It's typical of the ancient Greeks that they conceived of forethought and afterthought as divine siblings, Prometheus and Epimetheus. The ironic antithesis between the two had to be a source of tragedy and comedy, as has become in modern American culture. Although Americans love to think of themselves in Promethean terms, and we do have extraordinary examples -- Steve Jobs the latest of a long line of American Prometheans -- I believe America's Promethean Age is over. We now are in a period in which we celebrate Epimethean "heroes," the likes of which can be seen in Presidents Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
There once was a time when forethought was valued. We see great moments in American history during the Theordore Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt administrations; through literature and the arts, the sectarian darkness of European thought have been challenged by the likes of Raplh Waldo Emerson, Herman Melville, William James, Eric Hoffer, and Hunter S. Thompson; business and industry have been transformed by innovators like Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs. And, very possibly, we may continue to produce that kind of promethean thinking.
From where I sit today, though, I see a lot of epimethean thinking, and worse, a celebration of that kind of thinking. I too have been seduced into the "age of reflection" as reflecting became a celebrated practice of academics and professionals. But, ultimately reflection is nothing more than regret and sorrow, hashing out what has been, and can't be changed with any amount of thought. This simple practice of jumping into wars or economic strategies without any forethought and then later, saying "I'm sorry, I f**ked up" has led us into a deep national debt and despair. It's not good enough to look back and muse upon how one made mistakes when a little up front thinking and planning might have avoided stupid errors like the deregulation of the airlines, stock markets, and interstate commerce (Reagan), the fatal deregulation of banks (Clinton), and the infinitely stupid and unprovoked wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (Bush the 2nd). Now we're experiencing the failure of air, rail, and public transportation systems; the collosal collapse of the financial system; the spirally public debt that may prevent any future generation of enjoying the same quality of life as the post-WWII generation. Now there's very little satisfaction in the afterthoughts of commentators, critics, and politicians who think a "Oops, we goofed" is and adequate apology for little or no forethought.
What happened in the last four decades to lead a great nation into the Epimethean Age? On a very basic level, American society moved from a culture of planning and saving for the future to one that lived for today by borrowing against the future. We started to use easy credit (the age of the credit card started in the 60s and 70s) to avoid having to plan and save. We could wave a credit card at every issue, borrowing against time with an unfounded faith in future receipts.