ABSTRACT
Another thing that makes the modern world baffling is that technical developments have made a new social psychology necessary. From the dawn of history until the present century the road to success was victory in competition. We descend from many centuries of progenitors who exterminated their enemies, occupied their lands, and grew rich. In England this process took place in the time of Hengist and Horsa. In the United States it took place during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. We therefore admire a certain sort of character, namely the sort of character that enables you to kill skilfully and without compunction. The milder believers in this creed content themselves with inflicting economic rather than physical death, but the psychology is much the same. In the modern world, owing to increase of skill, this process is no longer so satisfactory. In a modern war even the victors suffer more than if there had been no war. To the British, who are enduring the results of complete victory in two great wars, this is fairly obvious. What applies in war, applies also in the economic sphere. The victors in a competition do not grow so rich as both parties could by combination. The half-unconscious appreciation of these facts produces in intelligent young people an impulse towards general good will, but this impulse is baffled by the mutual hostility of powerful groups. Good will in general-yes; good will in particular-no. A Hindu may love mankind, but must not love a Pakistani; a Jew may believe that men are all one family, but dare not extend this feeling to the Arabs; a Christian may think it his duty to love his neighbour, but only if his neighbour is not a Communist. These conflicts between the general and the
particular seem to make it impossible to have any one clear principle in action. This trouble is due to a very general failure to adapt human nature to technique. Our feelings are those appropriate to warlike nomads in rather empty regions, but our technique is such as must bring disaster unless our feelings can become more co-operative.
