Negative Trends in Society

A series of articles in the Los Angeles times on the gradual disappearance of some independently owned book stores caused me to ponder the topic of the the ephemeral nature of human culture.

Few of the experiences, the discoveries, the reactions, the thoughts, the inventions, and the ideas of human beings through the ages have lasted very long. Early civilizations had no way of permanently recording their cultures; they passed them from generation to generation by word of mouth. Some of this valuable information has been lost and re-learned several times during the evolution of modern societies. Some information will never be retrieved from past cultures.

One of the earliest methods of recording culture proved to be one of the most durable: information carved into stone tablets. Records of that kind have survived for thousands of years (a mere instant in the time continuum of the universe). But the stone tablets are not very portable. Nor do they hold very much information. They are not easy to reproduce and make available to large numbers of people. But they do last a long time.

Recording methods that have been devised since the development of stone carving have greater capacity and are more convenient to use, but the trend is toward the less and less durable: stylus on wax tablet, ink on parchment, ink on linen paper, ink on paper from wood pulp. The advent of computers has increased our storage capacity for information, but made the data itself even more ephemeral. As storage media, magnetic disks and compact laser discs will probably not endure much longer than the highest quality written books. In addition, the electronic storage media require special complex machines to retrieve the data. Should some great catastrophe befall modern societies, the instructions to construct and use such machines will be locked in that same, inaccessible storage media.

This is not an alarmist cry for the preservation of books and bookstores in our society, and certainly not a call for a return to the use of stone tablets. I suspect that books will be available for many more years. There are many people in the world who are committed to preserving our knowledge for as long as possible. I am pointing, however, to some generally negative trends in modern societies.

One person wrote to the Times that retail bookstores are disappearing because it is so much easier and cheaper to find the books and obtain them on the internet. I find that I have said the same thing. I could wander through used bookstores for years before I would find a copy of an out-of-print book that I want. Or, I can log on to Amazon or Alibris and find a dozen or more copies in different conditions and at different prices, all to be delivered within a week or so. The trend that we are experiencing is that of instant gratification. We no longer have the patience, the tenacity, or the desire for the pursuit of something. We want the item immediately, at the lowest possible expenditure of energy and money. In the extreme, this trend makes us all more selfish and more impatient with those around us.

The second trend that results from purchasing items via the internet is personal isolation. When I buy something on the internet, my only interaction is with a machine, my computer. If I search for a book or another item in retail stores I come into contact with other people. Whether or not these people share my interests and beliefs, the interaction with them is an opportunity to grow and learn, to experience our culture first-hand. Most organizations of collectors have experienced a decline in attendance at their meetings and shows as more and more members choose instead to seek and purchase items through the internet auctions. This loss of personal interaction will make it more difficult for us to engage with others when we have to, say, in some kind of emergency.

These two trends, instant gratification and personal isolation, are not good for us as individuals, or as a society. Before the Socialists suggest that the Government take action to reverse the trends by subsidizing book stores or by limiting internet sales transactions, I propose that we individuals do something about the trends. We probably can not change the infrastructure or the habits of the whole society, but we can change ourselves. When we use the internet, remove personal interaction from the procurement of goods, and satisfy our specific need immediately, we should consider some new activities to provide the psychological and sociological benefits of which we have deprived ourselves. We can pursue a goal that is intangible, and therefore cannot be just bought on the internet. And we can find other people who are pursuing the same or similar objectives, and meet with them in pursuit of the common goals.

The development of a simple and convenient way to preserve our knowledge and ideas may be just that kind of goal. The people who take on that challenge may help to reverse three negative trends.