Cultures, Wars, Wiping Asses off the Planet

[Murthy Yenamandra]

Joe Varo writes:
> Is it so much "our own culture's misguided tendency" to wipe other
> peoples' asses off the planet or is that just a side-effect of the
> Technology (i.e. fire-power) we have?

Cultures invent technologies that help them express their cultural
tendencies. (Note that this is different from "science" - different
cultures could use the same scientific understanding to come up with
different technologies suited for different purposes.) But when they
come into contact with technologies from a different culture, they
sometimes have a choice of adopting or rejecting them, but in some cases
may be forced to adopt them (as with military technologies).

> If those cultures which particpate in limited skirmishes simply for the
> sake of marking off their territory had (or had had) 20th century Western
> Technology, would they have stopped just as soon as they, shall we say,
> made their point, or have gone on to total domination and the wiping-of-
> asses-off-the-planet?

Acquiring and adopting the 20th century Western military technology
(which is purposefully designed for the wiping-of-asses-off-the-planet)
is probably a sign that they are on their way to adopting the 20th
century Western culture that goes with it. This is one of the side
effects of wiping-of-asses-off-the-planet - you eliminate the other
cultures by eliminating the people altogether or by forcing them to
adopt our culture.

> To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure this is a valid question.  Perhaps
> Culture and Technology are too intertwined...perhaps Technology shapes
> Culture to some extent...is there a Culture resistant to the shaping power
> of Technology?

I think that technologies are cultural expressions and can be imported
from or forced upon others along with the cultures that go with it.  But
I'm not sure if it's possible for a culture to adopt a technology and
not be shaped by it.

Murthy

-- 
Murthy Yenamandra, Dept of CompSci, U of Minnesota. mailto:yenamand at cs.umn.edu
    "I'm stubborn as those garbage bags that time can not decay
     I'm junk, but I'm holding up this little wild bouquet
     Democracy is coming to the USA" - Leonard Cohen