Alfred Korzybski
"For a while he trampled with impunity on laws human and divine but, as he was obsessed with the delusion that two and two makes five, he fell, at last a victim to the relentless rules of humble Arithmetic.
"Remember, O stranger, Arithmetic is the first of the sciences and the mother of safety."
BRANDEIS
It is the aim of this little book to point the way to a new science and art-the science and art of Human Engineering. By Human Engineering I mean the science and art of directing the energies and capacities of human beings to the advancement of human weal. It need not be argued in these times that the establishment of such a science-the science of human welfare-is an undertaking of immeasurable importance. No one can fail to see that its importance is supreme.
It is evident that, if such a science is to be established it must be founded on ascertained facts-it must accord with what is characteristic of Man-it must be based upon a just conception of what Man is-upon a right understanding of Man's place in the scheme of Nature.
No one need be told how indispensable it is to have true ideas-just concepts-correct notions-of the things with which we humans have to deal; everyone knows for example, that to mistake solids for surfaces or lines would wreck the science and art of geometry; anyone knows that to confuse fractions with whole numbers would wreck the science and art of arithmetic; everyone knows that to mistake vice for virtue would destroy the foundation of ethics; everyone knows that to mistake a desert mirage for a lake of fresh water does but lure the fainting traveler to dire disappointment or death. Now, it is perfectly clear that of all the things with which human beings have to deal, the most important by far is Man himself-humankind-men, women and children. It follows that for us human beings nothing else can be quite so important as a clear, true, just, scientific concept of Man-a right understanding of what we as human beings really are. For it requires no great wisdom, it needs only a little reflection, to see that, if we humans radically misconceive the nature of man-if we regard man as being something which he is not, whether it be something higher than man or lower-we thereby commit an error so fundamental and far reaching as to produce every manner of confusion and disaster in individual life, in community life and in the life of the race.
The question we have, therefore, to consider first of all is fundamentally: What is Man? What is a man? What is a human being? What is the defining or characteristic mark of humanity? To this question two answers and only two have been given in the course of the ages, and they are both of them current to-day. One of the answers is biological- man is an animal, a certain kind of animal; the other answer is a mixture partly biological and partly mythological or partly biological and partly philosophical-man is a combination or union of animal with something supernatural. An important part of my task will be to show that both of these answers are radically wrong and that, beyond all things else, they are primarily responsible for what is dismal in the life and history of humankind. This done, the question remains: What is Man? I hope to show clearly and convincingly that the answer is to be found in the patent fact that human beings possess in varying degrees a certain natural faculty or power or capacity which serves at once to give them their appropriate dignity as human beings and to discriminate them, not only from the minerals and the plants but also from the world of animals, this peculiar or characteristic human faculty or power or capacity I shall call the time-binding faculty or time-binding power or time-binding capacity. What I mean by time-binding will be clearly and fully explained in the course of the discussion, and when it has been made clear, the question-What Is Man?-will be answered by saying that man is a being naturally endowed with time-binding capacity-that a human being is a time-binder-that men, women and children constitute the time-binding class of life.
There will then remain the great task of indicating and in a measure sketching some of the important ways in which the true conception of man as man will transform our views of human society and the world, affect our human conduct and give us a growing body of scientific wisdom regarding the welfare of mankind including all posterity.
The purpose of this introductory chapter is to consider certain general matters of a preliminary nature-to indicate the spirit of the undertaking- to provide a short course of approach and preparation-to clear the deck, so to speak, and make ready for action.
There are two ways to slide easily through life: Namely, to believe everything, or to doubt everything; both ways save us from thinking. The majority take the line of least resistance, preferring to have their thinking done for them; they accept ready-made individual, private doctrines as their own and follow them more or less blindly. Every generation looks upon its own creeds as true and permanent and has a mingled smile of pity and contempt for the prejudices of the past. For two hundred or more generations of our historical past this attitude has been repeated two hundred or more times, and unless we are very careful our children will have the same attitude toward us.
There can be no doubt that humanity belongs to a class of life which to a large extent determines its own destinies, establishes its own rules of education and conduct, and thus influences every step we are free to take within the structure of our social system. But the power of human beings to determine their own destinies is limited by natural law, Nature's law. It is the counsel of wisdom to discover the laws of nature, including the laws of human nature, and then to live in accordance with them. The opposite is folly.
A farmer must know the natural laws that govern his wheat, or corn, or cow, as otherwise he will not have satisfactory crops, or the quality and abundance of milk he desires, whereas the knowledge of these laws enables him to produce the most favorable conditions for his plants and animals, and thereby to gain the desired results.
Humanity must know the natural laws for humans, otherwise humans will not create the conditions and the customs that regulate human activities which will make it possible for them to have the most favorable circumstances for the fullest human development in life; which means the release of the maximum natural-creative energy and expression in mental, moral, material and spiritual and all the other great fields of human activities, resulting in happiness in life and in work-collectively and individually-because the conditions of the earning of a livelihood influence and shape all our mental processes and activities, the quality and the form of human inter-relationship.
Every human achievement, be it a scientific discovery, a picture, a statue, a temple, a home or a bridge, has to be conceived in the mind first-the plan thought out-before it can be made a reality, and when anything is to be attempted that involves any number of individuals-methods of coordination have to be considered-the methods which have proven to be the best suited for such undertakings are engineering methods-the engineering of an idea toward a complete realization. Every engineer has to know the materials with which he has to work and the natural laws of these materials, as discovered by observation and experiment and formulated by mathematics and mechanics; else he can not calculate the forces at his disposal; he can not compute the resistance of his materials; he can not determine the capacity and requirements of his power plant; in short, he can not make the most profitable use of his resources. Lately in all industries and particularly during the late World War, which was itself a gigantic industrial process, another factor manifested itself and proved to be of the utmost importance: namely, the human factor, which is not material but is mental, moral, psychological. It has been found that maximum production may be attained when and only when the production is carried on in conformity with certain psychological laws, roughly determined by the analysis of human nature.
Except for productive human labor, our globe is too small to support the human population now upon it. Humanity must produce or perish.
Production is essentially a task for engineers; it essentially depends upon the discovery and the application of natural laws, including the laws of human nature. It is, therefore, not a task for old fashioned philosophical speculation nor for barren metaphysical reasoning in vacuo; it is a scientific task and involves the coordination and cooperation of all the sciences. This is why it is an engineering task.
For engineering, rightly understood, is the coordinated sum-total of human knowledge gathered through the ages, with mathematics as its chief instrument and guide. Human Engineering will embody the theory and practice-the science and art-of all engineering branches united by a common aim-the understanding and welfare of mankind.
Here I want to make it very clear that mathematics is not what many people think it is; it is not a system of mere formulas and theorems; but as beautifully defined by Professor Cassius J. Keyser, in his book The Human Worth of Rigorous Thinking (Columbia University Press, 1916), mathematics is the science of "Exact thought or rigorous thinking," and one of its distinctive characteristics is "precision, sharpness, completeness of definitions." This quality alone is sufficient to explain why people generally do not like mathematics and why even some scientists bluntly refuse to have anything to do with problems wherein mathematical reasoning is involved. In the meantime, mathematical philosophy has very little, if anything, to do with mere calculations or with numbers as such or with formulas; it is a philosophy wherein precise, sharp and rigorous thinking is essential. Those who deliberately refuse to think "rigorously"-that is mathematically-in connections where such thinking is possible, commit the sin of preferring the worse to the better; they deliberately violate the supreme law of intellectual rectitude.
Here I have to make it clear that for the purpose of Human Engineering the old concepts of matter, space and time are sufficient to start with; they are sufficient in much the same way as they have been sufficient in the old science of mechanics. Figuratively speaking Human Engineering is a higher order of bridge engineering-it aims at the spanning of a gap in practical life as well as in knowledge. The old meanings of matter, space and time were good enough to prevent the collapse of a bridge; the same understanding of space and time as used in this book will protect society and humanity from periodical collapses. The old mechanics lead directly to such a knowledge of the intrinsic laws governing the universe as to suggest the new mechanics. Human Engineering will throw a new light on many old conceptions and will help the study and understanding of matter, space and time in their relative meanings, and perhaps will ultimately lead to an understanding of their absolute meanings.
Philosophy in its old form could exist only in the absence of engineering, but with engineering in existence and daily more active and far reaching, the old verbalistic philosophy and metaphysics have lost their reason to exist. They were no more able to understand the "production" of the universe and life than they are now able to understand or grapple with "production" as a means to provide a happier existence for humanity. They failed because their venerated method of "speculation" can not produce, and its place must be taken by mathematical thinking. Mathematical reasoning is displacing metaphysical reasoning. Engineering is driving verbalistic philosophy out of existence and humanity gains decidedly thereby. Only a few parasites and "speculators" will mourn the disappearance of their old companion "speculation." The world of producers -the predominating majority of human beings- will welcome a philosophy of ordered thought and production.
The scientists, all of them, have their duties no doubt, but they do not fully use their education if they do not try to broaden their sense of responsibility toward all mankind instead of closing themselves up in a narrow specialization where they find their pleasure. Neither engineers nor other scientific men have any right to prefer their own personal peace to the happiness of mankind; their place and their duty are in the front line of struggling humanity, not in the unperturbed ranks of those who keep themselves aloof from life. If they are indifferent, or discouraged because they feel or think that they know that the situation is hopeless, it may be proved that undue pessimism is as dangerous a "religion" as any other blind creed. Indeed there is very little difference in kind between the medieval fanaticism of the "holy inquisition," and modern intolerance toward new ideas. All kinds of intellect must get together, for as long as we presuppose the situation to be hopeless, the situation will indeed be hopeless. The spirit of Human Engineering does not know the word "hopeless"; for engineers know that wrong methods are alone responsible for disastrous results, and that every situation can be successfully handled by the use of proper means. The task of engineering science is not only to know but to know how. Most of the scientists and engineers do not yet realize that their united judgment would be invincible; no system or class would care to disregard it. Their knowledge is the very force which makes the life of humanity pulsate. If the scientists and the engineers have had no common base upon which to unite, a common base must be provided. To-day the pressure of life is such that we cannot go forward without their coordinating guidance. But first there must be the desire to act. One aim of this book is to furnish the required stimulus by showing that Human Engineering will rescue us from the tangle of private opinions and enable us to deal with all the problems of life and human society upon a scientific basis.
If those who know why and how neglect to act, those who do not know will act, and the world will continue to flounder. The whole history of mankind and especially the present plight of the world show only too sadly how dangerous and expensive it is to have the world governed by those who do not know.
Read the full essay taken from Alfred Korzybski's Manhood of Humanity
