Wade
  • Wade
  • Veteran Member
14 years ago

I was waiting for Wade, the professor, to respond and break it down..

Obscure lists like this gets one to think outside "their" box.. which IMO is what education basis should be about.. and after going to colleges for over half a decade.. you rarely bump into a professor that gets "it".

"pack93z" wrote:



You are absolutely right about the list's usefulness as getting people to go outside the box, Shawn. There's a lot of talk about getting outside, but sometimes the biggest barriers to doing so come from our inability to see the box our thinking is in. (We can see others stuck in their boxes, but we can't see our own.)

Here's something I'm currently working on as a "minihomework" for the second day of class: They will be required to read the Beloit list, then rank the "top five or ten" in terms of historical significance". I'll then use their responses to point out what their choices reveal about how they value technological change (they're also reading part of World is Flat) and information about the past and the limitations/strengths of those values.


So, for those of you who are game, which of the items on the Beloit list do you think are more significant, and why?
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)
zombieslayer
14 years ago

I definitely agree that most profs don't get "it," though.

I sometimes wonder if the best we can hope for from the big chunk of college faculties is their recognition that they don't and that it matters that they don't.

An awful lot of academics are doubly in denial: They deny that they don't get it. And they deny that getting it matters.

I'm not sure I agree about the relative unimportance of changes since 1950, zombie.

Yes, they tend to be primarily information-centered. And without the enabling that 1750-1950 offered, they wouldn't have had the shoulders of giants required to build upon.

But arguably the real revolution of 1750-1950 was not technology or resources/labor, it was knowledge and knowledge use. (Check out the work of Joel Mokyr sometime, especially his Gifts of Athena.) And arguably the changes of PC/Internet/Netscape/Google/cloud computing have been even more transforming.

Or perhaps the story lies somewhere else entirely. Which is why this term my students are going to look at something very different. I've always focused on technology and some other traditional topics (e.g. myths about the economics of slavery and imperialism). But I'm going well outside my comfort zone this term. -- We'll start with Thomas Friedman's World if Flat...then move backward. Still do the Industrial Revolution, but in large part as a way of connecting the "after" of today to the "before" history of trade and globalization between 1000 and 1750 A.D.

I'm really excited about the class, but I keep telling myself to be careful. I was really excited about the way I had the class set up last fall, too, and I laid an [strike]ostrich[/strike]dinosaur-sized egg.

"Wade" wrote:



OK, if you had to give up a time period, which one would you give up? The 1900-1950 or 1951-2000? I'd gladly give up the advances made from '51-00 over the advances made from 1900-1950. Planes, cars, almost universal indoor plumbing, hot showers over speed and availability of knowledge, the internet, text messaging, and near space travel? That's not even close. Plus, labor relations. I'm seriously profiting. I love my life and am thankful for those who got their heads bashed in from the 1900-1950 time period so I can sit back and enjoy America.
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Wade
  • Wade
  • Veteran Member
14 years ago
I think its a really tough choice.

Plumbing is huge. Its reason #1 in my book why the "health care has gone to hell in a handbasket" people miss the boat. Its not sexy, but the progress in "sanitation" are profoundly more important than just about any other technologies IMO.

Another big, and usually omitted from people's calculation, are the changes in chemicals that 1900-1950 brought (petrochemicals, CFCs and HFCs -- can you say freon, refrigeration, air conditioning). Of course saying how good those were gets us in all sorts of trouble with all sorts of people.

And, especially if you fudge a few years into the 50s, most of the space travel stuff was done in the earlier period. (Don't get me going on how we screwed up space development in the second half of the 20th.)

On the other hand, of course could not be having this conversation without the Internet. And as someone who has felt first hand the constraints of small town America -- which still lived in that pre-1950 world for my childhood. I'm not sure I would have escaped even as much as I did.

On balance, I probably agree with you, zombie, in terms of 1950-2000 vs. 1900-1950. But not about 2000-2050. I'd much rather be 22 now than 52. Because I think the only time that offered as much potential for world-changing-for-the-better as today does was the world on the brink of the Industrial Revolution. And this one starts from a position of much greater wealth.

It might not happen in the USA, alas. And I would be extraordinarily surprised if it happens in Iowa. The Industrial Revolution didn't happen in Spain or Portugal or Venice. But I think its going to happen.

I'm just going to be too geriatric or dead to enjoy it.
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)
zombieslayer
14 years ago
Wade - good and bad about 2000-2050.

Bad, the environment will be pretty messed up. How bad, no one really knows. All these stupid politicians on all sides get in the way of the real facts.

Good, I completely agree with you that the chances for serious wealth are much greater now than before. We have so much economic freedoms now that we didn't have before. Not because the laws make it easier as in fact the laws are in the way.

It's more as you were originally saying about information access. Heck, that's the reason I'm well-off today financially. I didn't know what software was 20 years ago or we didn't have brokerage accounts open to commoners either. You had to prove a dollar amount to even open one.

Heh. I'd much rather be young because the girls now are easier than before, there are more of them, and the dudes today are too stupid to know what to do about it. Plus, I wouldn't have played sports so I wouldn't be in the pain I'm in today.
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2010 will be seen as the beginning of the new Packers dynasty. 🇹🇹 🇲🇲 🇦🇷
Wade
  • Wade
  • Veteran Member
14 years ago
Zombie --

I think a case could be made for 1950 or 2000.

But the ones I laugh at are the ones who think it would be better to live in the pre-industrial world. First thing you'd have to do is cut the world population by about 90 percent. Second, you'd have to be in the top 1 % of the population (i.e., the aristocracy) to have a half-decent quality of life. Even then, you'ld likely have more than one child die before the age of 3. And you'd be extremely lucky to live until you're thirty.

Industrialization had a lot of bad going along with the good. But the pre-industrial world defined suckitude.
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)
zombieslayer
14 years ago
Wade - Even today's working class Americans have better lives than the royalty of pre-industrialized world. Sure, the royalty got to wear fancy hats and jewelry, but plumbing sucked, spices and good chefs weren't readily available, and medicine wasn't that much better than the dude with the bone in his nose who would pray to keep away the evil spirits. Plus, the "babes" often had bad teeth.

Actually, cutting the world's population by 90% was the good thing about living back then. Could you imagine being able to drive 90 mph from San Francisco to Los Angeles at peak times? That would rule. I'd love to have open space again.
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2010 will be seen as the beginning of the new Packers dynasty. 🇹🇹 🇲🇲 🇦🇷
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