29 January 2020

Utopia is a dangerous ideal: should we aim for ‘protopia’?

by Michael Shermer

Utopias are idealised visions of a perfect society. Utopianisms are those ideas put into practice. 

This is where the trouble begins.

Thomas More coined the neologism utopia for his 1516 work that launched the modern genre for a good reason. The word means ‘no place’ because when imperfect humans attempt perfectibility – personal, political, economic and social – they fail. Thus, the dark mirror of utopias are dystopias – failed social experiments, repressive political regimes, and overbearing economic systems that result from utopian dreams put into practice.  

The belief that humans are perfectible leads, inevitably, to mistakes when ‘a perfect society’ is designed for an imperfect species. There is no best way to live because there is so much variation in how people want to live. Therefore, there is no best society, only multiple variations on a handful of themes as dictated by our nature.

Sir Thomas More, statesman,
by Hans Holbein via Wikipedia.

For example, utopias are especially vulnerable when a social theory based on collective ownership, communal work, authoritarian rule and a command-and-control economy collides with our natural-born desire for autonomy, individual freedom and choice. Moreover, the natural differences in ability, interests and preferences within any group of people leads to inequalities of outcomes and imperfect living and working conditions that utopias committed to equality of outcome cannot tolerate. 

As one of the original citizens of Robert Owen’s 19th-century New Harmony community in Indiana explained it:
We had tried every conceivable form of organisation and government. We had a world in miniature. We had enacted the French revolution over again with despairing hearts instead of corpses as a result. … It appeared that it was nature’s own inherent law of diversity that had conquered us … our ‘united interests’ were directly at war with the individualities of persons and circumstances and the instinct of self-preservation.
Most of these 19th-century utopian experiments were relatively harmless because, without large numbers of members, they lacked political and economic power. But add those factors, and utopian dreamers can turn into dystopian murderers. People act on their beliefs, and if you believe that the only thing preventing you and/or your family, clan, tribe, race or religion from going to heaven (or achieving heaven on Earth) is someone else or some other group, then actions know no bounds. From homicide to genocide, the murder of others in the name of some religious or ideological belief accounts for the high body counts in history’s conflicts, from the Crusades, Inquisition, witch crazes and religious wars of centuries gone to the religious cults, world wars, pogroms and genocides of the past century.

We can see that calculus behind the utopian logic in the now famous ‘trolley problem’ in which most people say they would be willing to kill one person in order to save five. Here’s the set-up: you are standing next to a fork in a railroad line with a switch to divert a trolley car that is about to kill five workers on the track. If you pull the switch, it will divert the trolley down a side track where it will kill one worker. If you do nothing, the trolley kills the five. What would you do? Most people say that they would pull the switch. If even people in Western enlightened countries today agree that it is morally permissible to kill one person to save five, imagine how easy it is to convince people living in autocratic states with utopian aspirations to kill 1,000 to save 5,000, or to exterminate 1,000,000 so that 5,000,000 might prosper. What’s a few zeros when we’re talking about infinite happiness and eternal bliss?

The fatal flaw in utilitarian utopianism is found in another thought experiment: you are a healthy bystander in a hospital waiting room in which an ER physician has five patients dying from different conditions, all of which can be saved by sacrificing you and harvesting your organs. Would anyone want to live in a society in which they might be that innocent bystander? Of course not, which is why any doctor who attempted such an atrocity would be tried and convicted for murder.

Yet this is precisely what happened with the grand 20th-century experiments in utopian socialist ideologies as manifested in Marxist/Leninist/Stalinist Russia (1917-1989), Fascist Italy (1922-1943) and Nazi Germany (1933-1945), all large-scale attempts to achieve political, economic, social (and even racial) perfection, resulting in tens of millions of people murdered by their own states or killed in conflict with other states perceived to be blocking the road to paradise. The Marxist theorist and revolutionary Leon Trotsky expressed the utopian vision in a 1924 pamphlet:
The human species, the coagulated Homo sapiens, will once more enter into a state of radical transformation, and, in his own hands, will become an object of the most complicated methods of artificial selection and psychophysical training. … The average human type will rise to the heights of an Aristotle, a Goethe, or a Marx. And above this ridge new peaks will rise.
This unrealisable goal led to such bizarre experiments as those conducted by Ilya Ivanov, whom Stalin tasked in the 1920s with crossbreeding humans and apes in order to create ‘a new invincible human being’. When Ivanov failed to produce the man-ape hybrid, Stalin had him arrested, imprisoned, and exiled to Kazakhstan. As for Trotsky, once he gained power as one of the first seven members of the founding Soviet Politburo, he established concentration camps for those who refused to join in this grand utopian experiment, ultimately leading to the gulag archipelago that killed millions of Russian citizens who were also believed to be standing in the way of the imagined utopian paradise to come. When his own theory of Trotskyism opposed that of Stalinism, the dictator had Trotsky assassinated in Mexico in 1940. Sic semper tyrannis.

In the second half of the 20th century, revolutionary Marxism in Cambodia, North Korea and numerous states in South America and Africa led to murders, pogroms, genocides, ethnic cleansings, revolutions, civil wars and state-sponsored conflicts, all in the name of establishing a heaven on Earth that required the elimination of recalcitrant dissenters. All told, some 94 million people died at the hands of revolutionary Marxists and utopian communists in Russia, China, North Korea and other states, a staggering number compared with the 28 million killed by the fascists. When you have to murder people by the tens of millions to achieve your utopian dream, you have instantiated only a dystopian nightmare.

The utopian quest for perfect happiness was exposed as the flawed goal that it is by George Orwell in his 1940 review of Mein Kampf:
Hitler … has grasped the falsity of the hedonistic attitude to life. Nearly all western thought since the last war, certainly all ‘progressive’ thought, has assumed tacitly that human beings desire nothing beyond ease, security and avoidance of pain. … [Hitler] knows that human beings don’t only want comfort, safety, short working-hours, hygiene, birth-control and, in general, common sense; they also, at least intermittently, want struggle and self-sacrifice …
On the broader appeal of Fascism and Socialism, Orwell added:
Whereas Socialism, and even capitalism in a more grudging way, have said to people ‘I offer you a good time,’ Hitler has said to them ‘I offer you struggle, danger, and death,’ and as a result a whole nation flings itself at his feet. … we ought not to underrate its emotional appeal.
What, then, should replace the idea of utopia? One answer can be found in another neologism – protopia – incremental progress in steps toward improvement, not perfection. As the futurist Kevin Kelly describes his coinage:
Protopia is a state that is better today than yesterday, although it might be only a little better. Protopia is much much harder to visualise. Because a protopia contains as many new problems as new benefits, this complex interaction of working and broken is very hard to predict.
In my book The Moral Arc (2015), I showed how protopian progress best describes the monumental moral achievements of the past several centuries: the attenuation of war, the abolishment of slavery, the end of torture and the death penalty, universal suffrage, liberal democracy, civil rights and liberties, same-sex marriage and animal rights. These are all examples of protopian progress in the sense that they happened one small step at a time.

A protopian future is not only practical, it is realisable.

This essay is based on Heavens on Earth: The Scientific Search for the Afterlife, Immortality, and Utopia, published by the author in 2018.Aeon counter – do not remove

This article was originally published at Aeon and has been republished under Creative Commons.

21 January 2020

A Melbourne Masonic mystery part 3: The foundation stone


Part 2 of the story described the Freemasons of Melbourne before they knew they had no place in the foundation stone ceremony for the University of Melbourne. This concluding part of the story looks at why Hiram might have imagined he’d been ‘uninvited’ and suggests what might have really been going on.


Barry’s response to Levick

Levick’s letter to Barry has apparently not survived. We do have Barry’s immediate response, however. It is worth a close reading.

Melbourne April 29 1854

Gentlemen,

In reply to your letter of the 28th inst, I have the honor to inform you that it was proposed to adopt, on the occasion of laying the foundation stone of the University, the arrangement & order of procession observed on the 15th of November 1850, when the separation of the Colony of Victoria from the Colony of New South Wales was celebrated by a procession to open the Prince’s Bridge.

His Excellency the Lieutenant Governor would have laid the stone. No form of prayer would have been read.

The members of the various Lodges of Free and accepted Masons took their place on the 15th of November 1850 after the Grand United Order of Odd Fellows and before the general body of inhabitants who joined the procession.

If it be the wish of you, Gentlemen, & the members of your Lodges to do honor to the procession by giving your attendance, timely notice will be published of the day on which the Ceremony now proposed will take place.

I have the honor to be Gentlemen your obedient Servant

Redmond Barry

Chancellor

Robert Levick. W.M. of the Australia Felix Lodge 697 [English Constitution]
J. W. Hall [sic though the actual WM seems to have been ‘M. Hall’]. W.M. of Lodge of Australasia No 773 [English Constitution]
Henry T. Shaw.  R.W.M. Lodge of Australasian Kilwinning 337 [Scottish Constitution]
J. Elliott. W.M. Lodge of Hiram. No 349 [Irish Constitution]
(Addressed to Robert Levick)

Barry is saying that the Freemasons were not included in his plans for 1 May except to be part of the procession. Invoking the Bridge Opening as a precedent was a convenient way to avoid the question of Masonic ceremony and is perhaps a deliberate obfuscation. The precedent should have been the foundation stone ceremony for the Bridge, but that would not have suited Barry’s purpose.

What was his purpose? ‘No form of prayer would have been said.’ The Bridge event is not invoked for this sentence and he is talking about what had been proposed for 1 May.

The next paragraph invokes the Bridge opening again on the subject of where the Freemasons would appear in the procession.

Freemasons could take part in the procession and witness the event along with everyone else if they wished but nothing more. There is no suggestion that they would officiate in setting the foundation stone and no formal prayers of any sort were to be read.

The Masters understood this clearly. There is also no suggestion of any face to face meeting

The event and letters to the editor

What occurred on 3 July 1854? Shortly after noon the governor's carriage led the procession to an untidy paddock one mile north of the city. There was no formal representation of either Freemasons or Oddfellows. Was there a boycott?

Raised seats surrounded three sides of the place where the stone was to be laid. Barry, wearing 'the very handsome robes' of the Chancellor's office, conducted Lady Hotham to her seat under a canopy. She and her husband inspected the plans of the building and expressed themselves satisfied. The Argus was less satisfied with the attendance: the spectators were fewer than expected, and ladies were not numerous.

The Melbourne correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald wrote an entertaining account which included the following:

‘… a very noticeable feature in the affair was, the military aspect it presented to an onlooker, not only were the whole of the soldiers there under arms, but there was a strong detachment of dragoons with drawn sabres present. … a friend … said it was “the way they managed these things in Ireland." But however well it chimed in with the military notions of the Irish Chancellor of the University, and acting Chief Justice of Victoria, Englishmen generally felt it to be out of place, and thought it smelt too much of continental despotism. I may remark that there is a hankering after military display in some quarters here, for I saw it noticed in the Argus, the other day, that on the opening of a new church by the Bishop, on Sunday last, "a detachment of soldiers was present". Probably we shall hear next of "strong detachments" being present at missionary and prayer meetings.’

Barry gave a protracted speech and the Argus reported that 'when the learned gentleman desired to be most impressive, he became the least audible'. Full details of the event have been preserved in a publication prepared by the University’s convocation.




The foundation stone was actually two stones: one in the ground and the other suspended above it from cross-trees. After Hotham had replied to Barry's speech, some coins and the constitution of the University were placed in a cavity in the lower stone. The cavity was covered with a brass plate carrying a Latin inscription composed by Barry. The plate pronounced that the university had been 'instituted in honour of God, for establishing young men in philosophy, literature and piety, cultivating the talent of youth, fostering the arts, and extending the bounds of science'. Hotham spread mortar with a silver trowel (inscribed with La Trobe’s name), the upper stone was lowered, and, tapping it with a mallet 'in Masonic fashion three several times', he declared it well laid.

Although the Argus describes the tapping as being ‘in Masonic fashion’ it was not in any sense a Masonic ceremony. Barry offered a prayer but the words are not recorded. In both cases these actions are more likely to have been customary practice.

We are now ready to hear ‘Hiram’. His letter appeared in The Argus, on Thursday 6 July 1854.

To the Editor if the Argus.

Sir - I regret that the ceremony of laying the foundation stones of the two public buildings by His Excellency Lieutenant-Governor Sir Charles Hotham yesterday, was not attended by any of the various public bodies who at the similar ceremonies of laying the foundation stones of the bridge and hospital by His Honor Mr La Trobe, on the 20th March, 1846, joined and contributed to enliven the procession; but more particularly regret the non-attendance of the Freemasons.

I am myself a freemason, and jealous of the privilege of our order, and among them I rank the right which in England is almost invariably conceded of being present and assisting in the ceremony of laying the foundation stone of all stately and superb edifices.

I had understood that the officers and members of the several Melbourne lodges had been invited through their respective W. M.s to assist at the ceremony when it was arranged to have taken place on the 1st of May, and should have been glad to have availed myself of the invitation then, had not the domestic affliction of Mr. La Trobe necessitated its postponement.

But why has not the Invitation been renewed? For on inquiry of a brother Mason whom I casually met, he informed me that the W. M of his lodge had not received any, nor did he believe that any other master had: nay, he went so far as to intimate that he had hardly expected from what he had heard that the invitation would be renewed; but he declined giving any reasons, as he said that the matter had been left in the hands of the W. M s, and that he placed confident reliance in their judgement.

Now, Sir. I don't in the least understand this, nor why, in a colony like this, Freemasons should be deprived of a privilege belonging to them - a privilege which they highly prize and one which is moreover cheerfully granted them in England on all occasions - [w]ether through the caprice of the officers by whom the arrangements are made, or from any other cause.

I do not mean in the least degree to question the authority of the masters of the lodges, or to impugn either their actions or their motives; but it does seem to me that some explanation is due to the large body of the fraternity who, like myself, may have expected to have been honored with an invitation, and, like myself, are mortified and annoyed at finding that they have been neglected,

Yours faithfully, HIRAM

Melbourne, July 4th.

We do not pretend to interfere with the motives or decisions of the mysterious race of W. M.s, P. G.s, &c.; but we confess that we think the foundation stones in question are quite firmly enough laid as they are. Why the Freemasons did not attend, or were not invited, we are not in the position to say. Possibly the world Is getting old enough to think that It can begin to do without the pretty babyisms of the blue apron. Ed. A

The story of Hiram is well-known to all Masonic constitutions (Hiram was set upon by three ruffians who tried to steal secrets they were not entitled to) and may suggest the writer felt persecuted so it is only a signal that the writer is a Freemason. The letter refers to supposed customs ‘in England’ suggesting the writer was English and thus a member of an English Lodge.

The response came swiftly and was published on 7 July.

To the Editor of the Argus.

Sir, - Permit me to make a few observations in reply to the letter of your correspondent Hiram, which appears in your paper of this day, and to your own remarks on the subject upon which it treats.

I believe that the masters of the several lodges have no wish to keep back the truth from any brother, however much they may condemn the mode in which he has thought proper to make his inquiry, and however little they may be disposed to recognise his right to receive a reply to an anonymous communication, addressed to the editor of a daily paper.

I will therefore state at once, and without further preface, that your correspondent has been rightly informed that the several Melbourne lodges had the compliment paid them of being invited by His Honor the Chancellor or the University of Melbourne, through their respective masters, to assist at the ceremony of laying the foundation stone on the first of May: as also, that it had not been renewed, and that the masters had not expected that it would be.

It seems hardly necessary to vindicate the acts of the masters, on whom, in the absence of a Provincial Grand Lodge, devolved the duty of considering the invitation: as, however, their silence may be misconstrued, I will proceed to say that they felt that, under the proposed arrangement, they had no alternative but to decline it.

It would occupy too much space in your valuable column to insert the correspondence which took place between them and His Honor the Chancellor upon the occasion, and your correspondent, or of any other proved brother, can, if he desired it, have access to the documents on application to me in a regular manner in open lodge.

It may suffice to say that among other objections, the following were Insurmountable: -
It was not contemplated that the stone should be laid, or assisted to be laid, by a Freemason.

The customary masonic ceremonies were to be neglected; and, above all, no form of prayer was to be observed.

I feel satisfied that the enunciation of this last startling fact will deprive every true brother of the least trace of mortification or annoyance at having been absent from the ceremony, and will only have the effect of inducing a change of those feelings into pure astonishment that such an omission should have been determined on by Christian authorities, in a Christian community. And now will your correspondent allow me to offer, on behalf of himself and the alleged large body of Mason to whom he refers, a little advice?

Let me recommend him and them to lose no time in joining, and thereafter regularly at attending, one of the lodges in this city, when it will be their own fault if they have again occasion to seek for the elucidation of any supposed masonic mystery in the columns of a public journal.

Having disposed of Brother Hiram's letter, I will now, with your permission, remark briefly on your own comment. ...

[The writer then addresses the editor’s remarks about Freemasonry.]

Yours faithfully,

M. Hall. W.M. Lodge of Australasia, N 773. [A Lodge of the English Constitution]

The Editor could not resist the opportunity to repeat his views in more detail concluding that ‘we hope the day is fast coming when a body of worthy and intelligent men shall be able to go about a grave undertaking sensibly and in plain clothing’ which was criticism not only of Freemasons but all those who enjoyed dressing up to elevate themselves above their peers - judges, mayors and a Chancellors.


So, what happened?

There was probably an initial expectation that Freemasons would take part, though Hall thinks that this was also planned for 1 May. The Freemasons were not uninvited. The WMs declined the invitation. Did anyone ask Barry why the foundation stone laying for the Prince’s Bridge was not a better precedent? Levick was probably aware of the facts but seems not to have raised it.

After some months a formal report was printed in The Freemasons’ Monthly Magazine in 1855 published in England which provides a considered summary:

‘A correspondence, involving an important Masonic principle, took place during the past year. The Chancellor of the Melbourne University, the Acting Chief Justice, Judge Barry, solicited the Masonic Lodges to attend a procession for the laying of the foundation stone of the University. But as prayer was not to be offered up on the occasion, or the Masons either to lay the foundation stone, or, after its being laid by a civilian [ie Hotham who was not a Mason], to adjust it with the usual Masonic observations, they declined to attend, to the general satisfaction of the Craft.’

However, there is one further thread in the tapestry which may explain why the Masonic leadership didn’t wish to press the case. The lodges were collectively becoming better educated and were focussed on growth and development. Hall didn’t address Hiram’s assertion of the Masonic ‘right’ to take part in such events in England, though perhaps he would have privately.


Thomas McCombie revived Masonry after the Goldrush.
Courtesy State Library of Victoria.

The Lodge of Hiram was just being brought out of its Gold Rush slump by the efforts of Thomas McCombie (1819-1869). McCombie was a journalist, merchant and politician and founding master of the Lodge of Hiram. He had probably been elected master of the Lodge in April replacing ‘J. Elliot’. The Lodge formed a committee on 4 July 1854 to take ‘all steps necessary’ for the formation of a Provincial Grand Lodge and by 8 August John Thomas Smith had been recruited to lead the effort.

From support role to centre stage

The aforementioned ‘eminent member of the Craft’ provided this somewhat clumsily worded insight. It suggests another issue for which the change of Lieutenant Governor provided the opportunity to resolve quietly. It may also be the other unmentioned issue which Hall referred to. Barry’s insistence on ‘no formal prayer’ and dismissal by silence of the idea of a Masonic ‘right’ to conduct such ceremonies, may have been a convenient way to change what seems to have been the Melbourne custom of ‘assisting’ the Governor in foundation stone laying ceremonies. Barry may well have been in silent agreement with the change and after La Trobe, Governors were not ‘assisted by Freemasons’ in laying foundation stones.

Here is the relevant section from Fairfax;

‘Contrary, however, to prescriptive right, to take a secondary part in such ceremonies, the brethren assisted Charles J. LaTrobe, Esq., Superintendent of Port Phillip, and in his subsequent position as Lieutenant Governor of Victoria, to lay the foundation stones of several public structures, namely, the Supreme Court in July, 1842 ; Prince's Bridge and the Hospital in March, 1846; and the Benevolent Asylum in June, 1850. The R.W. Master of the Australasian Kilwinning Lodge, with the Masters of the other lodges, laid the foundation-stone of the Temperance Hall, Russell-street, in December, 1846.’

In contrast, the Foundation Stone of the Freemason's Alms-houses was laid on 17 July 1867. The ceremony was conducted entirely by Freemasons. The Governor, Sir John Manners-Sutton, was present as a witness and was not a Freemason. He spoke after the ceremony.

The foundation stone ceremony at the Gas Works in December 1854 was explicitly a Masonic ceremony. The stone was laid by ‘Brother J T Smith’ who in his address said ‘Gentlemen - in compliance with your request to the Freemasons to lay with masonic honors the foundation stone of the Melbourne Gas Works.  …I have had the honor of performing this interesting ceremony.’ Smith was a Freemason, a member of Parliament and the Mayor. The event was well-attended with both military and musical entertainment, perhaps organised in part by McCombie who was a shareholder.  Hotham was toasted – in his absence.


Brother John Thomas Smith, Mayor and Masonic leader.
Courtesy State Library of Victoria.


The third example is the foundation stone ceremony for Collingwood Bridge on 7 November 1856. The entire ceremony was a Masonic one, although they were supported by the Oddfellows and a military band. The guest of honour was the Mayor of Melbourne who made clear he was a Freemason. Although not named he was probably John Thomas Smith.

The Fairfax reference suggests that what occurred in La Trobe’s tenure was unusual. It may have been one of the things corrected with the arrival of Freemasons, such as Levick, who were ‘fully conversant’ with the various rituals. Barry may well have had the same view.

Barry could not entirely escape the Omnipotent. He did say a prayer. Though it was not formal and, as far as the press was concerned, it was certainly silent.

Two Postscripts

Item 1
The Lodge of Australia Felix No 697 met on Friday, July 7, 1854, with Brother Robert Levick Worshipful Master in the Chair. After regular business Levick brought before the notice of the Lodge the (unspecified) conduct of the Worshipful Master of the Australasia Lodge Brother M. Hall.

Brother J W Hill proposed, that ‘the members of this Lodge express in the strongest terms their disapprobation of the Conduct of the W.M. of the Lodge of Australasia, and at the same time they would wish to express the fullest confidence in the W.M. of their own Lodge believing him to be quite capable of Carrying out the onerous duties entrusted to him. Carried unanimously.’

The issue is not stated but involved some kind of joint activity between the Lodges. There were only two at the time; 1 – arrangements to meet the new Governor which Hall took the lead in and seemed to go well, 2 – the non-participation at the University where Hall responded to Hiram.

What is the principal duty of the WM? Everything it seems. ‘If lodge functions go awry, it is the Master who bears the blame’. If ‘Hiram’ was a member of Hall’s lodge, Hall could be held responsible for his public outburst. Levick and the other WMs had successfully managed their memberships in not making a fuss.

Item 2
The Argus thought ‘the foundation stones in question are quite firmly enough laid … without the help of the Freemasons’. Why then did the Convocation of the University of Melbourne create a replica of the covering plate in 2007? The building was finished within two years, but the foundation stones and plate went missing. Perhaps they lie buried on the location of the wing of the original building which did not go ahead. Or perhaps some miffed Masons wanted to make a final point and it waits to be discovered.

In any case, the stones were somehow not firmly enough laid to be found again.

This concludes the series. The story will also appear in the 2020 edition of the ‘Transactions’ of the Victorian Lodge of Research with full footnotes. A more academic version will be published in March 2020 and readers will be informed when this takes place.

The University of Melbourne, Victoria Illustrated 1857. Courtesy State Library of Victoria.