What would it take for us to see a technological leap forward on the scale of the Industrial Revolution? May we see one in our lifetime? May it even ever happen again?
Ignore the meme chart.
>that meme pic
Really, shoot yourself.
>"ignore the meme chart"
>he thinks I'm going to ignore his meme chart
I would like to congratulate you on the accuracy of that chart.
>this fucking chart
>>476721
>>476716
>>476677
>>476670
This is a bully-free zone lads thank you very much
>>476768
But I complimented your chart.
>>476659
This certainly is a meme chart since it doesn't include the vast contributions made during the Islamic Golden Age.
It also fails to mention that the Rennaisance was thanks to Muslims as well.
If it wasn't for the Crusades and white people just oppressing themselves for literally no reason we'd be on Mars by now.
Ha ha, OP! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous of which is "never get involved in a land war in Asia," but only slightly less well-known is this: "Never post a picture more interesting than your thread!"
>>476777
Thanks john green
>>476799
It's not interesting desu. It's complete memery but it does kinda introduce the explosion of technology the Industrial Revolution brought on. To imply we have hit the industrial revolution under Roman rule is ridiculous and certainly not the fault of Christianity. "atheists" should be exterminated tbqh.
>>476824
*it does kinda illustrate
Brain autocorrect in action
>>476799
This is /tg/'s second golden rule.
>>476659
Two cardinal sins, OP.
First
>For the purpose of determining what is history, please do not start threads about events taking place less than 25 years ago. Historical discussions should be focused on past events, and not their contemporary consequences. Discussion of modern politics, current events, popular culture, or other non-historical topics should be posted elsewhere.
Second
>Posting a meme image.
We all know that OP is a retard, so let's redirect the thread.
1. What do "Dark Ages" entail, exactly?
2. Were the middle ages truly a "dark age"?
3. Was this "dark age" caused directly by Christianity?
Discuss.
>>476878
>3. Was this "dark age" caused directly by Christianity
>Having to frame your question this carefully
I think the industrial revolution was dependent on clock tech. If you want to gauge how close people were to the industrial revolution then look at how advance their mechanical clocks were.
I think Europe always had the best clocks.
digitisation was that leap forward
>>476878
3. Was this "dark age" caused directly by Christianity?
No, it was caused by Muslim expansion and piracy. As Muslims cut off the trade route to the East, raided southern coasts, and made territorial gains in and around the Mediterranean, the post-Roman kingdoms/territories were forced to localize and feudalize. Paranoia took hold and gold going into Europe was reduced to a tiny sliver (which was mostly vikings selling slaves to Muslims, notably white women). Before the rise of Islam, post-Roman territories were quite wealthy and urbanized.
As economy and culture hit an all-time low, what is known as the Dark Ages set in. The same process happened to Byzantium and cities such as Axum.
>>476899
Well that is what the picture in OP suggests. I'm genuinely curious: was Christianity (and specifically, Christian theology) a causal factor in the (disputed) "Dark Ages"?
>>476935
Any large scale institutional change in an state will inevitably cause instability. Rome changing christianity from illegal to mandatory in the space of 90 years undoubtably did not help to conserve the empire. The specific theology of the new religion is completely irrelevent, as is how nice it tells you to be.
>>476959
*in a state
damn typos
>ignore the meme chart
Then why post it?
To answer your question: singularity.
>>476972
>Everyone thinks exponential processor speed increase is the same thing as exponential technological development in all fields
>Everyone buys into kurzweil
Why don't most people think for themselves?
>>476659
What modern breakthrough in the 21st century is as significant as the automobile? I can't think of anything besides the computer becoming popular, which I would say is not as significant as the automobile.
Violence.
Look at how far we advanced after WW2. A few short years of war catapulted us at least a century into the future.
>>476987
>Implying we aren't on the cusp of an AI revolution that will change everything about technology and (mods pay attention) >>humanities<<
>>477016
nigga keep dreaming
>>477005
>I can't think of anything besides the computer becoming popular, which I would say is not as significant as the automobile.
He says communicating in real time with people around the world.
>>477005
Too early to really tell, but I'd say the smartphone.
>>477019
Great, but the automobile has allowed movement of resources. What good is your communication if you have no means of acting on it?
>>477028
for more efficient*
>>477018
nice refutation
>>476659
>What would it take for us to see a technological leap forward on the scale of the Industrial Revolution? May we see one in our lifetime? May it even ever happen again?
Go read the Unbound Prometheus. Hammond & Hammond Town Labourer. Federici Caliban and the Witch. EP Thompson Making of the English Working Class.
You need a moribund society which has technically repressed the qualitative means of production through quantitative exploitation of a foreign labour source, an emiserable proletariat, and a captive international market.
We're currently seeing another industrial revolution of equivalent scale to at least iron/steel or enclosure. The industrial revolutions of course being the proletarianisation of agriculture, weaving, iron/steel (new industry), chemicals (new industry) and data.
>>477028
>Great, but the automobile has allowed movement of resources.
So did carts and boats.
>What good is your communication if you have no means of acting on it?
There's no particular reason to think of resources or economics in bits of physical coal or whatever. Most modern economies are service based, you can provide services to people all over the world from your laptop. And work on useful products, such as software, or even physical designs of things with teams from all over the world.
I can write a book and make it immediately available to billions of people without a single physical copy being made.
We are in the middle of a technological revolution far greater than the Industrial Revolution, you just can't see it because you are in the middle of it.
>>477053
>means of production
Is this economically relevent in the information age of the 21st century?
Would marx need to update his thesis if he was alive today?
>>477056
You're right. Information sharing has taken a huge leap forward. But at the end of the day, the physical resources used in services still have to be shipped to where they need to go, and we haven't advanced our means of transportation. Until we get a breakthrough in transportation, I don't see a major technological leap happening for the majority of society.
>>477064
>Is this economically relevent in the information age of the 21st century?
relevant
And yes. Nick Dyer-Witheford has a decent book called Cybermarx worth reading.
Basically, Google and Apple's market capitalisation aren't spent on hookers and blow, they're spent on library writing engineers and fab plants.
>Would marx need to update his thesis if he was alive today?
Marx so needed to update his thesis while alive in the 19th century, and return to the British Museum's documents, that he only finished one fucking volume out of a plan for around 19, and left near complete drafts for two others.
Marx barely gets up to class. Were he alive today the little cunt would probably jump into organising instead of finishing the fucking books.
>>477053
What I never managed to wrap my head around is the concept of "exploitation of the proletariat". How can it be exploitation since two agents are voluntarily exchanging services?
>a miserable proletariat
Compared to what? Their previous lives plowing the fields, always depending on the weather in order to eat and dying at a young age?
>>476659
Why did you even post that stupid fucking memeshit fedora chart?
>>477097
>And yes. Nick Dyer-Witheford has a decent book called Cybermarx worth reading.
Thanks for the recommendation
>Basically, Google and Apple's market capitalisation aren't spent on hookers and blow, they're spent on library writing engineers and fab plants.
So how well does "means of production" describe it's contemporary analogous resource?
I haven't got a great working knowledge of this topic, just a cursory interest. Did or didn't marx advocate for violent revolution, like /pol/lacks always claim?
>>477415
>>a miserable proletariat
>Compared to what? Their previous lives plowing the fields, always depending on the weather in order to eat and dying at a young age?
British peasants ate meat up until the enclosure period (Hammond & Hammond). British out-work proles did too and worked lazy 18 hour days (Thompson).
>>477415
>What I never managed to wrap my head around is the concept of "exploitation of the proletariat". How can it be exploitation since two agents are voluntarily exchanging services?
An exchange under threat of death isn't voluntary, but voluntarism isn't the definition of exploitation in Marx. Exploitation is like exploiting a coal seam.
Marx does not propose increasing the price of labour until profit disappears: he proposes the abolition of the wage system entirely.
Let us increase the wage until all surplus value not spent on capital is spent on wages, ie for
M—C…P…C'—M'
C' now ~= C
ie:
C1 (lp + mp) ~= C2 (c)
thus:
M—C…P…C—M
workers are still exploited IN THAT C2= (ca+cb) where ca = lp and cb = mp. Without their labour, under another's direction, cb wouldn't exist. A surplus of labour exists such that mp in C1 can be transformed into cb in C2.
Even under steady state reproduction surplus labour, ie: surplus value, is produced to pay for depreciation.
This exploitation would exist even in reduced reproduction, as labour power would still be exerted towards depreciation & would still be exerted at another's command and embodied in an alienated product.
>>477506
>So how well does "means of production" describe it's contemporary analogous resource?
Means of production include factories, networks, libraries, code repositories, concepts, patents. It isn't a physical thing (a machine) but a social relationship (potentially productive capital).
>Did or didn't marx advocate for violent revolution, like /pol/lacks always claim?
He pretty clearly advocated for it in manifesto. But "violence" isn't the central category, the abolition of the wage system is.
>>477582
>Means of production include factories, networks, libraries, code repositories, concepts, patents. It isn't a physical thing (a machine) but a social relationship (potentially productive capital).
So does it still work in the original context when applied to educated/trained human capital, and people with the potential to become educated, the accumulation of information and the ability to produce information etc?
How do the workers sieze the means of production when that includes human capital, and when it doesn't often requires the user to be highly skilled?
>>476659
even after years I'm still triggered every time
>We are in the middle of a technological revolution far greater than the Industrial Revolution, you just can't see it because you are in the middle of it.
this. My parents had to go to library if they wanted to get some information, can you imagine that? And now I can shitpost on American website from my comfy east European home, download any movie, get access to thousands articles on JSTOR or read twitter posts of ISIS jihadists.
>>477620
>So does it still work in the original context when applied to educated/trained human capital
No. Human capital enters marx as labour power. IIRC he discusses complex abstract labour power in Contribution to a Critique.
Read Braverman on deskilling (Labor and Monopoly Capital).
>How do the workers sieze the means of production when that includes human capital, and when it doesn't often requires the user to be highly skilled?
Self-education, like the movement has been doing illegally since 1780? Putting more skill into the machines to reduce required labour, just like the capitalists do?
>>477671
fifel put your name back on.
I knew I saved this for a reason.
>>477690
Just for you baby.
>>477696
Aw, what the fuck, why is it only a tiny section?
>>477704
>>477696
Here we go.
>>477696
>>477710
If you plebs could actually read you'll notice that he fails to refute it.
Actual quote from the article:
>"The enshrining of reason at the heart of inquiry, combined with the influx of "new" Greek and Arabic learning, launched a vertiable explosion of intellectual activity in Europe from the Twelfth Century onwards."
>from the Twelfth Century onwards
Notice how the image literally implies the exact same thing.
The technological leap isn't the Industrial Revolution, it's the Scientific Revolution which started in the 17th century (and which made the Industrial Revolution possible).
And that leap never stopped, we're right in the middle of it.
>>477544
Yes, I am well familiar with the concept of "surplus value". It makes complete sense from Marx's point of view. However, what was seen as exploitation by him is nowadays understood, at least among more orthodox economists, as a compensation for the risk of investing. Therefore, I can't see it as being exploitation, since both parties are consenting in regards to their contract as well as aware of its terms.
>>477696
>"a laundry list of theologians"
>>476659
We fucking did you imbecile.
It was called the Space Age. We went from from flimsy airplanes that struggled to fly for a minute to building a rocket that sent three men to the moon (and one into orbit) within sixty fucking nine years.
>>477729
He's arguing against the sharp drop at the fall of Rome though.
>>477730
>someone digs up a graphic and flourishes it triumphantly as though it is proof of sometimes other than the fact that most people are utterly ignorant of history and unable to see that something called "Scientific Advancement" can't be measured, let alone plotted on a graph
Goddamn motherfucking street sign captchas
>>477759
Those aren't theologians at all.
No idea why he didn't mention Oresme though, he's the greatest of them all.
>>477731
"thinking science plateaued during the roman era."
c'mon now.
>>477760
That was 50 years ago, and since then we haven't advanced at all.
>>477771
What are you typing on right now?
Cause I'm pretty sure it's not a computer the size of a house.
>>477770
Can you name any advancements?
>>477775
It also isn't a spaceship.
>>477766
No but many had to study these things, in order to keep the church for asking questions. Are you guys really defending the freedom of church and state in the medieval era??
>>477731
The fuck did the renaissance do?
>>477777
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=scientific+advancements+during+the+roman+era
>>477777
Aqueducts, concrete, siege mechanisms.
>>477780
But is it more or less advanced than a computer fifty years ago?
>>477785
Decided all of medieval thought was bullshit and went back to jacking off over Aristotle.
Course, they also continued to do amazing things with architecture and innovating naval technology, so. I don't think it was as crazy a decline as that.
>>476659
We are literary living in an age of scientific revolutions at this very moment.
There's been more scientific papers published the last 20 years than during all of humanity before it. Most of us will experience the singularity in our lifetime. Everyone of us have so much knowledge at the tip of out fingers that we wouldn't be able to read all of it even if we spent our entire life devoted to it.
I weep for the people who aren't part of academica in one way or another and take part of this truly remarkable age we're living in.
>>477771
Either you're a troll or you're the most oblivious moron in the first world.
The computer you can hold in your palm is exponentially more powerful than the giant brick in your home during the 1990's, let alone the computer the size of a two story house from the 40's that was exponentially weaker than that 1990's PC.
>>477796
can you blame them? the church really did have there hands in every pie. I'd be done with that bullshit too.
>>477765
>He's arguing against the sharp drop at the fall of Rome though.
He doesn't even do that though. He focuses all his examples on the tail end of the dark ages when yurop was on the cusp of the renaissance.
>>477785
Renaissance humanists believed everything medieval was crap and we should do everything like the ancient Romans instead, so Gothic era advancements were burned and disregarded, and science went back to blindly worshiping Aristotle like in the early Middle Ages.
That's why there was almost no scientific progress during the Renaissance, until the very end after people like Galileo rediscovered what had been discovered 300 years earlier already, but still had to fight humanist academia tooth and nail to get it accepted.
>>477812
They continued to during the Renaissance. Note how the majority of Renaissance art is Christian. Michelangelo's greatest work was done at the behest of the Pope, even if he was pissy about it.
>>477828
Science didn't exist before the 19th century (Popper)
>>477828
>engineering isn't science
>>477836
Good, you understood something at least.
>>477843
Dude your argument makes zero sense. you saying that roman culture stole all of their scientific knowledge for 800+ years from the hellenistic age. chill, breh. You're defiantly wrong,here.
>>476659
Romans put Lead (II) Acetate in their wine so that it wouldn't taste bitter lol that's surely some nice scientific advancements.
>>477903
>nitpicking this hard
Should i bring up children workers conditions during the industrial age?
Or what modern countries can do to their environment?
>>477909
lol go ahead faggot
>>477914
>being this stupid. go read a book
>>477923
The meme talked about scientific advancements and I'm just pointing out their flaws.
Jesus christ /his/ really hates it when people criticise small details. I need to start doing this more as bait for you faggots haha
>>477931
:-)
>>476659
Technological singularity.
They are predicting around 2030 to 2050
>>477962
I think you mean from 2030 to around 3000 anon.
>>476659
>What would it take for us to see a technological leap forward on the scale of the Industrial Revolution?
we are currently moving forward at a rate far faster than during the Industrial Revolution, because computers
>>476777
shame islam lobotomized itself ending the 'golden age' and leading to everything wrong in the world today
>>476777
Implying the muslims didnt steal aot of knowledge from the assyrians
>>477053
Unfortunately, Marx economics and ideas are obsolete in a post-industrial informational era.
It was a marvelous attempt though.
>>477903
We live in a society where there still exist climate change deniers. We're not much better than the Romans. In fact we're worse since we KNOW it's happening yet herp derp while they didn't knew any better.
>>478000
>in a post-industrial informational era.
>>477731
>The dark ages were actually the light ages and the renaissance was a technological lull
Is this the new /his/ meme?
>>477813
Nice refutation.
>>>/trash/
>>478010
>implying complete automatization of all human labour is not inevitable
>>478033
It's not so simple. The thing is, late Medieval scholars such as Nicole Oresme, Jean Buridan and Thomas Bradwardine were closer to the technological leap which characterizes the Scientific Revolution, specially with their mathematization of physics, than Renaissance scholars.
Look, I know how great Copernicus and Vesalius were, but these are actually very late scientists, and from outside Italy. What we actually understand as typical Renaissance, Italy during the 15th century, was absolutely shit from a scientific point of view. It's great scholars were mystical hacks such as Marsilio Ficino, Paracelsus and Pico della Mirandola.
>>478010
>Cherry picking
Some countries are still enduring industrial revolutions.
>>478044
Ironically, this would actually make communism possible.
>>478068
>Got a time line on determining what consciousness is? Hard AI? Of course not.
>I need be able to predict the future in order for it to happen
Moore's Law, baby
>On making language mean things?
Not this language. What are you referring to?
>>478088
>Moore's Law, baby
And that's why the earth is in fact infinite, because of the growth trends of capital.
>argument from an exponential
ffs.
>Not this language.
Time for you to read Deleuze.
>>478062
What about the scarcity of actual resources?
>>478128
Sorry, I don't get your point.
>>478128
Automatization of labour is all well and good, but for communism to actually work we need to go post-scarcity.
>>478114
>And that's why the earth is in fact infinite, because of the growth trends of capital.
Where did I say or imply explicitly or implicitly that the earth was infinite?
>>argument from an exponential
>ffs.
Again, that does nothing to refute my point. You're not very good at this are you?
>Time for you to read Deleuze.
Quote/summarise the relevent material or you're just throwing books on my plate so I can't respond.
>>478033
It's almost as if history ISN'T a continuous process of improvement with things eternally getting better and better every day.
>>478145
>Quote/summarise the relevent material or you're just throwing books on my plate so I can't respond.
You don't deal in humanities do you?
Language is not reducible to meaning. Humanists have known this before there was such a thing as humanities.
>>478146
just laugh at the whigs
>>478165
As normal with a graph, the Y axis is meaningless and undefined.
>>477962
Thank god I'll be dead by then. They can shove their AI up their asses. If I do remain alive, I'll be the first to blow one of their machines up.
>>478173
My post was as ambiguous as the one I was quoting, but graphical rather than linguistic.
>>478253
x: time
y: what I want to prove
data source: my own arsehole
>>477980
damn you ghazali
that and the rejection of the printing press
>>478294
Progress can be objectively defined for certain variables.
Out of interest, what politics did the whigs have, in general and in comparison to the opposition they tended to have?
>>476820
this to be truthful blood relative
>>478318
>Progress can be objectively defined for certain variables.
Firstly, reality doesn't have variables. Models have variables. Observations through apparatus produce values that you assign to a variable in a model.
Secondly, variables don't "progress," they increase and decrease.
Are you really this epistemologically retarded, or are you pretending to be an engineer for erotic purposes?
I dont think that we will have such a big leap again but steady progression. Maybe if we discover something that will really have a big impact and makes something much easier or faster.
>>478368
>Thinks this has anything to do with epistemology
Yeah I'm done
>>478373
Le shig whig.
Remember, the y-axis is what you like. It isn't scalar, or defined. The data source is your fucking rectum, x is time. y=x is the trend.
You can reuse this graph for anything you like.
If y is something you don't like then y=-x
>>478394
It's not supposed to be a representation of data. Are you fucking dense? Have you never seen an illustrative graph? OP's pic wasn't brilliant, but it certainly fits into the category.
>>478401
Please leave /his/ until you've read The Whig Interpretation of History
>>477828
>The Romans were great at building infrastructure based on Greek knowledge. Not at advancing science.
Ptolemy, Hero, Dioscorides, Menelaus, and Galen were all Romans.
It's hard to tell just how advanced Roman science was since Christian Europe preserved very little of it.
>>478088
>Moore's Law, baby
I like how they keep tacking 6 months onto the doubling time every decade.
>>476659
>The meme pic
>>476777
>the Rennaisance was thanks to Muslims as well.
The Byzantines are muslims?
>Moore's law
Oh fuck off, this doesn't mean what you think it does. It doesn't even have anything to do with the actual performance, it's a pure engineering trend.
I hate how people parade it around as if it meant something or allowed some kind of prediction. It's trivia. A meme. A billion predictions turned out wrong, one turned out right, so let's worship it and pretend it was more than pure chance.
>>479874
>A post scarcity society would just be capitalism with a golden age of charity
It just depends how you frame it. Given that it could be supported, with a decent guaranteed income, there would be no homeless people, no famine, and everyone could focus on their interest.
