The SocialAI app is absolutely bleak. As the parent of a teenager, I'm fighting the real world vs. online world battle daily. There is hope though. My 14 year has a phone, but with strict limits on it. This weekend, she and a bunch of her friends met up at a local park and just hung out and enjoyed the beautiful fall weather.
I didn't worry about her, I didn't constantly check her location. I let her and her friends just be kids for a few hours. She came home and we ended up having a nice, family evening enjoying sushi around our firepit. It all felt so normal and refreshing.
I have no illusions that I've somehow cracked the code, I have not. But, I know enough to take the small victories.
Literally today getting a phone with our 13yr old daughter after lots of convos. Limits? Check. No social media. Check. Texting, calling. Check. We’ve discussed how it’s a tool primarily to organize time in the real world. Like your daughter meeting with friends. The small victories.
Reminds me of JOMO: joy of missing out of online time-sucking spaces. You give me hope for the coming battles 😉 🙏
The other day, I was half joking that we need a Scouts-like program for grown-ups. Earn merit badges for fixing things, decluttering your house, hosting a party, making and sticking to a family budget.
Get together in real physical space to learn how to do stuff that your parents/uncle/aunt/etc. didn’t teach you. Get practical; get personal.
The existence of DIY clubs tells me this isn’t impossible. The trick would be getting people organized and committed to make it happen.
Right on! There's only so much a person can learn from old Foxfire magazines, but I wouldn't be surprised if some old timers in your area know how to do that stuff.
Oh yes they do! Our old timers lived off grid before it was cool. They mostly just think it's "common sense" though and don't realize how valuable their skills are. Doesn't everyone know how to pluck a chicken?
Yes - "The promise of constant connection turned out to be a cruel trap." The business model all of this is built on only makes money if it's a "trap." We're told it's a "tool." But that's just deceptive marketing. Social media doesn't make money if we only pick up an app like a hammer from time to time. It starts with parents - we need to take the red pill, wake up, and start to realize that we are more responsible for the future wellness of our children than their current happiness. Most of the best things for our kids are almost always analog.
I heartily agree except I prefer to think of it as taking the green pill— as in touching grass, nature, the real world versus the gray bloodless medium of the interwebs🤓🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿
I love the concept of "the green pill!" As long as it brings a heavy dose of "Wake up, parents!" along with all that wonderful nature you described 😊🏕️
Your proposed cure might not work, because in order to restore real community, we might need to really need each other in more concrete ways. We need to need each other for both material and psychological resources, instead of needing impersonal institutions to distribute goods that are imported from impersonal institutions and people far away (and now bots whose distance matters not). We evolved in families, tribes and villages, where people needed each other for material, not just emotional, resources. Everyone in the village or tribe had a role: the hunter, the grain farmer, the vegetable farmer, the dairy cow farmer, the chicken/pig/farmer, the arborist, the storyteller, the shaman/priest, the blacksmith, the mason, wheelwright, barrel-wright etc. The family was not just about bringing in money, raising children and cooking, but producing food, and all the crafts that make life good.
It's worse than that. Tesla's humanoid robot can teach you almost anything in natural language, 1:1, in your own house... and it can cook your dinner and vacuum your floor too. You won't need a spouse, kids, friends, tutors, anything! For $30K (that's the target price point) you get a 24x7 in-house servant/teacher/therapist.
My family is currently helping an old lady at our church who broke 2 ribs and can't get around for a few weeks. When I saw the video of Musk's robot, the first thing I thought was, "Wow, this would really help Linda. It could prepare her meals, fetch what she needed, and help her to the bathroom." The 2nd thing I thought was, "But it can't do the most important thing, which is show Linda that she's loved."
I am very torn about these technologies, but increasingly, I find myself agreeing with skeptics like Sherry Turkle more than optimists like Noah Harari.
Here is my comment (copied from my response to your post): "One could have money in a mostly local village/tribal economy to the benefit of that economy. The main problem would occur if someone has so much money that they don't produce anything anymore, only consume, hurting their relationships with others in the community. Conversely, a global economy that has destroyed villages, tribes and families is not going to get much better (will probably get worse) without money."
There were many attempts at either local currency or some form of barter (like time banks) that in my opinion have faltered because they didn't address the root problem, which is: agreements, skills, technology and incentives are necessary to create a local inter-dependence economy. It's a collective action problem, not just something individuals can do on their own.
I agree to an extent. No top down, essentially fascist, economy has ever worked well. In fact, they generally fail.
But a bunch of individuals all doing their own thing is not going to build an economy that is as efficient as what we have. As is probably generally the case, the best practice is somewhere in the middle, or some combination.
I created and ran my own business (retired now). It was whatever I wanted it to be. But to make money, I had to make my business dovetail into the overall economy. My choices in that regard were nearly endless, but still, they were my choices. And the overall economy that I was dovetailing into involved other people like me, as well as giant corporations and government systems.
I am not trying to redefine economics, but it bothers me that so many people have come to presume that a top-down economy is the only possible one, and the only one that can work. There are things that I produced that no giant corporation could produce, and vice versa.
Also, in reference to things that individuals can produce that no giant corporation can produce. That is only half of the equation. The other half is there needs to be a market for what individuals can produce. I produced beautiful hand (and foot) crafted, natural fiber screens on a loom for a bit, but there was no market for them (and I am not a good marketer), and they required too much work compared to the amount of money people were willing to spend on them.
Most people fall in three (not one) categories: there are the fundamentalist socialists who want a top down economy (and they also point out that the global economy evolves towards top-down corporate, instead of government control, despite anti-trust laws), the fundamentalist capitalists who want a global (because the market selects for global over local, mass production and consumption are more efficient) market economy, and the compromise of the two (Keynesians) who want both a top down (government and central bank), and a market-driven economy, with the former regulating the latter. But none of these addresses the breakdown in family and community that happen in all 3 scenarios. Only the Distributists have addressed that (most people have not heard of them, except for Gandhi, and even there he got famous for other stuff).
Local coordination of production and consumption is not the same thing as top-down control, and is also not just "individuals doing their own thing". Coordination starts at the family level, and continues to the village or tribe level, followed by inter-village/tribe. It's market-driven, but also compassion- and relationship-driven. There can also be more global trade for things (or information) that can't be produced locally (as opposed to "can't be produced as efficiently"). Our model could be pre-capitalist village or tribal economies, except that these were not always bastions of freedom and tolerance, especially for creative individuals. Or it could be the way multi-cellular organisms organize their organelles, cells, and organs, in a nested hierarchy with clear boundaries/membranes at each level, and interactions mostly through these membranes. Except that these seem to be totalitarian with no freedom for the organelles, cells and organs, with only the brain organ having some apparent freedom (or at least agency), and all the others mere servants of the brain. Or else just all (even the brain) servants of the multicellular organism.
We have this pesky individual freedom value, where we don't want individuals to be just servants of the family, the village/tribe, state, federation of states, or UN. Forgive my big-picture, old-man rantings.
We live in an age which cultivates addictions (food, porn, phones, weed, attention) for profit. To find a more lasting and natural form of happiness you'll need to turn towards sunshine, companionship, exercise, challenge, faith, and basic healthcare (food, sleep, activity). Medications and technology are awesome tools to solve acute problems but are no basis for a lifestyle.
Somehow all those practical suggestions from your blog for community don't seem enough (I like the others, for companionship, outdoors, exercise, challenge and health). Maybe they could work for a few people. Religion can be a powerful community glue, but we probably need a new one that is more relevant to modern life, and consistent with science. It's hard for many moderns to pretend to believe ridiculous stuff just so they can have a community.
Volunteering also seems lame to me, because it is not offering people a wholesome alternative. It might help some poor people become more middle class, but the middle class is part of the problem. It might feed hungry people, but people need more than just food. It might clean up some trash, but that's like putting lipstick on the pig of Climate Change and industrial pollution. And spending energy on these superficial things means there is less energy to spend on more impactful things. But yeah, it might also create some community among the volunteers, sure.
Mentoring would be great if the youngsters could be mentored into a meaningful world, with villages or tribes, and intact healthy families. But just mentoring them to continue the disaster we have wrought is not satisfying.
Clubs: yeah, I tried getting the local recreation department of my town interested in me teaching international folk-dancing, but they weren't interested. Probably no takers for alternative tech, or evolutionary psychology or physics clubs in this conservative town either. I tried getting my 2 liberal friends interested in deer hunting, but they weren't. The third was interested, but 2 people is not a club.
Intergenerational: the younger generation is so lost in their social media, and care about how they look and the approval of their peers more than anything else. Their world is so small and parochial, despite the globality of the internet. They are not interesting in anything I can offer them.
I think the answer is intentional communities. But ones that value families, that have a healthy balance of liberal and conservative values, that value local production and consumption of goods and services, and that are part of an economic federation of ICs.
Here's an anecdote from a speech therapist. Ten years ago, I'd ask kids to make up a story with these little story cubes I have. They'd generate these elaborate and often quite funny narratives. Now when I ask kids to do the same task, they give me blank looks. Or they tell me a story that is quite dull "this happened, then this happened, then this happened, the end." One kid asked me "How do I make up a story?"
I have a nephew who ALWAYS asks me what funny things my students have said. I've noticed in the last 4-5 years, I have few reports of kids being funny.
I have certainly noticed the reduction of creativity and wit in our children with the influx of screens. Kids used screens ten years ago, but not nearly as much as they do now. They were funnier ten years ago, just ask my nephew.
"Kids today have their imaginary worlds generated for them. Instead of writing their own stories, they can put prompts into ChatGPT. Instead of creating their own fantasy worlds, they can generate them with a few clicks."
You're assuming that the next Poe or Kipling or LeGuin will end up lost in a ChatGPT generated world while his or her imagination withers. But it's equally likely that such people will use ChatGPT to supercharge their own imaginations and produce ever more remarkable worlds and stories.
As for the rest of us, I've spent nearly 40 years in the tech world on and off. Machine learning will be a tool almost as useful as the PC. Will there be downsides? Yes. But I have limited artistic skills but lots of artistic ideas (engineers are often like that). Midjourney sounds like a wonderful tool to me.
Would I keep it away from VERY young children? Probably yes. But I wouldn't be nearly as concerned about machine learning as I am about social media. The corrosive effects of ChatGPT pale in comparison with those of Instagram.
And that SocialAI app should be treated as a Schedule 1 drug like heroin: a technological dopamine pump with absolutely no real value.
Regarding the loss of imagination, we have sought to eliminate the risk and the arduous nature of acquiring skills. As Orson Wells said “ The enemy of art is the absence of limitations”. Those limitations, when overcome or when innovation brings you something new is replaced with digital libraries, AI that creates art of music for you.
I went to high school in the 80s, and in that analog, kinetic world you had to work at not being bored. So you did things with others: band, sports, scouts, work, clubs, school year book.
Since you are younger than I, you may not be aware of the tradition of signing a friends school yearbook, which in my time had maybe 8 pages with color photos, and the rest was black and white. You signed the book with something you wanted your friend to remember for that year. So you’d trade your yearbook, take some time to think, then write your message next to your photo. Crazy different from social media today. Something to look forward to in the spring.
I wrote this article regarding what we did in the 80s when we musicians didn’t have ubiquitous access to music, as I was inspired in part by your earlier article about removing experiences from childhood.
Some places real play still exists. Yesterday riding my bike into my street (a cul de sac) I had to stop because there was a very active flag football game going on in the street involving all the neighborhood kids and friends. Ages 5 - 15. This is not abnormal on our block and people who are our neighbors have learned to approach their homes driving no more than 10 mph. Balls, bikes, and the warning call of "Car!) are a constant.
We are building a neighborhood like this. Half a dozen Catholic families and a few single people moved to live within a few blocks of each other. The kids play in backyards, we can walk to each other's houses, the parents chat while the kids play.
My husband and I host a weekly dinner, bringing a dish admired but not required, and it's grown and grown over the last eight years. Most weeks is twenty adults and three to ten kids, a rotating group. The only rule is no phones at dinner. People break bread together and make connections, we've had three couples meet at dinners and get married, jobs found, friends made, and a number of people convert (which is all the Holy Spirit, not me, I just cook).
Our encouragement to other people to try experiments in real life Hosting:
Our neighborhood has had several "get togethers" the most recent being a chili cookoff. Halloween and 4th of July celebrations as well. One member, a very prolific gardener, invited all the kids in the neighborhood to help harvest their abundance of fruit. We are a relatively diverse neighborhood -multi generation families, single people, unmarried couples, grand parents, "traditional" families - 2 parents, children, gay families, retired people, temporarily unemployed people, artists, professionals, and lots and lots of dogs.
That's great! And having something low pressure (and ideally hosted at a home vs a church or impersonal gathering location) to invite people in the neighborhood to helps with being welcoming! We invite to our dinners families we meet at the library, people walking dogs, neighbors, anyone we see out and about! Some don't ever come, but some do! And keep coming back.
My first grade daughter said (when her class made a graph of their favorite day of the week), "My favorite day is Friday, because we attack-friendship strangers, and they come to dinner and become our friends."
I'm starting to understand the Amish more every day. Technology appears to connect us, but in reality, it drives us further apart. A thousand connections, yet no real relationships—even close friends have become distant, digital ones.
My son's phone is locked down. (Google Family Link on Android) He doesn't have any Social Media app except WhatsApp. He does play online, with randoms as well as his own friends. He also goes out, gets into mischief as a 13yo should. He is however somewhat dubious about the use or necessity of girls. Plus he's returning to Greco Roman wrestling.
I just finished watching the documentary 'Join or Die' and realized that appeals to 'real community' is just another way authoritarian capitalists are trying to manage the downsides of racial communism.
People don't trust other people for a reason.
The demand that all organizations and activities be anti-White eliminates their value to White adults and White children.
Restore racially homogeneous communities via the destruction of the 'civil rights' regime and relationships will flourish in time.
Until then, why should Whites support a system that hates them?
For better or worse, people will choose imaginary worlds they prefer to the reality they don't. Books, television, video games supplemented, but could never replace human companionship. Virtual romantic partners, and eventually perfected virtual reality and/or companionship robots (Jude Law in A.I.) will claim to. Whether people will be happier with these than the old ways of human companionship will be debated. Saying "it's not real" will fall on deaf ears. Reality is the mind of the beholder.
The SocialAI app is absolutely bleak. As the parent of a teenager, I'm fighting the real world vs. online world battle daily. There is hope though. My 14 year has a phone, but with strict limits on it. This weekend, she and a bunch of her friends met up at a local park and just hung out and enjoyed the beautiful fall weather.
I didn't worry about her, I didn't constantly check her location. I let her and her friends just be kids for a few hours. She came home and we ended up having a nice, family evening enjoying sushi around our firepit. It all felt so normal and refreshing.
I have no illusions that I've somehow cracked the code, I have not. But, I know enough to take the small victories.
Literally today getting a phone with our 13yr old daughter after lots of convos. Limits? Check. No social media. Check. Texting, calling. Check. We’ve discussed how it’s a tool primarily to organize time in the real world. Like your daughter meeting with friends. The small victories.
Reminds me of JOMO: joy of missing out of online time-sucking spaces. You give me hope for the coming battles 😉 🙏
The other day, I was half joking that we need a Scouts-like program for grown-ups. Earn merit badges for fixing things, decluttering your house, hosting a party, making and sticking to a family budget.
Get together in real physical space to learn how to do stuff that your parents/uncle/aunt/etc. didn’t teach you. Get practical; get personal.
The existence of DIY clubs tells me this isn’t impossible. The trick would be getting people organized and committed to make it happen.
Yes! Except I live in the country so I'd like 4H for adults! Learn canning, how to build a woodshed, train a dog or raise chickens!
Right on! There's only so much a person can learn from old Foxfire magazines, but I wouldn't be surprised if some old timers in your area know how to do that stuff.
Oh yes they do! Our old timers lived off grid before it was cool. They mostly just think it's "common sense" though and don't realize how valuable their skills are. Doesn't everyone know how to pluck a chicken?
Art of Manliness website has something like this. https://strenuouslife.co/
Ooh, interesting! Thanks for sharing that link.
I'd join that.
Yes - "The promise of constant connection turned out to be a cruel trap." The business model all of this is built on only makes money if it's a "trap." We're told it's a "tool." But that's just deceptive marketing. Social media doesn't make money if we only pick up an app like a hammer from time to time. It starts with parents - we need to take the red pill, wake up, and start to realize that we are more responsible for the future wellness of our children than their current happiness. Most of the best things for our kids are almost always analog.
I heartily agree except I prefer to think of it as taking the green pill— as in touching grass, nature, the real world versus the gray bloodless medium of the interwebs🤓🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿
I love the concept of "the green pill!" As long as it brings a heavy dose of "Wake up, parents!" along with all that wonderful nature you described 😊🏕️
Your proposed cure might not work, because in order to restore real community, we might need to really need each other in more concrete ways. We need to need each other for both material and psychological resources, instead of needing impersonal institutions to distribute goods that are imported from impersonal institutions and people far away (and now bots whose distance matters not). We evolved in families, tribes and villages, where people needed each other for material, not just emotional, resources. Everyone in the village or tribe had a role: the hunter, the grain farmer, the vegetable farmer, the dairy cow farmer, the chicken/pig/farmer, the arborist, the storyteller, the shaman/priest, the blacksmith, the mason, wheelwright, barrel-wright etc. The family was not just about bringing in money, raising children and cooking, but producing food, and all the crafts that make life good.
It's worse than that. Tesla's humanoid robot can teach you almost anything in natural language, 1:1, in your own house... and it can cook your dinner and vacuum your floor too. You won't need a spouse, kids, friends, tutors, anything! For $30K (that's the target price point) you get a 24x7 in-house servant/teacher/therapist.
My family is currently helping an old lady at our church who broke 2 ribs and can't get around for a few weeks. When I saw the video of Musk's robot, the first thing I thought was, "Wow, this would really help Linda. It could prepare her meals, fetch what she needed, and help her to the bathroom." The 2nd thing I thought was, "But it can't do the most important thing, which is show Linda that she's loved."
I am very torn about these technologies, but increasingly, I find myself agreeing with skeptics like Sherry Turkle more than optimists like Noah Harari.
I avoid promoting my own stuff on someone else's page. But I just made a post that speaks very much to this sentiment.
https://individualistsunite.substack.com/p/how-to-get-rich-with-no-money?r=z324w
Here is my comment (copied from my response to your post): "One could have money in a mostly local village/tribal economy to the benefit of that economy. The main problem would occur if someone has so much money that they don't produce anything anymore, only consume, hurting their relationships with others in the community. Conversely, a global economy that has destroyed villages, tribes and families is not going to get much better (will probably get worse) without money."
There were many attempts at either local currency or some form of barter (like time banks) that in my opinion have faltered because they didn't address the root problem, which is: agreements, skills, technology and incentives are necessary to create a local inter-dependence economy. It's a collective action problem, not just something individuals can do on their own.
I agree to an extent. No top down, essentially fascist, economy has ever worked well. In fact, they generally fail.
But a bunch of individuals all doing their own thing is not going to build an economy that is as efficient as what we have. As is probably generally the case, the best practice is somewhere in the middle, or some combination.
I created and ran my own business (retired now). It was whatever I wanted it to be. But to make money, I had to make my business dovetail into the overall economy. My choices in that regard were nearly endless, but still, they were my choices. And the overall economy that I was dovetailing into involved other people like me, as well as giant corporations and government systems.
I am not trying to redefine economics, but it bothers me that so many people have come to presume that a top-down economy is the only possible one, and the only one that can work. There are things that I produced that no giant corporation could produce, and vice versa.
Also, in reference to things that individuals can produce that no giant corporation can produce. That is only half of the equation. The other half is there needs to be a market for what individuals can produce. I produced beautiful hand (and foot) crafted, natural fiber screens on a loom for a bit, but there was no market for them (and I am not a good marketer), and they required too much work compared to the amount of money people were willing to spend on them.
Most people fall in three (not one) categories: there are the fundamentalist socialists who want a top down economy (and they also point out that the global economy evolves towards top-down corporate, instead of government control, despite anti-trust laws), the fundamentalist capitalists who want a global (because the market selects for global over local, mass production and consumption are more efficient) market economy, and the compromise of the two (Keynesians) who want both a top down (government and central bank), and a market-driven economy, with the former regulating the latter. But none of these addresses the breakdown in family and community that happen in all 3 scenarios. Only the Distributists have addressed that (most people have not heard of them, except for Gandhi, and even there he got famous for other stuff).
Local coordination of production and consumption is not the same thing as top-down control, and is also not just "individuals doing their own thing". Coordination starts at the family level, and continues to the village or tribe level, followed by inter-village/tribe. It's market-driven, but also compassion- and relationship-driven. There can also be more global trade for things (or information) that can't be produced locally (as opposed to "can't be produced as efficiently"). Our model could be pre-capitalist village or tribal economies, except that these were not always bastions of freedom and tolerance, especially for creative individuals. Or it could be the way multi-cellular organisms organize their organelles, cells, and organs, in a nested hierarchy with clear boundaries/membranes at each level, and interactions mostly through these membranes. Except that these seem to be totalitarian with no freedom for the organelles, cells and organs, with only the brain organ having some apparent freedom (or at least agency), and all the others mere servants of the brain. Or else just all (even the brain) servants of the multicellular organism.
We have this pesky individual freedom value, where we don't want individuals to be just servants of the family, the village/tribe, state, federation of states, or UN. Forgive my big-picture, old-man rantings.
We live in an age which cultivates addictions (food, porn, phones, weed, attention) for profit. To find a more lasting and natural form of happiness you'll need to turn towards sunshine, companionship, exercise, challenge, faith, and basic healthcare (food, sleep, activity). Medications and technology are awesome tools to solve acute problems but are no basis for a lifestyle.
https://jmpolemic.substack.com/p/modern-communities
Your link doesn't work. Is that intentional irony?
I'm eroding the techno superstructure one dead html link at a time.
Just kidding. Thanks for letting me know.
https://jmpolemic.substack.com/p/modern-communities
Somehow all those practical suggestions from your blog for community don't seem enough (I like the others, for companionship, outdoors, exercise, challenge and health). Maybe they could work for a few people. Religion can be a powerful community glue, but we probably need a new one that is more relevant to modern life, and consistent with science. It's hard for many moderns to pretend to believe ridiculous stuff just so they can have a community.
Volunteering also seems lame to me, because it is not offering people a wholesome alternative. It might help some poor people become more middle class, but the middle class is part of the problem. It might feed hungry people, but people need more than just food. It might clean up some trash, but that's like putting lipstick on the pig of Climate Change and industrial pollution. And spending energy on these superficial things means there is less energy to spend on more impactful things. But yeah, it might also create some community among the volunteers, sure.
Mentoring would be great if the youngsters could be mentored into a meaningful world, with villages or tribes, and intact healthy families. But just mentoring them to continue the disaster we have wrought is not satisfying.
Clubs: yeah, I tried getting the local recreation department of my town interested in me teaching international folk-dancing, but they weren't interested. Probably no takers for alternative tech, or evolutionary psychology or physics clubs in this conservative town either. I tried getting my 2 liberal friends interested in deer hunting, but they weren't. The third was interested, but 2 people is not a club.
Intergenerational: the younger generation is so lost in their social media, and care about how they look and the approval of their peers more than anything else. Their world is so small and parochial, despite the globality of the internet. They are not interesting in anything I can offer them.
I think the answer is intentional communities. But ones that value families, that have a healthy balance of liberal and conservative values, that value local production and consumption of goods and services, and that are part of an economic federation of ICs.
Here's an anecdote from a speech therapist. Ten years ago, I'd ask kids to make up a story with these little story cubes I have. They'd generate these elaborate and often quite funny narratives. Now when I ask kids to do the same task, they give me blank looks. Or they tell me a story that is quite dull "this happened, then this happened, then this happened, the end." One kid asked me "How do I make up a story?"
I have a nephew who ALWAYS asks me what funny things my students have said. I've noticed in the last 4-5 years, I have few reports of kids being funny.
I have certainly noticed the reduction of creativity and wit in our children with the influx of screens. Kids used screens ten years ago, but not nearly as much as they do now. They were funnier ten years ago, just ask my nephew.
"Kids today have their imaginary worlds generated for them. Instead of writing their own stories, they can put prompts into ChatGPT. Instead of creating their own fantasy worlds, they can generate them with a few clicks."
You're assuming that the next Poe or Kipling or LeGuin will end up lost in a ChatGPT generated world while his or her imagination withers. But it's equally likely that such people will use ChatGPT to supercharge their own imaginations and produce ever more remarkable worlds and stories.
As for the rest of us, I've spent nearly 40 years in the tech world on and off. Machine learning will be a tool almost as useful as the PC. Will there be downsides? Yes. But I have limited artistic skills but lots of artistic ideas (engineers are often like that). Midjourney sounds like a wonderful tool to me.
Would I keep it away from VERY young children? Probably yes. But I wouldn't be nearly as concerned about machine learning as I am about social media. The corrosive effects of ChatGPT pale in comparison with those of Instagram.
And that SocialAI app should be treated as a Schedule 1 drug like heroin: a technological dopamine pump with absolutely no real value.
The part about kids outsourcing their imaginary friendships to influencers and Twitch streamers hit me hard. “Baby’s First Parasocial Relationship.”
Regarding the loss of imagination, we have sought to eliminate the risk and the arduous nature of acquiring skills. As Orson Wells said “ The enemy of art is the absence of limitations”. Those limitations, when overcome or when innovation brings you something new is replaced with digital libraries, AI that creates art of music for you.
I went to high school in the 80s, and in that analog, kinetic world you had to work at not being bored. So you did things with others: band, sports, scouts, work, clubs, school year book.
Since you are younger than I, you may not be aware of the tradition of signing a friends school yearbook, which in my time had maybe 8 pages with color photos, and the rest was black and white. You signed the book with something you wanted your friend to remember for that year. So you’d trade your yearbook, take some time to think, then write your message next to your photo. Crazy different from social media today. Something to look forward to in the spring.
I wrote this article regarding what we did in the 80s when we musicians didn’t have ubiquitous access to music, as I was inspired in part by your earlier article about removing experiences from childhood.
https://culturalcourage.substack.com/p/the-absence-of-limits
The real world is right here. Step outside. Leave all the gadgets inside. Smile at people. Talk to them. This is life.
Some places real play still exists. Yesterday riding my bike into my street (a cul de sac) I had to stop because there was a very active flag football game going on in the street involving all the neighborhood kids and friends. Ages 5 - 15. This is not abnormal on our block and people who are our neighbors have learned to approach their homes driving no more than 10 mph. Balls, bikes, and the warning call of "Car!) are a constant.
We are building a neighborhood like this. Half a dozen Catholic families and a few single people moved to live within a few blocks of each other. The kids play in backyards, we can walk to each other's houses, the parents chat while the kids play.
My husband and I host a weekly dinner, bringing a dish admired but not required, and it's grown and grown over the last eight years. Most weeks is twenty adults and three to ten kids, a rotating group. The only rule is no phones at dinner. People break bread together and make connections, we've had three couples meet at dinners and get married, jobs found, friends made, and a number of people convert (which is all the Holy Spirit, not me, I just cook).
Our encouragement to other people to try experiments in real life Hosting:
https://faithandwitness.org/2024/07/16/how-about -dinner/
Our neighborhood has had several "get togethers" the most recent being a chili cookoff. Halloween and 4th of July celebrations as well. One member, a very prolific gardener, invited all the kids in the neighborhood to help harvest their abundance of fruit. We are a relatively diverse neighborhood -multi generation families, single people, unmarried couples, grand parents, "traditional" families - 2 parents, children, gay families, retired people, temporarily unemployed people, artists, professionals, and lots and lots of dogs.
That's great! And having something low pressure (and ideally hosted at a home vs a church or impersonal gathering location) to invite people in the neighborhood to helps with being welcoming! We invite to our dinners families we meet at the library, people walking dogs, neighbors, anyone we see out and about! Some don't ever come, but some do! And keep coming back.
My first grade daughter said (when her class made a graph of their favorite day of the week), "My favorite day is Friday, because we attack-friendship strangers, and they come to dinner and become our friends."
Thank you for an excellent article
I'm starting to understand the Amish more every day. Technology appears to connect us, but in reality, it drives us further apart. A thousand connections, yet no real relationships—even close friends have become distant, digital ones.
https://frankkarsten.substack.com/p/tesla-optimus-and-the-dangers-of
My son's phone is locked down. (Google Family Link on Android) He doesn't have any Social Media app except WhatsApp. He does play online, with randoms as well as his own friends. He also goes out, gets into mischief as a 13yo should. He is however somewhat dubious about the use or necessity of girls. Plus he's returning to Greco Roman wrestling.
I just finished watching the documentary 'Join or Die' and realized that appeals to 'real community' is just another way authoritarian capitalists are trying to manage the downsides of racial communism.
People don't trust other people for a reason.
The demand that all organizations and activities be anti-White eliminates their value to White adults and White children.
Restore racially homogeneous communities via the destruction of the 'civil rights' regime and relationships will flourish in time.
Until then, why should Whites support a system that hates them?
For better or worse, people will choose imaginary worlds they prefer to the reality they don't. Books, television, video games supplemented, but could never replace human companionship. Virtual romantic partners, and eventually perfected virtual reality and/or companionship robots (Jude Law in A.I.) will claim to. Whether people will be happier with these than the old ways of human companionship will be debated. Saying "it's not real" will fall on deaf ears. Reality is the mind of the beholder.
The internet seems to have turned us all into children.
People can’t commit or focus anymore, they've become digital addicts, and they fear the confrontation of a phone call or meeting in person.