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Sometimes I’m just SO AWESTRUCK by innovation.
I’m not talking about high tech stuff from today, but things that have been around for hundreds of not thousands of years. There are things that feel so fundamental to me now that I struggle to envision what it could be like without
I’m not talking about high tech stuff from today, but things that have been around for hundreds of not thousands of years. There are things that feel so fundamental to me now that I struggle to envision what it could be like without
It’s not to say that there aren’t people who DO live without these innovations, but I am so thoroughly situated within them that I must stretchhhh to imagine what that experience might be like
I was talking with @CLeibowicz about these sorts of technologies, so I’ll share a list!
I was talking with @CLeibowicz about these sorts of technologies, so I’ll share a list!
LIST OF INNOVATIONS THAT BLOW MY MIND:
1) written language
I read a book (meta!) about the various developments of writing systems through history, and I found it mind-boggling. I know spoken languages must have been an even more radical thing, but I really REALLY can’t imagine!
1) written language
I read a book (meta!) about the various developments of writing systems through history, and I found it mind-boggling. I know spoken languages must have been an even more radical thing, but I really REALLY can’t imagine!
There’s a lot to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, but gosh if it isn’t wild to think about (or experience) language literally reshaping your perception of the world! https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/segments/91730-new-words-new-world
Studying Chinese definitely changed how I think (for the better, imho) and one of the things that really resonated was the “tā” pronoun. In spoken language, the gendered forms of this pronoun sound identical. As a nonbinary person this was a gender euphoria-inducing discovery!
In writing, however, the pronoun for a person can be written with the masculine or feminine radicals: 他 and 她, respectively.
More recently, there have been efforts to develop nonbinary versions of the pronoun https://www.arianalife.com/topics/gender-equality/x%E4%B9%9Fand-ta-the-gradual-rise-of-gender-neutral-pronouns-in-chinese/
More recently, there have been efforts to develop nonbinary versions of the pronoun https://www.arianalife.com/topics/gender-equality/x%E4%B9%9Fand-ta-the-gradual-rise-of-gender-neutral-pronouns-in-chinese/
So imagine my surprise a few years ago learning that the GENDERED form is actually a 20th century invention! 她 (written equivalently tā in pingyin) was created in part as a reaction to gendered pronouns in European languages https://www.harvard-yenching.org/research/cultural-history-of-the-chinese-character-ta/
But I digress! Written language is so fascinating & so very integrated into how I think & move through the world, it’s dizzying to imagine life without it.
So much of my memory & thinking is an interplay between actual writing & verbal constructions that lean on written forms.
So much of my memory & thinking is an interplay between actual writing & verbal constructions that lean on written forms.
I don’t know if it represents anything close to reality, but I appreciated thinking about the process of turning meaning sounds into broken up chunks of written words as represented in Ted Chiang’s “The Truth Of Fact, The Truth Of Feeling.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Truth_of_Fact,_the_Truth_of_Feeling
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Truth_of_Fact,_the_Truth_of_Feeling
I’m having trouble finding history about when the concept of words emerged, which maybe is one of those things that predates a lot of history, but I would be awfully curious to learn more, if anyone has resources to point to!
LIST OF INNOVATIONS THAT BLOW MY MIND:
2) perspective drawing
Sometimes I look at old paintings with people at all sorts of funny angles & sizes, I think “did they really think it looked like that?”
Of course, not all art is in pursuit of realism but perspective still astounds me
2) perspective drawing
Sometimes I look at old paintings with people at all sorts of funny angles & sizes, I think “did they really think it looked like that?”
Of course, not all art is in pursuit of realism but perspective still astounds me
One of those things that’s fascinating about perspective drawing is that it’s a thing that has been found and lost and found (maybe multiple times!)
I’m fascinated by the knowledge that we may have lost and what we might (re)discover in the future
I’m fascinated by the knowledge that we may have lost and what we might (re)discover in the future
It’s hard to imagine this given all the tools of today
I was lucky to be taught about multi-point perspective in elementary school. I am able to use tracing paper, reference photos or layers in photoshop to selectively hide and reveal helpful extra info http://www.howtotalkaboutarthistory.com/reader-questions/tims-vermeer-artistic-genius/
I was lucky to be taught about multi-point perspective in elementary school. I am able to use tracing paper, reference photos or layers in photoshop to selectively hide and reveal helpful extra info http://www.howtotalkaboutarthistory.com/reader-questions/tims-vermeer-artistic-genius/
It’s often said that you must learn the rules before you can break them. Could it be that artists throughout history actually did know how to draw more photorealistically but chose not to? Surely some have throughout time. Photorealism is not the paramount of art. https://twitter.com/schichmax/status/1332422310075232261
LIST OF INNOVATIONS THAT BLOW MY MIND:
3) markets
This is one of those things that’s been so baked into my thinking about things that I confess it’s a lens that’s hard to see outside even when learning about specifically non-market organizations of relationships and distribution
3) markets
This is one of those things that’s been so baked into my thinking about things that I confess it’s a lens that’s hard to see outside even when learning about specifically non-market organizations of relationships and distribution
Whoops! Going to have to take a break from threading (love y’all) but more on this later. Still have a lot to learn about the history of markets, tbh, to wrap my brain around.
