The Victory of Humanism - Softcover

Thomas Martin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0939479362 ISBN 13: 9780939479368

Publisher: Backintyme, 2011

Synopsis

The Inversion of Western Aesthetic Sensibility

Our experience of "race" is based on how we define beauty. In the past, we thought that discipline was liberating and beautiful, while raw nature was confining and ugly. Today we believe that raw nature is liberating and beautiful, and discipline is confining and ugly. And for better or worse, modernists see the African Americans as somehow non-Western, more natural, or a kind of moral avant-garde. This volume surveys the arts and politics to illustrate the change in our idea of the beautiful.

"For the select few who appreciate a masterful weaving of history, philosophy and the arts (from grand opera to the movies) the book is a tour de force. Reading it is like a return to college. For those concerned about the state of modern life, it is a must read." -- Robert Weissberg, Professor of Political Science (Emeritus), University of Illinois--Urbana

"Modern sleep and dream science teaches us, as does The Victory of Humanism that all human activity, including art and politics are products of the human brain and that each of us has the privilege and responsibility of using it actively and communicating its creations." -- Dr. J. Allan Hobson. Professor of Psychiatry, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School, author of Dreaming: An Introduction to the Science of Sleep (Oxford University Press, 2004).

"Martin has written a work of critical importance about American life that merits our attention. His thoughts are well phrased and reflect the author's detailed knowledge of the American cultural scene. Martin moves easily from highbrow to lowbrow culture and can write intelligently about both." -- Prof. Paul Gottfried, Ph.D., author of Leo Strauss and the Conservative Movement in America (Cambridge University Press, 2012).

"In this revolutionary work, Martin shows that during the ancien regime the upper class controlled the lower classes, but during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries this became inverted, and so the low increasingly started to control the high, in both politics and culture. This process of inversion is so well documented it is clear the author has achieved what most scholars thought impossible: a unification of the apparent diversity of modern culture with a few basic principals from philosophy and evolutionary psychology. He also shows the origin and nature of the fear of biological determinism prevalent today. This book will cause a paradigm shift and allow us to get our emotions, values, culture and politics back under control. Highly recommended." — Prof. Richard Webster, received Ph.D. from Cambridge, author of several books.

"This brilliant work shows how the classical values and hierarchy of western culture have been unnaturally inverted resulting in disaster for our civilization." -- Charles Thompson, writer.

Thomas Martin has a degree in philosophy from American Military University. He was recently elected to membership in the elite H.L. Mencken Club.

About this edition

• Publisher: Backintyme
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0939479362
• ISBN 13: 9780939479368
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 188