4 ms·

Startling to read that if we were to choose a mythology for ‘this age’ it would be space flight. And not e.g. biomedical breakthroughs (vaccin within very short

by plank 4y ago

Startling to read that if we were to choose a mythology for ‘this age’ it would be space flight. And not e.g. biomedical breakthroughs (vaccin within very short timeframe), computing (Moore’s law prominent in period since 1960’s) or some other field. Now if the article had stated that space flight was ONE of the fields in which much progress was I wouldn’t have argued that?

DocTomoe 4y ago
I would guess that for a mythology to work, in the end you need easy-to-understand progress, movement, and an easily-identifiable cadre of heroes. Can't have a hero's journey without a hero or the journey. Just take a look at 'fictional mythology', as in 'stories and media': one or several folks take a long trip and fight a common foe. That's the kind of story you'd tell around a campfire in Europe, ca. 5000 BC, and that's the story you can tell in cinemas today. One guy sat down and thought really hard until he got an idea? Bo-ring. The Space Race fulfils that structure: You got your heroes cadre (astronauts), their journey (both figuratively in meticulous training and actual in the journey across space), a common foe (the deadly emptiness of space // the cosmonauts // the communists).
paganel 4y ago
It was definitely a shared mythology (meaning both the East&West) but it's true that its "force of attraction" (for lack of a better expression) has somewhat faded in the last 15-20 years, I'd say the 1980s was the pinnacle of it all. We don't have Star Wars-like movie phenomenons about computers and vaccines, and we especially don't have music like this [1] that would make us dream about computers the same way it makes us dream about space. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMoCM_FgLP8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMoCM_FgLP8 Later edit: I'll just blatantly copy-paste a high-voted comment from that YT link which better explains it: """ I was born in the USSR, and in the 80s we thought about space, other planets, stars. We read good science fiction. We dreamed of participating in all this. We wanted to be pilots, build rockets, explore space. We listened to news about cosmonauts, without distinction of Soviet or American. We thought that space was a place for cooperation of all mankind. We wanted peace and development. But, everything collapsed in one moment. Now children do not want to go into space. They don't want to be like Gagarin or Armstrong. They want to be like Kardashian or Deripaska. This is a tragedy for many of us. And this music is just a reminder of what we have lost. """
- nonrandomstring 4y ago
  > But, everything collapsed in one moment. Now children do not want to go into space. They don't want to be like Gagarin or Armstrong. They want to be like Kardashian or Deripaska. Man, this really hurts to read. But there is some hope. As I was was saying to a prominent lisper just the other day, I think "space and the planet" is something young people are refocussing on. I sense a long overdue and deep rejection of "fast cars, money and fame" in the air.
  - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
    I'm pretty sure there were kids who wanted to grow up to be James Dean or Marilyn Monroe when they were prominent.
    - Pamar 4y ago
      Not sure. Probably they dreamed of becoming Babe Ruth or another sport star, maybe?
      - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
        Babe Ruth would have been another generation, they might have dreamed of being Joe DiMaggio (who Monroe was married to for a bit) but he was also a bit old when she was a star so I would guess they were more interested in being Mickey Mantle or Hank Aaron.
        Pamar 4y ago
        Yup, sorry for the wrong reference. What I meant is that I believe (might be wrong) that earlier generations would not be so taken with the idea of becoming showbiz stars. Actors/actresses, singers etc. would be famous, well regarded and so on, but I think they were seen more like a sort of "aristocracy" while, at least for boys, the aspirational models were more in the field of sports.
        4y ago
nonrandomstring 4y ago
Mythologies carry a lot along with them. On the positive side they give a structure and direction to the conceit of progress. By the same token they can hurt us when we project all our hopes into them. The disappointment of a "space-age" generation, who grew up on promises they'd be living on moon-bases and zooming about in spacecraft, turned to emptiness when around 2000 the new millennium turned out to be about just more Earth bound in-fighting. 2001 should have been the great Odyssey, but tuned out to be a drab journey towards neo-fascism and isolation. Psychologically, as a result we started to create our own personal space capsules, cut off from the rest of humanity. The militarisation of space was glorious in 1977. The Battle of Britain redone with X-Wings, in our mythology George Lucas cast space as a battleground "Far Far Away". If the "Home before Christmas" of WW1 is any indication, young men romanticise far away battlegrounds, as do hawks and pacifists alike, because at least they are somewhere else. The reality of space militarisation is unfolding 50 miles above our heads, as spy satellites and drones delivering death from above. For poor, brown people in Overthereistan, space has been the enemy for a decade, and cloud cover is a friend. Colonisation, cooperation, and trade are another part of our mythology. Sworn enemies could unite against a common foe of the void, With infinity in all directions, humans would finally be freed of their petty border disputes and overcrowding amidst infinite resources. But the ISS is coming to end of life, with no replacement in the planning. I was saddened by the effect of the Russo-Ukraine war on the departure of astronauts from the ISS. It seems like a breakdown and taint of parochialism beyond Earth straight from Arthur C. Clarke's story book. Yet I was mocked and down-voted here on HN for expressing the mildest solidarity with Russian geeks who might also be feeling the same disappointment. Around 2000 I also remember feeling that some of most dangerous minds on the planet are lawyers, who at the turn of century were trying to give serious credence to people owning Moon plots. Despite international agreements, territorial disputes over orbital space and ridiculous "claims" to bits of other planets looks set to grow. It is our Kierkegaardian paradox that humankind loves mythologies we can't quite live up to. But that's what mythologies are for I guess.
Cthulhu_ 4y ago
I mean, what does history mainly remember of e.g. the Romans; was it their biomedical breakthroughs? Or the works they left behind? Or the Greeks; was it their works, writing and philosophy, or their technology like the Antikythera mechanism or early steam engines? What people in 2000 years care about will be... pretty arbitrary, I think.
api 4y ago
I grew up in the 90s and computing was definitely a huge part of the mythology. Space wasn’t out but it was kind of back burner. The author of this piece seems to think space is the ur myth of modernity which I don’t think it is. One of the characteristics of our age is many myth narratives that overlap and ebb and flow. The coolest thing about our age though is that many of them come true to some limited extent at least. We don’t get Star Trek but we do go somewhere.

by plank 4y ago

DocTomoe 4y ago

I would guess that for a mythology to work, in the end you need easy-to-understand progress, movement, and an easily-identifiable cadre of heroes. Can't have a hero's journey without a hero or the journey. Just take a look at 'fictional mythology', as in 'stories and media': one or several folks take a long trip and fight a common foe. That's the kind of story you'd tell around a campfire in Europe, ca. 5000 BC, and that's the story you can tell in cinemas today. One guy sat down and thought really hard until he got an idea? Bo-ring. The Space Race fulfils that structure: You got your heroes cadre (astronauts), their journey (both figuratively in meticulous training and actual in the journey across space), a common foe (the deadly emptiness of space // the cosmonauts // the communists).

paganel 4y ago

It was definitely a shared mythology (meaning both the East&West) but it's true that its "force of attraction" (for lack of a better expression) has somewhat faded in the last 15-20 years, I'd say the 1980s was the pinnacle of it all. We don't have Star Wars-like movie phenomenons about computers and vaccines, and we especially don't have music like this [1] that would make us dream about computers the same way it makes us dream about space. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMoCM_FgLP8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMoCM_FgLP8 Later edit: I'll just blatantly copy-paste a high-voted comment from that YT link which better explains it: """ I was born in the USSR, and in the 80s we thought about space, other planets, stars. We read good science fiction. We dreamed of participating in all this. We wanted to be pilots, build rockets, explore space. We listened to news about cosmonauts, without distinction of Soviet or American. We thought that space was a place for cooperation of all mankind. We wanted peace and development. But, everything collapsed in one moment. Now children do not want to go into space. They don't want to be like Gagarin or Armstrong. They want to be like Kardashian or Deripaska. This is a tragedy for many of us. And this music is just a reminder of what we have lost. """

nonrandomstring 4y ago
> But, everything collapsed in one moment. Now children do not want to go into space. They don't want to be like Gagarin or Armstrong. They want to be like Kardashian or Deripaska. Man, this really hurts to read. But there is some hope. As I was was saying to a prominent lisper just the other day, I think "space and the planet" is something young people are refocussing on. I sense a long overdue and deep rejection of "fast cars, money and fame" in the air.
- bryanrasmussen 4y ago
  I'm pretty sure there were kids who wanted to grow up to be James Dean or Marilyn Monroe when they were prominent.
  - Pamar 4y ago
    Not sure. Probably they dreamed of becoming Babe Ruth or another sport star, maybe?
    - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
      Babe Ruth would have been another generation, they might have dreamed of being Joe DiMaggio (who Monroe was married to for a bit) but he was also a bit old when she was a star so I would guess they were more interested in being Mickey Mantle or Hank Aaron.
      - Pamar 4y ago
        Yup, sorry for the wrong reference. What I meant is that I believe (might be wrong) that earlier generations would not be so taken with the idea of becoming showbiz stars. Actors/actresses, singers etc. would be famous, well regarded and so on, but I think they were seen more like a sort of "aristocracy" while, at least for boys, the aspirational models were more in the field of sports.
        4y ago

nonrandomstring 4y ago

Mythologies carry a lot along with them. On the positive side they give a structure and direction to the conceit of progress. By the same token they can hurt us when we project all our hopes into them. The disappointment of a "space-age" generation, who grew up on promises they'd be living on moon-bases and zooming about in spacecraft, turned to emptiness when around 2000 the new millennium turned out to be about just more Earth bound in-fighting. 2001 should have been the great Odyssey, but tuned out to be a drab journey towards neo-fascism and isolation. Psychologically, as a result we started to create our own personal space capsules, cut off from the rest of humanity. The militarisation of space was glorious in 1977. The Battle of Britain redone with X-Wings, in our mythology George Lucas cast space as a battleground "Far Far Away". If the "Home before Christmas" of WW1 is any indication, young men romanticise far away battlegrounds, as do hawks and pacifists alike, because at least they are somewhere else. The reality of space militarisation is unfolding 50 miles above our heads, as spy satellites and drones delivering death from above. For poor, brown people in Overthereistan, space has been the enemy for a decade, and cloud cover is a friend. Colonisation, cooperation, and trade are another part of our mythology. Sworn enemies could unite against a common foe of the void, With infinity in all directions, humans would finally be freed of their petty border disputes and overcrowding amidst infinite resources. But the ISS is coming to end of life, with no replacement in the planning. I was saddened by the effect of the Russo-Ukraine war on the departure of astronauts from the ISS. It seems like a breakdown and taint of parochialism beyond Earth straight from Arthur C. Clarke's story book. Yet I was mocked and down-voted here on HN for expressing the mildest solidarity with Russian geeks who might also be feeling the same disappointment. Around 2000 I also remember feeling that some of most dangerous minds on the planet are lawyers, who at the turn of century were trying to give serious credence to people owning Moon plots. Despite international agreements, territorial disputes over orbital space and ridiculous "claims" to bits of other planets looks set to grow. It is our Kierkegaardian paradox that humankind loves mythologies we can't quite live up to. But that's what mythologies are for I guess.

Cthulhu_ 4y ago

I mean, what does history mainly remember of e.g. the Romans; was it their biomedical breakthroughs? Or the works they left behind? Or the Greeks; was it their works, writing and philosophy, or their technology like the Antikythera mechanism or early steam engines? What people in 2000 years care about will be... pretty arbitrary, I think.

api 4y ago

I grew up in the 90s and computing was definitely a huge part of the mythology. Space wasn’t out but it was kind of back burner. The author of this piece seems to think space is the ur myth of modernity which I don’t think it is. One of the characteristics of our age is many myth narratives that overlap and ebb and flow. The coolest thing about our age though is that many of them come true to some limited extent at least. We don’t get Star Trek but we do go somewhere.