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Intriguing article. We are in our time so used to thinking of time as fluid, of history as dynamic (and generally progressing), that it is difficult for us to conceive that for much of history both time and history itself were considered static. If there were changes, they were invariably regression from some golden age.

The Discovery of Time [1] provides quite a good introduction both to how we came to conceive (intellectually and culturally) of time and history as dynamic and changing and to what it was like to live in a time when time and history were considered static, unchanging.

What has been seen cannot be unseen, what has been integrated into one's thoughts and emotions and way of being cannot be removed, but by replacement or damage. This book does a good job of at least letting us imagine how shockingly different static time culture truly was.

[1] http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/D/bo3615904...

Contrast this article with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_science_fiction
I love how people looked at electricity as a way to get back to a traditional life style (no crowded industrial areas) but with new opportunities for work.