Blog #4

"New ideas in politics and philosophy tend to emerge in times of social, political, and/or economic stress. How can this be explained?"

First of all, people are more open to new ideas when they are unhappy with their current situation. In times of happiness people are going to be less open to people coming in with radical new ideas on how to change things, because people don't want change. However, when people are unhappy, new ideas and change sounds wonderful. People will look to almost any idea with hope and this allows very smart people to capitalize on this by introducing their concepts. If a government is working well and people are happy with it, a philosopher with an idea for how to better run the government is going to be ignored. But if you take a government that is not working well and people that aren't happy that philosopher will be listened to. My point being, it is not only that these ideas are thought of during times of stress but that they are brought to the forefront by a population that will listen.