This book is the second of the three books which come under the series PHILOSOPHY UNLEASHED. This book deals with ideas, societies and civilizations. The first book in the series, EVOLUTION RELOADED, deals with the controversial topic of evolution. The third book, WORDS AND DEEDS, explores the possibility of a new knowledge system on the lines of the Nyaya Philosophy of the ancient as well as a philosophy of history which accounts for a constantly evolving perspective of historical narration.
The domains of social evolution, historical interpretation and philosophical speculation generally form baffling zones of intellectual debate, because on the one hand, all the guiding principles of these fields are subjected to constant changes and on the other hand, the subject matter of all these fields, i.e. the society itself, is subjected to the process of unstoppable evolution. In this work named ‘Form and Soul’ we are trying to understand the human society by considering it as a confluence of various dynamic social flows. An effort to understand a society as an organism is undertaken in the introduction which also tries to discuss the pros and cons of such a consideration.
In chapter 1 a new approach to define the pattern of social evolution is discussed from the perspectives of both philosophy and history. Ideas and processes are the two platforms where we can build a theory which can define a workable pattern of social evolution. Unlike in other sociological theories where ideas became tools to interpret a society, we follow the processes of social evolution which can be standardized to understand a general theory of social evolution. This chapter also undertakes an attempt to define as well as to distinguish culture and civilization and come to the conclusion that both cannot be used as yard sticks to define a workable theory of social evolution.
From chapters to 2 to 6 the readers can find an elaborate discussion on the dynamic forces of social evolution such as the flow of people over geographical territories, the flow of genes in the social milieu, the flow of resources in the economy, the flow of ideas in the social psyche and the flow power in the polity, in that order. Under normal circumstances a society is considered as a system that tries to attain equilibrium in its existence. The dynamic flows in the social system are responsible for maintaining the equilibrium of a society.
Chapter 7 deals with a systemic change in a society which the consciousness of modern Europe recognized in terms of modernization. However, many social scientists used the term modernization in a limited sense that it is mainly concerned with a transition from human power to machine power. The concept of modernization failed to deal with the manifold changes that a society undergoes when it is subjected to an unavoidable course of cyclic evolution. Now we are on the threshold of a more imposing type of transition in terms of technology from machine power to artificial intelligence and consequently there arises a greater need to reshape our society in terms of the emerging new technologies. We cannot call this process modernization or post-modernization. Therefore the whole idea is brought under a new category named systemic revitalization.
Chapter 8, the final chapter, deals with the emerging patterns of social dynamics both nationally and internationally going beyond national states and civilizations. There are many dynamic forces that occasionally gather momentum to become defining forces of an age. Philosophers and social scientists try to deal with one or the other such force according to their convenience. It is due to this reason that ideas such as cultural nationalism in Germany, social democracy in Soviet Union and liberal democracy in America dominated the domain of political discussion during particular periods of history.
On the whole this book is an effort to understand the emerging new society which is being reshaped by the emerging new technology. Everything is new in this society. It has new ideas about itself, history, philosophy, polity, economy and human relations. There took place an inevitable break with the past which makes us the esteemed generations of a new age where we are compelled to add new definitions to the arts and sciences of our own time.
Once upon a time our ancestors lived in an age where innumerable rural societies existed in isolation. Notwithstanding the ongoing inter-civilization trade, which continuously exchanged ideas, techniques and commodities among various territorial societies, influences from outside world could not bring substantial impacts on the social dynamics of innumerable isolated inhabitations where the same mode of life continued to exist for thousands of years. It was an age when wars were fought face to face and most of the victories were determined on the basis of the brute power of man.
Then came an age where machines cut short the distance between isolated inhabitations and liberated the creative energies of man. The processes of political campaigns and workers’ agitations reduced the scope of otherwise recurring wars which halted the progress of civilization.
But now we have almost entered into a new age where we force ourselves into a new kind of isolation amidst all possibilities of human interaction. Today most people live and work in metropolitan cities where they don't know who lives by the next door. The world dominated by information technology, quantum mechanics and artificial intelligence, though offered a hitherto unheard scale of human connectivity, practically led to the isolation of man. Mass agitations, political campaigns and workers strikes are replaced by social media campaigns, virtual meetings and online campaigns.
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