I am shifting this exchange with Curtiss from the ``H G Wells_Utopian`` thread because I am entertaining the hypothesis that Wells may be a useful focus for attention in teasing out the nature of the `policy of a philosophy` issue. It may also help Curtiss to grasp the point I have hitherto failed to get across about Wells.
The point (hypothesis): In his trilogy on human history, the life sciences and the social sciences, Wells was enunciating an alternative to what our Social Credit spokesmen call a ``philosophy``. (Wells said that in his day, the popular term was ``ideology``; I would call it a world view.)
This was a radical project in his day, and intended to be, for he was interpreting world history in post-Darwinian terms, following the lead of his mentor, T.H. Huxley, the 19th century popularizer of the descent of Man who was also the bete noir of conservative clergymen. When I was growing up in a rural corner of Alberta, Wells` ``Outline of History`` was the kind of reading from which young minds should be protected. By contrast, I never heard of any such caveats about Social Credit. My hypothesis, then, to which I seek correction by those in the know, is that the philosophy which got Social Credit into trouble as having exclusive application to Christianity might also be archaic in not having incorporated an up to date view of the human situation. It is conceivable that this could be a serious problem, at least to the extent that promoters of Social Credit do not like to take an explicit focus on it?
Given this explanation for my interest in Wells, the following additional comments by Curtiss do not have strong application:
CURTISS:
1. We have to understand that Wells was an extremely inventive "borrower" of knowledge
KW: That is the inescapable nature of the work of historians. They do not make`discoveries`` in the same way as physicists.
CURTISS:
2. For example, it is most likely that the wonderous 4 volume set called "Outline of History" mainly came from a woman who sent a manuscript to MacMillan in London.
It is said, while MacMillan turned down the manuscriptmost of it "leaked" to Wells.
There was a law suit against Wells, but, imagine culminating an inter-country law suit, when the person in Canada is most likely much less able to afford counsel than Wells
KW: If he stole the woman’s work without compensation it certainly merits righteous indignation, but the fact would have no bearing on the argument I am making. And if the rumor is true, it raises the interesting question of why MacMillan chose to publish it (and there are only two volumes, not four) when submitted by Wells? No doubt he appeared to be a better risk for the publisher—and maybe he gave the work a more forceful presentation the next time MacMillan`s reviewers saw it? But no matter. It is not my intent to make a hero out of Wells. The important thing is his intent to make an interpretation of man-environment relations that was based in the main scientific revolution of the 19th century—that is, in biology rather than in the Newtonian cosmology which had left a lot more scope for human uniqueness in our relationship to a Creator.
CURTISS:
3. So, I don't care what Wells said in the "Science of Life" -- I have looked through that and am convinced that Wells' one course under Aldous Huxley would have been insufficient to produce this work.
As he "borrowed" with the Outline of History, he also put his name "first" on a number of things that were also borrowed
KW: Again, I don`t see how your insistence on co-authors and plagiarism has any bearing on my initial suggestion that it would be useful to look upon him as a writer of utopian works, especially for its relevance to the issues of humanism and socialism. If you had looked a bit more carefully in the "Science of Life" (which does have four volumes) and in the subsequent work you would have noticed thtat he was quite frank about his reliance on Julian Huxley and his own son for expertise in biology. His own contribution was the conceptual energy for a new interpretation of the human condition that he had picked up from his mentor, who was Julian`s grandfather. (Aldous Huxley, the novelist and essayist was Julian’s brother. Their grandfather was Thomas Henry Huxley, who is famous mostly as ``Darwin’s bulldog`` for popularizing the ideas of organic evolution and origin of species.) The idea and the framework were Wells’; he depended on the others for accuracy of detail. The difference at issue here is that between scientific discovery, which I assume to be your field, and synthesis of isolated elements of knowledge into new interpretations of broad areas of understanding. This difference has been treated by many senior scientists and philosophers of science, so I will not try to replicate what is done better elsewhere. I will content myself by recommending Edward O. Wilson`s 1998 book ``Consilience``, in particular the earlier chapters where he addresses issues of this kind directly.
CURTISS:
4. As for Work, Wealth and Happiness" -- the volumes I have are boxed, so I cannot speak directly. However, if we accept that, without mathematical formulism, that a person can be an "economist" -- then, I will surely agree that Wells was well enough versed in matters of finance, to so label him an economist. I think I said this in the last note.
KW: Yes, you did. And my point is not to make a either a territorial claim or to tar the man with a derisive label. Rather, it is to open up a field of vision as broad as that represented by Wells’ 8 volume trilogy as the appropriate domain for thinking about economic relationships and policy. This seems useful because the work is almost contemporary with that of C.H. Douglas and appears similar in the breadth of its scope and comprehensive intent. It might therefore serve as a foil in evaluating the degree to which Douglas’ philosophy had been adapted to the new understanding of humankind in the biosphere and how it compares to Wells’ treatment of economics as a branch of biology. Furthermore, since in my last posting on this subject I quoted Wells’ disagreement with Gesell over individualism versus community discipline, his views on the nature of mankind and society do have direct relevance to the philosophy of Social Credit, as I have understood it here so far. But it is important to add that ``The Science òf Life`` is long obsolete by this time, so that a new synthesis is needed. That is the effort undertaken by Wilson in ``Consilience``, making it a new standard for evaluating the philosophy from which economic policy is to be inferred.
KeithPlease address return mail to me at:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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