Another one of Chesterton’s fences:) In the name of our goddess Progress we keep removing necessary friction without understanding its purpose, its impact, and outcomes on us….Perhaps we should pause to reflect before rushing to make everything “easy”.
People don’t need 100% ease (or no friction), they need challenges they can manage at a rate that feels motivating. A frictionless life or society is lifeless, static & boring. Growth requires appropriate challenges, and can never be without discomfort or holding space for the process of discovery. Appropriate challenges make humans feel capable; when we remove them we do our(future)selves such an incredible disservice.
I love AI, but I love discernment better. It’s not about making everything easy but WHICH workflows need automation vs not and which places truly need ease vs “right sized” challenges. As a silly example, it should be hard to generally access things that can cause widespread harm (drugs that can be fatal in small doses), require effort to learn about them (professional schooling), and expertise/licensing (NP, PA, MD, DO) to finally use them. This is friction but it makes sense & does something useful for the community at large (preventing charlatans from poisoning ppl regularly). However accessing the professionals to prescribe your (potentially) fatal medicine should be “easy” since the thing you are accessing is judgement & we've made a societal pact that licensed experts can be trusted.
“Where can we relinquish trust?” is probably the question to ask vs could this be easier (or faster, for that matter). Thank you! This article fired me up bigly.
Another one of Chesterton’s fences:) In the name of our goddess Progress we keep removing necessary friction without understanding its purpose, its impact, and outcomes on us….Perhaps we should pause to reflect before rushing to make everything “easy”.
People don’t need 100% ease (or no friction), they need challenges they can manage at a rate that feels motivating. A frictionless life or society is lifeless, static & boring. Growth requires appropriate challenges, and can never be without discomfort or holding space for the process of discovery. Appropriate challenges make humans feel capable; when we remove them we do our(future)selves such an incredible disservice.
I love AI, but I love discernment better. It’s not about making everything easy but WHICH workflows need automation vs not and which places truly need ease vs “right sized” challenges. As a silly example, it should be hard to generally access things that can cause widespread harm (drugs that can be fatal in small doses), require effort to learn about them (professional schooling), and expertise/licensing (NP, PA, MD, DO) to finally use them. This is friction but it makes sense & does something useful for the community at large (preventing charlatans from poisoning ppl regularly). However accessing the professionals to prescribe your (potentially) fatal medicine should be “easy” since the thing you are accessing is judgement & we've made a societal pact that licensed experts can be trusted.
“Where can we relinquish trust?” is probably the question to ask vs could this be easier (or faster, for that matter). Thank you! This article fired me up bigly.