We are natural villagers 20 Jul 2009 We are natural villagers. For most of mankind’s history we have lived in very small communities in which we knew everybody and everybody knew us. But gradually there grew to be far too many of us, and our communities became too large and disparate for us to be able to feel a part of them, and our technologies were unequal to the task of drawing us together. But that is changing. Douglas N. Adams, 1999 [Hat tip Jeb Baugh] Social evolution Technology
Evolution Not the end of evolution again! 6 Oct 2008 I get so tired of comments like this: The Grim Reaper is taking a rest, and inherited differences in the ability to withstand cold, starvation or disease no longer power Darwin’s machine. Those who die from such killers do so when they are so old that natural selection has lost… Read More
Evolution Explaining religion 4 – Wolves and gods 6 Nov 2007 The saying that “man is a wolf to man” comes from a saying of Erasmus of Rotterdam, but it is incomplete. The Latin is Homo homini aut deus aut lupus or “Man is either a god or a wolf to man”. I’m beginning to wonder if there is a difference… Read More
Politics You can’t have proper human relationships unless you are a Christian 4 Apr 201018 Sep 2017 … according to Archbishop Peter Jensen of Sydney, who seems to think that prior to Jesus nobody ever had a decent human relationship. A secular society is right out, brother. The idea that secularism suggests that people might form relationships without the scaffolding of the church seems to worry him… Read More
I was born in a village and I grew up in a village. I now live in a village, literally on the boundary of a smallish town whose main characteristic is that it is like a village, everybody knows everybody, and that is the reason that I live where I do and why I’m staying put.
Of course, I grew up in a village of some 1500 in a remote region. Where I live now is another village, but this one is not defined by physcial geography. It is more defined by a social geography enabled by mass communications and social networks. I think that was Adams’ point. The world is no longer round, you see.
“The world is no longer round, you see.” WOW! New theorem – “The shortest distance between two points on a sphere (ours) is through the keypad.
It is more defined by a social geography enabled by mass communications and social networks. I think that was Adams’ point. Didn’t Marshall McLuhan say something like that?
Perhaps we are natural villagers, – but for millenia man has tried to escape the country. As the saying from the Middle Ages goes “Stadtluft macht free” (city air make you fee)
And what do we do when we reach the city? Start up small groups of friends and neighbours. We are still villagers.
I always found London rather village like in a strange sort of way. I lived in Brixton for years, very strong sense of community and a very distinctive local identity. Its a vast city split up into little tribal groups and zones.