Things Your Grandkids Wont Believe

“Time keeps on slippin into the future” ~ Steve Miller

Those lyrics pops into my head more often these days. It feels like it’s slipping faster and faster. Just look around. In the past year we’ve seen real-time translating headphones, glasses with built in heads-up display, fleets of driverless taxis, and literal telepathy hit the market.

You realize that tech like this was unfathomable magic witchcraft for all of human history until like the last few months. It’s crazy how fast we become desensitized to it all. It’ll make your brain mushy if you’re not careful.

Now I am all for tech accelerationism. But it’s hard not to be a bit nostalgic about what once was. As I think back on some of the tech that’s come out in my lifetime (27), I think about all of the little things that have gone extinct, good and bad.

Things that used to be a part of every day life, your grand kids won’t believe you when you tell them. Some of the things that I vividly remember as once a big part of my life have disappeared out from under my nose the past few years:

• Sitting on bus without phone/airpods

• Stackoverflowing how to write VBA code

• Facebook feeds but it’s just people from my school

• Using just my raw brain to write paper/blog/email

• Seeing the 2nd+ page of Google Search

• Late fees on movie rentals from Family Video

• Buying songs for $0.99 on iTunes

• Talking to a human when I call tech support

• Memorizing directions to/from anywhere

• Using cash (most places wont even let you now)

Some are habits, some are just new versions of the old thing. Some I love, some parts of it I don’t care for - it feels like all are moving toward this hyper-dopamine culture wherein nobody is allowed to face boredom ever again.

Of course this is just the start of the brave new world. Look ahead where the ball is moving and it’s not hard to imagine some of the things that will no longer exist in a few more years:

• Having to learn another language

• Driving your own car down the road

• Physical keys for your house/car

• Typing on a keyboard with your fingers

• Manually scheduling meetings/taking notes

• 4-year colleges for most jobs

There are some more exciting ones I can’t think of at the moment, but it’s not the point. The point that strikes me most is the acceleration itself. The gap between unfathomable magic witchcraft and boring everyday tool keeps shrinking. Surely this has some effect on our ability to connect/perceive/experience in the world?

Your grandparents had decades to adjust to TVs, cars, telephones. Now you get a few years, maybe a few months to wrap your head around AI that can think for you, cars that can drive for you, computers that can read your mind. If you were born before it started you might feel like catching up is hopeless (I know I sometimes do)

And while much of it’s for the better, I can’t help but hope that we might be able to hang onto some of the low-tech sentimental interpersonal thing that used to anchor a lot of connection, perception, experience.

This video popped on my timeline recently. I think about moments like this. Where will they go in the accelerational tech future?

Peace,
Ramsey