On 12 September 1940, the entrance to the Lascaux Cave was discovered on the La Rochefoucauld-Montbel lands by 18-year-old Marcel Ravidat when his dog, Robot, investigated a hole left by an uprooted tree (Ravidat would embellish the story in later retellings, saying Robot had fallen into the cave.)[8][9] Ravidat returned to the scene with three friends, Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas. They entered the cave through a 15-metre-deep (50-foot) shaft that they believed might be a legendary secret passage to the nearby Lascaux Manor.[9][10][11] The teenagers discovered that the cave walls were covered with depictions of animals.[12][13] Galleries that suggest continuity, context or simply represent a cavern were given names. Those include the Hall of the Bulls, the Passageway, the Shaft, the Nave, the Apse, and the Chamber of Felines. They returned along with the Abbé Henri Breuil on 21 September 1940; Breuil would make many sketches of the cave, some of which are used as study material today due to the extreme degradation of many of the paintings. Breuil was accompanied by Denis Peyrony, curator of Les eyzies (Prehistory Museum) at Les Eyzies, Jean Bouyssonie and Dr Cheynier.
The cave complex was opened to the public on 14 July 1948, and initial archaeological investigations began a year later, focusing on the Shaft. By 1955, carbon dioxide, heat, humidity, and other contaminants produced by 1,200 visitors per day had visibly damaged the paintings. As air condition deteriorated, fungi and lichen increasingly infested the walls. Consequently, the cave was closed to the public in 1963, the paintings were restored to their original state, and a monitoring system on a daily basis was introduced.
Lascaux II, an exact copy of the Great Hall of the Bulls and the Painted Gallery was displayed at the Grand Palais in Paris, before being displayed from 1983 in the cave’s vicinity (about 200 m or 660 ft away from the original cave), a compromise and attempt to present an impression of the paintings’ scale and composition for the public without harming the originals.[10][13] A full range of Lascaux’s parietal art is presented a few kilometres from the site at the Centre of Prehistoric Art, Le Parc du Thot, where there are also live animals representing ice-age fauna.[14]
The paintings for this site were duplicated with the same type of materials (such as iron oxide, charcoal, and ochre) which were believed to be used 19,000 years ago.[9][15][16][17] Other facsimiles of Lascaux have also been produced over the years.
They have also created additional copies, Lascaux III, Lascaux IV, and Lascaux V.
Consequently, the cave was closed to the public in 1963, the paintings were restored to their original state, and a monitoring system on a daily basis was introduced.
“I actually find it overwhelmingly hopeful, that four teenagers and a dog named Robot discovered a cave with 17,000-year-old handprints, that the cave was so overwhelmingly beautiful that two of those teenagers devoted themselves to its protection. And that when we humans became a danger to that caves’ beauty, we agreed to stop going. Lascaux is there. You cannot visit.”
-John Green
People preserve the remains of Lucy, work hard to preserve old books, the Mona Lisa is protected under bullet-proof glass and is not up for sale.
What is the mechanistic reason for this? There are perfect copies of these things, yet humans go through great lengths to preserve the original. Why is there the Sacred?
They have created copies of Lascaux, yet still work hard to preserve the original. Humans cannot enter. They get no experience of joy from visiting. It is not for sale. Yet they strongly desire to protect it, because it is the original, and no other reason.
Robin Hanson gave a list of Sacred characteristic, some I find promising:
Sacred things are highly (or lowly) valued. We revere, respect, & prioritize them.
Sacred is big, powerful, extraordinary. We fear, submit, & see it as larger than ourselves.
We want the sacred “for itself”, rather than as a means to get other things.
Sacred makes us feel less big, distinct, independent, in control, competitive, entitled.
We get emotionally attached to the sacred; our stance re it is oft part of our identity.
We desire to connect with the sacred, and to be more associated with it.
Sacred things are sharply set apart and distinguished from the ordinary, mundane.
Re sacred, we fear a slippery slope, so that any compromise leads to losing it all.
If we can understand the sacred, it seems like a concept that probably wouldn’t fall into a simple utility function, something that wouldn’t break out-of-distribution. A kind of Sacred Human Value Shard, something that protects our part of the manifold.
A practical reason for preserving the original is that new techniques can allow new things to be discovered about it. A copy can embody no more than the observations that we have already made.
There’s no point to analysing the pigments in a modern copy of a painting, or carbon-dating its frame.
if we could somehow establish how information from the original was extracted, do you expect humans to then destroy the original or allow it to be destroyed?
No. The original is a historical document that may have further secrets to be revealed by methods yet to be invented. A copy says of the original only what was put into it.
I think you’re missing the point. If we could establish that all important information had been extracted from the original, would you expect humans to then destroy the original or allow it to be destroyed?
My guess is that they wouldn’t. Which I think means practicality is not the central reason why humans do this.
Can humans become Sacred?
On 12 September 1940, the entrance to the Lascaux Cave was discovered on the La Rochefoucauld-Montbel lands by 18-year-old Marcel Ravidat when his dog, Robot, investigated a hole left by an uprooted tree (Ravidat would embellish the story in later retellings, saying Robot had fallen into the cave.)[8][9] Ravidat returned to the scene with three friends, Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas. They entered the cave through a 15-metre-deep (50-foot) shaft that they believed might be a legendary secret passage to the nearby Lascaux Manor.[9][10][11] The teenagers discovered that the cave walls were covered with depictions of animals.[12][13] Galleries that suggest continuity, context or simply represent a cavern were given names. Those include the Hall of the Bulls, the Passageway, the Shaft, the Nave, the Apse, and the Chamber of Felines. They returned along with the Abbé Henri Breuil on 21 September 1940; Breuil would make many sketches of the cave, some of which are used as study material today due to the extreme degradation of many of the paintings. Breuil was accompanied by Denis Peyrony, curator of Les eyzies (Prehistory Museum) at Les Eyzies, Jean Bouyssonie and Dr Cheynier.
The cave complex was opened to the public on 14 July 1948, and initial archaeological investigations began a year later, focusing on the Shaft. By 1955, carbon dioxide, heat, humidity, and other contaminants produced by 1,200 visitors per day had visibly damaged the paintings. As air condition deteriorated, fungi and lichen increasingly infested the walls. Consequently, the cave was closed to the public in 1963, the paintings were restored to their original state, and a monitoring system on a daily basis was introduced.
Lascaux II, an exact copy of the Great Hall of the Bulls and the Painted Gallery was displayed at the Grand Palais in Paris, before being displayed from 1983 in the cave’s vicinity (about 200 m or 660 ft away from the original cave), a compromise and attempt to present an impression of the paintings’ scale and composition for the public without harming the originals.[10][13] A full range of Lascaux’s parietal art is presented a few kilometres from the site at the Centre of Prehistoric Art, Le Parc du Thot, where there are also live animals representing ice-age fauna.[14]
The paintings for this site were duplicated with the same type of materials (such as iron oxide, charcoal, and ochre) which were believed to be used 19,000 years ago.[9][15][16][17] Other facsimiles of Lascaux have also been produced over the years.
They have also created additional copies, Lascaux III, Lascaux IV, and Lascaux V.
Consequently, the cave was closed to the public in 1963, the paintings were restored to their original state, and a monitoring system on a daily basis was introduced.
“I actually find it overwhelmingly hopeful, that four teenagers and a dog named Robot discovered a cave with 17,000-year-old handprints, that the cave was so overwhelmingly beautiful that two of those teenagers devoted themselves to its protection. And that when we humans became a danger to that caves’ beauty, we agreed to stop going. Lascaux is there. You cannot visit.”
-John Green
People preserve the remains of Lucy, work hard to preserve old books, the Mona Lisa is protected under bullet-proof glass and is not up for sale.
What is the mechanistic reason for this? There are perfect copies of these things, yet humans go through great lengths to preserve the original. Why is there the Sacred?
They have created copies of Lascaux, yet still work hard to preserve the original. Humans cannot enter. They get no experience of joy from visiting. It is not for sale. Yet they strongly desire to protect it, because it is the original, and no other reason.
Robin Hanson gave a list of Sacred characteristic, some I find promising:
Sacred things are highly (or lowly) valued. We revere, respect, & prioritize them.
Sacred is big, powerful, extraordinary. We fear, submit, & see it as larger than ourselves.
We want the sacred “for itself”, rather than as a means to get other things.
Sacred makes us feel less big, distinct, independent, in control, competitive, entitled.
Sacred quiets feelings of: doubts, anxiety, ego, self-criticism, status-consciousness.
We get emotionally attached to the sacred; our stance re it is oft part of our identity.
We desire to connect with the sacred, and to be more associated with it.
Sacred things are sharply set apart and distinguished from the ordinary, mundane.
Re sacred, we fear a slippery slope, so that any compromise leads to losing it all.
If we can understand the sacred, it seems like a concept that probably wouldn’t fall into a simple utility function, something that wouldn’t break out-of-distribution. A kind of Sacred Human Value Shard, something that protects our part of the manifold.
A practical reason for preserving the original is that new techniques can allow new things to be discovered about it. A copy can embody no more than the observations that we have already made.
There’s no point to analysing the pigments in a modern copy of a painting, or carbon-dating its frame.
if we could somehow establish how information from the original was extracted, do you expect humans to then destroy the original or allow it to be destroyed?
No. The original is a historical document that may have further secrets to be revealed by methods yet to be invented. A copy says of the original only what was put into it.
Only recently an ancient, charred scroll was first read.
I think you’re missing the point. If we could establish that all important information had been extracted from the original, would you expect humans to then destroy the original or allow it to be destroyed?
My guess is that they wouldn’t. Which I think means practicality is not the central reason why humans do this.
I think you’re missing my point, which is that we cannot establish that.
Yes, I’m questioning your hypothetical. I always question hypotheticals.