Maximum Verbosity: TMI
I'm a day dreamer by nature, the kind of guy who will stare off wistfully into a hazy fog of meaningless delusion while you're saying something important like your hair is on fire or I've just driven off the road and into eel infested waters. While some of my somnambulistic musings are not fit for print unless you begin the literature with Dear Penthouse, most of the wandering thoughts are benign entertainment with no more real-world relevance than the mindless cooing of an infant or political stump speeches. But, very occasionally, these daydreams are cryptic hints that drive me toward some personal insight about which I was not previously aware.
This is all a way of beginning to explain why daydreaming about going back in time to subjugate a feudal England under my technologically advanced thumb led me to conclude that I have far less worth than I'd ever considered.
Were one to measure the uniqueness of fantasies across the male population, one would probably find time travel right between being able to fly and having Alessandra Ambrosio ask you to make passionate Brazilian beach-love. It is not a particularly unique intellectual exercise and has been explored in detail by every hack sci-fi writer to pen a Star Trek script and, of course, Michael Chrichton. It's an intoxicating power fantasy, like winning the lottery increased by a factor of ten, placing oneself and resources beyond the limited scope of our own temporally linearity, and usually visits any number of variations on the Turtledovian world where the Civil War Confederacy is armed with AK-47s. What would I do with my power as an advanced human in a bygone era, and who would I want to talk to? What would they say? What would Mozart think of my iPod, Charles Babbage of my laptop, Edison of my camcorder, Da Vinci of my automobile or Guttenberg of my Palm Pilot.
But, inevitably in this imaginary scenario, a strange and troubling epiphany manifests. I play the game out across hours, and then days, and suddenly my advanced future devices lose their charge, and I the technological divinity that both defines my uniqueness and probably protects my ass from villagers with pointy sticks and snap judgments about who is and who is not possessed of a demon. I then put myself on the unenviable task of trying to imagine ways that my vast accumulation of academic and trivial knowledge from the far flung future is valuable. Without pieces of equipment, these accessories and trappings with which I surround myself, I would not be deific, nor even the equal of these imaginary pastlings, because when it comes down to it, for all my twenty-first century sophistication and digital accoutrements, when I ask myself what I can actually do with the piled shavings of data in my head, I am left uncertain and humbled.
A few weeks ago I heard a man on the radio say something that would normally be offensive to my sensibilities, but it was said at just the right time and with just the right tone that it slipped through my stalwart defenses of preconceived notions and struck a strong but odd chord. The man on the radio said, and I paraphrase: our culture has become so obsessed with accumulating information that we've forgotten how to use it.
This is not a fact that shimmies and jives nicely with my stubborn worldview that knowledge has intrinsic value. The foundation of this philosophy, though I may never have thought it out quite so empirically before, assumes there is a basic unit of value to every piece of information, and the more information you absorb, the more intellectually rich you become and perhaps the more worthwhile. This perspective, which I suspect is no less uncommon than the number of people who daydream about playing Chopin a song by Coldplay and asking, "now, what do you think about that?", is a nice justification for a degree in, say, English which gives one a limitless capacity for extrapolating abstract and usually incorrect meaning from a text, up to and including the warning label on aspirin, but offers no practical ability such as, say, charging up one's iPod in sixteenth century England with some bird droppings, a bag of gunpowder, and a flask of rancid milk. Were I to hazard a guess, I'd bet that people with degrees in sociology, philosophy and communications might also be in the knowledge is valuable for its own sake camp along with English majors and career students.
I've always had a poorly hidden arrogance about intellectual capacity, which is probably why I go around whipping out big words on a gaming site like some obscene vocabulary wang, and for the first time I find myself reconsidering that position. I know a great many things, like how to convert from Celsius to Farenheit, the symbolic imagery in Donne's metaphysical poetry, how to parse even complex sentence structures – evidence to the contrary not withstanding – and how the fusing of increasingly heavier elements in the nuclear furnace of stars can lead to a supernova. I accumulate knowledge every day, both large and small, and hoard them away like the billions of dollars that my English degree will never earn me. I invest time, emotion and energy into the stock market of a thousand nuggets of information, and draw great conclusions from the smallest segments of data to shape and distort the world I see outside my front door. Small stories about people I will never meet in situations I don't understand become a foundation for thinking about people and events within my own tiny sphere, and all too often I feel lost in the conflicting shreds of knowledge. But, I rest quietly when I remember that just the capacity for, the interest in, and the accumulation of that knowledge rounds me out, gives me worth, makes me better.
Except, maybe it doesn't.
At the end of the day, if you take away the devices I employ to make myself useful what makes me more advanced than a sixteenth century serf, or American frontiersman. Hell, at least the frontiersman knows how to survive, maybe build a simple house and sow seeds into the land. I'll be sitting there explaining the quantum mechanics of sub atomic particles while he's eating some nice venison over a fire he scratched out of dried twigs and string.
I am shocked to discover that being challenged to do something with the things I know is a terrifying prospect. It feels like something I should've come to grips with years ago. It feels like something that every generation before mine knew in their bones, and why ours may be the first generation that takes their car in for an oil change not out of convenience but ignorance.
When did it become preferred to know things without knowing also how to make that knowledge useful? Why did so many of us decide to gain just enough knowledge to make us opinionated, but not enough to make us productive? What good is my education, or the things I take in every day if I'm not actually trying to make something of it? Have I had it backwards all these years, where the farmer in the field, and the welder, and the cobbler, and the guy who changes my oil at Jiffy Lube are really the productive members of society while I toddle around with my baccalaureate and thesaurus producing nothing better than an air of smug superiority?
- Elysium
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Nice piece, Elysium. I go through a similar struggle almost on a daily basis. My brother is a surgeon and I (hopefully soon) a professional academic. We'll both be "doctors," but he'll be saving lives while I'll be...what? That's the question.
Are you not trying to make anything of your education? You write great articles on a popular website, and started the darn thing to begin with. You're "producing" quite a lot. You may not be using all the facts you've learned from Wikipedia or textbooks on a daily basis, but as a writer and someone who deals in "ideas" instead of "widgets," if you can identify a message that needs to be delivered to a certain audience and you succesfully do that, you've done your work. There's a place for you in a society where ideas are commodified and where work is so specialized, that we need intermediaries who make it their jobs to go between specialized fields and help them understand one another. I've never had any illusions that my students would remember more than 10% of the "facts" I teach them. It's the analytical/communicational skills that matter, and will help them the rest of their lives.
Maybe I'm taking your words too literally though, too personally. Rhetorically speaking, why aren't non-farmers or non-mechanics productive? Someone who surfs Wikipedia all day or plumbs the most obscure corners of factoid lists and popular culture trivia can't change my oil, that's true. Watching all those videos on YouTube at 3am on a Wednesday night is not going to cure cancer or provide food for my family. But like it or not, we're all receiving a crash course in prioritizing every day, every time we sit down at our computer or watch TV. Is it more important that I catch the latest news from the BBC or go read a bed time story to my daughter before she falls asleep? One will teach us some new facts and one will challenge us to apply the knowledge (both academic and interpersonal) we've already acquired. At some point, you're right, we have to act on what we know.
"This is the series where you have a fistfight with the Pope because he's misusing the wizard staff he stole from the dead aliens. I think they're okay with stretching the truth for plot purposes." -CptGlanton
Edit: I'm sorry; seeing that in the context of a sentence partially about your English degree made commenting irresistible.
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GWJFFLK|GWJFFL1|GWJFFL2|GWJFFL3|GWJFFLD
Damn.
I felt -- I feel -- that Shawn, Rob and Julian were making out with the game, and as their friend I felt it was important to point out that they were making out with an ugly chick. - Cory Banks, keeping it real
What I always remember is to have respect for those who do make daily needed things. My programming skills make it so I can buy the things those guys make, but without them, I would have nothing.
Good piece.
I don't watch, I interact!
Elysium you are one mad genius.
BTW this is my first post at GWJ and I'm so glad I found an interesting, intelligent gaming website and community.
Hey, don't bogart, URL? (grin)
(welcome)
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"Publishers still speak in hushed tones about el bunny de la muerte." - *Legion*
On a more serious note: this is a great thought provoking piece, but while I see your point, and have felt these things, I reject the potential negative conclusion.
I believe that I, as homo internetus, do in fact possess useful knowledge and capacity in my brain. Aside from the SciFi "could you make gunpowder in 12BC" kind of straw man, I believe that I, and most of us here, have a capacity to absorb, process and experiment that would dwarf your hypothetical medieval serf. This is hubris, I TOTALLY see that. But I also know that I can kinda figure stuff out, and I believe a lot of that is because over the course of my life I've absorbed all kinds of bits and pieces that are actually useful.
I mean think about it. Do you think you could build a trebuchet? I do. Not because I've done it because I understand that its possible, have seen pictures, and have a basic understanding of how wood and leverage work. How about an axe? Or a field of wheat? While I may not have DONE these things, i feel like I know how to learn them, even in the absence of a library or the internet.
Perhaps the more important question is "so what." Is what I do all day actually useful to society or not? I think it's a question people have been asking themselves for millenia. After all, ancient Egypt had artists and accountants too.
Last.fm | Twitter
"Publishers still speak in hushed tones about el bunny de la muerte." - *Legion*
?
My good man, if you have found said bastion of intelligence, please let the rest of us know its locale!
(A joke)
Last.fm | Twitter
"Publishers still speak in hushed tones about el bunny de la muerte." - *Legion*
It's a good thing your jokes are funny in your articles Rabbit.
I felt -- I feel -- that Shawn, Rob and Julian were making out with the game, and as their friend I felt it was important to point out that they were making out with an ugly chick. - Cory Banks, keeping it real
It's important to have thinkers in society, but there's a problem when there are more of them than laborers. Read this thought provoking thread from P&C.
I am currently in academia, and have observed that people who are pursuing a lib arts degree are often more passionate about their field than IT/Bio sci majors. It's easy to make money after graduation with an IT degree, most people just whore themselves to a big corporation for awhile until they are able to find other options. But I take it one would have to find more creative ways to make money from a literature or history degree.
I wanna friend you up!
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Damn...
Good piece Elysium. I also often feel the same way. I have a wealth of technical knowledge as well as a rediculous amount of useless pop culture trivia tucked away and yet I'm always in awe of my father's ability to tend to his farm and keep everything running smoothly. The practical "get your hands dirty" side of things is something I have always had someone else do, and that has bred a fear of failure if I was to try anything new.
892 condescending Certis quotes out of a possible infinity - Elysium scores Torchlight lower than expected.
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Alright, you primitive screw-heads, listen up! See this? This...is my iPod! It's an eighty gigabyte, 5.5 generation. Apple Computer's top of the line. You can find this in the electronics department. That's right, this sweet baby was made in Taiwan. Retails for about $349.99. It's got a black finish, two point five inch screen, and a hair trigger Click Wheel. That's right...Apple Computer; think different. You got that?!!
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"Butt hat is my opinion and we all know how far that goes around here." - Demonicmaster
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About a year ago, I felt the same way, and decided to confront that feeling with the purchase of additional "information" in the form of these excellent books. "The Self Sufficient Life" and "Forgotten Arts and Crafts".
Granted, the only time I'll probably have a use for it (other than mental stimulation) would be in a post-apocalyptic environment, but I'd probably be too busy making armor out of football pads and tweaking out my Solara to run on Beagle droppings.
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"War is god's way of teaching Americans geography." - Jon Stewart
"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents." - Howard Philips Lovecraft
Shop smart. Shop S-mart!
I felt -- I feel -- that Shawn, Rob and Julian were making out with the game, and as their friend I felt it was important to point out that they were making out with an ugly chick. - Cory Banks, keeping it real
Don't make love on Brazilian beaches. They have bodflies. Love is good. Giant maggots crawling out of your skin, not so good.
NOTE: Not a doodle bug.
Steam-XBox-PSN: Lobstermancer
Oddly enough, my friend (Kevwah, some of you might recognize from XBL) and I had lunch today, where we talked about the incident with that poor guy and his family from CNET. It kind of highlights this kind of thing. Like so many of us, I can see being in his situation: cellphone, GPS, persistent anywhere internet connection, then being complete cut off from the crutches. All of the sudden your in the middle of nowhere, with no map, no cold weather clothes, no water, etc...
I wonder how many folks who have a GPS to go hiking know how to actually navigate with dead reckoning and a compass and a USGS map? I'm not being a smartass -- I think I'd last moments in such a situation for all sorts of reasons. But the combo of my wife growing up in an earthquake zone and me being a boy scout means we've got two weeks of food and water in the basement and a pile of firewood. But this last thing has made me re-evaluate what we're keeping in the minivan. We keep the normal car stuff and a good high-end medical field pack, but that's it.
Be prepared, I guess, is the order of the day. All the brains in the world ain't nothin' without the tools.
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"Publishers still speak in hushed tones about el bunny de la muerte." - *Legion*
Somnambulisitic?
I had to look that up. I want to say thanks to Elysium and Tycho for expanding my vocabulary. I'm going to try my darnedest to force that word into conversation soon. Hopefully, ladies will be present. Particularly, the kind that are impressed by syllables. Rowwwrrrrrr.
Also, I think this article could easily be translated into a treatise on the merits of solar power.
JUST PUZZLED YOUR ASS UP, SON! -Mr Crinkle
If your hands get tired from button-mashing, remember that toes are the fingers of the feet. - Clemenstation
Schmi was a slave, right? Anakin's father is probably Thomas Jefferson. -Quintin_Stone
Nice artile, Elysium, and something I've been thinking about. See, I've been designing a game which is, like Johnvanjim mentions, set in a post-apoc enviornment, and requires the player to employ a lot of very primitive tech before moving on to develop and employ higher tech. And it's been interesting as I explore the various basics that I really had no understanding about but are still foundations of our civilization. (By the way, Wikipedia is really useful for this.)
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You surprise me again, Elysium. I hadn't thought about this in a long time.
I guess you'd think I've got the best of both worlds. I grew up in rural Alaska. We hunted and fished or grew most of our own food. Us kids helped build our house. No civilization to speak of. You still can't drive to the place we lived until I was nine. That house is still heated by a single wood stove, but I think the new owners replaced the oil-barrel one my Dad made with something a bit more modern.
Now I've moved Outside and gone to college and I program computers for a living. I still put up vegetables when they're on sale and stuff. We pick wild apples and blackberries and stuff for jam. I refuse to pay $4 for a tub of blackberry jelly when I have the accursed vines dropping berries in my hair when I'm on the fitness trail every summer and encroaching on us in every direction like kudzu. Plus, it makes things easier in the budget department. I don't hunt or fish; too many rules and regulations and I haven't seen a fish or a deer big enough to even be legal to take back home since I've been here.
I don't have the uncertainty you do, I guess. If you gave me one pack full of gear (that I get to pick) and dropped me off at the place of my choosing back home in the spring I would be set for winter with no problem. You better airdrop me a library once the snow flies, though. With no internet and no games I'd need a LOT Of books and yarn to get through the winter without going nuts. I'm all citi-fied and spoiled, I guess.
You have more advantages than your Ipod, though. Even after the Energizer Bunny has toddled off into the sunset. While you may not have all the practical knowledge you would need, what you do have is a finely honed ability to learn. Don't underestimate that.
I assure you, this stuff isn't rocket surgery. It's messy and smelly and physically demanding, but not exactly complex.
Suggested reading:
Back to Basics : How to Learn and Enjoy Traditional American Skills
This one will teach you how to do everything from choosing a good lot to building your cabin to powering it with wind and water, to raising vegetables and livestock. Then once you've raised it they go into how to harvest and store it and cook it both by modern and 17th century methods. Then add every craft imaginable from metalworking on up to quilting. Spinning thread, making soap, everything. How about making a broom, or a scrub-brush, or a shovel? There are even sections on how to make and play old-fashioned games and stuff and a great section on wilderness camping and survival. It's not an exhaustive reference, but it gives you enough to start with and each section contains sources to get more information on the topic. Even if you're never going to do any of these things, just having it around for the recipes and home craft stuff is good. Plus, it's comforting to have on the bookshelf.
Where the Hell is Sourdough, Alaska
If you really want to have some idea of what it was like when I was growing up, we lived not too far from this guy. When he talks about "going into Town", he means the town my Gramma lived in. The brother he has such a rivalry with was in my class at school. His mom is the most amazing character. No, we're not mentioned in it. Thank goodness!
The Adventures of Conrad Stargard, by Leo Frankowski
Series of five books about a Polish engineer who accidentally ends up in 10th Century Poland with only 10 years to get the place ready for the Mongols to invade. Mostly for fun, but it goes into a mindset that you would have to have.
Maybe this issue is best debated amongst the people who need to get off my lawn. - JoeBedurndurn
Surprised it hasn't been mentioned yet, but [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Connecticut_Yankee_in_King_Arthur's_Court]Mark Twain[/url] had something to say on the subject. More fanciful than realistic though, I don't know how many people have the wealth of knowledge this man was supposed to have (or at least would have figured it out in such a short time).
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Is the term "sleepwalking" really that offensive to your sensibilities?
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Sonar ambulances aside, isn't sleepwalking something approaching the opposite of daydreaming?
Also, do you mean to suggest that, were I to be stranded in the wild, Derrida would not help me? Lacan? Foucault?
Are you saying that being able to analyze the disparities between real things and their signifiers such as "tree," "oak," "moss," "north," and (eventually) "starvation" wouldn't help me at all?
Seriously though, I remember kids in college who didn't know how to hold a hammer. You could be worse. Besides, you obviously have some skill with diction and rhetoric. That'll get you pretty far in just about any society--so long as they speak the same language.
Pyroman wrote:
Gravey wrote:
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PS: That tree is a phallus. Ants have repressed Oedipal complexes.
If you assume authorial intent, you may discover a good number of fascinating religious ideas by analyzing nature before you're eaten by a grue.
Pyroman wrote:
Gravey wrote:
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I think not. Dreaming while walking, of one kind or another, might be somnambulistic.
How pedestrian. It's worth it just to make McChuck run to a dictionary.
I felt -- I feel -- that Shawn, Rob and Julian were making out with the game, and as their friend I felt it was important to point out that they were making out with an ugly chick. - Cory Banks, keeping it real
Never, in over 30 years since I played my first round of Pong, have I enjoyed video games like I do since finding GWJ. What part in that do I owe to you, sir? As I grow older, I find 2 things - my grandest dreams dashed, and my accomplishments were greater than initially assessed. Good piece, Elysium. Now I'm going to drive home and hate myself
"Once you can accept the universe is matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy." -- Albert Einstein
Firefox searchbar, my friend. If I were inclined to run (I am not), I wouldn't even know where to go for a dictionary. Just hearing that makes you want to seek the security and comfort of your APA grammar book and snuggle with it, doesn't it?
JUST PUZZLED YOUR ASS UP, SON! -Mr Crinkle
If your hands get tired from button-mashing, remember that toes are the fingers of the feet. - Clemenstation
Schmi was a slave, right? Anakin's father is probably Thomas Jefferson. -Quintin_Stone
Elysium, I will totally copy-edit all front page articles if you get a subscription to the OED for us to share. Googling for etymologies makes me feel like a peon.
"Zug-zug. Dabu."
("How pedestrian" might make it as my favorite pun of the week.)
Pyroman wrote:
Gravey wrote:
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Thank you for getting the joke!
I felt -- I feel -- that Shawn, Rob and Julian were making out with the game, and as their friend I felt it was important to point out that they were making out with an ugly chick. - Cory Banks, keeping it real
Truly my pleasure.
Pyroman wrote:
Gravey wrote:
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