In ‘Unclear Background’, the author aims to demonstrate that ordinary answers to questions of a general nature are not exhaustive. He begins with Voltaire, in whose opinion the wish to rob has caused all wars. The author of this essay points to three particularly important wars where the wish to get rich did not function as a cause. These three are: the Hundred Years’ War, the War of the Spanish Succession, and the Franco-Prussian War. The reason why the heliocentric system, the possibility of which was conceived in ancient times, did not gain general acceptance until the modern era is just as unclear (in the author’s opinion). The author sees that the modern era differs from preceding eras in the change in the way the world is seen: previously, submission to the world was seen as mankind’s duty (of divine origin), while in the modern era, people start wishing to subjugate the world.
By developing natural sciences, mankind advanced over the course of three centuries to where Friedrich Schiller, the famous German writer, could write: compared to Europe, the rest of the world’s continents do not really come into consideration to any extent.
A hundred years earlier, Peter I already proved by his actions that he recognised Europe’s supremacy. The Japanese started copying Europeanness in the 19th century.
In the 20th century, modern Europe became the model for the Islamic world and China. Europe’s earlier culture, including Christianity, was not needed, but the modern attitude towards life, the wish to subjugate the world, has found favour everywhere. Europeans in the 16th century did not know that ‘by discovering man and the world’ (Jacob Burchardt), they were creating a religion that the whole world was to start practicing.