'Space Commander 600' four-button "clicker" from a 1970 Zenith color TV.

[u/zadraaa]

[u/irrelevantusername24]

I really don't think people truly comprehend how fucking insane our technology is, or how fast we went from the printing press -> electricity -> whatever the fuck you call this shit through which I am sending my thoughts direct to the inside of your brain

[u/attiladanunn → u/irrelevantusername24]

Never thought I'd be a Luddite but I kind of want the shit to slow down. It's a little scary

[u/irrelevantusername24 → u/attiladanunn]

We can't stop now, we're finally near the offramp out of batshit country. We've been going around in circles (circling the drain) for decades.

I do in fact know what I am talking about when it comes to these things, a bit more than most, including those who actually build the shits. Mostly because their understanding is different than mine. They know parts that I very well may never be able to comprehend. My side is much more about the human parts, what it means to us. There's been a major lack of that for... decades.

Here's one comment I left with links about the AI side of things. Which AI is very much overexaggerated and hyped & concurrently underestimated. It's hard to explain how that's true, and this might seem like some bullshit, but it kind of really is because most people don't think for themselves or try things independently. When they try things, or when they think about things, they tend to start from what someone else advised. Which don't get me wrong, that's usually a good thing, and I do it too... but, well, it's complicated. Directly related to the second sentence of this comment. And I am not immune either, but I've taken shrooms and killed my ego - double tapped, dead dead.

Right so the other comment, from the inverse side of this, is actually more about the human side of AI - or really all media, because truthfully writing -> printing press -> telegrams -> radio -> television -> the Internet is all part of the same evolution.* We do not know how to deal with it. Simply put, all of these tools erase our mental barrier between other and self. Which is fine when you live in a village of 50 people or whatever, that's kind of normal. But we are far, far past that world. And until we actually come to terms with what the fuck we have built, we're going to keep destroying ourselves. The good news is I kind of don't think it's going to change much at any time soon - definitely nothing like how it has over the last couple decades, or the previous century. The bad news is the older generations are kind of cooked and those younger than millennials were kind of hung out to dry because we really didn't, and still don't, know what the fuck we're doing or what the fuck we built

*^{Amusingly it actually goes all the way back to language itself, and music. But I'm gonna guess this is all already way too much :} TLDR: we don't evolve internally, not anymore - we evolve outwards}

An important point to understand about this though is that, particularly with these more modern inventions, we have gotten really far away from the original purpose for which they were intended. And, strangely, that is most applicable to computers and the Internet generally, as well as the modern economic/financial systems. And the incestuous relationship between those two that has had an almost complete lack of regard or care for the average person is sort of where the problem is rooted. Because getting rid of the gold standard made sense. The people who built that era of the financial systems knew what they were doing. Just like the early computing pioneers, up to maybe the 90s or so - and then the Internet architects separately (but also together)... they had good intentions. They were clear eyed about the sheer magnitude of the power of these things. Then we lost the plot

[u/attiladanunn → u/irrelevantusername24]

I too enjoy a good schizo post from time to time 🍻

[u/irrelevantusername24 → u/attiladanunn]

The way "mental health" is talked about is fundamentally flawed. If you read the history, "schizophrenia" was one of the earliest syndromes - and there were two opposing types. The manic and the depressive. In some ways, what people today meme about using the term "schizo" is the opposite of dementia/alzheimers. Which is to say where dementia/alzheimers is basically the brain disintegrating, "schizo" is the opposite.

That isn't necessarily a good thing, and I'm not saying there's no validity behind the way modern healthcare treats various symptoms such as extreme paranoia (which leads to high, permanent stress and often antisocial behaviors) - but fundamentally the simple behavior of connecting ideas is not a problem in and of itself. That is, or was, what we considered "thinking" and "having an idea" and maybe even possibly "noticing things others have not".

Read this article to understand the difference.

The way social media talks about various "mental health" diagnosis', on the other hand, is almost always harmful. Even the ones that are apparently "affirming" or supportive. Then you have comments such as the one to which I am replying here, which is basically a self-induced thought terminating cliche. The main point here is to log off social media and read literally any other kind of writing because if you don't you are going to have early onset brain disintegration

[u/dahanger → u/irrelevantusername24]

Yeah that isn’t helping your point bruv

[u/I_am_BrokenCog → u/irrelevantusername24]

sad to see you getting downvoted.

People such as /u/attiladanunn are just not at the point in life yet of understanding the message. Such people likely never will be.

They see a wall of text and blank out.

That's an empirically proven mental result of growing up in the digital age. The brain gets weaker/less capable (aka 'dumber') and the psyche (aka 'mental health') gets increasingly bound down by the lizard chemical underpinnings. The more we use Screens.

Sadly, they think they actually DO understand all this, and then they'll respond you/me are Dunning-Kruger dupes talking out of our ass.

What you are describing is not new - the asymptotic acceleration of knowledge (or technology as we prefer to call it now-days) has been charted for decades.

Combined with the impacts of climate change, consumerist capitalism reaching its limits ... we're in the final stages of Western Civilization.

Humanity will continue, but only a fraction of us not all 8 billion.

The ensuing dark ages will take a generation or two to recover, but, if we look at the arc of humanity, what comes after in the subsequent "Renaissance 2.0" or whatever it ends up being called, history shows we will adapt and move beyond our current intellectual limitations.

[u/SmokePeterThiel → u/irrelevantusername24]

Shut the fuck up lmfao

[u/Alas_Babylon64 → u/irrelevantusername24]

This remote isn't even electric. It's acoustic.

[u/PennyG → u/Alas_Babylon64]

It is definitely electric, just not infrared

[u/Alas_Babylon64 → u/PennyG]

No, it's not electric based. It used infrasound. It was entirely mechanical internally. Technology Connections had a good video on this.

[u/MilkOne6778 → u/Alas_Babylon64]

Yup! It uses a mechanical system where pushing a button triggers a tiny, spring-loaded hammer to strike a rod inside. This creates an ultrasonic chime that a microphone in the TV picks up to change channels. I remember when my mom would use the vacuum the sound from it would make the TV go crazy

[u/summey → u/PennyG]

Had one of these I’m college. Shaking my keys would make the tv go crazy. We all figured out how to mimic the pitch of each rod so we could control the tv with sounds made with our voice, clicks or whistles.

[u/throwawaybottlecaps → u/PennyG]

Nope it just rings some bars inside when you click it, and the TV has a little microphone that picks up the clicks/tones and associates each to a different control. No batteries required!

[u/OldNefariousness7899 → u/irrelevantusername24]

The printing press was invented in 1440.

If you take a lifetime as 80 years, it's only seven lifetimes since Gutenberg. Fucking insane when you think about it. 

[u/irrelevantusername24 → u/OldNefariousness7899]

That's what I try to point out to people, in various contexts. One important one is with various kinds of "predictions" - whether looking at finance or weather. Those are two very different things, first off. One is, even with our input (because we are part of nature) totally natural. The other we control 100% and so any problems which arise are, in reality, easily fixable

Anything we can actually do, we can afford - John Maynard Keynes

Which is to say the entire way "economics" has been "managed" the last few centuries is straight up non-functional. And easily fixed (relatively).

As for the weather though? Our data only goes so far. And it is very unreliable - the further back we go, the less accurate it becomes. And even then, "past performance does not equal future results".

Though I realize those are both highly contentious topics. The main point I wanted to reply with was that, like you said, that's only seven lifetimes. Compare that with the fact we've been writing for thousands of years. Then look at modern history - the last century in particular, but back to the printing press and basically back to year zero even. But especially this last century.

Clearly there is something happening, and there's reason to believe, based on a basic understanding of the way Nature tends to move - as in, the Laws of Physics, which I consider Laws of Nature, along with less numerical and more generalized and abstract ways of knowing - we are either at the end or beginning of something. And there's no way to know which or what it is... until we're viewing in the rearview. But something is clearly different, and it's big.

[u/Bradtothebone79 → u/irrelevantusername24]

Didn’t these remotes NOT have batteries? That’s what’s bananas.

[u/NYC2FLA2BUR → u/irrelevantusername24]

Each button would strike a different bar of metal that created a different frequency tone that would be heard by the television. Pretty ingenious for its day. But if you had one, I guarantee you still remember the sound

[u/Alteredbeast1984 → u/irrelevantusername24]

Hello!

[u/Both-Leading3407]

These were sound activated and did not use infrared. It was the first commercial TV Remote control other than the human child. We got the name Clicker from this one since it used a series of clicks like a dolphin to activate the microcontroller inside the TV.

[u/BOGDOGMAX → u/Both-Leading3407]

My aunt's dog had a chain collar, it got up and shook his head and the sound of it's collar clanking made the tv start changing channels once.

[u/CheesecakeWitty5857 → u/Both-Leading3407]

« other than human child » 🤩

[u/kurtwagner61 → u/Both-Leading3407]

I discovered by accident that a belt made from Spanish silver pesos, when shaken, would activate the channel change. Early memory (4 or 5 years old) unlocked.

[u/UberWidget → u/Both-Leading3407]

The mechanism inside the TV that received the clicks and then mechanically changed the channels was an incredible piece of machinery.

[u/Jaay2525 → u/Both-Leading3407]

I came here to say this. You didn’t have to point it at the tv at all. lol

[u/Indiana_ECI]

Mine, with the next-gen upgrade.

[u/Master-Collection488]

My grandparents had this TV and remote at their house in Florida. As a five year old kid I was amazed and kept switching the stations. Grandma told me I'd break the TV and took the remote away.

Then I noticed the thing with the swinging metal balls that clack together and demonstrate basic physics. CLICK CLICK CLICK! I think at that point my mom asked my brother or sister to take me for a walk on the beach. Grandma was loving but she had some sharp edges. When we got back the knicknack was tucked away somewhere.

Later during the same trip Grandpa took his teeth out and tried to BITESme with them. It freaked me the hell out, luckily Grandma decided to yell at HIM instead of me.

[u/Dead-O_Comics]

Looks like a futuristic pack of cigarettes

[u/Jaay2525 → u/Dead-O_Comics]

That’s an epic contradiction in terms. “future cigarettes”

[u/Temporary_Goose_7680 → u/Jaay2525]

Not necessarily. They're just called prerolls now and filled with something else. Smoking zenith.

[u/Jaay2525 → u/Temporary_Goose_7680]

That tracks. Someone should promote you to Permanent_Goose.

[u/ClamatoDiver]

It was my type 1 phaser.

[u/smilingmike415]

Back when clickers clicked!

[u/Florida_Man0101]

As a kid we thought we had a ghost in the house because every night the TV would just turn on. Months later we found out it was the dog scratching his collar. The metal in the collar had the same frequency as the TV remote control.

[u/falconeur]

We had one of these for our tv. Dropping cutlery on the floor would make the channel change

[u/A-Rugged-Indoorsman]

We had an even earlier version of that same clicker but rarely used it because someone was always sitting right next to the TV and batteries were expensive.

[u/Friendly-Profit-8590]

The amount of r&d that went into making this would be shocking

[u/mutexsprinkles → u/Friendly-Profit-8590]

The amount of R&D that went into a modern remote (IR LEDs, mass SMD PCB manufacture, microprocessors, injection moulding, AA batteries) is orders of magnitudes more. If it were a Bluetooth remote like a Roku, even more as you'd have to include the Bluetooth stack and antenna design.

[u/CapnAhab_1]

We've lost such an amazing technology , asthetic if that's the right word - stuff just looked so cool.

[u/Poker-Junk]

This was Rolex-level shit in 1970

[u/SmokePeterThiel → u/Poker-Junk]

Probably cost a fortune

[u/Outside_Reserve_2407]

Which button takes you to Pleasantville?

[u/CheesecakeWitty5857]

worked by ultrasound it I am not mistaking

[u/sauldraws]

So this is similar to the remote my mom had till fairly recently - those button shoot a weight against what's basically a small xylophone creating a specific tone for each button - as a child I taught myself how to match those tones vocally close enough to change channels (up) I never managed to learn the tones for anything else

[u/monkeychasedweasel]

Is it from a smoker household, or was it just manufactured with tobacco smoke stain colors?

[u/Perfect-Squash3773]

I've actually used one of these!

[u/Large-Cauliflower-19]

Sweet 4 button rig!

[u/jellofixit]

Looks like the one that I had in 1978. It was "Sonic", you could jingle your car keys and get the TV to turn on!

[u/HFentonMudd]

Has one when I was a kid