WHAT IS PROGRESS?

In section 4 of his book the Antichrist, the famous philosopher Nietzsche claims that the idea of progress is a false one, and he then goes onto make the erroneous argument that the people in the renaissance period were superior to that of his own time in their essential worth as people, then afterwards he contradicts himself and mentions that progress does exist after all, but only in isolated and individual cases. Putting Nietzsche's confused sophistry aside, let us now tackle what this concept of progress really means for the rest of us, that is for the rest of us who really desire to understand what this concept of progress really means in this world that we all happen to live in, and in how it applies to reality as well as in our lives generally. We cannot say that progress means that in the future there will be less problems in the world because of it, for evolution and complexity produces more problems in the world than we are able to adequately solve due to the sense of progress that we feel that we have made in the world generally, for example, the population increase, nihilism, a lack of jobs relative to the amount of people who need them, outsourcing of jobs for financial reasons, the flawed and corrupt monetary system, new viruses, technology becoming more powerful, and also problems due to the general unreliability of technology itself and the problems it creates, etc., are some of the main problems that may arise in any future scenario. We can say without a doubt that our knowledge and living conditions has progressed and improved since the renaissance period, for example, we can cure more diseases and sicknesses than we were able to cure back then, we definitely know more now about the physical universe than we did back in those days. We must remember that progress means an advancement or development towards a better state or condition, invariably this can only apply to particular things in evolution, and not to all things, this means that progress is a concept that is true for some things, yet is not true for all thing in evolution. I will not repeat here in this essay all that I have already mentioned in my writings concerning the concept of progress, because repetition is a bad vice, that is, and one that I do not care to indulge in myself. The fact that progress is an inevitable force in evolution cannot be denied, its existence is not a matter of whether we really think that it exists or not, it simply does, it is all around us, we cannot escape it. How are we as individuals going to confront progress with an open mind? Are we going to prop up useless metanarratives to condone it? Are we going to attempt to understand it? How do we come to truly understand its nature? Nietzsche was a sophistic charlatan and phoney of the highest order! Nietzsche was in real life, a polite, timid, warm, ethical and soft spoken man, whereas in his philosophical writings, he was cold, arrogant, immoral, harsh, cynical, vain, conceited, mean spirited, deluded, sophistic and a megalomaniac. Now it is exactly this inauthentic Jekyll and Hyde aspect of Nietzsche's character, that makes him a complete fraud and charlatan, and the fact that many people can take him seriously as a whole, even though he had some interesting and good ideas, is a sign of stupidity in the reader. In his book "On The Genealogy Of Morals" Nietzsche claims that the evil that was done by the strong, noble, aristocratic types can be considered good and that the concept of evil is merely an invention of the weak, if this is so, then why did Alexander the Great feel deep remorse after murdering his friend Cleitus the Black, if doing evil is merely a false idea of the weak? Nietzsche also claimed that the concept of justice is merely an agreement between equal powers and does not count if it is between weaker and stronger types, so according to him it should not be pursued by either the weaker or the stronger party. This argument sounds like hypocrisy, it says, that one party who desires justice, deserves it, whereas another party that desires it, does not deserve it, because he says so. Nietzsche also calls the morality that was propounded by priests a "slave morality", he does not call it the "priests morality". Slaves were not able to put their morality into effect. So-called slave morality is nothing more than the morality that the different priests used to civilize the strong and make them less barbaric and evil as well as a means in which to control, manipulate and protect the weak and downtrodden. Nietzsche also claims that there was a great divide and sense of resentment that the priestly class felt towards the strong, noble, aristocratic types, but this is not so, all good historians know that all these different types lived harmoniously with one another, it is even a well known fact that some of the Roman emperors themselves represented the priesthood itself, we must remember that people were highly religious and superstitious back then. Nietzsche also claimed that the priestly class in ancient times felt so powerless and resentful towards the noble aristocratic types that it made them devise Christian values and the last judgement as a means to get power over them. Not only do we know that the priestly class was not powerless and resentful relative to the noble aristocratic types, we can also infer that the rise of the priestly class to a state of power has a less cynical motive than simply a powerless resentment that they felt that made them plot to take power away from the noble aristocratic types in order to empower themselves. As I mentioned before in my essay entitled " The Lust For Power" it is what people can do with power that usually motivates people to get power. In regard to Christian priests it must of been a desire of theirs to civilize people with Christian values that made them get power and not simply a need for power itself out of a sense of impotence alone. A good article that one can read concerning all the errors that can be found in Nietzsche's "On The Genealogy Of Morals" text, is called: A philosopher's appreciation for Jean-Pierre Vernant (January 4, 1914—January 9, 2007) By Nickolas Pappas. It is from the Department of Philosophy, CCNY & the Graduate center, CUNY. Progress is a reality that exists objectively in the world around us, it is not just an idea that exists in our mind that we can either dismiss or affirm as Nietzsche would have you believe, in my view this attitude of Nietzsche's and the postmodernists that makes them think that objective reality is merely a subjective opinion and not an objective fact of the world is a major failing in their way of thinking. The cynical view that Nietzsche had that made him think that societal evolution is nothing more than a battle and a struggle among weak and strong people for the acquisition of power is a black and white and childish way of viewing the world. In Nietzsche's view, evolution for people is not about becoming more civilized and making more progress, to him it is merely a battle and a struggle among weak and strong people vying for the acquisition of power to be used for their own ends and nothing more. According to Nietzsche's way of thinking, it was only the small minority of noble, aristocratic types that could be considered to be strong, whereas the rest of the population were merely weak and slavish and wanted the noble aristocratic peoples power for themselves. Nietzsche seems to conflate strength with privilege and weakness with lack of privilege, he also conflates strength with power, it did not seem to occur to him that strength also existed among those who lacked privileges or power, weakness and resentment also existed among the privileged and powerful. Nietzsche does not seem to judge people as individuals, he seems to judge them as simply fitting convenient categories that suit his purposes of argument. One of the main reasons that Nietzsche refused to fully acknowledge progress, both as a reality and as a concept, is the fact that his philosophy is essentially regressive and backwards in nature, this is so, with its desire to recreate the ideals and lifestyles of the ancient Greek and Roman nobles and aristocrats. Nietzsche's philosophy is antithetical to all the philosophers and thinkers who are predominantely progressive visionaries or who count themselves to be forward looking people. I could write many books concerning all the sophistry and charlatanry that exists in Nietzsche's ideas and theories, but I have better things to do with my time and efforts. At the end of the day Nietzsche was just an insecure cynic who could not handle the objective and systematic rigour of science, logic and mathematics, his deep distrust of these subjects, must, I am sure, have come about due to a deep insecurity he felt about the power of his own intellect. One observes that towards the end of the third essay of his "On The Genealogy Of Morals" Nietzsche cynically and distrustfully ridicules and dismisses the wise, objective scientists of his day and what he considered to be their so-called real knowledge of the world. Any theory of progress cannot really be complete without a theory of history, evolution and mass consciousness and their course through time as well as in how they set the stage for progress in its different manifestations. Hegel was correct to think that the desire of people to express and enforce their own sense of freedom was a large and prominent aspect of history, evolution and progress generally, one could also add to this the desire for people to express and enforce their individuality in the world. The desire for insight and knowledge are also two main driving forces in history and evolution as well as the desire for people to express and enforce their own values, this means expressing one's values irrespective of the mainstream values which are largely designed to manipulate and control the masses. Any individuals act of revolt towards rigid customs and traditions or old values and institutions is one of the main ways that people express and enforce their own desires and values as a constructive means towards progress. Customs and traditions are enforcers of values, whereas rebellion is a creator of newer more meaningful and progressive values. Anarchy exists as a form of rebellion, a form of rebellion that soon exhausts itself, this is due to its lack of desire to be constructive, ordered, systematic, progressive and ambitious. A state of anarchy cannot last for very long, this is because people cannot live in a state of unordered rebellion for too long. Anarchists detest hierarchy, yet hierarchy is part of nature. Anarchists think that because they want to govern themselves in a world without rulers, leaders, governments, laws, a state, etc., then this is what everyone else should want also, it does not occur to anarchists that most people in the world do not want what they want themselves, some people are quite happy for competent and trustworthy politicians to represent and govern them politically. In our investigation into the matter of progress so far, we have determined that it is only particular things that have progressed and not all things, this means that the concept of progress can only be applied to some things and not to all things in reality. We have also determined that progress can be curbed and stalled by old customs, traditions, institutions and values and the people that represent and uphold them. To say that progress is a false idea simply because it cannot be observed in all things, is a clever piece of sophistry, so is claiming that science does not give us any truth simply because it cannot give us a complete picture of reality, this is because truth can still be found in a partial view of something, a partial view of a phenomenon is not a false view, it is merely a limited view of the truth of a phenomenon. Postmodernists like to make the false argument that all truth is limited, approximate and is constantly evolving, this is not completely true, it is our knowledge of the truth that is limited and approximate, it is our view that alters and becomes more complete, truth itself is not limited or altered by us or our knowledge of it, the truth exists independently of us and our lives, except for subjective truths, that is, which is a topic that I have already covered elsewhere. Even though simple facts can be demonstrably proven to be true, no elaborate theory can ever be proven to be completely true (we can only show that a theory is partly false). No elaborate theory can ever explain all the things that it professes to describe. Thus an absolute and certain truth that explains all things to us is unobtainable. In our investigation into the matter of progress we have also discovered certain aspects of the human consciousness as well as the human condition that need to be expressed and enforced for real growth and progress to be made by people generally. Progress as a reality and as a concept will always have its detractors, yet our aim in this investigation is to clarify what progress is and what it is not, so that some semblance of coherence can be found in it for all who think of it as an important aspect of their own lives. To simply doubt that one is able to make any progress in any particular thing in one's life, is an absurdity. The intuitive, mental and real knowing that one experiences as one is able to make progress at any particular thing that one makes an effort with, is overwhelming, it is something that we experience when we slowly learn a language, a musical instrument, a sport or any other skill or subject that we choose to learn. It is I am sure in the desire of most people around the world to want to attempt to shape the future in such a way as to avoid the mistakes of the past. People desire to make improvements on the past, to learn from the past, to take what is good and useful from the past as if they were lessons they had learned, this is so even if this occurs indirectly through historical knowledge. It is the people that want to change the world who most understand history, that seem to be the most competent and able to shape the future for the better. Progress in a realistic sense is knowing that we can make the future better in many ways because we have a knowledge of the past and are able to use it to improve matters in the world and also because we know that progress is inevitable and unavoidable because of our current knowledge and conditions. Nietzsche's master and slave morality dichotomy, is based on his claim that all human beings value morality because it is a means to an end; and for Nietzsche, this end which morality aims towards, is the will to power. It does not seem to occur to Nietzsche, due to his biased and subjective way of thinking, that morality is actually something that most people value because it makes them happy, and because it helps them fulfill all their other values as well, and because it gives them a feeling of well-being. Nietzsche always treats the will to power as an end in itself, and other values as a means to this end, when in fact, most humans treat the will to power as a means to an end; the end being their happiness, the fulfillment of their values, and their feelings of well-being.