Innovation, children, is the current buzzword these days.
At least it is in the circles, your daddy travels in.
It’s not a bad word. In fact, Daddy has used it for years. Maybe not out loud,
but certainly in that playground called his mind.
Innovation is nice; it means progress is being made.
Generally, I am an advocate for progress. However, as the Dave Matthews Band
said in the song The Dreaming Tree,
“Now progress takes away from what forever took to find”. I say this because
newer and bigger does not necessarily equal “better”. Let me hopefully illustrate
this a little with a couple of examples….
Let’s start with movie theaters. When I was a child there were
hardly any movie theaters. The few movie theaters that existed had between two
and eight screens, and the tickets were taken at each screen. Nowadays, we have
multiplexes with digital screens and sound systems, and the tickets are taken when
you walk into the theater. Does it sound and look better? Yes. There are also a
lot more movies that are churned out these days, which means there are more good
movies and more bad movies.
The way the multiplexes are set up, though, encourages theater
hopping. Think about it: You walk in, they take your ticket, and then you have
your choice of 20-30 movies. After you walk into the theater, you go over to
the concession stand, and they want to sell you 15 pounds of soda and popcorn
with free refills. It’s like they are asking
you to camp there for the day. Of course, when you walk into the movie, they
show you a commercial about how piracy is not a victimless crime. Movie
theaters have improved in certain aspects but in other ways they have
detracted. They have better sound
systems, pictures, and ways to quickly move people through lines, but now that
same innovation promotes people to steal.
Another example is telecommunications. When I was a wee lad,
homes usually had one phone line. I remember my great-grandma had a party line
down on her farm. A party line meant that several houses shared the same
number. They took turns and made it work. Nowadays, everyone has a cellphone
including kids…little kids! It used to be hard to catch someone on the phone. Now
you can find anyone almost any time of day. Phones also have GPS which used to
be a science fiction concept. Now, if you are carrying a cell phone, you can be
tracked. It’s nice to get a hold of
anyone at any hour, but it also removes a certain aspect of privacy. That’s
gone, and I don’t see it coming back.
The thing is, kids, innovation means we are moving forward. Progress is great, but you have to watch
out for the downsides to it. The industrial revolution brought many
improvements to our world, but it also brought a lot of pollution, injuries,
overcrowding, and child labor victims. Our food these days is a lot easier to
cook, but according to a good percentage of the world, our quick food has a lot
of consequences to it: obesity, cancer, high cholesterol, and a slew of other
heath problems. There is the question of are there more diseases now than there
was 200 years ago, or are we just better informed?
Instant communication and instant gratification have brought
forth a lack of patience along with progress. A lack of patience has brought an
increasing amount of debt. Debt leads to even more problems. What I want you to understand is that progress and innovation aren't bad, but constantly looking for the next bigger and better thing will hurt you in the long run. Enjoy the progress that will be made over your life, but also learn contentment with what you have. Eventually, everything on earth will go away, and the things that were so important to you, will no longer matter. Read the book of
Ecclesiastes, children, and do not chase after the wind.
I agree, not all innovation is real progress, he makes a good point about losing patience. Great advice here, loved the book of Ecclesiastes! What an interesting read!
ReplyDeleteGreat post. I completely agree.
ReplyDelete