Rebooting SDGC: Introduction

While I’m looking for work, I’m going to try writing this series of essays. Feedback is always appreciated.

My best friend died of cancer in 2018 at the age of 52. His death led to these essays in two ways:

1. The particular kind of cancer he had was mesothelioma, which was almost certainly caused by exposure to asbestos when he was in his teens. Asbestos was widely used in construction for decades: it was cheap, easy to work with, a good insulator, and an excellent fire retardant. It took many years to recognize that it was also killing people, and many more years before victims got compensation, but it is now banned or tightly regulated in most countries.

2. My friend wasn’t actually killed by his cancer—he was killed by a lethal injection administered by a doctor with his consent after many long discussions with his family. Doctors have probably been helping people end their lives with dignity for as long as there have been doctors, but the practice was illegal and the subject was taboo until quite recently. It is still controversial and tightly regulated, but I think we are all better off now that the conversation is happening in public.

Today, eight years later, some of the worst people in the world are using social media and AI in ways that undermine democracy and our mental health. I think the best way to think about these technologies and how we should manage them is in terms of cognitive pollution. I’m allowed to own and use chemicals like turpentine and acetone, but if I dump them in a stream or put them in your dinner, I expect to be fined or jailed for damaging your physical health. Similarly, if my recommendation algorithm amplifies your eating disorder, or my chatbot teaches you that “no” actually means “make me”, I should be held liable for harming your mental health.

This is a simple argument, but also a dangerous one. A lot of people think that talking about gay or transgender rights is harmful to children. I think they’re wrong, but what gives me the right to draw the line? And just as no single cigarette causes lung cancer, no single meme radicalizes someone, so how do we decide who is liable for what? Finally, even if we agree, how do we get society to change?

I started thinking about these questions in 2017. The UK had begun its long, slow stumble out of Europe, Donald Trump had been inaugurated as president, and the government of Myanmar was using Facebook to incite genocide. Somehow, the Internet had gone from being a way to bring people closer together to being a slow social poison—or rather, we had finally realized that it was both at once, and didn’t know what to do about it.

These essays have taken almost a decade to put together for two reasons. The first is that life happens: between COVID, other projects, and being laid off a couple of times, I never ~found~ made time to focus on it. The more important reason is impostor syndrome. Some of the people I will cite have spent decades thinking about these issues, only to reach the conclusion that, “It’s complicated”. I’m just a tourist, and an impatient one at that: I skim rather than reading deeply, and prefer simple explanations to accurate ones.

After years of searching, though, I haven’t found anything that talks about these issues in a way that will appeal to young programmers who haven’t ever taken a course on politics or sociology but don’t like being made to feel ignorant. I don’t understand everything I’ve read, but I think I understand you. I want you to understand the world so that you can make it better, because that’s the greatest adventure of all time.

In the year I was born most of the world’s people suffered under totalitarian rule, judges could and did order electroshock therapy to “cure” homosexuals, people could legally be denied jobs because of their skin color, and women couldn’t open bank accounts without their husband’s permission. Yes, a lot of things are bad and getting worse, but look at how far we’ve come. Look at how many more choices you have than your grandparents did. Look at how many more things you can know, and be, and enjoy. And most importantly, look at how many other people can too.

That didn’t happen by chance. Every time you buy one brand of t-shirt rather than another or take a minutes to vote you are choosing one future over another. Every time you help someone do something they couldn’t do before, you are giving them more more control over their own life. The world doesn’t get better on its own. It gets better because we make it better: penny by penny, vote by vote, and one lesson at a time.

The climate crisis, mass extinction, surveillance capitalism, inequality on a scale we haven’t seen in a century, the re-emergence of racist nationalism: my generation could have prevented them, but decided that quarterly earnings were more important. The bills for our cowardice, lethargy, and greed are now coming due; as they do, we have left you no easy solutions to these problems.

That doesn’t mean there are no solutions at all, though. The essays that follow will explore a few things I wish I had known earlier: where power comes from, how it is used, how its use is hidden, and how people have held the powerful accountable and made the world a fairer place. I’m not going to try to be comprehensive or even-handed, but I hope you’ll find it informative, entertaining, and inspiring. If you do, or if you have suggestions for improving it, I’d enjoy hearing from you.