A MACHINE-MADE WORLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19454, 9 October 1926, Page 1 (Supplement)

A MACHINE-MADE WORLD.

BiT KOTAIIE.

NATIONALISM TO THE RESCUE

" One of the effects of industrialism," writes Bertrand Russell, " is to make the world an economic unit; its ultimate consequences will bo very largely due to this fact." Wo shall not achieve complete unification to-day or to-morrow; but no one can doubt that we are on the way. The world must ultimately pool its resources; growing scientific control will enable the world to satisfy its demands from a fully-tapped and developed world-supply. I must confess that this prospect terrifies me. A world run on scientific lines is as little attractive to me as an individual who has ceased to be a human being and who controls his life in obedience to mechanical formula;. The mechanisation of life has gone far enough under industrialism; humanity is in for a bad timo when all life is under the soulless control of big business. As the chief charm of the individual lies not in his points of similarity to other people, but in the distinctive parts of him, the points in which he differs from the rest of mankind, so the chief charm of nationalism lies in the idiosyncrasies, the colour, the variety each group, following its own independent lino of development, gives to the human picture. A world inhabited by a race scientifically evolved to meet the demands of a universal industrialism under one central control is surely the weirdest nightrnaro that ever afflicted the human mind. One can only hope that the assertion of the forco of individuality in men and in nations, an impulse that lies far deeper in human nature than any ideal fixed from the outside, will keep such an abomination in the realm of dreams. The Individual. I think we are safe to trust to that instinctive urge toward self-expression on one's own lines. Yet we must admit that very little is known of the operation of the conditions that have produced the kaleidoscopic variety of the world's life to-day. The differences between nations are even more obvious than the differences between individuals. The study of heredity has done something to reveal the incredible criss-cross of different strands that make the tapestry of every singlo human character. Every man is the product of forces that have been operating from the very first stirrings of life, in the primeval slime. Can the mere influence of environment in a few years reduce to uniformity the infinito variety evolved through myriads of millenniums? May not man, in these last hundred years of feverish scientific activity, have been subjected to a vigour and pace of development which the human soul and mind and body will not be able to stand very much longer ? " It has yet to be proved," says Stanley Hall, " that man can remain permanently civilised." From tho horror of a machine-made world controlled from one mighty centre through machine-made men we turn with delight to tho colour of Vffc as it still is to-day. Tho individual differences between man and man save life from the intolerable oppression of a drab uniformity; even industrialism has not so far managed to thrust humanity into a mould. On the wider field of nationalism the East is still tho East, in spite of the coming of the Industrial Revolution and tho eastward march of Bolshevism. When one has the dire vision of the rich, various pulsing life of man mechanised into uniformity, one finds infinite comfort in the consciousness that most people are still often irrational; one finds signs of life in the prevalence of superstition and feels the old world is not such a had place after nil when intelligent people refuse to walk under ladders, or carry lucky coins in their pockets, or refuse to sit 13 at a table. The forces that will resist the advance of mechanisation are still potent, have still to be reckoned with, and will probably have the last word in the end. National Differences. But it is tho national aspect that gives us our strongest assurance that man will always bo bigger than any of the creations of his brain and hand. Take any very marked national type; note its mental attitudes, its reactions (blessed word!) to its environment. The Scot has his clearly marked characteristics that differentiate him from the rest of the British stock. Wo cannot, say what are tho component parts in his personality; wo cannot go back far enough, and there are too many threads crossing and recrossing to follow any one of them back to its origin. But a poor country, and centuries of struggle and war, have made the Scot what he is today. Ho is canny, he does not wear his heart on his sleeve, he knows the value of money, he believes in understatement when he docs not hold that it is best to make no statement at all. That is all tho fruit of troublous times for generation after generation. Long periods of peace in a rich fat land would produce different qualities suitable to the different environment. The history of Scotland is written in tho character of her people. Sometimes a nation adopts a pose. Certain men are believed to be typical. Their qualities appeal especially to the young men and women, and the national character grows by imitation. I be.lievo the American typo has developed on these lines. If young New Zealand finds the American type admirable, it will set out on the same path; if the American type is kept prominently before us, the two-fisted he-man, iOO per cent. American, ho will givo direction to tho aspirations of our youth. For youth always follows ■where its admiration is given. Tho Australian has already drawn a picture, of the man he would be, and lie tries wholeheartedly to reproduce it in his own character. It is only partly pose, for there must be something in the condition of life that leads hero worship to its gods. The ideal must be in part realised before it is set as an ideal. The pictures in the mind, howover they are. placed there, have the biggest share in producing national types. Tho Bedouin Mind. Look at the Aral). A wandering Bedouin tribesman sees a great bird close to tho ground and cannot resist having a, shot at it. And Cobhaih's righthand man falls in the cockpit, of their aeroplane, mortally wounded. Lowell Thomas in his brilliant picture fjf "Lawrence of Arabia " has noted that an Arab always tries a pot-shot at any large object moving rapidly. A motorcar, a train, an aeroplane—it is big, it is moving, obviously it is a heavensent target. There is no thought of hostility; it may bo that his best friend is aboard, but with tho enthusiasm of a, boy he swings his rifle to his shoulder and tries for a hull's.eye. That plea will probably not avail when Elliott's slayer stands his trial, but all the same hundreds of years of wild life in the desert wore behind that shot. It was the national mind expressing itself. I am fold by one who ought to know that in spite of outward appearances at. tourist resorts, the heart of the Maori has little changed siriro the days of the Mnori War; that with nil our boasted solution of the Maori problem, Maori nationalism is as strong as over, and the Maori acquiesces unwillingly and sullenly in a white man's control he is not strong enough to resent in stronger terms. It, is still a wonderful world; and much of its beauty, much of its charm, lies in the fact that menial outlook and custom are still largely a matter of latitude, and men still give colour to the world by insisting on their differences.