Hardly ever we get to practice the exercise of self-criticism, especially with things that are part of our daily basis. That everyday life is full of relationships, with other people, objects, animals, ideas etc. Sometimes we do not criticize the elements of our daily life because they are the solidest part of our reality, and how dare us to question that! We could of course, that’s the philosopher’s job. It is because almost nobody has the time to do it, not if you must work a lot of hours, doing something not related to books and articles, or if you are too comfortable in your reality that you don’t really care about questioning those commodities. In the busy world of today, the long explanations have no room, so the philosopher must master the skill of the abbreviator, being careful of not excessively using the resources of the omission and simplification.
Our generation was granted with the enormous gift of
playing in the outside, experiencing Nature: forests, mountains, climbing
trees, swimming rivers, eating from earth. Not only watching ecosystems on a
screen but to have the chance to be there, to be part of that nature (which we
are). Before our generation, the so-called X generation, by the popular
literature, also enjoyed of that contact with nature during their early days.
We are not mentioning the adulthood of this generation, sadly, they were too
busy working, and not all of them had the chance to work in the very Nature. If
we keep this exercise of thinking, considering the generations before us,
eventually, we will reach the ancient times, with no buses, no schools, no
government, no entertainment, no religion, perhaps not even words, but a lot of
Nature. That shaped our development, Nature, physically and mentally, not the
devices and structures that interact with us all the time in our days. These
objects are the ways and the ends for most people. It could be said that we are
kind of addicted to these devices; maybe that’s one of the reasons for the
denial, for avoiding the topic and only look at it as a necessary evil in the
journey of progress. Today we will allow ourselves to look directly at it, the
elephant in the room, the planned obsolescence.
Any average day is good for an example, just consider
all the objects around you, everything that makes your day possible. All of
them contain an intrinsic element of obsolescence, in the physical realm and in
the psychological one. Everything can be broken, even us when we get sick
remember how fragile we are. Thermodynamics could explain these changes using its
second postulate, the one about entropy. Nevertheless, that same science cannot
explain why we planned for it, to make it happen at a determined time, in a
planet of finite resources, with only an economic purpose. It doesn’t make a
lot of sense when we put it in that way, but that’s what it is. Clothes are no
longer fashionable, electronics change constantly (under the logic of design,
functions, spare parts, durability, etc.), tools must be changed when they get
broken, burned, bend, deformed; the same goes for transportation, any
industrial or domestic object will have an element (at least) related to
obsolescence. Practically every object in the market, all of them, must fail,
otherwise the economy will collapse, there is no business on selling
everlasting products. It is completely obvious that at some point humanity will
face a problem with resources, so, why don’t we ask ourselves the awkward questions
before the awkward facts hit us in the face. ¿Can we push the stop button at
the industries without any repercussion? Of course not, that would be a very
puerile question. Making the right questions is not always easy, how can we
appeal to reason when we act irrationally about our must precious thing in the
world, sacrificing it for the sake of economy. Fortunately, making questions is
another area in which philosophers work a lot. Taking every aspect into
account, we get to make the question: How can we develop a more resilient
mentality in a society of use and throw? The answer to that question is not
only in the hands of philosophy, but in all natural and physical sciences, in the
humanities, in the interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary realm. Only working
together in this reflexive exercise is possible to find a way out of obsolescence.
