June 14, 2026
Much of my concern with atomization at-large is rooted in my experience of isolation when I lived in Iowa. I have written about it in other books, and I may be vain enough to not recount it here out of a presumption of familiarity with my other writing—but to provide the briefest description: it was a very unpleasant experience.
Moving to a new place is often described as one of the more common painful experiences, and facially, this seems obvious. From an emotional standpoint, one loses and must recreate a group of others who understand the mover—no easy task given the continual enlarging of one’s self. On a detached, evolutionary science level, one loses their “tribe,” triggering feelings of danger and anxiety which are then abstracted into a desire for belonging and connection by our modern brains. Regardless of interpretation, those who have moved around will likely mention how difficult the early days were. A small portion of people may have adapted such that they require less from others than the average person. However, they are outliers and should not be counted; furthermore, not all adaptations are positive for eudaimonia.
That I have had a poor footing in New York has, in a way, been a blessing. Though I wish to be truly known by those around me, being able to skip the early days of matching and misunderstanding is no small gift—may all be so lucky when considering a move. As well, I suspect that the character of this city is such that these random connections are made easier and are befitting of those with a social character.
Though the forces of anti-friction still threaten the social fabric, one particular example I saw today (which was particularly funny) was a pizza deliveryman making a delivery right next door to an apartment that had a pizzeria on the bottom floor. Sure, there may be legitimate reasons for this, but regardless, it was a funny sight. There remains a drive for an easier existence above all else.
One such development in the realm of effortless living (“effortless” being derogatory in this sense, as effort provides meaning to our lives) is the use of ChatGPT and other LLMs. The use of these tools is not necessarily bad, though many of their applications tend toward the suboptimal.
Expediting one’s cognitive functions acts as a leveler. Those without artistic ability experience an augmentation that advances their (context-less) output beyond that of a beginner. On the other side of the coin, those who depend on these tools may see their more advanced skills atrophy with continued usage. This is the same for writing, research, and other fields (all of which I care about!). This has already happened in certain realms; oftentimes truck drivers take non-truck routes in New York, delegating inborn navigation to Google Maps to the point that they have a poor internal concept of the city. In prior years, a driver who wished to keep their job would require this skill. Technology already enables these disempowerments.
Our society has gradually increased in complexity over time. That it will do so forever is not a given, but its current scale is already at a level too massive for any one person to grasp. This constant delegation of mental activity to machines represents a danger: our collective society may eventually become unable to understand the processes that make it work. This risks causing some sort of cascading collapse, or at the very least, a reality where things simply get worse.
One way in which circumstances may deprave rather quickly is within the social realm. Any period of extended isolation for people seems to result in a rapid degradation of their ability to relate to others; we must only look back to COVID to see how people became less able to relate, how rates of sociopathy rose, and so on. Currently, it is said that 60% of ChatGPT usage is spent supplanting conversations one would previously have had with a friend. It may be that these users are receiving higher-quality advice, but their capacity for overall connection is being reduced. It seems that we choose the easiest path in isolation; not having to face the thoughts of other feeling beings is easiest—and much more deterministic, to say the least. If we collectively take this path, we may hit a stage at which the underbelly of our society fails, losing the gentle threads that allow us to exist at all.
The existence of a preference does not make it good, and not all desires need to be fulfilled. Effort is merited because its continued exertion facilitates our capacity for it in perpetuity. If we are to continue our society, we ought to evaluate which crutches advance us and which further debilitate us.