Those of us alive today and in a position to be reading a blog, like this one, are, on the whole, a rather arrogant lot. Just look at what we're capable of: the best of technology, the vastness of knowledge, the widespread access to information, the high level of our standard of living, our overall rate of literacy and general level of education. We are witness to wonders only dreamt of by our forebears.
This tends to make us arrogant, you know? Who else has accomplished so much? Who else has made as many advances as us in the last, oh, just say, half-a-century? We've deposed monarchies, de-mythologized religion, discovered some of the deepest secrets of matter, send quasi-intelligent probes to distant planets. We've globalized trade, spread democracy around like fertilizer, and are literally capable -- even if not so inclined ... at the moment -- of destroying the planet. Who has ever done what we have done? No one, ever. We're the best that's been here yet, or so we like to think. Yes, arrogance is as simple as thinking you're better than someone else.
But, for all we can do, what do we really know? Do we really understand nature? Can we explain the phenomenon of consciousness? If we're so smart and powerful, why can't we ensure that every person on the planet has clean water and enough to eat, a roof over their heads, or that we all can live free of fear? Who knows what money really is, or how it works, or how our finance systems function, or what ideologies are and which ones we're individually and personally susceptible to? Why can't we recognize injustice when it stares us in the face? Why can't we do what is right, even if we know that to do so would perhaps reduce our own power? Who knows the difference between data, information, knowledge and wisdom? When did data become more valued and important than wisdom, in fact? Who understands the difference between a society, a culture, and political system? Who of you can even describe the difference between wave and particle theories of physics, or even know that there are different theories? Why is it that in the most informed, allegedly enlightened, knowledgeable, and supposedly advanced ages the world has ever known, we have so many who don't know the sun revolves around the sun and the sun around the center of our galaxy and our galaxy ... well, you get the idea.
There is so much we just don't know, either individually or collectively, but it doesn't stop us from looking down upon those who came before us: be it just a couple hundred years (that silly Descartes still believed in a soul) or a couple of millennium (the Ancient Greeks couldn't calculate their way out of a wet paper bag) and other than piling up rocks, what do the Ancient Egyptians have to show for themselves? Yeah, nobody has ever had their stuff together like we do, eh?
We look down on those who came before us for two primary reasons: (1) we consider them less developed, rather childlike and, OK, I'll say it, primitive, and (2) we can't begin to understand them; that is, meet them on their terms. Arrogance, you should know, is simply a form of blindness, no more and no less. If you think you know it all, what can you possibly learn from someone else? Truth be told, we're neither informed nor as smart as we like to think we are, and so we're blind to what we might be able to learn from those who came before us.
No, for the observant reader of the past few posts, it should be clear that yesterday still has a lot to tell ... if we had but the ears to hear, and the eyes to see.
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