Mastodawn

PierreC Jan 9, 2023

Douglas Adams' three rules of technology are great examples of normalization of deviance:

1/ Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.

2/ Anything that's invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.

3/ Anything invented after you've turned thirty-five is against the natural order of things.

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John Gordon Jan 9, 2023

@pkedrosky

The last is extreme for comic effect, but it's quite true that it's hard to make a career out of something invented when one is 40+ outside of a leadership type role (CEO, etc). Employers will want a younger person.

One of the problems with adopting new things over, say, 60, is that they usually have functional regressions over established habits.

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Paul Kedrosky Jan 9, 2023

@jgordon Yes, obviously an extreme statement for comic effect, but the point stands in a general sense, as you say..

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Kevin Marks Jan 9, 2023

@pkedrosky he also said “We are natural villagers. For most of mankind’s history we have lived in very small communities in which we knew everybody and everybody knew us. But gradually there grew to be far too many of us, and our communities became too large and disparate for us to be able to feel a part of them, and our technologies were unequal to the task of drawing us together. But that is changing.” https://douglasadams.com/dna/19990901-00-a.html

DNA/How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Internet

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Paul Kedrosky Jan 9, 2023

@KevinMarks Hi Kevin. Yes, I recall that one as well, which is apt. As biologist Paul Ehrlich said in an interview once, we are adapting to this situation, but it will likely take a thousand years or so, which we may or may not have.