The Age of Angst

It should come as a surprise to no one that we are currently living in a very destabilizing and perscipitously dangerous time. I write "should" because, while we publically indicate to others our awareness of these times, such expressed acknowledgement flies in the face of recent historical programming drilled into our minds. Hear me out. Ever since the Industrial Revolution (the 19th Century revolution, and not the erstarz Fourth Industrial Revolution of the 21st Century), humanity in WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, Democratic) nations have been literally conditioned to view the unfolding of history as an ever-progressing linear event, instead of the cyclical-based process of renewal that it has historically been seen as. The ancient Greeks and Romans understood history as a repetitive cycle of season-like stages. Romans called this cycle a saeculum and it usually lasted as long as a human lifetime (i.e. 60 to 80 years). From this Latin word, we get 'century' and the more liminal fin de siecle from the French. The seasonality of this approach usually went something like this: a new age is born in the Spring, prospers in the Summer, begins to degrade in the Fall, and dies in the Winter. It is an interpretation that lasted centuries. In the mid 1920s, economist Nikolai Kondratiev premised his 'wave theory' of economic cycles on seasonal templates, which was later improved upon by the 'Elliot Wave' theory. Even as late as 1997, there was the 'Stauss-Howe generational' theory comprised of four stages (turnings) in a cycle: the High, the Awakening, the Unraveling, and the Crisis. These, too, became loosely linked with seasonal metaphors. This cyclical approach, while seemingly pessimistic about humanity, was in fact a healthy tool for dealing with the vagaries of Life; vagaries that repeated in some form throughout history. It was healthy because of its brutal realism that, it was hoped, would prepare future generations for recurring adversities. Much like the epitaph 'Memento Mori' utilized a penultimate negative experience (death) to urge preparation on the living. Some might look upon this psychological approach as burdensome and depressing but, as we will see, when compared to the linear option, its long-term coping mechanisms produced less anxiety and sense of hopelessness. Criticism, however, of this worldview did evolve and it began during the Enlightenment, with the proposal that man was divorced from any association with and manipulation by the Divine and all its accoutrements. This idea reached its zenith in Nietzsche's 'New Man', who was the embodiment of the Secular killing the God of monotheism. (As an aside, the cyclical view of history was almost entirely pagan. The Messianism of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are more in line with a linear progression of history out of eschatological necessity). If there was perhaps one entity that began the push for linear history, it was the Fabian socialists (Utopians) of the 19th Century. Their promise of a secularly-achieved paradise on earth necessitated the fact, or at least the perception, of a society steadily improving, while uplifting humanity. The first step to achieving this was to make the children of the next generation as 'unlike their parents' as possible by stressing the primacy of an empowering future over the shackles of past traditions and routines. John Dewey, an American psychologist and education philosoph, summarized this thinking when he said, "The good man is the man who, no matter how morally unworthy he has been, is moving to become better." The education of children began to be slowly unmoored from the lessons of history and critical thinking, thus setting them adrift in a disparate sea of rote memorization, computational formating, progressive theories, and material determinism. Step one underway, the second step was to form a civil/cultural environment centered on the economy. Unfortunately, and ironically, both socialists and capitalists saw the WEIRD economic system of merchantilism (later capitalism) as the vehicle of progressive change, but with differing hoped-for results. Capitalists deified their system as the deliverer of material wealth, which would elevate the standard of living of the participant. Socialists, however, saw capitalism as the tool that would reify the 'inevitable' overthrow, by the suffering masses, of a crass and abusive form of new fuedalism. Thus, the WEIRD system triumphed ostensibly because of different intentions. Step three was the wedding of the much lauded 'systemic necessity of the economy' to the guardianship of the political classes. Thus was born the socio-economic terrarium we now live in. This matrimony has produced progeny such as a caste-system (e.g. social-economic status, class), the domination of material wealth over metaphysical health, nefarious GSEs (government sponsored enterprises), political corruption via corporate lobbysists, and the establishment of international monopolies (cartels) backed by the military power of Washington, D.C. In essence, this is the WEIRD nations branching out to bring 'conformity' to the rest of the world for the sole benefit of an elite few. Don't believe me. Just read 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by John Perkins to see how this has been playing out for decades. All of the above is to say that the current Zeitgeist was intentionally crafted into a system predicated on the view of history as a linear progress. But, why is this important? In my opinion, this tailored historical view is significant because of the physiological and psychological effects it causes. An ontological system that promises that tomorrow will always be better than today is inherently reward-based. Agree to the social contract, do your part, and tomorrow will be more benefiting than yesterday. This is all well and good, but what happens when progress does not live up to reality? On a physiological level, expectations of reward that are then not received causes sharp increases in glucocorticoid levels that trigger the human pre-frontal cortex to cause exhibitions of anxiety, frustration, and increased aggression. Even a received reward that is smaller than expected can elicit comparable physiological effects. On a psychological level, frequent and/or extended periods of such anxiety et al can result in depression, maladaptive behavioral changes, and reduced mental function. Now move to the social level, and people with such issues become victims of flasely-advertised progress; Hopeful expectations are replaced by the 'sturm und drang' of a world view increasingly seen as inhumane, if not inhuman. Societies within the WEIRD have been robbed of their traditional tools of coping with the revelation that, despite generations of advocacy, the Emperor does indeed have no clothes. 'Ever forward' means something entirely detrimental when it is forward over a cliff. Instead of people seeing the dissolution of a societal system as the ultimate low-point in the renewable cycle of history, they see it as the finality to history itself. It is one thing to resign oneself to a measurable period of societal reset, it is another, more catalclysmic thing to become aware that a system that promised all was nothing more than a machine of nihilism. People conditioned for linear progress are currently exhibiting such core-shaking realizations. Anti-social attitudes are rising, aggressive enforcement of self-interest is exploding, misplaced escapism (i.e. 'safe spaces', major identity transformations, increased immersion in VR or AI-created realities) is growing, diseases of disassociation (Autism, anxiety disorders, oppositional defiant disorder, ADD, and ADHD) are burgeoning, and the plethora of those convinced that Armageddon is rapidly approaching, are all signs of a society removed from a rational acceptance of their current affliction. We must overturn this historical outlook. How we do this deserves to be debated. What I have come to realize is the current Zeitgeist has three columns supporting it: materialism, unbridled humanism, and political/cultural polarism. Removing these will, hopefully, save us from ourselves.