Jumpinggenius’s Weblog

For the last essay we did in class instead of getting back the essay with a grade and some notes  we recieved voice recordings with the teachers comments as they came to mind. These comments were really helpful when it came to making revisions and the positive feedback was nice. There could be some drawbacks to this method of commenting though. Including more negative feedback then ussual or in-efective feedback. Both of those problems are easily soved though with a neutral mood and some practice.

Many Intellectuals before the 20th Century disagreed on the relationship between Modernity’s progress and Happiness. Some believed that such as all other aspects of human life, there could be no result but complete perfection. Others were sure that modernity brought with it widespread and severe unhappiness due to to working conditions. Also, there were some who believed that modernity eroded real sources of happiness leaving only material happiness.

Many thinkers of the time believed that the progress spurred by modernity was exactly what was making people happier, and would would continue to do so with the only limit being the absolute perfection of civilization. Jean Antoine Nicholas De Condorcet was a strong believer in this theory. He stated that, “The advantages that must result from this state of improvement… can have no limit but the absolute perfection of the human species.” Condorcet believed that through constant advances in politics, society, and the sciences, humans would become more intelligent, more cultured , happier and perfect in every way.

Walt Whitman wrote, “Never was average man, his soul, more energetic, more like a god.” These modernists felt that humans were just at the beginning of a long journey to perfection.

Other influential people didn’t think of it as a journey to perfection but a descent to a civilization filled with unhappiness. They also thought of capitalism as the vessel that would take us to this unhappy destination. These people, when they imagined the future, did see a Utopian society filled with happy, healthy, and satisfied individuals, but these were only a fraction of the population. While the bourgeoisie, also known as capitalists, lived a life of luxury, the masses worked in overcrowded factories all day to produce and sustain the capitalists’ lifestyles. Friedrich Engels was a writer who discussed how capitalism inevitably exploits the working class. The over-working of some allowed for the under-working of others. In 1958, Gandhi said, “Formerly men were made slaves under physical compulsion. Now they are enslaved by the temptation of money and of the luxuries that money can buy.” This modern “slavery” is shown in Fritz Lang’s film, Metropolis. Screen shots show a sprawling city made of different layers. The upper part of the city is filled with towering skyscrapers, housing the bourgeois population. It sits directly on top of the part of the city sustaining it, providing the city its happiness and prosperity. There is a screen shot depicting the workers of the lower city, they look identical and are in a constant slouching position. They look overworked and almost completely devoid of happiness in any form.

With this future as a warning, another view held by intellectuals was that modernity tagged all sources of real happiness as backwards and left only material sources. Mohandis K. Gandhi was one of the most influential of these thinkers. He agreed that humanity was progressing, he noted how, “the people of Europe live in better built houses than they did one hundred years ago”, but questioned whether it was progressing in the right direction. In his view modernity and most aspects of it was an issue of bodily welfare and making it the object of life promoted greed and immorality. He also said,”The more we indulge in our passions, the more unbridled they become. Our ancestors therefore set a limit to our indulgences. They saw that happiness was largely a mental condition. A man is not necessarily happy because he is rich or unhappy because he is poor.”Gandhi even questioned whether modernity’s progression was good at all. He brought up that even as humanity’s capabilities for peace and happiness raise its drive and abilities in war and suffering rise as well. He states,” Formerly, when people wanted to fight with one another, they measured between them their bodily strength; now it is possible to take away thousands of lives by one man working behind a gun from a hill.”

As we have seen, writers, leaders, and other influential figures before the 20th century had a large variety of views on the issues brought up by modernity and their relation to happiness. On one hand we have read that humanity’s progress can have no other conclusion but total perfection. We have observed the belief that modernity’s progress and capitalism will result in an unhappy working class exploited by capitalists and the rich. Then we learned about Gandhi’s views of modern happiness and progress, stating that society would eventually destroy itself through greed and immorality. Now would it be easy choose a side and say that the world we live in now is matching any one of these beliefs? Or even pick one that you believe in?

My first knoledge of world events came probably like most other people my age with september 11th. Even if i was aware of other events before this like the election of bush, the sheer magnitude of the event makes it the one i remember. After this i was much more aware ofthe world. I remember afterwards the begining of the afghan war and then next the iraq war which i happened to be really confused about cause i though it would be much easier to start one war but i didnt really understand the formalities yet.after that the most a memerable thing for me is trying to understand the presidental election process because first i thought it was all up to the peoples votes until i learned it also had to do with delegates the electoral college. This was all when i was about 10 and this was when i started reading the newspaper. The newspaper changed my view on the world and expanded my knowledge from issues in the united states and around it to the world and things i didnt even knew existed before. My knoledge and understanding of these things slowly grew to the point at which they are today which even though i think is alot is very little compared to what i can know, and minescule compared to everything that is actually happening.