Charles Brass wrote:
Ed Weick replied to my post about the changing world of work by
questioning my analysis of life in pre-industrial times. He noted,
correctly, that the nobility in these times lived distinctly different
lives from the serfs and peasants - and mused about how much work each did.
Well, there is a lot of romanticism about pre-industrial times
(particularly for the idle rich) and I have certainly been guilty of
over simplifying things.
But my fundamental point is not affected. First the serfs and peasants
knew nothing of a distinction between 'work' and 'life'. Their life was
their work. I don't advocate this, I simply note the distinction.
And for this reason, those promoting the industrial revolution had a
good selling point - no longer will all of your life be in service to
someone else, now only part of it will be.
My understanding of pre-Industrial (pre-Enclosure, etc.) life
is a bit different: more like Brueghel paintings of peasants
working-and-playing. Not what I would aspire to, but a lot
better than being an early industrial worker.
I read the stuff a long time ago, so the references are
lost, but a large part of the "moral" rationalization of the
industrial system was that the peasants worked little and
drank/screwed a lot. My understanding is that
peasants worked far fewer hours than early industrial
workers.
> And unions have been working
diligently to reduce that part ever since.
I want to reduce it to zero, which is way below where even the most
ardent unionist believes it can get. They point out that someone has to
clean the public toilets. Well I point out that in our own homes we
clean our own toilets (or live in a mess). In communities people either
clean their public toilets or tolerate a mess. Only in economic
societies do people believe it is someone else's responsibility to clean
the toilet - and they don't want to know anything about how or when or
how much.
Well, cleaning toilets is part of the work which needs to be done in the
world. Most of us do it for some part of our lives, but equally most
of us don't want to believe that this is the highest labour to which we
can aspire.
Making a job of cleaning toilets creates toilet cleaners and brings in
arguments about minimum wages, and occupational health and safety.
Doing the work of cleaning toilets is part of living (just as is using
them).
I would argue that there can be at least a partial solution
to this problem.
The thought of sweeping most floors is anathema to me.
Sweeping the floor of the Unitarian Church I once belonged to
was ambivalent. I actually volunteered to sweep the floor
of a National Treasure Buddhist temple in Kyoto.
Of course I would rather design Ryoanji than wash the
floor of Ryoanji. But I might well choose to wash the floor
of Ryoanji than to do most of computer programming
work I have done for 30 years.
I don't think I would sign up to clean the toilets at
Ryoanji, but then I would not want to be a surgeon either
(both jobs involve getting one's hands dirty).
I am not being facetious here. I really believe that
a combination of *eliminating as much pragmatic agenda as possible*
and *transfiguring as much of the banal as possible* might
make a big dent in the problem (and, as you write,
if technology doesn't implement Aristotle's
observation that if machines could move themselves
we would not need slaves, then technology is worse than
useless, since slaves only produce feces whereas
machines produce monstrous biohazards).
"The rich" understand this -- at least some of them. Look
at some of their leisured avocations: they are the same
things as ordinary people do, just the product is something exquisite
and not something banal. In the old days, the children of
the nobility spent their youth being servants in other
nobles' houses.... And many of the things the rich
buy are the same things as the many buy, except that
the thing the many buy is a consumable whereas the
thing the rich person buys is an investment that
becomes a classic (as well as being an object of
connoisseurship and delectation in the interim). The many
buy Ford Pintos. The rich buy Bentleys and Bugattis.
I see something similar with many aspects of biological
life. Instead of sublimation of the flesh, we need
transfiguration of the flesh.
(Oh, yes, and engineers need to have mystical experiences
in doing their most exacting work.)
\brad mccormick
Why are we constrained to thinking of work only in the form of jobs?
Charles Brass
Chairman
the futures foundation
PO Box 122 Fairfield 3078 Australia
phone 61 3 9459 0244
the mission of the futures foundation is
"...to engage all Australians in creating a better future..."
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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