Is presentism a lower perspective?

[Basman]

Particularly moral presentism when analyzing the past, like colonialism, pre-feminist society, slavery, whether or not the Wehrmacth was "evil" during WW2, etc.

In my experience, moral presentism can quickly devolve into painting the past with an overly broad brush and lacks appreciation for moral relativism. What if slavery was in its historical context moral due survival pressure in the time? Of course, it would be unspeakable today but today is not hundreds of years ago. Or just a couple of decades ago even. That's why moral presentism strikes me a lower perspective. It lacks nuance. Not to mention that it doesn't appreciate how future societies might look upon present society. If your morally righteous about the past then you should make peace with future humans being morally righteous about how you live right now.

Its kind of unfair in sense when you consider that perhaps it wouldn't be possible to have the advanced societies that we thrive in today if the Romans didn't use slaves. Or if the natives weren't ethnically cleansed during the settling of America. Et cetera.

[Shane Hanlon]

Ya. I have never heard of the term "presentism" before, but going off of your explanation of it, it is totally useless. But so is using culture as a yardstick for morality. That is like using groupthink to determine morality. It might have been socially acceptable but not moral. Same with purchasing factory farmed meat today.

 

On 1/21/2025 at 7:33 PM, Basman said:

Its kind of unfair in sense when you consider that perhaps it wouldn't be possible to have the advanced societies that we thrive in today if the Romans didn't use slaves. Or if the natives weren't ethnically cleansed during the settling of America. Et cetera.

Check out a book like:

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow

After reading that, I feel that I would have been happier living in an indigenous tribe on ecologically healthy land than how I live today.

[Basman]

9 hours ago, Shane Hanlon said:

Check out a book like:

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow

After reading that, I feel that I would have been happier living in an indigenous tribe on ecologically healthy land than how I live today.

I have thought a bit whether or not I would be happier living in a hunter-gatherer tribe as much of human physiology and psychology is arguably adapted for that kind of social environment and way of survival. But it would probably be a much harder and generally worse life I think. Much shorter and more at the mercy of nature. The supposed high homicide rate during the Stone Ages indicate to me the degree of difficulty that is to survive in a tribal setting (no holds barred competition for scarce resources).

And keep in mind caring about ecology is a modern thing. Tribes only care about ecology to the extent that they have to in order to survive like an animal does. If they cared about ecology or any of the virtues we hold as moral today like not being racist or against slavery or valuing diversity (ethnically, ideologically) the supposedly those traits would have been passed down from the time we where tribes, which has not been the case at all. Stage Green ideals are way beyond a Stage Purple a tribe.

Edited 2 hours ago by Basman

[Shane Hanlon]

3 hours ago, Basman said:

And keep in mind caring about ecology is a modern thing.

This is not true.

 

3 hours ago, Basman said:

If they cared about ecology or any of the virtues we hold as moral today like not being racist or against slavery or valuing diversity (ethnically, ideologically) the supposedly those traits would have been passed down from the time we where tribes

Colonization massacered every tribe that wasn't oriented towards power and war. So those that were highly developed and didn't integrate powerful weapons (almost all of them) into their way of life, were wiped from the planet.

 

3 hours ago, Basman said:

Stage Green ideals are way beyond a Stage Purple a tribe.

Be careful to take this too literally. Tribes can also be at any stage of development.

 

3 hours ago, Basman said:

I have thought a bit whether or not I would be happier living in a hunter-gatherer tribe as much of human physiology and psychology is arguably adapted for that kind of social environment and way of surviva

It goes much deeper than this.