ABSTRACT
The Conclusion starts by evoking a story from A Time of Gifts by Patrick Leigh Fermor, contrasting this with the dominant current mentality that rather relies on Milton Friedman’s idea that ‘There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch’, and illustrating the central point that we no longer live in a time of gifts, but are entrapped in Trickster Land. The question of how to escape from this entrapment cannot be dealt with in such a short conclusion. Making use of the metaphor of walking, it only indicates that if a wrong turn is taken at a certain point, one must trace back one’s way and return to the right road. Here Renaissance and Enlightenment are presented as radically opposed poles of historical dynamics: the Enlightenment, following the hubris of its master figure, Prometheus, is set on continuing on the mistaken path; why, this idea of the Renaissance is to renew culture by a return to the charis logos, instead of persisting with the trickster logic dominating the modern economy, politics, and technology.
