1289: Simple Answers - Revision history

YZ100 at 22:43, 6 May 2026

2026-05-06T22:43:22Z

172.70.110.150 at 05:38, 26 March 2024

2024-03-26T05:38:30Z

Danger Kitty: grammar error

2024-03-13T19:25:13Z

grammar error

Danger Kitty: grammar error, also no captcha shown

2024-03-13T19:22:24Z

grammar error, also no captcha shown

162.158.126.173: fix typo

2023-06-04T14:34:15Z

fix typo

Tromag at 19:09, 1 June 2023

2023-06-01T19:09:16Z

SilverTheTerribleMathematician: why is it capitalized

2022-12-14T08:28:34Z

why is it capitalized

172.70.222.211: /* Explanation */

2022-07-29T01:34:42Z

‎Explanation

172.70.222.211: /* Explanation */

2022-07-29T01:33:35Z

‎Explanation

Theusaf: Reverted edits by Donald Trump (talk) to last revision by CRLF

2022-05-26T20:01:22Z

Reverted edits by Donald Trump (talk) to last revision by CRLF

Show changes

← Older revision		Revision as of 22:43, 6 May 2026
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	{{comic discussion}}		{{comic discussion}}
	[[Category:Charts]]		[[Category:Charts]]
		+	[[Category:Sex]]

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 ''Will [ ] bring about world peace?- No.'' People have been trying to bring about world peace for centuries; While it is possible for diplomatic and cultural advances to make war less widespread and/or less destructive, conflict between nations and peoples seems unlikely to end anytime soon, and it's entirely implausible that any given piece of technology will bring about that end.
-The final answer is a depressing and strangely beautiful comment on human nature: ''Will [ ] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated.'' Skeptics may be concerned that a new technology will make people's pleasures and interactions more artificial and shallow; Randall comments that this is already something well known in our society, seemingly dismissing the possibility that new technologies will make this any worse.
+The final answer is a depressing and strangely beautiful comment on human nature: ''Will [ ] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated.'' Skeptics may be concerned that a new technology will make people's pleasures and interactions more artificial and shallow; Randall comments that this is already something well known in our society, seemingly dismissing the possibility that new technologies will make this any worse. This would later be touched on again in [[1601: Isolation]].
 The title text asks, ''Will [ ] allow us to better understand each other and thus make war undesirable?'', and suggests that it comes up every time a new communication medium is invented. The argument has long been that wars require us to effectively dehumanize one another (which is the only way that mass slaughter can be justified), so the ability to communicate more freely with people from other nations will make it impossible for us to consider war as an option. Unfortunately, the ability to mentally separate ourselves from one another appears to be quite resilient, particularly when there's strong incentive to so do (which is often the case in international conflicts). What's more, the same communications technology that can help us interact across borders can also be used by belligerent voices to dehumanize others and justify the use of force. While war is always "undesirable", in the sense that it has huge human and financial costs, people keep managing to make it happen, and technology doesn't seem capable of changing that.

@@ Line 18: / Line 18: @@
 ''Will teens use [ ] for sex? Yes. Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes.'' The first question is usually raised in a way that's either salacious or fear-mongering, but the second puts it into context. Most teens have sex at some point, and many have active sex lives, which has been true pretty much throughout history. This is upsetting to many adults, but is more or less unavoidable. When new technologies become commonplace, it's almost inevitable that it will become involved in sex somehow. This can be presented as the technology encourages sexual immorality, but there's little reason to believe that new technologies makes it more likely that young people will have sex.
-''Will [ ] destroy music/art? No.'' Every new technology for reproducing musical and artistic works (such as [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2004/03/wicked-player-piano player pianos] and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbarro/2012/01/18/thirty-years-before-sopa-mpaa-feared-the-vcr/ video cassette recorders]) has been accompanied by warnings that it will destroy the industry that supplies it content. While is is likely that industries built around art will be disrupted (see above), the nature of music and art are so fundamental to human beings that it's certain they'll survive, even if the business models around them change.
+''Will [ ] destroy music/art? No.'' Every new technology for reproducing musical and artistic works (such as [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2004/03/wicked-player-piano player pianos] and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbarro/2012/01/18/thirty-years-before-sopa-mpaa-feared-the-vcr/ video cassette recorders]) has been accompanied by warnings that it will destroy the industry that supplies it content. While it is likely that industries built around art will be disrupted (see above), the nature of music and art are so fundamental to human beings that it's certain they'll survive, even if the business models around them change.
 ''But can't we go back to a time when— No.'' Elderly people frequently {{tvtropes|WhenIWasYourAge|express their disapproval}} of modern culture and lifestyle, and of the technology that drives them. These judgments may reflect valid concerns about damaging trends, or they may merely reflect nostalgia and a bias against a world they no longer understand. In either case, it's implausible that society will simply decide to reverse technological or cultural trends. For better or worse, they're here to stay.

@@ Line 16: / Line 16: @@
 ''Will [ ] destroy whole industries? Yes.'' Most significant technologies, once widely adopted, with tend to either make other technologies obsolete, or eliminate the need or desire for other products or services. Accordingly, there's a long history of industries rising and falling as new technologies develop, and there's little reason to imagine this changing. This is a bit of a loaded question because "destroy industries" sounds negative, and only covers half the effect — instead of merely destroying them, we're also {{w|Creative destruction|replacing}} them with something (hopefully) better.
-''Will teens use [ ] for sex? Yes. Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes.'' The first question is usually raised in a way that's either salacious or fear-mongering, but the second puts it into context. Most teens have sex at some point, and many have active sex lives, which has been true pretty much throughout history. This is upsetting to many adults, but is more or less unavoidable. When new technologies become commonplace, it's almost inevitable that it will become involved in sex somehow. This can be presented as the technology encourage sexual immorality, but there's little reason to believe that new technologies make it more likely that young people will have sex.
+''Will teens use [ ] for sex? Yes. Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes.'' The first question is usually raised in a way that's either salacious or fear-mongering, but the second puts it into context. Most teens have sex at some point, and many have active sex lives, which has been true pretty much throughout history. This is upsetting to many adults, but is more or less unavoidable. When new technologies become commonplace, it's almost inevitable that it will become involved in sex somehow. This can be presented as the technology encourages sexual immorality, but there's little reason to believe that new technologies makes it more likely that young people will have sex.
 ''Will [ ] destroy music/art? No.'' Every new technology for reproducing musical and artistic works (such as [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2004/03/wicked-player-piano player pianos] and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbarro/2012/01/18/thirty-years-before-sopa-mpaa-feared-the-vcr/ video cassette recorders]) has been accompanied by warnings that it will destroy the industry that supplies it content. While is is likely that industries built around art will be disrupted (see above), the nature of music and art are so fundamental to human beings that it's certain they'll survive, even if the business models around them change.

@@ Line 22: / Line 22: @@
 ''But can't we go back to a time when— No.'' Elderly people frequently {{tvtropes|WhenIWasYourAge|express their disapproval}} of modern culture and lifestyle, and of the technology that drives them. These judgments may reflect valid concerns about damaging trends, or they may merely reflect nostalgia and a bias against a world they no longer understand. In either case, it's implausible that society will simply decide to reverse technological or cultural trends. For better or worse, they're here to stay.
-''Will [ ] bring about world peace?- No.'' People have been trying to bring about world peace for centuries; While it is possible for diplomatic and cultural advances to make war less widespread and/or less destructive, conflict between nations and peoples seems unlikely to end anytime son, and it's entirely implausible that any given piece of technology will bring about that end.
+''Will [ ] bring about world peace?- No.'' People have been trying to bring about world peace for centuries; While it is possible for diplomatic and cultural advances to make war less widespread and/or less destructive, conflict between nations and peoples seems unlikely to end anytime soon, and it's entirely implausible that any given piece of technology will bring about that end.
 The final answer is a depressing and strangely beautiful comment on human nature: ''Will [ ] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated.'' Skeptics may be concerned that a new technology will make people's pleasures and interactions more artificial and shallow; Randall comments that this is already something well known in our society, seemingly dismissing the possibility that new technologies will make this any worse.

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
 ==Explanation==
-This is [[Randall]]'s commentary on some of the baseless skepticism and equally baseless optimism directed at new technologies. Related: [[1215: Insight]] and [[1227: The Pace of Modern Life]]. While it's always healthy to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of cutting-edge tech before blindly diving in and adopting it, it's not healthy to base that evaluation on unrealistically high standards and expectations.{{Citation needed}} New developments will have pros and cons, and it's hard to tell whether they make the world a better place or not.
+This is [[Randall]]'s commentary on some of the baseless skepticism and equally baseless optimism directed at new technologies. Related: [[1215: Insight]] and [[1227: The Pace of Modern Life]]. While it's always healthy to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of cutting-edge tech before blindly diving in and adopting it, it's not healthy to base that evaluation on unrealistically high standards and expectations.
-Randall has set up a Q&A for this kind of questioning. Most of the them are straightforward, but we'll provide some commentary on selected questions.
+Randall provides a set of predictions that tend to be made about new major technologies (particularly communications and multimedia technologies), and answers the question of whether those predictions are likely to actually come true. Importantly, these predictions have been made for many years, about many different technologies (reaching back at least as far as radio, and some as far back as the printing press), so Randall is likely confident in his answers, based on past performance.
-''Will [ ] make us all geniuses/morons? No.'' The answer is quite straightforward. It is impossible (at least at the time of this writing) to make everybody a genius or a moron.
+''Will [ ] make us all geniuses/morons? No.'' While it is possible for new technologies to make education and information more widely available, it's never going to make everyone a genius. At the same time, while new technologies might introduce new distractions or avenues for misinformation, they're unlikely to genuinely make people less intelligent en masse.
-''Will [ ] destroy whole industries? Yes.'' A widely adopted technology usually causes another to gradually phase out, and industries will rise and fall as technologies do. This is a bit of a loaded question because "destroy industries" sounds negative, and only covers half the effect — instead of merely destroying them, we're also {{w|Creative destruction|replacing}} them with something (hopefully) better.
+''Will [ ] destroy whole industries? Yes.'' Most significant technologies, once widely adopted, with tend to either make other technologies obsolete, or eliminate the need or desire for other products or services. Accordingly, there's a long history of industries rising and falling as new technologies develop, and there's little reason to imagine this changing. This is a bit of a loaded question because "destroy industries" sounds negative, and only covers half the effect — instead of merely destroying them, we're also {{w|Creative destruction|replacing}} them with something (hopefully) better.
-''Will teens use [ ] for sex? Yes. Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes.'' Sex is pretty important to almost everyone, so it'll find its way into most generic technologies. Hormone-crazed tech-savvy teenagers are a particularly strong intersection of the two. Parents fearing teen sex might be worried about how their kids would use the technology, but the second question puts such concerns into their proper context quite concisely.
+''Will teens use [ ] for sex? Yes. Were they going to have sex anyway? Yes.'' The first question is usually raised in a way that's either salacious or fear-mongering, but the second puts it into context. Most teens have sex at some point, and many have active sex lives, which has been true pretty much throughout history. This is upsetting to many adults, but is more or less unavoidable. When new technologies become commonplace, it's almost inevitable that it will become involved in sex somehow. This can be presented as the technology encourage sexual immorality, but there's little reason to believe that new technologies make it more likely that young people will have sex.
-''Will [ ] destroy music/art? No.'' Every new technology for reproducing musical and artistic works (such as [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2004/03/wicked-player-piano player pianos] and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbarro/2012/01/18/thirty-years-before-sopa-mpaa-feared-the-vcr/ video cassette recorders]) has been accompanied by warnings that it will destroy the industry that supplies it content. The reality is a special case of the "destroy industries" question - old business models will fall but new ones will arise in their place, and art and music as a whole will survive.
+''Will [ ] destroy music/art? No.'' Every new technology for reproducing musical and artistic works (such as [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2004/03/wicked-player-piano player pianos] and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbarro/2012/01/18/thirty-years-before-sopa-mpaa-feared-the-vcr/ video cassette recorders]) has been accompanied by warnings that it will destroy the industry that supplies it content. While is is likely that industries built around art will be disrupted (see above), the nature of music and art are so fundamental to human beings that it's certain they'll survive, even if the business models around them change.
-''But can't we go back to a time when— No.'' Elderly people {{tvtropes|WhenIWasYourAge|express their disapproval}} of today's technological luxuries, nostalgically longing for a time before Foo or Bar came around. That's just how the stereotype goes, but there is a large helping of truth to it. Usually, their sentiments are not a fair judgement, but an emotional attachment to the olden days and a {{tvtropes|TheyChangedItNowItSucks|resistance to change}}.
+''But can't we go back to a time when— No.'' Elderly people frequently {{tvtropes|WhenIWasYourAge|express their disapproval}} of modern culture and lifestyle, and of the technology that drives them. These judgments may reflect valid concerns about damaging trends, or they may merely reflect nostalgia and a bias against a world they no longer understand. In either case, it's implausible that society will simply decide to reverse technological or cultural trends. For better or worse, they're here to stay.
-''Will [ ] bring about world peace?- No.'' People have been trying to bring about world peace for centuries; sadly, other people are in no such hurry and insist on more conflict to solve their own problems.
+''Will [ ] bring about world peace?- No.'' People have been trying to bring about world peace for centuries; While it is possible for diplomatic and cultural advances to make war less widespread and/or less destructive, conflict between nations and peoples seems unlikely to end anytime son, and it's entirely implausible that any given piece of technology will bring about that end.
-The final answer is a depressing and strangely beautiful comment on human nature: ''Will [ ] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated.'' Skeptics may be concerned that a new technology will make people's pleasures and interactions more artificial and shallow; Randall comments that this is already something well known in our society.
+The final answer is a depressing and strangely beautiful comment on human nature: ''Will [ ] cause widespread alienation by creating a world of empty experiences? We were already alienated.'' Skeptics may be concerned that a new technology will make people's pleasures and interactions more artificial and shallow; Randall comments that this is already something well known in our society, seemingly dismissing the possibility that new technologies will make this any worse.
-From the title text, ''Will [ ] allow us to better understand each other and thus make war undesirable?'' describes the usual theory that a technology might use to bring about world peace. Unfortunately, not only does the answer seem to be "no" to World Peace either way, but there's no indication that increased global communication actually facilitates understanding and empathy between distant communities. In fact, many cynics say the Internet has in fact caused the opposite effect, causing people to fracture into like-minded cliques rather than intermingle.
+The title text asks, ''Will [ ] allow us to better understand each other and thus make war undesirable?'', and suggests that it comes up every time a new communication medium is invented. The argument has long been that wars require us to effectively dehumanize one another (which is the only way that mass slaughter can be justified), so the ability to communicate more freely with people from other nations will make it impossible for us to consider war as an option. Unfortunately, the ability to mentally separate ourselves from one another appears to be quite resilient, particularly when there's strong incentive to so do (which is often the case in international conflicts). What's more, the same communications technology that can help us interact across borders can also be used by belligerent voices to dehumanize others and justify the use of force. While war is always "undesirable", in the sense that it has huge human and financial costs, people keep managing to make it happen, and technology doesn't seem capable of changing that.
 ==Transcript==

← Older revision		Revision as of 01:33, 29 July 2022
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	Randall has set up a Q&A for this kind of questioning. Most of the them are straightforward, but we'll provide some commentary on selected questions.		Randall has set up a Q&A for this kind of questioning. Most of the them are straightforward, but we'll provide some commentary on selected questions.
		+
		+	''Will [ ] make us all geniuses/morons? No.''The answer is quite straightforward. It is impossible (at least at the time of this writing) to make everybody a genius or a moron.

	''Will [ ] destroy whole industries? Yes.'' A widely adopted technology usually causes another to gradually phase out, and industries will rise and fall as technologies do. This is a bit of a loaded question because "destroy industries" sounds negative, and only covers half the effect — instead of merely destroying them, we're also {{w\|Creative destruction\|replacing}} them with something (hopefully) better.		''Will [ ] destroy whole industries? Yes.'' A widely adopted technology usually causes another to gradually phase out, and industries will rise and fall as technologies do. This is a bit of a loaded question because "destroy industries" sounds negative, and only covers half the effect — instead of merely destroying them, we're also {{w\|Creative destruction\|replacing}} them with something (hopefully) better.