> it increasingly feels like there’s some kind of disconnect with the real world that’s hard to put my finger on
My take: echo chambers have become mainstream (ironically, aided by technology). Typically that's online for most people, but in SF, it's a physical echo chamber, too.
That echo chamber allows large numbers of people (coincidentally, the people shepherding a lot of the technology) to rationalize any position they come up with and fall into a semi-permanent state of cognitive dissonance ("of course my technological solution is the solution").
If other people are saying the same thing nearly everywhere you look, who's to say those who disagree are actually the correct ones?
> My take: echo chambers have become mainstream (ironically, aided by technology).
Technology can scale up small conveniences into major economic and quality of life wins.
But when it's tolerated, technology also ramps up seemingly small conflicts of interest into economic and society-degrading monsters.
Our legal intolerance for conflicts of interest as business models needs to go up a lot. No amount of strongly worded letters, uncomfortable senate interviews, or unplug-the-system theater, are going to discourage billionaires farming people's behavior, attention and psychology from continuing to farm people's behavior, attention and psychology.
My take: echo chambers have become mainstream (ironically, aided by technology). Typically that's online for most people, but in SF, it's a physical echo chamber, too.
That echo chamber allows large numbers of people (coincidentally, the people shepherding a lot of the technology) to rationalize any position they come up with and fall into a semi-permanent state of cognitive dissonance ("of course my technological solution is the solution").
If other people are saying the same thing nearly everywhere you look, who's to say those who disagree are actually the correct ones?