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Hedonic adaptation is a very good thing. Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization. Open-ended progress is the only chance civilizati

Hedonic adaptation is a very good thing. Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization. Open-ended progress is the only chance civilization has to survive (and even that's not a guarantee). There is an infinite sequence of future problems to be solved. Each time you solve a problem, you don't reduce the total number of future problems, but you are left with one or more better problems than you had before. It's a very good thing that, as soon as you get accustomed to having air conditioning, you start looking for the next problem to fix.

jjice 2mo ago
I've never thought about hedonic adaptation as a positive, but that's a good point that it has some real value in the case of societal adaptations and driving further innovation. We usually view it through the lens of an individual over-adapting to niceties that end up being a drain on their lives long term somehow.
fcarraldo 2mo ago
We are solving problems, but we're also creating more problems with those solutions. Greenhouse gases, global warming, oil spills, wars over resources, straining power grids, species extinction, worsening mental health, worsening social cohesion, widening inequality. All are the result of technological progress within our systems of government. Hedonic adaptation prevents us from asking "is this worth the downsides, or should we go back to how it was?"
- tshaddox 2mo ago
  It's possible to mistakenly think you've solved a problem when you've actually made the situation worse, of course, and that's just plainly a bad thing. It's important to be able to identify specific things which we thought were solutions but were actually new worse problems, and roll them back if possible. [0] But that's not really what the hedonic treadmill refers to! The hedonic treadmill is referring to the fact that, when a problem is solved, the level of pleasure or happiness individuals experience reportedly quickly returns to the pre-solution baseline. [0] Crucially, this must not be conflated with advocating a general slowdown or pause on attempts at progress. That's the civilizational death sentence.
  - breuleux 2mo ago
    I feel that oftentimes our biggest problems come with the irresponsible scaling up of certain solutions, at which point it is usually too late to roll back because we have come to depend on them. There has to be some time between the moment we invent something great and the moment we make trillions of the thing and realize, oh, maybe that's a problem. But we don't pace ourselves. And if we keep plowing ahead heedlessly, we may very well end up burning everything and collapsing our entire civilization. It's a dangerous game to keep betting on the future without actually ever properly planning anything at all.
    - tshaddox 2mo ago
      I don't think anything like a "general speed limit applied to experimentation" makes sense. In general we should move as fast as possible. When there's a specific explanation why a specific experiment should move slowly (or even be prohibited), I respect that, but the explanation can't just be "we don't know all the bad things that might happen as a result of this experiment." That's the precautionary principle, which I staunchly oppose.
      - breuleux 2mo ago
        I'm describing a speed limit applied to production, not experimentation. We can progress science, knowledge and technology all we want without necessarily committing every resource we can find to producing ten times more stuff than we need. Moving too quickly in terms of production can be detrimental to progress: first movers can and often do take over entire markets, leaving no room for the often better-designed second or third movers to shine. Moving more slowly allows for better maneuvering and making sure the best systems and technology can prevail. And it allows us to see problems coming before they hit us. I think we could have made a utopia purely from fossil fuels if we had been more careful and restrained using them. In my view, the fact that we couldn't do that is a major indictment of our process.
        nradov 2mo ago
        Nah. Rapid, unconstrained growth in the early production and use of fossil fuels was one of the greatest factors ever in saving lives and improving quality of life worldwide. Stopping that would have condemned millions to poverty, darkness, and death. And it's a moot point anyway because there was no way to slow down even if some people wanted to.
andai 2mo ago
>Hedonic adaptation is a very good thing. Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization. Actually, it's the other way around. Thanks to technology, civilization has become unnecessary. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS2N4VWIbCI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS2N4VWIbCI “Visiting,” says a French writer, “forms the cord which binds society together, and it is so firmly tied, that were the knot severed, society would perish.” https://www.gutenberg.org/files/39293/39293-h/39293-h.htm#CHAPTER_V https://www.gutenberg.org/files/39293/39293-h/39293-h.htm#CH...
ifyoubuildit 2mo ago
> Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization Why?
- nradov 2mo ago
  Stasis leads to increasing entropy and a sclerotic inability to adapt to changing circumstances. You're either growing or dying: there is no middle ground.

jjice 2mo ago

I've never thought about hedonic adaptation as a positive, but that's a good point that it has some real value in the case of societal adaptations and driving further innovation. We usually view it through the lens of an individual over-adapting to niceties that end up being a drain on their lives long term somehow.

fcarraldo 2mo ago

We are solving problems, but we're also creating more problems with those solutions. Greenhouse gases, global warming, oil spills, wars over resources, straining power grids, species extinction, worsening mental health, worsening social cohesion, widening inequality. All are the result of technological progress within our systems of government. Hedonic adaptation prevents us from asking "is this worth the downsides, or should we go back to how it was?"

tshaddox 2mo ago
It's possible to mistakenly think you've solved a problem when you've actually made the situation worse, of course, and that's just plainly a bad thing. It's important to be able to identify specific things which we thought were solutions but were actually new worse problems, and roll them back if possible. [0] But that's not really what the hedonic treadmill refers to! The hedonic treadmill is referring to the fact that, when a problem is solved, the level of pleasure or happiness individuals experience reportedly quickly returns to the pre-solution baseline. [0] Crucially, this must not be conflated with advocating a general slowdown or pause on attempts at progress. That's the civilizational death sentence.
- breuleux 2mo ago
  I feel that oftentimes our biggest problems come with the irresponsible scaling up of certain solutions, at which point it is usually too late to roll back because we have come to depend on them. There has to be some time between the moment we invent something great and the moment we make trillions of the thing and realize, oh, maybe that's a problem. But we don't pace ourselves. And if we keep plowing ahead heedlessly, we may very well end up burning everything and collapsing our entire civilization. It's a dangerous game to keep betting on the future without actually ever properly planning anything at all.
  - tshaddox 2mo ago
    I don't think anything like a "general speed limit applied to experimentation" makes sense. In general we should move as fast as possible. When there's a specific explanation why a specific experiment should move slowly (or even be prohibited), I respect that, but the explanation can't just be "we don't know all the bad things that might happen as a result of this experiment." That's the precautionary principle, which I staunchly oppose.
    - breuleux 2mo ago
      I'm describing a speed limit applied to production, not experimentation. We can progress science, knowledge and technology all we want without necessarily committing every resource we can find to producing ten times more stuff than we need. Moving too quickly in terms of production can be detrimental to progress: first movers can and often do take over entire markets, leaving no room for the often better-designed second or third movers to shine. Moving more slowly allows for better maneuvering and making sure the best systems and technology can prevail. And it allows us to see problems coming before they hit us. I think we could have made a utopia purely from fossil fuels if we had been more careful and restrained using them. In my view, the fact that we couldn't do that is a major indictment of our process.
      - nradov 2mo ago
        Nah. Rapid, unconstrained growth in the early production and use of fossil fuels was one of the greatest factors ever in saving lives and improving quality of life worldwide. Stopping that would have condemned millions to poverty, darkness, and death. And it's a moot point anyway because there was no way to slow down even if some people wanted to.

andai 2mo ago

>Hedonic adaptation is a very good thing. Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization. Actually, it's the other way around. Thanks to technology, civilization has become unnecessary. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS2N4VWIbCI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS2N4VWIbCI “Visiting,” says a French writer, “forms the cord which binds society together, and it is so firmly tied, that were the knot severed, society would perish.” https://www.gutenberg.org/files/39293/39293-h/39293-h.htm#CHAPTER_V https://www.gutenberg.org/files/39293/39293-h/39293-h.htm#CH...

ifyoubuildit 2mo ago

> Culture or technological stasis is a death sentence for civilization Why?

nradov 2mo ago
Stasis leads to increasing entropy and a sclerotic inability to adapt to changing circumstances. You're either growing or dying: there is no middle ground.