Tuesday December 16, 2008 5:20 am Lethbridge

Chap. 1 Globalization and Its Discontents

• "Looking at the global village from a philosopher's orbit, you can see prominent civilizational features: politics, religions, cultures, sciences, technologies, arts." [p. 4]
  
  
• "I draw your attention to four mighty human civilizations ... Western, Islamic, Indian, and East Asian ... They are currently the mightiest civilizations on the planet, and events that unfold within, between, and among them have the greatest impact on the entire global village." [p. 4]
  
  

  Continuing to make notes ...

  
  
• "My purpose is not to praise, condemn, or judge. Rather it is to characterize, to articulate the foundational principles that inform their [the four 'great' civilizations] "operating systems", to understand how these principles converge and conflict within and between the civilizations themselves, and to apply The Middle Way to reconciling some of the extremes that lead to the most destructive conflicts." [p. 6]

This is disingenious to say the least. I do not see how one can say that he will not praise, condemn, or judge and in the next sentence advocate one particular perspective, the Buddhist middle way. I also see a huge difference between a discussion of how civilizations operate and how individuals should lead their lives.

Here are the major subheadings for the remainder of the chapter:

• Western Civilization
• Islamic Civilization
• Indian Civilization
• East Asian Civilization
• Convergence at Ground Zero: From Locality to Globality
• Happily Ever After, or a Good Life Now?

The first four subheadings provide a quick summary of each civilization's roots. Good. But the last two are quite different. One is a comparison of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and the destruction of the World Trade Center on 9/11. The last section is a brief attempt to suggest that the future is dependent on everyone adopting a middle way perspective.

Western Civilization

• "Western civilization itself is characterized by a cultural 'double helix'. One strand is Hellenic philosophy; the other Judeo-Christian religion." [p. 7]
  
  
• "Above all, the double helix of Western civilization has encouraged and celebrated individual achievement ..." [p. 9]
  
  
• This has led to the West developing a high proportion of the technological inventions that have revolutionized our way global way of life. [p. 10]
  
  
• The West has also had, among its own countries, a high proportion of the bloodiest wars and conflicts. [p. 11]

Islamic Civilization

• "During its rapid rise from desert tribal origins to a great world religion, Islam encountered, and is still encountering, trials and tribulations similar to those of Christianity, born six hundred years earlier. Like Christianity, Islam has won converts by political coercion, military conquest, and adopted faith. Like Christianity, islam has seen periods of schism and civil war, expansion and contraction, renaissance and repression, tolerance and intolerance." [p. 13]
  
  
• "But, like Western societies, Islamic civilization is riven by complex internal religious and tribal factions ..." [p. 17]
  
  
• "Conflict between Arabian Islamic sects, and between Islam and the West, are also fueled by oil." [p. 17]
  
  
• "The six-hundred-year gap between Christianity and Islam is also a source of much tension. Just like unreformed Christianity of yore, unreformed Islam is a fundamentalist religion, reluctant to evolve and resistant to change." [p. 17]
  
  
• "Yet globalization forces change upon all, and so most Islamic leaders realize that they too must adapt. ... They must bridge a centuries-wide chasm in political, philosophical, scientific, and technological development - and make conspicuous progress in mere decades. India and China are doing this now ... But India and China are not governed by the Abrahamic faiths, whose adherents are renowned for being proud and stiff-necked, vengeful and unforgiving. These qualities may have served a worthwhile purpose during the infancy of human history, but they too must be outgrown ..." [p. 17 - 18]
  
  
• "... Western and Middle Eastern nations are both cooperating yet still clashing, and into this centuries-old fray is drawn the whole of Islamic and Western civilizations." [p. 19]
  
  
• "This is the great challenge facing Islamic civilization: to modernize without losing its identity." [p. 20]

Tags: philosophy, religion