The Snowballing Paradox
in 'life, love, and destruction' i said we're experts in life, but also in its destruction. while we're surely experts in its destruction, we just tend to believe we're experts in progress.
and while so far, somehow, it has always worked out in the end, i don't think there's any kind of insurance for that.
some people subscribe to the idea that our time isn't special. they argue that 200 years ago, people said the same thing about the speed of their advancements, and people 200 years from now will do the same.
and while i can see that happening, that future is way more worrying than the idea that we've reached some kind of plateau. it’s also partially true that with faster advancements, our knowledge increases in a similar fashion.
but i think that’s only one possibility. sometimes, advancements are made first, and only after the fact, when we see the effects, do we start to gain any real knowledge.
thinking about it, it obviously depends on the specific invention. with most of them, there’s a bit of both, but the distribution varies. leaded gasoline, for example, is a good case of one where we didn't really know so much in the beginning.
i was thinking about the computer as the opposite example. but then the whole internet rabbit hole evolved from that, so i figured glasses were a better fit.
once people became aware of the principles, it was basically just mathematics from that point on. the results were pretty clear and foreseeable (pun intended).
and while our methods for evaluating new things are getting better and more predictable, largely thanks to sheer computing power, we can only ever guarantee their safety to a certain degree.
this holds especially true when the creators care more about money than they do about people. a point the Veritasium video i mentioned earlier shows all too well.
so, you know Teflon? that non-stick coating on pretty much every pan. well, it turns out that to produce it, they used a chemical called PFOA, also known as c8.
and here's the kicker: this stuff is a so-called "forever chemical." and when they say "forever," they aren't kidding. it doesn't break down, and it's now basically everywhere in the snow on the highest mountains, in pretty much every animal,
and in us.
the truly insane part is that DuPont, the company behind Teflon, knew how toxic c8 was as far back as the 1960s. they had their own internal studies showing it harmed animals and was building up in their workers' blood.
but instead of raising an alarm, they just buried the truth and kept polluting for decades, hiding the danger from the public and regulators.
eventually, when the legal pressure got too intense, they finally agreed to phase out c8.
a win, right?
not really. they just replaced it with a similar chemical called GenX (😂) (or c6), which, surprise, surprise, is also part of the same toxic PFAS family of "forever chemicals" and shows its own lovely signs of toxicity.
it's only very recently that the EPA has set incredibly low legal limits for some of these PFAS in drinking water, which honestly just highlights what a severe and completely widespread disaster this contamination has become.
we've so far only covered easily measurable and quantifiable things. but with inventions that have more and more impact on a non-physical level: the internet, smartphones, social media, AI. those consequences are way harder to predict, let alone measure in any meaningful way.
and they emerge rather slowly, for the most part. the shrinkage of our attention spans due to 'vine-style' videos (which was TikTok before it got popular) showed up pretty quick, but that also makes it easier to undo. there were probably people vocal about the danger back then,
but just like with global warming, they were kind of ignored. and afterwards, people are pissed they didn't see colorful corals while snorkeling and give the tour company a bad rating.
that's a direct consequence. a more remote one is less variety in marine life and the endangerment of many species.
that’s high, watch the video to get an idea
as if that wasn't bad enough, the vanishing of those species enables others to conquer areas they couldn't before. and at that point,
the consequences are just a big question mark.
at some point, someone noticed that digging up million-year-old sludge and blowing it into the atmosphere does, in fact, have something to do with the atmosphere's ability to absorb light, and by that, energy and heat.
now, you've waited, and it's time for the punchline. we all know that if a penalty is only financial, it becomes a price tag for the wealthy. and if you produce a lot of CO², you either smoke like a chimney or you produce stuff. and stuff that gets produced has a use, and with that, a value.
they generate money to pay the penalties. that's a loophole, isn't it? it’s also snowballing, except snow is becoming less and less present in the world.
i have a petition: let the people who made those 'rules' be in charge of drug laws. you might say that’s a stupid way to handle it in the first place, but hey, they've been doing it for quite some time, and so far? we're still here.
no, but seriously, the first step has to be awareness. how and why should anyone be worried about something they don't even know exists? the idea of the D/A/CH's 'fee to fund public television' is a good start and could be the first step. but its execution is, at best, in need of maintenance and, at worst, kind of questionable in its intentions.
when they surprisingly came to the conclusion, ‘oh, the internet kind of fits the bill,’ they did start producing stuff on there. but there was a huge gap between collecting the money and actually creating content.
i mean, yeah, they streamed their five shows online, but that was it. at some point,
they had to figure out that just because they publish their content online, it wouldn't magically be watched by people under 50.
which led to them producing content for YouTube, with decent success, i would say. some questionable topics and practices happened, but hey, it's YouTube.
they also started sponsoring podcasts, which... i don't really know how that's justified. maybe so smaller channels become aware of them and ask for sponsoring? do they become just another content network?
and while it's good and right to sponsor entertainment channels, i miss more scientific channels, ones that teach and care about the important topics, the topics the audience will have to deal with the longest.
and since we ended on a completely different topic than i had anticipated, i want to close with a kind of paradoxical thought. while we do and should care for our offspring, that offspring will have offspring. and just because we might only be confronted with the consequences for our direct kids, at some point, someone will have to face them.
i'm sure if these rules were adapted in most areas (and better enforced), the overall change for each individual would be negligible.
but yeah, my thoughts on the problems that stand in the way of that... we'll get into that at some point. enough for now.
