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The Pace of Modern Life

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'Unfortunately, the notion of marriage which prevails ... at the present time ... regards the institution as simply a convenient arrangement or formal contract ... This disregard of the sanctity of marriage and contempt for its restrictions is one of the most alarming tendencies of the present age.' --John Harvey Kellogg, Ladies' guide in health and disease (1883)
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20 public comments
chrisamico
4150 days ago
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All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again.
Boston, MA
oliverzip
4153 days ago
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Has twitter wrecked modern communcation?
Sydney, Balmain, Hornsby.
izogi
4162 days ago
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Fortunately, as I'm informed, it had all calmed down again by the time of my parents' generation.
antgiant
4162 days ago
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"Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things." -- Douglas Adams
Oviedo, Florida
bloodvayne
4161 days ago
Society will be society, what's interesting is how inherently the "nostalgia fallacy" is simply society's self-preservation against seemingly "hostile" undercurrent. Reminds me of this article from Art of Manliness, also a very thorugh read http://www.artofmanliness.com/2012/07/12/the-generations-of-men-how-the-cycles-of-history-have-shaped-your-values-your-place-in-the-world-and-your-idea-of-manhood/
stsquad
4162 days ago
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Nice commentary on modern commentary.
Cambridge, UK
bscherrer
4163 days ago
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@mahea50 Word.
San Diego, California
iridesce
4163 days ago
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now let's make one for "damn kids are spoiled and have no respect for their elders these days"
DC
iridesce
4163 days ago
whoops, nevermind, i see you 1906.
rgsunico
4163 days ago
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Brilliant.
marcrichter
4162 days ago
tl;dnr :P
redson
4163 days ago
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The Golden Age Fallacy in action.
claysmith
4163 days ago
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“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” — Ecclesiastes 1:9
Escondido, CA
dcwarwick
4163 days ago
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And on it goes.
Edmonton, AB, Canada
taddevries
4163 days ago
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Get off my internet lawn you free loaders.
mscholes
4163 days ago
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The summary is beautiful ;-)
benmurray
4163 days ago
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Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things. -- Douglas Adams
adamgurri
4163 days ago
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the public comments on this comic seem to imply everyone swallows the premise of the letters...I had though Munroe's point was more that we keep hearing the same arguments over and over again in each age.
New York, NY
btomhave
4163 days ago
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Those who fail to learn from history... yada yada yada...
Michdevilish
4163 days ago
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Definitive proof that human faculties have been dwindling since at least 1871, and show no signs of abating in their sad dwindleMent...
Canada
the7roy
4163 days ago
1871? Try ~360 BCE when Plato wrote, "they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, and you give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality."
PaulPritchard
4163 days ago
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Nostalgia isn't as good as it used to be.
Belgium
internetionals
4163 days ago
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Nice to see it spelled out to people that "nostalgia" is of all times. And the that troubles of today were often already there earlier, but people just remember them differently.
Netherlands
Ludwig
4163 days ago
Consider the possibility that the authors of these quotes were correct (well, except the divorce and nudity one,) like that Aristotle quote where he bitches about “kids these days,” instead of resigning it to “ah, it was ever thus.”

Neophilia as a form of hiding

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Every once in a while someone will say to me, "yeah, sure, I've heard that before... what do you have that's new?"

In contemporary art or movies, it makes perfect sense to be focused on the bleeding edge, on the new idea that's never been previously contemplated.

But when we're discussing our goals, our passion and the way we interact with the culture, it seems to me that what works is significantly more important than what's new. Racing to build your organization around the latest social network tool or graphics-rendering technology permits you to spend a lot of time learning the new system and skiing in the fresh powder of the unproven, but it might just distract you from the difficult work of telling the truth, looking people in the eye and making a difference.

"I can't describe the value we deliver, I'm too busy integrating this new technology into my workflow!"

All too often, the ones who are aggressively seeking the theory of the day don't have a lot to show for what they did yesterday.

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benmurray
4238 days ago
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I struggle with myself regarding this constantly!