The inability to imagine.

[JPK Huson 1863]

There's so much. The new fridge, supposedly your ' hub '? Look inside while you're at the store? Just no. I'd rather forget eggs. We're being asked/told/conditioned past what another generation enjoyed- which was peace, really. If you buy into tech you'd spend a HUGE amount of time programming alllll your apps to run your house, then your life, and your children's lives- all on a screen. All that depends on paying your phone bill each month or it all goes poof. So was any of this progress or just various goodies we've been conditioned to accept we can't do without? I'm lucky, just generally hate phones ( not a crank, honest, just have always detested the things without knowing why ) - it's been easy to resist the new ones, too.

I think perhaps it is wheat-chaff, as far as belief systems, what philosophies and world views were in place ' then '. You do not see society wide poetry rages, for Heaven's sake, as in the past, or huge community parades or very nearly comprehensive church memberships ( more community than religious, especially in small towns ). Seems to me we spent an awful lot of time interested in the world around us, next to us and beneath our feet. Tech is great used beautifully- just saw where some college students for Heaven's sake used a 3-D printer and gave a child an arm. Tech + awareness = best of both worlds.

Anything separating us more has taken us backwards hence created a less sophisticated society- easy to be fooled because this whole technology thing is so impressive.

 

[Yankeedave]

There's so much. The new fridge, supposedly your ' hub '? Look inside while you're at the store? Just no. I'd rather forget eggs. We're being asked/told/conditioned past what another generation enjoyed- which was peace, really. If you buy into tech you'd spend a HUGE amount of time programming alllll your apps to run your house, then your life, and your children's lives- all on a screen. All that depends on paying your phone bill each month or it all goes poof. So was any of this progress or just various goodies we've been conditioned to accept we can't do without? I'm lucky, just generally hate phones ( not a crank, honest, just have always detested the things without knowing why ) - it's been easy to resist the new ones, too.

I think perhaps it is wheat-chaff, as far as belief systems, what philosophies and world views were in place ' then '. You do not see society wide poetry rages, for Heaven's sake, as in the past, or huge community parades or very nearly comprehensive church memberships ( more community than religious, especially in small towns ). Seems to me we spent an awful lot of time interested in the world around us, next to us and beneath our feet. Tech is great used beautifully- just saw where some college students for Heaven's sake used a 3-D printer and gave a child an arm. Tech + awareness = best of both worlds.

Anything separating us more has taken us backwards hence created a less sophisticated society- easy to be fooled because this whole technology thing is so impressive.

Perfect ma'am. You don't know what you've got till its gone. And the flip side of the same coin 'you don't miss something you've never had.'

 

[Yankeedave]

Let me also add that one of the final markers of the decline of a civilization is its decline in language. We have a part of our nation who are fairly illiterate and have no drive to solve the problem. I was told one day 'since I don't understand what you said I will take it as an insult. ?!

 

[Yankeedave]

If you have never read it, Yankeedave, you may enjoy a book called "Where Did You Go? Out. What Did You Do? Nothing," about the kind of childhood you enjoyed.

Also the author of "How do do nothing with nobody all by yourselves"! Nice.

 

[48th Miss.]

It was an interesting article but it needed to go into more depth, it posed a question without considering all the variables. Do I think that we are more sophisticated than our ancestors, well, that all depends on which period of history we are asked to compare ourselves to. I'm old enough to remember living in a house without a phone or a television, I spent years never having seen a computer and I also remember using a map to navigate my way around the country. Am I more sophisticated because I now have these things at my disposal, not really. I'm the same person I have always been, I don't know how many people are aware of Maslow's 'Hierarchy of needs' but they are fundamental human needs, they have never changed and never will change, in that respect we are exactly the same as our ancestors.
Maslow's Theory, you start at the bottom of the pyramid and work your way up, these are your needs for survival in prioritised order. Every single human regardless of the time period that they lived in will need the basics, even today people don't always make it to the top of the pyramid, the truth is, people struggle to make it past the first step, perhaps some of our ancestors never made it past the first two steps and that is the one advantage we have that they didn't, maybe our ability to reach the top of the pyramid makes us slightly more sophisticated. IMHO technology doesn't makes us sophisticated, its our ability to meet our needs that advances us.

Great post. Gps is no substitute for being able to read a map when the battery dies. Gps can tell you what to do and where to go but it does not mean you know where you are. Followed one yesterday to a deadend even though I knew I was making the wrong turn as I had been where I was going before. Just thought something had changed. Sometimes you trust them sometimes you don't.

 

[Waterloo50]

Great post. Gps is no substitute for being able to read a map when the battery dies. Gps can tell you what to do and where to go but it does not mean you know where you are. Followed one yeaterday to a deadend even though I knew I was making the wrong turn as I had been where I was going before. Just thought something had changed. Sometimes you trust them sometimes you don't.

That's the problem with modern technology, we have come to believe that we need it. Kids today go into a complete meltdown if there is a power cut and they can't charge their smartphones.

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[48th Miss.]

That's the problem with modern technology, we have come to believe that we need it. Kids today go into a complete meltdown if there is a power cut and they can't charge their smartphones.

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AMEN TO THAT. It is really more a question of When than If I think.

Great quote by Einstein. My best to you as you weather the Storm of Thurday. I will say no more on that my Friend. Tough road ahead but you folks have been through worse.

 

[James B White]

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http://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/03/19/tech-surpass/

"In conclusion, QI [the website Quote Investigator] believes that Albert Einstein did not write or say any of the three variant quotations. Individuals who were aggravated by the behavior patterns of cell phone users probably facilitated the construction, evolution, and dissemination of this meme. The phrasing of the saying has changed over time and different sets of pictures have been attached."

Personally, I don't get it. I have far more, and far more enjoyable, human interaction with technology than before. For example, where would I find a hundred Civil War buffs to come from all across the country, hang out all day every day at my house, never demanding to be served my food or use my bathroom, but be ready to talk about obscure topics I'm interested in at a moment's notice, but only when I want then to. If I'm bored of them, there are half a dozen similar groups waiting.

Thirty years ago, that would have seemed like an incredible dream about heaven or something, while I traveled hundreds of miles to find such groups on rare occasions, or pretended to be interested in boring topics like sports or rock music to attract local people to interact.

 

[Waterloo50]

I thought that perhaps this quote sums up the title of this thread. Perhaps that's the way our ancestors viewed it.
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