As strange as it may seem, there are many cultures whose concept of ‘time’ literally do not include any recognition of a ‘future.’ While this may seem an innocuous and harmless notion, unfortunately it may be symptomatic of a dark cultural malaise.
Sounding an alarm about the danger this presents to Western culture, UK podcaster Connor Tomlinson recently warned that “we don’t understand how Africa thinks” and that “we don’t understand how the third world thinks.” In two separate presentations warning about the risks and dangers of immigration by people who fail to conceptualize any concept of a ‘future,’ his insights and analysis certainly do explain many behaviors and attitudes about such immigrants not previously understood.
Citing the African concepts of Sasa (Sasha) and Zamani as the two dimensions of time, he concludes that “we can’t have a civilization if people don’t think the future exists.”
Sasa is described by African philosophers as the “now, the recent past and the immediate future which can be experienced.” Zamani is the “vast endless past where all events eventually go on to live forever, but the ‘future’ in African thought barely exists.” Continue reading »