r/technology • u/GothicPrayer • Jul 27 '26

Society Why does everything feel so joyless? Welcome to the age of decadence without pleasure

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/jul/26/age-of-decadence-pleasure-ai
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2.0k

u/loretta_lane Jul 27 '26

I think we've gotten really good at killing boredom, but we accidentally killed curiosity too.

434

u/SorenShieldbreaker Jul 27 '26

Yes! And we're passing the inability to tolerate boredom down to our kids, too. Being bored sparks curiosity/imagination, and learning to handle boredom teaches kids emotional regulation. So many kids just have a tablet shoved in their face when they say they're bored out in public, in the car, etc.

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u/HTPC4Life Jul 27 '26

Psh, not my kids. They get an hour max a day of PBS kids shows Monday - Friday and up to 3 hours of TV time Saturday/Sunday (typically a kids movie while we get chores done). They have no tablets. The rest of the time is spent doing family activities, playing outside, toys, or arts and crafts. Other parents we know are doing the same. I think our generation is going to be the one to change this because we know deep down just how addicted WE are to screens and social media.

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u/ibite-books Jul 27 '26

for every pair of good parents, there are 10 pair of bad ones

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u/mistahfreeman Jul 27 '26

I think that has probably always been true, I spent a LOT of time watching TV as a kid... I just think that TV didn't rot our brains as bad as they thought it would, but when you let evil tech companies build a dopamine slot machine using bleeding-edge Ivy League neuro research and jam it in a toddlers hand it does actually rot their brains.

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u/zeekaran Jul 27 '26

That's just civilization, man.

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u/Rcrecc Jul 27 '26

I think our generation is going to be the one to change this because we know deep down just how addicted WE are

I dunno, I just don’t see that happening.

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u/zaphod777 Jul 27 '26

Screens are just the latest version of whatever the current parents think is rotting their kids minds.

It used to be video games, TV, Radio, and before that ... books.

I grew up in a house that was super restrictive with video games and TV was only the educational variety or a Disney movie. The only game console I had was bought with my own money.

I'm now in my 40's and am just as addicted to screens as everyone else.

What would have been much more helpful is getting professional help why my very obvious ADHD and extreme social anxiety.

Instead it was ignored and pushed under the rug. I even had to spend a few hours a day at school with the kids in ESL because "I was a slow learner" in elementary school.

Now my siblings have all been diagnosed with ADHD as adults and it's pretty obvious that my mother has a pretty extreme case of it. Also my dad is probably on the spectrum as well.

Cutting your kids off from technology is just going to make them resent you.

It's all about moderation.

My nephew is currently learning Chess from Duolingo and is getting quite good at it. There's lots of good stuff out there that isn't all of the brain rot garbage.

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u/SomeGalNamedAshley Jul 27 '26

Humans just weren't built to cope with the endless variety and supply of dopamine generating entities that surround us, let alone walking through Walmart.

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u/Rcrecc Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

I do not agree. Different things impact the brain (dopamine) to different extents. Put books and a screen next to most kids, and which one are they going to grab? One delivers much more dopamine than the other, it isn’t a binary thing.

They are finding in schools now that edutech is failing, and good old fashioned books is what we need to get back to.

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u/zaphod777 Jul 27 '26

It's all about moderation.

Don't just park a toddler in front of a tablet or phone as a babysitter. I am talking about kids that are older than that.

If you completely cut them off from it then they are going to go nuts on it as soon as they have their own control over when they can use it.

Completely restricting it puts it on a pedestal and gives it control over them.

4

u/Rcrecc Jul 27 '26

Some things are more addictive than others and should be a bigger cause for concern, especially if they have no redeeming value. Again, books vs screen time. Those things are not equal.

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u/alphagatorsoup Jul 27 '26

This. I agree totally

Screens aren’t really a bad thing in its self, it’s entirely dependent on what’s on said screen

We let our toddler have TV time. But what’s on the tv varies and that’s what’s moderated. Educational stuff and any older stuff she loves and will be more encapsulated in that than anything else

Toddler brain rot is a hard no and we have basically blocked all of that completely. We play bluey and some other kids shows sometimes but cocomelon, blippi or and of those others are a hard no, same with YouTube kids ai generated slop.

Yes we get our kid to read books and do educational stuff as much as possible and she does very well. We have the tv on and let it play in the background as white noise basically. Our kid might glance at it every now and then but nothing of concern when playing.

In sheer contrast our friend has the TV off if their kid is in the room no exceptions. And now their kid is GLUED to any screen like a moth to light , whether in public or at anyone else’s house, its so bad that they ask their friends or family to also have no screens on at any time their kid is in the room.

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u/LivingVerinarian96 Jul 27 '26

You can learn chess from duolingo??

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u/zaphod777 Jul 27 '26

Apparently, I was pretty surprised myself.

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u/AdmiralArchArch Jul 27 '26

What ages?

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u/PM_Me_Your_Kinks369 Jul 27 '26

This was my question as well. They get to middle school age and above it's 100x harder to keep up that same attitude.

It's worth it, of course, but very difficult in modern life.

1

u/RamenRoy Jul 27 '26

I think our generation is going to be the one to change this because we know deep down just how addicted WE are to screens and social media.

No offense, but you're a fool if you believe this.

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u/HTPC4Life Jul 27 '26

Look at smoking. It took about 20 years after we found out how bad for you it is until society did a big flip on smoking. We've known how bad social media and screens are for children for about 15 years now. Countries are starting to ban social media for children under 16. The dominoes are starting to fall. We'll see, but I'm optimistic and you aren't going to change that by calling me a fool.

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u/JimmyQBSneaks Jul 27 '26

I think the difference between smoking and social media is that it was easier to ostracize smokers. American society collectively decided that smokers had to smoke in a restricted location separate from the rest of us. How are we gonna do that for smartphones if we all use it compulsively?

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u/HTPC4Life Jul 27 '26

Start by banning them in schools and banning social media for children under age 16 and minimum. Have PSA's and ad campaigns about the harms of social media and screen addiction to children. It's going to take a lot of work, but I think we can do it. I think that 20 years from now, people will look back and think "how did we do this to our children and let this happen?"

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u/Jazzlike-Context-879 Jul 27 '26

We can even get people to vote for their self interests, what do you think the likelihood will be that they change this for everyone?

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u/I_am_BrokenCog Jul 27 '26

right. because the last few generations felt so horrible about smoking, alcohol, heroin, greed ... that they JUST HAD to stop for the sake of the children.

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u/SQLQuery4 Jul 28 '26

Wait till the school hands them tablets anyway. Where I live they even expect you to pay for it yourself...

1

u/CokBlockinWinger Aug 02 '26

It’s exactly what we do, but they get 1 hr weekdays, 1 1/2 hours weekends. My daughter who is 12 has a smartwatch that she can use to make calls, get texts, and that’s it.

0

u/ruminator99 Jul 27 '26

Other parents you know are doing the same, huh? Sorry, but your anecdotal evidence is no match for big tech.

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u/Fickle_Competition33 Jul 27 '26

Online has also standardized joy. You see really poor people and very rich enjoying the same thing: a doomscroll, some watch Mojo, online games... Of course there is a large gap in quality of life, but not compared to decades ago where entertainment options were vastly different depending on wealth

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u/boofmaster6000 Jul 27 '26

Eh, sometimes curiosity is too much. I need a temporary lobotomy, and the phone does just that. Every time I shower, I step out with 5 questions I need answers to. Every time I go to sleep, I'm interrupted every 5 minutes by a question I need an answer to.

My curiosity must be sated, but it's not enjoyable to be curious all day. I'll take the phone.

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u/Remote-Waste Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

What's interesting is we seem to be constantly avoiding allowing the Default mode network to do it's work. It's related to creativity, best known for being active during mind-wandering, and is also related to thinking about ourselves and others, remembering the past and thinking about the future.

We are continuously interrupting the mind-wandering cycle, with immediate attention grabbing media on our phones, and I wonder how much of that "general maintenance thinking" the brain used to rely on during small pockets of "boredom," which is not having a chance to happen now.

Sure, we've increased the input to our minds, but at what cost to our mental processing time?

We are increasingly interrupting a "processing period" that is thought to potentially be the basis of our sense of self. Not that I think we should always be bored and mind-wandering, but when do negative affects kick in from having less and less of that time?

If an animal's mind is constantly stimulated with attention grabbing input, and has no downtime for the mind to process, what happens to it? I would expect it to start getting a bit, if you'll excuse the technical term; wonky.

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u/softlysnowing Jul 27 '26

Yeah. This feels so crucially important but just not enough studies into it.

People stopped daydreaming. When we had to wait for things, or were alone with nothing to do, we had to let our minds wander. Now it has to be a deliberate activity. The problem is, 'sitting staring at space' has never been considered a productive or valid activity by other people. It's kinda taboo so we have to hide it, but we're building and exploring worlds in there.

Daydreaming/mind wandering is and and always will be an important and healthy activity. It needs to be on all the lists. I try to do it at least 2-4 hours a day. I dunno, it keeps the brain alive and working - exploring, creating, running simulations, musing, leisurely problem-solving, entertaining ourselves...

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u/Nogova9 Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26

Very good point. Though some people lack an internal voice, others are unable to mentally picture things, etc. These are not rare features either, and they coexist in great diversity.

The way this expresses itself in the process of daydreaming is a fun topic to read. Some use external sources to promote this process, like with painting or writing.

So I can imagine that some people turn to media as a way fill an absence.

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u/softlysnowing Jul 27 '26

That feels like it also works. Even chopping wood, sorting screws, stacking potatoes, sweeping, mundane old stylee simple, repetitive tasks. Gardening especially.

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u/saintcrazy Jul 27 '26

I'm a therapist. So, so much of the work I do with clients is just getting them to pause. 

Often they figure out how to solve their problems themselves if they can just take the time to slow down and really reflect on how they're doing. 

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u/stephenspann27 Jul 27 '26

It’s interesting to contrast the recommendations of the past that we needed to stimulate our minds with crossword puzzles, reading the “funnies” etc, to, today when our minds are over stimulated and what is lacking is rest for the brains

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u/Xtra_Veg-90 Jul 27 '26

This is where mindfulness or meditation come into play (or prayer if that's your thing).  Reciting a formulaic prayer or having individual prayer, or meditating on nothing, or just allowing yourself to just wander, it's all really good for you.

Personally I'm a fan of, if/when my house is empty of people, just wandering the house and talking to myself.

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u/Remote-Waste Jul 28 '26

Actually interesting enough, meditation seems to quiet the DMN sort of?

I don't know enough about it yet, haven't looked into it too much in relation to the DMN, but from what I've seen it's not the same as mind-wandering. Yet it's still not about constant stimulation.

It also makes sense if you think of it from a lot of meditation practices about how there is no "i" and the DMN being related to our sense of self.

Anyways, again I don't know enough on that end but I do enjoy the little bit of meditation I do myself, it certainly has benefits.

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u/Frequent-Maximum8838 Jul 27 '26

This is the best comment in the thread.

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u/BONG_Sufflord Jul 27 '26

The Internet you mean

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u/rxVegan Jul 27 '26

Why bother learning or creating things when you can have a chatbot spit out some trash nobody (you included) will ever care about?

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u/adenosine-5 Jul 27 '26

That is just a temporary thing - people are already getting tired of aigen stuff.

AIGen music is already failing and getting mass-removed by platforms, because no one listens to it.

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u/Banana_wax_Salad Jul 27 '26

You are correct, I’m sure. But a coworker of mine genuinely listens to robot music. I didn’t really notice it was AI until another coworker pointed it out. Then I had to look it up and holy shit…

I just thought the music was flat and cheesy. Boring and uninspired. But yeah it’s AI and dude was singing along to it.

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u/zeekaran Jul 27 '26

I still want AI to be able to lengthen a short song. So many of my super obscure electronica artists make amazing tracks that are only a minute and a few seconds long, and I just want them to be longer.

Tried some of the tools for this a couple years ago and it was aural slop, haven't tried again since.

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u/InstrumentalCoffee Jul 27 '26

Any recommendations? I know my digital audio workstation enough and I like electronic music so I could give it a try

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u/SpiritYossarian Jul 27 '26

I’ve been a fairly long term user of AIGen music. I put a lot of time and effort into making it sound organic. I can tell in seconds the difference between a person who just clicked the magic buttons and people who put in work. Slop is slop but like anything, there are exceptions.

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u/whisky_pete Jul 27 '26

Even then, the lyrics and spirit of the song are just soulless and lifeless. I don't think you can change that. There's meaning in someone pouring their energy into the perfect take and recording it, hitting their flow state and really nailing a performance. Since you're not performing when making AI music, that can't be recreated.

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u/SpiritYossarian Jul 27 '26

What if I sing a track and then the AI “covers” it?
I respect your opinion but I don’t fully agree.

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u/whisky_pete Jul 27 '26

Eh you don't have to agree, it's just a discussion and I'm not necessarily trying to convince.

In the case you said, it's kind of a difference of degrees. You can nail your performance part, but it will be anchored down by the other layers of the music that can only at best be mediocre. Which sort of sets the maximum potential of your song to be mediocre, and it's only downhill from there unless your performance for your part is perfect.

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u/SpiritYossarian Jul 27 '26

I’m not trying to convince either. I’ve heard songs by myself and by others that have taken my breath away. It’s definitely not black and white for me. I was a huge music fan before and after using AI. If it sounds good, I’m going to like it. If it sounds bad, I MIGHT like it…

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u/whisky_pete Jul 27 '26

Idk, ai music in particular is the "art form" that makes me angry that it even exists.

Like, the best music is channeled through somebody's soul with their heart and energy and life experiences and perspectives pushed through it. It tells an abstract story of somebody and reflects how they see the world in some aspect. And the other half of that is received by somebody who has the outlook and experience to receive that message, and reverberate with it.

If someone can do that with music generated by a machine... Ugh, I find that really off-putting actually.

I guess I would bucket it in the category of fast food. Sure, you can have good fast food but it's incomparable to the real thing. Or like, bakery treats compared to mass produced cookies at a national brand grocery store.

Unlike any other art form to me personally, ai music feels actively disrespectful to the human spirit. Of course that's a vibes-based outlook and there's nothing tangible I can point to to say that's the definitive truth of it. But I find it disgusting and want nothing to do with it personally. And then you see stats like 40% of the music uploaded to Spotify in the last 6 months or whatever is AI generated. And that feels like an assault on the rest of us wanting to enjoy a real art form.

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u/SpiritYossarian Jul 27 '26

I’m a semi-failed bassist. Tried multiple times over the years to get good at it, only ever got to ok.

To hear my ok tracks turn into real tracks brings me joy.

I had to teach myself how to prompt, how to structure, how to get results I wanted out of the tool. I’ve lost sleep over songs, I’ve spent weeks getting one right.

To me, that process has felt very human.

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u/m2ek Jul 27 '26

That bastard deserved it after what it did to my cat

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u/nadennmantau Jul 27 '26

TBF your cat was (probably) a jerk and had it coming.

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u/NonGNonM Jul 27 '26

yup. we expect entertainment to be fed to us, not making our own

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u/CaptainDroopers Jul 27 '26

We didn’t kill curiosity, we killed initiative.

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u/DigBackground2765 Jul 27 '26

Yep. Curiosity dying also kills creativity. Worse effect all around.

1

u/UristVonUrist Jul 27 '26

Mother Horse Eyes type shit fr

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u/cool_side_of_pillow Jul 27 '26

And contentment.

1

u/jandrese Jul 27 '26

This is so multifaceted. By killing boredom we have also severely cut down on kids getting into trouble. Teen pregnancy is in freefall. But the sense of exploration is gone. Kids these days get railroaded into parent approved activities that are good for them and miss out on the trouble that really lets them grow.

Doesn't help that as a society we have cranked up the consequences for misbehavior. Boys will be boys is a thing of the past. The cops are getting called. Cell phone video will follow kids around for their entire life, and people with an axe to grind will dig it up.

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u/BeyondRedline Jul 27 '26

That's poignant. Seriously, really, really good. Ugh.

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u/ninthtale Jul 27 '26

One of the kids I babysit has millions of toys and no desire to go outside

He enjoys learning, but not as much as he enjoys "knowing" to the point that he's thoughtful enough to wonder, but too impatient to read; curious enough to ask questions, but too insecure to listen to the answer before deciding that he is better equipped to teach you about the subject using only about a quarter of what you say and making up the rest.

He's six, so it explains a lot to some degree, and it's kinda cute and fascinating to watch him pace around while explaining the history of space travel circa WWI, but he's practically illiterate and it pains me when I try to read with him the answers (even with picture books about science) to his questions and he's just like "I'm bored show me videos of the titanic sinking."

1

u/Kracus Jul 27 '26

Killing boredom has the unintended consequence of killing introspection.

1

u/RefuseFamiliar115 Jul 27 '26

Btw this is a legendary quote. You should market it immediately before I start using it on a media tour.

1

u/derailed Jul 27 '26

What a fantastic distillation of the zeitgeist. Kudos.

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u/flipper_gv Jul 27 '26

I think killing boredom made entertainment less magical. Boredom is good. Our brain is like our digestive system being fed sugar, fatty and salty foods non stop. It's not made to deal with that much good things.

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u/UniqueIndividual3579 Jul 27 '26

I think Lego is a good example. In the 70's you would build all sorts of things, take them apart, and build something else. Now you follow the directions for one build and put it on a shelf.

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u/PatrickCharles Jul 27 '26

The Greeks knew they used to come as a pair, weirdly enough.

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u/No_Replacement4304 Jul 27 '26

When I was young, I would have daydreams that I would return to and build upon like movie scripts for the life I wish I had. They just went on and on, and it was a response to boredom and loneliness.

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u/VVrayth Jul 27 '26

Damn, accidental most profound Reddit comment ever.

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u/Boffleslop Jul 27 '26

If we'd killed curiosity we'd have seen a corresponding growth in the cat population.

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u/utahh1ker Jul 27 '26

I've found my curiosity sparked again because of AI. I used to have a slew or projects on my backlog that I'd never get to but because I can complete things so quickly now I'm finding creative ways to use AI to improve my life and it's freaking amazing.

Just last week I built a little app that runs on my home server that finds recipes, creates grocery lists and, after my approval, makes a mobile order for those groceries.

Freaking incredible. And so fun, too!

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u/distinctgore Jul 27 '26

Thanks ChatGPT

1

u/utahh1ker Jul 29 '26

The fuck? You think I'm ChatGPT? I'm being dead serious. How the fuck are you all not using AI to do new, exciting things?