Comment by ffsm8
4 hours ago
> has rewired our kids
The kids? I mean sure, they too - but seriously... It's not just the kids that have been affected.
Things have been spiralling out of control ever since social media was introduced.
Ever more extreme positions are being agreed as the norm, and what had previously been the norm is being decried as evil itself.
I'm an atheist myself but I cannot help but think that a lot of our western issues is because we generally no longer see the world from the lens of religion.
Evil has lost its meaning, and people started randomly selecting other behaviors as "evil", and excusing actual evil deeds like rape, murder etc because "reasons".
This has opened up social media to become a echo chamber of ever increasing insanity.
I'm not seeing things get better through initiatives like that. I suspect things are gonna keep spiralling more and more out of control until we end up in a dystopia in which the populus looses a lot of their rights. And not in the too far future either, I'm almost certain I'll witness it before I grow old.
I’m not sure it’s social media so much as the smartphones. It’s been surprising to me watching my parents become slightly senile in a way that seems related to phones – much less ability to cope when the phones aren’t quite working and a lack of the habits I see in my own generation (eg one should obviously try to avoid having a phone out at the dinner table).
I don’t think I agree with your take around religion or ‘evil’. (Imo two big advantages of religion we are currently or will soon be wanting for society are firstly the social/community component and secondly the idea that one can lead a worthy and fulfilling life through acting virtuously and faithfully, rather than through the worth implied by educational or career achievements, which are often a rough proxy for certain kinds of intelligence, that are neither evenly distributed across the population nor easily changed, and which may become unimportant as machines outcompete us there)
> I'm an atheist myself but I cannot help but think that a lot of our western issues is because we generally no longer see the world from the lens of religion.
Yeah it's a fun situation to be in I'm also an atheist but while not perfect the Judeo-Christian moral and legal framework is pretty damn good compared to everything else we've created.
I'm not that doomer about what you are referring to. I think a lot of kids are wising up to the echo chamber.
Nah to me it's more about a loss of connection with the physical world, les slowing down, less being bored. Without that, it's a different reality and I think studying requires that kind of brain. Otherwise you're just flitting this way and that and never really focusing.