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There are lots of reasons one might want to avoid human interaction: 1. Human interaction is perceived as complicated, inefficient, noisy and slow. I can't r

There are lots of reasons one might want to avoid human interaction: 1. Human interaction is perceived as complicated, inefficient, noisy and slow. I can't recall the source of where I heard it, an article or podcast perhaps, but there's the idea the current situation of increasing populism (anti-globalism, anti-immigration, xenophobia) is partly a result of ever mounting complexity in our societies. I wouldn't be surprised if the anti-human interaction thing (as well as hikikomori in Japan f.e.) was another effect. Of course, I'm sure this being HN, people will think it's the obviously just technology marching on -- but I'm not so sure. Businesses go where the money is. Personally, I tried to get away from it as much as possible and it still feels like too much and I have every plan of simplifying down the road. edit: I found the podcast I think was referenced, but disclaimer I haven't listened to it specifically: http://omegataupodcast.net/184-societal-complexity-and-collapse/ http://omegataupodcast.net/184-societal-complexity-and-colla...

losteric 9y ago
That vaguely reminds me of Calhoun's "mouse utopia": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun#Mouse_experiments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun#Mouse_experime... I feel like lessons from software often have parallels in society. There are a lot of parallels between a project developed from scratch by a team that deeply understands their business domain, and a product+team combination that's missing any of those aspects. When the system is worked on by people that don't comprehend the problem or how the system solves it, the project slowly accrues hacks that eventually become an operational death march towards deprecation. It's worth considering the longevity of religions. Those systems were born to explain the supernatural, but the ideas that created social stability were the ones that survived. Religions outlive nations because they have built-in error-correction that prevents process degradation, even when spread by adherents that do not comprehend the context of the rules they preach.

losteric 9y ago

That vaguely reminds me of Calhoun's "mouse utopia": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun#Mouse_experiments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun#Mouse_experime... I feel like lessons from software often have parallels in society. There are a lot of parallels between a project developed from scratch by a team that deeply understands their business domain, and a product+team combination that's missing any of those aspects. When the system is worked on by people that don't comprehend the problem or how the system solves it, the project slowly accrues hacks that eventually become an operational death march towards deprecation. It's worth considering the longevity of religions. Those systems were born to explain the supernatural, but the ideas that created social stability were the ones that survived. Religions outlive nations because they have built-in error-correction that prevents process degradation, even when spread by adherents that do not comprehend the context of the rules they preach.