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30 minutes with a stranger

(pudding.cool)
1103 points MaxLeiter | 2 comments | 04 Sep 25 05:56 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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alex-moon ◴[04 Sep 25 08:22 UTC] No.45124947[source]▶
I'm increasingly convinced that social isolation is the single great social ill of our time. I am not one for "respecting others' opinions" at all, make no mistakes, if someone believes something incorrect - or worse - then they need to be corrected. But so much of the hate simmering away like a pot about to boil over is the result of loneliness. The evidence on this is startingly clear.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S235215462...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027795362...

https://www.psychiatrist.com/news/hate-lies-and-loneliness-f...

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rkagerer ◴[04 Sep 25 08:31 UTC] No.45125001[source]▶
I wonder how much of this is due to social media sites and how the choice to interact that way (where the medium is geared to show off shallow facets of our achievements or amplify polarized opinions) is robbing us from traditional ways of spending time together.
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rahulnair23 ◴[04 Sep 25 09:14 UTC] No.45125226[source]▶
Isolating tech goes earlier than that.

I know all my neighbours in my block who walk, cycle, or take the bus. Repeated interactions. The ones who take the elevator to the basement car park are the ones I never cross paths with.

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1. federiconafria ◴[04 Sep 25 09:39 UTC] No.45125380[source]▶
That's what I was thinking, if social media was not there, would we be more social? Or is it really the fact that our necessities can be covered without being social the real "problem".
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2. 9rx ◴[04 Sep 25 14:41 UTC] No.45127842[source]▶
I expect the latter. Social media isn't social in any meaningful sense. It is more like an interactive diary or interactive television. Any human involvement behind the scenes is merely an implementation detail — and with the way AI is going, an implementation detail that may not even remain for much longer. Social media may reduce overall social interaction, but only in the same way that reading books reduced social interaction. There is only so much time in the day; but that doesn't make all uses of time equivalent.