Shoulda read the link before posting. 45% urbanized as of 1999. My bad.
Still, this number will pass 50% before long.
Re:Disorienting and Infuriating
on
LonelyNet
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· Score: 1
Urbanized environments are characterized by very dense populations
Not true. All typical N. American suburbs are classified as urbanized, and they are not dense at all.
most people find the vast majority of people they are *forced* to be surrounded by to be strangers
Yes, that's called "Life". It's how we develop and grow and learn about the world we live in and how we differ from others. Some people prefer gated communities and Disneyland. That's too bad because they aren't living.
that's where cities came from: dense agregations of people concentrated for economic purposes.
That is not where cities come from. The current mindset towards cities was developed during the industrial revolution, and it sharply conflicts a mindset that prevailed for millenia. Yes, I know it's currently fashionable to think that we've outgrown the need for cities, but most people who actually study these issues for a living strongly disagree. (I'll supply sources if you're curious.)
Re:25% of American Pop. Doesn't Live in Urban Area
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LonelyNet
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· Score: 1
The most interesting statistic is that more than half the world population doesn't live in an urban area.
You might want to double check that. I don't believe it is true any longer, as most 3rd world countries are rapidly urbanizing.
As for the other, I agree that it was a dumb article (and stated such in another post). What concerns me, however, is that many people here consider online socializing to be better than the real thing, which is something that I absolutely can not accept as a general rule. Yeah, there are exceptions, but for the vast majority of the world I must advocate real interpersonal interaction over the virtual.
It gets so tedious listening to all you people prattle on about this Brave New World we're in.
So far to date we have a set of nifty little communications, data processing, and entertainment tools that have made some small changes in how we spend some of our time. This is not a revolution. This isn't even much of an evolution. The digital arrival has yet to cause any kind of significant change in how we view ourselves or the world.
Don't believe me? Let's see, currently we have rampant conservativeism and intolerant religious fundamentalists, not just in the US, but all over the world. China is still arresting and abusing peaceful protesters. Nazi sympathizers are in positions of power in Austria. Fringe Muslim groups get more militant every day ( I said "fringe". No flame, please). Peace in the mideast is still a joke. Peace in the Balkans is still a joke. Peace in sub-Saharan Africa is still a joke. N. Irish self-rule looks like it will be a joke, which will lead right back to more bombings. Children are starving to death everywhere. AIDS is ravishing millions. etc. etc.
Oh, but wait! I can now email grandma & tell her about my new shoes! BY GOD IT'S A REVOLUTION!!! WE"VE CHANGED THE WORLD!!!
whatever...
Re:Disorienting and Infuriating
on
LonelyNet
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· Score: 1
Wait a sec. His parents are a small minority who, we can only assume, willingly chose to be isolated. The majority of the world lives in urbanized areas where this is not an issue.
Of course there will always be exceptions to the majority, many of the posters on this topic being prime examples. It's great that the internet is helping these people, but it is VERY WRONG to assume that everyone is in a similar position, or that they would even WANT to be in that position. I sincerely doubt that most people are being held in urbanized living environments against their will at gunpoint.
This was a somewhat boneheaded study, but the knee-jerk reaction from the online evangelists is, as usual, equivalent to a 5 yr. old covering his ears with his hands a screaming becasue he doesn't want to hear what's being said.
Here's the awful truth: Face to face human interaction is, and always will be, far superior to virtual interaction. We are social creatures. We perform our best in social environments. Those activities which truly do benefit from being solitary, such as coding, are NOT the purpose of life. Technology is just a TOOL, whose purpose is (or at least should be) to advance what is really important; the meaningful interaction of people.
The internet can of course significantly advance this goal at times, but for a growing number of people it is instead being used to SUPPLANT the goal. This is bad. It is equivalent to how the original purpose of the automobile (make getting around easier=more free time) got perverted into the current state where we have become enslaved by it, much to the detriment of both our time and our wallets, not to mention all the other social and environmental ills spawned.
Sometimes I seriously fear that this is happening with the internet. Everbody seems to be aiming for virtual reality, when the proper goal should be AUGMENTED reality. We do not need to replace the world, we just need to improve it. Wouldn't it be far nicer to sit in a coffee shop with friends and discuss something that cought your eye on your unobtrusive heads-up display instead of sitting in your basement fragging these same friends accross town?
One final note that often goes unmentioned: An important part of life is encountering the unexpected, or even the undesirable. If your reality consists entirely of things you actively requested and sought out then you are not living, you are just existing. There is very little experience of the unexpected or undesirable when offensive or tangential information can easily be dispatched with a quick click. It's not a lot of fun to see some homeless guy slowly dying from alcoholism, but if you never leave the house you won't even know he exists. And that's truly shameful.
Slashdot Mirror
LOL
But it's not seamless. Those little preforations really detract from the Dancing Bears picture :)
Shoulda read the link before posting. 45% urbanized as of 1999. My bad.
Still, this number will pass 50% before long.
Urbanized environments are characterized by very dense populations
Not true. All typical N. American suburbs are classified as urbanized, and they are not dense at all.
most people find the vast majority of people they are *forced* to be surrounded by to be strangers
Yes, that's called "Life". It's how we develop and grow and learn about the world we live in and how we differ from others. Some people prefer gated communities and Disneyland. That's too bad because they aren't living.
that's where cities came from: dense agregations of people concentrated for economic purposes.
That is not where cities come from. The current mindset towards cities was developed during the industrial revolution, and it sharply conflicts a mindset that prevailed for millenia. Yes, I know it's currently fashionable to think that we've outgrown the need for cities, but most people who actually study these issues for a living strongly disagree. (I'll supply sources if you're curious.)
The most interesting statistic is that more than half the world population doesn't live in an urban area.
You might want to double check that. I don't believe it is true any longer, as most 3rd world countries are rapidly urbanizing.
As for the other, I agree that it was a dumb article (and stated such in another post). What concerns me, however, is that many people here consider online socializing to be better than the real thing, which is something that I absolutely can not accept as a general rule. Yeah, there are exceptions, but for the vast majority of the world I must advocate real interpersonal interaction over the virtual.
It gets so tedious listening to all you people prattle on about this Brave New World we're in.
So far to date we have a set of nifty little communications, data processing, and entertainment tools that have made some small changes in how we spend some of our time. This is not a revolution. This isn't even much of an evolution. The digital arrival has yet to cause any kind of significant change in how we view ourselves or the world.
Don't believe me? Let's see, currently we have rampant conservativeism and intolerant religious fundamentalists, not just in the US, but all over the world. China is still arresting and abusing peaceful protesters. Nazi sympathizers are in positions of power in Austria. Fringe Muslim groups get more militant every day ( I said "fringe". No flame, please). Peace in the mideast is still a joke. Peace in the Balkans is still a joke. Peace in sub-Saharan Africa is still a joke. N. Irish self-rule looks like it will be a joke, which will lead right back to more bombings. Children are starving to death everywhere. AIDS is ravishing millions. etc. etc.
Oh, but wait! I can now email grandma & tell her about my new shoes! BY GOD IT'S A REVOLUTION!!! WE"VE CHANGED THE WORLD!!!
whatever...
Wait a sec. His parents are a small minority who, we can only assume, willingly chose to be isolated. The majority of the world lives in urbanized areas where this is not an issue.
Of course there will always be exceptions to the majority, many of the posters on this topic being prime examples. It's great that the internet is helping these people, but it is VERY WRONG to assume that everyone is in a similar position, or that they would even WANT to be in that position. I sincerely doubt that most people are being held in urbanized living environments against their will at gunpoint.
This was a somewhat boneheaded study, but the knee-jerk reaction from the online evangelists is, as usual, equivalent to a 5 yr. old covering his ears with his hands a screaming becasue he doesn't want to hear what's being said.
Here's the awful truth: Face to face human interaction is, and always will be, far superior to virtual interaction. We are social creatures. We perform our best in social environments. Those activities which truly do benefit from being solitary, such as coding, are NOT the purpose of life. Technology is just a TOOL, whose purpose is (or at least should be) to advance what is really important; the meaningful interaction of people.
The internet can of course significantly advance this goal at times, but for a growing number of people it is instead being used to SUPPLANT the goal. This is bad. It is equivalent to how the original purpose of the automobile (make getting around easier=more free time) got perverted into the current state where we have become enslaved by it, much to the detriment of both our time and our wallets, not to mention all the other social and environmental ills spawned.
Sometimes I seriously fear that this is happening with the internet. Everbody seems to be aiming for virtual reality, when the proper goal should be AUGMENTED reality. We do not need to replace the world, we just need to improve it. Wouldn't it be far nicer to sit in a coffee shop with friends and discuss something that cought your eye on your unobtrusive heads-up display instead of sitting in your basement fragging these same friends accross town?
One final note that often goes unmentioned: An important part of life is encountering the unexpected, or even the undesirable. If your reality consists entirely of things you actively requested and sought out then you are not living, you are just existing. There is very little experience of the unexpected or undesirable when offensive or tangential information can easily be dispatched with a quick click. It's not a lot of fun to see some homeless guy slowly dying from alcoholism, but if you never leave the house you won't even know he exists. And that's truly shameful.