The Nature Of Humanity – Dantes Inferno Essay, Research Paper
The Nature of Humanity
There are many differences between modern society and Dante s perception Florence, Italy. These differences are caused by the passage of time. The society depicted in Dante s Inferno is almost completely different than modern society, when taken at face value. The one factor that ties the two together is their inhabitation by Humans. The Human s that inhabit both time periods have very similar ways of thinking, which is displayed in their actions. The sins of the people of Dante s world are much the same as the sins committed by the people of today’s society, how, if at all, has humanity changed?
Although civilization and the world around humanity has changed, human nature has not changed. Many things have changed sense Dante s times due to the advancing technology of the world. Things like increased sanitation, the automobile, the airplane, and many others have shaped the way we live, work, and play. These things have changed the methods used to live, but they have not changed the motivations behind following these methods. Although it comes about in different ways, the motivation of greed, fame, pleasure, and other darker desires still dwells within humanity. These factors cause humans to constantly change and advance themselves, but the motivation behind far too many people s success lies in one of those categories.
Because the society around humanity has changed, the methods of committing sin have changed, but the nature of the sin has not changed at all. In Dante s time, if someone wanted something untouchable, they might have been able to duel for it, whereas in modern times, hi-tech espionage and terrorism fulfills the same desire. In Dante s Florence, if one desired revenge, a face-to-face confrontation would occur, but, due to the advanced in technology, assassins and sniper equipment could be used to carry out the same task. If a ruler in Dante s times wanted to expand their empire, they fought until one side was defeated, modern warfare tends to involve many, many countries and other factors like diplomacy and nuclear weapons play their rolls, but the motivation behind it all is still greed. In Dante s Florencs, prostitution was not such a vise as it is today, and although modern society has to break laws, they still manage to partake in it.
Through the evolution of human civilizations, the technology level of the world is constantly increasing. These changes have affected nearly every facet of a person s life, but it has not affected human nature. By nature, a human desires to be happy, at peace with the world around it. Many things can stray someone off of that path to happiness, which is maybe more common toady then in the past because of the large mass of people on the earth. Dante was in the middle of another group of peoples struggle to attain greatness, which they though would bring them happiness, when he discovered his quest for happiness being disrupted by these people. Much of the same type of thing goes on today, people are trampled by other striving to attain greatness, just showing another level of the greed built into human nature.
It is clearly apparent that although time and the surroundings of humanity has changed, human nature, the driving force from within, has changed little. The forces that drove people to commit sin in Dante s time still dwells within the depth of each and every human on the face of the earth. It is very unlikely that this has changed much, and even less likely, based on our societies growing acceptance of imperfection, that it will ever change. The only way to avoid the fate depicted in Dante s Inferno is to have enough self control to fight the age-old evil that resided within every human on the face of the earth.