Thoughts

Just doing some re-calibrating...

Modern psychologists agree that the human mind is made up of equal parts nature and nurture. Hence, 50% of who we are is determined by the world around us. If we hold this to be true, then the examination and analysis of culture is a crucial activity, one that has the potetial to yield enormous results. However, it is also a laborious activity, requiring hours of study and research. It's also easy to screw up. The question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" can be modified in cultural study to say "Which came first: the cultural product or the environment that produced it?" In short, where does culture begin and where does it end? The output – that which determines "culture" (art, literature, advertisments, etc.) – is at once a product of the culture and a producer of culture, resulting in a constant push-pull relationship between a culture and its members. Just like the electron, we can never know with absolute certainty the position of culture and its velocity, not least because publishing a corpus on such a phenomenon would inevitably change that velocity.

Luckily, we can look back at past cultures and analyze those with a closer degree of accuracy. This of course brings its own host of problems, most of which stem from the well-publicized unreliability of memory. But, nevertheless, looking at the past has proved itself to be much more fruitful than trying to put your hands around the effervescent present.

For the past few months, I've studied the past. Namely, the 20th century. This has been mostly through the lens of intellectual achievement, and not as much physical history. I've been whirlwinded through Einstein, the Frankfurt School, WIlliam James, Niehls Bohr, the atom, the division of the atom, etc. etc.. My goal was to trace the cultural history of the world since 1900. (This goal may or may not be shortened to the cultural history of the United States, or the cultural history of Western civilization, but even that term is inaccurate in my opinion, given the differences between culture in France, England, and the U.S., for example)

So let's get down to the meat and potatoes. Our great nation, the United States of America, is usually characterized as the alpha-male of history. We were born of a later generation than England or Germany, and as such, we don't have a complex, entangling history like these other countries. We were born amidst an era of rationalism – the Enlightenment – which purportedly has some effect on our values and beliefs, and, sure enough, America is constantly characterized for its pragmatic approach to life. This is not idle speculation either, seeing as most philosophical output from the U.S. has been of the pragmatic nature. Most, not all. We are unique in that we are the only country that has stuck with its governmental system since day one. Thus, the spirit of Capitalism and Democracy is indelibly wound up in all things American. What words come to mind when you see the colors red, white and blue? Democracy and Capitalism. We are brought up to have a reverence for these twin dragons, and this undoubtedly affects the America conscience. Other countries' political systems come and go with the will of the people, but Americans will never abandon theirs.

America is also based on a certain conceit that isn't mentioned very much. That conceit is this: money=happiness. Hence, money is an ever-present source of tension for Americans. Yet, at the same time, it is the device – developed out of necessity – that lets American society function. A quick glance around the magazines in the library shows the extraordinary degree to which money affects society – nearly every magazine alludes to the saving of money, a crisis in money, or how to solve money problems.

Anthropological and archaeological studies show that money has been around almost as long as humans, and that it is necessary for any complex society to develop. But surely not to the degree which we see today. Money is seen as one of the chief measures of value in American society (one who has no money is basically a non-person, unable to eat, sleep or live anywhere.). The current American debt is 11 trillion dollars. That's $11,000,000,000,000, This number attests to the sheer vastness our society has grown to. As a result, the average person feels ineffectual and small, like the world at large is complex and frightening, ruled by machinery high in the skyscrapers of Washington and Wall Street.