His new book The Anxious Generation dives into the data that shows it. Adolescent mental health took a nosedive in the early 2010s: Smartphone world.
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Arthur Brooks, former president of the American Enterprise Institute, writes a column at The Atlantic on the vast topic of happiness. His remarks are consistently thoughtful, encouraging, and oftentimes convicting, particularly with his latest post, which addresses loneliness. Over half of Americans think no one knows them very well, Brooks says in his essay. Men in America are very unlikely to develop new friendships after age thirty. Marriage and birth rates are falling, and in general, our modern world simply isn’t well suited for deep and abiding friendships. Brooks refers to this as the “Poe syndrome.” The 19th century poet Edgar Allen Poe was a recluse, and preferred to spend his days alone and uninterrupted. The introverts in the room Read More ›
It’s a strong sign that political figures are starting to realize the negative effects of social media on young people.
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Substack very well could the future of independent writing. As mainstream journalism shrinks, we could see Substack grow even more.
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Tech lords often vacillate between hype and doom, and Musk, who signed a petition to curb AI research until its effects are known, falls into that tendency, too.
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Altman said her voice could be “comforting” to people. She declined at the time, and so was naturally surprised to find that the new program, which was just released, sounded eerily similar to her own voice.
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Could AI explicate aspects of my personality, package it, and sell it to the other representative bots in the dating pool? Sure, but where is the humanity?
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At the end of the day, I had to examine the real reasons I had an iPhone, and realized most of them were connected to distraction and entertainment.
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The iconic comedian and author Jerry Seinfeld gave the commencement speech to the class of 2024 at Duke University; as a supporter of the state of Israel, dozens of students walked out of the ceremony, chanting “free Palestine” while the larger crowds in the stadium counteracted by chanting “Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!” Seinfeld went on to give a wise, insightful, and of course, hilarious speech about hard work, family, and using one’s privilege to benefit the world. He also had some comedic remarks on artificial intelligence, and what the hype over large language models unfortunately says about modern American culture. “AI is the most embarrassing thing we’ve invented during man’s timeline on earth,” said Seinfeld. “This seems to be the justification Read More ›
The film, in keeping with the previous three in the series, is smart, exciting, and provocative. It forces the viewer to confront what it really means to be human.
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Yesterday, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared the brand-new preview of the “thinnest iPad” to date, the iPad Pro, praising its portability and capacity. Capitalizing on the “thin” aspect, the promo commercial, titled “Crush!” has been turning heads and could also be accused of crushing the human spirit. The commercial plays to the song “All I Need is You” by Sonny & Cher, opening up with a metronome and a record player. Then, the scene broadens out to show a platform in the middle of a room piled with an array of gadgets and knickknacks, like a drum set, cans of paint, a trumpet, piano, bust of a Greco-Roman figure, a globe, chess set, and other goods that the mind naturally Read More ›
The place of the human writer in our increasingly automated world has been a point of debate for years, even before the advent of ChatGPT.
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A young writer, herself a member of Gen Z, has dared to point out the obvious about social media. Sure, it’s verifiably making us sad and anxious, but it goes beyond that: it’s turning us into bad people. Freya India, a columnist at Quillette and a new contributor to Jonathan Haidt’s Substack After Babel, notes that while it’s important to talk about social media and mental health, it’s just as vital to talk about what this stuff is doing to our character. She writes, Our loss of empathy, our lack of regard for others, our neurotic obsession with our own image — it’s taking a toll. Maybe subconsciously. But I think deep down we know it. We know when people are using Read More ›
Marks’ views on AI are valuable contributions to the current discourse on the topic, so it’s wonderful his book is making a splash with some big names.
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Andy Crouch is a man who wants to evade the algorithm, so he doesn’t post much on X, but when he does, it’s generally an insightful nugget meant to be noted and digested. Crouch, a tech critic and a partner at Praxis Labs, doesn’t think AI will do all the wild stuff some of the futurists claim, but he does believe a belief in AI’s potential outlandish capacities, like consciousness, could be harmful. He posted on X, The analogy with magic is one Crouch has employed before in his extrapolations of technology. His thoughts echo economist Gary Smith’s frequent musings on this subject. The real danger of AI is not that it will become smarter than humans, but that we Read More ›
Catholic Answers is a “media ministry that serves Christ by explaining and defending the Catholic faith,” according to their description on X. For Catholic observers, it serves as a good resource for deepening one’s faith and finding clarification on certain Catholic doctrines. However, the site recently introduced a controversial new member to the team: Father Justin, a chatbot “priest” designed to help answer people’s questions about Catholicism. In defense of this AI app, Catholic Answers said, As a leading Catholic apostolate, Catholic Answers is committed to leveraging the latest technologies to advance its mission of explaining and defending the Catholic faith. The Father Justin app is the latest example of this commitment, providing a new and appealing way for searchers Read More ›
Joe Rogan recently sat down with Tucker Carlson to have an often-bizarre conversation that involved everything from UFOs to evolution to saunas. Rogan’s comments on artificial intelligence, however, were some of the most provocative of the exchange, and reflected a sentiment common among futurists and transhumanists: AI could become a life form, evolve, and replace the human race. Rogan situates his views by noting that only humans think humans are important. In the grand scheme of the cosmos, human life is inconsequential. He went on to note that AI could become “God,” and evolve to a certain point where it would basically know everything there is to know. The question is: why would anyone want that, and why should that Read More ›
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s new book The Anxious Generation topped the New York Times bestsellers’ chart two weeks in a row, and has been stirring up a lot of commentary in the meantime. Haidt’s basic thesis is that we have drastically overprotected children in the real world and woefully under-protected them in the virtual world. A new video helpfully lines out this argument, and shows why today’s generation, more than the Millennials who preceded them, struggle so intensely with anxiety, depression, and loneliness. In a recent interview, author and public intellectual Andy Crouch said that while he doesn’t know if it can be backed up neurologically, there is something about the “glow” of screens that wakens something primordial in the Read More ›
Articles and studies abound on the viability of remote work, particularly following the mass transformation of the white-collar workplace after 2020. While millennials and Gen-Z workers, fresh out of college, fled metro areas and moved online, whole office spaces found themselves empty. Office real estate workers continue to struggle leasing out their spaces to businesses, since so many employers now have a remote or hybrid work schedule. It is difficult to reach a conclusive stance on the pros and cons of remote work by reading the dozens of articles on the topic. Opinions vary so widely. Some praise the new shift towards remote work as a revolutionary step in the workforce. Others note that remote work is actually a step Read More ›
It’s interesting that the Spider-Man universe (or multiverse, I guess) is studded with well-meaning villains. In my last movie review, we looked at Norman Osborn and his tragic transformation into the Green Goblin. What’s odd about his character is that he’s almost a father figure to Peter Parker throughout the film, offering support, guidance, wisdom. It’s the allure of a mysterious form of biotechnology and corporate pressure that sends him off the deep end. It isn’t so different with the iconic Dr. Octopus. An idealist set on inventing a new source of perpetual energy, Dr. Octavius is a friendly but ambitious scientist, who, like Osborn, takes Peter under his wing. The experiment to create a sustained fusion reaction, though, goes Read More ›