Originally Posted by
Mark Jakabcsin
As long as oranges are still desired they will still be available. When oranges are no longer desired they will no longer be available. Simple as that.
I think it's a bit more complicated than that, Mark. Even if people, on the whole, stop desiring the "oranges" of koryu doesn't mean that we shouldn't keep them around. Sixty years from now someone might really wish that there were still some oranges left, and feel rather disappointed that no one was working "against the grain" to make sure that the oranges were preserved.
Of course, at the moment there are such people. I think that part of Nathan's point-- and I don't want to put words in his mouth, of course-- is that these arts are very important, and it is hard for us to know which parts of these arts are necessary to the art as a whole. For that reason, there is a definite need for some people to be ultra-traditionalists, to be the ones who insist on doing it exactly the way that it has always been done.
Perhaps the art can survive a lot of innovation. But if we have a mix of people who insist on tradition and people who innovate, we ensure that the original art survives as well as the modified strains. It's good to know that, whatever happens to the modified strains, there will always be a preserved form of the art so that we can go back to the source when it becomes necessary to evaluate the purity of the strains that have developed. Just my opinion, and my signature line makes it clear how much that is worth these days
David Sims
"Cuius testiculos habes, habeas cardia et cerebellum." - Terry Pratchet
My opinion is, in all likelihood, worth exactly what you are paying for it.