I think historically, societies have often thrived as some sort of dogma was on the rise, but ultimately, this led to failure. The Dark Ages of Europe come to mind as well as the rise and fall of many early civilizations. People usually fight back against too much suppression of creativity and intelligence.

Dear Barry,

Society had never been established and sustained  on ignorance but on intelligence, knowledge and reasoning. False structures eventually disappear fast but with  fast and blistering destructive  effects as they are not true from their foundations and with glues of irrationality than logic and not true to lead to a future as any social structure needs continuity of existence within and without among neighbors in which stability and true projections to the future are of a necessity.

In fact it is not only such pseudo social structures disappear but anything  that is false, unnatural, violent or catastrophic is innately short lived.

Dear George,

I think that ignorance was only one factor in maintaining communism. The main raison was an erroneously evaluated and badly established theory. Lenin and Stalin deformed Marx’s idea and destroyed Russia and Eastern Europe. Ignorance and fear were characteristic for their followers and executors of their orders. Ignorance is not sufficient. Evil will and brutal force = disdain of people opinion and right played the main role.

Dear Barry,

Dear All,

Your question is proper but ignorance has not been sufficient to deform societies. The determining forces and interests were greed, desire for power and often megalomania. These dictators were often talented but unscrupulous people full with energy who were able to masterly manipulate their environment. Of course, their system was built on ignorance. Ignorance can efficiently break progression and development of social changes. It is generally used even these days.  I stress, ignorance is only a side phenomenon and only the subjects of dictatorships were ordered to remain ignorant.

I disagree Andras, it's the other way around.

Everything - brutality, economic incompetence, religious fundamentalism, racial theories, megalomania and so on , are all side effects of ignorance.

The problem with ignorance is where it is promoted as a virtue.  The Catholic church for centuries suppressed learning because it challenged dogma.  Extremist Islam is now blighting the lives of millions and destroying priceless remains of civilization on absurd ideological grounds that it is idolatry.  The bizarre aspects of this are that both Catholicism and Islam learned vast amounts from studying the classical world. Aristotle was a major influence on both Christian and Muslim scholars until iconoclasts and ideologues distorted both of these great philosophies.

Communism too propagated an anti-intellectual ideology.  I remember the famous joke from the GDR "why do border guards patrol in threes? One can read, one can write and the other is there to watch two dangerous intellectuals".

Societies based on ignorance will fall.  Societies that ignore or erase the past have no future. 

Your question is rhetorical, Barry, but ignorance is moniker.

Dear George,

communism was not led by ignorant people. You have poor information.

Excuse, Barry, but these GDR's jokes are copies of soviet's and are too primitive. I have heard much of them.

Well, it all depends on what you call 'ignorance', Eugene, does not it?

Communism was led by folks who did not have a clue about physics, biology, mathematics, or for that matter even about mathematical modeling applied to economics. Neither were they well-traveled nor multilingual.

As such, they were, in fact, profoundly ignorant.

Chris,

I, personally, knew very well educated people with communist's ideas.

P.S. Communist's ideas are not much worse, than religious, and religions have very important role in any human's civilization.

The purpose of the religion is to unite people, and it do this very well.

What you hold as ignorance is what I hold as arrogance. An ignorant society is supposed to be the one, which uses same yard stick to all such acts and actions irrespective of the situation and conditioning they operate into, or the subject or object they target to, without any fear or favour. While as on the contrary  an arrogant society is the one which is intentional, selective, lack objectivity and harmful for their personal gains as such can not be termed as ignorant.

whatsoever be the case, the fact remains all such societies are deemed to doom sooner or later.  

I think we must first define "ignorance". Although I do not share these biliefs and I do think every piece of history ought to be protected this is another vision of what the world should be. It's very sad watching this happening but defining this situation as "ignorance" is, in my opinion, a huge mistake. In order to arrive to a some kind of solution we cannot think this as ignorance.

Besides US army has destroyed as much as all rest the armies/guerrillas in the world and they call it "peace process". Again, I do not shared these biliefs but I do bilieve the only way to get real peace is deposing ALL arms.

I think this a question that presupposes perfect knowledge of events. All societies, irrespective of their knowledge level have a level of ignorance (in my humble opinion). I would rephrase the question either in terms such as András puts it of "badly established theory" and/or purposeful misdirection and/or totalitarianism.

Eugene, I stand by what I said. 

I have BTW known quite a number of allegedly well-educated Western communists, left-bank types who thought an awful lot of themselves but - all they knew was literature , Sartre et al. They had zero inkling of any hard science whatsoever, would have been unable to solve a simple second-order equation, neither any true idea of economics save for unproven and untested theories, and so on. Being well read in literature is emphatically not education.

Speaking of religions (not spirituality, which is a totally separate thing), here is a rather interesting article on how they arose:

www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-90254984.html

I stress once more, Chris, that it is religion.

Dear Barry,

Like everyone I am sorry to see the destruction of ruins of the world heritage.  Those ruins were a reminder that even the most powerfull civilisation at some point collapse.  If we are to blame ignorance then we should try to minimize our own regarding these events.  Who support those ISIS fighters and what are the forces really clashing there?  Wahhabism was borned in the 18th century with the union of the house of Saud with  the religious movement leaded by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab  forr a restoration of true monotheistic worship purified of innovations, such as invoking or making vows to "holy men" or "saints". An universal classic of the union of political power with religious power.  

Wikipedia:

The 1802l attacks  on Karbala , according to Wahhabi chronicler `Uthman b. `Abdullah b. Bishr: "The Muslims"—as the Wahhabis referred to themselves, not feeling the need to distinguish themselves from other Muslims, since they did not believe them to be Muslims --

scaled the walls, entered the city ... and killed the majority of its people in the markets and in their homes. [They] destroyed the dome placed over the grave of al-Husayn [and took] whatever they found inside the dome and its surroundings ... the grille surrounding the tomb which was encrusted with emeralds, rubies, and other jewels ... different types of property, weapons, clothing, carpets, gold, silver, precious copies of the Qur'an."

Wahhabis also massacred the male population and enslaved the women and children of the city of Ta'if in Hejaz in 1803.[

The Ottoman state managed to push them back in the desert but following World War I, the Ottoman empire collapse .  The history is complex but a cartoonish version of it is that British American Oil financial capitalism aligned with the House of Saud and thus with Wahhabism against all arab secular political movement in the middle east and against the international communist in every muslim countries and against the traditional persian  Shi'a Islam ennemies.  

The financial powers controlling our democratic govements in the west are allied  with  the house of Saud but our governments pretends to be against it.  When I pay at the pump and fill my tank of gas, most of the profit goes to the financial power that depend on this alliance and so I pay for the destruction of all these heritage and for the killing of all these peoples.

Dear H. Chris,

Dear All,

Dictators or statesmen should not know physics, biology, mathematics, and not even mathematical modelling. I do not think that capitalist politicians were better educated in science than the communists. Lenin spoke several languages and was finely educated philosophically. Trotsky spoke also 2 or 3 languages and was an excellent chess player.  Dictators and leading politicians are mainly sly, ruthless and cruel. They know very well how to manipulate people and this is plentifully sufficient. This kind of people can easily find well educated people who are willing – for some money - to work for them.

I think there is only one thing what politicians should know: to be able to distinguish good and bad. I think they were and are able to see the difference. This means, they are not ignorant, simply egoistic and without ethics.     

Dear Louis,

Regarding your last sentences, are we, partisans of democracy and science in spite of our education and culture, slaves or servants of the financial super power? Are we maintainers of the most serious sins and are we deeply ignorant?  

Andras, I kindly disagree.

If politicians know about mathematical modeling applied to economics, they are not going to commit the egregious mistakes committed by many, such as Mao and others, who implemented economic reforms which simple math modeling would have shown were nonsensical, and which indeed led to widespread misery, much lowered standards of living, and in some cases starvation.

If politicians knew about evolutionary biology, they would not turn into racist monsters as some sometimes do

If politicians knew about brain structures left over by man's evolutionary process, they would understand about the ancient tribal imperatives still embedded into our brain structures and they would not believe that people with other religions or whatever should be slaughtered, as many still blithely do today. As an added benefit they would cast a better educated eye on the limitations of man's made up models of reality, inevitably flawed and/or incomplete, and also understand the differences between Godhood and religion.

The list is absolutely endless.  A firm grounding in objective science should be a requirement for people in positions of power. I could not care less if they know chess. A horrible little Austrian politician with a ridiculous moustache owned 6000 books and had read most - all of his books were vaporous ridiculous musings by folks who did not have the slightest hard science background, and therefore pontificated about racial superiority and economics and whatnot - all of which musings would have been destroyed instantly by straightforward application of simple hard science.

The list is endless, and it has always been thus throughout history. Incas were sacrificing thousands of teens yearly lest the sun god, in high dudgeon at the absence of blood, refuse to rise in the morning. The priests killed away ... all with the best of intents - protect the crops and society - because they were crassly ignorant of simple astronomical science. We are still there.

How do You think, George, was Karl Marx ignorant?

Chris,

1. About politicians. They do nothing solely.

2. About religion. If people have not common beliefs ( there are always inevitebly some beliefs, even in your case, Chris, be true), they simply can not understand each other.

Regards,

Eugene.

Hitler's library in fact contained 16,000 books some of them works of classical philosophy and even some written by Jews and banned in the rest of the 3rd Reich.  It is true that he collected books containing ridiculous musings but he also collected scientific and technical manuals and according to his close confidents had read and memorised many of them.  

That however should not be confused or conflated with any concept of 'education'. It is a myth that Hitler was an ignoramus, based largely on his lack of sophistication. He was a highly intelligent and insightful man but he was incapable of being educated because of his insane dogma and ideology.  His accumulation of facts was not an education because he could not benefit from it.  His ideology twisted every fact he absorbed into a vindication of his own already perverse beliefs.  Such a person cannot be educated because education is supposed to nurture and develop the person.  One so morally stunted as Hitler would never have been able to 'learn' anything.

Ignorance is not simply lack of knowledge, it is the inability to grow and progress from that knowledge.  Fundamentalist ideology and dogma does not allow for the use of knowledge and even wishes to destroy it.  The burning of books and the destroying of artefacts will never suppress human ingenuity and those societies that live in the dark of ignorance will wither and perish in the brilliant light of education and progress.  

Can You change people, Barry?

Not sure I get your point Eugene. Maybe it's the English, what does 'do nothing solely ' mean ? Are you saying that Mao, Stalin, Ghandi, George Bush, Churchill, Lincoln, Johnson, Putin, et al. , do nothing/ have no impact ?

Mark, about your last point, I agree, but with a probability threshold of less than 100% - either we learn all this within the foreseeable future. Or if we don't, there may not be a long term future.

Unfortunately, every time we see horrors unfold - we beat our chests, erect monuments, and wisely pledge 'never again'. Yet we see it over and over and over again. Nazism happened long after a long string of horrors, Rwanda happened long after Nazism, current events (extremely well documented) are happening long after Rwanda, and we never see the end of it - and every time, the leaders are unscientific morons who just know that they're right.

A scientist once sent me his novel theory about an aspect of the nature of reality  for assessment - in the cover letter he asserted that he was quote one hundred percent certain unquote that he was right. Guess what - i did not even read the theory and binned it. Anyone who is one hundred percent sure is not a scientist. But all those who kill and torture, including children, are one hundred percent sure.

May be I misused word, Chris. Solely, I mean alone. It is always some system, organization, and it is grounded on human's beliefs. For example, how could 25 thousands bol'schevics force more than 100 millions russians in 1917 year?

You know, in Jürgen Todenhöfer's latest book, there is a fascinating tale of how 200 fighters won over thousands.

The impact of a minority has existed since time immemorial - Bayard held a bridge alone against a whole army back in the 16th century, and won, and there are very many such examples throughout history -apartheid, etc.etc.. You could ask today, how do 4000 ISIS fighters hold the whole 2-million plus city of Mosul today ? There are very specific , well-known reasons why - it's not a mystery at all.

I, personally, don't overestimate the role of person, Chris.

I see everyday how these persons are constrained by others.

Dear H. Chris,

I can but perfectly agree with you. I have not said that it is not necessary for politicians to know science. I wanted to explain that mostly they have no idea on science.

I would have had to write: "Dictators or statesmen should not know physics, biology, mathematics, and not even mathematical modelling in order to be dictators."

I would add the lacking knowledge on system analysis. I think the work of Donella Meadows should be a compulsory teaching material for politicians and leaders http://www.donellameadows.org/archives/leverage-points-places-to-intervene-in-a-system/

Practically, they ignore it.

Dear H. Chris,

The generally existing trouble is at the beginning of your first paragraph: “If politicians know about mathematical modeling” but they do not… 

Dear H. Chris,

Your argumentation is logical, even right. I think no one could deny that real scientists should organise societies.   There is only a very tiny trouble: if a scientist becomes politician his preferences radically change and he will act as policy makers used to.  Another sad detail, politicians have their scientific consultants, and use scientific theories and results to realise their political objectives. Many politicians confirmed by their scientific consultants are “those who kill and torture, including children, and they are one hundred percent sure”.

And now, the circle is closed.   

Dear H. Chris,

ISIS Knechts are not too good examples. They use terror and extreme intimidation. The cruelness of Genghis khan.  Their killing videos were distributed not by chance.

The power of a minority is equal to the amount of money it controls.  Thomas Piketty has shown that less and less families control most of the money and the trend is accelerating. 

Dear George,

Have you ever read anything from Marx? If yes, what? Please, consider, what was implicated in the Soviet Union, in Romania and other East European countries had not much to do with the Marxism. Marx, a highly educated and talented man cannot be compared with Ceausescu, a half illiterate megalomaniac who after having had an official meal wiped his mouth in the tablecloth.

Karl Marx was a philosopher, a theorist who spent most of his productive life in the British museum reading room.  He made one serious error in his theory in believing that it would be the industrialised western European countries that would be the birthplace of the proletarian revolution.  Neither he nor Engels foresaw the disaster that would befall the countries in which this did happen and neither can really be blamed for it.

The Soviet Union and the former Warsaw Pact nations did not practice communism but an oppressive statism with the ideology as a mask.   Only two of the countries in the former Soviet empire had ever known any form of democracy so the replacement of one authoritarian system with another was no surprise.

I have memories of the GDR and the bizarre and stifling effect of statism at its extreme. The country produced good quality science and had a highly educated population but the mind numbing effect of its version of Marxist ideology kept people ignorant because it was not a good idea to be seen to think too much.

The population looked to western TV and radio for information and entertainment and those who lived outside its reach were referred to as being in the 'valley of the clueless'.  It is quite possible to be intelligent and educated but to be simultaneously kept in ignorance by al all powerful and perverse ideology.

Dear George and Barry,

It is difficult to remodel the past and calculate its likelihood, but I think if Marx or Engels had lived in the Soviet Union in the time of Stalin both would have been executed as dangerous traitors in the name of communism.

Dear Barry,

Have you ever talked with a GDR citizen on his/her real ideas? I have been grown in the socialist Hungary. As a student in 1975 I and most of my friends thought members of the Hungarian communist party as ridicule, ignorant swindlers.  People are not stupid but you cannot do much against arms. Please remember, the Soviet red army occupied Hungary till 1989.

Far from me to praise the faile communist social experiments but comparing them with rich western democraties is not a proper comparison.  Why?  Because the western democracries have instituted a world financial systems on top of the ancient colonies.  The ancient communist countries could not exploit and participated in this exploitation because they were excluded of the international finantial system.  The system is global and those living in little islands were profits are concentrated cannot say to other look at our economical system and our lifestyle.  If it is achieved by the expense of others then the comparisons is not exactly fair.  

Andras

I spoke with many GDR citizens while I was there in the 1980's and I have a number of Russian, Polish, Rumanian and Ukrainian friends and colleagues too who lived through the communist era.  When I visited the GDR I was always aware that I could leave when I wanted, not the case for those resident there.  

It always fascinated me that so many of them wanted to but oddly this was really because of the suffocating boredom of life in the 'socialist paradise'.  The driving force was economic and intellectual improvement, not necessarily antipathy towards communism.  Many remained communist long after the wall came down.

Dear Barry,

Many people really and naively believed in the nice human principles which were always repeated. Although, it was shocking when people became aware of the terrible events Stalin made in the name of communism, the happenings and incidents which came after the collapse of communism proved that Western capitalists prefer easily obtainable property. Hungary and most of ex-socialist countries were very quickly and almost perfectly plundered by our Western friends. They got everything valuable of the country. People say, communists were cruel and boring, some even stole but with the pillage of the country our development had been hampered. What people hoped was in vain and what was good in socialism – practically unlimited access to culture and free education – disappeared and we got the freedom to steal, criminality, organised crime, prostitution which was known only from American films.  In addition, there are here the best students of our Western friends, the nouvelle riches and the new class of our politicians, both thoroughly exploit the nation. I am sorry but these are the raisons why old naïve communists are believing still in communism where merely little thiefs existed.     

I think one of the problems with looking back is that we tend to filter our thoughts and emotions.  For several year after the fall of the Berlin wall there was often expressed a desire for the security of the old system.  People had lost jobs and faced a long period of uncertainty. This created the phenomena of "Ostalgia' and it was very real.

People would have fond memories of the welfare state, the camaraderie the odd security that communism brought.  It was fragile though, all that you had to ask them was "would you like to go back to it?".  That usually caused a rapid return from nostalgia to reality. The answer was invariably NO!.

In the UK we suffer from a kind of nostalgia for a golden age too.  Many people want 'independence' from the EU and to return to when 'we' were in charge.  They shout very loudly that we should control our borders.  They are more difficult to convince.  To start with 'they' were never in charge.

For me this is difficult to understand.  I remember controlled borders and that was not a good time at all.  The 'Anti-Fascist Protection Barrier' of the Inner German 'grenze' and the Berlin wall faced inwards, borders neally always do and no 'border' ever protected the people behind it.

One more note if I may, about how history unfolds.

There is a Marxist-tinged view of the "forces of history" as something akin to shifting tectonic plates, whereby individuals and statesmen and politicians are mere puppets.

Observation of history leads to the conclusion that it unfolds more like chaos theory, with lone individuals operative at the critical inflection points:

World-changing operation Barbarossa was decided by one individual only, against the unanimous misgivings of everyone around him. It is impossible to underestimate the effects of OB on world history.

Two individuals - Vasili Arkhipov and Stanislav Petrov - changed history totally. If someone else had then been in their stead, we would not be having this thread.

George W Bush changed world history single-handedly, in a way steered by his own personality, personal hangups, and knowledge background.

In democracies, often one individual sets the agenda, the society's narrative, and its tone, often artificially, to serve political goals (see the society discussion points in France under Sarkozy and Hollande - extremely different, but in both cases the people, and the press, follow. No one is discussing Sarkozy's themes any more at all, which were all the rage when he was in power.)

It is true both at macro-level and at micro-level - Mayor Koch had a huge effect on the city of New York, for instance.

The 'tectonic forces' of history are also shaped by overall trends such as population growth and/or shrinkage, immigration, environmental pressures, which in turn are also conditioned by political decisions made by individuals.

All-important technological progress is also extremely conditioned by political leadership - Sam Harris muses that , had it not been for the catholic church, the Internet would have happened in Europe in the 14th century. Or, George W . Bush - who overall had 540,000 fewer votes than Al Gore (but owing to the Electoral College system, won because of about 400 votes in Florida) - blocked stem cell research in the US (which Gore favored), thus setting back the US by years.

Chaos theory seems to be alive and well. As often, Marx sounded plausible on paper, but utterly failed in the real world.

George,

African leaders and economical elites work hand in hand with international corporations, oil companies, mining companies, arm dealers, western politicians, bankers and all under a thick cover of lies.  This not their systems but the same system we are in.

George,

the main official goal of communists was to change this politico-economic situation and to free the poor African populations as well as afro-americans in USA. And it was actually the goal of true common communists. Also they educated poor people from Asia, Africa and Latin America in soviet universities.

Louis, we all have to take care of ourselves, or others will take advantage of us.

If they can, interests will exploit anyone and anything exploitable - it is not specific to Africa at all. It is incumbent on everyone to defend themselves and their kin and kith, and statesmen their communities and nations, from potential thieves. In some cases, ignorance opens doors that should not have been opened.

Dear All,

Have a good time. I do not participate in threads where anonymous down-voters operate.

I roundly condemn the practice of anonymous down voting.  It is a practice akin to the anonymous denunciations well known in the ignorant societies I am questioning here.  Anyone who shouts down an academic discussion or surprises free speech from behind a mask is not worthy of academic debate.  Come out from that shadows and argue honestly.  If you don't your opinion and down vote are worthless. 

Napoleon,

I wll play the devi'sl advocate. You said that: ''no Society can really be Established and Sustained on Ignorance''  .

I say that all societies are established and sustaine on a certain type of enforce ignorance defined by what the fundational act prevent to revisite.  THis applies to all human socieites from the most ancient hunter gatherer , to the ancient polytheistic in all their phases, the monothesistic, the secular from the marxist to the capitalist.  There is always a fundational set of beliefs that cannot be revisited and which must be protected and thus necessaritly sustain a particular form of ignorance.  All member of any societies easily see this core of ingorance in the other societies but those so from its own core ignorance impose on his consciousness from birth to death.  Even someone that during his lifetime decided to leave his own tradition and adopt another one fall automatically into another ignorance circle from which the person judge others.  All point of views are necessarily situated from a perspective that constitue his whole world but is not the whole world.  By looking at all sort of fanatics we may wrongly confort ourself that we are not narrow mind like them but we are necessarily narrow mind, just a different sort and call heros/saint/sage/prophet/genius/founding fathers/martyrs those giving their life for creating our views.

A brief note Napoleon, a society is not a 'she' : it is 'its problems', not 'her problems'

I stress once more, that ignorance is moniker. Your question is provocative, Barry. If You don't undersrand africans, it does not mean, that You must or should name them ignorant. In their environment they are far more clever, than You.

Actually there are no any ignorance, but difference of interests.

Eugene, if you think seriously that ignorance does not exist, you should watch a 'Who Wants To Be a Millionaire' show, in any country that runs the show :-)) (I've seen it in 5 different countries) I assure you - you'll be stunned.

Alternatively, you could study the old Inca religion & its cosmology (yes, the one that says you have to slaughter heaps of teenagers lest the sun doesn't rise in the morning. Or medieval medicine ...

Today, 80% of the public apparently do not know that Nitrogen is the most common gas in the atmosphere,  52% believe that lasers are sound waves, and so on. (PEW Research figures)

I fully agree with you that ignorance absolutely cannot be blindly imputed to other cultures, but very unfortunately it does not mean either that it does not exist:

Being ignorant of the fact that Zeus makes the lightning bolts is not ignorance; knowing that Zeus makes them, however, is.

TV is separate world, Chris. It can not be the source of objective information. For more than 10 years I, personally, don't see any TV at all.

I very seldom watch it, it's on occasion a good brain-flusher after a long and hard day though, Eugene. I'm sure you'd have a far less rosy view of the world you live in if you did, just once in a long while :-)

Ignorance is evenly distributed but everyone has a different type of ignorance.  Each point of view has its necessary cluster of ignorance from which the ignorance of the other point of view is visible and look terrible.  But your point of view look equally terrible from the other point of view.  

Chris, 

The old Inca religion & its cosmology may from the way you cartooned it as a point of view were you have to slaughter heaps of teenagers but it was certainly not seen like that by them.  I do not think we can describe the american culture as shooting bearded young men in Yemen from a drone command control room in Texas.  It may be true fact but is it an accurate description of the american culture.

The summum of ignorance for me is laughing at the other ignorance.  When I see something as ignorance, the first reflex should be: what are the equivalent blindness in me that prevent me to understand that person.  Understanding does not mean approving but to see this person as a person like me but with another viewpoint.  Instead of denouncing or laughing we have  to be able to access the viewpoint of the person that we consider the most ignorant.  

Jacob Von Uexkull proposed to understand other animals and their relations and biology in general by trying to discover the specific world of each life form (umwelt) http://xenopraxis.net/readings/uexkull_foray.pdf.  I think we should try to do the same with other humans.  

http://xenopraxis.net/readings/uexkull_foray.pdf

It is not easy and in spite of his insightVon Uexkull was like all men of his time a deeply racist person.

I'm not laughing, Louis. I'm weeping. And sorry, I do not agree with you. I do not have time to try & understand people who kill teenagers out of patently nonsensical beliefs. Life is too short, and maybe the onus is on them to wisen up instead.

I believe it is deeply racist to consider that it's a case of 2 weights 2 measures, and that they are not like everybody else and that their inexcusable acts can somehow be excused because they're different.

This is my last contribution to this thread.

Hello

The history showed us that tyrans were excuted by their people.

Ignorance from my point of view does not mean formal education, but to hear the people's needs. In addition, no culture will last if it doesn;t tries to deal with factors that damaging her people. So in other words, an ignorance culture contradict the human curiosity, so logicaly this kind of culture can not exist.

Eugene,

Communism/socialism as a philosophy of social governance for equality and justice was not coined and developed for Africa but for the very poor people which they called it proletarians in the very countries these "revolutionaries" emerged. It was in Russia, Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America that these theories took deep penetrations and approvals and also commotion in America not in Africa and not for Africa,  and claimed the western monopolized way of economic living  will be best fit for communism to take root  in the future as they claim the working people live in more hardship than the rich which is apparent now with only 1% of the western society controls  almost the total wealth of that society. There were only few African countries who jumped in to that wagon and sang for some time.

George mentioned  important point though, African leaders today are the cancers of their society well served and fed by western governments and profit touting companies with hypnotizing effects of corruptions and abandoning their society to the kingdom of poverty.

Chris made a good point as to who shapes society from the perspective of a dynamical system/chaos theory. Singularities do in fact give shapes to dynamical systems, some singularities pull the whole system to rotate around them and determine the way the system behaves. Leading political figures are dangerous, treacherous singularity of their society which shape their society or beyond if their sphere of influence is wider. 

Eugene

I cannot understand why this thread is discussing Africans, as if Africans represent a single entity.  My question was about ignorance and society not about ethnicity or politics.  Louis is correct in saying that ignorance is evenly distributed.

Ignorance is not about one culture or another nor is it about lack of education or resources.  In many cases it is Wilful Ignorance, an actual desire to keep the people in ignorance.  That was the driving force behind the iconoclasts and the religious zealots. It was also the dogma of Nazis and Stalinists alike.  Deny everyone knowledge and they are subservient.

No one ever got smarter by denying knowledge and experience.  Ignorance is the ally of the despot and the weapon of the tyrant.   

The question specifically addresses visible ignorance and act on it to affect society ( for progress or regress)  - complete absence of knowledge of science or otherwise and shear detest for it. In this case as development of society is based on what humans do to better their lives  creating and utilizing bridges, highways, electronic medias, planes, ships, cars, medicine, food, environment, etc,  which all are products of knowledge of science and technology and those earlier societies were not as such ignorant but extremely local but need all knowledge to advance their society and consolidate their power.

Therefore it is very hard to assert they were established and developed from ignorance per se. But the current kind of acts of ignorance the question addresses is to regress society to the beginning of time.  

In Canada like everywhere else we try to actively ignore the harmfull effects on the earth eccosystem of our economical activities.  If you go watch a movie, you are forced to watch advertizing of how good for the forest is the extraction of tar sand.  Billion of dollars campaig to convince us that our lifestyle depend on oil and we cannot do thing differently.  In the last 10 years, half of the scientists in the federal environment agency have been layed off and all other scientists working for the federal government have been banned from speaking with the public and the public cannot even request information from them.  Our prime minister belong to some evangelical sect that does not believe in biological evolution, think litterary the biblical story of the chosen people and in the defense of the holy land.  They belief that everybody should be allowed to have guns.  We had a legislation forcing the registration of guns which was put in place after a massacre of 12 women in Ecole Polytechnique by a man who thought that educated women were dangerous feminists.  That laws was banished as an constraints  on the total freedom to have gun.  A good proportin of the mining companies operating in the world are canadian (only in legal status) because canada provides them an heaven and financial and legal protection.  Whatever irresponsible act they commit in the world, canada will defend them and will not hold them responsible.  I can go on and on of example where ignorance combine positively with profits and where long time consequences, cost for other, cost for futur generation are volontary forgotten, in purposefull ignorance enforcement.

Barry,

my answer was: Ignorance is moniker (or nickname). Africa and all the other is not my initiative.

Oil is not ignorance, Louis. It is interests. In Russia it is the same.

You can not change people. All attempts of church, communists and so on failed.

Have you seen any society without lie, dear colleagues? The purpose of lie is to do somebody ignorant.

"Can a society or civilisation be established and sustained on ignorance and dogma"... to me is a more a moral question, more than a historic or archaeological question.

Civilization (when was used by archaeologist in the middle of XX century) or society (a unit of analysis invented by sociologists in XIX century) are not a moral enterprise around rational issues. That´s why modern liberalism or socialism don´t have existencial answers provided by religions for centuries. 

Why endure Roman Empire? 

Finley, Moses, ‘Manpower and the Fall of Rome’, in his Aspects of Antiquity: Discoveries and Controversies (Harmondsworth, 1966), chp. 12; rpt. in Carlo M. Cipolla (ed.), The Economic Decline of Empires (London, 1970), pp. 84–91.

Grant, Michael, The Fall of the Roman Empire: A Reappraisal (New York, 1976; rpt. London, 1997), chp. 7, ‘The People against the Emperor’.

Why colapse the Maya´s cities?

Fagan, Brian. The Rise and Fall of Maya Civilization. In: Ancient Misteries, pg. 76-94. Ballatine Book, 1999

The unexpected collapse (to the CIA; NSA, and Holllywood) of Soviet Empire

Richard K. Herrmann & Richard Ned Lebow (Editors). Ending the Cold War: Interpretations, Causation, and the Study of International Relations (New Visions in Security), 2004

Josep Fontana. Por el bien del imperio. Una historia del mundo desde 1945. Pasado & Presente, 2014.

And why societies rise? These are some hypothesis

Searle, John R. Making the social world. The structure of human civilization. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010

Michael Tomasello, Why We Cooperate,  Boston Review Books, 2009

Eric Hobsbawn, The Invention of Tradition.

And about the ignorance and stupidity of people

Carlo M. Cipolla, The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity

Hannah Arendt. The Origins of Totalitarianism.

Doko,

the hordes of Vandals could never destroy Rome empire, if it had no internal causes to fall. It concerns also USSR and so on.

Today, we learn quickly if any damage is inflicted on heritage sites, but previously the damage done was unknown to the world. This has made Asia Minor a Graveyard of Ancient Art. The society that inflicted the damage has merged with the indigenous people and their status has elevated somewhat, but still able to do further damage.

The society has managed to survive partly with the help of the military (western) who pay dearly for military bases and other favours. 

Mainz, Germany

Dear all,

Here is a story from yesterday, based on an incident at Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA. The story appeared as an opinion piece in the New York Times, and was written by an author on campus at the time of the incident.

"When the Left Turns on Its Own"

by

Bari Weiss

I quote from the opening:

Bret Weinstein is a biology professor at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., who supported Bernie Sanders, admiringly retweets Glenn Greenwald and was an outspoken supporter of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

You could be forgiven for thinking that Mr. Weinstein, who identifies himself as “deeply progressive,” is just the kind of teacher that students at one of the most left-wing colleges in the country would admire. Instead, he has become a victim of an increasingly widespread campaign by leftist students against anyone who dares challenge ideological orthodoxy on campus.

This professor’s crime? He had the gall to challenge a day of racial segregation.

---End quotation

This episode ended up with a mob of students calling for Weinstein's resignation.

See:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/opinion/when-the-left-turns-on-its-own.html?_r=0

There is also a short video of an interview with the professor, available and of possible interest:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_j9nFced_eo

This strikes me as a good example of illiberal attitudes on campus. In effect, whatever the mob does in the interest of a "higher goal" dare not be questioned. They alone decide what is included in the scope of their higher goal and who is to be excluded from further discussion. This basically is an attempt to intimidate and decide all questions of interest by threat of exclusion.

The technique is, in my judgment, quasi-fascist. (This is not a word I would not use widely or without due consideration.) It seems clear to me that the state and federal governments must act to support freedom of speech and opinion on campus.

H.G. Callaway

Is liberal democracy in decline?. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_liberal_democracy_in_decline [accessed Jun 2, 2017].

It is for academics to challenge imbecile students such as these.  This can cut both ways.  Where institutions permit students to harrass academics they shoud be subjected to reverse no-platforming.  Or as we call it in the UK Grey Listing.

A grey listed institution loses all research collaboration, all visting lecturers, all grading moderators and is ostracised until it learns to behave.

The illiberals on campus soon find themselves shunned by all and in the dark.  I fopr one will not participate with institutions that deny free speech.  If we all boycotted them this bunch of prima-donna fascists would be extinct within a semester. 

Dear Callaway,

My daughter is studying at Simon Fraser University in political science and gender studies.  She has participate in the creation of ''safe spaces'' at Simon Fraser which are places that are supposed to be supportive of women having been abuse or rape, etc.  She visited that ''safe space'' and realized that the level of sensitivity in there does not make her feel safe in there.  Whatever you do can be interpreted as in negative way.  So she does not feel safe in the ''safe space''.  

There is also a new rising cause for the political correctness:  ''cultural appropriation''.  The concept is ludicrous and could be the subject of a very funny movies but it is not funny since some people takes this very seriously.  The whole history of humanity is based on cultural appropriation. Wearing a mexican poncho is now a grave act of cultural appropriation!  

Mainz, Germany

Dear Turner and Brassard,

Many thanks for your thoughtful and supportive comments on the issue at Evergreen state. My own view is that the states must act, through their legislatures and departments of education to put the administrators back in line. Too often, I suspect they are simply managerial careerists and bureaucratic empire builder, who cater to the hyper-sensitivities of the student activists, while raising tuition rates through the ceiling.

In effect, the administrators use the students against the faculty, no matter how stupid the complaints. Socially and politically, though, the students are implicitly trained to live inside protective bubbles --which in the real world, they will chiefly find in association with authoritarian structures.Just as they pay sky-high tuition in exchange for  their  academic "protection," they will be more inclined to pay in deference for some similar  "protection" once they graduate.

This makes no sense socially or politically--not in any free society. Destroy the universities as locations of the freedom of thought, discussion and expression, and we will surely live in ignorance.

H.G. Callaway

Dear Callaway,

I watch this long and interesting interview with  Bret Weinstein.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fEAPcgxnyY

The ridiculous concept of 'safe space' is a hideously distorted and magnified version of its predecessor 'empowerment'.

While it is essential to have accountability and the ability to contribute the concept of 'empowerment' facilitated neither.  This was simply a shift of power from one actor to another, not a balancing of the power.   Those 'empowered' were just as likely to abuse that power as those who went before them.

This preposterous notion of creating 'safe spaces' where one can harbour and nurture ones own prejudices and ideological shibboleths creates a form of tribalism and promotes ignorance and exclusion rather than tollerance and understanding.  The protective bubble is a prison, a dark corner to hide in.

A society that looks inwards and eschews the views of others, a society that censors,  no-platforms and rejects all other views is doomed and academia is on that path.  Universities are meant to be places where our views and values are challenged.  Education itself is a challenge not an affirmation and if we want to live full enlightened lives being offended, being challenged, refused, obstructed and even at times insulted is the long hard road to enlightenment.  Protective bubbles lead nowhere.

It was once said a ship in the harbour is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.   

Mainz, Germany

Dear Turner & readers,

Your criticism of the concept of  "safe spaces," is well stated and well argued. The concept fosters tribalism and defensive attitudes rather than social engagement and intellectual cross-currents. It belongs to the cult of victim-hood --the idea that the way to get ahead in life is to demonstrate one's status as victim. It also trades on an emphasis on "them vs. us.' This, apparently, is only countenanced in the case of classes of demonstrated victims. But, as you put it, "The protective bubble is a prison."

Now, I wonder to what extent you may have explored the idea that what is going on in the construction of "protective" ideological bubbles is an imitation of what goes one elsewhere in society. Have our various elites also been constructing their own protective bubbles? Say, e.g., "gated communities," or privileged institutional positions  --constructed in relation to dependable political configurations? Perhaps many such things arise simply through confluence of interests. But I think that there is a good deal of " identity politics" in our various establishments, social, economic, governmental, etc. It seems to me that people established in various sorts of institutions are not much subject to criticism, whatever the shenanigans that go on, but are protected by forms of institutional loyalty--while the outsiders have no such protection. Doesn't this belong to our picture of growing inequalities around the world?

I'd be interested see related comments. Can a society be constructed based on general ignorance of self-serving practices within major institutions? One may hear the frequent call for " transparency" in the background. 

H.G. Callaway

Mainz, Germany

Dear Turner & readers,

Here follows a short interview, originally broadcast on NPR. I quote from the transcript:

There's a hidden force shaping our politics, says author Richard Reeves, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and it's hidden in plain sight.

In his forthcoming book, Dream Hoarders, Reeves argues that the top 20 percent of Americans — those with six-figure incomes and above — dominate the best schools, live in the best-located homes and pass on the best futures to their kids.

"They are members of the American upper-middle class, who, through various ways of rigging the market ... are essentially hoarding the American dream," he tells NPR's Steve Inskeep.

Originally from England, Reeves has been "startled" to see what he calls "opportunity hoarding mechanisms" in America.

---End quotation

See:

http://www.npr.org/2017/05/31/530843665/top-20-percent-of-americans-hoard-the-american-dream

You can read the transcript or also listen to the recording of the interview. The recording runs about 7 Min. Part of the message is that those " hoarding" the American dream are often not even aware of their own privileged position. On the other hand, those not advantages often fail to see what is going on.

H.G. Callaway

Dear Dr. Turner,

Big Question!! I want also know why United States Citizens couldn't understand 9/11? I think that societies, usually, are established by violence and sustained by ignorance.

Best,

D.