The Western Accel Manifesto

Progress is not guaranteed. For nearly 300,000 years, it barely existed. Humans lived like their ancestors. They scavenged with the same stone tools. Half of the children did not reach the age of five. And most adults died before thirty. Then something fundamentally changed.

The ascent of Western Civilisation began 2,500 years ago in Ancient Greece. Knowledge grew as philosophers unshackled themselves from mythological explanations. A culture that encouraged critical thinking was essential for a dynamic society to emerge. People were allowed to think, question and challenge the ideas of the past without fear of reprisal. 

This tradition of criticism began with Thales of Miletus who in mid-6th century BC founded the Milesian School. What made his school unique was that students were encouraged to criticise and improve upon the ideas of the past. Bad ideas were rejected. Better ones replaced them.

This philosophical quest to better understand reality led to Athens' golden age. Progress could not have happened without it. A civilisation can't advance unless the ideas, values and principles it adheres to are grounded in reality.

Ideas that ignore reality can survive in theory, but not in practice. Evidence and reason are man's most powerful tools for discovering truth. When this principle was forgotten after Rome's fall, the West stagnated for a thousand years. When it was rediscovered in the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment, progress exploded.

Today the West is fortunate to stand on the shoulders of giants—intellectuals who throughout the centuries, gradually and painstakingly moved human knowledge forward.

Ptolemy thought that Earth was at the center. Copernicus proposed that the sun was. Galileo proved it through his telescope. Kepler perfected the orbital mechanics. And Newton explained gravity. Each improved on what came before. Knowledge refined across fifteen centuries.

With time, humanity’s understanding of reality improved across every field. The results are visible all around us—embedded in the high standards of living that we enjoy, and the technological advancements we now take for granted.

But this privilege should also come with a duty to preserve and build upon the legacy of the past. Unfortunately, most people don't know why civilisations rise and fall. They don't understand how progress happens. Nor what makes Western Civilisation unique and worth preserving.

This makes them easy targets for seductive ideologies that destroy civilisations. It's not enough to know which ideas work—It's equally important to know what ideas lead to ruin. As Charlie Munger said: Invert, always invert.

Democracy is only as good as the ideas held by those who vote. Good ideas lead to wealth and prosperity. Bad ideas lead to poverty and decline. The West will regress unless its citizens can distinguish between the two. And progress is never more than one generation away from extinction.

Even institutions across the West now promote ideas that undermine the roots of Western Civilisation. Reforming them is incredibly difficult. As such, the defence of the West's intellectual heritage rests with the citizenry. Antifragility can occur from the bottom up, not top down.

Western Accel is an attempt to create a decentralised movement that advances the ideas, values and principles that underpin the West. A force multiplier that repackages the best ideas into easy to understand, sharable formats.