Tuesday, September 07, 2004
(1:31 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
I am sure the world cannot end yet
because our shaving technology has not yet reached its telos. In approximately 1998, by my memory, a great leap forward was made: the Gilette Mach 3, a three-bladed razor that produced the cleanest imaginable shave. Now certainly there were some smart-asses who thought to themselves, "Oh, so they want three blades now? Two isn't good enough? Well, fine -- I'm making a four-blade razor!" But as we all know, that didn't happen. Shaving innovation takes time. It's only within the last year or two that the new four-bladed razor, the Quattro, has come to market, this time with two comfort strips. According to their advertisements, with the Quattro, you'll have to wait much later than five if you want to see a five o'clock shadow.That's all well and good, but it should be clear that we have not pushed this as far as we can. I've seen futurist literature that includes laser razors that actually shave below the skin, so that we would not have to shave for weeks -- our colloquial usage would have to change to "end of the month shadow." But as of yet, I have not seen any action in terms of implementing the laser razor system. Now surely if it took approximately five years to perform the engineering feat and, more importantly, to accomplish the total paradigm shift necessary to move from three to four razors, it will take even longer to shift to laser technology for body hair removal. Then implementing it on a large scale -- think, with a shudder, how many hapless shavers are still just barely getting by with their tacky two-blade razors -- will take a generational shift in consciousness.
And then to get the public to accept the next step in shaving, gene therapy to remove facial hair before it starts -- well, that'll take decades, if not centuries. But I don't think that a just God would allow human civilization to end before we've decisively solved the Shaving Question, and so for that reason, I am sure the world cannot end yet.
