The anastomosing effects of expertisism and gnostic scientism have diminshed the country's respect for the generalist. Even if I fix or build something 30% worse than the expert, it is still 100% mine.
There's a book from 2010, Why America is Not A New Rome, by Vaclav Smil. A fair amount of his argument is that technologies and economic and political structures have changed, so the two entities are not all that similar.
Thanks David. When I see your substack in my email I’m always excited. Please don’t stop these thoughtful articles.
Well done, sir.
The anastomosing effects of expertisism and gnostic scientism have diminshed the country's respect for the generalist. Even if I fix or build something 30% worse than the expert, it is still 100% mine.
There's a book from 2010, Why America is Not A New Rome, by Vaclav Smil. A fair amount of his argument is that technologies and economic and political structures have changed, so the two entities are not all that similar.
Cayley maintains an excellent blog (he's a national treasure).
https://www.davidcayley.com/blog/