Modern Tech Versus the Past 219
Posted
by
ScuttleMonkey
from the bring-back-gladiators dept.
from the bring-back-gladiators dept.
CNETNate writes "Most of us assume modern life is the peak of human achievement, but is it really? CNET decided to take a look at the major technologies of the modern world and compare them to their closest equivalent of pre-digital mankind — Facebook vs. dinner parties, World of Warcraft vs. actual war craft, iPhones vs. hills on fire — and the results are surprising. And slightly dumb, so laugh."
Probably 1940s peak of USA (Score:2, Interesting)
You could make the argument that for many people the 1940s-1950s was the present local peak of the USA. Since that time, due to resource exhaustion, increasing population and foolish trade deals, the standard of living has dropped in relative terms, the opportunities are not what they were, there's more aggravation, less optimism. The writing is worse, reporting is worse, the arts are terrible and people actually build less and make less. We're just shoved into boxes with sex and drugs but can't really ever get out of it, lest we bump into someone else's box. Yeah, if you weren't white, it sucked, but I'd bet we'd reach a point where due to declining wealth, where even the disenfranchised black guy in the 1940s had more real wealth than a near future free black guy of today. Certainly this is true in Detroit...
So what was the Slashdot of the past . . . ? (Score:5, Interesting)
Craftsmen's Guilds come to mind: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild [wikipedia.org]. "They were organized in a manner something between a trade union, a cartel and a secret society . . . tended to form associations based on their trades . . . each of whom controlled secrets of traditionally imparted technology, the "arts" or "mysteries" of their crafts."
They had bizarre initiation rituals, We have goatse.
They had secret phrases. We have, "in Soviet . . . X, Y's you!"
They had a monopoly on their trade. We get outsourced.
Oh, I guess they won.
I say late 1960's - early 1970's was the peak. (Score:5, Interesting)
The Apollo program and moon landings were surely the peak of the USA.
Re:You don't have to go that far back... (Score:4, Interesting)
nostalgia (Score:5, Interesting)
Telegraph vs internet: If you wanted to, you could use VOIP to send the right audio dots and dashes in morse code only this time there's nothing stopping you. The major draw for the author seems to be the scarcity of such communication back in the time period when telegraphs were the big thing.
Twitter vs gossip: gossip isn't dead. There's no evidence that Twitter destroyed gossip, it just went online. A far more efficient means of spreading rumors.
Facebook vs Dinner party: Same as above. The author seems to pine for a time when the world was very disconnected.
World of Warcraft vs Actual war craft: Iraq? War isn't anything to be pinning for.
Swine flu mass-panic vs The plague: not a very good comparison. Try AIDS and the plague.
Iphone vs fire on a hill: Same scarcity makes it cool argument.
Viruses vs the Trojan horse: not really a fair comparison. There's tons of military strategies that put that horse to shame.
MP3s vs Tribal chants: We still have those. Heck, my friends and I went to Denver just to see a few.
Post-Enlightenment scientific rigour vs Superstition and quack doctors: Yeah that living to the old age of 30 sounds great. Get me a piece of that action... We've still got voodoo nonsense and you're free to go get "treated" by one if you wish.
Re:this is a joke? (Score:4, Interesting)
We have: use your wimpy moderation points to bury it.
They had: kill it with fire.
Re:not always quite so (Score:2, Interesting)
Actually there were some pretty clever medics 'way back when. When Henry V took an arrow in the cheek, one surgeon devised a tool to reach down into the wound and extract the arrow stub.
http://www.rcpsg.ac.uk/hdrg/2006Nov3.htm
Not that such treatment would be available to everyone, of course. I've always thought that pre-antibiotics, if you made it to adulthood, your immune system was tough. You'd proved yourself resistant to or at least able to deal with all those childhood diseases without modern treatments. There were *some* valuable herbal and folklore remedies, but imagine the prospect of facing smallpox, bubonic plague, cholera, typhus, even measles without antibiotics, anti-pyretics, a decent diet, and good hygiene.
Re:Better comparisons (Score:3, Interesting)