The Internet: Our Future Lies In Ruins
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 41 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Years ago I read an amusing article in Reader’s Digest (back in the 70s when my grandmother subscribed to it) in which an archeologist of 5,000 years in the future dug up the ruins of a Motel 6 or some similar establishment, and attempted to “interpret” the various artifacts he found. He came to the conclusion that the TV was some kind of religious object of worship (not too far from the truth there!) and that the toilet seat and drain plugs were ritual jewelry worn by “priestesses” of the TV-worshiping “cult.” He even drew a picture of a woman wearing the toilet seat around her neck with the lid behind her head and drain plugs dangling from her ears… for some reason that mental image has stuck with me for 35+ years 🙂
I read the same article Elaine! Context is everything, and sometimes archaeologists simply have little to no context for some of the items that they find.
Sheesh, I can just picture some future archeologist digging up our apartment and coming to the conclusion that we worshipped an Apple computer 🙂
Believe it or not, modern archeologists usually find their most useful artifacts in what’s left of the garbage receptacles and, ahem, bathroom facilities of ancient or pre-modern homes and businesses. That’s how they figure out what people ate, what kind of utensils they used, etc.
(Guest comment by Don’s wife Cathy): I didn’t read the Reader’s Digest article Don & Elaine referred to, but David Macaulay’s “Motel of the Mysteries” was a very similar children’s book.
Good news! “AD” will continue to be used to identify dates in the future.