this is (imo) one of the most impressive and deeply insightful passages from Debt: The First 5,000 Years, and something i wanted to share with the most of you who aren’t going to sit down and read the whole book. it’s going under a read more because it is just a smidge long, but do read it
When dealing with conquistadors, we are speaking not just of simple greed, but of greed raised to mythic proportions. This is, after all, what they are best remembered for. They never seemed to get enough. Even after the conquest of Tenochtitlán or Cuzco, and the acquisition of hitherto-unimaginable riches, the conquerors almost invariably regrouped and started off in search of more treasure.
Moralists through the ages have inveighed against the endlessness of human greed, just as they have against our supposedly endless lust for power. What history actually reveals, though, is that while humans may be justly accused of having a proclivity to accuse others of acting like conquistadors, few really act this way themselves. Even for the most ambitious of us, our dreams are more like Sindbad’s: to have adventures, to acquire the means to settle down and live an enjoyable life, and then, to enjoy it. Max Weber of course argued that the essence of capitalism is the urge–which he thought first appeared in Calvinism–never to settle down, but to engage in endless expansion. But the conquistadors were good medieval Catholics, even if ones usually drawn from the most ruthless and unprincipled elements of Spanish society. Why the unrelenting drive for more and more and more?
Friday, January 6, 2017
quoms: this is (imo) one of the most impressive and deeply insightful passages from Debt: The First... 14
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