Will Philosophers Save the World?

Humans have many personality types, as you’ll know from your friends and from online quizzes. These personalities were a result of our evolution, and each one would have been useful to our hunter-gatherer ancestors. Although some may have been more useful than others in different contexts, each would have been valued as necessary for the survival of the tribe. Just as some people are night owls and some are morning larks because both would have been needed to keep watch at different times, sometimes aggressive people would be needed, sometimes negotiators, sometimes planners, sometimes mystics, etc.

Then about 11,000 years ago, people started farming. And very few people like farming. It’s back-breaking and menial work, and for most personality types they cannot fulfil what they see as their role in society. It’s no wonder then that people tried to claw their way out of farming and into a more comfortable profession. But given that the vast majority of people need to keep farming to avoid mass starvation, only personality types that can successfully fulfil a social need will be able to escape the farms.

The first people to do this were probably shamans, who may have been the most respected people in the tribe before the agricultural revolution and managed to keep hold of their position. Göbekli Tepe, a mysterious complex which was built around the time of the agricultural revolution, seems to be some sort of temple. In the Bronze Age, smiths, merchants and warriors emerged. Then later came the artists, bureaucrats, politicians, teachers, philosophers, etc. Societies became more complex as more aspects of human psychology were expressed and empowered.

In my mind’s eye, this is reminiscent of a lava lamp. As the wax at the bottom heats up, globules form, separate and rise upwards. We could then call these groups globules, and history can be seen from this perspective as the history of globules competing with one another for the dominant position. Each globule has its own talents, goals and perceived role in society. Individuals in the same globule will usually work together to further their mutual interests, forming institutions such as churches, parliaments, universities, trade unions, etc.

Globules sometimes form alliances: by using their different talents in concert, they can become more influential than they would have been on their own. The most successful alliance between globules in history has been between warriors and priests. Max Weber called the state the monopoly of legitimate violence – warriors provided the violence, priests provided the legitimacy. Nonetheless, like in all marriages, there were arguments over who would be on top. For most of its history, warriors dominated the Roman Empire, but by the time Alaric the Visigoth sacked Rome priests were in the ascendency.

A dramatic shift happened 200 years ago, when the Industrial Revolution led to many people moving to cities to work in factories. In Marxist terms this was the creation of the proletariat, but from this perspective on history we could call this the rapid expansion of the smith globule, replacing the farmers as the foundation of society. Smiths are those who use technology to produce goods, which encompasses everything from making swords with a smelter, making cars with machinery and making software with a computer. But like with farming, not everyone is suited to being a smith, creating widespread alienation. Only a minority of people are smiths by nature, yet most people are forced to work and think like smiths by economic circumstances.

The Rise of Politics

Another important change happened 200 years ago. Politicians have existed since ancient Greece, but they rarely gained full control of the state. However after the American and French revolutions, politicians controlling the state started becoming the norm. Politicians claim to represent the People – winning an election is generally the best way to prove this, but many 20^th Century politicians were so confident that they represented the People that they saw no need to confirm with the People that this was actually the case. Their commitment to an ideology was supposedly proof enough.

Harari argues that humanism can be classified as a religion, and that liberalism, communism and fascism can be considered different sects of that religion. We can explore why he’s wrong in another post, but if he is right, then politicians are the priesthood of humanism. After the Scientific and Industrial Revolutions, humanity began to see itself as the force that shaped the world, rather than God. Politicians, as representatives of the People, were in the unique position of being able to try to embody humanist ideas. As such, they were able to replace priests as the globule that provided the state with legitimacy. At the same time, they were able to cut the head off of the warrior globule, sometimes literally. The aristocracy (the descendants of the most successful warriors) were rendered historically irrelevant. In most cases this takeover has been so successful that politicians completely control the direction the state takes, although warriors sometimes refuse to take orders from politicians, leading to coups and military juntas.

Politicians aren’t necessarily good leaders. Priests only had to represent God, who made His will clear in His Book. But because politicians try to represent millions of people who have different interests and values, parliaments can resemble a church trying to organise a crusade while at the same time going through a schism. At their core, politicians are influence traders – using their talent for rhetoric they try to persuade you to give them your influence (e.g. your vote), which they will then exert on the apparatus of the state in your name. However not only does this come into conflict with their attempts to embody humanist ideas (even the most idealistic politician looks cynical sometimes), this also leaves them susceptible to influence from other globules. This is helped by the fact that ‘the People’ is not a monolithic entity, and people will generally view a globule more favourably than others, perhaps because they align with their values and they would join that globule if they could. This is how even in democracies vested interests seem to call the shots.

How did merchants become kings?

Historically, merchants have played a vital role in bringing societies out of a dark age, making new connections and spurring technological and social change, and being greatly respected as a result. The Beaker People were likely merchants who brought bronze working to Neolithic Western Europe. After the Bronze Age collapse, the Phoenicians rebooted civilisation by building a trade network across the Mediterranean. In both these cases, having spurred change, the merchant globule was supplanted by the warrior globule which was better at using the new technologies to their advantage: bronze-wielding Proto-Indo-European warriors swept across Europe after the Beaker People, and the Phoenician colony Carthage was eventually defeated by the warrior-centric Romans.

The equivalent golden age of merchants in the modern era would be the 16^th to 19^th Centuries, with the Portuguese explorers, and later the Dutch and British Empires. Although priest-backed Spain was the first to take advantage of the discovery of the New World, it was the merchants who broke down the narrow worldview of the Middle Ages. And they took advantage of how vast and rich they discovered the world to be, creating outfits such as the Dutch and British East Indian Companies.

Eventually the merchant era came to an end. Both of these companies came to be nationalised by their respective states. The European empires declined and new, state-centric ideologies emerged. Just like in the Bronze and Iron Ages, it looked like that the merchants, having built a new world, would be supplanted by those who could most effectively use violence in that new world. The fear of what the implications of this would be is exemplified by George Orwell’s 1984.

Yet this didn’t happen. The state-centric ideologies fell apart, and we are now faced with the opposite problem: increasingly weak states unwilling to do anything which might displease the merchants. A huge amount of thinking and writing has already gone into trying to explain this, but from this perspective on history I think we can point to four reasons:

1)      In previous ages merchants have been influential but quite small in the scale of their operations. A merchant would rarely own more than one ship. But developments in accounting and finance in the Renaissance and early modern period led to the emergence of a new form of organisation called a company. These allowed merchants to greatly expand the assets and employees at their disposal, making them much bigger fish in the social pond.

2)      The invention of nuclear weapons made the warrior globule terrifyingly powerful, but for that very reason they are forced to be extremely careful when making threats. So rather ironically, becoming more powerful has made them less influential, because the moves they can make when dealing with a threat are limited. Although nuclear war is certainly a possibility, the warrior globule is no longer as reckless as it used to be, creating the most peaceful period in human history. Merchants thrive in such a peaceful world, since it makes it much easier to break down economic barriers between nations, which now need to find prosperity through trade not war.

3)      Scientists have a better relationship with merchants than they do with the state. The bedrock of our civilisation is science, and so those who can stimulate scientists’ brains the most effectively will have the technological advantage. Scientists require freedom of thought in order to work well, which is not something anxious states can always provide. The Soviet Union’s reliance on bureaucracy and state-control of information flows led to the Chernobyl disaster, which Mikhail Gorbachev believes was the cause of the Soviet Union’s collapse. By contrast, merchants will usually give scientists as much freedom and resources as they can afford if they think their research will make them money.

4)      Merchants created their own ideology: consumerism. It is the idea that happiness can be found by spending money on products. It’s quite a shaky proposition, not least as it’s responsible for the rise in obesity and environmental deterioration in recent decades. Consumption will give you a dopamine spike, so to avoid dissatisfaction, you need to speed up your consumption so that the gaps between fleeting pleasures are minimised. In extreme cases, people will prioritise working so that they can spend more money over spending time with friends and family, leading to relationship breakdown. Consumerism could be seen as an attempt to make the world addicted to giving money to merchants, which they use to ensure that they remain the dominant globule. In fact there is a contradiction between consumerism and neoliberalism - it can be dangerous to make people consumerists and then limit how much they can consume, as the UK found out in 2011 when people smashed shopfronts and stole TVs in response (at least partly) to austerity. But consumerism speaks to people’s material desires, penetrating even the Soviet Union in its final years, making it a successful strategy despite its flaws.

This is not a conspiracy. Merchants are consumerist true believers, and perhaps this explains why they pursue economic growth at whatever cost. They believe that they only need another million in the bank, another vintage car to show off, and then they’ll be happy – but they never are.

To claim that there is a conspiracy among the business elites would be to give them too much credit. The reality is that they are far too disorganised and short-sighted to come up with a secret evil plan for the world. They are quite open about their plan for the world: the free market. In other words, merchants free to do as they please. Ever since the 2008 financial crash, the flaws of the free market have become increasingly obvious, from melting glaciers to food banks.

Of course to lay the blame at the door of everyone with a knack for business would be a gross oversimplification. The guy who runs your local Indian restaurant is probably not a member of the business elite. The only way we could say he is socially dominant is that the prevailing wisdom says that the government should give him as much freedom as feasible. There’s nothing wrong with giving small businesses leeway to grow if they work well. It’s the most powerful merchants who are wrecking the world. 

Most merchants do not support nationalistic or xenophobic movements – why would they, when they profit so much from an open, peaceful, interconnected world? However some individuals seem to understand the usefulness of xenophobia and use the resources at their disposal to actively spread it, notable examples being Rupert Murdoch and the Koch Brothers. The merchants did not create nationalistic movements, but some encourage them and all stand to benefit from them. Nationalism is very convenient for the merchants, because it redirects anger that would otherwise be directed at them because of the free market’s flaws. Sadly that anger is instead directed at the most excluded members of society, and those who are trying to improve the welfare of everyone.

Nationalism gives merchants the opportunity to slip lower taxes and weaker regulations into government policy, shiny packaging for policies which would otherwise be seen as flagrant money grabs. And with the Left busy defending itself from nationalism, there is no consensus within the electorate to stop the merchants from being so irresponsible, greedy and heartless. However, this conflict does have the effect of galvanising the Left into action and making it crystal clear in their minds that they need to win.

Who can rival the merchants?

Philosophers have a talent for critical thinking, their goal is to solve the world’s mysteries, and they see their role as generating ideas that their tribe can use. For most of human history they were probably shamans, like the priest globule. Only in the Iron Age did they emerge as a distinct group. Although the ancient Greek philosophers might spring to mind, I would argue that Jesus of Nazareth and Siddhartha Gautama were among the most important members of this globule in history. They generated ideas which priests subsequently used to become the dominant globule for over a thousand years. Under the reign of Christianity, Islam and Buddhism, philosophers became theologians, put to work finding justifications for their religion’s contradictions.

The invention of the printing press and the discovery of the New World made people re-examine old certainties and broke the shackles that tied philosophers to religion. Allured by the mysterious world now opened up to them, philosophers developed ‘natural philosophy’, which would evolve into science. Science is a refined form of reflecting on the world, and is itself an astounding achievement - it is the first conscious attempt to increase consciousness as far as possible, and so is arguably the most important step in the evolution of conscious life since the eye. For the first time, philosophers used ideas about the material world in order to benefit society materially. Traditional, non-natural philosophy is closer to art than to science, because although they may claim to be describing objective reality, philosophical treatises reflect the philosopher’s personality and subjective worldview (this of course includes this essay). But science can be said to be a branch of philosophy insofar as philosophy is the pursuit of knowledge through questioning, critical thinking and logic.

In 1690 John Locke said “I shall always have the satisfaction to have aimed sincerely at Truth and Usefulness, though in one of the meanest ways. The Commonwealth of Learning, is not at this time without Master-Builders, whose mighty designs, in advancing the Sciences, will leave lasting Monuments to the Admiration of Posterity ... ‘tis Ambition enough to be employed as an Under-Labourer in clearing the Ground a little, and removing some of the Rubbish, that lies in the way to Knowledge”.

Philosophers and merchants have always been close, since they share a passion for exploration, albeit one being more interested in intellectual exploration and the other more interested in the geographical kind. Philosophers are constantly hungry for new ideas, and merchants would often bring fresh ones from faraway lands. The relationship between these two globules became crucial in the Age of Exploration and it was cemented in the Industrial Revolution, when science started being used to develop technology which could then be used to make money. Thus did the marriage of philosophers and merchants become the foundation of our civilisation.

Only recently has the marriage started to strain. The most obvious sticking point is climate change. Along with the residents of Greenland and Vanuatu, scientists are among those most keenly aware of the impact of greenhouse gases. They cannot ignore the continually building evidence that humanity is changing the planet’s climate and the implications this will have for our survival. Despite the warnings from scientists, the merchants continue to act irresponsibly.

Either because merchants see the marriage failing, or much more likely because they are very unaware of the world they’re living in, they have found more ways to anger the scientists. They have pressured governments to reduce investment in education, shifting the funding burden onto students. Merchants are being allowed greater say in what students are taught. Some merchants (usually the same ones who support nationalist movements, mentioned above) encourage the spread of unscientific worldviews, such as climate change denial. The aim (or at least consequence) of this is that fewer people trust scientists, despite the fact our civilisation is built on science. This is summed up in Michael Gove’s infamous proclamation during the EU referendum campaign that the British People had had enough of experts. This could be interpreted as a declaration of culture war. As fewer people trust scientists, their ability to influence politicians is hampered.

Thankfully many people still do trust scientists, as evidenced by the millions taking to the streets preaching Greta’s simple message of listen to the scientists. Currently in the UK most people still trust scientists. The fact that we will need follow scientists’ guidance to get out of the climate crisis may be sufficient for them to rise to become the dominant globule. Perhaps for most young people authority has already shifted from the merchants to philosophers, so it is only a matter of time before this is reflected in our politics. As I write, the world is hunkering down amid the coronavirus outbreak, and government scientists are on all our screens – and politicians and people in general are listening very carefully.

In addition to having the respect of many people because of the many wonders they have created, scientists have in their arsenal a global network. They are already used to working together to rigorous standards to find consensus, through universities, conferences and journals. Such a network could help them outmanoeuvre the merchants, whose instincts favour competition over cooperation.  

In the long term, if our civilisation survives long enough to become reliant on a Dyson swarm for energy, we may need scientists to be the dominant globule to survive – in the alien environments of space and the other planets, the only way to adapt is through knowledge and technology. Given that our civilisation is built on science, perhaps it is inevitable that scientists will one day become the dominant globule, because the other globules will only misuse it.  

Today, as throughout history, philosophers see themselves as advisors to society, particularly its most powerful members. This means they rely on advocates who are less temperate and better communicators than they are. As mentioned, priests have used philosophers’ ideas to help themselves climb to the top, and more recently politicians have used pseudo-science to justify their ideology, the most obvious example being the Nazis using now thoroughly debunked theories on race. If philosophers are going to become the dominant globule, they will need to make sure that they control the application of their ideas.

But what ideas can philosophers rule by? You can’t rule by quantum mechanics, just as you can’t rule by mysticism. The ideas must speak to people’s needs and desires, just as consumerism and religion do. We already have recommendations on healthy and environmentally-friendly lifestyles, but these often come across as stern and a little masochistic. And because our lives are complex and constantly changing, there seems to be a constant stream of pronouncements on specifics, which is annoying and hard to keep track of. Instead of just offering a list of commandments, scientists should instead offer the promise of a better world.

What would a world ruled by philosophers look like?

Would it be a utopia? No. Scientists are still human after all. And being the dominant globule comes with a serious drawback: sociopaths are attracted to your institutions. If you’re a sociopath in ancient Assyria, you become a soldier and butcher your way up the ranks. If you’re a sociopath in medieval Spain, you become priest and burn as many heretics as you can. If you’re a sociopath today, you become a merchant and invest in industries you know will kill your grandchildren. Mad scientists who build doomsday devices for their own sadistic pleasure are currently confined to over-the-top science fiction, but if scientists were to become the dominant globule they would be wise to make as many precautions as possible to ensure responsible use of technology. Allowing sociopaths to wreak havoc, aside from the human cost, will sow the seeds of the globule’s downfall as it has done with others.

Plato’s vision of philosopher-kings was one of an unaccountable, aristocratic elite who knew what was best for everyone, including even who should have sex with whom. This is as unlikely to work today as it was in Plato’s time. Instead, philosophers should work to mimic the merchants. Currently merchants influence politics by methods including lobbying, making donations, owning media outlets, becoming politicians and threatening to move to another country. Philosophers’ greatest strength is their persuasion, but it needs to find more and better ways of using that strength effectively to guide government policy. Modifying the merchants’ tactics to play to philosophers’ strengths could allow them to replace the merchants as the globule who dominates the politicians without the need for anything recklessly heavy-handed. By heavily influencing politics while keeping it democratic, philosophers could push society in the right direction while ensuring that the government is held to account and seen as legitimate. It would also allow the merchants to keep some influence. It’s almost impossible to kill a globule. The Soviet Union tried to eliminate the merchants, but they undermined communism from the black market. Globules are necessarily useful and influential in society, or else they wouldn’t exist as a distinct group. Better to keep them in the tent pissing out, rather than outside pissing in.   

Why do merchants put such effort into controlling politicians? Because they fear the state. While money can buy you almost everything under the sun, it is rather meaningless in the face of the state when it is wielding ‘legitimate violence’. Merchants are generally just afraid that the state will forcibly take away more of what they see as their rightful property by taxation. But they also have the French and Russian revolutions in the back of their minds. So the merchants try to sap the state’s strength, which also means that the philosophers and other globules need to rely more on merchants. At the same time they are trying to turn the state into a guard-dog that protects them from the rabble (as a character in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy puts it, “That's libertarians for you - anarchists who want police protection from their slaves”). If we can describe the politician and the merchant globules as being in a marriage, then it is an abusive one. The politicians can do better.

Philosophers and politicians could be a good match. The philosophers need the state to flourish, to be well-resourced and well-organised if it is going to fight climate change and win. If the state invested more in universities and other scientific institutions, in return the philosophers could provide the state with the new technological power it needs. With politicians’ legitimacy as representatives of the People, and philosophers’ legitimacy as founts of knowledge and proven problem solvers, they could be formidable if they stood side-by-side. Compared to the merchant-politician marriage, a philosopher-politician marriage would hopefully be a more balanced and reciprocal relationship. Instead of trying to starve the state, they would probably try to buttress it.

Of course not all scientists and academics are left-wing. If they become the dominant globule, we can still expect there to be disagreements among them over the direction society should take. Harari argues that science is by nature neutral and the same technologies can be used to build very different societies – “the engineers need some prophet to make the crucial choices and point towards the required destination” (p.313, Homo Deus). I agree that science as an abstraction and technology as objects are neutral, but does the engineer need the prophet? What if he has his own ideas about how his technology should be used? What if he has the confidence to become a prophet himself? Knowledge for the betterment of the community is a value that is essential to the philosopher globule, and although there are of course arguments over what constitutes ‘betterment’ and ‘community’, it’s hard to see how anyone could rationally argue that not fighting climate change would benefit any community in the long run, or that fighting climate change would not involve large-scale initiatives by states. With terrifyingly big problems like climate change, the direction should be clear and the arguments should be about the precise methods (both political and technological). Philosophers do not need to servilely offer statistics and gadgets for others to use as they please. They can lead society by illuminating the path laid by evidence.

Whereas the merchants are currently leading us to climate catastrophe, if the philosophers take the reins they might be able to instead steer us towards a post-scarcity economy. The implications of eliminating poverty and possibly even work are well-trodden by other writers (and I’ll taking about it more in other posts). But this has revolutionary implications for the globule perspective. As hunter-gatherers, everyone’s personality was also the role they played in society. In the Agricultural Revolution, economic circumstances squeezed the vast majority of people into the role of farmer, and then in the Industrial Revolution they were squeezed into the role of proletarian. But once we become sufficiently technologically (and so economically) developed, the pressure will be lifted and people will be free to fill the social role that feels most natural to them. In the social lava lamp, there will no longer be a block of wax at the base, but simply free-floating globules reminiscent of (but not exactly like) our hunter-gatherer past. In such a society, I would expect the artist globule to expand significantly, as people who had always wanted to spend their lives creatively found that they could now afford to. But while this would no doubt be a happier society than today’s, it would not be an anarchist utopia – we would expect the globules at the top to keep on wrestling each other over the throne, as they have done for millennia.

It’s not inevitable that the philosophers will come to dominate society. If we suddenly improve our ability to escape Earth’s gravity well and build extra-terrestrial colonies, we could find ourselves on the brink of a new Age of Exploration led by the merchants, just as they led the last one. Perhaps because industrial civilisation is characterised by constant technological revolution, merchants will always be in the lead because they are best placed to sell and exploit new technology – they are in their element when they are remaking the world, and modern technology could allow them to never stop. And although the Gods of the Iron Age may be dead, we shouldn’t discount the possibility of the priests rising again on the back of new, supposedly science-based religions. Two thousand years ago the priests discovered that philosophers’ ideas are mightier than the sword, and philosophers now are much more numerous and organised than they were back then. If the philosophers don’t try to take the mantle of leadership using their own ideas, we’ll never know if they can.   

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