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.
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...
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?
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Also solar parks are just the most ugly thing in the world. They must be banned.
https://www.metlink.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/FAQ6_2.pd...
It's the total CO2 amount in atmosphere that determines radiative forcing.
The IPCC summarized the current scientific consensus about radiative forcing changes as follows: "Human-caused radiative forcing of 2.72 W/m2 in 2019 relative to 1750 has warmed the climate system. This warming is mainly due to increased GHG concentrations, partly reduced by cooling due to increased aerosol concentrations"
All high-income countries already trend down in emissions.
Global emissions are rising because poorer countries that were basically almost "no emission"/capita in the past are still catching up (but that catch-up is less steep than in the past because green energy is available from the get-go).
Conclusions would be: Emission reductions in rich countries need to be aaccelerated, and helping poor countries peak at a lower level would probably be prudent (but good luck selling such policies to alt-right voters).
"Renewable are not helping" is not a sensible conclusion.
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.
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.