> The world is more complex than it was a couple of generations ago.
But is it, really?
That was already the era of "information overload" and "future shock."
But is it, really?
That was already the era of "information overload" and "future shock."
My grandfather's shop included a lathe and welding torch. He and my dad swapped out the engine to a car in my Dad's carport. That's technology - the car, the tools to fix it, and parts supply system to make it possible.
My mother had an automatic sewing machine which she used to make clothes. Sewing machines, motorized sewing machines, the looms to make the cloth, the machines to process the cotton - all technology.
We had several hams in the neighborhood, and CB radios were a craze. That's technology.
We got the city newspaper, which was possible from centuries of technological development - the printing press, ink and paper production, typesetting machines, distribution, vending machines.
Most homes had a particle accelerator in them to watch TV. That's certainly technology.
Compare a home now to one made two generations ago, and little has changed - assuming you are lucky enough to avoid the inherent death cycle of products tied to a smartphone. You've got easier access to shows and music, but people in the 1970s still had TV, radio, records, etc.
Compare a home from 1925 to two generations before that, and there you'll see a whole lot more changed.
Electricity is technology. Running water is technology. Municipal sewage is technology. Telephony is technology. Cheap aluminum is technology. Gasoline is technology. Weather forecasting is technology. The vertical filing system is technology. A card catalog is technology. Punched cards is technology.
You had access to a lot of technology when you were young. Why do you dismiss it so?
Not all technology is equal. It varies in complexity and the demands it places on our lives.
Now how do you get from your true observation to characterize how technology now is 'several orders of magnitude' greater than the 'very little "technology"' af3d had as kid?
When you talk about "demands it places on our lives", do you mean modern life has higher demands, or lower? And is that a good thing?
Like, in the 1800s, employees worked 12 hour shifts, 6 days/week, with few rest days or holidays. Working conditions were horrible, and a simple slip in attention could cut your fingers off or worse.
That placed a high demand on people's lives - higher than ours now, and higher than those in the Middle Ages. Quoting https://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/hours_... :
"Before capitalism, most people did not work very long hours at all. The tempo of life was slow, even leisurely; the pace of work relaxed. Our ancestors may not have been rich, but they had an abundance of leisure. When capitalism raised their incomes, it also took away their time. Indeed, there is good reason to believe that working hours in the mid-nineteenth century constitute the most prodigious work effort in the entire history of humankind."
My mother would make clothes for the family when I was a kid. Sewing is a complex skill which takes effort and time to learn. She stopped when the price of cloth got more expensive than the price of pre-made clothing. Does technology place fewer demands on our lives now?
And how do you factor in the lack of effort we should have been doing to avoid global warming - a problem we've known about since I was a teenager in the 1980s?
Which makes it decidedly difficult to see a simple correlation between technology and ease of life, no matter how many "orders of magnitude" technology has changed.
The 1890s were a tumultuous time. You now had cities with a nightlife, because the arc light and other new technologies meant you no longer depended on candles. Photography and telegraphy was now decades old - by the 1880s news could travel around the world within hours. This fueled the presses, powered by Linotype machines that could churn out pages with ease.
Telephony was now available in homes. The first X-ray was 1895. Hollerith's tabulating machine completed the 1890 census in only six years - two years less than the 1880 census - and transformed information processing.
Astronomy was making exciting new discovery, polar explorers were getting closer to the poles. Steam engines were getting ever more powerful. The Turbinia - the first turbine-powered steamship, 1894 - upset old ideas on ship power.
The chemical industry, with Germans in the lead, created amazing new products. Bayer produced Aspirin in the late 1890, and the new synthetic colors transformed the Victorian era.
The 1890's/1900s were not a lot simpler.
It’s not often that I diss content, but if there was ever a summary of a topic written that tried to sound like it was a novel idea by labelling everything under the sun, this is it.
Maybe I’m not smart enough to understand it, but honestly after 4 tries I still don’t get what the point is.
Also, the topic of “reflexive” came about in the early to mid 20th century, so for many people here, our parents have always existed in this reflexive modern. That doesn’t mean things have gotten more complex in the last generation
Personally I find this the easiest simple mental model for reflexive modernity:
"Modernity linearly accelerated change. Reflexive modernity loops back on itself and accelerates the acceleration". So a bit of "singularity is near".
The whole theory itself has quite a bit more baggage, but again I agree, the wikipedia article does not help at all.
The linked page to “reflexive” is much better, FWIW.
Meanwhile sociology was hardest hit by the replication crisis and I see no sign that they have done anything to improve replicability of their "research"
Do you have some sources for Sociology being hit harder than, say, Psychology, in the replication crisis? I personally don't even know of a many labs replication attempt from them (Sociology). So we probably don't know.
That said, Sociology is the attempt to explain the most complex thing in the universe (collective behavior arising out of sentient individuals), so if you think there's a better way, I'd be extremely excited :)