Hayek On The "Reality Based" Community

Check this out at QandO:

It may indeed prove to be far the most difficult and not the least important task for human reason rationally to comprehend its own limitations. It is essential for the growth of reason that as individuals we should bow to forces and obey principles which we cannot hope fully to understand yet on which the advance and even the preservation of civilisation depends. Historically this has been achieved by the influence of the various religious creeds and by traditions and superstitions which made men submit to those forces by an appeal to his emotions rather than his reason. The most dangerous stage in the growth of civilisation may well be that in which man has come to regard all these beliefs as superstitions and refuses to accept or to submit to anything which he does not rationally understand. The rationalist whose reason is not sufficient to teach him those limitations of the powers of conscious reason, and who despises all the institutions and customs which have not been consciously designed, would thus become the destroyer of the civilisation built upon them. This may well prove a hurdle which man will repeatedly reach, only to be thrown back into barbarism.

Hayek is vastly underappreciated, even by conservatives. Of course, the problem is that the "reality based" community isn't actually "reality based" -- it's actually just the "Church of the Left". But I'll get to that in the next few posts. And conservatives aren't blame free either...