The 2018 Bavarian state elections showed a familiar trend: extremists won and the mid lost. The same even happens in bipartisan countries (eg, UK, USA) as polarisation between both parties still increases. During my US trips in the 1980’s, I already noticed that both parties were kind of disgusted by each other’s political opinions. Today, it’s far worse.
At the moment of writing this, I’m doing my laundry. It occurred to me that the centrifugal force of my washing machine pushes the laundry to the (extreme) sides and leaves a void in the middle. Apparently, there’s a centrifugal force in society as well. In my blogs, I refer to this force as Change, and in particular the Technological Revolution of 1800-2100.
The ever increasing speed of Change can be illustrated by 2 short impressive videos: (1) Earth’s history from a Time and a Technology perspective by Business Insider, and (2) the History of Urbanisation from 3700 BC to 2000 AD based on a 2016 study published in Nature.
In general, humans do not cope well with Change as it usually triggers one of our two primal emotions: Fear – rather than Love. Fear triggers one of three types of behaviour: Fight, Flight or Freeze. Human resistance to Change equals fighting. In the center of Politics, we still talk about joint solutions but at its fringes people fight for their beliefs and opinions.
Recently, I noticed some articles about the impact of Change, including climate change, on our mental health (eg, Independent). Mental health and the speed of Change have a common link: Fear. This notion of Change or Fear is very different in forests and at sea. Hence, the scientifically claimed benefits of forests and the sea to our mental health (eg, IFL, MPG).
To some extent, humans are caught in a similar scientific experiment as the proverbial frog in a pan with boiling water. If the temperature rises slowly, both will accommodate to their changing environment. If put in boiling water, both will jump out. Wiki claims this 19th century scientific experiment is no longer considered as true (for frogs).
Change is the centrifugal force for all the 7 Belief Systems. Love is the only Belief system that is subject to minor Change. The reason for this appears to be the fundamental nature of equality in (selfless) Love. Similarly, inequality seems to increase the pace of Change in the 6 selfish Belief systems (ie, Money, Philosophy, Politics, Religion, Science and the Truth).
A notion of fair inequality rather than unfair equality slows down extremist views. The political center will still deteriorate but may not turn into an unhealthy bipartisan political system. A recent NYT article argued that the Bavarian election outcome shows a “healthy democracy”.
“The law of centrifugal force seems to be as true for the human condition as it is for the Newtonian mechanics. The faster our lives spin, the more things tend to fly apart.” A quote from the 2011 novel Lost December by Richard Paul Evans (b. 1962).
Centrifugal Force (2016) by Naiwen Yang
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Note: all markings (bold, italic, underlining) by LO unless stated otherwise
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