working together

...we will have to learn to work together with each other in groups in order to cope with the future. It does not matter what kind of groups: study groups, life sharing groups, working groups...join together to run a school, a business, or a farm in a deeply human way. We have to be ready for the things that are coming towards us...  

--Bernard Lievegoed, The Battle for the Soul.

Working with the Universe

"...when we work with tools or till the soil or do any other knd of work, but especially when we weave something into the fabric of the social order, then we are doing something that does not concern human beings alone, but belongs to the whole universe. When a steam engine is built, or when a telephone or a lightning conductor or a table is constructed, or if a sick person is healed, people assume as a matter of course that these are things which take place merely within human evolution on the earth. But that is not the case...events take place in the whole of the universe when something happens here on earth. This is a profound truth..."

--Rudolf Steiner, Ideas for a New Europe.

Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics

“...Is there not a great deal of superstition where numbers are concerned? What can in some way be counted is accepted in science. Science loves to weigh, to compute; and social science loves statistics--again a matter of computation and reckoning. It will be difficult indeed for people to bring themselves to admit that all knowledge of the external world acquired through measure and number is so much delusion.

To measure--what does it mean, in reality? It means to compare something with a given dimension, be it length or volume...with a smaller unit. In such measurements, no matter whether of lengths or surfaces or weights, the qualitative element is entirely lacking. The number three always remains the same, whether one is counting sheep or politicians. It is not a matter of quality but merely quantity. The essential principle of volume and number is that the qualitative aspect is left out of account. 

But for that very reason all knowledge derived from the principle of volume and measure is illusory; and the fact to be taken in all seriousness is that the moment we enter the world that can be weighed and measured, the world of space and time, we enter a world of illusion, a world that is nothing but a mirage as long as we take it to be reality. ...in truth, what things signify in space and time is their external aspect only, and we must transcend space and time, penetrating to much deeper levels if we are to reach the innermost truth, the innermost essence of things. -- Rudolf Steiner, Dornach 2/11/19

"There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose." --Lenin, as quoted by John Maynard Keynes in his book The Economic Consequences of the Peace. 

Quality versus Quantity
an excerpt from 'The National Being' by George Russell (AE), published in 1930. (the few comments in parentheses are mine--SCM)

"Often with sadness I hear people speak of industrial (commercial) development in Ireland, for I feel they contemplate no different system than that which fills workers with despair in countries where it is more successfully applied. All these energetic people are conspiring to build factories and mills and to fill them with human labour, and they believe the more they do this the better it will be for Ireland. They talk of Ireland as if it was only admirable as a quantity rather than a quality. They express delight at swelling statistics and increased trade, but where do we hear any reflection on the quality of life engendered by this industrial development? Our civilization is to differ in no way from any other. No new ideal of life is suggested to differentiate us. We are to go on exploiting human labour. Our working classes (the people) are to...earn profits for an employing (ruling) class, as labour has done from time immemorial in Babylon, in Nineveh, in Rome, and in London today. But a choice yet remains to us, because the character of our civilization is not yet fixed...It fills the spirit with weariness to think of another nation following the old path without thought or imagination of other roads leading to new and more beautiful life..."