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[Vintage Computer Festival]

On Tue, 24 May 2005, Kevin Handy wrote:

> >Future computer historians (or even current ones for that matter) won't
> >necessarily have the computer skills necessary to track down or even use
> >tar.
> >
> >
> Why is it assumed that people in the future will be complete idiots?

I don't know what it's like in your worldview, but mine is filled with
total morons, and I have little hope for the future.  Plus, and this has
been expressed several times already, when you're talking about preserving
information, ALWAYS EXPECT THE WORST.  It is the safest approach.

> Like current library technicians, who cannot possibly figure out the
> technology  of books that were printed more than 100 years ago.
> It's impossible for them to figure out how to "turn the page", and are
> struggling with the strange concept of "letters". And those "book"
> things don't even  taste very good.

Do they know how to read a wax cylinder?  Do they know how to make
equipment to do so?  Are they capable of doing so?

Is tar any less complex a technology?  What about 50-500 years from now?
This is the crux of the matter.  You cannot apply your current level of
knowledge and understanding to what someone in the future might possess.
Worldviews change: what seems common and sensible and completely logical
to you today might not be so to someone in the future, so you simply
cannot make this sort of assumption.

> These stupid people won't have any concept of a computer, so it is
> unlikely that they will be able to read a tape, cd, etc. You will have
> to carve the data on stone blocks in foot high letters.

So tell me then how to read the information from a Quipu.  It's a simple
device: just a bunch of multi-colored knotted string.  If you can figure
this out, there's a huge community of archaeologists who study the Incas
who would erect a permanent shrine for you to celebrate your name for all
eternity.

> Would they even know of "English"? You better make sure that the
> data has been converted into cartoons without captions, like those
> "spy-vs-spy" ones, because they will be too dumb to handle anything
> more complex than that. The cartoons will probably be stretching
> the limits of their minuscule brain-power.

The ancient Egyptians were by all measures a fairly advanced society for
their place in history, yet the only reason we know how to read their
heiroglyphic writings is because we found teh Rosetta Stone that basically
translated it for us.  Again, you cannot assume English will be known in
the future.

> >It's not just technical people who will be interested in this stuff.
> >
> >
> It will also interest  the priests, like the Spanish priests who demanded
> that all the Inca codex's be destroyed, and the people brought all they
> could find to the priests to be burned; they couldn't read them, thus
> they were obviously about devil warship.

Right, and this is why we don't know how to decode Quipus.  Thanks for
qualifying my example :)

> So, you better hide the archive so that it cannot be found by priests,
> or anyone who might know any priests; they cannot possibly understand
> tar format, thus they will assume it must be evil and destroy it.

And this is a remote possibility because...?  Do you watch the news these
days?  Witch burnings are not far off in some parts of the US today.  I
hear they're still debating evolution vs. creationism.  I thought we had
that debated licked about 100 years ago but apparently ignorance is a more
powerful force than intelligence.

> And to make sure they won't actively search it out, you better
> make sure it confirms to all possible religious beliefs:
>
> 1. The earth is flat.

The Biblical support for a Flat Earth and Geocentricism
http://www.skepticfriends.org/forum/showquestion.asp?faq=4&fldAuto=61

These people are still out there.

> 2. The sun and planets go around the earth.
> 3. Rome is the center of the universe.
> 4. China is the center of the universe.
> 5. Mexico is the center of the universe.
> 6. Mount Olympus is the center of the universe.
> 7. The world was created in 7 days.

Do I even need to offer URLs?

> 8. The world was created from Budda's navel.
> 9. The stars are mounted on a fixed celestial globe.
> 10. There is no such thing as evolution.

DITTO

> 11. It's Ok, even required, to kill anyone of another religion.
> 12. Killing them in the most brutal, slow, and painful ways
> will gain you brownie points in the next life.
> 13. Oral sex isn't sex.
> 14. Microsoft is the center of the universe.
> 15. The earth sits on the back of a giant tortoise.

These are all examples of things that people believe or do today, so I'm
not sure how they can be examples that support your argument.  These are
all examples of ancient beliefs, some somewhat unsophisticated, that still
persist in some segment or in some manner in today's world!  On some
issues we are even regressing (re: evolution).  So it shouldn't be too
much of a stretch to imagine in the future these "truths" being subverted.

Which brings me back to the one immutable truth: people are stupid; expect
the worst.

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
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International Man of Intrigue and Danger                http://www.vintage.org

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