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What counts as "spending time"? I'm sure they define it somewhere in the article, but I wonder what percentage of the effects do I get to experience by comment

What counts as "spending time"? I'm sure they define it somewhere in the article, but I wonder what percentage of the effects do I get to experience by commenting here. Are we "spending time" together right now? I ask because I've bugged a few healthcare professionals I randomly meet about how millennials (and younger) will age, and if their comfort with the connective nature of the Internet will help reduce mental decline due to inactivity through aging, and I've gotten positive responses (e.g. "for people who can use the Internet to stay cognitively active, aging will be a more pleasant experience generally").

wil421 6y ago
No I don’t think it’s the same. We are spending some time here but the amount of interaction is very low. I recently bought something from a whiskey group on FB. We spent about 30 minutes talking about whiskey after our transaction. It was probably more meaningful than a week of HN interactions.
- offtop5 6y ago
  Lost Connections is a fantastic book on this. While it's definitely worth a read, the author's core argument is eroding community structures have led to an explosion in mental illness. He has a very interesting tale of a man in a small village who is essentially supported by everyone else there and with that is helped Compared to the typical Western solution assuming your poor or homeless neighbor is the responsibility of some outside entity. Online interactions also have a tendency to be very impersonal , and very mean. I don't really use any social media aside from this ( although that will change when I start promoting my side project game, I'll never speak outside of just promoting the game or asking for community feedback). I'm very much looking forward to a post-corona world, my hope would be that more people embrace this beautiful world of ours instead of arguing about which movie casted who on Reddit all day.
  - rabuse 6y ago
    This is why I genuinely enjoy going to this bar near me regularly. It's a very high-end place, but everyone that goes there knows one another, and we're like a giant extended family. People within the group have newborns, and they bring them all the time, and pass them around for all of us to enjoy .
- jimmygrapes 6y ago
  I believe online interaction can be a mild substitute for real interaction, even through a forum like this, but it requires that it be the same people interacting (and for the interaction to be pleasant). Me writing this here isn't to you, person I am responding to, but to anyone who reads it. It lacks the building of interpersonal camaraderie until we have direct, frequent, and multiple interactions.
- TameAntelope 6y ago
  I think I'm with you on the general notion that this time doesn't generally hold a candle to "real" interactive conversation, but you put it at "more than a week of HN interactions" so there is some value here, which I do find interesting, if ultimately negligible/useless.
deleted 6y ago
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asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
I don't think much true human connection is happening here -- in the sense of connections that are emotionally fulfilling and improve psychological well-being. It may work for some people but I guess for most people the monkey brain is too far from what we're doing right now.
- rantwasp 6y ago
  I sort-of disagree. Maybe for just browsing hn in general you’re right. That changes when you engage in a conversation with someone on a thread. also, i don’t really believe in the idea of the “monkey brain”. our brain is both “hardware” and “software”. The tooling we are using is an extension of our brain.

wil421 6y ago

No I don’t think it’s the same. We are spending some time here but the amount of interaction is very low. I recently bought something from a whiskey group on FB. We spent about 30 minutes talking about whiskey after our transaction. It was probably more meaningful than a week of HN interactions.

offtop5 6y ago
Lost Connections is a fantastic book on this. While it's definitely worth a read, the author's core argument is eroding community structures have led to an explosion in mental illness. He has a very interesting tale of a man in a small village who is essentially supported by everyone else there and with that is helped Compared to the typical Western solution assuming your poor or homeless neighbor is the responsibility of some outside entity. Online interactions also have a tendency to be very impersonal , and very mean. I don't really use any social media aside from this ( although that will change when I start promoting my side project game, I'll never speak outside of just promoting the game or asking for community feedback). I'm very much looking forward to a post-corona world, my hope would be that more people embrace this beautiful world of ours instead of arguing about which movie casted who on Reddit all day.
- rabuse 6y ago
  This is why I genuinely enjoy going to this bar near me regularly. It's a very high-end place, but everyone that goes there knows one another, and we're like a giant extended family. People within the group have newborns, and they bring them all the time, and pass them around for all of us to enjoy .
jimmygrapes 6y ago
I believe online interaction can be a mild substitute for real interaction, even through a forum like this, but it requires that it be the same people interacting (and for the interaction to be pleasant). Me writing this here isn't to you, person I am responding to, but to anyone who reads it. It lacks the building of interpersonal camaraderie until we have direct, frequent, and multiple interactions.
TameAntelope 6y ago
I think I'm with you on the general notion that this time doesn't generally hold a candle to "real" interactive conversation, but you put it at "more than a week of HN interactions" so there is some value here, which I do find interesting, if ultimately negligible/useless.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago

I don't think much true human connection is happening here -- in the sense of connections that are emotionally fulfilling and improve psychological well-being. It may work for some people but I guess for most people the monkey brain is too far from what we're doing right now.

rantwasp 6y ago
I sort-of disagree. Maybe for just browsing hn in general you’re right. That changes when you engage in a conversation with someone on a thread. also, i don’t really believe in the idea of the “monkey brain”. our brain is both “hardware” and “software”. The tooling we are using is an extension of our brain.