the Southern Poverty Law Center, said that this form of intentional aggression
was not common among far-right groups in the past; she said: ‘ We’re going to show up and
we’re intending to get in fights, that’s a new thing.’ In August 2018, Twitter shut down
the official account for the group, as well as McInnes’ account, under its policy prohibiting
violent extremist groups; at the time, the group’s profile photo was a member punching a
counter-protester.

4
Wikipedia describes this event as follows: “The Unite the Right rally was a white supremacist rally
that occurred in Charlottesville, Virginia, from August 11 to 12, 2017. Protesters were members of the
far-right and included self-identified members of the alt-right, neo-Confederates, neo-fascists,[13] white
nationalists, neo-Nazis, Klansmen, and various right-wing militias. The marchers chanted racist and
antisemitic slogans, carried semi-automatic rifles, Nazi and neo-Nazi symbols (such as the swastika, Odal
rune, Black Sun, and Iron Cross), the Valknut, Confederate battle flags, Deus Vult crosses, flags and other
symbols of various past and present anti-Muslim and antisemitic groups.”
206 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.55: Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes.

Figure 5.56: A member of Proud Boys.

5.15. EVANGELICALS 207

5.15 Evangelicals
Here is an excerpt from a December 31, 2018 article in the New York Times by Katherine
Stewart:
The month before the 2018 midterms, a thousand theaters screened “The
Trump Prophecy,” a film that tells the story of Mark Taylor, a former firefighter
who claims that God told him in 2011 that Donald Trump would be elected
president.
At a critical moment in the film, just after the actor representing Mr. Taylor
collapses in the flashing light of an epiphany, he picks up a Bible and turns to
the 45th chapter of the book of Isaiah, which describes the anointment of King
Cyrus by God. In the next scene, we hear Mr. Trump being interviewed on
“The 700 Club,” a popular Christian television show.
As Lance Wallnau, an evangelical author and speaker who appears in the
film, once said, “I believe the 45th president is meant to be an Isaiah 45 Cyrus,”
who will “restore the crumbling walls that separate us from cultural collapse.”
Cyrus, in case you’ve forgotten, was born in the sixth century B.C.E. and
became the first emperor of Persia. Isaiah 45 celebrates Cyrus for freeing a
population of Jews who were held captive in Babylon. Cyrus is the model for
a nonbeliever appointed by God as a vessel for the purposes of the faithful.
The identification of the 45th president with an ancient Middle Eastern
potentate isn’t a fringe thing. “The Trump Prophecy” was produced with
the help of professors and students at Liberty University, whose president,
Jerry Falwell Jr., has been instrumental in rallying evangelical support for Mr.
Trump. Jeanine Pirro of Fox News has picked up on the meme, as has Ron
Dermer, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, among many others.
As the Trump presidency falls under siege on multiple fronts, it has become
increasingly clear that the so-called values voters will be among the last to
leave the citadel. A lot of attention has been paid to the supposed paradox
of evangelicals backing such an imperfect man, but the real problem is that
our idea of Christian nationalism hasn’t caught up with the reality. We still
buy the line that the hard core of the Christian right is just an interest group
working to protect its values. But what we don’t get is that Mr. Trump’s
supposedly anti-Christian attributes and anti-democratic attributes are a vital
part of his attraction.
Today’s Christian nationalists talk a good game about respecting the Con-
stitution and America’s founders, but at bottom they sound as if they prefer
autocrats to democrats. In fact, what they really want is a king. ‘It is God
that raises up a king,” according to Paula White, a prosperity gospel preacher
who has advised Mr. Trump.
Ralph Drollinger, who has led weekly Bible study groups in the White House
attended by Vice President Mike Pence and many other cabinet members, likes
the word “king” so much that he frequently turns it into a verb. “Get ready
208 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.57: Apparently insanity rules the United States today. The Evangelical
Right believes that Trump was sent by God to be King, despite the fact that,
according to Glenn Kessler, author of the Washington Post’s Fact Checker
column, Trump told an average of 15 lies per day in 2018, bringing the total
number of documented lies since he took office in January 2017 to 7,645. But
neither Trump’s lies, nor his racism and mysogeny, nor his cruel authoriza-
tion of imprisonment of very young children and even babies, are his worst
crimes. His most serious offense is a crime against human civilization and the
biosphere: his support for coal, his climate change denial, his sabotaging of
renewable energy, and his withdrawal from the Paris agreement. These ac-
tions. and support for them by Republicans, caused Noam Chomsky to call
the Republican Party “the most dangerous organization in history”.

to king in our future lives,” he tells his followers. “Christian believers will -
soon, I hope - become the consummate, perfect governing authorities!”
The great thing about kings like Cyrus, as far as today’s Christian nation-
alists are concerned, is that they don’t have to follow rules. They are the law.
This makes them ideal leaders in paranoid times.
5.15. EVANGELICALS 209

Figure 5.58: An artist’s impression of Trump’s National Security Advisor John

Bolton.

Figure 5.59: Stars and stripes.

210 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.60: Anti-Mexican language used by Trump is very similar to the lan-
guage used by the El Paso mass murderer. A recent article Ex-FBI Official,
FBI reluctant to probe white supremacists because Trump considers them his
base, quotes Dave Gomez as saying “There’s some reluctance among agents to
bring forth an investigation that targets what the president perceives as his
base.”

Figure 5.61: Family members mourning the victims of the El Paso murders.
5.15. EVANGELICALS 211

Figure 5.62: A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial outside Walmart,

near the scene of a mass shooting which left 22 people dead, on August 4, 2019,
in El Paso, Texas.
212 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

5.16 The El Paso mass murders

On the morning of August 3, 2019, 21-year-old Patrick Wood Crusius, a Republican follower
of Donald Trump, walked into a Walmart in El Paso Texas. carrying an AK-47 automatic
weapon. He opened fire on the largely Latino customers, killing 22 people and seriously
injuring 24 others. In a manifesto, which he published on the Internet just before the
murders, he wrote “In general, I support the Christchurch shooter and his manifesto. This
attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas. They are the instigators, not me. I
am simply defending my country from cultural and ethnic replacement brought on by an
invasion.” The language and ideas used by Crucius are similar to those of Donald Trump,
who often speaks of a Mexican invasion.
The following day, there was another mass shooting, this time in Dayton, Ohio. Again
an automatic attack rifle was used. Nine people were killed.
Between January and February, 2019, President Donald Trump’s Facebook page ran
about 2,200 ads referring to immigration as an “invasion”.

5.17 The murder of George Floyd

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, which is in itself a crisis, many American cities
have erupted in massive protests over the senseless killing by police of yet another black
man - George Floyd. The country is deeply divided. Throughout the world there have
been anti-racist protests, partly in sympathy with the US protesters, and partly because
racism exists in many countries.
Donald Trump, who was elected on an openly racist platform, and who has been a
racist in both word and deed during his term of office, has reacted by threatening to use
the US army against citizens of his own country, calling the demonstrators “lowlifes and
losers”, and telling governors, “If you don’t dominate, you are wasting your time”.
After hiding in a White House bunker, Donald Trump ordered officers to clear a path
for him so that he could be photographed holding a Bible in front of St. John’s Episcopal
Church. The forces used tear gas and flash grenades against peaceful protesters in Lafayette
Square.
Trump’s threats to use federal troops were too much for defense secretary, Mark Esper,
who insisted that military personnel “be used as a matter of last resort, and only in the
most urgent and dire of situations”.
Another rebuke came from Trump’s former secretary of defense, James Mattis, who
said, “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the
American people. We know that we are better than the abuse of executive authority that
we witnessed in Lafayette Square. We must reject and hold accountable those in office who
would make a mockery of our constitution”.
What will happen if Trump loses the 2020 election but refuses to give up the White
House, claiming that the votes were counted incorrectly? Will the military support him?
This danger has to be considered. We must remember the testimony before congress of
5.17. THE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD 213

Figure 5.63: Frame from witness video, showing Derek Chauvin kneeling on
George Floyd’s neck.

Trump’s former associate Michael Cohen, who said, “I fear that if he loses the election in
2020, there will never be a peaceful transition of power”.
214 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.64: A makeshift memorial outside the store where Floyd was killed.

Figure 5.65: George Floyd’s death changed the world.

5.17. THE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD 215

Figure 5.66: Protests erupted throughout the world, partly in sympathy for anti-
racist protests in the United States, and partly because racism exists in many
countries.
216 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.67: An anti-racist protest march in Spain.

5.17. THE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD 217

Figure 5.68: Donald Trump holding a Bible in front of Ashburton House,

the parish house of St. John’s Episcopal Church. Minutes before a speech
by Trump in the White House Rose Garden, hundreds of officers in riot
gear rapidly advanced on the protesters at the direction of Attorney General
William Barr. Officers used chemical irritants (including tear gas and pepper
balls), flash grenades, smoke canisters, rubber bullets, riot shields, and batons
to disperse the crowd. By 6:30 p.m., police were pushing people off the patio of
St. John’s Church. Police on foot and mounted police on horses began moving
the crowd west down H towards Connecticut Avenue by 6:35 p.m.

Figure 5.69: Donald Trump was elected on an openly racist platform, and he has
been a racist in both word and deed during his term of office. He has shown
contempt for the truth, for both domestic and international law, and for the
US Constitution,
218 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

5.18 Right-wing parties in Europe and elsewhere.

Brexit
Across the developed world, the reaction to threatened migration of refugees from climate
change has been less than generous, to say the least. The recent decision of Britain to
leave the European Union was motivated largely by the fear of British workers that EU
laws would force their country to accept large numbers of refugees.

Swings to the right in Europe

In Germany, Angela Merkel’s generous policies towards refugees have cost her votes, while
an openly racist party, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, has gained in strength.
Frauke Petry, 40, the party’s leader, has said border guards might need to turn guns on
anyone crossing a frontier illegally. The party’s policy platform says “Islam does not belong
in Germany” and calls for a ban on the construction of mosques.
In September, 2017, eight people from the neo-Nazi Freital Group were put on trial in
Dresden for bomb attacks on homes for asylum applicants. Hundreds of similar assaults
occur in Germany every year, but they had never before been tried as terrorism in a federal
court.
In the German election, which took place on Sunday, October 1, 2017, Angela Merkel
won a fourth term as Chancellor, but her party won only 33% of the votes, a percentage
much reduced from the 41% won in the election of 2013. Angela Merkel was paying a high
price for her refugee-friendly policies.
Meanwhile the far right anti-immigration AfD party made a historic breakthrough,
winning 13.5% of the vote, thus becoming the first overtly nationalist party to sit in the
Bundestag in 60 years. The Greens have already complained that “Nazis have returned to
parliament”. In fact, members of the AfD party have begun to say that Germans should
stop being ashamed of their country’s Nazi past.
In France, the National Front is a nationalist party that uses populist rhetoric to pro-
mote its anti-immigration and anti-European Union positions. The party favors protec-
tionist economic policies and would clamp down on government benefits for immigrants.

Similarly, in the Netherlands, the anti-European Union, anti-Islam Party for Freedom
has called for closing all Islamic schools and recording the ethnicity of all Dutch citizens. In
early November, the party was leading in polls ahead of next year’s parliamentary elections.

Other far-right anti-immigrant parties in Europe include Golden Dawn (Greece), Jobbic
(Hungary), Sweden Democrats (Sweden), Freedom Party (Austria), and People’s Party
- Our Slovakia (Slovakia). All of these parties have gained in strength because of the
widespread fear of immigration.
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 219

Populism in the United States

The election of Donald Trump, who ran for President in 2016 on an openly racist and
anti-immigrant platform, can also be seen as the result of fear of immigration, especially
on the part of industrial workers.

A more humane response to the refugee crisis

In the long-term future, climate change will make the refugee crisis much more severe. Heat
and drought will make large regions of the world uninhabitable, and will threaten many
populations with famine. The severity of the refugee crisis will depend on how quickly we
reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
While making many parts of the world uninhabitable, long-term climate change will
make other regions more suitable for human habitation and agriculture. For example,
farming will become more possible in Siberia, Greenland, the Canadian Arctic, Alaska and
Patagonia. A humane response to the refugee crisis could include the generous opening of
these regions to refuges.
The global population of humans is currently increasing by almost a billion people every
decade. Global population must be stabilized, and in the long run, gradually reduced.
Money currently wasted (or worse than wasted) on armaments could be used instead to
promote universal primary health care, and with it, universal access to the knowledge and
materials needed for family planning.
Finally, reduced consumption of meat, particularly beef, would shorten the food chain
thus make more food available for famine relief.

5.19 Trump copies Hitler’s rhetoric

Book review: When at Times the Mob Is Swayed
Below are some quotations from an article by Steven Rosenfeld, published by Common
Dreams on Friday, August 9, 2019. Rosenfeld’s article is a review of a book by Bert
Neuborne entitled When at Times the Mob Is Swayed: A Citizen’s Guide to Defending
Our Republic.

Neuborne doesn’t make this comparison [between Trump and Hitler] lightly.
His 55-year career began by challenging the constitutionality of the Vietnam
War in the 1960s. He became the ACLU’s national legal director in the 1980s
under Ronald Reagan. He was founding legal director of the Brennan Center
for Justice at New York University Law School in the 1990s. He has been part
of more than 200 Supreme Court cases and Holocaust reparation litigation.
“Why does an ignorant, narcissistic buffoon like Trump trigger such anx-
iety? Why do so many Americans feel it existentially (not just politically)
220 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

Figure 5.70: Burt Neuborne’s brilliant book on the current crisis of American
democracy is a warning that we must take very seriously.
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 221
222 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

important to resist our forty-fifth president?” he writes. “Partly it’s just aes-
thetics. Trump is such a coarse and appalling man that it’s hard to stomach
his presence in Abraham Lincoln’s house. But that’s not enough to explain the
intensity of my dread. LBJ was coarse. Gerald Ford and George W. Bush were
dumb as rocks. Richard Nixon was an anti-Semite. Bill Clinton’s mistreatment
of women dishonored his office. Ronald Reagan was a dangerous idealogue. I
opposed each of them when they appeared to exceed their constitutional pow-
ers. But I never felt a sense of existential dread. I never sensed that the very
existence of a tolerant democracy was in play.”
A younger Trump, according to his first wife’s divorce filings, kept and
studied a book translating and annotating Adolf Hitler’s pre-World War II
speeches in a locked bedside cabinet, Neuborne noted. The English edition of
My New Order, published in 1941, also had analyses of the speeches’ impact
on his era’s press and politics. “Ugly and appalling as they are, those speeches
are masterpieces of demagogic manipulation,” Neuborne says.
“Watching Trump work his crowds, though, I see a dangerously manipula-
tive narcissist unleashing the demagogic spells that he learned from studying
Hitler’s speeches - spells that he cannot control and that are capable of eroding
the fabric of American democracy,” Neuborne says. “You see, we’ve seen what
these rhetorical techniques can do. Much of Trump’s rhetoric - as a candidate
and in office - mirrors the strategies, even the language, used by Adolf Hitler
in the early 1930s to erode German democracy.”
Many Americans may seize or condemn Neuborne’s analysis, which has
more than 20 major points of comparison. The author repeatedly says his goal
is not “equating” the men - as “it trivializes Hitler’s obscene crimes to compare
them to Trump’s often pathetic foibles.”
Indeed, the book has a larger frame: whether federal checks and balances
- Congress, the Supreme Court, the Electoral College - can contain the havoc
that Trump thrives on and the Republican Party at large has embraced. But
the Trump-Hitler compilation is a stunning warning, because, as many Holo-
caust survivors have said, few Germans or Europeans expected what unfolded
in the years after Hitler amassed power.
Here’s how Neuborne introduces this section. Many recent presidents have
been awful, “But then there was Donald Trump, the only president in recent
American history to openly despise the twin ideals - individual dignity and
fundamental equality - upon which the contemporary United States is built.
When you confront the reality of a president like Trump, the state of both sets
of brakes - internal [constitutional] and external [public resistance] - become
hugely important because Donald Trump’s political train runs on the most
potent and dangerous fuel of all: a steady diet of fear, greed, loathing, lies, and
envy. It’s a toxic mixture that has destroyed democracies before, and can do
so again.
“Give Trump credit,” he continues. “He did his homework well and became
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 223

the twenty-first-century master of divisive rhetoric. We’re used to thinking of

Hitler’s Third Reich as the incomparably evil tyranny that it undoubtedly was.
But Hitler didn’t take power by force. He used a set of rhetorical tropes codified
in Trump’s bedside reading that persuaded enough Germans to welcome Hitler
as a populist leader. The Nazis did not overthrow the Weimar Republic. It
fell into their hands as the fruit of Hitler’s satanic ability to mesmerize enough
Germans to trade their birthright for a pottage of scapegoating, short-term
economic gain, xenophobia, and racism. It could happen here.”

Twenty points of similarity

Neuborne lists the following points of similarity between early Hitler and Trump:

1. Neither was elected by a majority. Trump lost the popular vote by 2.9
million votes, receiving votes by 25.3 percent of all eligible American vot-
ers. “That’s just a little less than the percentage of the German electorate
that turned to the Nazi Party in 1932-33,” Neuborne writes. “Unlike the
low turnouts in the United States, turnout in Weimar Germany averaged
just over 80 percent of eligible voters.” He continues, “Once installed as
a minority chancellor in January 1933, Hitler set about demonizing his
political opponents, and no one - not the vaunted, intellectually brilliant
German judiciary; not the respected, well-trained German police; not the
revered, aristocratic German military; not the widely admired, efficient
German government bureaucracy; not the wealthy, immensely powerful
leaders of German industry; and not the powerful center-right political
leaders of the Reichstag - mounted a serious effort to stop him.”

2. Both found direct communication channels to their base. By 1936’s

Olympics, Nazi narratives dominated German cultural and political life.
“How on earth did Hitler pull it off ? What satanic magic did Trump
find in Hitler’s speeches?” Neuborne asks. He addresses Hitler’s extreme
rhetoric soon enough, but notes that Hitler found a direct communication
pathway - the Nazi Party gave out radios with only one channel, tuned
to Hitler’s voice, bypassing Germany’s news media. Trump has an online
equivalent.
“Donald Trump’s tweets, often delivered between midnight and dawn, are
the twenty-first century’s technological embodiment of Hitler’s free plastic
radios,” Neuborne says. “Trump’s Twitter account, like Hitler’s radios,
enables a charismatic leader to establish and maintain a personal, unfil-
tered line of communication with an adoring political base of about 30-40
percent of the population, many (but not all) of whom are only too willing,
even anxious, to swallow Trump’s witches’ brew of falsehoods, half-truths,
personal invective, threats, xenophobia, national security scares, religious
224 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

bigotry, white racism, exploitation of economic insecurity, and a never

ending-search for scapegoats.”

3. Both blame others and divide on racial lines. As Neuborne notes, “Hitler
used his single-frequency radios to wax hysterical to his adoring base
about his pathological racial and religious fantasies glorifying Aryans and
demonizing Jews, blaming Jews (among other racial and religious scape-
goats) for German society’s ills.” That is comparable to “Trump’s tweets
and public statements, whether dealing with black-led demonstrations
against police violence, white-led racist mob violence, threats posed by
undocumented aliens, immigration policy generally, protests by black and
white professional athletes, college admission policies, hate speech, even
response to hurricane damage in Puerto Rico,” he says. Again and again,
Trump uses “racially tinged messages calculated to divide whites from
people of color.”

4. Both relentlessly demonize opponents. “Hitler’s radio harangues demo-

nized his domestic political opponents, calling them parasites, criminals,
cockroaches, and various categories of leftist scum,” Neuborne notes.
“Trump’s tweets and speeches similarly demonize his political opponents.
Trump talks about the country being ‘infested’ with dangerous aliens of
color. He fantasizes about jailing Hillary Clinton, calls Mexicans rapists,
refers to ‘shithole countries,’ degrades anyone who disagrees with him,
and dreams of uprooting thousands of allegedly disloyal bureaucrats in
the State Department, the Environmental Protection Agency, the FBI,
and the CIA, who he calls ‘the deep state’ and who, he claims, are sabo-
taging American greatness.”

5. They unceasingly attack objective truth. “Both Trump and Hitler main-
tained a relentless assault on the very idea of objective truth,” he con-
tinues. “Each began the assault by seeking to delegitimize the main-
stream press. Hitler quickly coined the epithet Lügenpresse (literally ‘ly-
ing press’) to denigrate the mainstream press. Trump uses a paraphrase
of Hitler’s lying press epithet - ‘fake news’ - cribbed, no doubt, from one of
Hitler’s speeches. For Trump, the mainstream press is a ‘lying press’ that
publishes ‘fake news.’” Hitler attacked his opponents as spreading false
information to undermine his positions, Neuborne says, just as Trump
has attacked “elites” for disseminating false news, “especially his possible
links to the Kremlin.”

6. They relentlessly attack mainstream media. Trump’s assaults on the me-

dia echo Hitler’s, Neuborne says, noting that he “repeatedly attacks the
‘failing New York Times,’ leads crowds in chanting ‘CNN sucks,’ [and] is
personally hostile to most reporters.” He cites the White House’s refusal
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 225

to fly the flag at half-mast after the murder of five journalists in Annapolis
in June 2018, Trump’s efforts to punish CNN by blocking a merger of its
corporate parent, and trying to revoke federal Postal Service contracts
held by Amazon, which was founded by Jeff Bezos, who also owns the
Washington Post.

7. Their attacks on truth include science. Neuborne notes, “Both Trump

and Hitler intensified their assault on objective truth by deriding scien-
tific experts, especially academics who question Hitler’s views on race or
Trump’s views on climate change, immigration, or economics. For both
Trump and Hitler, the goal is (and was) to eviscerate the very idea of
objective truth, turning everything into grist for a populist jury subject
to manipulation by a master puppeteer. In both Trump’s and Hitler’s
worlds, public opinion ultimately defines what is true and what is false.”

8. Their lies blur reality - and supporters spread them. “Trump’s patho-
logical penchant for repeatedly lying about his behavior can only succeed
in a world where his supporters feel free to embrace Trump’s ‘alterna-
tive facts’ and treat his hyperbolic exaggerations as the gospel truth,”
Neuborne says. “Once Hitler had delegitimized the mainstream media by
a series of systematic attacks on its integrity, he constructed a fawning
alternative mass media designed to reinforce his direct radio messages and
enhance his personal power. Trump is following the same path, simultane-
ously launching bitter attacks on the mainstream press while embracing
the so-called alt-right media, co-opting both Sinclair Broadcasting and
the Rupert Murdoch-owned Fox Broadcasting Company as, essentially, a
Trump Broadcasting Network.”

9. Both orchestrated mass rallies to show status. “Once Hitler had cemented
his personal communications link with his base via free radios and a fawn-
ing media and had badly eroded the idea of objective truth, he reinforced
his emotional bond with his base by holding a series of carefully orches-
trated mass meetings dedicated to cementing his status as a charismatic
leader, or Führer,” Neuborne writes. “The powerful personal bonds nur-
tured by Trump’s tweets and Fox’s fawning are also systematically rein-
forced by periodic, carefully orchestrated mass rallies (even going so far as
to co-opt a Boy Scout Jamboree in 2017), reinforcing Trump’s insatiable
narcissism and his status as a charismatic leader.”

10. They embrace extreme nationalism. “Hitler’s strident appeals to the base
invoked an extreme version of German nationalism, extolling a brilliant
German past and promising to restore Germany to its rightful place as
a preeminent nation,” Neuborne says. “Trump echoes Hitler’s jingoistic
appeal to ultranationalist fervor, extolling American exceptionalism right
226 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

down to the slogan ‘Make America Great Again,’ a paraphrase of Hitler’s

promise to restore German greatness.”

11. Both made closing borders a centerpiece. “Hitler all but closed Germany’s
borders, freezing non-Aryan migration into the country and rendering it
impossible for Germans to escape without official permission. Like Hitler,
Trump has also made closed borders a centerpiece of his administration,”
Neuborne continues. “Hitler barred Jews. Trump bars Muslims and seek-
ers of sanctuary from Central America. When the lower courts blocked
Trump’s Muslim travel ban, he unilaterally issued executive orders re-
placing it with a thinly disguised substitute that ultimately narrowly won
Supreme Court approval under a theory of extreme deference to the pres-
ident.”

12. They embraced mass detention and deportations. “Hitler promised to

make Germany free from Jews and Slavs. Trump promises to slow, stop,
and even reverse the flow of non-white immigrants, substituting Muslims,
Africans, Mexicans, and Central Americans of color for Jews and Slavs as
scapegoats for the nation’s ills. Trump’s efforts to cast dragnets to arrest
undocumented aliens where they work, live, and worship, followed by mass
deportation... echo Hitler’s promise to defend Germany’s racial identity,”
he writes, also noting that Trump has “stooped to tearing children from
their parents [as Nazis in World War II would do] to punish desperate
efforts by migrants to find a better life.”

13. Both used borders to protect selected industries. “Like Hitler, Trump
seeks to use national borders to protect his favored national interests,
threatening to ignite protectionist trade wars with Europe, China, and
Japan similar to the trade wars that, in earlier incarnations, helped to
ignite World War I and World War II,” Neuborne writes. “Like Hitler,
Trump aggressively uses our nation’s political and economic power to fa-
vor selected American corporate interests at the expense of foreign com-
petitors and the environment, even at the price of international conflict,
massive inefficiency, and irreversible pollution [climate change].”

14. They cemented their rule by enriching elites. “Hitler’s version of fas-
cism shifted immense power - both political and financial - to the leaders
of German industry. In fact, Hitler governed Germany largely through
corporate executives,” he continues. “Trump has also presided over a
massive empowerment - and enrichment - of corporate America. Under
Trump, large corporations exercise immense political power while receiv-
ing huge economic windfalls and freedom from regulations designed to
protect consumers and the labor force. Hitler despised the German labor
movement, eventually destroying it and imprisoning its leaders. Trump
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 227

also detests strong unions, seeking to undermine any effort to interfere

with the ’prerogatives of management.”

15. Both rejected international norms. “Hitler’s foreign policy rejected in-
ternational cooperation in favor of military and economic coercion, cul-
minating in the annexation of the Sudetenland, the phony Hitler-Stalin
nonaggression pact, the invasion of Czechoslovakia, and the horrors of
global war,” Neuborne notes. “Like Hitler, Trump is deeply hostile to
multinational cooperation, withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partner-
ship, the Paris Agreement on climate change, and the nuclear agreement
with Iran, threatening to withdraw from the North American Free Trade
Agreement, abandoning our Kurdish allies in Syria...”

16. They attack domestic democratic processes. “Hitler attacked the legit-
imacy of democracy itself, purging the voting rolls, challenging the in-
tegrity of the electoral process, and questioning the ability of democratic
government to solve Germany’s problems,” Neuborne notes. “Trump has
also attacked the democratic process, declining to agree to be bound by
the outcome of the 2016 elections when he thought he might lose, sup-
porting the massive purge of the voting rolls allegedly designed to avoid
(nonexistent) fraud, championing measures that make it harder to vote,
tolerating - if not fomenting - massive Russian interference in the 2016
presidential election, encouraging mob violence at rallies, darkly hinting
at violence if Democrats hold power, and constantly casting doubt on the
legitimacy of elections unless he wins.”

17. Both attack the judiciary and rule of law. “Hitler politicized and eventu-
ally destroyed the vaunted German justice system. Trump also seeks to
turn the American justice system into his personal playground,” Neuborne
writes. “Like Hitler, Trump threatens the judicially enforced rule of law,
bitterly attacking American judges who rule against him, slyly praising
Andrew Jackson for defying the Supreme Court, and abusing the pardon
power by pardoning an Arizona sheriff found guilty of criminal contempt
of court for disobeying federal court orders to cease violating the Consti-
tution.”

18. Both glorify the military and demand loyalty oaths. “Like Hitler, Trump
glorifies the military, staffing his administration with layers of retired gen-
erals (who eventually were fired or resigned), relaxing control over the use
of lethal force by the military and the police, and demanding a massive
increase in military spending,” Neuborne writes. Just as Hitler “imposed
an oath of personal loyalty on all German judges” and demanded courts
defer to him, “Trump’s already gotten enough deference from five Repub-
lican [Supreme Court] justices to uphold a largely Muslim travel ban that
228 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

is the epitome of racial and religious bigotry.” Trump has also demanded
loyalty oaths. “He fired James Comey, a Republican appointed in 2013 as
FBI director by President Obama, for refusing to swear an oath of per-
sonal loyalty to the president; excoriated and then sacked Jeff Sessions,
his handpicked attorney general, for failing to suppress the criminal in-
vestigation into... Trump’s possible collusion with Russia in influencing
the 2016 elections; repeatedly threatened to dismiss Robert Mueller, the
special counsel carrying out the investigation; and called again and again
for the jailing of Hillary Clinton, his 2016 opponent, leading crowds in
chants of ‘lock her up.’” A new chant, “send her back,” has since emerged
at Trump rallies directed at non-white Democratic congresswomen.

19. They proclaim unchecked power. “Like Hitler, Trump has intensified a dis-
turbing trend that predated his administration of governing unilaterally,
largely through executive orders or proclamations,” Neuborne says, citing
the Muslim travel ban, trade tariffs, unraveling of health and environmen-
tal safety nets, ban on transgender military service, and efforts to end
President Obama’s protection for Dreamers. “Like Hitler, Trump claims
the power to overrule Congress and govern all by himself. In 1933, Hitler
used the pretext of the Reichstag fire to declare a national emergency and
seize the power to govern unilaterally. The German judiciary did noth-
ing to stop him. German democracy never recovered. When Congress
refused to give Trump funds for his border wall even after he threw a
tantrum and shut down the government, Trump, like Hitler, declared a
phony national emergency and claimed the power to ignore Congress,”
Neuborne continues. “Don’t count on the Supreme Court to stop him.
Five justices gave the game away on the President’s unilateral travel ban.
They just might do the same thing on the border wall.” It did in late July,
ruling that Trump could divert congressionally appropriated funds from
the Pentagon budget - undermining constitutional separation of powers.

20. Both relegate women to subordinate roles. “Finally,” writes Neuborne,

“Hitler propounded a misogynistic, stereotypical view of women, valu-
ing them exclusively as wives and mothers while excluding them from
full participation in German political and economic life. Trump may be
the most openly misogynist figure ever to hold high public office in the
United States, crassly treating women as sexual objects, using nondisclo-
sure agreements and violating campaign finance laws to shield his sexual
misbehavior from public knowledge, attacking women who come forward
to accuse men of abusive behavior, undermining reproductive freedom,
and opposing efforts by women to achieve economic equality.”
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 229

Suggestions for further reading

1. Martin A. Lee, The Beast Reawakens, (New York: Little, Brown and Company,
(1997)
2. Roger Griffin. Fascism, (Oxford Readers), (1995).
3. Kurt P. Tauber. Beyond Eagle and Swastika: German nationalism since 1945, (Wes-
leyan University Press; [1st ed.] edition, (1967).
4. Philip Rees, editor, Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890, (1991).
5. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth, and Neo-Nazism by Nicholas
Goodrick-Clarke (1998).
6. Kevin Coogan, Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist
International, Autonomedia, Brooklyn, NY, (1998).
7. William H. Schmaltz. Hate: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party,
Potomac Books, (2000).
8. Frederick J. Simonelli. American Fuehrer: George Lincoln Rockwell and the Ameri-
can Nazi Party, University of Illinois Press, (1999).
9. Richard C. Thurlow. Fascism in Britain: A History, 1918-1985, Olympic Marketing
Corp, (1987).
10. Angelo Del Boca and Mario Giovana. Fascism Today: A World Survey, Pantheon
Books, 1st American edition, (1969).
11. Anglo-Jewish Association. Germany’s New Nazis, Jewish Chronicle Publications,
(1951).
12. Tete Harens Tetens. The New Germany and the Old Nazis, Random House, (1961).
13. Clifford L Linedecker. Swastika and the Eagle: Neo-Naziism in America Today, A &
W Pub, (1982).
14. Kevin Flynn and Gary Gerhardt. The Silent Brotherhood: Inside America’s Racist
Underground, Signet Book; Reprint edition, (1995).
15. James Ridgeway. Blood in the Face: The Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nations, Nazi Skin-
heads, and the Rise of a New White Culture, Thunder’s Mouth Press; 2nd edition,
(1995).
16. Elinor Langer. A Hundred Little Hitlers: The Death of a Black Man, the Trial of
a White Racist, and the Rise of the Neo-Nazi Movement in America, Metropolitan
Books, (2003).
17. Raphael S. Ezekiel. The Racist Mind: Portraits of American Neo-Nazis and Klans-
men, Penguin (Non-Classics); Reprint edition, (1996).
18. Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics
of Identity, (2001).
19. Paul Hockenos. Free to Hate: The Rise of the Right in Post-Communist Eastern
Europe, (Routledge; Reprint edition, (1994).
20. Geoff Harris. The Dark Side of Europe: The Extreme Right Today, Edinburgh Uni-
versity Press; New edition, (1994).
21. Luciano Cheles, Ronnie Ferguson, and Michalina Vaughan. The Far Right in Western
and Eastern Europe, Longman Publishing Group; 2nd edition, (1995).
230 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

22. Herbert Kitschelt. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis,
University of Michigan Press; Reprint edition, (1997).
23. Martin Schain, Aristide Zolberg, and Patrick Hossay, editors. Shadows Over Europe:
The Development and Impact of the Extreme Right in Western Europe, Palgrave
Macmillan; 1st edition, (2002).
24. Robert S. Griffin. The Fame of a Dead Man’s Deeds: An Up-Close Portrait of White
Nationalist William Pierce, Authorhouse, (2001).
25. Jeffrey Kaplan and Tore Bjorgo. Nation and Race: The Developing Euro-American
Racist Subculture, Northeastern University Press, (1998).
26. Mattias Gardell. Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism, Duke
University Press, (2003)
27. Kathleen Blee. Inside Organized Racism: Women in the Hate Movement. Berkeley,
California; London: University of California Press, (2002).
28. E.J. Hobsbawn, The Age of Empire, 1875-1914, Vintage Books, (1989).
29. L. James, The Rise and Fall of the British Empire, St Martin’s Press, (1997).
30. N. Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the
Lessons for Global Power, Basic Books, (2003).
31. S. Schama, The Fate of Empire, 1776-2000, Miramax, (2002).
32. A.P. Thorton, The Imperial Idea and Its Enemies: A Study in British Power, Pal-
grave Macmillan, (1985).
33. H. Mejcher, Imperial Quest for Oil: Iraq, 1910-1928, Ithaca Books, London, (1976).
34. P. Sluglett, Britain in Iraq, 1914-1932, Ithaca Press, London, (1976).
35. D.E. Omissi, British Air Power and Colonial Control in Iraq, 1920-1925, Manchester
University Press, Manchester, (1990).
36. V.G. Kiernan, Colonial Empires and Armies, 1815-1960, Sutton, Stroud, (1998).
37. R. Solh, Britain’s 2 Wars With Iraq, Ithaca Press, Reading, (1996).
38. D. Hiro, The Longest War: The Iran-Iraq Military Conflict, Routledge, New York,
(1991).
39. T.E. Lawrence, A Report on Mesopotamia by T.E. Lawrence, Sunday Times, August
22, (1920).
40. D. Fromkin, A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the
Creation of the Modern Middle East, Owl Books, (2001).
41. T. Rajamoorthy, Deceit and Duplicity: Some Reflections on Western Intervention in
Iraq, Third World Resurgence, March-April, (2003).
42. P. Knightley and C. Simpson, The Secret Lives of Lawrence of Arabia, Nelson, Lon-
don, (1969).
43. G. Lenczowski, The Middle East in World Affairs, Cornell University Press, (1962).
44. John A. Hobson, Imperialism; A Study, (1902).
45. P. Cain and T. Hopkins, British Imperialism, 1688-200, Longman, (2000).
46. N. Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the
Lessons for Global Power, Basic Books, (2003).
47. G. Kolko, Another Century of War, New Press, (2002).
5.19. TRUMP COPIES HITLER’S RHETORIC 231

48. G. Kolko, Confronting the Third World: United States Foreign Policy, 1945-1980,
Pantheon Books, (1988).
49. M.T. Klare, Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict, Owl Books
reprint edition, New York, (2002).
50. J.H. Bodley, Cultural Anthropology: Tribes, States, and the Global System, 3rd ed.,
Mayfield, Mountain View, CA, (2000).
51. K. Raaflaub and N. Rosenstein, eds., War and Society in the Ancient and Medieval
Worlds, Harvard University Press and Center for Hellenic Studies, (1999).
52. Elie Kedourie, Nationalism, Hutchison University Library, Third Edition, (1966).
53. Eugene Kamenka, editor, Nationalism, Edward Arnold Ltd., London, (1976).
54. Elie Kedourie, editor, Nationalism in Asia and Africa, New American Library, (1970).
55. G. Allport, The Nature of Prejudice, Doubleday Anchor Books, New York, (1958).
56. I.A. Berg and B.M. Bass, eds., Conformity and Deviation, Harper and Row, New
York, (1961).
57. W. Buchanan and H. Cantril, How Nations See Each Other, University of Illinois
Press, Urbana, IL, (1953).
58. H.C.J. Duijker and N.H. Frijda, National Character and National Stereotypes, North-
Holland Publishing Co., Amsterdam, (1960).
59. S. Freud, Warum Krieg? Das Bild vom Feind, Arbeitsgem. Friedenspädegogik,
(1983).
60. S. Freud, Why War?, in The Basic Writings of Sigmund Freud, A.A. Brill, ed.,
Modern Library, (1995).
61. S. Freud, Civilization, War and Death. Psycho-analytical Epitomes No. 4, Hogarth
Press, London, (1953).
62. S. Keen, Faces of the Enemy: Reflections of the Hostile Imagination, Harper and
Row, San Francisco, (1986).
63. W.E. Lampert, Children’s Views of Foreign Peoples, Appleton-Century-Crofts, New
York, (1967).
64. R.A. Levine and D.T. Campbell, Ethnocentricism: Theories of Theories of Conflict,
Ethnic Attitudes and Group Behavior, Wiley, New York, (1972).
65. V.D. Volken, Cyprus: War and Adaption: A Psychoanalytical History of Two Ethnic
Groups in Conflict, University Press of Virginia, Charlottsville, VA, (1979).
66. L. Durrell, Bitter Lemons (nationalism in the Cyprus conflicts), Faber and Faber,
London, (1957).
67. N. Choucri and R. North, Nations in Conflict: National Growth and International
Violence, W.H. Freeman, San Francisco, (1975).
68. R. Cohen, Warfare and State Formation, in Warfare, Culture and the Environment,
B. Ferguson, ed., Academic Press, Orlando, (1984).
69. A. Giddens, The Nation-State and Violence: Volume Two of a Contemporary Cri-
tique of Historical Materialism, University of California, Berkeley, CA, (1985).
70. M. Haas, Social Change and National Aggressiveness, 1900-1960, in Quantitative
International Politics, J.D. Singer, ed., Free Press, New York, (1968).
71. W. Schwartzwaller, The Unknown Hitler, Berkeley Books, (1990).
232 NEOLIBERALISM, RACISM, FASCISM

72. Francis King, Satan and the Swastika, Mayflower, St. Albans, (1976).
73. J.M. Angebert, The Occult and the Third Reich, New York, (1974).
74. J.H. Brennan, Occult Reich, New York, (1974).
75. N. Goodrick-Clarke, The Occult Roots of Nazism, Aquarium Press, Wellingborough,
(1985).
76. T. Ravenscroft, The Spear of Destiny, Putnam’s, New York, (1974).
77. D. Sklar, The Nazis and the Occult, Dorset Press, New York, (1977).
78. W. Schirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Crest Books, New York, (1962).
Chapter 6

WE SEE ONLY WHAT IS NEAR

TO US

6.1 Contrasting responses to the pandemic and the

climate crisis
There is a remarkable contrast in the way that governments around the world have re-
sponded to the COVID-19 pandemic and the way that they have responded to the climate
emergency. The pandemic, which indeed represents an extremely grave danger to hu-
manity, has produced a massive global response. Borders have been closed, airlines have
become virtually inoperative, industries, restaurants and entertainments have been closed,
sporting events have been cancelled or postponed, people have been asked to stay at home
and practice social distancing, and the everyday life of citizens around the world has been
drastically changed.
By contrast, let us consider the threat that if immediate action is not taken to halt the
extraction and use of fossil fuels, irreversible feedback loops will be initiated which will
make catastrophic climate change inevitable despite human any human efforts to prevent
it.
This threat is even more serious than the COVID-19 pandemic. Climate change could
make much of the earth too hot for human life. It could produce a famine involving billions
of people, rather than millions.
My own belief is that catastrophic climate change would not lead do the extinction of the
human species; but I think that because much of the world would become uninhabitable,
the global population of humans would be very much reduced.
How have governments responded to the climate emergency? A minority, for example
the Scandinavian countries, have taken appropriate action. Most governments pay lip
service to the emergency, but do not take effective action; and a few countries, such as
the United States under Donald Trump, Bolsonaro’s Brazil, and Saudi Arabia, deny that
there is a climate emergency and actively sabotage action.
The world’s net response has been totally inadequate. The Keeling Curve, which mea-

233
234 HUMAN MYOPIA

sures CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere, continues to rise, and the rate of rising is
even increasing.
What is the reason for this remarkable contrast in our response to two serious emer-
gencies? We see clearly and respond to what is close to us, and are relatively indifferent to
what is far away. We hear of people dying every day from the COVID-19 pandemic, and
there is a danger that as many as 100 million people could die before it is over.
By contrast, although immediate climate action is needed today to avoid disaster, the
worst consequences of climate change lie in the long-term future. Old people, like me, will
not live to see massive deaths from starvation and overheating.
However, we have a responsibility to our children and grandchildren, and to all future
generations. A large-scale global famine could occur by the middle of the present century,
and children who are alive today could experience it.

6.2 Under-reporting of the climate emergency

There is also a remarkable contrast between the massive news coverage of the COVID-19
pandemic and the shocking under-reporting of the potentially much more serious threat of
catastrophic climate change.
Only immediate climate action can save the future. If we don’t take action, the collapse
of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon.

A speech by Bill Moyers

At an April 30, 2019 conference entitled “Covering Climate Now”, co-sponsored by The
Nation and Colombia Journalism Review, Bill Moyers made a speech which included the
following remarks:
“I have been asked to bring this gathering to a close by summing up how
we can do better at covering the possible ‘collapse of our civilization and ex-
tinction of much of the natural world’, to quote the noted environmentalist
David Attenborough, speaking at the recent Unites Nations climate summit in
Poland...
“Many of us have recognized that our coverage of global warming has fallen
short. There’s been some excellent reporting by independent journalists and
by enterprising reporters and photographers from legacy newspapers and other
news outlets. But the Goliaths of the US news media, those with the biggest
amplifiers - the corporate broadcast networks - have been shamelessly AWOL.
Despite their extraordinary profits. The combined coverage of the three major
networks and Fox fell from just 260 minutes in 2017 to a mere 142 minutes in
2018, a drop of 45 percent, reported by the watchdog group Media Matters”.
6.3. RECOVERY FROM THE PANDEMIC OFFERS CLIMATE ACTION OPPORTUNITIES235

The Golden Rule: “Whoever has the gold makes the rules”
Mainstream media are in the grip of powerholders, which include wealthy fossil fuel oli-
garchs, who stand to lose immense sums if the public really starts to take the climate
emergency seriously. It is therefore not surprising that the media (with a few notable
exceptions such as the UK’s Guardian newspaper) grossly under-reports the climate crisis.

World-wide student strikes under-reported

On Friday, March 15, 2019, over 1.4 million students on all continents took to the streets
for the first ever global climate strike. Messages in more than 40 languages were loud
and clear: World leaders must act now to address the climate crisis and save our future.
The school strike was the largest climate action in history. Nevertheless, it went almost
unmentioned in the media.
On Friday, May 24, massive student strikes advocating rapid climate action again took
place, this time in an expected 1,351 separate locations all over the world. Again the
historic and highly important event was under-reported by mainstream media. In fact,
on the CNN and BBC World News broadcasts that I watched on Friday evening, the
worldwide student strikes for climate action were not reported at all.

6.3 Recovery from the pandemic offers climate action

opportunities
When the COVID-19 pandemic is over, governments will be faced by the task of repairing
the enormous economic damage that it has caused. The situation will be similar to the
crisis that faced US President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he took office during the Great
Depression of the 1930s. Roosevelt, encouraged by John Maynard Keynes, used federal
funds to build much-needed infrastructure around the United States. His programs, the
New Deal, ended the Great Depression in his country.
Today, the concept of a similar Green New Deal is being put forward globally. This
concept visualizes government-sponsored programs aimed at simultaneously creating both
jobs and urgently-needed renewable energy infrastructure. The Green New Deal programs
could be administered in such a way as to correct social injustices.

6.4 Quick action is needed to save the long-term fu-

ture
The worst effects of catastrophic climate change lie in the distant future, a century or even
many centuries from the present; but disaster can only be avoided if quick action is taken.
The nations of the world must act immediately to reduce and eventually stop the use of
fossil fuels and the destruction of forests. If decisive action is not taken within the next
236 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.1: The Carbon Bubble according to data by the Carbon Tracker Ini-
tiative 2013. In order to avoid tipping points that will make human attempts
to avoid catastrophic climate change useless, we must leave most of the known
fossil fuel reserves in the ground!

few decades, feedback loops will make human intervention useless. These feedback loops
include the albedo effect, the methane hydrate feedback loop, and the fact as tropical
forests become drier, they become vulnerable to fires ignited by lightning. These fires
accelerate the drying, and thus a feed-back loop is formed.
As time passes, and as the disastrous consequences of climate change become more
apparent, the political will required for action will increase; but by that time it may be
too late. We are rapidly approaching several crucial tipping points.
At present, the average global rate of use of primary energy is roughly 2 kWt per person.
In North America, the rate is 12 kWt per capita, while in Europe, the figure is 6 kWt .
In Bangladesh, it is only 0.2 kWt . This wide variation implies that considerable energy
savings are possible, through changes in lifestyle, and through energy efficiency.

6.5 Is the transition to 100% renewable energy possi-

ble?
If we ask whether the transition to 100% renewable energy is possible, the answer is very
simple: It is not only possible; it is inevitable! This is because the supply of fossil fuels is
finite, and at the present rate of use they will be exhausted in less than a century. While
the transition to 100% renewables is inevitable, the vitally important point to remember
is that if we are to avoid disaster, the transition must come quickly.
6.5. IS THE TRANSITION TO 100% RENEWABLE ENERGY POSSIBLE? 237

Reserves 2005 rate of use Years remaining

Coal 780 TWy 3.5 TW 217 years

Oil 250 TWy 6.0 TW 42 years

Natural gas 250 TWy 3.7 TW 68 years

Total 1260 TWy 13.2 TW (95 years)

238 HUMAN MYOPIA

Year Demand Population Per Capita

1980 9.48 TW 4.45 bil. 2.13 kW

1985 10.3 TW 4.84 bil. 2.11 kW

1990 11.6 TW 5.99 bil. 2.20 kW

1995 12.3 TW 5.68 bil. 2.16 kW

2003 14.1 TW 6.30 bil. 2.23 kW

2010 17.1 TW 6.84 bil. 2.50 kW

2015 18.9 TW 7.23 bil. 2.58 kW

2020 20.5 TW 7.61 bil. 2.70 kW

2025 22.3 TW 7.91 bil. 2.82 kW

2030 24.2 TW 8.30 bil. 2.93 kW

In this book, we will use kilowatts (kW), megawatts (MW) and terawatts (TW) as the
units in which we discuss the rate of use of energy. A megawatt is equal to a thousand
kilowatts or a million watts. A terawatt is equal to a thousand megawatts, or a million
kilowatts or a billion (1,000,000,000) watts. A citizen of the European Union uses energy
at the rate of about 6 kilowatts, while in North America, the rate of energy use is double
that amount. The global average rate of energy use is a little over 2 kilowatts. Since
there are now 7.5 billion people in the world, our present rate of energy use is roughly 15
terawatts,
6.5. IS THE TRANSITION TO 100% RENEWABLE ENERGY POSSIBLE? 239

Figure 6.2: A map of the world showing per capita rates of energy use.

The total available energy from fossil fuels can be measured in terawatt.years (TWy).
Rough estimates of global coal reserves of coal, oil and natural gas are given by the table
shown above.
The present rate of use of fossil fuels is greater than the 2005 rate shown in the table,
and the remaining reserves are smaller than those shown. It is assumed that as oil becomes
exhausted, coal will be converted into liquid fuels, as was done in Germany during World
War II.
A second table, shown below, illustrates the historical and projected total global energy
demand as a function of time between 1980 and 2030. In this slightly out-of-date table,
the last year using historical data is 2003, later years being estimates based on projections.

Notice that the per capita energy use is almost constant. Our rapidly growing demand
for energy is primarily the result of the world’s rapidly growing population of humans.
It would be wise to stabilize human populations because of the threat of human-caused
ecological catastrophes and the danger of an extremely large-scale famine, involving billions
of people rather than millions. Such a famine is threatened because growing populations
require a growing food supply, climate changes threaten agriculture through droughts,
melting glaciers and loss of agricultural land. The end of the fossil fuel era will also mean
the end of high-yield petroleum.based agriculture.

The rate of growth of renewable energy

There is reason for hope that even the high energy demands show in the second table can
be met by renewables. The basis of this hope can be found in the extremely high present
rate of growth of renewable energy, and in the remarkable properties of exponential growth.
According to figures recently released by the Earth Policy Institute, the global installed
photovoltaic capacity is currently able to deliver 242,000 megawatts, and it is increasing
at the rate of 27.8% per year. Wind energy can now deliver 370,000 megawatts, and it is
increasing at the rate of roughly 20% per year.
240 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.3: Energy use per capita by country (World Bank data)

Because of the astonishing properties of exponential growth, we can calculate that if

these growth rates are maintained, renewable energy can give us 24.8 terawatts within only
15 years! This is far more than the world’s present use of all forms of energy.

6.6 Renewables are now much cheaper than fossil fu-

els!
According to an article written by Megan Darby and published in The Guardian on 26
January, 2016, “Solar power costs are tumbling so fast the technology is likely to fast
outstrip mainstream energy forecasts.
“That is the conclusion of Oxford University researchers, based on a new forecasting
model published in Research Policy1 .
“Commercial prices have fallen by 58% since 2012 and by 16
“Since the 1980s, panels to generate electricity from sunshine have got 10% cheaper
each year. That is likely to continue, the study said, putting solar on course to meet 20%
of global energy needs by 2027.’ ’

Solar energy
Unlike the burning of fossil fuels, renewables like solar energy do not release pollutants
into the atmosphere. In China. public opinion has shifted in favor of renewables because
of air pollution in cities.

1
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733315001699
6.6. RENEWABLES ARE NOW MUCH CHEAPER THAN FOSSIL FUELS! 241

Figure 6.4: The cost of photovoltaic cell panels is falling rapidly

242 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.5: Driven by falling prices, new solar installations in the United States
are increasing rapidly. The acronym ITC stands for Solar Investment Tax
Credit. Commercial prices have fallen by 58% since 2012 and by 16% in the
last year

Figure 6.6: Air pollution from the burning of coal has become a serious problem
in China. This problem has helped to shift Chinese public opinion away from
the burning of coal and towards renewables. China has now become a major
manufacturer of photovoltaic cells.
6.6. RENEWABLES ARE NOW MUCH CHEAPER THAN FOSSIL FUELS! 243

Photovoltaic cells

The price of solar photovoltaic panels has declined 99 percent over the last four decades,
from $74 a watt in 1972 to less than 70 cents a watt in 2014.
Between 2009 and 2014, solar panel prices dropped by three fourths, helping global PV
installations grow 50 percent per year.
Deutsche Bank notes that as of early 2014, solar PV was already competitive with aver-
age residential, commercial or industrial electricity rates in 14 countries, and in California
- even without subsidies. By late 2014 there were nearly 600,000 individual PV systems in
the United States, almost twice as many as in 2012. This number may well pass 1 million
in 2016.
In 2013, just 12 percent of U.S homebuilders offered solar panels as an option for new
single-family homes. More than half of them anticipate doing so by 2016. Four of the top
five U.S. home construction firms - DR Horton, Lennar Corp, PulteGroup and KB Home
- now automatically include solar panels on every new house in certain markets.
In 2007 there were only 8,000 rooftop solar installations in coal-heavy Australia; now
there are over a million.
Saudi Arabia has 41,000 megawatts of solar PV operating, under construction and
planned - enough to generate up to two thirds of the country’s electricity.
For the roughly 1.3 billion people without access to electricity, it is now often cheaper
and more efficient simply to install solar panels rooftop-by-rooftop than to build a central
power plant and transmission infrastructure.

Wind energy
Over the past decade, world wind power capacity grew more than 20 percent a year, its
increase driven by its many attractive features, by public policies supporting its expansion,
and by falling costs.
By the end of 2014, global wind generating capacity totaled 369,000 megawatts, enough
to power more than 90 million U.S. homes. Wind currently has a big lead on solar PV,
which has enough worldwide capacity to power roughly 30 million U.S. homes.
China is now generating more electricity from wind farms than from nuclear plants, and
should have little trouble meeting its official 2020 wind power goal of 200,000 megawatts.
For perspective, that would be enough to satisfy the annual electricity needs of Brazil.
In nine U.S. states, wind provides at least 12 percent of electricity. Iowa and South
Dakota are each generating more than one quarter of their electricity from wind.
In the Midwestern United States, contracts for wind power are being signed at a price
of 2.5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh), which compares with the nationwide average grid
price of 10-12 cents per kWh.
Although a wind farm can cover many square miles, turbines occupy little land. Coupled
with access roads and other permanent features, a wind farm’s footprint typically comes
to just over 1 percent of the total land area covered by the project.
244 HUMAN MYOPIA

Wind energy yield per acre is off the charts. For example, a farmer in northern Iowa
could plant an acre in corn that would yield enough grain to produce roughly $1,000 worth
of fuel-grade ethanol per year, or the farmer could put on that same acre a turbine that
generates $300,000 worth of electricity per year. Farmers typically receive $3,000 to $10,000
per turbine each year in royalties. As wind farms spread across the U.S. Great Plains, wind
royalties for many ranchers will exceed their earnings from cattle sales.

The problem of intermittency

Many forms of renewable energy encounter the problem of intermittency. For example, on
windy days, Denmark’s windmills generate more than enough electricity to meet the needs
of the country, but on days when the wind is less strong, the electrical energy generated is
insufficient. Denmark solves this problem by selling surplus electrical power to Germany
on windy days, and buying power from hydroelectric-rich Norway on less windy days.
The problem of intermittency can alternatively be solved by pumping water to uphill
reservoirs when the wind is strong, and letting the stored water drive turbines when the
wind is weak. The problem of intermittency can also be solved with lithium ion storage
batteries, by splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen, or by using other types of fuel cells.

Developing countries: No need for grids

When cell phones came into general use, developing countries with no telephone networks
were able to use the new technology through satellites, thus jumping over the need for
country-wide telephone lines. Similarly, village solar or wind installations in the developing
countries can supply power locally, bypassing the need for a grid.

6.7 An economic tipping point

Renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels
Solar energy and wind energy have recently become cheaper than fossil fuels. Thus a
tipping point has been passed. From now on, despite frantic efforts of giant fossil fuel
corporations to prevent it from happening, the transition to 100% renewable energy will
be driven by economic forces alone.

Subsidies to the fossil fuel industry

http://www.imf.org/en/News/Articles/2015/09/28/04/53/sonew070215a
http://priceofoil.org/fossil-fuel-subsidies/
6.8. AN UNPRECEDENTED INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY 245

6.8 An unprecedented investment opportunity

Investment in electric vehicles
On July 5, 2017, the Volvo Car Group made the following announcement: 2
“Volvo Cars, the premium car maker, has announced that every Volvo it launches from
2019 will have an electric motor, marking the historic end of cars that only have an internal
combustion engine (ICE) and placing electrification at the core of its future business.
“The announcement represents one of the most significant moves by any car maker to
embrace electrification and highlights how over a century after the invention of the internal
combustion engine electrification is paving the way for a new chapter in automotive history.
“’This is about the customer,’ said Håkan Samuelsson, president and chief executive.
’People increasingly demand electrified cars and we want to respond to our customers’
current and future needs. You can now pick and choose whichever electrified Volvo you
wish.’
“Volvo Cars will introduce a portfolio of electrified cars across its model range, embrac-
ing fully electric cars, plug in hybrid cars and mild hybrid cars.
“It will launch five fully electric cars between 2019 and 2021, three of which will be
Volvo models and two of which will be high performance electrified cars from Polestar,
Volvo Cars’ performance car arm. Full details of these models will be announced at a later
date.”
The electric vehicle investment opportunity was also illustrated by the 2017 vote of
Germany’s Bundesrat to ban the manufacture of internal combustion engines after 2030 3 .
The article announcing the vote adds that “It’s a strong statement in a nation where
the auto industry is one of the largest sectors of the economy; Germany produces more
automobiles than any other country in Europe and is the third largest in the world. The
resolution passed by the Bundesrat calls on the European Commission (the executive arm
of the European Union) to ’evaluate the recent tax and contribution practices of Member
States on their effectiveness in promoting zero-emission mobility,’ which many are taking
to mean an end to the lower levels of tax currently levied on diesel fuel across Europe.”
France plans to end the sale of vehicles powered by gasoline and diesel by 2040, envi-
ronment minister Nicolas Hulot announced recently.
Hulot made the announcement on Thursday, June 13, 2017, in Paris as he launched
the country’s new Climate Plan to accelerate the transition to clean energy and to meet
its targets under the Paris climate agreement.
To ease the transition, Hulot said the French government will offer tax incentives to
replace fossil-fuel burning cars with clean alternatives.
Furthermore, the government of India has recently announced its intention to only
2
https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressreleases/210058/volvo-cars-to-go-all-
electric
3
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/10/germanys-bundesrat-votes-to-ban-the-internal-combustion-
engine-by-2030/
246 HUMAN MYOPIA

nave electric vehicles by 20304 . This hugely ambitious plan was announced during the
2017 Confederation of Indian Industry Annual Session. Besides the avoidance of climate
change, which might make many regions of India uninhabitable, the motive for replacing
28 million combustion engine vehicles by electric ones was the severe air pollution from
which India suffers. Severe air pollution also motivates efforts by the government of China
to promote the transition to electric vehicles.
The governments of Norway and the Netherlands have taken steps towards banning
the internal combustion engine5 . Both the upper and lower houses of the Netherlands’
government voted to ban cars driven by internal combustion engines by 2025, the same
year in which Norway plans to sell nothing but zero-emission vehicles.
In a report commissioned by the investment bankers Cowan & Co, managing director
and senior research analyst Jeffrey Osborne, predicted that electric vehicles will cost less
than gasoline-powered cars by the early- to mid-2020s due to falling battery prices as well
as the costs that traditional carmakers will incur as they comply to new fuel-efficiency
standards. Osbourne pointed out that a number of major car brands are hopping onto the
electric bandwagon to compete in a space carved out by industry disrupter, Tesla.
“We see the competitive tides shifting in 2019 and beyond as European [car makers]
roiled by the diesel scandal and loss of share to Tesla in the high margin luxury segment
step on the gas and accelerate the pace of EV introductions”, he wrote.
Bloomberg New Energy Finance reported similar predictions: “Falling battery costs
will mean electric vehicles will also be cheaper to buy in the U.S. and Europe as soon as
2025,” the report said. “Batteries currently account for about half the cost of EVs, and
their prices will fall by about 77 percent between 2016 and 2030.”
In October, 2017, General Motors unveiled plans to roll out 20 new entirely electric car
models by 2023, with two of the new EVs coming out in the next 18 months. Meanwhile,
Ford announced the creation of ”Team Edison,” intended to accelerate the company’s EV
development and partnership work. The name, is “seemingly in direct response to Elon
Musk’s Tesla, which recently surpassed Ford’s market capitalization.”
Tesla’s Chairman, highly successful inventor and entrepreneur Elon Musk, has made
massive investments in factories manufacturing electric vehicles, improved lithium ion stor-
age cells, and photovoltaic panels, as will be discussed in Chapter 2.

Investment in wind turbine energy

In Denmark, the wind turbine industry contributes substantially to the country’s positive
balance of payments. According to Wikipedia, “The Danish wind turbine industry is the
world’s largest. Around 90% of the national output is exported, and Danish companies
accounted for 38% of the world turbine market in 2003, when the industry employed some
20,000 people and had a turnover of around 3 billion euro.”
4
https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/what-country-will-become-the-first-to-ban-internal-
combustion-cars
5
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-dutch-revolution-in-smart-charging-of-electric-
vehicles-597268791.html
6.9. FOR CREATING JOBS, RENEWABLES BEAT FOSSIL FUELS 247

Denmark’s two largest wind turbine manufacturers are Vestas and Simiens Wind Power.
Vestas employs more that 21000 people globally. In February 2016, Vestas got its largest
order of 1,000 MW (278 x 3.6 MW) for the Fosen project near Trondheim in Norway. It
costs DKK 11 billion, and should deliver 3.4 TWh per year.
In 2015 Siemens Wind had a combined market share of 63% of European offshore wind
turbines (nearly 75% in 2009 by capacity and number). In 2011, Siemens Wind Power had
6.3% share of the world wind turbine market, and was the second largest in 2014.
In many countries, including Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, India, The Nether-
lands, United Kingdom, and United States, wind turbine cooperatives have sprung up. In
these cooperatives, communities share the costs and profits of wind turbine projects. For
example, the Hepburn Wind Project in Victoria, Australia, owns two 2MW wind turbines
which produce enough power for 2,300 households.

Investment in solar energy

Global retinues from solar photovoltaic installations are expected to reach $1.2 trillion
between the present and 2024 according to a recent article6
Another article7 states that “The global electric power industry is evolving into a model
that offers more diversity, both in terms of generation and in the ownership of generation
assets, and solar PV is one technology at the head of this change. Following years of
unsustainable pricing and oversupply, demand for solar PV systems has finally caught up,
with 2015 expected to be the year when the global solar PV market shifts and starts to
compete with other technologies. According to a recent report from Navigant Research,
global revenue from solar PV installations is expected to total more than $1.2 trillion from
2015 to 2024.”

6.9 For creating jobs, renewables beat fossil fuels

Here are some excerpts from a 2016 report issued by the Solar Foundation:
• One out of every 50 new jobs added in the United States in 2016 was created by the
solar industry, representing 2 percent of all new jobs.
• Solar jobs in the United States have increased at least 20 percent per year for the
past four years, and jobs have nearly tripled since the first Solar Jobs Census was
released in 2010.
• Over the next 12 months, employers surveyed expect one out of every 50 new jobs
added in the United States in 2016 was created by the solar industry, representing 2
percent of all new jobs.
6
https://cleantechnica.com/2016/01/25/global-revenue-solar-pv-installations-expected-reach-1-2-
trillion/
7
http://www.navigantresearch.com/newsroom/global-revenue-from-solar-pv-installations-is-expected-
to-total-more-than-1-2-trillion-from-2015-to-2024
248 HUMAN MYOPIA

• In 2016, the five states with the most solar jobs were California, Massachusetts,
Texas, Nevada, and Florida.

• The solar industry added $84 billion to the US GDP in 201t to see total solar industry
employment increase by 10 percent to 286,335 solar workers.

• The solar industry added $84 billion to the US GDP in 2016.

6.10 The Stern Review

Background of the Stern Review
The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change is a 700 page document com-
missioned by the government of the United Kingdom and released on 30 October, 2006.
The research behind this report was conducted by a team led by Nicolas Stern (Baron
Stern of Brentford), chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the
Environment.
The Stern Review discusses the catastrophic climate change which will result if prompt
action is not taken, and it proposes that 1% of global GDP be used annually to prevent
such disasters. In 2014, the global GDP was estimated to be 77.9 trillion dollars, so that
the 1% investment in renewable energy recommended by Lord Stern and his research team
would have amounted to nearly a trillion dollars.

The Middle East

According to current estimates, 81.5% of the world’s proven crude oil reserves are located
in OPEC Member Countries, with the bulk of OPEC oil reserves in the Middle East,
amounting to 65.5% of the OPEC total.

China
China’s large reserves of coal lie near to the surface, and are thus very easily accessible.
Mining of coal has driven the country’s rapid industrial growth, but it has also produced
a severe public health problem because of air pollution.
In April, 2017, China’s rate of economic growth was 6.9%8 . This rate of growth, if
continued, would mean that China’s economy would double every ten years. and increase
by a factor of 1024 every century. Obviously this is impossible. Never-ending economic
growth on a finite planet is a logical absurdity. China’s high economic growth rate, is
driven by its use of coal, and this must quickly stop if ecological disaster is to be avoided.
6.10. THE STERN REVIEW 249

Figure 6.7: Protesters at the 2017 G20 meeting in Hamburg Germany.

Figure 6.8: India’s installed and future energy mix, as visualized by the World
Coal Association
250 HUMAN MYOPIA

India

The MIT Technology Review recently published an important article entitled India’s En-
ergy Crisis9 .
The article makes alarming reading in view of the world’s urgent need to make a very
rapid transition from fossil fuels to 100% renewable energy. We must make this change
quickly in order to avoid a tipping point beyond which catastrophic climate change will be
unavoidable.
The MIT article states that “Since he took power in May, 2014, Prime Minister Naren-
dra Modi has made universal access to electricity a key part of his administration’s ambi-
tions. At the same time, he has pledged to help lead international efforts to limit climate
change. Among other plans, he has promised to increase India’s total power generating
capacity to 175 gigawatts, including 100 gigawatts of solar, by 2022. (That’s about the
total power generation of Germany.)”
However India plans to expand its industrial economy, and to do this, it is planning to
very much increase its domestic production and use of coal. The MIT article continues,
pointing out that
However India plans to expand its industrial economy, and to do this, it is planning to
very much increase its domestic production and use of coal. The MIT article continues,
pointing out that “Such growth would easily swamp efforts elsewhere in the world to curtail
carbon emissions, dooming any chance to head off the dire effects of global climate change.
(Overall, the world will need to reduce its current annual emissions of 40 billion tons by 40
to 70 percent between now and 2050.) By 2050, India will have roughly 20 percent of the
world’s population. If those people rely heavily on fossil fuels such as coal to expand the
economy and raise their living standards to the level people in the rich world have enjoyed
for the last 50 years, the result will be a climate catastrophe regardless of anything the
United States or even China does to decrease its emissions. Reversing these trends will
require radical transformations in two main areas: how India produces electricity, and how
it distributes it.”
The Indian Minister of Power, Piyush Goyal, is an enthusiastic supporter of renewable
energy expansion, but he also supports, with equal enthusiasm, the large-scale expansion
of domestic coal production in India.
Meanwhile, the consequences of global warming are being felt by the people of India.
For example, last May, a heat wave killed over 1,400 people and melted asphalt streets.10
Have India’s economic planners really thought about the long-term future? Have they
considered the fact that drastic climate change could make India completely uninhabitable?

8
https://tradingeconomics.com/china/gdp-growth-annual
9
http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/542091/indias-energy-crisis/
10
https://www.rt.com/news/262641-india-heat-wave-killed/
6.10. THE STERN REVIEW 251

Figure 6.9: Oil production on the shelf in the Russian Arctic.

Russia
According to Wikipedia, “The petroleum industry in Russia is one of the largest in the
world. Russia has the largest reserves, and is the largest exporter, of natural gas. It has
the second largest coal reserves, the eighth largest oil reserves, and is one of the largest
producer of oil. It is the third largest energy user.”
One of the difficulties of reducing Russia’s fossil fuel production is that the Russian
economy depends so heavily on its oil and gas industries. Many European countries also
depend on natural gas from Russia for winter heating of homes and workplaces.

North America
Canadian oil sands
Canada’s oil-sands deposits contain an amount of carbon comparable to the world’s total
reserves of conventional oil. Oil is currently being extracted by methods that release four
times as much carbon into the atmosphere as is contained in the refined oil from the
deposits. Nevertheless, the government of Canada wholeheartedly supports extraction of
oil from the tar sands.
The position of the Canadian government has been strongly criticized by leading cli-
mate scientist Professor James Hansen. A recent article in The Guardian11 , reported him
as saying; “To leave our children with a manageable situation, we need to leave the uncon-
ventional fuel in the ground. Canada’s ministers are acting as salesmen for those people
11
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/may/19/tar-sands-exploitation-climate-scientist
252 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.10: Get rich quick at the oil sands.

who will gain from the profits of that industry. But I don’t think they are looking after
the rights and wellbeing of the population as a whole.
“The thing we are facing overall is that the fossil fuel industry has so much money
that they are buying off governments. Our democracies are seriously handicapped by the
money that is driving decisions in Washington and other capitals.”

Fracking in the United States

According to the US Department of Energy (DOE), in 2013 at least two million oil and
gas wells in the US have been hydraulically fractured, and that of new wells being drilled,
up to 95% are hydraulically fractured. The output from these wells makes up 43% of the
oil production and 67% of the natural gas production in the United States.
Because of earthquakes and poisoning of water supplies caused by fracking, this prac-
tice has been banned by several states in the US, and nine countries or regions in Europe:
France, Bulgaria, Roumania, Germany, The Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Northern Ire-
land, Spain and Switzerland,

Latin America
Venezuela’s Belt of Tar
The Orinoco River Basin in Venezuela contains the world’s largest deposit of extra-heavy
oil and tar. The amount of carbon contained in this deposit is comparable to the carbon
content of all the world’s known reserves of conventional oil, and also larger than the carbon
contained in Canada’s oil sands.
6.10. THE STERN REVIEW 253

Figure 6.11: The sharply increased number of earthquakes in the United States
has been linked to fracking. The use of fracking has also caused poisoning of
water supplies.

Figure 6.12: Venezuela’s Belt of Tar under the Orinoco River Basin is the world’s
largest deposit of extra-heavy oil and tar. Desire for control of Venezuela’s huge
oil reserves lies behind US interference in the internal politics of the country.
254 HUMAN MYOPIA

The Belt of Tar follows the line of the Orinoco river. It is approximately 600 kilometers
(370 mi) from east to west, and 70 kilometers (43 mi) from north to south, with an area
about 55,314 square kilometers (21,357 sq mi). The Orinoco deposit is estimated to contain
1.2 trillion barrels of extra-heavy oil.
The government of Venezuela has no plans for halting extraction from the Belt of Tar.
On the contrary, detailed plans have been made for expanded exploitation of the deposit12 .

Extraction of oil in Brazil

According to a recent article in The Guardian13 “The discovery of tens of billions of barrels
of oil in fields far off the coast of Rio de Janeiro was billed as one of the biggest finds of
this century when it was announced in 2006.
“Many hoped it would deliver a bonanza for education and health and make Brazil one
of world’s major economies.
“But with the country’s biggest energy company, Petrobras, mired in debt and scandal,
the low price of oil and the dangers of a second Deepwater Horizon, the viability of this
massive undertaking has never been under more scrutiny.”
The Brazilian offshore deposits are called “presalt oil”, since they lie under a thick layer
of salt deposits.
According to the article in The Guardian, “Suggestions by climate campaigners that
this reservoir of fossil fuel is a ’carbon bomb’ that should be left in the ground, are dismissed
as hypocrisy.”
The article quotes the geologist who discovered the off-shore fields as saying “The big
countries of the world today developed without any concern for the environment. The
base of US development was the oil in the Gulf of Mexico. The base of the UK’s industrial
revolution was coal. How can they now say we can’t use our own pre-salt?”

The European Union

Coal in Germany and Poland

In 2016, Germany produced 176,100,000 tonnes of coal while Poland produced 131,100,000
tonnes. In the past, Poland experienced severe ecological effects from acid rain due to the
burning of coal. Polish forests were destroyed by the effects of acid rain, and the facades
of statues and buildings in Krakow and elsewhere were dissolved by the acid. Today the
situation is improving, but the two countries are still heavily dependant on coal.

12
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDVSA
13
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2015/jun/25/brazils-gamble-on-deep-
water-oil-guanabara-bay
6.11. MAJOR PRODUCERS OF FOSSIL FUELS 255

North Sea oil

According to Wikipedia, “The British and Norwegian sections hold most of the remainder
of the large oil reserves. It is estimated that the Norwegian section alone contains 54% of
the sea’s oil reserves and 45% of its gas reserves- More than half of the North Sea oil reserves
have been extracted, according to official sources in both Norway and the UK. For Norway,
the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate [28] gives a figure of 4,601 million cubic meters of oil
(corresponding to 29 billion barrels) for the Norwegian North Sea alone (excluding smaller
reserves in Norwegian Sea and Barents Sea) of which 2,778 million cubic meters (60%)
has already been produced prior to January 2007. UK sources give a range of estimates
of reserves, but even using the most optimistic ’maximum’ estimate of ultimate recovery,
76% had been recovered at end 2010.[citation needed] Note the UK figure includes fields
which are not in the North Sea (onshore, West of Shetland).

6.11 Major producers of fossil fuels

The top 20 oil-producing nations in 2016

Wikipedia’s article entitles List of countries by oil production gives information shown in
the table below. In the table. which is based on data from the International Energy
Agency, production is measured in barrels of oil per day
1 Russia 10,551,497
2 Saudi Arabia 10,460,710
3 United States 8,875,817
4 Iraq 4,451,516
5 Iran 3,990,956
6 China 3,980,650
7 Canada 3,662,694
8 United Arab Emirates 3,106,077
9 Kuwait 2,923,825
10 Brazil 2,515,459
11 Venezuela 2,276,967
12 Mexico 2,186,877
13 Nigeria 1,999,885
14 Angola 1,769,615
15 Norway 1,647,975
16 Kazakhstan 1,595,199
17 Qatar 1,522,902
18 Algeria 1,348,361
19 Oman 1,006,841
20 United Kingdom 939,760
256 HUMAN MYOPIA

The top 10 coal producing nations in 2016

Wikipedia gives a similar list of coal producing nations. Only the top 10 are shown here,
since these countries completely dominate global coal production. In the table, production
is measured in millions of tonnes per year.

1 China 3411.0
2 India 692.4
3 United States 660.6
4 Australia 492.8
5 Indonesia 434.0
6 Russia 385.4
7 South Africa 251.3
8 Germany 176.1
9 Poland 131.1
10 Kazakhstan 102.4
World 7,460.4
The world production of coal is falling. In 2014 it was 8,164.9 tonnes, in 2015, 7,861.1
tonnes, and in 2016 7,460.4 tonnes. Nevertheless, global production of coal remains worry-
ingly high. If catastrophic climate change is to be avoided, it must stop altogether within
one or two decades. At the moment the world is still producing roughly 1 tonne of coal
per capita each year.

List of countries by natural gas production

Here is a similar table for natural gas. Production is measured in m3 per year. The final
column indicates the date of the data.

1 United States 728,200,000,000 2014

2 Russia 578,700,000,000 2014
3 Iran 438,000,000,000 2017
4 Canada 143,100,000,000 2012
5 Qatar 133,200,000,000 2011
6 Norway 114,700,000,000 2012
7 China 107,200,000,000 2012
8 Saudi Arabia 103,200,000,000 2012
9 Algeria 82,760,000,000 2011
10 Netherlands 80,780,000,000 2012
World 4,359,000,000,000 2010
6.12. BLOOD FOR OIL 257

6.12 Blood for oil

There is a close relationship between petroleum and war. James A. Paul, Executive Direc-
tor of the Global Policy Forum, has described this relationship very clearly in the following
words:
“Modern warfare particularly depends on oil, because virtually all weapons systems rely
on oil-based fuel - tanks, trucks, armored vehicles, self-propelled artillery pieces, airplanes,
and naval ships. For this reason, the governments and general staffs of powerful nations
seek to ensure a steady supply of oil during wartime, to fuel oil-hungry military forces in
far-flung operational theaters.”
“Just as governments like the US and UK need oil companies to secure fuel for their
global war-making capacity, so the oil companies need their governments to secure control
over global oilfields and transportation routes. It is no accident, then, that the world ’s
largest oil companies are located in the world ’s most powerful countries.”
“Almost all of the world ’s oil-producing countries have suffered abusive, corrupt and
undemocratic governments and an absence of durable development. Indonesia, Saudi Ara-
bia, Libya, Iraq, Iran, Angola, Colombia, Venezuela, Kuwait, Mexico, Algeria - these and
many other oil producers have a sad record, which includes dictatorships installed from
abroad, bloody coups engineered by foreign intelligence services, militarization of govern-
ment and intolerant right-wing nationalism.”

The resource curse

The way in which the industrialized countries maintain their control over less developed
nations can be illustrated by the “resource curse”, i.e. the fact that resource-rich developing
countries are no better off economically than those that lack resources, but are cursed with
corrupt and undemocratic governments. This is because foreign corporations extracting
local resources under unfair agreements exist in a symbiotic relationship with corrupt local
officials.
One might think that taxation of foreign resource-extracting firms would provide de-
veloping countries with large incomes. However, there is at present no international law
governing multinational tax arrangements. These are usually agreed to on a bilateral basis,
and the industrialized countries have stronger bargaining powers in arranging the bilateral
agreements.

6.13 Fossil fuel extraction must stop!

“Leave the oil in the soil! Leave the coal in the hole! Leave the gas under the grass!”
That was message of protesters at the 2017 G20 meeting. But from the facts shown in
this chapter, we can see that on the whole, fossil fuels are not being left in the ground,
where they have to remain if an ecological disaster is to be avoided. On the contrary,
the extraction of coal, oil and gas continues almost as though the climate emergency did
258 HUMAN MYOPIA

not exist. Most politicians, with their eyes focused on the present, seem blind to future
dangers. They think primarily about the jobs and living standards of their constituents,
and about the next election. Meanwhile, the future of human civilization is neglected and
remains in peril.14
The fact that historically, the highly industrialized nations were primarily responsible
for atmospheric CO2 increases does not excuse the developing countries from their respon-
sibility for saving the future. Today China’s coal, India’s coal, Venezuela’s tar sands and
Brazil’s pre-salt oil are among the greatest threats, and in these countries as elsewhere,
extraction must stop.
We have to wake up! Business as usual cannot continue!

6.14 Extinction events and feedback loops

Scientists warn that if the transition to renewable energy does not happen within very
few decades, there is a danger that we will reach a tipping point beyond which feedback
loops, such as the albedo effect and the methane hydrate feedback loop, will take over and
produce an out-of-control and fatal increase in global temperature.
In 2012, the World Bank issued a report warning that without quick action to curb
CO2 emissions, global warming is likely to reach 4 ◦ C during the 21st century. This
is dangerously close to the temperature which initiated the Permian-Triassic extinction
event: 6 ◦ C above normal. During the Permian-Triassic extinction event, which occurred
252 million years ago, 96% of all marine species were wiped out, as well as 70% of all
terrestrial vertebrates.15

14
See https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/18/enough-tiptoeing-around-lets-make-
this-clear-coal-kills-people
15
http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/prehistoric-world/permian-extinction/
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2012/11/18/Climate-change-report-warns-dramatically-
warmer-world-this-century
6.14. EXTINCTION EVENTS AND FEEDBACK LOOPS 259

Figure 6.13: Monthly September ice extent for 1979 to 2012 shows a decline of
13.0% per decade. One can also see that the straight line does not really fit the
data, which more nearly resemble a downward curve will that reach zero in the
period 2016-2019. Source: National Snow and Ice Data Center. Wikimedia
Commons
260 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.14: Loss of species caused by the Permian-Triassic extinction event.

Unless quick steps are taken to lower our greenhouse gas emissions, we may
cause a similar extinction event, which will threaten the survival of our own
species. Source: Australian Frontiers of Science, www.sciencearchive.org.au
6.15. A WARNING FROM THE WORLD BANK 261

6.15 A warning from the World Bank

In 2012, the World Bank issued a report warning that without quick action to curb CO2
emissions, global warming is likely to reach 4 ◦ C during the 21st century. This is dan-
gerously close to the temperature which initiated the Permian-Triassic extinction event:
6 ◦ C above normal. During the Permian-Triassic extinction event, which occurred 252
million years ago, 96% of all marine species were wiped out, as well as 70% of all terrestrial
vertebrates.16
The 4o C scenarios are devastating: the inundation of coastal cities; increasing risks for
food production potentially leading to higher malnutrition rates; many dry regions becom-
ing dryer, wet regions wetter; unprecedented heat waves in many regions, especially in the
tropics; substantially exacerbated water scarcity in many regions; increased frequency of
high-intensity tropical cyclones; and irreversible loss of biodiversity, including coral reef
systems.
And most importantly, a 4o C world is so different from the current one that it comes
with high uncertainty and new risks that threaten our ability to anticipate and plan for
future adaptation needs. The lack of action on climate change not only risks putting
prosperity out of reach of millions of people in the developing world, it threatens to roll
back decades of sustainable development. It is clear that we already know a great deal
about the threat before us. The science is unequivocal that humans are the cause of
global warming, and major changes are already being observed: global mean warming is
0.8o C above pre industrial levels; oceans have warmed by 0.09o C since the 1950s and are
acidifying; sea levels rose by about 20 cm since pre-industrial times and are now rising
at 3.2 cm per decade; an exceptional number of extreme heat waves occurred in the last
decade; major food crop growing areas are increasingly affected by drought.
Despite the global community’s best intentions to keep global warming below a 2o C
increase above pre-industrial climate, higher levels of warming are increasingly likely. Sci-
entists agree that countries’ cur- rent United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change emission pledges and commitments would most likely result in 3.5 to 4o C warming.
And the longer those pledges remain unmet, the more likely a 4o C world becomes.
Data and evidence drive the work of the World Bank Group. Science reports, including
those produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, informed our decision
to ramp up work on these issues, leading to, a World Development Report on climate
change designed to improve our understanding of the implications of a warming planet;
a Strategic Framework on Development and Climate Change, and a report on Inclusive
Green Growth. The World Bank is a leading advocate for ambitious action on climate
change, not only because it is a moral imperative, but because it makes good economic
sense.
But what if we fail to ramp up efforts on mitigation? What are the implications of a
o
4 C world? We commissioned this report from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact
16
http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/prehistoric-world/permian-extinction/
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2012/11/18/Climate-change-report-warns-dramatically-
warmer-world-this-century
262 HUMAN MYOPIA

Research and Climate Analytics to help us understand the state of the science and the
potential impact on development in such a world.
It would be so dramatically different from today’s world that it is hard to describe
accurately; much relies on complex projections and interpretations. We are well aware of
the uncertainty that surrounds these scenarios and we know that different scholars and
studies sometimes disagree on the degree of risk. But the fact that such scenarios cannot
be discarded is sufficient to justify strengthening current climate change policies. Finding
ways to avoid that scenario is vital for the health and welfare of communities around the
world. While every region of the world will be affected, the poor and most vulnerable
would be hit hardest. A 4o C world can, and must, be avoided.
The World Bank Group will continue to be a strong advocate for international and
regional agreements and increasing climate financing. We will redouble our efforts to
support fast growing national initiatives to mitigate carbon emissions and build adaptive
capacity as well as support inclusive green growth and climate smart development. Our
work on inclusive green growth has shown that, through more efficiency and smarter use
of energy and natural resources, many opportunities exist to drastically reduce the climate
impact of development, without slowing down poverty alleviation and economic growth.
This report is a stark reminder that climate change affects everything. The solutions
don’t lie only in climate finance or climate projects. The solutions lie in effective risk
management and ensuring all our work, all our thinking, is designed with the threat of a
4o C degree world in mind. The World Bank Group will step up to the challenge.

6.16 Permian-Triassic extinction event

The geological record shows five major extinction events.

• Ordovician-Silurian Extinction. around 439 million years ago.

• Late Devonian Extinction. 375-360 million years ago.

• Permian-Triassic extinction. 352 million years ago.

• Triassic-Jurassic extinction, 201 million years ago.

• Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction, 66 million years ago.

The most devastating of these was the Permian-Triassic extinction, which occurred 252
million years ago.17 In the Permian-Triassic extinction, 96% of all marine species and
76% of all terrestrial vertebrates disappeared forever. The cause of this extremely severe
17
https://www.thomhartmann.com/bigpicture/last-hours-climate-change
The Last Hours of Humanity: Warming the World To Extinction (book), by Thom Hartmann
https://www.amazon.com/Last-Hours-Humanity-Warming-Extinction/dp/1629213640
http://www.mediaite.com/online/leonardo-dicaprio-boosts-thom-hartmann-apocalyptic-global-warming-
film-last-hours/
6.17. THE HOLOCENE (ANTHROPOCENE) EXTINCTION 263

event is disputed, but according to one of the most plausible theories it was triggered by
a massive volcanic eruption in Siberia, which released enormous amounts of CO2 into the
earth’s atmosphere.
The region where massive volcanic eruptions are known to have occurred 252 million
years ago called the “Siberian Traps”. (The “Traps” part of the name comes from the fact
that many of the volcanic rock formations in the region resemble staircases. The Swedish
word for staircase is “trapped”.) The eruptions continued for about a million years.
Today the area covered is about 2 million square kilometers, roughly equal to western
Europe in land area. Estimates of the original coverage are as high as 7 million square
kilometers. The original volume of lava is estimated to range from 1 to 4 million cubic
kilometers.
The CO2 released by the Siberian Traps eruption is believed to have caused a global
temperature increase of 6o C, and this was enough to trigger the methane-hydrate feedback
loop, which will be discussed below, The earth’s temperature is thought to have continued
to rise for 85,000 years, finally reaching 15o above normal.

6.17 The Holocene (Anthropocene) extinction

We are now living in the midst of a sixth, human-caused, mass extinction. How severe it
becomes is up to us.
Recently a group of scientists stated that the scope of human impact on planet Earth
is so great that the Anthropocene warrants a formal place in the Geological Time Scale.
In a statement issued by University of Leicester Press Office on 2 October 2017, professor
Jan Zalasiewicz from the University of Leicester’s School of Geography, Geology, and the
Environment said: “Our findings suggest that the Anthropocene should follow on from the
Holocene Epoch that has seen 11.7 thousand years of relative environmental stability, since
the retreat of the last Ice Age, as we enter a more unstable and rapidly evolving phase of
our planet’s history,”18
“We conclude that human impact has now grown to the point that it has changed the
course of Earth history by at least many millennia, in terms of the anticipated long-term
climate effects (e.g. postponement of the next glacial maximum: see Ganopolski et al.,
2016; Clark et al., 2016), and in terms of the extensive and ongoing transformation of the
biota, including a geologically unprecedented phase of human-mediated species invasions,
and by species extinctions which are accelerating (Williams et al., 2015, 2016).”
The report stated that defining characteristics of the period include “marked accelera-
tion of rates of erosion and sedimentation; large-scale chemical perturbations to the cycles
of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and other elements; the inception of significant change in
global climate and sea level; and biotic changes including unprecedented levels of species
invasions across the Earth. Many of these changes are geologically long-lasting, and some
are effectively irreversible.”
18
http://www2.le.ac.uk/offices/press/press-releases/2017/october/significant-scale-of-human-impact-
on-planet-has-changed-course-of-earth2019s-history-scientists-suggest
264 HUMAN MYOPIA

Loss of biodiversity
Tropical rain forests are the most biologically diverse places in the world. This is because
they have not been affected by the periods of glaciation that have periodically destroyed
the forests of temperate and boreal regions. The destruction of species-rich tropical rain
forests is one of the mechanisms driving the present high rate of species loss.
According to a recent article published in The Guardian19 “Conservation experts have
already signalled that the world is in the grip of the ”sixth great extinction” of species,
driven by the destruction of natural habitats, hunting, the spread of alien predators and
disease, and climate change.
“The IUCN20 created shock waves with its major assessment of the world’s biodiversity
in 2004, which calculated that the rate of extinction had reached 100-1,000 times that
suggested by the fossil records before humans.
“No formal calculations have been published since, but conservationists agree the rate of
loss has increased since then, and Stuart said it was possible that the dramatic predictions
of experts like the renowned Harvard biologist E O Wilson, that the rate of loss could reach
10,000 times the background rate in two decades, could be correct.”
A recent article by Profs. Gerardo Ceballos, Paul R. Ehrlich and Rodolfo Dirzo in
the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences was entitles “Biological Annihilation
via the Ongoing Sixth Mass Extinction Signaled by Vertebrate Population Losses and
Declines”.
The Abstract of the paper reads as follows: “The population extinction pulse we de-
scribe here shows, from a quantitative viewpoint, that Earth’s sixth mass extinction is more
severe than perceived when looking exclusively at species extinctions. Therefore, humanity
needs to address anthropogenic population extirpation and decimation immediately. That
conclusion is based on analyses of the numbers and degrees of range contraction (indica-
tive of population shrinkage and/or population extinctions according to the International
Union for Conservation of Nature) using a sample of 27,600 vertebrate species, and on a
more detailed analysis documenting the population extinctions between 1900 and 2015 in
177 mammal species. We find that the rate of population loss in terrestrial vertebrates is
extremely high, even in ’species of low concern.’ In our sample, comprising nearly half of
known vertebrate species, 32% (8,851/27,600) are decreasing; that is, they have decreased
in population size and range. In the 177 mammals for which we have detailed data, all have
lost 30% or more of their geographic ranges and more than 40% of the species have expe-
rienced severe population declines (¿80% range shrinkage). Our data indicate that beyond
global species extinctions Earth is experiencing a huge episode of population declines and
extirpations, which will have negative cascading consequences on ecosystem functioning
and services vital to sustaining civilization. We describe this as a ’biological annihilation’
to highlight the current magnitude of Earth’s ongoing sixth major extinction event.“

19
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/mar/07/extinction-species-evolve
20
International Union for the Conservation of Nature
6.18. GLOBAL WARMING AND ATMOSPHERIC WATER VAPOR 265

6.18 Global warming and atmospheric water vapor

A feedback loop is a self-re-enforcing trend. One of the main positive feedback loops in
global warming is the tendency of warming to increase the atmospheric saturation pressure
for water vapor, and hence amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, which in turn leads
to further warming, since water vapor is a greenhouse gas.
Wikipedia’s article on greenhouse gases states that, “Water vapor accounts for the
largest percentage of the greenhouse effect, between 36% and 66% for clear sky conditions
and between 66% and 85% when including clouds.”

6.19 The albedo effect

Albedo is defined to be the fraction of solar energy (shortwave radiation) reflected from
the Earth back into space. It is a measure of the reflectivity of the earth’s surface. Ice,
especially with snow on top of it, has a high albedo: most sunlight hitting the surface
bounces back towards space.

Loss of sea ice

Especially in the Arctic and Antarctic regions, there exists a dangerous feedback loop
involving the albedo of ice and snow. As is shown in Figure 4.1, Arctic sea ice is rapidly
disappearing. It is predicted that during the summers, the ice covering arctic seas may
disappear entirely during the summers. As a consequence, incoming sunlight will encounter
dark light-absorbing water surfaces rather than light-reflecting ice and snow.
This effect is self-re-enforcing. In other words, it is a feedback loop. The rising temper-
atures caused by the absorption of more solar radiation cause the melting of more ice, and
hence even more absorption of radiation rather than reflection, still higher temperatures,
more melting, and so on.
The feedback loop is further strengthened by the fact that water vapor acts like a
greenhouse gas. As polar oceans become exposed, more water vapor enters the atmosphere,
where it contributes to the greenhouse effect and rising temperatures.

Darkened snow on Greenland’s icecap

Greenland’s icecap is melting, and as it melts, the surface becomes darker and less re-
flective because particles of soot previously trapped in the snow and ice become exposed.
This darkened surface absorbs an increased amount of solar radiation, and the result is
accelerated melting.
266 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.15: The worrying thing about the methane/hydrate feedback loop is the
enormous amount of carbon in the form of hydrate crystals, 10,000 gigatons
most of it on the continental shelves of oceans. This greater than the amount of
carbon in all other forms that might potentially enter the earth’s atmosphere.
6.19. THE ALBEDO EFFECT 267

Figure 6.16: When ocean temperatures rise, methane hydrate crystals become
unstable, and methane gas bubbles up to ocean surfaces.

Figure 6.17: This diagram shows two important feedback loops, one involving
the albedo effect, and the other involving methane hydrates.
268 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.18: A “hockey stick” graph showing atmospheric concentrations of three

important greenhouse gasses during the last 2,000 years. The most dramati-
cally increasing of these is methane.

6.20 The methane hydrate feedback loop

If we look at the distant future, by far the most dangerous feedback loop involves methane
hydrates or methane clathrates. When organic matter is carried into the oceans by rivers, it
decays to form methane. The methane then combines with water to form hydrate crystals,
which are stable at the temperatures and pressures which currently exist on ocean floors.
However, if the temperature rises, the crystals become unstable, and methane gas bubbles
up to the surface. Methane is a greenhouse gas which is 70 times as potent as CO2 .
The worrying thing about the methane hydrate deposits on ocean floors is the enor-
mous amount of carbon involved: roughly 10,000 gigatons. To put this huge amount into
perspective, we can remember that the total amount of carbon in world CO2 emissions
since 1751 has only been 337 gigatons.
A runaway, exponentially increasing, feedback loop involving methane hydrates could
lead to one of the great geological extinction events that have periodically wiped out most
of the animals and plants then living. This must be avoided at all costs.

6.21 A feedback loop from warming of soils

On October 6, 2017, the journal Science published an article entitled Long-term pattern
and magnitude of soil carbon feedback to the climate system in a warming world21 . The
21
J.M. Melillo et al., Long-term pattern and magnitude of soil carbon feedback to the climate system in
a warming world, Science, Vol. 358, pp. 101-105, (2017).
6.22. DRYING OF FORESTS AND FOREST FIRES 269

lead author, Jerry Melillo, is an ecologist working at the Marine Biological Laboratory,
Woods Hole Massachusetts. In an interview with Newsweek, he said: “This self-reinforcing
feedback is potentially a global phenomenon with soils, and once it starts it may be very
difficult to turn off. It’s that part of the problem that I think is sobering... We think
that one of the things that may be happening is both a reorganization of the microbial
community structure and its functional capacity,”
The study reported on three decades of observations of heated sections of a forest owned
by Harvard University. The heated sections were 5o C warmer than control sections.

6.22 Drying of forests and forest fires

According to a recent article in Nature22 ,“Across the American west, the area burned
each year has increased significantly over the past several decades, a trend that scientists
attribute both to warming and drying and to a century of wildfire suppression and other
human activities. Allen suggests that the intertwined forces of fire and climate change
will take ecosystems into new territory, not only in the American west but also elsewhere
around the world. In the Jemez, for example, it could transform much of the ponderosa
pine (Pinus ponderosa) forest into shrub land. ’We’re losing forests as we’ve known them
for a very long time,’ says Allen. ’We’re on a different trajectory, and we’re not yet sure
where we’re going.’
“All around the American west, scientists are seeing signs that fire and climate change
are combining to create a ’new normal’. Ten years after Colorado’s largest recorded fire
burned 56,000 hectares southwest of Denver, the forest still has not rebounded in a 20,000-
hectare patch in the middle, which was devastated by an intense crown fire. Only a
few thousand hectares, which the US Forest Service replanted, look anything like the
ponderosa-pine stands that previously dominated the landscape.”

6.23 Tipping points and feedback loops

A tipping point is usually defined as the threshold for an abrupt and irreversible change23 .
To illustrate this idea, we can think of a book lying on a table. If we gradually push the
book towards the edge of the table, we will finally reach a point after which more than
half of the weight of the book will not be not supported by the table. When this “tipping
point” is passed the situation will suddenly become unstable, and the book will fall to the
floor. Analogously, as the earth’s climate gradually changes, we may reach tipping points.
If we pass these points, sudden instabilities and abrupt climatic changes will occur.
Greenland ice cores supply a record of temperatures in the past, and through geological
evidence we have evidence of sea levels in past epochs. These historical records show that
22
http://www.nature.com/news/forest-fires-burn-out-1.11424
23
Other definitions of tipping points are possible. A few authors define these as points beyond which
change is inevitable, emphasizing that while inevitable, the change may be slow.
270 HUMAN MYOPIA

abrupt climatic changes have occurred in the past.

Timothy Michael Lenton, FRS, Professor of Climate Change and Earth System Science
at he University of Exeter, lists the following examples of climatic tipping points:
• Boreal forest dieback
• Amazon rainforest dieback
• Loss of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice (Polar ice packs) and melting of Greenland and
Antarctic ice sheets
• Disruption to Indian and West African monsoon
• Formation of Atlantic deep water near the Arctic ocean, which is a component process
of the thermohaline circulation.
• Loss of permafrost, leading to potential Arctic methane release and clathrate gun
effect
It can be seen from this list that climate tipping points are associated with feedback
loops. For example, the boreal forest dieback and the Amazon rainforest dieback tipping
points are associated with the feedback loop involving the drying of forests and forest fires,
while the tipping point involving loss of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice is associated with the
Albedo effect feedback loop. The tipping point involving loss of permafrost is associated
with the methane hydrate feedback loop.
Once a positive feedback loop starts to operate in earnest, change may be abrupt.

6.24 Greta Thunberg’s TED talk

While political leaders and the older generation have been slow to react to the climate
crisis, young people, whose future is at stake, are wide awake and are warning the world
that action must be taken immediately if disaster is to be avoided. Massive global demon-
strations have been initiated by the teenage activist, Greta Thunberg, who has succeeded
where others have failed by speaking with extraordinary clarity, honesty and forcefulness.
Greta was born in Sweden in 2003. Her father, Svante Thunberg, is related to Svante
Arrhenius, one of the important pioneers of climate science, and is named after him. Greta’s
mother was a successful opera singer. Greta Thunberg’s strong belief in the urgency of
action to prevent catastrophic climate change converted her parents, so that they made
changes in their lives. For example, Greta’s mother gave up her career as an opera singer
because it involved air travel.
In November, 2018, Greta Thunberg gave an impressively clear TEDx talk in Stock-
holm, the video of which was recently released.24 . Here is a transcript of the talk.

24
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/12/16/1819508/-A-Call-to-Action-on-Climate-Change-by-
15-year-Old-Greta-Thunberg
6.24. GRETA THUNBERG’S TED TALK 271

When I was about 8 years old, I first heard about something called ‘climate
change’ or ‘global warming’. Apparently, that was something humans had
created by our way of living. I was told to turn off the lights to save energy
and to recycle paper to save resources. I remember thinking that it was very
strange that humans, who are an animal species among others, could be capable
of changing the Earth’s climate. Because, if we were, and if it was really
happening, we wouldn’t be talking about anything else. As soon as you turn
on the TV, everything would be about that. Headlines, radio, newspapers:
You would never read or hear about anything else. As if there was a world war
going on, but no one ever talked about it. If burning fossil fuels was so bad
that it threatened our very existence, how could we just continue like before?
Why were there no restrictions? Why wasn’t it made illegal?
To me, that did not add up. It was too unreal.
So, when I was 11, I became ill, I fell into depression, I stopped talking,
and I stopped eating. In two months, I lost about 10 kilos of weight. Later on,
I was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, OCD and selective mutism. This
basically means, I only speak, when I think it is necessary.
Now is one of those moments.
For those of us, who are on the spectrum, almost everything is black or
white. We aren’t very good at lying and we usually don’t enjoy participating
in the social games that the rest of you seem so fond of. I think, in many
ways, that we autistic are the normal ones and the rest of the people are
pretty strange. Especially when it comes to the sustainability crisis: Where
everyone keeps saying that climate change is an existential threat and the most
important issue of all. And yet, they just carry on like before.
I don’t understand that. Because if the emissions have to stop, then we
must stop the emissions. To me, that is black or white. There are no gray
areas when it comes to survival. Either we go on as a civilization or we don’t.
We have to change.
Rich countries like Sweden need to start reducing emissions by at least
15% every year. And that is so that we can stay below a 2 degrees warming
target. Yet, as the IPCC has recently demonstrated, aiming instead for 1.5
degrees Celsius would significantly reduce the climate impacts. But we can
only imagine what that means for reducing emissions.
You would think the media and every one of our leaders would be talking
about nothing else. But they never even mention it.
Nor does anyone ever mentioned the greenhouse gases already locked in the
system. Nor that air pollution is hiding some warming; so that, when we stop
burning fossil fuels, we already have an extra level of warming - perhaps as
high as 0.5 to 1.1 degrees Celsius.
Furthermore, does hardly anyone speak about the fact that we are in the
midst of the sixth mass extinction: With up to 200 species going extinct every
single day. That the extinction rate is today between 1000 and 10,000 times
272 HUMAN MYOPIA

higher than what is seen as normal.

Nor does hardly anyone ever speak about the aspect of equity or climate
justice, clearly stated everywhere in the Paris agreement, which is absolutely
necessary to make it work on a global scale. That means that rich countries
need to get down to zero emissions within 6 to 12 years with today’s emission
speed. And that is so that people in poorer countries can have a chance to
heighten their standard of living by building some of the infrastructures that
we have already built, such as roads, schools, hospitals, clean drinking water,
electricity, and so on. Because, how can we expect countries like India or
Nigeria to care about the climate crisis if we, who already have everything,
don’t care even a second about it or our actual commitments to the Paris
agreement?
So why are we not reducing our emissions? Why are they in fact still
increasing? Are we knowingly causing a mass extinction? Are we evil?
No, of course, not. People keep doing what they do because the vast major-
ity doesn’t have a clue about the actual consequences for their everyday life.
And they don’t know that rapid change is required.
We all think we know and we all think everybody knows. But we don’t.
Because, how could we? If there really was a crisis, and if this crisis was
caused by our emissions, you would at least see some signs. Not just flooded
cities. Tens of thousands of dead people and whole nations leveled to piles of
torn down buildings. You would see some restrictions.
But no. And no one talks about it. There are no emergency meetings, no
headlines, no breaking news. No one is acting as if we were in a crisis.
Even most climate scientists or green politicians keep on flying around the
world, eating meat and dairy.
If I live to be 100, I will be alive in the year 2103. When you think about
the future today, you don’t think beyond the year 2050. By then I will, in the
best case, not even have lived half of my life. What happens next? In the year
2078, I will celebrate my 75th birthday. If I have children or grandchildren,
maybe they will spend that day with me. Maybe they will ask me about you,
the people who were around back in 2018. Maybe they will ask why you didn’t
do anything while there still was time to act. What we do or don’t do right
now, will affect my entire life and the lives of my children and grandchildren.
What we do or don’t do right now, me and my generation can’t undo in the
future.
So, when school started in August of this year, I decided that this was
enough. I set myself down on the ground outside the Swedish parliament. I
school-striked for the climate.
Some people say that I should be in school instead. Some people say that
I should study, to become a climate scientist so that I can solve the climate
crisis.
But the climate crisis has already been solved. We already have all the facts
6.25. ONLY IMMEDIATE CLIMATE ACTION CAN SAVE THE FUTURE 273

and solutions. All we have to do is to wake up and change.

And why should I be studying for a future that soon will be no more, when
no one is doing anything whatsoever to save that future? And what is the
point of learning facts in the school system, when the most important facts
given by the finest science of that same school system clearly means nothing
to our politicians and our society?
Some people say that Sweden is just a small country and that it doesn’t
matter what we do. But I think that if a few children can get headlines all
over the world just by not coming to school for a few weeks, imagine what we
could all do together if we wanted to?
Now we’re almost at the end of my talk and this is where people usually
people usually start talking about hope. Solar panels, wind power, circular
economy, and so on. But I’m not going to do that. We’ve had 30 years of pep
talking and selling positive ideas. And I’m sorry but it doesn’t work because
if it would have, the emissions would have gone down by now. They haven’t.
And yes, we do need hope. Of course, we do. But the one thing we need
more than hope is action. Once we start to act, hope is everywhere. So instead
of looking for hope, look for action. Then and only then, hope will come today.
Today we use 100 million barrels of oil every single day. There are no politics
to change that. There are no rules to keep that oil in the ground. So, we can’t
save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
Everything needs to change and it has to start today.
Thank you.

6.25 Only immediate climate action can save the fu-

ture
Immediate action to halt the extraction of fossil fuels and greatly reduce the emission
of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses is needed to save the long-term future of human
civilization and the biosphere.
At the opening ceremony of United Nations-sponsored climate talks in Katowice, Poland,
Sir David Attenborough said “Right now, we are facing a man-made disaster of global scale.
Our greatest threat in thousands of years. Climate change. If we don’t take action, the
collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the hori-
zon. The world’s people have spoken. Their message is clear. Time is running out. They
want you, the decision-makers, to act now.”
Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary-General, said climate change was already “a matter
of life and death” for many countries. He added that the world is “nowhere near where it
needs to be” on the transition to a low-carbon economy.
Swedish student Greta Thunberg, is a 16-year-old who has launched a climate protest
274 HUMAN MYOPIA

movement in her country. She said, in a short but very clear speech after that of UN leader
Antonio Guterres: “Some people say that I should be in school instead. Some people say
that I should study to become a climate scientist so that I can ‘solve the climate crisis’. But
the climate crisis has already been solved. We already have all the facts and solutions.”
She added: “Why should I be studying for a future that soon may be no more, when
no one is doing anything to save that future? And what is the point of learning facts when
the most important facts clearly mean nothing to our society?”
Thunberg continued: “Today we use 100 million barrels of oil every single day. There
are no politics to change that. There are no rules to keep that oil in the ground. So we
can’t save the world by playing by the rules. Because the rules have to be changed.”
She concluded by saying that “since our leaders are behaving like children, we will have
to take the responsibility they should have taken long ago.”
Appearing among billionaires, corporate CEO’s and heads of state at the Davos Eco-
nomic Forum in Switzerland, like a new Joan of Arc, 16-year-old Swedish climate activist
Greta Thunberg called on decision-makers to fulfil their responsibilities towards future
generations. Here are some excerpts from her speech:

Greta’s speech at Davos

Our house is on fire. I am here to say, our house is on fire. According to
the IPCC, we are less than 12 years away from not being able to undo our
mistakes. In that time, unprecedented changes in all aspects of society need to
have taken place, including a reduction of our CO2 emissions by at least 50%...

Here in Davos - just like everywhere else - everyone is talking about money.
It seems money and growth are our only main concerns.
And since the climate crisis has never once been treated as a crisis, people
are simply not aware of the full consequences on our everyday life. People are
not aware that there is such a thing as a carbon budget, and just how incredibly
small that remaining carbon budget is. That needs to change today.
No other current challenge can match the importance of establishing a wide,
public awareness and understanding of our rapidly disappearing carbon budget,
that should and must become our new global currency and the very heart of
our future and present economics.
We are at a time in history where everyone with any insight of the climate
crisis that threatens our civilization - and the entire biosphere - must speak
out in clear language, no matter how uncomfortable and unprofitable that may
be.
We must change almost everything in our current societies. The bigger your
carbon footprint, the bigger your moral duty. The bigger your platform, the
bigger your responsibility.
6.25. ONLY IMMEDIATE CLIMATE ACTION CAN SAVE THE FUTURE 275
276 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.19: Greta Thunberg on the cover of Time Magazine, The Intergovern-
mental Panel on Climate Change, in their October 2018 report, used strong
enough language to wake up at least part of the public: the children whose
future is at stake. Here is an excerpt from a speech which 16-year-old Swedish
climate activist Greta Thunberg made at the Davos Economic Forum in Jan-
uary, 2019: “Our house is on fire. I am here to say, our house is on fire.
According to the IPCC, we are less than 12 years away from not being able
to undo our mistakes. In that time, unprecedented changes in all aspects of
society need to have taken place, including a reduction of our CO2 emissions
by at least 50%...”
6.26. WORLDWIDE SCHOOL STRIKE, 15 MARCH, 2019 277

6.26 Worldwide school strike, 15 March, 2019

Over 1.4 million young students across all continents took to the streets on Friday March
15th for the first ever global climate strike. Messages in more than 40 languages were loud
and clear: world leaders must act now to address the climate crisis and save our future.
The school strike was the largest climate action in history. Nevertheless it went almost
unmentioned in the media,
Here are some of the statements by the students explaining why they took part in the
strikes:

In India, no one talks about climate change. You don’t see it on the news
or in the papers or hear about it from government. We want global leaders
to declare a climate emergency. If we don’t act today, then we will have no
tomorrow. - Vidit Baya, 17, Udaipur, India.

We face heartbreaking loss due to increasingly extreme weather events. We

urge the Taiwanese government to implement mitigation measures and face
up to the vulnerability of indigenous people, halt construction projects in the
indigenous traditional realm, and recognize the legal status of Plains Indige-
nous People, in order to implement environmental protection as a bottom-up
approach - Kaisanan Ahuan, Puli City, Taiwan.

We have reached a point in history when we have the technical capacities

to solve poverty, malnutrition, inequality and of course global warming. The
deciding factors for whether we take advantage of our potential will be our
activism, our international unity and our ability to develop the art of making
the impossible possible. Whether we succeed or not depends on our political
will - Eyal Weintraub, 18, and Bruno Rodriguez, 18, Argentina.

The damage done by multinationals is enormous: the lack of transparency, du-

bious contracts, the weakening of the soil, the destruction of flora and fauna,
the lack of respect for mining codes, the contamination of groundwater. In
Mali, the state exercises insufficient control over the practices of the multina-
tionals, and it is us, the citizens, who suffer the consequences. The climate
alarm has sounded, and the time has come for us all to realize that there is
still time to act locally, in our homes, our villages, our cities - Mone Fousseny,
22, Mali.
25

25
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/03/parents-around-the-world-mobilise-behind-
youth-climate-strikes
278 HUMAN MYOPIA
6.26. WORLDWIDE SCHOOL STRIKE, 15 MARCH, 2019 279
280 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.20: Eve White and her children join climate protesters in Tasmania.
According to an article in The Guardian, parents and grandparents around the
world are mobilizing in support of the youth climate movement that has swept
the globe.
6.26. WORLDWIDE SCHOOL STRIKE, 15 MARCH, 2019 281

Concerns of young protesters are justified

In an article in the journal Science dated 12 April, 2019, 26 20 prominent climate scientists
stated that the concerns of student protesters around the world are fully justified. Here
are some quotations from the article:

The world’s youth have begun to persistently demonstrate for the protec-
tion of the climate and other foundations of human well-being. As scientists
and scholars who have recently initiated similar letters of support in our coun-
tries, we call for our colleagues across all disciplines and from the entire world
to support these young climate protesters. We declare: Their concerns are
justified and supported by the best available science. The current measures for
protecting the climate and biosphere are deeply inadequate.
Nearly every country has signed and ratified the Paris Agreement of 2015,
committing under international law to hold global warming well below 2o C
above preindustrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature in-
crease to 1.5o C. The scientific community has clearly concluded that a global
warming of 2o C instead of 1.5o C would substantially increase climate-related
impacts and the risk of some becoming irreversible. Moreover, given the un-
even distribution of most impacts, 2o C of warming would further exacerbate
existing global inequalities.
It is critical to immediately begin a rapid reduction in CO2 and other green-
house gas emissions. The degree of climate crisis that humanity will experience
in the future will be determined by our cumulative emissions; rapid reduction
now will limit the damage. For example, the Intergovernmental Panel on Cli-
mate Change (IPCC) has recently assessed that halving CO2 emissions by
2030 (relative to 2010 levels) and globally achieving net-zero CO2 2 emissions
by 2050 (as well as strong reductions in other greenhouse gases) would allow a
50% chance of staying below 1.5o C of warming. Considering that industrialized
countries produced more of and benefited more from previous emissions, they
have an ethical responsibility to achieve this transition more quickly than the
world as a whole.
Many social, technological, and nature-based solutions already exist. The
young protesters rightfully demand that these solutions be used to achieve a
sustainable society. Without bold and focused action, their future is in critical
danger. There is no time to wait until they are in power...
The enormous grassroots mobilization of the youth climate movement -
including Fridays for Future, School (or Youth) Strike 4 Climate, Youth for (or
4) Climate, and Youth Climate Strike - shows that young people understand
the situation. We approve and support their demand for rapid and forceful
action. We see it as our social, ethical, and scholarly responsibility to state in
no uncertain terms: Only if humanity acts quickly and resolutely can we limit
26
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/364/6436/139.2
282 HUMAN MYOPIA

global warming, halt the ongoing mass extinction of animal and plant species,
and preserve the natural basis for the food supply and well-being of present
and future generations. This is what the young people want to achieve. They
deserve our respect and full support.
6.26. WORLDWIDE SCHOOL STRIKE, 15 MARCH, 2019 283

Figure 6.21: Greta Thunberg addressing a meeting of the European Parliament

in April, 2019. She complained that Brexit was treated as an emergency by the
European Union, but climate change, which is a far greater emergency has been
almost neglected. The 16-year-old, who is due to meet the Pope on Wednesday,
said, “We face an end to civilization as we know it unless permanent changes
take place in our society...European elections are coming soon and many like
me who are affected most by this crisis, are not allowed to vote. That is why
millions of children are taking to the street to draw attention to the climate
crisis... It is not too late to act but it will take far-reaching vision and fierce
determination... My plea is: Please wake up and do the seemingly impossible.”
284 HUMAN MYOPIA

6.27 The World Meteorological Organization’s report

According to a recent United Nations report, extreme weather events displaced 2 million
people during 2018. While no single event can be unambiguously attributed to anthro-
pogenic climate change, scientists believe the the increasing frequency of extreme weather
events is definitely linked to global warming. The same is true of their increasing severity.
The report states that during 2018, extreme weather events impacted roughly 62 million
people, of whom 2 million were displaced from their homes. In the words of the WMO
report, “The physical signs and socio-economic impacts of climate change are accelerating,
as record greenhouse gas concentrations drive global temperatures towards increasingly
dangerous levels.”
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, speaking at the launching of the WMO re-
port, used the occasion to remind global leaders of the urgency of the climate emergency.
Guterres has convened a climate summit meeting scheduled for September 23, 2019, and
referring to the meeting, he said: “Don’t come with a speech, come with a plan. This is
what science says is needed. It is what young people around the globe are rightfully de-
manding.” Two weeks previously, on March 15, one and a half million students from more
that 130 countries had skipped school to participate in the largest climate demonstration
in history, demanding action to save the future from the threat of catastrophic climate
change.

6.28 Only 12 years left to limit climate change catas-

trophe
The world’s leading scientists met at the Forty-Eighth Session of the IPCC and First Joint
Session of Working Groups I, II, and III, 1-5 October 2018 in Inchon, Republic of Korea
and openly declared that civilization is on track for collapse because of reckless use of fossil
fuels, unless immediate action is taken to drastically cut the extraction and use of fossil
fuels.
The report finds that limiting global warming to 1.5o C would require “rapid and far-
reaching” transitions in land, energy, industry, buildings, transport, and cities. Global net
human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide would need to fall by about 45 percent from
2010 levels by 2030, reaching ‘net zero’ around 2050.
“It’s a line in the sand and what it says to our species is that this is the moment and
we must act now,” said Debra Roberts, a co-chair of the working group on impacts. “This
is the largest clarion bell from the science community and I hope it mobilizes people and
dents the mood of complacency.”
“We have presented governments with pretty hard choices. We have pointed out the
enormous benefits of keeping to 1.5C, and also the unprecedented shift in energy systems
and transport that would be needed to achieve that,” said Jim Skea, a co-chair of the
working group on mitigation. “We show it can be done within laws of physics and chemistry.
6.29. COP24, THE CLIMATE SUMMIT IN POLAND 285

Figure 6.22: A firefighter battles fire in California. The world is currently 1

degree Centigrade warmer than preindustrial levels.

Then the final tick box is political will. We cannot answer that. Only our audience can -
and that is the governments that receive it.”
Bob Ward, of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change, said the final doc-
ument was “incredibly conservative” because it did not mention the likely rise in climate-
driven refugees or the danger of tipping points that could push the world on to an irre-
versible path of extreme warming.
Policymakers commissioned the report at the Paris climate talks in 2016, but since
then the gap between science and politics has widened. Donald Trump has promised to
withdraw the US - the world’s biggest source of historical emissions - from the accord.
Brazil’s president. Jair Bolsonaro, threatens to do the same and also open the Amazon
rainforest to agribusiness.

6.29 COP24, the climate summit in Poland

The UN Secretary General’s address to the opening session
Welcome to COP 24.
I thank President Duda, Minister Kowalczyk and COP President Designate
Mijal Kurtyka for their warm welcome.
We are in trouble. We are in deep trouble with climate change.
Climate change is running faster than we are and we must catch up sooner
rather than later before it is too late.
For many, people, regions even countries this is already a matter of life and
death.
This meeting is the most important gathering on climate change since the
Paris Agreement was signed.
286 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.23: UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres: “It is hard to overstate

the urgency of our situation. Even as we witness devastating climate impacts
causing havoc across the world, we are still not doing enough, nor moving fast
enough, to prevent irreversible and catastrophic climate disruption. Nor are we
doing enough to capitalize on the enormous social, economic and environmental
opportunities of climate action.”

It is hard to overstate the urgency of our situation.

Even as we witness devastating climate impacts causing havoc across the
world, we are still not doing enough, nor moving fast enough, to prevent irre-
versible and catastrophic climate disruption.
Nor are we doing enough to capitalize on the enormous social, economic
and environmental opportunities of climate action.
And so, I want to deliver four simple messages.
First: science demands a significantly more ambitious response.
Second: the Paris Agreement provides the framework for action, so we must
operationalize it.
Third: we have a collective responsibility to invest in averting global climate
chaos, to consolidate the financial commitments made in Paris and to assist the
most vulnerable communities and nations.
Fourth: climate action offers a compelling path to transform our world for
the better.
Let me turn first to science.
According to the World Meteorological Organization, the 20 warmest years
on record have been in the past 22 years, with the top four in the past four
years.
The concentration of carbon dioxide is the highest it has been in 3 million
years.
6.29. COP24, THE CLIMATE SUMMIT IN POLAND 287

Emissions are now growing again.

The recent special report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change finds that warming could reach 1.5 degrees as soon as 2030, with dev-
astating impacts.
The latest UN Environment Programme Emissions Gap Report tells us that
the current Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement
will lead to global warming of about 3 degrees by the end of the century.
Furthermore, the majority of countries most responsible for greenhouse gas
emissions are behind in their efforts to meet their Paris pledges.
So, it is plain we are way off course.
We need more action and more ambition.
We absolutely have to close this emissions gap.
If we fail, the Arctic and Antarctic will continue to melt, corals will bleach
and then die, the oceans will rise, more people will die from air pollution,
water scarcity will plague a significant proportion of humanity, and the cost of
disasters will skyrocket.
Last year I visited Barbuda and Dominica, which were devastated by hur-
ricanes. The destruction and suffering I saw was heart-breaking. That story is
repeated almost daily somewhere in the world.
These emergencies are preventable.
Emissions must decline by 45 per cent from 2010 levels by 2030 and be net
zero by 2050.
Renewable energy will need to supply half to two-thirds of the world’s pri-
mary energy by 2050 with a corresponding reduction in fossil fuels.
In short, we need a complete transformation of our global energy economy,
as well as how we manage land and forest resources.
We need to embrace low-carbon, climate-resilient sustainable development.
I am hopeful that the Talanoa Dialogue will provide a very strong impulse
for increased ambition in the commitments for climate action.
Excellencies,
This brings me to my second point.
The Paris Agreement provides a framework for the transformation we need.
It is our job here in Katowice is to finalize the Paris Agreement Work
Programme – the rule book for implementation.
I remind all Parties that this is a deadline you set for yourselves and it is
vital you meet it.
We need a unifying implementation vision that sets out clear rules, inspires
action and promotes raised ambition, based on the principle of equity and
common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in light
of different national circumstances.
We have no time for limitless negotiations.
A completed Work Programme will unleash the potential of the Paris Agree-
ment.
288 HUMAN MYOPIA

It will build trust and make clear that countries are serious about addressing
climate change.
Dear Friends,
This brings me to my third point: the central importance of finance.
We need concerted resource mobilization and investment to successfully
combat climate change.
We need transformative climate action in five key economic areas - energy,
cities, land use, water and industry.
Some 75 per cent of the infrastructure needed by 2050 still remains to be
built.
How this is done will either lock us in to a high-emissions future or steer us
towards truly sustainable low-emissions development.
Governments and investors need to bet on the green economy, not the grey.
That means embracing carbon pricing, eliminating harmful fossil fuel sub-
sidies and investing in clean technologies.
It also means providing a fair transition for those workers in traditional
sectors that face disruption, including through retraining and social safety nets.
We also have a collective responsibility to assist the most vulnerable com-
munities and countries - such as small island nations and the least developed
countries - by supporting adaptation and resilience.
Making clear progress to mobilize the pledged $100 billion dollars a year
will provide a much-needed positive political signal.
I have appointed the President of France and Prime Minister of Jamaica to
lead the mobilization of the international community, both public and private,
to reach that target in the context of preparation of the Climate Summit I
have convened in September of next year.
I also urge Member States to swiftly implement the replenishment of the
Green Climate Fund.
It is an investment in a safer, less costly future.
Dear Friends,
All too often, climate action is seen as a burden. My fourth point is this:
decisive climate action today is our chance to right our ship and set a course
for a better future for all.
We have the knowledge.
Many technological solutions are already viable and affordable.
Cities, regions, civil society and the business community around the world
are moving ahead.
What we need is political more will and more far-sighted leadership.
This is the challenge on which this generation’s leaders will be judged.
Climate action is not just the right thing to do - it makes social and economic
sense.
Meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement would reduce air pollution - saving
more than a million lives each year by 2030, according to the World Health
6.29. COP24, THE CLIMATE SUMMIT IN POLAND 289

Organization.
According to the recent New Climate Economy report, ambitious climate
action could yield 65 million jobs and a direct economic gain of $26 trillion US
dollars compared to business as usual over the next 12 years.
We are seeing early signs of this economic transformation, but we are
nowhere near where we need to be.
The transition to a low-carbon economy needs political impetus from the
highest levels.
And it requires inclusivity, because everyone is affected by climate change.
That is the message of the Talanoa Dialogue.
We need a full-scale mobilization of young people.
And we need a global commitment to gender equality, because women’s
leadership is central to durable climate solutions.
A successful conference here in Katowice can provide the catalyst.
There is now significant global momentum for climate action.
It has galvanized private business and investors around the world, while
cities and regional governments are also showing that ambitious climate action
is possible and desirable.
Let us build on this momentum.
I am convening a Climate Summit in September next year to raise ambition
and mobilize the necessary resources.
But that ambition needs to begin here, right now, in Katowice, driven by
governments and leaders who understand that their legacies and the well-being
of future generations are at stake.
We cannot afford to fail in Katowice.
Some might say that it will be a difficult negotiation. I know it is not
easy. It requires a firm political will for compromise. But, for me, what is
really difficult is to be a fisherman in Kiribati seeing his country in risk of
disappearing or a farmer or herder in the Sahel losing livelihoods and losing
peace. Or being a woman in Dominica or any other Caribbean nation enduring
hurricane after hurricane destroying everything in its path.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Climate change is the single most important issue we face.
It affects all our plans for sustainable development and a safe, secure and
prosperous world.
So, it is hard to comprehend why we are collectively still moving too slowly
- and even in the wrong direction.
The IPCC’s Special Report tells us that we still have time to limit temper-
ature rise.
But that time is running out.
We achieved success in Paris because negotiators were working towards a
common goal.
290 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.24: Greta: “Many people say that Sweden is just a small country, and
it doesn’t matter what we do. But I’ve learned that you are never too small to
make a difference. And if a few children can get headlines all over the world
just by not going to school, then imagine what we could all do together if we
really wanted to.”

I implore you to maintain the same spirit of urgent collaboration here in

Katowice with a dynamic Polish leadership in the negotiations.
Katowice must ensure that the bonds of trust established in Paris will en-
dure.
Incredible opportunity exists if we embrace a low-carbon future and unleash
the power of the Paris Agreement.
But we must start today building the tomorrow we want.
Let us rise to the challenge and finish the work the world demands of us.
Thank you.

Greta Thunberg’s address to the opening session

Greta Thunberg (born 3 January 2003) is a Swedish climate activist. She is known for
protesting outside the Swedish parliament building to raise climate change activism.
On 20 August 2018, Thunberg, then in 9th grade, decided to not attend school until
the 2018 Sweden general election on 9 September after heat waves and wildfires in Sweden.
Her demands were that the Sweden government reduce carbon emissions as per the Paris
Agreement, and she protested via sitting outside the Riksdag every day during school hours
with the sign “Skolstrejk för klimatet” (school strike for the climate). After the general
elections, she continued to strike only on Fridays. The strike is now in its 17th week. The
6.29. COP24, THE CLIMATE SUMMIT IN POLAND 291

Figure 6.25: Greta: “You only talk about moving forward with the same bad
ideas that got us into this mess, even when the only sensible thing to do is pull
the emergency brake. You are not mature enough to tell it like it is. Even that
burden you leave to us children.”

Figure 6.26: Greta: “Until you start focusing on what needs to be done, rather
than what is politically possible, there is no hope. We cannot solve a crisis
without treating it as a crisis. We need to keep the fossil fuels in the ground,
and we need to focus on equity. And if solutions within the system are so
impossible to find, then maybe we should change the system itself.”
292 HUMAN MYOPIA

transcript of her address to the opening session of COP242728 29 30

is given below,

My name is Greta Thunberg. I am 15 years old, and I’m from Sweden. I

speak on behalf of Climate Justice Now!
Many people say that Sweden is just a small country, and it doesn’t matter
what we do. But I’ve learned that you are never too small to make a difference.
And if a few children can get headlines all over the world just by not going to
school, then imagine what we could all do together if we really wanted to.
But to do that, we have to speak clearly, no matter how uncomfortable that
may be. You only speak of green eternal economic growth because you are too
scared of being unpopular. You only talk about moving forward with the same
bad ideas that got us into this mess, even when the only sensible thing to do
is pull the emergency brake. You are not mature enough to tell it like it is.
Even that burden you leave to us children.
But I don’t care about being popular. I care about climate justice and the
living planet. Our civilization is being sacrificed for the opportunity of a very
small number of people to continue making enormous amounts of money. Our
biosphere is being sacrificed so that rich people in countries like mine can live
in luxury. It is the sufferings of the many which pay for the luxuries of the
few.
The year 2078, I will celebrate my 75th birthday. If I have children, maybe
they will spend that day with me. Maybe they will ask me about you. Maybe
they will ask why you didn’t do anything while there still was time to act. You
say you love your children above all else, and yet you are stealing their future
in front of their very eyes.
Until you start focusing on what needs to be done, rather than what is
politically possible, there is no hope. We cannot solve a crisis without treating
it as a crisis. We need to keep the fossil fuels in the ground, and we need to
focus on equity. And if solutions within the system are so impossible to find,
then maybe we should change the system itself.
We have not come here to beg world leaders to care. You have ignored us
in the past, and you will ignore us again. We have run out of excuses, and
we are running out of time. We have come here to let you know that change
is coming, whether you like it or not. The real power belongs to the people.
Thank you.

27
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFkQSGyeCWg
28
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TYyBtb1PH4
29
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdAOgNTxxt0
30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ1HRGA8g10
6.29. COP24, THE CLIMATE SUMMIT IN POLAND 293

Figure 6.27: Greta Thunberg addresses the National Assembly In Paris on July
23, 2019 in Paris, France.
294 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.28: Greta Thunberg crossing the Atlantic on a small emission-free boat.
6.30. THE UK DECLARES A CLIMATE EMERGENCY 295

6.30 The UK declares a climate emergency

Introducing the motion in the House of Commons, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said:
“We have no time to waste. We are living in a climate crisis that will spiral
dangerously out of control unless we take rapid and dramatic action now. This
is no longer about a distant future. We’re talking about nothing less than the
irreversible destruction of the environment within our lifetimes of members of
this house.”
Here are some excerpts from an article by Amy Goodman and Nermeen Shaikh of
Democracy now published in Truthout on May 2, 2019.31 :

On Wednesday, the House of Commons became the first parliament in the

world to declare a climate emergency. The resolution came on the heels of the
recent Extinction Rebellion mass uprising that shut down Central London last
month in a series of direct actions. Activists closed bridges, occupied public
landmarks and even superglued themselves to buildings, sidewalks and trains
to demand urgent action to combat climate change. Police arrested more than
1,000 protesters. Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn told Parliament, “We
are witnessing an unprecedented upsurge of climate activism, with groups like
Extinction Rebellion forcing the politicians in this building to listen. For all
the dismissive and defensive column inches the processes have provoked, they
are a massive and, I believe, very necessary wake-up call. Today we have the
opportunity to say, ‘We hear you.’” We speak with George Monbiot, British
journalist, author and columnist with The Guardian. His recent piece for The
Guardian is headlined “Only rebellion will prevent an ecological apocalypse.”
Monbiot says capitalism “is like a gun pointed at the heart of the planet.
It will essentially, necessarily destroy our life-support systems. Among those
characteristics is the drive for perpetual economic growth on a finite planet.”

31
https://truthout.org/video/george-monbiot-on-the-uk-climate-emergency/
296 HUMAN MYOPIA

6.31 Understatement of existential climate risk

Here are some excerpts from a 44-page report entitled What Lies Beneath: The Under-
standing of Existential Climate Risk, by David Spratt and Ian Dunlop32 :

Three decades ago, when serious debate on human-induced climate change

began at the global level, a great deal of statesmanship was on display. There
was a preparedness to recognize that this was an issue transcending nation
states, ideologies and political parties which had to be addressed pro-actively
in the long-term interests of humanity as a whole. This was the case even
though the existential nature of the risk it posed was far less clear cut than it
is today.
As global institutions, such as the United Nations Framework Convention
on Climate Change (UNFCCC) which was established at the Rio Earth Summit
in 1992, were developed to take up this challenge, and the extent of change
this would demand of the fossil-fuel-dominated world order became clearer, the
forces of resistance began to mobilize. Today, as a consequence, and despite the
diplomatic triumph of the 2015 Paris Agreement, the debate around climate
change policy has never been more dysfunctional, indeed Orwellian.
In his book 1984, George Orwell describes a double-think totalitarian state
where most of the population accepts “the most flagrant violations of real-
ity, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of
them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was
32
https://www.breakthroughonline.org.au/
6.31. UNDERSTATEMENT OF EXISTENTIAL CLIMATE RISK 297

happening. By lack of understanding they remained sane.”

Orwell could have been writing about climate change and policymaking. In-
ternational agreements talk of limiting global warming to 1.5-2 degrees Celsius
(o C), but in reality they set the world on a path of 3-5o C of warming. Goals
are reaffirmed, only to be abandoned. Coal is “clean”. Just 1o C of warming
is already dangerous, but this cannot be admitted. The planetary future is
hostage to myopic national self-interest. Action is delayed on the assumption
that as yet unproven technologies will save the day, decades hence. The risks
are existential, but it is “alarmist” to say so.
A one-in-two or one-in-three chance of missing a goal is normalized as rea-
sonable. Moral hazard permeates official thinking, in that there is an incentive
to ignore the risks in the interests of political expediency.
Climate policymaking for years has been cognitively dissonant, “a flagrant
violation of reality”. So it is unsurprising that there is a lack of understanding
amongst the public and elites of the full measure of the climate challenge. Yet
most Australians sense where we are heading: three-quarters of Australians see
climate change as catastrophic risk, and half see our way of life ending within
the next 100 years.
Politics and policymaking have norms: rules and practices, assumptions
and boundaries, that constrain and shape them. In recent years, the previous
norms of statesmanship and long-term thinking have disappeared, replaced
by an obsession with short-term political and commercial advantage. Climate
policymaking is no exception. Since 1992, short-term economic interest has
trumped environmental and future human needs.
The world today emits 50% more carbon dioxide (CO2 ) from the consump-
tion of energy than it did 25 years ago, and the global economy has more than
doubled in size. The UNFCCC strives “to enable economic development to pro-
ceed in a sustainable manner”, but every year humanity’s ecological footprint
becomes larger and less sustainable. Humanity now requires the biophysical
capacity of 1.7 Earths annually as it rapidly chews up natural capital.
A fast, emergency-scale transition to a post-fossil fuel world is absolutely
necessary to address climate change. But this is excluded from consideration
by policymakers because it is considered to be too disruptive. The orthodoxy is
that there is time for an orderly economic transition within the current short-
termist political paradigm. Discussion of what would be safe - less warming
than we presently experience - is non-existent. And so we have a policy failure
of epic proportions.
Policymakers, in their magical thinking, imagine a mitigation path of grad-
ual change to be constructed over many decades in a growing, prosperous
world. The world not imagined is the one that now exists: of looming finan-
cial instability; of a global crisis of political legitimacy and “fake news”; of a
sustainability crisis that extends far beyond climate change to include all the
fundamentals of human existence and most significant planetary boundaries
298 HUMAN MYOPIA

(soils, potable water, oceans, the atmosphere, biodiversity, and so on); and of
severe global energy-sector dislocation.
In anticipation of the upheaval that climate change would impose upon
the global order, the IPCC was established by the United Nations (UN) in
1988, charged with regularly assessing the global consensus on climate science
as a basis for policymaking. The IPCC Assessment Reports (AR), produced
every five-to-eight years, play a large part in the public framing of the climate
narrative: new reports are a global media event.
AR5 was produced in 2013-14, with AR6 due in 2022. The IPCC has
done critical, indispensable work of the highest standard in pulling together a
periodic consensus of what must be the most exhaustive scientific investigation
in world history.
It does not carry out its own research, but reviews and collates peer-
reviewed material from across the spectrum of this incredibly complex area,
identifying key issues and trends for policymaker consideration. However, the
IPCC process suffers from all the dangers of consensus-building in such a wide-
ranging and complex arena. For example, IPCC reports, of necessity, do not
always contain the latest available information. Consensus-building can lead to
“least drama”, lowest-common-denominator outcomes, which overlook critical
issues. This is particularly the case with the “fat-tails” of probability distri-
butions, that is, the high-impact but lower-probability events where scientific
knowledge is more limited.
Vested-interest pressure is acute in all directions; climate denialists accuse
the IPCC of alarmism, whereas many climate action proponents consider the
IPCC to be far too conservative. To cap it all, the IPCC conclusions are subject
to intense political oversight before being released, which historically has had
the effect of substantially watering-down sound scientific findings.
These limitations are understandable, and arguably were not of overriding
importance in the early period of the IPCC. However, as time has progressed,
it is now clear that the risks posed by climate change are far greater than
previously anticipated. We have moved out of the twilight period of much
talk, but relatively limited climate impacts, into the harsh light of physically-
evident existential threats. Climate change is now turning nasty, as we have
witnessed recently in the North America, East and South Asia, the Middle
East and Europe, with record-breaking heatwaves and wildfires, more intense
flooding and more damaging hurricanes.
The distinction between climate science and risk is the critical issue, for
the two are not the same. Scientific reticence - a reluctance to spell out the
full risk implications of climate science in the absence of perfect information
- has become a major problem. Whilst this is understandable, particularly
when scientists are continually criticized by denialists and political apparatchiks
for speaking out, it is extremely dangerous given the fat-tail risks of climate
change. Waiting for perfect information, as we are continually urged to do
6.31. UNDERSTATEMENT OF EXISTENTIAL CLIMATE RISK 299

by political and economic elites, means it will be too late to act. Time is not
on our side. Sensible risk management addresses risk in time to prevent it
happening, and that time is now.
Irreversible, adverse climate change on the global scale now occurring is an
existential risk to human civilization. Many of the world’s top climate scientists
- Kevin Anderson, James Hansen, Michael E. Mann, Michael Oppenheimer,
Naomi Oreskes, Stefan Rahmstorf, Eric Rignot, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber,
Kevin Trenberth and others - who are quoted in this report well understand
these implications and are forthright about their findings, where we are head-
ing, and the limitations of IPCC reports.
This report seeks to alert the wider community and business and political
leaders to these limitations and urges changes to the IPCC approach, to the
wider UNFCCC negotiations, and to national policymaking. It is clear that ex-
isting processes will not deliver the transformation to a carbon-negative world
in the limited time now available. We urgently require a re-framing of scien-
tific research within an existential risk-management framework. This requires
special precautions that go well beyond conventional risk management. Like
an iceberg, there is great danger in “what lies beneath”.

Existential Risk to Human Civilization

In 2016, the World Economic Forum survey of the most impactful risks for the
years ahead elevated the failure of climate change mitigation and adaptation to
the top of the list, ahead of weapons of mass destruction, ranking second, and
water crises, ranking third. By 2018, following a year characterized by high-
impact hurricanes and extreme temperatures, extreme-weather events were
seen as the single most prominent risk. As the survey noted: “We have been
pushing our planet to the brink and the damage is becoming increasingly clear.”
Climate change is an existential risk to human civilization: that is, an ad-
verse outcome that would either annihilate intelligent life or permanently and
drastically curtail its potential.
Temperature rises that are now in prospect, after the Paris Agreement, are
in the range of 3-5 o C. At present, the Paris Agreement voluntary emission
reduction commitments, if implemented, would result in planetary warming of
3.4 o C by 2100, without taking into account “long-term” carbon- cycle feed-
backs. With a higher climate sensitivity figure of 4.5 o C, for example, which
would account for such feedbacks, the Paris path would result in around 5 o C
of warming, according to a MIT study.
A study by Schroeder Investment Management published in June 2017
found - after taking into account indicators across a wide range of the politi-
cal, financial, energy and regulatory sectors - the average temperature increase
implied for the Paris Agreement across all sectors was 4.1 o C.
Yet 3 o C of warming already constitutes an existential risk. A 2007 study
300 HUMAN MYOPIA

by two US national security think-tanks concluded that 3 o C of warming and

a 0.5 meter sea-level rise would likely lead to “outright chaos” and “nuclear
war is possible”, emphasizing how “massive non-linear events in the global
environment give rise to massive nonlinear societal event”.
The Global Challenges Foundation (GCF) explains what could happen: “If
climate change was to reach 3 o C, most of Bangladesh and Florida would drown,
while major coastal cities - Shanghai, Lagos, Mumbai - would be swamped,
likely creating large flows of climate refugees. Most regions in the world would
see a significant drop in food production and increasing numbers of extreme
weather events, whether heat waves, floods or storms. This likely scenario for
a 3 o C rise does not take into account the considerable risk that self-reinforcing
feedback loops set in when a certain threshold is reached, leading to an ever
increasing rise in temperature. Potential thresholds include the melting of
the Arctic permafrost releasing methane into the atmosphere, forest die-back
releasing the carbon currently stored in the Amazon and boreal forests, or the
melting of polar ice caps that would no longer reflect away light and heat from
the sun.”
Warming of 4 o C or more could reduce the global human population by 80%
or 90%, and the World Bank reports “there is no certainty that adaptation to
a 4 o C world is possible.”
Prof. Kevin Anderson says a 4 o C future “is incompatible with an organized
global community, is likely to be beyond ‘adaptation’, is devastating to the
majority of ecosystems, and has a high probability of not being stable”.
This is a commonly-held sentiment amongst climate scientists. A recent
study by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre found that if the
global temperature rose 4 o C, then extreme heatwaves with “apparent tem-
peratures” peaking at over 55 o C will begin to regularly affect many densely
populated parts of the world, forcing much activity in the modern industrial
world to stop. (“Apparent temperatures” refers to the Heat Index, which
quantifies the combined effect of heat and humidity to provide people with a
means of avoiding dangerous conditions.)
In 2017, one of the first research papers to focus explicitly on existential
climate risks proposed that “mitigation goals be set in terms of climate risk
category instead of a temperature threshold”, and established a “dangerous”
risk category of warming greater than 1.5 o C, and a “catastrophic” category
for warming of 3 o C or more. The authors focussed on the impacts on the
world’s poorest three billion people, on health and heat stress, and the impacts
of climate extremes on such people with limited adaptation resources. They
found that a 2 o C warming “would double the land area subject to deadly heat
and expose 48% of the population (to deadly heat). A 4 o C warming by 2100
would subject 47% of the land area and almost 74% of the world population to
deadly heat, which could pose existential risks to humans and mammals alike
unless massive adaptation measures are implemented.”
6.32. THE 2018 IPCC REPORT 301

A 2017 survey of global catastrophic risks by the Global Challenges Foun-

dation found that: “In high-end [climate] scenarios, the scale of destruction
is beyond our capacity to model, with a high likelihood of human civilization
coming to an end.”
84% of 8000 people in eight countries surveyed for the Foundation considered
climate change a “global catastrophic risk”.
Existential risk may arise from a fast rate of system change, since the capac-
ity to adapt, in both the natural and human worlds, is inversely proportional
to the pace of change, amongst other factors. In 2004, researchers reported on
the rate of warming as a driver of extinction...
At 4 o C of warming “the limits for adaptation for natural systems would
largely be exceeded throughout the world”.
Ecological breakdown of this scale would ensure an existential human crisis.
By slow degrees, these existential risks are being recognized. In May 2018,
an inquiry by the Australian Senate into national security and global warming
recognized “climate change as a current and existential national security risk...
defined as ‘one that threatens the premature extinction of Earth-originating
intelligent life or the permanent and drastic destruction of its potential for
desirable future development’”.
In April 2018, the Intelligence on European Pensions and Institutional In-
vestment think-tank warned business leaders that “climate change is an exis-
tential risk whose elimination must become a corporate objective”.
However the most recent IPCC Assessment Report did not consider the
issue. Whilst the term “risk management” appears in the 2014 IPCC Synthe-
sis Report fourteen times, the terms “existential” and “catastrophic” do not
appear...

6.32 The 2018 IPCC report

Excerpts from an article summarizing the report
Here are excerpts from an article entitled UN Experts Warn of ’Climate Catastrophe’
by 2040 by Jesica Corbett. The article was published in Common Dreams on Monday,
October 8, 2018.33 :

“The climate crisis is here and already impacting the most vulnerable,”
notes 350.org’s program director. “Staying under 1.5o C is now a matter of
political will.”
Underscoring the need for “rapid, far-reaching, and unprecedented” changes
to life as we know it to combat the global climate crisis, a new report from
33
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/10/08/un-experts-warn-climate-catastrophe-2040-
without-rapid-and-unprecedented-global
302 HUMAN MYOPIA

the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - the United Nations’

leading body for climate science - details what the world could look like if the
global temperature rises to 1.5o C versus 2o C (2.7o F versus 3.6o F) above pre-
industrial levels, and outlines pathways to reducing greenhouse gas emissions
in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.
“Climate change represents an urgent and potentially irreversible threat to
human societies and the planet,” the report reads. “Human-induced warming
has already reached about 1o C (1.8o F) above pre-industrial levels at the time
of writing of this Special Report... If the current warming rate continues, the
world would reach human-induced global warming of 1.5o C around 2040.”
Approved by the IPCC in South Korea on Saturday ahead of COP24 in
Poland in December, Global Warming of 1.5o C was produced by 91 authors
and reviewers from 40 countries. Its release has elicited calls to action from
climate campaigners and policymakers the world over.
“This is a climate emergency. The IPCC 1.5 report starkly illustrates the
difference between temperature rises of 1.5o C and 2o C - for many around the
world this is a matter of life and death,” declared Karin Nansen, chair of
Friends of the Earth International (FOEI). “It is crucial to keep temperature
rise well below 1.5 degrees ... but the evidence presented by the IPCC shows
that there is a narrow and shrinking window in which to do so.”
The report was requested when the international community came together
in December of 2015 for the Paris agreement, which aims to keep global warm-
ing within this century “well below” 2o C, with an ultimate target of 1.5o C.
President Donald Trump’s predecessor supported the accord, but Trump has
vowed to withdraw the United States, even as every other nation on the planet
has pledged their support for it. In many cases, however, sworn support hasn’t
led to effective policy.
“It’s a fresh reminder, if one was needed, that current emissions reduction
pledges are not enough to meet the long-term goals of the Paris agreement. In-
deed, they are not enough for any appropriately ambitious temperature target,
given what we know about dangerous climate impacts already unfolding even
at lower temperature thresholds,” Rachel Cleetus, lead economist and climate
policy manager for the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), wrote ahead of
its release.
“The policy implications of the report are obvious: We need to implement a
suite of policies to sharply limit carbon emissions and build climate resilience,
and we must do all this is in a way that prioritizes equitable outcomes partic-
ularly for the world’s poor and marginalized communities,” Cleetus added.
“We want a just transition to a clean energy system that benefits people not
corporations,” Nansen emphasized. “Only with a radical transformation of our
energy, food and economic systems, embracing environmental, social, gender
and economic justice, can we prevent climate catastrophe and temperature
rises exceeding 1.5o C.”
6.32. THE 2018 IPCC REPORT 303

Only immediate climate action can save the future

Immediate action to halt the extraction of fossil fuels and greatly reduce the emission
of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses is needed to save the long-term future of human
civilization and the biosphere.
At the opening ceremony of United Nations-sponsored climate talks in Katowice, Poland,
Sir David Attenborough said “Right now, we are facing a man-made disaster of global scale.
Our greatest threat in thousands of years. Climate change. If we don’t take action, the
collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the hori-
zon. The world’s people have spoken. Their message is clear. Time is running out. They
want you, the decision-makers, to act now.”
Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary-General, said climate change was already “a matter
of life and death” for many countries. He added that the world is “nowhere near where it
needs to be” on the transition to a low-carbon economy.
Swedish student Greta Thunberg, is a 16-year-old who has launched a climate protest
movement in her country. She said, in a short but very clear speech after that of UN leader
Antonio Guterres: “Some people say that I should be in school instead. Some people say
that I should study to become a climate scientist so that I can ‘solve the climate crisis’. But
the climate crisis has already been solved. We already have all the facts and solutions.”
She added: “Why should I be studying for a future that soon may be no more, when
no one is doing anything to save that future? And what is the point of learning facts when
the most important facts clearly mean nothing to our society?”
Thunberg continued: “Today we use 100 million barrels of oil every single day. There
are no politics to change that. There are no rules to keep that oil in the ground. So we
can’t save the world by playing by the rules. Because the rules have to be changed.”
She concluded by saying that “since our leaders are behaving like children, we will have
to take the responsibility they should have taken long ago.”

Institutional inertia
Our collective failure to respond adequately to the current crisis is very largely due to in-
stitutional inertia. Our financial system is deeply embedded and resistant to change. Our
entire industrial infrastructure is based on fossil fuels; but if the future is to be saved, the
use of fossil fuels must stop. International relations are still based based on the concept
of absolutely sovereign nation states, even though this concept has become a dangerous
anachronism in an era of instantaneous global communication and economic interdepen-
dence. Within nations, systems of law and education change very slowly, although present
dangers demand rapid revolutions in outlook and lifestyle.
The failure of the recent climate conferences to produce strong final documents can be
attributed to the fact that the nations attending the conferences felt themselves to be in
competition with each other, when in fact they ought to have cooperated in response to
a common danger. The heavy hand of the fossil fuel industry also made itself felt at the
conferences.
304 HUMAN MYOPIA

Until the development of coal-driven steam engines in the 19th century humans lived
more or less in harmony with their environment. Then, fossil fuels, representing many
millions of years of stored sunlight, were extracted and burned in two centuries, driving a
frenzy of growth of population and industry that has lasted until the present. But today,
the party is over. Coal, oil and gas are nearly exhausted, and what remains of them must
be left in the ground to avoid existential threats to humans and the biosphere. Big coal
and oil corporations base the value of their stocks on ownership of the remaining resources
that are still buried, and they can be counted on to use every trick, fair or unfair, to turn
those resources into money.
In general corporations represent a strong force resisting change. By law, the directors of
corporations are obliged to put the profits of stockholders above every other consideration.
No room whatever is left for an ecological or social conscience. Increasingly, corporations
have taken control of our mass media and our political system. They intervene in such a
way as to make themselves richer, and thus to increase their control of the system.

Polite conversation and cultural inertia

Each day, the conventions of polite conversation contribute to our sense that everything
is as it always was. Politeness requires that we do not talk about issues that might be
contrary to another person’s beliefs. Thus polite conversation is dominated by trivia,
entertainment, sports, the weather, gossip, food, and so on, Worries about the the distant
future , the danger of nuclear war, the danger of uncontrollable climate change, or the
danger of widespread famine seldom appear in conversations at the dinner table, over coffee
or at the pub. In conversations between polite people, we obtain the false impression that
all is well with the world. But in fact, all is not well. We have to act promptly and
adequately to save the future.
The situation is exactly the same in the mass media. The programs and articles are
dominated by trivia and entertainment. Serious discussions of the sudden crisis which
civilization now faces are almost entirely absent, because the focus is on popularity and
ratings. As Neil Postman remarked, we are entertaining ourselves to death.

Further growth implies future collapse

We have to face the fact that endless economic growth on a finite planet is a logical
impossibility, and that we have reached or passed the the sustainable limits to growth.
In today’s world, we are pressing against the absolute limits of the earth’s carrying
capacity, and further growth carries with it the danger of future collapse. In the long run,
neither the growth of industry not that of population is sustainable; and we have now
reached or exceeded the sustainable limits.
6.32. THE 2018 IPCC REPORT 305

Our responsibility to future generations and to the biosphere

All of the technology needed for the replacement of fossil fuels by renewable energy is
already in place. Although renewable sources currently supply only 19 percent of the
world’s energy requirements, they are growing rapidly. For example, wind energy is growing
at the rate of 30 percent per year. Because of the remarkable properties of exponential
growth, this will mean that wind will soon become a major supplier of the world’s energy
requirements, despite bitter opposition from the fossil fuel industry.
Both wind and solar energy can now compete economically with fossil fuels, and this
situation will become even more pronounced if more countries put a tax on carbon emis-
sions, as Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, Costa Rica, the United Kingdom and Ireland
already have done. 34
Much research and thought have also been devoted to the concept of a steady-state
economy. The only thing that is lacking is political will. It is up to the people of the world
to make their collective will felt. 35
History has given to our generation an enormous responsibility towards future genera-
tions. We must achieve a new kind of economy, a steady-state economy. We must stabilize
global population. We must replace fossil fuels by renewable energy. We must abolish
nuclear weapons. We must end the institution of war. We must reclaim democracy in our
own countries when it has been lost. We must replace nationalism by a just system of
international law. We must prevent degradation of the earth’s environment. We must act
with dedication and fearlessness to save the future of the earth for human civilization and
for the plants and animals with which we share the gift of life.

“And yes, we do need hope. Of course, we do. But the one thing we need more
than hope is action. Once we start to act, hope is everywhere. So instead of
looking for hope, look for action. Then and only then, hope will come today.”
Greta Thunberg

34
http://eruditio.worldacademy.org/issue-5/article/urgent-need-renewable-energy
35
http://steadystate.org/category/herman-daly/
306 HUMAN MYOPIA

Figure 6.29: Our carbon budget. If global warming is to be limited to 1.5o C,

CO2 emissions must fall extremely rapidly. This means radical and fundamental
changes for economies and lifestyles.
6.32. THE 2018 IPCC REPORT 307

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314 HUMAN MYOPIA
Chapter 7

SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

In order to have a chance of avoiding catastrophic climate change, we must reduce our
carbon footprings. Understanding the part of human nature that drives us to excessive
consumption can help us to achieve this goal.

7.1 Charles Darwin’s theory of sexual selection

Darwin’s sequel to The Origin of Species
In 1871, Charles Darwin published a book entitled The Descent of Man and Selection
in Relation to Sex. It was a sequel to his 1859 book On the Origin of Species, from
which he had intentionally omitted any discussion of human ancestry. In 1871, however,
honesty compelled him to discuss this highly controversial topic. In his 1871 book, Darwin
also discusses a question that had long bothered him. Why do the males of some bird
species have extravagantly ornamental plumages, which are so elaborate that they may
even hinder the birds’ escape from predators? Darwin had often remarked that the sight
of a peacock’s beautiful feathers made him ill because it seemed to contradict his theory
of natural selection. By 1871, however, he had found the answer: sexual selection.

Male-male competition and female choice

In discussing sexual selection, Darwin divided the subject into two headings - male-male
competition and female choice.
Regarding male-male competition, Darwin wrote that survival “...depends, not on a
struggle for existence, but on a struggle between the males for possession of the females;
the result is not death to the unsuccessful competitor, but few or no offspring.”
In discussing female selection, he wrote “ ...when the males and females of any animal
have the same general habits ... but differ in structure, colour, or ornament, such differences
have been mainly caused by sexual selection.”
The statastician and evolutionary biologist Sir Ronald Aylmer Fischer (1890-1962) later
wrote that “...plumage development in the male, and sexual preference for such develop-

315
316 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

Figure 7.1: A male peacock.

ments in the female, must thus advance together, and so long as the process is unchecked
by severe counterselection, will advance with ever-increasing speed. In the total absence
of such checks, it is easy to see that the speed of development will be proportional to the
development already attained, which will therefore increase with time exponentially, or
in geometric progression... In most existing species the runaway process must have been
already checked, and we should expect that the more extraordinary developments of sex-
ual plumage are not due like most characters to a long and even course of evolutionary
progress, but to sudden spurts of change.”
7.1. CHARLES DARWIN’S THEORY OF SEXUAL SELECTION 317

Figure 7.2: Display by a male bird of paradise.

Figure 7.3: Red bird of paradise male in display.

318 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

Figure 7.4: The King-of-Saxony bird of paradise.

Figure 7.5: Mating display of a seabird on the Galapagos Islands. The females
find this very attractive.
7.2. WE MUST STOP USING MATERIAL GOODS AS A MEANS OF SOCIAL COMPETITION319

Figure 7.6: Female bowerbirds judge males according to their building skills and
aesthetic taste.

7.2 We must stop using material goods as a means of

social competition
Shooting Santa Claus
No one wants to shoot Santa Claus. That goes without saying! Who would want to harm
that jolly old man, with his reindeer and sleigh, and his workshop at the North Pole? Who
would want to prevent him from bringing happiness to everyone? Who would want to stop
him from making the children’s eyes light up like stars? Surely no one!
But the sad truth today is that we have to get rid of Santa somehow, before he kills us,
and before he kills most of the plants and animals with which we share our world. Perhaps
shooting is too harsh. Perhaps we should just forget Santa and all that he stands for, with
his red suit, invented by the advertising department of Coca Cola.
This is what Santa stands for: The customer is always right. Your wish is our command.
You have a right to whatever you desire. If you feel like taking a vacation on the other
side of the world, don’t hesitate, just do it. If you feel like buying a SUV, just do it.
Self-fulfillment is your birthright. Spending makes the economy grow, and growth is good.
Isn’t that right?
But sadly that isn’t right. We have to face the fact that endless economic growth
on a finite planet is a logical impossibility, and that we have reached or passed the the
sustainable limits to growth.
In today’s world, we are pressing against the absolute limits of the earth’s carrying
320 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

Figure 7.7: An expensive automobile can be thought of as a mating display used

by human males to impress females.

capacity, and further growth carries with it the danger of future collapse. In the long run,
neither the growth of industry not that of population is sustainable; and we have now
reached or exceeded the sustainable limits.
The size of the human economy is, of course, the product of two factors: the total
number of humans, and the consumption per capita. Let us first consider the problem of
reducing the per-capita consumption in the industrialized countries. The whole structure
of western society seems designed to push its citizens in the opposite direction, towards
ever-increasing levels of consumption. The mass media hold before us continually the ideal
of a personal utopia, filled with material goods.
Every young man in a modern industrial society feels that he is a failure unless he
fights his way to the “top”; and in recent years, women too have been drawn into the
competition. Of course, not everyone can reach the top; there would not be room for
everyone; but society urges us all to try, and we feel a sense of failure if we do not reach
the goal. Thus, modern life has become a competition of all against all for power and
possessions.
When possessions are used for the purpose of social competition, demand
has no natural upper limit; it is then limited only by the size of the human ego,
which, as we know, is boundless. This would be all to the good if unlimited
industrial growth were desirable; but today, when further industrial growth
implies future collapse, western society urgently needs to find new values to
replace our worship of power, our restless chase after excitement, and our
admiration of excessive consumption.
7.2. WE MUST STOP USING MATERIAL GOODS AS A MEANS OF SOCIAL COMPETITION321

Figure 7.8: A very large house can also be thought of as a human mating display.

Figure 7.9: Size matters!

322 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

Figure 7.10: Males fighting for dominance and mating rights.

Figure 7.11: Males fighting for dominance and mating rights.

7.3. THOREAU: A PIONEER OF SIMPLE LIVING 323

7.3 Thoreau: a pioneer of simple living

In the distant future (and perhaps even in the not-so-distant future) industrial civilization
will need to abandon its relentless pursuit of unnecessary material goods and economic
growth. Modern society will need to re-establish a balanced and harmonious relationship
with nature. In pre-industrial societies harmony with nature is usually a part of the cultural
tradition. In our own time, the same principle has become central to the ecological counter-
culture while the main-stream culture thunders blindly ahead, addicted to wealth, power
and growth.
In the 19th century the American writer, Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), pioneered
the concept of a simple life, in harmony with nature. Today, his classic book, Walden, has
become a symbol for the principles of ecology, simplicity, and respect for nature.
Thoreau was born in Concord Massachusetts, and he attended Harvard from 1833 to
1837. After graduation, he returned home, worked in his family’s pencil factory, did odd
jobs, and for three years taught in a progressive school founded by himself and his older
brother, John. When John died of lockjaw in 1842, Henry David was so saddened that he
felt unable to continue the school alone.
Thoreau refused to pay his poll tax because of his opposition to the Mexican War and
to the institution of slavery. Because of his refusal to pay the tax (which was in fact a
very small amount) he spent a night in prison. To Thoreau’s irritation, his family paid the
poll tax for him and he was released. He then wrote down his ideas on the subject in an
essay entitled The Duty of Civil Disobedience, where he maintains that each person has a
duty to follow his own individual conscience even when it conflicts with the orders of his
government. “Under a government that which imprisons any unjustly”, Thoreau wrote,
“the true place for a just man is in prison.” Civil Disobedience influenced Tolstoy, Gandhi
and Martin Luther King, and it anticipated the Nuremberg Principles.
Thoreau became the friend and companion of the transcendentalist writer Ralph Waldo
Emerson (1803-1882), who introduced him to a circle of writers and thinkers that included
Ellery Channing, Margaret Fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Nathaniel Hawthorne described Thoreau in the following words: “Mr. Thorow [sic] is
a keen and delicate observer of nature - a genuine observer, which, I suspect, is almost
as rare a character as even an original poet; and Nature, in return for his love, seems to
adopt him as her especial child, and shows him secrets which few others are allowed to
witness. He is familiar with beast, fish, fowl, and reptile, and has strange stories to tell of
adventures, and friendly passages with these lower brethren of mortality. Herb and flower,
likewise, wherever they grow, whether in garden, or wild wood, are his familiar friends.
He is also on intimate terms with the clouds and can tell the portents of storms. It is a
characteristic trait, that he has a great regard for the memory of the Indian tribes, whose
wild life would have suited him so well; and strange to say, he seldom walks over a plowed
field without picking up an arrow-point, a spear-head, or other relic of the red men - as if
their spirits willed him to be the inheritor of their simple wealth.”
At Emerson’s suggestion, Thoreau opened a journal, in which he recorded his obser-
vations concerning nature and his other thoughts. Ultimately the journal contained more
324 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

than 2 million words. Thoreau drew on his journal when writing his books and essays, and
in recent years, many previously unpublished parts of his journal have been printed.
From 1845 until 1847, Thoreau lived in a tiny cabin that he built with his own hands.
The cabin was in a second-growth forest beside Walden Pond in Concord, on land that
belonged to Emerson. Thoreau regarded his life there as an experiment in simple living.
He described his life in the forest and his reasons for being there in his book Walden, which
was published in 1854. The book is arranged according to seasons, so that the two-year
sojourn appears compressed into a single year.
“Most of the luxuries”, Thoreau wrote, “and many of the so-called comforts of life,
are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. With
respect to luxuries, the wisest have ever lived a more simple and meager life than the poor.
The ancient philosophers, Chinese, Hindoo, Persian, and Greek, were a class than which
none has been poorer in outward riches, none so rich in inward.”
Elsewhere in Walden, Thoreau remarks, “It is never too late to give up your prejudices”,
and he also says, “Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such
desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is
because he hears a different drummer.” Other favorite quotations from Thoreau include
“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth”, “Beware of all enterprises that
require new clothes”, “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation” and “Men have become
tools of their tools.”
Towards the end of his life, when he was very ill, someone asked Thoreau whether he
had made his peace with God. “We never quarreled”, he answered.
Thoreau’s closeness to nature can be seen from the following passage, written by his
friend Frederick Willis, who visited him at Walden Pond in 1847, together with the Alcott
family: “He was talking to Mr. Alcott of the wild flowers in Walden woods when, suddenly
stopping, he said: ‘Keep very still and I will show you my family.’ Stepping quickly outside
the cabin door, he gave a low and curious whistle; immediately a woodchuck came running
towards him from a nearby burrow. With varying note, yet still low and strange, a pair
of gray squirrels were summoned and approached him fearlessly. With still another note
several birds, including two crows flew towards him, one of the crows nestling upon his
shoulder. I remember that it was the crow resting close to his head that made the most
vivid impression on me, knowing how fearful of man this bird is. He fed them all from his
hand, taking food from his pocket, and petted them gently before our delighted gaze; and
then dismissed them by different whistling, always strange and low and short, each wild
thing departing instantly at hearing his special signal.”
In an essay published by the Atlantic Monthly in 1853, Thoreau described a pine tree in
Maine with the words: “It is as immortal as I am, and perchance will go to as high a heaven,
there to tower above me still.” However, the editor (James Russell Lowell) considered the
sentence to be blasphemous, and removed it from Thoreau’s essay before publication.
In one of his essays, Thoreau wrote: “If a man walk in the woods for love of them half
of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer; but if he spends his whole day
as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is
esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen.”
7.3. THOREAU: A PIONEER OF SIMPLE LIVING 325

Figure 7.12: Henry David Thoreau, 1817-1862.

326 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

7.4 Veblen; economics as anthropology; conspicuous

consumption
The phrase “conspicuous consumption” was invented by the Norwegian-American econo-
mist Thorstein Veblen (1857-1929) in order to describe the way in which our society uses
economic waste as a symbol of social status. In The Theory of the Leisure Class, first
published in 1899, Veblen pointed out that it is wrong to believe that human economic
behavior is rational, or that it can be understood in terms of classical economic theory. To
understand it, Veblen maintained, one might preferably make use of insights gained from
anthropology, psychology, sociology, and history.
Thorstein Veblen was born into a large Norwegian immigrant family living on a farm
in Wisconsin. His first language was Norwegian, and in fact he did not learn English well
until he was in his teens. He was a strange boy, precociously addicted to reading, but
negligent about doing his chores on the farm. His family recognized that he was unusually
intelligent and decided to send him to Carlton College, where he obtained a B.A. in 1880.
Later he did graduate work at Johns Hopkins University and finally obtained a Ph.D. from
Yale in 1884.
Despite the Ph.D., he failed to obtain an academic position. His iconoclastic views
and non-conformist attitudes undoubtedly contributed to this joblessness. Returning to
the family farm, Thorstein Veblen continued his voracious reading and his neglect of farm
duties for six years. As one of his brothers wrote, “He was lucky enough to come out of a
race and family who made family loyalty a religion... He was the only loafer in a highly
respectable community... He read and loafed, and the next day he loafed and read.”
An interesting fact about this strange man is that, for some reason, women found him
very attractive. In 1888, Thorstein Veblen married Ellen Rolfe, the niece of the president
of Carlton College. His wife was to leave him many times, partly because of his many
infidelities, and partly because of his aloofness and detachment. He was like a visitor from
another planet.
In part, the marriage to Ellen was motivated by Veblen’s search for a job. He hoped to
obtain work as an economist for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, of which her
uncle was president. However, the railway was in financial difficulties, and it was taken
over by bankers, after which the position disappeared.
Finally a family council was held on the Veblen farm, and it was decided that Thorstein
should once again attempt to enter the academic world. In 1891, wearing corduroy trousers
and a coonskin hat, he walked into the office of the conservative economist J.L. Laughlan
and introduced himself. Although taken aback by Veblen’s appearance, Laughlan began
to talk with him, and he soon recognized Veblen’s genius. A year later, when he moved to
the University of Chicago, Laughlan brought Veblen with him at a salary of $520 per year.
At the University of Chicago, Veblen soon established a reputation both for eccentricity
and for enormous erudition. His socks were held up by safety pins, but he was reputed
to be fluent in twenty-six languages. He gained attention also by publishing a series of
brilliant essays.
7.4. VEBLEN; ECONOMICS AS ANTHROPOLOGY; CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION327

Figure 7.13: Thorstein Veblen (1857-1929).

328 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

In 1899, Veblen “fluttered the dovecotes of the East” by publishing a book entitled The
Theory of the Leisure Class. It was part economics, part anthropology, and part social
satire. Nothing of the kind had ever been seen in the field of economics. Until that mo-
ment it had been universally assumed that human economic behavior is rational. Veblen’s
detached and surgically sharp intelligence exposed it as being very largely irrational.
According to Thorstein Veblen, ancient tribal instincts and attitudes motivate us today,
just as they motivated our primitive ancestors. Veblen speaks of a predatory phase of
primitive society where the strongest fighters were able to subjugate others. This primitive
class structure was based on violence, and, according to Veblen, the attitudes associated
with it persist today.
For example, Veblen noted that male members of the leisure class liked to go about with
walking sticks. Why? Because, answers Veblen, it is “an advertisement that the bearer’s
hands are employed otherwise than in useful effort.” Also, a walking stick is a weapon:
“The handling of so tangible and primitive a means of offense is very comforting to anyone
who is gifted with even a moderate share of ferocity”.
Even in modern society, Veblen says, we have an admiration for those who succeed in
obtaining power and money through predatory means, and this admiration makes honest
and useful work seem degraded. “During the predatory culture”, Veblen wrote, “labour
comes to be associated in men’s habits of thought with weakness and subjugation to a mas-
ter. It is therefore a mark of inferiority, and therefore comes to be accounted to be unworthy
of man in his best estate. By virtue of this tradition, labour is felt to be debasing, and this
tradition has never died out. On the contrary, with the advance of social differentiation it
has acquired the axiomatic force of ancient and unquestioned prescription.”
“In order to gain and hold the esteem of men it is not sufficient merely to possess wealth
or power. The wealth or power must be put in evidence, for esteem is awarded only on
evidence. It is felt by all persons of refined taste that a spiritual contamination is insepara-
ble from certain offices that are conventionally required of servants. Vulgar surroundings,
mean (that is to say, inexpensive) habitations, and vulgarly productive occupations are
unhesitatingly condemned and avoided. They are incompatible with life on a satisfactory
spiritual plane - with ‘high thinking’.”
“...The performance of labour has been accepted as a conventional evidence of inferior
force, therefore it comes by itself, by a mental shortcut, to be regarded as intrinsically
base.”
“The normal and characteristic occupations of the [leisure] class are... government,
war, sports, and devout observances... At this as at any other cultural stage, government
and war are, at least in part, carried out for the pecuniary gain of those who engage in
them, but it is gain obtained by the honourable method of seizure and conversion.”
Veblen also remarks that “It is true of dress even in a higher degree than of most items
of consumption, that people will undergo a very considerable degree of privation in the
comforts or the necessities of life in order to afford what is considered a decent amount of
wasteful consumption; so that it is by no means an uncommon occurrence, in an inclement
climate, for people to go ill clad in order to appear well dressed.”
The sensation caused by the publication of Veblen’s book, and the fact
7.5. GANDHI AS AN ECONOMIST; MERIT AND GOODS ARE NOT CONNECTED329

that his phrase, “conspicuous consumption”, has become part of our language,
indicate that his theory did not completely miss its mark. In fact, modern
advertisers seem to be following Veblen’s advice: Realizing that much of the
output of our economy will be used for the purpose of establishing the social
status of consumers, advertising agencies hire psychologists to appeal to the
consumer’s longing for a higher social position.

7.5 Gandhi as an economist; merit and goods are not

connected
If humans are to achieve a stable society in the distant future, it will be necessary for
them to become modest in their economic behavior and peaceful in their politics. For both
modesty and peace, Gandhi is useful as a source of ideas.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in 1869 in Porbandar, India. His family
belonged to the Hindu caste of shopkeepers. (In Gujarati “Gandhi” means “grocer”.)
However, the family had risen in status, and Gandhi’s father, grandfather, and uncle had
all served as prime ministers of small principalities in western India.
In 1888, Gandhi sailed for England, where he spent three years studying law at the Inner
Temple in London. Before he left India, his mother had made him take a solemn oath not
to touch women, wine, or meat. He thus came into contact with the English vegetarians,
who included Sir Edward Arnold (translator of the Bhagavad Gita), the Theosophists
Madame Blavatsky and Annie Besant, and the Fabians. Contact with this idealistic group
of social critics and experimenters helped to cure Gandhi of his painful shyness, and it also
developed his taste for social reform and experimentation.
Gandhi’s exceptionally sweet and honest character won him many friends in England,
and he encountered no racial prejudice at all. However, when he traveled to Pretoria in
South Africa a few years later, he experienced racism in its worst form. Although he was
meticulously well dressed in an English frock coat, and in possession of a first-class ticket,
Gandhi was given the choice between traveling third class or being thrown off the train.
(He chose the second alternative.) Later in the journey he was beaten by a coach driver
because he insisted on his right to sit as a passenger rather than taking a humiliating
position on the footboard of the coach.
The legal case which had brought Gandhi to South Africa was a dispute between a
wealthy Indian merchant, Dada Abdullah Seth, and his relative, Seth Tyeb (who had
refused to pay a debt of 40,000 pounds, in those days a huge sum). Gandhi succeeded
in reconciling these two relatives, and he persuaded them to settle their differences out of
court. Later he wrote about this experience:
“Both were happy with this result, and both rose in public estimation. My joy was
boundless. I had learnt the true practice of law. I had learnt to find out the better side of
human nature and to enter men’s hearts. I realized that the true function of a lawyer was
to unite parties riven asunder. The lesson was so indelibly burnt into me that a large part
330 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

of my time during my twenty years of practice as a lawyer was occupied in bringing about
compromises of hundreds of cases. I lost nothing thereby - not even money, certainly not
my soul.”
Gandhi was about to return to India after the settlement of the case, but at a farewell
party given by Abdullah Seth, he learned of a bill before the legislature which would deprive
Indians in South Africa of their right to vote. He decided to stay and fight against the bill.
Gandhi spent the next twenty years in South Africa, becoming the leader of a struggle
for the civil rights of the Indian community. In this struggle he tried “...to find the better
side of human nature and to enter men’s hearts.” Gandhi’s stay in England had given him
a glimpse of English liberalism and English faith in just laws. He felt confident that if
the general public in England could be made aware of gross injustices in any part of the
British Empire, reform would follow. He therefore organized non-violent protests in which
the protesters sacrificed themselves so as to show as vividly as possible the injustice of
an existing law. For example, when the government ruled that Hindu, Muslim and Parsi
marriages had no legal standing, Gandhi and his followers voluntarily went to prison for
ignoring the ruling.
Gandhi used two words to describe this form of protest: “satyagraha” (the force of
truth) and “ahimsa” (non-violence). Of these he later wrote: “I have nothing new to teach
the world. Truth and non-violence are as old as the hills. All that I have done is to try
experiments in both on as vast a scale as I could. In so doing, I sometimes erred and learnt
by my errors. Life and its problems have thus become to me so many experiments in the
practice of truth and non-violence.”
In his autobiography, Gandhi says: “Three moderns have left a deep impression on
my life and captivated me: Raychandbhai (the Indian philosopher and poet) by his living
contact; Tolstoy by his book ‘The Kingdom of God is Within You’; and Ruskin by his
book ‘Unto This Last’.”
Ruskin’s book, “Unto This Last”, which Gandhi read in 1904, is a criticism of modern
industrial society. Ruskin believed that friendships and warm interpersonal relationships
are a form of wealth that economists have failed to consider. He felt that warm human
contacts are most easily achieved in small agricultural communities, and that therefore
the modern tendency towards centralization and industrialization may be a step backward
in terms of human happiness. While still in South Africa, Gandhi founded two religious
Utopian communities based on the ideas of Tolstoy and Ruskin. Phoenix Farm (1904)
and Tolstoy Farm (1910). At this time he also took an oath of chastity (“bramacharya”),
partly because his wife was unwell and he wished to protect her from further pregnancies,
and partly in order to devote himself more completely to the struggle for civil rights.
Because of his growing fame as the leader of the Indian civil rights movement in South
Africa, Gandhi was persuaded to return to India in 1914 and to take up the cause of Indian
home rule. In order to re-acquaint himself with conditions in India, he traveled tirelessly,
now always going third class as a matter of principle.
During the next few years, Gandhi worked to reshape the Congress Party into an
organization which represented not only India’s Anglicized upper middle class but also the
millions of uneducated villagers who were suffering under an almost intolerable burden of
7.5. GANDHI AS AN ECONOMIST; MERIT AND GOODS ARE NOT CONNECTED331

Figure 7.14: Gandhi’s spinning wheel was incorporated into the flag of the
Congress Party and later into the national flag of an independent India.

poverty and disease. In order to identify himself with the poorest of India’s people, Gandhi
began to wear only a white loincloth made of rough homespun cotton. He traveled to the
remotest villages, recruiting new members for the Congress Party, preaching non-violence
and “firmness in the truth”, and becoming known for his voluntary poverty and humility.
The villagers who flocked to see him began to call him “Mahatma” (Great Soul).
Disturbed by the spectacle of unemployment and poverty in the villages, Gandhi urged
the people of India to stop buying imported goods, especially cloth, and to make their
own. He advocated the re-introduction of the spinning wheel into village life, and he often
spent some hours spinning himself. The spinning wheel became a symbol of the Indian
independence movement, and was later incorporated into the Indian flag.
The movement for boycotting British goods was called the “Swadeshi movement”. The
word Swadeshi derives from two Sanskrit roots: Swa, meaning self, and Desh, meaning
country. Gandhi described Swadeshi as “a call to the consumer to be aware of the violence
he is causing by supporting those industries that result in poverty, harm to the workers
and to humans or other creatures.”
Gandhi tried to reconstruct the crafts and self-reliance of village life that he felt had
been destroyed by the colonial system. “I would say that if the village perishes India
will perish too”, he wrote, “India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world
will get lost. The revival of the village is only possible when it is no more exploited.
Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of
the villagers as problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore we have to
concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided
this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers
332 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

using even the modern machines that they can make and can afford to use. Only they
should not be used as a means of exploitation by others.”
“You cannot build nonviolence on a factory civilization, but it can be built on self-
contained villages... Rural economy as I have conceived it, eschews exploitation altogether,
and exploitation is the essence of violence... We have to make a choice between India of
the villages that are as ancient as herself and India of the cities which are a creation of
foreign domination...”
“Machinery has its place; it has come to stay. But it must not be allowed to displace
necessary human labour. An improved plow is a good thing. But if by some chances, one
man could plow up, by some mechanical invention of his, the whole of the land of India,
and control all the agricultural produce, and if the millions had no other occupation, they
would starve, and being idle, they would become dunces, as many have already become.
There is hourly danger of many being reduced to that unenviable state.”
In these passages we see Gandhi not merely as a pioneer of nonviolence; we see him also
as an economist. Faced with misery and unemployment produced by machines, Gandhi
tells us that social goals must take precedence over blind market mechanisms. If machines
are causing unemployment, we can, if we wish, and use labor-intensive methods instead.
With Gandhi, the free market is not sacred - we can do as we wish, and maximize human
happiness, rather than maximizing production and profits.
Gandhi also organized many demonstrations whose purpose was to show the British
public that although the British raj gave India many benefits, the toll exacted was too high,
not only in terms of money, but also in terms of India’s self-respect and self-sufficiency.
All of Gandhi’s demonstrations were designed to underline this fact. For example, in 1930
Gandhi organized a civil-disobedience campaign against the salt laws. The salt laws gave
the Imperial government a monopoly and prevented Indians from making their own salt by
evaporating sea water. The majority of Indians were poor farmers who worked long hours
in extreme heat, and salt was as much a necessity to them as bread. The tax on salt was
essentially a tax on the sweat of the farmers.
Before launching his campaign, Gandhi sent a polite letter to the Viceroy, Lord Irwin,
explaining his reasons for believing that the salt laws were unjust, and announcing his
intention of disregarding them unless they were repealed. Then, on March 12 1930, Gandhi
and many of his followers, accompanied by several press correspondents, started on a march
to the sea to carry out their intention of turning themselves into criminals by making salt.
Every day, Gandhi led the procession about 12 miles, stopping at villages in the evenings
to hold prayer meetings. Many of the villagers joined the march, while others cast flower
petals in Gandhi’s path or sprinkled water on his path to settle the dust.
On April 5 the marchers arrived at the sea, where they spent the night in prayer on the
beach. In the morning they began to make salt by wading into the sea, filling pans with wa-
ter, and letting it evaporate in the sun. Not much salt was made in this way, but Gandhi’s
action had a strong symbolic power. A wave of non-violent civil disobedience demon-
strations swept over India, so extensive and widespread that the Imperial government, in
danger of losing control of the country, decided to arrest as many of the demonstrators as
possible. By midsummer, Gandhi and a hundred thousand of his followers were in prison,
7.5. GANDHI AS AN ECONOMIST; MERIT AND GOODS ARE NOT CONNECTED333

but nevertheless the civil disobedience demonstrations continued.

In January, 1931, Gandhi was released from prison and invited to the Viceroy’s palace
to talk with Lord Irwin. They reached a compromise agreement: Gandhi was to call off the
demonstrations and would attend a Round Table Conference in London to discuss Indian
home rule, while Lord Irwin agreed to release the prisoners and would change the salt laws
so that Indians living near to the coast could make their own salt.
The salt march was typical of Gandhi’s non-violent methods. Throughout the demon-
strations he tried to maintain a friendly attitude towards his opponents, avoiding escalation
of the conflict. Thus at the end of the demonstrations, the atmosphere was one in which a
fair compromise solution could be reached. Whenever he was in prison, Gandhi regarded
his jailers as his hosts. Once, when he was imprisoned in South Africa, he used the time
to make a pair of sandals, which he sent to General Smuts, the leader of the South African
government. Thus Gandhi put into practice the Christian principle, “Love your enemies;
do good to them that hate you.”
Gandhi’s importance lies in the fact that he was a major political leader who sincerely
tried to put into practice the ethical principles of religion. In his autobiography Gandhi
says: “I can say without the slightest hesitation, and yet with all humility, that those who
say that religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion means.”
Gandhi believed that human nature is essentially good, and that it is our task to find
and encourage whatever is good in the character of others. During the period when he
practiced as a lawyer, Gandhi’s aim was “to unite parties riven asunder,” and this was also
his aim as a politician. In order for reconciliation to be possible in politics, it is necessary
to avoid escalation of conflicts. Therefore Gandhi used non-violent methods, relying only
on the force of truth. “It is my firm conviction,” he wrote, “that nothing can be built on
violence.”
To the insidious argument that “the end justifies the means,” Gandhi answered firmly:
“They say ‘means are after all means’. I would say ‘means are after all everything’. As
the means, so the end. Indeed the Creator has given us control (and that very limited)
over means, none over end. ... The means may be likened to a seed, and the end to a tree;
and there is the same inviolable connection between the means and the end as there is
between the seed and the tree. Means and end are convertible terms in my philosophy of
life.” In other words, a dirty method produces a dirty result; killing produces more killing;
hate leads to more hate. But there are positive feedback loops as well as negative ones.
A kind act produces a kind response; a generous gesture is returned; hospitality results in
reflected hospitality. Hindus and Buddhists call this principle “the law of karma”.
Gandhi believed that the use of violent means must inevitably contaminate the end
achieved. Because Gandhi’s methods were based on love, understanding, forgiveness and
reconciliation, the non-violent revolution which he led left very little enmity in its wake.
When India finally achieved its independence from England, the two countries parted
company without excessive bitterness. India retained many of the good ideas which the
English had brought - for example the tradition of parliamentary democracy - and the two
countries continued to have close cultural and economic ties.
Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by a Hindu extremist on January 30,
334 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

1948. After his death, someone collected and photographed all his worldly
goods. These consisted of a pair of glasses, a pair of sandals and a white
homespun loincloth. Here, as in the Swadeshi movement, we see Gandhi as a
pioneer of economics. He deliberately reduced his possessions to an absolute
minimum in order to demonstrate that there is no connection between personal
merit and material goods. Like Veblen, Mahatma Gandhi told us that we must
stop using material goods as a means of social competition. We must start to
judge people not by what they have, but by what they are.

7.6 The counter-culture; stepping off the treadmill

Say’s Law (“Supply creates its own demand”), was proposed by the French economist
Jean-Baptiste Say (1767-1832). Say’s basis for this proposition was the assumption that a
consumer’s desire for goods is infinite. He combined this assumption with the observation
that the wages paid for the production of goods will provide money enough to buy back
the goods, even if the amount involved increases without limit. Comforted by Say’s “law”,
and by the observation that people in industrial societies do indeed consume far more than
they actually need, economists continue to pursue economic growth as though it were the
Holy Grail. We do indeed devote much of our efforts to “making the earth bald before her
time”.
As things are today, the advertising industry, which is part of the mainstream culture,
whips demand towards ever higher levels by exploiting our tendency to use material goods
for the purpose of social competition. Meanwhile, a small but significant counter-culture
has realized that unlimited economic growth will lead to ecological disaster unless we stop
in time.
In the 1960’s, a counter-culture developed in the United States, partly as a reaction
against the Vietnam War and partly as a reaction against consumerism. It seemed to
young people that they were being offered a possession-centered way of life that they did
not want, and that they were being asked to participate in a war that they thought was
immoral.
In 1964, a free speech movement began on the campus of the University of California
in Berkeley. Students demanded that the university administration should lift a ban that
it had imposed on on-campus political activities. Student movements elsewhere in the
United States and in Europe echoed the Berkeley protests throughout the late 1960’s and
early 1970’s.
Mario Savo, one of the leaders of the Berkeley free speech movement, compared the
Establishment to an enormous anti-human machine: “There is a time when the operation
of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part;
you can’t even passively take part, and you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and
upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop.
And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless
you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all.”
7.6. THE COUNTER-CULTURE; STEPPING OFF THE TREADMILL 335

The Greening of America, by Charles Reich, describes the youth-centered counter-

culture: “Industrialism produced a new man...”, Reich wrote, “one adapted to the demands
of the machine. In contrast, today’s emerging consciousness seeks a new knowledge of what
it means to be human, in order that the machine, having been built, may now be turned
to human ends; in order that man once more can become a creative force, renewing and
creating his own life and thus giving life back to society.”

Suggestions for further reading

1. R. Tilman, The Intellectual Legacy of Thorstein Veblen: Unresolved Issues, Green-
wood Press, (1996).
2. R. Tilman, Thorstein Veblen and His Critics, 1891-1963, Princeton University Press,
(1992).
3. K. McCormick, Veblen in Plain English, Cambria Press, (2006).
4. J. Dorfman, Thorstein Veblen and His America, Harvard University Press, (1934).
5. J. Homer, ed., The Gandhi Reader: A Sourcebook of his Life and Writings, Grove
Press, New York, (1956).
6. G. Sharp, Gandhi as a Political Strategist, with Essays on Ethics and Politics, Ex-
tending Horizon Books, Boston, (1979).
7. J.V. Bondurant, Conquest of Violence: The Gandhian Philosophy of Conflict, Prince-
ton University Press, (1988).
8. L. Fischer, The Essential Gandhi: An Anthology of his Writings on His Life, Work
and Ideas, Vintage, New York, (2002).
9. M.K. Gandhi, Hind Swaraj and Other Writings, edited by A.J. Parel, Cambridge
Texts in Modern Politics, (2006).
10. C. Bode, Best of Thoreau’s Journals, Southern Illinois University Press, (1967).
11. J. Meyerson et al., The Cambridge Companion to Henry David Thoreau, Cambridge
University Press, (1995).
12. W. Howarth, The Book of Concord: Thoreau’s Life as a Writer, Viking Press, (1982).
13. W. Harding, Days of Henry Thoreau, Princeton University Press, (1982).
14. T. Roszak, The Making of a Counter Culture, (1970).
15. E. Nelson, The British Counterculture 1966-1973, Macmillan, London, (1989).
16. G. McKay, Senseless Acts of Beauty: Cultures of Resistance since the Sixties, Verso,
London, (1996).
17. K. Goffman, Counterculture Through the Ages, Villard Books, (2004).
18. Brundtland Commission, Our Common Future, Oxford University Press, (1987).
19. G.O. Barney, , The Unfinished Agenda: The Citizen’s Policy Guide to Environmental
Issues, Thomas Y. Crowell, New York, (1977).
20. R.E. Benedick, Ozone Diplomacy: New Directions in Safeguarding the Planet, Har-
vard University Press, Cambridge, (1991).
21. T. Berry, The Dream of the Earth, Sierra Club Books, San Francisco, (1988).
22. L.R. Brown, The Twenty-Ninth Day, W.W. Norton, New York, (1978).
336 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION

23. M.E. Clark, Ariadne’s Thread: The Search for New Modes of Thinking, St. Martin’s
Press, New York, (1989).
24. W.C. Clark and others, Managing Planet Earth, Special Issue, Scientific American,
September, (1989).
25. B. Commoner, The Closing Circle: Nature, Man and Technology, Bantam Books,
New York, (1972).
26. Council on Environmental Quality and U.S. Department of State, Global 2000 Report
to the President: Entering the Twenty-First Century, Technical Report, Volume 2,
U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington D.C., (1980).
27. J.C.I. Dooge et al. (editors), Agenda of Science for Environment and Development
into the 21st Century, Cambridge University Press, (1993).
28. E. Eckholm, The Picture of Health: Environmental Sources of Disease, New York,
(1976).
29. Economic Commission for Europe, Air Pollution Across Boundaries, United Nations,
New York, (1985).
30. P.R. Ehrlich, A.H. Ehrlich and J. Holdren, Ecoscience: Population, Resources, En-
vironment, W.H. Freeman, San Francisco, (1977)
31. P.R. Ehrlich and A.H. Ehrlich, Extinction, Victor Gollancz, London, (1982).
32. P.R. Ehrlich and A.H. Ehrlich, Healing the Planet, Addison Wesley, Reading MA,
(1991).
33. C. Flavin, Slowing Global Warming: A Worldwide Strategy, Worldwatch Paper 91,
Worldwatch Institute, Washington D.C., (1989).
34. H.F. French, Clearing the Air: A Global Agenda , Worldwatch Paper 94, Worldwatch
Institute, Washington D.C., (1990).
35. H.F. French, After the Earth Summit: The Future of Environmental Governance,
Worldwatch Paper 107, Worldwatch Institute, Washington D.C., (1992).
36. G. Hagman and others, Prevention is Better Than Cure, Report on Human Envi-
ronmental Disasters in the Third World, Swedish Red Cross, Stockholm, Stockholm,
(1986).
37. G. Hardin, “The Tragedy of the Commons”, Science, December 13, (1968).
38. P.W. Hemily and M.N. Ozdas (eds.) Science and Future Choice, Clarendon, Oxford,
(1979).
39. IUCN, UNEP, WWF, Caring for the Earth, Earthscan Publications, London, (1991).
40. L. Rosen and R.Glasser (eds.), Climate Change and Energy Policy, Los Alamos Na-
tional Laboratory, AIP, New York, (1992).
41. J.J. MacKenzie and M.T. El-Ashry, Ill Winds: Airborne Pollution’s Toll on Trees
and Crops, World Resources Institute, Washington D.C., (1988).
42. J.T. Mathews (editor), Preserving the Global Environment: The Challenge of Shared
Leadership, W.W. Norton, New York, (1991).
43. J. McCormick, Acid Earth, International Institute for Environment and Development,
London, (1985).
44. N. Myers, The Sinking Ark, Pergamon, New York, (1972).
7.6. THE COUNTER-CULTURE; STEPPING OFF THE TREADMILL 337

45. N. Myers, Conservation of Tropical Moist Forests, National Academy of Sciences,

Washington D.C., (1980).
46. D.W. Orr, Ecological Literacy, State University of New York Press, Albany, (1992).
47. D.C. Pirages and P.R. Ehrlich, Ark II: Social Responses to Environmental Impera-
tives, W.H. Freeman, San Francisco, (1974).
48. J. Rotblat (ed.), Shaping Our Common Future: Dangers and Opportunities (Proceed-
ings of the Forty-Second Pugwash Conference on Science and World Affairs), World
Scientific, London, (1994).
49. J.C. Ryan, Life Support: Conserving Biological Diversity, Worldwatch Paper 108,
Worldwatch Institute, Washington D.C., (1992).
50. S.F. Singer, Global Effects of Environmental Pollution, Springer Verlag, New York,
(1971).
51. B. Stokes, Local Responses to Global Problems: A Key to Meeting Basic Human
Needs, Worldwatch Paper 17, Worldwatch Institute, Washington D.C., (1978).
52. L. Timberlake, Only One Earth: Living for the Future, BBC/ Earthscan, London,
(1987).
53. UNEP, Environmental Data Report, Blackwell, Oxford, (published annually).
54. UNESCO, International Coordinating Council of Man and the Biosphere, MAB Re-
port Series No. 58, Paris, (1985).
55. P.M. Vitousek, P.R. Ehrlich, A.H. Ehrlich and P.A. Matson, Human Appropriation
of the Products of Photosynthesis, Bioscience, 34, 368-373, (1986).
56. B. Ward and R. Dubos, Only One Earth, Penguin Books Ltd., (1973).
57. P. Weber, Abandoned Seas: Reversing the Decline of the Oceans, Worldwatch Paper
116, Worldwatch Institute, Washington D.C., (1993).
58. E.O. Wilson (ed.), Biodiversity, National Academy Press, Washington D.C., (1988).
59. E.O. Wilson, The Diversity of Life, Allen Lane, The Penguin Press, London, (1992).
60. G. Woodwell (ed.), The Earth in Transition: Patterns and Processes of Biotic Im-
poverishment, Cambridge University Press, (1990).
61. World Commission on Environment and Development, Our Common Future, Oxford
University Press, (1987).
62. World Resources Institute (WRI), Global Biodiversity Strategy, The World Conser-
vation Union (IUCN), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), (1992).
338 SEX AND OVER-CONSUMPTION
Chapter 8

OUR ROOTS IN SHARING

SOCIETIES

8.1 The San people of the Kalahari Desert

Wikipedia says of them:

“Traditionally, the San were an egalitarian society. Although they had
hereditary chiefs, their authority was limited. The San made decisions among
themselves by consensus, with women treated as relative equals. San economy
was a gift economy, based on giving each other gifts regularly rather than on
trading or purchasing goods and services.

8.2 Sharing in Inuit societies

An article entitled Inuit: Family, Sharing, and Community Life, published by Teachers
Centre1 , states that in Inuit society,
“A primary contribution that binds people together socially, and which has
always played a part in our survival, is the sharing of food and the willingness
to cooperate when the need arises. At times sharing and cooperation are based
on very formal rules, while at other times, it is simply expected to be done.
When animals are killed on the hunt, they are shared, when people are in
need, they are looked after; it is the Inuit way and it represents a value that
we continue to honour.”

1
http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/edu/Login.do?method=load

339
340 ROOTS IN SHARING SOCIETIES

8.3 Sharing in early Christian communities

Acts of the Apostles 4:32-5:11
“Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no
one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned
was held in common. With great power the apostles gave their testimony to
the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There
was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold
them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles’
feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.”

8.4 Trading in primitive societies

Although primitive societies engaged in frequent wars, they also cooperated through trade.
Peter Watson, an English historian of ideas, believes that long-distance trade took place as
early as 150,000 before the present. There is evidence that extensive trade in obsidian and
flint took place during the stone age. Evidence for wide ranging prehistoric obsidian and
flint trading networks has been found in North America. Ancient burial sites in Southeast
Asia show that there too, prehistoric trading took place across very large distances. Anal-
ysis of jade jewelry from the Phillipines, Thailand, Maylasia and Vietnam shows that the
jade originated in Taiwan.
The invention of writing was prompted by the necessities of trade. In prehistoric
Mesopotamia, clay tokens marked with simple symbols were used for accounting as early
as 8,000 BC. Often these tokens were kept in clay jars, and symbols on the outside of the
jars indicated the contents. About 3,500 BC, the use of such tokens and markings led to
the development of pictographic writing in Mesopotamia, and this was soon followed by
the cuneiform script, still using soft clay as a medium. The clay tablets were later dried
and baked to ensure permanency. The invention of writing led to a great acceleration of
human cultural evolution. Since ideas could now be exchanged and preserved with great
ease through writing, new advances in technique could be shared by an ever larger coop-
erating community of humans. Our species became more and more successful as its genius
for cooperation developed.
Early religions tended to be centered on particular tribes, and the ethics associated
with them were usually tribal in nature. However, the more cosmopolitan societies that
began to form after the Neolithic agricultural revolution required a more universal code of
ethics. It is interesting to notice that many of the great ethical teachers of human history,
for example Moses, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Lao-Tzu, Confucius, Buddha, and Jesus,
lived at the time when the change to larger social units was taking place. Tribalism was
no longer appropriate. A wider ethic was needed.
Today the size of the social unit is again being enlarged, this time enlarged to include
the entire world. Narrow loyalties have become inappropriate and there is an urgent need
8.5. INTERDEPENDENCE IN MODERN HUMAN SOCIETY 341

for a new ethic - a global ethic. Loyalty to one’s nation needs to be supplemented by a
higher loyalty to humanity as a whole.

8.5 Interdependence in modern human society

The enormous success of humans as a species is due to their genius for cooperation. The
success of humans is a success of cultural evolution, a new form of evolution in which
information is passed between generations, not in the form of DNA sequences but in the
form of speech, writing, printing and finally electronic signals. Cultural evolution is built
on cooperation, and has reached great heights of success as the cooperating community
has become larger and larger, ultimately including the entire world.
Without large-scale cooperation, modern science would never have evolved. It devel-
oped as a consequence of the invention of printing, which allowed painfully gained detailed
knowledge to be widely shared. Science derives its great power from concentration. At-
tention and resources are brought to bear on a limited problem until all aspects of it are
understood. It would make no sense to proceed in this way if knowledge were not perma-
nent, and if the results of scientific research were not widely shared. But today the printed
word and the electronic word spread the results of research freely to the entire world. The
whole human community is the repository of shared knowledge.
The achievements of modern society are achievements of cooperation. We can fly, but no
one builds an airplane alone. We can cure diseases, but only through the cooperative efforts
of researchers, doctors and medicinal firms. We can photograph and understand distant
galaxies, but the ability to do so is built on the efforts of many cooperating individuals.
The comfort and well-being that we experience depends on far-away friendly hands and
minds, since trade is global, and the exchange of ideas is also global.

8.6 Benefits of equality

Hobson’s explanation of imperialism
The English economist and Fabian, John Atkinson Hobson (1858-1940), offered a famous
explanation of the colonial era in his book Imperialism: A Study (1902). According to
Hobson, the basic problem that led to colonial expansion was an excessively unequal dis-
tribution of incomes in the industrialized countries. The result of this unequal distribution
was that neither the rich nor the poor could buy back the total output of their society.
The incomes of the poor were insufficient, and rich were too few in number. The rich had
finite needs, and tended to reinvest their money. As Hobson pointed out, reinvestment in
new factories only made the situation worse by increasing output.
Hobson had been sent as a reporter by the Manchester Guardian to cover the Second
Boer War. His experiences had convinced him that colonial wars have an economic motive.
Such wars are fought, he believed, to facilitate investment of the excess money of the rich
in African or Asian plantations and mines, and to make possible the overseas sale of excess
342 ROOTS IN SHARING SOCIETIES

manufactured goods. Hobson believed imperialism to be immoral, since it entails suffering

both among colonial peoples and among the poor of the industrial nations. The cure that
he recommended was a more equal distribution of incomes in the manufacturing countries.
Interestingly, TED Talks (ideas worth spreading) was recently under fire from many
progressive groups for censoring a short talk by the adventure capitalist, Nick Hanauer,
entitled “Income Inequality”. In this talk, Hanauer said exactly the same thing as John
Hobson, but he applied the ideas, not to colonialism, but to current unemployment in
the United States. Hanauer said that the rich are unable to consume the products of
society because they are too few in number. To make an economy work, demand must
be increased, and for this to happen, the distribution of incomes must become much more
equal than it is today in the United States.
TED has now posted Hanauer’s talk, and the interested reader can find another won-
derful TED talk dealing with the same issues from the standpoint of health and social
problems. In a splendid lecture entitled How economic inequality harms societies, Richard
Wilkinson demonstrates that there is almost no correlation between gross national product
and a number of indicators of the quality of life, such as physical health, mental health, drug
abuse, education, imprisonment, obesity, social mobility, trust, violence, teenage pregnan-
cies and child well-being. On the other hand he offers comprehensive statistical evidence
that these indicators are strongly correlated with the degree of inequality within coun-
tries, the outcomes being uniformly much better in nations where income is more equally
distributed.
Warren Buffet famously remarked, “There’s class warfare, all right. But it’s my class,
the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” However, the evidence presented by
Hobson, Hanauer and Wilkinson shows conclusively that no one wins in a society where
inequality is too great, and everyone wins when incomes are more evenly distributed.

Extreme inequality today

Here are two quotations from a report by the Global Inequality organization:2
“Inequality has been on the rise across the globe for several decades. Some countries
have reduced the numbers of people living in extreme poverty. But economic gaps have
continued to grow as the very richest amass unprecedented levels of wealth. Among indus-
trial nations, the United States is by far the most top-heavy, with much greater shares of
national wealth and income going to the richest 1 percent than any other country.”
“The world’s 10 richest billionaires, according to Forbes, own $745 billion in combined
wealth, a sum greater than the total goods and services most nations produce on an annual
basis. The globe is home to 2,208 billionaires, according to the 2018 Forbes ranking.”

2
https://inequality.org/facts/global-inequality/
8.6. BENEFITS OF EQUALITY 343

Corporate oligarchs control governments and the mainstream me-

dia
Today, the world faces two existential threats, the threat of an all-destroying thermonuclear
war, and the threat of uncontrollable catastrophic climate change. In the United States,
and several other countries, immensely rich corporate oligarchies use money to control both
the mass media and politics, and the result is that no action is taken to save the future of
the earth for our children and grandchildren.
It is not surprising that the fossil fuel industry supports, on a vast scale, politicians
and mass media that deny the reality of climate change. The amounts of money at stake
are vast. If catastrophic climate change is to be avoided, coal, oil and natural gas “assets”
worth trillions of dollars must be left in the ground. Giant fossil fuel corporations are
desperately attempting to turn these “assets” into cash.
Our military-industrial complexes maintain the threat of thermonuclear war, as well
as spending vast amounts of government money that could alternatively be used for social
programs or renewable energy infrastructure. A military-industrial complex involves a
circular flow of money. The money flows like the electrical current in a dynamo, driving
a diabolical machine. Money from immensely rich corporate oligarchs buys the votes of
politicians and the propaganda of the mainstream media. Numbed by the propaganda,
citizens allow the politicians to vote for obscenely bloated military budgets, which further
enrich the corporate oligarchs, and the circular flow continues.
Excessive economic inequality is at the root of the decay of democracy and the drift
towards neofacism in a number of countries. It is not a coincidence that the United States
and Brazil, two of the countries where inequality is the greatest, now have governments
characterized by racism, militarism, cruelty, mysogeny, decay of democracy and climate
change denial.

Economic equality and climate action in Scandinavia

Senator Bernie Sanders, a popular reformist candidate for the US Presidency in 2016 and
2020, has said that he is a socialist. When asked to explain in detail what he meant by
that, Sanders said that he believed that the US would benefit from having a social and
economic system similar to those of Scandinavia.
The Green New Deal can simultaneously address the climate crisis and the problem of
excessive economic inequality. In this context, it is interesting to look at the social and
economic systems of the Scandinavian countries, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and
Iceland. In these countries the contrast between the rich and poor has been very much
reduced. It is almost true to say that poverty has been eliminated in these countries. At
the same time, the Scandinavians have strong policies to address the climate emergency.
Thus Scandinavian successes are a counter-argument to those who say that the Green New
Deal cannot be put into practice.
344 ROOTS IN SHARING SOCIETIES

8.7 Two sides of human nature

Looking at human nature, both from the standpoint of evolution and from that of everyday
experience, we see the two faces of Janus; one face shines radiantly; the other is dark
and menacing. Two souls occupy the human breast, one warm and friendly, the other
murderous. Humans have developed a genius for cooperation, the basis for culture and
civilization; but they are also capable of genocide; they were capable of massacres during
the Crusades, capable of genocidal wars against the Amerinds, capable of the Holocaust,
of Hiroshima, of the killing-fields of Cambodia, of Rwanda, and of Darfur
As an example of the two sides of human nature, we can think of Scandinavia. The
Vikings were once feared throughout Europe. The Book of Common Prayer in England
contains the phrase “Protect us from the fury of the Northmen!”. Today the same people
are so peaceful and law-abiding that they can be taken as an example for how we would
like a future world to look. Human nature has the possibility for both kinds of behavior
depending on the circumstances. This being so, there are strong reasons to enlist the help
of education and religion to make the bright side of human nature win over the dark side.
Today, the mass media are an important component of education, and thus the mass media
have a great responsibility for encouraging the cooperative and constructive side of human
nature rather than the dark and destructive side.
Chapter 9

A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

9.1 Caring for the future of our children

Our present situation is this:
The future looks extremely dark because of human folly, especially the long-term future.
The greatest threats are catastrophic climate change and thermonuclear war, but a large-
scale global famine also has to be considered.
We give our children loving care, but it makes no sense do so and at the same time to
neglect to do all that is within our power to ensure that they and their descendants will
inherit an earth in which they can survive. We also have a responsibility to all the other
living organisms with which we share the gift of life.
Inaction is not an option. We have to act with courage and dedication, even if the odds
are against success, because the stakes are so high. The mass media could mobilize us to
action, but they have failed in their duty. Our educational system could also wake us up
and make us act, but it too has failed us. The battle to save the earth from human greed
and folly has to be fought in the alternative media. Hence this book, and hence urgent the
tone of this final chapter.
We need a new economic system, a new society, a new social contract, a new way of
life. Here are the great tasks that history has given to our generation: We must achieve a
steady-state economic system. We must restore democracy. We must decrease economic
inequality. We must break the power of corporate greed. We must leave fossil fuels in the
ground. We must stabilize and ultimately reduce the global population. We must eliminate
the institution of war. And finally, we must develop a more mature ethical system to match
our new technology.

9.2 We must achieve a steady-state economic system

A steady-state economic system is necessary because neither population growth nor eco-
nomic growth can continue indefinitely on a finite earth. No one can maintain that ex-
ponential industrial growth is sustainable in the long run except by refusing to look more

345
346 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

Figure 9.1: Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen: He showed that our present economic

system is not cyclic but unidirectional, since it involves the irreversible degra-
dation of non-renewable resources.

than a short distance into the future.

Of course, it is necessary to distinguish between industrial growth, and growth of cul-
ture and knowledge, which can and should continue to grow. Qualitative improvements
in human society are possible and desirable, but resource-using and pollution-producing
industrial growth is reaching its limits, both because of ecological constraints and because
of the exhaustion of petroleum, natural gas and other non-renewable resources, such as
metals. The threat of catastrophic climate change makes it imperative for us to stop using
fossil fuels within very few decades.
Our present economic system as unidirectional and entropic: Low-entropy resources are
converted into high-entropy waste, a unidirectional process. By contrast, to be sustainable
in the long run, a process must be cyclic, like the growth and regeneration of a forest.
Georgescu-Roegen’s list of desiderata remains valid today: We need drastic cuts in
weapons production, thereby releasing productive forces for more constructive purposes.
We need immediate aid to underdeveloped countries and gradual decrease in population to
a level that can be maintained by organic agriculture. We also need avoidance, and strict
regulation if necessary, of wasteful energy use. Finally, we need to abandon our attachment
to extravagant gadgetry and fashion, and we must cure ourselves of workaholic habits by
re-balancing the time spent on work and leisure.
Today, the distinguished economist Herman Daly (a student of Georgescu-Roegen) con-
tinues to write perceptive articles and books documenting the need for a steady-state econ-
omy. Among his books, the following are noteworthy: “Steady-State Economics” (1977);
“For the Common Good” (1989, with John B. Cobb, Jr.); “Valuing the Earth” (1993, with
Kenneth Townsend); “Beyond Growth” (1996); “Ecological Economics and the Ecology of
Economics” (1999); “Local Politics of Global Sustainability” (2000, with Thomas Prugh
and Robert Costanza), and “Ecological Economics: Principles and Applications” (2003,
9.2. WE MUST ACHIEVE A STEADY-STATE ECONOMIC SYSTEM 347

Figure 9.2: Herman E. Daly: A student of Georgescu-Roegen the distinguished

economist, Prof. H.E. Daly calls for a transition to a steady-state economic
system, in which processes would be cyclic and sustainable.

with Joshua Farley.1

1
http://steadystate.org/category/herman-daly/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman Daly
http://grist.org/article/bank/
http://www.donellameadows.org/wp-content/userfiles/Limits-to-Growth-digital-scan-version.pdf
http://www.clubofrome.org/?p=326
348 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

9.3 We must restore democracy

It is obvious, almost by definition, that excessive governmental secrecy and true democracy
are incompatible. If the people of a country have no idea what their government is doing,
they cannot possibly have the influence on decisions that the word “democracy” implies.
Governmental secrecy is not something new. Secret diplomacy contributed to the out-
break of World War I, and the secret Sykes-Picot Agreement later contributed to the
bitterness of conflicts in the Middle East. However, in recent years, governmental secrecy
has grown enormously.
The revelations of Edward Snowden have shown that the number of people involved in
secret operations of the United States government is now as large as the entire population
of Norway: roughly 5 million. The influence of this dark side of government has become
so great that no president is able to resist it.
Many modern governments have become very expert in manipulating public opinion
through mass media. They only allow the public to hear a version of the “news” that has
been handed down by powerholders. Of course, people can turn to the alternative media
that are available on the Internet. But on the whole, the vision of the world presented on
television screens and in major newspapers is the “truth” that is accepted by the majority
of the public, and it is this picture of events that influences political decisions. Censorship
of the news by the power elite is a form of secrecy, since it withholds information that is
needed for a democracy to function properly.
Snowden has already said most of what he has to say. Nevertheless, Washington was
willing to break international law and the rules of diplomatic immunity by forcing its Eu-
ropean allies to ground the plane of Bolivian President Evo Morales following a rumor that
Snowden was on board. This was not done to prevent Snowden from saying more, but with
the intention of making a gruesome example of him, as a warning to other whistleblowers.
In a democracy, the power of judging and controlling governmental policy is supposed
to be in the hands of the people. It is completely clear that if the people do not know
what their government is doing, then they cannot judge or control governmental policy,
and democracy has been abolished. There has always been a glaring contradiction be-
tween democracy and secret branches of the government, such as the CIA, which conducts
its assassinations and its dirty wars in South America and elsewhere without any public
knowledge or control.
The gross, wholesale electronic spying on citizens revealed by Snowden seems to be
specifically aimed at eliminating democracy. It is aimed at instilling universal fear and
conformity, fear of blackmail and fear of being out of step, so that the public will not dare
to oppose whatever the government does, no matter how criminal or unconstitutional.
We must restore democracy wherever it has been replaced by oligarchy. When we do so,
we will free ourselves from many evils, including excessive economic inequality, violation
of civil rights, and the suffering produced by perpetual wars.
9.4. WE MUST DECREASE ECONOMIC INEQUALITY 349

Figure 9.3: Edward Snowden.

9.4 We must decrease economic inequality

In his Apostolic Exhortation, “Evangelii Gaudium”, Pope Francis said: “In our time hu-
manity is experiencing a turning-point in its history, as we can see from the advances being
made in so many fields. We can only praise the steps being taken to improve people’s wel-
fare in areas such as health care, education and communications. At the same time we have
to remember that the majority of our contemporaries are barely living from day to day,
with dire consequences. A number of diseases are spreading. The hearts of many people
are gripped by fear and desperation, even in the so-called rich countries. The joy of living
frequently fades, lack of respect for others and violence are on the rise, and inequality is
increasingly evident. It is a struggle to live and, often, to live with precious little dignity.”
“This epochal change has been set in motion by the enormous qualitative, quantitative,
rapid and cumulative advances occurring in the sciences and in technology, and by their
instant application in different areas of nature and of life. We are in an age of knowledge
and information, which has led to new and often anonymous kinds of power.”

Figure 9.4: We must decrease economic inequality.

350 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

“Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard
the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of
exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills. How can it be that it is not a news item
when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market
loses two points? This is a case of exclusion. Can we continue to stand by when food is
thrown away while people are starving? This is a case of inequality. Today everything
comes under the laws of competition and the survival of the fittest, where the powerful
feed upon the powerless. As a consequence, masses of people find themselves excluded and
marginalized: without work, without possibilities, without any means of escape.”
“In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume
that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing
about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been
confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wield-
ing economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system.
Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.”
In a recent speech, Senator Bernie Sanders quoted Pope Francis extensively and
added: “We have a situation today, Mr. President, incredible as it may sound, where the
wealthiest 85 people in the world own more wealth than the bottom half of the world’s
population.”2
The social epidemiologist Prof. Richard Wilkinson, has documented the ways in which
societies with less economic inequality do better than more unequal societies in a number
of areas, including increased rates of life expectancy, mathematical performance, literacy,
trust, social mobility, together with decreased rates of infant mortality, homicides, impris-
onment, teenage births, obesity and mental illness, including drug and alcohol addiction.3
We must also remember that according to the economist John A. Hobson, the basic prob-
lem that led to imperialism was an excessively unequal distribution of incomes in the
industrialized countries. The result of this unequal distribution was that neither the rich
nor the poor could buy back the total output of their society. The incomes of the poor
were insufficient, and rich were too few in number.

9.5 We must break the power of corporate greed

When the United Nations was established in 1945, the purpose of the organization was
to abolish the institution of war. This goal was built into many of the articles of the UN
Charter. Accordingly, throughout the world, many War Departments were renamed and
became Departments of Defense. But the very name is a lie. In an age of nuclear threats
2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9 LJpN893Vg
https://www.oxfam.org/en/tags/inequality
https://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/file attachments/cr-even-it-up-extreme-inequality-
291014-en.pdf
3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ7LzE3u7Bw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard G. Wilkinson
9.5. WE MUST BREAK THE POWER OF CORPORATE GREED 351

Figure 9.5: We must break the power of corporate greed.

Figure 9.6: Greed is driving us towards disaster.

and counter-threats, populations are by no means protected. Ordinary citizens are just
hostages in a game for power and money. It is all about greed.
Why is war continually threatened? Why is Russia threatened? Why is war with
Iran threatened? Why fan the flames of conflict with China? Is it to “protect” civilians?
Absolutely not! In a thermonuclear war, hundreds of millions of civilians would die horribly
everywhere in the world, also in neutral countries. What is really being protected are the
profits of arms manufacturers. As long as there are tensions; as long as there is a threat
of war, military budgets are safe; and the profits of arms makers are safe. The people in
several “democracies”, for example the United States, do not rule at the moment. Greed
rules.
As Institute Professor Noam Chomsky of MIT has pointed out, greed and lack of ethics
are built into the structure of corporations. By law, the Chief Executive Officer of a
corporation must be entirely motivated by the collective greed of the stockholders. He
352 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

must maximize profits. If the CEO abandons this single-minded chase after corporate
profits for ethical reasons, or for the sake of humanity or the biosphere or the future, he
(or she) must, by law, be fired and replaced.
Occasionally, for the sake of their public image, corporations seem to do something for
other motives than their own bottom line, but it is usually window dressing. For example,
Shell claims to be supporting research on renewable energy. Perhaps there is indeed a small
renewable energy laboratory somewhere in that vast corporation; but the real interest of
the organization is somewhere else. Shell is sending equipment on a large scale to drill for
more and more environment-destroying oil in the Arctic.4

9.6 We must leave fossil fuels in the ground

The threat of catastrophic climate change requires prompt and dedicated action by the
global community. Unless we very quickly make the transition from fossil fuels to 100%
renewable energy, we will reach a tipping point after which uncontrollable feedback loops
could take over, leading to a human-caused 6th geological extinction event. This might
even be comparable to the Permian-Triassic event, during which 96% of all marine species
and 70% of terrestrial vertebrates became extinct.
New hope that such a catastrophe for human civilization and the biosphere can be
avoided comes from two recently-released documents: The Encyclical “Laudato Si’ ” by
Pope Francis, and the statistics on the rate of growth of renewable energy newly released
by the Earth Policy Institute.
Arctic sea-ice is melting at an increasingly rapid rate, because of several feedback loops.
One of these feedback loops, called the albedo effect, is due to the fact that white snow-
covered sea-ice in the Arctic reflects sunlight, while dark water absorbs it, raising the
temperature and leading to more melting.
Another feedback loop is due to the fact that rising temperatures mean that more water
is evaporated. The water vapor in the atmosphere acts like a greenhouse gas, and raises
the temperature still further.
If we consider long-term effects, by far the most dangerous of the feedback loops is
the melting of methane hydrate crystals and the release of methane into the atmosphere,
where its effects as a greenhouse gas are roughly twenty times great as those of CO2 .
When organic matter is carried into the oceans by rivers, it decays to form methane.
The methane then combines with water to form hydrate crystals, which are stable at the
temperatures which currently exist on ocean floors. However, if the temperature rises, the
crystals become unstable, and methane gas bubbles up to the surface.
The worrying thing about methane hydrate deposits on ocean floors is the enormous
amount of carbon involved: roughly 10,000 gigatons. To put this huge amount into per-
spective, we can remember that the total amount in world CO2 emissions since 1751 has
4
http://www.countercurrents.org/avery170715.htm
http://human-wrongs-watch.net/2015/06/25/militarisms-hostages/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJUA4cm0Rck
9.6. WE MUST LEAVE FOSSIL FUELS IN THE GROUND 353

Figure 9.7: We must leave fossil fuels in the ground.

been only 337 gigatons.

Despite the worrying nature of the threats that we are facing, there are reasons for
hope. One of the greatest of these is the beautiful, profound and powerful encyclical that
has just been released by Pope Francis.5
Pope Francis tells us that the dictates of today’s economists are not sacred: In the
future, if we are to survive, economics must be given both a social conscience and an
ecological conscience. Nor are private property and profits sacred. They must be subor-
dinated to the common good, and the preservation of our global commons. Less focus on
material goods need not make us less happy. The quality of our lives can be increased,
not decreased, if we give up our restless chase after power and wealth, and derive more of
our pleasures from art, music and literature, and from conversations with our families and
friends.
Another reason for hope can be found in the extremely high present rate of growth of
renewable energy, and in the remarkable properties of exponential growth. According to
figures recently released by the Earth Policy Institute,6 the global installed photovoltaic
capacity is currently able to deliver 242,000 megawatts, and it is increasing at the rate of
27.8% per year. Wind energy can now deliver 370,000 megawatts, and it is increasing at
the rate of roughly 20% per year.
Because of the astonishing properties of exponential growth, we can calculate that
if these growth rates are maintained, renewable energy can give us 24.8 terawatts within
only 15 years! This is far more than the world’s present use of all forms of energy.
All of us must still work with dedication to provide the political will needed to avoid
catastrophic climate change. However, the strong and friendly voice of Pope Francis, and
the remarkable rate of growth of renewable energy can guide our work, and can give us
hope and courage.
5
http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents
/papa -francesco 20150524 enciclica-laudato-si.html
6
http://www.earth-policy.org/books/tgt
354 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

The award-winning author and activist Naomi Klein has emphasized that the climate
crisis changes everything. Environmentalists and antiwar activists must unite! We need
a new economic system! The people of the world don’t want climate change; they want
system change!7

9.7 We must stabilize, and ultimately reduce, global

population
According to the World Resources Institute and the United Nations Environment Pro-
gramme, “It is estimated that since World War II, 1.2 billion hectares...[of agricultural
land] has suffered at least moderate degradation as a result of human activity. This is a
vast area, roughly the size of China and India combined.” This area is 27% of the total
area currently devoted to agriculture 5 . The report goes on to say that the degradation
is greatest in Africa.
David Pimental and his associates at Cornell University pointed out in 1995 that “Be-
cause of erosion-associated loss of productivity and population growth, the per capita food
supply has been reduced over the past 10 years and continues to fall. The Food and Agri-
cultural Organization reports that the per capita production of grains which make up 80%
of the world’s food supply, has been declining since 1984.”
Pimental et al. add that “Not only is the availability of cropland per capita decreasing
as the world population grows, but arable land is being lost due to excessive pressure on
the environment. For instance, during the past 40 years nearly one-third of the world’s
cropland (1.5 billion hectares) has been abandoned because of soil erosion and degradation.
Most of the replacement has come from marginal land made available by removing forests.
Agriculture accounts for 80% of the annual deforestation.”
The phrase “developing countries” is more than a euphemism; it expresses the hope
that with the help of a transfer of technology from the industrialized nations, all parts of
the world can achieve prosperity. An important factor that prevents the achievement of
worldwide prosperity is population growth.
In the words of Dr. Halfdan Mahler, former Director General of the World Health
Organization, “Country after country has seen painfully achieved increases in total output,
7
https://www.transcend.org/tms/2015/03/naomi-klein-the-economic-system-we-have-created-global-
warming/
http://thischangeseverything.org/naomi-klein/
http://eruditio.worldacademy.org/issue-5/article/urgent-need-renewable-energy
http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2012/11/18/Climate-change-report-warns-dramatically-
warmer-world-this-century
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRGVTK-AAvw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVwmi7HCmSI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjZaFjXfLec
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6pFDu7lLV4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVwmi7HCmSI
http://therightsofnature.org/universal-declaration/
9.7. WE MUST STABILIZE, AND ULTIMATELY REDUCE, GLOBAL POPULATION355

Figure 9.8: We must stabilize, and ultimately reduce, global population. If we

are to avoid a large-scale famine, all countries must pass through the demo-
graphic transition.

food production, health and educational facilities and employment opportunities reduced
or nullified by excessive population growth.”
The growth of population is linked to excessive urbanization, infrastructure failures and
unemployment. In rural districts in the developing countries, family farms are often divided
among a growing number of heirs until they can no longer be subdivided. Those family
members who are no longer needed on the land have no alternative except migration to
overcrowded cities, where the infrastructure is unable to cope so many new arrivals. Often
the new migrants are forced to live in excrement-filled makeshift slums, where dysentery,
hepatitis and typhoid are endemic, and where the conditions for human life sink to the
lowest imaginable level. In Brazil, such shanty towns are called “favelas”.
If modern farming methods are introduced in rural areas while population growth con-
tinues, the exodus to cities is aggravated, since modern techniques are less labor-intensive
and favor large farms. In cities, the development of adequate infrastructure requires time,
and it becomes a hopeless task if populations are growing rapidly. Thus, population sta-
bilization is a necessary first step for development.
It can be observed that birth rates fall as countries develop. However, development
is sometimes blocked by the same high birth rates that economic progress might have
prevented. In this situation (known as the “demographic trap”), economic gains disappear
immediately because of the demands of an exploding population.
For countries caught in the demographic trap, government birth control programs are
especially important, because one cannot rely on improved social conditions to slow birth
rates. Since health and lowered birth rates should be linked, it is appropriate that family-
planning should be an important part of programs for public health and economic devel-
opment.
356 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

A recent study conducted by Robert F. Lapham of Demographic Health Surveys and

W. Parker Maudlin of the Rockefeller Foundation has shown that the use of birth control
is correlated both with socio-economic setting and with the existence of strong family-
planning programs. The implication of this study is that even in the absence of increased
living standards, family planning programs can be successful, provided they have strong
government support.
Education of women and higher status for women are vitally important measures, not
only for their own sake, but also because in many countries these social reforms have proved
to be the key to lower birth rates. As Sir Partha Dasgupta of Cambridge University
has pointed out, the changes needed to break the cycle of overpopulation and poverty
are all desirable in themselves. Besides education and higher status for women, they
include state-provided social security for old people, provision of water supplies near to
dwellings, provision of health services to all, abolition of child labor and general economic
development. The money required to make these desirable changes is a tiny fraction of the
amount that is currently wasted on war.
In order to avoid a catastrophic future famine, it is vitally important that all of the
countries of the world should quickly pass through a demographic transition from a situ-
ation characterized by high birth rates and high death rates to a new equilibrium, where
low death rates are balanced by low birth rates.

9.8 We must eliminate the institution of war

The problem of achieving internal peace over a large geographical area is not insoluble.
It has already been solved. There exist today many nations or regions within each of
which there is internal peace, and some of these are so large that they are almost worlds
in themselves. One thinks of China, India, Brazil, Australia, the Russian Federation,
the United States, and the European Union. Many of these enormous societies contain
a variety of ethnic groups, a variety of religions and a variety of languages, as well as
striking contrasts between wealth and poverty. If these great land areas have been forged
into peaceful and cooperative societies, cannot the same methods of government be applied
globally?
But what are the methods that nations use to achieve internal peace? Firstly, every
true government needs to have the power to make and enforce laws that are binding on
individual citizens. Secondly the power of taxation is a necessity. Thirdly, within their
own territories, almost all nations have more military power than any of their subunits.
For example, the US Army is more powerful than the State Militia of Illinois.
This unbalance of power contributes to the stability of the Federal Government of the
United States. When the FBI wanted to arrest Al Capone, it did not have to bomb
Chicago. Agents just went into the city and arrested the gangster. Even if Capone had
been enormously popular in Illinois, the the government of the state would have realized in
advance that it had no chance of resisting the US Federal Government, and it still would
have allowed the “Feds” to make their arrest. Similar considerations hold for almost all
9.9. EDUCATIONAL REFORMS 357

Figure 9.9: We must abolish the institution of war.

nations within which there is internal peace. It is true that there are some nations within
which subnational groups have more power than the national government, but these are
frequently characterized by civil wars.
Of the large land areas within which internal peace has been achieved, the European
Union differs from the others because its member states still maintain powerful armies.
The EU forms a realistic model for what can be achieved globally in the near future by
reforming and strengthening the United Nations. In the distant future, however, we can
imagine a time when a world federal authority will have much more power than any of its
member states, and when national armies will have only the size needed to maintain local
order.
Today there is a pressing need to enlarge the size of the political unit from the nation-
state to the entire world. The need to do so results from the terrible dangers of modern
weapons and from global economic interdependence. The progress of science has created
this need, but science has also given us the means to enlarge the political unit: Our almost
miraculous modern communications media, if properly used, have the power to weld all of
humankind into a single supportive and cooperative society.

9.9 Educational reforms

Educational reforms are urgently needed, particularly in the teaching of history. As it is
taught today, history is a chronicle of power struggles and war, told from a biased national
standpoint. Our own race or religion is superior; our own country is always heroic and in
the right.
We urgently need to replace this indoctrination in chauvinism by a reformed view of
history, where the slow development of human culture is described, giving adequate credit
to all those who have contributed. Our modern civilization is built on the achievements
358 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

of ancient cultures. China, India, Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, Greece, the Islamic world,
Christian Europe, and Jewish intellectual traditions all have contributed. Potatoes, corn
and squash are gifts from the American Indians. Human culture, gradually built up over
thousands of years by the patient work of millions of hands and minds, should be presented
to students of history as a precious heritage - far too precious to be risked in a thermonuclear
war.
In the teaching of science too, reforms are needed. Graduates in science and technology
should be conscious of their responsibilities. They must resolve never to use their education
in the service of war, or in any way which might be harmful to society or to the environment.

In modern societies, mass media play an extremely important role in determining be-
havior and attitudes. This role can be a negative one when the media show violence and
enemy images, but if used constructively, the mass media can offer a powerful means for
creating international understanding. If it is indeed true that tribalism is part of human
nature, it is extremely important that the mass media be used to the utmost to overcome
the barriers between nations and cultures. Through increased communication, the world’s
peoples can learn to accept each other as members of a single family.
Finally, let us turn to religion, with its enormous influence on human thought and
behavior. Christianity, for example, offers a strongly stated ethic, which, if practiced,
would make war impossible. In Mathew, the following passage occurs: “Ye have heard it
said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy. But I say unto you: Love your
enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them
that spitefully use you and persecute you.”
This seemingly impractical advice, that we should love our enemies, is in fact of the
greatest practicality, since acts of unilateral kindness and generosity can stop escalatory
cycles of revenge and counter-revenge such as those which characterize the present conflict
in the Middle East and the recent troubles of Northern Ireland. However, Christian nations,
while claiming to adhere to the ethic of love and forgiveness, have adopted a policy of
“massive retaliation”, involving systems of thermonuclear missiles whose purpose is to
destroy as much as possible of the country at which the retaliation is aimed. It is planned
that entire populations shall be killed in a “massive retaliation”, innocent children along
with the guilty politicians. The startling contradiction between what the Christian nations
profess and what they do was obvious even before the advent of nuclear weapons, at the
time when Leo Tolstoy, during his last years, was exchanging letters with a young Indian
lawyer in South Africa. In one of his letters to Gandhi, Tolstoy wrote:
“...The whole life of the Christian peoples is a continuous contradiction between that
which they profess and the principles on which they order their lives, a contradiction
between love accepted as the law of life, and violence, which is recognized and praised,
acknowledged even as a necessity...”
“This year, in the spring, at a Scripture examination at a girls’ high school in Moscow,
the teacher and the bishop present asked the girls questions on the Commandments, and
especially on the sixth. After a correct answer, the bishop generally put another question,
whether murder was always in all cases forbidden by God’s law; and the unhappy young
9.9. EDUCATIONAL REFORMS 359

ladies were forced by previous instruction to answer ’Not always’ - that murder was per-
mitted in war and in the execution of criminals. Still, when one of these unfortunate young
ladies (what I am telling is not an invention but a fact told to me by an eye witness) after
her first answer, was asked the usual question, if killing was always sinful, she, agitated
and blushing, decisively answered ’Always’, and to the usual sophisms of the bishop, she
answered with decided conviction that killing was always forbidden in the Old Testament
and forbidden by Christ, not only killing but every wrong against a brother. Notwithstand-
ing all his grandeur and arts of speech, the bishop became silent and the girl remained
victorious.”
As everyone knows, Gandhi successfully applied the principle of non-violence to the
civil rights struggle in South Africa, and later to the political movement, which gave India
its freedom and independence. The principle of non-violence was also successfully applied
by Martin Luther King, and by Nelson Mandela. It is perhaps worthwhile to consider
Gandhi’s comment on the question of whether the end justifies the means: “The means
may be likened to a seed”, Gandhi wrote, “and the end to a tree; and there is the same
inviolable connection between the means and the end as there is between the seed and
the tree.” In other words, a dirty method produces a dirty result; killing produces more
killing; hate leads to more hate. Everyone who reads the newspapers knows that this is
true. But there are positive feedback loops as well as negative ones. A kind act produces
a kind response; a generous gesture is returned; hospitality results in reflected hospitality.
Buddhists call this principle of reciprocity ”the law of karma”.
The religious leaders of the world have the opportunity to contribute importantly to
the solution of the problem of war. They have the opportunity to powerfully support the
concept of universal human brotherhood, to build bridges between religious groups, to
make intermarriage across ethnic boundaries easier, and to soften the distinctions between
communities. If they fail to do this, they will have failed humankind at a time of crisis.
It is useful to consider the analogy between the institution of war and the institution
of slavery. We might be tempted to say, “There has always been war, throughout human
history; and war will always continue to exist.” As an antidote for this kind of pessimism,
we can think of slavery, which, like war, has existed throughout most of recorded history.
The cultures of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome were all based on slavery, and, in more
recent times, 13 million Africans were captured and forced into a life of slavery in the New
World. Slavery was as much an accepted and established institution as war is today. Many
people made large profits from slavery, just as arms manufacturers today make enormous
profits. Nevertheless, in spite of the weight of vested interests, slavery has now been
abolished throughout most of the world.
Today we look with horror at drawings of slave ships, where human beings were packed
together like cord-wood; and we are amazed that such cruelty could have been possible.
Can we not hope for a time when our descendants, reading descriptions of the wars of the
twentieth century, will be equally amazed that such cruelty could have been possible? If
we use them constructively, the vast resources now wasted on war can initiate a new era of
happiness and prosperity for the Family of man. It is within our power to let this happen.
The example of the men and women who worked to rid the world of slavery can give us
360 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

courage as we strive for a time when war will exist only as a dark memory fading into the
past.

9.10 Culture, education and human solidarity

Cultural and educational activities have a small ecological footprint, and therefore are more
sustainable than pollution-producing, fossil-fuel-using jobs in industry. Furthermore, since
culture and knowledge are shared among all nations, work in culture and education leads
societies naturally towards internationalism and peace.
Economies based on a high level of consumption of material goods are unsustainable
and will have to be abandoned by a future world that renounces the use of fossil fuels in
order to avoid catastrophic climate change, a world where non-renewable resources such
as metals will become increasingly rare and expensive. How then can full employment be
maintained?
The creation of renewable energy infrastructure will provide work for a large number of
people; but in addition, sustainable economies of the future will need to shift many workers
from jobs in industry to jobs in the service sector. Within the service sector, jobs in culture
and education are particularly valuable because they will help to avoid the disastrous wars
that are currently producing enormous human suffering and millions of refugees, wars that
threaten to escalate into an all-destroying global thermonuclear war.8
Human nature has two sides: It has a dark side, to which nationalism and militarism
appeal; but our species also has a genius for cooperation, which we can see in the growth
of culture. Our modern civilization has been built up by means of a worldwide exchange
of ideas and inventions. It is built on the achievements of many ancient cultures. China,
Japan, India, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, the Islamic world, Christian Europe, and
the Jewish intellectual traditions all have contributed. Potatoes, corn, squash, vanilla,
chocolate, chilli peppers, and quinine are gifts from the American Indians.9
We need to reform our educational systems, particularly the teaching of history. As it is
taught today, history is a chronicle of power struggles and war, told from a biased national
standpoint. We are taught that our own country is always heroic and in the right. We
urgently need to replace this indoctrination in chauvinism by a reformed view of history,
where the slow development of human culture is described, giving credit to all who have
contributed. When we teach history, it should not be about power struggles. It should be
about how human culture was gradually built up over thousands of years by the patient
work of millions of hands and minds. Our common global culture, the music, science,
literature and art that all of us share, should be presented as a precious heritage - far too
precious to be risked in a thermonuclear war.
We have to extend our loyalty to the whole of the human race, and to work for a world
not only free from nuclear weapons, but free from war. A war-free world is not utopian but
8
http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/library/need.pdf
http://eruditio.worldacademy.org/issue-5/article/urgent-need-renewable-energy
9
http://eruditio.worldacademy.org/article/evolution-cooperation
9.11. CONSTRUCTION VERSUS DESTRUCTION 361

very practical, and not only practical but necessary. It is something that we can achieve
and must achieve. Today their are large regions, such as the European Union, where war
would be inconceivable. What is needed is to extend these.
Nor is a truly sustainable economic system utopian or impossible. To achieve it, we
should begin by shifting jobs to the creation of renewable energy infrastructure, and to the
fields of culture and education. By so doing we will support human solidarity and avoid
the twin disasters of catastrophic war and climate change.

9.11 Construction versus destruction

It is often said that ethical principles cannot be derived from science , that they must
come from somewhere else. Nevertheless, when nature is viewed through the eyes of mod-
ern science, we obtain some insights which seem almost ethical in character. Biology at the
molecular level has shown us the complexity and beauty of even the most humble living
organisms, and the interrelatedness of all life on earth. Looking through the eyes of con-
temporary biochemistry, we can see that even the single cell of an amoeba is a structure
of miraculous complexity and precision, worthy of our respect and wonder.
Knowledge of the second law of thermodynamics , the statistical law favoring disorder
over order, reminds us that life is always balanced like a tight-rope walker over an abyss
of chaos and destruction. Living organisms distill their order and complexity from the
flood of thermodynamic information which reaches the earth from the sun. In this way,
they create local order; but life remains a fugitive from the second law of thermodynamics.
362 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

Disorder, chaos, and destruction remain statistically favored over order, construction, and
complexity.
It is easier to burn down a house than to build one, easier to kill a human than to raise
and educate one, easier to force a species into extinction than to replace it once it is gone,
easier to burn the Great Library of Alexandria than to accumulate the knowledge that
once filled it, and easier to destroy a civilization in a thermonuclear war than to rebuild it
from the radioactive ashes. Knowing this, we can form an almost ethical insight: To be on
the side of order, construction, and complexity, is to be on the side of life. To be on the
side of destruction, disorder, chaos and war is to be against life, a traitor to life, an ally of
death. Knowing the precariousness of life, knowing the statistical laws that favor disorder
and chaos, we should resolve to be loyal to the principle of long continued construction
upon which life depends.
War is based on destruction, destruction of living persons, destruction of homes, de-
struction of infrastructure, and destruction of the biosphere. If we are on the side of life,
if we are not traitors to life and allies of death, we must oppose the institution of war. We
must oppose the military-industrial complex. We must oppose the mass media when they
whip up war-fever. We must oppose politicians who vote for obscenely enormous military
budgets at a time of financial crisis. We must oppose the planned illegal and insane Israeli
attack of Iran, which threatens to lead to a world-destroying conflict. We must oppose
these things by working with dedication, as though our lives depended on it. In fact, they
do.
9.12. NEW ETHICS TO MATCH NEW TECHNOLOGY 363

Figure 9.10: The second law of thermodynamics tells us that disorder is statisti-
cally favored over order, and that life is always balancing above a sea of chaos.
It is easier to burn down a house than to build one, easier to burn down the
Great Library at Alexandria than to accumulate the knowledge that once filled
it, and easier to start a thermonuclear war than to rebuild civilization from the
radioactive ashes.

9.12 New ethics to match new technology

Modern science has, for the first time in history, offered humankind the possibility of a
life of comfort, free from hunger and cold, and free from the constant threat of death
through infectious disease. At the same time, science has given humans the power to
obliterate their civilization with nuclear weapons, or to make the earth uninhabitable
through overpopulation and pollution.
The question of which of these paths we choose is literally a matter of life or death for
ourselves and our children. Will we use the discoveries of modern science constructively,
and thus choose the path leading towards life? Or will we use science to produce more
and more lethal weapons, which sooner or later, through a technical or human failure,
may result in a catastrophic nuclear war? Will we thoughtlessly destroy our beautiful
planet through unlimited growth of population and industry? The choice among these
alternatives is ours to make. We live at a critical moment of history, a moment of crisis
for civilization.
No one living today asked to be born at such a moment, but by an accident of birth,
history has given us an enormous responsibility, and two daunting tasks: If civilization is to
survive, we must not only stabilize the global population but also, even more importantly,
we must eliminate the institution of war. We face these difficult tasks with an inherited
emotional nature that has not changed much during the last 40,000 years. Furthermore, we
364 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

Figure 9.11: We must develop a new system of ethics to match our advanced
technology.

face the challenges of the 21st century with an international political system based on the
anachronistic concept of the absolutely sovereign nation-state. However, the human brain
has shown itself to be capable of solving even the most profound and complex problems.
The mind that has seen into the heart of the atom must not fail when confronted with
paradoxes of the human heart.
We must replace the old world of international anarchy, chronic war and institutional-
ized injustice, by a new world of law. The United Nations Charter, the Universal Declara-
tion of Human Rights and the International Criminal Court are steps in the right direction,
but these institutions need to be greatly strengthened and reformed.10
10
http://www.countercurrents.org/zuesse050815.htm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=16&v=hDsPWmioSHg
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2014/04/14/us-oligarchy-not-democracy-says-scientific-study
http://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/striking-chart-showing-solar-power-will-take-over-
world.html
http://www.countercurrents.org/richard120815.htm
http://priceofoil.org/content/uploads/2015/08/OCI-Untouchable Arctic FINAL.pdf
http://priceofoil.org/2015/08/13/untouchable-the-climate-case-against-arctic-drilling/
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/08/14/untouchable-climate-case-against-arctic-drilling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=124&v=9 LJpN893Vg
http://americamagazine.org/content/all-things/which-candidate-quotes-pope-most
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32336-our-united-states-of-indebtedness
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/08/17/ahead-australia-visit-naomi-klein-brands-pm-abbott-
climate-villain
http://www.footprintnetwork.org/ecological footprint nations/
http://ecowatch.com/2015/08/16/earth-overshoot-day/2/
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/08/18/islamic-declaration-blasts-short-sighted-capitalism-
9.12. NEW ETHICS TO MATCH NEW TECHNOLOGY 365

We also need a new global ethic, where loyalty to one’s family and nation is supple-
mented by a higher loyalty to humanity as a whole. The Nobel laureate biochemist Albert
Szent-Györgyi once wrote:
“The story of man consists of two parts, divided by the appearance of modern science....
In the first period, man lived in the world in which his species was born and to which his
senses were adapted. In the second, man stepped into a new, cosmic world to which he
was a complete stranger.... The forces at man’s disposal were no longer terrestrial forces,
of human dimension, but were cosmic forces, the forces which shaped the universe. The
few hundred Fahrenheit degrees of our flimsy terrestrial fires were exchanged for the ten
million degrees of the atomic reactions which heat the sun.”
“This is but a beginning, with endless possibilities in both directions; a building of a
human life of undreamt of wealth and dignity, or a sudden end in utmost misery. Man
lives in a new cosmic world for which he was not made. His survival depends on how well
and how fast he can adapt himself to it, rebuilding all his ideas, all his social and political
institutions.”
“...Modern science has abolished time and distance as factors separating nations. On
our shrunken globe today, there is room for one group only: the Family of man.”

Suggestions for further reading

1. Herman Daly, Steady-State Economics: Second Edition with New Essays, Island
Press, (1991).
2. Herman Daly, Economics in a Full World, Scientific American, Vol. 293, Issue 3,
September, (2005).
3. Herman Daly and John Cobb, For the Common Good, Beacon Press, Boston, (1989).
4. E.O. Wilson, The Diversity of Life, Allen Lane, The Penguin Press, (1992).
5. Lester R. Brown et. al.,Saving the Planet. How to Shape an Environmentally Sus-
tainable Global Economy, W.W. Norton, New York, (1991).
6. Muhammad Yunus, Banker to the Poor; Microcredit and the Battle Against World
Poverty, (2003).
7. UN Global Compact, http://www.unglobalcompact.org (2007).
8. UN Millennium Development Goals http://www.un.org/
millenniumgoals/ (2007).
9. Amartya Sen, Poverty and Famine; An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation, Ox-
ford Univeersity Press, (1981).
10. Amartya Sen, Development as Freedon, Oxford University Press, (1999).
11. Amartya Sen, Inequality Reexamined, Harvard University Press, (1992).
demands-action-climate
http://islamicclimatedeclaration.org/islamic-declaration-on-global-climate-change/
http://ecowatch.com/2015/06/29/dalai-lama-pope-encyclical/
http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/28/dalai-lama-glastonbury-verdict-isis-unthinkable
http://ecowatch.com/2015/07/02/naomi-klein-people-planet-first/
366 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

12. Paul F. Knitter and Chandra Muzaffar, editors, Subverting Greed; Religious Perspec-
tives on the Global Economy, Orbis Books, Maryknoll, New York, (2002).
13. Edy Korthals Altes, The Contribution of Religions to a Just and Sustainable Eco-
nomic Development, in F. David Peat, editor, The Pari Dialogues, Volume 1, Pari
Publishing, (2007).
14. Hendrik Opdebeeck, Globalization Between Market and Democracy, in F. David Peat,
editor, The Pari Dialogues, Volume 1, Pari Publishing, (2007).
15. Paul Hawken The Ecology of Commerce; A Declaration of Sustainability, Collins
Business, (2005).
16. Luther Standing Bear, Land of the Spotted Eagle, Houghton Mifflin, (1933).
17. T. Gyatso, HH the Dalai Lama, Ancient Wisdom, Modern World: Ethics for the
New Millennium, Abacus, London, (1999).
18. T. Gyatso, HH the Dalai Lama, How to Expand Love: Widening the Circle of
Loving Relationships, Atria Books, (2005).
19. J. Rotblat and D. Ikeda, A Quest for Global Peace, I.B. Tauris, London, (2007).
20. M. Gorbachev and D. Ikeda, Moral Lessons of the Twentieth Century, I.B. Tauris,
London, (2005).
21. D. Krieger and D. Ikeda, Choose Hope, Middleway Press, Santa Monica CA 90401,
(2002).
22. P.F. Knitter and C. Muzaffar, eds., Subverting Greed: Religious Perspectives on the
Global Economy, Orbis Books, Maryknoll, New York, (2002).
23. S. du Boulay, Tutu: Voice of the Voiceless, Eerdmans, (1988).
24. Earth Charter Initiative, www.earthcharter.org, The Earth Charter
25. P.B. Corcoran, ed., The Earth Charter in Action, KIT Publishers, Amsterdam,
(2005).
26. R. Costannza, ed., Ecological Economics: The Science and Management of Sustain-
ability, Colombia University Press, New York, (1991).
27. A. Peccei, The Human Quality, Pergamon Press, Oxford, (1977).
28. A. Peccei, One Hundred Pages for the Future, Pergamon Press, New York, (1977).
29. E. Pestel, Beyond the Limits to Growth, Universe Books, New York, (1989).
30. B. Broms, United Nations, Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, Helsinki, (1990).
31. S. Rosenne, The Law and Practice at the International Court, Dordrecht, (1985).
32. S. Rosenne, The World Court - What It Is and How It Works, Dordrecht, (1995).
33. J. D’Arcy and D. Harris, The Procedural Aspects of International Law (Book Series),
Volume 25, Transnational Publishers, Ardsley, New York, (2001).
34. H. Cullen, The Collective Complaints Mechanism Under the European Social Charter,
European Law Review, Human Rights Survey, p. 18-30, (2000).
35. S.D. Bailey, The Procedure of the Security Council, Oxford, (1988).
36. R.A. Akindale, The Organization and Promotion of World Peace: A Study of Universal-
Regional Relationships, Univ. Toronto Press, Toronto, Ont., (1976).
37. J.S. Applegate, The UN Peace Imperative, Vantage Press, New York, (1992).
38. S.E. Atkins, Arms Control, Disarmament, International Security and Peace: An An-
notated Guide to Sources, 1980-1987, Clio Press, Santa Barbara, CA, (1988).
9.12. NEW ETHICS TO MATCH NEW TECHNOLOGY 367

39. N. Ball and T. Halevy, Making Peace Work: The Role of the International Develop-
ment Community, Overseas Development Council, Washington DC, (1996).
40. F. Barnaby, Ed., The Gaia Peace Atlas: Survival into the Third Millennium, Dou-
bleday, New York, (1988)
41. J.H. Barton, The Politics of Peace: An Evaluation of Arms Control, Stanford Univ.
Press, Stanford, CA, (1981).
42. W. Bello, Visions of a Warless World, Friends Committee on National Education
Fund, Washington DC, (1986).
43. A. Boserup and A. Mack, Abolishing War: Cultures and Institutions; Dialogue with
Peace Scholars Elise Boulding and Randall Forsberg, Boston Research Center for the Twenty-
first Century, Cambridge, MA, (1998).
44. E. Boulding et al., Bibliography on World Conflict and Peace, Westview Press, Boul-
der, CO, (1979).
45. E. Boulding et al., Eds., Peace, Culture and Society: Transnational Research Dia-
logue, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, (1991).
46. A.T. Bryan et al., Eds., Peace, Development and Security in the Caribean, St. Mar-
tins Press, New York, (1988).
47. A.L. Burns and N. Heathcote, Peace-Keeping by UN Forces from Suez to Congo,
Praeger, New York, (1963).
48. F. Capra and C. Spretnak, Green Politics: The Global Promise, E.P. Dutton, New
York, (1986).
49. N. Carstarphen, Annotated Bibliography of Conflict Analysis and Resolution, Inst.
for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason Univ., Fairfax, VA, (1997).
50. N. Chomsky, Peace in the Middle East? Reflections on Justice and Nationhood,
Vintage Books, New York, (1974).
51. G. Clark and L. Sohn, World Peace Through World Law, World Without War Pubs.,
Chicago, IL, (1984).
52. K. Coates, Think Globally, Act Locally: The United Nations and the Peace Move-
ments, Spokesman Books, Philadelphia, PA, (1988).
53. G. De Marco and M. Bartolo, A Second Generation United Nations: For Peace and
Freedom in the 20th Century, Colombia Univ. Press, New York, (1997).
54. F.M. Deng and I.W. Zartman, Eds., Conflict Resolution in Africa, Brookings Insti-
tution, Washington, DC, (1991).
55. W. Desan, Let the Future Come: Perspectives for a Planetary Peace, Georgetown
Univ. Press, Washington, DC, (1987).
56. D. Deudney, Whole Earth Security. A Geopolitics of Peace, Worldwatch paper 55.
Worldwatch Institute, Washington, DC, (1983).
57. A.J. Donovan, World Peace? A Work Based on Interviews with Foreign Diplomats,
A.J. Donovan, New York, (1986).
58. R. Duffey, International Law of Peace, Oceania Pubs., Dobbs Ferry, NY, (1990).
59. L.J. Dumas, The Socio-Economics of Conversion From War to Peace, M.E. Sharpe,
Armonk, NY, (1995).
368 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT

60. W. Durland, The Illegality of War, National Center on Law and Pacifism, Colorado
Springs, CO, (1982).
61. F. Esack, Qur’an, Liberation and Pluralism: An Islamic Perspective on Interreligious
Solidarity Against Oppression, Oxford Univ. Press, London, (1997).
62. I. Hauchler and P.M. Kennedy, Eds., Global Trends: The World Almanac of Devel-
opment and Peace, Continuum Pubs., New York, (1995).
63. H.B. Hollins et al., The Conquest of War: Alternative Strategies for Global Security,
Westview Press, Boulder, CO, (1989).
64. H.J. Morgenthau, Peace, Security and the United Nations, Ayer Pubs., Salem, NH,
(1973).
65. C.C. Moskos, Peace Soldiers: The Sociology of a United Nations Military Force, Univ.
of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL, (1976).
66. L. Pauling, Science and World Peace, India Council for Cultural Relations, New
Delhi, India, (1967).
67. C. Peck, The United Nations as a Dispute Resolution System: Improving Mechanisms
for the Prevention and Resolution of Conflict, Kluwer, Law and Tax, Cambridge, MA,
(1996).
68. D. Pepper and A. Jenkins, The Geography of Peace and War, Basil Blackwell, New
York, (1985).
69. J. Perez de Cuellar, Pilgrimage for Peace: A Secretary General’s Memoir, St. Mar-
tin’s Press, New York, (1997).
70. R. Pickus and R. Woito, To End War: An Introduction to the Ideas, Books, Or-
ganizations and Work That Can Help, World Without War Council, Berkeley, CA,
(1970).
71. S.R. Ratner, The New UN Peacekeeping: Building Peace in Lands of Conflict after
the Cold War, St. Martins Press, New York, (1995).
72. I.J. Rikhye and K. Skjelsbaek, Eds., The United Nations and Peacekeeping: Results,
Limitations and Prospects: The Lessons of 40 Years of Experience, St. Martins Press,
New York, (1991).
73. J. Rotblat, Ed., Scientists in Quest for Peace: A History of the Pugwash Conferences,
MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, (1972).
74. J. Rotblat, Ed., Scientists, The Arms Race, and Disarmament, Taylor and Francis,
Bristol, PA, (1982).
75. J. Rotblat, Ed., Striving for Peace, Security and Development in the World, World
Scientific, River Edge, NJ, (1991).
76. J. Rotblat, Ed., Towards a War-Free World, World Scientific, River Edge, NJ, (1995).
77. J. Rotblat, Ed., Nuclear Weapons: The Road to Zero, Westview, Boulder, CO, (1998).
78. J. Rotblat and L. Valki, Eds., Coexistance, Cooperation and Common Security, St.
Martins Press, New York, (1988).
79. United Nations, Peaceful Settlement of Disputes between States: A Select Bibliogra-
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9.12. NEW ETHICS TO MATCH NEW TECHNOLOGY 369

80. United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Arms Control and Disarma-
ment Agreements: Texts and Histories of Negotiations, USACDA, Washington, DC,
(updated annually)
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370 A NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT
Chapter 10

ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Science investigates, religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge, which is power; re-
ligion gives man wisdom, which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals
mainly with values. The two are not rivals. Martin Luther King Jr.

10.1 Some goals for the future

History has given all of us living today an enormous responsibility, and several daunting
tasks: If civilization is to survive, we must not only stabilize the global population and avoid
catastrophic climate, but also, even more importantly, we must eliminate the institution
of war.
We face these difficult tasks with an inherited emotional nature that has not changed
much during the last 40,000 years. Furthermore, we face the challenges of the 21st century
with an international political system based on the anachronistic concept of the absolutely
sovereign nation-state. However, the human brain has shown itself to be capable of solving
even the most profound and complex problems. The mind that has seen into the heart of
the atom must not fail when confronted with paradoxes of the human heart.
We must replace the old world of international anarchy, chronic war and institutional-
ized injustice, by a new world of law. The United Nations Charter, the Universal Declara-
tion of Human Rights and the International Criminal Court are steps in the right direction,
but these institutions need to be greatly strengthened and reformed.
We also need a new global ethic, where loyalty to one’s family and nation will be
supplemented by a higher loyalty to humanity as a whole.
In the words of the great Hungarian-American biochemist Albert Szent-Györgyi, “Man
lives in a new cosmic world for which he was not made. His survival depends on how well
and how fast he can adapt himself to it, rebuilding all his ideas, all his social and polit-
ical institutions. ...Modern science has abolished time and distance as factors separating
nations. On our shrunken globe today, there is room for one group only - the family of
man.”

371
372 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

The Russell-Einstein Manifesto of 1955, which led to the founding of Pugwash Con-
ferences on Science and World Affairs, contains the following words: “There lies before
us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, in-
stead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings
to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.”

Strengthening the United Nations

The problem of building a stable, just, and war-free world is difficult, but it is not impossi-
ble. The large regions of our present-day world within which war has been eliminated can
serve as models. There are a number of large countries with heterogeneous populations
within which it has been possible to achieve internal peace and social cohesion, and if this
is possible within such extremely large regions, it must also be possible globally.
When we ask how very large and heterogeneous states achieve internal peace and secu-
rity, we find that they do so by means of laws that act directly on individual citizens. Thus,
the International Criminal Court is an extremely important first step towards the global-
ization of the methods of governance used by large states. The power to make and enforce
laws which act directly on individuals is one of the key powers of successful federations.
An extremely important first step towards strengthening the United Nations would be
to give the U.N. a greatly enlarged and reliable source of income. The amount of money
available to the U.N., and its member organizations such as UNESCO, WHO and FAO,
should be increased by a factor of at least 50. The beneficial services rendered by expanded
agencies such as WHO would give the U.N. de facto power and prestige that could be used
in situations where conflict resolution is needed.

Various sources of increased income have been proposed:

• Dues paid to the U.N. by member states. These should be compulsory in the sense
that member states would lose their voting rights if they did not pay their dues.

• Revenues from resources belonging to the international community, for example sea-
bed resources.

• A tax on multinational corporations for the service of regulating international agree-

ments.

• The Tobin tax, i.e. a tax of between 0.1% and 1% on international currency trans-
actions.

12 European countries favor the Tobin tax. These include France and Germany, al-
though not the U.K.
Tobin taxes are in place in some of the world’s fastest-growing financial centers - Hong
Kong, Mumbai, Seoul, Johannesburg and Taipei - where they are said to collectively raise
12 billion U.K. pounds a year.
10.2. THE ETHICS OF MAHATMA GANDHI 373

The volume of international currency transactions is so enormous that a universally

imposed Tobin tax of only 0.5% would raise between $100 billion and $300 billion per year.
In 2015 the total UN budget was only $5.6 billion, an absurdly small sum, considering the
enormous importance of global governance, or the fact that the world spends $1.7 trillion
each year on armaments..

10.2 The ethics of Mahatma Gandhi

If humans are ever to achieve a stable global society in the future, they will have to become
much more modest in their economic behavior and much more peaceful in their politics.
For both modesty and peace, Gandhi is a useful source of ideas. The problems with which
he struggled during his lifetime are extremely relevant to us in the 21st Century, when
both nuclear and ecological catastrophes threaten the world.

Avoiding escalation of conflicts

Today we read almost every day of killings that are part of escalating cycles of revenge
and counter-revenge, for example in the Middle East. Gandhi’s experiences both in South
Africa and in India convinced him that such cycles could only be ended by unilateral acts
of kindness and understanding from one of the parties in a conflict. He said, “An eye for
an eye makes the whole world blind”.
To the insidious argument that “the end justifies the means”, Gandhi answered firmly:
“They say that ’means are after all means’. I would say that ’means are after all everything’.
As the means, so the end. Indeed, the Creator has given us limited power over means,
none over end... The means may be likened to a seed, and the end to a tree; and there
is the same inviolable connection between the means and the end as there is between the
seed and the tree. Means and end are convertible terms in my philosophy of life.”
Gandhi’s advocacy of non-violence is closely connected to his attitude towards ends
and means. He believed that violent methods for achieving a desired social result would
inevitably result in an escalation of violence. The end achieved would always be contam-
inated by the methods used. He was influenced by Leo Tolstoy with whom he exchanged
many letters, and he in turn influenced Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela.

The power of truth

Gandhi was trained as a lawyer, and when he began to practice in South Africa, in his
first case, he was able to solve a conflict by proposing a compromise that satisfied both
parties. Of this result he said, “My joy was boundless. I had learnt the true practice of
law. I had learnt to find out the better side of human nature and to enter men’s hearts.
I realized that the true function of a lawyer was to unite parties riven asunder.” When
Gandhi became involved with the struggle for civil rights of the Indian minority in South
Africa, his background as a lawyer once more helped him. This time his jury was public
374 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.1: Mahatma Gandhi firmly rejected the insidious doctrine that “the
end justifies the means”.

opinion in England. When Gandhi lead the struggle for reform, he insisted that the means
of protest used by his followers should be non-violent, even though violence was frequently
used against them. In this way they won their case in the court of public opinion. Gandhi
called this method of protest “satyagraha”, a Sanskrit word meaning “the power of truth”.
In today’s struggles for justice and peace, the moral force of truth and nonviolence can
win victories in the court of world public opinion.

Harmony between religious groups

Gandhi believed that at their core, all religions are based on the concepts of truth, love,
compassion, nonviolence and the Golden Rule. When asked whether he was a Hindu,
Gandhi answered, “Yes I am. I am also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a Jew.”
When praying at his ashram, Gandhi made a point of including prayers from many religions.
One of the most serious problems that he had to face in his efforts to free India from British
rule was disunity and distrust, even hate, between the Hindu and Muslim communities.
Each community felt that with the British gone, they might face violence and repression
from the other. Gandhi made every effort to bridge the differences and to create unity and
harmony. His struggles with this problem are highly relevant to us today, when the world
is split by religious and ethnic differences.
10.2. THE ETHICS OF MAHATMA GANDHI 375

Solidarity with the poor

Today’s world is characterized by intolerable economic inequalities, both between nations
and within nations. 8 million children die each year from poverty-related causes. 1.3 billion
people live on less than 1.25 dollars a day. Gandhi’s concern for the poor can serve as an
example to us today, as we work to achieve a more equal world. He said, “There is enough
for every man’s need, but not for every man’s greed.”

Voluntary reduction of consumption

After Gandhi’s death, someone took a photograph of all his worldly possessions. It was a
tiny heap, consisting of his glasses, a pair of sandals, a homespun cloth (his only garment)
and a watch. That was all. By reducing his own needs and possessions to an absolute
minimum, Gandhi had tried to demonstrate that the commonly assumed connection be-
tween wealth and merit is false. This is relevant today, in a world where we face a crisis
of diminishing resources. Not only fossil fuels, but also metals and arable land per capita
will become scarce in the future. This will force a change in lifestyle, particularly in the
industrialized countries, away from consumerism and towards simplicity. Gandhi’s exam-
ple can teach us that we must cease to use wealth and “conspicuous consumption” as a
measure of merit.

Gandhian economics
In his autobiography, Mahatma Gandhi says: “Three moderns have left a deep impression
on my life and captivated me: Raychandbhai (the Indian philosopher and poet) by his
living contact; Tolstoy by his book ’The Kingdom of God is Within You’; and Ruskin
by his book ’Unto This Last’.” Ruskin’s book, “Unto This Last”, which Gandhi read in
1904, is a criticism of modern industrial society. Ruskin believed that friendships and warm
interpersonal relationships are a form of wealth that economists have failed to consider. He
felt that warm human contacts are most easily achieved in small agricultural communities,
and that therefore the modern tendency towards centralization and industrialization may
be a step backward in terms of human happiness. While still in South Africa, Gandhi
founded two religious Utopian communities based on the ideas of Tolstoy and Ruskin,
Phoenix Farm (1904) and Tolstoy Farm (1910).
Because of his growing fame as the leader of the Indian civil rights movement in South
Africa, Gandhi was persuaded to return to India in 1914 and to take up the cause of Indian
home rule. In order to re-acquaint himself with conditions in India, he travelled tirelessly,
now always going third class as a matter of principle.
During the next few years, Gandhi worked to reshape the Congress Party into an
organization which represented not only India’s Anglicized upper middle class but also the
millions of uneducated villagers who were suffering under an almost intolerable burden of
376 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

poverty and disease. In order to identify himself with the poorest of India’s people, Gandhi
began to wear only a white loincloth made of rough homespun cotton. He traveled to the
remotest villages, recruiting new members for the Congress Party, preaching non-violence
and “firmness in the truth”, and becoming known for his voluntary poverty and humility.
The villagers who flocked to see him began to call him “Mahatma” (Great Soul).
Disturbed by the spectacle of unemployment and poverty in the villages, Gandhi urged
the people of India to stop buying imported goods, especially cloth, and to make their
own. He advocated the re-introduction of the spinning wheel into village life, and he often
spent some hours spinning himself. The spinning wheel became a symbol of the Indian
independence movement, and was later incorporated into the Indian flag.
The movement for boycotting British goods was called the “Swadeshi movement”. The
word Swadeshi derives from two Sanskrit roots: Swa, meaning self, and Desh, meaning
country. Gandhi described Swadeshi as “a call to the consumer to be aware of the violence
he is causing by supporting those industries that result in poverty, harm to the workers
and to humans or other creatures.”
Gandhi tried to reconstruct the crafts and self-reliance of village life that he felt had
been destroyed by the colonial system. “I would say that if the village perishes, India
will perish too”, he wrote, “India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world
will get lost. The revival of the village is only possible when it is no more exploited.
Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of
the villagers as problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore we have to
concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided
this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers
using even the modern machines that they can make and can afford to use. Only they
should not be used as a means of exploitation by others.”
“You cannot build nonviolence on a factory civilization, but it can be built on self-
contained villages... Rural economy as I have conceived it, eschews exploitation altogether,
and exploitation is the essence of violence... We have to make a choice between India of
the villages that are as ancient as herself and India of the cities which are a creation of
foreign domination...”
“Machinery has its place; it has come to stay. But it must not be allowed to displace
necessary human labour. An improved plow is a good thing. But if by some chances, one
man could plow up, by some mechanical invention of his, the whole of the land of India,
and control all the agricultural produce, and if the millions had no other occupation, they
would starve, and being idle, they would become dunces, as many have already become.
There is hourly danger of many being reduced to that unenviable state.”
In these passages we see Gandhi not merely as a pioneer of nonviolence; we see him also
as an economist. Faced with misery and unemployment produced by machines, Gandhi
tells us that social goals must take precedence over blind market mechanisms. If machines
are causing unemployment, we can, if we wish, and use labor-intensive methods instead.
With Gandhi, the free market is not sacred; we can do as we wish, and maximize human
happiness, rather than maximizing production and profits.
Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by a Hindu extremist on January 30, 1948. After
10.3. THE ETHICS OF ALBERT EINSTEIN 377

his death, someone collected and photographed all his worldly goods. These consisted of
a pair of glasses, a pair of sandals, a pocket watch and a white homespun loincloth. Here,
as in the Swadeshi movement, we see Gandhi as a pioneer of economics. He deliberately
reduced his possessions to an absolute minimum in order to demonstrate that there is no
connection between personal merit and material goods. Like Veblen, Mahatma Gandhi
told us that we must stop using material goods as a means of social competition. We must
start to judge people not by what they have, but by what they are.

10.3 The ethics of Albert Einstein

Besides being one of the greatest physicists of all time, Albert Einstein was a lifelong
pacifist, and his thoughts on peace can speak eloquently to us today. We need his wisdom
today, when the search for peace has become vital to our survival as a species.

Einstein’s letter to Freud: Why war?

Because of his fame, Einstein was asked to make several speeches at the Reichstag. and in
all these speeches he condemned violence and nationalism, urging that these be replaced by
and international cooperation and law under an effective international authority. He also
wrote many letters and articles pleading for peace and for the renunciation of militarism
and violence.
Einstein believed that the production of armaments is damaging, not only economically,
but also spiritually. In 1930 he signed a manifesto for world disarmament sponsored by
the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom. In December of the same year,
he made his famous statement in New York that if two percent of those called for military
service were to refuse to fight, governments would become powerless, since they could
not imprison that many people. He also argued strongly against compulsory military
service and urged that conscientious objectors should be protected by the international
community. He argued that peace, freedom of individuals, and security of societies could
only be achieved through disarmament, the alternative being “slavery of the individual
and annihilation of civilization”.
In letters, and articles, Einstein wrote that the welfare of humanity as a whole must
take precedence over the goals of individual nations, and that we cannot wait until leaders
give up their preparations for war. Civil society, and especially public figures, must take
the lead. He asked how decent and self-respecting people can wage war, knowing how
many innocent people will be killed.
In 1931, the International Institute for Intellectual Cooperation invited Albert Einstein
to enter correspondence with a prominent person of his own choosing on a subject of
importance to society. The Institute planned to publish a collection of such dialogues.
Einstein accepted at once, and decided to write to Sigmund Freud to ask his opinion about
378 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.2:

how humanity could free itself from the curse of war. A translation from German of part
of the long letter that he wrote to Freud is as follows:
“Dear Professor Freud, The proposal of the League of Nations and its International
Institute of Intellectual Cooperation at Paris that I should invite a person to be chosen by
myself to a frank exchange of views on any problem that I might select affords me a very
welcome opportunity of conferring with you upon a question which, as things are now,
seems the most important and insistent of all problems civilization has to face. This is the
problem: Is there any way of delivering mankind from the menace of war? It is common
knowledge that, with the advance of modern science, this issue has come to mean a matter
of life or death to civilization as we know it; nevertheless, for all the zeal displayed, every
attempt at its solution has ended in a lamentable breakdown.”
“I believe, moreover, that those whose duty it is to tackle the problem professionally
and practically are growing only too aware of their impotence to deal with it, and have
now a very lively desire to learn the views of men who, absorbed in the pursuit of science,
can see world-problems in the perspective distance lends. As for me, the normal objective
of my thoughts affords no insight into the dark places of human will and feeling. Thus in
the enquiry now proposed, I can do little more than seek to clarify the question at issue
and, clearing the ground of the more obvious solutions, enable you to bring the light of
your far-reaching knowledge of man’s instinctive life upon the problem..”
“As one immune from nationalist bias, I personally see a simple way of dealing with
the superficial (i.e. administrative) aspect of the problem: the setting up, by international
consent, of a legislative and judicial body to settle every conflict arising between nations...
But here, at the outset, I come up against a difficulty; a tribunal is a human institution
which, in proportion as the power at its disposal is... prone to suffer these to be deflected
by extrajudicial pressure...”
10.3. THE ETHICS OF ALBERT EINSTEIN 379

Freud replied with a long and thoughtful letter in which he said that a tendency towards
conflict is an intrinsic part of human emotional nature, but that emotions can be overridden
by rationality, and that rational behavior is the only hope for humankind.

The fateful letter to Roosevelt

Albert Einstein’s famous relativistic formula, relating energy to mass, soon yielded an
understanding of the enormous amounts of energy released in radioactive decay. Marie
and Pierre Curie had noticed that radium maintains itself at a temperature higher than
its surroundings. Their measurements and calculations showed that a gram of radium
produces roughly 100 gram-calories of heat per hour. This did not seem like much energy
until Rutherford found that radium has a half-life of about 1,000 years. In other words,
after a thousand years, a gram of radium will still be producing heat, its radioactivity only
reduced to one-half its original value. During a thousand years, a gram of radium produces
about a million kilocalories, an enormous amount of energy in relation to the tiny size of
its source! Where did this huge amount of energy come from? Conservation of energy was
one of the most basic principles of physics. Would it have to be abandoned?
The source of the almost-unbelievable amounts of energy released in radioactive decay
could be understood through Einstein’s formula equating the energy of a system to its
mass multiplied by the square of the velocity of light, and through accurate measurements
of atomic weights. Einstein’s formula asserted that mass and energy are equivalent. It
was realized that in radioactive decay, neither mass nor energy is conserved, but only a
quantity more general than both, of which mass and energy are particular forms. Scientists
in several parts of the world realized that Einstein’s discovery of the relationship between
mass and energy, together with the discovery of fission of the heavy element uranium meant
that it might be possible to construct a uranium-fission bomb of immense power.
Meanwhile night was falling on Europe. In 1929, an economic depression had begun
in the United States and had spread to Europe. Without the influx of American capital,
the postwar reconstruction of the German economy collapsed. The German middle class,
which had been dealt a severe blow by the great inflation of 1923, now received a second
heavy blow. The desperate economic chaos drove German voters into the hands of political
extremists.
On January 30, 1933, Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor and leader of a coalition
cabinet by President Hindenburg. Although Hitler was appointed legally to this post,
he quickly consolidated his power by unconstitutional means: On May 2, Hitler’s police
seized the headquarters of all trade unions, and arrested labor leaders. The Communist
and Socialist parties were also banned, their assets seized and their leaders arrested. Other
political parties were also smashed. Acts were passed eliminating Jews from public service;
and innocent Jewish citizens were boycotted, beaten and arrested. On March 11, 1938,
Nazi troops entered Austria.
On March 16, 1939, the Italian physicist Enrico Fermi (who by then was a refugee in
America) went to Washington to inform the Office of Naval Operations that it might be
possible to construct an atomic bomb; and on the same day, German troops poured into
380 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Czechoslovakia.
A few days later, a meeting of six German atomic physicists was held in Berlin to
discuss the applications of uranium fission. Otto Hahn, the discoverer of fission, was not
present, since it was known that he was opposed to the Nazi regime. He was even said to
have exclaimed: “I only hope that you physicists will never construct a uranium bomb! If
Hitler ever gets a weapon like that, I’ll commit suicide.”
The meeting of German atomic physicists was supposed to be secret; but one of the
participants reported what had been said to Dr. S. Flügge, who wrote an article about
uranium fission and about the possibility of a chain reaction. Flügge’s article appeared in
the July issue of Naturwissenschaften, and a popular version in the Deutsche Allgemeine
Zeitung. These articles greatly increased the alarm of American atomic scientists, who
reasoned that if the Nazis permitted so much to be printed, they must be far advanced on
the road to building an atomic bomb.
In the summer of 1939, while Hitler was preparing to invade Poland, alarming news
reached the physicists in the United States: A second meeting of German atomic scientists
had been held in Berlin, this time under the auspices of the Research Division of the
German Army Weapons Department. Furthermore, Germany had stopped the sale of
uranium from mines in Czechoslovakia.
The world’s most abundant supply of uranium, however, was not in Czechoslovakia,
but in Belgian Congo. Leo Szilard, a refugee Hungarian physicist who had worked with
Fermi to measure the number of neutrons produced in uranium fission, was deeply worried
that the Nazis were about to construct atomic bombs; and it occurred to him that uranium
from Belgian Congo should not be allowed to fall into their hands.
Szilard knew that his former teacher, Albert Einstein, was a personal friend of Elizabeth,
the Belgian Queen Mother. Einstein had met Queen Elizabeth and King Albert of Belgium
at the Solvay Conferences, and mutual love of music had cemented a friendship between
them. When Hitler came to power in 1933, Einstein had moved to the Institute of Advanced
Studies at Princeton; and Szilard decided to visit him there. Szilard reasoned that because
of Einstein’s great prestige, and because of his long-standing friendship with the Belgian
Royal Family, he would be the proper person to warn the Belgians not to let their uranium
fall into the hands of the Nazis. Einstein agreed to write to the Belgian king and queen.
On August 2, 1939, Szilard again visited Einstein, accompanied by Edward Teller
and Eugene Wigner, who (like Szilard) were refugee Hungarian physicists. By this time,
Szilard’s plans had grown more ambitious; and he carried with him the draft of another
letter, this time to the American President, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Einstein made a few
corrections, and then signed the fateful letter, which reads (in part) as follows:
“Some recent work of E. Fermi and L. Szilard, which has been communicated to me in
manuscript, leads me to expect that the element uranium may be turned into an important
source of energy in the immediate future. Certain aspects of the situation seem to call for
watchfulness and, if necessary, quick action on the part of the Administration. I believe,
therefore, that it is my duty to bring to your attention the following..”
“It is conceivable that extremely powerful bombs of a new type may be constructed.
A single bomb of this type, carried by boat and exploded a port, might very well destroy
10.3. THE ETHICS OF ALBERT EINSTEIN 381

the whole port, together with some of the surrounding territory..”

The letter also called Roosevelt’s attention to the fact that Germany had already
stopped the export of uranium from the Czech mines under German control. After making
a few corrections, Einstein signed it. On October 11, 1939, three weeks after the defeat
of Poland, Roosevelt’s economic adviser, Alexander Sachs, personally delivered the letter
to the President. After discussing it with Sachs, the President commented,“This calls for
action.” Later, when atomic bombs were dropped on civilian populations in an already
virtually-defeated Japan, Einstein bitterly regretted having signed Szilard’s letter to Roo-
sevelt. He said repeatedly that signing the letter was the greatest mistake of his life, and
his remorse was extreme.
Throughout the remainder of his life, in addition to his scientific work, Einstein worked
tirelessly for peace, international understanding and nuclear disarmament. His last public
act, only a few days before his death in 1955, was to sign the Russell-Einstein Manifesto,
warning humankind of the catastrophic consequences that would follow from a war with
nuclear weapons.

A few more things that Einstein said about peace:

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking that we used when we
created them.

It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our hu-
manity.

Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.

The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil,
but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting to get dif-
ferent results.

Nothing will end war unless the people themselves refuse to go to war.

Past thinking and methods did not prevent world wars. Future thinking must
prevent war.

You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.

Never do anything against conscience, even if the state demands it.

Taken as a whole, I would believe that Gandhi’s views were the most enlight-
ened of all political men of our time.
382 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Without ethical culture, there is no salvation for humanity.

War seems to me to be a mean, contemptible thing: I would rather be hacked

in pieces than take part in such an abominable business. And yet so high, in
spite of everything, is my opinion of the human race that I believe this bogey
would have disappeared long ago, had the sound sense of the nations not been
systematically corrupted by commercial and political interests acting through
the schools and the Press.

10.4 The ethics of Saint Francis

The life of Saint Francis
Saint Francis of Assisi was born in 1181 in the Italian hilltop town of Assisi. His father,
Pietro di Bernardone, was a prosperous silk merchant, and his mother Pica de Bourlemont,
was a noblewoman from Provence. Saint Francis was originally called Giovanni, but his
father later renamed him Francesco because of his successful business dealings in France
and his admiration for all things French.
After leading the ordinary (somewhat dissolute) life of a wealthy young man of that
period, Saint Francis underwent a religious conversion, following which he renounced his
inheritance and embraced a life of poverty. Although not ordained as a priest, he began
teaching what he believed to be the true Christian message. He soon acquired a small group
of followers, and he traveled with them to Rome to ask Pope Innocent III for permission to
found a new religious order. During his life, Saint Francis founded three religious orders.
Saint Francis continued to preach, and is even said to have preached to birds and
animals, whom he regarded as his sisters and brothers. His attitude towards nature can
be seen in his “Canticle of the Sun”:

Canticle of the Sun

Most High, all powerful, good Lord,
Yours are the praises, the glory, the honor,
and all blessing.

To You alone, Most High, do they belong,

and no man is worthy to mention Your name.

Be praised, my Lord, through all your creatures,

especially through my lord Brother Sun,
who brings the day; and you give light through him.
10.4. THE ETHICS OF SAINT FRANCIS 383

Figure 10.3: Saint Francis

384 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

And he is beautiful and radiant in all his splendor!

Of you, Most High, he bears the likeness.

Praise be You, my Lord, through Sister Moon

and the stars, in heaven you formed them
clear and precious and beautiful.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brother Wind,

and through the air, cloudy and serene,
and every kind of weather through which
You give sustenance to Your creatures.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Water,

which is very useful and humble and precious and chaste.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brother Fire,

through whom you light the night and he is beautiful
and playful and robust and strong.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Mother Earth,

who sustains us and governs us and who produces
varied fruits with colored flowers and herbs.

Praised be You, my Lord,

through those who give pardon for Your love,
and bear infirmity and tribulation.

Blessed are those who endure in peace

for by You, Most High, they shall be crowned.

Praised be You, my Lord,

through our Sister Bodily Death,
from whom no living man can escape.

Woe to those who die in mortal sin.

Blessed are those whom death will
find in Your most holy will,
for the second death shall do them no harm.

Praise and bless my Lord,

and give Him thanks
and serve Him with great humility.
10.5. THE ETHICS OF POPE FRANCIS 385

Canonization
Pope Gregory IX canonized Francis on 16 July 1228. Along with Saint Catherine of Sienna,
he was designated Patron Saint of Italy. He later became associated with patronage of
animals and the natural environment, and it became customary for Catholic and Anglican
churches to hold ceremonies blessing animals on his feast day of 4 October.

A prayer of Saint Francis

Blessed is he who loves and does not therefore desire to be loved;
Blessed is he who fears and does not therefore desire to be feared;
Blessed is he who serves and does not therefore desire to be served;
Blessed is he who behaves well toward others and does not desire that others behave well
toward him;

10.5 The ethics of Pope Francis

Despite the worrying nature of the threats that we are facing, there are reasons for hope.
One of the greatest of these is the beautiful, profound and powerful encyclical that has
just been released by Pope Francis.
When he accepted the responsibility for leading the world’s 1.2-billion-strong Catholic
Church, Cardinal Bergoglio of Argentina adopted the name Francis, after the universally
loved Saint Francis of Assisi, whose life of simplicity, love for the poor, and love of nature
he chose as the model for his Papacy. The Pope’s inspiring encyclical letter “Laudato Si’
” takes its name from a canticle of Saint Francis, that begins with the words “Praise be to
you, my Lord, through our sister, mother Earth, who sustains and governs us...”
We can remember that Saint Francis regarded birds and animals as his brothers and
sisters. He even thought of the sun, moon, clouds, rain and water as brothers and sisters.
Like his chosen namesake, Pope Francis stresses the unity of all of nature, and our kinship
with all of creation. Francis appeals to love. We can be saved through love.
His encyclical is addressed not only to Catholics, but also to all men and women of good
will, and almost all of its 102 pages appeal to moral sensibilities and rational arguments
that can be shared by all of us. Pope Francis stresses that the natural world that sustains
us is in grave danger from our ruthless exploitation and greed-driven destruction of all the
beauty and life that it contains: animals, forests, soil, and air.
Pope Francis tells us that the dictates of today’s economists are not sacred: In the
future, if we are to survive, economics must be given both a social conscience and an eco-
logical conscience. Nor are private property and profits sacred. They must be subordinated
to the common good, and the preservation of our global commons.
Less focus on material goods need not make us less happy. The quality of our lives can
be increased, not decreased, if we give up our restless chase after power and wealth, and
derive more of our pleasures from art, music and literature, and from conversations with
386 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.4: Pope Francis reminds us that Christian ethics require both respect
and care for the earth and elimination of the institution of war.

our families and friends, Please read this great encyclical in its entirety. It can give us
hope and courage as we strive to make the changes that are needed to avert an ecological
mega-catastrophe.
Don Joao Mamede Filho is the Bishop of the Diocesis of Umuarama, commented: “
’Laudato Si’, considered by environmentalists all around the world as the Green Encyclical,
has become a work read by Christians and non-Christians alike in all corners of the world.
In it, Pope Francis calls on us all to take care of our ‘Common Home’ and all that exists
in it.
“In his call, the Pope reaffirms that the planet is a common good that must be preserved
and guarded. Therefore, it is our duty to refrain from any human activity that may degrade,
pollute or pose any kind of threat or risk to our planet and those who inhabit it.
“’Laudato Si’ also presents a strong and persisting plea for a shift towards a new
energy and development model, leaving fossil fuels behind. Since these energy sources
are responsible for the highest emissions of greenhouse gases, they pollute, render climate
changes more intense, bring on diseases, and kill.
“It is important to remember that, at the beginning of Creation, an organic relationship
between all living beings was established. All that exists is connected and coexists in a
sustainable and wholesome manner. However, by choosing dirty energy sources such as
fossil fuels, which leave trails of destruction behind them, we disconnect ourselves from our
surroundings and ignore the harm they may cause us and to our fellow creatures.”
10.6. ALL HUMANS ARE BROTHERS AND SISTERS! 387

Figure 10.5: The message of Beethoven’s Choral 9th: All humans are brothers
and sisters! Not just some - All!

10.6 All humans are brothers and sisters!

Besides a humane, democratic and just framework of international law and governance, we
urgently need a new global ethic, - an ethic where loyalty to family, community and nation
will be supplemented by a strong sense of the brotherhood of all humans, regardless of race,
religion or nationality. Schiller expressed this feeling in his “Ode to Joy”, a part of which is
the text of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Hearing Beethoven’s music and Schiller’s words,
most of us experience an emotion of resonance and unity with the message: All humans
are brothers and sisters - not just some - all! It is almost a national anthem of humanity.
The feelings that the music and words provoke are similar to patriotism, but broader. It
is this sense of a universal human family that we need to cultivate in education, in the
mass media, and in religion. We already appreciate music, art and literature from the
entire world, and scientific achievements are shared by all, regardless of their country of
origin. We need to develop this principle of universal humanism so that it will become the
cornerstone of a new ethic.

10.7 The ethics of Henry David Thoreau

In the distant future (and perhaps even in the not-so-distant future) industrial civilization
will need to abandon its relentless pursuit of unnecessary material goods and economic
growth. Modern society will need to re-establish a balanced and harmonious relationship
with nature. In preindustrial societies harmony with nature is usually a part of the cultural
tradition. In our own time, the same principle has become central to the ecological counter-
culture while the main-stream culture thunders blindly ahead, addicted to wealth, power
388 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

and growth.
In the 19th century the American writer, Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), pioneered
the concept of a simple life, in harmony with nature. Today, his classic book, Walden, has
become a symbol for the principles of ecology, simplicity, and respect for nature.
Thoreau was born in Concord Massachusetts, and he attended Harvard from 1833 to
1837. After graduation, he returned home, worked in his family’s pencil factory, did odd
jobs, and for three years taught in a progressive school founded by himself and his older
brother, John. When John died of lockjaw in 1842, Henry David was so saddened that he
felt unable to continue the school alone.

Nonviolent civil disobedience

Thoreau refused to pay his poll tax because of his opposition to the Mexican War and to
the institution of slavery. Because of his refusal to pay the tax (which was in fact a very
small amount) he spent a night in prison. To Thoreau’s irritation, his family paid the
poll tax for him and he was released. He then wrote down his ideas on the subject in an
essay entitled The Duty of Civil Disobedience, where he maintains that each person has a
duty to follow his own individual conscience even when it conflicts with the orders of his
government.
In his essay, Thoreau said: “A common and natural result of an undue respect for law
is that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys,
and all marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay,
against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed,
and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business
in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men
at all? or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in
power?”
“Under a government that which imprisons any unjustly”, Thoreau wrote, “the true
place for a just man is in prison.” Civil Disobedience influenced Tolstoy, Gandhi and Martin
Luther King, and it anticipated the Nuremberg Principles.

Harmony with nature

Thoreau became the friend and companion of the transcendentalist writer Ralph Waldo
Emerson (1803 1882), who introduced him to a circle of New England writers and thinkers
that included Ellery Channing, Margaret Fuller and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Nathaniel Hawthorne described Thoreau in the following words: “Mr. Thorow [sic] is a
keen and delicate observer of nature, a genuine observer, which, I suspect, is almost as rare
a character as even an original poet; and Nature, in return for his love, seems to adopt him
as her especial child, and shows him secrets which few others are allowed to witness. He
is familiar with beast, fish, fowl, and reptile, and has strange stories to tell of adventures,
and friendly passages with these lower brethren of mortality. Herb and flower, likewise,
wherever they grow, whether in garden, or wild wood, are his familiar friends. He is also
10.7. THE ETHICS OF HENRY DAVID THOREAU 389

Figure 10.6: Thoreau, with his cabin at Walden Pond in the background.

on intimate terms with the clouds and can tell the portents of storms. It is a characteristic
trait, that he has a great regard for the memory of the Indian tribes, whose wild life would
have suited him so well; and strange to say, he seldom walks over a plowed field without
picking up an arrow-point, a spear-head, or other relic of the red men, as if their spirits
willed him to be the inheritor of their simple wealth.”

Walden, an experiment in simple living

At Emerson’s suggestion, Thoreau opened a journal, in which he recorded his observations
concerning nature and his other thoughts. Ultimately the journal contained more than 2
million words. Thoreau drew on his journal when writing his books and essays, and in
recent years, many previously unpublished parts of his journal have been printed.
From 1845 until 1847, Thoreau lived in a tiny cabin that he built with his own hands.
The cabin was in a second-growth forest beside Walden Pond in Concord, on land that
belonged to Emerson. Thoreau regarded his life there as an experiment in simple living.
He described his life in the forest and his reasons for being there in his book Walden,
“Most of the luxuries”, Thoreau wrote, “and many of the so-called comforts of life,
are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. With
respect to luxuries, the wisest have ever lived a more simple and meager life than the poor.
The ancient philosophers, Chinese, Hindoo, Persian, and Greek, were a class than which
none has been poorer in outward riches, none so rich in inward.”
Elsewhere in “Walden”, Thoreau remarks, “It is never too late to give up your preju-
dices”, and he also says, “Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in
such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it
is because he hears a different drummer.” Other favorite quotations from Thoreau include
“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth”, “Beware of all enterprises that
require new clothes”, “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation” and “Men have become
tools of their tools.”
Thoreau’s closeness to nature can be seen from the following passage, written by his
friend Frederick Willis, who visited him at Walden Pond in 1847, together with the Alcott
family: “He was talking to Mr. Alcott of the wild flowers in Walden woods when, suddenly
stopping, he said: ‘Keep very still and I will show you my family.’ Stepping quickly outside
390 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

the cabin door, he gave a low and curious whistle; immediately a woodchuck came running
towards him from a nearby burrow. With varying note, yet still low and strange, a pair
of gray squirrels were summoned and approached him fearlessly. With still another note
several birds, including two crows flew towards him, one of the crows nestling upon his
shoulder. I remember that it was the crow resting close to his head that made the most
vivid impression on me, knowing how fearful of man this bird is. He fed them all from his
hand, taking food from his pocket, and petted them gently before our delighted gaze; and
then dismissed them by different whistling, always strange and low and short, each wild
thing departing instantly at hearing his special signal.”

Thoreau’s views on religion

Towards the end of his life, when he was very ill, someone asked Thoreau whether he had
made his peace with God. “We never quarreled”, he answered.
In an essay published by the Atlantic Monthly in 1853, Thoreau described a pine tree in
Maine with the words: “It is as immortal as I am, and perchance will go to as high a heaven,
there to tower above me still.” However, the editor (James Russell Lowell) considered the
sentence to be blasphemous, and removed it from Thoreau’s essay.
In one of his essays, Thoreau wrote: “If a man walk in the woods for love of them half
of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer; but if he spends his whole day
as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is
esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen.”

A few more things that Thoreau said

It is the beauty within us that makes it possible for us to recognize the beauty
around us. The question is not what you look at, but what you see.

Simplify your life. Don’t waste the years struggling for things that are unim-
portant. Don’t burden yourself with possessions. Keep your needs and wants
simple and enjoy what you have. Don’t destroy your peace of mind by looking
back, worrying about the past. Live in the present. Simplify!

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined.

Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you,
but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on
your shoulder.

Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.

10.8. THE MESSAGE OF BERTHA VON SUTTNER 391

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.

You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity
in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward
another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this

Be not simply good, be good for something,

Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of genera-
tions and nations.

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where
they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears
a different drummer. Let him step to the music he hears, however measured
or far away.

The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what
I thought, and attended to my answer.

We need the tonic of wildness...At the same time that we are earnest to explore
and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable,
that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us be-
cause unfathomable. We can never have enough of nature.

10.8 The message of Bertha von Suttner

Early life and marriage
Baroness Bertha von Suttner (1843-1914) was born in Prague as Countess Kinsky. She
was the posthumous daughter of a Field Marshall, and during the first part of her life, she
accepted the military traditions of her family. Later she vigorously opposed militarism,
and she became a leader of the peace movement. It was her arguments that persuaded
Alfred Nobel to establish the Nobel Peace Prize, and in 1905 she became the first woman
to receive the prize.
After serving as Alfred Nobel’s secretary (and close friend) in Paris (1876), Bertha
married Baron Arthur von Suttner. However, the von Suttner family was strongly opposed
to the marriage, and the young couple left for the Caucasus where for nine years they earned
a living by giving lessons in languages and music. During this period, Bertha von Suttner
became a highly successful writer.
392 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.7: Bertha von Suttner

In 1885 the von Suttner family relented, and welcomed the couple back to Austria. Here
Bertha von Suttner wrote most of her books, including her many novels. The couple’s life
was oriented almost solely toward the literary until, through a friend, they learned about
the International Arbitration and Peace Association1 in London and about similar groups
on the Continent, organizations that had as an actual working objective what they had
now both accepted as an ideal: arbitration and peace in place of armed force.
Bertha von Suttner immediately added material on this to her second serious book, Das
Maschinenzeitalter (The Machine Age) which, when published early in 1889. Her book was
much discussed and reviewed. It criticizing many aspects of the times, and it was among
the first to foretell the results of exaggerated nationalism and armaments. Her novel Lay
Down Your Arms, published in the same year, had a huge impact.

The 1905 Nobel Peace Prize

Here are some excerpts from Bertha von Suttner’s acceptance speech:
10.9. HELEN KELLER’S MESSAGE 393

One of the eternal truths is that happiness is created and developed in peace, and one
of the eternal rights is the individual’s right to live. The strongest of all instincts, that
of self-preservation, is an assertion of this right, affirmed and sanctified by the ancient
commandment ”Thou shalt not kill.”
It is unnecessary for me to point out how little this right and this commandment are
respected in the present state of civilization. Up to the present time, the military organiza-
tion of our society has been founded upon a denial of the possibility of peace, a contempt
for the value of human life, and an acceptance of the urge to kill...
It is erroneous to believe that the future will of necessity continue the trends of the past
and the present. The past and present move away from us in the stream of time like the
passing landscape of the riverbanks, as the vessel carrying mankind is borne inexorably by
the current toward new shores...
“If you keep me in touch with developments, and if I hear that the Peace Movement is
moving along the road of practical activity, then I will help it on with money.” These words
were spoken by that eminent Scandinavian to whom I owe this opportunity of appearing
before you today, Ladies and Gentlemen. Alfred Nobel said them when my husband and I
visited with him in 1892 in Bern, where a peace congress was in progress...
..although the supporters of the existing structure of society, which accepts war, come
to a peace conference prepared to modify the nature of war, they are basically trying to keep
the present system intact. The advocates of pacifism, inside and outside the Conference,
will, however, defend their objectives and press forward... to “bring nearer the time when
the sword shall not be the arbiter among nations”.

A few more things the Bertha von Suttner said about peace
Strange how blind people are! They are horrified by the torture chambers of
the Middle Ages, but their arsenals fill them with pride!

After the verb ’to Love’, ’to Help’ is the most beautiful verb in the world.

10.9 Helen Keller’s message

Childhood
Helen was a normal child until the age of 19 months, when she contracted an illness which
may have been scarlet fever or meningitis. It left her both deaf and blind. When Helen was
6 years old, her parents followed the advice of Alexander Graham Bell and contacted the
Perkins Institute for the Blind. The Perkins Institute recommended their recent graduate
Annie Sullivan, who became Helen’s teacher.
Annie Sullivan, who was 20 years old at that time and also blind, began to work with
Helen, spelling out words on the palm of Helen’s hand. This method was unsuccessful at
394 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.8: Helen Keller: Although blind, she could see injustice. Although
deaf, she could hear the cries of the oppressed, and the voices of victims of
war.

first, but one day, when Annie Sullivan was spelling out “water” on one of Helen’s hands
while water was running over the other, Helen suddenly realized that the letters were a
symbol for water. For the next many days, the child almost wore her teacher out by
demanding the spelling of hundreds of other things within her experience. Annie Sullivan
later became Helen’s lifelong friend and companion.

Victory over a triple handicap

Starting in 1888, Helen Keller began her formal education, at first at the Perkins Institute,
then at a succession of other schools. Finally, at the age of 24, with financial help from
a wealthy friend of Mark Twain. Helen graduated from Radcliffe College. She was the
first blind and deaf person to obtain a BA degree. On the way to this triumph, Helen had
taught herself to speak normally, and she could understand what other people were saying
by placing her hand on their lips.
Helen Keller quickly developed into a popular lecturer and author. She spoke and wrote
to advocate many social reforms, including woman’s suffrage, labour rights, socialism and
antimilitarism.
The story of Helen Keller and Annie Sullivan, as told in Helen’s Autobiography, became
known to a very wide public through the drama The Miracle Worker, which was first
produced as a radio broadcast, then as a television drams, then as a Broadway play and
finally as a succession of films.

Here is a newspaper account of one of Helen Keller’s lectures:

“The wonderful girl who has so brilliantly triumphed over the triple afflictions of blind-
10.9. HELEN KELLER’S MESSAGE 395

ness, dumbness and deafness, gave a talk with her own lips on ‘Happiness,’ and it will be
remembered always as a piece of inspired teaching by those who heard it.
“According to those who attended, Helen Keller spoke of the joy that life gave her. She
was thankful for the faculties and abilities that she did possess and stated that the most
productive pleasures she had were curiosity and imagination. Keller also spoke of the joy
of service and the happiness that came from doing things for others ... Keller imparted
that ‘helping your fellow men is one’s only excuse for being in this world and in the doing
of things to help one’s fellows lay the secret of lasting happiness.’ She also told of the joys
of loving work and accomplishment and the happiness of achievement. Although the entire
lecture lasted only a little over an hour, the lecture had a profound impact on the audience.”

A few things that Helen Keller said

Strike against war, for without you no battles can be fought! Strike against
manufacturing shrapnel and gas bombs and all other tools of murder! Strike
against preparedness that means death and misery to millions of human beings!
Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction! Be heroes in an army
of construction.

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched
- they must be felt with the heart.

Believe. No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars or sailed to an

uncharted land or opened a new heaven to the human spirit

Alone we can do so little. Together we can do so much!

It is for us to pray not for tasks equal to our powers, but for powers equal to
our tasks, to go forward with a great desire forever beating at the door of our
hearts as we travel toward our distant goal

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long
at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.

To keep our faces toward change, and behave like free spirits in the presence
of fate, is strength undefeatable.

Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything
wise in the world.

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the chil-
dren of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long
396 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing

I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding
which bringeth peace.

10.10 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

On December 10, 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. 48 nations voted for adoption, while 8 nations abstained
from voting. Not a single state voted against the Declaration. In addition, the Gen-
eral Assembly decided to continue work on the problem of implementing human rights.
The preamble of the Declaration stated the it was intended “as a common standard of
achievement for all peoples and nations, to the end that every individual and every or-
gan of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and
education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms.”
Articles 1 and 2 of the Declaration state that “all human beings are born free and
equal in dignity and in rights”, and that everyone is entitled to the rights and freedoms
mentioned in the Declaration without distinctions of any kind. Neither race color, sex,
language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property or social
origin must make a difference.
The Declaration states that everyone has a right to life, liberty and security of person
and property. Slavery and the slave trade are prohibited, as well as torture and cruel,
inhuman or degrading punishments. All people must be equal before the law, and no
person must be subject to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile. In criminal proceedings
an accused person must be presumed innocent until proven guilty by an impartial public
hearing where all necessary provisions have been made for the defense of the accused.
No one shall be subjected to interference with his privacy, family, home or correspon-
dence. Attacks on an individual’s honor are also forbidden. Everyone has the right of
freedom of movement and residence within the borders of a state, the right to leave any
country, including his own, as well as the right to return to his own country. Every person
has the right to a nationality and cannot be arbitrarily deprived of his or her nationality.
All people of full age have a right to marry and to establish a family. Men and women
have equal rights within a marriage and at its dissolution, if this takes place. Marriage
must require the full consent of both parties.
The Declaration also guarantees freedom of religion, of conscience, and of opinion and
expression, as well as freedom of peaceful assembly and association. Everyone is entitled
to participate in his or her own government, either directly or through democratically
chosen representatives. Governments must be based on the will of the people, expressed in
periodic and genuine elections with universal and equal suffrage. Voting must be secret.
Everyone has the right to the economic, social and cultural conditions needed for dignity
and free development of personality. The right to work is affirmed. The job shall be of
10.10. THE UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS 397

a person’s own choosing, with favorable conditions of work, and remuneration consistent
with human dignity, supplemented if necessary with social support. All workers have the
right to form and to join trade unions.
Article 25 of the Declaration states that everyone has the right to an adequate standard
of living, including food, clothing, housing and medical care, together with social services.
All people have the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability,
widowhood or old age. Expectant mothers are promised special care and assistance, and
children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection. Ev-
eryone has the right to education, which shall be free in the elementary stages. Higher
education shall be accessible to all on the basis of merit. Education must be directed
towards the full development of the human personality and to strengthening respect for
human rights and fundamental freedoms. Education must promote understanding, toler-
ance, and friendship among all nations, racial and religious groups, and it must further the
activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
A supplementary document, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, was adopted
by the United Nations General Assembly on the 12th of December, 1989. Furthermore, in
July 2010, the General Assembly passed a resolution affirming that everyone has the right
to clean drinking water and proper sanitation.
Many provisions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, for example Article
25, might be accused of being wishful thinking. In fact, Jean Kirkpatrick, former US
Ambassador to the UN, called the Declaration “a letter to Santa Claus”. Nevertheless,
like the Millennium Development Goals, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has
great value in defining the norms towards which the world ought to be striving.
It is easy to find many examples of gross violations of basic human rights that have taken
place in recent years. Apart from human rights violations connected with interventions of
powerful industrial states in the internal affairs of third world countries, there are many
cases where governmental forces in the less developed countries have violated the human
rights of their own citizens. Often minority groups have been killed or driven off their land
by those who coveted the land, as was the case in Guatemala in 1979, when 1.5 million
poor Indian farmers were forced to abandon their villages and farms and to flee to the
mountains of Mexico in order to escape murderous attacks by government soldiers. The
blockade of Gaza and the use of drones to kill individuals illegally must also be regarded
as gross human rights violations, and there are many recent examples of genocide.
Wars in general, and in particular, the use of nuclear weapons, must be regarded as
gross violations of human rights. The most basic human right is the right to life; but this
is right routinely violated in wars. Most of the victims of recent wars have been civilians,
very often children and women. The use of nuclear weapons must be regarded as a form
of genocide, since they kill people indiscriminately, babies, children, young adults in their
prime, and old people, without any regard for guilt or innocence.
Furthermore, recent research shows that a war fought with nuclear weapons would be
an ecological disaster. Smoke from burning cities would rise to the stratosphere, where it
would spread globally and remain for a period of 10 years, blocking sunlight, destroying the
the ozone layer, and blocking the hydrological cycle. An all-out war with thermonuclear
398 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

weapons would essentially destroy all agriculture for such a long period that most humans
would die from starvation. The damage to the biosphere would also be enormous. We
may ask: by what right do the nuclear nations threaten the world with a disaster of these
proportions? Would not a war fought with nuclear weapons be the greatest imaginable
violation of human rights? We should remember that both war in general and the use of
nuclear weapons in particular violate democratic principles: The vast majority of ordinary
citizens prefer peace to war, and the vast majority also long for a world without nuclear
weapons.
It is plain that if the almost unbelievable sums now wasted on armaments were used
constructively, most of the pressing problems facing the world today could be solved;
but today the world spends more that 20 times as much on armaments as it does on
development.
Today’s world is one in which roughly 10 million children die every year from diseases
related to poverty. Besides this enormous waste of young lives through malnutrition and
preventable disease, there is a huge waste of opportunities through inadequate education.
The rate of illiteracy in the 25 least developed countries is 80 percent, and the total number
of illiterates in the world is estimated to be 800 million. Meanwhile every 60 seconds the
world spends roughly 3 million dollars on armaments. The millions who are starving have a
right to food. The millions of illiterates have a right to education. By preferring armaments
to development, we deny them these rights.
It is time for civil society to make its voice heard. Politicians are easily influenced by
lobbies and by money, but in the last analysis they have to listen to the voice of the people.
We have seen this recently in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Yemen. We should try
to learn from the courage of the people of these countries who have defied guns and tanks
to demand their human rights. No single person can achieve the changes that we need,
but together we can do it: together we can build the world that we choose.
No one living today asked to be born in a time of crisis, but the global crisis of the 21st
century has given each of us an enormous responsibility: We cannot merely leave things
up to the politicians, as we have been doing. The future is in our own hands: the hands
of the people, the hands of civil society. This is not a time for building private utopias or
cultivating our own gardens. Today everyone has two jobs: Of course we have to earn a
living, but in addition, all of us have the duty to work actively, to the best of our abilities,
to save humanity’s future and the biosphere.
10.10. THE UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS 399

Figure 10.9: Eleanor Roosevelt and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
which she helped to draft.
400 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

10.11 The voice of Martin Luther King, Jr.

The son of a southern Baptist minister, Martin Luther King, Jr received his Ph.D. in
theology from Boston University in 1955. During his studies, he had admired Thoreau’s
essay “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience,” and he had also been greatly moved by the life
and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi.
Martin Luther King Jr. had been pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in
Montgomery Alabama for only a year when he was chosen to lead a boycott protesting
segregation in the Montgomery buses. Suddenly thrust into this situation of intense con-
flict, he remembered both the Christian principle of loving one’s enemies and Gandhi’s
methods of non-violent protest. In his first speech as President of the Montgomery Im-
provement Association (a speech which the rapid pace of events had forced him to prepare
in only twenty minutes, five of which he spent in prayer), he said:
“Our method will be that of persuasion, not coercion. We will only say to people, ‘Let
your conscience be your guide’. Our actions must be guided by the deepest principles of
our Christian faith. Love must be our regulating ideal. Once again we must hear the words
of Jesus echoing across the centuries: ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, and
pray for them that despitefully use you.’ If we fail to do this, our protest will end up as a
meaningless drama on the stage of history, and its memory will be shrouded by the ugly
garments of shame. In spite of the mistreatment that we have confronted, we must not
become bitter and end up by hating our white brothers. As Booker T. Washington said,
‘Let no man pull you down so low as to make you hate him.’”
“If you will protest courageously, and yet with dignity and Christian love, when the
history books are written in future generations, the historians will have to pause and say,
‘There lived a great people, a black people, who injected new meaning and dignity into the
veins of civilization.’ This is our challenge and our overwhelming responsibility.”

Victory in the court of public opinion

This speech, which Dr. King made in December 1955, set the tone of the black civil
rights movement. Although the protesters against racism were often faced with brutality
and violence; although many of them, including Dr. King were unjustly jailed; although
the homes of the leaders were bombed; although they constantly received telephone calls
threatening their lives; although many civil rights workers were severely beaten, and several
of them killed, they never resorted to violence in their protests against racial discrimination.
Because of this adherence to Christian ethics, public opinion shifted to the side of the
civil rights movement, and the United States Supreme Court ruled bus segregation to be
unconstitutional.

Welcomed to India by Nehru

In 1959, while recovering from an almost-fatal stabbing, Martin Luther King Jr. visited
India at the invitation of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Dr. King and his wife Coretta
10.11. THE VOICE OF MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. 401

were warmly welcomed by Nehru, who changed his schedule in order to meet them. They
had an opportunity to visit a religious community or “ashram” that Gandhi had founded,
and they discussed non-violence with many of Gandhi’s disciples.

King is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

In 1964, the change in public opinion produced by the non-violent black civil rights move-
ment resulted in the passage of the civil rights act. In the same year, Dr. King was awarded
the Nobel Peace Prize. He accepted it, not as an individual, but on behalf of all civil rights
workers; and he immediately gave all the prize money to the movement.

Opposition to the Viet Nam War

In 1967, a year before his assassination, Dr. King forcefully condemned the Viet Nam
war in an address at a massive peace rally in New York City. He felt that opposition
to war followed naturally from his advocacy of non-violence. Speaking against the Viet
Nam War, Dr. King said: “We have corrupted their women and children and killed their
men. They move sadly and apathetically as we herd them off the land of their fathers into
concentration camps where minimal social needs are rarely met. They know they must
move on or be destroyed by our bombs ... primarily women and children and the aged
watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their crops. They must weep
as the bulldozers roar through their areas preparing to destroy the precious trees. They
wander into the hospitals. So far we may have killed a million of them, [in Vietnam by
1967] mostly children. They wander into the towns and see thousands of the children,
homeless, without clothes, running in packs on the streets like animals. They see the
children degraded by our soldiers as they beg for food. They see the children selling their
sisters to our soldiers, soliciting for their mothers.”

Opposition to nuclear weapons

In his book, “Strength to Love”, Dr. King wrote,“Wisdom born of experience should tell
us that war is obsolete. There may have been a time when war served a negative good
by preventing the spread of an evil force, but the power of modern weapons eliminates
even the possibility that war may serve as a negative good. If we assume that life is worth
living, and that man has a right to survival, then we must find an alternative to war ... I
am convinced that the Church cannot be silent while mankind faces the threat of nuclear
annihilation. If the church is true to her mission, she must call for an end to the nuclear
arms race.”

Assassination
On April 4, 1968, Dr. King was shot and killed. A number of people, including members
of his own family, believe that he was killed because of his opposition to the Viet Nam
402 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.10: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks in Washington: “I have a
dream!”

War. This conclusion is supported by the result of a 1999 trial initiated by members of
the King family. Summing up the arguments to the jury, the family’s lawyer said “We are
dealing in conspiracy with agents of the City of Memphis and the governments of the State
of Tennessee and the United States of America. We ask that you find that a conspiracy
existed.” After two and a half hour’s deliberation, the jury found that Lloyd Jowers and
“others, including governmental agencies, were parties to this conspiracy”. The verdict of
the jury remains judicially valid today, and it has never been overturned in a court of law,
although massive efforts have been made to discredit it.

Redemptive love
Concerning the Christian principle of loving one’s enemies, Dr. King wrote: “Why should
we love our enemies? Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a
night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that ... Love is the only force capable of
transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with
hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity... It is this attitude that made it
possible for Lincoln to speak a kind word about the South during the Civil War, when
feeling was most bitter. Asked by a shocked bystander how he could do this, Lincoln said,
‘Madam, do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?’ This is the power
of redemptive love.”
To a large extent, the black civil rights movement of the ’50’s and ’60’s succeeded in
ending legalized racial discrimination in America. If the methods used had been violent,
the movement could easily have degenerated into a nightmare of interracial hatred; but by
remembering the Christian message, “Love your enemy; do good to them that despitefully
10.11. THE VOICE OF MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. 403

use you”, Martin Luther King Jr. raised the ethical level of the civil rights movement; and
the final result was harmony and understanding between the black and white communities.
Later the nonviolent methods of Gandhi and King were successfully applied to the South
African struggle against Apartheid by Nelson Mandela and his followers.

Here are a few more things that Martin Luther King said
I have decided to stick to love...Hate is too great a burden to bear

Faith is taking the first step even when you can’t see the whole staircase.

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of
our friends.

If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then
crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.

Only in the darkness can you see the stars.

There comes a time when a person must take a position that is neither safe, nor
politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.

Everybody can be great...because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have
a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree
to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a constant attitude.

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.

There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When
we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

We must live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education

True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.
404 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge, which

is power; religion gives man wisdom, which is control. Science deals mainly
with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort

and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given

by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an in-

escapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever
affects one directly, affects all indirectly.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce ur-
gency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to
take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the
promises of democracy.

The time is always right to do what is right.

For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to
sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.

All we say to America is, ‘Be true to what you said on paper.’ If I lived in...
any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand the denial of certain ba-
sic First Amendment privileges, because they hadn’t committed themselves to
that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere
I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of the press.
Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right.

We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now
because I’ve been to the mountaintop . . .I’ve looked over and I’ve seen the
promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight
that we as a people will get to the promised land.
10.12. ICAN WINS THE 2017 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE 405

10.12 ICAN wins the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize

What is ICAN?
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, abbreviated ICAN, is a coali-
tion of 468 NGO’s in 101 countries. The purpose of ICAN is to change the focus in the
disarmament debate to “the the humanitarian threat posed by nuclear weapons, drawing
attention to their unique destructive capacity, their catastrophic health and environmental
consequences, their indiscriminate targeting, the debilitating impact of a detonation on
medical infrastructure and relief measures, and the long-lasting effects of radiation on the
surrounding area.”
ICAN was founded in 2007 by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear
War, an organization which itself received a Nobel Peace Prize in 1985. IPPNW was
inspired by the success of the campaign that achieved the Ottawa Treaty in 1997, a treaty
which banned antipersonnel land-mines against bitter opposition from the worst offenders.
Thus, from the start. ICAN envisioned a treaty passed and without the participation or
signatures of the nuclear weapons states. ICAN believed that such a treaty would have the
great value of unambiguously underlining the illegality, immorality and omnicidal nature
of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons states would eventually be forced to yield to the will
of the vast majority of humankind.
On July 7, 2017, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was adopted by an
overwhelming majority, 122 to 1, by the United Nations General Assembly. The adoption
of the treaty, a milestone in humanity’s efforts to rid itself of nuclear insanity, was to a
large extent due to the efforts of ICAN’s participating organizations.
On December 10, 2017 ICAN’s efforts were recognized by the award of the Nobel Peace
Prize. Part of the motivation for the award was the fact that the threat of a thermonuclear
global catastrophe is higher today than it has been at any time since the Cuban Missile
Crisis. Because of the belligerent attitudes and mental instability of Donald Trump and
Kim Jong-un, the end of human civilization and much of the biosphere is, in the words of
Beatrice Fihn, “only a tantrum away”.
406 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.11: From left to right: Berit Reiss-Andersen, Chairman of the Norwe-
gian Nobel Committee, Setsuko Thurlow, an 85-year-old survivor of the 1945
atomic bombing of Hiroshima, and ICAN Executive Director Beatrice Fihn.

10.13 Compassion versus greed

Humans are capable of great compassion and unselfishness. Mothers and fathers make
many sacrifices for the sake of their families. Kind teachers help us through childhood,
and show us the right path. Doctors and nurses devote themselves to the welfare of their
patients.
Sadly there is another, side to human nature, a darker side. Human history is stained
with the blood of wars and genocides. Today, this dark, aggressive side of human nature
threatens to plunge our civilization into an all-destroying thermonuclear war.
Humans often exhibit kindness to those who are closest to themselves, to their families
and friends, to their own social group or nation. By contrast, the terrible aggression
seen in wars and genocides is directed towards outsiders. Human nature seems to exhibit
what might be called “tribalism”: altruism towards one’s own group; aggression towards
outsiders. Today this tendency towards tribalism threatens both human civilization and
the biosphere.
Greed, in particular the greed of corporations and billionaire oligarchs, is driving human
civilization and the biosphere towards disaster.
The greed of giant fossil fuel corporations is driving us towards a tipping point after
which human efforts to control climate change will be futile because feedback loops will
have taken over. The greed of the military industrial complex is driving us towards a Third
10.13. COMPASSION VERSUS GREED 407

World War that might develop into a catastrophic thermonuclear war. The greed of our
financial institutions is also driving us towards economic collapse, as we see in the case of
Greece.
Until the start of the Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries, human
society maintained a more or less sustainable relationship with nature. However, with the
beginning of the industrial era, traditional ways of life, containing elements of both social
and environmental ethics, were replaced by the money-centered, growth-oriented life of
today, from which these vital elements are missing.
According to the followers of Adam Smith (1723-1790), self-interest (even greed) is a
sufficient guide to human economic actions. The passage of time has shown that Smith
was right in many respects. The free market, which he advocated, has turned out to be
the optimum prescription for economic growth. However, history has also shown that
there is something horribly wrong or incomplete about the idea that self-interest alone,
uninfluenced by ethical and ecological considerations, and totally free from governmental
intervention, can be the main motivating force of a happy and just society. There has also
proved to be something terribly wrong with the concept of unlimited economic growth.
The Industrial Revolution marked the start of massive human use of fossil fuels. The
stored energy from several hundred million years of plant growth began to be used at
roughly a million times the rate at which it had been formed. The effect on human society
was like that of a narcotic. There was a euphoric (and totally unsustainable) surge of
growth of both population and industrial production. Meanwhile, the carbon released into
the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels began to duplicate the conditions which
led to the 5 geologically-observed mass extinctions, during each of which more than half
of all living species disappeared forever.
The Stern Review Discussion Paper of 2006 stated that “Melting of permafrost in the
Arctic could lead to the release of huge quantities of methane. Dieback of the Amazon
forest could mean that the region starts to emit rather than to absorb greenhouse gases.
These feedbacks could lead to warming that is at least twice as fast as current high-emission
projections, leading to temperatures higher than seen in the last 50 million years.”
The greed of giant fossil fuel corporations has recently led them to conduct large-scale
advertising campaigns to convince the public that anthropogenic climate change is not real.
These corporations own vast oil, coal and gas reserves that must be kept in the ground if we
are to avoid catastrophic global warming. It does not seem to bother the fossil fuel giants
that if the earth is made uninhabitable, future generations of both humans and animals
will perish.
When the United Nations was established in 1945, the purpose of the organization was
to abolish the institution of war. This goal was built into many of the articles of the UN
Charter. Accordingly, throughout the world, many War Departments were renamed and
became Departments of Defense. But the very name is a lie. In an age of nuclear threats
and counter-threats, populations are by no means protected. Ordinary citizens are just
hostages in a game for power and money. It is all about greed.
Why is war continually threatened? Why is Russia threatened? Why is war with
Iran threatened? Why fan the flames of conflict with China? Is it to “protect” civilians?
408 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Absolutely not! In a thermonuclear war, hundreds of millions of civilians would die horribly
everywhere in the world, also in neutral countries. What is really being protected are the
profits of arms manufacturers. As long as there are tensions; as long as there is a threat
of war, military budgets are safe; and the profits of arms makers are safe. The people in
several “democracies”, for example the United States, do not rule at the moment. Greed
rules.
Greed and lack of ethics are built into the structure of corporations. By law, the Chief
Executive Officer of a corporation must be entirely motivated by the collective greed of the
stockholders. He must maximize profits. Nothing must count except the bottom line. If
the CEO abandons this single-minded chase after corporate profits for ethical reasons, or
for the sake of humanity or the biosphere or the future, he (or she) must, by law, be fired
and replaced.
Occasionally, for the sake of their public image, corporations seem to do something for
other motives than their own bottom line, but it is usually window dressing. For example,
Shell claims to be supporting research on renewable energy. Perhaps there is indeed a small
renewable energy laboratory somewhere in that vast corporation; but the real interest of
the organization is somewhere else. Shell is sending equipment on a large scale to drill for
more and more environment-destroying oil in the Arctic.
What does Christianity say about greed? Wikipedia states that “The seven deadly sins,
also known as capital vices or cardinal sins, is a classification of vices (part of Christian
ethics) that has been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct Christians
concerning fallen humanity’s tendency to sin. In the currently recognized version, the sins
are usually given as wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy and gluttony. Each is a form of
Idolatry-of-Self wherein the subjective reigns over the objective.”
Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote: “Greed is a sin against God, just as all mortal sins, in
as much as man condemns things eternal for the sake of temporal things”.
In the New Testament, we can find many passages condemning greed, for example:
“For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have
erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” Timothy 6:10
“Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt,
and where thieves break through and steal.” Mathew 6:19
In his encyclical Laudato Si’, and on his recent visit to South America, Pope Francis
has spoken strongly against economic activity that lacks both social and environmental
ethics.
Much depends on whether we are able to break the power that corporations and ex-
tremely rich oligarchs now hold over our governments and our mass media. Pope Francis
has shown by example what a world leader of courage and honesty can do. Most of us are
not in such a position, but each person can do his or her best to restore democracy where
it has been lost to corporate money and greed. If the mass media have sold themselves to
the highest bidder, we can make our own media. If most politicians are corrupt, we can
make our own political movements. As Shelly said, “We are many, they are few”.
10.13. COMPASSION VERSUS GREED 409

We need your voice today

Saint Francis said:

“Blessed is he who loves and does not therefore desire to be loved;

Blessed is he who fears and does not therefore desire to be feared;
Blessed is he who serves and does not therefore desire to be served;
Blessed is he who behaves well toward others and does not desire that others
behave well toward him.”

William Blake said:

“Every Night & every Morn

Some to Misery are Born
Every Morn and every Night
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to sweet delight
Some are Born to Endless Night.”

Thomas Paine said:

“It is a perversion of terms to say that a charter gives rights. It operates

by a contrary effect: that of taking rights away. Rights are inherently in all
the inhabitants; but charters, by annulling those rights, in the majority, leave
the right, by exclusion, in the hands of a few... They... consequently are in-
struments of injustice ... The fact, therefore, must be that the individuals,
themselves, each, in his own personal and sovereign right, entered into a con-
tract with each other to produce a government: and this is the only mode in
which governments have a right to arise, and the only principle on which they
have a right to exist.”

Thomas Jefferson said:

“I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the
people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise
their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from
them but to inform their discretion.”

Mary Wollstonecraft said:

“I entreat (men) to assist to emancipate their companion, to make her a help

meet for them! Would men but generously snap our chains, and be content
with rational fellowship instead of slavish obedience, they would find us more
410 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

observant daughters, more affectionate sisters, more faithful wives, more rea-
sonable mothers: in a word, better citizens.”

William Godwin said:

“To whom does any article, suppose a loaf of bread, justly belong? I have an
hundred loaves in my possession, and in the next street there is a poor man
expiring with hunger, to whom one of these loaves would be a means of pre-
serving his life. If I withhold this loaf from him, am I not unjust? If I impart
it, am I not complying with what justice demands?”

The Marquis de Condorcet said:

“Any person who has contributed to the progress of mankind to the best of
his ability becomes immune to personal disaster and suffering. He knows that
human progress is inevitable and can take comfort and courage from his inner
picture of the epic march of mankind, through history, towards a better future.”

Thomas Robert Malthus said:

“That population cannot increase without the means of subsistence is a propo-

sition so evident that it needs no illustration. That population does invariably
increase, where there are means of subsistence, the history of every people
who have ever existed will abundantly prove. And that the superior power
cannot be checked without producing misery and vice, the ample portion of
these two bitter ingredients in the cup of human life, and the continuance of
the physical causes that seem to have produced them, bear too convincing a
testimony. (He later modified this opinion and made it less pessimistic by allowing for
the effect of preventive checks such as late marriage. Malthus considered birth control to
be a form of vice, but today it is accepted as the most humane method of avoiding the
grim Malthusian forces, famine, disease and war.”)

Percy Bysshe Shelley said:

“Rise, like lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number!
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you:
Ye are many, they are few!”

Robert Owen said:

“I know that society may be formed so as to exist without crime, without

10.13. COMPASSION VERSUS GREED 411

poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, if any, misery. and with in-
telligence and happiness increased a hundredfold; and no obstacle whatsoever
intervenes at this moment except ignorance to prevent such a state of society
from becoming universal.”

John Stuart Mill said:

“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any mem-
ber of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”

Henry David Thoreau said:

“Simplify your life. Don’t waste the years struggling for things that are unim-
portant. Don’t burden yourself with possessions. Keep your needs and wants
simple and enjoy what you have. Don’t destroy your peace of mind by looking
back, worrying about the past. Live in the present. Simplify!”

Count Leo Tolstoy said:

“The sharpest of all contradictions can be seen between the government’s pro-
fessed faith in the Christian law of the brotherhood of all humankind, and the
military laws of the state, which force each young man to prepare himself for
enmity and murder.”

Mahatma Gandhi said:

“They say that ’means are after all means’. I would say that ’means are after
all everything’. As the means, so the end. Indeed, the Creator has given us
limited power over means, none over end... The means may be likened to a
seed, and the end to a tree; and there is the same inviolable connection between
the means and the end as there is between the seed and the tree. Means and
end are convertible terms in my philosophy of life.”

Martin Luther King said:

“Wisdom born of experience should tell us that war is obsolete. There may
have been a time when war served a negative good by preventing the spread of
an evil force, but the power of modern weapons eliminates even the possibility
that war may serve as a negative good. If we assume that life is worth living,
and that man has a right to survival, then we must find an alternative to war
... I am convinced that the Church cannot be silent while mankind faces the
threat of nuclear annihilation. If the church is true to her mission, she must
call for an end to the nuclear arms race.”
412 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Wilfred Owen said:

“If in some smothering dream, you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin,
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori”.

Albert Einstein said:

“The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything except our ways of
thinking, and thus we drift towards unparalleled catastrophes.”

Edna St. Vincent Millay said:

“Man, doughty Man, what power has brought you low,

That heaven itself in arms could not persuade
To lay aside the lever and the spade
And be as dust among the dusts that blow?
Whence, whence the broadside? Whose the heavy blade?...
Strive not to speak, poor scattered mouth; I know.”

Bertha von Suttner said:

“Strange how blind people are! They are horrified by the torture chambers of
the Middle Ages, but their arsenals fill them with pride!”

George Orwell said:

“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”

Helen Keller said:

“Strike against war, for without you no battles can be fought! Strike against
manufacturing shrapnel and gas bombs and all other tools of murder! Strike
10.14. THE FRAGILITY OF OUR COMPLEX CIVILIZATION 413

against preparedness that means death and misery to millions of human beings!
Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction! Be heroes in an army
of construction.”

Today, human civilization and the biosphere are facing a crisis. Here are the tasks
which history has given to our generation:

• We must abolish the institution of war before modern weapons destroy us.
• We must replace institutionalized violence by a just, democratic and enforcible system
of global governance and international law.
• We must stabilize and ultimately reduce global population to a level that can be
supported by sustainable agriculture.
• We must leave fossil fuels in the ground.
• We must avoid the large-scale global famine which threatens us because of the com-
bined effects of climate change, population growth and the end of the fossil fuel
era.
• We must achieve a steady-state economic system. Limitless growth on a finite planet
is a logical absurdity.
• We must decrease economic inequality, both between nations and within nations,
• We must strive for governments that are true democracies rather than oligarchies.
• And finally, we must develop a mature ethical system to match our new technology.

These are difficult tasks, but together we can overcome the difficulties. As Helen Keller
said, Alone we can do so little! Together we can do so much!

At a time of crisis, with the future at stake, please don’t be silent. We urgently
need your voice today!

10.14 The fragility of our complex civilization

The rapid growth of knowledge
Cultural evolution depends on the non-genetic storage, transmission, diffusion and uti-
lization of information. The development of human speech, the invention of writing, the
development of paper and printing, and finally, in modern times, mass media, computers
and the Internet: all these have been crucial steps in society’s explosive accumulation of in-
formation and knowledge. Human cultural evolution proceeds at a constantly-accelerating
speed, so great in fact that it threatens to shake society to pieces.
414 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

In many respects, our cultural evolution can be regarded as an enormous success. How-
ever, at the start of the 21st century, most thoughtful observers agree that civilization is en-
tering a period of crisis. As all curves move exponentially upward, population, production,
consumption, rates of scientific discovery, and so on, one can observe signs of increasing
environmental stress, while the continued existence and spread of nuclear weapons threaten
civilization with destruction. Thus, while the explosive growth of knowledge has brought
many benefits, the problem of achieving a stable, peaceful and sustainable world remains
serious, challenging and unsolved.
Our modern civilization has been built up by means of a worldwide exchange of ideas
and inventions. It is built on the achievements of many ancient cultures. China, Japan,
India, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, the Islamic world, Christian Europe, and the Jewish
intellectual traditions, all have contributed. Potatoes, corn, squash, vanilla, chocolate, chili
peppers, and quinine are gifts from the American Indians.
The sharing of scientific and technological knowledge is essential to modern civilization.
The great power of science is derived from an enormous concentration of attention and
resources on the understanding of a tiny fragment of nature. It would make no sense to
proceed in this way if knowledge were not permanent, and if it were not shared by the
entire world.
Science is not competitive. It is cooperative. It is a great monument built by many
thousands of hands, each adding a stone to the cairn. This is true not only of scientific
knowledge but also of every aspect of our culture, history, art and literature, as well as
the skills that produce everyday objects upon which our lives depend. Civilization is
cooperative. It is not competitive.
Our cultural heritage is not only immensely valuable; it is also so great that no individ-
ual comprehends all of it. We are all specialists, who understand only a tiny fragment of
the enormous edifice. No scientist understands all of science. Perhaps Leonardo da Vinci
could come close in his day, but today it is impossible. Nor do the vast majority people
who use cell phones, personal computers and television sets every day understand in detail
how they work. Our health is preserved by medicines, which are made by processes that
most of us do not understand, and we travel to work in automobiles and buses that we
would be completely unable to construct.

The fragility of modern society

As our civilization has become more and more complex, it has become increasingly vulner-
able to disasters. We see this whenever there are power cuts or transportation failures due
to severe storms. If electricity should fail for a very long period of time, our complex society
would cease to function. The population of the world is now so large that it is completely
dependent on the high efficiency of modern agriculture. We are also very dependent on
the stability of our economic system.
The fragility of modern society is particularly worrying, because, with a little thought,
we can predict several future threats which will stress our civilization very severely. We
will need much wisdom and solidarity to get safely through the difficulties that now loom
10.14. THE FRAGILITY OF OUR COMPLEX CIVILIZATION 415

Figure 10.12: The earth at night, seen from space: The thin layer of atmo-
sphere covering the earth is vulnerable to the greenhouse gases that can cause
catastrophic climate change. At night we can see the massive energy use that
produces these greenhouse gases.

ahead of us.

We can already see the the problem of famine in vulnerable parts of the world. Climate
change will make this problem more severe by bringing aridity to parts of the world that are
now large producers of grain, for example the Middle West of the United States. Climate
change has caused the melting of glaciers in the Himalayas and the Andes. When these
glaciers are completely melted, China, India and several countries in South America will be
deprived of their summer water supply. Water for irrigation will also become increasingly
problematic because of falling water tables. Rising sea levels will drown many rice-growing
areas in South-East Asia. Finally, modern agriculture is very dependent on fossil fuels
for the production of fertilizer and for driving farm machinery. In the future, high-yield
agriculture will be dealt a severe blow by the rising price of fossil fuels.

Economic collapse is another threat that we will have to face in the future. Our present
fractional reserve banking system is dependent on economic growth. But perpetual growth
of industry on a finite planet is a logical impossibility. Thus we are faced with a period
of stress, where reform of our growth-based economic system and great changes of lifestyle
will both become necessary.

How will we get through the difficult period ahead? I believe that solutions to the
difficult problems of the future are possible, but only if we face the problems honestly
and make the adjustments which they demand. Above all, we must maintain our human
solidarity.
416 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

10.15 Looking towards the future

Tensions created by the rapidity of technological change
In human cultural evolution, information transfer and storage through the language of
molecular complementarity is supplemented by new forms of biological information flow
and conservation - spoken language, writing, printing, and more recently electronic com-
munication. The result has been a shift into a much higher evolutionary gear.
Because of new, self-reinforcing mechanisms of information flow and accumulation, the
rate of evolutionary change has increased enormously: It took 3 billion years for the first
autocatalytic systems to develop into multicellular organisms. Five hundred million years
were required for multicellular organisms to rise from the level of sponges and slime molds to
the degree of complexity and organization that characterizes primates and other mammals;
but when a branch of the primate family developed a tool-using culture, spoken language,
and an enlarged brain, only 40,000 years were required for our ancestors to change from
animal-like hunter-gatherers into engineers, poets and astronomers.
During the initial stages of human cultural evolution, the rate of change was slow
enough for genetic adaptation to keep pace. The co-evolution of speech, tool use, and an
enlarged brain in hominids took place over a period of several million years, and there
was ample time for genetic adaptation. The prolonged childhood which characterizes our
species, and the behavior patterns of familial and tribal solidarity, were built into the
genomes of our ancestors during the era of slow change, when cultural and genetic evolution
moved together in equilibrium. However, as the pace of cultural information accumulation
quickened, genetic change could no longer keep up.
Genetically we are almost identical with our neolithic ancestors; but their world has
been replaced by a world of quantum theory, relativity, supercomputers, antibiotics, genetic
engineering and space telescopes - unfortunately also a world of nuclear weapons and nerve
gas. Because of the slowness of genetic evolution in comparison to the rapid and constantly-
accelerating rate of cultural change, our bodies and minds are not perfectly adapted to
our new way of life. They reflect more accurately the way of life of our hunter-gatherer
ancestors.
In addition to the contrast between the slow pace of genetic evolution when com-
pared with the rapid and constantly-accelerating rate of cultural evolution, we can also
notice a contrast between rapidly- and slowly-moving aspects of cultural change: Social
institutions and structures seem to change slowly when compared with the lightning-like
pace of scientific and technological innovation. Thus, tensions and instability character-
ize information-driven society, not only because science and technology change so much
more rapidly than institutions, laws, and attitudes, but also because human nature is not
completely appropriate to our present way of life. In particular, human nature seems to
contain an element of what might be called “tribalism”, because our emotions evolved
during an era when our ancestors lived in small, mutually hostile tribes, competing with
one an- other for territory on the grasslands of Africa.
Looking towards the future, what can we predict? Detailed predictions are very diffi-
10.15. LOOKING TOWARDS THE FUTURE 417

cult, but it seems likely that information technology and biotechnology will for some time
continue to be the most rapidly-developing branches of science, and that these two fields
will merge. We can guess with reasonable certainty that much progress will be made in
understanding the mechanism of the brain, and in duplicating its functions artificially. Sci-
entists of the future will undoubtedly achieve greatly increased control over the process of
evolution. Thus it seems probable that the rapidity of scientific and technological change
will produce ethical dilemmas and social tensions even more acute than those which we
experience today. It is likely that the fate of our species (and the fate of the biosphere) will
be made precarious by the astonishing speed of scientific and technological change unless
this progress is matched by the achievement of far greater ethical and political maturity
than we have yet attained.
Science has proved to be double-edged - capable of great good, but also of great harm.
Information-driven human cultural evolution is a spectacular success - but can it become
stable? Terrestrial life can look back on almost four billion years of unbroken evolutionary
progress. Can we say with confidence that an equal period stretches ahead of us?

Can information-driven society achieve stability?

“We are living in a very special time”, Murray Gell-Mann1 remarked in a recent interview,
“Historians hate to hear this, because they have heard it so many times before, but we are
living in a very special time. One symptom of this is the fact that human population has
for a long time been increasing according to a hyperbolic curve - a constant divided by
2020 minus the year.”
The hyperbola has the form P = C/(2020 – y), P being the population, y, the year,
and C a constant. This form is at first surprising. One might have expected it to be an
exponential, if the rate of increase were proportional to the population already present. The
fact that the curve is instead a hyperbola can be understood in terms of the accumulation
of cultural information. New techniques (for example the initial invention of agriculture,
the importation of potatoes to Europe, or the introduction of high-yield wheat and rice
varieties) make population growth possible. In the absence of new techniques, population
is usually held in check by the painful Malthusian forces - famine, disease, and war.
Gell Mann’s curve shows an explosive growth of human population, driven by an equally
explosive growth of stored cultural information - especially agricultural and medical infor-
mation, and the information needed for opening new land to agriculture. As Gell-Mann
remarks, population cannot continue to increase in this way, because we are rapidly ap-
proaching the limits of the earth’s carrying capacity. Will human numbers overshoot these
limits and afterwards crash disastrously? There is certainly a danger that this will happen.
Besides the challenge of stabilizing global population, the information-driven human
society of the future will face another daunting task: Because of the enormously destructive
weapons that have already been produced through the misuse of science, and because of
1
Gell-Mann is an American physicist who was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1969 for his contributions to
the theory of elementary particles.
418 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

the even worse weapons that may be invented in the future, the long-term survival of
civilization can only be insured if society is able to eliminate the institution of war. This
task will be made more difficult by the fact that human nature seems to contain an element
of tribalism.
Humans tend to show great kindness towards close relatives and members of their
own group, and are even willing to sacrifice their lives in battle in defense of their own
family, tribe or nation. This tribal altruism is often accompanied by inter-tribal aggression
- great cruelty towards the “enemy”, i.e. towards members of a foreign group which is
perceived to be threatening ones own. The fact that human nature seems to contain
a genetically-programmed tendency towards tribalism is the reason why we find football
matches entertaining, and the reason why Arthur Koestler once remarked: “We can control
the movements of a space-craft orbiting about a distant planet, but we cannot control the
situation in Northern Ireland.”
How could evolutionary forces have acted to make the pattern of tribal altruism and
inter-tribal aggression a part of human nature? To put the same question differently, how
could our ancestors have increased the chances for survival of their own genes by dying
in battle? The statistician R.A. Fisher and the evolutionary biologist J.B.S. Haldane
considered this question in the 1920’s.2 Their solution was the concept of population
genetics, in which the genetically homogeneous group as a whole - now sometimes called
the “deme” - is taken to be the unit upon which evolutionary forces act.
Haldane and Fisher postulated that the small tribes in which our ancestors lived were
genetically homogeneous, since marriage within the tribe was more probable than marriage
outside it. This being the case, a patriotic individual who died for the tribe, killing many
members of a competing tribe in the process, increased the chance of survival for his or
her own genes, which were carried into the future by the surviving members of the hero’s
group. The tribe as a whole either lived or died; and those with the best “team spirit”
survived most frequently.
Because of the extraordinarily bitter and cruel conflicts between ethnic groups which
can be found in both ancient and modern history, it is necessary to take the ideas of Haldane
and Fischer seriously. This does not mean that the elimination of the institution of war is
impossible, but it means that the task will require the full resources and full cooperation of
the world’s educational systems, religions, and mass media. It will be necessary to educate
children throughout the world in such a way that they will think of humanity as a single
group - a large family to which all humans belong, and to which they owe their ultimate
loyalty.
In addition to educational reform, and reform of the images presented by the mass
media, the elimination of war will require the construction of a democratic, just, and
humane system of international governance, whose laws will act on individuals rather
than on states. The problems involved are very difficult, but they must be solved if the
information-driven society of the future is to achieve stability.
2
More recently the evolution of tribal altruism and inter-tribal aggression has also been discussed by
W.D. Hamilton and Richard Dawkins.
10.15. LOOKING TOWARDS THE FUTURE 419

Respect for natural evolution

The avalanche of new techniques in biotechnology and information technology will soon
give scientists so much power over evolution that evolutionary ethical problems will become
much more acute than they are today. It is already possible to produce chimeras, i.e.
transgenic animals and plants incorporating genetic information from two or more species.
Will we soon produce hybrids which are partly machines and partly living organisms? What
about artificial life? Will humans make themselves obsolete by allowing far more intelligent
beings to evolve in cyberspace, as Thomas Ray proposes? What about modification and
improvement of our own species? Is there a limit beyond which we ought not to go in
constructing new organisms to suit human purposes?
Perhaps one answer to these questions can be found by thinking of the way in which
evolution has operated to produce the biosphere. Driven by the flood of Gibbs free energy
which the earth receives from the sun, living organisms are generated and tested by life.
New generations are randomly modified by the genetic lottery, sometimes for the worse, and
sometimes for the better; and the instances of improvement are kept. It would be hard to
overestimate the value of this mechanism of design by random modification and empirical
testing, with the preservation of what works. The organisms which are living today are
all champions! They are distillations of vast quantities of experience, end products of four
billion years of solar energy income.
The beautiful and complex living organisms of our planet are exquisitely adapted to
survive, to live with each other, and to form harmonious ecological systems. Whatever
we do in biotechnology ought to be guided by caution and by profound respect for what
evolution has already achieved. We need a sense of evolutionary responsibility, and a
non-anthropocentric component in our system of ethics.

Construction versus destruction

It is often said that ethical principles cannot be derived from science - that they must
come from somewhere else. Nevertheless, when nature is viewed through the eyes of mod-
ern science, we obtain some insights which seem almost ethical in character. Biology at the
molecular level has shown us the complexity and beauty of even the most humble living
organisms, and the interrelatedness of all life on earth. Looking through the eyes of con-
temporary biochemistry, we can see that even the single cell of an amoeba is a structure
of miraculous complexity and precision, worthy of our respect and wonder.
Knowledge of the second law of thermodynamics - the statistical law favoring disorder
over order - reminds us that life is always balanced like a tight-rope walker over an abyss
of chaos and destruction. Living organisms distill their order and complexity from the
flood of thermodynamic information which reaches the earth from the sun. In this way,
they create local order; but life remains a fugitive from the second law of thermodynamics.
Disorder, chaos, and destruction remain statistically favored over order, construction, and
complexity.
It is easier to burn down a house than to build one, easier to kill a human than to raise
420 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

and educate one, easier to force a species into extinction than to replace it once it is gone,
easier to burn the Great Library of Alexandria than to accumulate the knowledge that
once filled it, and easier to destroy a civilization in a thermonuclear war than to rebuild
it from the radioactive ashes. Knowing this, scientists can form an almost ethical insight:
To be on the side of order, construction, and complexity, is to be on the side of life. To
be on the side of destruction, disorder, chaos and war is to be against life, a traitor to life,
an ally of death. Knowing the precariousness of life - knowing the statistical laws that
favor disorder and chaos, we should resolve to be loyal to the principle of long continued
construction upon which life depends.

What kind of future world do we want?

Our political and educational systems must reflect the kind of world that we want for the
future - and what kind of world do we want? We want a world where war is abolished as an
institution, and where the enormous resources now wasted on war are used constructively.
We want a world where a stable population of moderate size lives in comfort and security,
free from fear of hunger or unemployment. We want a world where peoples of all countries
have equal access to resources, and an equal quality of life. We want a world with a new
economic system, not designed to produce unlimited growth, but aiming instead at meeting
the real needs of the human community in equilibrium with the global environment. We
want a world of changed values, where extravagance and waste are regarded as morally
wrong; where kindness, wisdom and beauty are admired; and where the survival of other
species than our own is regarded as an end in itself, not just a means to our own ends.
In our reverence for the intricate beauty and majesty of nature, and our respect for
the dignity and rights of other humans, we can feel united with the great religious and
philosophical traditions of mankind, and with the traditional wisdom of our ancestors.
Pictures sent back by the astronauts show the earth as it really is - a small, fragile,
beautiful planet, drifting on through the dark immensity of space - our home, where we
must learn to live in harmony with nature and with each other.

10.16 Chaplin’s speech: Hope

At the end of his 1940 film, The Great Dictator, Charlie Chaplin suddenly abandons
satire and speaks to us directly with his own voice, his own idealism. In the film, the
speech is given by a small Jewish barber, who looks very much like the dictator, Adenoid
Henkel (Adolf Hitler). Mistaken for Henkel, the barber must address a huge expectant
crowd. Here is the speech:

Hynkel: I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an Emperor - that’s not my business. I don’t
want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone, if possible - Jew, gentile,
black man, white. We all want to help one another; human beings are like that. We want
to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and
10.16. CHAPLIN’S SPEECH: HOPE 421

despise one another. In this world there’s room for everyone and the good earth is rich and
can provide for everyone.
The way of life can be free and beautiful.
But we have lost the way.
Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped
us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed but we have shut ourselves in. Ma-
chinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical, our
cleverness hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery,
we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these
qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these
inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood for the
unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of
despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture
and imprison innocent people.
To those who can hear me I say, “Do not despair.” The misery that is now upon us is
but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The
hate of men will pass and dictators die; and the power they took from the people will return
to the people and so long as men die, liberty will never perish.
Soldiers: Don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you, enslave you, who regi-
ment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel; who drill you, diet you,
treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural
men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You
are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t
hate; only the unloved hate, the unloved and the unnatural.
Soldiers: Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of Saint
Luke it is written, “the kingdom of God is within man” - not one man, nor a group of
men, but in all men, in you, you the people have the power, the power to create machines,
the power to create happiness. You the people have the power to make this life free and
beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then, in the name of democracy, let us use that power! Let us all unite!! Let us fight
for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give you the
future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power,
but they lie! They do not fulfill their promise; they never will. Dictators free themselves,
but they enslave the people!! Now, let us fight to fulfill that promise!! Let us fight to free the
world, to do away with national barriers, to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance.
Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s
happiness.
Soldiers: In the name of democracy, let us all unite!!!

In Chaplin’s film, Hannah is the sweetheart of the Jewish barber, and she is listening
(as he hopes) to a radio broadcast of the speech. He continues his speech, talking to her:
422 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

Figure 10.13: Look up, Hannah!

Figure 10.14: Alone we can do so little; together, we can do so much!

Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up, Hannah. The clouds are lifting.
The sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are
coming into a new world, a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed
and brutality.
Look up, Hannah. The soul of man has been given wings, and at last he is beginning
to fly. He is flying into the rainbow – into the light of hope, into the future, the glorious
future that belongs to you, to me, and to all of us.
Look up, Hannah. Look up!
10.16. CHAPLIN’S SPEECH: HOPE 423

Figure 10.15: Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?

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428 ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE

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140. M. Gorbachev and D. Ikeda, Moral Lessons of the Twentieth Century, I.B. Tauris,
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142. S. du Boulay, Tutu: Voice of the Voiceless, Eerdmans, (1988).
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Index

A new economic system, 345, 353 Air travel, 270

A new Joan of Arc, 274 Alaska, 104, 219
A new society, 345 Albedo effect, 258, 265, 270, 352
Abolition of child labor, 356 Albert Szent Györgyi, 364
Abolition of slavery, 359 Alexander of Macedon, 12
Abolition of war, 154, 356, 359, 363 Alexander Pope, 9
Abraham Lincoln, 402 Alexandria, 163
Abrahamic religions, 13 Alfred Nobel, 391
Abrupt climate change, 270 Algebra, 20
Absolute monarchy, 29 Algeria, 257
Absolute sovereignty, 134 All men are created equal, 28
Absolutely sovereign nation-states, 303 Alliances, 142, 144
Abstraction of patterns, 88 Alsace, 142
Abstractions, 90 Alsace-Loraine, 149
Academie royale des Sciences, 32 Alt-right, 193
Academy, 10 Alt-right fight club, 205
Accelerated melting, 265 Alt-right supported Donald Trump, 194
Accelerating cultural evolution, 416 Alternative for Germany party, 218
Acceleration of cultural change, 104 Alternative media, 348
Accents, 106 Alternative Right webzine, 193
Acetylcholine, 77, 79, 87 Alternative ways of life, 28
Acidification of oceans, 261 Altruism, 35, 102
Acquisition of colonies, 154 Alzheimer’s disease, 79
Addictive drugs, 79 Amazon rainforest, 285
Adolf Hitler, 379 Amazon rainforest dieback, 270
Advertising, 329 Ambition, 145
African voting rights, 173 American Civil War, 153
Age of Discovery, 28 American fleet, 163
Age of Reason, 28, 30 American Nazi Party, 180
Aggression, 100, 102 American Revolution, 30
Aggressive interventions, 153 Amherst, Lord Jeffrey, 161
Agricultural revolution, 341, 417 Anachronism of nation-states, 133
Ahimsa, 330 Anarchy, 133
Aid to underdeveloped countries, 346 Anatomy, 12
Air pollution in China, 240 Ancestor worship, 106

430
INDEX 431

Ancien régime, 29 Assassination, 144

Anderson, Kevin, 299, 300 Assassination of King, 402
Andrew Anglin’s Daily Stormer, 193 Astronomy, 20
Anglo-Saxon master race, 172 Atlas Struggled, 177
Angola, 257 Atmospheric water vapor, 265
Anions, 88 Atom bomb, 101
Annie Sullivan, 393 Atomic bomb, 380
Annihilation of civilization, 377 Atomic reactions, 153
Antarctic sea ice loss, 270 ATP, 88
Anthropocene Extinction, 264 Atrocities, 100, 140, 162, 165
Anthropology, 29, 326 Attenborough, Sir David, 273, 303
Anti-Christian and anti-democratic, 207 Austria, 134, 144
Anti-communism, 180 Austria-Hungary, 142
Anti-gay demonstration in Russia, 180 Austro-Hungarian Emperor, 148
Anti-semitism, 180 Autocatalytic systems, 416
Anti-war activists, 353 Automated agriculture, 37
Antimitarism, 394 Avoidance of energy waste, 346
Apartheid system, 172 Axons, 76, 87, 88
Aquinas, St. Thomas, 12
Arab nationalism and Islam, 108 Baba Yar, 175
Arbitration and Peace Association, 392 Balance of power, 164
Archduke Francis Ferdinand, 144 Balkan Peninsula, 142
Arctic methane release, 270 Balzac, 42
Arctic permafrost, 300 Bangladesh, 236
Arctic sea ice loss, 265, 270 Bangladesh under water, 300
Arctic sea-ice, 352 Barbed wire, 145
Are we evil?, 272 Baron d’Holbach, 30
Aristotle, 10, 340 Baron Stern of Brentford, 248
Armaments race, 154 Battle of Leipzig, 138, 139
Armistice, 148 Bavaria, 150, 152
Arms manufacturers’ profits, 351 Beagle, 44
Arms race, 154 Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, 153
Arndt, Ernst Moritz, 137 Behaving like animals, 14
Arnold, Sir Edward, 329 Behavior, 69
Arrhenius, Svante, 270 Belgian Congo, 380
Art, 353 Belgian Queen Mother, 380
Art objects, 104 Belgium, 144, 149, 163
Arthur von Suttner, 391 Belloc, Hilaire, 163
Articles dominated by trivia, 304 Belt of Tar, 252
Artificial life, 419 Benevolence, 39
Artillery, 145 Benjamin Franklin, 32
Aryan-Hyperborean blood, 180 Bering Strait, 104
Asphalt melting, 250 Berkeley, California, 334
432 INDEX

Bertha von Suttner, 391 Bramacharya, 330

Besant, Annie, 329 Brazil’s economy, 254
Beyond Growth, 346 Brazil’s offshore oil, 254
Bhagavad Gita, 329 Brazil’s presalt oil, 258
Biased national standpoint, 357 Breach-loading rifles, 153
Bible, 13 Breastfeeding, 79
Big coal and oil corporations, 304 Breitbart News popularized alt-right, 194
Bilateral agreements, 257 Brexit and refugees, 218
Biodiversity, 298 Britain, 163
Biodiversity loss, 261 British colonial India, 165
Biological annihilation, 264 British Empire, 330
Biological diversity, 264 British imperialism, 172
Biological weapons, 161 British North Sea oil, 255
Biology, 12, 361 British public, 332
Biology of War and Peace, 105 British raj, 332
Biophysical capacity, 297 British warships, 163
Biosphere, 258 Brockendorff-Rantzau, Count Ulrich von, 149
Biosphere is being sacrificed, 292 Brutalization, 148
Biotechnology, 416, 419 Buchenwald, 175
Birth control, 219 Buddha, 19, 340
Birth rates, 355 Buddhism, 19, 333
Bismark, Otto von, 142, 143 Buddhists, 359
Bits, 71 Bulgaria bans fracking, 252
Black legion sign, 180 Bumble bees, 70
Black Lives Matter, 212 Burial customs, 106
Blackmail, 348 Business as usual, 258
Blavatsky, Madame, 329 Bypassing the need for grids, 244
Blood for oil, 257
Bloodbath at Cajamarca, 162 Calculus, 32
Boer War, 164 Caleb Williams, 41
Bolsonaro, Jair, 285 Cambodian genocide, 344
Bolton, John, 208 Canadian Arctic, 219
Bombardments, 163 Canadian government, 252
Bombs, 208 Canadian oil sands, 251
Bonding, 79 Canons, use in warfare, 133
Booker T. Washington, 400 Canticle of the Sun, 382
Books, 133 Canton, 163
Boreal forest dieback, 270 Carbon bubble, 235
Bottom line, 351 Carbon budget, 235, 274, 305
Bottomless pit of war, 154 Carbon footprint, 274
Boycott protesting segregation, 400 Carbon Tracker Initiative, 235
Boycotting British goods, 376 Carbon-negative world, 299
Brahmagupta, 20 Caring for our children, 345
INDEX 433

Caste markings, 106 Christian elements of national cult, 139

Castles, 133 Christian ethical principles, 333
Catastrophic climate change, 235, 250, 256, Christian ethics, 382
258, 270, 284, 296, 345, 346, 352, 353 Christian nationalism, 207
Catastrophic future famine, 356 Christian peoples, 358
Catholic Church, 200 Christianity, 163, 400
Cave-man’s brain, 15, 109 Chronic war, 364
Ceballos, Gerardo, 264 Circumcision, 106
Cell differentiation, 76 Civil disobedience, 323, 332
Cell membrane, 76 Civil rights, 330, 359, 374
Cell society, 76 Civil rights movement, 400, 403
Celtic cross, 180 Civilization, 344
Central banks, 173 Civilization and Christianity, 166
Central government, 134 Civilization coming to an end, 301
Central monarchs, 133 Clark, General Wesley, 177
Central nervous system, 78 Classical Philology, 173
Centralization, 330 Clay tablets, 340
Ceremonies, 106 Clean energy, 302
Chadors, 106 Clemenceau, Georges, 148
Chain of causes, 39 Climate change, 153, 258
Change is coming, 292 Climate change denial, 208
Change the system, 292 Climate change emission pledges, 261
Changes of diet, 219 Climate crisis, 274, 277, 301
Chaos and war, 362 Climate emergency, 258, 284, 295, 302
Charles Darwin, 35 Climate financing, 262
Charles Dickens, 42 Climate justice, 272
Charlottesville rally, August 2017, 194 Climate Justice Now, 292
Chastity, 330 Climate tipping points, 270
Chatelet, Madame du, 30 Climate-driven refugees, 285
Chernobyl, 154 Coal per capita, 256
Childbirth, 79 Coal produced in Germany, 254
Chimeras, 419 Coal produced in Poland, 254
China, 163 Coal producers, 256
China’s coal, 258 Coal production in India, 250
China’s use of coal, 248 Coal reserves in China, 248
China, air pollution, 240 Cocoons, 70
China, rapid industrial expansion, 248 Cognitive functions, 79
Chinese public opinion, 240 Cohesion, 140
Cholula Massacre, 162 Cold War, 164
Chomsky hierarchy, 65 Collapse of our civilization, 273, 303
Chomsky, Noam, 65, 208 Collective greed, 351
Choshu, 163 Collectivism, 177
Christian and pagan symbolism, 138 Colombia, 257
434 INDEX

Colonial expansion, 163 Cooperative society, 357

Colonial Roots of Nazism, 172 COP24, 290, 302
Colonial system, 331, 376 Corbyn, Jeremy, 295
Colonialism, 162, 164, 165 Corporate greed, 350
Comb-making instinct, 70 Corporate profits, 351
Come with a plan, 284 Corrupt government, 257
Commercial middle class, 29 Cortez, Hernan, 162
Committee for Public Safety, 34 Cosmic forces, 365
Common future, 153 Cost of war, 148
Common good, 385 Cotton, 20
Common sense, 29 Cotton cloth, 162
Communal aggression, 100 Council on Foreign Relations, 173
Communal defense response, 100, 101 Count Leo Tolstoy, 373
Communication, 133 Counter-culture, 323, 334
Communication between cells, 76 Coup in Venezuela, 252
Communist government of Russia, 148 Courage, 101
Communist revolution, 148 Court of world opinion, 374, 400
Compassion, 109 Court-marshalled and shot, 145
Competition, 105, 163 Creating jobs, 247
Complexity, 361, 362, 419 Cretaceous-Paleogene Extinction, 262
Compromise, 329 Crime, 39
Compulsory military service, 377 Crime against human civilization, 208
Computer science, 65 Crimes, wars and murders, 28
Concerns are justified, 281 Crippled for life, 148
Condorcet, Marquis de, 32, 36 Crisis, 108
Conformational change, 76 Crisis of civilization, 363
Confucius, 15, 340 Cropland per capita decreasing, 354
Congo, 165 Cruelty by children, 106
Congress Party, 330, 375 Crusades, 108, 163, 344
Conquistadors, 162 Cuban Missile Crisis, 134
Consent of the governed, 28, 30 Cult of nationalism, 139
Conspicuous consumption, 326, 328, 375 Cultural activities, 360
Constraints on languages, 65 Cultural barriers to marriage, 105
Construction, 362 Cultural evolution, 104, 416
Construction versus destruction, 361, 419 Cultural history, 358
Consumerism, 334 Cultural inertia, 304
Consumption, 328, 375 Culture, 70
Contemporary biochemistry, 361 Culture and education, 360, 361
Continued extraction of fossil fuels, 248 Culture and human solidarity, 360
Convention of 1792, 134 Current annual emissions, 250
Convergent evolution, 90 Cyberspace, 419
Conversations with our families, 353 Cyclic AMP, 76
Cooperation, 102, 341 Czar Alexander III, 143
INDEX 435

Czech Republic bans fracking, 252 Diction, 106

Diderot, Denis, 30
Dale, Henry, 77, 87 Diet, 106
Dances and songs, 106 Dietary changes, 219
Danish wind industry, 246 Diminishing resources, 375
Danton, 134 Dirty wars, 348
Darfur, 344 Dirzo, Rudolfo, 264
Dark side of government, 348 Disease, 35, 330, 417
Darkened snow, 265 Disorder, 419
Darwin’s finches, 46 DNA sequences, 341
Darwin, Charles, 12, 35, 43, 69, 97, 108 Domestication, 50
Darwin, Erasmus, 42 Dominance and mating rights, 80
David Pimental, 354 Donald Trump, 212
Davos Economic Forum, 274 Dopamine, 77, 79, 87
Dawkins, Richard, 418 Double-think totalitarian state, 297
Death-machine, 144 Drought, 261
Decimal system, 20 Drying of forests and fires, 269
Declaration of Human Rights, 348, 364 Duty to humanity, 40
Declaration of Independence, 28, 30 Dysentery, 355
Declaration of war, 144
Decrease in population, 346 Earth Policy Institute, 239, 352, 353
Deepwater Horizon, 254 Earthquakes, 252
Deforestation, 354 Ecological breakdown, 301
Degradation of agricultural land, 354 Ecological catastrophe, 80, 373
Demes, 418 Ecological conscience, 304, 353, 385
Democratic Party, 149 Ecological constraints, 346
Demographic transition, 356 Ecological counter-culture, 388
Demographic trap, 355 Ecological footprint, 297
Demonstrations, 332 Ecological niche, 50
Denazification, 180 Ecology, 419
Dendrites, 76, 87 Economic chaos, 150
Departments of Defense, 350 Economic Consequences of the Peace, 149
Depolarization, 88 Economic growth, 323, 334, 345
Destruction of forests, 236 Economic inequality, 35
Destruction of habitats, 264 Economic interdependence, 133
Destruction of information, 90 Economic tipping point, 244
Deteriorating living standards, 194 Economics, 29
Developing countries, 244, 257, 354 Economics of Climate Change, 248
Developing world, 261 Economy of Brazil, 254
Devil’s Dynamo, 154 Economy of exclusion, 349
Devotion, 101, 102 Ecosystem functioning, 264
Dialects, 106, 138 Ecstasy, 101
Dictatorships, 257 Edgar Allen Poe, 42
436 INDEX

Edmond Burke, 40 Enormous spending on arms, 154

Education, 30, 39, 344, 345 Enrico Fermi, 380
Education of women, 356 Entertaining ourselves to death, 304
Educational activities, 360 Entropic process, 346
Educational reforms, 357 Environment, 39
Edward Snowden, 348 Environmental component of learning, 72
Effector part, 76, 87 Environmental threats, 109
Ehrlich, Paul R., 264 Environmentalists, 353
Eibl-Eibesfeldt, Irenäus, 105, 108 Envy, 37
Einstein, Albert, 58 Equality, 30
Elderly homeless persons, 349 Equality under law, 164
Electric cars, 245 Equity, 272
Electric vehicles, 246 Ergot fungus, 77, 87
Electronic communication, 416 Escalation, 153, 358
Electronic spying, 348 Escalation of conflicts, 333, 373
Eliminating democracy, 348 Esquisse, 32, 35
Elitist goal, 173 Essay on Man, 9
Ellery Channing, 388 Estrogen, 76
Elon Musk, 246 Ethical maturity, 416
Embryology, 51 Ethical principles, 108
Emergency, 295 Ethics, 37, 109
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 323 Ethics for the future, 385
Emissions have to stop, 271 Ethics, non-anthropocentric, 419
Emotions, 69, 97, 133, 134, 142 Ethnic boundaries, 359
Emperor Napoleon III, 142 Ethnic differences, 374
Emperor’s Battle, 148 Ethnicity, 105
Encyclical of Pope Francis, 385 Ethnicity and religion, 108
Encyclopedia, 30 Ethology, 51, 69, 70, 97
Endless conflicts, 154 Eugenics movement, 172
Endless threats to peace, 154 Europe, 164, 236
Endorphins, 79 Europe’s right-wing parties, 218
Ends and means, 333, 373 European colonial conquests, 108
Enemies, 333 European dependence on natural gas, 251
Enemy images, 358 European diseases, 162, 163
Energy, 262 European Parliament, 282
Energy demand, global, 239 European rule, 163
Energy efficiency, 236 European Union, 357
Energy use per capita, 239 Evabgelii Gaudium, 349
England, 28, 143, 144, 154, 329, 330, 333 Evangelicals, 207
Enlarged brain, 416 Everyday experience, 344
Enlarging the political unit, 357 Evo Morales, 348
Enlightenment, 28, 30, 134 Evolution, 12, 35, 36, 45, 344
Enormous military budgets, 362 Evolutionary responsibility, 419
INDEX 437

Exceptionalism, 165, 166 Feudal barons, 133

Excessive economic inequality, 348 Feudal landowning class, 144
Exchange of ideas, 341 Feudal principalities, 134
Exhaustion of petroleum, 346 Fichte, Johan Gottlieb, 136
Existential risk, 296 Fichtians, 142
Existential risk to civilization, 299 Filed teeth, 106
Experimental science, 29 Finite earth, 345
Exploding population, 355 Finite supply of fossil fuels, 236
Exploding populations, 15, 109 Fire, 140
Exploitation, 165, 166, 331, 376 Firearm and Confederate T-shirt, 194
Explosives, 144 Fires ignited by lightning, 236
Exponential growth, 239, 305, 353 Firestorms, 154
Exponential industrial growth, 345 Firmness in the truth, 375
Expression of emotion by babies, 70 First World War, 148
Expression of emotions, 69, 70, 97 Fisher, R.A., 102, 418
Extinction of marine species, 263 Flags, 101, 139
Extinction of terrestrial vertebrates, 263 Flash grenades, 212
Extinction Rebellion, 295 Floods, 261
Extravagant gadgetry, 346 Florida under water, 300
Extreme heatwaves, 300 Floyd, George, 212
Extreme-weather events, 299 Focus on what needs to be done, 290
Folly, 345
Fabian Society, 329 Food security, 153
Fabians, 164 For the Common Good, 346
Facial expressions, 70 Force of truth, 333
Factory civilization, 332, 376 Foreign domination, 376
Failure of epic proportions, 297 Forest destruction, 236
Failure to respond adequately, 303 Forest die-back, 300
Fake news, 298 Forest fires, 269
Family of man, 360, 365 Forgiveness, 333
Family planning, 219 Formal languages, 65
Famine, 417 Fosen project, 247
Fanaticism, 101, 135, 142 Fossil fuel corporations, 244
Far-right neo-fascist organization, 205 Fossil fuel extraction must stop, 273, 303
Fashion, 346 Fossil fuel industry, 252
Fatherland, 137, 139 Fossil fuel producers, 255
Favelas, 355 Fossil fuels, 235, 303, 305, 346, 352, 360
Fear and conformity, 348 Fossil fuels, continued extraction, 248
Feedback loop, definition, 265 Fossil fuels, rate of use, 239
Feedback loops, 236, 258, 300, 352, 359 Fourteen Points, 148
Ferocity, 328 Fourth Amendment, 348
Fertility of mixed marriages, 105 Fourth Reich, 180
Festivals, 138, 139 Fracking, 252
438 INDEX

Fracking banned by 9 countries, 252 General good, 37

Framework Convention, 261 General Rosas’ genocide, 161
France, 134, 142, 144, 149, 163 Generative grammar theory, 65
France bans fracking, 252 Genes, 102
France bans internal combustion engine, 245 Genetic change, 104, 416
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 380 Genetic engineering, 416
Fraud, 37 Genetic predisposition, 72
Frederick the Great, 134, 137 Genetically programmed responses, 72
Free market not sacred, 376 Genius for cooperation, 344
Free speech movement, 334 Genocide, 80, 108, 165, 175, 344
Freedom Party (Austria), 218 Genocide against Jews, 108
French coal mines, 148 Genocide of Amerinds, 165
French culture, 134, 137 Genocides, 174
French fascist groups, 180 Genocides in the Americas, 161
French Revolution, 30, 34, 134, 135 Geology, 44
Freud, Sigmund, 55 George Floyd murder, 212
Fridays for the Future, 277 George Orwell, 348
Friendly hands, 341 German Fatherland, 137
Friendship, 330 German Kaiser, 148
Frisch, Karl von, 70, 71, 97 German language, 137
Fuel cells, 244 German May, 139
Fukushima, 154 German nationalism, 108, 136
Full employment, 360 German nationalist movement, 135, 138, 142
Fully electric cars, 245 German nationalists, 139
Future dangers, 258 German production of coal, 254
Future generations, 282, 345 German-speaking students, 134
Future human needs, 297 Germany, 134, 149, 154, 163
Future of human civilization, 258 Germany bans fracking, 252
Germany bans internal combustion engine,
GABA, 78 245
Galapagos Islands, 46 Germany’s African empire, 172
Gama-amino buteric acid, 77, 87 Germany’s wars, 138
Game for power and money, 350 Giant squid axon, 88
Gandhi, 373, 388, 400, 401 Gibbs free energy, 88, 419
Gandhi, Mahatma, 330, 332, 333, 358 Gift of life, 345
Gandhi, Mohandas, 323, 329 Gigawatts (GW), 238
Gandhian economics, 375 Glaciation, 264
Ganglions, 88 Global catastrophic risk, 301
Garden of Eden, 13 Global Challenges Foundation, 300, 301
Gas production, 256 Global climate strike, 277
Gautama Buddha, 19 Global commons, 353
Gebrial, Dalia, 172 Global disaster, 153
Gell-Mann, Murray, 417 Global ethic, 122
INDEX 439

Global exchanges, 341 Gymnasts, 139

Global famine, 345
Global inequalities, 281 Habeus Corpus, 348
Global production of coal, 256 Hair standing on end, 100
Global temperature, 258 Haldane, J.B.S., 102, 418
Global war, 148 Half of Congo’s people killed, 165
Global warming, 261, 281 Halfdan Mahler, 354
Globalization, 133 Hals, Franz, 28
Glorious Revolution of 1688, 29 Halt extraction of fossil fuels, 273, 303
Glory, 136, 144 Halving CO2 by 2030, 281
Glutamate, 77, 78, 87 Hambrach Castle, 139
Glycine, 78 Hamilton, W.D., 102, 418
Godwin, William, 32, 37 Hanging, 37
Golden Dawn in Greece, 180 Hansen, James, 252, 299
Golden Dawn party (Greece), 218 Hapsburg Emperors, 142
Goodman, Amy, 295 Harmony with nature, 323, 388
Government birth control programs, 355 Harvard University, 388
Governmental secrecy, 348 Hate, 333
Gratitude, 40 Hatred, 148
Great famine of 1876-1878, 165 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 323
Great Library of Alexandria, 362 Health, 262
Greed, 161, 165, 345, 350, 375 Heat deaths in India, 250
Greed and folly, 109 Heat waves, 261
Greed-driven destruction of nature, 385 Heat waves in Sweden, 292
Greenhouse effect, 265 Heather Heyer murdered, 194
Greenhouse gas emissions, 219 Hegel, G.W.F., 140
Greening of America, 334 Heiliger Schauer, 101
Greenland, 219 Heine, Heinrich, 140
Greenland ice cores, 270 Helen Keller, 393
Greta Thunberg’s TED talk, 270 Henry David Thoreau, 388, 400
Grey, Sir Edward, 144 Henslow, John S., 43
Griffin, G. Edward, 173 Hepatitis, 355
Griffith, D,W,, 200 Hereditary component of learning, 72
Group selection, 102 Hereditary transmission of power, 35
Growth, 323, 388 Herman E. Daly, 346
Growth implies future collapse, 304 Hermann’s Battle, 140
Growth of culture, 346 Hero face, 100
Growth of knowledge, 346 Heroic behavior, 102
Growth of population and industry, 304 Heroism, 100
Guardian, 295 Herring gulls, 71
Guatemalan genocide, 162 Heterogeneous populations, 154
Gulf Wars, 134 High-entropy waste, 346
Guterres, Antonio, 273, 284, 285, 303 Higher loyalty, 122, 341
440 INDEX

Higher status for women, 356 Human rights, 33

Hindu and Muslim communities, 374 Humane response to refugees, 219
Hinduism, 19, 329 Humans cause global warming, 261
Hiroshima, 102, 344 Humboldt, Alexander von, 43
History, 106 Humility, 330
History of Racism, 165 Hungarian Skins, 180
Hitler Youth, 101 Hunger, 39
Hitler’s rise to power, 379 Hunter-gatherers, 104, 133
Hitler, Adolf, 150–152, 180, 194, 219 Hurricanes more severe, 298
Hitler-Trump parallels, 219 Hutton, James, 44
Hobson, John Atkinson, 164 Huxley, Andrew, 88
Hodgkin, Alan, 88 Huxley, Thomas Henry, 88
Holland, 28 Hybrid cars, 245
Holocaust, 175, 344 Hydrogen technology, 244
Holocaust denial, 180 Hydrological cycle, 154
Holocaust Museum in Huston, 162 Hyper-capitalist society, 177
Holocene Extinction, 264 Hyperbolic curve, 417
Holy festivals, 138
Holy shiver, 100 I can’t breath, 213
Holy war, 138 Idealism, 10
Homeostasis, 76 Ignorance, 35, 37, 39
Homespun cotton, 330 Illegality of war, 164
Hominids, 416 Image-forming eye, 90
Honey-bees, 70 Imagine what we could do together, 273
Hooke, Robert, 28 Immediate action required, 273, 303
Hooker, Sir Joseph, 49 Imperialism, 163, 164, 172, 350
Hoover, Herbert, 149 Imperialism: A Study, 164
Hormones, 76 Imprinting, 100
Hospitality, 106, 359 Inaction not an option, 345
House of Commons, 29, 295 Inborn knowledge, 65
House of Representatives, 149 India, 134, 329–333
Hubel, David H., 90 India’s coal, 258
Human baby versus kitten, 65 India’s Energy Crisis, 250
Human civilization, 153 India’s Prime Minister Modi, 250
Human culture, 358 Indian flag, 331
Human emotional nature, 379 Indian home rule, 330, 333, 375
Human emotions, 70, 80 Indian independence movement, 376
Human emotions, a paradox, 109 Indian Minister of Power, 250
Human folly, 345 Indian monsoon disruption, 270
Human hands as currency, 165 Indian textile industry, 162
Human nature, 9, 70, 108, 329, 344, 360 Indigenous peoples, 161
Human perfectibility, 34 Individual conscience, 388
Human progress, 35 Individual Judgement, 39
INDEX 441

Individual, value of, 136, 137 Intermittency, problem of, 244

Individualism, 137, 177 Internal combustion engine ban, 245
Indoctrination in chauvinism, 358 Internal peace within nations, 356
Indonesia, 257 International agreements, 262
Inductive reasoning, 65 International anarchy, 364
Industrial infrastructure, 303 International Criminal Court, 364
Industrial powers, 163 International law, 164, 257
Industrial Revolution, 154, 162, 164, 254 International understanding, 358
Industrial revolution, 143 Internationalism, 360
Industrialization, 330 Internuncial part, 76, 87, 88
Industrialized countries, 257 Intertribal aggression, 102
Industrialized nations, 163, 354 Intertribal massacres, 108
Industriousness, 29 Intragroup aggression, 100
Inequality, 348, 349 Inundation of coastal cities, 261
Inequality between men and women, 35 Invasion of Belgium, 144
Infectious disease, 363 Invention of agriculture, 417
Infinite desire for goods, 334 Invention of printing, 340
Inflation, 151 Investment in solar energy, 247
Information accumulation, 104, 416 Investment opportunity, 245
Information technology, 419 Ion pump, 88
Information transfer, 341, 416 IPCC, 261, 281, 298, 301, 302
Information-driven society, 416, 418 IPCC report from Inchon, 2018, 284
Infrastructure failures, 355 Iran, 257
Inhibitory neurotransmitter, 79 Iraq, 257
Inhibitory neurotransmitters, 77, 87 Irreversible adverse climate change, 299
Injustice, 330 Irreversible biodiversity loss, 261
Injustice, economic, 133 Isaiah 45 = 45th President, 207
Innate linguistic capacity, 65 Israel, 153
Inspector General of the Mint, 33 Italian neo-fascists, 180
Installed photovoltaic capacity, 353 Italy, 142, 149, 163
Instinctive behavior, 69 Ituri Provence of Congo, 108
Instincts, 51, 69, 97 IUCN, 264
Institutional inertia, 303
Institutionalized injustice, 364 James Hansen, 252
Insulin, 76 James Russell Lowell, 390
Insurrection of peoples, 134 Japan, 163, 164
Intellectual improvement, 37 Jesus, 340
Intense flooding, 298 Jewelry, 340
Inter-tribal aggression, 418 Jewish plot for white genocide, 193
Interdependence, 134, 341 Jobbic party (Hungary), 218
Intermarriage, 359 Jobs from renewables, 247
Intermittency, Denmark and Germany, 244 John Atkins Hobson, 350
Intermittency, Denmark and Norway, 244 John Locke, 28
442 INDEX

Justice, 34 Lao-Tzu, 340

Lapps, 104
Kahr, Dr. Gustav von, 151 Large countries, 154
Kaiser Wilhelm, 153 Late Devonian Extinction, 262
Kaiser Wilhelm I, 142 Latin, 137
Kaiser Wilhelm II, 142, 144 Laudato Si’, 352
Kaiser’s genocide, 172 Laws binding on individuals, 356
Kantians, 142 Lay Down Your Arms, 392
Kapp Putsch, 150 League of Nations, 149
Karma, 333, 359 Learning, 72, 79
Keep that oil in the ground, 273, 274, 303 Lebanese civil war, 108
Keynes, John Maynard, 149 Leeuwenhoek, Anton van, 28
Kiel Canal, 149 Legislative Assembly, 34
Killing always sinful, 359 Leisure, 346
Kilowatts (KW), 238 Leisure class, 326
Kindness, 102 Lenton, Timothy Michael, 270
King Louis XVI, 29 Leo Szilard, 380
King, Martin Luther, 323 Leonhard Euler, 32
KKK classified as a hate group, 200 Leopold II, King of Belgium, 165
KKK cross-burning, 200 Leopold’s private army, 165
KKK responsible for many lynchings, 200 Liberalism, 137, 330
Kleist, 140 Libya, 257
Klu Klux Klan, 200 Lifestyles, 236
Knowledge, 37 Light of the black sun, 180
Known resources, 235 Light-receptor cells, 88
Koestler, Arthur, 101, 418 Limited problems, 341
Korean Peninsula, 153 Limited war, 138
Korean War, 134 Limiting global warming to 1.5o C, 284
Kosovo, 108 Limits for adaption, 301
Krupp industries, 154 Limits to Growth, 304
Kuffler, Steven W., 88 Line in the sand, 284
Kurdish civilians gassed, 108 Linguistic groups, 35
Kuwait, 257 Linguistics, 65
Linnaeus, Carolus, 42
Labor-intensive methods, 376 Linnean Society, 50
Labour rights, 394 Literature, 106, 353
Lack of action, 261 Lithium ion storage batteries, 246
Lamarck, J.B. de, 42 Lithium ion storage cells, 244
Land of the Spotted Eagle, 24 Living organisms, 345
Language, 72, 137, 416 Living standards, 258
Language acquisition device, 65 Local communities, 106
Language and ethnic identity, 106 Local order, 362
Language aquisition, 65 Locke, John, 28–30
INDEX 443

Loewi, Otto, 77, 87 Malthusian forces, 417

Logic, 12 Mammalian eye, 88
Long human childhood, 35 Man is born free, 28
Long-distance trading, 340 Man-made disaster, 273, 303
Look for action. Then hope will come, 305Manchester Guardian, 164
Looming financial instability, 298 Manipulating public opinion, 348
Loot, 140 Mann, Michael E., 299
Lorenz, Konrad, 70, 97, 100, 102, 105 Manufactured goods, 143, 164
Lorraine, 142 March in Poland, 180
Louis XVI, 34 Marching down Pennsylvania Avenue, 200
Love, 333 Marie and Pierre Curie, 379
Love for the poor, 375 Market mechanisms, 332
Love your enemies, 358, 403 Markets, 163, 164
Low-carbon economy, 273, 303 Marriage, 102
Low-entropy resources, 346 Marriage across boundaries, 359
Lowell, James Russell, 324 Marriage across ethnic boundaries, 108
Lowlifes and losers, 212 Marseillaise-singing masses, 135
Loyalty, 40, 101, 102, 133 Martin Luther King, 373, 388, 400
Ludendorff, General, 148, 150, 152 Mass media, 271, 304, 344, 345, 348, 358
Luther Standing Bear, 24 Mass meeting, 139
Luxembourg bans fracking, 252 Massacres, 108
Luxuries, 37, 324, 389 Masses, 136
Luxuries of the few, 292 Massive non-linear events, 300
Lyceum, 12 Massive retaliation, 358
Lyell’s hypothesis, 44 Master Morality, 173
Lyell, Sir Charles, 44, 47 Material goods, 334, 353, 376
Material possessions, 37
Müller, Adam, 136 Material want, 37
Machine gun, 144, 145, 163 Mathematics, 10, 19
Machinery, 332 Maxim gun, 163
Machines, 331 Maxim machine gun, 153
Madame Vernet, 35 Maxim, Hiram S., 163
Magna Carta, 348 Maximizing human happiness, 376
Mahatma Gandhi, 323, 329, 331, 373, 375, Maximizing production, 376
400 Maylasia, 340
Major coal producers, 256 McInnes, Gavin, 205
Major extinction event, 264 Means, 333
Major fossil fuel producers, 255 Mechanism of the brain, 416
Major oil producers, 255 Medicine, 19
Malice, 37 Megalomania, 142
Malnutrition, 261 Megawatts (MW), 238
Malthus, 49 Mein Kampf, 152
Malthus, Daniel, 32 Melted asphalt, 250
444 INDEX

Melting of polar icecaps, 300 Modern weapons, 162

Membrane permeability, 88 Monarchists, 151
Membrane-bound proteins, 76 Monbiot, George, 295
Memory, 79 Money and growth our main concerns, 274
Men’s choirs, 139 Money driving decisions, 252
Mercenary soldiers, 136 Monsoon disruption, 270
Merchants, 133 Montesquieu, 30
Merkel, Angela, 218 Mood, 79
Mesopotamia, 340 Moral force, 374
Metallurgy, 20 Moral improvement, 37
Metals, 360 Moral responsibility, 274
Methane hydrate feedback loop, 258, 263, Morality, 35, 136
268, 270, 352 More than hope, we need action, 273
Methane, 10,000 gigatons, 268 Morphology, 69
Mexican War, 388 Moses, 340
Mexico, 257 Most dangerous organization in history, 208
Microscope, 28 Mother love, 80
Middle East, 134, 142, 248 Multicellular organisms, 76, 416
Migration, political reactions, 218 Munich, 151
Migrations, 104 Murder, 140, 165
Militant enthusiasm, 100, 101 Murder of black people, 175
Militarism, 360, 377, 394 Murder of ethnic Poles, 175
Militarization of governments, 257 Murder of Soviet citizens, 175
Military budgets, 351 Murder permitted in war, 359
Military figures, 154 Music, 353
Military preparedness, 154 Musk, Elon, 246
Military strength, 164 My Indian Boyhood, 24
Military use of oil, 257 My People, the Soux, 24
Military world dominance, 177 Myopic national self-interest, 297
Military-industrial complex, 154 Myth, 138
Mines, 164
Minimalist program, 65 N. Georgescu-Roegen, 346
Minimum government, 40 Nagasaki, 102
Miracle Worker, 394 Naomi Klein, 353
MIT Technology Review, 250 Napoleon, 140
Mitigation, 262 Napoleon Bonaparte, 134, 138, 142
Mobilization, 144 Narrow and shrinking window, 302
Modern communications media, 357 Nathaniel Hothorne, 388
Modern feudalist society, 173 Nation-state, 134, 136
Modern machines, 376 Nation-states, 133
Modern science, 341 National Academy of Sciences, 264
Modern society, 341 National Convention, 34
Modern warfare and oil, 257 National cult, 139
INDEX 445

National Front party, 218 Netherlands bans petrol driven cars, 246
National identity, 134, 137, 140 Neuborne, Burt, 219
National Socialist German Workers Party, Neurons, 76, 87
150 Neurotransmitter molecules, 77, 87
National symbolism, 139 Neurotransmitters, 78
Nationalism, 101, 133, 134, 136, 138, 140, New clothes, 324
148, 360 New era of happiness, 30
Nationalism a dangerous anachronism, 303 New ethics, 363
Nationalism an anachronism, 152 New French Constitution, 34
Nationalism and religion, 108 New Joan of Arc, 274
Nationalism in England, 140 New Philosophy, 41
Nationalists, 151 New social contract, 345
Native Americans, 163 New world of law, 364
Natural gas, 346 Newspapers, 133
Natural gas production, 256 Newton’s solar system, 39
Natural habitat destruction, 264 Newton, Isaac, 29, 30
Natural laws, 39 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 173
Natural resources, 262
No one ever talked about it, 271
Natural selection, 49, 102
No rightful duty to submit, 28
Naval arms race, 163
Noam Chomsky, 65, 351
Naval bombardments, 163
Nobel Peace Prize, 393, 401
Naval power, 143
Nobel Prize in Literature, 59
Navigant Research, 247
Noble dead, 138
Nazi and neo.Nazi symbols, 205
Non-renewable resources, 346, 360
Nazi atrocities, 174
Non-violence, 330, 332, 333, 359, 375
Nazi genocides, 174
Nazi ideology revived, 180 Non-violent protest, 330, 332
Nazi murder of homosexuals, 175 Nonviolent civil disobedience, 388, 400
Nazi Party, 108, 139, 150–152, 172 Noradrenalin, 77, 87
Nazi salute, 194 Norepinephrine, 77, 87
Nazi symbols, 180 North America, 163, 236
Nazism, 172 North Sea oil, 255
Nehru, 401 Northern Ireland bans fracking, 252
Nelson, 140 Norway bans petrol driven cars, 246
Nelson Mandela, 373 Norwegian North Sea oil, 255
Neo-Nazi demonstration in Leipzig, 180 Nuclear arms race, 401
Neo-Nazi skinheads in Spain, 180 Nuclear catastrophe, 373
Neo-Nazi symbols in Ukraine, 180 Nuclear threats, 350
Neo-Nazism, 180 Nuclear war, 154
Neocolonialism, 165 Nuclear war is possible, 300
Neoliberal philosophy, 177 Nuclear weapons, 363, 379, 381
Nervous systems, 76, 87 Nuremberg Principles, 153, 323, 388
Netanyahu, Benjamin, 153 Nuremberg trials, 180
446 INDEX

Oak leaves, 138, 139 Party for Freedom, 218

Observation, 28 Patagonia, 219
Octopus brain, 90 Patriotism, 101, 140
Octopus eye, 90 Pattern abstraction, 90
Off-center arrays, 88 Peace and cooperation, 153
Oil producers, 255 Peace movement, 391
Oil reserves in OPEC countries, 248 Peace without victory, 148
Oil sands in Canada, 251 Pembroke Lodge, 65
Oligarchy, 348 Penal system, 37
Omnicide, 80 People without electricity, 243
On-center arrays, 88 People’s Party-Our Slovakia, 218
OPEC countries, 248 Per capita energy use, 236
Oppression, 37 Perfectibility, 35
Ordine Nuovo, 180 Perfectibility of society, 30
Ordovician-Silurian Extinction, 262 Perkins Institute for the Blind, 393
Organic agriculture, 346 Permafrost melting, 270
Orgy of external cruelty, 166 Permian extinction, 261, 352
Origin of Species, 47 Permian-Triassic Extinction, 258, 262
Original sin, 14 Perpetual growth, 375
Orinoco River, 252 Perpetual wars, 348
Orwell, George, 297 Personal merit, 375
Otto Hahn, 380 Peru, 162
Our house is on fire, 274 Petrobras, 254
Our leaders are behaving like children, 274, Petroleum production in Russia, 251
303 Philanthropy, 37
Overconsumption, 80 Phillipines, 340
Overcrowded cities, 355 Philosophes, 30
Overpopulation, 363 Phoenix Farm, 330, 375
Oxytocin, 79 Photovoltaics, rate of growth, 239
Ozone layer, 154 Pictographic writing, 340
Pieter de Hooch, 28
Pace of change, 301 Pizarro, Francisco, 162
Pack leader, 72 Planetary boundaries, 298
Pagan festivals, 138 Plantations, 164
Pagan tradition, 138 Plato, 10, 340
Pakistan, 134 Pledges remain unmet, 261
Pan-Serbia, 142 Poetry, 106
Pan-Slavic movement, 144 Poison gas, 108, 145
Paranoia, 142 Poisoning of water supplies, 252
Paranoid times, 208 Policymakers’ magical thinking, 298
Paris Agreement, 272, 281, 296, 299, 302 Policymaking cognitatively dissonant, 297
Parliamentary democracy, 333 Polish production of coal, 254
Partha Dasgupta, 356 Polite conversation, 304
INDEX 447

Political action, 136 Predatory culture, 328

Political cohesion, 133 Prehistoric trading, 340
Political expediency, 297 Preindustrial societies, 388
Political institutions, 134 Presalt oil, 254
Political Justice, 32, 37, 41 Priests, 139
Political liberty and equality, 30 Primary energy, 236
Political maturity, 416 Primary linguistic data, 65
Political philosophy, 29 Primitive class structure, 328
Political philosophy: the Enlightenment, 28 Prince Max of Baden, 148
Political reforms, 30 Principia, 30
Political unity of France, 134 Principia Mathematica, 59
Political will, 236, 285, 353 Printing, 133, 416
Politicians, 154 Prison, 332
Politicians, next election, 258 Private army, 172
Politics, 37 Private life, 136
Pollution, 363 Private property and profits, 353
Poor and most vulnerable, 262 Probability theory, 33
Pope Francis I, 282, 349, 352, 353, 385 Production of grains, 354
Pope Gregory IX, 385 Production of natural gas, 256
Pope Innocent III, 382 Profits of stockholders, 304
Pope, Alexander, 9 Progesterone, 76
Popularity and ratings, 304 Progress, 32, 37, 163
Population explosion, 417 Prolactin, 76
Population extinction pulse, 264 Prolonged childhood, 416
Population genetics, 102, 418 Promises, 40
Population growth, 49, 345 Promotes political violence, 205
Population losses and declines, 264 Propagandist drama, 140
Populism in the US, 219 Property, 37
Positive feedback loops, 265 Prosperity gospel preacher, 207
Post-fossil fuel world, 297 Protecting indigenous peoples, 161
Post-Kantians, 136 Protesting at the Swedish parliament, 290
Post-synaptic cleft, 77, 87 Proud Boys, 205
Postman, Neil, 304 Provision of health services, 356
Potentially irreversible threat, 302 Prussia, 134, 137, 142
Potsdam Institute, 262 Prussian army officers, 105
Poverty, 39, 330, 376 Prussian military caste, 148
Poverty alleviation, 262 Pseudospeciation, 105
Poverty of the stimulus, 65 Psychological techniques, 138
Power, 140, 323, 328, 388 Psychology, 29, 51, 326
Power and wealth, 353 Public image, 352
Power of taxation, 356 Pugwash Conferences, 59
Prayer of Saint Francis, 385 Pull the emergency brake, 290
Pre-industrial cultures, 323 Puritan Rebellion, 29
448 INDEX

Pythagoras, 10 Reduced consumption of meat, 219

Pyush Goyal, 250 Reform, 37, 330
Reformed view of history, 358
Quantum theory, 416 Regeneration of a forest, 346
Quasi-religious attitude, 140 Regional agreements, 262
Quasi-religious fervor, 138 Reich, Charles, 334
Quasi-religious nationalism, 152 Reinvestment, 164
Quasi-religious worship, 140 Religion, 138, 163, 358
Quick action, 236 Religion and culture, 108
Religion and ethnicity, 108
Rössler, Fritz, 180 Religion and politics, 333
Racial cleansing, 108 Religious bigotry, 35
Racial discrimination, 403 Religious tolerance, 374
Racism, 165, 175, 180, 329 REM sleep, 79
Racism of Cecil Rhodes, 172 Rembrandt van Rijn, 28
Racist theories and atrocities, 165 Renewable energy, 258, 352, 353
Radcliffe College, 394 Renewable energy infrastructure, 360, 361
Radical transformation, 302 Renewables cheaper than fossil fuels, 240,
Radium, 379 244
Rage, 80 Reparations, 149, 151
Railroads, 144 Republican Party, 149, 208
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 388 Republicanism, 136
Rand, Ayn, 177 Resource curse, 257
Rank-determining fights, 80, 100, 102 Resource-extracting firms, 257
Rapid and unprecedented changes, 302 Resources wasted on war, 360
Rapid change is required, 272 Respect for natural evolution, 419
Rate of change, 416 Respect for nature, 388
Rate of fossil fuel use, 239 Responsibility of scientists, 358
Rate of species loss, 264 Responsibility towards future generations, 305
Rational arguments, 385 Resting potential, 88
Rationalism, 29 Restoring democracy, 348
Rationality, 379 Restricting air travel, 270
Raw materials, 163 Revenge, 140
Ray, Thomas, 419 Revenge and counter-revenge, 358
Raychandbhai, 330 Reverence for Life, 382
Real power belongs to the people, 292 Reverential attitude, 140
Realistic view of the world, 29 Revival of Nazi ideology, 180
Receptors, 76 Revolutions in outlook and lifestyles, 303
Reciprocity, 333 Reward-motivated behavior, 79
Reconciliation, 329, 333 Rhineland, occupation of, 149
Record-breaking heatwaves, 298 Rhodes’ secret society, 173
Recovery of the U.S., 173 Rhodes, Cecil, 172
Redemptive love, 402 Richard Wilkinson, 350
INDEX 449

Righteousness, 100 Salt tax, 332

Rights of man, 28 Sanctions against Venezuela, 252
Rio Earth Summit, 296 Sanctity of the family, 35
Risk management, 262 Satan, 13
Risk to human civilization, 299 Saturation pressure, 265
Ritual scarification, 105 Satyagraha, 330, 374
Rituals, 106 Saudi Arabia, 257
Robespierre, 34, 36 Saudi Arabia and photovoltaics, 243
Rockwell, George Lincoln, 180 Saving the future, 273, 274, 303
Roma, 175 Savo, Mario, 334
Romantic attachment, 80 Say’s Law, 334
Romantic Movement, 134 Scandinavia, 344
Romeo and Juliet, 80 Schiller, 153
Romer, Ernst, 180 Schizophrenia, 79
Rooftop solar installations, 243 Schlieffen Plan, 144
Rosenfeld, Steven, 219 Schoolstrike for climate action, 277
Rothschild, Nathan, 173 Schrade, Herbert, 139
Roumania bans fracking, 252 Science, 281, 363, 365
Round dance, 71 Science and technology, 153, 358
Round Table Conference, 333 Science means nothing to politicians, 273
Rousseau, Jean Jacques, 26 Science-based industries, 162
Ruhr, occupation by France, 151 Scientific evidence, 261
Rules have to be changed, 273 Scientific method, 30
Rural economy, 332 Scientific progress, 37
Ruskin, 375 Scientific sociology, 33
Ruskin, John, 330 Sea ice loss, 265
Russell, Lord Bertrand, 58 Sea level rise, 261, 270
Russell, Lord Conrad, 65 Second Law of Thermodynamics, 362
Russell, Lord John, 58 Second law of thermodynamics, 419
Russell-Einstein Manifesto, 59, 381 Secrecy, 348
Russia, 142, 144, 163 Secret diplomacy, 348
Russia’s reserves of oil and gas, 251 Secret societies, 150
Russian Arctic oil production, 251 Secret society, 173
Russian Czars, 142, 148 Security for old people, 356
Russian petroleum industry, 251 Sedgwick, Adam, 43
Rwandan genocide, 344 Segregation, 400
Selection, 50
Sacred duty, 100, 140 Self-congratulatory mood, 166
Sacred flame, 138, 139 Self-destruction, 101
Sacred space, 139 Self-fulfillment, 37
Saddam Hussien’s atrocities, 108 Self-reliance, 331
Saint Francis, 382, 385 Self-reliance of villages, 376
Salt march, 332 Self-sacrificing courage, 101
450 INDEX

Self-sufficiency, 332 Social goals, 332

Selfish motives, 101, 102 Social institutions, 416
Selfishness, 37 Social reform, 329, 394
Semi-automatic rifles, 205 Social science, 29
Senate, 149 Social status, 326, 329
Sensibility, 35 Social unit enlarged, 341
Serbian nationalists, 142, 144, 153 Socialism, 394
Serotonin, 77, 79, 87 Sociology, 29, 326
Service sector, 360 Socrates, 340
Servility, 37 Softening ethnic boundaries, 108
Severe hurricanes, 298 Solar energy, 305
Shamanism, 104 Solar Foundation, 247
Shared culture, 360 Solar Jobs Census, 247
Shared knowledge, 341 Solar panel prices, 243
Sharp-shooters, 139 Solar panels on new houses, 243
Sheep-dogs, 72 Solstice, 138
Shell drilling in the Arctic, 352 Solutions exist, 281
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 58 Somme, Battle of, 145
Shiver, 100 Soot particles, 265
Short-term political advantage, 297 Sophie de Grouchy, 33
Shortened food chain, 219 South Africa, 329, 330, 333, 359, 373
Shrunken globe, 365 South America, 163
Siberia, 104, 219 Southern Asia, 340
Siberian Traps, 263 Sovereignty, 134
Sigmund Freud, 55 Space-age science, 140
Simiens, 246 Spain bans fracking, 252
Simplicity, 388 Speak out in clear language, 274
Sixth mass extinction, 264, 272 Specialization, 341
Slave Morality, 173 Species, 105
Slave ships, 360 Species loss, 264
Slavery, 35 Spemcer, Richard B., 193
Slavic majorities, 138 Spinning wheel, 331, 376
Slime molds, 76, 416 Sponges, 416
Small agricultural communities, 375 St. John’s Episcopal Church, 212
Small communities, 40 Stability, 418
Smallpox, 161, 163 Stabilization of population, 219
Smuts, General Jan, 149 Stabilizing global population, 354, 363
Social competition, 334, 376 Stable family structure, 35
Social conscience, 304, 353, 385 Stalemate, 144
Social contract, 30 Stanley, Henry Morton, 163
Social Darwinism, 172, 174 Stars and stripes, 208
Social epidemiology, 350 Starvation, 165
Social games, 271 State, 136, 137, 140
INDEX 451

State of nature, 30 Tabula rasa, 28

Status symbols, 326 Taiwan, 340
Steady State Economics, 346 Tanks, 148
Steady-state economic system, 345 Tattoos, 106
Steel, 20, 143, 163 Teaching of history, 357
Stern Review, 248 Teaching of science, 358
Stevenson, David, 154 Team-spirit, 102
Stockholders, 351 Tear gas, 212
Stone-age politics, 140 Technological change, 416
Stonehenge, 139 Technology, 133, 134, 140, 144, 163, 349, 354
Strasser, Otto, 180 Telegraph, 144
Student climate strike in Belgium, 274 Telescope, 28
Stupidity, 145 Television, 304
Subjugation, 30, 328 Tell it like it is, 290
Submission, 100 Temple Massacre, 162
Subversion of democracy, 28 Temporary fame, 41
Suffering, 35 Terawatts (TW), 238
Territorial integrity, 148
Surface antigens, 76
Testosterone, 80
Survival, 102
Thailand, 340
Survival of the fittest, 349
The “love hormone—hyperpage, 79
Sustainability, 360
The Birth of a Nation, 200
Sustainability crisis, 271
The Fountainhead, 177
Sustainable economies, 360
The Guardian, 264, 295
Sustainable process must be cyclic, 346
The Machine Age, 392
Sustainable society, 281
The party is over, 304
Svante Arrhenius, 270 The power of truth, 373
Svante Thunberg, 270 The rules have to be changed, 274, 303
Swadeshi movement, 331, 376 The Social Contract, 26
Swastika, 152 The Telegraph, 172
Sweden, 290 Theologians, 134
Sweden Democrats party, 218 Theory of the Leisure Class, 326
Swings to the right in Europe, 218 Theosophists, 329
Switzerland bans fracking, 252 Thermodynamic information, 362, 419
Sykes-Picot Agreement, 348 Thermohaline circulation, 270
Symbolism, 138 Thermonuclear war, 109, 154, 345, 351
Synapses, 77, 87 Thermonuclear weapons, 80, 102, 133
Syntactic knowledge, 65 Things As They Are, 41
Syntactic variants, 65 This changes everything, 353
Syria, 153 Thomas Paine, 34
System of despotism, 173 Thomas Robert Malthus, 36
Systematic murder, 172 Thoreau’s Journal, 389
Szent-Györgyi, Albert, 153 Thoreau, Henry David, 323
452 INDEX

Thou shalt not kill, 349, 393 Trump sent by God to be King, 207
Threat to white womanhood, 200 Trump’s father a KKK member, 200
Thunberg, Greta, 270, 274, 282, 290, 292, Trump, Donald, 207, 208, 212, 219, 285, 302
303, 305 Truth, 330, 333, 373
Thunberg, Svante, 270 Truthout, 295
Thusnelda, 140 Turgot, 30
Tinbergen’s studies of instincts, 71 Turkish Sultan, 148
Tinbergen, Nikolaas, 70, 97 Two faces of Janus, 344
Tipping point, 258, 285 Typhoid, 355
Tipping points, 236 Tyrannical government, 30
Tipping points and feedback, 269
Tipping points, definition, 269 UK declares climate emergency, 295
Tolstoy, 373, 375, 388 Ukraine, 153
Tolstoy Farm, 330, 375 Ukrainian Neo-Nazis, 180
Tolstoy, Count Leo, 358 Ultra-nationalists, 180
Tolstoy, Leo, 323, 330 Ultranationalism, 180
Tools of their tools, 389 UN Charter, 153
Torture, 165, 172 UN Framework Convention, 261
Total output of a society, 350 UN Secretary-General, 285
Totalitarianism, 137 Unbalance of power, 356
Trade, 133 Undemocratic government, 257
Transgenic animals, 419 Understatement of Existential Climate Risk,
Transgenic plants, 419 296
Transition to 100% renewable energy, 236 Unemployment, 355, 376
Transition to 100%renewables, 244 Unequal distribution of incomes, 164
Transmission infrastructure, 243 Unidirectional process, 346
Transmitter molecules, 76 Uniforms, 139, 144
Transportation, 133 Unilateral acts of kindness, 373
Trench warfare, 102, 145 Unilateral kindness, 358
Triassic-Jurassic Extinction, 262 Union of Concerned Scientists, 302
Tribal instincts, 135 Unite the Right rally, 194
Tribal markings, 105 United Nations, 164, 357
Tribal religions, 341 United Nations Charter, 350, 364
Tribalism, 80, 101, 102, 133, 136, 340, 358, United Nations Framework Convention, 296
416, 418 United States, 163, 164
Tribes, 140 Universal grammar, 65
Trickle-down theories, 350 Universal grammar theory, 65
Trigonometry, 20 Universal human brotherhood, 108, 109, 359
Trinity College, Cambridge, 59, 65 Universality of religion, 108
Triple Entente, 143 Unnecessary material goods, 388
Tropical cyclones, 261 Unprecedented changes, 274
Tropical rain forests, 264 Unprecedented heat waves, 261
Trump is Alt-Right with us, 194 Unprecedented investment opportunity, 245
INDEX 453

Unto This Last, 330, 375 Violent team sports, 101

Uranium, 380 Virtue, 34
Urbanization, 355 Visual cortex, 88, 90
Urgency of our situation, 285 Vlaamse Militanten Orde, 180
US Constitution, 348 Volcanic eruptions in Siberia, 263
US Department of Energy, 252 Volcanic islands, 50
US Evangelicals, 207 Voltaire, 30
Utopian communities, 330 Voluntary poverty and humility, 375
Volvo bans petroleum driven cars, 245
Vaccination, 19 Votes for women, 394
Value systems, 106 Voyage of the Beagle, 161
Vanguard America, 194
Vanishing resources, 15, 109, 153 Waggle dance of bees, 71
Vanity, 145 Walden, 323, 324, 388
Vapor pressure, 265 Wallace, Alfred R., 49
Variation, 50 War, 35, 36, 140, 208
Variations of instincts, 70 War and slavery compared, 359
Veblen, Thorstein, 80, 326 War criminals, 149
Vegetarians, 329 War Departments, 350
Veils, 106 War guilt, 149, 150
Venezuela, 257 War of subjugation, 138
Venezuela’s Belt of Tar, 252 War, unbridled, 140
Verdun, Battle of, 145 War-free world, 154
Vermeer, Jan, 28 Warlike traditions, 144
Versailles, 134, 142 Warm human contacts, 375
Versailles, Treaty of, 149 Warning from the World Bank, 261
Vestas, 246 Wars of religion, 108
Vested-interest pressure, 298 Water scarcity, 261
Vestigial organs, 50 Water supplies near dwellings, 356
Vice, 35, 37, 39 Water vapor, 352
Viceroy Lord Irwin, 332 Water vapor a greenhouse gas, 265
Viceroy Lord Lytton, 165 Watering-down scientific findings, 298
Victor Hugo, 42 Watts, 238
Viet Nam War, 401 Wave of depolarization, 88
Vietnam, 340 We Are All Loyal Klansmen, 200
Vietnam War, 334 We have the facts and solutions, 273
Vikings, 344 We have to change, 271
Village life, 331, 376 We have to speak clearly, 292
Village solar installations, 244 We must act now, 284
Village wind turbines, 244 Wealth, 328, 388
Violation of civil rights, 348 Weaponry, 163
Violence, 140, 328, 358, 377 Weapons manufacturers, 154
Violence on television, 101 Weapons of mass destruction, 101
454 INDEX

Weapons production, 346 World Economic Forum survey, 299

Weaving machines, 162 World federal authority, 357
Wedgwood, Emma, 49 World Meteorological Organization report,
Wedgwood, Josiah, 43, 44 284
Weimar Republic, 150, 151 World Resources Institute, 354
Welfare, 262 World trade, 162
Wellington, 140 World under British rule, 173
Wessel, Torsten N., 90 World War I, 152
West African monsoon loss, 270 World War II deaths, 175
Western Front, 145 World War III, 153
What Lies Beneath, 296 World Wars, 134
When at Times the Mob is Swayed, 219 World’s oil reserves, 252
Whistleblowers, 348 World’s poorest three billion, 300
White nationalists, 193 Wounded, 148
White supremacists, 193 Writing, 416
Whitehead, Alfred North, 59
Why wasn’t it made illegal?, 271 Xenophobia, 180
Why were there no restrictions?, 271 Years remaining, 236
Wider loyalty, 152 Young, J.Z., 90
Wildfires in Sweden, 292 Yugoslavia, 142
Will, 137, 142
Will to Power, 173 Zanzibar, 163
William Godwin, 32, 37 Zero, 20
William Hazlitt, 41 Zionism, 108
William Wordsworth, 41 Zoonomia, 42
Wilson, E.O., 102, 264
Wilson, President Woodrow, 148, 149
Wind energy, 243, 305
Wind energy, rate of growth, 239
Wind farm’s footprint, 243
Wind turbine cooperatives, 247
Window dressing, 352
Winter heating of homes, 251
Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 59
Wolves, 72
Women held as hostages, 165
Workaholic habits, 346
Worked to death, 172
World Bank, 258, 261
World Bank Group, 262
World Bank’s warning, 261
World Development Report, 261
World domination, 173