The Anglo Saxon Protestant Revolution

[Reason Man]

Following is a continuation of my response-post to M S Kelly’s article “The Ayn Rand Love / Hate Myth – Part – 4” about the importance of history and the greatness of Greek civilization. You may also see that post on page 2 of MSK’s article – it includes quotes from Plato, J Adams, J Madison, T Jefferson and Ayn Rand – showing the necessity of studying history.

It is also chapter no 4 of Release – 1 of my book awaiting acceptance by publishers, posted on this forum for discussion. Being a middle chapter, there may be some difficulty in understanding ideas explained in earlier part of the book. I shall give explanation with thanks to anybody who asks for it. For further details about “Fall due to Democracy”, please see at the end of this article.

CHAPTER 4

THE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANT REVOLUTION – PHASE OF ASCENT

A. The Anglo Saxon Protestant (ASP) Revolution

The Protestant Revolution started in Europe as protest against the above described rule of the Church, the Dark Ages. Aristotle’s philosophy, otherwise hated by irrationalists, got a prolonged chance of development because it was specifically inducted to justify Christianity after the 1000 year misrule of traditional Christian philosophy of unselfishness, non-egoism and brother-love. So its initial period of existence in Christian world was with basic contradictions about nature of universe, position of god, etc. This induction of Aristotelian Philosophy, though starting with a religious base, moved slowly but inexorably to reverse several tenets of Christianity. Some of the direct contributors were the leaders of the European Protestant movements. Some of the indirect contributors too were Europeans like Galileo (who claimed to be a devout Catholic, nevertheless giving strong impetus to the then Protestant demand of freedom of the mind, because of his life long fight with the Church). Point is that the Aristotelian philosophy of reason does not belong to any particular race like the Greeks or the ASPs, it is open to Man the Rational Being, whosoever amongst men chooses to achieve that state. But the ASPs have been relatively the most consistent practitioners of Aristotelian philosophy, of protecting freedom of mind (i.e. man’s freedom to use his own ego) and man’s right to his own life. (We will see ahead that though the Protestant movement itself started against Christian rule in Germany, the seeds of the fall of Aristotelianism were also sown in Germany – and Germany has contributed a lot to the backward movement. Similarly, even though the earliest contributors to Renaissance were Italians, in later years their contribution is not much; in fact the political rule in Italy shows a similar corruption and chaos as in undeveloped societies, including their role in the two world wars. As a society, the Spaniards are closer to the Italians, though having discovered ‘The New World’, while the French are in between these Europeans and the ASPs. (These are all different mixes of Semi Rational (SRS) Societies – and amongst them, see condition of Latin American societies.) Also, note one important sign of progress – The ASPs were free of dictators much prior to other Europeans – this is an important indicator of level of rationality in society, because if low on rationality, the society ends in dictatorial rule, and dictators have wrecked far more havoc on earth than democracy. While the ASP countries were stable democracies, the leading nations of Europe, France and Germany, were in dictatorial turmoil even in the 19th century (Germany continuing into 20th). Tocqueville, a well-known French thinker of 19th century, made special visit to the US (almost one year duration) to study “the most stable democracy of the time on earth!” The Europeans could perhaps have known vaguely, but could never have strongly imbibed or practiced the concept of “the inalienable rights of an individual”, which subdued the majority to the individual and which was the climax of the ASP Revolution. Based on the weaknesses of “Christian Democracy” described in this book, and actual history, it would not be wrong to infer that the Europeans would have most probably destroyed the Renaissance, had it not been for the achievements of the ASPs. Add to it the fact that the Industrial Revolution was mainly grown in England! As compared to Europeans, the Americans (mainly the English and German Protestants who migrated in protest against this state of affairs) have done much more for furthering mankind’s progress and civilization, and therefore the name, The Anglo Saxon Protestant Revolution. But beyond that, the reasons why it is not called as American Revolution are given ahead.

Regarding the above nomenclature, “ASP Revolution”, I have been cautioned that it is racist. I have insisted to call it so for reasons explained in the book, particularly in the above paragraph and the sub-article on ‘Racism and Reverse Racism’.

B. The Greatness of Aristotelian Philosophy – The Guarantee of its Success

The meaning of the term Aristotelian philosophy as used here is as follows: It would be incorrect to expect of Aristotle to develop a philosophy that would solve all problems of humanity, leaving nothing for future generations to do. But he gave to mankind the base of a good metaphysics (a real, knowable world independent of the perceiver), and a method for development of knowledge via his laws of logic. Aristotelian philosophy, as referred to here, is a time-wise correct development of the philosophy of reason, applicable to any aspect of human concerns. Nor was Aristotle infallible, and there are several mistakes in his theories, particularly physics. But these are negligible in comparison to the core of his achievements.

The most important differences in terms of basics, between the religious rules versus the ASP Revolution are summarized below: While religion considers reality to be illusory, ever-changing, or otherwise unknowable, Aristotelians consider it to be firm, orderly and knowable. Religion considers man to be a weakling, unable to individually combat the forces of nature, and therefore men should live collectively necessitating each to submit his individual ego in favor of the wisdom of society. Aristotelians consider man to be capable of every achievement if he strives correctly, each man’s ego being the means of achievement (i.e individualism) . Religion considers Ego to be the root of all evil, therefore to be annihilated and banished from earth if an ideal society is to be established. Aristotelians consider the rational exercise of the ego to be the root of a life of reason for man, and had come very close to the establishment of a perfect society in the 19th century, a totally New World far away from the Old one. Politically, Religion therefore established a rule based on the submission of the ego of the Ruled, thereby conferring unlimited powers to the Rulers. Total Freedom to ego and limitation of the power of Rulers by a written constitution of checks and balances was the basis of the ASP government. While religious rulers ruled the subjects as favor, the American rulers ceased to be rulers in the conventional sense – as bureaucrats they were servants chosen for particular tasks, and more importantly, they were paid servants, performing specific tasks within the limitations of what was allowed to them for monetary payment in return. (As politicians, they were volunteers offering themselves for specific tasks, sometimes receiving honorarium in return.) Conversely, the taxpayer, the producer of money, the Businessman and the Industrialist were considered to be important persons, indirectly benefiting society while they prospered. The westerners were the first ones to accord the VIP status to businessmen – no other society in men’s history had recognized them as so.

The above also explains the reason as to why the Europeans, particularly the ASPs, were destined to progress far ahead of the rest of the world and why their success was guaranteed. If a society has a metaphysics that declares the surrounding reality to be unknowable, an epistemology that calls the senses to be invalid and the ego to be a tool of distortion, an ethics of self-sacrifice and renunciation of the world, and politically, if this philosophy is imposed on that society with the help of swords, then that society never intended to have much knowledge of Reality around, which it claimed to be unknowable in the first place. But on the other hand, if a society has a good philosophy (the Aristotelian base), i.e. it considers the world to be stable and knowable, the senses and the ego to be the tools of gathering and interpreting knowledge about that world, armed with logic to filter right knowledge from wrong one, if ethically that society accepts living by means of production by using knowledge of the world around as its “way of life”, and if politically that society is protected from any agency (including its own government) that intends to rob its individuals by ensuring “inalienable rights of the individual” and a constitution of checks and balances in ensuring such a “way of life”, then it will only be a matter of time before that society unravels all the mysteries that the other people call as “miracles of science”.

Also note a derivation from the above: Just as an Aristotelian society is destined to succeed, so also a non-Aristotelian society is destined to fail sooner or later – it may copy some science and methods of production, acquire bombs, temporarily be a threat, cause destruction and so on – but in the long run it will fail because of the weight of its own irrationality. Therefore, the long term stability of England and America has been proof of their rationality, while the ever-growing internal tensions today, are a strong indication of loss of Aristotelianism – and once they cross that crucial level, they too will collapse. This is very important while studying the ‘Descent of ASP Revolution’ today, from two angles: that internally the western countries are slowly, even if imperceptibly, moving towards collapse; and that their external policies are very wrong on this count, viz. that the irrational societies are destined to fail sooner or later.

The above difference between the Aristotelian and the Non-Aristotelian societies is so very simple to understand; the reason why the world does not accept it is complicated, though we will discuss the same as we proceed in this article.

Continuing with the ASP Revolution, once its concepts became appreciably established in society, there was no looking back. The Rational usage of the ego went on creating ideas and conquering knowledge forbidden and punished by Religion. In a few days, men who were afraid of and ravaged by nature, by famines, drought, floods and epidemics were soon free of that permanent wrath of nature. Men till then were born and brought up to look with awe and fear at religious leaders for their alleged abilities to perform miracles now had the chance to really be dazzled by “miracles of science”. The ships, the cranes, the railway and the steam engines which they called as the Iron Horse, eradication of diseases after Pasteur and others, and in a later century, the airplane, the above 100 storied buildings, artificial organs in human bodies, the cyclotrons – all these were in their service. Today, physical material is so very easily and amply available to men, that many Asian countries, perennially famished even till the middle of 20th century, now have become food surplus, but only due to usage of western concepts like dams and irrigation, tractors, fertilizers, harvesters, storage silos etc. (As an aside, these men of the backward countries look down upon Western achievements as “mere materialism”. Many centuries back, before the dawn of this cursed modernity their moral leaders tell them, they were an ego-less society of men who loved each-other, and sacrificed for each-other and for the country.)

The first beneficiaries of science were the Europeans – but they continued with the old practice of “conquests”, i.e. attacking, annexing and subjugating other countries and fighting with each other over the spoils. Some of the continental Europeans were straight away pirates and buccaneers! The change within Western society was not overnight. The struggle for supremacy was long and drawn out between the French, the English, the Germans, the Spanish, and the other Europeans – but the clear winners were the Anglo Saxon Protestants originating from England, for the simple reason that they inducted Aristotelian philosophy the most amongst all the Europeans into their lives. The game was very easy for the Europeans – when aided by science in their conquests, resistance worth mention was impossible, and conquests were quick and easy, with very few casualties. Such was the difference of power between them and the rest of the undeveloped world that within a small period of time the British started controlling all the seven seas and the five continents. A handful of them were enough to rule vast countries like China and India – in fact 1500 ICS officers assisted by Indian clerks and sepoys, was all that the Queen required to govern India’s hundreds of millions from her palace. Ditto with China, ditto with rest of Asia, ditto with the whole of Africa. And in fact, for the first 100 years India was ruled merely by the officers of East India Co, only after 1857 the Queen took over the rule from them. (Contrast this with the fact that even today governing India is a very difficult task for Indians. Several other countries have already collapsed.)

The ASPs conquered most of the seven seas, becoming economically the most prosperous nation, scientifically the most advanced, in fact giving birth to the Industrial Revolution. Yet, there were men all over Europe, most particularly amongst the ASPs themselves, who were not content with the irrationalities from the earlier ages that still remained in the European way of life. This, they gave up as the “Old World”, and departed across the ocean in search of the “New World”, in search of greater freedom to the ego from a society closer to religion.

Within 2 centuries of the ASP philosophy spreading to an appreciable extent within society, the ASPs had built two full continents on two sides of the Pacific Ocean, far away from little England of yester years. Of these, one chose a new path in the name of reason and freedom to the individual, vowing to build the greatest country in human history. Within a few years they fulfilled their pledge. This country then proceeded to become the citadel of reason and all its consequences in human life, achievement, success, prosperity and strength based on knowledge. And not only in one sphere of life, but every aspect of life, whether it be research and the Nobel prizes in science (*see below), sports and the Olympic Medals, film-making and other entertainment, production, business and industry, military might, literature – or any other, name it and America led. Soon it started producing and owning a huge percentage of the world’s GDP, many times more than any other nation. (That phrase “citadel of reason” is important – it is the thesis of this write-up that erosion of reason is the point over which America is likely to collapse.)

(*) – Amongst such Prizes, and those awarded by governments of different countries, the Nobel Prize for science has retained some credibility (while losing some), science being more objective. Other Prizes leave room for much more skepticism because irrationality can be practiced a lot more in humanities and social sciences, which is also mankind’s practice so far. Few more details of this are given ahead. PS Oct ‘09: The nomination (and subsequent award) to President Obama, not only without any performance, but even without full announcement of policies, gives further credence that either the awards are used for political purposes, or something is wrong with mankind’s philosophical theories.

C. Spiritual and Moral Aspects of the ASP Revolution

The ASP revolution was not merely materialistic, as alleged by the world looking at the success of the ASPs in the fields of science, industry and business. The revolution was first and foremost spiritual and moral, because without being so, material progress is impossible. The society that the Protestant revolution produced was the most moral / honest society to have ever lived on earth. Consider these examples typical of social life of the 19th century: There was the story of newspaper sale in all the towns and cities of 19th century England and America. A pile of newspapers would be left in the squares, unattended, with a box for money. At the end of the day, the cash in the box would automatically be equal to the cost of newspapers taken away. In the developing countries of the “unselfish”, this would have caused riots for every broken piece of the box and the stool supporting the newspapers. (Similar was the situation in some parts of Europe where people would go away from their houses without closing the entrance door – in the so-called “backward” countries where ‘pious religion’ rules and people are supposed to be ‘unselfish’, 2 – 3 days is how much it takes for the owners to be away from their house, even for a locked house in a crowded city to get wiped out.) Following is another story narrated by a man from a “developing” country, visiting a western country, who once tried to make a phone call from a public phone in a post-office. He told the employee inside that he had wasted three coins, but could not get the connection. The employee gave the visitor his three coins, informing that the instrument was faulty, further adding that he would recover the money later. The visitor was aghast at the employee’s credulousness, because back home he knew there would be long queues and heated arguments for coins wasted in spoilt instruments, if such a policy were in practice. The first claimant’s demands would far exceed the daily turnover of the machine.

Compare this with the achievements of “pious religion” from another angle: Let us forget for a moment that the rulers of religious societies were heartlessly cruel, cutting of organs, blinding etc was common. What is the mental state of the common folks, the Gareebs, in such societies? Just to give a sample, if an accident happens in any of the villages – cars dashing against each other with 4 – 5 mangled bodies in each of them needing immediate medical attention, blood infusion etc, or a bus of 30 – 40 passengers collapses leaving them in the above state – A mob of villagers is seen running merrily towards the accident spot, one may be moved by their compassion and be a bit surprised at their merriment – but the reason for merriment is that it is the chance for the Gareebs to pull ornaments and clothes from the dying bodies, to snatch purses and belongings. Flesh of the dying is simply torn to get some ornaments! This is the brother-love and compassion “pious religion” has infused into the Gareebs over last 5000 years!

The above were the achievements of Aristotelian philosophy getting ingrained into society, to which rest of the world (the so-called “developing” world) is unaccustomed. That the world is real, not an illusion and an ever-changing phenomenon, that words of language have fixed, firm meaning, that Mine and Not Mine are words whose meaning was not to be inter-changed as per convenience, was ingrained into men’s mind as per Aristotelian philosophy. Even today, despite heavy erosion of Aristotelian philosophy post Immanuel Kant, the level of honesty in Western Societies is far, far superior as compared to the undeveloped world. (But it is pertinent to add here that with changing times, there is substantial erosion of this atmosphere in their societies, details of which are given under the Descent Phase.) But this is the reason for claiming further ahead in this article that though the Americans are trying to use the UN as East India Company, they are no match for the cheats from the ‘undeveloped’ countries – they have to lose in the game.

In other respects also (apart from honesty), the benevolent atmosphere had created a tremendous respect for the stature of ‘man’ – he was looked upon, not as an object of pity, but as a being to be respected for his capabilities. Charity, a solely private concern then, unlike the corrupt display of unearned government extravaganza today, took this form of magnanimity and benevolence. The man who had much more than others, and also than his personal needs, shared it with others during their misfortune – but others did not look at it as beggars who immediately throng in religious societies – they first looked for work, and only as a last recourse accepted charity as a temporary measure with acknowledgement of situation. Even when poor, men had self respect and self-esteem, and were not hated for the same, as in religious societies.

The above respect for the stature of ‘man’ meant a substantial reduction of envy, and a commensurate increase of respect and appreciation of others’ achievements – an atmosphere of benevolence exactly opposite to the “religious” atmosphere, where all the Gareebs participate whole-heartedly in the defeat of rationality. Ambition was not a crime that incurred hatred from others around. This was because there was ‘good-will’ in society instead of the ‘evil-will’ generated by unselfishness of religion.

Now-a-days many people in the world know the term ‘good-will’. The reason for such a construction of the sentence is that during religious times that term was absent, it was not known to anybody, and even today, there are many people to whom it is unknown (in societies closer to Thoroughly Irrational Society (TIS) where the influence of religion / communism is strong.) That feeling is replaced in these societies by ‘evil-will’. Good-will is typically a term that can be used amongst traders only – the people who were given their appropriate place in society by the ASPs and the French alone – no other society, not even the Greeks have done that.

This reduction in envy, and an atmosphere of benevolent good-will had been achieved because the American had achieved the highest of morality – he had become rationally selfish! At the peak of the ASP Revolution, i.e. not in terms of technological progress but in terms of emotionally benevolent atmosphere of the 19th century, they were truly selfish enough to be motivated by how much they personally achieved / earned, and not with how much the other person earned – they were not concerned with comparative standards, but their own absolute achievement. It is only rational selfishness that can ever cure this poisonous disease of envy – it has no other cure – and no other cause except the theories of self-sacrifice and evil-of-the-ego.

From a sense of life point of view (i.e. implicit in behavior), the 19th century American was relatively the most Rationally Selfish human being, i.e the most moral person. Somewhat sarcastically it is said that a typical American’s world is limited to his workplace, his spouse, his friend circle and parties (in short he is self-centered). This is the most moral of the attitudes ever, it implies that he will not claim false unselfishness, nor preach unselfishness to others, which means not expect, impose, deceive, persuade others into unselfishness taking pleasure in their losses, the way “unselfishness” is practiced all over the world – especially amongst relatives of “unselfish” societies. At the same time he will not claim to love his brothers falsely, nor demand that they love him arbitrarily, indiscriminately, overlooking his shortcomings and vices. This achievement is a part of what we have called as the ASP Revolution, as per which culture each man is expected to support his life only by means of productive work, acquiring his sustenance from nature, neither sacrificing himself, nor expecting sacrifices from others. (The exhortation for “universal love” is also motivated by the same intention as unselfishness and non-egoism. Universal Love? Of-course a great ideal so that fools may get deceived, as well as, my vices, wrong-doings, acts of injustice – in fact my indulgence in evil – is over-looked.)

Patriotism was not community service or self-sacrifice – it was man’s love for himself and his freedom. He would be ready to give up his life rather than live as a conquered person. His country, a community of independent-minded, free, rationally selfish men, had ensured for him, independence and freedom to act and produce – and he would defend the same even at the cost of his life, if it were threatened by an external or internal enemy. Today, because of America’s unnecessary participation in wars, coupled with the use of the ‘draft’, it is the opposite – and like in religious times, the upper sections use the lower sections as cannon fodder while goading them to ‘sacrifice for the country’ and ‘sacrifice for the poor people of the earth’.

The climax of moral aspect of ASP Revolution was seen in the history of its first 150 years. Despite the philosophy originating in England, the latter was not free of the worst aspect of mankind’s past, viz. Empire building, annexation and subjugation. She continued with conquests, part development and part aggrandizement under the name of “enlightenment”, “white man’s burden” etc till she met with nemesis in W W II and reduction to being a second rate power.

But the US in its early days, particularly the first 100 – 150 years (up to about W W I), was the great emancipator. May be that was because it had to win its own freedom from British aggrandizement itself and earn the statue of liberty. My admiration for the achievement of those 150 years is vast. Americans were the first to realize that there was no superiority in men conquering other men, whether as nations or as individuals. (This statement has important implications while handling issues of slavery and racism. They were the first and the only emancipators of entire mankind from all kind of discrimination – and see what they get in return – in the article on Racism.) Science was to be used for conquest of nature and for self-defense, i.e. for retaliation, not for domination / initiation of force. The first 150 years of the US coincided with a period that saw the least number of wars in the developed world, and a huge expansion in knowledge and production! And though the US had become the most powerful country on earth, it broke from the standard history of the past, by not attacking a single country on its own, the only 2 –3 wars it won during these years were the ones imposed on it by others. To sum it up in a single sentence – the US changed the pattern of history that mankind wrote so far, from history of wars and loot, to a history of all round achievements in all fields of knowledge – science, arts, production, entertainment and sports – a history of anybody who has achievement to his credit, not just the kings killing the populace, and the “saints” preaching unselfishness and renunciation as way of life.

But this did not mean the US had become a weakling, afraid of wars. Quite contrarily, it became too very powerful for the world to wage any wars against, but at the same time was also a moral country. Any other nation fractionally as powerful as the US would have launched into all round attacks – theirs was morality at its highest – the mightiest nation on earth, having many times the power to conquer the world, got engaged in the least number of wars, and that too the ones that were forced upon them by others. (No other country on earth can match this kind of record for a prolonged period of almost 150 years – least number of wars despite huge power, and maximum development of human virtues! (One para from the sub-article on Typical Theoretical Analysis of unselfishness and non-egoism is copied here: Not satisfied with internal loot, the kings’ armies always turned to external aggression – this is the root of history being the same all over the earth, a history of continuous wars with emperors becoming “Great” by killing others and then getting killed in their turn; a history of sons killing fathers, and brothers killing brothers for succession. (Therefore an important statement is attached to the birth of the US, which highlights its moral superiority: For a brief span of about 150 years, the US changed the nature of this history in the developed world – rest of the undeveloped world still goes on with the same history of wars. For details see any standard school text-book on history.)))

(In recent years, i.e. about last 100 years, the history of American wars too has changed with changed atmosphere with bad consequences mainly to its own honest citizens – details available in ‘Descent’ phase ahead – and it is yet another example of philosophy of unselfishness breeding wars.)

At the same time, the country enjoyed the greatest internal stability – almost no other country on earth, with as huge a size as the US, has remained immune to internal strife for so long a period of time. As mentioned earlier, Tocqueville, a well-known French thinker of 19th century, specially went to the US to study it as “the most stable democracy of its time on earth”. With the exception of one single internal war meant for the eradication of slavery, and one instance of defying a government that was using prohibition of alcohol as a ploy for violating individual rights and imposing “welfare measures”, there is no appreciable internal strife worth mention amongst far flung regions of the country. The internal war was to free African-Americans from the clutches of Southern Religionists, the Church Belt, which is one more example of the fact that the more a society believes in “unselfish love and non-egoism”, whether of religion or of communism, the more it believes in and practices slavery. Any other empires which achieved such stability over so extensive area did so by means of suppression and liberal usage of the sword – and therefore achieved it only for a short period of time. The US achieved it by creating the best conditions of life, including justice dispensation. The rest of the world has accused the country of inhuman capitalist exploitation of workers, but simple observations show that jealousy and misrepresentation of facts are major components of such allegations. During the ascent phase, and a long time after, the standard of living of even the poor was much higher than better off people in the rest of the world.

So very free and benevolent was the atmosphere that the best minds from all over the earth, including Europe / England, first sought opportunity to migrate to the US – and year after year, at least 50% of Nobel prizes in science are won by Americans even today! And the yearning for migration by rest of the undeveloped world is typified by the story of the Chinese (given just ahead) who died in his second attempt to illegally enter the country in a container box!

Overall the ASP society had so much gone away from evil and towards rational selfishness / Aristotelian good that today they are unable to properly identify / analyze several issues that are tormenting them. They are confused by ‘they’ of the world attacking them, are unable to identify ‘hatred of good for being the good’ as leitmotif, as essence of TIS engraved on the minds of Gareebs (or all components of TIS). They are unable to know why they are many times isolated in world forums, why even allies gang up against them to side obvious irrationality.

There is a case to call the ASP Revolution, beyond this point, as American Revolution. But I have not done so because: The American revolution too had its roots in the English theories, the American constitution abundantly quoting John Locke and other English thinkers of the time of its writing. Other aspects of philosophy too the Americans borrowed from English thinkers like Bacon, Adam Smith etc. Apart from Locke, all these other thinkers, particularly Adam Smith, have a huge following in the US. As per Wikipedia, this is what Thomas Jefferson said about the English legacy: The third US president Thomas Jefferson wrote; "Bacon, Locke and Newton..I consider them as the three greatest men that have ever lived, without any exception and as having laid the foundation of those superstructures which have been raised in the Physical and Moral sciences". Adam Smith is absent because Wealth of Nations was just getting published, in 1776. Almost the entire effort depended on the English philosophy. The fight was because a basic change was taking place in that society – the individual was getting a superior, sanctified position vis-à-vis the state, as against the individual meant only to serve the state till then – but otherwise, for all practical purposes they all were English only.

This had an important effect from the point of view of this write-up, that like the English, the Americans too lacked in one particular point viz. developing a theory claiming anexplicit moral base to the Revolution, though the induction of reason was even superior to the English. Their improvement over the English was to implicitly give scope to rational selfishness as a way of life, what they frequently refer to as “the American way of life”, capitalism, etc. (These differences, ascending steps towards full rationality, along with the lack mentioned above, are important for studying further development of these societies including today’s problems.)

CHAPTER 5

THE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANT REVOLUTION – TRANSITION TO DESCENT

What has caused the decline of such a great country? Why so many problems came out with the present sub-prime lending crisis? Why are crises repeating in the last few decades? Let us now check this important point in detail. As is the thesis of this article, all the glory seen above was effect of Aristotelian philosophy being of utmost importance to the best of the English society (in the wider sense of the term, including those who had migrated to build the New World with reason as the foundation.) The fall started with the erosion of Aristotelian concerns post Immanuel Kant, exacerbated by the weakness of democracy and multi-culturalism.

The above is the connection of this article with the issue of why the best of the societies have reached upto the stage of democracy and then fallen – that Democracy has become “the problem of civilization”. But I am cutting off at this point because of the risk of posting too lengthy an article.

PS: The above was chapter no 4 of Release – 1 of my book awaiting acceptance by publishers. In case there was any difficulty in understanding ideas explained in earlier part of the book, I shall be glad to give explanation – but better still, please see more parts of the book by ctrl + clicking on the first link below, which will give an MS word file, therefore more recommended; or by feeding the URL in the second link (this link changes the formatting – but ideas are in tact).

1. Download link : http://myfreefilehosting.com/f/9b7728a1ee_0.38MB

2. URL: http://wp.me/pguKM-3/ASP Revo Abstract and 3 chapters

Apart from abstract, contents and first 2 chapters, these also include discussion about moral degeneration and fall due to democracy.

The above was a continuation of my response-post to M S Kelly’s article “The Ayn Rand Love / Hate Myth – Part – 4” about the importance of history and the greatness of Greek civilization. You may also see that post on page 2 of MSK’s article – it includes quotes from Plato, J Adams, J Madison, T Jefferson and Ayn Rand – showing the necessity of studying history.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Reason Man,

I just now saw this in the moderation queue.

Since I rarely check this queue, I missed it even though it was posted about a week ago.

I'm afraid that articles posted in the "Articles" section will continue to have this problem until I do the Portal page the way I want it.

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

To O.P.

How great was Aristotelian philosophy? It held up the development of a proper science of matter and motion for nearly two millenia. Logic did not break its Aristotelian shackles until the 19-th century c.e. with the works of Boole, Frege and others.

The only scientific portions of Aristotle that held up reasonably well were his descriptions of the life and growth of animals and plants. He did as well as anyone could be expected to do without microscopes.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[syrakusos]

How great was Aristotelian philosophy? It held up the development of a proper science of matter and motion for nearly two millenia. Logic did not break its Aristotelian shackles until the 19-th century c.e. with the works of Boole, Frege and others.

It so happens that although I do not need the credit for my master's, I am taking a class in "Ethics in Physics." We are reading Plastic Fantastic, about fraud at Bell Labs. So, I started to backtrack for the roots of the Scientific Method. I found Robert Boyle and Francis Bacon both cited. The reading is harder for sytlistic reasons, but up front, no doubt about it, both men, Bacon circa 1600 and Boyle in the next century, cited Aristotle as the source of all their problems.

That brings me back to where I was in 1966 before I read Ayn Rand.

Since then, I have had the need to read Aristotle (sometimes even in Greek) and I have a greater appreciation for him now, but, truly, no more nor less than for any of a dozen other philophers. And Aristotle never said "A is A." He did state explicitly the law of the excluded middle, that a thing cannot both be and not be the same of the same at the time. (About as close to the actual Greek as English will allow.) As for the rest, well, pre-approval of Aristotle is alot like smoking cigarettes and wearing capes.

[Reason Man]

How great was Aristotelian philosophy? It held up the development of a proper science of matter and motion for nearly two millenia. Logic did not break its Aristotelian shackles until the 19-th century c.e. with the works of Boole, Frege and others.

.... both men, Bacon circa 1600 and Boyle in the next century, cited Aristotle as the source of all their problems.

.....And Aristotle never said "A is A." He did state explicitly the law of the excluded middle, ....

Because of the above comments, I am including 2 new paras between the first 2 paras of the sub-article "The Greatness of Aristotelian Philosophy -- the Guarantee of its Success". I had thought of including something to this effect initially, but at the same time also thought that the matter is obvious and excluded them -- now I am re-introducing them. (New paras are italicized).

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..... The meaning of the term Aristotelian philosophy as used here is as follows: It would be incorrect to expect of Aristotle to develop knowledge that would solve all problems of humanity, leaving nothing for future generations to do. But he gave to mankind the base of a good metaphysics (a real, knowable world independent of the perceiver), and a method for development of knowledge via his laws of logic. Aristotelian philosophy, as referred to here, is a time-wise correct development of the philosophy of reason, applicable to any aspect of human concerns. Nor was Aristotle infallible, and there are several mistakes in his theories, particularly physics. But these are negligible in comparison to the core of his achievements.

I am elucidating / emphasizing the above point because of my experiences during discussion of this sub-article on the Net. There is a very strong criticism of Aristotle’s theories – not merely from unknown academicians of every type, but from such men as Bacon, Galileo, Robert Boyle etc. Some part of this criticism is valid (and for a more detailed discussion of its interpretation see the sub-article “The Short-comings of ASP Revolution” ahead.) But I was surprised to see it voiced on web-sites that should consider Aristotle as their Founding Father. To repeat a sentence used just above, his mistakes are negligible in comparison to the core of his achievements. There is a famous painting known as “The School of Athens” by a Renaissance Master, Raphael, made in 1509-10 when they were rediscovering civilization via Aristotle (specifically brought in by Thomas Aquinas around 1250 for this very purpose after the moral fall of the Church). The central part of this painting is equally famous. It shows Plato and Aristotle arguing philosophy -- Plato points to the heavens, implying that this earth is semi-real, imperfect realm which man should strive to give up in exchange for the perfection of the heavens (which is also the basic philosophy of most religions); Aristotle on the other hand points towards the earth (the surroundings) as the true reality, as man’s real abode. I believe the word Metaphysics was specifically coined by him as the subject to be studied prior to physics – the answer to the question whether reality, this earth etc is real or no. This painting shows the essence of the difference between Plato (representing all irrationalists like religion, Heraclitus via communism etc) and Aristotle (it has been used by Ayn Rand for the cover of her book “Philosophy Who Needs It”). If this earth is unreal (or semi-real), unknowable, an ever-changing flux etc, then what were men (whether they be ordinary men, or geniuses like Bacon, Galileo and Boyle) to study? But that question is answered just ahead in this sub-article. The entire religious (and other irrational) poison against the ego, against human mind, oozes out of this base of Plato and other non-Aristotelians. (The main reason why Aristotle’s theories in physics continued to impede men of later years is totally different. It is the same reason why it took so many years for his name to percolate down to academicians though Aquinas brought it in around 1250 AD itself. It reached the common man much later. This is because evil irrationalists make full use of errors of big men to the extent they can – in this case, Church continued to have is hold over academics for a long period even after Renaissance. And having used it for their evil purposes, it is easy for them to point at the same person as the culprit.

As shown in the discussion on “Advanced Civilizations of Ancient Times”, all ancient civilizations reached more or less the same level of knowledge, independent of each other, and then stagnated, as if waiting for some important piece of knowledge necessary for further progress – that piece of knowledge was Aristotle’s fundamental philosophy, his metaphysics and his logic (and even his ethics is very good contextual to his time, and generations of Englishmen were brought up on it to achieve what has been called here as the ASP Revolution.). It is because of Aristotle’s philosophy that western contribution to knowledge beyond what the “advanced civilizations of ancient times” reached, is 99.xx%.

The most important differences in terms of basics, between the religious rules (which also includes Plato and his predecessors like Parmenides and Heraclites) versus the ASP Revolution are summarized below: While religion considers reality to be illusory, ever-changing, or otherwise unknowable, Aristotelians consider it to be firm, orderly and knowable. .........

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That sentence is in bold -- But I was surprised to see it voiced on web-sites that should consider Aristotle as their Founding Father. Though some have objected to it yet he is the only philosopher to whom Ayn Rand has acknowledged debt -- as seen even in the titles of parts of Atlas Shrugged, its body etc. You can also see the difference explained at the start of "For The New Intellectual", and so many other places of her writing where she called him as the Original Founding Father of the US. She says: We owe everything to him -- which is a fact! England came to prominence with him, other-wise what was England prior to 15th century? The language in which we are dealing presently was "third rate" then, with no social recognition. Generations of men brought up on Aristotelian metaphysics, logic and even ethics is what made England a world power, America a possibility.

See more about this in the links provided by me -- there is an entire chapter "The Importance of Aristotle in Human Affairs" available in the links. Such matters as he did not use the words "A is A", or that so much of his physics was wrong, etc are too very minor.

[BaalChatzaf]

Aristotle had a bad habit (along with most other Greek thinkers) of not checking his conclusions empirically. Which is why he persisted in two major errors that could easily have been found and fixed:

1. Heavier bodies fall faster than lighter bodies. True in a viscous medium like water, false in a rare medium like air. Also true in vacuums , but Aristotle denied the existence of vacuums.

2. A force must be constantly applied for a body to be in motion. He assumed bodies wanted to be at rest. If this were the case an arrow would fall straight down after it lost contact with the bow string. Aristotle completely ignored or overlooked inertia. This major error took 1600 years to fix.

This habit of Greek thinkers to be dazzled and enchanted by their own logic lead to a priorism in theories about reality. Empirical thinking did not dominate Natural Philosophy until the 16-th century c.e.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

It is because of Aristotle's philosophy that western contribution to knowledge beyond what the "advanced civilizations of ancient times" reached, is 99.xx%.

Natural Science and technology progressed rapidly after the Aristotelian nonsense was purged. Newton did not proceed along Aristotelian lines. He was a major league experimentalist.

England became great because of gun-powder, canons and sailing ships. Once Spain was eliminated as a major sea power in 1588 Britania ruled the waves with a little competition from the Dutch, who also jettisoned Aristotelian thinking. Both the Brits and the Dutch were empiricists. Even after this England became great because of steam engines which Aristotle could not have envisioned since he denied the existence of vacuums. When water vapor condenses inside a cylinder a partial vacuum is formed. There is no way Aristotelian physics or metaphysics could produce a proper science of matter and motion

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Reason Man]

Natural Science and technology progressed rapidly after the Aristotelian nonsense was purged. ..... Even after this England became great because of steam engines which Aristotle could not have envisioned since he denied the existence of vacuums. When water vapor condenses inside a cylinder a partial vacuum is formed. There is no way Aristotelian physics or metaphysics could produce a proper science of matter and motion

Ba'al Chatzaf

(Similar stuff about Aristotle's "bad habits" etc from previous posts not produced here.)

Sorry for the delay in responding (slightly indisposed and busy with other urgent work in that state), but I think you have a problem differentiating between philosophy and particular sciences, and you expect Aristotle to deal with everything like steam-engines, rockets, DNA, nuclear bombs, oil etc. More than that there is a problem, not specific to this, but to several O’ist sites I look at, viz. reducing serious discussion to triviality by stretching arguments beyond limits. To explain this I will say that there is the photo of a lady on the left hand top corner of every page of this site, and above it words saying that in part the site is dedicated to her. I am quoting a few words from her book For the New Intellectual – Aristotle, the Father of Logic should be given the title of the world’s first intellectual, in the purest and noblest sense of the word. …. If we consider the fact that to this day everything that makes us civilized beings, every rational value that we possess – including the birth of science, the industrial revolution, the creation of US, even the structure of language – is the result of Aristotle’s influence, of the degree to which, explicitly or implicitly, men accepted his epistemological principles, men would have to say: never have so many owed so much to one man. Unquote.

You will be able to infer similar things from Atlas Shrugged, her PS comments about it, etc.

I am detailing the above words -- the degree to which, explicitly or implicitly, men accepted his epistemological principles – in my book THE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANT REVOLUTION, A Review of the Anglo Saxons against 5000 years’ history of Mankind, justifying the title, giving the details etc therein. It is Aristotelian philosophy (i.e. Reason) that upholds truth, honesty, justice, and all other virtues necessary for civilized human life; to the extent it is eroded in a society, those values fade away from that society, and accordingly, societies rise and fall on the world stage. This statement is justified as the cause for the rise, and today the erosion, of the Anglo Saxons on the world stage for the last 400 years. In another post here, Immaculate Conceptions, Greybird discusses that Ayn Rand’s view about US history / 1787 Constitution etc was lop-sided or incomplete. I do not go into the details of Ayn Rand’s view alone about that topic, or the 1787 constitution only etc. But I detail on what their lives, their achievements etc meant – all of it based on Aristotle’s philosophy alone – and what kind of erosion has happened today because of the implicit fall of that philosophy as Ayn Rand said (and not to keep repeating about minor errors of Aristotle or his wrong views in specific sciences).

I don’t think your arguments are correct from an O’ist point of view.

[BaalChatzaf]

Sorry for the delay in responding (slightly indisposed and busy with other urgent work in that state), but I think you have a problem differentiating between philosophy and particular sciences,

Science is mostly useful and abstract philosophy is mostly useless. That is a way of differentiating between the two.

Bob Kolker

[Reason Man]

Sorry for the delay in responding (slightly indisposed and busy with other urgent work in that state), but I think you have a problem differentiating between philosophy and particular sciences,

Science is mostly useful and abstract philosophy is mostly useless. That is a way of differentiating between the two.

Bob Kolker

This time the reason for delay in responding is that I had to come out of the shock of the above statement, particularly on this forum dedicated to Ayn Rand's PHILOSOPHY. Yeah, she cheated us by being "the Greatest Salesman of philosophy" and not selling any "useful science". The sub-forums on Metaphysics, Epistemology etc on this site are all useless! We have too much time to spare, so we indulge in wastage.

I don't wish to continue this dialogue further over here, it has gone far beyond my limits, but some more details will be given in another post in response to one of Barbara Branden's post: Objectivism's Plague. The above dialogue was a good example of it.

Reason Man

[Brant Gaede]

Sorry for the delay in responding (slightly indisposed and busy with other urgent work in that state), but I think you have a problem differentiating between philosophy and particular sciences,

Science is mostly useful and abstract philosophy is mostly useless. That is a way of differentiating between the two.

Bob Kolker

This time the reason for delay in responding is that I had to come out of the shock of the above statement, particularly on this forum dedicated to Ayn Rand's PHILOSOPHY. Yeah, she cheated us by being "the Greatest Salesman of philosophy" and not selling any "useful science". The sub-forums on Metaphysics, Epistemology etc on this site are all useless! We have too much time to spare, so we indulge in wastage.

I don't wish to continue this dialogue further over here, it has gone far beyond my limits, but some more details will be given in another post in response to one of Barbara Branden's post: Objectivism's Plague. The above dialogue was a good example of it.

Reason Man

Bob is not an Objectivist and does not represent himself as one. My friend Petr Beckmann also had a low opinion of philosophy. He had a scientific orientation and such people frequently can't see the forest they live in for the trees right about them. It's best to think of OL as a conglomeration of individuals not Objectivists a la Ayn Rand.

The irony of it is how people like Bob and Petr go on and on with non-scientific explications not understanding that they are defaulting into philosophical positions.

--Brant

Edited February 7, 2010 by Brant Gaede

[tjohnson]

But there is a difference between philosophy and Philosophy, with a capital 'P'. Everyone adheres to some philosophy of life but they don't expect the rest of the world to embrace it and write volumes about it. For some reason, Philosophers think they are contributing something important to mankind but mostly it's just a bunch of words.

[Selene]

But there is a difference between philosophy and Philosophy, with a capital 'P'. Everyone adheres to some philosophy of life but they don't expect the rest of the world to embrace it and write volumes about it. For some reason, Philosophers think they are contributing something important to mankind but mostly it's just a bunch of words.

GS:

These types of statements absolutely astound me.

Would you stipulate that humans are creatures and creations of their own language?

Adam

[Brant Gaede]

But there is a difference between philosophy and Philosophy, with a capital 'P'. Everyone adheres to some philosophy of life but they don't expect the rest of the world to embrace it and write volumes about it. For some reason, Philosophers think they are contributing something important to mankind but mostly it's just a bunch of words.

At least 99.99%.

--Brant