Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
One of the central historical tenets of conservative thought is a respect for “tradition.” Russell Kirk said that conservatives believe that “[c]ustom, convention, and old prescription are checks upon man’s anarchic impulse and upon the innovator’s lust for power.” But Kirk also said that “[s]ociety must alter, for prudent change is the means of social preservation.” Edmund Burke put it this way: “Change is inevitable, . . . [b]ut let change come as the consequence of a need generally felt, not inspired of fine-spun abstractions.”
Liberals portray conservatives as pure reactionaries who wish to put society into reverse. Nothing demonstrates this pernicious liberal tendency than the false “conservative war on women.” Conservatives strongly believe the country has gone way too far in inhibiting markets and allowing overweening bureaucratic regulation to clog the economic system (the EPA’s meddling regulation of carbon dioxide is a good example). Other conservatives believe that abortion-on-demand for the past 39 years has been a national tragedy and that the current efforts to redefine marriage will, if successful, knock another prop from beneath a tottering culture.
Yet I don’t know a single conservative who isn’t glad to have modern sanitation, hot water on demand, or antibiotics. But, in a variety of ways, we are leery of the “innovator’s lust for power”—particularly when the innovator is in the form of a government-run command and control society; we see it in grand utopian schemes like Obamacare. Ironically, conservatives aren’t afraid to change entitlements (it’s the liberals who are reactionary on that issue) or to make market-based changes that will improve American health care; but we oppose wild-eyed schemes that will bankrupt the nation or that are based on the premise that human nature is perfectible.
Love for tradition is central to my beliefs. I agree with Edmund Burke’s belief that it is essential that we link the generations together by paying fealty to the great traditions of the past (those that reflect the first principles of our culture), and by leaving a civilized, strong society as an inheritance to our children:
“By this unprincipled facility of changing the state often, and as much, and in as many ways, as there is floating fancies or fashions, the whole chain and continuity of commonwealth would be broken. No one generation could link with another. Men would become little better than the flies of the summer.”
With that as background, let me point out a wonderful passage written by Patrick O’Brian. I noted in a post a few days ago that Peter Robinson has inspired me to re-read O’Brian’s Master and Commander novels featuring Jack Aubrey, the captain, and Stephen Maturin, the philosophical surgeon. I just finished the third novel, H.M.S. Surprise.
In that volume, O’Brian presents a wonderful scene that illustrates the conservative respect for tradition. Tom Pullings, a young naval officer and protégé of Jack Aubrey, is teaching a young midshipman the weights of different ships by pointing out and describing a group of India merchant ships then passing by their ship. Pullings calls them “twelve hundred ton ships” even as he says that some are as much as fifteen hundred tons. When the midshipman suggests that it would be simpler to call the fifteen hundred ton ships “fifteen hundred ton ships,” Pullings is aghast. Instead, he reaffirms the tradition of the British navy and its fight against unnecessary innovation:
“Simpler, maybe: but it would never do. You don’t want to be upsetting the old ways. Oh dear me, no. God’s my life, if the Captain was to hear you carrying on in that reckless Jacobin, democratical line, why, I dare say he would turn you adrift on a three-inch plank, with both your ears nailed down to it, to learn you bashfulness. . . . No, no: you don’t want to go arsing around with the old ways: the French did so, and look at the scrape it has gotten them into.”
Isn’t that a beautifully-written passage? But, more importantly, it teaches us why we can continue to live with “miles” and “yards” instead of “kilometers” and “meters,” and why British currency is charming because it eschews the metric system. [Note: I’m not a complete troglodyte—I understand why science uses the decimal system].
The old ways aren’t always the best, but they should never be replaced just because they are old and tried. The old ways are often best because they reflect a moral order and the wisdom of the ages. Yes, change is necessary, but history shows that to be effective, it must always be thoughtful and almost always incremental.
Respect for tradition and the rejection of revolutionary change and “transformational leaders” remain central to the conservative view of life. Your thoughts?
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Jan '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Bob Schwalbaum
Second!
I remember the day my wife told me that "Those books you like so much are going to be made into a movie." My immediate flush of pleasure was overcome by a sense of dread. Pointing at the newspaper in her hand I asked Linda, "Does it say who is going to star in it?"
I anticipated with horror hearing names like Leonardo, Johnny, Ethan or that of some other under-sized, chestless clone.
"Russell Crowe," she answered.
"He's perfect!" I said, and I was right.
It is a quibble that Dr. Maturin, a diamond whose many facets included that of cold-blooded killer, was reduced to a Napoleonic-era Mr. Spock to Aubrey's Captain Kirk, but it was just a two hour movie after all.
And folks, that scene at the captain's table when Aubrey describes the impact that a brief meeting with Lord Nelson had on him as a youth to a young sailor eager to hear of great men and great adventures - by God, those few moments tell you more about the wellsprings of heroism and courage than any ten books of psychology.
Edited on June 5, 2012 at 5:12amMay '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Metric: the measurement system for the simple minded? (Sorry, low blow.) Your divided loyalties are hurting Ricochet, Mama!
To get serious, there is nothing inherently superior about the metric system over the English system for science. Each system has a complementary set of canonical units:
(Of course, both systems have all kinds of non-canonical units like the English miles, acres, ounces, cups, and the metric hectares, angstroms, liters, barns, but they each have practical uses. Even in metric countries, cooking uses tbsp and tsp.)
Metric people measure their "weight" in kilograms, which is actually a unit of mass. Who's being unscientific now?
And about that kilogram: what kind of sick joker defines the fundamental mass unit as 1000 mass units?
Might I finally point out that metric countries rate engine power in kilowatts instead of horsepower. In fact,
That's just sad.
Aug '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Liberals love to congratulate themselves for their greater "openness to new ideas", but they're way beyond that. The left suffers from a perverse form of neophilia, a slavish attraction to new ideas simply because they're new, coupled with a reflexive contempt for old ideas simply because they're old. Almost any right/left conflict has an element of that on the left side.
One might construct the mirror argument that conservatives have a reflexive contempt for new ideas, and a slavish attachment to old ones. But old ideas have the great advantage of having already had their effect on the world. If an idea has been in general acceptance for a long time, we at least know that it is compatible with a functioning civilization. We know no such thing about new ideas, and history is to a considerable extent the story of the horrible tragedies that have been caused by people's blind commitment to their bright, shiny new ideas.
Jun '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Paul DeRocco: Liberals love to congratulate themselves for their greater "openness to new ideas", but they're way beyond that. The left suffers from a perverse form of neophilia, a slavish attraction to new ideas simply because they're new, coupled with a reflexive contempt for old ideas simply because they're old. Almost any right/left conflict has an element of that on the left side.
One might construct the mirror argument that conservatives have a reflexive contempt for new ideas, and a slavish attachment to old ones. But old ideas have the great advantage of having already had their effect on the world. If an idea has been in general acceptance for a long time, we at least know that it is compatible with a functioning civilization. We know no such thing about new ideas, and history is to a considerable extent the story of the horrible tragedies that have been caused by people's blind commitment to their bright, shiny new ideas.
Well said. What's the opposite: "neophobia"?
True conservatives don't oppose thoughtful, incremental change--what we hate is unreflective, wholesale changes based on the empirically obvious fact that an elite cannot change human nature.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Yes, good grief, I've read Austen, mostly for my sins, and I've tried to like this woman - but I can't.
I first read P&P at 14, after seeing part of it on PBS, and thinking that was great, I must read that book. Acquired it, and after three pages, hated it. I forced myself to finish it.
Then I was forced to re-read it my senior year. I was taken through the book by one of my favorite teachers, who loved the work, lavished praise on it, and I thought, I'm all wet, let's try again, hated it.
Strangely, I do thoroughly enjoy film versions of her books.
At 26, I thought, you know I love these movies, I was just too young, male, whatever - I'll try again. I bought the complete novels and a biography of Austen, I read the whole set - most arduous task of my literary life, still hated it, could see her skill and talent, but honestly, it was like the proverbial paint drying.
At age 32 I tried again - this time I quit after 3 or 4 pages.
Larry Koler:
St. S, have you read Austen?
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Mark Wilson
Metric: the measurement system for the simple minded? (Sorry, low blow.) Your divided loyalties are hurting Ricochet, Mama!
To get serious, there is nothing inherently superior about the metric system over the English system for science. Each system has a complementary set of canonical units:
Metric people measure their "weight" in kilograms, which is actually a unit of mass. Who's being unscientific now?
And about thatkilogram: what kind of sick joker defines the fundamental mass unit as 1000 mass units?
Might I finally point out that metric countries rate engine power in kilowattsinstead of horsepower. In fact,
That's just sad. · 7 hours ago
Mark Wilson -- Working conversions in science or math is much easier when using metric. All Toads are not in accord. The tadpoles, schooled by me, like the metric system, but Papa Toad, an architect, much prefers inches and feet. He waxes poetic about the way the old system relates to the human body etc. etc. I like to waggle my ten fingers at him in response -- base ten and all... I don't mind being simple!
Feb '12
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
St. Salieri: Yes, good grief, I've read Austen, mostly for my sins, and I've tried to like this woman - but I can't.
I first read P&P at 14, after seeing part of it on PBS, and thinking that was great, I must read that book. Acquired it, and after three pages, hated it. I forced myself to finish it.
Then I was forced to re-read it my senior year. I was taken through the book by one of my favorite teachers, who loved the work, lavished praise on it, and I thought, I'm all wet, let's try again, hated it.
Strangely, I do thoroughly enjoy film versions of her books.
Larry Koler:
St. S, have you read Austen?
2 minutes ago
As heretical as it may sound, try Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. It's 75% Austen but with zombie attacks every time the plot slows too much.
I have much the same reaction to Austin as you do, but PPZ I read in a single sitting.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Now Trollope, a true favorite. Such characters, fun, a little snobby at times, but a great writer. I bumped into Barchester Towers in college at a used book sale. I knew of him by reputation and association, mostly via his mother, but I had never read him, and become a devoted fan from that point onward.
You should read the Hornblower/Forrester books, I cut my teeth on them when a boy. Great adventures, not nearly as detailed or as original as O'Brian's books, which were supposed to be a continuation of Forrester's work. They are lighter fare, but well written in a deft style, the sort that looks easy, but isn't.
For some real rarities of the Victorian age there are actually a few novels by Bulwer-Lytton worth your time - especially if you like comedies of manners, I recommend Pelham (stick with the 2nd ed. only) and My Novel. And yes, it is that Bulwer-Lytton; but both books are exceptionally well written and entertaining without the pretentiousness of his "serious" novels. Though The Last Days of Pompeii, for all it's flaws, is worth the read at least once in a life time.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Amy Schley As heretical as it may sound, try Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. It's 75% Austen but with zombie attacks every time the plot slows too much.
I have much the same reaction to Austin as you do, but PPZ I read in a single sitting.
Thanks for the suggestion, and I'm glad I'm not alone in my aversion to Austen, but I've seen those books, and they're just not my cup of tea. I dislike most fantasy, modern horror, and sci-fi works, and the idea of taking someone else's novel and cannibalizing it (sorry couldn't help it), just sticks in my craw. My own snobby-hobby horse comes out and is riden with dash and vim across the field.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Well said, both comments.
tabula rasa
Paul DeRocco: Liberals love to congratulate themselves for their greater "openness to new ideas", but they're way beyond that. The left suffers from a perverse form of neophilia, a slavish attraction to new ideas simply because they're new, coupled with a reflexive contempt for old ideas simply because they're old. Almost any right/left conflict has an element of that on the left side.
One might construct the mirror argument that conservatives have a reflexive contempt for new ideas, and a slavish attachment to old ones. But old ideas have the great advantage of having already had their effect on the world. If an idea has been in general acceptance for a long time, we at least know that it is compatible with a functioning civilization. We know no such thing about new ideas, and history is to a considerable extent the story of the horrible tragedies that have been caused by people's blind commitment to their bright, shiny new ideas.
True conservatives don't oppose thoughtful, incremental change--what we hate is unreflective, wholesale changes based on the empirically obvious fact that an elite cannot change human nature.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Bob Schwalbaum and Freesmith -- Master and Commander is a movie Papa Toad and I have watched about 10 times. Peter Weir is a very interesting and evocative filmmaker, and I really like the movie, but there are a couple of uber-evocative scenes that always make me guffaw. First on my list is when Maturin has been shot by the Marine captain, and Jack sees Stephen's cello propped up and realizes how much his friend means to him. Sorry, but the instrument would be packed safely away, not be lolling about on board ship! Another is the long inspirational speech by Jack to the crew before the trick used on the Acheron. Jack Aubrey would not have spent so much time just talking.
Anyone who likes Jane Austen's stories on screen should see this movie, Persuasion with Ciaran Hinds and Amanda Root. The opening scene is at sea, and the British navy figures almost as another character throughout.
Feb '12
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Yes, how sad that they don't rate power in terms of the amount of coal a pit pony can pull out of the mines in four hours. A "horse power" may be a sexy name, but the imagined images of a thundering herd weren't exactly what was being measured.
And as for a "foot" as a standard measurement corresponding to the human body? Hah! A foot-long foot is a size 14 American men's/15 English/48 European, a size you won't find outside a specialty shop. Might as well make a ten inch unit of measure and call it the "genital" for as realistic a measurement as the "foot" is.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Amy Schley
Amy Schley -- you are killing me! Very funny...
Nov '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Hmmm? Antibiotics . . . the jury might still be out about that one.
Highly dangerous is our unquestioning acceptance of new technology, i.e., technological progress. Such "progress" is difficult to resist because it seems always to make our lives easier, more convenient, more productive, more entertaining. But what it often does is empower us to alter the course of nature, especially the course of human nature. In doing so technological progress increasingly permits us to ignore, or causes us to lose sight of, what a human is and how a human should live.
"Natural law" becomes obsolete and inapposite, because we are no longer creatures bound by nature.
Technology, particularly biotechnological "progress," will dictate social and political change in ways and at a furious pace that should be obvious, but which will seem insidious. An example from the past: The Pill changed everything about the natural course of female life, and that change sent shock waves throughout society, permanently, fundamentally altering relations between men and women, relations between parents and children, childrearing, marriage, family, the labor force . . . everything.
Edited on June 5, 2012 at 6:37pmMay '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Mama Toad
Working conversions in science or math is much easier when using metric.
I've always thought the ease of conversion with powers of 10 is overrated. If you're doing anything but the most basic scientific calculations, you're using a calculator or computer to do the logs, trig, multiplication, or exponentiation of your data. It's no added burden to type in a 12 to go from inches to feet instead of a 100 to go from cm to meters.
Take a case with constructed units such as heat transfer, W/(K*m^2), which in canonical units is (kg*m^2/s^3)/(K*m^2). Suppose you made your heat transfer measurements in kilojoules per millisecond per square centimeter Kelvin [(Mg*m^2/s^s/ms)/(K*cm^2)]. Now you have to meticulously apply the exponents to all your prefix conversions. The conversion is [(1000)/(1/1000)/(1/100^2)]. That's not a conversion you'd attempt in your head, even in metric--it is too easy to screw up the exponents or denominators and shift the decimal point the wrong direction or number of places. You should just use a calculator anyway.
Feb '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Mark Wilson
Mama Toad
Working conversions in science or math is much easier when using metric.
Take a case with constructed units such as heat transfer, W/(K*m^2), which in canonical units is (kg*m^2/s^3)/(K*m^2). Suppose you made your heat transfer measurements in kilojoules per millisecond per square centimeter Kelvin [(Mg*m^2/s^s/ms)/(K*cm^2)]. Now you have to meticulously apply the exponents to all your prefix conversions. The conversion is [(1000)/(1/1000)/(1/100^2)]. That's not a conversion you'd attempt in your head, even in metric--it is too easy to screw up the exponents or denominators and shift the decimal point the wrong direction or number of places. You should just use a calculator anyway. · 17 minutes ago
Come on, Mark. Do the work in exponents with +/- signs and it's easy enough to do in your head.
May '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Amy Schley
Yes, how sad that they don't rate power in terms of the amount of coal a pit pony can pull out of the mines in four hours. A "horse power" may be a sexy name, but the imagined images of a thundering herd weren't exactly what was being measured.
And as for a "foot" as a standard measurement corresponding to the human body? Hah!
I've made no argument for the relation of English units to the human body--only Mama Toad's husband has. (Though I do think meters are unwieldy for human body measurements, and centimeters are too small. But kilograms-force, even though they are a funky unit, are just as good as pounds for body weight.)
This is a thread about traditions. In 2012, literal horse power is still within living memory. Horses and other beasts still abound in the naming and marketing of cars (Mustang, Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Impala, Ram). It is obvious to compare engines to horses. The horsepower unit was heavily used by James Watt himself.
You've mocked the horsepower for its quaintness, but what does a kg*m^2/s^3 have to do with anything?
May '10
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Hang On
Come on, Mark. Do the work in exponents with +/- signs and it's easy enough to do in your head. · 1 minute ago
I'm not saying it's inherently difficult or that you can't do it, just that it's error prone. You're liable to flip the signs on denominators or forget the square.
Edited on June 5, 2012 at 7:08pmSep '11
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Mark Wilson
In 2012, literal horse power is still within living memory.
Still within memory?
Feb '12
Re: Patrick O’Brian and Conservative Respect for "Tradition"
Mark Wilson
Amy Schley
Yes, how sad that they don't rate power in terms of the amount of coal a pit pony can pull out of the mines in four hours. A "horse power" may be a sexy name, but the imagined images of a thundering herd weren't exactly what was being measured.
This is a thread about traditions. In 2012,literalhorse power is still within living memory. Horses and other beasts still abound in the naming and marketing of cars (Mustang, Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Impala, Ram). It is obvious to compare engines to horses. The horsepower unit was heavily used by James Watt himself.
You've mocked the horsepower for its quaintness, but what does a kg*m^2/s^3 have to do with anything? · 5 hours ago
Trust me, the average person encounters Watts far more often than horses. Now, imagining my car as the equivalent of 12 million lightbulbs isn't terribly helpful, but imagining my car being pulled by 170 pit ponies isn't exactly helpful either. (I actually grew up riding a pony of the type that would have been used in mines ... not exactly an inspiring sight.)