#ancientgreece — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #ancientgreece, aggregated by home.social.
-
Hippocrates: The Father of Medicine and the Birth of Scientific Thinking
From Temple Dreams to Natural Causes Born around 460 BCE on the Greek island of Kos, Hippocrates stands as one of the most radical intellectual revolutionaries in human history. Before him, illness was understood through a lens of myth and mystery: disease was divine punishment, demonic possession, or the result of offending the gods. Healing required prayer, sacrifice, and rituals performed by priests in temples like the Asklepieion.
Hippocrates, trained within that very temple tradition, did something unprecedented. Influenced by the pre-Socratic philosophers who sought natural explanations for cosmic phenomena, he asked a terrifyingly simple question: "What if disease is just... natural?" He proposed that illness had natural causes—environmental factors, diet, lifestyle, and bodily imbalances—that could be observed, understood, and treated through reason rather than revelation. This wasn't just a medical shift; it was the birth of scientific thinking itself. He declared that the human body operated according to discoverable principles, not the whims of supernatural beings.
The Theory of the Four Humours To explain health and disease, Hippocrates developed the Theory of the Four Humours, a systematic framework that would dominate Western medicine for two millennia. He posited that the body contained four vital fluids:
Blood (Air, Spring, Sanguine)
Phlegm (Water, Winter, Phlegmatic)
Yellow Bile (Fire, Summer, Choleric)
Black Bile (Earth, Autumn, Melancholic)
Health was defined as the perfect balance (eucrasia) of these humours; disease was an imbalance (dyscrasia). While we now know the theory is scientifically incorrect (there is no "black bile"), its philosophical brilliance lies in its holism. It connected the human body to the cosmos, linking physiology to the elements, seasons, and even personality types. It asserted that humans are not separate from nature but part of it, subject to the same laws.
Holistic Care and the Clinical Method Hippocrates revolutionized the method of healing. He moved away from treating isolated symptoms to treating the whole person. His approach considered the patient's entire lifestyle, occupation, social circumstances, environment, and mental state.
Observation: He insisted on careful, detailed observation of symptoms and their progression over time.
Documentation: The Hippocratic Corpus (a collection of ~60 treatises by him and his followers) contains detailed case studies, representing the first systematic clinical records.
Prognosis: He tracked disease patterns to predict outcomes, laying the groundwork for evidence-based medicine.
Natural Remedies: Treatments focused on restoring balance through diet, exercise, herbal remedies, and environmental changes—practices that often worked, even if the theoretical justification was flawed.
The Hippocratic Oath: Ethics as Foundation Perhaps his most enduring contribution is the Hippocratic Oath, the first comprehensive code of medical ethics. It established that medicine is not just a technical skill but a moral practice.
Non-maleficence: "Do no harm." The physician must never use their power to injure or wrong the patient.
Beneficence: Act in the patient's best interest.
Confidentiality: Protect the privacy of what is seen and heard in the course of treatment.
Professional Integrity: Maintain exemplary conduct and acknowledge human limitations.
This oath created a social contract between the healer, the patient, and society, establishing trust as the cornerstone of medicine. While modern versions have updated specific prohibitions (like those on surgery or abortion) to reflect contemporary values, the core principle remains: power must be constrained by ethics.
Legacy: A Living Tradition Hippocrates transformed medicine from a subset of theology into a distinct scientific discipline. His legacy is not just in the specific theories (which were often wrong) but in the methodology (observation, systematization, natural explanation) and the ethics (compassion, integrity, patient-first). Today, as we face new ethical dilemmas in gene editing, AI diagnostics, and end-of-life care, we still return to the Hippocratic framework. We ask: How do we balance innovation with safety? How do we treat the whole person in a high-tech world? Hippocrates' vision endures as an eternal beacon: Great medicine combines scientific rigour with profound humanity.
watch the lecture: https://tube.leshley.ca/w/jHZR1pHzvtqhzuAWLW3NYA
#Hippocrates #FatherOfMedicine #MedicalEthics #Philosophy #AncientGreece -
Hippocrates: The Father of Medicine and the Birth of Scientific Thinking
From Temple Dreams to Natural Causes Born around 460 BCE on the Greek island of Kos, Hippocrates stands as one of the most radical intellectual revolutionaries in human history. Before him, illness was understood through a lens of myth and mystery: disease was divine punishment, demonic possession, or the result of offending the gods. Healing required prayer, sacrifice, and rituals performed by priests in temples like the Asklepieion.
Hippocrates, trained within that very temple tradition, did something unprecedented. Influenced by the pre-Socratic philosophers who sought natural explanations for cosmic phenomena, he asked a terrifyingly simple question: "What if disease is just... natural?" He proposed that illness had natural causes—environmental factors, diet, lifestyle, and bodily imbalances—that could be observed, understood, and treated through reason rather than revelation. This wasn't just a medical shift; it was the birth of scientific thinking itself. He declared that the human body operated according to discoverable principles, not the whims of supernatural beings.
The Theory of the Four Humours To explain health and disease, Hippocrates developed the Theory of the Four Humours, a systematic framework that would dominate Western medicine for two millennia. He posited that the body contained four vital fluids:
Blood (Air, Spring, Sanguine)
Phlegm (Water, Winter, Phlegmatic)
Yellow Bile (Fire, Summer, Choleric)
Black Bile (Earth, Autumn, Melancholic)
Health was defined as the perfect balance (eucrasia) of these humours; disease was an imbalance (dyscrasia). While we now know the theory is scientifically incorrect (there is no "black bile"), its philosophical brilliance lies in its holism. It connected the human body to the cosmos, linking physiology to the elements, seasons, and even personality types. It asserted that humans are not separate from nature but part of it, subject to the same laws.
Holistic Care and the Clinical Method Hippocrates revolutionized the method of healing. He moved away from treating isolated symptoms to treating the whole person. His approach considered the patient's entire lifestyle, occupation, social circumstances, environment, and mental state.
Observation: He insisted on careful, detailed observation of symptoms and their progression over time.
Documentation: The Hippocratic Corpus (a collection of ~60 treatises by him and his followers) contains detailed case studies, representing the first systematic clinical records.
Prognosis: He tracked disease patterns to predict outcomes, laying the groundwork for evidence-based medicine.
Natural Remedies: Treatments focused on restoring balance through diet, exercise, herbal remedies, and environmental changes—practices that often worked, even if the theoretical justification was flawed.
The Hippocratic Oath: Ethics as Foundation Perhaps his most enduring contribution is the Hippocratic Oath, the first comprehensive code of medical ethics. It established that medicine is not just a technical skill but a moral practice.
Non-maleficence: "Do no harm." The physician must never use their power to injure or wrong the patient.
Beneficence: Act in the patient's best interest.
Confidentiality: Protect the privacy of what is seen and heard in the course of treatment.
Professional Integrity: Maintain exemplary conduct and acknowledge human limitations.
This oath created a social contract between the healer, the patient, and society, establishing trust as the cornerstone of medicine. While modern versions have updated specific prohibitions (like those on surgery or abortion) to reflect contemporary values, the core principle remains: power must be constrained by ethics.
Legacy: A Living Tradition Hippocrates transformed medicine from a subset of theology into a distinct scientific discipline. His legacy is not just in the specific theories (which were often wrong) but in the methodology (observation, systematization, natural explanation) and the ethics (compassion, integrity, patient-first). Today, as we face new ethical dilemmas in gene editing, AI diagnostics, and end-of-life care, we still return to the Hippocratic framework. We ask: How do we balance innovation with safety? How do we treat the whole person in a high-tech world? Hippocrates' vision endures as an eternal beacon: Great medicine combines scientific rigour with profound humanity.
watch the lecture: https://tube.leshley.ca/w/jHZR1pHzvtqhzuAWLW3NYA
#Hippocrates #FatherOfMedicine #MedicalEthics #Philosophy #AncientGreece -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Celestial Goddess Selene: The Ancient Greek Goddess of the Moon
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Ancient wisdom meets modern discovery! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/celestial-goddess-selene-star-night-003046
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Celestial Goddess Selene: The Ancient Greek Goddess of the Moon
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Ancient wisdom meets modern discovery! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/celestial-goddess-selene-star-night-003046
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Celestial Goddess Selene: The Ancient Greek Goddess of the Moon
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Ancient wisdom meets modern discovery! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/celestial-goddess-selene-star-night-003046
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Celestial Goddess Selene: The Ancient Greek Goddess of the Moon
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Ancient wisdom meets modern discovery! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/celestial-goddess-selene-star-night-003046
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Celestial Goddess Selene: The Ancient Greek Goddess of the Moon
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Ancient wisdom meets modern discovery! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/celestial-goddess-selene-star-night-003046
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Garden of Eden Depicted in Ancient Greek Religious Art
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/garden-hesperides-021562
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Fascinating #MustRead #Amazing -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Garden of Eden Depicted in Ancient Greek Religious Art
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/garden-hesperides-021562
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Fascinating #MustRead #Amazing -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Garden of Eden Depicted in Ancient Greek Religious Art
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/garden-hesperides-021562
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Fascinating #MustRead #Amazing -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Garden of Eden Depicted in Ancient Greek Religious Art
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/garden-hesperides-021562
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Fascinating #MustRead #Amazing -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: Garden of Eden Depicted in Ancient Greek Religious Art
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/garden-hesperides-021562
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Fascinating #MustRead #Amazing -
So, you can't just watch The Odyssey; you need to be *alerted* for those elusive 70mm #IMAX seats, like some kind of ancient Greek Telegram group? 🤔✨ Perhaps next, you'll get an app to notify you when it's time to breathe. 📲💨
https://imaxxing.io/ #TheOdyssey #Notifications #AncientGreece #AppDevelopment #MovieExperience #HackerNews #ngated -
So, you can't just watch The Odyssey; you need to be *alerted* for those elusive 70mm #IMAX seats, like some kind of ancient Greek Telegram group? 🤔✨ Perhaps next, you'll get an app to notify you when it's time to breathe. 📲💨
https://imaxxing.io/ #TheOdyssey #Notifications #AncientGreece #AppDevelopment #MovieExperience #HackerNews #ngated -
I'm really looking forward to watching The Odyssey this weekend
I took this photo at the acropolis of Mycenae, getting some shelter from the summer heat
#doorsday #photography #ancientgreece #Μυκήνη #Mycenae #greece #ελλάδα
-
Necromancy in Ancient Greece involved practices to communicate with the dead for knowledge and foresight, reflecting beliefs in shades as enduring entities. #necromancy #ancientgreece https://connectparanormal.net/2026/07/14/exploring-necromancy-in-ancient-greece/
-
Can we map The Odyssey? How ancient geographers and modern researchers have traced Odysseus’s travels.
Attempts to transpose the locations of The Odyssey accurately to modern maps have proved difficult.
#Odyssey #Geographers #AncientGreece #Homer #Books #Mythology
-
Can we map The Odyssey? How ancient geographers and modern researchers have traced Odysseus’s travels.
Attempts to transpose the locations of The Odyssey accurately to modern maps have proved difficult.
#Odyssey #Geographers #AncientGreece #Homer #Books #Mythology
-
Human Legacy And The Preservation Of Knowledge
The preservation of digital information is a problem that humans have tried to combat ever since the internet’s inception. There’s the Internet Archive, IPFS (Inter Planetary File System), and other various attempts to figure out how to preserve what we do, but the very concept of preservation is itself a difficult task. How do we humans ensure that our knowledge, or at least our ways of thinking about the world, is passed on to future generations, and can that knowledge last in […]https://johnbronze.wordpress.com/2026/07/13/human-legacy-and-the-preservation-of-knowledge/
-
Human Legacy And The Preservation Of Knowledge
The preservation of digital information is a problem that humans have tried to combat ever since the internet’s inception. There’s the Internet Archive, IPFS (Inter Planetary File System), and other various attempts to figure out how to preserve what we do, but the very concept of preservation is itself a difficult task. How do we humans ensure that our knowledge, or at least our ways of thinking about the world, is passed on to future generations, and can that knowledge last in […]https://johnbronze.wordpress.com/2026/07/13/human-legacy-and-the-preservation-of-knowledge/
-
https://www.europesays.com/videos/57697/ Tom Holland: ‘I’ve learnt more on The Odyssey than any other film’ #AncientGreece #Channel4 #Channel4News #Channel4 #ChristopherNolan #cinema #greek #GreekMythology #Homer #InternationalNews #LatestNews #NewFilm #TheOdyssey #TomHolland #UKNews #WorldNews
-
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: The Legendary Hyperborea and the Ancient Greeks: Who Really Discovered America?
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Share your thoughts below! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-americas/-hyperborea-ancient-greeks-005258
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Amazing -
?? EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: The Legendary Hyperborea and the Ancient Greeks: Who Really Discovered America?
?? Trending with 100K+ readers! Share your thoughts below! ??
https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-americas/-hyperborea-ancient-greeks-005258
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Amazing -
Muses, Saints, Women Artists ✍️🖌️📜 Muse, sante, artiste
#poetry #symbolism #ancientgreece #womenartists #muses #muse #art #portraits #youtubeshorts #visualnarrative #multimedia
-
Muses, Saints, Women Artists ✍️🖌️📜 Muse, sante, artiste
#poetry #symbolism #ancientgreece #womenartists #muses #muse #art #portraits #youtubeshorts #visualnarrative #multimedia
-
Muses, Saints, Women Artists ✍️🖌️📜 Muse, sante, artiste
#poetry #symbolism #ancientgreece #womenartists #muses #muse #art #portraits #youtubeshorts #visualnarrative #multimedia
-
Muses, Saints, Women Artists ✍️🖌️📜 Muse, sante, artiste
#poetry #symbolism #ancientgreece #womenartists #muses #muse #art #portraits #youtubeshorts #visualnarrative #multimedia
-
Muses, Saints, Women Artists ✍️🖌️📜 Muse, sante, artiste
#poetry #symbolism #ancientgreece #womenartists #muses #muse #art #portraits #youtubeshorts #visualnarrative #multimedia
-
La crátera de Vix de 1,64 m de altura y 208,6 kg en bronce elaborada en la Grecia arcaica en, al menos, siete piezas, importadas y ensambladas en Borgoña en un entorno celta en torno al 500 a.C. Tiene 1100 litros de capacidad para mezclar vino y agua. 🏛️Museo del Pays Châtillonnais #antiguagrecia #ancientgreece
-
La crátera de Vix de 1,64 m de altura y 208,6 kg en bronce elaborada en la Grecia arcaica en, al menos, siete piezas, importadas y ensambladas en Borgoña en un entorno celta en torno al 500 a.C. Tiene 1100 litros de capacidad para mezclar vino y agua. 🏛️Museo del Pays Châtillonnais #antiguagrecia #ancientgreece
-
Can you imagine your #writing surviving 2000 years and a #volcano?
Complete text of carbonised Herculaneum scroll unlocked for first time https://www.reuters.com/science/complete-text-carbonised-herculaneum-scroll-unlocked-first-time-2026-06-25/
-
Can you imagine your #writing surviving 2000 years and a #volcano?
Complete text of carbonised Herculaneum scroll unlocked for first time https://www.reuters.com/science/complete-text-carbonised-herculaneum-scroll-unlocked-first-time-2026-06-25/
-
Professional Politics Is Intrinsically Corrupt, Go For Direct Democracy Instead
Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and this is exactly why there are professional politicians: so that they, and individuals gravitating around them, can get absolutely corrupt (I have seen the process at the closest distance; little difference with Nero’s court).
What we are submitted to is not true democracy, but OLIGARCHIC REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY (ORD): power (kratia) of the people (demos) from the rule (archeon) of the few (oligos).
In a real democracy -that is, in a direct democracy- there are no professional politicians (because when there are, they are more powerful than We The People). In a real democracy, politics belongs to We The People: We The People rule, not just a few individuals.
There are ways to ensure this, including by distributing offices by drawing lots (“SORTITION”). If anybody can suddenly become the most important decision maker, for, say, a year, and subject to prosecution after leaving office, it will be impossible for an elite of power to become encrusted into a volume of corrupt barnacles so thick that the ship of state completely disappears in it… It will also motivate even janitors and farmers to know what is going on.
It is known how to do without professional politicians, because several Greek states and the Roman Republic, long succeeded to do so when they were as democratic as possible.
It is a bit intricate, as many types of assemblies and offices have to institute various checks and balances…. Including some drawn by lots … so everybody had to get ready to become a top politician, at least for a while. Pericles, according to Thucydides, characterized the Athenians as politically literate:
We do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business; we say that he has no business here at all
Many of Democracy’s contemporaries whose work is part of historiography were highly critical of Democracy, but that is likely coming from more than a millennium of dictatorial filtering. Plato and Aristotle were intimate, in love and in business, with actual kings, tyrants and autocratic generals (such as Antipater for Aristotle; Antipater went to war against Athenian democracy, defeated it, established it as a plutocracy and was the executor of Aristotle’s testament in more ways than one…) As Democracy was followed by two millennia of dictatorship, there was a self-selective effect: a monk from the European Middle Ages would reproduce a manuscript friendly to the idea of having a local prince instead of reproducing a book calling people such as the local prince “tyrants”…. Which they were. Making the local tyrant unhappy could often be only alleviated by long tortures of the miscreant…
One valid critique from Socrates is that Democracy sometimes put ignorant individuals in power where experts were needed. This can be corrected with guilds and orders, MERITOCRATIC DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS when one reaches positions of authority through merit and experience. The Middle Ages built such a system over more than a millennia, ending with orders for doctors, lawyers, engineers, masons, etc.
Politics is too important to be left to politicians who are adept at hiding their most important decisions, because that is where the real power lies.
Here is a crucial, even fatal, example of the present lack of true democracy:
NOBODY DEBATES INTELLIGENTLY THE WORLD’S MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE:
The official nuclear strategy of France for example is completely insane and nonsensical (and the unexpressed US nuclear strategy, or that of NATO, are similar, and just as inappropriate… Differently from the French, though, they have been smart enough to not talk of what they do not understand…). I will write a specific essay on it. I am not per se opposed to nukes (Hiroshima and Nagasaki, however atrocious, were better than any potential alternative, as it turned out). What I am opposed to is the specifics of the French nuclear doctrine, as both extremely ineffective and hyper dangerous (a bit like the Chernobyl reactor).
However, this, the fate of humanity, no less, is not debated anywhere except probably in the Kremlin. As it is, individuals without knowledge of even physics, sitting in their hidden recesses like cockroaches, agitating their homicidal antennas, have elaborated secret doctrine to end humanity. And they present their conclusion with gravitas, heavily applauded by the other cockroaches they paid and honored, and who pretend to know stuff as they jet around the world.
Instead the fate of the universe ought to be the object of a cogent, loud and fierce public debate (with the aim to reduce the insanity).
***
Direct democracy will prevent, as much as possible, the emergence of informal elites (e.g., charismatic orators, wealthy influencers) to manipulate public opinion better than any alternative. Isonomia and Parheisia, already perceived in antiquity as pillars of democracy enabling really free speech by all to all, should be enforced as much as possible. That super thinkers would have more influence is to be hoped for, and no sin, just the opposite.
AI assemblies, deliberating from various biases or viewpoints, to be used as advisers will help further.
If one of the woke AI we have today had been able to advise the Athenians, they would not have genocidized the city-island-state of Milo, and they would not have attacked and invaded Syracuse. Nor would they have left their entire fleet on a beach (that’s how they lost the last battle; Alcibiades had told them not to, and why, but he was no AI and they ignored him… once again and for the last time…
***
With the Internet, it should be easier to institute a MUCH MORE DEMOCRATIC system than in antiquity, though… By TWEAKING the existing democracies (the referendum system already exists on a large scale in California; Brexit was a referendum, true, and a disastrous one, but it was applied in a country not used to taking decisions by itself, without any remedy, and when PM Cameron decided it, he thought he would win… Thus it originated as an authoritative trick, not a genuine consultation.)
Consulting with We The People could be done lightly, as in Switzerland: any “votation” of We The People has to go through the conventional Oligarchic Democratic Process (ODP), with all its checks and balances, to become law… Working through ODP avoids the notorious hysteria of Athenian democracy… By the way, Rome had the opposite problem: so many checks and balances that reforms, even when voted, could not be effected, thanks to the Optimates in the Senate… Julius Caesar had understood this perfectly and rammed necessary reforms… But he should have remembered that this was an unforgivable crime…
***
Let’s go back to the question of Mob Rule, the old objection made against democracy as early as Plato. The Melian Dialogue shows its ruthlessness:”the strong do what they can, the weak do what they must”. It finished in complete idiocy. Athenian democracy executed generals not just after a failed battle. After a crucial and belated victory on the Persian financed) Spartan fleet, Athenian democracy executed the nine victorious admirals. The atrocious defeat of Athenian civilization with about half of the population killed promptly followed a s aresult… How to prevent hysteria or tyranny of the majority? Let me repeat: I propose an EVOLUTION, NOT A REVOLUTION: use a combination of Direct Democracy, debate, helped by AI assemblies (AI will be there, make it official and transparent…) Use them to IMPROVE the present Representative Oligarchic Democracy… By progressively forcing us to consult with intelligence.
***
Athens had three political bodies where citizens gathered in numbers running into the hundreds or thousands. These are the assembly (in some cases with a quorum of 6,000), the council of 500 (boule), and the courts (a minimum of 200 people, on some occasions up to 6,000).
A citizen could sit twice, non consecutively, in the Boule, for a year in his lifetime.
***
The traditional objection to augmenting Direct Democracy is to point out that Athens had at most 80,000 voters. Yes. But it was not easy: major laws required 6000 votes, and farmers had to travel more than a day to come and vote (hungry Athens was surrounded by the crucial arable land of Attica, full of voting Athenian farmers). After a while, it was found necessary to pay voters to travel, come and reach a quorum. With modern communications, people can just talk to their phone.
On top of this, the Roman Republic had several million voters, and could have survived, had the Optimates not been so stubborn and stupid, generation after generation, or had they not assassinated Caesar (long story). As it was, after the utterly chaotic civil war which followed Caesar’s assassination, a military dictatorship was established and Augustus made himself Tribune for life.
The Roman Republic was three centuries old when it started to fall to a plutocratic exponentiation (very long story). It could have been avoided with much more sagacity after the defeat of Carthage and its Hellenistic Allies in the Second Punic war (surviving in good intelligence and trade with a subordinated Carthage would have been part of it).
As it was, it was one war after another. Distant wars made the generals and the traders accommodating them, immensely wealthy; tax avoidance schemes, globalization, etc. followed… In the chaos, the ROMAN ABSOLUTE WEALTH LIMIT became less than a memory (I have computed it to be around 22 millions in 2022 $). When Tiberius Gracchus tried to reestablish it, the Optimates engaged in a process which broke the Republic in the 100 years which led to Caesar’s assassination.
***
Both Athenian and Roman Direct Democracies were mostly defeated and ruined by plutocrats (even in the Peloponnesian War, the main shock to Athens, the Persian plutocratic superpower played the crucial role, by paying for everything, using Sparta as a telerobotic terminator)
***
Rome’s Direct Democracy had similar limitations for its various institutions (Consul for one year, and could not be re-elected for a decade). However in emergencies, Rome could elect a dictator with the powers of an absolute king. Cincinatus was elected to the highest offices several times, including dictator twenty years apart, because Rome was being invaded by foreign armies… But still he was a farmer…. The first time, having defeated the enemy in a spectacular battle thanks to a massive mobilization and innovative methods which involved all of Rome making hundreds of thousands of stakes in a couple of days. Cincinatus returned to his plow within two weeks…
Democracy was not invented just because it is the natural state of human beings as created by millions of years of evolution. The interest civilization has in democracy is that democracy makes civilization more intelligent. This is why greater democracy tends to win wars.
Want democracy?
Want more intelligence in saving civilization from destruction?
Proscribe professional politicians!
Patrice Ayme
Note: The thoroughly corrupt present US political system seems very far from Direct Democracy. Systems in other oligarchic representative democracies are not as bad, but it is still the same general problem. Timid steps have been taken, such as term limits. The US went overboard with an amendment preventing more than two presidential terms. France forbids two consecutive terms, and that is wiser: the only reason California governor Newson, a Getty creature, has a chance to run for president is that Obama can’t be a candidate again… It is likely that Obama would become a much better president if he was reelected. California’s governor Brown was better in his second 8 year passage.
In any case the California mandatory referendums (1856 CE) and initiative system (1911 CE) has worked very well, and intensely, for more than a century, and is compatible with ORD … And the first start to do for other nation-states would be to imitate it if they want to augment the Democratic Index.
That little light is a giant harvester working the fields. Enough fields to feed the two million people who call the area home, surrounded by mountains centered around Western Europe’s largest lake. The Swiss and the French have been careful to maintain self-sufficiency in food production… Which would be necessary if world trade collapsed as it did when the Roman state disnitegrated. By the way, Caesar defended Geneva successfally against the Helvetiae…
#AncientGreece #Athens #Caesar #Corruption #democracy #DirectDemocracy #history #Intelligence #Optimates #Philosophy #plutocracy #Politicians #politics #Referendum #Republic #Rome -
Professional Politics Is Intrinsically Corrupt, Go For Direct Democracy Instead
Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and this is exactly why there are professional politicians: so that they, and individuals gravitating around them, can get absolutely corrupt (I have seen the process at the closest distance; little difference with Nero’s court).
What we are submitted to is not true democracy, but OLIGARCHIC REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY (ORD): power (kratia) of the people (demos) from the rule (archeon) of the few (oligos).
In a real democracy -that is, in a direct democracy- there are no professional politicians (because when there are, they are more powerful than We The People). In a real democracy, politics belongs to We The People: We The People rule, not just a few individuals.
There are ways to ensure this, including by distributing offices by drawing lots (“SORTITION”). If anybody can suddenly become the most important decision maker, for, say, a year, and subject to prosecution after leaving office, it will be impossible for an elite of power to become encrusted into a volume of corrupt barnacles so thick that the ship of state completely disappears in it… It will also motivate even janitors and farmers to know what is going on.
It is known how to do without professional politicians, because several Greek states and the Roman Republic, long succeeded to do so when they were as democratic as possible.
It is a bit intricate, as many types of assemblies and offices have to institute various checks and balances…. Including some drawn by lots … so everybody had to get ready to become a top politician, at least for a while. Pericles, according to Thucydides, characterized the Athenians as politically literate:
We do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business; we say that he has no business here at all
Many of Democracy’s contemporaries whose work is part of historiography were highly critical of Democracy, but that is likely coming from more than a millennium of dictatorial filtering. Plato and Aristotle were intimate, in love and in business, with actual kings, tyrants and autocratic generals (such as Antipater for Aristotle; Antipater went to war against Athenian democracy, defeated it, established it as a plutocracy and was the executor of Aristotle’s testament in more ways than one…) As Democracy was followed by two millennia of dictatorship, there was a self-selective effect: a monk from the European Middle Ages would reproduce a manuscript friendly to the idea of having a local prince instead of reproducing a book calling people such as the local prince “tyrants”…. Which they were. Making the local tyrant unhappy could often be only alleviated by long tortures of the miscreant…
One valid critique from Socrates is that Democracy sometimes put ignorant individuals in power where experts were needed. This can be corrected with guilds and orders, MERITOCRATIC DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS when one reaches positions of authority through merit and experience. The Middle Ages built such a system over more than a millennia, ending with orders for doctors, lawyers, engineers, masons, etc.
Politics is too important to be left to politicians who are adept at hiding their most important decisions, because that is where the real power lies.
Here is a crucial, even fatal, example of the present lack of true democracy:
NOBODY DEBATES INTELLIGENTLY THE WORLD’S MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE:
The official nuclear strategy of France for example is completely insane and nonsensical (and the unexpressed US nuclear strategy, or that of NATO, are similar, and just as inappropriate… Differently from the French, though, they have been smart enough to not talk of what they do not understand…). I will write a specific essay on it. I am not per se opposed to nukes (Hiroshima and Nagasaki, however atrocious, were better than any potential alternative, as it turned out). What I am opposed to is the specifics of the French nuclear doctrine, as both extremely ineffective and hyper dangerous (a bit like the Chernobyl reactor).
However, this, the fate of humanity, no less, is not debated anywhere except probably in the Kremlin. As it is, individuals without knowledge of even physics, sitting in their hidden recesses like cockroaches, agitating their homicidal antennas, have elaborated secret doctrine to end humanity. And they present their conclusion with gravitas, heavily applauded by the other cockroaches they paid and honored, and who pretend to know stuff as they jet around the world.
Instead the fate of the universe ought to be the object of a cogent, loud and fierce public debate (with the aim to reduce the insanity).
***
Direct democracy will prevent, as much as possible, the emergence of informal elites (e.g., charismatic orators, wealthy influencers) to manipulate public opinion better than any alternative. Isonomia and Parheisia, already perceived in antiquity as pillars of democracy enabling really free speech by all to all, should be enforced as much as possible. That super thinkers would have more influence is to be hoped for, and no sin, just the opposite.
AI assemblies, deliberating from various biases or viewpoints, to be used as advisers will help further.
If one of the woke AI we have today had been able to advise the Athenians, they would not have genocidized the city-island-state of Milo, and they would not have attacked and invaded Syracuse. Nor would they have left their entire fleet on a beach (that’s how they lost the last battle; Alcibiades had told them not to, and why, but he was no AI and they ignored him… once again and for the last time…
***
With the Internet, it should be easier to institute a MUCH MORE DEMOCRATIC system than in antiquity, though… By TWEAKING the existing democracies (the referendum system already exists on a large scale in California; Brexit was a referendum, true, and a disastrous one, but it was applied in a country not used to taking decisions by itself, without any remedy, and when PM Cameron decided it, he thought he would win… Thus it originated as an authoritative trick, not a genuine consultation.)
Consulting with We The People could be done lightly, as in Switzerland: any “votation” of We The People has to go through the conventional Oligarchic Democratic Process (ODP), with all its checks and balances, to become law… Working through ODP avoids the notorious hysteria of Athenian democracy… By the way, Rome had the opposite problem: so many checks and balances that reforms, even when voted, could not be effected, thanks to the Optimates in the Senate… Julius Caesar had understood this perfectly and rammed necessary reforms… But he should have remembered that this was an unforgivable crime…
***
Let’s go back to the question of Mob Rule, the old objection made against democracy as early as Plato. The Melian Dialogue shows its ruthlessness:”the strong do what they can, the weak do what they must”. It finished in complete idiocy. Athenian democracy executed generals not just after a failed battle. After a crucial and belated victory on the Persian financed) Spartan fleet, Athenian democracy executed the nine victorious admirals. The atrocious defeat of Athenian civilization with about half of the population killed promptly followed a s aresult… How to prevent hysteria or tyranny of the majority? Let me repeat: I propose an EVOLUTION, NOT A REVOLUTION: use a combination of Direct Democracy, debate, helped by AI assemblies (AI will be there, make it official and transparent…) Use them to IMPROVE the present Representative Oligarchic Democracy… By progressively forcing us to consult with intelligence.
***
Athens had three political bodies where citizens gathered in numbers running into the hundreds or thousands. These are the assembly (in some cases with a quorum of 6,000), the council of 500 (boule), and the courts (a minimum of 200 people, on some occasions up to 6,000).
A citizen could sit twice, non consecutively, in the Boule, for a year in his lifetime.
***
The traditional objection to augmenting Direct Democracy is to point out that Athens had at most 80,000 voters. Yes. But it was not easy: major laws required 6000 votes, and farmers had to travel more than a day to come and vote (hungry Athens was surrounded by the crucial arable land of Attica, full of voting Athenian farmers). After a while, it was found necessary to pay voters to travel, come and reach a quorum. With modern communications, people can just talk to their phone.
On top of this, the Roman Republic had several million voters, and could have survived, had the Optimates not been so stubborn and stupid, generation after generation, or had they not assassinated Caesar (long story). As it was, after the utterly chaotic civil war which followed Caesar’s assassination, a military dictatorship was established and Augustus made himself Tribune for life.
The Roman Republic was three centuries old when it started to fall to a plutocratic exponentiation (very long story). It could have been avoided with much more sagacity after the defeat of Carthage and its Hellenistic Allies in the Second Punic war (surviving in good intelligence and trade with a subordinated Carthage would have been part of it).
As it was, it was one war after another. Distant wars made the generals and the traders accommodating them, immensely wealthy; tax avoidance schemes, globalization, etc. followed… In the chaos, the ROMAN ABSOLUTE WEALTH LIMIT became less than a memory (I have computed it to be around 22 millions in 2022 $). When Tiberius Gracchus tried to reestablish it, the Optimates engaged in a process which broke the Republic in the 100 years which led to Caesar’s assassination.
***
Both Athenian and Roman Direct Democracies were mostly defeated and ruined by plutocrats (even in the Peloponnesian War, the main shock to Athens, the Persian plutocratic superpower played the crucial role, by paying for everything, using Sparta as a telerobotic terminator)
***
Rome’s Direct Democracy had similar limitations for its various institutions (Consul for one year, and could not be re-elected for a decade). However in emergencies, Rome could elect a dictator with the powers of an absolute king. Cincinatus was elected to the highest offices several times, including dictator twenty years apart, because Rome was being invaded by foreign armies… But still he was a farmer…. The first time, having defeated the enemy in a spectacular battle thanks to a massive mobilization and innovative methods which involved all of Rome making hundreds of thousands of stakes in a couple of days. Cincinatus returned to his plow within two weeks…
Democracy was not invented just because it is the natural state of human beings as created by millions of years of evolution. The interest civilization has in democracy is that democracy makes civilization more intelligent. This is why greater democracy tends to win wars.
Want democracy?
Want more intelligence in saving civilization from destruction?
Proscribe professional politicians!
Patrice Ayme
Note: The thoroughly corrupt present US political system seems very far from Direct Democracy. Systems in other oligarchic representative democracies are not as bad, but it is still the same general problem. Timid steps have been taken, such as term limits. The US went overboard with an amendment preventing more than two presidential terms. France forbids two consecutive terms, and that is wiser: the only reason California governor Newson, a Getty creature, has a chance to run for president is that Obama can’t be a candidate again… It is likely that Obama would become a much better president if he was reelected. California’s governor Brown was better in his second 8 year passage.
In any case the California mandatory referendums (1856 CE) and initiative system (1911 CE) has worked very well, and intensely, for more than a century, and is compatible with ORD … And the first start to do for other nation-states would be to imitate it if they want to augment the Democratic Index.
That little light is a giant harvester working the fields. Enough fields to feed the two million people who call the area home, surrounded by mountains centered around Western Europe’s largest lake. The Swiss and the French have been careful to maintain self-sufficiency in food production… Which would be necessary if world trade collapsed as it did when the Roman state disnitegrated. By the way, Caesar defended Geneva successfally against the Helvetiae…
#AncientGreece #Athens #Caesar #Corruption #democracy #DirectDemocracy #history #Intelligence #Optimates #Philosophy #plutocracy #Politicians #politics #Referendum #Republic #Rome -
Professional Politics Is Intrinsically Corrupt, Go For Direct Democracy Instead
Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and this is exactly why there are professional politicians: so that they, and individuals gravitating around them, can get absolutely corrupt (I have seen the process at the closest distance; little difference with Nero’s court).
What we are submitted to is not true democracy, but OLIGARCHIC REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY (ORD): power (kratia) of the people (demos) from the rule (archeon) of the few (oligos).
In a real democracy -that is, in a direct democracy- there are no professional politicians (because when there are, they are more powerful than We The People). In a real democracy, politics belongs to We The People: We The People rule, not just a few individuals.
There are ways to ensure this, including by distributing offices by drawing lots (“SORTITION”). If anybody can suddenly become the most important decision maker, for, say, a year, and subject to prosecution after leaving office, it will be impossible for an elite of power to become encrusted into a volume of corrupt barnacles so thick that the ship of state completely disappears in it… It will also motivate even janitors and farmers to know what is going on.
It is known how to do without professional politicians, because several Greek states and the Roman Republic, long succeeded to do so when they were as democratic as possible.
It is a bit intricate, as many types of assemblies and offices have to institute various checks and balances…. Including some drawn by lots … so everybody had to get ready to become a top politician, at least for a while. Pericles, according to Thucydides, characterized the Athenians as politically literate:
We do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business; we say that he has no business here at all
Many of Democracy’s contemporaries whose work is part of historiography were highly critical of Democracy, but that is likely coming from more than a millennium of dictatorial filtering. Plato and Aristotle were intimate, in love and in business, with actual kings, tyrants and autocratic generals (such as Antipater for Aristotle; Antipater went to war against Athenian democracy, defeated it, established it as a plutocracy and was the executor of Aristotle’s testament in more ways than one…) As Democracy was followed by two millennia of dictatorship, there was a self-selective effect: a monk from the European Middle Ages would reproduce a manuscript friendly to the idea of having a local prince instead of reproducing a book calling people such as the local prince “tyrants”…. Which they were. Making the local tyrant unhappy could often be only alleviated by long tortures of the miscreant…
One valid critique from Socrates is that Democracy sometimes put ignorant individuals in power where experts were needed. This can be corrected with guilds and orders, MERITOCRATIC DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS when one reaches positions of authority through merit and experience. The Middle Ages built such a system over more than a millennia, ending with orders for doctors, lawyers, engineers, masons, etc.
Politics is too important to be left to politicians who are adept at hiding their most important decisions, because that is where the real power lies.
Here is a crucial, even fatal, example of the present lack of true democracy:
NOBODY DEBATES INTELLIGENTLY THE WORLD’S MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE:
The official nuclear strategy of France for example is completely insane and nonsensical (and the unexpressed US nuclear strategy, or that of NATO, are similar, and just as inappropriate… Differently from the French, though, they have been smart enough to not talk of what they do not understand…). I will write a specific essay on it. I am not per se opposed to nukes (Hiroshima and Nagasaki, however atrocious, were better than any potential alternative, as it turned out). What I am opposed to is the specifics of the French nuclear doctrine, as both extremely ineffective and hyper dangerous (a bit like the Chernobyl reactor).
However, this, the fate of humanity, no less, is not debated anywhere except probably in the Kremlin. As it is, individuals without knowledge of even physics, sitting in their hidden recesses like cockroaches, agitating their homicidal antennas, have elaborated secret doctrine to end humanity. And they present their conclusion with gravitas, heavily applauded by the other cockroaches they paid and honored, and who pretend to know stuff as they jet around the world.
Instead the fate of the universe ought to be the object of a cogent, loud and fierce public debate (with the aim to reduce the insanity).
***
Direct democracy will prevent, as much as possible, the emergence of informal elites (e.g., charismatic orators, wealthy influencers) to manipulate public opinion better than any alternative. Isonomia and Parheisia, already perceived in antiquity as pillars of democracy enabling really free speech by all to all, should be enforced as much as possible. That super thinkers would have more influence is to be hoped for, and no sin, just the opposite.
AI assemblies, deliberating from various biases or viewpoints, to be used as advisers will help further.
If one of the woke AI we have today had been able to advise the Athenians, they would not have genocidized the city-island-state of Milo, and they would not have attacked and invaded Syracuse. Nor would they have left their entire fleet on a beach (that’s how they lost the last battle; Alcibiades had told them not to, and why, but he was no AI and they ignored him… once again and for the last time…
***
With the Internet, it should be easier to institute a MUCH MORE DEMOCRATIC system than in antiquity, though… By TWEAKING the existing democracies (the referendum system already exists on a large scale in California; Brexit was a referendum, true, and a disastrous one, but it was applied in a country not used to taking decisions by itself, without any remedy, and when PM Cameron decided it, he thought he would win… Thus it originated as an authoritative trick, not a genuine consultation.)
Consulting with We The People could be done lightly, as in Switzerland: any “votation” of We The People has to go through the conventional Oligarchic Democratic Process (ODP), with all its checks and balances, to become law… Working through ODP avoids the notorious hysteria of Athenian democracy… By the way, Rome had the opposite problem: so many checks and balances that reforms, even when voted, could not be effected, thanks to the Optimates in the Senate… Julius Caesar had understood this perfectly and rammed necessary reforms… But he should have remembered that this was an unforgivable crime…
***
Let’s go back to the question of Mob Rule, the old objection made against democracy as early as Plato. The Melian Dialogue shows its ruthlessness:”the strong do what they can, the weak do what they must”. It finished in complete idiocy. Athenian democracy executed generals not just after a failed battle. After a crucial and belated victory on the Persian financed) Spartan fleet, Athenian democracy executed the nine victorious admirals. The atrocious defeat of Athenian civilization with about half of the population killed promptly followed a s aresult… How to prevent hysteria or tyranny of the majority? Let me repeat: I propose an EVOLUTION, NOT A REVOLUTION: use a combination of Direct Democracy, debate, helped by AI assemblies (AI will be there, make it official and transparent…) Use them to IMPROVE the present Representative Oligarchic Democracy… By progressively forcing us to consult with intelligence.
***
Athens had three political bodies where citizens gathered in numbers running into the hundreds or thousands. These are the assembly (in some cases with a quorum of 6,000), the council of 500 (boule), and the courts (a minimum of 200 people, on some occasions up to 6,000).
A citizen could sit twice, non consecutively, in the Boule, for a year in his lifetime.
***
The traditional objection to augmenting Direct Democracy is to point out that Athens had at most 80,000 voters. Yes. But it was not easy: major laws required 6000 votes, and farmers had to travel more than a day to come and vote (hungry Athens was surrounded by the crucial arable land of Attica, full of voting Athenian farmers). After a while, it was found necessary to pay voters to travel, come and reach a quorum. With modern communications, people can just talk to their phone.
On top of this, the Roman Republic had several million voters, and could have survived, had the Optimates not been so stubborn and stupid, generation after generation, or had they not assassinated Caesar (long story). As it was, after the utterly chaotic civil war which followed Caesar’s assassination, a military dictatorship was established and Augustus made himself Tribune for life.
The Roman Republic was three centuries old when it started to fall to a plutocratic exponentiation (very long story). It could have been avoided with much more sagacity after the defeat of Carthage and its Hellenistic Allies in the Second Punic war (surviving in good intelligence and trade with a subordinated Carthage would have been part of it).
As it was, it was one war after another. Distant wars made the generals and the traders accommodating them, immensely wealthy; tax avoidance schemes, globalization, etc. followed… In the chaos, the ROMAN ABSOLUTE WEALTH LIMIT became less than a memory (I have computed it to be around 22 millions in 2022 $). When Tiberius Gracchus tried to reestablish it, the Optimates engaged in a process which broke the Republic in the 100 years which led to Caesar’s assassination.
***
Both Athenian and Roman Direct Democracies were mostly defeated and ruined by plutocrats (even in the Peloponnesian War, the main shock to Athens, the Persian plutocratic superpower played the crucial role, by paying for everything, using Sparta as a telerobotic terminator)
***
Rome’s Direct Democracy had similar limitations for its various institutions (Consul for one year, and could not be re-elected for a decade). However in emergencies, Rome could elect a dictator with the powers of an absolute king. Cincinatus was elected to the highest offices several times, including dictator twenty years apart, because Rome was being invaded by foreign armies… But still he was a farmer…. The first time, having defeated the enemy in a spectacular battle thanks to a massive mobilization and innovative methods which involved all of Rome making hundreds of thousands of stakes in a couple of days. Cincinatus returned to his plow within two weeks…
Democracy was not invented just because it is the natural state of human beings as created by millions of years of evolution. The interest civilization has in democracy is that democracy makes civilization more intelligent. This is why greater democracy tends to win wars.
Want democracy?
Want more intelligence in saving civilization from destruction?
Proscribe professional politicians!
Patrice Ayme
Note: The thoroughly corrupt present US political system seems very far from Direct Democracy. Systems in other oligarchic representative democracies are not as bad, but it is still the same general problem. Timid steps have been taken, such as term limits. The US went overboard with an amendment preventing more than two presidential terms. France forbids two consecutive terms, and that is wiser: the only reason California governor Newson, a Getty creature, has a chance to run for president is that Obama can’t be a candidate again… It is likely that Obama would become a much better president if he was reelected. California’s governor Brown was better in his second 8 year passage.
In any case the California mandatory referendums (1856 CE) and initiative system (1911 CE) has worked very well, and intensely, for more than a century, and is compatible with ORD … And the first start to do for other nation-states would be to imitate it if they want to augment the Democratic Index.
That little light is a giant harvester working the fields. Enough fields to feed the two million people who call the area home, surrounded by mountains centered around Western Europe’s largest lake. The Swiss and the French have been careful to maintain self-sufficiency in food production… Which would be necessary if world trade collapsed as it did when the Roman state disnitegrated. By the way, Caesar defended Geneva successfally against the Helvetiae…
#AncientGreece #Athens #Caesar #Corruption #democracy #DirectDemocracy #history #Intelligence #Optimates #Philosophy #plutocracy #Politicians #politics #Referendum #Republic #Rome -
Professional Politics Is Intrinsically Corrupt, Go For Direct Democracy Instead
Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and this is exactly why there are professional politicians: so that they, and individuals gravitating around them, can get absolutely corrupt (I have seen the process at the closest distance; little difference with Nero’s court).
What we are submitted to is not true democracy, but OLIGARCHIC REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY (ORD): power (kratia) of the people (demos) from the rule (archeon) of the few (oligos).
In a real democracy -that is, in a direct democracy- there are no professional politicians (because when there are, they are more powerful than We The People). In a real democracy, politics belongs to We The People: We The People rule, not just a few individuals.
There are ways to ensure this, including by distributing offices by drawing lots (“SORTITION”). If anybody can suddenly become the most important decision maker, for, say, a year, and subject to prosecution after leaving office, it will be impossible for an elite of power to become encrusted into a volume of corrupt barnacles so thick that the ship of state completely disappears in it… It will also motivate even janitors and farmers to know what is going on.
It is known how to do without professional politicians, because several Greek states and the Roman Republic, long succeeded to do so when they were as democratic as possible.
It is a bit intricate, as many types of assemblies and offices have to institute various checks and balances…. Including some drawn by lots … so everybody had to get ready to become a top politician, at least for a while. Pericles, according to Thucydides, characterized the Athenians as politically literate:
We do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business; we say that he has no business here at all
Many of Democracy’s contemporaries whose work is part of historiography were highly critical of Democracy, but that is likely coming from more than a millennium of dictatorial filtering. Plato and Aristotle were intimate, in love and in business, with actual kings, tyrants and autocratic generals (such as Antipater for Aristotle; Antipater went to war against Athenian democracy, defeated it, established it as a plutocracy and was the executor of Aristotle’s testament in more ways than one…) As Democracy was followed by two millennia of dictatorship, there was a self-selective effect: a monk from the European Middle Ages would reproduce a manuscript friendly to the idea of having a local prince instead of reproducing a book calling people such as the local prince “tyrants”…. Which they were. Making the local tyrant unhappy could often be only alleviated by long tortures of the miscreant…
One valid critique from Socrates is that Democracy sometimes put ignorant individuals in power where experts were needed. This can be corrected with guilds and orders, MERITOCRATIC DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS when one reaches positions of authority through merit and experience. The Middle Ages built such a system over more than a millennia, ending with orders for doctors, lawyers, engineers, masons, etc.
Politics is too important to be left to politicians who are adept at hiding their most important decisions, because that is where the real power lies.
Here is a crucial, even fatal, example of the present lack of true democracy:
NOBODY DEBATES INTELLIGENTLY THE WORLD’S MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE:
The official nuclear strategy of France for example is completely insane and nonsensical (and the unexpressed US nuclear strategy, or that of NATO, are similar, and just as inappropriate… Differently from the French, though, they have been smart enough to not talk of what they do not understand…). I will write a specific essay on it. I am not per se opposed to nukes (Hiroshima and Nagasaki, however atrocious, were better than any potential alternative, as it turned out). What I am opposed to is the specifics of the French nuclear doctrine, as both extremely ineffective and hyper dangerous (a bit like the Chernobyl reactor).
However, this, the fate of humanity, no less, is not debated anywhere except probably in the Kremlin. As it is, individuals without knowledge of even physics, sitting in their hidden recesses like cockroaches, agitating their homicidal antennas, have elaborated secret doctrine to end humanity. And they present their conclusion with gravitas, heavily applauded by the other cockroaches they paid and honored, and who pretend to know stuff as they jet around the world.
Instead the fate of the universe ought to be the object of a cogent, loud and fierce public debate (with the aim to reduce the insanity).
***
Direct democracy will prevent, as much as possible, the emergence of informal elites (e.g., charismatic orators, wealthy influencers) to manipulate public opinion better than any alternative. Isonomia and Parheisia, already perceived in antiquity as pillars of democracy enabling really free speech by all to all, should be enforced as much as possible. That super thinkers would have more influence is to be hoped for, and no sin, just the opposite.
AI assemblies, deliberating from various biases or viewpoints, to be used as advisers will help further.
If one of the woke AI we have today had been able to advise the Athenians, they would not have genocidized the city-island-state of Milo, and they would not have attacked and invaded Syracuse. Nor would they have left their entire fleet on a beach (that’s how they lost the last battle; Alcibiades had told them not to, and why, but he was no AI and they ignored him… once again and for the last time…
***
With the Internet, it should be easier to institute a MUCH MORE DEMOCRATIC system than in antiquity, though… By TWEAKING the existing democracies (the referendum system already exists on a large scale in California; Brexit was a referendum, true, and a disastrous one, but it was applied in a country not used to taking decisions by itself, without any remedy, and when PM Cameron decided it, he thought he would win… Thus it originated as an authoritative trick, not a genuine consultation.)
Consulting with We The People could be done lightly, as in Switzerland: any “votation” of We The People has to go through the conventional Oligarchic Democratic Process (ODP), with all its checks and balances, to become law… Working through ODP avoids the notorious hysteria of Athenian democracy… By the way, Rome had the opposite problem: so many checks and balances that reforms, even when voted, could not be effected, thanks to the Optimates in the Senate… Julius Caesar had understood this perfectly and rammed necessary reforms… But he should have remembered that this was an unforgivable crime…
***
Let’s go back to the question of Mob Rule, the old objection made against democracy as early as Plato. The Melian Dialogue shows its ruthlessness:”the strong do what they can, the weak do what they must”. It finished in complete idiocy. Athenian democracy executed generals not just after a failed battle. After a crucial and belated victory on the Persian financed) Spartan fleet, Athenian democracy executed the nine victorious admirals. The atrocious defeat of Athenian civilization with about half of the population killed promptly followed a s aresult… How to prevent hysteria or tyranny of the majority? Let me repeat: I propose an EVOLUTION, NOT A REVOLUTION: use a combination of Direct Democracy, debate, helped by AI assemblies (AI will be there, make it official and transparent…) Use them to IMPROVE the present Representative Oligarchic Democracy… By progressively forcing us to consult with intelligence.
***
Athens had three political bodies where citizens gathered in numbers running into the hundreds or thousands. These are the assembly (in some cases with a quorum of 6,000), the council of 500 (boule), and the courts (a minimum of 200 people, on some occasions up to 6,000).
A citizen could sit twice, non consecutively, in the Boule, for a year in his lifetime.
***
The traditional objection to augmenting Direct Democracy is to point out that Athens had at most 80,000 voters. Yes. But it was not easy: major laws required 6000 votes, and farmers had to travel more than a day to come and vote (hungry Athens was surrounded by the crucial arable land of Attica, full of voting Athenian farmers). After a while, it was found necessary to pay voters to travel, come and reach a quorum. With modern communications, people can just talk to their phone.
On top of this, the Roman Republic had several million voters, and could have survived, had the Optimates not been so stubborn and stupid, generation after generation, or had they not assassinated Caesar (long story). As it was, after the utterly chaotic civil war which followed Caesar’s assassination, a military dictatorship was established and Augustus made himself Tribune for life.
The Roman Republic was three centuries old when it started to fall to a plutocratic exponentiation (very long story). It could have been avoided with much more sagacity after the defeat of Carthage and its Hellenistic Allies in the Second Punic war (surviving in good intelligence and trade with a subordinated Carthage would have been part of it).
As it was, it was one war after another. Distant wars made the generals and the traders accommodating them, immensely wealthy; tax avoidance schemes, globalization, etc. followed… In the chaos, the ROMAN ABSOLUTE WEALTH LIMIT became less than a memory (I have computed it to be around 22 millions in 2022 $). When Tiberius Gracchus tried to reestablish it, the Optimates engaged in a process which broke the Republic in the 100 years which led to Caesar’s assassination.
***
Both Athenian and Roman Direct Democracies were mostly defeated and ruined by plutocrats (even in the Peloponnesian War, the main shock to Athens, the Persian plutocratic superpower played the crucial role, by paying for everything, using Sparta as a telerobotic terminator)
***
Rome’s Direct Democracy had similar limitations for its various institutions (Consul for one year, and could not be re-elected for a decade). However in emergencies, Rome could elect a dictator with the powers of an absolute king. Cincinatus was elected to the highest offices several times, including dictator twenty years apart, because Rome was being invaded by foreign armies… But still he was a farmer…. The first time, having defeated the enemy in a spectacular battle thanks to a massive mobilization and innovative methods which involved all of Rome making hundreds of thousands of stakes in a couple of days. Cincinatus returned to his plow within two weeks…
Democracy was not invented just because it is the natural state of human beings as created by millions of years of evolution. The interest civilization has in democracy is that democracy makes civilization more intelligent. This is why greater democracy tends to win wars.
Want democracy?
Want more intelligence in saving civilization from destruction?
Proscribe professional politicians!
Patrice Ayme
Note: The thoroughly corrupt present US political system seems very far from Direct Democracy. Systems in other oligarchic representative democracies are not as bad, but it is still the same general problem. Timid steps have been taken, such as term limits. The US went overboard with an amendment preventing more than two presidential terms. France forbids two consecutive terms, and that is wiser: the only reason California governor Newson, a Getty creature, has a chance to run for president is that Obama can’t be a candidate again… It is likely that Obama would become a much better president if he was reelected. California’s governor Brown was better in his second 8 year passage.
In any case the California mandatory referendums (1856 CE) and initiative system (1911 CE) has worked very well, and intensely, for more than a century, and is compatible with ORD … And the first start to do for other nation-states would be to imitate it if they want to augment the Democratic Index.
That little light is a giant harvester working the fields. Enough fields to feed the two million people who call the area home, surrounded by mountains centered around Western Europe’s largest lake. The Swiss and the French have been careful to maintain self-sufficiency in food production… Which would be necessary if world trade collapsed as it did when the Roman state disnitegrated. By the way, Caesar defended Geneva successfally against the Helvetiae…
#AncientGreece #Athens #Caesar #Corruption #democracy #DirectDemocracy #history #Intelligence #Optimates #Philosophy #plutocracy #Politicians #politics #Referendum #Republic #Rome -
💫 AMAZING REVELATION: Crime and Punishment: Eternal Damnations as handed down by the Ancient Greek Gods
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! History just got more interesting! 📚
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/crime-and-punishment-eternal-damnations-handed-down-ancient-greek-gods-003603
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Ancient -
💫 AMAZING REVELATION: Crime and Punishment: Eternal Damnations as handed down by the Ancient Greek Gods
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! History just got more interesting! 📚
https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/crime-and-punishment-eternal-damnations-handed-down-ancient-greek-gods-003603
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #Legends #Mythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #Ancient -
La crátera del pintor pullés de Darío, creada probablemente en Taras (Tarento) entre el 340-320 a.C. Representa el combate entre Alejandro Magno y Darío III bajo los dioses griegos. Esta pudo ser una escena de un drama griego. 🏛️Museo Arqueológico Nacional de Nápoles 📷ArchaiOptix #antiguagrecia #ancientgreece
-
La crátera del pintor pullés de Darío, creada probablemente en Taras (Tarento) entre el 340-320 a.C. Representa el combate entre Alejandro Magno y Darío III bajo los dioses griegos. Esta pudo ser una escena de un drama griego. 🏛️Museo Arqueológico Nacional de Nápoles 📷ArchaiOptix #antiguagrecia #ancientgreece
-
🏛️ ANCIENT MYSTERY: Phryne, The Ancient Greek Prostitute Who Flashed Her Way to Freedom
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! 🔐
https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/phryne-ancient-greek-prostitute-who-flashed-her-way-freedom-007571
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #HistoryFacts #Ancient #MustRead -
🏛️ ANCIENT MYSTERY: Phryne, The Ancient Greek Prostitute Who Flashed Her Way to Freedom
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! The past holds incredible secrets! 🔐
https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/phryne-ancient-greek-prostitute-who-flashed-her-way-freedom-007571
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #HistoryFacts #Ancient #MustRead -
Historians explain why men in old-timey portraits always had one hand in their vest or coat
https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://www.upworthy.com/why-men-have-hand-in-vest-portraits-ex1/
-
Historians explain why men in old-timey portraits always had one hand in their vest or coat
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://www.upworthy.com/why-men-have-hand-in-vest-portraits-ex1/
-
Historians explain why men in old-timey portraits always had one hand in their vest or coat
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://www.upworthy.com/why-men-have-hand-in-vest-portraits-ex1/
-
Historians explain why men in old-timey portraits always had one hand in their vest or coat
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://www.upworthy.com/why-men-have-hand-in-vest-portraits-ex1/
-
🚀 EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: The Colossus of Rhodes: Ancient Greek Mega Statue
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! History just got more interesting! 📚
https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/colossus-rhodes-ancient-greek-mega-statue-003249
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead #Past #DidYouKnow -
🚀 EXPLOSIVE DISCOVERY: The Colossus of Rhodes: Ancient Greek Mega Statue
📈 Trending with 100K+ readers! History just got more interesting! 📚
https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/colossus-rhodes-ancient-greek-mega-statue-003249
#AncientOrigins #History #Archaeology #AncientGreece #GreekMythology #HumanOrigins #Evolution #MustRead #Past #DidYouKnow