{ Friday, March 14, 2003 }
I was seeking some information on The Laments -- mythological or legendary figures, generally women, who wailed at the gravesides of the recently dead -- but Google returned to me this lovely piece called The Ten Laments: Technology and Education in Ancient China. Written in the 13th century, it laments people's lack of interest in books and learning, and shows how we always believe things were better "in ancient times", when in fact things are not in decline, just the way they've always been:
In ancient times, people did not feel it too far to come from a thousand li carrying their books on their back, looking for a teacher. Today, people have worthy fathers and elder brothers to teach them and yet they do not listen to those. Or they have a worthy teacher in the village and yet they do not know of his vicinity. This is the second lament.
I remember reading a 3,000-year-old Egyptian inscription which said, "The youth of today are unruly, belligerent, and do not listen to their parents..."
Also, does anyone remember reading an article in The New Yorker in the past two or three years, in which a philosopher or historian propounded this theory that we live in the age of "nothing special", i.e. that we live in a time that is not that much different than any other time, and that our predictions should be predicated on the preceding? I can't remember the guy's name, or find the article (amidst all the piles and piles of NYers I can't bear to throw out until they put the damn archives online.)
LINK | 1:54 PM | TB
The New Yorker archives are online as 12/27/1999, but only via Lexis-Nexis (a fee service).
Your academic library probably has a subscription.
Jay Datema | March 15, 2003 5:28 AMYou're talking about the "doomsday argument"; it was discussed in "How to Predict Everything," by Timothy Ferris (New Yorker, 12 July 1999).
Here's the basic story:
http://24.86.132.253/090101/feature/feature.htm
And here's a detailed discussion:
http://www.anthropic-principle.com/preprints/inv/investigations.html
I hope you appreciate this; it took me forever to find! (Just try Googling on "probability," "history," "end"...)
steve | March 16, 2003 8:57 AMPerhaps the "Laments" were true in their time? It was the time of the failing of the Sung dynasty. Or perhaps they were neo-Confucian works, exhortations of Confucian values.
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{ Post a comment }
The Ch'an tradition is full of these laments during the same period, collected in Zen Lessons, by Shambhala Press.
There is a similar lament in my school of painting, since the Carracci, every generation thinks their grandfathers had better training, or clearer insight into what's valuable.
I do not remember the "nothing special" article, and I have four years of NYers in my house. Sounds a bit like Harper's to me...
tim | March 14, 2003 4:50 PM