A question from one of my students
Several of my former (and current) students are friends of mine on Facebook. One of them posted a question today and then further on down in the discussion, asked for my thoughts on the question. Facebook's limits on what you can say in reply to a post drove me to post them here. First, the question:
"Earlier today Neil degrades Tyson tweeted "Just an FYI: The year 1980 is as far in today's past as 1947 was to 1980."
Why does it feel like the national conversations & cultural shifts between 47-80 seem to be so much larger to me than 80-2013? I can see such large changes from the 50-60s, but don't feel much from 2000-2010 other than focus on terrorism & smartphones. Is this an effect of getting older, or have my lessons of history got me seeing things completely out of context?..."
Before analyzing national conversations and cultural shifts between 1947, 1980 and 2013, it's important to describe the state of the nation and world in those three chosen years and how things changed moving forward from the first to the middle to the last.
In 1947 it was considered constitutional to:
Ban interracial marriage.
Outlaw sodomy.
Permit racial discrimination in any public setting in the South.
In 1947 we also saw:
The Japanese who were interned in camps like Manzanar struggling to recover economically, having lost everything during their internment.
The nation's economy dealing with moving from a wartime footing to a peacetime footing, while absorbing the returning veterans into the workforce.
A nation with only 48 states.
A segregated military (integration would begin the following year).
A much smaller gap between rich, middle class and poor than exists in 2013.
What changed between then and 1980 that would frame the national conversation?
The Korean War.
The Vietnam War.
The end of the draft.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The first resignation of a President.
The failure of the states to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.
Court-ordered integration of public schools and busing.
These decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court:
Roe v Wade.
Doe v Bolton.
Brown v Board of Education.
United States v Paramount Pictures, Inc.
Feres v United States
Hernandez v Texas
One, Inc v Olesen
Trop v Dulles
Flora v United States
New York Times Co v Sullivan
McLaughlin v Florida
Griswold v Connecticut
Miranda v Arizona
Loving v Virginia
We had "free love", the "sexual revolution", LSD and other hard drugs, along with a proliferation of marijuana use. We had Jimmy Carter's WIN plan to "Whip Inflation Now". We thought we had a "peace dividend" after Vietnam had fallen but it never really came into being
* * *
In 1947, if a restaurant owner anywhere wanted to, he could deny service to anyone based on the color of their skin, their religion, their gender, or any other factor about themselves they could not change. 33 years later that was not the case. In his brilliant autobiography, Colin Powell wrote about the discrimination he faced in the military in the early 1960s. How he could not find adequate quarters in the community outside the base where he'd been assigned. The military on-base housing that had been promised to him and his wife wouldn't be available for months. How he went to a burger joint near the post and was told they would hand him a burger out the back door. And, how he went back there and ate in the front of the place after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 took effect.
Technology started to progress on a faster scale. The personal computer was just around the corner. In 1981 the development of CSNET (Computer Science Network) followed quickly by the TCP/IP protocol's standardization. The internet was on its way to becoming the realm of the people rather than just university and government scientists.
Now in 1980, things accelerated even more in the growth of technology and how fast it improved. The military started issuing personal computers to the lowest level echelons of command in 1984. These early computers (mostly Zenith-Z100s) used an early version of DOS and very simple programs written in languages like Basic. In 1988 I had my first home computer, a 286 CPU with math co-processor. It was a 12 megahertz machine with a 2400 baud modem. Top of the line stuff. Less than two years later it was replaced by a 486 CPU that was more than twice as fast and a 9600 baud modem. It's only grown faster since, with more RAM, more HDD space and faster and faster BUS speed.
I have a solid understanding of the current versions of Windows, but I also know all the prior versions. In fact, if we all of a sudden found ourselves in a world where the only computers that worked were working on one of the old versions of DOS, I'd have no problem making them work.
I use that to demonstrate that there are parallels. From 1947 to 1980, how students learned to do math changed. There were no calculators early on in that period. Everything was done by hand with pencils, erasers and for the advanced student, a slide rule. You learned your multiplication tables through rote memorization. Then came the handheld calculator. Ten years later (or sooner), the students who relied on those calculators to do basic math could not do the equations by hand, for the most part. Using DOS is the same thing. The old will always work, if you know how to do it.
* * *
I'm getting long winded so let me see if I can summarize. It's now 1947 and you're doing a paper for a class in college. You go to the library and get the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature and begin looking for articles that have information on the subject of your paper. Office photocopiers didn't come along until 1959. Microfiche storage of magazines was common and printers attached to readers provided very poor quality prints. By 1980 it was better, but not great.
Today if you need to research a paper you go to Google or Bing or Yahoo and start searching. Everything you need is available on-line.
But there's a much simpler way to look at all of this. The speed of change is actually fairly constant over the long term. The M-134 "Minigun" is just an updated, highly upgraded version of the old Gatling Gun. It shoots faster, it shoots better bullets, but the basic design is the same. The Gatling Gun has been around for 150 years now. 100 years ago, pilots started carrying handguns for the first air to air combat. Now drones don't need to have a human aboard, the pilot can fly the plane safely from an air-conditioned office somewhere.
One last thought. If someone were to ask me what books they should read to prepare to be successful in life, the list I'd give would be an interesting one.
"The Book of Five Rings" - Miyamoto Mushashi, published first in 1645.
"The Art of War" - Sun Tzu, first translated into French in 1772 and into English around the year 1905.
"Who Moved My Cheese" - Spencer Johnson, first published in 1998.
"How to Win Friends and Influence People" - Dale Carnegie, first published in 1936.
"The Prince" - Machiavelli, first published in 1532.
"Motivation and Personality" - Abraham Maslow, first published in 1954.
If anyone has questions, let me know. You can follow me on Twitter @cyclist1959
"Earlier today Neil degrades Tyson tweeted "Just an FYI: The year 1980 is as far in today's past as 1947 was to 1980."
Why does it feel like the national conversations & cultural shifts between 47-80 seem to be so much larger to me than 80-2013? I can see such large changes from the 50-60s, but don't feel much from 2000-2010 other than focus on terrorism & smartphones. Is this an effect of getting older, or have my lessons of history got me seeing things completely out of context?..."
Before analyzing national conversations and cultural shifts between 1947, 1980 and 2013, it's important to describe the state of the nation and world in those three chosen years and how things changed moving forward from the first to the middle to the last.
In 1947 it was considered constitutional to:
Ban interracial marriage.
Outlaw sodomy.
Permit racial discrimination in any public setting in the South.
In 1947 we also saw:
The Japanese who were interned in camps like Manzanar struggling to recover economically, having lost everything during their internment.
The nation's economy dealing with moving from a wartime footing to a peacetime footing, while absorbing the returning veterans into the workforce.
A nation with only 48 states.
A segregated military (integration would begin the following year).
A much smaller gap between rich, middle class and poor than exists in 2013.
What changed between then and 1980 that would frame the national conversation?
The Korean War.
The Vietnam War.
The end of the draft.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The first resignation of a President.
The failure of the states to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.
Court-ordered integration of public schools and busing.
These decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court:
Roe v Wade.
Doe v Bolton.
Brown v Board of Education.
United States v Paramount Pictures, Inc.
Feres v United States
Hernandez v Texas
One, Inc v Olesen
Trop v Dulles
Flora v United States
New York Times Co v Sullivan
McLaughlin v Florida
Griswold v Connecticut
Miranda v Arizona
Loving v Virginia
We had "free love", the "sexual revolution", LSD and other hard drugs, along with a proliferation of marijuana use. We had Jimmy Carter's WIN plan to "Whip Inflation Now". We thought we had a "peace dividend" after Vietnam had fallen but it never really came into being
* * *
In 1947, if a restaurant owner anywhere wanted to, he could deny service to anyone based on the color of their skin, their religion, their gender, or any other factor about themselves they could not change. 33 years later that was not the case. In his brilliant autobiography, Colin Powell wrote about the discrimination he faced in the military in the early 1960s. How he could not find adequate quarters in the community outside the base where he'd been assigned. The military on-base housing that had been promised to him and his wife wouldn't be available for months. How he went to a burger joint near the post and was told they would hand him a burger out the back door. And, how he went back there and ate in the front of the place after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 took effect.
Technology started to progress on a faster scale. The personal computer was just around the corner. In 1981 the development of CSNET (Computer Science Network) followed quickly by the TCP/IP protocol's standardization. The internet was on its way to becoming the realm of the people rather than just university and government scientists.
Now in 1980, things accelerated even more in the growth of technology and how fast it improved. The military started issuing personal computers to the lowest level echelons of command in 1984. These early computers (mostly Zenith-Z100s) used an early version of DOS and very simple programs written in languages like Basic. In 1988 I had my first home computer, a 286 CPU with math co-processor. It was a 12 megahertz machine with a 2400 baud modem. Top of the line stuff. Less than two years later it was replaced by a 486 CPU that was more than twice as fast and a 9600 baud modem. It's only grown faster since, with more RAM, more HDD space and faster and faster BUS speed.
I have a solid understanding of the current versions of Windows, but I also know all the prior versions. In fact, if we all of a sudden found ourselves in a world where the only computers that worked were working on one of the old versions of DOS, I'd have no problem making them work.
I use that to demonstrate that there are parallels. From 1947 to 1980, how students learned to do math changed. There were no calculators early on in that period. Everything was done by hand with pencils, erasers and for the advanced student, a slide rule. You learned your multiplication tables through rote memorization. Then came the handheld calculator. Ten years later (or sooner), the students who relied on those calculators to do basic math could not do the equations by hand, for the most part. Using DOS is the same thing. The old will always work, if you know how to do it.
* * *
I'm getting long winded so let me see if I can summarize. It's now 1947 and you're doing a paper for a class in college. You go to the library and get the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature and begin looking for articles that have information on the subject of your paper. Office photocopiers didn't come along until 1959. Microfiche storage of magazines was common and printers attached to readers provided very poor quality prints. By 1980 it was better, but not great.
Today if you need to research a paper you go to Google or Bing or Yahoo and start searching. Everything you need is available on-line.
But there's a much simpler way to look at all of this. The speed of change is actually fairly constant over the long term. The M-134 "Minigun" is just an updated, highly upgraded version of the old Gatling Gun. It shoots faster, it shoots better bullets, but the basic design is the same. The Gatling Gun has been around for 150 years now. 100 years ago, pilots started carrying handguns for the first air to air combat. Now drones don't need to have a human aboard, the pilot can fly the plane safely from an air-conditioned office somewhere.
One last thought. If someone were to ask me what books they should read to prepare to be successful in life, the list I'd give would be an interesting one.
"The Book of Five Rings" - Miyamoto Mushashi, published first in 1645.
"The Art of War" - Sun Tzu, first translated into French in 1772 and into English around the year 1905.
"Who Moved My Cheese" - Spencer Johnson, first published in 1998.
"How to Win Friends and Influence People" - Dale Carnegie, first published in 1936.
"The Prince" - Machiavelli, first published in 1532.
"Motivation and Personality" - Abraham Maslow, first published in 1954.
If anyone has questions, let me know. You can follow me on Twitter @cyclist1959
posted by me at 9:39 PM
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