The stupidity of predicting the future reveals itself to generations who live in the predicted future.
As a control freak, man never accepts the idea of an unforeseen future. If they had a way, even corpses would want to have a say on how we the living should live our lives.
In the 19th century, some philosophers predicted what they thought life would be like in the 21st century. One such forecast was that our modern age would be so science and technology driven that machines would do all work, and mankind would be there mainly to drink and have sex.
The idea of a future where days would be filled with sex and booze was sublimated in economic theories that ascribed directionality to man's material progress.
Conventional economic theory told us that man's economic activity, perforce, proceeds from agriculture via industrialisation to a post-industrial world.
It is in the final stage - the post-industrial phase - where philosophers of yore envisioned working machines that would turn man into a permanent libidinal being, lubricated by an unending flow of alcohol.
Those who are able to discern the workings of a deep structure will not fail to see how modern Western civilisation has been influenced by the idea of sex and alcohol as the end of life.
The Renaissance, and later Enlightenment, propelled the scientific discoveries that culminated in the Industrial Revolution that facilitated Europe's move from backwardness to development.
Following the successful post-World War 2 reconstruction of Western Europe, a time came when Europeans felt it was time to drink and have sex. Indeed, the grand narrative of European cultural progress is not complete until you mention wine and beer.
Being an integral part of the West, Americans too did arrive at their glorious drink-and-sex moment where they stopped producing.
The most outstanding country in the West that saw through the destructive conception of sensual pleasure as the goal of life is Germany.
Germany understood that whenever rich men want to drink and have sex, they would also want to impress their women with flashy cars. And so the Germans continued to perfect and produce their VW, Mercedes-Benz and BMW.
This explains why the 2008 global financial crisis that debilitated almost all Western countries left Germany standing, like a defiant tree in a ferocious river determined to flatten everything.
The sublimation of the idea of a drink-and-sex, post-industrial economy was done by redefining productive work, giving it a new image of men in suits and ties in air-conditioned offices located on the top floor of the tallest skyscraper.
These are the bankers who brought the world economy to its knees in 2008. Itching to go and drink and have sex, the bankers wanted to amass as much money as soon as possible - without real work.
What the hallucinating philosophers of old forgot is that the suits and ties worn by the sex-obsessed bankers of their imaginary modern world would still need to be produced not by automated machines, but by human beings.
Before they realised it, many citizens of the West were clothed by the Chinese - who woke up every morning and went to factories that produce the things needed by human beings for daily life.
Even such popular American labels as Nike, or gadgets like the iPad, are produced in China. Today it is rare to meet a citizen in Europe or America without a Samsung smartphone in the pocket.
Westerners can drink and have as much sex as they want; they still need to phone their girlfriends and boyfriends through devices produced by human beings in Asian factories.
East Asia is a practical example of the stupidity of ancient Western philosophers. It is true that, like the rest of mankind, Asians do drink and have sex, but that is not what life in the 21st century is about.
For as long as mankind exists, machines will never replace minds and hands completely. Computers and robots will never be able to produce everything we need. In short, man shall not become the sex machine that floated in the heads of dead Western philosophers.
There is a lesson for South Africa here. Even as we posit a knowledge-based future, South Africans must never entertain the possibility of a future without manufacturing.
It is true that we will need scientific knowledge to design modern wares, but we will still depend on the hands of skilled employees who work in real factories to produce an assortment of articles.
We must therefore guard against the trap into which Greece and France fell: the overproduction of philosophers at the expense of trained practical men who take pride in wearing overalls.
Look around wherever you are, and you will see not a single item produced by the drink-and-sex, idling men once imagined by dead philosophers. Life is real.
Overalls take pride of place in modern world
The stupidity of predicting the future reveals itself to generations who live in the predicted future.
As a control freak, man never accepts the idea of an unforeseen future. If they had a way, even corpses would want to have a say on how we the living should live our lives.
In the 19th century, some philosophers predicted what they thought life would be like in the 21st century. One such forecast was that our modern age would be so science and technology driven that machines would do all work, and mankind would be there mainly to drink and have sex.
The idea of a future where days would be filled with sex and booze was sublimated in economic theories that ascribed directionality to man's material progress.
Conventional economic theory told us that man's economic activity, perforce, proceeds from agriculture via industrialisation to a post-industrial world.
It is in the final stage - the post-industrial phase - where philosophers of yore envisioned working machines that would turn man into a permanent libidinal being, lubricated by an unending flow of alcohol.
Those who are able to discern the workings of a deep structure will not fail to see how modern Western civilisation has been influenced by the idea of sex and alcohol as the end of life.
The Renaissance, and later Enlightenment, propelled the scientific discoveries that culminated in the Industrial Revolution that facilitated Europe's move from backwardness to development.
Following the successful post-World War 2 reconstruction of Western Europe, a time came when Europeans felt it was time to drink and have sex. Indeed, the grand narrative of European cultural progress is not complete until you mention wine and beer.
Being an integral part of the West, Americans too did arrive at their glorious drink-and-sex moment where they stopped producing.
The most outstanding country in the West that saw through the destructive conception of sensual pleasure as the goal of life is Germany.
Germany understood that whenever rich men want to drink and have sex, they would also want to impress their women with flashy cars. And so the Germans continued to perfect and produce their VW, Mercedes-Benz and BMW.
This explains why the 2008 global financial crisis that debilitated almost all Western countries left Germany standing, like a defiant tree in a ferocious river determined to flatten everything.
The sublimation of the idea of a drink-and-sex, post-industrial economy was done by redefining productive work, giving it a new image of men in suits and ties in air-conditioned offices located on the top floor of the tallest skyscraper.
These are the bankers who brought the world economy to its knees in 2008. Itching to go and drink and have sex, the bankers wanted to amass as much money as soon as possible - without real work.
What the hallucinating philosophers of old forgot is that the suits and ties worn by the sex-obsessed bankers of their imaginary modern world would still need to be produced not by automated machines, but by human beings.
Before they realised it, many citizens of the West were clothed by the Chinese - who woke up every morning and went to factories that produce the things needed by human beings for daily life.
Even such popular American labels as Nike, or gadgets like the iPad, are produced in China. Today it is rare to meet a citizen in Europe or America without a Samsung smartphone in the pocket.
Westerners can drink and have as much sex as they want; they still need to phone their girlfriends and boyfriends through devices produced by human beings in Asian factories.
East Asia is a practical example of the stupidity of ancient Western philosophers. It is true that, like the rest of mankind, Asians do drink and have sex, but that is not what life in the 21st century is about.
For as long as mankind exists, machines will never replace minds and hands completely. Computers and robots will never be able to produce everything we need. In short, man shall not become the sex machine that floated in the heads of dead Western philosophers.
There is a lesson for South Africa here. Even as we posit a knowledge-based future, South Africans must never entertain the possibility of a future without manufacturing.
It is true that we will need scientific knowledge to design modern wares, but we will still depend on the hands of skilled employees who work in real factories to produce an assortment of articles.
We must therefore guard against the trap into which Greece and France fell: the overproduction of philosophers at the expense of trained practical men who take pride in wearing overalls.
Look around wherever you are, and you will see not a single item produced by the drink-and-sex, idling men once imagined by dead philosophers. Life is real.
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