How do we capture wasted human intellect value from an addictive internet? | Hacker News Reader

How do we capture wasted human intellect value from an addictive internet?

2 points__jambo11 comments

Having people mindlessly scrolling on social media represents a real economic loss. There is perhaps some short-term gain from allowing or manipulating more purchases, and perhaps some purchases will be "socially good". But for the most part people learn nothing and develop mental health problems from social media habits.

This is a waste, and therefore a business opportunity. Can productive intellectual activity be made as enjoyable as cat videos?

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The other day I read about a brain interface that uses a human's passively viewing things to notify an algorithm of a particular condition. I'm not describing it very well, but the point was that the human brain picks up on visual cues so quickly, even without processing them consciously, that the signals can sort of be hijacked by a program that is filtering visuals for a specific item or change in status.

I understood it as the first true implementation of a cyborg sense that goes beyond merely connecting the "same old" sensors and processors to yourself that you can already buy off the shelf. This is something that couldn't be picked up consciously by the person, and the sensor would not pick up the signal without the human brain response to it. It allowed for very rapidly sorting through images that were too fast to be seen consciously, but enough that the expected brain regions still reacted.

I really hope to hear more of this sort of hybrid brain-compute interface in the future. This is one way to use brain power that you aren't even aware is already there for use.

I'll update this reply if I find the link. Unless of course someone beats me to it.

super interesting, and somewhat scary.

This is something I've thought of before.

I've done work for clients on 'celebrity' news sites and the amount of celebrity trivia I absorbed without conscious effort was terrifying. I knew who was who, who was banging who, what they'd done etc. And I really couldn't care less about any of them.

There should be sites that make it that easy to absorb math, science and technology and actual worthwhile subjects, but I think they would take a lot more effort, it'd be something worth paying for though.

"..and actual worthwhile subjects" as defined by who ?

Most people gain absolutely nothing learning more math and science which is why they don't bother. Most people do however gain something learning about sports stats, celebrity/political gossip, etc. because they can then relate to the masses better and be social[0]. The content is also easier to assimilate, like junk food.

A person needs a "why" to learn more about challenging subjects to justify the effort. For me it just became part of my identity.

[0] As a side note, I recall a blind date TV show where the young successful founder of a competitor to PayPal (WePay?) was being coached by his match maker. "you need to learn more about celebrities", she said, "women like gossip.". His expression (or maybe it was mine) was one that implied he'd rather run a spike through his hand.

There exist Duolingo addicts. If you count that as "productive intellectual activity", then they're a great example. I'd certainly argue that it is productive.

Amazon etc have all this video surveillance and problems with making AI smart enough to gain useful data from it; I'm wondering when someone connects that to a video game like in Stephenson's "Reamde" so that pasty basement game nerds worldwide can contribute to the massive state panopticon.

haha

Waste is not "therefore" a business opportunity, especially intellectual "waste".

Part of being a free person is the ability to choose how you spend your own time. Just because you consider other people's choices to be a "waste", doesn't mean a) the time is indeed "Wasted" or b) that the people making those choices want to change their decision and can't.

Can watching cat videos be turned into productive intellectual activity?

The answer to my question is yes, however, I don't quite know the answer to yours, as enjoyment is somewhat subjective.

However, watching cat videos creates data(and also uses the intellect, i.e., to identify cats, and make some sort of vague judgement), and that data could potentially be leveraged to make algorithms, which makes it a potentially productive activity.

As for what algorithms? Well, algorithms that find out which videos people are more likely to watch, so they can watch even more cat videos.

You are correct, it is an opportunity, and one already leveraged, by the same people who caused the problem.

> Having people mindlessly scrolling on social media represents a real economic loss.

As opposed to a useful emotional blowoff valve attached to circumstances likely involving a difficult job or an annoying team, and projects to be completed in that mess during a terrible time? Show your work, please.

Some percentage will always be lost. Cant save everybody.

Or like S.Augustine of Hippona said, massa damnata -> https://www.reddit.com/r/Catholicism/comments/vm865t/about_t... "can't save everybody"

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