Notre Dame (Paris) on fire?



In order to progress you need to take the Good with the bad. The main issue with Western Society since WW2 in my view is that we’ve been so frightened by where veveration for History got us-Germany in particular-that we’ve tried to act like it never happened or that only bad can come of investing in it.

But as the past few years have suggested, futurism leaves a very flimsy foundation for a species inherently interested in knowing where it has come from, and also, prejudice, inequality, violence, war, greed and all that bad stuff is simply always going to be part of our species and it’s condition. Basically because they are the scars that come with being left behind or out in the cold as the victors move on planning their new utopia.

By acting like it dosent need to be indebted to the past, as well as cautious of it, we’ve taken the history of our species and suggested that we’re the ones who uniquely have got it right, failing to understand that the very act of doing such is a symptom of decline repeated timevand time again throughout history. The only unique thing about us doing it is we have greater collective cultural and historical ignorance of the fact that it’s happening, sadly.
I mean, I love gothic architecture. But in a nutshell, doesn’t this really sum up why we’re in the mess we’re in today? All of the nostalgia and sentiment, and the idea that the way things were done hundreds of years ago should be held on to and can never be surpassed? That we should cling on to the old, instead of just constantly coming up with things that are better? I mean, when Notre Dame was built, it would have been absolutely revolutionary at the time, and I bet even then, someone will have moaned at the idea a grandiose gothic building was replacing the ‘traditional’ way of doing things. Everything has it’s time, better to move on and build a better future than hang on to the past.

It’s not that we’ve got it right, we’ve actually got it really wrong. I went to Malta not so long back, every single building there is preserved to be exactly the way they were when they were built. Keeping everything the way it was sounds lovely, but that’s actually complete stagnation. We seem to be ‘all or nothing’ as a species at times. We either viciously denounce the past or we want to cling to an idealised vision of it, and the notion that the way things used to be done can never be topped. The truth is somewhere in between. Recognise the past, learn from it, and then do something you think is better anyway. Then someone in a few hundred years will look back it, and either say what you’ve come up with was really good, or that it was f***ing terrible and that it should be burned down. But the truth is, if a few hundred years down the line, they can’t conclude that ‘It was good for it’s day, but actually, I think it’s terrible and I can do a bit better and knock up something which more accurately reflects and symbolises today.’ And they end up having the exact same conversation we’re having now, we haven’t advanced. But that’s just the way I look at things. Notre Dame was a beautiful building, and it’s sad when things end, but that’s the way things should be.
 
I think my subsequent posts have made clear what I meant. I find your point of view understandable but ultimately far more individualistic than my own values. The strangest bit about all this is why you seem insistent upon making your disagreements personal.



In many respects, we've moved past "better," and replaced it with shortcuts in order to save money or time, both frequently to the benefit of individuals rather than society. That's one of the reasons seeing this is so sad.

Now there is a lot to unpack in terms of how a giant edifice built to the glory of the version of the Catholic church that existed nine centuries ago has metamorphosed into the cultural icon (not an accidental term) that it has become today, but @sonson's excellent post covered most of that.
So the sadness is actually more a reflection of our own current inadequacies. We should actually see that as a red flag. That what we’re presently experiencing is social and cultural destitution. It would really be something if enough people can actually make the connection between that feeling of nostalgia and how terrible their present environment actually is, or that they might have the realisation that longing for a fantasy of a dreadful past - and the thing is, for all we consider Notre Dame beautiful now, you just know that there'll have been plenty of people when it was built who thought it was a bit of a monstrosity - and subsequently contrasting it with reality, in doing so, acknowledging that that idea is the result of living in an even more dreadful present, with an even worse future in store. When we’re romanticising the dark ages, and think we can’t do any better, we really have a problem.
 
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Oh yrs it is. Durham is the best cathedral on the planet.
Correct.

I mean, I love gothic architecture. But in a nutshell, doesn’t this really sum up why we’re in the mess we’re in today? All of the nostalgia and sentiment, and the idea that the way things were done hundreds of years ago should be held on to and can never be surpassed? That we should cling on to the old, instead of just constantly coming up with things that are better? I mean, when Notre Dame was built, it would have been absolutely revolutionary at the time, and I bet even then, someone will have moaned at the idea a grandiose gothic building was replacing the ‘traditional’ way of doing things. Everything has it’s time, better to move on and build a better future than hang on to the past.

It’s not that we’ve got it right, we’ve actually got it really wrong. I went to Malta not so long back, every single building there is preserved to be exactly the way they were when they were built. Keeping everything the way it was sounds lovely, but that’s actually complete stagnation. We seem to be ‘all or nothing’ as a species at times. We either viciously denounce the past or we want to cling to an idealised vision of it, and the notion that the way things used to be done can never be topped. The truth is somewhere in between. Recognise the past, learn from it, and then do something you think is better anyway. Then someone in a few hundred years will look back it, and either say what you’ve come up with was really good, or that it was f***ing terrible and that it should be burned down. But the truth is, if a few hundred years down the line, they can’t conclude that ‘It was good for it’s day, but actually, I think it’s terrible and I can do a bit better and knock up something which more accurately reflects and symbolises today.’ And they end up having the exact same conversation we’re having now, we haven’t advanced. But that’s just the way I look at things. Notre Dame was a beautiful building, and it’s sad when things end, but that’s the way things should be.
I agree to a certain extent, but then look at the clip of the civic centre in Sunderland.
 
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