Nichols: But Civilizations decline and fail. “Yet it moves”.

The objections in that article seems to two fold;t he first is logical — that the Tytler phases are neither necessary or sufficient, and thus not logically compelling — and the standard Anti-Hegalian ontological critique — that inviduals cannot not be reduced to willless and hapless atoms buffed around by larger “historical forces” somehow larger than themselves. These are standard libertarian critiques against Hegelian economics, and for obvious reason. And, as far as the go they do have merit. It is a solid analytic counter to Marxism and “scientific socialism”, and a good background philosophical to the larger moral, political and spiritual critiques.

However, civilizations do decline and fall, and the historical eye can spot consistent patterns in them individually and comparatively, and these can well be articulate. That article you post seems to me to rather confound the historical with the philosophical, or rather, could be misused if taken out of contect.

I think that this historical sense is the one that people intend when they bring up the Tytler scheme (and it does matter if Tytler ever existed or not), and I believe that is how C4 employs it. So there is in fact truth to the Tytler scheme, though it is not be forerdained that a civilization need fail at any given point nor that they go through all of the satges outlined should they fail.

I do not think it wise that we should cast aside C4′s alarm.

Certainly we are in a decadent period, and core beliefs — and even core ways of knowing — are in decline. It is up to our exercise free wil to alter this, but Renaissance will require more than the free will of the individual, it will require assent to the pursuit and form of that revival and renewal by a large portion of the citizenry.. I do not know of many successful examples of this happening, at least not on the scale of the crisis before us.