Name: 揭開西方文明的神話 (The Myth of Western Civilization EXPOSED)
Uploaded: 2025-08-01T21:24:41.000Z
Duration: 37 min 6 s

進階被動語態

We've been sold a lie that Western civilization is the pinnacle of human progress, reason, and morality.

西方文明是人類進步、理性和道德的頂峰，這個謊言一直在向我們兜售。

關係子句

I spent the first 21 years of my life fully indoctrinated in Christian conservatism, which I now realize is the cultural foundation for the empire that is the United States.

在我生命的前 21 年裡，我完全被灌輸了基督教保守主義，現在我意識到這是美國這個帝國的文化基礎。

Deconstructing Christianity and colonization is a never-ending journey.

解構基督教和殖民化是一個永無止境的旅程。

But we all have to start somewhere because we all have a part to play in building a better, more equitable future.

但我們都必須從某個地方開始，因為我們都有責任建設一個更美好、更公平的未來。

And that's gonna have to start with debunking the idea that we were ever the supreme civilization in the first place.

要做到這一點，首先要推翻我們曾經是最高文明的想法。

My name is Kacey Malone, and I'm so glad you're here.

我叫凱西-馬龍，很高興你能來。

The term Western civilization gets thrown around a lot like it's some unbroken concept of rationality, democracy, and progress.

西方文明這個詞經常被人提起，就好像它是理性、民主和進步的某種不間斷的概念。

You've probably seen it in school curriculums, YouTube explainer videos, or more recently in political speeches.

你可能在學校課程、YouTube 解說視頻或最近的政治演講中見過它。

This tidy narrative that links ancient Greece to Rome, then to the Enlightenment, and finally to the United States as though the moral arc of human history just naturally culminated in a Starbucks on every corner and the United States military patrolling half of the globe.

這種整齊劃一的敘事將古希臘與羅馬、啟蒙運動以及美國聯繫在一起，彷彿人類歷史的道德弧線自然而然地達到了頂點，星巴克遍佈每個角落，美國軍隊在半個地球上巡邏。

That is a narrative that is just marketing and Western civilization is not a neutral, objective, or even positive concept.

這只是一種市場營銷的說法，西方文明並不是一箇中立、客觀甚至積極的概念。

It's a kind of branding carefully constructed to uphold a myth of cultural supremacy.

這是一種精心打造的品牌，旨在維護一種文化至上的神話。

Now, before we get too far into this, Western civilization has traditionally included both the United States and the majority of European countries, though now under the current United States administration, a lot of European countries are understandably wanting to distance themselves from association with said current administration.

現在，在我們深入探討這個問題之前，西方文明傳統上包括美國和大多數歐洲國家，儘管在美國現任政府執政期間，許多歐洲國家希望與美國現任政府保持距離，這是可以理解的。

And I totally get that, but unfortunately for the concepts that I'm talking about in this segment, I am going to be using Western civilization to include European countries because we practiced the same colonization is really what the point is.

我完全明白這一點，但不幸的是，就我在這一部分中談論的概念而言，我將使用西方文明來包括歐洲國家，因為我們實行了同樣的殖民統治，這才是重點所在。

The narrative we're handed goes like this.

Democracy was born in Athens, then went to Rome, then it was preserved through European Christendom, reborn in the enlightenment and the scientific revolution, and finally reaches its full expression in modern Western democracies like the United States.

民主誕生於雅典，之後傳入羅馬，然後在歐洲基督宗教中得到傳承，在啟蒙運動和科學革命中獲得新生，最終在美國等現代西方民主國家中得到充分體現。

That's exactly what I was taught in the evangelical fundamentalist Christian high school I attended.

在我就讀的基督教原教旨福音派高中裡，老師就是這麼教我的。

But this is a carefully edited and intentionally edited story that leaves out most of humanity's contributions and whitewashes the parts of history that don't fit that script, that idea.

但這是一個經過精心剪輯的故事，故意忽略了人類的大部分貢獻，粉飾了不符合劇本和理念的歷史部分。

This concept of Western civilization frames history as a straight line, linear path from Plato to NATO or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, erasing entire cultures and peoples along the way.

這種西方文明的概念將歷史定格為一條直線，一條從柏拉圖到北約或北大西洋公約組織的直線，沿途抹殺了整個文化和民族。

Not that I'm a huge fan of everything NATO does, but you get the point.

我並不是北約的忠實粉絲，但你應該明白我的意思。

So let's go back to Egypt as an example of ancient history that is kind of just brushed aside because it doesn't really fit into the mainstream Western civilization's historical narrative.

是以，讓我們回到埃及，以它的古代史為例，因為它並不符合西方主流文明的歷史敘事，所以被擱置一旁。

Ancient Egypt was much more than what it is usually painted at in most United States public education systems.

古埃及遠不止美國大多數公共教育系統通常所描述的那樣。

We are taught that it was just like a civilization of, you know, like there were pyramids, there were pharaohs, that's it.

我們被教導說，那只是一種文明，你知道，就像有金字塔、有法老，僅此而已。

There, you know, this was also the place where the ancient Israelites were slaves in that one story in the Bible, that's it.

要知道，在《聖經》中的那個故事裡，這裡也是古代以色列人做奴隸的地方，僅此而已。

But the reality is it was also a hub of very advanced science, mathematics, and medicine.

但實際上，它也是一個非常先進的科學、數學和醫學中心。

In fact, there's a lot that we still don't know about how advanced, how civilized that society actually was.

事實上，關於那個社會究竟有多先進、多文明，我們還有很多不瞭解的地方。

But what we do know tells us that long before the Greeks, Egyptians had developed concepts of geometry, surgical tools, solar calendars, and in fact, many of the Greek philosophers we revere and hold up today, like Pythagoras and Plato, traveled to Egypt to study.

但我們所知道的是，早在希臘人之前，埃及人就已經發展出了幾何學、外科手術工具、太陽曆等概念，事實上，我們今天推崇備至的許多希臘哲學家，如畢達哥拉斯和柏拉圖，都曾前往埃及學習。

But modern studies in Western civilization rarely mention this because acknowledging that much of Greek thought was influenced by African civilization kind of complicates the neat little story of European intellectual superiority.

但現代西方文明研究很少提及這一點，因為承認希臘思想的大部分受到非洲文明的影響，就會使歐洲智力優越的小故事變得複雜。

And the same goes for the African empires of Mali, Songhai, and Ethiopia.

馬裡、桑海和衣索匹亞等非洲帝國也是如此。

These were sophisticated states with complex systems of governance, education, and trade, and these are just a few of many that I'm naming.

這些國家都是先進的國家，擁有複雜的治理、教育和貿易體系，而這只是我列舉的眾多國家中的一小部分。

Timbuktu, actually, often used as a metaphor for remoteness, was actually one of the most important intellectual centers in the world during the 14th and 15th centuries.

實際上，廷巴克圖經常被用來比喻偏遠地區，但在 14 和 15 世紀，它實際上是世界上最重要的知識中心之一。

It was a central trading post on the Trans-Saharan caravan route.

它是跨撒哈拉商隊路線上的一箇中心貿易站。

Its libraries held tens of thousands of manuscripts on astronomy, medicine, law, and theology, many written in Arabic, some in indigenous languages.

其圖書館藏有數以萬計的有關天文學、醫學、法律和神學的手稿，其中許多用阿拉伯語書寫，有些用土著語言書寫。

But you don't hear about Mali or Songhai when people talk about the roots of civilization, even though the study of evolution actually traces all of our genetics back to Africa.

但是，當人們談論文明的根源時，你不會聽到馬裡或桑海，儘管進化論的研究實際上將我們所有的基因都追溯到了非洲。

And all of that is because the word civilization in Western usage has always been kind of racially coded.

而這一切，都是因為文明一詞在西方的使用中一直帶有種族色彩。

Indigenous governance systems in the Americas were also, by the way, complex and democratic.

順便提一下，美洲的土著管理制度也是複雜而民主的。

The Haudenosaunee Confederacy, also known as the Iroquois Confederacy, operated under a more sophisticated model of federalism long before the United States Constitution was written.

早在《美國憲法》制定之前，豪德諾索尼部落聯盟（又稱易洛魁部落聯盟）就在一種更為複雜的聯邦制模式下運作。

In fact, some of the founding fathers, including Benjamin Franklin, and I learned this specifically when researching for this segment, openly admired and borrowed ideas from indigenous political structures.

事實上，包括本傑明-富蘭克林在內的一些開國元勳（我在研究本部分內容時專門瞭解到這一點），公開欽佩並借鏡了土著政治結構的思想。

But instead of crediting those systems, of course, the United States positioned native people as savages in need of civilizing.

當然，美國並沒有歸功於這些制度，而是將原住民定位為需要文明化的野蠻人。

Their knowledge systems, their contributions to political thought, their ecological wisdom, all erased.

他們的知識體系、他們對政治思想的貢獻、他們的生態智慧，全都被抹去了。

Western canon wanted nothing to do with it.

And that also makes me bring up the East.

Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist philosophies go back thousands of years, and they do offer deep insights into consciousness, ethics, and the nature of reality.

印度教、耆那教和佛教哲學可追溯到數千年前，它們確實對意識、倫理和現實的本質有深刻的見解。

The Upanishads contain philosophical and metaphysical discourses that rival anything written in the rest, especially the Bible.

奧義書》所包含的哲學和形而上學論述可與其他任何著作相媲美，尤其是《聖經》。

Buddhist logic schools develop system of debate and epistemology that mirror Western rationalism, but we weren't really taught that, were we?

佛教邏輯學派發展的辯論和認識論體系與西方理性主義如出一轍，但我們並沒有真正學到這一點，不是嗎？

These traditions shaped entire civilizations, but they rarely appear in world history textbooks in the United States, unless they're framed as spiritual or mystical rather than intellectual.

這些傳統塑造了整個文明，但它們很少出現在美國的世界歷史教科書中，除非它們被歸類為精神或神祕而非智力。

And we all know how the West loves to promote rationalism over intuition, and that's worked out so well.

我們都知道，西方人喜歡宣揚理性主義，而不是直覺，而這一做法非常奏效。

Edward Said's foundational work called Orientalism, which I haven't read in full, but I know of, and read a few summaries for this segment, this work makes it clear.

愛德華-薩義德（Edward Said）的奠基之作《東方學》（Orientalism），我沒有讀過全文，但我知道這本書，也讀過一些這一部分的摘要，這本書說得很清楚。

He argues that the West only truly defined itself by inventing its opposite, aka the East.

他認為，西方只有通過發明自己的對立面，也就是東方，才能真正定義自己。

Europe constructed the Orient as exotic, irrational, and inferior, so it could see itself as rational, free, and civilized.

歐洲將東方構建為異國情調、非理性和低等的，這樣它就可以將自己視為理性、自由和文明的。

And this binary specifically emerged from empire.

而這種二元論正是從帝國中產生的。

By the way, empire is quite adept at manufacturing distinctions amongst people and creating divisions so that binaries can exist.

順便說一句，帝國非常善於製造人與人之間的區別，製造分裂，從而使二元對立得以存在。

So as Europe expanded through colonization, it needed a story or a narrative that justified its domination so that people could consent to this domination.

是以，當歐洲通過殖民擴張時，它需要一個故事或一種敘事來證明其統治是合理的，這樣人們才能同意這種統治。

And so it told one, that it was the bearer of enlightenment and order in a chaotic, backward world.

它告訴人們，在這個混亂、落後的世界裡，它是啟蒙和秩序的傳播者。

The myth of Western civilization still lingers today in every conversation that positions the Western world as a beacon of liberty and everyone else is catching up.

西方文明的神話至今仍縈繞在每一次談話中，將西方世界定位為自由的燈塔，其他國家都在迎頭趕上。

So when we talk about Western civilization, what we're really talking about is a curated version of history that selectively includes whatever makes Europe and later the United States look like the natural leaders of humanity.

是以，當我們談論西方文明時，我們真正談論的是一個經過精心策劃的歷史版本，它選擇性地包含了任何能讓歐洲和後來的美國看起來像是人類天然領袖的東西。

It's not that Greek philosophy or the enlightenment weren't important, it's that they didn't develop in a vacuum.

這並不是說希臘哲學或啟蒙運動不重要，而是它們並不是在真空中發展起來的。

They were deeply interwoven with and often directly borrowed from other cultures that were later dismissed as primitive or underdeveloped.

它們與後來被視為原始或不發達的其他文化深深交織在一起，而且往往直接借鏡這些文化。

And the worst part of this is the West didn't necessarily just ignore these other knowledge systems or cultures, it actively erased them.

而最糟糕的是，西方並不一定只是忽視了這些其他的知識體系或文化，而是積極地抹殺了它們。

Not just military bases, libraries, not to mention hospitals and civilians.

不僅僅是軍事基地、圖書館，更不用說醫院和平民了。

Missionaries have intentionally and systematically destroyed temples and sacred texts.

傳教士蓄意、有計劃地破壞寺廟和聖典。

Entire languages and oral histories were wiped out in the name of civilization.

整個語言和口述歷史以文明的名義被抹去。

This was an active intellectual colonization and it is why colonization has such a stronghold in the minds of all of us to this day.

這是一種積極的思想殖民，這也是為什麼殖民至今在我們所有人的頭腦中佔有如此重要地位的原因。

European scholars claimed the mantle of universal knowledge while portraying the rest of the world as its raw material where it gets its inspiration, but not its actual manifestation of intellectualism.

歐洲學者聲稱自己擁有普世知識，同時將世界其他地區描繪成其獲取靈感的原材料，但卻不是其知識主義的實際體現。

And this intellectual theft still shapes our world.

而這種知識盜竊仍在影響著我們的世界。

It affects what's taught in schools, who gets published, whose voices seem as authoritative and whose seem as fringe or extreme.

它影響著學校的教學內容，影響著誰能發表文章，影響著誰的聲音顯得權威，誰的聲音顯得邊緣或極端。

It defines the boundaries of credible philosophy and real science, and it reinforces a worldview in which Western institutions are the default, objective, neutral, advanced, while everyone else is seen as derivative, emotional, or spiritual.

它界定了可信哲學和真正科學的界限，並強化了一種世界觀，在這種世界觀中，西方機構是默認的、客觀的、中立的、先進的，而其他所有人都被視為衍生的、情感的或精神的。

When people say the West is more advanced, more rational, or more civilized, they're not stating a fact.

當人們說西方更先進、更理性或更文明時，他們並不是在陳述事實。

Western civilization is not a civilization.

It's a story, a narrative, a brand, a story that justifies empire and cultural eraser.

這是一個故事，一種敘事，一個品牌，一個為帝國和文化抹黑辯護的故事。

And it's time we stop telling it uncritically without really questioning it because the real history of human progress is far more global, collaborative, and interconnected than the myth allows.

現在是時候了，我們不能再不加批判、不加質疑地講述神話了，因為人類進步的真實歷史遠比神話所描述的更具全球性、協作性和相互關聯性。

And when we recognize that, we open ourselves up to a far richer understanding of who we are and who we could become.

當我們認識到這一點時，我們就會對我們是誰以及我們能成為誰有更豐富的理解。

One of the most persistent lies in the myth of Western supremacy is that the West, and particularly Christianity, is somehow responsible for modern scientific advancement.

西方至上神話中最頑固的謊言之一，就是西方，尤其是基督教，對現代科學進步負有某種責任。

We're taught that without the guiding hand of Christianity, the world would still be in the Dark Ages.

我們被教導說，如果沒有基督教的指引，世界仍將處於黑暗時代。

But history tells a very different story.

但歷史卻告訴我們一個截然不同的故事。

The Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution often held up as pinnacles of Western intellectual achievement did not emerge because of the church.

啟蒙運動和科學革命常常被視為西方思想成就的頂峰，但它們的出現並不是因為教會。

And much of the foundational knowledge that powered these so-called Western breakthroughs didn't originate in Europe at all.

而為這些所謂的西方突破提供動力的基礎知識，很多根本不是源自歐洲。

It was inherited, borrowed, or stolen from other civilizations, particularly the Islamic world, South Asia, and East Asia.

它是從其他文明，尤其是伊斯蘭世界、南亞和東亞繼承、借鏡或竊取而來的。

Let's start with the tension between Christianity and early science, which is still very prominent to this day.

讓我們從基督教與早期科學之間的緊張關係說起，這種緊張關係至今仍然非常突出。

Let's remember that the Catholic Church has never been known for nurturing scientific inquiry.

讓我們記住，天主教會從來都不是以培養科學探索精神而聞名的。

It's not out of left field to recognize that it has rather spent a fuck ton of time and energy actively suppressing it.

認識到它花了大量時間和精力積極壓制這一點並不奇怪。

The church maintained a monopoly on knowledge for so long and punished deviation pretty fucking harshly.

教會長期壟斷知識，對偏差的懲罰非常嚴厲。

Scientific progress didn't flourish under Christianity.

在基督教統治下，科學進步並沒有蓬勃發展。

It had to fight its way through it via visionaries like Galileo and Bruno.

它不得不通過像伽利略和布魯諾這樣的有遠見的人在其中掙扎。

Meanwhile, while Europe was slowly crawling out of the intellectual stranglehold of the church, the Islamic world was already thriving in what's now known as the Islamic Golden Age, spanning roughly the 8th to the 14th centuries.

與此同時，當歐洲正在慢慢擺脫教會對知識分子的束縛時，伊斯蘭世界已經開始蓬勃發展，即現在所說的伊斯蘭黃金時代，時間跨度大約為 8 世紀到 14 世紀。

During this time, Muslim scholars and scientists were building libraries, translating Greek and Persian texts and producing groundbreaking original work in every field from mathematics to medicine.

在此期間，穆斯林學者和科學家建立了圖書館，翻譯了希臘文和波斯文典籍，並在從數學到醫學的各個領域取得了突破性的原創成果。

The House of Wisdom in Baghdad became a renowned center of learning and innovation.

巴格達的智慧之家成為著名的學習和創新中心。

It was a research institute, a translation hub, and it was almost also kind of like a think tank all rolled into one.

它是一個研究機構，一個翻譯中心，同時也是一個智囊團。

And this is important because we are constantly getting the message here in the United States about how when you compare the religion of Islam with the religion of Christianity, it's supposedly obvious how backwards and unprogressive and even violent Islam is in comparison with the more modernized, civilized, and even moral faith system of Christianity.

這一點很重要，因為在美國，我們不斷收到這樣的資訊：當你把伊斯蘭教與基督教進行比較時，就會發現伊斯蘭教與更加現代化、文明甚至道德的基督教信仰體系相比，是多麼的落後、不進步甚至暴力。

But as many of you know, I will never stand for the idea of any patriarchal Abrahamic religion to be better than any other.

但正如你們中的許多人所知，我絕不會支持任何宗法亞伯拉罕宗教優於其他宗教的觀點。