CIVILISATION

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 37, 13 February 1930, Page 24

CIVILISATION

i-VpVT DOES IT MEAN? DAY SAVAGERY T!THE SCAIjE OF PROGEESS ; By Professor A. M. Low. .- J: : ■•': ■ (Copyright.) • the majority of people the question; - "Are we really civilised?" probably seems :. ridiculous. They are as certain that they ~; are ■'civilised as they are that the inhabit- :": a nts of the Fiji Islands are not. They; '.'find proofs of civilisation in the.houses in . w.Ki.ch'tlicy live, in the buses which take •■diem tft'-'-ivovk, o.iid the cinemas which help ■ them, to■•■wWle. away their leisure hours. '••-■'Yet if.the matter is considered carefully, ""utilisation k a matter of the mind and •"■ not." of/material .'lohievement. It is a ■great thing to build a skyscraper in three :»atifmv but. the awient Egjiitians built ..''pVramicls, the difforen.-o being that they 1 t66kion"er, and used thousands ot slaves "to"whom they denied tho right of possess- -■ im? a soul. That is why we do not con- '- elder they were civilised. But it is equally -certain that future generations will look "back-on the Britain of 1929 and deny that -it was civilised in any degree whatsoever. v .We say that we are wonderful people bei ' cause we appreciate the sanctity of hie, freedom of man, and the right of.every* :. one to live. Yet our wars are more terrible and devastating than those of men ~ -who fought with primitive weapons. And, ;.- worse still, unlike those of savages, they '» result'in no decision. ;■' We may believe in humanity and Iree- •' doiri, but it is still possible to see a ','-, photograph of a famous woman busy at a 'charity bazaar when the clothes on her • back cost more than many men can earn :". in six months. We pay a golf professional - £2000 a year to teach us how to push ;?a;ball into a hole with totally inadequate '•• instruments, and those self-same maniacs -hit balls costing from 2s 6d each from !;'the roof of a London hotel into the.rn-er '"•for practice. We do not bother about men sleeping on the embankment be- : low to whom 2s 6d would mean luxury for ;!'^CANNIBALISTIC TENDENCIES. '~ We are~ho louger cannibals, but we still •1- tear half-cooked flesh with our teeth and - find pleasure in pursuing animals merely :;" for the sake of killing. We no longer 1 liave orgies round the fire at night, but .-the blood of a fox when it is torn to 'pieces by the hounds is sprinkled on the •"-face of a young and presumably innocent !:.girl. The surest way to raise a laugh *in a musical hall is to simulate a drunken :V;man or to hint at a degree of bestial unfaithfulness. •■ Man has given up going to war with :.;his fists because they do not kill quickly '■>'■ enough, but he will still pay two or three ''guineas for the privilege of sitting near ;»".ring in which two men are battering '"•each other with the most primitive of !," weapons. And in an age that calls itself ■-civilised these men are sometimes paid "more for one night's work than many |' s scientists, working in # the interests of ■-• humanity, can earn in a lifetime. vl' ..Thiß is an age, I will allow, of many ij great achievements. Wireless is a typical it.''discovery, but to the average man radio £ means listening to a somewhat distorted in his own home rather than to v, communication over long distances. And ■we have not even discovered how to direct >=our messages so that they cannot be pickif ed.'iip broadcast. Nor have we found out, ;■; as will our followers, how. to send and .receive messages direct from the. brain. ':'-We have, in fact, progressed so little that: we have to blow air through our mouth and waggle our lips in order to communicate with oiir neighbours, and we prevent ourselves being irritated because the woman at the next table in the restaurant has a high-pitched voice. Transport is becoming more rapid every day, but a flight across the Atlantic is still an event of note, and we celebrate the first air crossing of the Channel, probably in much the same way as Julius Caesav celebrated his adventurous voyage , in ; a boat across the same strip of water •rrb'y. eating and drinking. .No doubt the visitors to that function travelled in motor-cars which wasted 30 per. cent, of their petrol and dined in a room lit by artificial light at an efficiency of 2% per cent. .Every boy and girl in the kingdom is now given the opportunity of being educated, but our idea of teaching is so primitive that many who know the dates of every King of England are ignorant of the workings of/ their own body, and not a few who win prizes for poems in dead languages cannot explain how a taxi works. When we are really educated we shall forget most of our Latin and Greek and try to erplain to our children the wonder of the natural phenomena about us. The beauty of an oil spot in a puddle in the road is, after all, far greater than that of an ode by Horace, and the explanation of its origin is much more interesting. We are beginning to decide whether we have children, by chance or choice, but we cannot choose the sex of our children nor the profession for which they will be best suited. The really civilised men and "women of the future will have complete control of these points. We still eat because we enjoy it, and have very little idea of the effect of food upon the mind, ■whereas if we were civilised we shenld undoubtedly be able to specifically nourish our brains. It is not impossible that the tendencies of some criminals might be eradicated by a vastly-improved knowledge of diet or surgery. PROGRESS IN MEDICINE. The medical world perform what would «eem miracles to savages, but it cannot tell us how to cure a common cold nor prevent a man being killed by creatures so small that he cannot see them without the aid of-a microscope. Bad conditions of working have resulted in our eyesight becoming defective, but the best that surgery can do is to balance a conglomeration of glass and gold upon our noses. While it is only within the last two or three years that the deaf have been given back their Bearing by . mechanical means, I believe that in the future we shall not only be able to have our eyesight, teeth, and hearing artificially corrected, but also that we may discover some mechanical means of protection so that we shall not be disturbedby unnecessary sights and sounds. Exeriments have, even now, achieved partial success in Germany, where lenses have been applied by direct attachment to the eye. The' answer to the question "Are we really_ civilised?" seems to be "No," but that is not altogether our own fault. We exist at a certain point in the scale of progress,' and we do not yet know how to alter our position. If we realise only ■Rfhat civilisation can be, we have achieved something that takes us beyond the savage. It is worth while bearing in mind the statement'of a famous scientist, that if the whole life of the earth is reckoned as 100 years then mankind has lived for only four minutes. . IVoin the aspect of the future man we are half-baked savages. ■