That’s why Hayek tends to flip his lid when puffed-up radicals come around with big ideas for rapid advances in social justice. As imperfect as our society may be, we’ve got a pretty good thing going, but mostly we don’t actually understand what’s keeps it going, or what makes its going so good. So we need to be careful not to screw it up. When we think about making a difference, we need to think small, or else anticipate a high probability of failure.Such would substitute for my critique of the formalists in 1 paragraph.
In 1 word? Hubris. It's as arrogant as Marxism, and as likely to work.
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The core of Moldbug's Formalism is a neo-reactionary return to something that worked well and produced the Belle Epoque.
Isegoria,
That makes the enormous assumption that those things that are different about us now as compared to then are not a major part of the difference in standards of living. Hubris.
Recommending following the recipe that brought about some of the greatest economic growth ever seen is not as arrogant as Marxism.
Arrogant? Perhaps. As arrogant as Marxism? Hardly.
Fair enough. It's not as arrogant as Marxism. Maybe just there with Plato. Suggesting a minor improvement on Despotism, and calling it utopia.
Do you consider 19th-century European monarchies despotic? More despotic than the popular governments that came after? (Or before, in the case of France?)
And who is calling a formalist state a utopia?
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