Interesting essay.
One comment. It seems to me that "teaching" three year olds etc to memorize the "classics" by rote is a form of totalitarian brainwashing. Preparing the worker ants to unconsciously and automatically know their place in the ant-colony, and to simultaneously obey those in "authority" without question.

Reg you tell us that Ruddy could understand the words, but not the meaning of the sentence.

With your very similar qualifications, why should we believe you have any better idea of the meaning of the sentence.

Yes you can probably befuddle most with your string of really long & somewhat obscure words, but does this indicate understanding, or simply pride.

For example, what did you understand when you heard our Julia pronounce "there will be no carbon tax under a government I lead"?

Did you realise she was actually saying, "I will prostitute myself before anyone who can & will give me the keys to the Lodge". "Don't get in my way, I still have a kitchen full of knives"?

Now I will admit, not all that many of us did hear what she was really saying, but did you? Unless you can interpret the meaning of a simple liar like Julia, how can you expect us to believe you can interpret the convoluted speaking of expert liars like the Chinese leadership.

Hell even the US, with it's deeply tricky current president is very hard to interpret.

I'm afraid mate, you are going to have to get quite a few runs on the board, before we are going to see your pronouncements as gospel.

Never the less, thanks for the article, & do keep them coming, it is always interesting to see things through another thinking persons eyes. Without that to make us think, we are likely to get things as badly wrong as Ruddy.

Welcome back Reg.

One of my favourite quotations is from Chou En Lai who when asked for his views of the effects of the French Revolution replied "too soon to tell".

We in the West not only fail to take the longer view but increasingly obviously put down the memory hole inconvenient facts. A current example is the drum beat for war on both Syria and Iran, fed by the same lies the fed the invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. In this exercise in selective memory loss they are aided and abetted by a compliant mainstream media.

Similarly Rudd's lengthy essay (job application?) fails to acknowledge that China used to be the world's greatest power, interrupted by the consequences of Western imperialism. What we are witnessing now is a reassertion of China's traditional place. Their forthcoming pre-eminent role will owe much to the structure of their educational system which contrary to the views of the commentator above is designed to provide stability and continuity.

We have much to learn.

Hi Reg,

Interesting article. I think the rise or decline of China isn't something we'll see in our lifetimes. Similarily I do't think we'll see the USA exhaust itself... ever.

What I see in your article is a simple Australian truism.

Julie Bishop is developing the sense of nuance we've seen in successive long serving Liberal Australian Foreign Ministers, more especially Downer, Casey and Spender. Yep I didn't rate Peacock.

If you recall Labor Australian Foreign Affairs Ministers or External Affairs Ministers you'll recognise the contrast instantly. The shallowness and lack of understanding of those in our region with whom we share history.

Carr, Rudd, Evans and Evatt all had other agendas. Again I omitted one. Willessee. He did understand nuance but was stood over by Whitlam.

I think Julie Bishop is developing grandly and will make a great Australia Foreign Affairs Minister

Here's a more pertinent question:

Why is (the West - CROSSED OUT) Australia unprepared for (China’s - CROSSED OUT) Indonesia's rise?

In order to make this discussion meaningful, can you please be more specific, Reg, and tell us:

1) What are those Platonic traditions and legacies that we are about to lose lest we stand guard against China?
2) Are we actually following Platonism at the moment and in what ways?
3) Are those Platonic traditions, legacies and values virtuous and worth keeping enough to fight for?

Thank you.

It's rather interesting how many Western 'minds' can't get around the fact that the Western 'mind' is a miserable, vain, half-blind thing that is obsessed by its imagined intelligence and imagined achievements.

As the West is left behind in the dustbin of history, it will have centuries to examine where it went wrong and how it came to so badly misjudge the world scene and the cleverness and wisdom of other nations.

The West is an anachronism!

http://dangerouscreation.com

Dear David,

It's rather interesting how many human 'minds' can't get around the fact that the human 'mind' is a miserable, vain, half-blind thing that is obsessed by its imagined intelligence and imagined achievements.

As humans are left behind in the dustbin of history, they will have centuries to examine where it went wrong and how it came to so badly misjudge the world scene and the cleverness and wisdom of other species.

Humanity is an anachronism!

Good questions re the presumed influence of Platonic tradition Yuyutsu.
I was going to ask the same question when I made my comment, but I decided not to.
Reminds me of one of the village idiot George Bush's associates who proclaimed that what used to be called reality was now obsolete, and that consequently he/they were creating/inventing a completely new "reality" as events unfolded.

Yuyutsu, in my comment I singled out the Western mind because it is distinctly different from other minds especially that of Asians.

The Western mind is not Platonic in any way because it is based upon 'Kulture' like Coca Cola, MacDonalds, Terminator movies, Warmongering, and Greed.

David G, the main thing wrong with the western mind is that it has become too kind for it's own good.

Permitting minds like yours appears to be, to live with in it's midst, is probably the greatest mistake the west has made to date.

The corrosion that such rampant hate, that you appear to harbour, would cause, must be bad for any society.

Hee, hee, Hasbeen, that's a laugh.

You run a pretty good line in "rampant hate" yourself, directed at anything you don't approve of....very funny....any very "corrosive".

Hasbeen wrote:

>>David G, the main thing wrong with the western mind is that it has become too kind for it's own good.>>

Actually Hasbeen I think the fact that we allow David G and his ilk to vent is a sign of our strength. Only insecure regimes like the Saudi monarchy or the Communist Party regime in China seek to shut up their critics

The Western Mind is too kind for its own good, eh, Hasbeen?

Tell that to the folk that survived the onslaught in Iraq and Afghanistan and live with the effects of depleted uranium and white phosphorous. Tell that to the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Agent Orange in Vietnam and Cambodia. Tell that to the starving people all over the world who work for their capitalist employers for a pittance. Tell that to the folk that have been tortured and rendered by Western authorities, put in cages without trial, threatened by dogs, etc.

The Western mind is a sick thing. It is amoral. It is brutal and cruel. It is greedy. It hates peace because peace threatens profits and takes away the chance of achieving power and domination.

I stand for peace and equality. What do you stand for?

Like most neo-Marxists, David G reduces all Western achievements to the horrors of war (and advertising coca-cola). It is a reduction to the absurd. Let's look the achievements. Good sanitation methods, computers, radio, automobiles, liberal democracy, telephones, satellite communication, economic prosperity beyond anything previous, equal opportunity regardless of race, sex or class. There's plenty more, but those few will get my point across.

The sick mind is really David G. To only view (Western) life through the prism of war and advertising says more about his agenda than any objective description of what really is the western mind

Hi Reg,

I'm surprised at the comments in regards to your well written article. Many are vague in criticism of 'the West' and, with apologies, like your article seem to focus on only those things that are pertaining only to how we organise our society.

In defence of the West I'd say China's development is largely being conducted 'on the back' of a great many Western Traditions.

Thales, Pythagoras, Plato's Academy, Aristotle, Euclid, Archimedes, Ptolemy among many other are the basis of western mathematics... growth and development in every area.

I know a little of the History of Chinese Mathematic's and it's seems it's influence is accepted to have waned greatly in recent centuries.

Science is a field in which western written and applicational traditions are much much stronger than Chinese. I acknowledge Chinese accomplishments are numerous but there is not the body of scholarship or development comparable to that in the western tradition.

In matters of medicine I'm utterly ignorant.

In matters of economic's ... well command economies simply fail because they are unreal and create unreality. The West has a body of thinkers from generations not from a totalitarian political party.

In political and social philosophy the Chinese are retarded. The body of Western literature, thought and practise hasn't led us to totalitarianism and now seems to be influencing the developing modern Chinese society.

Morality? well a choice between Christ's new testament scriptures, the basis of western society, and learned by rote and sometime applied Confusian homily, imposed by totalitarianism?

We'll let the future decide.

My view is complex. Oh yes China will rise, the West will also continue it's development and an equalibrium which adopts the strengths of both traditions will eventuate. It will probably take centuries. Not decades. During this time we'll see movements of power and influence but overwhelmingly we'll see all growth and development revolve around the broader Western proven traditions with some adaption of Chinese traditions.

Underlying my view is the fact generally Westernism has been extrovert, inclusive and more egalitarian in nature, Chinese traditions generally do not have these attributes.

It's funny how, when you mention words like peace, equality, cooperation, sharing, etc, suddenly, out of the woodwork, appear all manner of psychotic beasties with tiny minds who predictably go on the attack.

In Washington, humans see the world in black and white. There are only friends or enemies. There are only winners and losers. Might is always right. Kill or be killed. Greed is worshiped as the ultimate virtue, compassion is viewed as weakness.

In a Buddhist Monastery a different mindset is encouraged. People are taught to revere all life, to share what little they have, to help others, to respect the planet and all other creatures.

Unfortunately, most humans are born with equal quantities of nobility and evil. Which predominates depends on which social setting they find themselves in.

Our Western world is doomed because, lead by the U.S., it encompasses all the wrong things.

The survivors of the coming nuclear holocaust may set the survivors on a new path.

Then again, there may well be no survivors and human extinction may prove to be a blessing for all other lifeforms.

http://dangerouscreation.com

Oh,dear! I didn't mean my comment to be a show-stopper, honestly.

Has my view of things caused intellectual paralysis? Is everyone watching the British Open? Has the rise of China (as distinct from Batman Rises) caused folk to retreat to caves and old mines?

Reg, your article was prescient, wonderfully so.

http://dangerouscreation.com

Dear David,

<<Has the rise of China caused folk to retreat to caves and old mines?>>

No, it's your exalted preaching which sent us all remorseful and penitent into our caves.

'Oh,dear! I didn't mean my comment to be a show-stopper, honestly.

No it wasn't your comments David ... it was the blog you referenced

No one bothers with those attitudes any longer ... after seeing their results in communism's colapse.

Imajulianutter, your misreading of my position is breathtaking.

I have no time for Communism OR for so-called 'Democracy' where politicians are owned by the Corporations. Both of these extremes are obscene and lead to the exploitation of the masses.

We need to set up a new political paradigm, one based on equality for all, one where 1% don't own most of the wealth, one where a good education and health system is the right of all, and one where war is only an unpleasant memory.