Comment by quacked | Hacker News Reader

Comment by quacked | Hacker News Reader

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I tried to in my initial comment draft, but I couldn't really come to a satisfactory answer so I thought I'd just post the observation.

I believe the average person today is far more apathetic about the parts of their own civilization that aren't explicitly political than ever before. Morality, cultural expression, architectural aesthetics, manners, fashion, product design, whatever. I think this slide into apathy predates the Internet and has something to do with copyright law, mega-corporate capture of the supply chain (and it's subsequent off shoring), excessive focus on cultural and behavioral neutrality in education, lawsuit culture, and endless video evidence of everything, but I can't spin that into a coherent narrative.

I'm not entirely sure what this implies, but I definitely don't think the introduction of LLMs is going to move the needle back toward widespread elitism and highly motivated creative industries. I wish I had a better answer to your question, which I appreciate you asking.

I can't help but feel the shift to apathy is in part due to a cultural shift from a sense of building society together to a more exploitative view where people have to get what they can while they still can get it. The lack of motivation to produce Great Works feels related to the disconnect from a greater purpose/community.

It all feels related in some way to the dearth of great statesmen. At least the Rockefellers of the past contributed back in the form of great works dedicated to public use.

I think adjacent to this is an element of reduced risk taking from younger people because the stakes are much higher (or at least feel much higher). I've worked with so many smart and talented grads who have seemingly planned their lives/career to the nth degree, in a way that was certainly not that common in my broad circles when I was a similar age.

From conversations with them, it all stems from the view of you can't afford any mistakes/missteps if you want a relatively benign type of comfortable middle class life, in terms of things like housing in particular. If that'd your starting point, you're looking to ge a guaranteedish success at anything you're trying to do and that inherently puts a lid on how much you want to deviate or be creative from the norm. More so than ever, I think, people are more aware of optimising monetisation in all aspects of their lives, and that sort of results in more things being the same or only having minor deviation from what "works".

> More so than ever, I think, people are more aware of optimising monetisation in all aspects of their lives, and that sort of results in more things being the same or only having minor deviation from what "works".

This infiltration of monetization is insidious. Even in my own idle thoughts I find myself wondering how I might profit off of something I threw together for fun. Or make a great cake and people say you should open a bakery. It's hard for people to imagine doing something for its own sake, let alone for no financial gain.

This video [1] touches on the same theme. Its opening comparison of historic and modern lampposts is illustrative of the greater shift in culture.

In the modern day, when the public has the opportunity to create something dedicated to the public, the opportunity is squandered and used for trolling (like boaty mcboatface or the stick figure euro coin).

[1]: https://youtu.be/tWYxrowovts

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