7 ms·

It's going to be an interesting century for sure. The human mind is simply not evolutionary adapted for what's coming up.

ekianjo 3y ago
> The human mind is simply not evolutionary adapted for what's coming up. This can be said of pretty much everything humans ended up creating with technology so... not sure there's anything really new down the road. Humans adapt.
- pizza234 3y ago
  Humans adapt within boundaries. A couple of examples of things humans did not adapt to: - emphathy at distance; nowadays, a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame - prioritizing long-term and abstract rewards, over short term ones; this is the reason why we have phenomenons like global warming - adjusting hunger to virtually unlimited availability of food All the above are concrete and very serious problems for humanity.
  - krzat 3y ago
    The fact that you point this out, is a proof that humanity can improve, what needs to change is our culture, especially education, ofc it may take a lot of time but it will happen eventually.
    - lynx23 3y ago
      Regarding long-term rewards and global warming: What is the actual long term reward here? As I see it, there is no way to collect any sort of reward for helping to prevent global warming by changing your habits. Before the problem gets really problematic, most of us will be dead and burried. I fail to see how "caring for the future generation" has any kind of reward attached to it. Its an act of kindness, but there are no rewards attached to it.
      - krzat 3y ago
        Probably a question to the guy above, but there is immediate psychological reward in any act of kindness or generosity (at least in healthy, thriving individuals).
        lynx23 3y ago
        However, OP argued that global warming is suffering from people NOT getting immediate rewards for their actions. Your argument basically says OP is wrong, and there is no need to counteract peoples tendency to prefer short-term rewards over long-term because they are supposed to get enough incentive by just knowing they have been kind. I doubt that.
        krzat 3y ago
        What I think OP said, is that humans won't adapt to these challenges due to our biological limitations. IMO humanity will adapt, and the first sign of this is that those problems are getting recognized and given more and more traction.
      - pizza234 3y ago
        > Before the problem gets really problematic, most of us will be dead and burried. The situation lies on a spectrum between "not problematic" and "really problematic". There is actually plenty of evidence that tangible impact already started, independently of the perception of those whoe live in areas where the effect is neither perceived nor obvious.
      - nerdbert 3y ago
        For many people, feeling like one has exhibited kindness is a strong reward.
  - butlike 3y ago
    What if war became just a couple of countries intelligence bots crunching digits of pi until one came up with a new one. That country would be the winner and they could ask one thing from the 'losing' side that didn't result in destruction or terror.
    - notpachet 3y ago
      You're not far from describing Bitcoin.
    - antod 3y ago
      Humans being humans, they'd then want to start destroying the other sides ability to design/make/run/maintain/afford pi digit crunching intelligence bots. Then ways to defend against those attacks on their people and economy by attacking the aspects of the other sides ability to attack etc. After a few rounds of that, soon the pi digit crunching element is completely replaced by a traditional war.
      - cwillu 3y ago
        Those who try to end warfare, but who do not understand warfare, are doomed to reinvent it.
    - PeterisP 3y ago
      If the 'losing' side simply refused to give that one thing asked, how could the 'winner' get them to comply?
  - jollyllama 3y ago
    Drone operators experience trauma. https://archive.li/j5urs https://archive.li/j5urs
  - horrible-hilde 3y ago
    One more: attacking people who are familiar and comfortable to you rather than the people causing your actual problems. As a manager in tech, people who were on performance management rarely attacked me, they would find someone on the team to harass instead. Same thing with blaming a downturn in the economy on women painting their hair blue or mini skirts. Anything but blaming the powerful.
    - bumby 3y ago
      Pure conjecture on my part, but I wonder how much of this is risk-based status-mongering. Challenging the powerful is obviously risky. But knocking someone weaker down a few pegs can solidify your status in the hierarchy at a much lower risk. From that perspective, it's arguably rational behavior to maintain your status within a group when you feel vulnerable. (Pardon my reach here, I watched Chimp Empire not too long ago...)
      - horrible-hilde 3y ago
        maybe, if you are in a closed system (like a small tribe). When most bullies Ive worked with went looking for other jobs they were treated like pariah, so it hit them when they left the closed system or someone from outside came in.
  - fallingknife 3y ago
    We never seemed to have a problem killing back when you had to do it face to face with a spear, so I don't think the drone really changes anything. Agree on the others though.
  - Bud 3y ago
    [dead]
  - bumby 3y ago
    >a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame This might depend on the context. RadioLab recently did a podcast titled "Toy Soldiers." Using low-flying "toy" drones rather than the high-flying "predator" drones, they make the case that drone operators get an oddly intimate portrait of their enemies. They go into how they reference them by their attire ("the 'red shoe' guy”) and witness on an up-close and personal level how they grieve over their comrades.
  - amanaplanacanal 3y ago
    As a species, I don’t think those matter. They could kill off 90% of the population and humans will go on. Evolution is a bitch in that way, individuals matter not at all.
    - all2 3y ago
      I will note that this is a purely naturalistic take and is countered by traditional Christianity that posits every human life was worth the death of God Himself. That is, the intrinsic value of a human life is incalculable. The rejection of spirituality leaves mankind pretty hopeless, I think. > Evolution is a bitch in that way, individuals matter not at all.
  - lmm 3y ago
    > emphathy at distance; nowadays, a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame People were traditionally able to kill each other face to face > prioritizing long-term and abstract rewards, over short term ones; this is the reason why we have phenomenons like global warming There's a balance. If anything I'd say people are putting too much priority on long term abstract rewards, so we see people saving too much and never enjoying themselves, or putting off having children until they can't because they're worried they can't raise that child perfectly. > adjusting hunger to virtually unlimited availability of food We're already solving this; people who overeat are already having fewer children, there's been a huge cultural shift towards gyms and health food, and we've seen some promising drugs released recently. We don't adapt instantly overnight, but we do adapt.
- mensetmanusman 3y ago
  The survivors adapt.
butlike 3y ago
it depends.
mordechai9000 3y ago
I can't help but think of those beetles that preferred a beer bottle over the bumpy carapace of an appropriate mate. https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/06/19/193493225/the-love-that-dared-not-speak-its-name-of-a-beetle-for-a-beer-bottle https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/06/19/193493225/t...
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
datadrivenangel 3y ago
Nothing human makes it out of the near future.
eqvinox 3y ago
> The human mind is simply not evolutionary adapted for what's coming up. Maybe we're in fact evolutionarily adapted to not being evolutionarily adapted. We have successfully dealt with a whole sequence of hard societal pivots by now…
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  That's literally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias.
  - nerdbert 3y ago
    All the humans who couldn't deal with tiktok are dead?
    - lmm 3y ago
      No, but they're not going to be able to reproduce.
  - eqvinox 3y ago
    That's how evolution works (?)
    - ceejayoz 3y ago
      Yes, but as with stocks, past performance is no guarantee of future results. The fact that humanity as a species has survived past social shocks does not mean it's a certain thing we'll survive future ones. Our ancestors had much longer to adjust their societies for new technology than we're getting these days.
      - fidelramos 3y ago
        When talking about survival I would rather apply the Lindy Effect: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect

ekianjo 3y ago

> The human mind is simply not evolutionary adapted for what's coming up. This can be said of pretty much everything humans ended up creating with technology so... not sure there's anything really new down the road. Humans adapt.

pizza234 3y ago
Humans adapt within boundaries. A couple of examples of things humans did not adapt to: - emphathy at distance; nowadays, a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame - prioritizing long-term and abstract rewards, over short term ones; this is the reason why we have phenomenons like global warming - adjusting hunger to virtually unlimited availability of food All the above are concrete and very serious problems for humanity.
- krzat 3y ago
  The fact that you point this out, is a proof that humanity can improve, what needs to change is our culture, especially education, ofc it may take a lot of time but it will happen eventually.
  - lynx23 3y ago
    Regarding long-term rewards and global warming: What is the actual long term reward here? As I see it, there is no way to collect any sort of reward for helping to prevent global warming by changing your habits. Before the problem gets really problematic, most of us will be dead and burried. I fail to see how "caring for the future generation" has any kind of reward attached to it. Its an act of kindness, but there are no rewards attached to it.
    - krzat 3y ago
      Probably a question to the guy above, but there is immediate psychological reward in any act of kindness or generosity (at least in healthy, thriving individuals).
      - lynx23 3y ago
        However, OP argued that global warming is suffering from people NOT getting immediate rewards for their actions. Your argument basically says OP is wrong, and there is no need to counteract peoples tendency to prefer short-term rewards over long-term because they are supposed to get enough incentive by just knowing they have been kind. I doubt that.
        krzat 3y ago
        What I think OP said, is that humans won't adapt to these challenges due to our biological limitations. IMO humanity will adapt, and the first sign of this is that those problems are getting recognized and given more and more traction.
    - pizza234 3y ago
      > Before the problem gets really problematic, most of us will be dead and burried. The situation lies on a spectrum between "not problematic" and "really problematic". There is actually plenty of evidence that tangible impact already started, independently of the perception of those whoe live in areas where the effect is neither perceived nor obvious.
    - nerdbert 3y ago
      For many people, feeling like one has exhibited kindness is a strong reward.
- butlike 3y ago
  What if war became just a couple of countries intelligence bots crunching digits of pi until one came up with a new one. That country would be the winner and they could ask one thing from the 'losing' side that didn't result in destruction or terror.
  - notpachet 3y ago
    You're not far from describing Bitcoin.
  - antod 3y ago
    Humans being humans, they'd then want to start destroying the other sides ability to design/make/run/maintain/afford pi digit crunching intelligence bots. Then ways to defend against those attacks on their people and economy by attacking the aspects of the other sides ability to attack etc. After a few rounds of that, soon the pi digit crunching element is completely replaced by a traditional war.
    - cwillu 3y ago
      Those who try to end warfare, but who do not understand warfare, are doomed to reinvent it.
  - PeterisP 3y ago
    If the 'losing' side simply refused to give that one thing asked, how could the 'winner' get them to comply?
- jollyllama 3y ago
  Drone operators experience trauma. https://archive.li/j5urs https://archive.li/j5urs
- horrible-hilde 3y ago
  One more: attacking people who are familiar and comfortable to you rather than the people causing your actual problems. As a manager in tech, people who were on performance management rarely attacked me, they would find someone on the team to harass instead. Same thing with blaming a downturn in the economy on women painting their hair blue or mini skirts. Anything but blaming the powerful.
  - bumby 3y ago
    Pure conjecture on my part, but I wonder how much of this is risk-based status-mongering. Challenging the powerful is obviously risky. But knocking someone weaker down a few pegs can solidify your status in the hierarchy at a much lower risk. From that perspective, it's arguably rational behavior to maintain your status within a group when you feel vulnerable. (Pardon my reach here, I watched Chimp Empire not too long ago...)
    - horrible-hilde 3y ago
      maybe, if you are in a closed system (like a small tribe). When most bullies Ive worked with went looking for other jobs they were treated like pariah, so it hit them when they left the closed system or someone from outside came in.
- fallingknife 3y ago
  We never seemed to have a problem killing back when you had to do it face to face with a spear, so I don't think the drone really changes anything. Agree on the others though.
- Bud 3y ago
  [dead]
- bumby 3y ago
  >a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame This might depend on the context. RadioLab recently did a podcast titled "Toy Soldiers." Using low-flying "toy" drones rather than the high-flying "predator" drones, they make the case that drone operators get an oddly intimate portrait of their enemies. They go into how they reference them by their attire ("the 'red shoe' guy”) and witness on an up-close and personal level how they grieve over their comrades.
- amanaplanacanal 3y ago
  As a species, I don’t think those matter. They could kill off 90% of the population and humans will go on. Evolution is a bitch in that way, individuals matter not at all.
  - all2 3y ago
    I will note that this is a purely naturalistic take and is countered by traditional Christianity that posits every human life was worth the death of God Himself. That is, the intrinsic value of a human life is incalculable. The rejection of spirituality leaves mankind pretty hopeless, I think. > Evolution is a bitch in that way, individuals matter not at all.
- lmm 3y ago
  > emphathy at distance; nowadays, a drone operator will push a button, kill a dozen people, and feel like it was a videogame People were traditionally able to kill each other face to face > prioritizing long-term and abstract rewards, over short term ones; this is the reason why we have phenomenons like global warming There's a balance. If anything I'd say people are putting too much priority on long term abstract rewards, so we see people saving too much and never enjoying themselves, or putting off having children until they can't because they're worried they can't raise that child perfectly. > adjusting hunger to virtually unlimited availability of food We're already solving this; people who overeat are already having fewer children, there's been a huge cultural shift towards gyms and health food, and we've seen some promising drugs released recently. We don't adapt instantly overnight, but we do adapt.
mensetmanusman 3y ago
The survivors adapt.

butlike 3y ago

it depends.

mordechai9000 3y ago

I can't help but think of those beetles that preferred a beer bottle over the bumpy carapace of an appropriate mate. https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/06/19/193493225/the-love-that-dared-not-speak-its-name-of-a-beetle-for-a-beer-bottle https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/06/19/193493225/t...

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

datadrivenangel 3y ago

Nothing human makes it out of the near future.

eqvinox 3y ago

> The human mind is simply not evolutionary adapted for what's coming up. Maybe we're in fact evolutionarily adapted to not being evolutionarily adapted. We have successfully dealt with a whole sequence of hard societal pivots by now…

ceejayoz 3y ago
That's literally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias.
- nerdbert 3y ago
  All the humans who couldn't deal with tiktok are dead?
  - lmm 3y ago
    No, but they're not going to be able to reproduce.
- eqvinox 3y ago
  That's how evolution works (?)
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    Yes, but as with stocks, past performance is no guarantee of future results. The fact that humanity as a species has survived past social shocks does not mean it's a certain thing we'll survive future ones. Our ancestors had much longer to adjust their societies for new technology than we're getting these days.
    - fidelramos 3y ago
      When talking about survival I would rather apply the Lindy Effect: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect