Been doing too much thinking lately

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>>2717312
The only rule thumb that doesn't include extreme judgement from your own cultural perspective is rate of success, even then, the exact values used would depend on your own cultural perspectives. For instance:

- Did the civilization grow?
Some folks may argue that a smaller civilization might actually be preferable under various circumstances.

- Did it progress technologically?
Lots of luddites would argue against this, though the rest could certainly argue there are more important factors.

- How long did it remain stable?
Of course a civilization full of suffering that lasts a long time might just be seen as a perpetual hell.

- How complex was the social strata?
Social advancement is a sort of advancement, but one could argue that the complexity of say, the ancient Chinese Bureaucracy, might be an example of where that's more determent than not.

- What did they contribute to the modern era?
Which is a largely loaded cultural question, but if your culture happens to be the modern dominant, it might be somewhat relevant, particularly as it pertains to the survival and success of your own civilization. (ie. what did they do for you?)

Still, factors along those lines cross cultural lines to a degree.

Long and short of it being, in essence, utilitarian: Did it work?

Of course, you get into the whole moral relativist vs. moral realist debate. The relativist assumes that your own culture is always the best culture from your own perspective, thus its values are the best value by default, and this speculation is largely moot. The moral realist believes there is some universal standard by which all cultures maybe judge, and it maybe that some other culture is or was closer to that ideal than your own. ...and then there's the moral nihilist who just doesn't give a shit.

Best culture ever was the incans

>>2717355
are you fucking serious??

>>2717354
Amazing post anon. You obviously have some knowledge to share on the subject. So ill ask you; Can you speak more along the lines of how to judge a cultures moral values? Its much more difficult to me. Sure you can observe what makes a culture good, what what about MORALLY good. Im thinking in terms of punishment, slavery, healthcare, things of that sort. I appreciate your post.

>>2717312
>also if you came across a culture that believed in sacrificing babies to the gods for good fortune or other harmful pseudo medicine do you step in and try to tell the brownies that what they are doing is wrong? Do you punish them? Do you let them be for the purposes of cultural conservation?
Provided I'm inside a battle tank and they are bronze age, I tell them they are wrong, make some noise, and GTFO before I run out of gas and ammo.

If my entire nation is involved, I'm sure they'd do much the same, sans the running away part, and probably start offing them until they stopped.

Kindest scenario, we might claim some land on their doorstep (by force), and start providing them various services and education there via missionaries or equivalent in an effort to alter their culture until they stop. (Probably instigating a civil war at some point, deliberately or not.)

I suppose some more non-interference minded people might leave them alone, but I don't think any culture exists that's gone full Federation of Planets, even if there are a few citizens of nearly every existing culture who might argue for that approach.

>>2717381
OP here by the way. obviously some cultural practices that arent as good as are current setup would be things like Egyptian slavery, the raiding practices of the Vikings, pre-Colombian human sacrifice in Latin America, the forced conversions of natives by sixteenth-century Spanish conquistadors, private dueling between gentlemen in 18th and 19th century Europe and America. Are there any practices that we dont take part in today that were used in the past that you see as positive? Visions for the future?

>>2717384
>I suppose some more non-interference minded people might leave them alone, but I don't think any culture exists that's gone full Federation of Planets, even if there are a few citizens of nearly every existing culture who might argue for that approach.
Eh... We can, and do, put up with it on small scales. There are cannibals out there, and we don't fuck with them if their land is of no value to us.

OP does sound like he's suggesting something Aztec Empire scale, and yeah, that wouldn't stand in the modern world.

>>2717384
kek. plot twist: they have impenetrable leaf shields and will fuck your shit up

>>2717391
Eh, I don't want to get into the debate about how much slavery the Egyptians actually practiced... But slavery does go into the category of things that worked, but are nonetheless no longer considered moral. Though, for the most part, particularly in the ancient world, it also wasn't as bad as most people tend to think. Often, slaves were merely second class citizens, some less so than others.

The utilitarian factor still comes into play, however. A workforce that believes it is free, but doesn't live much better than slaves, is less apt to revolt, and more apt to be useful. "Willing slaves" are more productive. There's something to be said for the illusion of being a participant in a society as it pertains to its stability. True even among serfs.

Similarly, even those who lived as raiders, such as the Vikings and Mongols, generally settled down eventually. Raiding is dangerous and invites reprisals. Farming, not so much so. Most often, a peaceful society is more stable than a reckless one. Still, desperate times, desperate measures - if raiding is the only way your people can survive, there's something to be said for it when it succeeds in that goal.

Lawsuits are just more practical than duels all around.

Forced conversion... I'm actually not well versed on how effective that was. If it stuck, converting people to your culture is certainly more beneficial than killing them when it conflicts.

I know I'm going to start a shitstorm if I open up either of those last two questions, and am always a bit hesitant to discuss the future on /his/... But will consider.

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>>2717396
Well if they have magic, fuck that shit. Whatever god they are sacrificing to might actually be real then, and I don't wanna go anywhere near that until I know I've got something that can beat it.

Or, perhaps *somewhat* more realistically, if I'm in some alt-history where the Aztecs took over the damned world, and am in the last Christian holdout - definitely gonna be more cloak and dagger involved, but I suppose I'd still try to topple the culture. Perhaps I could shitpost proselytization all over their image boards from behind seven boxxies, in between high priest assassination attempts.

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>>2717391
>Are there any practices that we dont take part in today that were used in the past that you see as positive?
There's a lot of activities that we *do* take part in today that would have been considered criminal in the ancient world (and in some cases, less than a century ago), some of which I believe were considered criminal for good reason.

These would include some forms of usury, some forms of insurance, aspects of the stock market, and some forms of speculation, among others. Not calling for a blanket ban on all of the above - many aspects of our civilization would have been stunted without the lifting of some of these taboos - but certain elements of said have certainly contributed to both economic and social instability.

Some ancient civilizations were wise enough to realize that "the enemy of my enemy, is not necessarily my friend", and those that came to that conclusion often tended to last longer. Meanwhile, today, we tend to ally with whoever is most convenient, regardless of how distasteful they are or apt to turn on us, and this pretty much always comes back to bite us in the ass.

I would like to see a greater value placed on knowledge and reason, such as we saw among the late Christian civilizations just prior to and during the Renaissance, or such as that as the Athenians were similarly near infamous for during their heyday. Similarly, during the Victorian Era when science was still spelled with a capital "S", and during the 50's, when everyone was so gleeful about the arrival of the atomic age - even if it was largely due to ignorance of things to come.

I'd also like to see a return to certain Enlightenment principles of the early days of the American Revolution, when limiting the power of government over the people was a central goal for some parties. In short, merely living should be as regulation free as humanly possible, and so long as no harm is done to another, no law is violated.

Which culture is most successful?

The ability to sustain itself is the only objective measure of a culture's worth.