Today the technocrat, tomorrow the artist. ✎ By Wayne K. Spear

The historian looks backward in time to understand the present.

The lawyer argues from precedent.

Technocrats study the world as it is and apply rational, systems thinking to their endeavors.

Interpretation, argumentation, and rational systems thinking.

Artists create something from nothing. They see the world that does not yet exist, the world that may never exist, the world that the powerful do not want to exist.

Creation.

Imagination is an act of will. To create something from nothing is to choose a radical form of human freedom.

Rational thought is also an act of will. To understand the world as it is, and to apply this knowledge to human society, is to choose the freedom of living according to natural law.

The world was created perfect. We shall create the perfect world.

Human nature is fixed and eternal. Human nature is a creation of human beings.

The laws of the natural order must prevail. Human freedom must prevail.

Progress is an illusion. Progress is the human story.

We must look to the past for our answers. The answers will be found in the future.

Conserve. Progress.

Right. Left.

The will to imagine the world in radical new ways versus the will to conserve and manage it as it is: this is human politics.