Welcome to Chapter Two in Dr. Peter Corning's Linked Essay Series Unite or Die. In Chapter Two, Dr. Corning examines Winston Churchill and Plato within the context of current American politics.
We need to stop repeating old, costly, and deadly mistakes. Will we ever learn? To borrow a line from America’s baseball-player philosopher, Yogi Berra, it’s déjà vu all over again. America has once again done it wrong (on the whole), with tragic consequences. There are models in other countries for how to do it right.
The evidence suggests that cooperation was the “master architect” of evolutionary complexity, especially in humankind. That’s why ethics is so important. The selfish gene model of evolution is a one-sided caricature. Darwin himself understood the important role of ethics in human evolution. The ethical implications of a fundamentally cooperative model of human evolution are obvious. Effective social cooperation depends on having a harmonious social relationship.
A dysfunctional government can be a matter of life-and-death, and these days they are all too common. We should follow Plato’s sage advice. Plato’s diagnosis of the many dysfunctional kinds of government, and their root causes, still rings true, and so does his ultimate prescription.
There is a potentially effective international response to the rise of China as a superpower, but it will require a twenty-first century Winston Churchill with vision. In the next decade, China is likely to challenge the United States in many ways. Winston Churchill understood the crucial value of cooperation against a common foe. A twenty-first century Winston Churchill, with a keen eye on the global chess board, might see the proposed “Global Government Initiative” as an opportunity to create a new political alliance.
