Comments by "Joshua Mitchell" (@joshuamitchell5018) on "Civilizations of the Future" video.

  1. There’s a version of “The West” that refers to liberal industrialized democracies that mostly stood in opposition to the USSR in the cold war. Not all of Latin America fits this definition, while East Asian democracies do. The other big definition of “The West” though is the inheritors of the European cultural legacy wrapped up in ideas of a worldwide, ‘Christendom’ and/or the enlightenment including linguistics, enlightenment political ideas, and significant European immigration, etc - which for most of Latin America is a slam dunk but it starts to be a harder pill to swallow when big parts of Latin America have little affection for Spain, let alone a larger ‘west’. Populations who diligently don’t self-identify as connected to European stock or culture are 20-40% of the population. And among the parts of LATAM that are more strongly tied with Zthe west those places also act is a very different than way to many other "western" regions with things like land ownership, political sentiments and social ladders taking their cue from Iberia. So the middle ground seems to be just hedging bets and labelling the whole continent with a lighter shade of blue.
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  2. I think Islam will be partitioned in the future. I guess Iran will convert Afghanistan and Central Asia to Shia Islam forming a Persian-Shia civilization. Saudi Arabia is currently pushing a very traditionalistic form of Salafism, they will influence Somalia and probably the Sahara and create a Arabian-Salafi civilization. Lastly, I think Quranism will take off. I'm clearly biased as I myself am often intermingling with their circles but it makes so much sense, it provides strong laws but is also very versitile. My guess is that Quranist Islam will be championed by Turks, European muslims and converts. Maybe parts of the balkans become quranist as a result of the turkish expansion. I see quranism being a way in which jews and muslims can make peace in the Levant a well. Of those, I see Salafi civilization being the weakest. Dependen on how missionary quranist and shias become, they may survive or be taken over by other Muslim civilizations. Then, the fate of the Shia civilization depends on how well they can control Afghanistan, Central Asia and Pakistan. I don't see that coming well so I think that Pakistan will be such a pain to Iran that it will never have a strong influence over the region. Finally, the fate of the Quranist civilization depends on how well they can establish social standards. Many quranist just take the bare minimum requirements of the Quran and I don't see a society functioning just with. I also think that the Sehel, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia will merge with neighbour civilizations. Lastly, I think that Japan will have a sliver of native brewed Islam since its currently the fastest growing religion there and it has the potential to solve the nihilism endemic to the Japanese. I think Japan will found a sect that reject the Sunnah as the millenia-old japanese culture can't just be replaced with some arabian traditions sustained by chains of narration (the hadith). However, the collectivist Japanese culture makes it imposible to adopt quranism as it requires lots of critical thinking and is accessible to everyone. They might be quranist but somehow pay huge ammounts of respect to the Japanese government and culture.
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