Decline of the West
by Oswald Spengler · first published 1926
24% recommend71% neutral5% critical
Why HN recommends it
Comparative history arguing that civilizations pass through cyclical rises and declines; valued for its sweeping scope and for framing modern Western society as a late-stage culture. Suits philosophy of history readers.
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…Master And Margarita by Bulgakov - Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes - The Iliad by Homer - The Odyssey by Homer - Meditations by Marcus Aurelius - The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandra Dumas - The Decline of the West by Oswald Spengler - The Qur'an - The Prince by Machiavelli - The Art of War by Sun Tzu - Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky - The Confessions by Saint Augustine - Les Miserables by Victor Hugo - We…
on “Ask HN: You've got $300 to fill an empty library. What do you choose?” ↗…(2001) The Ancient City by Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges (1864) Intellectuals By Paul Johnson Daniel J. Boorstin - The Discoverers The Great Courses - The Industrial Revolution (audiobook/lectures) Decline of the West - Spengler
on “Ask HN: What nonfiction books do you keep rereading?” ↗…quite well explained in The Science Delusion by Rupert Sheldrake. If you are interested in nature of non-linearity of learning, what were steps in forming human's worldview, I think Oswald Spengler's The Decline of the West make a good point. I can't say for sure, because I have only started (it's very long, 1500 pages), but I definitely like the guy. :)
on “Ask HN: Learning about philosophy” ↗Oswald Spengler's 'The Decline of the West'. The primary thesis of the author is of a cyclical development and decline of civilization (and his estimate that western civilization in particular is in the declining phase, hence perhaps the not so…
on “The Griffin Warrior Tomb Upends What We Know About the Roots of Mycenae” ↗…an observation by the Roman rhetoritician. Apocalyptic concepts are common in the Bible. Eastern religions tend to take a more cyclical view, of recurring expansion and collapse. Oswald Spengler's Decline of the West is a classic. There's a modern literature largely spawning from the Club of Rome's Limits to Growth (1972) of which I'd include Tainter. James Howard Kunstler's The Long Emergency is a more recent take…
on “The Collapse of Complex Societies (Book Review)” ↗…megaregion is typically defined as a chain of roughly adjacent metropolitan areas. The term was used by Patrick Geddes in his 1915 book Cities in Evolution,[1] by Oswald Spengler in his 1918 book, The Decline of the West, and Lewis Mumford in his 1938 book, The Culture of Cities, which described it as the first stage in urban overdevelopment and social decline." vs megacity: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megacity "A…
on “China’s Pearl River Delta overtakes Tokyo as world’s largest megacity” ↗This is addressed early on in the article. Maybe one of the problems with lack of genius is that we don't actually read anymore. Ponder that! Spengler began writing Decline of the West in 1914. Tolstoy was only four years dead when Spengler started his book; Marx was only 30 years deceased. But Spengler could state, with the full expectation that his audience would not question him,…
on “Geniuses of the past were aristocratically tutored” ↗"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West
on “How the FDA Manipulates the Media” ↗…suspicion of the fact. The great movement which makes use of the catchwords of Marx has not delivered the entrepreneur into the power of the worker, but both into that of the Bourse." - O. Spengler, "The Decline of the West", Vol. 2 (1928)
on “U.S. drinking water widely contaminated with 'forever chemicals': report” ↗It has been a few years since I read some of Spengler's "Decline of the West". As I recall, he believed that history had a certain determinism to it; it had universal laws like the laws of physics. I don't think it does, and I have a hard time understanding how he could have thought…
on “Oswald Spengler – an intellectual life” ↗West in decline? This was predicted back in '18 when Spengler published his famous book, "The Decline of the West". Oh wait, that was 1918. The "west" faces a relative decline, which is something to celebrate.* And I can hardly blame the Chinese government for taking an assertive position or for capitalizing on…
on “China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline” ↗Not a trick... an observation. Spengler put it better than I ever could in "The Decline of the West": If by "democracy" we mean the form which the Third Estate as such wishes to impart to public life as a whole, it must be concluded that democracy and plutocracy are the same thing under the two aspects…
on “Mudge Twitter whistleblower testimony [video]” ↗“What is truth? For the multitude, that which it continually reads and hears.” ― Oswald Spengler, The Decline of the West, Vol. 2: Perspectives of World History “The press today is an army with carefully organized weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its soldiers. The reader neither knows nor is supposed to…
on “Censorship 2.0: Shadowy forces controlling online conversations” ↗"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West
on “US Ranks 41st in Press Freedom Index Thanks to 'War on Whistleblowers'” ↗"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_West
on “How the CIA writes history” ↗