
When Technology Takes Revenge - feross
https://fs.blog/2020/09/revenge-effects/
======
NicolasGorden
I love Farnam Street.

They produce some amazing content.

But sometimes they fall into a trap of trying to define new concepts from
disparate issues that don't have a clear natural delineation.

I've seen the same in the New Yorker and Ted Talks. They fall in love with
their own narrative and forget to see how applicable it is, or if there is a
better 'mental model' to understand something.

I feel this happened here.

The mention 4 'types of revenge effects' which I simply see as something else;

1- Repeating Effects: it sounds to me that with decreased cost per activity
users have the option to increase their activity to meet whatever they want
based on individual cost-benefit analysis. In the example they mention of 'end
up spending the same amount of time on hosework' technology allows me to
hardly ever have to clean (dish washer, robot vacuum, washing machine,
insulation + central HVAC + merv 13 air filters, grilling food outside, etc) -
It's really hard to spend as much time cleaning with technology as you would
without it, even if your standard of cleanliness is higher. I know this from
experience I grew up poor in the 3rd world. The whole point feels like forced
categorization.

2- Recomplicating effects - They also become more complex because the
technology becomes more reliable and automation increases wealth. Just look at
cars. They used to be less reliable and people used to be poorer. So features
we take for granted now were great luxuries at some point. Yes, it's more
complex, but it doesn't appear to be. Modern cars are way more complex, but
cars when I was a kid were something people knew a lot about because they had
to because they broke down and people were poorer. Now they break down less
and they pay someone else. Again, not saying such effects aren't true, just
that the examples and categories seem forced like a listicle.

3- Regenerating effects - They mention the issue that are caused by things
like pesticides and antibiotics. But forget the issues that existed before
them and don't seem to count them as part of a pro and contra point of view.
Overall I think whatever issues humans face as a consequence of these two, are
infinitely less than the issues they faced without them. It's like there's no
sense of sacrifice and underlying difficulties, instead things are discussed
on absolute 'look at the bad this is causing' vs 'look at what happens with X
vs what happens without X or maybe with Y instead' (perfectly illustrated with
pros and cons for nuclear)

4- Rearranging effects - basically same critique as for 'regenerating
effects'.

A part of the article that really gets me is how little they seem to delve
into anything or even think things through. They say things that take about .5
seconds to understand why it isn't so. Here's another example:

> Rather, a revenge effect must actually reverse the benefit for at least a
> small subset of users... typing on a laptop compared to a typewriter has led
> to an increase in carpal tunnel syndrome ... turns out that the physical
> effort required to press typewriter keys and move the carriage protected
> workers from some of the harmful effects of long periods of time spent
> typing.

Yeah, but what about the trees that weren't cut down for the typewriters
paper. The trucks that didn't have to bellow smoke through city streets to get
the paper to users, etc. Surely there's a benefit to people typing on
keyboards? I'm not really sure the 'revenge effect reverses the benefit' in
this case for anyone. I've had carpal tunnel. Personally I prefer that to the
smog and increased pressure on forest resources. Especially when mechanical
keyboards, wrist braces and physical therapy work as well as they do. Not to
mention the cost of storage of all that paper, the need for climate control to
maintain it, the cost of classifying it and retrieving it, etc.

At some point, it feels the author is being disingenuous in order to promote
the narrative that was the basis for starting the article.

~~~
Nasrudith
Yeah it frankly feels a bit "I'm not X but"... blatant X follows. In this case
the old pseudoprofound meme about considering the impact of technology before
we even try to implement it at scale when history has shown that we really had
no way of knowing it and instead place all evils of the world on the inventor
claiming they should have been as hindsight omniscient and not release it
until preperfected to the most minute detail.

The unneeded attempt to adhoc a redudant all consuming indexing makes it a bit
better for once instead of just being tedious at least due to acknowledging
that their predictions of consequences aren't that great.

They go with the iso standard demand for caution but that warning isn't
exactly useful. If the seperate seats result in more parents exposing their
kids to danger by driving it says nothing about what decision any actor
involved should make. Should the airline operator subsidize child tickets at
the cost of all other passenger tickets rendering it a side effect? Should
they not make children actually on the plane safer and shift the moral fault
onto themselves for the believed systemic benefit? Or should they implement
them to mean that regardless of their impact on unneeded deaths of children
their hands will remain technically clean. Caution for what exactly? What is
the signal supposed to tell. A warning completely empty of content of
actionable things to watch for and absent handling is a useless distraction.
Even something generic as "be mindful of resource usage and what happens after
it becomes obsolete" would be far better as they would be actually remotelty
actionable even if the desired outcome may not be foreseen.

Looking forward the evaluation may be: "So tearing up asbetos insulation will
make a real mess because it flakes everywhere, don't put it in the way of
anything that needs serviced. It also will be hard to recycle."

In hindsight however: "Oh crap it causes cancer when inhaled and it sends
pieces everywhere ensuring it will be inhaled when it breaks down or is broken
damage. Removing it safely in any way including tearing the whole place down
will be expensive! "

The whole "should have been more considerate before making technology" meme
has the unspecified problem with unspecified solution issue while engaging in
moral scapegoating by implicitly setting all of the evils of the practice on
the creator who contrary to the waggling fingers is not an omniscient god
capable of forseeing that their rubber bicycle tires will instead of driving
trade and maybe causing some tribes to specialize in rubber tree harvesting
instead of traditional self-sufficency as they trade for manufactured goods
result in many hands getting chopped off in King Leopold's depraved and
counterproductive evil management. All from those with future hindsight who
reap the benefits with none of the work and no moral responsibility as they
can do nothing to change the past. It is frankly almost resembles a nerdier
version of the stereotypical high school "popular kid" image bullying for
status - trying to make oneself look good by looking down on others since you
aren't in violation of your lofty standards of wisdom unlike them.

The root "damning the practical" also is related to some old Bronze age origin
philsopher/aristocratic memes of lauding oneself for their leadership and lack
of connection with the practical as a virtue and wise. If you want a laugh
look at blatant falsehoods unchecked accepted like impetus's triangular
throwing arcs or that women have fewer teeth because of having smaller heads
as "purity of thought". That seperation from practicality was lauded as a
virtue and wisdom reality calls "being out of touch" and folly.

Charitably some of the worse examples may have been written by rivals as
strawmen of more reasonable theses (that a well thought out model may
approximate better than coarse measurements or one which tries to factor in
other details badly) or were misattributed to the author now known to us as X
but that didn't stop later generations from taking them dead seriously and
unironically using impetus models that any artilley operator or archer would
have taken as a joke.

