Comment by whoisyc
2 days ago
1950: cars give you the freedom to go anywhere you want. Artificial fertilizer puts an end to hunger in industrialized world. Yeehaw!
2000: you are a second class citizen who can’t even get a job in many places if you do not have a car. Also the median person is overweight. But here is this new internet thing that lets you get everything you need in life sorted out with no need for human interactions. Yeehaw!
2025: the average person can no longer hold a conversation with a stranger for five seconds without having an anxiety attack. Oops!
> So when Vashti found her cabin invaded by a rosy finger of light, she was annoyed, and tried to adjust the blind. But the blind flew up altogether, and she saw through the skylight small pink clouds, swaying against a background of blue, and as the sun crept higher, its radiance entered direct, brimming down the wall, like a golden sea. It rose and fell with the air-ship’s motion, just as waves rise and fall, but it advanced steadily, as a tide advances. Unless she was careful, it would strike her face. A spasm of horror shook her and she rang for the attendant. The attendant too was horrified, but she could do nothing; it was not her place to mend the blind. She could only suggest that the lady should change her cabin, which she accordingly prepared to do. People were almost exactly alike all over the world, but the attendant of the air-ship, perhaps owing to her exceptional duties, had grown a little out of the common. She had often to address passengers with direct speech, and this had given her a certain roughness and originality of manner. When Vashti swerved away from the sunbeams with a cry, she behaved barbarically — she put out her hand to steady her.
> “How dare you!” exclaimed the passenger. “You forget yourself!”
> The woman was confused, and apologized for not having let her fall. People never touched one another. The custom had become obsolete, owing to the Machine
The Machine Stops (1909)
https://www.cs.ucdavis.edu/~koehl/Teaching/ECS188/PDF_files/...
Wow. It's hard to believe this novella was written in 1909. The imagination and insight of the author is remarkable. It reads as an account of a dystopic future that we are now more and more living in the present.
Thank you for sharing this.
I don't _want_ to have a random conversation with a person every time I ride a cab. Especially after a long flight and/or early in the morning.