Pessimists Archive
@PessimistsArc
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Fear of new things in the past. Exploring pessimism through the ages. Curated by @louisanslow - Substack: https://t.co/ICDLE3Wrbm
Joined October 2015
When was the good old days of childhood? Not 147 years ago apparently! https://t.co/dhHwhVSTIJ
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The pessimists arc
Regardless of how old they are, people tend to think that things were better when they were young. As a result, you'd expect more negativity as the median age goes up and up.
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What's striking about these old moral panics about kids is just how much better, healthier, safer childhood got in the proceeding years In 1878 1 in 3 kids died before adulthood in US... the ones that made it were 80% literate, with access to more books, how was this a concern?!
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The pessimists arc
Regardless of how old they are, people tend to think that things were better when they were young. As a result, you'd expect more negativity as the median age goes up and up.
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We're all nostalgic idiots
Regardless of how old they are, people tend to think that things were better when they were young. As a result, you'd expect more negativity as the median age goes up and up.
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Growing up, TV was called the "boob tube." It was going to rot your brain. Wreck your eyesight. The programming was low art, ruining good art Now, we have a new screen to blame. And suddenly TV is fine. Here's a selection of worries people had about TV:
en.wikipedia.org
The phone is the most evil screen. The computer is somewhat evil but less so than the phone. The TV is benevolent.
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"OāBrien had the advantage of being able to shock his debating partner while he was strapped to a table, and then sending him to room 101 where he would be fitted with a cage filled with starving rats. With the benefit of 77 years since Orwell imagined his dystopia, and 41 years
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Nineteen Eighty-Four and Twenty Twenty-Five: A condensed version of my Orwell lecture from last night, just published in The Times. https://t.co/b5ZFsIMihZ
thetimes.com
Itās common to suggest the great dystopian novel was full of warnings that have largely come true. But the evidence shows otherwise
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My lecture was called "Nineteen Eighty-Four and Twenty Twenty-Five," and in it I looked at the data to see if Orwell's implied prophecy came to pass. (Taken literally, no.) A condensed version will appear in a UK paper tomorrow. (No room for my analysis on how, 77 years later, we
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In 1972 a Rockefeller funded study concluded: āCalifornia must slow its growth rate in the use of electricity if it is to meet the demands of the future"
The Rockefeller Foundation has released a report which concludes that nuclear could provide 30% of the electricity in developing countries by 2050, at a cost that is ~31% lower than that of an all-renewable grid. Article link in reply.
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A wonderful lecture by @sapinker on Orwellās 1984 and whether - as many feel - it predicted the world of 2025.
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Technology is removing the need for skill in art
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You sure about that buddy?
The phone is the most evil screen. The computer is somewhat evil but less so than the phone. The TV is benevolent.
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Because worry is driven by fear it is very vulnerable to hijack by self-interested populists. So many of the unfounded concerns we share originate from societal elites trying to preserve cultural, political or economic power.
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Good example of why the āFrankenstein Fallacyā is dangerous: We should fear human driven cars more than AI driven cars. We should fear the past & present more than the future. Modern sci-fi implores us to do the opposite. Via my April @Guardian article https://t.co/ksIpI90tOn
"Thereās a public health imperative to quickly expand the adoption of autonomous vehicles. More than 39,000 Americans died in motor vehicle crashes last year, more than homicide, plane crashes and natural disasters combined." Not surprisingly to a psychologist, properly
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Guillermo del Toro very publicly said he likes digital cameras bc the ānumbers donāt make senseā to pay humans to develop and process film. None of these people are intellectually honest.
Guillermo del Toro declares āf*ck AIā while accepting a #GothamAward for āFrankensteinā: āIād like to tell the rest of our extraordinary cast and our crew that the artistry of all of them shines on every single frame of this film that was willfully made by humans, for humans.
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I often encounter this strange idea: that large numbers of people are persuadable - but only by bad ideas.
New essay! Why does social media benefit populism? And if, like me, you're a small "l" liberal who opposes populism, what can be done about it? The essay has three parts. Part 1 argues that the main reason social media benefits populism is that it destroys elite gatekeeping,
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What a scam!
Wild how confused people were that Super Mario World needed a whole new SNES. Early ā90s chaos.
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People take the best of yesterday and compare it to the average/below average of today and present it as evidence of a decline from the good old days. This fallacy needs a name. The Apex-Average Fallacy?
This NYT article on the "golden age" of air travel is an amazing example of an unthinking journalist failing to make contact with reality. The narrative: air travel used to be much better, but less affordable. 1/
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