by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Old methods and old ways must be used again in many instances as they are much better for us than the modern ways, and this includes a different way of travel.
If mankind wants to have a future on Earth, our Mother, our Planet; the only one that will sustain us, for there is not another Earth or Earth-like planet within reach, then mankind must change its ways and that rather pronto.
A great many methods of old, as said, may have to be – and more like will have to be – rediscovered and employed in order for us to be able to live more sustainable and in harmony with our Planet.
This may even mean heating and cooking with wood in many places as wood is the only carbon neutral fuel about, as far as I am aware.
While it may be true that the BTU output from wood may be different that that of coal we must reinvent the wheel, so to speak, as to living better on this Earth. It can be done and we must learn from those that are more or less masters in this field.
The ones that know their business as to using wood as fuel in the most efficient ways, at least as far as cooking and heating stoves are concerned are the Amish and we should take a leaf out of their book here. Maybe not only in respect of wood fueled heating and cooking but in respect to other points as well.
In many aspects the ancient ones too knew more about things environmental than it would appear does modern man; man of the twentieth and the twenty-first century.
We cold start, for instance, at the size of the windows in the nineteenth century and before. They were smaller than today's windows and studies have shown – surprise NOT – that smaller windows lose less heat to the outside.
It is often claimed that the windows were that small was because of the cost of glass then and also that glass could not be produced in large sheets in those days. That may be so but whether that was the reason for smaller windows or not is another question.
The same study that found that smaller windows are more efficient as to heat also found that they do not allow the sun to overheat a house and hence no need to cool it too much in warm summers. In addition to that those windows often were deeply recessed into the walls thus shading them from direct sunlight.
While this may make for slightly lower light conditions it means, however, that heat in winter is not lost at a large scale to the outside and neither is the building becoming too hot in hot summers.
Did those ancient ones know more than we give them credit for? I think yes. It is the same in that today we cannot make, so it seems, good manual watches anymore that can keep proper time, or at least not at a reasonable price.
Nino Cochise in his autobiography mentioned a Swiss pocket watch that he was given in the later nineteenth century and when he tried to get it repaired just after the first moon landing (if there ever was one) – and yes, Nino Cochise was over 100 years old – he was told that they were unable to reproduce the hair spring in the watch. This is a very poor show when in the nineteenth century and before they could make such springs by hand and in our modern world we cannot do this. One really must wonder then as to how much we have advanced since or whether, in some aspects, we have actually gone backwards.
The same seems to be true as regards the electric cars. In the first years of he twentieth century there were, so I have read, such cars that did have a far better range at 30mph than today's ones despite the fact that they were very heavy, being but converted horse wagon with iron hoops on wheels, etc., and very big heavy lead acid batteries. The batteries also, so it would seem, could be charged rather fast too. If that all is the case why then can we not make then electric cars today that are faster and have a greater range as the cars and the batteries are lighter today? What happened to the knowledge? Was it destroyed on purpose by the powerful oil lobby?
It would seem that many such technologies have been allowed to be forgotten and such because of certain lobbies that could wave large wads of money in the faces of politicians.
While my suspicions of such fact that we seem to have “lost” all that technology and knowledge may be the fault of lobby groups such as the oil industry and other groups with an agenda, much like today as regards to Climate Change being the result of man's activities, and politicians in their pay, may be seen by some as conspiracy theories, there seems to be some truth in that. How else can we explain the loss of such knowledge and skills?
Much akin as well in regards to medicines when it always has to be the chemical compounds, ideally synthesized, rather than herbal and natural ways.
When people began using colloidal silver in the late twentieth century again all the medical professionals , bar one or two, were saying that this is all just old wives beliefs and now... well, now we have plasters that are coated with silver for better healing and for the antibacterial properties. Oops!
Honey for wound treatment is as old as the hills – well, nearly – and it has been found – at great cost no doubt – that it does work, after medical science had for decades claimed that honey is no good for use on wounds.
I could go on and will for a moment for the other treatment, often also pooh poohed by the medical profession is the use of copper in the form of jewelery for the treatment of arthritis.
While the use of copper bracelets, for instance, and rings, etc., will not cure arthritis, and I doubt that there ever will be a real cure for it, it eases things and I am living proof of that.
So, back to the future we must go in order to have a chance of real survival on the Earth and of living in better symbiosis with the Earth.
While I would not like to live without the PC, Netbook and Internet, etc. and I am no Luddite there are many things where we can and should go back to older ways and technologies.
However, but then this is my opinion, the old technology of paper, as in notebook, Filofax, or such, and pen still beats that of the hand-help PC or PDA. Having experienced those things going wobbly again and again I must say that I am much happier with a notebook and a pen – or even pencil – to draft my articles, take notes, and such. I also am not dependent on batteries and can read it in most light conditions, unless it is dark and there is no light source available.
Can we create a hybrid society that uses good old proven technologies together with modern ones? We better for, otherwise, we may be lost.
© 2009
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Old methods and old ways lead to the future
