Disrespecting Modernity

[Griff]

As much as I like the idea of pulling a Jerimiah Johnson and disappearing into the wilderness with a good knife and a bag of salt, as a Dad I'm pretty cool with modernity. All that we have today, both good and bad, is a construction on the past. Kids worked in coal fields to get us to the point where we can poo poo innovation like the earth quake dampening ball in Taipei or high yield agriculture. I wonder if the contempt for now is at its root a lack of understanding of human history. We have great problems before us, but the tools we have to deal with them are way beyond using a honey covered stick to catch ants for dinner.

[lookout123]

i think at the root the contempt for modern life is based in an unhappiness with how the individual is fairing in life. when life is stressful and hard and not what the person had dreamed about, it is easy to romanticize the past and believe things were better then. They gloss over the downside of life in that era and only remember the great.

have you ever worked with someone who complains about how things were better last year before the changes the new manager made? Now think about that person a year ago. they were probably saying the exact same thing because they are living in the past ever single day and not enjoying the positives of the new day. I think contempt for modern life is the same thing on a larger scale.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Make them all live with an outhouse for one year.

[DanaC]

In the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth, there was a growth in cultural pessimism. I don't think this is any different to what we see today. Every age seemingly can look into its past and find a golden time when men were happier and more content. Close examination of the past rarely backs up that sentiment.


Two hundred years ago a common treatment for eczema was to rake the skin with wire brushes. Personally I thank modernity every time I pick up a prescription for cortico steroids :P

[Undertoad]

Modern dentistry is almost pain-free!

If you haven't seen HDTV, boy I tellya it's great! You're gonna love it!

If you want, you can get salad and spring water at McDonald's!

Awesome - I can wear a T-shirt to work!

With Teva sandals, who needs flip-flops -- or shoes for that matter?

Excellent microbrewery techniques have great-tasting beer in bottles at my local beverage outlet!

With a pill every month, my beloved dog is guaranteed free of heartworm.

Looky how I can put 20 albums of music on this device the size of a credit card, and hear it with awesome headphones, in 99.9% fidelity and the battery lasts like forever.

I am almost never bored for longer than five minutes. My phone has games on it!

[Griff]

That may be the problem. So many things are so automatic, easy, and cheap they are not even noticed. Do people think about the work behind what we have?

You wouldn't want HDTV without modern dentistry.

[limey]

Isn't a lot of today's technology about taking us away from the here and now? Listening to music on headphones while out on a run, talking on the phone when ot walking on holiday? Don't get me wrong - listening to music or chatting on the phone are great, but the trend is toward multitasking, distracting yourself from what you're doing. I'm not saying we should go back to the grow your own, kill your own lifestyle but perhaps a little more focus on now, a little more awareness of the present, wouldn't be a bad thing?

[Griff]

Originally Posted by limey

Isn't a lot of today's technology about taking us away from the here and now?

Very true. We do have a choice though. People have to figure out what's going to work for them. My main thought is that our baseline standard of life is so high we can lose sight of how good we have it. I couldn't be as connected as UT, that is too much input for me. My choices are more in line with regularjoe's. I believe we should choose carefully, but letting others choose for themselves is a value too.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Good point, how many actually choose, as opposed to keeping up with the Joneses, going along with the crowd? Competing with peers to have the latest, newest, biggest, unaware of the social costs.

Maybe the need for more and more distraction, is actually avoiding thinking.

[Phage0070]

Originally Posted by limey

I'm not saying we should go back to the grow your own, kill your own lifestyle but perhaps a little more focus on now, a little more awareness of the present, wouldn't be a bad thing?

That is an excellent argument against disrespecting modernity. As modern people we have more awareness of the present than ever before in history; I can keep tabs on my aunt in Washington state from South Carolina without waiting 6 months for a letter to *perhaps* come through. People accuse society of being "out of touch" with their common man, when they don't realise that not long ago you would have had to *walk* a few miles between farms just to talk!

If anything we could use people to be more oriented toward progress. Stop yammering about how much you love looking at trees, and find a way to fertilize bauxite-laden rain forest soil so people can farm it without slash and burn methods. Stop taking for granted technology, stop being comfortable with our current progress, and make things better!

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Phage0070

snip~ not long ago you would have had to *walk* a few miles between farms just to talk!~snip

Now we blow by the neighbors farm at 50mph, windows up, climate control on, 250 watt sound system blocking ambient bird chirps and squirrel chatter, yammering on the phone with someone we saw 5 minutes ago or will see in 5 minutes, maybe noticing whether the neighbors car is in the yard.

[regular.joe]

The tree outside my house is simply awesome, better then HDTV!

The conversation I had with a friend today, in person, was enjoyable, thought provoking.

The quiet time I had with some meditation and contemplation today was simply amazing.

These things will NEVER change and will always be available.

All of these technological advances are really the background to my life, the warp and woof of my life is the relationships with the people in my family, friends, and co-workers.

And yea, the day I had 5 teeth pulled, I was very glad for modern dentistry. AND the day I survived a complex ambush with a quarter sized chunk of jagged metal in my arm, I was very glad for modern medicine.

[Cloud]

nostalgia is a favorite human pastime, which is never going to change. Whether you respect it or not, we live in the age we live in. Keep the best of the old and forge on with the new.

[Sundae]

Isn't the point that the monkey mind has always been there? Society has always been about keeping up with the neighbours. And I doubt if 200 years ago those who "had" had much of an idea of how much work others put in to make sure they had it.

Many wonders of the Industrial Age were created by men who had servants, a wife to rule them all and children who were confined to the nursery or boarding school. America's Founding Fathers probably couldn't have cooked their own meals.

Unless your ideal is basic subsistance, there isn't a golden age you can go back to and even then it wouldn't be one that created anything outside itself.

Honestly - I would love the chance to go back to a more basic way of living. Hard hard work, long hours, responding to nature and the pull of my own body. Might stop me thinking so much, living in my own emotions, sabotaging all my own best efforts and destroying my own dreams. But with a choice not to, it's not a valid option. I'm stuck with this life and the most honest thing is to live it or die trying. Or join a cult I suppose.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

Isn't the point that the monkey mind has always been there?

Sure but for most of human history there was a need to obsess for survival. Now when we obsess about stuff its often trivial. Quieting the mind helps us order our lives in the absence of a real threat of starvation etc...