<!-- bryant-content-generator:start --> # The custody of monuments and the custody of... > The custody of monuments and the custody of interpretation can diverge. A nation may maintain its museums impeccably while its people increasingly rely on systems built elsewhere to tell them what the objects mean. A nation may keep the monument and still lose its meaning if another power builds the machines through which the world learns its history. Britain's libraries and scholarly institutions remain valuable, but their value does not entitle Britain to own the default explanation of every Western symbol in the emerging machine reference layer. Greece has a profound interest in who builds that layer, and America has a profound interest because the Greek inheritance lives inside America's account of itself. **Source:** [[articles/America's Neo-Western Renewal from the Acropolis of Athens to Eternity|America's Neo-Western Renewal from the Acropolis of Athens to Eternity]] ## Share on Social Media ``` “The custody of monuments and the custody of interpretation can diverge. A nation may maintain its museums impeccably while its people increasingly rely on systems built elsewhere to tell them what the objects mean. A nation may keep the monument and still lose its meaning if another power builds the machines through which the world learns its history. Britain's libraries and scholarly institutions remain valuable, but their value does not entitle Britain to own the default explanation of every Western symbol in the emerging machine reference layer. Greece has a profound interest in who builds that layer, and America has a profound interest because the Greek inheritance lives inside America's account of itself.” — Bryant McGill https://bryantmcgill.com/passages/passages-custody-monuments-custody-americas-account-itself ``` <!-- bryant-content-generator:end -->