By now.

After being resurrected for hundreds of years, Isaac finally calmed down and returned to his hometown. After witnessing that the world had indeed changed, but also that it had not changed.

He finally began to have doubts about his former career and the value of his life.

Annan was not surprised by this.

It would be better to say that, like Hugo and Salvatore, there are very few people who are able to pay any price, do not pray for certain results, and burn their completely good souls for others... On the contrary, they are very few

.

That is a qualification worthy of a saint.

But it is impossible for Annan to use Salvatore's standards to demand Isaac.

After all, it is human nature to hope that one's efforts will be rewarded.

"As for what you said...this country has changed a lot in the past hundred years, but it seems like nothing has changed. This is actually quite normal."

Annan held the wine glass with both hands, took a sip and replied softly: "Because what you have changed is 'a lot', not 'all'."

"...not all?"

"That's right. In the final analysis, the hope that we can directly improve society and bring about social progress through 'only increasing productivity' is a rather idealistic expectation. It is a kind of productivity theory."

Annan said calmly: "Whether it is the Jade Tower or the Zedi Black Tower, the technology you have developed has indeed promoted the evolution of the times and brought great convenience to people.

"But why can you detect that the world has indeed changed?"

"...Because I haven't been back for a long time."

Isaac took a deep breath: "I haven't been back here for more than one hundred and forty years... no, it should be more than one hundred and eighty years. It's like getting along with your own child day and night, it's hard to tell whether he has

It’s the same as getting fatter or getting taller.”

"That is to say, you actually know that no matter what new technology it is, it is difficult to feed it back to the entire society immediately."

"Well. After all, it takes a lot of time to spread news, and people will not change their lifestyles easily. Invention and civilian use, civilian use and popularization, popularization and habits are all different concepts."

As a wizard of the Transformation School, Isaac is still aware of this situation.

Transformation wizards who have just graduated often hope that they can change the entire world immediately.

Whenever they develop a new technology, they are eager to promote it immediately, preferably for everyone to use it immediately... without realizing what the most urgent needs of the people are, and whether the people really need to spend money.

Come and buy this thing.

And when they find that no one cares about their invention and no one understands it, they inevitably feel a sense of underappreciation.

Therefore, it is also one of the tasks of the mentors in the wizard tower to inoculate young wizards in advance before they graduate to prevent their mental collapse.

"Then you should actually be able to understand...the changes in production relations caused by the improvement of productivity, whether at the time level or at the spatial level, the changes will not be average and take effect immediately."

Annan said slowly: "People have the habit of 'following habits'. Unless necessary, they will not realize that this production relationship needs to change. Over a long period of time, this kind of 'habits' will be quite fixed.

Will not change easily.

"As long as productivity continues to develop, society will change sooner or later. Although you feel that Denis Sawyer has not changed at all compared to the past... but is this really not your subjective feeling? There is really no change at all, except for the city

Apart from the improvement in appearance, hasn’t it changed for the better or a little bit for the worse?”

"...That's not true."

By this time Isaac had already calmed down.

He was not an impetuous young man to begin with. When he heard "This change will not be uniform and will take effect immediately," he had actually realized what his problem was.

But he still didn't know how to deal with this problem.

So he could only think carefully following Annan's words: "More than a hundred years ago, there were multiple pirate gangs competing for power and profit in each city. For larger cities, there were even new gangs born every day.

, there will also be old gangs dying out.

"But now... it seems that the Zipper Gang has completely controlled 'Black Sail Town'. There are no piles of corpses appearing in the streets and alleys."

"That's right."

Annan nodded: "But that's not because they have more conscience or morality than in the past... but because they have artillery, and because the size and technology of ships have increased.

"In this way, it will be difficult for pirates to fight each other as gangs. When one party gains an advantage, it will quickly turn it into a victory; and after they are completely victorious, they will find ways to consolidate their presence in these ports.

'Domination' in the city, which in turn suppressed the formation of other gangs.

"Isn't the relationship between these pirates changed because of these new technologies? But is this change caused by the 'pirate relationship modifier' technology?"

……Yes.

Isaac's pupils, which had dimmed before, gradually brightened again.

He realized the problem.

The inventions of Zedi Black Tower are all good things that can "immediately improve people's lives".

For example, convenient and easy-to-use wound medicine, cheap and safe lighting technology, papermaking and printing technology that can be popularized, underground equipment groups that can explore tunnels more safely and with less effort...

These things are said to have not changed society... but have they really accomplished nothing?

it's not true.

In Isaac's time, a book required at least one gold coin to start with. Those books were all hand-copied, and it was impossible for poor people to even buy books. Because the price could not be reduced at all... The labor cost of the scribe and the cost of paper

The cost is difficult to ignore.

Nowadays, with the popularization of papermaking and printing technology, books have become cheap. You can buy a book for one to two silver coins, and there is a premium... In Noah, if you want to take away a newspaper,

What is required is not a purchase of a silver coin, but a "donation".

If you want to read books or newspapers, you don’t even have to spend money. There are public libraries in every city for the general public. You only need a relatively small amount of money to "buy a monthly card" and enter them.

And this is only possible because printing costs have dropped significantly.

It is precisely because of the development of lighting technology that it is now possible to have such a thing as "street lights". With this thing, the nighttime crime rate has also dropped significantly.

"What you did was not meaningless."
Chapter completed!