“More often geographical expansion is a concomitant of real decline and coincides with a ‘time of troubles’ or a universal state—both of them stages of decline and disintegration. The reason is not far to seek. Times of trouble produce militarism, which is a perversion of the human spirit into channels of mutual destruction, and the most successful militarist becomes, as a rule, the founder of a universal state. Geographical expansion is a by-product of this militarism, in interludes when the mighty men of valour turn aside from their assaults upon their rivals within their own society to deliver assaults upon neighbouring societies.”
Arnold J. Toynbee
A Study of History (Primary source)
A Study of History is a monumental multi-volume inquiry into the origins, development, and disintegration of civilizations across the span of human history. Conceived as a comparative study on an exceptionally broad scale, the work examines a wide range of civilizations—including Western, Islamic, Hindu, and East Asian societies—in an effort to discern recurrent patterns in their historical development.
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“History, in the objective meaning of the word, is the process of change; in the subjective meaning, it is the study of how and why one situation changes into another.”
— Arnold J. Toynbee Primary source“Technology is, of course, only a long Greek name for a bag of tools; and we have to ask ourselves: What are the tools that count in this competition in the use of tools as means to power?”
— Arnold J. Toynbee Primary source“Civilization, as we know it, is a movement and not a condition, a voyage and not a harbour.”
— Arnold J. Toynbee Primary source“The fact that I am neither a Greek nor a Turk perhaps creates little presumption of my being fair-minded, for Western partisans of non-Western peoples are often more fanatical than their favourites.”
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“It’s common for men to give pretended reasons instead of one real one.”
— Benjamin Franklin Primary source“When it is useful to them, men can believe a theory of which they know nothing more than its name.”
— Vilfredo Pareto Primary source“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”
— Marie Curie Disputed“In the development of our understanding of complex phenomena, the most powerful tool available to the human intellect is abstraction.”
— Tony Hoare Primary source