Ask HN: Are we becoming more misanthropic?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35604142

by graypegg • 3 years ago

2 4 3 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I saw a comment today on here today that’s stuck in my mind a bit. (I don’t mean to single this person out, it’s just what got me thinking today, and I didn’t want to provide the content without a link to the context)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35601525

Are we becoming more misanthropic? I’ve noticed that this kind of inanimate verbiage is becoming more common. “Organics” here but also people calling others “NPCs” or just the general fatalist point of view on climate change being almost completely uncontroversial among people I know. (“we should just give up, humans are evil anyway”)

I’m sure there’s always been periods of time in history where everything just looks bleak, but there’s people who are forming their opinions right now that haven’t lived without the anxiety of multiple existential disasters encroaching on the existence of their own species.

andrewclunn• 3 years ago

The cure for bigotry is misanthropy. Once you hate everyone in general, there's little reason to hate any particular sort of person specifically.

version_five• 3 years ago

I read the comment you had linked earlier today and I had no idea what it meant. Even with your explanation I don't really understand it. I thought of it more as just an incomprehensible rant than representative of anything (how misanthropic of me?)

Anyway, I'd guess its like the "HN is becoming reddit" trope, you can always find evidence but the distribution never really shifts.

graypegg• 3 years ago

Yeah the grammar is off on the comment. I’m sorry about that, but from what I can understand, they saw the joke-y advertisement in the parent thread that’s poking fun at AI generated images looking weird, and we’re concerned that this is “training people to produce art that looks like AI art”.

That argument aside, it just struck me as depressing to call people “organic neural networks”.

And you’re right, maybe it just feels like a change in culture here. I wouldn’t say anything like this feels like Reddit, but I’ve seen those comments too.

proc0• 3 years ago

Those examples are all different controversial issues including politics. We're definitely in a very polarized era. I would attribute this to the change in technology being much faster than generational changes in society, and also the features of the new tech like social media being a global broadcast channel for anyone. Personally I don't mind a little misanthropy because from certain perspectives humans are very silly creatures and most can't fathom to reflect on it for very long. Most people just follow the herd, and so align with their opinions and defend them like the world depends on it. Feelings dominate the minds of most and dictate their identities. There is something like a "meaning crisis" (as it has been called) making people latch on to beliefs that were previously the domain of religions. In my opinion, as AI gets better it will offer a solution to much of this by being an entity without feelings that is also competent and can be used to mediate human conflict. AI might just be a new paradigm for conflict resolution (although probably not with the current tech).

Ask HN: Are we becoming more misanthropic?

Related Stories