I don't necessarily agree. I'd like to know if the ancient greeks could name the names of their biggest actors or their best scholars. I'd like to know if in 2000 years people will know the name of Sean Penn, Chris Rock, Albert Einstein, or Stephen Hawking.
I can't name many Vaudevillians, though I'm sure many people could at the time.
To illustrate my point, take their example:
Quote:
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To gauge the effect of entertainers being at the epicenter of a national consciousness, just imagine if it were to happen in the life of a single individual. What if entertainment, rather than scholarship, were the foremost preoccupation of a medical student. Instead of working at a library and attending lectures for eights hours each day, our student watched eight hours of television and DVDs each day. Would you trust him with your kidney?
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the answer of course, is, "no, but he or she'd probably make a better writer for 'The Simpsons'". Would it be better if that medical student was spending all his or her time drinking at the bar, or working the fields, or recovering from various illnesses, or any other past-time that was available before the 20th century? Hardly.
But turn it around a bit:
Imagine that Rosanne Barr or Britney Spears had decided to learn medical surgery instead of going into entertainment. Would you trust either with your kidney?
I think our science, philosophy, politics, etc. are advancing quite well. We've got lots of people. Lots of smart people. Lots of nerds who are doing lots of good, nerdy work. I might be convinced if there were no organ transplants, no mapping of the genetic code, no explorations of mars, no advancement in number theory, no invention of psychology in the last 100 years, no computers, no cars, no air conditioners or microwaves or viagra, no advancement of the standard of living since the onset of media. But there has been. Relax, chicken little. Go see a movie.