The End of History

[OldScratch]

so how much does a year of tuition cost at a good university? Im always hearing of ppl bitching about university being too expensive.

Annual tuition at a good school is extortionate by most accounts, so what you hear is essentially correct. However, when you use terms like "underfunded" this clearly implies that someone(presumably the government) should foot or "fund" the bill, aside from the student themselves.
Obviously, I was refering only to "public" education which doesn't cover higher-ed, etc. in America. My apologies if this wasn't made clear.

 

[schivmeister]

I have to agree with Speed on pretty much everything he/she said.

But i think the case for culture, it's because Americans themselves were not there for a long time. It was a foreign land discovered by Europeans. So if you look at it that way, North America would be a haven for all sorts of foreigners and hence the mass immigration. The need to be different is another case. The left-hand driving, the left-hand refrigerators, the left-hand everything, God knows who thought these up. Well maybe only I am not informed The need to be totally different adds to whatever sleep-eat-drink-fuck-and-die life there is.

History is written by the victors, so sometimes you don't really learn from the correct story, almost always 99% of the time it's the one-sided books. No historian is right, unless he/she had lived in those times of concern. We can only live upto 100 years +-, so none of us are really qualified to teach or agree on any particular part of history.

However, when you throw in the Illuminati, everything comes apart and it's not the same world

 

[s_a_o]

History "represents" a lot of things, and I don't really see how the fact that history "represents" tradition would be seen as some kind of threat or impediment to personal freedom. Are you sure you're not just making things up?

I completely agree.

History is my intended major...

That being said, history is what you make of it. History will always exist -- it will exist as long as the world exists and humans keep reproducing. History encompasses the human experience.

History does not limit freedom... History is found everywhere, from all view points. If somebody wants to believe everything that their parents tell them (i.e. Everybody who doesn't believe in god is going to hell! -or- Eastern Europeans suck!) then they are close-minded and unfortunate individuals. This has nothing to do with history. If people are going to limit themselves, it is their own fault, not history.

 

[derek]

History only makes sense through the eyes that interpret it. I'm not sure some pure form of history exists.

 

[speed]

History only makes sense through the eyes that interpret it. I'm not sure some pure form of history exists.

Well, feminist, neo-marxist, and multi-cultural history is terribly pure! Well, thats what I was told by my midwestern undergrad history profs six years ago. The only true history is of the poor and oppressed, the common man, hehe.

But instead of analysing what "history" means, and is (which I suppose my poorly reasoned thread brought up), let us instead think of the almost total amnesia of the past that is going on now. Again, if no one but a few "historians" and other eccentric or interested individuals knows of the past, how does this condition the future and the present?

 

[speed]

Baudrillard has this to say about the end of history:

The end of history is, alas, also the end of the dustbins of history. There are no longer any dustbins for disposing of old ideologies, old regimes, old values. Where are we going to throw Marxism, which actually invented the dustbins of history? (Yet there is some justice here since the very people who invented them have fallen in.) Conclusion: if there are no more dustbins of history, this is because History itself has become a dustbin. It has become its own dustbin, just as the planet itself is becoming its own dustbin.

 

[infoterror]

I think he's right. We've ended history by agreeing to the non-philosophy of humanism/materialism (liberalism). Therefore, no real changes except linear changes and the corresponding failure response await us at this point. I think it's RIP Humanity unless we correct this outlook, which is also boring.

 

[speed]

I think he's right. We've ended history by agreeing to the non-philosophy of humanism/materialism (liberalism). Therefore, no real changes except linear changes and the corresponding failure response await us at this point. I think it's RIP Humanity unless we correct this outlook, which is also boring.

I agree. Have you read any Fukuyama? He wrote The End of History and the Last Man, and like you, he stated (this is before Iraq) history had ended because democratic capitalism and open market liberalism had won. But he was happy, and a willing cheerleader for this End of history to come about (disgusting Neo-con). I however, prefer Braudrillard's cynical thinking on all this. I totally agree with his conclusion that everything in the modern world has been reduced to an object value--specifically a sign value. Indeed, I do find him to be the most important thinker on the modern world.

Although I do make a meaningless semantic argument that humanism and liberalism are entirely seperate things (although, misguided and bastardized humanism did aid liberalism's eventual triumph).

What shall we do after the orgy then Infoterror? hehe.

 

[speed]

Baudrillard interests me - where would you recommend starting with his work?

I would start with America. A wonderfully poetic, easy, yet remarkably prescient and substantial read.

You will love Baudrillard An Etching. His prose is poetic. In fact, all of his works are wonderfully descriptive, flowing, worthy of a great writer. Imagine the prose philosophy style of Foucault, Cioran, and Nietszche combined. His flaw from a philosophical perpective (and his strength as a writer) is his use of wonderully on point and witty declarative statements, full of meaning.

And his philosophy is perhaps the most relevant of any philosopher I know of, to todays world. He's originally a sociologist, with a strong background in political economy and semiotics. All I think are terribly important in understanding this postmodern age.

 

[s_a_o]

History only makes sense through the eyes that interpret it. I'm not sure some pure form of history exists.

History is only pure when it is being experienced firsthand. Unfortunately, we are left to do our best to recreate it.

 

[Omnis_Sathanas]

I would start with America. A wonderfully poetic, easy, yet remarkably prescient and substantial read.

You will love Baudrillard An Etching. His prose is poetic. In fact, all of his works are wonderfully descriptive, flowing, worthy of a great writer. Imagine the prose philosophy style of Foucault, Cioran, and Nietszche combined. His flaw from a philosophical perpective (and his strength as a writer) is his use of wonderully on point and witty declarative statements, full of meaning.

And his philosophy is perhaps the most relevant of any philosopher I know of, to todays world. He's originally a sociologist, with a strong background in political economy and semiotics. All I think are terribly important in understanding this postmodern age.

I would second that recommendation. You can probably read through America in a couple of hours, but it brings up a lot of issues in a very small space. It's also great to read an as American because it gives you an outsider perspective of a society so concerned with productivity and economic competition (some of the things people routinely do here without thinking seem to appear very absurd to him).

 

[speed]

I would second that recommendation. You can probably read through America in a couple of hours, but it brings up a lot of issues in a very small space. It's also great to read an as American because it gives you an outsider perspective of a society so concerned with productivity and economic competition (some of the things people routinely do here without thinking seem to appear very absurd to him).

I concur.

Also, after you finish America, start with The Political Economy of the Sign and The Consumer Society. Here, he lays out all of his ideas on economics and post-modern advertising and capitalism. Although, I confess, my reading of him ends with SImularca and SImulation. So, I have some catching up to do myself.

 

[MetalBooger]

History:
1. the branch of knowledge dealing with past events.
2. a continuous, systematic narrative of past events as relating to a particular people, country, period, person, etc., usually written as a chronological account; chronicle: a history of France; a medical history of the patient.


Mmmk, so i guess this proves history is not dead, we have records dealing with the goings on of humanity for thousands of years to this very date. By saying history is dead you essentially say that humanity is dead, because a recurring theme in humanity is logging of events and passing down of information. And enough of this bullshit that the victors write history and that its a bad thing. If you dont like the way history is taught do your own damn research.

If you think history is dead however, for some crazy reason, see if you can buy a newspaper, that should give a rather good clue. Lemme give a lil timeline of the creation of history:

Event :::> document ::::> storage

its always been done and always will, just go to a library.


This is for you Conservationist.