History of the Idea of Progress
History of the Idea of Progress

Author: Robert Nisbet

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-07-12

Total Pages: 594

ISBN-13: 1351515462

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The idea of progress from the Enlightenment to postmodernism is still very much with us. In intellectual discourse, journals, popular magazines, and radio and talk shows, the debate between those who are "progressivists" and those who are "declinists" is as spirited as it was in the late seventeenth century. In History of the Idea of Progress, Robert Nisbet traces the idea of progress from its origins in Greek, Roman, and medieval civilizations to modern times. It is a masterful frame of reference for understanding the present world. Nisbet asserts there are two fundamental building blocks necessary to Western doctrines of human advancement: the idea of growth, and the idea of necessity. He sees Christianity as a key element in both secular and spiritual evolution, for it conveys all the ingredients of the modern idea of progress: the advancement of the human race in time, a single time frame for all the peoples and epochs of the past and present, the conception of time as linear, and the envisagement of the future as having a Utopian end. In his new introduction, Nisbet shows why the idea of progress remains of critical importance to studies of social evolution and natural history. He provides a contemporary basis for many disciplines, including sociology, economics, philosophy, religion, politics, and science. History of the Idea of Progress continues to be a major resource for scholars in all these areas.

A Short History of Progress
A Short History of Progress

Author: Ronald Wright

Publisher: House of Anansi

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 226

ISBN-13: 0887847064

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Each time history repeats itself, so it's said, the price goes up. The twentieth century was a time of runaway growth in human population, consumption, and technology, placing a colossal load on all natural systems, especially earth, air, and water — the very elements of life. The most urgent questions of the twenty-first century are: where will this growth lead? can it be consolidated or sustained? and what kind of world is our present bequeathing to our future?In his #1 bestseller A Short History of Progress Ronald Wright argues that our modern predicament is as old as civilization, a 10,000-year experiment we have participated in but seldom controlled. Only by understanding the patterns of triumph and disaster that humanity has repeated around the world since the Stone Age can we recognize the experiment's inherent dangers, and, with luck and wisdom, shape its outcome.

Peter Oliver’s “Origin and Progress of the American Rebellion”
Peter Oliver’s “Origin and Progress of the American Rebellion”

Author: Peter Oliver

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 1967

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 9780804706018

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One difficulty in writing a balanced history of the American Revolution arises in part from its success as a creator of our nation and our nationalistic sentiment. Unlike the Civil War, unlike the French Revolution, the American Revolution produced no lingering social trauma in the United States—it is a historic event widely applauded by Americans today as both necessary and desirable. But one consequence of this happy unanimity is that the chief losers of the War of Independence—the American Loyalists—have fared badly at the hands of historians. This explains, in part, why the account of the Revolution recorded by self-professed Loyalist and Chief Justice of the Superior Court of Massachusetts, Peter Oliver, has heretofore been so routinely overlooked. Oliver's manuscript, entitled "The Origins & Progress of the American Rebellion," written in 1781, challenges the motives of the founding fathers, and depicts the revolution as passion, plotting, and violence. His descriptions of the leaders of the patriot party, of their program and motives, are unforgiving, bitter, and inevitably partisan. But it records the impressions of one who had experienced these events, knew most of the combatants intimately, and saw the collapse of the society he had lived in. His history is a very important contemporary account of the origins of the revolution in Massachusetts, and is now presented here in it entirety for the first time.

Civilization and Progress
Civilization and Progress

Author: Radoslav A. Tsanoff

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2014-07-15

Total Pages: 385

ISBN-13: 081316477X

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Historical and systematic in its treatment, this work reviews the idea of progress in Western thought as it relates to civilization, in a more comprehensive survey than is to be found in previous writings on the subject. In the author's view, the history of civilization reveals an increasing range of human capacity, both for good and for evil, depending upon men's choice between contending values. From this standpoint, the work proceeds to the exploration of such fields of social activity as the evolution of the family, the emancipation of women, economic conditions and technology, intellectual and aesthetic values, moral and religious experience. Civilization and Progress is marked by balanced and judicious treatment, very broad learning, and a lucid and forceful style. The author asks us to consider the alternatives we face and to reflect on the choices which men have made in the past, which confront us in the present world crisis, and on which our destiny hangs in the future. Seminal in scholarship and creativity, this work will interest those concerned with the Western intellectual tradition and with the condition of mankind.

When Technology Wounds
When Technology Wounds

Author: Chellis Glendinning

Publisher: William Morrow

Published: 1990

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13:

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Explains why thousands of dangerous technologies are often employed in our homes, our schools, our workplaces, and in our bodies without adequate assessment of the long-range impact, and often without the consumer's knowledge. Here is a vigorous call to review and assess technological advancement.