There’ve been too many changes, and it’s not just tech. The never-before-in-human-history cultural changes together with the tech changes of the last generation have overwhelmed many of us in the older generations. I’m 87 today. I think MAGA will lose its legs when our generation - 70 and more - dies off. Youth (under 70) must be part of the calculation for Democracy, its future, and the impact of tech. I feel a reaction in me against tech. Tech makes life both easier and more challenging, especially as it becomes more complex. I sometimes spend as much time talking to Mumbai about tech support as I do working. That is a waste, and sometimes emotionally exhausting because algorithms were not created with elders in mind.
From my perspective today’s tech feels like my uncle’s Model T. He spent more time working with the damn thing to keep it running, than he did driving it. He had to crank it to get it started. That’s the way tech is for me. …especially passwords, which are like getting out and cranking the Model T. Tech needs a simple starter button.
BUT, and here is the essential point, it’s not just tech. Every aspect of the culture has been challenged since WWII and those challenges and changes will not go away just because the Trumpist crowd has been given a chance to turn things back to 1951 (the year, by the way) we were losing thousands of men in our never ending Korean Police Action War.
Blacks and women won’t go back to MAGA and from my pov, tribalism, which is our culture’s main theme these days, will wither. And that won’t be good for American football.
So, I recommend we contemplate all the changes in sexual attitudes, religious attitudes, table manners, non-existent service at service stations, militarized local cops, our use of trains, our submission to airline policies, and an endless list that could fill this page. We, in my generation, think of those changes a lot, and whether we like ‘em or not, we -I- are beginning to react negatively to the never ending rush of change!
At the same time, I can foresee a more interesting future arising from AI when the arts and handicrafts will rise again. Think about it. The most significant tech in the 17th and 18th centuries focused on developments in the arts: music, its software, and its instruments for one.