Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id PAA28709 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 5 Jun 2000 15:26:11 +0100 Message-ID: <393B71C1.43C0C163@mediaone.net> Date: Mon, 05 Jun 2000 10:24:18 +0100 From: Chuck <cpalson@mediaone.net> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Jabbering ! References: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D31017458A5@inchna.stir.ac.uk> <00060510231301.00606@faichney> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Robin Faichney wrote:
> On Mon, 05 Jun 2000, Vincent Campbell wrote:
> >Ask people what a tie is for though- what's its functionality? What is the
> >bit of material under your shirt collar supposed to do? I don't think most
> >people would know, and would instead ascribe far more less manifest
> >(although no less important) functions like those you mention. The problem
> >then becomes one of arbitrariness- why does a strange bit of cloth around
> >one's neck offer all these other (social) functions that they indeed do?
> >
> >Perhaps this is the distinctive element of cultural, as oppsed to say
> >technological, artefacts, in that their (apparent) utility is highly
> >flexible hence behaviours survive long after their origins have been
> >forgotten.
>
> Tools can be extremely flexible. Just ask anyone who ever used a knife as
> a screwdriver! Though there's obviously a distinction to be drawn between
> practical and social/psychological utility. But the main point I want to
> make is that, on any broad definition of culture, i.e. not just fine art,
> technology is part of it. That's what the "industrial evolution" thing is
> about, isn't it?
Having come originally from the field that practically invented culture, I can
tell you that after about 125 years of discussion, anthropologists pretty much
agree to disagree. It's one of those concepts that has a lot of grey areas no
matter how you slice it. As I have posted last week, I **might** want to say
that culture is the ideational/conceptual part of culture that is in free
variation. That is, the part that varies without consequence. It doesn't seem to
matter that some brown ties dominate one group, and blue in another. "Seem" is
the key word here - we might find out down the line that it does matter, so it's
a moving target.
But since you want to talk about technology and culture, you might be interested
in knowing that some anthropologists talk about "technological culture".
>
>
> Talking of which, the second instalment of the show we both saw last week
> was on last night, don't know if you caught it, but again, I don't think
> there was one reference to natural resource depletion. Plenty to economic
> motivation, though! And contrasts with social conditions in continental
> Europe, where innovations tended to be viewed as toys for the rich, rather
> than commodities and income generators for the middle class. England
> really was a nation of shopkeepers!
>
If they don't mention it by the end, we might want to start a discussion here on
brain depletion - that of the producers of the show - and whether or not this
disease can cause defective memes. :)
Ok - you yourself asked for this one: here's a more specific description of how
depletion of **land** and **wood fuel** and the consequent adoption of fossil
fuels totally transformed the American economy within 150 years of its first
industrial use.
1. 1830s - coal is introduced.
2. In less than a decade, the geographical distribution of cities was profoundly
affected because industries could be located near the raw materials of the
products being produced instead of rivers. People began moving in prodigous
numbers to where the jobs were, and old communities broke up and were never
restablished elsewhere.
3. In another 30-50 years, the entire country became "smaller" and more
effectively a nation due to the development of railroads.
4. Oil is introduced in the late 1800s and introduces more technological
possibilities.
4. Made the country even "smaller" when electrical generating plants based on
fossil fuels made rural electrification possible (radio, for example,
transformed national politics).
5. Continued to have profound effects by the development of TV as a mass product
in the 1950s, computers startingin the 1960s, and ---- the ***internet*** in the
1990s.
6. Oil was the major factor in increasing farm productivity by orders of
magnitude with the introduction of the tractor. We went from a country which was
90% agricultural to an astonishing <1% in the blink of an eye - in a tiny
fraction of 1% of the history of all of agriculture!!
All of this produced profound changes in the psychology and sociology of
Americans. And it happened because we ran out of trees to burn and land to farm.
Now -- I could go back to your own British history and talk about the enclosure
movement and how that came about in part because of the growing shortage of
land. And I am going to assume that you know what a profound effect the
enclosure movement had on England. The shortage of land, in fact, had a key role
in the motivations of the Puritans to establish their City on a Hill here in my
home country.
I could, of course, go on and on and on. It's so obvious that you might even
complain that it's too obvious, too easy, just like some of you protest that my
notion of utility is too easy. But that's often the problem with the behavioral
sciences - they are looking for the novel and forget the obvious which is
usually far more fundamental, although less glitzy. And perhaps "obvious" is the
wrong word because it obviously isn't obvious much like water isn't obvious to
fish. And remember - I have only listed a few gross changes. But each change
richochets throughout the economy in countless smaller ways which force other
technological/social/cultural changes, and the aggregate is an entirely
different way of life.
And I might add, Vincent, that it appears to me that you are avoiding the
"obvious," if I may use that term, in how radio, and later TV, has profoundly
changed mentalities by creating new channels for the spread of your memes.
McCluan had it at least half right: the medium is the message. He had to make it
a big glitzy to get people's attention, and in so doing he also avoided some of
the more obvious stuff. But he was on the right track.
For what its worth, take my humble [ :)!! ]advice: start with the obvious
because you will find plenty of stuff that isn't so obvious down the road.
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