Conversation

Quarantine is too scripted. No serendipity. Twitter and zoom and discord are fine but just not as surprising or detailed as reality. I used to think the most potent sources of surprise in the universe is other humans, but that’s only when they’re not in quarantine.
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In normal times you’re constantly triangulating novelty by reacting to it and watching others react to it. For that you have to be in novel settings that generate randomness. Pseudorandom zoom backgrounds and Twitter don’t cut it.
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Even meme culture feels scripted compared to a busy sidewalk or a mall. And all social media conversations have a bit of claustrophobia going due to the missing cosmic background radiation of reactions to unscripted novelty jumping out at people from behind bushes.
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Oddly enough I don’t miss in-person meetings with friends that much, since I’ve been very online for a decade now. It’s the backdrop of humanity going about its business in public. Little slices of life you barely notice every minute when hanging out at Starbucks.
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Here even apparently random interactions I might witness in Twitter are only pseudorandom since it’s people I followed and whoever they followed. A closed universe of pre-determined nonzero significance. They fit a script of sorts.
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I think what we’ve learned is that place and setting matter for life. Currently we’re living lives in nowhere. A bunch of home offices connected by video links at best. Walking a block outside your home probably pipes more novel bits into your brain than a whole day online.
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Also learned that good scripted TV does a better job simulating unquarantined reality than social media 24x7 reality show. You guys are great but not as good as TV. Like the GME/WSB show was worse than Real Housewives.
Replying to
There’s of course a lot of stuff going on still but it’s all very transactional and scripted too. People picking up food orders or running or mailing stuff etc. Nobody is just out and about with no agenda except the homeless.
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Went for a walk on Venice beach the other day. Saddest thing ever. A couple of stores open. A few people sadly walking about hoping to catch some whiff of its normal explosively busy tackiness.
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The basic unit of human life maybe 2 strangers reacting to the same unscripted random novel thing at the same time in the same place, and registering each other’s reactions. You gain a bit of real new information about the universe and cross check it with another random human.
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Some books have been better than even TV, at simulating unquarantined reality. But rare kinds. Last year has been half a dozen Culture novels and half a dozen nonfiction reads that fit Covid mood. Plus a few wildcards. I think I’ve marked time with books.
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“Scripted” is perhaps the wrong word in OT. Something like arranged or orchestrated is what I mean. Intentionality everywhere. Like a too-taut fictional built world where there is no extraneous random shit. Only things of use to the storytelling. Amateurish and scarcity-minded.
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