I was thinking about why “chemistry in the kitchen” type frames for provoking curiosity kinda underwhelm. I remember when I learned about the flame test, I tried it at home with salt. But it was meh, because yellow is not an exotic color in a flame. As a kid, you want exotic.
Conversation
I really wanted to see purple, which we finally got to see during the chem lab session that came after the textbook lesson.
There’s an important lesson here. Science is mainly fun when you get to produce exotic effects outside everyday experience.
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In physics, a ball rolling down a plane is meh. But a double cone rolling uphill? Exotic and fun.
In astronomy: resolving double stars is meh. Resolving Saturn’s rings? Exotic and fun.
In biology, drawing a leaf naked-eye is meh, looking through a microscope? Exotic and fun.
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Same with devices/engineering, though that’s much more expensive. Building exotic gadgets is fun. Replicating common household ones like a doorbell or a box is meh.
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There’s another dimension of fun though — solving a real problem with a repair instead of asking an adult or buying a service. I recall feeling pretty smug the first time I replaced a blown fuse wire, wired up a plug... simple, non-exotic things.
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The sweet spot is exotic effect+solves a real problem, in a newish-to-you way. That’s the feeling of invention. At trivial levels it’s not hard to come by. Just has to be new to you, exotic as in not-seen-before.
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Like I was really pleased when I (re)invented the trick of wrapping sandpaper around a small cylindrical object to sand a larger cylindrical hole (came up in a sophomore shop class assignment and my team mates were struggling with clumsier sanding methods).
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Where it gets really powerful is when you figure out a science-based technical trick that doesn’t just solve a problem, but solves a problem that has others stuck, in even a small way. Then when someone uses your solution and gets unstuck? That’s the feeling of political power.
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It’s the big brother of the lesser feeling of someone merely buying your product or service. That’s just money, and there’s many non-exotic, non-real-problem ways to make money. The power of tech lies in getting people unstuck. That’s not just political power but the deepest kind
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You expand the equation, write new political actors on to the stage, old ones off the stage, and do so without being mired 100% in pure other-directed social cognition. Half your mind is oriented in a non-human direction. You’re outside the game in a powerful way.
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Replying to
In part because when you see through the lens of exotic, but real and political consequential agency, that’s a kind of god-like/superhuman perspective. And if you tend to normalize yourself as “human” it induces the uncomfortable sense of seeing others as subhuman.
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There’s a stack of fulfillment/meaning types here, with each higher level being richer, but also requiring more imagination and nerve to reach and *tolerate*
Staying with non-exotic/real feels safe and offers a domestic kind of satisfaction many engineers don’t want to leave.
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OTOH exotic/non-real is safe in a different way: it is stimulating in a mentos-in-coke way but with no risk of disturbing the political peace with tech levers.
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2x2:
Non-exotic, non-real: hobby crafts like model building. Relaxing and safe.
Exotic, non-real: geewhiz tech. Stimulating in a mid way, and politically safe.
Non-exotic, real: adult satisfaction, politically safe.
Exotic+real: god-feeling, politically destabilizing
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Most of the hatred in the tech backlash is due to techies wandering into the exotic+real quadrant and awakening new Promethean forces, but then being unwilling to exercise the political agency unleashed. Those who want the agency can’t exercise it, those who have it don’t want it
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As a result, the political agency gets downcycled to mere economic agency, often of a banal (eg advertising) or criminal variety.
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Not sure where I’m going with this, but something to do with the general air of NPCness around a lot of tech tinkering that feels consciously self-chosen. Which is funny because of the “doer” and “maker” self-images that go with it. Agency as a hobby that avoids turning real.
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To non-techies this seems like “not working on real problems”. Really they mean “real but not exotic so you help out in ways we want you to, but otherwise shut up and stay in your lane”
Try real+exotic and you’ve bought yourself a political fight whether you want one or not.
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This is partly why startup techies love “disruption” in a limited business sense. It’s a sort of deactivated political agency that disturbs just the economic peace and makes more money than power.
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But if business disruption is the limit of your political vision you’re still in hobby mode. A big, lucrative hobby but short of dent-in-the-universe ambitions you might pretend to. The most interesting techies embrace the political consequences of what they do.
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Which doesn’t mean turning into a politician formally or haunting DC. That’s just selling tech short for a shot at cronyism with existing political equilibrium. It means letting the tech find full expression and accepting the consequences, including any hate.
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It’s saying — this is a legit way of being human and the rest of you have to deal. Not apologizing for the impacts of tech or going through ritual contrition and penance. You moved the equation and created an imperative for others to either adapt or suffer being left behind.
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It feels cruel to say this, but if others don’t feel a responsibility to keep up, and try to impose on others the burden of maintaining a changeless state, you need feel no responsibility to bend over backwards maintaining an equilibrium you don’t need.
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Change is natural and inevitable, changeless stability is what takes unnatural force to maintain. A world that makes those who lean into change feel apologetic towards those who resist it is backwards.
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