Diminishing returns and R&D. Any new research field has a problem where low hanging fruit is picked first and those, who are first, celebrate their genius. But progress is through recombination. The increasing new methods discovered in DL make it a toolbox without comparison.
Humans tend to give a bigger weight to progress that is entirely new over progress than is based on recombination. But most technologies that are useful are a product of recombination. Exponential growth is a consequence of recombination.
Humans also are unable to recognize exponential growth. Many technologies today are recombinant. The technologies that do fail are those that have difficulty being repurposed to new applications.
We also don't recognize that technology gradually changes how we do things. This implies that old ways of doing things don't instantly disappear, but gradually fade away. Old ways are related to other old ways, and it takes a while for changes to propagate.
Language, laws, customs, ethics and beliefs are all technologies. We assume these are permanent, but like technologies, they also decline in their usefulness. Many promote the falsehood of their permanence to benefit themselves.
Many today are born in a world that the internet has always existed. For them, this is a natural part of the world. Virtual things are for as real to them as physical things.
But the fluidity of the virtual world isn't present in the physical world. Cognitive dissonance is pervasive. One becomes suspicious when one's notion of what is natural doesn't exist in the real world.
This embrace of fluidity over permanence is pervasive in the mindset of many. This has its effect also on the kind of technologies we chose to build on. In software, we use technologies that prefer the speed of construction over the stability of its foundations.
It's only through experience that we learn the flaws in our ways. Ex: Javascript and Python now can declare types. There are many technologies that we've adopted in recent years that are unmaintainable. But perhaps that's okay, we favor movement over stability.
However, to build something of relevance today, one always needs to balance the old with the new. This is why our designs must incorporate a bridge from the old and the new.
The reality of the old is that it will someday disappear. Humans seek permanence, unfortunately that permanence is an illusion. Future technologies thus will fulfill our needs of permanence by creating an illusion of permanence.
The disconnect in today's politics is that many have the nostalgia of a previously better world. This is an illusion and the reality of that world will never come back. To satisfy the needs of humanity, we can learn from the Amish and to create virtual worlds in the real.
The future of humanity depends on creating an illusion.
@threadreaderapp unroll please
