October 12th, 2010 / 7:28 pm
Technology

Stasis, Movement, Perception, Forward

from the manifesto of transition, a literary journal, published in 1929: “Tired of the spectacle of short stories, novels, poems and plays still under the hegemony of the banal word, monotonous syntax, static psychology, descriptive naturalism, and desirous of crystallizing a viewpoint… Narrative is not mere anecdote, but the projection of a metamorphosis of reality.”

from Reddit: “In 1903 the Wright brothers flew for 59 seconds. 38 years later the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. 28 years after that, we landed on the moon. We went from gliding a few feet off the ground for less than a minute to launching rockets out of orbit, traveling for hundreds of thousands of miles, landing on the moon, and then returning, all within a single lifetime.”

If you define technological growth/advancement as the continual manifestation of processes previously unexperienced, how would you define cultural growth/advancement? Is there such a thing? I sometimes think that evolution is a weird and harmful idea; so easy to term something as growth that may be more destructive in implicit or temporally stretched ways. Most of this relates to what I get in arguments about most of the time, anyway, which is: should there ever be an accepted utopia-pointed all-human goal? And if not, doesn’t the notion of advancement, even on a small (cultural; decade-to-decade) scale crumble? And, even smaller still: isn’t the (for now mostly inexplicable) emotional foundation for human action the purest and most reasonable foundation there is?

addendum: Also: if we say that technological improvement is understood as making new processes or making old processes with less energy, maybe we try to make our culture more efficient.

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23 Comments

  1. Anonymous

      isn’t survival every biological creatures inherent goal?

  2. deadgod

      In cultural terms, “adaptation to a hostile environment” by an individual means ‘survival’ (for that individual). – for example, in the case of an immigrant learning the language of her or his new home. But biologically speaking, individuals don’t “adapt”; in newly “hostile” circumstances, either they survive – non-culturally – with their given capabilities, or they don’t.

      “[A]daptation to a hostile environment” by a species – that is, the change of that species to a (slightly) different species: evolution – is, therefore, one of the two opposites of that species’s ‘survival’. That is, the survival of some portion of the species in the face of conditions lethal to the rest means, not that the species survives, but rather that a part of it does not survive in the form of extinction, and a part does not survive in the form of being the first generation which has evolved into another species.

      Yes, ‘survival’ is a goal for an individual trying ‘to adapt to a hostile situation’, but not a goal towards which one “advances”. ‘Survival’ is not remote; it’s directly immediate. When an individual tries ‘to survive’, it’s already ‘surviving’, and its attempts not to perish are attempts to persist in doing what it’s already doing.

      Do you see how biological evolution entails no “advancement” for a species, and biological survival for an individual is the continuance of a goal already in effect?

      Culturally speaking, transforming oneself in order ‘to survive’ might be, in a sense, an “advancement”; one has “bettered” oneself, made oneself more fit.

      Ken is talking (I think) about historical changes in the art of, say, language usage. In the case of a single person, one becomes “better” at using language. But in terms of a culture, a civilization, a level of expertise – that of, say, Attic tragic drama – is not “bettered” as some basic set of cultural structures – say, theater – changes as whole communities change materially, culturally, political-economically, etc., or as similar or parallel institutions come into being and recognize structural resemblance with the earlier institution. It’s not a matter of “advance” to – there’s nowhere, other than beauty and understanding, to go. Although there seem to be high- and low-water marks in the historical record of, say, the institution of ‘theater’, none of the periods of greatness mean ‘more “advanced” people‘.

      If there were “advancement”, what would the “better” person, a citizen of a “better” community, be??

      (I mean: what, in addition to being more concise?)

  3. deadgod

      In cultural terms, “adaptation to a hostile environment” by an individual means ‘survival’ (for that individual). – for example, in the case of an immigrant learning the language of her or his new home. But biologically speaking, individuals don’t “adapt”; in newly “hostile” circumstances, either they survive – non-culturally – with their given capabilities, or they don’t.

      “[A]daptation to a hostile environment” by a species – that is, the change of that species to a (slightly) different species: evolution – is, therefore, one of the two opposites of that species’s ‘survival’. That is, the survival of some portion of the species in the face of conditions lethal to the rest means, not that the species survives, but rather that a part of it does not survive in the form of extinction, and a part does not survive in the form of being the first generation which has evolved into another species.

      Yes, ‘survival’ is a goal for an individual trying ‘to adapt to a hostile situation’, but not a goal towards which one “advances”. ‘Survival’ is not remote; it’s directly immediate. When an individual tries ‘to survive’, it’s already ‘surviving’, and its attempts not to perish are attempts to persist in doing what it’s already doing.

      Do you see how biological evolution entails no “advancement” for a species, and biological survival for an individual is the continuance of a goal already in effect?

      Culturally speaking, transforming oneself in order ‘to survive’ might be, in a sense, an “advancement”; one has “bettered” oneself, made oneself more fit.

      Ken is talking (I think) about historical changes in the art of, say, language usage. In the case of a single person, one becomes “better” at using language. But in terms of a culture, a civilization, a level of expertise – that of, say, Attic tragic drama – is not “bettered” as some basic set of cultural structures – say, theater – changes as whole communities change materially, culturally, political-economically, etc., or as similar or parallel institutions come into being and recognize structural resemblance with the earlier institution. It’s not a matter of “advance” to – there’s nowhere, other than beauty and understanding, to go. Although there seem to be high- and low-water marks in the historical record of, say, the institution of ‘theater’, none of the periods of greatness mean ‘more “advanced” people‘.

      If there were “advancement”, what would the “better” person, a citizen of a “better” community, be??

      (I mean: what, in addition to being more concise?)

  4. Anonymous

      deadgod, doesn’t evolution begin and end with an individual though?

      where is your distinction of adaption one and all?

      as for the rest, i don’t think there is a utopia. there is only an end waiting for art.

      did you ever notice there wasn’t much art in the show star trek?

      they also had “peace” on earth.

      so an end to art will result in a superior culture?

  5. jereme_dean

      the earth will bear only one scar: man

  6. deadgod

      cultural growth/advancement

      I think that if this progress exists, it has to be considered in political-economic terms.

      I agree with (T. S.) Eliot: ‘Art does not improve.’ – meaning, ‘artists today aren’t (necessarily) “better” than they were at some other historical moment’.

      That a community’s energy (and resources) might flag, and later be revitalized – that there is an ebb and flow to ‘cultural’ vitality – , seems to be indicated in and by the historical record. But, of course, this dark age/renaissance pattern, in its particulars, might be only the projection of current receptivity. – as must be some portion of the impressions some particular artist leaves at some later moment.

      So, looking at the evidence from the early 3rd millenium AD, are writers today “better” than Sophocles? Horace? Dante? etc. Hah – such as? in which way “better”?? If one can hear the voices of a moment in a culture’s history, the best of those voices will probably impress as much as the best of one’s own time.

      But Ken – “evolution” does NOT mean “advancement” in biology! It just means ‘change in and of a species compelled by relation to environmental pressures’. Humans are not an “advancement” on other great apes, biologically speaking. So maybe “evolution” is a useful metaphor for ‘change in artistic means and goals’ . . .

  7. drewkalbach

      just because there is no goal does not mean there is no advancement.

  8. Ken Baumann

      Typed a big response, then lost it! Damn. Here goes a softer recreation:

      ‘If one can hear the voices of a moment in a culture’s history, the best of those voices will probably impress as much as the best of one’s own time.’ I agree with you. My line of questioning here is more directed to a leveling of culture & politics & economics; all structures of activity, really; in order to cast all under a more evenly spread and arbitrary (and objective? probably; sad because it kills whatever is examined, transforms it into the desert, but also brings it back alive, casts the desert in an alive light) assessment and understanding. All of this to better suss out ‘universal’, or greatly shared, human desires. Coming more from the mode of Sartre’s Existentialism Is A Humanism line of ‘your own self-made best behavior must be the best behavior, or ideal behavior, for all.’ What would you say is the most common human desire? I think ‘happiness’ is too fuzzy and ambient a lens, as is the even more problematic ‘freedom.’

      Art does not improve… but does it even diversify?

      Oops! I was going off my dictionary def. of evolution, which certainly includes ‘develop’ next to ‘diversify’… But, yes, I agree; evolution is suited to the perverse and comically static realm of art, which exists primarily as salve…

  9. Ken Baumann

      Meaning: You don’t have to know what you’re moving towards to be moving towards something. ?
      If so: wait: How can you move towards something if there’s nothing in any direction?

  10. jereme_dean

      if adaptation to a hostile environment is not advancement, what is it?

  11. Ken Baumann

      Good point. So this says that advancement = reproduction. That whatever circumstances or properties that let something (a species, idea/meme, routine) survive are a good. So: is the best culture, the best economic system, the best politic, that which allows the most to survive? That’s obviously our only biological function. Gets interesting when it applies to culture, though; Dalkey Archive (keeping books in print ‘no matter what’) is like the most fertile valley for culture… Although exposure definitely relates to successful reproduction.

  12. Grant Bapsy

      There’s the answer: If there’s a goal, it’s advancement. No goal, evolution.

  13. jereme_dean

      fist,

      i don’t think it CAN apply to culture. A biological entity adapts out of necessity, out of strength, resolve.

      but art isn’t biological. it is the byproduct of the biological. it is their excrement flower.

      so i would say the human self can evolve, but art cannot.

      or, maybe, it can, but it is a passive evolution.

      its forward progress depends on man’s forward progress. but man is progressing towards nothingness.

      in terms of utopia, i cannot think of any but one: the utopia of the individual.

      the perfection of one’s own mind.

      before death.

      that’s it.

      everything else is snake oil.

      i think.

  14. jereme_dean

      isn’t survival every biological creatures inherent goal?

  15. Michael

      I bet if we saw their annual sales (lack thereof) we’d believe it real quick.

  16. deadgod

      In cultural terms, “adaptation to a hostile environment” by an individual means ‘survival’ (for that individual). – for example, in the case of an immigrant learning the language of her or his new home. But biologically speaking, individuals don’t “adapt”; in newly “hostile” circumstances, either they survive – non-culturally – with their given capabilities, or they don’t.

      “[A]daptation to a hostile environment” by a species – that is, the change of that species to a (slightly) different species: evolution – is, therefore, one of the two opposites of that species’s ‘survival’. That is, the survival of some portion of the species in the face of conditions lethal to the rest means, not that the species survives, but rather that a part of it does not survive in the form of extinction, and a part does not survive in the form of being the first generation which has evolved into another species.

      Yes, ‘survival’ is a goal for an individual trying ‘to adapt to a hostile situation’, but not a goal towards which one “advances”. ‘Survival’ is not remote; it’s directly immediate. When an individual tries ‘to survive’, it’s already ‘surviving’, and its attempts not to perish are attempts to persist in doing what it’s already doing.

      Do you see how biological evolution entails no “advancement” for a species, and biological survival for an individual is the continuance of a goal already in effect?

      Culturally speaking, transforming oneself in order ‘to survive’ might be, in a sense, an “advancement”; one has “bettered” oneself, made oneself more fit.

      Ken is talking (I think) about historical changes in the art of, say, language usage. In the case of a single person, one becomes “better” at using language. But in terms of a culture, a civilization, a level of expertise – that of, say, Attic tragic drama – is not “bettered” as some basic set of cultural structures – say, theater – changes as whole communities change materially, culturally, political-economically, etc., or as similar or parallel institutions come into being and recognize structural resemblance with the earlier institution. It’s not a matter of “advance” to – there’s nowhere, other than beauty and understanding, to go. Although there seem to be high- and low-water marks in the historical record of, say, the institution of ‘theater’, none of the periods of greatness mean ‘more “advanced” people‘.

      If there were “advancement”, what would the “better” person, a citizen of a “better” community, be??

      (I mean: what, in addition to being more concise?)

  17. jereme_dean

      deadgod, doesn’t evolution begin and end with an individual though?

      where is your distinction of adaption one and all?

      as for the rest, i don’t think there is a utopia. there is only an end waiting for art.

      did you ever notice there wasn’t much art in the show star trek?

      they also had “peace” on earth.

      so an end to art will result in a superior culture?

  18. deadgod

      As I said, some individuals surviving and others not when all are faced with hostile circumstances might lead, if this survival is down to key traits having been inherited or not (or inherited to unequal degrees), to the evolution of one species into another. When a species changes into another – “adaptation” – , individuals don’t “adapt”; either they are fit (the first members of the new species), or not.

      (This is a drastically, but I hope neither incorrect-in-outline nor misleading, oversimplification of speciation.)

      I think you mean your last question to be ‘will a superior culture have, as a result of coming into existence, no art?’ Again, the superior people of this culture: from what will humanity have “advanced”, and to what??

  19. Tim Horvath

      Can’t believe Dalkey, in general exemplary in this regard, let McElroy’s Women and Men fall out of print, though. How’d that happen?

  20. Tim Horvath

      Ken,

      I tend to think the premium put on maximizing efficiency has harmed us as much as helped us. The harder way, against resistance, is more fulfilling in many instances. We crave that resistance, and when we don’t get it become complacent, sedentary, self-absorbed, and oftentimes don’t know what to do with ourselves. When Google steers our cars for us, we will miss the act of driving, though the accident rate will go down. The act of driving will seem like riding a bike does now. We will find something else to do with our hands, but what will that be–sudoku? Art, in particular, demands resistance. If it becomes too easy to make, we devalue what is made, and if it becomes too easy to comprehend or experience, we see it as diluted and middlebrow. We like to chew, and we like spice, which resists going down too readily–there is euphoria in the palatial (as in of the palate) friction.

  21. Michael

      I bet if we saw their annual sales (lack thereof) we’d believe it real quick.

  22. MM

      i appreciate the addendum, as i consider myself a Buckminsterfullerist, and that grand man defined technology as doing more and more with less and less, in terms of energy (and maybe materials).

      And let’s say communication is too a technology (so, fine, distilling art down to an emotional need is cute, perhaps appropriate).

      Though this wet rock has some sunder for a fate, and that any beacon or vector of our humanism has a hope of eternal survival is a fallacy, all talk of trajectory treads on becoming trite… Right?

      Yet, I posit peace, make our efface endure no stress. Let’s quit the violence and rape of land and skincolor dichotomy. Let’s figure out better ways to hold each others’ hands, not just curtsy and coitus and commentboxes on blogs.

  23. MM

      i appreciate the addendum, as i consider myself a Buckminsterfullerist, and that grand man defined technology as doing more and more with less and less, in terms of energy (and maybe materials).

      And let’s say communication is too a technology (so, fine, distilling art down to an emotional need is cute, perhaps appropriate).

      Though this wet rock has some sunder for a fate, and that any beacon or vector of our humanism has a hope of eternal survival is a fallacy, all talk of trajectory treads on becoming trite… Right?

      Yet, I posit peace, make our efface endure no stress. Let’s quit the violence and rape of land and skincolor dichotomy. Let’s figure out better ways to hold each others’ hands, not just curtsy and coitus and commentboxes on blogs.