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The simple answers to the questions that get asked about every new technology:
Will [blank] make us all geniuses? No
Will [blank] make us all morons? No
Will [blank] destroy whole industries? Yes
Will [blank] make us more empathetic? No
Will [blank] make us less caring? No
Will teens use [blank] for sex? Yes
Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes
Will [blank] destroy music? No
Will [blank] destroy art? No
But can’t we go back to a time when- No
Will [blank] bring about world peace? No
Will [blank] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated
I love how well most of this has aged, but that line there feels very pre-2016 to me, unfortunately.
And that’s not even just hinting at politics and world events, but also about how much more we know about those empty experiences from the last line, and how they are meticulously engineered to fuck with people’s brains for juuuust a bit more engagement.