evilkog
kiwifarms.net
- Registrado
- 10 de Sep, 2025
I believe in the notion of the "perfect culture". For each environment, there's a theoretical culture that achieves the highest likelihood of prosperity in that environment, prosperity being a sufficiently objective metric that can be measured through HDI. In other words, the perfect culture is the culture with the highest HDI EV in that environment. Because humans are logical creatures, a culture's tenets tend to trend towards that of its environment's perfect culture, with some cultures moving faster than others. I'll illustrate with a few examples.
Western nations have adopted gender equality. However, in medieval times, men and women had vastly different roles, with women getting the short end of the stick. To put it simply, in agrarian Western Europe, a man's labour was worth more than a woman's, and as a result men had more individual power. It made practical sense to restrict men and women to the roles that suited their strengths. This isn't to say that this inequality was a good thing, but rather this structuring of society was pragmatic, and a consequence was this inequality. Come the Industrial Revolution, Western nations shifted from being agrarian to industrial societies. As a result, the value of a man and woman's labour become equal. The previous system of gender inequality was no longer practical, and gender equality followed. This is an example of an environment changing, then its culture realigning towards its the perfect culture, and how in developed countries, gender equality is a tenet of their perfect culture.
An example of a suboptimal culture is that of Arab nations. Arab cultures are greatly influenced by Islam, which was codified into many of their cultures by Sharia Law. Islam spread across these nations due to conquest, but one of the reasons it was able to entrench itself was its proximity to the perfect culture Arab countries at the time (Islam was founded in 610 CE). However, the environments of these Arab nations have greatly changed since then, but due to their strict adherence to Islam, their movement towards their perfect culture has been slow. This can be seen in some of their suboptimal tenets such as their gender inequality. In the modern day, a strict adherence to Islam is at odds with a developed nation's "perfect culture".
In short, I believe that you can objectively analyse a culture through its distance from its environment's perfect culture, and decide that cultures are optimal or suboptimal. In addition, cultures of similar environments can be compared using this same rationale. I'd argue that most developed countries are sufficiently alike due to technology and globalisation, and can thus be compared.
Western nations have adopted gender equality. However, in medieval times, men and women had vastly different roles, with women getting the short end of the stick. To put it simply, in agrarian Western Europe, a man's labour was worth more than a woman's, and as a result men had more individual power. It made practical sense to restrict men and women to the roles that suited their strengths. This isn't to say that this inequality was a good thing, but rather this structuring of society was pragmatic, and a consequence was this inequality. Come the Industrial Revolution, Western nations shifted from being agrarian to industrial societies. As a result, the value of a man and woman's labour become equal. The previous system of gender inequality was no longer practical, and gender equality followed. This is an example of an environment changing, then its culture realigning towards its the perfect culture, and how in developed countries, gender equality is a tenet of their perfect culture.
An example of a suboptimal culture is that of Arab nations. Arab cultures are greatly influenced by Islam, which was codified into many of their cultures by Sharia Law. Islam spread across these nations due to conquest, but one of the reasons it was able to entrench itself was its proximity to the perfect culture Arab countries at the time (Islam was founded in 610 CE). However, the environments of these Arab nations have greatly changed since then, but due to their strict adherence to Islam, their movement towards their perfect culture has been slow. This can be seen in some of their suboptimal tenets such as their gender inequality. In the modern day, a strict adherence to Islam is at odds with a developed nation's "perfect culture".
In short, I believe that you can objectively analyse a culture through its distance from its environment's perfect culture, and decide that cultures are optimal or suboptimal. In addition, cultures of similar environments can be compared using this same rationale. I'd argue that most developed countries are sufficiently alike due to technology and globalisation, and can thus be compared.
