I’m old enough to see it in my own life. It’s not only technology but a decline of spirituality — one aspect being religion. So in a sense one major contributing factor is a change in philosophy.

An interesting example is looking at the arts — movies, television, music. Compare Woodstock 1969 to Woodstock 1999. That alone says it all. — Mikie

I think the major part has to do with disconnection to others. With technology and internet we've increased our ability to communicate, but we are disconnected to the physical form of communication. There's tons of studies on the importance of physical connection, being in the room with other people. It's been something very much experienced coming out of the pandemic, how mental health drastically improves as soon as people started physically seeing each other again.

We're blasted by information in our alone time, and the information is "dead". Like this text, like all text on this forum, it is a dead representation of who the people writing here are as a whole. If we all gathered and met up, the discussions would look very different, but it would also have a dimension of emotion that isn't seen online. Respect is higher when facing each other talking.

So it's not really about just "meeting up", it's about the quality of interaction that is lost online. Humans are built to interact through micro-expressions, body language, tonality in voice. While we don't need it all the time, the dominance of online communication over the physical have led to a change in behavior.

Together with the focus on individuality, the neoliberal ideology of the self, it has skewed the perspective people have of their ego.

What we need more today than ever is social groups not just meeting, but building something together within the physical realm. A step back from the individual perspective, the focus on the ego and into a collective realm in which social groups build something together.

There's no surprise that there's been a rise in isolated groups over the years; stronger polarization between different ideas and ideologies. The lack of a sense of collective as a society has pushed people into other forms of gatherings and without careful guidance formed into destructive ones like MAGA, incel communities, ethnic groups divided away from multicultural collaboration and into hostility against other groups etc We've even seen it in the extreme ways that political parties have generated followers that are less open to actual politics in which a party in parlaments collaborate with a "give and take" structure towards other opposing parties. Previously, political parties collaborated all over the spectrum with the intent of representing their voters wills and needs in the halls of power. Now, they only try to play a political game without any real vision and in closed rooms, scheming stronger ill-willed strategies against other opposing political parties; everything is about sabotaging others party politics than a give and take strategy for progress and problem solving.

What all of this shows is that while the neoliberal individuality have focused on the ego, that ego still craves the social realm, but with a lack of a collective dimension it clusters together with whatever rhymes with that specific ego and the group behaves outwards with hostility as the single individual ego does at its core.

It also shows that the individual craves something to be passionate about, and without a larger collective vision, they can only turn to these minor ones and double down on them. As you mentioned, the decline in spirituality and religion has created a void in the larger collective sense.

But I believe that the solution should be to have something that connects people within the context of a larger collective aspiration. We need a form of goal for humanity as a whole. Something that feels like we're heading somewhere, without necessarily having to do with religion. We need something that people feel is something we build together and can collaborate within.

The major obstacles is that the largest policies today are controlled by corporations who's interest is in profit. That's nothing that can be collectively gathered around.

We therefore need a shift towards a collective goal that we can all build together. Something we can all believe in is the right path forward for humanity. Something that gathers people across borders and breaking away from capitalistic profit seeking.

One such project, I would say, is building a new form of living that mitigates climate change. That project demands collaboration from all people and a dismantle of the selfish individuality that is toxic to us. Figuring that out requires innovations, engineers, philosophers, builders, collaboration across industries and different people. Across borders, nationalities and ethnicities.

It could be such a projects that we collectively gather around to achieve together, but for that we need to remove power from those holding us back from doing so. We need to stop being careless with who we vote for, who we support and what industries we give our money to. We need to stop our cognitively biased rhetoric that's only there to hide our laziness and find a goal and vision for a future with this problem fixed and work towards it, gathering people around us for it.

When you look at Woodstock 69 as you mentioned, the one thing that is key is that they were a social group who focused on the good of the collective rather than the expression of the individual. And the LSD helped with a lot of ego death that infused such mentality even further.

We need more ego death, more of a large collective goal or spirit (without it having to be religion), and we need projects and visions as a collective to focus on. Solving world problems and returning to a sense of collective achievements, like returning to looking up at the stars and dreaming of new human achievements in exploration and reaching new heights as a species.

People underestimate the importance of such dreams. The constant complain against those who dream of things like space exploration is that we should focus on stuff like ending poverty instead, but they're missing the point of what such dreams do to us. Let's say we end poverty.... and then what? The emptiness of just existing without a sense of purpose kills people far more than a lack of food, because it kills the mind and makes us empty bodies; husks mindlessly moving around, acting out confused emotions in the lack of a path forward.

We need to dream collectively, we need to collaborate more as a collective and we need to kill the ego. That's the difference between Woodstock 69 and 99.

Great post. Some thoughts…

we are disconnected to the physical form of communication. There's tons of studies on the importance of physical connection — Christoffer

Yes— and it’s just obvious from experience.

We're blasted by information in our alone time, and the information is "dead". — Christoffer

It’s dead from lack of physical communication as you mention, but also dead in the sense that we’ve become desensitized to information. We now have knowledge and information of all kinds at our fingertips, while walking in the woods, and we’re less knowledgeable and less informed (and more confused, distracted, divided) than ever.

So it’s a problem of abundance as well. But one more supplemental point: even books are removed from the person writing it. Books never substituted for conversation in real time, but I wouldn’t say they were dead. What’s truly “dead,” and I think we all can feel, is reading and communicating through screens. Reading a book in the real world versus online is a very different experience. The former I consider alive, the latter rather dead. I’m exaggerating, but there’s something to it. Reading a book online is simply different— whether it’s the light from the screen or whatever, the experience is cheapened. At least for me.

Together with the focus on individuality, the neoliberal ideology of the self, it has skewed the perspective people have of their ego. — Christoffer

One important aspect of a general assault on the majority of mankind. The elites have the power and want to keep that power. They know the only real power the masses have are their numbers.

Undermining a sense of community, solidarity, and the common good are all necessary. Keep everyone as divided, alone, apathetic and passive as possible. The emphasis on individual consumption is therefore an important piece. Destroying unions is another. Infiltrating the education system is another and, of course, owning and controlling the media — of which social media is another piece (owned by major multinational corporations).

What we need more today than ever is social groups not just meeting, but building something together within the physical realm. A step back from the individual perspective, the focus on the ego and into a collective realm in which social groups build something together. — Christoffer

Yes— and it has to be in the real world. It cannot be on a Facebook group. It’s too easy and cheap. People have to show up. There’s other prerequisites too: awareness, some education, the ability to listen, and some control of emotions. But schools and parents and media fail at cultivating these attributes, based on deliberate decisions years ago — so this itself is a challenge. If people are tired, financially insecure, indebted, busy, addicted to technology and never educated on any of it, it’s no wonder of the percentage of people even interested in politics, less than 5% do anything more than slacktivism. It’s all by design, really. In the sense that none of it is an accident.

the decline in spirituality and religion has created a void in the larger collective sense. — Christoffer

Yes — and there’s been nothing to replace it. We have science and capitalism. That’s it. It’s material gain and material existence. It’s not fair to “blame” science for this as the creationist-type people like to do, but there’s something to it. Even if we believe science — whatever it is — has stumbled on the ultimate and infinite truth, it may well be worth implementing something like Plato’s noble lies, just for the health and betterment of society.

One such project, I would say, is building a new form of living that mitigates climate change. — Christoffer

A big one, yes. It’s good to have a problem and a goal, to be problem-solving with others. Nuclear weapons is another one. We have problems never faced in human history. Wars and famines have always existed, at least going back 10,000 years or so, but nuclear weapons and 420 ppm of CO2? Man…

Bowling Alone was developed from his 1995 essay entitled "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital". Putnam surveys the decline of social capital in the United States since 1950.

Apparently Robert Putnam found enough decline in social capital over 1950 and 1995 to justify the seminal essay. Those are years some are likely to now reference as "the good old days" before the personal computer, the internet, smart phones, social media, apps for everything, etc. became ubiquitous. New technology and new media have, no doubt, exacerbated isolation and solitary activity, but the process began before either their existence or ubiquity.

If we can't blame social media, cell phones, dating apps, etc. for declining sociability, then what contributed to the decline of "social capital"?

Some candidates:

Television. It has most often been viewed at home; it's less social than watching a film in a theater or any kind of live performance. Per Marshal McLuhan, it's the media not the content.

Suburbia. A very large share of suburbs were created de novo after WWII. "Actual, interpersonal community" might or might not develop from the process of peopling the settlement through real estate sales. Many women who were not working found suburbia a lonely place, a population of lonely people. IF men did not establish community at work, they commuted home to a lonely town/

Work. There are a variety of workplace 'styles': some of them highly competitive and hierarchical; some of them highly exploitative; some of them extremely boring; some of them egalitarian; some more interesting than others. Over time (from the early 70s forward) wages and benefits began to stagnate then decline, eventually requiring workers to put in more hours at work. Maintaining a family's lifestyle might require a second member of the family to begin working as well. More work = less time and energy for social activity.

Automobiles. Cars enabled some degree of personal liberation. A car provided private transportation free of supervision or observation. This function may have become invisible by its ubiquity. Having a car provides numerous individual benefits. A car can enable one to reach destinations for social activity, but the trip itself is often alone. The more time one spends traveling in a car (commuting, for instance) the more one is forced to spend time alone.

Geographical and social mobility. Americans tend to move fairly often -- maybe a few blocks away or a few miles from one's last home. Or maybe 2,000 miles away, from Des Moines to Los Angeles or St. Louis to New York. Mobility often breaks up social networks, while at the same time creating new social networks -- or not.

When the personal computer, Internet, cell and then smart phone, and social media arrived, they offered a simulacrum of social life. it is often much more "social-like" than "actually social". And, of course, it's all pretty much dependent on advertising dollars which yields high incomes for owners and investors.

What to do? Join a bowling league. The local Eagles Club has a couple hours of dancing every nigh, tango to polka. Go to church (for the society). Talk to your neighbors whenever there is an opportunity; create opportunities. Talk to at least one person while grocery shopping -- some brief friendly chat. Participate in groups engaged in activities you find interesting. Find someone to have lunch or dinner with once a week. Engage.

“Often, we don’t think something is beneficial unless it’s productive,” she said. We don’t always realize “that sitting around and resting with someone is still a productive state, and worthy of our time,” she said.

Liming, an associate professor of writing at Champlain College, said there wasn’t much research on hanging out and more was needed. But there’s evidence to suggest that face-to-face contact can strengthen emotional closeness. Plus, hanging out has an appealingly low barrier of entry, and it’s inexpensive: You don’t need reservations or tickets or special skills.

Hanging out also invites deeper conversation and builds intimacy, Liming said. (Dr. Ayers points to the trending desire on social media for a “couch friend” — a buddy that will sit with you on the couch and happily do nothing.)

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/09/well/live/hanging-out-adult-friendships.html

Apropos of this thread.

economics. Particularly the pursuit of wealth and neo liberal policies, reducing everything to value, including people and their relationship you each other and nature and thereby reinforcing the atomised worldview of individualism.

Exactly! "Under capitalism, everything is reduced to the cash nexus." Karl Marx

It's still true; maybe even more so now.

Atheist problems.