| |
 |
Saturday, November 15, 2003 |
"I grieve for angry young men, and the societies that produce them." --
Johnny Cash, as quoted by Al Gore on the Cash memorial concert. What an
amazing statement.
7:14:46 PM Permalink
|
|
The Oak Trees of New College, Oxford
Brian Eno's talk about long term thinking last night at Fort Mason was a strange affair. Very crowded, lots of people there for this $10 suggested donation event. Brian Eno
has a lot of name recognition, certainly, though I'm pretty ignorant of
his work. The day before the talk, he was on KQED, interviewed by the
amazine Michael Krasny, and the interview is archived (it's hard to
link to it, becausee the link is to a JavaScript that plays the
program; go here and do a search).
Anyway, he was impressive to listen to; charismatic in a low-key way
(though a young woman I stood in line with was kind of hoping he'd be
wearing a feathered outfit). He talked about how his ideas
about music had changed in the mid-70s and how his ideas about long
term thinking had grown, and explained the purpose behind the Long Now
Foundation. It's kind of obvious: humans just aren't very good at
thinking about things that are going to happen next year or ten years
from now or a thousand years from now. The aim of the clock they're
building is to start a conversation, even in within yourself, that
leads to a different type of thinking about the future. If, thinking
about a clock that's supposed to keep time for 10,000 years, you say
something like "well, what about an earthquake or a meteor or a dark
age," then that's the kind of response they see to want. It seems a
noble cause to me.
It's funny, as one who grew up reading Robert Heinlein, Arthur Clarke,
Isaac Asimov, and Olaf Stapledon, this kind of thinking isn't very
unusual. In a way, it's easier to think about a thousand or ten
thousand years in the future than it is to think about 10 years or 30
years in the future. I know in my life I've certainly been better at
the former than the latter.
Eno mentioned the story Stewart Brand also tells about the Oak Trees of New College, Oxford.
According to the story, the great dining hall was built in the 14th
century. Four hundred years later, it was found that the oak beams
which made up the dining hall were rotting. It turned out that an oak
grove had been planted nearby, the oaks growing for hundreds of years,
just waiting for the time, foreseen by the original builders, when the
beams would rot. Alas, though it's a great, it is, according to New
College, a hoary, false tale. Too bad.
Lots of food for thought anyway, last night, and lots of ideas I'll
keep with me. I'm looking forward to all the lectures in the series,
and am very happy I'll be able to take them in.
By the way, Stewart Brand's Long Now book is great reading. Seek it out. In the same vein is Gregory Benford's Deep Time.
He tackles some of the same topics mentioned last night, in particular
the problem of warning future people to stay way from the sites where
we bury our nuclear waste. I wonder why someone like Benford isn't on
the Long Now board.
6:38:43 PM Permalink
|
|
Adam Curry: "Yesterday Dave added a 35Mb quicktime video to his RSS feed that automagically popped up ready to play on my machine this morning. I will pay anyone who is willing to set up a similar RSS feed with daily enclosures of Letterman and/or Leno's TV show for my private viewing pleasure." [Scripting News]
Jeez, just buy a Tivo. And skip Letterman and Leno. Conan is the one to watch.
9:52:22 AM Permalink
|
|
Moving Left. This is the third installment in a three-part series on "Religion in America" that investigates whether the United States is really dividing into two distinct camps: a secular Left and a religious Right. The first post, which examines the evidence... [The Right Christians]
9:32:40 AM Permalink
|
|
© Copyright 2004 Steve Michel.
|
|
|
|
|
