But What If We're Wrong?: Thinking About the Present as If It Were the Past

If you ask people if anything that we believe in today could be considered wrong in the future, they would likely say yes. However, if you ask about a specific thing (such as gravity), you are likely to get an answer that it would never be considered wrong. That is a conundrum that we run into when looking at the present. We know that past accepted truths are no longer believed today, yet we have trouble imagining specific truths of today no longer being accepted.

With his experience as an art critic, he pays special interest to how music and art will be remembered. The 78 era is defined by those who have collected these records. Their tastes are different than the general population that purchased records and thus tend to show a more quirky taste than the general public. Moby Dick was a commercial failure when written, but become well regarded later. At the turn of 19th to 20th century there were a large number of march composers. However, Sousa is pretty much the only one remembered today. Centuries from now, the "rock" era may be consolidated to a single person or group. Perhaps the Beatles or Bop Dylan will be remembered. Or perhaps some obscure artist that we don't think of much today will be used to signify the era. The past works that are acclaimed are often more a reflection of the current day than the time they were written. There is a great deal of subjectiveness in the matter. 

There is also a "merging" of years from the past. Julius Caesar and Constantine are lumped together as "leaders of Rome". Yet they were much further apart than George Washington and Joe Biden. Roman history may be summarized as "Julias Caesar was assassinated, Augustus became emperor, Constantine became Christianity. How would our history be summarized?

Science and technology are also evolving. We scoff at "flat earth" beliefs of those of the part. It is difficult to see that some of our beliefs are just wrong. Yet, we have seen accepted scientific truths change before our eyes. Einstein ripped apart details of Newtonian physics. New work has lead to different understandings of basic physics. Our knowledge of biological science is constantly evolving. Germ theory seems second nature. Fields like epigenetics seem to take us back to understandings that were disregarded before. The slow evolution of science causes us to miss some of the big changes that have occurred. When we look back at a long view, they may become much more apparent.

I liked the premise of the book, but did feel it dragged on a bit. The pop-culture analysis seemed to be the author's forte. There were some great chapters, though there were also areas that seemed to ramble on without building up the central thesis. It is a great topic to explore, yet also a difficult one to get your brain around. It feels we are "stuck" in our current view, and our brains extrapolate forward from where we are today rather than expect turns and detours.