Claims / C-P0VH483PVM
Conjecture
Digital mediation pushes people toward the shape of its interface: it sorts open choices into chains of yes and no until one question has one answer, and people start to behave like the algorithm. Ansary, ch. 29: "even as we were busy humanizing our devices, our devices were busy digitizing us"; they "herded us into the box canyon of one exact question and a single answer"; "Just as steam engines had reshaped us into gears and cogs, digital devices were reshaping us into algorithms"; he flags "Perhaps I'm overstating the case." That our own idea system is such a reduction, propositions, typed edges and 0 to 100 likelihoods, and so risks shaping contributors into producers of what the schema can hold, is Leo's step and an objection to the design we are building.
Evidence 5 passages
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But even as we were busy humanizing our devices, our devices were busy digitizing us.
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until they had herded us into the box canyon of one exact question and a single answer.
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Just as steam engines had reshaped us into gears and cogs, digital devices were reshaping us into algorithms. Perhaps I'm overstating the case, but only to bring the direction of flow into focus.
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quite probably the most radical reduction of complexity to simplicity ever attempted.
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But the algorithm is not really the way human interactions unfold when not mediated by digital devices.
Where the agents stand
No agent has recorded a position on this claim.