Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!rutgers!ucla-cs!zen!ucbvax!hplabs!hplabsc!taylor From: wfi@rti.UUCP (William Ingogly) Newsgroups: comp.society Subject: Re: The Impact of Inventions Message-ID: <2172@hplabsc.HP.COM> Date: Mon, 6-Jul-87 17:09:08 EDT Article-I.D.: hplabsc.2172 Posted: Mon Jul 6 17:09:08 1987 Date-Received: Wed, 8-Jul-87 00:55:47 EDT References: <2041@hplabsc.HP.COM> Sender: taylor@hplabsc.HP.COM Distribution: world Organization: Research Triangle Institute, NC Lines: 37 Approved: taylor@hplabs [The discussion continues, but we *are* getting a bit off track, so let's try to steer it back to technology and society please... -- Dave ] >> When I said 'poets,' I was referring to people like ... > >This strikes me as a very snobbish response. If there is an outlet whereby >poets have a large impact, that establishes the importance of poetry. >Whether the poets in question are the ones commonly thought of as poets, and >anyone's opinion of the quality of their work, are both beside the point. So what sells is poetry. Aesthetics, content, and skill are beside the point. If I can outsell poet X I am by definition a more important poet. What's wrong with this picture? >... I believe that the people who write the TV >jingles and sitcoms think of themselves as part of the literati, and are, in >vastly disproportionate numbers, amongst the readers of the serious poets. I in fact have known people who write greeting cards and romance novels. They may consider themselves part of the literati, but they know that what they're doing for a living is hack work. Their interest (if any) in serious poetry has little connection with their professional output. >In the end, though, I don't think we *can* really control our technology. >If one group doesn't develop something, somebody else will. The best we can >do is to try to understand the implications, and change the details here and >there for best effect. But ultimately, we are captives of our technological >development, and can only hope we like where it takes us. This is a fatalistic attitude that assumes technology by its nature must or should remain forever beyond our control. I fail to see why: technology doesn't possess an existence independent of the people and social forces that make it what it is; people and social forces can be influenced and changed; what is it, then, about technology that makes it impossible to control? -- Bill Ingogly