I recently heard the claim that the modern world prospers by innovation, not conquest. The claim was made in the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. <\/p>\n
Innovation was also tied to free trade. I.e., the more we trade — and the more horizontal things become — the better. <\/p>\n
Those are lovely thoughts, but I think they’re naive. <\/p>\n
The modern, western, liberal mind (in the broad sense of liberal) can’t understand Putin, or anyone who would try to gain an advantage by conquest. That mindset is too foreign. That’s not cricket. We don’t do things that way anymore. <\/p>\n
Our genius leaders have been under the impression that we will win the battle against communism by giving them access to new markets. Consumerism is going to convert them. Once they have big-screen TVs and smartphones and Netflix, they’ll forget about all that ideological stuff. <\/p>\n
It’s not going to work, and the clearest indication is that it hasn’t worked here. Entitled brats in college, who have all the latest tech toys, and drink $5 coffee drinks every morning, are ideologically driven monsters. <\/p>\n
Prosperity does not eliminate the human quest for meaning and purpose. The guy who sells blood, fire, suffering, and anguish — with a clear ideological vision — will beat the guy who promises a new iPhone. <\/p>\n
The west is living under some very serious delusions. One is that war is never rational. It very clearly is, in some cases. Another is that prosperity trumps meaning and purpose. <\/p>\n
We will not achieve or preserve freedom through commercial or technical innovation, or through trade, or with abundant prosperity. Freedom is a philosophical, theological vision that has to transcend those petty things. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I recently heard the claim that the modern world prospers by innovation, not conquest. The claim was made in the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. Innovation was also tied to free trade. I.e., the more we trade — and the more horizontal things become — the better. Those are lovely thoughts, but I think … Continue reading “Prosperity through innovation or conquest?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2446"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2447,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446\/revisions\/2447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}