Back from a hiatus, my intellectual rantings come in periodical outpourings. Went to California for a week, Santa Cruz, SF. Good brewpub in Arcata, Humbolt brewery, love the red nectar. Was moved by Obama's victory speech, I am wary of politicians who can stir my emotions. I can't buy into the whole "hope" thing, not because I don't have hope, but because I know better than to invest it on a politician. Some people thought that some desperate false-flag terrorism or other fascist power grab would take place, but they are missing the fact that its not only republicans who are part of the power structure. Big business, intel, and other players we despise as having hijacked our government can play either side of the game, they'll support democrats or republicans, so long as the status quo is maintained. Obama is acceptable to the ruling class because he is not going to rock the boat. He is a friend of Israel (speech to AIPAC) and is not going after the intel community (retroactive immunity). Hope is OK, but I would rather place it on the rationality of the human mind than a politician.
The rationality of the human mind and its need for creative expression are topics Lewis Mumford adresses in his 1966 book The Myth of The Machine. I've been wanting to read Mumford for a while, as he is frequently sourced by anthro/soc writers. The relation between him and Paul Shepard is obvious from the initial 40 pages I have read so far. He is dealing with the historical paradigm/preconception of human history as being the development of man the tool-maker, homo faber. This view, which we are somewhat beyond today, sees technology as the driving force of cultural development to the level of civilization. He explains how this comes from the transposition of modern views, and the emphasis of archaeology on material remains (stone tools, architecture). Its is his hypothesis that use of technology is a byproduct of the real key to human culture, human thought and its unique vehicle, symbolic language.
Rather than tool making to increase food supply being the key to the growth of intelligence, Mumford sees toolmaking as connected to the artisitic dimension born of mans need to express "...superorganic demands and aspirations". (Mumford, 8) He balances his emphasis on rationality with the observation that man can be most irrational. He relates this to the minds capacity for adaptabilty seen in phenomena such as uncertainty, creativity, and counterproductive behavior. We are not simply instictual, but have the freedom of creative thought. As a counterbalance to this creative unpredicability, we create ordered systems to explain the natural world. (Mumford, 39)
The parellels between this and Shepard's ideas are blatant, if you compare this to earlier entrys.
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