Very much worth the read, when you’ve got a few moments:
(Ideology) should flourish where education is widespread, and especially where opportunities are limited for the educated to lose themselves in grand projects, or to take leadership roles to which they believe that their education entitles them. The attractions of ideology are not so much to be found in the state of the world—always lamentable, but sometimes improving, at least in certain respects—but in states of mind. And in many parts of the world, the number of educated people has risen far faster than the capacity of economies to reward them with positions they believe commensurate with their attainments. Even in the most advanced economies, one will always find unhappy educated people searching for the reason that they are not as important as they should be.
His observations on ideology fit so many of today’s “isms” from Islamism to radical environmentalism.
We could use a few more worrying about how, and having to be, productive then engaging in idealist daydreaming of how to make life for everyone else so grand.
I sometimes seek a little more passion on my side of the spectrum. But them not too many understood when he said:
“I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!”
Barry Goldwater
1964
right to the heart of the issue… excellent!
I like Dalrymple, what he says is usually well worth reading.
“Francis Bacon pointed out four hundred years ago that one reason for sedition and mutiny in any polity was ‘breeding more scholars than preferment can take off’” (from Honor: a History, by James Bowman)
A modern translation of “breeding more scholars than preferment can take off” might be “graduating more PhDs than have any hope of getting tenure.”
ABSOLUTELY everything the man writes/has written is right on tgt and is absolutely a delight to read. Someone who has certainly mastered the English language. Was wondering if Lex would pick up on his latest missive… Dr. Ted is THE MAN!
(Aside from the Proprietor, of course)
Well, but are liberalism (the Hume, Hayek et al. strand of) and neoconservativism now ideologies or not?
david foster/
One of the great ironies of history is that Eastern Europe, that part of the Continent least affected by the Industrial Revolution, was home to most of the Western world’s finest universities–which pumped out far more highly educated individuals than the local/regional economy could find meaningful use for–thus providing fertile ground and a receptive ear by unappreciated and unemployed youth for the admonishments of Marx and Communism.