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Do you refuse to use a calculator or spreadsheet, because doing long hand division helps you exercise your mental muscle? Do you refuse to use a database, because it will make your memory weaker? Or, do you refuse to use a car, because it makes you less able to walk when the car is unavailable? No. Because the car empowers you to do something that, at the very least, takes a lot longer on foot.

People have worried with every single new technology that it will enfeeble the masses, rather than empower them, and yet in the end, we usually find ourselves better off.

by wongarsu1 hours ago|

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The car seems like a great example of a technology with a lot of problematic side effects. Places that had a more measured adoption ended up a lot better than those that replaced all public transit with cars and routinely demolished neighborhoods to make space for bigger highways

Cars are an essential part of modern life, but the sweetspot for car adoption isn't on either of the extremes

by mayukh1 hours ago|

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Tragedy of the commons perhaps ? Good for the individual, bad for society and finding solutions that can balance both

by wongarsu57 minutes ago|

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I'd call it bad on both levels. The costs imposed by car infrastructure are a tragedy of the commons. But even if you were the only person with a modern car you'd still be hit with the social effects of traveling in the isolation of your private metal box and the health effects of walking or biking less

On the other hand there are also big positives on both the societal and individual level. That's where the balance comes in. You want some individual travel and part of your logistics to run on cars, but not all of it. And probably a lot less of it than what most people in the 60s to 90s thought

by bluefirebrand1 hours ago|

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> Do you refuse to use a calculator or spreadsheet, because doing long hand division helps you exercise your mental muscle

Yeah when I was learning in school we weren't allowed electronics for division, and I think I absolutely would be dumber if I had never done that

> People have worried with every single new technology that it will enfeeble the masses, rather than empower them, and yet in the end, we usually find ourselves better off.

If you're posting this from America, you're living in a society that is fatter than ever thanks to cars. So there's surely some nuance here, not every technology upgrade is strictly better with no downsides