We invent and communicate, we publish articles at an ever-increasing rate, we create videos and we’re never offline. A recent PNAS article, “ external pageScience in the age of selfies call_made”, analysed this quite incisively: we may have more technology and information than ever before, but our creativity seems to be paralysed by all the hustle and bustle surrounding us – which we ourselves are encouraging. The vast hamster wheel of science is made up of technological developments, publications, applications, competitions, and so on and so forth. But it has also created centrifugal forces that drive us to the edge of the wheel and persuade us that the world would turn upside down – or maybe far worse – if we dared to stop running. Technology has given us a longer, more meaningful life, and enriched our understanding of the world. There was no longer time to find hamsters, so humanity simply subjugated itself instead.
From the plough to glyphosate, from the steam engine to the assembly line, and from the first computer to the smartphone, these transitions got quicker – and increasingly quicker.
It took a long time to get from the wheel to the hamster wheel. The creature would stumble and fall victim to the uncontrollable effects of centrifugal force. Once it’s underway, the idea of stopping becomes unthinkable. Technology enables humanity to subjugate an animal, appeal to its instincts and give it a new occupation. The synthesis of the two – the hamster wheel – can therefore serve as the ideotype of a variety of complex cultural developments. Another was the domestication of animals. The invention of the wheel was one of humanity’s earliest cultural achievements.
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