Absent a different legislative structure (hard to imagine here in the US), going forward I will any treat digital technology for me and my kids like a medical intervention: avoid it as much as possible unless I have very good reason to think its benefits outweigh its harms. This includes backing away from technology we'd previously adopted that doesn't meet this standard. No more giving it the benefit of the doubt first.
Examples:
- GPS while driving: Some potential concerns with privacy, inaccurate directions, and diminished ability to navigate without it, but outweighed by the usefulness of getting to places I'm not familiar with. Verdict: Avoid when not needed, but otherwise fine to use.
- Using generative AI to help make apparently "tedious" tasks easier: I see very legitimate concerns that increasingly offloading cognition to an AI will reduce people's ability to think deeply and critically over the whole of their lives, even with applied to tasks that seem unimportant in the moment. The problem becomes much more dire for children who haven't learned to think critically in the first place. Verdict: I'm open to the possibility that AI can support and enhance human cognition and well-being when used in the right way for the right things in the right amount. But until it's VERY well established what those criteria are, I am avoiding it entirely and keeping my kids away from it as much as I can.
Remember, someone demanding proof of something before they will accept it is always and invariably a bad-faith tactic. It's not meant to gather evidence that will convince the person demanding proof; it's meant to stop the person they're making the demand of in their tracks and distract them, sending them off on a wild goose chase looking for evidence that, in the end, will never be accepted.
This is one of the oldest bad-faith arguments in the book, as evidenced by the fact that it is literally called out and condemned in The Book. (Matthew 12: 39)
To know for certain that a person making this demand is doing so in bad faith, ask them what their standard of evidence is. They will never, ever, even in a thousand years give you one. The most common response to this question is meaningless platitudes like "my standard is objective evidence," which is not a standard of evidence at all. A standard of evidence is a specific, objective criterion by which evidence can be impartially judged to be valid or invalid, and a person demanding proof will never provide that, because to do that would be to hand their opponent a means to actually prove their point.
Because this is a bad-faith tactic designed to distract you and prevent you from advancing your point, this is the last thing they ever want to allow to happen. So ask someone for a standard of evidence. When they give you meaningless nonsense, tell them that it's meaningless nonsense and ask again for a standard of evidence. Repeat as many times as you want; they may give you things carefully crafted to appear reasonable, but you'll *never* get any criteria out of them that will admit any real possibility of you demonstrating that you're right. This serves as proof that they are a troll arguing in bad faith and can be safely ignored.
This principle applies just as well in policy spaces as it does in online debates, except for the last point: if you just ignore someone like that, they only get louder. But at least it helps you be aware of what you're dealing with.
Ideally, parents are driven by instinct, psychologists by learned observation, lawyers by justice, companies by social responsibility, and legislators by social harmony. Alas, each of us fail to live up to perfection,but together we make a real mess of it and occasionally get it right. Let’s make sure we get it right this time, for the brain is likely the most complex molecular configuration in the known universe, and houses the very mechanism that helps us navigate the unknown (future).
Great point on treating children, and our health moreover, like "trials."
Legislation will usually always occur as a lagging indicator, and why the ultimate judge, jury, and executioner is the parent, the self-aware adult, at home or in government.
Leaded gas didn’t stay on the market for 50 years because it was safe. It stayed because the right people made money off confusion.
The companies behind it paid for studies to blur the facts, lobbied lawmakers to stall, and kept it in everything from cars to paint. They didn’t have to prove it was safe, just cast enough doubt to keep selling it.
Smartphone companies are running the same play. More screen time means more profit. Studies that show harm get brushed off. Studies that say “maybe it’s fine” get all the airtime.
This isn’t a crash. It’s a stall. Confusion is the point, and kids are the ones paying for it.
legislators have no role to play in the new world. We are in a dual world as we always have been of commerce and natural law. All commercial transactions will be put onto the Internet, and natural law will be, what each one of us practices. Society is falling apart because it’s no longer needed. Legislation is a thing of the past. Natural law will never leave the Earth as long as men are alive. All commercial transactions can be put on the networks.
So a natural law, a man can rape his grandchild. And in natural law, the mother can kill the grandfather. In natural law nobody comes to the aid of the grandfather.
In commercial law, the buyer and sellers‘s reputation is everything, and that will be established on the digital networks. There will be no place for courts or legislation.
> The Declaration of Independence speaks of the pursuit of happiness as an unalienable right, a principle that has never been, and could never be, evidence-based in any scientific sense. We pursue happiness because we believe it's worth pursuing
This is a mistaken reading, caused by linguistic drift. Though the usage seems archaic to us today, in the 18th century "a pursuit" was a noun, not a form of a verb meaning "to chase." A pursuit is that with which one occupies one's time; the closest words in the modern lexicon are things like "hobby," "passtime," and "lifestyle."
When Jefferson says that mankind has a God-given right to things such as life, liberty, and a lifestyle of happiness, and to secure those rights governments are instituted among men, that's saying something *profoundly* different from what those words appear to say to modern eyes! He's saying that just as it is the affirmative duty of government to step in and crack down on people attempting to take away your life or your liberty, so it is also the government's affirmative duty to crack down on people destroying your ability to live a lifestyle of happiness.
Never ever has societies had any interest in children’s wellbeing. Only fear of change drives the older generation. A known known is that change is inevitable, god and bad.
Repeating a sentiment I've shared elsewhere.
Absent a different legislative structure (hard to imagine here in the US), going forward I will any treat digital technology for me and my kids like a medical intervention: avoid it as much as possible unless I have very good reason to think its benefits outweigh its harms. This includes backing away from technology we'd previously adopted that doesn't meet this standard. No more giving it the benefit of the doubt first.
Examples:
- GPS while driving: Some potential concerns with privacy, inaccurate directions, and diminished ability to navigate without it, but outweighed by the usefulness of getting to places I'm not familiar with. Verdict: Avoid when not needed, but otherwise fine to use.
- Using generative AI to help make apparently "tedious" tasks easier: I see very legitimate concerns that increasingly offloading cognition to an AI will reduce people's ability to think deeply and critically over the whole of their lives, even with applied to tasks that seem unimportant in the moment. The problem becomes much more dire for children who haven't learned to think critically in the first place. Verdict: I'm open to the possibility that AI can support and enhance human cognition and well-being when used in the right way for the right things in the right amount. But until it's VERY well established what those criteria are, I am avoiding it entirely and keeping my kids away from it as much as I can.
Remember, someone demanding proof of something before they will accept it is always and invariably a bad-faith tactic. It's not meant to gather evidence that will convince the person demanding proof; it's meant to stop the person they're making the demand of in their tracks and distract them, sending them off on a wild goose chase looking for evidence that, in the end, will never be accepted.
This is one of the oldest bad-faith arguments in the book, as evidenced by the fact that it is literally called out and condemned in The Book. (Matthew 12: 39)
To know for certain that a person making this demand is doing so in bad faith, ask them what their standard of evidence is. They will never, ever, even in a thousand years give you one. The most common response to this question is meaningless platitudes like "my standard is objective evidence," which is not a standard of evidence at all. A standard of evidence is a specific, objective criterion by which evidence can be impartially judged to be valid or invalid, and a person demanding proof will never provide that, because to do that would be to hand their opponent a means to actually prove their point.
Because this is a bad-faith tactic designed to distract you and prevent you from advancing your point, this is the last thing they ever want to allow to happen. So ask someone for a standard of evidence. When they give you meaningless nonsense, tell them that it's meaningless nonsense and ask again for a standard of evidence. Repeat as many times as you want; they may give you things carefully crafted to appear reasonable, but you'll *never* get any criteria out of them that will admit any real possibility of you demonstrating that you're right. This serves as proof that they are a troll arguing in bad faith and can be safely ignored.
This principle applies just as well in policy spaces as it does in online debates, except for the last point: if you just ignore someone like that, they only get louder. But at least it helps you be aware of what you're dealing with.
Ideally, parents are driven by instinct, psychologists by learned observation, lawyers by justice, companies by social responsibility, and legislators by social harmony. Alas, each of us fail to live up to perfection,but together we make a real mess of it and occasionally get it right. Let’s make sure we get it right this time, for the brain is likely the most complex molecular configuration in the known universe, and houses the very mechanism that helps us navigate the unknown (future).
Great point on treating children, and our health moreover, like "trials."
Legislation will usually always occur as a lagging indicator, and why the ultimate judge, jury, and executioner is the parent, the self-aware adult, at home or in government.
Leaded gas didn’t stay on the market for 50 years because it was safe. It stayed because the right people made money off confusion.
The companies behind it paid for studies to blur the facts, lobbied lawmakers to stall, and kept it in everything from cars to paint. They didn’t have to prove it was safe, just cast enough doubt to keep selling it.
Smartphone companies are running the same play. More screen time means more profit. Studies that show harm get brushed off. Studies that say “maybe it’s fine” get all the airtime.
This isn’t a crash. It’s a stall. Confusion is the point, and kids are the ones paying for it.
The delay is the strategy.
legislators have no role to play in the new world. We are in a dual world as we always have been of commerce and natural law. All commercial transactions will be put onto the Internet, and natural law will be, what each one of us practices. Society is falling apart because it’s no longer needed. Legislation is a thing of the past. Natural law will never leave the Earth as long as men are alive. All commercial transactions can be put on the networks.
So a natural law, a man can rape his grandchild. And in natural law, the mother can kill the grandfather. In natural law nobody comes to the aid of the grandfather.
In commercial law, the buyer and sellers‘s reputation is everything, and that will be established on the digital networks. There will be no place for courts or legislation.
> The Declaration of Independence speaks of the pursuit of happiness as an unalienable right, a principle that has never been, and could never be, evidence-based in any scientific sense. We pursue happiness because we believe it's worth pursuing
This is a mistaken reading, caused by linguistic drift. Though the usage seems archaic to us today, in the 18th century "a pursuit" was a noun, not a form of a verb meaning "to chase." A pursuit is that with which one occupies one's time; the closest words in the modern lexicon are things like "hobby," "passtime," and "lifestyle."
When Jefferson says that mankind has a God-given right to things such as life, liberty, and a lifestyle of happiness, and to secure those rights governments are instituted among men, that's saying something *profoundly* different from what those words appear to say to modern eyes! He's saying that just as it is the affirmative duty of government to step in and crack down on people attempting to take away your life or your liberty, so it is also the government's affirmative duty to crack down on people destroying your ability to live a lifestyle of happiness.
Never ever has societies had any interest in children’s wellbeing. Only fear of change drives the older generation. A known known is that change is inevitable, god and bad.