One way to think about the strange arc of civilization is to consider the slow increase in supernormal stimuli relative to the real world (say the raw, analog world of nature), from cave paintings and f2f conversation through religion and radio to iPads and MMPORGs.

The greater the gap between the levels of stimuli, the greater the addiction to the art or medium or movement that channels those supernormal stimuli. What does the medium have that we lack?

Mostly it aggregates and condenses other people and what they create. They become mediated by a technological channel that we purchase and subscribe to in order to access the feed.

One problem with that arc, for me, is that we humans will never escape the real world. We have to come back to it to cook, clean, sleep, bathe. And with the increasing intensity of mediated stimuli, I suspect many people get worse at normal.

That is, they/we are no longer properly incented to construct themselves and meaningful relations to people and objects in the slow-moving unmediated analog world. I don't have a fix for that. I just note it with regret.