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I don't know about number 3. As a 53 year old Gen X'er, I still haven't come across things that see against the natural order. The main things I don't understan

I don't know about number 3. As a 53 year old Gen X'er, I still haven't come across things that see against the natural order. The main things I don't understand are things like the Humane AI pin, which didn't seem against the natural order, I just didn't see the appeal or usefulness of it. Maybe it just doesn't seem like there is much new being invented.

munificent 5mo ago
> I still haven't come across things that see against the natural order. So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. Every time I see someone doing that, I just absolutely cannot relate to what's going on in their head at all. I'm certainly not above watching some YouTube, but the complete mindlessness of it, they watch it goes on forever, and the utter stupidity of the videos. I feel like I'm watching zombies in an opium den. But billions of people are doing that shit every day, so what do I know?
- delecti 5mo ago
  I don't want to defend short-form video feeds too much, but "They aren't even picking which videos to watch" is overstating it. Essentially nobody behaves like: watch 100% of a video, swipe, watch 100%, swipe. The expected behavior is that you swipe away if you're not interested, which is often done within a fraction of a second. Accordingly, Tiktok's content selection algorithm heavily weighs watch time as a signal of interest in related content. That actually can create a bit of a perverse incentive; if you linger on a video long enough to report it (as in for a TOS violation) or to click the "show less like this", it can lead to being shown more videos like that. In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing. Watch a few seconds, next channel, watch a few seconds, next channel, oh this is interesting, sure I'll watch a "How It's Made" marathon.
  - dylan604 5mo ago
    > In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing. I've been making the same comparison as well. As someone not watching the videos yet still hear the videos being played, the constant switching is very noticeable much like being the one in the room that didn't have the clicker in their hand. You're not in control of the constant switching which I think makes it even that much more annoying. Rather than just parking on the marathon, choosing to turn it off and do something else entirely is still my preferred "old man yells at clouds" option.
  - qotgalaxy 5mo ago
    [dead]
- torben-friis 5mo ago
  >They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. As a teenager, I used to torrent content I liked and scoff at my parents generation for letting tv feed then slop :) It's hard to understand why TikTok is addictive from the outside, precisely because if you look at the app over someone's shoulder you'll see their tailored content, not yours. Give the algorithm a couple weeks and it WILL find the weird thing that gets you to check. Maybe you find someone restoring books relaxing, or like toy commercials from where you were a kid, or are attentive on news of potential pandemics out of fear. It will learn.
- vjk800 5mo ago
  > So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. This is how TV broadcasts also work, though. You could even argue there's an algorithm behind TV broadcasts too - it's just a kinda poor human-run algorithm trying to maximize viewer numbers. Unlike many people, I still often watch TV broadcasts to relax for exactly this reason - there's no decision fatigue since I don't need to choose what to watch. Usually there's only one channel with something that's even remotely interesting and it's kind of an obvious choice.
  - lccerina 5mo ago
    With the (somehow sadly) added value that the TV broadcast algorithm is kinda known by everyone (morning programs, prime time etc), and that if there wasn't nothing interesting to watch, we would just do something else.
    - carterschonwald 5mo ago
      yeah shared “did you this weeks X” is lame, but it was social glue for a long time.
      - munificent 5mo ago
        I think about this all the time. The trend towards personalization in media and software comes at the cost of a loss of a shared social experience we can use to relate to each other.
        iammjm 5mo ago
        yeah but do we really need some trash reality-TV for a "shared social experience"? most of TV's programming was garbage anyway and contributed to a lot of what was/is wrong with the society
- chubot 5mo ago
  Ha, that’s the thing that gets me too. Also people watching mashed up YouTube clip compilations - these seem obviously designed for addiction. The other thing is watching the videos in public with the tinny speakers blaring. Judging by reactions on the trains, this is socially acceptable to most people now ???
  - iammjm 5mo ago
    I find it really hard to relate to people who do that. I never want people to see/hear what I am doing on my phone or computer, especially if it's something dumb or time-wasting. And to broadcast that into the world in a public space?? its crazy how different people are
cgriswald 5mo ago
I think that if the pattern exists, it is strongly muted for GenX because everything we are seeing (and more) was virtually promised to be here “any day now” during the hay day of science fiction media. If anything, 2026 in the real world isn’t futuristic enough compared to what was “supposed” to have happened by now.
- _carbyau_ 5mo ago
  >hay day of science fiction media I played Shadowrun. I am both disappointed but mostly glad it is not happening according to that game universe history! I do want cool cybereyes though...
silvestrov 5mo ago
A lot of boomers thinks windmills are against the natural order and will end the world. Also solar parks are just the most ugly thing in the world. They must be banned.
- inglor_cz 5mo ago
  My experience is that some people (of all generations) react really strongly against anything that involves birth and family. IVF, gamete donation, surrogacy, gay families, various experiments with human embryos or artificial wombs, much or all of this is banned in many countries of the world mostly due to the "ick" factor. The smarter opponents tend to decorate their objections in the "we must be very, very careful" cloak, but if you dig deeper, you will find that it is indeed just a cloak in many cases and that the underlying root cause is "ick, this is against nature", and "really careful" means "erect impossibly high barriers by law". This even isn't subject to polarization and seems to be shared across the political board.
  - gkoz 5mo ago
    Could it be all the conservative propaganda that gets people prejudiced against things they're ignorant about and aren't impacted by?
    - inglor_cz 5mo ago
      IDK, but I have read a lot of objections from feminists as well. Where I live, the religious population is under 10 per cent, but complete atheists will argue like this as well. I suspect the "ick" factor is simply inherent here. Kids provoke instinctive protective/emotional reactions in a way that other phenomena don't. For example, it is quite obvious that Trump faces a lot more popular backlash due to his suspected connections with Epstein than over his actual threats to Denmark/Greenland and war with Iran.
      - gkoz 5mo ago
        Non-religious people are also susceptible to the FUD about supposedly or genuinely new things. Whatever innate ick there clearly is, it gets co-opted to demonize much wider ranges of things, and conversely can be suppressed like in the Epstein's circle's case. I don't find it convincing that the legislators passing reactionary prohibitions are just driven by a natural ick rather than particular agenda.
CPLX 5mo ago
I am GenX and also an avowed fan of Douglas Adams and that quote. I have to say that recently I’ve been coming to the opinion that making it pointless to perfect the craft of producing music and art is against the natural order of things. I know I’m just old and the kids will figure out a way to bend and warp the new tools but I don’t think it’s for me any more.
throwaway52348 5mo ago
When I was a child in the 80s, 2026 was in the FUTURE. The expectations I had are not yet met. I have not seen anything that is not just an evolution of what we already had. The only exception may be how the internet usage has changed the economy and the world in general. Maybe we are only allowed one or two major changes in our lifetimes? (maybe AI will be the last change) Don't get me wrong. The world has generally become a better place, and I would not want to go back in time. But we are so far from where we could have been. I am actually more afraid that we will revert because the rule based world order that we has created stability (at least in the west) seem to be at risk.
ljosifov 5mo ago
What we see and experience - it's all natural, it's the natural order. :-) When people claim something is un-natural, usually it's natural in that occurs in nature, only - they themselves find it objectionable. It's something they personally dislike, and would rather it not happen.
- dugidugout 5mo ago
  Drama is the moment a person discovers their most private feelings are not private at all, but historical forces passing through them.
conductr 5mo ago
You have to know to look around you, at your peers, and come to the conclusion that this generality is quite true even if you’re personal datum varies.

munificent 5mo ago

> I still haven't come across things that see against the natural order. So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. Every time I see someone doing that, I just absolutely cannot relate to what's going on in their head at all. I'm certainly not above watching some YouTube, but the complete mindlessness of it, they watch it goes on forever, and the utter stupidity of the videos. I feel like I'm watching zombies in an opium den. But billions of people are doing that shit every day, so what do I know?

delecti 5mo ago
I don't want to defend short-form video feeds too much, but "They aren't even picking which videos to watch" is overstating it. Essentially nobody behaves like: watch 100% of a video, swipe, watch 100%, swipe. The expected behavior is that you swipe away if you're not interested, which is often done within a fraction of a second. Accordingly, Tiktok's content selection algorithm heavily weighs watch time as a signal of interest in related content. That actually can create a bit of a perverse incentive; if you linger on a video long enough to report it (as in for a TOS violation) or to click the "show less like this", it can lead to being shown more videos like that. In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing. Watch a few seconds, next channel, watch a few seconds, next channel, oh this is interesting, sure I'll watch a "How It's Made" marathon.
- dylan604 5mo ago
  > In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing. I've been making the same comparison as well. As someone not watching the videos yet still hear the videos being played, the constant switching is very noticeable much like being the one in the room that didn't have the clicker in their hand. You're not in control of the constant switching which I think makes it even that much more annoying. Rather than just parking on the marathon, choosing to turn it off and do something else entirely is still my preferred "old man yells at clouds" option.
- qotgalaxy 5mo ago
  [dead]
torben-friis 5mo ago
>They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. As a teenager, I used to torrent content I liked and scoff at my parents generation for letting tv feed then slop :) It's hard to understand why TikTok is addictive from the outside, precisely because if you look at the app over someone's shoulder you'll see their tailored content, not yours. Give the algorithm a couple weeks and it WILL find the weird thing that gets you to check. Maybe you find someone restoring books relaxing, or like toy commercials from where you were a kid, or are attentive on news of potential pandemics out of fear. It will learn.
vjk800 5mo ago
> So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it. This is how TV broadcasts also work, though. You could even argue there's an algorithm behind TV broadcasts too - it's just a kinda poor human-run algorithm trying to maximize viewer numbers. Unlike many people, I still often watch TV broadcasts to relax for exactly this reason - there's no decision fatigue since I don't need to choose what to watch. Usually there's only one channel with something that's even remotely interesting and it's kind of an obvious choice.
- lccerina 5mo ago
  With the (somehow sadly) added value that the TV broadcast algorithm is kinda known by everyone (morning programs, prime time etc), and that if there wasn't nothing interesting to watch, we would just do something else.
  - carterschonwald 5mo ago
    yeah shared “did you this weeks X” is lame, but it was social glue for a long time.
    - munificent 5mo ago
      I think about this all the time. The trend towards personalization in media and software comes at the cost of a loss of a shared social experience we can use to relate to each other.
      - iammjm 5mo ago
        yeah but do we really need some trash reality-TV for a "shared social experience"? most of TV's programming was garbage anyway and contributed to a lot of what was/is wrong with the society
chubot 5mo ago
Ha, that’s the thing that gets me too. Also people watching mashed up YouTube clip compilations - these seem obviously designed for addiction. The other thing is watching the videos in public with the tinny speakers blaring. Judging by reactions on the trains, this is socially acceptable to most people now ???
- iammjm 5mo ago
  I find it really hard to relate to people who do that. I never want people to see/hear what I am doing on my phone or computer, especially if it's something dumb or time-wasting. And to broadcast that into the world in a public space?? its crazy how different people are

cgriswald 5mo ago

I think that if the pattern exists, it is strongly muted for GenX because everything we are seeing (and more) was virtually promised to be here “any day now” during the hay day of science fiction media. If anything, 2026 in the real world isn’t futuristic enough compared to what was “supposed” to have happened by now.

_carbyau_ 5mo ago
>hay day of science fiction media I played Shadowrun. I am both disappointed but mostly glad it is not happening according to that game universe history! I do want cool cybereyes though...

silvestrov 5mo ago

A lot of boomers thinks windmills are against the natural order and will end the world. Also solar parks are just the most ugly thing in the world. They must be banned.

inglor_cz 5mo ago
My experience is that some people (of all generations) react really strongly against anything that involves birth and family. IVF, gamete donation, surrogacy, gay families, various experiments with human embryos or artificial wombs, much or all of this is banned in many countries of the world mostly due to the "ick" factor. The smarter opponents tend to decorate their objections in the "we must be very, very careful" cloak, but if you dig deeper, you will find that it is indeed just a cloak in many cases and that the underlying root cause is "ick, this is against nature", and "really careful" means "erect impossibly high barriers by law". This even isn't subject to polarization and seems to be shared across the political board.
- gkoz 5mo ago
  Could it be all the conservative propaganda that gets people prejudiced against things they're ignorant about and aren't impacted by?
  - inglor_cz 5mo ago
    IDK, but I have read a lot of objections from feminists as well. Where I live, the religious population is under 10 per cent, but complete atheists will argue like this as well. I suspect the "ick" factor is simply inherent here. Kids provoke instinctive protective/emotional reactions in a way that other phenomena don't. For example, it is quite obvious that Trump faces a lot more popular backlash due to his suspected connections with Epstein than over his actual threats to Denmark/Greenland and war with Iran.
    - gkoz 5mo ago
      Non-religious people are also susceptible to the FUD about supposedly or genuinely new things. Whatever innate ick there clearly is, it gets co-opted to demonize much wider ranges of things, and conversely can be suppressed like in the Epstein's circle's case. I don't find it convincing that the legislators passing reactionary prohibitions are just driven by a natural ick rather than particular agenda.

CPLX 5mo ago

I am GenX and also an avowed fan of Douglas Adams and that quote. I have to say that recently I’ve been coming to the opinion that making it pointless to perfect the craft of producing music and art is against the natural order of things. I know I’m just old and the kids will figure out a way to bend and warp the new tools but I don’t think it’s for me any more.

throwaway52348 5mo ago

When I was a child in the 80s, 2026 was in the FUTURE. The expectations I had are not yet met. I have not seen anything that is not just an evolution of what we already had. The only exception may be how the internet usage has changed the economy and the world in general. Maybe we are only allowed one or two major changes in our lifetimes? (maybe AI will be the last change) Don't get me wrong. The world has generally become a better place, and I would not want to go back in time. But we are so far from where we could have been. I am actually more afraid that we will revert because the rule based world order that we has created stability (at least in the west) seem to be at risk.

ljosifov 5mo ago

What we see and experience - it's all natural, it's the natural order. :-) When people claim something is un-natural, usually it's natural in that occurs in nature, only - they themselves find it objectionable. It's something they personally dislike, and would rather it not happen.

dugidugout 5mo ago
Drama is the moment a person discovers their most private feelings are not private at all, but historical forces passing through them.

conductr 5mo ago

You have to know to look around you, at your peers, and come to the conclusion that this generality is quite true even if you’re personal datum varies.