"Albert Einstein. The world as I see it (англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

animals; we have, therefore, to admit that we owe our principal advantage
over the beasts to the fact of living in human society. The individual, if
left alone from birth would remain primitive and beast-like in his thoughts
and feelings to a degree that we can hardly conceive. The individual is what
he is and has the significance that he has not so much in virtue of his
individuality, but rather as a member of a great human society, which
directs his material and spiritual existence from the cradle to the grave.

A man's value to the community depends primarily on how far his
feelings, thoughts, and actions are directed towards promoting the good of
his fellows. We call him good or bad according to how he stands in this
matter. It looks at first sight as if our estimate of a man depended
entirely on his social qualities.

And yet such an attitude would be wrong. It is clear that all the
valuable things, material, spiritual, and moral, which we receive from
society can be traced back through countless generations to certain creative
individuals. The use of fire, the cultivation of edible plants, the steam
engine-each was discovered by one man.

Only the individual can think, and thereby create new values for
society-nay, even set up new moral standards to which the life of the
community conforms. Without creative, independently thinking and judging
personalities the upward development of society is as unthinkable as the
development of the individual personality without the nourishing soil of the
community.

The health of society thus depends quite as much on the independence of
the individuals composing it as on their close political cohesion. It has
been said very justly that Gr”co-Europeo-American culture as a whole, and in
particular its brilliant flowering in the Italian Renaissance, which put an
end to the stagnation of medi”val Europe, is based on the liberation and
comparative isolation of the individual.

Let us now consider the times in which we live. How does society fare,
how the individual? The population of the civilized countries is extremely
dense as compared with former times; Europe to-day contains about three
times as many people as it did a hundred years ago. But the number of great
men has decreased out of all proportion. Only a few individuals are known to
the masses as personalities, through their creative achievements.
Organization has to some extent taken the place of the great man,
particularly in the technical sphere, but also to a very perceptible extent
in the scientific.

The lack of outstanding figures is particularly striking in the domain
of art. Painting and music have definitely degenerated and largely lost
their popular appeal. In politics not only are leaders lacking, but the
independence of spent and the sense of justice of the citizen have to a
great extent declined. The democratic, parliamentarian regime, which is
based on such independence, has in many places been shaken, dictatorships