Civilization #12: The Tyranny of Alexander the Great

Okay, so we are doing Exum the Great today. Let us review last class where we discussed the father -son dynamic between Philip II and his son Alexander, okay? We said that the father, he is the founder and the builder of a great organization and as such he will have three particular characteristics unique to him, okay? First of all, he will exercise really good judgment because he's starting with nothing and he has to build up slowly his nation or his organization, okay? Second thing that we said is he will promote talent, okay? He will be a very generous and fair -minded individual who will actively spot talent and create a meritocracy, okay? And the third thing we said was this person will be selfless, extremely disciplined, and this person will put the greater good before his or her own interests, okay? And that will inspire loyalty from his or her workers or soldiers.

We also said the son will be very different, okay? Because the son is inheriting this enterprise or this nation. The son will focus on expansion growth, okay? So the son will be, the son will be a very aggressive risk taker, okay? The second characteristic of the son is because he is under the father's shadow, he will promote obedience and loyalty, promote loyalty. And the final characteristic, the final contrast between father and son is the son will be very selfish, late the son will be very selfish, because the son will be focused on personal glory not And the reason why is the son is insecure, right? The son will hear people in the background, in the shadows, whispering, oh, everything you've achieved is because of your father. And so the son is desperate, very anxious, to prove his own self -worth, okay? So we see this dynamic in literature and in history, in our own lives, right? This is a very common dynamic.

Now, we said that this would be a, this is really a thought experiment, okay? But if you think about it, this is also a analytical model, okay? It's a way to understand the world around us. And in an analytical model, we have to test if it's true or not. And if it's true, it does two things, okay? First thing it does is it explains. Does it help us understand, better understand the motivations and behavior of people around us? In last class, we focused on Philip II, and that really helped us to understand his motivations and behavior, okay? Today, but the second thing it must do is predict, okay? It has to predict the future. If this analytical model that we have is correct, then it will allow us to predict future events and behavior. Okay, and that's what I propose today. I propose to use this model to predict the life of Alexander the Great, okay?

So, from this model, we can extrapolate three characteristics of Alexander's reign when he takes over as king, okay? What's the first characteristic of Alexander when he becomes king, okay? Echo, do you have any ideas of what he will do as king? Exactly, okay? So, the first thing we will say is that he will focus on expansion, okay? He'll be a very aggressive risk -taker. He will take risks that are not strategically wise, okay? That's the first prediction we can make about him. What's the second prediction we can make about him based on this? Exactly, and we call this a tyrant, okay? He's gonna become a tyrant, and a tyrant is someone who, who demands obedience from everyone, okay? Does that make sense? And so, if he's a tyrant, what is he gonna do to all these tyrant people that his father promoted? He's gonna kill them, right? Okay, he's gonna

get rid of them because he needs to promote his own people and because his tyrant people will counter his tyranny, okay? So, we predict he will demand complete and total obedience. From his followers, okay? And what's the third prediction we can make about him? Well, the third prediction is that he, the question is, will he ever be happy? When will he stop his ambition? Never, okay? So, his ambition is boundless. So, these are the three predictions we can make about Alexander if he were to become king, just based on our understanding of the father -son dynamic, okay? The first is that, if he were to become king, he will focus on aggressive expansion. He will take risks that his father will not take, okay? That's the first thing. Second thing is, he's gonna become a tyrant who will demand total loyalty and obedience from his followers. And if you, for his own good, speak up

and try to reason with him, he will see you as a threat, as disloyal, and as an enemy who must be eliminated, okay? The third prediction we can make is his ambition is boundless. He will never stop expanding. He will never stop going to war, okay? These are the three predictions we can make based on this analytical model, okay? And it turns out, these three predictions basically capture the essence of Alexander's life, okay? All right? So, now I will slowly explain the life and times of Alexander the Great. All right? So, any questions so far? Okay, so we are using this analytical model to understand the life and times of Alexander the Great. And while we're doing this, we're trying to see if there are problems with this model, okay? All right, so we have to take a very skeptical attitude. We have this prediction model. We're gonna use it, we're gonna apply it to

Alexander the Great, and we're gonna see that on the surface, it does actually capture well, or explains well. What is his life? At the same time, we want to be generous and skeptical, okay? We want to ask ourselves, is it possible that we are blinded by our prejudice? And maybe we are being unfair to Alexander the Great, okay? Does that make sense? All right, so let's start with the first major event in Alexander the Great's life, which is the death of his father in 333 BCE, okay? And Alexander right now, he's only 20. And when his father dies, he is automatically coronated as the king of Macedon. Now, I want to explain the circumstances of Philip's death, because it's very important for us to understand the sort of psychology of his son. So two years before his death, Philip actually remarried, okay? Now, remember that Macedon is a society that promotes polygamy, okay?

So Philip, at this point, already has six or seven wives. The problem is that only one of his wives, named Olympias, has given birth to a son, and therefore a heir, okay? The son is Alexander. The other wives have failed to give birth to a heir. And it seems Alexander will be anointed king at the death of his father. So when Philip marries, her name is Cleopatra Eurydice, it's extremely controversial. Controversial. Okay, and it disrupts the political order of Macedonia. The first reason is Cleopatra Eurydice, she is actually Macedonian before Philip married foreign wives for diplomacy reasons and what this means is if Cleopatra Eurydice gives birth to a son This son will be more legitimate I'll be more legitimate here than Alexander and this pushes Alexander out of the line of succession. Okay So this is extremely Controversial and it's like dynamite almost. Okay, so that's first problem. Second problem is Eurydice is the wife of One of Philip's great generals at Attalus.

Okay, and actually at the wedding ceremony Between Eurydice and Philip, Attalus gave a toast and he said here's a toast and I pray that Macedon will soon have a legitimate here and this is direct insult to Alexander. Okay. The other problem is that Attalus his father -in -law is Parmenion Who is really Philip's partner. Okay, the greatest general that Macedon has the person in control of the army Okay, so it seems like Alexander is being pushed out of the line of succession and Alexander and his mother Olympias are both freaking out. Okay, so in 336 BCE Philip is assassinated by his bodyguard and no one knows Who why this happened? Okay, but we know what happened afterwards what happened is first of all Olympias killed Eurydice and her her Daughter and son the son was going to be legitimate here to the throne now. They're all dead. Okay,

that's the first thing that happens second thing that happens is Attalus Becomes afraid and he's about to rebel. Okay, and that's listen again. It's a general at this stage at this point