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San Francisco, 9:37 PM
Sun Nov 8
12 posts in the last 24 hours
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09/22/09
For me that was a nice twist, a fun way of looking at it - it's fantasy through a sci-fi lens.
09/23/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
Agreed.
09/22/09
I guess what I'm saying is, this is hardly new. And it's been hardly new for quite some time. Which doesn't make it any less enjoyable. It just irks me when folks forget past-as-precedent (even as they interact or intertextualize with it).
Okay, I'll go back to being quiet now.
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
And you know this how?
09/22/09
09/22/09
The black plague would seem to indicate that they, in fact, did not know how to wash themselves.
09/22/09
09/22/09
it's just too simple to say that anything that isn't "Democracy" is bad
09/22/09
The spread of the black plague had almost nothing to do with germ theory, and almost everything to do with lack of cleanliness. It was spread by fleas that passed from animals to humans. In countries wear bathing was common (the middle east) it's impact was drastically reduced.
So no, the western world in the middle ages did not bath much at all.
09/22/09
[www.gallowglass.org]
[www.traditioninaction.org]
see the section 'Bathing and bouquets'
09/22/09
09/22/09
Interesting, but I think you'll concede the vast majority of scholarship on the period falls on my side of the argument.
And there's that whole 1/2 to 2/3 of the entire population dying off too. That's pretty hard to ignore in favor of your well washed surfs hypothesis.
09/22/09
Also this thread brings up the eternal notion that springs up all the time that simple technological advancement is interchangeable with total human evolution. For some reason, we have it in our heads that man from hundreds of years ago was a primitive and stupid creature, that the governments were barbaric and murderous, that everything was basically a bad episode of Xena.
But man's history is pretty uniform. Middle ages man was no different than we are intellectually or physically. The only thing that has radically changed is basically our diet. It's a mistake to think they were "primitive" when in many ways, Middle Ages man far surpassed us in achievement. And feudalism, all in all, had some plusses. It wasn't always dictatorship.
09/22/09
The pyramids were a fantastic achievement, but I sure as hell wouldn't have wanted to live when their were built and been part of the construction crew. Just because they achieved things does not mean they lived good lives.
As to bathing and the plague, and fleas. No, of course bathing alone doesn't get rid of fleas, but it does greatly reduced them, and coupled with general cleanliness it drastically reduces exposure to them.
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
Happily adding these to the queue.
09/22/09
09/22/09
People say the same thing about porn but that doesn't make it true.
The myth of Good Guys and Bad Guys is one of the most pervasive we own, and morally grey anti-heroes are simply one of modern fictions attempts to shake off that mythology and replace it with something a bit more honest.
One hesitates to suggest that honesty and justice are no less mythical, and "morally grey anti-heroes" no less clichéd, than farmboys with secret destinies and swarthy, wicked enemies.
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
I'm going to have to check out Morgan now...hopefully his stuff is just as dark as Abercrombie's!
09/22/09
09/22/09
Yes of course, Takeshi-san. That's where.
09/22/09
09/22/09
Some poor demigod perpetually reincarnated to fight the causes of others I imagine.
Anyone read Black Man (AKA Thirteen)?
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/22/09
09/21/09
The cities in Wingrove's Chung Kuo didn't cover 100 per cent of the available land area, just the more level; in City Europe, only the Alps and the Carpathians were not built over, and were left open as wilderness.
Moreover, on Wingrove's 23rd Century Earth, vast areas of continent were left open to grow food to feed the 36 Billions that the sealed Cities held.
All that being said, there's one important megaconurbation that was left out – the Hooterville/Pixley megacity, popularized by the shared universe of Green Acres/Petticoat Junction stories. Oh, it was kind of an inverted megacity – instead of being filled with humanity, it was filled with farms populated by surrealistic hayseed farmers - but it was a single, vaguely-defined entity. I think it deserved to be mentioned.
09/19/09
The problem with the old concept of mega-cities is that the future doesn't appear to be going to plan. Sure, Moscow is constantly growing, and perhaps Chinese and Indian cities, but they're just becoming supermassive sprawling versions of themselves. And in the West you don't get cities joining themselves. Los Angeles is the best example of what American urban areas will become: megalopolises. There is no city center, just a massive conurbation of many different cities and their centers which people commute to and from throughout. Even if it did get big enough with good enough rail travel to include Santa Barbara or San Diego, each of those individual cities in between will maintain their individuality, but will work together with other municipalities to make the entire area more enjoyable.
Less insanely fun, but more realistic, and arguably more personable.
09/19/09
09/19/09
09/19/09
09/19/09
Mike Davis generally is one of the best writers tackling these kinds of issues in non fiction, and deserves the attention of folk writing the posts for the Future Metro theme. [en.wikipedia.org])
As for the merger of Edinburgh and Glasgow-the whole reason that there was all the fuss made about how Edinburgh and Glasgow should co-operate is because they don't. There's a long history of rivalry if not straight up hatred between the two.
The reasons for this are complex but imo go back to the fact that Glasgow was the centre of heavy industry and perceived itself as more working class, and masculine, than Edinburgh, the centre of law, finance and, since the Scottish Parliament was established (and now with a Nationalist government the prospect of maybe full statehood) politics and government.
I doubt that this rivalry will be overcome any time soon, as it has pretty deep pyscho-social roots, which paradoxically are perhaps worsened by the end of heavy industry in Glasgow, since Glasgow has lost a lot of its identity and feels in some ways emasculated and defensive.
However, Scotland as a whole is dominated by Edinburgh, Glasgow and their surrounding sattelites, referred to as 'The Central Belt,' and much hated by people from more rural areas like the Highlands.
Incidentally, I'm an inhabitant of Maryhill, a place that was once its own town and has since been swallowed up by Greater Glasgow. [en.wikipedia.org]
09/19/09
(Dystopian Sydney ahoy!)