Long Now

### Undeniable Progress Hominids had upright walking, stone tools, fire, even language but still remained in profound stasis. What led to humanity's global takeoff, Ridley argues, was the invention of exchange about 120,000 years ago. "That's ten times older than agriculture." The beginnings of trade encouraged specialization and innovation, which encouraged further innovation, specialization, and...

### Parenting Earth The birth of a first child is the most intense disruption that most adults experience. Suddenly the new parents have no sleep, no social life, no sex, and they have to keep up with a child that changes from week to week. "Two ignorant adults learn from the newborn how to be decent parents." Everything now has to be planned ahead, and the realization sinks in that it will go on...

### Government 4.0 Americans have made major adjustments to our government before, Howard declared. At the beginning of the 20th century a Progressive era ended strict laissez-faire. The New Deal in the 1930s provided social safety nets. In the 1960s Civil Rights came to the fore. Now we need a fourth big change, because our government has managed to paralyze itself with the accretion of decades o...

### Lives of San Francisco "You are the soundtrack," Prelinger told the capacity audience at the Herbst Theater, and they responded to his mostly silent archival films by calling out locations, questions, comments, and jokes. They saw footage of a 1941 Market Street parade of allies---floats representing Malta, Russia, France, Britain---and Kezar Stadium hosting a ferocious mock battle/demonstrati...

### The Missing Science of Biological Longevity Creative photographer Sussman showed beautiful slides of very elderly organisms. The captions were as crucial as the images---naming the species, the place, and the approximate age. You can see many of them here: http://rachelsussman.com/portfolios/OLTW/main.html The series began with the only animal---an eighteen-foot brain coral in the waters of To...

### Languages are Parallel Universes "To have a second language is to have a second soul," said Charlemagne around 800 AD. "Each language has its own cognitive toolkit," said psychologist/linguist Lera Boroditsky in 2010 AD. Different languages handle verbs, distinctions, gender, time, space, metaphor, and agency differently, and those differences, her research shows, make people think and act dif...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...

**This is one conversation out of the 19 that took place as part of the Long Conversation.[Media links for the other Conversations are available here.](https://longnow.org/seminars/02010/oct/16/long-conversation/)** Long Conversation, an epic relay of one-to-one conversations among some of the Bay Area's most interesting minds, took place over 6 hours in San Francisco on Saturday October 16, 02010...