Ivan Efremov: Generation, accustomed to honest way of life, will die

I was going to write a story about morality, but could not figure out where to start and what to make it the Central idea. But then I came across excerpts from personal correspondence of the famous Soviet science fiction writer Ivan Efremov, and everything fell into place.

In 1969 Yefremov wrote: "All the destruction of empires, States, and other political organizations occur through the loss of morality".

Assertion is self-sufficient and thought-provoking, but Efremov adds in the next sentence, "This is the only valid reason for disasters in all of history, and therefore, examining the causes of almost all disasters, we can say that the destruction is in the nature of self-destruction".

Rogers: Indeed, if we look closely at history, paying attention to the periods of the rise of civilizations and their fall, we can see numerous confirmations of this statement.

Take the most vivid and widely described example is the Roman Empire. While Rome was United by the unity of interests and values, he was successful and invincible. But when Rome starts inside the bundle (property, legal, value) when he is wallowing in luxury and personal interests of individual citizens and groups become more important than the interest of Rome – he actually begins to devour itself. After all, the last time of its existence it has already evolved and all the efforts of his "decent men" are not reduced to the multiplication of his glory and prosperity, and internecine struggle for power, money, fame and position. And without such invasion of Attila, Rome was already doomed, just barbarians inflicted "blow of mercy", ended the agony.

The same can be seen in the case of the empires of the Aztecs, Byzantium, Ancient Egypt, and many others – the main reasons of their fall was the degeneration of the elite, the decadence, the decline of morals, disunity and internal struggle. Lev Gumilev cites many examples of this, calling it a "phase of obscuration".

Ivan Yefremov points out some characteristic features of a decadent society: "Incompetence, laziness and playfulness "boys" and "girls" in any endeavor is a characteristic feature of this time. I call it the "explosion of immorality," and this, I think, is much more dangerous than nuclear war."

Rogers: the Massive incompetence of our time have already led to the description of the effect of Dunning-Kruger, when "people with low skills, make erroneous conclusions and take bad decisions, but not able to realize their mistakes because of their low level of qualification".

And we, in "developed countries" researchers record the mass growth of all kinds of superstition, magical thinking, "wishful thinking". More and more people are guided by their prejudices (beliefs gained in early childhood, in the prelogical period perception, when all uncritically accepted on faith).





A real morality assumes as a prerequisite the awareness, not blind adherence to rituals and traditions. However, Berdyaev and of it long before me and much better described.

Ivan Efremov: We can see that since ancient times, the morality and honour (in the Russian sense of the word) much more important than swords, arrows and elephants, tanks and dive bombers.

Rogers: My teacher said, "the Spirit always triumphs over technology." First, I argue, because high technology can provide a short-term advantage even immoral and low-motivated army. But the examples of Afghanistan and Iraq show that the morale of the Muslims is higher and their awareness of their own rightness leads to the fact that Americans are powerless to enslave them and forced to hastily withdraw its troops, who do not understand the meaning of these wars (as can be seen from numerous publications in the us military journals and forums).

Ivan Efremov: When all people are honest and hard work will be unusual, what the future may await humanity? Who will be able to feed, clothe, heal and transport people? Dishonest as they are currently, as they can conduct scientific and medical research?

Rogers: Adam Smith said "Thrive-producing Nations." Indeed, the theory of money, we can see that the amount of money is secondary (although it is not always obvious), much more important is the availability of goods possible for the money to buy. In this respect, every "post-industrial economy" has collapsed – now the entire developed world speaks of the need of new industrialization.

But, to quote the American analyst James Chancellor: "In America there is neither the means nor the will to create large infrastructure projects. There would be existing infrastructure does not give the collapse. The American transportation infrastructure was built mainly in the 1930-ies during the New policies of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The last major works were carried out during the "Great society" of President Lyndon Baines Johnson in the 1960s. half of the bridges in the United States – in an emergency condition, most of the roads in bad condition.

Compared to Europe, Japan or China, American infrastructure is provincial and looks neglected. Big business does not show any interest to her. The financial sector has become the core of the American economy. 40% of corporate profits come from banking and trading activities. In fact, it's more than 40%. Because the housing sector is, in fact, also does not earn on the sale of homes and mortgage loans. And the car business sells are not cars, and loans for cars."

The immorality of the modern economy that it has put in the forefront not the creation of wealth and profit as an end in itself. Especially in the financial sector, which ceased to serve the needs of the real economy and turned into a "thing in itself", in fact, unrelated to the real economy, and produces "profits" out of thin air (and thus receiving much higher incomes than producers).

About the conscious inhibition of development of technologies in energy, transport, medicine and other industries can even write a whole volume. This course of action follows from the logic of capitalism, based on the minimization of costs, maximization of profits and the promotion of markets, and not to meet the needs of the people.

Ivan Efremov (1971): Generation, accustomed to honest way of life have become extinct over the next 20 years and then will occur the greatest catastrophe in history in the form of widely disseminated technical monoculture, the foundations of which now persistently implemented in all countries, and even China, Indonesia and Africa.

Rogers: twenty years later, in 1991, destroyed the Soviet Union. Destroyed largely because of the lust for "easy money" and also from-for falling of prestige of the working Man. Masters of life were speculators, thugs, crooks. "Engineer" became a dirty word, "work" is a sign of failure-a sucker.

"Good deeds can not be glorified" has become the dominant imperative of social life, creating hundreds of thousands of prostitutes, increased crime, moral degradation and other delights of modern liberalism.

Now as a result, we have a severe personnel shortage when the country is full of prestigious lawyers, economists, and sales managers, but in the afternoon with fire you will not find a competent machine operator, welder or plumber.

About the unification of humanity with the same brush as a result of globalization and have. The internationalism of the left sought to the peaceful coexistence of different cultures, right-liberalism (the neocons) offers their depersonalization in some obschechelovekov "separation" imposed by the West "the values of liberal democracy."

Ivan Efremov: to Think that you can build an economy that will satisfy any human need, the trend is what permeates the whole of Western (e.g. American), and our own, in a vulgar and literal meaning of "to each according to his needs", the fiction is an unaffordable utopia, akin to the utopia of perpetual motion, etc.

Rogers: should be Satisfied the natural needs of man, not bloated advertising and consumerism inflated artificial queries. No wonder the concept of "Measures" has long been one of the key medieval European philosophy in determining everyday behavior of all layers and classes.

Ivan Efremov: the Only way – in the strictest self-limitation of material needs based on understanding of the place of man and mankind in the universe, as a thinking species, absolute self-control, and absolute superiority of spiritual values before material.

Rogers: the Formula of Lyndon LaRouche in this issue – low on luxury (ideally no), maximum development (increase in energy flow systems).

But restraint only then will it be fair when to limit yourself will all, without exception, the agents in the economy. And when today's liberal standards, "austerity" refers only to the poor and the producing strata of the population (which in most cases is the same) and the incompetent top management that led the world economy to the brink of collapse, only increases their income – this can and should be a source of disturbance and revolution. It becomes! However, as expensive apartments, cars and watches, the monks...

Ivan Efremov: the Understanding that a rational being – a tool of cognition of the universe itself. If this understanding does not happen, then mankind will die out as a species during the natural course of cosmic evolution, as unsuitable/mariposensis for this task, having been superseded by a more appropriate (not necessarily encountered on the Ground). It is the law of historical development is as immutable as the laws of physics.

Rogers: the Central question of humanity "quo Vadis?". If you do not fill daily life a higher meaning, humanity (and its executives) would be no different from bacteria or worms, a parasite on the body of the planet. And at some point will run into some form of "antibiotic" on her part.

Ivan Efremov: the Desire for expensive things, fast cars, huge houses, etc. – a legacy of the Freudian complex of the psyche, developed through sexual selection.

Rogers: That Efremov has not yet seen the Golden bowls – that's where the real complexes on the microscopic size of his penis...

Ivan Efremov: the Only way to overcome the complex through a comprehensive understanding of mental and psychophysiological processes, which for 2,000 years practiced in India and Tibet. Ergo training and education should begin with the study of psychology as the history of the development of human consciousness and history as the history of the development of social consciousness. Physics, chemistry, mathematics is required, but not sufficient discipline for the consciousness of modern man with its huge population density and, as a result, information density, with the inevitable brainwashing that is required to maintain the current social order.

Rogers: Over the next forty years the population density, the density of information and the power of brainwashing has grown significantly. Psychology commercialized, and the story became a tool of the brainwashing.

While critical thinking and deep awareness of behavior will not be a mass phenomenon, neither of which direct democracy may not be considered. Kill yourselves...

Ivan Efremov: to Give the teenager 12-14 years view of himself as Creator, Explorer of the unknown is generated already by this time the stereotype of a "successful street", which filled the entire Western noosphere and ingrained in our.

Rogers: the petty Bourgeoisie and potreblyadstvo since intensified significantly. For the average man in the street "spiritual development" is an empty phrase. Populist and "democratic" politicians don't pull the masses up, and indulge their basest instincts – cattle are easier to manage, and the passions and greed is easier to make.

American authors openly write that there is a deliberate stupefying of the population, because "smart is less prone to mindless consumerism (buy less) and not susceptible to advertising and propaganda."

And the Godlike Man is supposed to be the Creator. Or he simply does not justify its existence before the Universe.

Ivan Yefremov: For the socialist and Communist slogans disappears for a long time petty-bourgeois, Philistine greed and envy and the desire for easy money and things.

Rogers: Social revolution preceded the revolution in consciousness. What led to the setback. A degenerated bureaucracy was not interested in forming a "new type of man," the Nietzschean "Superman," and quite consciously cultivated consumers to meet their goals.

The same goes for all of the experiments for the destruction of the state (or other transformations of companies) who do not attend to before this change of values and thinking of the masses. That values and mass consciousness successfully ingenerate, there is no doubt. But for a successful work in this direction, we need a long transition period, accompanied by a "dictatorship of experts" (at least in contrast to today's liberal dictatorship, declared his wretched ideology is the only correct one).

Ivan Efremov: The same thing can be said about schools, most of them producing stale and stagnant alumni, utterly devoid of curiosity, which was not the case 20 years ago. School program mired in the details instead to create a system of ideas about the world, as a result of successful disciples, "wonks", completely devoid of creative thinking. They get into UNIVERSITY, and then come to the company, in bureaus, research institutes, completely devoid of a holistic view about the world.

Rogers: the Bologna system dulls and kills the fantasy (abstract, divergent and critical thinking in particular) more effectively. If a five year old child can come up with about 200 different non-standard ways of using one object, a graduate of the modern University will call 4-5 of these methods. This "education" makes man a robot, acting on a strictly specified algorithm "Work, consume, die." And the consciousness of the masses in this situation every year will not grow (as I hope my utopian left-wing colleagues), and inevitably to decline, primitivearray.

Modern liberal society, "winning" almost all over the world, was self-destructive. Because it puts the private (personal, corporate, group) benefits higher than public. What is immoral and unethical.

And, in the end, it's silly, because it considers the individual in isolation from the system, society, world, macrocosm. And no human being, can not be good when the troubles of the environment – one way or the other environment will make him feel the consequences of their problems.

As he wrote Erich Fromm "Any society that denies love, is doomed to destruction". And capitalism denies the love, reducing her to a commodity-money relations "you tell me, I thee." And therefore will inevitably be destroyed (though it will not be "creative destruction" of Schumpeter, rather it will be "cathartic creation" of socialism).

Our society needs to rediscover the morality (not in its primitive or traditionalist bourgeois Philistine interpretation), otherwise it will be swept away by those who are not deprived. For example, Muslims that are part of their morality often operate flawlessly.

Only through the attainment of morality, the restoration of morality to stop the self-destruction that affects our society the last twenty years. I prefer to seek the origins of morality not in the past and in the future.

5 October marked the forty years since the death of Ivan Efremova. But his thoughts will live on far into the future... posted

Author: Alexander Rogers

P. S. And remember, only by changing their consumption — together we change the world! ©

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Source: lubosvet.org.ua/2015/12/ivan-efremov-pokoleniya-privykshie-k-chestnomu-obrazu-zhizni-vymrut/#more-2564