How To Live A Simple Life

[Edek]

It can be a good learning tool, a good way to meet people, a way to find new music, a tool for people with businesses to expand their audience, etc. However, it also can be a tool for creating divide, to pushing degeneracy, towards making people dumb and lazy.

The problem is that it changes us, and other people. I could say that a bar that gives away free booze is simply a good place to socialise, but we shouldn't be surprised that it slowly turns people into alcoholics whose lives increasingly revolve around the bar. The internet is a "dopamine reward bar" that slowly trains us to get our kicks from it in many ways. All of the young men in my family were seriously affected by internet prawn (I at least was too old for that to affect me as a kid, still fell into it regularly as an adult), and the fact that it is right there with no barrier to entry is not a neutral, take it or leave it thing, especially for a young lad. And that is only one example. It's tempting to say that there is "no bad technology, only bad use of it", but that assumes that technology has no ability to mould us without us being aware of it, especially as children.

Ages ago, I read a lament for the advent of guns somewhere in the jungle. Before guns, there was a whole industry of skilled craftsmen who built bows and other such weapons. Children practised using these weapons from a young age, along with all the other skills of tracking prey in the bush and getting close enough. And then came guns from the outside world. The crafts were gradually lost, and all the social aspects around that local industry. You need training to use a gun well, of course, but very little compared to a bow. An angry teen with a gun could easily kill a grown man, so respect between the generations was reduced. And because the people had to buy guns and bullets from outside, their whole relationship with the jungle changed. Sure, all of that is the people's fault, not the "inanimate object" (not so fast, he says, but that's another thread), but when everyone around you is changing, what's a man with a family to feed to do, now that the bow makers are all out of business?

And I am being drawn into it right now. I live out in the woods, work most of the day online and part of the day in the garden. When I take a break, inertia brings me here instead of for a walk, or another healthy activity. I could schlep into town, but I might not meet anyone. I can just login here and prattle away.

Anyway, back to work.

 

[Ah_Tibor]

As one of the oldest millennials (nearly 40), I am so ancient that when I was a teenager, writing letters/postcards to friends, family and girls was the norm. I didn't have a smartphone until I was 35, and didn't have a computer capable of using the internet until I was 25. I can say without reservation that all the internet & phone stuff has been ruinous to my concentration and happiness. Never mind being a horrible substitute for human contact: it destroys silence, and all manner of reflection and introspection. I used to wake up at dawn and go outside to see what the bugs were up to. Now I check my work email and have to stop myself thinking about killing time on youtube, or killing my soul on websites where the women are even more exposed.

I really miss the pre-internet world and pre-smartphone, especially. I think phones start to take on characteristics of ourselves so we perceive it as some part of our brain or inner life.

I remember back in the 90s internet culture had a stigma of being argumentative and useless. I don't think it's changed at all-- but the world has become that.

I read a comment somewhere recently (it was to the video of that scientist who wants to give people a meat-aversion disease) and it said "nerds must have done something horrible in the past to make people so naturally repulsed by them." lol

 

[Knight.of.Logos]

The problem is that it changes us, and other people. I could say that a bar that gives away free booze is simply a good place to socialise, but we shouldn't be surprised that it slowly turns people into alcoholics whose lives increasingly revolve around the bar. The internet is a "dopamine reward bar" that slowly trains us to get our kicks from it in many ways. All of the young men in my family were seriously affected by internet prawn (I at least was too old for that to affect me as a kid, still fell into it regularly as an adult), and the fact that it is right there with no barrier to entry is not a neutral, take it or leave it thing, especially for a young lad. And that is only one example. It's tempting to say that there is "no bad technology, only bad use of it", but that assumes that technology has no ability to mould us without us being aware of it, especially as children.

Ages ago, I read a lament for the advent of guns somewhere in the jungle. Before guns, there was a whole industry of skilled craftsmen who built bows and other such weapons. Children practised using these weapons from a young age, along with all the other skills of tracking prey in the bush and getting close enough. And then came guns from the outside world. The crafts were gradually lost, and all the social aspects around that local industry. You need training to use a gun well, of course, but very little compared to a bow. An angry teen with a gun could easily kill a grown man, so respect between the generations was reduced. And because the people had to buy guns and bullets from outside, their whole relationship with the jungle changed. Sure, all of that is the people's fault, not the "inanimate object" (not so fast, he says, but that's another thread), but when everyone around you is changing, what's a man with a family to feed to do, now that the bow makers are all out of business?

And I am being drawn into it right now. I live out in the woods, work most of the day online and part of the day in the garden. When I take a break, inertia brings me here instead of for a walk, or another healthy activity. I could schlep into town, but I might not meet anyone. I can just login here and prattle away.

Anyway, back to work.

Those are good points. As they say "the media is the message" and screens are inherently pacifying, dopamine-inducing, and transformative. Not to say anything about porn, divisive social media, stupid stuff like tiktok, etc., but the screens themselves do have a inherently negative effect. They can also effect circadian rhythms and I think screens are a big reason for sleep problems in modernity.

It is good to think critically about internet use and anything we can consume. Fasting can be applied to more than just food, but internet, social media, "smart" phones, caffeine, etc. I admit I need to do more work in this regard, although I have made some progress in the last few years.

 

[Edek]

I remember back in the 90s internet culture had a stigma of being argumentative and useless. I don't think it's changed at all-- but the world has become that.

I read a comment somewhere recently (it was to the video of that scientist who wants to give people a meat-aversion disease) and it said "nerds must have done something horrible in the past to make people so naturally repulsed by them." lol

It does seem like it has become much harder to discuss things with people and have a friendly debate. The rudeness enabled by typing into a faceless box online has spilled into people's face-to-face behaviour.

Many nerds have a grudge against the human race. They were treated badly at school, especially by girls, they worked hard at university while Chad and Stacy "partied", and then they grew up to become successful and gain power and influence. It has been said by others that the entire media / movie / music industry can be summed up as "bitter nerds becoming the bosses & directors over the good-looking, cool kids that they hated at school"