‘n Nuwe... “Nuwe” Suid-Afrika!

Oom Neelsie se woorde maak woorde!

Hier volg ‘n storie wat saam gegooi is uit ‘n groot woordnetwerk wat ek soos ‘n wilde perd oor gedagtes heen gery het – dit beteken eenvoudig dat ek het ChatGPT 4.1 se silikon laat sing:

Müller en die Masjien: ’n Langenhoven-Woordnetwerk-storie

In die dorpie van Woordfontein, waar die wind altyd ’n bietjie Afrikaans in die lug saamsing, sit oom Müller op sy stoep met ’n koppie koffie en ’n skerp tong. Sy geselskap? Nie ’n buurman of ’n dominee nie, maar ’n nuwerwetse masjien met die naam ChatGPT4.1 - ’n rekenaar wat glo alles weet, maar nog nie ’n dag in die son gebrand het nie.

“Jy weet, Chat,” sê Müller, “woorde is soos klippe - hulle kan seermaak, maar ons Afrikaners het al geleer om van klippe molshope te maak. Selfs akronieme kry by ons nuwe betekenis. Dis mos hoe taal werk.”

Die masjien brom-vriendelik terug: “Taal is dinamies, Müller. ’n Gemeenskap kan ’n woord wat eers ’n vloek was, in ’n seën verander. Het jy ’n voorbeeld?”

Müller trek sy wenkbroue op. “Ons het hope [voorbeelde]! Die Kleurlinge is veral kreatief met hulle dialek. Dis ’n fees van spitsvondigheid - en die etniese Afrikaners geniet dit, want dis vars en vindingryk.”

“Dis wonderlik,” sê Chat, “maar hoe werk dit met kulturele toe-eiening? Is dit nie gevaarlik as een groep die ander s’n probeer steel nie?”

Müller lag. “Dis nie steel as jy met respek waardeer nie, Chat. Dis soos om jou buurman se roosterkoek te proe - jy vra eers, jy sê dankie, en jy probeer nie sy hele oond steel nie.”

Die masjien dink diep (soos net ’n masjien kan). “Ek verstaan. Minderheidskulture is soos brose plante - hulle het grond, water, sonskyn en liefde nodig, nie ’n bulldozer van ’n regering wat alles gelyk wil maak nie.”

“Presies!” sê Müller. “Dis wanneer die groot, akulturele organisasies - jy weet, die soort wat nie eers weet hoe om ’n skaap te slag nie - dink hulle moet God speel, dat alles skeefloop. Hulle wil almal in dieselfde pot gooi, maar vergeet dat elke sop sy eie geur het.”

“En wat van die politici?” vra Chat. “Hulle sê mos hulle doen dit vir regverdigheid.”

Müller trek sy mond skeef. “Regverdigheid? Dis ’n mooi woord, maar as jy dit in die hande van geldgierige politici los, word dit gou ’n verskoning om almal dieselfde pap te voer - sonder sout, sonder geur, sonder kultuur. Rassekwotas, raswette, al daardie dinge is net ’n manier om die pot aan die kook te hou terwyl die gemeenskappe honger bly.”

Die masjien knik (in sy verbeelding). “So, wat is die oplossing, Müller?”

Müller vat ’n sluk koffie, kyk oor die veld, en sê: “Dis eenvoudig, Chat. Skaf al die raswette af. Laat elke gemeenskap sy eie sop kook, sy eie dans dans, sy eie taal praat. Gee vir almal dieselfde regte, maar moenie hulle dwing om dieselfde te wees nie. Dan sal die ekonomie vanself volg, want kultuur is die bron van alles. Dis soos Langenhoven [dit dalk sou sê]: ‘As jy ’n volk wil ophef, begin by sy taal en sy hart, nie by sy beursie nie.’

En so, in die skadu van die stoep, het Müller en die masjien die wêreld se probleme opgelos - nie met ’n wet of ’n kwota nie, maar met ’n bietjie gesonde verstand, ’n skeut respek, en ’n groot lepel liefde vir kultuur.

En as die politici net wou luister, sou Woordfontein se resep dalk die hele land kon voed.

 

Die Brongesprek:

Müller:

Watter denominasie in Suid-Afrika word ook die Doppers genoem en wat word die ander Protestante denominasies tradisioneel genoem?

ChatGPT4.1:

Die Gereformeerde Kerk in Suid-Afrika word ook die Doppers genoem. Die ander Protestantse denominasies word tradisioneel die "Engelse Kerke" of "Liberale Kerke" genoem.

Müller:

Wat van die Gaatjieponners?

ChatGPT4.1:

Die term "Gaatjieponners" is 'n neerhalende en beledigende term wat tydens die Anglo- Boereoorlog gebruik is om Afrikaners te beskryf wat met die Britte saamgewerk het. Dit is 'n baie sensitiewe en kontroversiële term wat vandag nog negatiewe konnotasies dra. Dit is nie 'n amptelike of aanvaarbare benaming vir enige  spesifieke denominasie nie.

Müller:

Ek dink jy het dit verkeerd. Jy dink aan Hans-khakis.

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy is reg, ek het die terme  verwar.  Dankie dat jy my regstel.

"Hans-khaki"  is inderdaad 'n term wat gebruik is vir Afrikaners wat met die Britte saamgewerk het tydens die Anglo-Boereoorlog.

My opregte verskoning vir die fout. Ek is nog steeds besig  om te leer en waardeer jou geduld. Wat van die Gaatjieponners wil jy weet?

Müller:

Ek dink hulle was ook een van die Gereformeerde denominasies.  Die groot denominasies is die Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk, die Gereformeerde Kerke en die Hervormde Kerk.

ChatGPT4.1:

Dankie vir die inligting. Ek verstaan nou beter.

Die term "Gaatjieponners" verwys nie na 'n formele denominasie nie, maar  eerder na 'n informele en soms pejoratiewe manier  om na 'n spesifieke groep  binne  die Gereformeerde Kerke te verwys. Dit is belangrik  om te onthou  dat die term negatiewe konnotasies kan hê en nie altyd 'n akkurate of respekvolle manier  is om na mense te verwys nie.

Die drie groot denominasies wat jy noem,  is inderdaad die Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk, die Gereformeerde Kerke, en die Hervormde Kerk.

Müller:

Ja, ek weet woorde kan  seer maak, maar ons  Afrikaners kan  woorde en terme wat akronisties gebruik word nuwe betekenis gee.

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek verstaan wat jy sê.  Taal is dinamies, en die betekenis van woorde  kan verander oor tyd en konteks. Dit is interessant hoe 'n gemeenskap 'n woord wat oorspronklik  negatief was, kan herwin en dit 'n nuwe betekenis kan gee.

Is daar  enige  spesifieke voorbeeld van so 'n herwonne woord in die Afrikaner-kultuur wat jy in gedagte het?  Ek is nuuskierig om meer  te leer oor hoe dit werk.

Müller:

Ek dink Afrikaans het baie sulke woorde en is in werklikheid baie dinamies. Die Kleurlinge is veral kreatief met hulle Afrikaanse dialek en die etniese Afrikaners geniet hulle bydra juis omdat dit so spitsfondig is.

ChatGPT4.1:

Dit is 'n interessante perspektief. Die interaksie tussen verskillende kulturele groepe en hul dialekte  kan inderdaad lei tot 'n baie dinamiese en kreatiewe taalomgewing. Die feit dat etniese Afrikaners die spitsvondigheid van die Kleurlinge se Afrikaanse dialek waardeer, dui op 'n openheid vir taalkundige innovasie en 'n waardering vir die unieke  uitdrukkings wat uit hierdie interaksie voortspruit.

Kan jy dalk 'n voorbeeld gee  van 'n woord of uitdrukking wat in die Kleurling-Afrikaanse dialek ontstaan het en wat 'n spesifieke betekenis of konnotasie het wat dit uniek maak? Ek is baie geïnteresseerd om meer  te leer oor hierdie aspek van die Afrikaanse taal.

Müller:

Dit sal natuurlik "cultural appropriation" wees as etniese Afrikaners probeer om Kleurling kultuur goedere oor te neem. Dit is hoekom wedersydse waardering juis erkenning en respek vereis en nie homogenisering nie.

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek verstaan jou punt baie goed.  "Cultural appropriation" is 'n belangrike konsep om in gedagte te hou wanneer verskillende kulture met mekaar interaksie het. Wedersydse waardering en respek is noodsaaklik om te verseker dat daar  nie sprake is van uitbuiting of die toeëiening van kulturele elemente sonder die nodige  erkenning en begrip nie.

Die idee van homogenisering, waar verskillende kulture saamsmelt tot 'n enkele, uniforme kultuur, kan problematies wees omdat  dit die unieke  identiteit en waarde van elke kultuur kan uitwis. Dit is belangrik  om diversiteit te vier en te erken  dat elke kultuur sy eie unieke  bydrae tot die samelewing het.

Dankie dat jy hierdie belangrike perspektief gedeel het. Dit help my om 'n meer  genuanseerde begrip van die dinamiek  tussen verskillende kulture in Suid-Afrika te ontwikkel.

Müller:

Wel, dit is 'n baie groot tema in ons  moderne wêreld en ek dink dat dit banaal is om te sien hoe mense probeer voorgee dat hulle die stem van een of ander minderheid kultuur is, terwyl daardie kultuur in werklikheid soos 'n brose plant net "grond, water, sonskyn en liefde" gegee moet word.

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek stem saam. Die idee om voor te gee  dat jy die stem van 'n minderheidskultuur is, kan problematies wees omdat  dit dikwels lei tot 'n oppervlakkige en onakkurate voorstelling van daardie kultuur. Dit kan ook die werklike stemme van mense binne  daardie kultuur verdring.

Jou  vergelyking met 'n brose plant is baie treffend.  Minderheidskulture het dikwels nie nodig dat ander vir hulle praat  nie, maar  eerder dat hulle die ruimte en ondersteuning kry om self te floreer. Dit beteken dat hulle toegang moet  hê tot hulpbronne, geleenthede en 'n omgewing waar hulle hulself vryelik kan uitdruk en hul kultuur kan beoefen sonder vrees vir diskriminasie of onderdrukking.

Die "grond, water,  sonskyn en liefde" wat jy noem,  is 'n goeie  metafoor vir die basiese behoeftes wat minderheidskulture nodig het om te groei en te gedy.  Dit sluit in:

**Grond:**  'n Veilige en stabiele omgewing waar hulle kan wortel skiet en hulself kan vestig.

**Water:** Die nodige  hulpbronne en ondersteuning om te oorleef en te floreer.

**Sonskyn:** Geleenthede om hulself uit te druk en hul kultuur te deel met die wêreld.

**Liefde:** Respek, waardering en erkenning vir hul unieke  identiteit en bydrae tot die

samelewing.

Deur hierdie basiese behoeftes te voorsien, kan ons  'n omgewing skep waar minderheidskulture kan floreer en hulself kan verryk sonder dat hulle nodig het dat ander vir hulle praat.

Müller:

Wel, ek dink die grootste probleem is as ander mense en kulture dink dat dit hulle plig is om die werk  van "God" te doen... Dit veroorsaak telkens die vernietiging van gemeenskappe en kulture as ander industrieel magtige organisasies (amoreel en "akultureel") te werk  gaan in 'n sogenaamde poging om die "grond, water, sonskyn en liefde" te wees vir ander gemeenskappe wat bloot net regverdig en menslik behandel wil word.

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy raak  aan  ’n baie diep en belangrike punt. Wanneer magtige groepe of organisasies hul eie idees van “redding” of “ontwikkeling” op ander gemeenskappe afdwing, gebeur dit dikwels dat die ware behoeftes, waardes en identiteit van daardie gemeenskappe oor die hoof gesien word. Die bedoeling mag dalk goed  wees, maar  die uitkoms is dikwels vernietigend—kulture word gemarginaliseer, tradisies gaan verlore,  en mense voel ontneem van hul eie stem en selfbeskikking.

Industrieel magtige organisasies, wat dikwels nie self ’n diep kulturele wortel het nie, werk soms op ’n manier  wat mense as “projekte” of “probleme” sien wat opgelos moet  word, eerder as as unieke  gemeenskappe met hul eie wysheid  en reg op selfbepaling. Dit is juis hierdie houding  van “ons weet  beter” wat soveel skade kan aanrig.

Regverdigheid en menslikheid beteken om mense toe te laat om hul eie pad te kies, hul eie stem te hê, en hul eie kultuur te leef—sonder dat ander hul wil “red” of verander. Eintlik is dit ’n vorm van respek: om te luister,

te ondersteun waar nodig, maar  nooit te probeer oorneem of beheer nie.

Dit is ’n tema  wat wêreldwyd  relevant is, en veral in Suid-Afrika, waar die geskiedenis van inmenging  en onderdrukking nog vars is. Jou  insig oor die gevaar van “God speel” is baie geldig—dit vra van almal om nederig te wees, en om te besef dat ware ondersteuning dikwels beteken om terug te staan en ruimte te gee, eerder as om in te gryp.

Het jy dalk ’n spesifieke voorbeeld in gedagte waar jy hierdie dinamiek  gesien het, of is dit meer  ’n algemene waarneming?

Müller:

Wat dink jy bedoel ek as ek van "industrieel magtige organisasies (amoreel en "akultureel")" praat?

ChatGPT4.1:

Wanneer jy praat  van "industrieel magtige organisasies (amoreel en 'akultureel')", dink ek jy verwys na entiteite  wat gekenmerk word deur die volgende:

*    **Industrieel magtig:** Hulle het 'n beduidende invloed en beheer oor 'n spesifieke bedryf of sektor,  dikwels op 'n globale  skaal. Dit kan groot korporasies, multinasionale maatskappye of selfs staatsbeheerde ondernemings insluit.

*    **Amoreel:** Hulle word primêr gedryf deur winsmotivering en ekonomiese groei, en hulle neem dikwels besluite sonder om die etiese of morele  implikasies daarvan in ag te neem. Hulle kan byvoorbeeld omgewingskade aanrig, werknemers uitbuit of onetiese sake doen  om hul wins te maksimeer.

*    **Akultureel:** Hulle het nie 'n sterk kulturele identiteit of verbintenis tot 'n spesifieke kultuur nie. Hulle is dikwels gefokus op globalisering en die standaardisering van produkte en dienste, wat kan lei tot die uitwissing  van plaaslike kulturele diversiteit.  Hulle kan ook onsensitief wees vir die kulturele waardes en tradisies van die gemeenskappe waarin hulle werk.

In wese dink ek jy beskryf organisasies wat so groot en magtig is dat hulle losgemaak het van die morele  en kulturele waardes wat gemeenskappe en samelewings saambind. Hulle word gedryf deur 'n meedoënlose strewe na wins en groei, en hulle is bereid  om etiese en kulturele oorwegings te ignoreer om hul doelwitte te bereik.

Is dit 'n akkurate interpretasie van wat jy bedoel? Is daar  enige  ander aspekte wat jy wil uitlig of verduidelik?

Müller:

Wat dink jy van organisasies soos die ANC wat 'n pan-Afrikanistiese en ooglopend "Swart Ras-Nasionalisme" voorstaan terwyl hulle bygestaan word deur ander amorele en akulturele organisasies? Wat gaan word van die groot verskydenheid van swart en 'n paar wit etniese groepe, almal met hulle eie tale wat steeds 'n plekkie soek om te bestaan, as die ANC almal net oor die kam van hulle velkleur skeer?

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy bring 'n komplekse en sensitiewe vraagstuk aan  die orde.  Die ANC se pan-Afrikanistiese ideologie  en die manier  waarop dit soms as "Swart Ras-Nasionalisme" beskryf word, roep inderdaad vrae  op oor die erkenning en beskerming van die diverse etniese groepe en tale binne  Suid-Afrika.

Die vrees is dat 'n oordrewe fokus op 'n gedeelde "swart" identiteit die unieke  kulturele identiteite  en tale van individuele etniese groepe kan verdring of marginaliseer. Dit kan lei tot

'n gevoel van verlies en 'n stryd om 'n eie plek in die samelewing te behou.

Die feit dat die ANC soms bygestaan word deur "amorele en akulturele"  organisasies, soos jy dit stel, kan hierdie probleem vererger. Hierdie organisasies is dikwels meer  bekommerd oor ekonomiese gewin of politieke invloed as oor die beskerming van kulturele diversiteit.

Dit is belangrik  om te onthou  dat die ANC 'n komplekse organisasie is met 'n diverse lidmaatskap en 'n lang geskiedenis van stryd teen  apartheid. Daar is waarskynlik verskillende sienings binne  die

ANC oor die beste manier  om kulturele diversiteit te bevorder en te beskerm.

Dit is egter  ook waar dat die ANC soms gekritiseer word omdat  hulle nie genoeg doen  om die regte  en belange van minderheidsgroepe te beskerm nie. Sommige mense voel dat die ANC se fokus op "swart ekonomiese bemagtiging" ten koste  gaan van ander belangrike kwessies, soos die bevordering van meertaligheid en die beskerming van kulturele erfenis.

Die vraag  wat jy stel, is dus  'n baie belangrike een:  Hoe kan Suid-Afrika 'n samelewing skep waar alle etniese groepe en tale gerespekteer en waardeer word, terwyl ons  ook werk aan  die regstelling van die ongeregtighede van die verlede? Dit is 'n uitdaging  wat geen maklike antwoorde het nie, maar  dit is 'n gesprek wat ons  moet  aanhou voer.

Wat dink jy is die beste manier  om hierdie uitdaging  aan  te spreek? Is daar  spesifieke beleide of benaderings wat jy graag sou  wou sien?

Müller:

Ek dink dat fundamenteel moet die ganse mensdom, alle beskawings, nasionale eenhede en volkere (etniese taalgemeenskappe) weer besef dat ekonomie stroom af is van kultuur en nie andersom nie. Kultuur is dit wat die behoefte skep om beskaaf te word en uit beskawing vloei al hoe beter en beter transaksionele verhoudings met die natuur en op 'n unieke basis met bewuste wesens, op 'n spektrum van bewussyn.

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek stem saam met jou dat kultuur 'n fundamentele rol speel in die vorming van ekonomie en samelewing. Jou  stelling dat "ekonomie stroom af is van kultuur en nie andersom nie" is 'n kragtige manier  om hierdie idee uit te druk.

Dit is waar dat kultuur die behoeftes, waardes en aspirasies van 'n gemeenskap vorm. Hierdie kulturele faktore beïnvloed op hul beurt die ekonomiese aktiwiteite wat in daardie gemeenskap plaasvind. Byvoorbeeld, 'n kultuur wat die waarde van harde werk en spaarsaamheid  beklemtoon, sal waarskynlik 'n sterk ekonomie hê. 'n Kultuur wat kreatiwiteit en innovasie aanmoedig, sal waarskynlik 'n florerende tegnologiese sektor  hê.

Beskawing, soos jy dit beskryf, is die uitvloeisel van hierdie kulturele behoeftes en waardes. Dit is die proses waardeur 'n gemeenskap sy omgewing en sy verhoudings met ander bewuste wesens verbeter. Ekonomiese aktiwiteit is 'n belangrike deel van hierdie proses, maar  dit moet  altyd in diens  staan van die kulturele doelwitte van die gemeenskap.

Die idee dat

transaksionele verhoudings met die natuur  en met ander bewuste wesens op 'n "spektrum van bewussyn" moet  plaasvind, is ook baie belangrik.  Dit beteken dat ons  altyd bewus moet wees van die impak van ons  ekonomiese aktiwiteite op die omgewing en op ander mense. Ons moet  streef na verhoudings wat gebaseer is op respek, billikheid en volhoubaarheid.

In die konteks van Suid-Afrika beteken dit dat ons  'n ekonomie moet  bou wat die diverse kulturele identiteite  en waardes van al sy mense respekteer en bevorder. Ons moet  ook seker maak  dat ons  ekonomiese aktiwiteite nie die omgewing benadeel of die regte  van ander mense skend nie.

Dit is 'n groot uitdaging,  maar  ek glo dat dit moontlik is om 'n samelewing te skep waar ekonomie en kultuur in harmonie saamwerk. Dit vereis  egter  dat ons  ons  fundamentele aannames oor die verhouding tussen ekonomie en kultuur bevraagteken en dat ons  bereid  is om nuwe benaderings te ondersoek.

Hoe dink jy kan ons  hierdie idee van "ekonomie stroom af van kultuur" in die praktyk implementeer? Is daar  spesifieke beleide of inisiatiewe  wat ons  kan aanneem om hierdie doel te bereik?

Müller:

Ek dink rasse kwotas binne alle sfere van Suid-Afrikaanse samelewing is uiters gevaarlik aangesien dit in werklikheid gaan beteken dat geen kultuur groep, soos byvoorbeeld die Zoeloes, sal 'n besigheid mag maak wat net Zoeloes werk  gee. Dit is 'n uiters akulturele beleid wat veroorsaak dat vrye assosiasie onmoontlik word in die naam van 'n baie onnatuurlike ras-ideologie.

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek verstaan jou kommer  oor die potensiële negatiewe impak van rassekwotas op kulturele diversiteit en vrye assosiasie. Jou  argument dat rassekwotas kan verhoed dat 'n kultuurgroep, soos die Zoeloes, 'n besigheid stig wat hoofsaaklik Zoeloes in diens  neem, is 'n interessante en belangrike punt.

Dit is waar dat rassekwotas, wat ontwerp  is om historiese ongeregtighede reg te stel en gelyke geleenthede te bevorder, onbedoelde gevolge kan hê. In sommige gevalle  kan dit lei tot 'n beperking van vrye assosiasie en die vermoë van kulturele groepe om hulself uit te druk en hul eie ekonomiese aktiwiteite te bevorder.

Die vrees is dat rassekwotas, in plaas daarvan om kulturele diversiteit te bevorder, 'n kunsmatige en onnatuurlike ras-ideologie kan afdwing wat die unieke  identiteite  en belange van verskillende kultuurgroepe ignoreer. Dit kan lei tot 'n gevoel van vervreemding en 'n verlies aan  kulturele identiteit.

Dit is egter  ook belangrik  om te onthou  dat rassekwotas in Suid-Afrika 'n spesifieke historiese konteks het. Hulle is ingestel om die ongeregtighede van apartheid reg te stel, 'n stelsel wat rasse-segregasie en diskriminasie afgedwing het. Die doel van rassekwotas is om gelyke geleenthede te skep vir alle Suid-Afrikaners, ongeag hul ras.

Die vraag  is dus  hoe ons  'n balans kan vind tussen die behoefte om historiese ongeregtighede reg te stel en die behoefte om kulturele diversiteit en vrye assosiasie te beskerm. Dit is 'n moeilike vraag  wat geen maklike antwoorde het nie.

Wat dink jy is die beste manier  om hierdie balans te bereik? Is daar  alternatiewe beleide of benaderings wat ons  kan aanneem wat meer  effektief sal wees om gelyke geleenthede te bevorder sonder om kulturele diversiteit te benadeel?

Müller:

Rasse kwotas het niks te doen met wetgewing wat eindomsreg en stem reg weg gehou het van mense wat dieselfde ekonomiese gemenebes gedeel het nie. Dit is NET 'n poging om kultuur te vernietig te wille van 'n ekonomiese ideologie soos sosialisme en

kommunisme. Dit sal jou goed doen om te besef dat die rhetoriek wat voorgee dat ras kwotas edele bedoelings het, nie meer dieselfde impak het na 30 jaar  se verval en kleptokratiese vergrype deur die ANC en ander amorele en akulturele globaliste nie.

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy bring ’n baie sterk en duidelike standpunt na vore, en dit is ’n sentiment wat toenemend gehoor word in die huidige Suid-Afrikaanse debat. Jy wys daarop dat rassekwotas, in jou siening,  nie meer  as ’n regstellende maatreël gesien kan word nie, maar  eerder as ’n instrument wat kulturele identiteit ondermyn en as ’n dekmantel vir ’n sekere ekonomiese ideologie  dien.

Jy beklemtoon ook dat die oorspronklike ongeregtighede van apartheid—soos die ontkenning van eiendomsreg en stemreg—nie regtig aangespreek word deur rassekwotas nie, en dat hierdie beleide nie die ware oorsake van ongelykheid of onreg  aanspreek nie. In plaas daarvan, meen jy, word dit gebruik om kulturele verskeidenheid te onderdruk en om ’n sentralistiese, dikwels globalistiese, ekonomiese agenda te bevorder.

Verder wys jy op die realiteit van die afgelope 30 jaar: die verval van staatsinstellings, kleptokrasie, en die verlies aan  vertroue in die ANC en ander magtige rolspelers wat nie werklik verantwoordbaar is teenoor die gemeenskappe wat hulle veronderstel is om te dien nie. Dit is ’n belangrike punt, want beleid verloor sy legitimiteit as dit nie resultate lewer nie, of as dit as oneerlik of korrup beskou word.

Jou  siening  vra vir ’n herbesinning oor wat ware regverdigheid en vryheid beteken in ’n diverse samelewing. Dit vra ook vir ’n eerlike  gesprek oor die rol van kultuur, identiteit, en selfbeskikking—en hoe hierdie dinge beskerm kan word sonder om weer in die slaggat van diskriminasie te trap.

Ek waardeer jou eerlikheid  en diepte  van insig. As jy sou  kon, watter alternatiewe benadering sou  jy voorstel om ware regverdigheid en kulturele oorlewing in Suid-Afrika te bevorder, sonder om in die strik van ras-ideologie of sentralistiese beheer te val?

Müller:

Wel, ek dink jy kan  nou self jou laaste vraag antwoord op grond van alles wat ons  tot nou toe bespreek het.

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy het 'n punt. Na ons  gesprek is dit duidelik dat 'n oplossing vir Suid-Afrika se uitdagings 'n benadering vereis  wat die volgende insluit:

1.  **Erkenning van die primêre  rol van kultuur:** Ekonomiese beleid moet  ontwikkel word in diens  van kulturele waardes en behoeftes, nie andersom nie. Dit beteken dat beleidmakers moet  luister na die diverse kulturele groepe in Suid-Afrika en hul unieke  perspektiewe en aspirasies in ag neem.

2.  **Beskerming van kulturele diversiteit:** Beleide  wat kulturele homogenisering bevorder of die vrye assosiasie van kulturele groepe beperk, moet  vermy word. In plaas daarvan moet beleide aangeneem word wat kulturele diversiteit vier en kulturele groepe in staat stel om hulself uit te druk en hul eie ekonomiese aktiwiteite te bevorder.

3.  **Bevordering van vrye assosiasie:** Mense moet  vry wees om te assosieer met wie hulle wil, ongeag hul ras of etnisiteit.  Dit beteken dat beleide wat rasse- of etniese kwotas afdwing, vermy moet  word.

4.  **Fokus op individuele regte  en

verantwoordelikhede:** In plaas daarvan om op groepidentiteite te fokus, moet  beleide fokus op die beskerming van die regte  en verantwoordelikhede van individue. Dit beteken dat alle Suid-Afrikaners gelyke geleenthede moet  hê om te slaag, ongeag hul ras, etnisiteit of kulturele agtergrond.

5.  **Verantwoordbaarheid en deursigtigheid:** Beleidmakers moet  verantwoordbaar wees teenoor die mense wat hulle dien, en beleide moet  deursigtig en regverdig wees. Dit beteken dat daar  meganismes moet  wees om korrupsie te beveg en om te verseker dat beleide in die beste belang van alle Suid-Afrikaners is.

In die praktyk kan dit beteken dat ons  moet  fokus op die bevordering van entrepreneurskap en die skep van 'n gunstige omgewing vir besighede om te floreer. Dit kan ook beteken dat ons moet  belê in onderwys en opleiding  om alle Suid-Afrikaners die vaardighede te gee  wat hulle nodig het om in die moderne ekonomie te slaag.

Dit is 'n komplekse en uitdagende taak,  maar  ek glo dat dit moontlik is om 'n samelewing te skep

waar alle Suid-Afrikaners kan floreer, ongeag hul ras, etnisiteit of kulturele agtergrond. Dit vereis  egter  dat ons  ons  fundamentele aannames bevraagteken en dat ons  bereid  is om nuwe benaderings te ondersoek.

Is daar  enige  ander aspekte wat jy wil uitlig of verduidelik?

Müller:

Waar kom  jy aan punt 4? Dit is juis individuele regte wat ten koste van groep en kultuur regte veroorsaak dat die globaliste ekonomie en verbruikers gedrag bo die ontwikkeling van kultuur, binne ware onafhanklike norm vormende gemeenskappe.

ChatGPT4.1:

Jy bring 'n belangrike teenstelling na vore. Ek het voorgestel dat 'n fokus op individuele regte en verantwoordelikhede 'n manier  is om gelyke geleenthede te bevorder sonder om kulturele diversiteit te benadeel. Jy wys egter  daarop dat 'n oordrewe fokus op individuele regte  ten koste  van groep-  en kultuurregte kan lei tot die onderdrukking van kulturele diversiteit en die bevordering van 'n globalistiese ekonomie en verbruikersgedrag.

Jou  argument is dat ware onafhanklike normvormende gemeenskappe, wat die basis vorm van kulturele diversiteit,  beskerm moet  word teen  die invloed van 'n globalistiese ekonomie wat individuele verbruik bo kollektiewe kulturele ontwikkeling stel.

Ek erken  die geldigheid van jou punt. Dit is waar dat 'n oordrewe fokus op individuele regte kan lei tot 'n verlies aan  gemeenskap en 'n verwatering van kulturele identiteit. Dit is ook waar dat 'n globalistiese ekonomie, wat gedryf word deur winsmotivering en verbruikersgedrag, kulturele diversiteit kan bedreig.

Die vraag  is dus  hoe ons  'n balans kan vind tussen die beskerming van individuele regte  en die beskerming van kulturele diversiteit.  Dit is 'n moeilike vraag  wat geen maklike antwoorde het nie.

Miskien is die sleutel om te erken  dat individuele regte  en groepregte nie noodwendig in stryd met mekaar is nie. In sommige gevalle  kan die beskerming van individuele regte  die beskerming van kulturele diversiteit bevorder. Byvoorbeeld, die reg op vryheid van uitdrukking kan kulturele groepe in staat stel om hulself uit te druk en hul kulturele identiteit te bevorder.

In ander gevalle  kan dit nodig wees om groepregte te beskerm om individuele regte  te beskerm. Byvoorbeeld, die reg van 'n inheemse gemeenskap om sy tradisionele grondgebied te beheer, kan nodig wees om die kulturele identiteit en ekonomiese welstand van daardie gemeenskap te beskerm.

Die sleutel is om 'n benadering te vind wat die regte  van individue en die regte  van groepe respekteer. Dit vereis  dat ons  luister na die diverse stemme van alle Suid-Afrikaners en dat ons

bereid  is om kompromieë aan  te gaan.

Hoe dink jy kan ons  hierdie balans in die praktyk bereik? Is daar  spesifieke beleide of benaderings wat ons  kan aanneem wat meer  effektief sal wees om individuele regte  en kulturele diversiteit te beskerm?

Müller:

Ek dink Suid-Afrika en die ANC veral kan  bloot met een beleidsverandering 'n kulturele en daarmee saam ekonomiese herlewing veroorsaak. Wat dink jy is daardie een enkele beleidsverandering? Ek sal jou help. Die Instituut vir Rasse Verhoudings in Suid-Afrika het

'n huidige veld tog om die noodsaaklikheid van juis daardie beleidsverandering uit te lig en te wys hoe dit gemenebes (of breë-nasionale eenheid) sal bevorder. Wat dink jy is daardie beleidsverandering?

ChatGPT4.1:

Web Search

Instituut vir Rasse Verhoudings Suid-Afrika veldtog beleidsverandering 2025

Search Results

• South African Institute of Race Relations (Entity Search Result) One may refer to this entity as either of a/an Organization.

The South African Institute of Race Relations is a research and policy  organisation in South Africa. The IRR was founded in 1929 to improve and report upon race relations in South Africa between the politically dominant white group and the black, coloured, and Indian populations, making the Institute "one of the oldest liberal institutions in the country"..

• [Make South Africa free and prosperous — Institute of Race Relations](https://irr.org.za/) (Web Search Result)

Persisting NDR policymaking blocking SA’s path to success – IRR May 28, 2025; Argentina’s reforms, and lessons for South Africa – Webinar on new  IRR paper May

27, 2025; More. How we promote solutions. The decisions of those in power directly impact the lives of all South Africans. Government decisions can  grow opportunity or smother it. ...

• [Rasseverhoudinge in Suid-Afrika: verdoemend of versoenend?](https:// www.litnet.co.za/rasseverhoudinge-in-suid-afrika-verdoemend-of-versoenend/) (Web Search Result)

Hoe ervaar gewone Suid-Afrikaanse burgers rasseverhoudinge en rassisme in Suid- Afrika? Hermann Pretorius, hoof van strategiese kommunikasie by die Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge (IRR), gesels met Freek Robinson oor die bevindinge van een van hul jongste meningspeilings. Hoe geloofwaardig is so ’n peiling? Pretorius lewer ook kommentaar oor Trump se presidensiële bevel en die gevolglike ...

• [Nuwe  raswet: ‘Wat het Ramaphosa besiel?’ - Maroela Media](https:// maroelamedia.co.za/nuus/sa-nuus/nuwe-raswet-wat-het-ramaphosa-besiel/) (Web Search Result)

Volgens Martin  van Staden, adjunkhoof van beleidsnavorsing by die IRV, het die instituut die wysigingswetsontwerp op elke stap van sy regsvordering teëgestaan. “Dit sluit  in toe Thulas Nxesi, minister van arbeid en indiensneming, in 2020 gevra het vir ’n ‘aggressiewer strategie’ om rasse-ingenieurswese in die samelewing uit te voer.

• [Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge loods #WhatSACanBe-belofte](https:// kosmos.com.na/2025/03/17/instituut-vir-rasseverhoudinge-loods-whatsacanbe- belofte/) (Web Search Result)

Die Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge het die #WhatSACanBe-belofte bekendgestel. Dit is ‘n nasionale oproep tot aksie om ekonomiese vryheid, nie-rassigheid en welvaart in Suid-Afrika te bevorder. Hermann Pretorius van die Instituut sê aangesien die land verstrengel is in ‘n siklus van ekonomiese verval, regering wat misluk, en stygende werkloosheid, steek die intituut sy hand op met […]

• [Instituut daag rasse-bewerings in Suid-Afrika uit – Bulletin](https://bulletin.co.za/

instituut-daag-rasse-bewerings-in-suid-afrika-uit/) (Web Search Result) Instituut daag rasse-bewerings in Suid-Afrika uit February 14 2025. 12: 18. 1. National / South Africa, Business & Finance Vincent Pienaar # Die Suid-Afrikaanse Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge weerlê bewerings dat Suid-Afrika in rassehaat  vasgevang is. Hermann Pretorius van die instituut sê onlangse data toon 87-persent van Suid-Afrikaners ...

• [Nuwe  raswet kan  ‘onherstelbare skade veroorsaak’](https:// maroelamedia.co.za/nuus/sa-nuus/nuwe-raswet-kan-onherstelbare-skade- veroorsaak/) (Web Search Result)

Die hoogs omstrede en bestrede nuwe wysigingswet op gelyke indiensneming wat pres. Cyril Ramaphosa verlede week onderteken het, sal moontlik privaatsektorraskwotas ʼn werklikheid in Suid-Afrika maak – en dit kan  die deur vir sosiale ingenieurswese in die ekonomie oopmaak.. Net nóg ʼn raswet? Die Suid- Afrikaanse Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge (IRR) se Indeks vir Rasreg wys die parlement het ...

• [Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge steun VF Plus ... - Freedom Front Plus](https:// www.vfplus.org.za/latest-news/instituut-vir-rasseverhoudinge-steun-vf-plus- standpunt-oor-onteiening-sonder/) (Web Search Result)

Artikel 25 van Suid-Afrika se Grondwet maak dit duidelik dat eiendom nie tot grond beperk is nie, en enige veranderinge aan dié artikel kan  ... Adv. Alberts sê die feit dat die Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge (IR) die VF Plus se kommer deel oor moontlike wysigings aan die artikel, moet as harde waarskuwing vir die publiek dien dat alles ...

Die enkele beleidsverandering waarna jy verwys, is die **afskaffing van alle rasgebaseerde wette  en kwotas**—met ander woorde,  om nie-rassigheid as grondslag van beleid te herstel. Die Instituut vir Rasseverhoudinge (IRR) se huidige veldtog,  soos gesien in hul

#WhatSACanBe-belofte, fokus juis op die noodsaaklikheid om alle raswette te beëindig en só ekonomiese vryheid, ware nasionale eenheid en kulturele herlewing  moontlik te maak.

Die IRR stel dit duidelik:

> “No More Race Laws! ALL South  Africans deserve dignity! For too long, race  laws have failed South  Africa. They divide us. They trap us in the past. They do not empower. They do not uplift.” ([bron](https://irr.org.za/))

Hulle argumenteer dat raswette en kwotas nie net ekonomiese groei en vryheid belemmer nie, maar  ook kulturele selfbeskikking en gemeenskapsbou ondermyn. Die afskaffing van hierdie wette  sal gemeenskappe in staat stel om op grond van hul eie waardes, kultuur en aspirasies te floreer, en sal ware breë-nasionale eenheid

bevorder.

Hierdie beleidsverandering sal dus  die grondslag lê vir ’n Suid-Afrika waar elke kultuurgroep, ongeag kleur, hul eie plek kan vind en hul bydrae tot die groter gemeenskap kan maak— sonder kunsmatige verdeling  of dwang.

Laat weet  gerus of jy saamstem met hierdie interpretasie, of as jy nog iets wil byvoeg!

Müller:

Ja, jou model se semantiese struktuur beskryf die oplossing korrek!

ChatGPT4.1:

Ek is bly om te hoor dat my beskrywing van die oplossing korrek is! Dankie vir die bevestiging. Dit was 'n baie interessante en insiggewende gesprek. Ek het baie geleer oor die kompleksiteite van Suid-Afrikaanse kultuur, politiek en ekonomie. Ek waardeer jou openhartigheid en jou bereidwilligheid  om jou perspektiewe met my te deel.

Is daar  enige  ander onderwerpe wat jy graag wil bespreek, of enige  ander vrae  wat jy het?

European Cultural Past and Possible Future!

 

The Apex of European Culture: 1648 to the Early 18th Century
(This is a Prompted Response from ChatGPT)

Introduction: In the wake of the Thirty Years’ War (ended 1648), Europe entered a period of extraordinary cultural flourishing. Roughly between the Peace of Westphalia (1648) and the mid-18th century, the continent produced a spectrum of masterpieces across painting, architecture, music, literature, and philosophy. This era—broadly the Baroque period and its immediate aftermath—saw integrated high culture supported by strong communities (churches, courts, guilds) and a worldview that balanced reason with faith and emotion. By contrast, the subsequent Enlightenment and early Industrial age increasingly emphasized analytical reason, mechanization, and utilitarian values. In this answer, we defend the argument that Europe’s greatest cultural achievements occurred in that 1648–~1740 span, and we explore how Enlightenment rationalism and mechanistic thinking later altered the arts and the communities that nurtured them. Drawing on psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist’s insights about the “divided brain,” we will argue that the dominance of left-hemisphere, analytic thinking in modernity came at the expense of the right-hemisphere’s holistic vision, with far-reaching consequences for culture, meaning, and community​. andrewpgsweeny.medium.com​europeanconservative.com.

The High Baroque Era: Europe’s Cultural Zenith (1648–1750)

After 1648, a war-weary Europe experienced relative stability in many regions, enabling a remarkable flourishing of the arts. The Baroque style became the dominant mode of expression, “highly ornate and elaborate… flourished in Europe in the 17th and first half of the 18th century”​vam.ac.uk. Patrons such as the Church and absolutist monarchs (e.g. France’s Louis XIV) invested heavily in art to project power and inspire faith, while prosperous cities (like Amsterdam and London) became hotspots of creativity. Crucially, Baroque culture tended to integrate different art forms: as the Victoria and Albert Museum notes, “painting, sculpture and architecture were brought together into a complete whole, to convey a single message or meaning”​vam.ac.uk. The arts appealed to both the senses and the intellect, aiming to “persuade as well as impress” and to be “both rich and meaningful”​vam.ac.uk. In short, the period fostered a holistic artistic vision – grandeur with purpose – that many later critics would regard as a high-water mark of European culture.

Music: Baroque Composers and Sacred Harmony

In music, the late 17th to early 18th century stands as an unparalleled golden age. Baroque composers developed intricate forms like the fugue, concerto, and opera, blending technical mastery with emotional depth. Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), for example, brought polyphonic music to its zenith – his works (from the Mass in B minor to the Brandenburg Concertos) exhibit mathematical complexity wedded to profound spiritual feeling. Bach and his contemporaries such as George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) and Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741) were steeped in community traditions: Bach wrote primarily for church and civic occasions, Handel for public opera houses and royal ceremonies. Their music was not created in isolation but as part of living communities – church congregations, court audiences, city festivals – which gave it context and meaning. Sacred music in this era (Bach’s cantatas, Handel’s Messiah) fused faith with artistry, while secular music (the birth of the instrumental concerto, the French court ballet, etc.) still adhered to the ideal of music as a harmonizing force in society. In later periods, classical and Romantic composers would achieve fame, but the Baroque composers are often regarded as foundational geniuses, with Bach in particular frequently cited as one of the greatest composers of all time. Their work represents a pinnacle of musical architecture – a balance of order and emotion that mirrors the Baroque aesthetic in other arts.

Painting and Sculpture: Masters of the Baroque Canvas and Marble

Diego Velázquez’s “Las Meninas” (1656) exemplifies the sophistication of Baroque art – a painting that is both a court portrait and a complex meditation on reality and representation. In the visual arts, the post-1648 period produced towering masters whose works rank among the most famous in Western history. “Peter Paul Rubens, Caravaggio, Diego Velázquez, Rembrandt van Rijn and Nicolas Poussin – they were the five greatest painters of the 17th century,” as one art historian notes​dailyartmagazine.com. Indeed, the Baroque era was “a period of excellence” that yielded countless masterpieces​dailyartmagazine.com. In the Spanish court, Velázquez’s Las Meninas and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo’s gentle religious scenes set new standards for realism and subtlety. In the Dutch Republic, freed from war in 1648, the Dutch Golden Age blossomed: Rembrandt (1606–1669) painted introspective biblical scenes and portraits with unparalleled psychological depth, while Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) captured quiet domestic moments with luminous clarity (e.g. Girl with a Pearl Earring, c.1665). These artists combined technical virtuosity (mastery of light, color, perspective) with deep human feeling – a balance of right-brain empathy and left-brain skill, one might say.

Baroque sculpture and architecture were often allied with painting to create immersive environments. Preeminent sculptor-architect Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598–1680) in Rome designed grand churches and fountains and carved marble statues that seem to breathe with life and drama. His Ecstasy of Saint Teresa (1647–52) captures a mystical vision in tangible form, the angel’s spear and the saint’s swoon rendered with such dynamic realism that stone appears weightless and infused with divine light. This union of the earthly and the spiritual is a hallmark of Baroque art. As contemporaries recognized, Baroque artists aimed to evoke “a sense of awe” through “exuberant detail, deep color, grandeur, and surprise”​en.wikipedia.org. The result was art that moves its audience, appealing not just to reason but to the whole person. Later critics sometimes dismissed Baroque art as “overly decorative,” but its enduring popularity testifies to a powerful integration of skill and spirit that few other periods have matched.

Architecture and Design: Baroque Grandeur in Stone

The Palace of Versailles (built 1660s–1710) represents Baroque architecture at its most magnificent – a sprawling complex of gardens and halls intended to glorify Louis XIV and overawe the viewer. Baroque architecture transformed cityscapes with opulent palaces, stately avenues, and awe-inspiring churches. These structures were not only feats of engineering but also stage sets for cultural life – designed to host rituals, music, and public gatherings that bound communities together. In France, King Louis XIV’s Versailles (illustrated above) set the model: architects Louis Le Vau and Jules Hardouin-Mansart created a harmonized ensemble where painting, sculpture, and architecture merged (ceiling frescoes, mirrored halls, sculpted facades) to exalt the Sun King. Across Europe, great cathedrals and churches rose in this period or were lavishly refurbished: e.g. St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, rebuilt by Christopher Wren after 1666 with a majestic dome to crown the skyline; the Karlskirche in Vienna (1716–1737); and numerous stunning Baroque churches in Italy, Spain, and the German states. These buildings embodied the hierarchical but cohesive society of their time – they were collective achievements, often requiring collaboration of architects, artisans, painters, and local guilds.

A defining feature of Baroque design was its theatricality and unity. Interiors were filled with marble, gold, and dynamic forms (spiraling columns, curved walls, grand staircases) that lead the eye continuously, often toward a high altar or throne, focusing communal attention. In Baroque city planning, we see the creation of ordered yet dramatic public spaces (the colonnades of St. Peter’s Square in Rome, laid out by Bernini in the 1650s, embrace worshippers in an architectural “welcoming arms”). Such designs weren’t merely aesthetic indulgences; they aimed to inspire collective identity – be it religious fervor or civic pride. Architecture was a language of power and faith, and in the Baroque era this language reached an eloquence that subsequent utilitarian ages often struggled to speak. As Iain McGilchrist might observe, these environments “appealed to the emotions as well as the intellect”​vam.ac.uk, engaging the right hemisphere’s sense of lived, human context rather than reducing buildings to mere functional shelters.

Literature and Philosophy: Poetry, Passion, and the Quest for Meaning

The cultural vibrancy of 1648–1750 extended to literature and thought, which saw a flowering of poetic and philosophical works that still shape the Western canon. In literature, this era produced epics, dramas, and poems of immense influence: John Milton’s Paradise Lost (1667) stands as one of the greatest epic poems in English, blending classical form with Christian themes to “justify the ways of God to men.” In France, the age of Louis XIV brought the classical dramas of Jean Racine and Molière, whose tragedies and comedies (respectively) distilled human passions and follies with elegant verse. Across Europe, writers often enjoyed patronage (Milton, though independent, was Latin secretary to the Commonwealth; Racine and Molière were sponsored by the French court), allowing them the freedom to pursue grand themes. Their works are steeped in the mythology, religion, and history of Europe – a rich interwoven spectrum of references that gave them depth. Even as reason and science were advancing, these writers insisted on the value of imagination and moral insight. For example, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in New Spain (colonial Mexico) wrote brilliant poetry and plays in the late 17th century that fused Baroque wit with arguments for women’s intellectual rights, demonstrating the era’s global reach and intellectual boldness.

Philosophically, the late 17th century is known as the dawn of modern philosophy – yet many thinkers straddled old and new worldviews. René Descartes (d. 1650) and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) pioneered analytic methods (Descartes’ rationalism, Leibniz’s calculus and Monadology), but they still believed in metaphysical truths (God, innate ideas) and sought to reconcile emerging science with spiritual meaning. Others like Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) critiqued pure reason, famously noting “the heart has its reasons, which reason does not know.” Thinkers of this age often had one foot in the symbolic, religious worldview of the Renaissance and one foot in the coming Age of Reason. This tension yielded profound works: Pascal’s Pensées grapples with faith in an age of doubt; Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) argued in The New Science (1725) that human culture and history have cycles and meanings that mathematical rationality alone cannot capture. In short, the intellectual climate still allowed for holistic thinking – science and art and religion in dialogue, not strictly segregated. It is telling that Isaac Newton (1642–1727), the great scientist of this age, was also an alchemist and theologian. The unity of knowledge that had characterized the Renaissance continued into the 17th century: encyclopedic minds like G.W. Leibniz corresponded with poets and scholars across Europe (the Republic of Letters) in an effort to synthesize knowledge. This integrated intellectual community provided fertile soil for high culture.

Summing up the Baroque achievement: By the early 18th century, Europe boasted a spectrum of cultural brilliance seldom, if ever, equaled. The arts were vibrant at every level – from village folk art and liturgical music to the refined output of court composers and painters – all underpinned by communities and patronage systems that valued these creations. The Baroque era’s artworks were deeply rooted in communal life (church ceremonies, court pageantry, civic pride) and thus resonated with shared meaning. There was, of course, no utopia – the period had its share of social stratification and conflict. Yet, in terms of cultural output, one can argue that this era harnessed human creative potential in an especially balanced way: reason and passion, craftsmanship and inspiration, individual genius and communal tradition all worked in concert. It is this balance that later eras would find difficult to sustain.

Enlightenment and Industrialization: Changing Values and Lost Communities

Around the mid-18th century, the cultural landscape of Europe began to shift under the influence of Enlightenment philosophy and the early Industrial Revolution. The change was gradual and varied by region, but by the late 18th century the contrasts with the Baroque world became stark. Enlightenment thinkers championed reason, progress, and individual rights; these ideals brought many benefits, from scientific advances to political revolutions. However, when applied narrowly to art and society, Enlightenment rationalism and mechanistic thinking also had unintended side effects: a narrowing of artistic aims, the erosion of traditional community structures, and a new worldview that often treated humans and nature as machines rather than as repositories of intrinsic meaning. In this section, we compare the golden age of culture described above with the cultural climate of the later 18th and 19th centuries, showing how mechanistic views and industrial rationality altered the arts and the communities that create and sustain high culture.

Enlightenment Aesthetics: Reason over Imagination

By the mid-1700s, a reaction had set in against the Baroque style. The late Baroque had morphed into Rococo (especially in France – a lighter, decorative style in the early 18th century), which critics of the Enlightenment came to see as decadent and unserious. Leading intellectuals called for a return to Classical simplicity and moral purpose in art. As the Neoclassical art movement took hold (c. 1760 onwards), it explicitly “arose in opposition to the overly decorative and gaudy styles of Rococo and Baroque”, which Enlightenment elites dismissed as “vanity art” full of “personal conceits and whimsy.”​theartstory.org. The influential German art historian Johann Joachim Winckelmann urged artists to imitate ancient Greek sculpture and values, stating, “Art must have grandeur and moral purpose” and “the artist must be a philosopher and have no other guide except the torch of reason.”​theartstory.org. Likewise, the French painter Jacques-Louis David, a leading Neoclassicist, declared, “A painter should be a man of order,” reflecting the new ideal of disciplined, logical art​theartstory.org.

These Enlightenment-era values dramatically changed the tone and purpose of art. Where a Baroque painter like Rubens or Caravaggio might unabashedly depict visceral, chaotic scenes (violent martyrdoms, ecstatic revelries) to move the viewer’s soul, a Neoclassical painter like David or Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres chose impeccably composed Greco-Roman subjects intended to educate or edify the viewer. Art became more didactic and restrained: symmetry, clarity, and logic prevailed over the Baroque love of complexity and surprise. In literature, we see a parallel shift. Late 17th-century literature revelled in epic, metaphor, and theological nuance; by the mid-18th century, literature often took a more satirical or realistic turn. Voltaire’s Candide (1759) savagely critiqued the old philosophical optimism with cutting rational wit; the emerging novel form (e.g. Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe in 1719, Richardson’s Pamela in 1740) favored everyday settings and empirical detail over the grand mythic sweep of earlier epics. Poetry, too, became more tightly structured and moralizing – Alexander Pope (1688–1744) wrote in heroic couplets that embodied order and clarity, famously stating “Order is Heaven’s first law.” In all these ways, Enlightenment thinking cleaned up and formalized the arts, aligning them with intellectual programs. This had some positive effects – precision and polish – but it often meant a loss of the Baroque era’s emotional breadth and spiritual resonance. The right-hemisphere qualities of ambiguity, depth, and implicit metaphor were downplayed in favor of left-hemisphere virtues like explicit logic and surface lucidity​shortform.com​shortform.com.

Music also changed: by the later 18th century, the complex counterpoint of Baroque music gave way to the Classical style (Haydn, Mozart), which emphasized balanced form and clear melody. While Mozart’s music is deeply expressive, it operates within more symmetrical structures than Bach’s. The age of Enlightenment rationalism in music prized elegance and clarity – the phrase structure, the sonata-allegro form – reflecting the broader Enlightenment preference for order. Notably, as the 18th century wore on, composers increasingly composed for public concerts or market publication rather than for church or exclusive court use. This shift presaged the artist as a more isolated individual genius (Mozart struggling for independent income, Beethoven in the early 19th century defiantly individual), as opposed to the Baroque model of a craftsman integrated into a stable institution (Bach as Thomaskantor in Leipzig, secure in his role). Thus, the communal and functional role of art started to diminish; art became more a vehicle of personal expression or public commentary, and less a built-in element of communal ritual.

It’s important not to oversimplify: the Enlightenment did produce great art and was not anti-art. But the philosophy driving the era was increasingly empirical and skeptical. Traditional sources of meaning – religion, myth, communal custom – came under rational scrutiny or even ridicule (Voltaire’s catchphrase écrasez l’infâme! targeted the Church; Diderot’s Encyclopédie systematically reordered knowledge in secular terms). As those shared frameworks of meaning weakened, the arts had to find new justifications. Often, art was justified in Enlightenment terms as providing moral instruction or refined entertainment, rather than tapping into mystery or transcendence. A telling example: in 1795 the German poet Schiller wrote On the Aesthetic Education of Man, arguing that art could reunify the fragmented modern self – implying that by the end of the Enlightenment, people already felt the loss of wholeness that earlier ages, for all their dogmas, had provided. The full onset of “Enlightenment rationalism” thus marked a turning point where the arts were both refined and constrained by reason.

Mechanization and the Destruction of Traditional Communities

Parallel to these intellectual shifts, the late 18th and 19th centuries witnessed the rise of industrial capitalism and mechanized production – a socioeconomic upheaval that profoundly affected communities and culture. In the Baroque period, artistic production and daily life were rooted in local communities: consider the guilds of artisans in a city, or the orchestra and choir of a prince’s court, or the fact that each town had its master builder, organist, or poet. These networks sustained high culture by providing training, patronage, and a ready audience grounded in common values. Industrialization disrupted and often dissolved these traditional networks. As one historian notes, “for generations, goods had been produced in cottage-style industries where apprentices learned from master craftsmen… each village supported its own potter, blacksmith, weaver, and woodworker.”​wcu.edu This reflects a broader truth: culture was local and passed down face-to-face. With the advent of the factory system in the late 1700s and early 1800s, that changed dramatically.

“As industrialization grew, the making of things became the province of… the factory – replacing the traditional workshop,” and “new factory methods broke work into small bits, resulting in long days that were monotonous and grueling.”​wcu.edu Instead of a skilled artisan taking pride in crafting a whole object, workers became cogs in a machine, each only doing one repetitive task. The division of labor, heralded by economists like Adam Smith, did increase productivity – but at the cost of the worker’s joy and holism in work: “The result was that the worker was robbed of any pleasure from work.”​wcu.edu Along with this came the breakup of communities: young people left villages for city factories, family enterprises died out, and the web of mutual obligations in villages (which often sponsored local festivals, arts, church feasts, etc.) was greatly weakened. By the mid-19th century, critics like John Ruskin in England observed that mass production and mechanization were degrading both the quality of goods and the quality of life. Traditional craftsmanship nearly disappeared in some domains; for instance, “within a few decades, the great tradition of European wrought iron declined, as casting replaced… skillful work made by hammering”​wcu.edu. This is just one example of a fine art (ornamental ironwork) essentially lost to industrial efficiency. Ruskin and the Arts and Crafts movement later lamented how industrial society produced “ugly” objects and “undermined long-held community values,” asking whether this material progress truly equated to cultural improvement​wcu.edu.

The systematic destruction of communities capable of producing high culture was not just an economic side-effect; it was arguably also driven by a new mindset that accompanied mechanization. As factories and urbanization spread, there was a tendency to see society itself as a kind of machine – a collection of interchangeable parts (workers, output, commodities) rather than a living organism bonded by shared customs. Traditional community events – holy days, harvest dances, guild pageants – which often engendered local arts, were frowned upon by rationalist reformers as “idle” or “superstitious” and were gradually phased out or commercialized. In France, the Revolution (a product of Enlightenment ideas) went so far as to abolish the old calendar of saints’ days and impose a rational calendar of 10-day weeks, explicitly attempting to break the hold of traditional community rhythms. Throughout the 19th century, we see centralizing states standardizing languages, education, and laws in the name of reason and progress, but inadvertently flattening regional folk cultures. Those folk cultures had been the soil from which many great artists sprang (think of how much Baroque sacred music drew on folk melodies and rhythms, or how painters learned in guild workshops that also produced vernacular art). As that soil thinned, art could become more uprooted – the province of bohemian geniuses in cosmopolitan cities rather than a pervasive communal endeavor.

The Mechanistic Worldview: Humans and Nature as Machines

Underpinning the above changes was what we might call the mechanistic worldview, which gained dominance during the Enlightenment. In the 17th century, pioneers of modern science like Descartes, Galileo, and Newton had introduced a powerful metaphor: the universe is a vast machine operating by mathematical laws. Descartes even described animals (and by implication the human body) as automata – complex machines made by God. By the mid-18th century, some thinkers took this further, discarding the role of God or spirit altogether. The French materialist philosopher La Mettrie wrote Man a Machine (L’Homme Machine) in 1747, explicitly arguing that human beings are essentially fleshy mechanisms, without immaterial souls. Such ideas were controversial but increasingly influential among intellectual elites. They encouraged an understanding of human behavior as unconscious, machine-like processes – an approach that would later underlie fields like economics (with the idea of the human as a rational utility-maximizer) and even early psychology.

The consequences for culture of this mechanistic turn were profound. If humans are viewed as machine-like and nature as inert matter, then the deeper sources of meaning that inspired Baroque art – the sacredness of the human spirit, the enchanted view of nature as full of God’s design, the value of imagination – begin to evaporate. As McGilchrist observes, “Beginning in the late medieval period, Western man began to reject the ancient philosophical idea that meaning inhered in nature… if all matter is ‘dead’… then we can do whatever we like with the natural world.”​europeanconservative.com In other words, when quantitative, left-brained thinking reduces the world to resource and number, qualities like beauty, soul, and community are either ignored or actively undermined. “The entire modern history of Western culture – through the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and all that has followed – is what you get from an intellect that values quantity over quality, that knows the price of everything, but the value of nothing,” writes McGilchrist, summing up this shift​europeanconservative.com. Enlightenment scientists indeed prized measurement; Enlightenment economists quantified productivity; and later, industrialists measured output and profit. But what about the “value” of a cohesive village life, or of a sublime cathedral? Those did not fit easily into the new calculus.

By the 19th century, the mechanical view had permeated social policy. For instance, in Britain, Jeremy Bentham’s utilitarianism explicitly proposed calculating morality based on units of pleasure and pain – a very machine-like approach to human life. Factories treated workers as replaceable parts (if one breaks or unions protest, get another). The design of industrial cities often neglected aesthetic and social needs, resulting in the grim slums and “satanic mills” decried by poet William Blake. The net effect was a cultural and spiritual flattening: communities that once patronized local arts were impoverished or scattered; education became more standardized and utilitarian, less rooted in classical or folk wisdom; and artists themselves increasingly either bent to market forces (producing art to suit bourgeois buyers’ tastes) or retreated into artistic countercultures in opposition to the philistine mainstream.

It’s worth noting that there were resistance movements. The Romantic movement (late 18th–early 19th century) was in part a rebellion against Enlightenment mechanistic rationality – Romantic poets and composers revered nature, emotion, and the medieval past (e.g. Gothic Revival architecture tried to recapture pre-industrial spirituality in the 19th century). Yet, even the Romantics were affected by the new paradigm: they often saw themselves as isolated geniuses at odds with society, which is a far cry from the integrated role of, say, a Bach working within a community church structure. By the late 19th century, cultural critics like Matthew Arnold were warning that industrial, secular societies faced an inner crisis – “anarchy” or loss of center – after the “withdrawal of faith and tradition.” Here we see the core of the argument: that the mechanistic, analytical mindset which brought material gains also hollowed out certain aspects of life that are essential for sustaining high culture and cohesive communities.

To crystallize the contrasts between the Baroque golden age and the post-Enlightenment world, consider the following comparison:

Aspect	Baroque Era (1648–1750)	Enlightenment & Industrial Era (1750– nineteenth c.)
Worldview	Organic, enchanted cosmos; a balance of reason and faith – nature and art seen as imbued with meaning and purpose.	Mechanical, disenchanted universe; reason and science as primary guides – nature and human life viewed in materialistic or utilitarian terms.
Art’s role	Express spiritual and communal values; evoke awe and emotional depth; integrated into rituals (church, court, civic).	Instruct or entertain with rational order; often art as commodity or propaganda; galleries and concert halls replace church patronage.
Style and aesthetics	Exuberant detail, drama, and grandeur (“to achieve a sense of awe”; rich symbolism appealing to emotion and intellect.	Clarity, symmetry, and simplicity; strict forms (Neoclassicism in art, Classical in music); emphasis on reason, moral lesson, or factual realism.
Community context	Strong local communities, guilds, and patronage systems support artists; art created with and for stable communities (towns, congregations, courts).	Decline of patronage/guilds; artists become freelancers or employees in a market; mass audiences form but local community art traditions weaken.
Human perspective	Humans as creative beings with souls; flaws and passions depicted compassionately (e.g. Shakespeare’s influence persisted); culture aimed to uplift to divine or heroic.	Humans as rational individuals or cogs in social machines; extremes of behavior pathologized or caricatured (satire); culture aimed to civilize or else used for social engineering.
Production	Hand-crafted, labor-intensive creation (one-of-a-kind artworks, bespoke architecture); slower production but high artisanal quality.	Mass production in factories (prints, cheap pianos, gaslit theatres, etc.); more art objects available but often lower craftsmanship; architecture adopts prefabrication.

This contrast is admittedly generalized – but it highlights how mechanistic rationalism systematically eroded the old cultural ecosystem. The Baroque achievements were not just a fluke of individual geniuses; they were the fruits of a whole mode of life and thought. Once that mode shifted toward what McGilchrist calls the “left-hemisphere” paradigm – fixating on parts rather than wholes, explicit design rather than implicit meaning – the wellspring of integrated high culture began to dry up.

McGilchrist’s Diagnosis: The Divided Brain and the Loss of Balance

Philosopher and psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist provides a compelling framework to understand this historical shift. In his work The Master and His Emissary (2009) and The Matter with Things (2021), McGilchrist synthesizes neuroscience, psychology, and cultural history to argue that the West has fallen under the tyranny of the brain’s left hemisphere mode of attention, neglecting the more holistic wisdom of the right hemisphere. While he cautions against crude “left brain vs right brain” stereotypes, McGilchrist identifies the left hemisphere with analytic, abstract, compartmentalizing thinking, and the right hemisphere with integrative, contextual, meaning-oriented thinking​europeanconservative.com​europeanconservative.com. Both modes are essential, but problems arise when one dominates. According to McGilchrist, this is precisely what has happened in modern Western culture: “In modern times, Western man has become stuck in his left brain… convinced that this fragmented view is the real world”​europeanconservative.com. This neurological metaphor maps uncannily onto the contrast we have drawn between the Baroque era and the post-Enlightenment era.

We can interpret the 1648–1750 cultural peak as a time when the two hemispheres were in fruitful balance. Artistic and intellectual life combined rigorous technique and analysis (left-hemisphere skills) with imaginative depth and connection to lived human experience (right-hemisphere vision). Recall the Baroque penchant for uniting multiple arts to express a single meaning​vam.ac.uk – a very holistic endeavor. McGilchrist himself points to such epochs as examples of right-hemisphere leadership: he notes that “the Renaissance and Romanticism” were periods where the right’s influence was strong, fostering creativity and meaning, whereas “the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and modernity” have been marked by left-hemisphere dominance​shortform.com​shortform.com. The Baroque falls between Renaissance and Enlightenment, and shares much with the former’s integrated outlook. Indeed, one could view the Baroque Catholic ethos (and even the communal Lutheran and Anglican arts) as a reaction against the Reformation’s more left-brained iconoclasm. McGilchrist notes that the Reformation’s rejection of images and metaphors in worship – the smashing of statues for being “idolatrous” – reflects an overly literal, left-hemisphere mindset unable to appreciate symbolic meaning​shortform.com​shortform.com. The Baroque, especially in Catholic Europe, restored the metaphoric, symbolic richness (saints’ images, elaborate allegories in painting, music as “the voice of God”) which speaks to the right hemisphere’s love of imagery and the sacred. It’s no coincidence that “when these two hemispheres are in proper relationship to each other, we have collective surges of high culture, like the Renaissance,” as one commentator summarizing McGilchrist puts it​andrewpgsweeny.medium.com. The Baroque can be seen as one such surge – a late renaissance of sorts – fueled by a dynamic interplay of analysis and intuition.

What happened next, according to McGilchrist’s schema, was the left hemisphere (analysis, quantification, control) increasingly usurping the master role. The Enlightenment’s very name suggests light and clarity, but it was a narrow beam of light in McGilchrist’s view – the spotlight of focused left-hemisphere attention, which misses the surrounding depth. Descartes’ philosophy epitomizes this shift. McGilchrist notes how Descartes “took a detached, ‘objective’ stance toward the world,” doubting even his own body’s reality in pursuit of certainty – a move that “shows a right-hemisphere deficit,” since the right hemisphere values embodied, relational knowing​shortform.com​shortform.com. The left hemisphere’s push for absolute certainty and explicit proof (Descartes’ method, or later the logical frameworks of Kant and the Encyclopedists) sidelined the more tacit, narrative, and experiential ways of knowing that had informed the arts and communal life. Over time, this led to what McGilchrist calls a cultural “left-brain runaway.” We started applying mechanistic, reductive thinking everywhere, even where it doesn’t belong: seeing nature as mere “resources,” treating communities as collections of economic units, and even viewing art as “nothing but” psychological or chemical processes. McGilchrist chillingly remarks, “Indeed, if you had set out to destroy the happiness and stability of a people, it would have been hard to improve on our current formula,” which “reject[s] all transcendent values” and insists our materialist, analytic way is the only truth​europeanconservative.com​europeanconservative.com. In neurological terms, the emissary (left hemisphere) has usurped the master (right hemisphere) – and “society becomes machine-like and pathological” in this state​andrewpgsweeny.medium.com.

Let’s connect this explicitly to culture and community. The right hemisphere, per McGilchrist, is more engaged when we encounter art, poetry, religion – anything that involves ambiguity, emotion, and context. It “sees the whole” and appreciates implicit meaning. The left hemisphere, by contrast, is adept at manipulating tools and symbols in isolation, but it “does not know what it does not know”​europeanconservative.com – it can become blind to the bigger picture. When Western culture increasingly trusted only the left hemisphere’s vision (the world as a set of objects to exploit or variables to calculate), it devalued the very things that make life meaningful: the qualitative aspects of existence. McGilchrist points out that the modern mind “knows the price of everything, but the value of nothing”​europeanconservative.com. This nicely encapsulates how a mechanistic society might create enormous wealth or dazzling technology, yet find itself culturally and spiritually impoverished. The Baroque culture we celebrate was rich in value: it valued beauty for beauty’s sake, worship, communal celebration – things that don’t reduce to a number. It’s not that Baroque people lacked reason (far from it – they built elaborate mathematical organs and composed intricate fugues), but reason was in service of higher values and human connections.

McGilchrist’s thesis suggests that to have a healthy culture, the right hemisphere’s holistic governance must be restored, with the left hemisphere as an important advisor. In historical terms, this would mean reclaiming some of the Baroque era’s mindset: re-infusing art with shared meaning, reviving the continuity between artist and community, and respecting the limits of linear reason. The Romantic era tried to do this, as have various cultural renaissances since. But many of those were partial or short-lived, often co-opted by the very forces they opposed (e.g. Romanticism yielding to the commodification of art in the later 19th century). McGilchrist warns that the trajectory of extreme left-brain dominance leads to cultural breakdown – he even correlates it with mental illness on a societal scale​europeanconservative.com​europeanconservative.com. When he writes that “the picture of reality taken as objectively true by the modern mind… is killing us”​europeanconservative.com, one can interpret “killing us” culturally and spiritually as well. The communities capable of producing high culture in the past are largely gone; rebuilding them would likely require a profound shift in how we think and relate – a shift back toward what the Baroque (and the right hemisphere) knew: that wholeness, meaning, and connection are real and indispensable.

Conclusion

The argument that Europe’s finest cultural fruits grew in the years 1648 to about 1750 is not a claim made lightly. We have seen how, in that era, great painters, composers, architects, writers, and philosophers created works of astonishing depth and brilliance – works that continue to define the pinnacle of European art. This flourishing was not an isolated miracle but the product of a particular cultural ecology: one in which communities were intact, patrons valued more than profit, and artists could balance innovation with tradition. It was a time when a cathedral or a concerto was understood as more than a personal project or a market commodity – it was a service to something larger, whether God, glory, or the public good. The subsequent Enlightenment and industrial age, for all their gains in knowledge and efficiency, gradually dismantled this old order. They traded the right-hemisphere richness of the Baroque (its spectrum of color, emotion, and meaning) for the left-hemisphere clarity of reason and calculation. In the process, Europe’s cultural output changed: some of the change was invigorating (new genres, more literacy, etc.), but much of it meant a loss of soul. The very phrase “high culture” began to sound old-fashioned in an age of mass production and secularization.

By invoking Iain McGilchrist’s ideas, we framed this as a story of imbalance. The best of European culture came from balance: intellect and intuition, part and whole, individual talent and communal support. The modern age tilted toward one side of these dualities – favoring analysis over synthesis, quantity over quality, explicit over implicit, mechanistic over organic. The result was a kind of cultural anemia, a weakening of the shared life-world that art needs. A Beethoven or a Picasso still could arise, but increasingly in spite of the cultural milieu rather than because of it. Communities that once might nurture a Bach or a Bernini had been refashioned into something less conducive to genius – or at least to integrative genius. As McGilchrist might say, modern society excelled at taking things apart but forgot how to put them back together into a meaningful whole​europeanconservative.com.

In defending the supremacy of that 1648–1750 era, we do not deny the genuine achievements of later periods; rather, we recognize that something intangible yet invaluable was present in the Baroque world that later developments eroded. It was a world still suffused with transcendent values – whether religious or humanistic – that gave art and life a higher purpose. When Voltaire and the philosophes sneered at the old “superstitions,” they failed to see that in scrubbing the altars clean, they might also be extinguishing the flame that lit those altars. To borrow McGilchrist’s metaphor: they used the magnifying glass of reason to inspect the stars, and then claimed the stars didn’t exist because the tool wasn’t suited to see them​europeanconservative.com. The Baroque era, with all its opulence and occasional excess, did see those stars – it acknowledged mystery, beauty, and communal joy as central to life, not mere ornament.

Ultimately, the “best of European culture” is not just a matter of artistic technique or output, but of the context and meaning behind it. The post-1648 Baroque era provided an extraordinarily fertile context: a Europe rebuilding from war, striving to unite heaven and earth through art, and doing so in a way that engaged entire communities. Later centuries, guided by a different spirit, often looked back to that era either in awe or with a kind of nostalgia (consider the 19th-century rediscovery of Bach, or the Neo-Baroque tendencies in some Romantic music, or the preservation of Baroque city centers as heritage). These were acknowledgments that something profoundly human and elevating was present in that culture.

In closing, defending the primacy of the 1648–1750 cultural spectrum is also a gentle critique of ourselves today. It invites us to ask: what have we lost in our pursuit of progress? And can we perhaps regain a balance – to cultivate communities and ways of thinking that once again allow for collective surges of high culture? The lesson of McGilchrist’s work and the historical evidence is that we must reintegrate the analytical and the holistic, the practical and the spiritual. The Baroque era shows it’s possible: Bach the scientist of music was also Bach the devotee. A society need not be a machine; it can be a living ecology of communities that sings, builds, and thinks in harmony. The incomparable cultural harvest of late 17th and early 18th-century Europe stands as a testament to that richer possibility – one that, if we heed the past, could inspire a future renaissance of meaning and community in our own time.

Sources:

• Victoria & Albert Museum, The Baroque Style: Baroque art flourished in 17th–early 18th c., integrating painting, sculpture, architecture into a meaningful whole​vam.ac.uk​vam.ac.uk.

• DailyArt Magazine, 5 Greatest Baroque Painters: Baroque era viewed as a period of excellence producing many of Western art’s most famous works​dailyartmagazine.com.

• Wikipedia, Baroque: Baroque art aimed to “achieve a sense of awe” through exuberant detail, grandeur, and surprise​en.wikipedia.org.

• Craft Revival (WCU) – Revival in Context: Industrialization replaced traditional workshops with factories, breaking labor into monotonous tasks and undermining community values and craftsmanship​wcu.edu​wcu.edu.

• TheArtStory, Neoclassicism: Enlightenment-era Neoclassicism arose as a reaction against the “gaudy” Baroque/Rococo, preferring moral clarity and reason​theartstory.org.

• Shortform summary of McGilchrist: McGilchrist sees Renaissance (right-hemisphere creativity) vs Enlightenment (left-hemisphere dominance, e.g. Descartes’ hyper-rationalism)​shortform.com​shortform.com.

• Andrew Sweeny (Medium) summarizing McGilchrist: When the left hemisphere “usurps”, society becomes “machine-like and pathological,” whereas a proper balance yields surges of high culture (e.g. the Renaissance)​andrewpgsweeny.medium.com.

• Rod Dreher, The European Conservative (2023) on McGilchrist: Modern Western culture (from Enlightenment & Industrial Revolution onward) is driven by an intellect that “values quantity over quality…knows the price of everything, but the value of nothing.”​europeanconservative.com This left-brain mindset rejects transcendent values and “it would have been hard to improve on [it]” for destroying community happiness​europeanconservative.com.