4 ms·

> My point is that the tool which was meant to augment one particular aspect of life, has metastasized into being a cancer on many other aspects of our lives, a

> My point is that the tool which was meant to augment one particular aspect of life, has metastasized into being a cancer on many other aspects of our lives, and that has downstream consequences on society as a whole. This is true of all important tools in history. From computers, to electricity, cars, steam, even agriculture. They reshape society and its practices. This has been documented multiple times. One I can remember on top of my head, but is not limited to, is historical materialism. From an misesian perspective, this seems fairly obvious: 1. smartphones are extremely useful (being miniature computers and all); 2. people tend to optimize their actions with the best tools available (i.e. smartphones in this case); 3. people will see others using smartphone increasing and will try to leverage that for their own goals, thus further adopting smartphones (even if indirectly); 4. the economy is the sum of human action, so this progressive adoption changes the economy and the culture. > A problem that impacts people is a problem that deserves attention, especially if an absolute terms the number of people impacted are in the tens/hundreds of millions. The real issue with your post is that you seem to be trying to fix smartphones addiction by getting rid of phones, ignoring the benefits they brought and the previous problems they fixed. Also, every problem impacts people.

jplusequalt 4mo ago
>The real issue with your post is that you seem to be trying to fix smartphones addiction by getting rid of phones, ignoring the benefits they brought and the previous problems they fixed. No, my post is decidedly not that. I'm saying maybe we should stop and think about the consequences and plan accordingly.
- bit-anarchist 4mo ago
  My bad, then. If I may suggest something, give a small acknowledgement and avoid words such as "cancer", which is pretty loaded. Still, people (as in most individuals in the economy) can't simply be stopped, even less so to plan, specially in a free system such as enjoyed by most of the west. That requires a high degree of coordination and coersion that I think only Cuba and NK are currently capable of, slightly. Otherwise, people will just do their own thing, leading to a technological revolution again, given the material means. A more practical approach is to continuously nudge the direction of change towards a better direction, constantly reevaluating approach, but avoiding having to stop everyone else.
aleph_minus_one 4mo ago
> 1. smartphones are extremely useful (being miniature computers and all); Whether they are extremely useful or just some tool that has its uses depends a lot on your lifestyle. > 2. people tend to optimize their actions with the best tools available (i.e. smartphones in this case); What "best (tools)" means for you, depends a lot on your values. For example, if you value privacy, mobile phones and in particular smartphones are incredibly bad tool choices.
- bit-anarchist 4mo ago
  > Whether they are extremely useful or just some tool that has its uses depends a lot on your lifestyle. The "useful" then didn't refer to the individual value judgments of all individuals, but the presence of material affordances that a sufficiently big mass of people would find useful. I admit this was not the best wording, but I forgot (and can't find it right now) the formal term that encapsulates the material qualities that others may see usefulness. > What "best (tools)" means for you, depends a lot on your values. For example, if you value privacy, mobile phones and in particular smartphones are incredibly bad tool choices. Agreed, but this misses the point. I didn't mean to imply that the value of things are objective (this is a misesian perspective, SToV is implied), but that some people would find smartphones useful, adopting themselves, and that would further expand the opportunities smartphones are useful to others, creating a positive feedback loop.

jplusequalt 4mo ago

>The real issue with your post is that you seem to be trying to fix smartphones addiction by getting rid of phones, ignoring the benefits they brought and the previous problems they fixed. No, my post is decidedly not that. I'm saying maybe we should stop and think about the consequences and plan accordingly.

bit-anarchist 4mo ago
My bad, then. If I may suggest something, give a small acknowledgement and avoid words such as "cancer", which is pretty loaded. Still, people (as in most individuals in the economy) can't simply be stopped, even less so to plan, specially in a free system such as enjoyed by most of the west. That requires a high degree of coordination and coersion that I think only Cuba and NK are currently capable of, slightly. Otherwise, people will just do their own thing, leading to a technological revolution again, given the material means. A more practical approach is to continuously nudge the direction of change towards a better direction, constantly reevaluating approach, but avoiding having to stop everyone else.

aleph_minus_one 4mo ago

> 1. smartphones are extremely useful (being miniature computers and all); Whether they are extremely useful or just some tool that has its uses depends a lot on your lifestyle. > 2. people tend to optimize their actions with the best tools available (i.e. smartphones in this case); What "best (tools)" means for you, depends a lot on your values. For example, if you value privacy, mobile phones and in particular smartphones are incredibly bad tool choices.

bit-anarchist 4mo ago
> Whether they are extremely useful or just some tool that has its uses depends a lot on your lifestyle. The "useful" then didn't refer to the individual value judgments of all individuals, but the presence of material affordances that a sufficiently big mass of people would find useful. I admit this was not the best wording, but I forgot (and can't find it right now) the formal term that encapsulates the material qualities that others may see usefulness. > What "best (tools)" means for you, depends a lot on your values. For example, if you value privacy, mobile phones and in particular smartphones are incredibly bad tool choices. Agreed, but this misses the point. I didn't mean to imply that the value of things are objective (this is a misesian perspective, SToV is implied), but that some people would find smartphones useful, adopting themselves, and that would further expand the opportunities smartphones are useful to others, creating a positive feedback loop.