Inspired by the work of John David Ebert, this new section (August 2021) will be dedicated to large scale and integrative human history, including the history of civilization(s).

See also our section on P2P Cycles.

This project will follow three different 'reading' and listening/watching threads.

Here is a short intro to a 'spiral' understanding of human history, which combines the cyclical trans-valuations of polarities in human development, along with the accumulation of knowledge and the arrow of time:

• Lene Rachel Andersen on the Five Phases in the Evolution of Human Cultural Sensibilities. By Gregg Henriques.

Introduction

This is a great 3-hour interview with John David Ebert introducing many of the themes around comparative civilizational inquiry:

* John David Ebert on Cultural Immune Systems

Contents

1. The Spengler thread of civilizational analysis, as suggested by John David Ebert. This thread looks at civilizations and how they evolve, or not.

1. It starts with the Decline of the West, by Oswald Spengler
2. Traces the reactions and updates to his work by Arnold Toynbee for the UK, and Carroll Quigley for the U.S.
3. Follows the work on comparative mythology and the evolution of mythology by Joseph Campbell
4. The work of Jean Gebser on the five mutations of consciousness, as explained in the Ever-Present Origin
5. The work of William Irwin Thompson

2. The thread inspired by the book edited by Sohail Inayatullah and John Galtung, on Macrohistory and Macrohistorians, which introduce authors that look at world history from an integrated perspective.

3. The thread inspired by the World Systems Theory as pioneered by Immanuel Wallerstein and others, which focuses on structural evolutions, class realities and geopolitical dominations and competition.

Key Quotes

This is a strong hint of what a specific p2p/commons approach can bring to the table:

"Civilizations break and fail because they require a fuller release of creative interchange between all participants than any civilization has yet provided. To achieve this fuller release, religion, education, social constitution and government must all be shaped to serve this kind of interchange and equip people to live in its power and keeping.

“Civilizations might be viewed as surges of history that rise toward this level of abundant living, but always fall back because social institutions are not appropriately modified at that time of crisis when accumulated resources – material, social and spiritual, open the way to it. Yet it is just at the same time when the surge of history breaks and fails that most wisdom is attained concerning the conduct of life. Failure is always the supreme teacher, if accompanied by faith and courage. In China, India, Egypt, Israel and the Roman Empire, a more noble and penetrating religious faith arose when the surge of history began to break. Also, the arts and principles of government were then matured, and moral principles were more clearly discerned, more profoundly interpreted. Thus, as civilizations rise and fall like waves, so to speak – each failing to reach the greater good that might be – they leave a deposit of wisdom that increases. In time this growing wisdom and truer religious faith might enable a surge of history to pass over and beyond the obstacle we have noted. Our own time offers just such an opportunity. But the opportunity will pass us by if we do not have a better interpretation of justice and freedom than is now prevalent.”

- Henry Nelson Wieman, The Directive in History*, pp. 107-108, 1949

Directory

Thread 1: Civilizational Analysis

Oswald Spengler

The Decline of the West

1. Book: The Decline of the West
2. Video: John David Ebert on Spengler's The Decline of the West

Man and Technics

1. Video: John David Ebert on Oswald Spengler's Man and Technics

Arnold Toynbee

A Study of History

1. Book: A Study of History
2. Video: John David Ebert on Arnold Toynbee's A Study of History

Caroll Quigley

1. Book: Evolution of Civilizations
2. Video: John David Ebert on Carroll Quigley's Evolution of Civilizations

Joseph Campbell

1. Book:
   1. The Monomyth of the Hero's Journey in Joseph Campbell's book: The Hero with a Thousand Faces
   2. Joseph Campbell's Masks of God and the Evolution of World Mythology
2. Video: John David Ebert on Joseph Campbell

Jean Gebser

The Ever-Present Origin

1. Book: The Ever-Present Origin
2. Video: John David Ebert on Jean Gebser's Ever-Present Origin

Franz Borkenau

1. Book: Borkenau Franz. End and Beginning: On the Generations of Cultures and the Origins of the West. Edited by Lowenthal Richard. (European Perspectives.) New York: Columbia University Press. 1981.
2. Video:
   1. John David Ebert on Franz Borkenau's Cycle of the Dead
   2. On the Generations of Cultures and the Origins of the West

William Irwin Thompson

1. Book(s):
   1. At the Edge of History: Examines the structure of four stages in Plato, Vico, Blake, Marx, Yeats, Jung, and McLuhan
   2. The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture; reviewed and critiqued the scholarship on the emergence of civilization from the Paleolithic to the historical period.
   3. Coming Into Being: Artifacts and Texts in the Evolution of Consciousness; Works and authors analyzed include the Enuma Elish, Homer, Hesiod, Sappho, the Book of Judges, the Rig Veda, Ramayana, Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita, and the Tao Te Ching
   4. Self and Society: Studies in the Evolution of Consciousness; related Gebser's structures to periods in the development of mathematics (arithmetic, geometric, algebraic, dynamical, chaotic) and in the history of music.
   5. Beyond Religion: The Culture Evolution of the Sense of the Sacred from Shamanism to Post-Religious spirituality
2. Video: John David Ebert on William Irwin Thompson

More authors recommended by John David Ebert

• Sri Aurobindo
  • John David Ebert on Sri Aurobindo's The Human Cycle
  • John David Ebert on Sri Aurobindo's The Life Divine
  • Books: Alexander Bard recommends reading: 1) "The Life Divine" and 2) "Synthesis of Yoga".
• Henri Bergson
  • John David Ebert on Henri Bergson's Creative Evolution
• Rene Guenon
  • John David Ebert on Rene Guenon
• Karl Jaspers:
  • John David Ebert on Karl Jaspers's The Origin and Goal of History
  • Book: The Origins and Goal of History
• Carl Jung
  • John David Ebert on Carl Jung
• Marshall McLuhan
  • John David Ebert on Marshall McLuhan
• Heiner Muhlmann:
  • John David Ebert on Heiner Muhlmann's Maximal Stress Cooperation Theory
  • Books: 1) The Nature of Cultures ; 2) Maximal Stress Cooperation
• Camille Paglia
  • John David Ebert on Camille Paglia's Sexual Personae
• Jordan Peterson
  • John David Ebert on Jordan Peterson's Maps of Meaning
• Friedrich Schelling:
  • John David Ebert on Schelling's Ages of the World
• Peter Sloterdijk
  • John David Ebert on Peter Sloterdijk's Spheres
  • Book: Spheres
• Ken Wilber
  • John David Ebert on Ken Wilber's Up From Eden
• Arthur Young:
  • John David Ebert on Arthur Young's The Reflexive Universe

Thread 2: Macrohistory and Macrohistorians

Among the macrohistorians discussed in this book are:

1. Ssu-Ma Ch’ien,
2. St. Augustine,
3. Ibn Khaldun,
4. Giambatista Vico,
5. Adam Smith,
6. G.W.F. Hegel,
7. Auguste Comte,
8. Karl Marx,
9. Herbert Spencer,
10. Vilfredo Pareto,
11. Max Weber,
12. Rudolf Steiner,
13. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,
14. Pitirim Sorokin,
15. Antonio Gramsci,
16. Prabhat Rainjan Sarkar,
17. Riane Eisler,

Not treated here as we have treated them in the section following John David Ebert's thread:

1. Oswald Spengler
2. Arnold Toynbee

P.R. Sarkar

1. Intro: Shrii Sarkar's Theory of Power