Peter Thiel: The Reasons for the Decline

Seems about right to me, but why has it happened and are we able to reverse the trend? There are a number of possible causes but it isn't easy to see how the trend could be reversed. Politically we are not even aware of it.

What could possibly go wrong?

Steyn on multiculturalism

The video is a few years old, but useful as a reminder. Mark Steyn’s take on multiculturalism is as amusing as one would expect, but there is an important point embedded in it. Multiculturalism is essentially lazy, it absolves the believer from understanding cultures and avoids the intellectually and politically difficult task of comparing one with another.

In politics, easy mantras usually beat the tedium of nuanced analysis. Successful politicians know it and maybe that is the appeal of multiculturalism – it seems to simplify an impossibly sensitive and complex issue. Once a simplifying mantra takes hold there is no way back because the mantra is no longer a conclusion but a starting point. If indeed it ever was a conclusion – probably not.

There are sinister possibilities buried in all this, as if we are being dragged along by a miasma of political mantras which appear to simplify complex realities but do no such thing. As if we are at war with complexity but complexity is winning and we don’t yet know it.

No sex please, we’re bloggers

In view of the never-ending stream of sexual misbehaviour stories swirling around the great and the not so good, I wish to point out that my penchant for blogging entails no sexual suggestion or innuendo of any kind.

For example, posts about Jeremy Corbyn are not covert references to the sensual delights of hairy cheeks. Similarly, references to Theresa May should not be construed as a lascivious reference to a strict schoolmarm with a taste for exotic footwear. Absolutely not.

On the same lines - references to Harriet Harman – they certainly don’t imply a taste for shrill matronly dimwits. As for posts about Boris Johnson...

...hmm I’m feeling a little queasy at this point...

...although queasy is not a euphemism for anything...

A shower of good things from the sky

It never was a religion for the rationalist and the worldling; it was based on alienation from the world, from the intellectual world no less than from the economic and political. It flourished in the Oriental imagination that is able to treat all existence with disdain and to hold it superbly at arm’s length, and at the same time is subject to visions and false memories, is swayed by the eloquence of private passion, and raises confidently to heaven the cry of the poor, the bereaved, and the distressed. Its daily bread, from the beginning, was hope for a miraculous change of scene, for prison-walls falling to the ground about it, for a heart inwardly comforted and a shower of good things from the sky.

George Santayana - The Life of Reason (1905-1906)

Santayana is describing the state of the Catholic church faced with the pressures of the modern world as it was over a century ago. Similarities are usually interesting - if we delete one of Santayana's words he could be describing the rise of socialism, or indeed any other political movement which promises a heart inwardly comforted against the dread spectre of reality.

Much the same promise also seems to be woven into modern secular leadership. Our leaders must seem to promise a heart inwardly comforted and a shower of good things from the sky. Leaders must display the right attitudes, the right emotions and seem to share the visceral expectations of the voter.

Fashions ebb and flow but we seem to be moving towards a world where nebulous sentimental posturing is more important than a firm grip on reality. Perhaps it always was, but as guide to reality our technical age seems to be stumbling. It is moving away from the technical outlook which has achieved so much over recent centuries and drifting backwards - back towards the shifting sands of sentimental standpoints on even the most technical matters.

Today the successful political leader is the one who understands how little interest there is in dispassionate analysis and precision. He or she is the one currently able to attract the modern voter who is subject to visions and false memories, is swayed by the eloquence of private passion, and raises confidently to heaven the cry of the poor, the bereaved, and the distressed.

Top English speakers

The Local has a piece on the latest English Proficiency Index.

Scandinavians are among the world's best non-native English speakers according to a global ranking, but have found themselves bested by the Dutch for the second year running.

The English Proficiency Index (EPI) from global language training company Education First (EF) put the Scandinavians behind the Netherlands for non-native English skills.

The Swedes were handed back the bragging rights over their Nordic rivals, snagging second place with Denmark following in third spot, down one place on last year. Sweden last came top in 2015 and Denmark in 2014. Norway came in fourth and Finland in sixth place. Iceland was not included in the study.

Eight countries in total earned the "very high" proficiency distinction, with six of them found in Europe: Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Singapore, Finland, Luxembourg and South Africa.

Interesting - a chap is bound to wonder how well England would do if it wasn't excluded. 

Vicarious snivelling

 No: their wish is, not that I shall weep, but that I shall weep obscenely in the public gaze. In other words, that I shall do their weeping for them, as a sort of emotional bedesman: that I shall make public parade of sympathy in their behalf, so that they may keep their own sympathy for themselves, and win comfort from the belief that they are eased of their just responsibility by vicarious snivelling.

Arthur Morrison

This is Arthur Morrison justifying his grimly realistic stories about life in the London slums, pouring scorn on those who used their middle class angst as a substitute for doing something constructive.

Vicarious snivelling eh? What a delightful phrase, and so apt for our times too.