c183# CIV2'S HEGELIAN TECH TREE

[MarkG]

183# CIV2'S HEGELIAN TECH TREE
Civ2 is not just another game, and LotM shows it's historical side

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I think that's the most highbrow column I've ever read. It's a good read, though.

Nice one, LOTM. You've clearly put a lot of thought into it.

[Sarxis]

Civ2's tech tree is the game's most ingenius feature. I always derived great pleasure from just reading through it.

[Buck Birdseed]

As you may know if you've followed the discussion in the Civ3 forum, me and lotm approach civ from two totally different angles. He appreciates it for it's historical qualities, I for it's gameplay and creative elements. However, one place where we certainly agree are the philosophical aspects of the greatness of civ.

I'm personally prone to think that Civ would lose much of its philosophical potential were it to be made more "historical". Real countries and cultures never survived wars lasting thousands of years and certainly not without fighting at all. What the Civ series always allowed you to do is to, which often a more accurate game can miss, is to take history to one of its extremes in terms of practical philosophy- that of your country rather than the overreaching analysis of history. However, I equally agree that you can derive much from the philosophical ideas presented within the game, not a mean feat for what is essentially a simplistic diversion...

I'm actually hoping that Civ3 will be moddable enough to allow us to create other philosophical frameworks. One of my most treasured ideas is a "Marxist Mod"- governments replaced by economic systems, the population bar replaced with a "class bar", revolutions automatically triggered by discrepancies between the means and systems of production, communism as the ultimate peaceful goal. Or how about other philosophies? Anyone up for a Nietchean Mod? A post-modernist mod? Civ is an open environment that through its moddability always has been able to provide for scenarios both real and fantastic. That, perhaps, is its greatest strength in my eyes.

[Avenoct]

Alright, I have to chime in here:

Two Criticisms: And admittedly, criticism is far easier than creative additions. I like your posts but just want to further explore two aspects.

Fukuyama was definately credited with the 'End of History' article, but just as neither Hobbs nor Locke were the first to discuss basic human Goodness or Evilness, just as Watson and Crick did NOT discover the Helical model of DNA (they stole it from a female colleague...can't remember her name, to prove the point!), Fukuyama didn't coin this phrase or even use it first as an isolated concept to patch onto Post-Modernism. I just read a book by Levi 'Barbarism with a Human Face' that uses this 'End of History' concept extensively. It was published in 1976 and was quite popular amongst philosophers, especially the French who dominated during that era.

Also, Lotm and Snapcase: You both mention Post-Modernism, but clearly crave submission to it's methods rather than it's philosophical aspects. What I mean is that Post-Modernism suggests that History is a creative and evolving process rather than some stone we all know and love and will be there, has been there, forever. Postmodernism goes so far as to suggest that we each create not only our sense of history, but our personal myth (ok, I'm tossing Jung in here).
Certainly the Civ series calls up many important philosophical and historical questions, but if you're going to acknowledge post-modernism you might take the perspective that these are questions that it's easy to subscribe to, easy to incorporate into the ever-evolving world sense. In this way, the Civ series presents History as Myth. It might as well be about differing and interacting histories of geology on the moon Io, so long as it's compelling (says the Post-Modernist). The value of it's historical element is not its Verity, but it's psychic libidinous appeal to the constructed self.

-Smack