A cold front is battling warm gulf air for dominance in my region, resulting in a cold and dreary winter storm outside my window. And as I sit here all cozy in my warm, comfortable house, I'm grateful for the luxury to do so. I think of all the people who lived their lives without such soundly built homes or safe, effective indoor lighting, and I realize how much more in tune such people were with their surroundings, as well as how dependent they were on the weather.
Certainly the weather still affects us in modern times, as Hurricane Katrina effectively demonstrated, but here and now we are far less at the whim of nature than any of our ancestors ever were. To wit, that I am even now leisurely and luxuriously reading and writing -- actively engaged in the transmission of knowledge -- while a thunderstorm rages outside is testament to the very real ways that progress breeds progress.
Even still, I wonder about our modern disengagement with the natural world, and I ponder whether it will prove to be a foolhardy course of action for humanity to take or if technological innovation will indeed propel our species into a new mode of existence....
Obviously, the history of science and society is still on my mind. I hope that I have chosen the right path with this interdisciplinary foray I am taking into the history of law and society. Probably so, because the socio-cultural innovations which I see as akin to technological developments will likely require more in-depth study. With background training in the nuanced field of law, I can go on to later expand my area of expertise to include humanity's utilization of material technologies.
After all, if I wish to seriously investigate the two phenomenon, I'll have to begin with one of the two. Truly, I could do it either way, but I feel like I'm presently better situated to begin with the socio-cultural side of the coin.
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