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> The original article makes me sad that people a few years younger than me are so addicted to this screen that 3 days away is as difficult and mind-boggling fo

> The original article makes me sad that people a few years younger than me are so addicted to this screen that 3 days away is as difficult and mind-boggling for them as 3 days without booze is for me. This is the same argument that has been used for generations. Our parents were addicted to rock music, before that it was something else, and you can go as far back as socrates to say they preferred "chatter" to exercise. Why is 3 days without any screens such a big deal. Not all screens are the same. 3 days of doomscrolling on instagram is not the same as watching an hour of a movie or a tv series, or using youtube for guitar lessons. Why is not going 3 days without screens an addiction, but not going 3 days without reading a book not an addiction?

noduerme 5y ago
Having one foot in both eras - pre and post internet screens - I can clearly see that no activity that existed before (TV, "rock music", radio shows) was anywhere near as addictive for me as the crack cocaine of smart phone apps. And I'm relatively inoculated against it. Relatively: Compared to people who never knew the world before. Our parents weren't "addicted" to rock music. Reading a book is, objectively, infinitely better for your mind than watching even the most erudite educational video on YouTube, for the simple reason that you're required to visualize the content for yourself. This was common knowledge during the TV era. The only thing that made TV not the end of reason was that it was a large object that children couldn't drag with them everywhere. No, it's not just an "old man" generational thing. The people raised in the smart phone era are different. This is a qualitatively different technology, a far more invasive and all-encompassing form of media than anything that's existed before, and it distorts the basic elements of what it means to be human, namely: *How one encounters others, how one encounters nature, and how one encounters oneself*. Three fundamental discoveries that are lost when they are discovered "for you" via a constant stream of videos, podcasts, news feeds, texts and blog posts in your pocket. For the first time, it's possible to imagine a human who never discovers any of the basic things about life; who lives from cradle to grave being shown images of kangaroos and dolphins, watching shows about lovers and wars, without ever actually experiencing any of them, and being satiated with the constant flood of images presented, dying with no knowledge of anything besides the shadows on the cave wall. That is a fundamental shift in what we do as a society with human capital, what we teach children, and what it means to be an adult; and this is visible throughout every aspect of our current decline as a civilization. Listen to an interview on YouTube with random people on the street in 1960, on any subject, and you will hear voices from blue-collar high school educated people that are more eloquent - by habit of learning to communicate directly with others - than the most gifted podcasters are today. So no, the difference here is not just "rock and roll" versus "big band". Or even printing press versus handwritten scrolls. It's a cheapening and denuding of the human landscape; and I say this as someone who spent most of my life building the systems that contributed to it and, superficially, am mostly enmeshed in it, understand it, and don't believe it should rob us of authenticity. But it does. Rock and roll never robbed anyone of authentic experience. Neither did reading a book.
- maccard 5y ago
  This is a nice post to read but it's utter nonsense. > anywhere near as addictive for me as the crack cocaine of smart phone apps. There's a big difference between smart phone apps and screens, you've just said it yourself. I don't think there's any argument that modern apps are destructive to many people, but the rest of your post is really just not understanding how anyone can have a view point that isn't yours. > For the first time, it's possible to imagine a human who never discovers any of the basic things about life; who lives from cradle to grave being shown images of kangaroos and dolphins, watching shows about lovers and wars, without ever actually experiencing any of them, Complete rubbish. Books have been giving that experience for generations. TV shows have been providing that experience for 50+ years. > Rock and roll never robbed anyone of authentic experience. Neither did reading a book. As much as you think this is a unique thought, this is what your parents generation thought about the decisions you made. Nonsense like what you're claiming here has been spouted about music, video games,TV shows, movies, dancing, music, etc.
  - noduerme 5y ago
    > As much as you think this is a unique thought, this is what your parents generation thought about the decisions you made. Nonsense like what you're claiming here has been spouted about music, video games,TV shows, movies, dancing, music, etc. No, I maintain that there's a qualitative difference between screens and books. "Screens" includes video games. Which are a model that encourages one person to sacrifice their life and time trying to decipher someone else's creation. RPGs are the same way. Yes, books can be treated this way, but only by zealots. The average person did not spend 8-12 hours a day reading books as an escape, at any time in history. That wouldn't be considered healthy. Screens can deliver good things -- they actually did, when they were liberated for content in the 90s and weren't just feeding distraction to the masses. That's long gone. You think you see what I'm saying because you've been told that any attack on the media environment you're accustomed to is just a reactionary howl like older generations always have. But I have no primary issue with Tiktok or Instagram. I have a problem with what I've literally witnessed them do to people's minds. And I have 40+ years of firsthand data collected as to how absolutely fucking melted people have become as the juggernaut of mass-social-media and smartphones has progressed to become a constant habit. All you have is an objection on the grounds that every generation thinks things were better before. But you have no proof (and can't prove) that the time you're living in is not intellectually inferior. You would have had to actually been alive before to know that.
jen20 5y ago
> Why is not going 3 days without screens an addiction, but not going 3 days without reading a book not an addiction? Because books are not (yet) generally authored by sociopaths working at social media companies, altering what you see to maximise "engagement".
- maccard 5y ago
  > Because books are not (yet) generally authored by sociopaths working at social media companies, altering what you see to maximise "engagement". You're making the same mistake that OP is; conflating screens and social media. How is watching one hour of Line of Duty/Better Call Saul a day worse than reading 3-4 hours of any of the hundreds of nonsense romance novels that are published every year. Also, if you think that book publishing is exempt from the abusive marketing/psychology tactics, you're sorely mistaken.
  - noduerme 5y ago
    > How is watching one hour of Line of Duty/Better Call Saul a day worse than reading 3-4 hours of any of the hundreds of nonsense romance novels Watching doesn't require imagination. It doesn't activate the creative part of the brain that even the most idiotic dime store novel requires to interpret. That's how. Again, this isn't new; it was standard knowledge taught to children in the 1960s-1980s as to why television was mind-rot.
    - ghaff 5y ago
      That is such complete and utter nonsense. And lots of things taught to children over the years have been complete and utter nonsense. Yes, at some level, you can sit in front of a mindless sitcom or reality show half-asleep and not engage at all. But there are plenty of TV shows and movies that require active engagement to even know what's going on. The idea that printed material occupies some higher plane than video material because it requires turning a page doesn't make a lot of sense.
    - maccard 5y ago
      imagination is not the same thing as visualisation. If you look at many modern TV shows, video games, and movies and only see what is explicitly put in front of you, that's on you, not the medium.
apatters 5y ago
No, those aren't the same things at all. Your parents weren't listening to rock music while saying "I know this is bad for me and I want to stop, but can't." Comparisons of social media to alcohol and tobacco are apt, it is something that's both harmful and difficult to quit. Rock music and books are not similar.
- Sebb767 5y ago
  Well, if you spend your time listening to rock music instead of working or if you spend all your money on drug-fueled concerts, it might be a problem. Just browsing on social media in itself does not hurt you at all. Excessive use and addiction is the problem. Same with books: They're usually seen as good, but just reading fantasy books all day is still not a great way to spend your time. Now, obviously rock music and books probably have less addictive design than social media, but it's still true: Once it starts negatively impacting your live, it becomes a problem.
- maccard 5y ago
  But the comparison isn't social media, it's "all screens". I'm definitely more on the side of social media platforms being problematic, but claiming BBC dramas are as bad as TikTok feeds is just nonsense. > Rock music and books are not similar. The issue isn't rock music, or dancing, or books. It's an older generation claiming that the way that they experienced things is better than the way the the current generation are, and they're worse off for it, and the younger generation just need to take their word for it (which is exactly what the commentor I've been replying to keeps saying).

noduerme 5y ago

Having one foot in both eras - pre and post internet screens - I can clearly see that no activity that existed before (TV, "rock music", radio shows) was anywhere near as addictive for me as the crack cocaine of smart phone apps. And I'm relatively inoculated against it. Relatively: Compared to people who never knew the world before. Our parents weren't "addicted" to rock music. Reading a book is, objectively, infinitely better for your mind than watching even the most erudite educational video on YouTube, for the simple reason that you're required to visualize the content for yourself. This was common knowledge during the TV era. The only thing that made TV not the end of reason was that it was a large object that children couldn't drag with them everywhere. No, it's not just an "old man" generational thing. The people raised in the smart phone era are different. This is a qualitatively different technology, a far more invasive and all-encompassing form of media than anything that's existed before, and it distorts the basic elements of what it means to be human, namely: *How one encounters others, how one encounters nature, and how one encounters oneself*. Three fundamental discoveries that are lost when they are discovered "for you" via a constant stream of videos, podcasts, news feeds, texts and blog posts in your pocket. For the first time, it's possible to imagine a human who never discovers any of the basic things about life; who lives from cradle to grave being shown images of kangaroos and dolphins, watching shows about lovers and wars, without ever actually experiencing any of them, and being satiated with the constant flood of images presented, dying with no knowledge of anything besides the shadows on the cave wall. That is a fundamental shift in what we do as a society with human capital, what we teach children, and what it means to be an adult; and this is visible throughout every aspect of our current decline as a civilization. Listen to an interview on YouTube with random people on the street in 1960, on any subject, and you will hear voices from blue-collar high school educated people that are more eloquent - by habit of learning to communicate directly with others - than the most gifted podcasters are today. So no, the difference here is not just "rock and roll" versus "big band". Or even printing press versus handwritten scrolls. It's a cheapening and denuding of the human landscape; and I say this as someone who spent most of my life building the systems that contributed to it and, superficially, am mostly enmeshed in it, understand it, and don't believe it should rob us of authenticity. But it does. Rock and roll never robbed anyone of authentic experience. Neither did reading a book.

maccard 5y ago
This is a nice post to read but it's utter nonsense. > anywhere near as addictive for me as the crack cocaine of smart phone apps. There's a big difference between smart phone apps and screens, you've just said it yourself. I don't think there's any argument that modern apps are destructive to many people, but the rest of your post is really just not understanding how anyone can have a view point that isn't yours. > For the first time, it's possible to imagine a human who never discovers any of the basic things about life; who lives from cradle to grave being shown images of kangaroos and dolphins, watching shows about lovers and wars, without ever actually experiencing any of them, Complete rubbish. Books have been giving that experience for generations. TV shows have been providing that experience for 50+ years. > Rock and roll never robbed anyone of authentic experience. Neither did reading a book. As much as you think this is a unique thought, this is what your parents generation thought about the decisions you made. Nonsense like what you're claiming here has been spouted about music, video games,TV shows, movies, dancing, music, etc.
- noduerme 5y ago
  > As much as you think this is a unique thought, this is what your parents generation thought about the decisions you made. Nonsense like what you're claiming here has been spouted about music, video games,TV shows, movies, dancing, music, etc. No, I maintain that there's a qualitative difference between screens and books. "Screens" includes video games. Which are a model that encourages one person to sacrifice their life and time trying to decipher someone else's creation. RPGs are the same way. Yes, books can be treated this way, but only by zealots. The average person did not spend 8-12 hours a day reading books as an escape, at any time in history. That wouldn't be considered healthy. Screens can deliver good things -- they actually did, when they were liberated for content in the 90s and weren't just feeding distraction to the masses. That's long gone. You think you see what I'm saying because you've been told that any attack on the media environment you're accustomed to is just a reactionary howl like older generations always have. But I have no primary issue with Tiktok or Instagram. I have a problem with what I've literally witnessed them do to people's minds. And I have 40+ years of firsthand data collected as to how absolutely fucking melted people have become as the juggernaut of mass-social-media and smartphones has progressed to become a constant habit. All you have is an objection on the grounds that every generation thinks things were better before. But you have no proof (and can't prove) that the time you're living in is not intellectually inferior. You would have had to actually been alive before to know that.

jen20 5y ago

> Why is not going 3 days without screens an addiction, but not going 3 days without reading a book not an addiction? Because books are not (yet) generally authored by sociopaths working at social media companies, altering what you see to maximise "engagement".

maccard 5y ago
> Because books are not (yet) generally authored by sociopaths working at social media companies, altering what you see to maximise "engagement". You're making the same mistake that OP is; conflating screens and social media. How is watching one hour of Line of Duty/Better Call Saul a day worse than reading 3-4 hours of any of the hundreds of nonsense romance novels that are published every year. Also, if you think that book publishing is exempt from the abusive marketing/psychology tactics, you're sorely mistaken.
- noduerme 5y ago
  > How is watching one hour of Line of Duty/Better Call Saul a day worse than reading 3-4 hours of any of the hundreds of nonsense romance novels Watching doesn't require imagination. It doesn't activate the creative part of the brain that even the most idiotic dime store novel requires to interpret. That's how. Again, this isn't new; it was standard knowledge taught to children in the 1960s-1980s as to why television was mind-rot.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    That is such complete and utter nonsense. And lots of things taught to children over the years have been complete and utter nonsense. Yes, at some level, you can sit in front of a mindless sitcom or reality show half-asleep and not engage at all. But there are plenty of TV shows and movies that require active engagement to even know what's going on. The idea that printed material occupies some higher plane than video material because it requires turning a page doesn't make a lot of sense.
  - maccard 5y ago
    imagination is not the same thing as visualisation. If you look at many modern TV shows, video games, and movies and only see what is explicitly put in front of you, that's on you, not the medium.

apatters 5y ago

No, those aren't the same things at all. Your parents weren't listening to rock music while saying "I know this is bad for me and I want to stop, but can't." Comparisons of social media to alcohol and tobacco are apt, it is something that's both harmful and difficult to quit. Rock music and books are not similar.

Sebb767 5y ago
Well, if you spend your time listening to rock music instead of working or if you spend all your money on drug-fueled concerts, it might be a problem. Just browsing on social media in itself does not hurt you at all. Excessive use and addiction is the problem. Same with books: They're usually seen as good, but just reading fantasy books all day is still not a great way to spend your time. Now, obviously rock music and books probably have less addictive design than social media, but it's still true: Once it starts negatively impacting your live, it becomes a problem.
maccard 5y ago
But the comparison isn't social media, it's "all screens". I'm definitely more on the side of social media platforms being problematic, but claiming BBC dramas are as bad as TikTok feeds is just nonsense. > Rock music and books are not similar. The issue isn't rock music, or dancing, or books. It's an older generation claiming that the way that they experienced things is better than the way the the current generation are, and they're worse off for it, and the younger generation just need to take their word for it (which is exactly what the commentor I've been replying to keeps saying).