4 ms·

It seems to me that the Amish approach starts with prejudice and outright rejection and leaves no scope for experimentation and trial dry runs of new tech. The

by avz 12y ago

It seems to me that the Amish approach starts with prejudice and outright rejection and leaves no scope for experimentation and trial dry runs of new tech. The author of the article urges reflection, but completely misses the importance of experimentation.

gumby 12y ago
> It seems to me that the Amish approach starts with prejudice and outright rejection This statement seems extraordinary and contrary to their practice. They simply see everything through the lens of their extremist faith. I think they are nuts but I respect their approach. For example, they often do have telephones. Many villages have one phone in a phone booth in the middle of the town. So everyone can see you use it. You can't hang out and impersonally communicate -- instead you stop by and visit in person. But if they need an ambulance, or to do a business deal with someone outside their community, they can. They also will use some power tools, though they don't want them to be electric. I don't quite understand the reasoning, but whatever. Apparently there was a lot of experimentation, and not everybody chose the same solution. They also let their teen agers leave the community and get drunk crash cars etc. Amazingly to me a majority decide to go back into the fold. Every adult has made a conscious choice to be observant. In a small way many of use use the same process (though hopefully from a different starting point and with different parameters). I love my MBP but the app I run most is Emacs. I know what an IDE is but don't see the point. I laugh when I see reviews of iOS apps that are described as "visually stunning" -- typically they have a low information density and slow interface, which makes them unpleasant to me. This doesn't make me a luddite nor does it make IDE (for instance) fans nitwits -- we simply find different local optima in the possibility space.
- MichaelGG 12y ago
  They let their teens, with no education or real introduction, jump into all sorts of problems. Then they threaten complete shunning from the community, totally cutting them off from everyone they know. How is it surprising people end up coming back under those conditions? If your first and only introduction to the Internet was just 4chan/b/, you might conclude the whole place is just for cp, gore, and other nonsense. The Amish approach is harmful, unfair, essentiality wicked, to force children into such things. Unfortunately, I'm unaware of a principled alternative.

by avz 12y ago

gumby 12y ago

> It seems to me that the Amish approach starts with prejudice and outright rejection This statement seems extraordinary and contrary to their practice. They simply see everything through the lens of their extremist faith. I think they are nuts but I respect their approach. For example, they often do have telephones. Many villages have one phone in a phone booth in the middle of the town. So everyone can see you use it. You can't hang out and impersonally communicate -- instead you stop by and visit in person. But if they need an ambulance, or to do a business deal with someone outside their community, they can. They also will use some power tools, though they don't want them to be electric. I don't quite understand the reasoning, but whatever. Apparently there was a lot of experimentation, and not everybody chose the same solution. They also let their teen agers leave the community and get drunk crash cars etc. Amazingly to me a majority decide to go back into the fold. Every adult has made a conscious choice to be observant. In a small way many of use use the same process (though hopefully from a different starting point and with different parameters). I love my MBP but the app I run most is Emacs. I know what an IDE is but don't see the point. I laugh when I see reviews of iOS apps that are described as "visually stunning" -- typically they have a low information density and slow interface, which makes them unpleasant to me. This doesn't make me a luddite nor does it make IDE (for instance) fans nitwits -- we simply find different local optima in the possibility space.

MichaelGG 12y ago
They let their teens, with no education or real introduction, jump into all sorts of problems. Then they threaten complete shunning from the community, totally cutting them off from everyone they know. How is it surprising people end up coming back under those conditions? If your first and only introduction to the Internet was just 4chan/b/, you might conclude the whole place is just for cp, gore, and other nonsense. The Amish approach is harmful, unfair, essentiality wicked, to force children into such things. Unfortunately, I'm unaware of a principled alternative.