Analysis of Society
Chapter 5
GWF Hegel (1770-1831) was probably the heaviest philosopher ever to put pen to paper. He saw himself as a public intellectual, as an idealist materially detached from orthodox theological institutions, which he detested, and profoundly sympathetic with Hellenic civilization, which he admired. He was also enthusiastic about the European Enlightenment and intellectual figures such as Rousseau and Lessing. The overall result was a grinding, apparently exhaustive and hard-to-ignore analysis of all the a priori phenomenological concepts of the human mind, among others, of Being, of Negation and of the Absolute. Hegel also produced a theory of ethics and legitimate government, also from phenomenological necessity, in Rationality.
Alessandra and Carl (A&C) likewise see themselves as public intellectuals, as a couple of historically important free agents able to make an a priori impression on the world and on world history. Here they would like to weigh in, together with Hegel, on the notion of legitimate government.
A&C are impressed by the organization of the Urantia Book (UB), a literary work which appears far beyond the capacity of a human mind to produce. The UB purports to issue from God by way of a team of cosmic personalities and auxiliaries who work in self-determined coordination with a mind and a presence which lies forever just beyond their ability to understand. Following Kant, who likewise forced himself into Hegel’s thinking, A&C think God is a concept the human mind needs to settle on as a way to express its limits. The human mind has no way either to register or adequately to express God’s actual divinity, but it always and everywhere respects it.
Today the idea of the Legitimate State is uppermost in the minds of most of the world’s leaders. The US invasions and attempts to change the regimes of Iraq and Afghanistan in the wake of the September 11 2001 attacks are the case in point. Regime change in Russia and even in China is almost certainly in the backs of the minds of all of the players in all of these societies, and in the minds of the leaders in all other societies as well. The guiding star in all of this is the great Hellenic question, How should the City be governed?
Avoiding the fast, ad hoc impulse toward political mobilization, A&C want to float the notion that legitimate government can be had from a careful, experimentally tested theory of conversation and consciousness. As a neutral, descriptive project, A&C think they know what conversation is and how it works. Its theory is minimal, to be sure, but it won’t be simple to get to its bottom. There is a system of concepts, behaviors and perceptions involved. A&C want us all, using the right technology, deliberately, together and in the right spirit, to get to the bottom.
For a discussion of this Blog Post with Inflection AI’s Pi, click here.
Bonaparte