In China the idea of individualism is diminished or frowned upon. There the main energy is in cooperative interaction. Even in the China sciences, it's normal for technical or research papers to have far more authors than is typical in the west. As a result the Chinese are taking the lead in scientific research and publishing. They're simply getting more done at the cutting edges and doing it faster as well. American style research has principal investigators leading a select group of secondary investigators. That's the slow way and being first in science and technological research races does count.
The other day we learned how the Chinese put up a tall building, a hotel, in just 6 days start to move-in finish. The lesson in that is not new technology as such but scheduling and cooperative organization. Everything had to happen "just in time" and perfectly. I can't imagine how the USA or any euro-centrc country --with their touted individualism -- could bring off such group-effort. How many tines have you seen a road paved only to be torn up piecemeal afterwards as, say, the sewer guys got around to their jobs? How many times have big projects been held up due to clumsy schedules among the contractors and tradesmen? That's all a function of over-ripened corporate and governmental individualism, competing trade unions, and just plain old laziness. We have built a post- renaissance world on the cult of western style individualism. Does it still work? Its central myth is the idea of freedom, personal freedom as the basis of all achievement. It has worked very well if we champion a vague sense of mythologized freedom (that has never been adequately defined) but what happens when the world resources become too fragile and scanty to support everyone's free individualism? I have no answer but the Chinese anti-individualist model is working for them...for now. Personally, I don't think I could adopt a non-individualist outlook but I can imagine how it might become more crucial to human survival. The America gospel of individualist freedom is enshrined in the old story of the westward pioneer who moved on when he heard the sound of another man's axe. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: joseph berg <[email protected]> To: aesthetics-l <[email protected]> Sent: Sat, November 13, 2010 5:37:27 PM Subject: "Therebs more alienation and separation of people in a commodified landscape, so as the actual creativity which is about being able to collectively and collaboratively change the world is disappearing, we get the emergence of individualized notions o http://halifax.mediacoop.ca/blog/kaley/4885 "Theres more alienation and separation of people in a commodified landscape, so as the actual creativity which is about being able to collectively and collaboratively change the world is disappearing, we get the emergence of individualized notions of creativity."
