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The scarcity of the long term

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Re: The scarcity of the long term

#11

Post by graemep »

roenxi wrote: post #3

This is almost a solved problem; institutions are capable of sustaining intentions for insane periods of time. The major organised religious institutes have been pushing some basic standards for ethical living for millennia. There aren't a lot of projects that humans have considered worth a millenium of effort. Due to the limited abilities of humans that long ago they are all philosophical projects. But we can do it.…

Yes, but they believe in eternity, or reincarnation, of something longer than a lifespan. They also often believe in a defined obligation to future generations. Our contemporary culture does not.

> Look at the educational institutions like Oxford for interesting examples of maintaining a culture.

They have changed over the centuries though. The ethos and aims of Oxford are hardly what they were when it got its royal charter in the 13th century. True, it still values scholarship, but it has also changed in a lot of ways.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#12

Post by kibwen »

dobin wrote: post #6

Many cathedrals took hundreds of years to build. The following around 500 years: Cologne Cathedral, St. Vitus Cathedral and Milan Cathedral. Sagrada Familia was started in 1882, and Gaudi is dead for 98 years. If the emperor demands, it will be built.

Cathedrals were public works projects that guaranteed generations of employment for local craftsmen. Plenty of cathedrals were left half-finished after funding dried up.

> If the emperor demands, it will be built.

The emperor rules for 50 years at best. His descendants may have different demands.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#14

Post by js8 »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #7
roenxi wrote: post #3

This is almost a solved problem; institutions are capable of sustaining intentions for insane periods of time. The major organised religious institutes have been pushing some basic standards for ethical living for millennia. There aren't a lot of projects that humans have considered worth a millenium of effort. Due to the limited abilities of humans that long ago they are all philosophical projects. But we can do it.…

Institutions sustain themselves or rather the jobs of the controlling minds of the institution. Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation. I think the difference here is we can view a company / institution as a machine to do a job, and between a company that has a controlling mind able to change its own machine “code” hen…

> Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation.

Are you sure? It seems to me that Jesus would be dismayed by how establishment they've become and not nearly radical enough.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#15

Post by denton-scratch »

> The only real scarcity would be of a long attention span.

I get the author's drift, and broadly agree. But I don't think it's really a long attention span that would get in the way of (e.g.) a Mars colony, or interstellar travel; it's that people's views change from one generation to the next. My kids have been imbued with some of my attitudes, sure; but I've not had much of a hand in the raising of my grandchildren. And kids rebel against their parents' views, even if they're objectively less sensible than the latest kids' fashion.

The Death Star, to take the author's example, is the product of a particular hypothetical society that looks a lot like fascist authoritarianism: a Glorious Leader, militarization, and oppression. But how many societies like that have lasted 500 years? The Golden Horde lasted about 250 years; the Roman Empire lasted about 200 years. Chinese imperial rule lasted much longer, maybe 1,500 years? Egyptian pharoahs about the same, if you treat the Early, Middle and Late as distinct empires. But these empires changed their character as the centuries passed, and were not characterized by any particular continuity of social outlook or collective goals.

I have only a vague knowledge of what the attitudes of my grandparents and their generation were - too vague for me to either support them or to rebel against them. So I think it's not so much a matter of attention-span, and more a question of plain old memory; history lessons and books are no substitute for talking to the people who were there, and after 200 years there's nobody left who "was there".

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#16

Post by denton-scratch »

graemep wrote: post #11
roenxi wrote: post #3

This is almost a solved problem; institutions are capable of sustaining intentions for insane periods of time. The major organised religious institutes have been pushing some basic standards for ethical living for millennia. There aren't a lot of projects that humans have considered worth a millenium of effort. Due to the limited abilities of humans that long ago they are all philosophical projects. But we can do it.…

Yes, but they believe in eternity, or reincarnation, of something longer than a lifespan. They also often believe in a defined obligation to future generations. Our contemporary culture does not. > Look at the educational institutions like Oxford for interesting examples of maintaining a culture. They have changed over the centuries though. The ethos and aims of Oxford are hardly what they were when it got its royal…

In the olden days, students at Oxford mainly studied Divinity; nowadays there are schools of Business, Islamic Studies, high-energy physics and so on. There is still a number of Oxford "halls" devoted to Divinity, but the number of students and fellows engaged in that kind of work is tiny.

So I agree: it's no longer the same institution at all.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#17

Post by scotty79 »

What's scary is that at time scales of one generation or longer societies seem to forget even very important things. How pandemic looks like. That war and militarization is not such a good idea.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#18

Post by Filligree »

js8 wrote: post #14
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Institutions sustain themselves or rather the jobs of the controlling minds of the institution. Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation. I think the difference here is we can view a company / institution as a machine to do a job, and between a company that has a controlling mind able to change its own machine “code” hen…

> Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation. Are you sure? It seems to me that Jesus would be dismayed by how establishment they've become and not nearly radical enough.

These can both be true.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#19

Post by lloeki »

denton-scratch wrote: post #15

> The only real scarcity would be of a long attention span. I get the author's drift, and broadly agree. But I don't think it's really a long attention span that would get in the way of (e.g.) a Mars colony, or interstellar travel; it's that people's views change from one generation to the next. My kids have been imbued with some of my attitudes, sure; but I've not had much of a hand in the raising of my grandchildre…

So essentially the problem is one of being able to foster a meme+ that outlives the scale of an individual's life.

+ the original meaning, not the internets one, which is only an extremely short-lived subset.

Re: The scarcity of the long term

#20

Post by Loughla »

js8 wrote: post #14
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Institutions sustain themselves or rather the jobs of the controlling minds of the institution. Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation. I think the difference here is we can view a company / institution as a machine to do a job, and between a company that has a controlling mind able to change its own machine “code” hen…

> Today’s Catholic Church would be viewed by its founders as some kind of uber-hippy bunch of democratic maniacs out to destroy civilisation. Are you sure? It seems to me that Jesus would be dismayed by how establishment they've become and not nearly radical enough.

And the money in the temple thing, too.
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