> Right now, we have (most of) my undergrad classmates' dream industry. They drink constantly [1], skip lectures, scrape by on their homework with AI, complain about classes, grind Leetcode to get internships, and eventually get their diploma. It must feel like walking around in a literal dream, where your footsteps have no weight, like Wile E. Coyote near a ledge.
There is a name for this in sociology: anomie [1].
In times of great change, the set of norms and rules that we take for granted as an organizing principle of our lives get uprooted. It's as if all of the pieces and tokens and rules of the board game we played our whole lives are swept off the table to make room for a new game, but the new game has not been set up yet. In that interim, we all feel a sense of unease. It is our turn to move, but we don't know the rules of the game or what moves to make. We feel intense pressure to play the game well, but don't know how.
In the past, these transitions have ended and society has generally returned to some sense of stability. A new board game gets set up, new pieces doled out, we learn to play the new game. I hope we get to that point with AI soon, but the revolutions seem to keep coming faster and faster.
When I went to college for CS, I was on a scholarship that required I keep my GPA. To have a little insurance for that, every semester I took a random extra easy intro class. That way, if I was bombing a hard class, I could drop it to keep my GPA while still being a full-time student.
One semester, I took Intro to Sociology and it was a revelation. I ended up completing all of the courses required to get a minor in sociology within a couple of years. I dropped out before I ever got close to finishing my CS major.
I wish more people knew sociology. It affects our lives more directly and profoundly than possibly any other science, but it's mostly unknown by the masses.
Paging through the four of Goffman's books I read a quarter of a century or so ago a day or two ago was a bit of a disappointment for me, personally; not sure if I am attempting to dissuade you, but it always disappoints me to read something years later, after experiencing a good chunk of a lifetime after it, and feel a let down. I remember that book well, though. And I know what you mean about sociology... though I feel like most of the models and almost everything they teach in school now doesn't fit anything people have spent the last ten or twenty years throwing out there. It upsets me (more than I let on). It isn't "only" or even largely AI that makes me sad; AI makes me angry on top of the 'sad', if anything.
Mostly just replying here because I enjoyed your other comments on this thread, and do not want to get too deep into comments. But man; it makes me sad how much the world changed. Most things in the world feel so heavily inauthentic now.
A comment on your other comment here, though: bespoke software will never be like it used to be. I don't know if anyone will FEEL the way it used to feel to program something, even as recently as 25-30 years ago. I mean, I still remember my excitement at buying my first real IDE, and how tickled I was that parts of it reminded me of Smalltalk/ParcPlace. Like, man; the first time I didn't have to make an icon for an exe independently of the software I was coding and compiling in. Or the first time I figured out cc on an old AT&T unix box with no documentation... or essentially grinding my way through learning SQL in the early 90s when books didn't exist... Who the heck would think that was even interesting now? We all have and had the web but even that seems
quaint to the newer people. I am not sure why they code or what they feel they get out of it other than inflated (often poor) attitudes and not always deserved paychecks.
Anyway.
Building actual things with one's actual hands is, indeed, nice. Disagree though about it being in the attic. Sometimes it has every bit as much meaning there as anywhere else. Don't need a reason to create things like that. And not interested in art.
Anyway, not sure I would enjoy it as much as I did the first time, but check out Sissela Bok's writing if you haven't.
There. All my replies to your threads in one place, kinda. Sorry if it is a bit hard to follow.
munificent · · focus · HN ↗
There is a name for this in sociology: anomie [1].
In times of great change, the set of norms and rules that we take for granted as an organizing principle of our lives get uprooted. It's as if all of the pieces and tokens and rules of the board game we played our whole lives are swept off the table to make room for a new game, but the new game has not been set up yet. In that interim, we all feel a sense of unease. It is our turn to move, but we don't know the rules of the game or what moves to make. We feel intense pressure to play the game well, but don't know how.
In the past, these transitions have ended and society has generally returned to some sense of stability. A new board game gets set up, new pieces doled out, we learn to play the new game. I hope we get to that point with AI soon, but the revolutions seem to keep coming faster and faster.
It's a psychologically difficult time.
[1]: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anomie" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anomie
ryandvm · · focus · HN ↗
munificent · · focus · HN ↗
One semester, I took Intro to Sociology and it was a revelation. I ended up completing all of the courses required to get a minor in sociology within a couple of years. I dropped out before I ever got close to finishing my CS major.
I wish more people knew sociology. It affects our lives more directly and profoundly than possibly any other science, but it's mostly unknown by the masses.
jambalaya8 · · focus · HN ↗
Mostly just replying here because I enjoyed your other comments on this thread, and do not want to get too deep into comments. But man; it makes me sad how much the world changed. Most things in the world feel so heavily inauthentic now.
A comment on your other comment here, though: bespoke software will never be like it used to be. I don't know if anyone will FEEL the way it used to feel to program something, even as recently as 25-30 years ago. I mean, I still remember my excitement at buying my first real IDE, and how tickled I was that parts of it reminded me of Smalltalk/ParcPlace. Like, man; the first time I didn't have to make an icon for an exe independently of the software I was coding and compiling in. Or the first time I figured out cc on an old AT&T unix box with no documentation... or essentially grinding my way through learning SQL in the early 90s when books didn't exist... Who the heck would think that was even interesting now? We all have and had the web but even that seems quaint to the newer people. I am not sure why they code or what they feel they get out of it other than inflated (often poor) attitudes and not always deserved paychecks.
Anyway.
Building actual things with one's actual hands is, indeed, nice. Disagree though about it being in the attic. Sometimes it has every bit as much meaning there as anywhere else. Don't need a reason to create things like that. And not interested in art.
Anyway, not sure I would enjoy it as much as I did the first time, but check out Sissela Bok's writing if you haven't.
There. All my replies to your threads in one place, kinda. Sorry if it is a bit hard to follow.