From: spike66 (spike66@attbi.com)
Date: Thu May 09 2002 - 20:51:26 MDT
Harvey Newstrom wrote:
>
> On Thursday, May 9, 2002, at 01:37 am, spike66 wrote:
>
>> You can have both. Life is simpler now than ever before,
>> and getting simpler all the time.
>
Perhaps I should have made it clearer I was only referring to survival.
>>
> I disagree, Spike. Modern people have to do taxes
sure, or pay someone else to do them.
> follow complicated politics,
Why?
> work TVs
Why?
> and VCRs
Mine flashes 12:00.
> use microwaves to cook, etc.
Which is so very much simpler than the old fashioned way. Since
you mention that example, the most popular microwave at work
is the one which has but one dial, a timer dial. Put the food in there,
turn that dial, when you hear the bell its lunchtime. Compare that
to the skill required just to start a fire.
> Basic math, reading, writing and computer skills are required for
> minimal jobs.
Depends on how you define basic. The businesses around here are
crying for minimum wagers to mop floors, trim hedges, sweep
drives and pick up trash. Kids wont do it, too undignified.
> I think there were fewer skills in the olden days.
For survival only, one can eke out a living by standing
on the street corner holding a "will work for food" sign,
even within sight of half a dozen permanently mounted
"help wanted" signs. I saw one bum with enough sense
of humor to hold a sign that said "too damn lazy to work"
sign. People were laughing and giving him money.
Compare that to the Frontier House families that labored
from dawn until dusk and still weren't producing enough
to survive the winter.
> I used to live on a farm and kill/eat our own animals and produce. I
> am not underestimating the work, because I lived much of it. My life
> is much more complicated than it used to be. I have a lot more power,
> resources, access and potential than ever before, but it takes more
> skill to manage all these new abilities.
Harvey, you and I are prospering. Every person reading this
comment right now is prospering. Not one of you is hungry,
(with the possible exception of JR Molloy and the CRers.)
To really prosper, sure it requires a lot of skills. But to just
survive in the modern world is a snap. There is an area in
downtown Milpitas where the huffers hang out. They snort
paint, solvents, whatever toxic chemical they can find. These
are tragic wrecks of humanity, broken shells of life,
sloppily high all the time. Somehow these wretches manage
to survive, in spite of themselves.
> Are you saying that learning to fish, or learning to kill and pluck a
> chicken takes longer than learning to drive or learning to use
> Windows? I doubt it.
But one need not drive or use Windows to survive. Actually
I think using Windows works against survival. Learning to
fish? The previously mentioned wretches can survive by
fishing cast off spoils from the dumpster behind every
grocery store.
> getting a computer job takes many years of training.
Sure, of course computer jobs are not the only jobs.
> Hell, just learning to read or do algebra or basic science...
I suspect that most modern adults have little or no
algebra skills and no practical knowledge of basic science.
> is much more complicated than learning to weed the garden or go
> fishing. I'm not trying to denigrate those skills, but they are a
> small set of survival skills. Being a modern renaissance person
> trying to explore the universe and discover new ideas is much more
> complicated than mere survival.
I catch your drift. We should redefine the question thus:
is it getting simpler or more complicated to be an
average prole in society? Middle of the pack. Then
vs now. I argue that basic survival has become
laughably easy. To be at the top of the heap has
become mind-boggling complicated. Has it gotten
easier or harder to be average?
Where I am going with this is showing that specialization
is allowing us to survive without knowing how most
of the machinery of life works. Our car breaks, we
take it to the mechanic. (Well, others do). We need
not know how it works. We need not know how the
grocery store gets filled with highly processed foods,
need not know how to do taxes, need not know how
the national defense system works. (Evidence: newspaper
writers spill gallons of ink writing about how the national
defense system works when it is perfectly clear in the
first paragraph that they know not the first thing about
their topic.)
Massive specialization allows us to thrive with a fraction
of the broad knowledge base required by our ancestors.
In exchange, we super-specialize in one narrow field and
learn it well. Harvey, you have already forgotten more
about computers than I will ever know. But you need
not master other areas of knowledge.
Our specialized society depends on all its parts. In 1883
(the setting of the Frontier House) if a meteor destroyed
a major city, the rest of the nation would go right on. Today,
if any major city is taken out, society will not work right
for some time.
If we extrapolate forward another 30 years, I expect
ever more specialization and ever more people who
forget basic survival skills. We might even see a
reality-based game show where the contestants
play a "Survivor" game with a technology level
like that available in 1950. spike
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