/lit/ - Literature

in terms of the ultimate consquences of the Schmitt friend/enemy distinction, it was not philosophy but technology - in specific, nuclear ballistic missile technology - that provides the decisive rejoinder, imho. mutually assured destruction, which is a thing that we could not have deduced out of any number of readings of dusty old tomes, is something to think about.

the reason why Girard isn't a Hegelian is because to his mind it was *Clauswitz* and not Hegel who fundamentally grasped what Napoleon was all about. when states come to perceive each other as rational, functioning, modernist entities, the logic of the duel is inescapable. but what makes the battles so destructive is because the wars do not unfold dialectically (or not completely dialectically), but as a struggle to the death between *twins.* and that is the most destructive form of warfare that there is, as any number of religious or quasi-religious schisms will tell you. whether it's the Crips and the Bloods, the Protestants and Catholics, the Sunni and the Shia, or the Cold War, it's when you are sucked into a position where *in order for You to be You, the Other guy has to be destroyed* - basically, the stakes cannot be any higher. and nothing prevents the escalation to extremes in those conditions, because human beings are not built for natural self-limitation. we are built for excess, dissipation, and ultimately, *explosion.*

so how you limit war is always a question. Augustine had his own way, and it was by what came to be known as Christendom. and after the Cold War we had something like this as well, the Washington consensus that led to American hyperpower through the 1990s. but that system was internally fragilized from within by the necessary requirements of technology, together with their encouragement of multinational corporations to do their thing, which eventually manifested in the public realm as a culture of globalization. said Culture is now breaking up eight ways from Sunday, and their resistance to change their ways is what produced Trump in 2016. the reasons *why* Capital couldn't play nice with liberal democracy are Uncle Nick's contributions to the dialectic.

it is probably time, in other words, for a new chapter to begin. that's why this thing is both acceleration and Cosmotech.