> The cure lies in balance and self-awareness. Ask yourself if you seek useful understanding, or another intellectual hit. Real progress happens when you apply discovery to problems that matter.
Rather naïve, I'm afraid to say. Because the system does not allow people to work on problems "that matter". The entire system is geared to give people intellectual hits in return for furthering the system, and very little good can come out of modern research institutions for the average researcher (or should I say, player of the game). There are exceptions and small areas that are different, but the vast majority of research fields are like this.
Balance is really not possible within modern technological society, at least if your career is research. Grants and private funding only go towards that which is ultimately profitable, not that which genuinely solves any problem. Even the vast majority of innovations these days are mainly ways to create new instances of the prisoner's dilemma so that profit can be extracted from the move towards the sub-optimal.
In the title of another one of your posts, you say that research can be a creative act. That is actually true, but again, the system distills all of that good stuff, throws away the experience and the part that helps you improve yourself, and uses it for destruction.
Thanks for the thoughtful response. You’re right to question the system. Most institutions are set up to reward profit, not meaning. That makes it hard, sometimes impossible, for researchers to focus on what truly matters.
Still, I believe there are small spaces outside that system where real work can happen. Open source projects, independent research, and community-led initiatives often escape the worst of these constraints.
In the AI era, and with the democratization of tools and technology, the kid in his bedroom hacking away has a larger chance for impact than ever before.
You’re right that research gets stripped of its creative and personal value when it’s fed into the system. The key may be to protect that value by staying aware of why we’re doing the work, and finding or building spaces where it can stay alive.
Again, thanks for taking time out for a kind reply :)
You are right that there are still spaces. But I think you are wrong when you say that democratization of tools will help anything. Because over time, the tools become part of the ecosystem and make things worse. The only problems the kid in their bedroom will solve is innovating to make more technology, which is fundamentally destructive. I mean, which sort of problems are supposed to be solved? None of our major problems are even technological any more. Climate change is about consumption, not about a technical problem. And we've solved most of the common diseases, and I'd argue that medical advances nowadays can even be more detrimental than helpful, because they are likely to allow the richest to live longer.
The technology only exists to further capitalism now. What is AI used for? Advertising, and consuming even larger amounts of energy. AI is a net detriment and acts as a uniformizer to make individuals less important, which just increases hopelessness amongst the general population. It is the entire scientific and engineering community that is the problem, and it's rotten to the core.
> The cure lies in balance and self-awareness. Ask yourself if you seek useful understanding, or another intellectual hit. Real progress happens when you apply discovery to problems that matter.
Rather naïve, I'm afraid to say. Because the system does not allow people to work on problems "that matter". The entire system is geared to give people intellectual hits in return for furthering the system, and very little good can come out of modern research institutions for the average researcher (or should I say, player of the game). There are exceptions and small areas that are different, but the vast majority of research fields are like this.
Balance is really not possible within modern technological society, at least if your career is research. Grants and private funding only go towards that which is ultimately profitable, not that which genuinely solves any problem. Even the vast majority of innovations these days are mainly ways to create new instances of the prisoner's dilemma so that profit can be extracted from the move towards the sub-optimal.
In the title of another one of your posts, you say that research can be a creative act. That is actually true, but again, the system distills all of that good stuff, throws away the experience and the part that helps you improve yourself, and uses it for destruction.
Thanks for the thoughtful response. You’re right to question the system. Most institutions are set up to reward profit, not meaning. That makes it hard, sometimes impossible, for researchers to focus on what truly matters.
Still, I believe there are small spaces outside that system where real work can happen. Open source projects, independent research, and community-led initiatives often escape the worst of these constraints.
In the AI era, and with the democratization of tools and technology, the kid in his bedroom hacking away has a larger chance for impact than ever before.
You’re right that research gets stripped of its creative and personal value when it’s fed into the system. The key may be to protect that value by staying aware of why we’re doing the work, and finding or building spaces where it can stay alive.
Again, thanks for taking time out for a kind reply :)
You are right that there are still spaces. But I think you are wrong when you say that democratization of tools will help anything. Because over time, the tools become part of the ecosystem and make things worse. The only problems the kid in their bedroom will solve is innovating to make more technology, which is fundamentally destructive. I mean, which sort of problems are supposed to be solved? None of our major problems are even technological any more. Climate change is about consumption, not about a technical problem. And we've solved most of the common diseases, and I'd argue that medical advances nowadays can even be more detrimental than helpful, because they are likely to allow the richest to live longer.
The technology only exists to further capitalism now. What is AI used for? Advertising, and consuming even larger amounts of energy. AI is a net detriment and acts as a uniformizer to make individuals less important, which just increases hopelessness amongst the general population. It is the entire scientific and engineering community that is the problem, and it's rotten to the core.