Friday, January 27, 2006

What would you pick?

Harris writes some fine pieces for Tech Central Station. Today he has written a fantasy featuring aliens and Mozart. The theme is: what single thing created by man would best represent humanity for eternity? Harris opts for music:
...the aliens want me, and me alone, to decide what human monument will be spared from the otherwise universal destruction awaiting our species and all the cultural objects that we have created in our brief tenure on this obscure planet. For example, the aliens offer me the choice of saving the Great Pyramids of Egypt, the Eiffel Tower, the Sistine Chapel, or the Washington Monument, the Empire State Building, or the Taj Mahal. But whatever item I select, it alone will continue to survive, and it alone will remain as evidence of the best that such a bad lot as us could do, despite our bestial failings.

What monument of humanity do I choose?

Without a moment’s hesitation, I respond, “Why, obviously, the opera, The Marriage of Figaro, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.”

What would you choose? I'm still pondering. Music is an awfully tempting choice. Monuments, achievements, art works, buildings, conquests, discoveries, inventions...what would it be?

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