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The Eloi weren't entirely a positive role model, you know. :)

I know it! I used to teach Catechism, and one of my young lads asked me, in all seriousness, why he would want to sit on a cloud all day plying a harp; wouldn't that be eternal boredom? He had a good point!

But really, think about it; what IS a job, and what does it say about our very existance?

IMNSHO it is a substitute for our previous role of hunter/gatherer. In the wild, we survived by finding and killing and foraging for our food. We built shelters or occupied natural ones such as caves where we could. We used our big, wonderful but costly brains--in terms of calories needed--to figure out how to do such things better than any other animal on the planet.

When we were not preoccupied with food or shelter, etc., we told stories, created art and fought each other. We were good at all those things. Unfortunately or fortunately, as the case may be, we didn't have a lot of time after food, shelter and safety.

Then we learned agriculture and built town and cities to live in. The majority of people in this situation were busy planting, rearing, butchering, harvesting, herding--and the JOB became born. A small number, who were smarter or more skilled, got out of THAT type of work by becoming skilled in a particular craft or used their social skills to get things from the workers. I'm not condemning these people--their leadership and insight often succeeded and kept the people of the town alive through droughts, floods, wars, etc. But they didn't labor in the fields or pastures, nor in the copper smelters and jug factories. No, they became the aristocracy.

Now we are also a an animal with a brain that has a desire to worship or feel spirituality, which I believe is set by God (let Us make man on Our image), so another group arose to service that, the priestly caste. Again, no condemnation, because often they brought us closer to God. (BTW I am a believer in Science and God)...

The industrial revolution led to the craftsman class becoming the aristocracy of modern times, thru the marketplace, which was its own craft, really. Think of the guy with a leather apron making a bronze knife now being a factory head or CEO and the herdsman now stamping out gizmos in the CEO's factory.

So what does the future hold for us? I contend a much bigger revolution than that of the industrial revolution. This one will be as big as changing from our tens of thousands of years existence as hunter/gatherers to farmers and herders. We can, ideally, pursue love and life, where ever it leads us, or simply laze around on an endless summer day. I also told the young boy that some people would LOVE to sit on a cloud and play the harp all day!