License & Renewal

Signs of Decline

Historians sometimes propose theories about the rise and fall of civilizations. Edward Gibbon famously wrote The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published in six volumes from 1776-1789.

Today, scientists offer "scientific" explanations for the rise and fall of empires. Jared Diamond won a Pulitzer Prize for Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (1997). In 2005 he followed with Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. He downplays cultural factors and elevates natural resources, with ecological and geographic contexts, to explain why societies succeed or fail.

Not all scientists, however, find Diamond's books scientific. Anthropologist Bryn Williams assessed his latest book, The World Until Yesterday, thus: "His examples are evocative and his narration is powerful, but Diamond ultimately fails to substantiate his arguments. By the end of the book, it is impossible to tell if one has finished reading a masterpiece of rigorous analysis or a masterfully written collection of just-so stories."¹

The same may likely be said of Jim Penman's new Biohistory (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2015). Reviews have been slow in coming, although The Daily Telegraph and The Daily Mail have featured the book, which claims to explain the rise and fall of civilizations in biological terms.

Penman sees the course of human history as dependent on changes in human "temperament," which he defines as "a behavioral and emotional state that varies among individuals, is relatively stable over time and situation, is biologically based and appears early in life, but is influenced by parenting style and other environmental variables which condition how the inherited temperament is expressed."

There are two systems that influence the temperament of animals, allowing them to "adjust their attitudes and behaviors to changes in the environment." One system responds to "relatively mild yet chronic food shortages," the other to "occasional famine or predator threat." Resulting behavioral changes "make individuals more likely to survive and prosper."

For humans, however, the systems that bestow greater viability can be triggered in other ways; for instance, by "developed codes of behavior, especially related to religion, that have the same effect." The development of civilization depends not only on physical technologies but also on "cultural technologies, especially religions." These cultural systems, however, are "vulnerable to the effects of abundance and population density." Wealthy societies "tend to abandon ascetic behaviors, such as restrictions on sexual activity," which "in turn leads to society-wide change[s] in temperament and behavior which undermine success."

Changes in the West, "especially since the 1960s, are the result of a dramatic fall" in civilizing factors, marked by "the declining age of puberty, increased sexual freedom, reduced control of children, declining work ethic, and economic stagnation." Other signs of decline include "female emancipation, plunging birth rates, and reduced enthusiasm for war." Taken individually, these are not all necessarily negative forces, but "the end result must be economic decline and political collapse."

Penman offers bad news: "Knowledge of the underlying biology indicates that no conventional social or political policy can reverse the process."

Common sense tells us that today's sexual promiscuity and experimentation and general moral freefall cannot end well (see p. 34).

But man has more than "conventional policy" at his disposal. While Rome was in decline, Christian life and culture were growing, even underground. Spiritual renewal, neither conventional nor scientific, comes from where the scientist cannot go.

Note
1. slate.com/articles/health_and_science/books/2013/02/jared_diamond_the_world_until_yesterday_anthropologists_are_wary_of_lack.html