GoFuckYourself.com - Adult Webmaster Forum - View Single Post - We are living in an amazing time in history

jayeff · 02-19-2007, 03:32 AM

Much as is innovative, one cannot help but wonder how more innovative we might be. For example, I have read that there are many health issues which likely have relatively simple solutions, but because they only affect small numbers of people, are often left unresearched.

I once visited Volkswagen's Wolfsburg factory where they have an amazing research facility. They were completely honest that marketing considerations dictate whether and when an innovation or improvement may appear in production. We could already have much safer cars, cars which last longer, require less maintenance, or which are dramatically more fuel efficient. Instead, the industry resists any change which might raise the cost of a car even a few cents, for fear of damaging sales.

Nor is all innovation a step forward. Despite "Cheddar" being the most popular cheese in the world, there is now only one farm still making it the traditional way. Cauliflowers, tomatoes, apples, etc., are all grown for appearance and uniformity these days, and not for flavor. Wine and beer are "helped along" with chemicals and technology. The irony is that future generations will never experience the taste, texture, color, which made a particular cheese or whatever, popular in the first place.

We also live in a world in which publishers can get rich reproducing the works of centuries-old authors for schools and colleges. Yet if there is a modern-day Shakespeare out there, he is probably struggling to find anyone willing to read his manuscripts. The music industry still uses A&R men, but for the past 30 years many producers have found it easier simply to create bands and singers in whatever mould is currently marketable.

Drifting away from the original direction of this thread? Possibly. And yet the style and fundamental quality of our lives is not driven only by overtly technological change. Perhaps not even mainly by such change. Social change, although it tends be noted in history books more than in media headlines, has a much more profound effect. Consider just the many consequences over the past 50 years, as working mothers have become the norm, instead of the exception.

Think too about the potential of further change. Living barely a mile from each other in the rich and poor parts of Washington DC, the US capital city, are males with average life expectancies 20 years apart. It took the whole of the 20th century for life expectancy to be extended 30 years, courtesy of medical advances. And most of that change came about before 1950, due to reductions in infant mortality and better treatments for childhood diseases. The right social/political change could have almost as dramatic an effect on some parts of our population.

02-19-2007, 03:32 AM
jayeff Confirmed User Join Date: May 2001 Posts: 2,944	Much as is innovative, one cannot help but wonder how more innovative we might be. For example, I have read that there are many health issues which likely have relatively simple solutions, but because they only affect small numbers of people, are often left unresearched. I once visited Volkswagen's Wolfsburg factory where they have an amazing research facility. They were completely honest that marketing considerations dictate whether and when an innovation or improvement may appear in production. We could already have much safer cars, cars which last longer, require less maintenance, or which are dramatically more fuel efficient. Instead, the industry resists any change which might raise the cost of a car even a few cents, for fear of damaging sales. Nor is all innovation a step forward. Despite "Cheddar" being the most popular cheese in the world, there is now only one farm still making it the traditional way. Cauliflowers, tomatoes, apples, etc., are all grown for appearance and uniformity these days, and not for flavor. Wine and beer are "helped along" with chemicals and technology. The irony is that future generations will never experience the taste, texture, color, which made a particular cheese or whatever, popular in the first place. We also live in a world in which publishers can get rich reproducing the works of centuries-old authors for schools and colleges. Yet if there is a modern-day Shakespeare out there, he is probably struggling to find anyone willing to read his manuscripts. The music industry still uses A&R men, but for the past 30 years many producers have found it easier simply to create bands and singers in whatever mould is currently marketable. Drifting away from the original direction of this thread? Possibly. And yet the style and fundamental quality of our lives is not driven only by overtly technological change. Perhaps not even mainly by such change. Social change, although it tends be noted in history books more than in media headlines, has a much more profound effect. Consider just the many consequences over the past 50 years, as working mothers have become the norm, instead of the exception. Think too about the potential of further change. Living barely a mile from each other in the rich and poor parts of Washington DC, the US capital city, are males with average life expectancies 20 years apart. It took the whole of the 20th century for life expectancy to be extended 30 years, courtesy of medical advances. And most of that change came about before 1950, due to reductions in infant mortality and better treatments for childhood diseases. The right social/political change could have almost as dramatic an effect on some parts of our population.