Exploring The Heavy World Of Human Accomplishment

Someone recently asked me to recommend them a good book.

"What type of book?" I asked.

"I don't know," was the reply.

"Now that doesn't help. Sports? History? Accordion lessons?"

"No, no. History."

"Ok. Let's narrow it down," I say.

"I'm just looking for a good book on history in general. You know?"

No I don't but fair enough.

Cocked and armed with scant information my little, tiny, oft-misguided brain sought the right book for the miscellaneous generalist.

I settled on "Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences 800 B.C, to 1950" by Charles Murray.

That's history right?

The person took note of it and off they went frolicking into world under a blazing October sun.

Mission accomplisharino.

For the rest of you still around reading this post you may be asking: Why this book?

Good question.

In a hazelnut nutshell, given the times we live in, it's controversial.

It attempts to quantify human accomplishment. Or as Murray opens with, "to assemble and describe the inventories of human accomplishment." He adds, "the dimensions and content of human accomplishment can be apprehended as fact." In other words, he goes where some dare not go: can we judge, for example, which societies gave more to human progress? He closes his thoughts by claiming that human achievement is in decline.

I remember a quote from a history book on Western Civilization in university that closed one of its chapters by saying, "...English, French, German and Italian culture was brilliant..."

It was an interesting passage and one that may make a relativist quiver. Nonetheless, the point is the bulk of Western accomplishment resided within these four countries. That is not to say other nations didn't contribute. Of course they did, the Netherlands, Russia, Austria and Sweden immediately spring to mind. And then there's the foundations laid by Ancient Greece followed by Rome. Murray does not restrict himself to the West as he compiles rosters of significant figures from China, Japan and the Arab world as well.

Indeed, I had a German political science professor who was even more blunt with his cultural assertions. But, I'll leave this story for another time. He was priceless to say the least.

Moving along.

The case of the United States (and to a lesser extent Canada) is special. There really isn't an American in the arts that rivals say, Beethoven or Michaelangelo but then again this really isn't meant to be their strength. America is about getting things done with concrete, youthful and optimistic vigor. That being said, American brilliance resides in the realm of business, technology and science. I would add sports to this list too.

Murray goes a step further. He doesn't restrict the impact of human accomplishment made by Westerners to the West. Rather, the achievements made by the West are in fact achievements for all of human civilization.

I'm not prepared to go into detail about how he goes about weaving his way through all this lest the purpose and meaning he attempts to convey is lost in translation. The scope of his work is such that I would not be able to give justice in a blog post.

This is where I pass the buck to others. As one reviewer put it, "In short, whatever the shortcomings of his methodology might be, he has amassed an amazing body of data that one might use test various hypotheses regarding what leads to innovation, and what does not."

Actually, it's a little deeper than this and you can read the rest of the review here.

Read a Q&A with Murray here.

I hope to explore some of the Canadian names in the book at a later time.