Earlier this month, Time Magazine printed an interview with Donald Trump. In the interview, Trump spoke about the Navy’s Gerald Ford-class aircraft carriers and the kinks that they’re still working out with the new magnetic catapult technology. The Electro-Magnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) isn’t perfect yet, but Trump, who seems to believe that nobody else can understand what he fails to understand, called for the Navy to trash EMALS and return to catapults powered by “G*ddamned steam.” While Trump’s steampunk directive is a bit cringeworthy, other retro trends merit a closer look. History may not repeat, but it certainly rhymes, and lately, everything old is new again.
Earlier this month, Time Magazine printed an interview with Donald Trump. In the interview, Trump spoke about the Navy’s Gerald Ford-class aircraft carriers and the kinks that they’re still working out with the new magnetic catapult technology. The Electro-Magnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) isn’t perfect yet, but Trump, who seems to believe that nobody else can understand what he fails to understand, called for the Navy to trash EMALS and return to catapults powered by “Goddamned steam.” To quote our President, “It sounded bad to me. Digital. They have digital. What is digital? And it’s very complicated, you have to be Albert Einstein to figure it out.” While Trump’s steampunk directive is a bit cringeworthy, other retro trends merit a closer look. History may not repeat, but it certainly rhymes, and lately, everything old is new again.
Trump has beef with ‘digital’ aircraft catapults, posted by Newsy.
Long ago, before the Enclosure Acts sent newly landless peasants to the cities and economic changes like industrialization forced people to abandon supportive communities to move where the jobs are, more people lived communally than they do now. The benefits are obvious: with grandparents there to watch the kids, parents were free to do productive work, many hands made jobs easier, costs and benefits were shared, and the inherent social support went a long way to offset the loss of privacy. With more millennials and even elders rediscovering the benefits of living in larger groups, everything old is new again. Whether people are driven to find new solutions by the economic downturn, inspired by the creative potential of living with a diverse set of artists and makers, or looking for alternatives to expensive daycare or large carbon footprints, co-housing is coming back.
Scientists are another group looking to medieval sources for today’s answers. The race to discover new cures as bacterial evolution eventually renders even the most promising modern antibiotics ineffective means searching in unlikely places for fresh (or especially old) ideas. As it turns out, some of those ancient physicians were on to something. In 2015, a team of scientists pored through “Bald’s Leechbook,” a thousand-year-old English text filled with truly old school remedies. That’s where they found Bald’s Eyesalve, a recipe calling for wine, garlic, leeks, and oxgall to be combined and aged for nine days in a brass vessel. As an experiment, they whipped up a batch, following the directions carefully. The result turned out to be a powerful antimicrobial agent that killed Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), considered a superbug.
Other researchers have looked at the anti-MRSA effects of traditionally-fermented mead, while current research into traditional Armenian remedies is inspiring modern skin-friendly cosmetics. The future of medicine may be behind us.
Many look to the past to find healthier alternatives to the problems of modern life. Living representatives of older lifeways, hunter-gatherer and horticultural groups like the Tsimane in Bolivia have a lot to teach us about how to stay healthy. Natives of the Amazon rainforest, the Tsimane feed themselves by hunting, fishing, foraging, and planting some crops. Even though 70% of their calories come from carbohydrates, their foods are rich in fiber. And they walk – boy do they walk, about 7.5 miles daily, while going about their everyday activities. While the popular conception of hunter-gatherers is that they suffer for the lack of modern medicine and die at age 35, the Tsimane turn out to have some of the healthiest hearts in the world. The heart of an 80-year-old Tsimane is about as healthy as that of an average 50-year-old American. Emulating the nutritious diet and moderate activity of Tsimane daily life could go a long way towards improving ours.
There’s a creeping realization among some of us that modern life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. We have amazing technology, but often lack deep human connections. Our bleeding-edge medical care hasn’t stopped people from dying of cancer, and our industrial food system hasn’t ended malnutrition (indeed, it is sometimes the cause of hunger). While we can’t return to a past that has slipped away, we can take a new path toward a future informed by the best of what came before. People are already starting down this road, as everything old is new again – except maybe steam-powered Navy catapults.
Related: Hunting and Gathering Poverty Food
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