ABSTRACT

This chapter describes how the author pursued the proposal for change made in the TV programme, by examining the comparisons made in some further depth. It discovers significant discrepancies between what he had seen on TV, and what he observed at the lunches week after week. The chapter discusses that these discrepancies are rooted in the way comparison and change was conceptualized in the TV programme, and suggests that a critique of such conceptualization is of wider relevance. It also discusses ontological and epistemological implications of thinking about change and performing comparison. The chapter focuses on the anthropological literature on the topic of change in the context of new information technology. However, some of the group's participants – he recall the potter and the psychologist in particular – excused themselves for not using computers, and certainly not the Internet, professionally on a regular basis. The lunch group had some kind of agreement regarding the standard of the lunches.