Arnold Kling presents a simple theory of history:
When wise people are influential, good things happen. When unwise people are influential, bad things happen.
I will just offer two data points. During the era of the American founding, influential people included George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, and other men who had great wisdom. Today, we have social media “influencers” who are idiots.
In politics, the Democratic Party is drifting way to the left, influenced by Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, the Squad, and a cadre of young activists. None of them has any wisdom.
The Republican Party looks worse. The new Speaker of the House does not strike me as wise. Nor does the prospective Republican Presidential nominee.
Contemporary journalism is a disaster. The influential writers are partisan hacks. No wise person could trust Paul Krugman or Tucker Carlson.
Most galling of all is the disconnect between influence and wisdom in higher education. The dominant influence at universities used to be faculty. And they were faculty in real disciplines, not grievance studies. Professors can be petty and juvenile, but there was enough wisdom to maintain a decent atmosphere for seeking truth and reasoning with rigor.
Today, the influence comes from administrators. Most notorious are the DEI administrators. They are not at all wise. The critical theorists and the grievance studies professors cause harm both psychologically and intellectually.
I suspect that the rise of foolish influencers reflects the new information environment. The Internet rewards tribalism, not wisdom.
“Today, the influence comes from administrators. Most notorious are the DEI administrators. They are not at all wise. The critical theorists and the grievance studies professors cause harm both psychologically and intellectually.”
“I suspect that the rise of foolish influencers reflects the new information environment. The Internet rewards tribalism, not wisdom.”
All his example fields (representation, academia, journalism) are rendered obsolete for serious people by disintermediation, and thus increasingly are clown-populated. Once serious people are gone, everything reverts to tribalism. It’s not the internet causing that; the internet just shuffled around the clown-wisdom distribution a bit. Looking for wisdom under the old brands won’t work. I guess it is taking Kling a while to catch up.
Some reasoning makes no sense. He says the Republican party is worse but then talks only about DEI, which is a product of the extreme wing of the Democratic party and is influencing the Democratic party overall.
Every human system gets corrupted after a while.
The DNC is run on a Leninist model where loyalty to the party comes first and is strictly enforced. The RNC is a happy-go-lucky shambles, yet I know which one I prefer.
The controlling faction in the Republican party, the neocons, are every bit as evil as the Democrat left. Of the 250 plus wars since 1945, the US has initiated at 80% of them, and almost every one was initiated against a country at peace with us and our allies. We have been fighting in Somalis for more than 30 years (our longest war). We are still fighting in Iraq after 20 years, and in Syria we are supporting ISIS (!!!) and looting the Syrian oil fields.
We used to have an evil party and a stupid party. Now both parties are evil and stupid.
“All his example fields (representation, academia, journalism) are rendered obsolete for serious people by disintermediation, and thus increasingly are clown-populated.”
They were always largely parasitic. No one learns anything in Academia but how to be an academic. Even Finance is mostly arbitrage, as are all the humanities.
What can you DO? That is the survival or not question of the future.
Take a look at Kling’s deep thoughts about immigration and ask yourself whether he’s wise or a fool.
I suppose we could find a man of wisdom, if we could find a man who had a proven history of managing money well and overseeing major projects such as construction projects.
It would be an added bonus if he had some quirky personal appearance, such as Cheeto-orange skin and blond hair.
Ceck:
No can do, Buckaroo.
Orange Man’s refusal to concede the fakest and gayest election in all of human history to the U.S. government’s living golem proves that, actually, he was never fit to ostensibly hold office at all.
No matter if USG loses two wars and aligns Russia and China in consequence thereof.
But the true moral of the story is that if you fit just the right bill the presidential playpen is but a legal name change away.