Toynbee was a man before his time

Arnold Joseph Toynbee -
a man before his time.

Arnold Joseph Toynbee was prescient, a man before his time.

The British historian, who was born late in 19^th Century and died in 1975, wrote tirelessly about civilization, why it succeeded and why it failed and his advice is equally relevant today as it was when in full bloom.

Toynbee, a history philosopher and the author of many books, once said: “Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder”.

Personal experience of civilizational violence early last century obviously shaped those views, but he could have just as easily been writing about humanity’s attitude toward climate change.

The research professor of International History at the London School of Economics and the history philosopher was concerned, as far back as the early 1920s that modern technology, which had changed the world for the better, could also wreak great havoc; there was always the risk that “the machine may run away with the pilot”, he said.

An intellectual and cultural historian of modern Europe at Stanford University in California, who lives in San Francisco, Ian Beacock, has written about Toynbee in a piece entitled: “Humanist among machines” on Aeon.