In Whitehead’s discussion of civilization in the book The Adventure of Ideas he argues that “[t]he most un-Greek thing that we can do, is to copy the Greeks. (353)†This argument comes from the historical look at all civilizations looking towards perfection by trying to copy the past. For Whitehead, this is a great perversion of the real point of civilization, which is not a static system that is called perfect but rather a system constantly in flux that is perfection. Whitehead explains that a civilized society exhibits five basic qualities and then goes on to explain these qualities, although he does so in an awkwardly ordered fashion – explaining three before he even talks about civilization. The five qualities are Truth, Beauty, Adventure, Art and Peace.

Truth and Beauty are both explained before they are attached to any purpose in explaining civilization and involve two similar concepts. Truth applies to Appearance only and is a marker of its conformity to Reality. For the purposes of people, the truth-relation lies in how an actuality conforms to a given proposition. For a person or a civilization propositions are given, expected to thought about and then what comes can fit the proposition or not, and to the degree that it does then the proposition – the preferred Appearance – is true. Truth is also a reflection of how sense perception reflects reality. According to Whitehead, “[t]he blunt truth that we require is the conformal correspondence of clear and distinct Appearance to Reality, (321)†and clear and distinct Appearance primarily comes from sense-perception.

The second quality a civilization exhibits is that of Beauty, which involves first the absence of mutual inhibition among prehensions so that no one inhibits the full intensity of any other. This, for Whitehead, is the minor form of beauty and the major form then comes and adds to it the condition that the synthesis of several prehensions adds new contrasts of objective content with objective content, leading to totally new conformal intensities of feelings and thus raising each part at the same time as creating a novel whole. Thus, both objective content, prehensions and occasions may all be deemed beautiful, but for differing reasons. Furthermore, Whitehead argues that since beauty can also be defined as the perfection of subjective form that discord and what he calls aesthetic destruction are the opposites of this perfection. However, discord can also end up creating a greater perfection than beauty alone by promoting progress and preventing stagnation of a civilization. Civilization’s maintenance requires more than education on what is true and what is beautiful, it requires adventure and adventure needs discord to ensure it continues.

The third important quality of civilization is adventure, and this the quality that ensures civilization continues and keeps the other qualities in check. Metaphysically, Whitehead argues that the very essence of real actuality is process and that all actual things must be understood in terms of their becoming and perishing. Under this metaphysical scheme, he also contends that humankind has only two options – advance or decadence – because perfection is achieved, perfection is the act of achieving. It is from this notion that past civilizations are discussed and it is argued that our advance towards perfection cannot be based on trying to attain the society of Athens because that is antithetical to progress. Athens in its prime was not a static, perfect civilization but a progressive, constantly perfecting system. It wasn’t until it fell into a static form, repeating its own art and narrowly defining perfection as what it had that it fell into decadence and became no longer desirable. Every civilization at its culmination should have a large measure of realization of a certain type of perfection, not all perfections, and this civilization can maintain itself at that culmination as long as fresh experimentation within the type is possible, but as soon as repetition becomes the norm then decadence has set in and the civilization is no longer exhibiting the quality of adventure. A good mark of decadence and the failing of a civilization, according to Whitehead, is satire, because it is the “last flicker of originality†(358) once freshness has gone and bitterness remains. For a civilization to continue it needs adventure and it continues the adventure so long as it maintains a real contrast between what has been and what may be.

This adventure is often maintained and fueled by another quality of civilization, art. Art can both be a benefit and a detriment to adventure and civilization but is certainly necessary. For art to be beneficial it should aim at the production of individuality in the component details of its compositions. The individuality provides discord to the whole at the same time as it is synthesized into something more than each part. Art needs to reflect civilization in its adventure towards perfection by at once emphasizing the individual and the whole.

The final quality of a civilized society is that of Peace, not in the political sense but in the mode of the “Harmony of Harmonies which calms destructive turbulence and completes civilization. (367)†This is not a stagnation or an An æsthesia as Whitehead terms the inhibition of intensity via one component, but rather a trust in the efficacy of Beauty that preserves the springs of energy and also masters them for the avoidance of paralyzing distractions. This peace is what maintains the vigor of civilized societies by promoting the wide-spread sense that high aims are worth-while. In his explanation of adventure he argues that if a civilization becomes decadent than imagination comes to the forefront and beats out actualization such that the civilization falls and a new one comes about. It is the quality of peace that prevents this feeling of discontent from arising in individuals such that they no longer find an output for their adventure in that of the society’s. “Zest of human adventure presupposed for its material a scheme of things with a worth beyond any single occasion, (372)†and it is peace that ensures this presupposition is maintained.

Finally, with all qualities explained, the middle chapter offers some conclusions. First, all civilizations – epochs – eventually die out because the leap of imagination will reach beyond the safe limits of the learned rules and tastes. Moreover, this means that moral codes should be viewed not as undeniable universalized truths of action but rather “behavior-patterns which in the environment for which [they are] designed will promote the evolution of that environment towards its proper perfection. (377)†Only when taken as universal do they impede progress by offering decadence in its place. All five qualities work together, Truth making actualities seem more Beautiful, beauty being the linchpin of continued peace, art promoting all of these qualities and adventure ensuring their continuance and correct usage. A civilization, then, is that which exalts all of these qualities and does so in a manner which promotes each individual as well as each individual promoting the whole in a great creative synthesis.