Force and energy in the age of more-than-human historical narratives
This paper investigates history in terms of force and energy. If a history is a narrative of change, it needs to examine the cause and momentum of change, and hence, history needs the notion of force and energy. In human history, historical narratives developed a number of such concepts, including dialectical force in historical materialism and heaven’s mandate in Chinese historiography. Nowadays, we find interesting examples of the usage of force in the discourse concerning the Anthropocene.
The word “Anthropocene” is a geological term developed by scientists working for the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), an international scientific joint research project of the earth sciences with more than 10,000 worldwide participants, which lasted for around 20 years from 1987 to 2005 (Terada and Niles, 2021; Steffen, 2022). As a geological term, it is a part of a narrative describing the entire Earth history of 4.6 billion years. The Anthropocene corresponds to the categorical system consisting of other terms of geological eras and epochs, beginning from the Hadean eon and running to the present. In this paper, we call this systematic view the Anthropocene concept. The scientists who developed it called their science “Earth System science”, emphasizing that “the Earth itself is a single system” (Steffen et al., 2004, p. 1).
But at the same time, as the prefix “anthropo” indicates, it is also a history of human beings. The epoch of the Anthropocene is thought to be equivalent to the recent period of modernity and industrialization. In this sense, the Anthropocene is a part of a geohistory and a part of an anthropo-history. In this paper, we call it a “geo-anthropo-history”, meaning that it wants to connect human historical time with geological time. This kind of a history has not existed thus far. By using the term “Anthropocene”, we are talking of an unprecedented history.
The scope of history extends further and further by enlarging the timescale on the one hand, and by including various historical actors on the other. The rise of the Anthropocene concept must be treated in this context. Yuval Noah Harari describes history which goes back to the origin of Homo sapiens more than one million years ago (Harari, 2015). Knowledges of the history of the universe had been accumulated and its resolution became higher and higher rapidly (Kragh and Longair, 2019). Astrobiology investigates the history of life not on our planet but in outer space (Smith and Morowitz, 2016; Cockell, 2020). More-than-human history is fast appearing and a different notion of the momentum of history is required.
What is interesting in our discussion here is that the Anthropocene concept is accompanied by the notion of force. As the Earth System scientists who developed the concept were natural scientists, it might come from the essence of the notion of force and energy, which is thought to be a fundamental element of physics. But it seems not to be used only in the natural scientific way. Rather, it is used in a more broad sense. This paper seeks to analyse the implication of force in terms of history.
Forces in the Anthropocene concept
There are several usages of the term “force” in the Anthropocene concept: geological force, natural force, driving force. These terms have different meanings and nuances, but all are utilized to emphasize the strength of human power, which is compared with natural power.
“Geological force” emerged almost simultaneously with the coinage of the term “Anthropocene” in 2000. When Paul Crutzen (1933–2021), who was the IGBP Vice Chair at that time and had won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1995, invented the term, he introduced it using the term “geological force” (Crutzen and Stoermer, 2000). In the paper, looking back at the historical path in which the Holocene was officialized in 1885, the authors say that “mankind’s activities gradually grew into a significant geological, morphological force” (Crutzen and Stoermer, 2000, p. 17, all italics in this paper are mine). The paper then introduces the 19th and early 20th century scientists who described human beings as a “telluric force” and compared it to “the greater forces of earth”. Crutzen and Stoermer concluded that without a major natural catastrophe, humankind would continue to be the “major geological force for many millennia, maybe millions of years, to come”. In the paper, the term Anthropocene was introduced with reference to the notions of force, but it was not defined explicitly. Although he was a scientist, Crutzen used the terms not in a scientific but in a metaphorical way, as he himself later acknowledged (Crutzen and Schwägerl, 2015, pp. 32–34).
“Driving force” and “force of nature” were introduced in Global Change and the Earth System: A Planet under Pressure, a book called the “IGPB Synthesis” (Steffen et al., 2004). The third chapter of the book, “The Anthropocene Era: How Humans Are Changing the Earth System”, says that human “driving force” affects the earth system components, and that “it matches and even exceeds some of the great forces of nature” (Steffen et al., 2004, p. 81). The book defines “driving force” as the driver of change in the components of the earth system, and “force of nature” as a power which drives the systems of nature.
The development of the Anthropocene concept referred to several forces with different connotations. But its relationship with history was not clearly explained at the time. Why were those forces mentioned in the Anthropocene concept? And how do they relate to geo-anthropo-history?
Force concepts in the ecosystem model and earth science
As the Earth System scientists who developed the Anthropocene concept did not explain what force is, we should infer its meaning by referring to the earth and environmental sciences.
First, we shall examine the ecosystem model, which uses the term “driving force”. Figure 1 shows how the model connects its elements (Odum and Barrett, 2005, pp. 11–13). The flow of energy enables the existence of a system as a whole. The system consists of several components. The model calls them “conditional variants (P)”. The conditional variants are related to each other by flow of energy (F). Energy (E) introduced into the system is adopted by one of the conditional variants and flows into the following ones. Basically, the flow of energy is one-way and does not return, but a feedback loop (L) sometimes allows it to return. The feedback loop makes the linear system into a partly circular system.
Figure 1
Ecosystem model.
▪ Credits: Drawn by Masahiro Terada by referring to Odum and Barret (2005, p. 12). All rights reserved.
It is said that the most significant contribution of the ecosystem model to natural science is the introduction of the concept of “flow of energy”. It enables the ecosystem to connect with the world of physics. In the ecosystems of the earth, the origin of energy flow is the radiation of the sun (Dickinson and Murphy, 1998, p. 17; Steffen et al., 2004, p. 7). The ecosystem model calls it “force”; more precisely, it is the “forcing function”, or the “external causal force”, that drives the system from outside (Dickinson and Murphy, 1998, p. 17).
If we consider this ecosystem model, the “great force of nature” referred to in the Anthropocene concept seen above might be that of the sun. However, it is not. The “IGBP synthesis” says that what should be compared to human activity is “some of the great forces of nature”. They clearly say that those forces belong to “every Earth System component”. For them, the force of nature is not singular but plural.
What are the forces, then? As the name of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) indicates, Earth System science presupposes the existence of four spheres: three geospheres (lithosphere, atmosphere and hydrosphere) and a biosphere. The “IGBP synthesis” says that humankind has a force similar to the forces these spheres have. But with regard to the definitions of energy and force in the ecosystem model, it is not clear whether every sphere has a force like the sun.
Furthermore, the IGBP talks of the “driving force”, whereas in the ecosystem model, there is no driving force. What exists is only the flow of energy. Here we see ambiguity and contradiction between the force notion of the Anthropocene concept and that of the ecosystem model.
Second, one may infer that “geological force” is the force that causes volcanic explosions and produces magma in the depths of the earth. However, in the Anthropocene concept, it is not.
Generally speaking, as geology is the science that investigates the strata and rocks of the earth, “geological force” can be defined as a power produced by the deep earth. A textbook of geology defines plate tectonic power, volcanic explosions and earthquakes as the “force within” (Tarbuck, Lutgens and Tasa, 2011). Geology defines the lithosphere as a sphere consisting of crust and plate, namely the upper mantle. Not so for the IGBP scientists. Their geosphere notion omits the movement of the plates and the heat of the mantle (Steffen et al., 2004, p. 71). They only analyse the surface movement of the lithosphere. In sum, they do not address the inner flows of the energy of the earth.
This stems from their view of the earth and the way they define the forces of nature; they do not see the earth as a whole, as the Gaia theory does. In earth biology, biological physics and astrobiology, the origin of life is discussed in relation to the inner movement of the earth; the volcanic bent in the deep ocean is hypothesized to be the cradle of life (Smith and Morowitz, 2016, chap. 3; Cockell, 2020, p. 295ff.). If so, the deep inner earth has vital force literally. But the Earth System scientists who developed the Anthropocene concept do not acknowledge the “power” of the earth itself. In “Anti-Gaia”, a short text in the “IGBP Synthesis” book, Crutzen harshly attacks the Gaia theory by using the label of “healing Gaia” (Crutzen, 2004, p. 72). The Anthropocene wants to separate geological force from the vital power of the earth.
Although the Anthropocene concept emphasizes the force of the earth, there is a persistent tendency to separate it from vital phenomena of nature. But if the force of nature plays a crucial role in geohistory, these vital phenomena should be properly addressed. Here, again, we see contradiction and ambiguity concerning the force notion in the Anthropocene concept.
The Anthropocene force in historians’ discussion
Although there are ambiguities and contradictions when seen from the scientific viewpoint, the force notion in the Anthropocene concept is accepted positively by historians.
Julia Adney Thomas deepens the Anthropocene concept from the viewpoint of the responsibility of historians. She uses the term “Anthropocene history”. Recognizing the uniqueness and importance of the Anthropocene concept as a discourse which clarifies human beings’ new task in an age of environmental crises, she addresses the necessity to narrate the Anthropocene as a history in terms of a single big story of earth history and multiple local experiences and voices of various human experiences. In discussing this, she adopts the term “force”. She poses the question of “why, when, and how humans came to overwhelm the great forces of nature”. She also invents a new term: the “anthropogenic Anthropocene force” (Thomas, 2022, pp. 10–11).
From the standpoint of critique of capitalism and colonialism, Dipesh Chakrabarty insists that the Anthropocene concept problematizes the view that human beings are one species. He investigates the meaning of it thoroughly and questions the human timescale of politics and world history. He analyses discourses in social science and argues that the “physical force” notion in the Anthropocene concept is “translated” into the “social-existential category of power” (Chakrabarty, 2021, pp. 159–164).
Both historians mention the notion of force. But both studies still lack proper analysis and investigation of the concept. Thomas does not explain what the “anthropogenic Anthropocene force” is. Is the force caused by the epoch of the Anthropocene? Or does the force belong to human beings? Chakrabarty’s analysis of the distinction between force and power is sound, however, it must not be possible to separate force and power clearly. Social and existential power often comes from physical force, like in the case of state power supported by the force of a violent state apparatus represented by an army or police. He says that physical force is “translated” into social and political power, but it is not clear in which way it is thus interpreted.
In spite of the interest shown by historians, the problem of what is the force of history in the Anthropocene is still not fully answered. Historians’ interests are concentrated in human history, or “anthropo-history”. And the Earth System scientists who developed the Anthropocene concept are interested in “geohistory”, as seen above. There are lacunae on both sides—the force in terms of geo-anthropo-history is not sufficiently addressed.
Driving force of history: Karl Marx and Carl Löwith
In the history of historiography and the philosophy of history, there are several cues to think about the force in geo-anthropo-history. Let us take a look at some of them.
In studies of historiography, or Western historiography, the force is generally thought to be the “force of history”. The most famous such study is that of Karl Marx. Philosophy of History and Historiography, one of the titles in the ‘Blackwell Companion to Philosophy’ series, evaluates the theory of Marx as “the theory of driving force of history” (Tucker, 2011, pp. 169, 488–497). But what is it? And what are its differences and similarities to the force of geo-anthropo-history?
Marx propounded that the contradiction between social productive forces (Gesellschaftlichen Produktivkräften) and relations of production (Produktionsverhältnissen) is what makes the leap in historical development. He said that because of this leap, history makes progress (Marx, 1859/1971, p. 9). It is a dialectical process. In the preface to Critique of Political Economy (Zur Kritik der politischen Ökonomie), he says that new social systems emerge from this contradiction.
In the same book, Marx says that a transition of social systems occurs according to change in mode of production: from the Asiatic mode to archaic, feudalistic, and finally the modern-bourgeois one. If this is the development of a history, historical development is caused by the forces of production. Although Marx himself seems not to term it as such, this is the “driving force” which makes history move forward.
Marx’s work makes its argument from the point of view of material relationships, but we should note that Marx thought of the development and change of history in terms of consciousness. He wrote that “the change should be explained by way of self-consciousness, which emerges from the contradiction in the material life” (Marx, 1859/1971, p. 9). The force of history comes from the self-consciousness of actors. In other words, actors should have consciousness. In Marx’s sense, force in the material world leaps into the world of consciousness.
A similar view is seen in the concept of the “dynamism of history” proffered by Carl Löwith, a Jewish-German philosopher. Marx thought of the problem of force in terms of production, whereas Löwith looked at it in terms of agency. Force does not make a history in a simple way. In order to make a history, a force has to make agents of history. Mere affairs and events are not history. If affairs and events are to be treated as history, there should be agents of history. Force is the function in which such agents are made. In his article, “The Dynamism of History and Historicism (Die Dynamik der Geschichte und der Historismus)”, Löwith explores the difference between acts, events and history (Löwith, 1953/1983, p. 324ff.).
According to Löwith, history, events and acts are different kinds of phenomena. An act in itself is not history, but a mere event. However, when the act is acted by a human being who knows that they are acting in history, the act can become historical. It means that the existence of history itself, or, in other words, the in-history-ness, makes an actor into a historical one. In this sense, history is a reciprocal process between human beings and history. Löwith says that history and actors are in a “to-act-and-to-be-acted-upon” relationship and calls it the “dynamism of history”.
Both thinkers think that the force of history relates to consciousness. Marx’s dialectic and Löwith’s dynamism of history function on the basis of conscious processes. If so, the dynamism of force cannot be applied to geo-anthropo-history in the Anthropocene because the latter must include not only human beings but also other-than-human beings, including living beings and non-living things, which seem not to have consciousness.
The force of poiesis: Kitaro Nishida and Kinji Imanishi
This paper theorizes that by focusing on more fundamental elements in the “to-act-and-to-be acted-upon” relationship in the dynamics of history, the notion of the driving force of history can be extended into that of other-than-human beings.
What exists behind the “to-act-and-to-be-acted-upon” relationship is the relationship between “active” and “passive” modes. It is the fundamental element not only in the realm of human beings, but also that of other-than-human beings. Kitaro Nishida (1871–1945), a modern Japanese philosopher, thought that the most fundamental dynamism in history can be found in such a relationship, especially one that appears as a relationship between “to be made” and “to make” (Nishida, 1939/1949).
Nishida argued that history proceeds as the successive transition from the mode of “to be made” to that of “to make”. Using the notion of poiesis by Aristotle, which presupposes an intention and a will to make a thing to be made, Nishida thought that the most essential act of human beings is “to make”. For him, all human beings primarily come to exist as an existence which was made; they cannot make themselves by themselves. But after coming into existence as a “what is made”, they begin to “make” themselves and other things around them. By doing so, human beings make history. Nishida summarized it in a phrase “tsukurareta mono kara tsukuru mono e (from what to be made to what to make)”. It is said to be one of his key concepts and appears in Nishida lexicons as “de ce qui est créé à ce qui crée” in French and “Vom Geschaffenen zum Schaffenden” in German (Tremblay, 2020, p. 109; Elberfeld, 1999, p. 307). Citing Hegel, Nishida calls it dialectic and says that it is the problem of poiesis of ideas, or forms (Nishida, 1939/1949, p. 222).
Primarily, Nishida developed this relationship as a principle of human history. Like Heidegger, who distinguished human beings from other beings in terms of the ability of world-making (Weltbildung) (Heidegger, 1929/1930/2018), Nishida thought that only the acts of human beings deserve the notion of poiesis in Aristotle’s sense (Nishida, 1937/1948, p. 297; 1939/1949, pp. 151–169,183–187; 1939/1999, pp. 64–65). But, later, it was interpreted as a basic principle of the history of living beings by Kinji Imanishi (1902–1992), a Japanese biologist (Yamagiwa, 2023, p. 9).
Imanishi thought that biological metabolism and reproduction are processes in which “what to be made” becomes “what to make” (Imanishi, 1941/2002, p. 17; 1941/2011, p. 67). With regard to environment and subjecthood, he argued that a subject is made in the environment first, and then, it makes the environment. As far as living beings live in an environment, they must be in a “to-be-made-and-to-make” existence. He insisted that the principle of “from what to be made to what to make” is the base of life. Imanishi thought that living beings are always in between these two modes of existence.
Furthermore, he thought that this process covers also the world of non-living beings. Living beings adopt non-living things into themselves as their constituent material and this material becomes a part of living beings. Imanishi argued that in this process, we have to presuppose some kind of “living-ness” in non-living things. He defends this view, although he admits that it is called animism (Imanishi, 1941/2002, p. 19; 1941/2011, p. 70). Certainly, in some cultures, especially in traditional or indigenous ones, it is not uncommon to think of non-living things as living, and it is usually referred to as animism. Animism might be underestimated from the viewpoint of scientific naturalism, but, as Philipp Descola reveals by using the logical square of opposition, animism, analogism and totemism are not inferior to the naturalism of modern science (Descola, 2005, p. 323).
Imanishi’s view can be termed as panpsychism, pan-experientialism or Russellian monism using the current Analytic Philosophy terms (Goff et al., 2022). Scientific naturalism is a product of a world-view brought by a particular history that happened in the European peninsula and the Western world from around the 17th century. Mathematization is one of its characteristics. But, as Husserl put it, over-mathematization may not fit the reality of the everyday life-world. Shozo Omori (1921–1997), a Japanese analytic philosopher of epistemology, argues that before the rise of natural science, the split between subject and object was blurred and the distinction between living beings and non-living things was more flexible. He questions scientific dualism and insists on recognizing the monistic aspect of everyday experience (Omori, 1973/2011; 1983/1998; Kobayashi, 2020, pp. 656–657).
Views like those of Nishida and Imanishi might be provocative, but to acknowledge life in a broad sense must open a door to geo-anthropo-history. As seen above, the IGBP model of geological force does not include the force of the earth. But our everyday presuppositions expect to do so. By broadening the notion of “living” beings, the force of the earth might be treated more broadly as an agent of history.
Movement beyond nature and history: Masao Maruyama and Hannah Arendt
Another interpretation is “dynamism of history”. The term “dynamism” or “dynamics” comes from Aristotle’s notion of dynamis and energeia, which are translated as “potentiality” and “actualization of potentiality”, respectively. Dynamis is a power that enables the emergence of a possible existence. Aristotle thought that our reality consisted of those two realms; reality comes into real when dynamis becomes energeia (Aristotle, 1929, II 3; 1933, V 2). If these two are embedded in nature as energy in today’s sense, dynamism of history can be interpreted as the natural energy of history. Indeed, etymologically, the word “nature” comes from the ancient Latin word natura, the past participle of nasci, which means “to be born” (Onions, 1966, pp. 603–604). Nature is the embodiment of the dynamism of dynamis and energeia.
Masao Maruyama (1914–1996), a philosopher and historian of Japanese political thought, argued that a notion of natural energy regulates Japanese historical consciousness. In his article, “Deep Strata of Historical Consciousness in Japan”, he called it the principle of “continual energy of becoming (tsugi tsugi ni nariyuku ikioi)” (Maruyama, 1972). He defined this term using a word, naru, which means “to become”, seen in O No Yasumaro’s Kojiki, one of the oldest Japanese national historiographies from the 8th century. Naru can be translated also as “to appear” or “to come about” in English and “zu entstehen” in German (O No Yasumaro, 1983, p. 7; Antoni, 2012, p. 16). The phrase is also interpreted as “impulse of continual becoming” or “natural momentum” (Davis, 2020, p. 703; Matsui, 2023, pp. 20–21).
Kojiki describes cosmogony and the origin of the Japanese imperial family. It begins with setting the scene for the world, wherein things “become” as divine existences, like divinity of the sky, cloud, country and the islands that make up the Japanese archipelago. Then, other deities “become” into the world successively like the sprouting of young reeds. Different from the Book of Genesis of The Old Testament, in Kojiki, there is no creator, hence deities “become” autonomously. Maruyama argues that such autonomy and successive becoming of divine existences are the manifestation of the “continual energy of becoming”.
Kojiki is regarded as a historical canon in Japan. Maruyama thought that Japanese historical consciousness was dominated by the principle of nature set by Kojiki. For him, Japanese modern history was a struggle to liberate the human world from the yoke of such principles of nature. In his view, the caste-like feudal system of the premodern age was one such constraint.
He problematized this conflict as that of shizen and sakui (Maruyama, 1941/1974, chap. 2). The former is translated as “nature”, whereas the latter is interpreted as “invention” (Maruyama, 1941/1974, p. 187; Thomas, 2001, p. 16ff.), “making” (Davis, 2020, p. 702), “artificialité” (Berque, 1986, p. 177), or “constructed order by human actions” (Matsui, 2023, p. 17). This dichotomy became the standard framework of Japanese modern political thought. Maruyama’s influence is longstanding, and subsequent investigations on the Japanese notion of nature followed his framework, as seen in the works of Augustin Berque in French and Julia Thomas in English (Berque, 1986; Thomas, 2001).
One thing we should note is that the “continual energy of becoming” in history had a negative impact on society. The most controversial example of this is seen in the Japanese realpolitik in the period from the 1930s to 1945. During that time, the totalitarian regime advocated the naturalness of Japanese history, and by doing so, legitimized the imperial nation’s conduct of the total war. The supreme bloodline that had ruled for more than 2,000 years and its legendary tradition was celebrated as the natural continuity. The imperial army’s attempt to build a puppet nation in north-east China was considered to be authorized by this notion. Tadayoshi Kihira (1874–1949), a Japanese philosopher, declared that the establishment of the state of Manchuria was a necessary consequence of the natural naru (becoming) process of history (Kihira, 1943).
Simultaneously, this usage of natural energy was seen on a global scale. In Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt (1951/2017) investigated the relationship between ideology and the terror of the Nazi and Stalin regimes, and argued that totalitarian ideology allows terror by implying that such terror is a natural consequence of history and nature. The ideologues of totalitarianism then insisted that the most fundamental element of nature and history is continual movement, so, as long as it is an act of movement, the terror is authorized. Arendt called it the “law of movement”. She wrote that “its chief aim is to make it possible for the force of nature or of history to race freely through mankind” (Arendt, 1951/2017, p. 610). She said that the difference between the “force of nature” and the “force of history” vanished at that time because both were merged into the principle of movement.
These examples show us the dangerous aspect of emphasizing natural force. In both cases, by emphasizing energy and force, ordinary social order is annihilated. Movement can be said to be dynamism. Dynamism may transcend the human–nature dichotomy. Energy is already there in nature. But if it is not properly treated, it will affect human society negatively. Force is in essence neutral, but its social function is not neutral.
Is the concept of force compatible with a sustainable future?
It is often said that to tackle the problematics of the Anthropocene, the notion of “business-as-usual” should be abandoned. If so, the notion of force should be renounced because to narrate history in terms of force must be “business-as-usual”. In the present, energy is the most fundamental element of physics. Physics considers thermodynamics to be one of the principles that explain the universe. Because of the introduction of energy, the ecosystem can be connected with the world of physics as already seen above. The so-called “energy thought” is ubiquitous. The fact that we think that force is a necessary element of history should be seen in this context.
But if we consider another viewpoint, this notion might be unnecessary for narrating history. It is the problem of the principle of explanation, or aitia in the ancient Greek sense. In our present mode, force is regarded as a major aitia of the world. However, there were a lot of other aitias: for example, in ancient Greece, luck (Empedocles), necessity and contingency (Democritus), intelligence (Anaxagoras and Diogenes), the God (Socrates documented by Xenophon), and form (Plato) were treated as aitias (Johnson, 2005, p. 41). If so, it is not inevitable to think of force as a necessary element to explain history.
The emphasis on force in the Anthropocene concept has already been questioned; Stefania Barca criticizes it from the viewpoint of postcolonialism and feminism, and says that it is a product of a “European-white-male” bias (Barca, 2020).
The notion of a historical driving force relates to historical progress. If the environmental crisis that led the epoch of the Anthropocene was produced by modern civilization, that very civilization must have been driven by the concept of progress. The concept of progress might be a product of historical consciousness which sees history as a linear and successive process of development.
Claude Levi-Strauss criticized the concept of history, or historical progress, and advocated the non-historical consciousness found in “cold” or “primitive” societies (Lévi-Strauss, 1962, chap. VIII). He reveals that in such societies, events are represented not as a linear form of past time, but are absorbed into a structure in the present time, e.g. rituals which represent ancestors’ deeds or drawings on sacred devices that show the relationship of old memories. In such societies, past events are not narrated backwards; they stay static as a particular structure in the present. On the other hand, in the modernized or “hot” society, elements of events are regulated into a linear narrative of history in a temporal order. The notion of progress and development was born only in a society where every event was put into chronological order. Only such historical consciousness narrates history as a thing which proceeds from the past to the future. If we think about the environmental crisis seriously, it might be the case that we should look for a way to narrate history without using the notion of force, and exit from such a modern notion of time. But if we do so, do we have to quit modern society?
Levi-Strauss thought that the difference between “cold” and “hot” societies came from the distinction between the primitiveness and modernity of the societies. However, this might not be so—it may come from the difference in the metaphysical and epistemological standpoints. The former view is seen not only in the so-called primitive societies, but also in the everyday reality in modernized society. Even in metaphysics, such a view is not unusual, and it is called presentism in contemporary analytic philosophy. John McTaggart (1866–1925), a British analytic philosopher, said that time, a linguistically constructed object, does not really exist (McTaggart, 1927/2008). Shozo Omori, a Japanese philosopher we have already referred to above, said that time does not flow (Omori, 1995/2011). If such a view exists already in our society, it would not be necessary to abandon modernity, and a door to the exit might be found in scrutinizing our reality more carefully.