Popularization of Optimism

Submitted by Electron_genius t3_11eg4sy in Futurology

Many of you have probably noticed that social media algorithms are designed in such a way that passively skews toward things that release maximum amounts of dopamine. Oftentimes those are funny but stupid memes, soft pornography, or emotionally charged political content.

Unfortunately, this means that people who are actually taking action on doing awesome things for the world are left out of sight amidst the meaningless noise. This phenomenon is important to be aware of going into the future because even now I am starting to see lots of uninspired, non-passionate, and nihilistic people. What is shown is not reality but people take it as such, especially the impressionable youth. In reality, there is a plethora of amazing people working on doing awesome things and working on solutions to the world's toughest problems. This idea was also mentioned in terms of climate change by u/civilrunner in his earlier thread but this extends to so many other fields.

Now, I am not here to just state the problem, I would like to actually work on solutions. Some people already making progress in this field are Veritasium, Quanta Magazine, VSauce, Sci-Show, and other similar YouTube channels. They are actively bringing out interesting topics and people into the light of the public.

The real question is how do we get this type of content to the maximum number of people? keeping in mind that the algorithms are not in our favor on this one.

If we are to move towards a bright future we need to address this problem. I would love to hear your thoughts and potential solutions.

I am currently working on a project at my university to tackle this challenge, if anyone is interested I can share it in a future post!

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idea-man t1_jadusps wrote

Forced tacky optimism dominated a large chunk of the 2010’s (“I Fucking LOVE Science!”) and it’s not clear it benefited anyone besides algorithm-gaming weirdos. Wariness of cynicism is a good thing, but I don’t think the problem is as dire as you’re describing it or that any kind of top-down solution will ever be very successful when it comes to cultural changes.

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Salarian_American t1_jae2pyd wrote

The only problem I have with this is that if we did manage to tweak algorithms to skew positive instead of negative, then everything would be flooded with cheap low-effort positive stuff instead of cheap low-effort negative content.

For sure it would be an improvement is the constant flood of prattle had a more positive tone, but I don't know how much it would help, especially with what passes for "positive" or "wholesome" or "heartwarming" anymore. It would just be variations on, " School kids raised $50,000 to save 10 orphans from the orphan-crushing machine" all the time.

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MRSN4P t1_jadycxk wrote

Large viewership on various platforms is attainable. It sounds like you’ve come to the quandary of mass appeal that public broadcasting has struggling with for decades. Despite having quality content about important issues, public broadcasting is widely viewed as tepid/boring. So, this might sound peculiar, but consider examples of media that have talked up to their audience and succeeded with mass appeal. If you are appealing, viewers will get others to watch the content through word of mouth. I think it might be worthwhile to ponder the appeal of (bear with me)

  • “Tough Jobs” which are fundamentally about learning how some jobs are done and sometimes offer segments of these people explaining the impact of what they do(but in my opinion, not deeply enough);

  • late night comedy shows which have educational segments (John Oliver just did a decent introduction to various forms of “AI” and the controversies around each;

  • Star Trek:TNG, which did not go deep but presented moral and ethical struggles, and I would argue was encouraging the audience to think in a more sophisticated manner (I’m talking average high school educated citizen of the 80s here);

  • Solarpunk as a genre: it involves both struggle, appreciation for small moments in life, and making the best of what you’ve got. It has an implied hope for the future, and does involve some escapism from our present through imagining that future hope, but also subtly acknowledges that our systems are broken and the way we do things are causing catastrophe and must change. The flavor of this genre could be a guideline for an aesthetic/atmosphere that integrates such elements.

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Electron_genius OP t1_jae16vz wrote

Remarkable analysis u/MRSN4P! Thank you for the input. I had a similar train of thought, the content that is "educational" is often not fun to watch. Mathematics, for example, is very objective, there is no story other than the one you create around it...

What I am working on right now is a whole platform separate from the noise, that way people have a single place to go to and to some extent escape. I can link to a more detailed description of the project if you are interested.

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MRSN4P t1_jae2vnc wrote

I think you should link to the project so that more people might check it out. Also, even with a separate platform, I think it is extremely likely that you will need multi-platform ads or small segments as a wide net to draw more people to your platform, just like getting people to check out your channel on existing platforms. This is a marketing/presentation problem, not merely a per se content problem.

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Surur t1_jadskgr wrote

Given that doom creates clicks, the simplest solution would be rules for social media that mandates a percentage of wholesome news in feeds.

In short, the companies control the feed, and they can put whatever stories they want in them, irrespective of the clicks it gets.

Given the impact of the deluge of negative news on the mental health of people, they have a social responsibility to address the issue and correct the skew.

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Electron_genius OP t1_jadvseu wrote

Very good! Chances are that big organizations will not make any changes, even though they have huge potential for something great. What is something we can do? Think out of the box, how can we put more people on the path to progress? Even though doom sells, people are still inherently looking for hope.

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Surur t1_jadw8bl wrote

> Chances are that big organizations will not make any changes, even though they have huge potential for something great.

That is where lobbying and pressure groups come in.

> What is something we can do?

Well, if you don't mind breaking the rules, you could game the algorithm by creating brigading discord groups that mass upvote good news stories and give them initial momentum, which may help them go viral.

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Electron_genius OP t1_jadwzxq wrote

Wow wow, very creative thinking, I love it!! Would you join the group lol?

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Surur t1_jadyb5k wrote

Sure, I guess. I'm not big on breaking rules usually, however.

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goldygnome t1_jaeuoe1 wrote

A start can be made by ending the attention economy, which is funded by advertising. If there's no monetary incentive a lot of the grifters manufacturing the fake content will go find some other scam.

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herfnturf t1_jaf3446 wrote

Focusing on the bad news and meaningless distractions is nothing new and not unique to social media. For example, these same concerns appeared when televisions were first becoming popular.

But you're right that it is hard to get people to see positive change. A lot of it is slow and steady and doesn't make breaking news or popular social media posts. In my experience, it helps to get people to take a longer view of the future. A lot of people who feel like the world is going downhill fast would still agree that we're generally better off than we were 100 years ago. Remind people of the compounding effects of small changes. Conversely, a lot of things that seem earth-shattering might not be that important in a few weeks or months.

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Kindred87 t1_jaeatmk wrote

Information systems like social media and video platforms would need to deliberately deprioritize distressing content. The issue with this is that distressing content is more engaging due to neural weighting regarding potential threats (i.e. scary stuff), so the platforms that volunteer to do this will be outcompeted by those that don't.

Through that lens, regulation will be necessary to force an even playing field for all platforms competing in the space.

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khamelean t1_jaeb8yf wrote

The root cause is not the “algorithm”. People focusing on the negative news has been the norm for thousands of years. There is no easy fix, the best you can do is educate people that the news that is presented to them is a curated selection of the worst shit happening in the world, it is not representative of the average persons experience.

Narcissism, by its nature, is very loud and attention hungry.

Generosity, by its nature, is quiet and humble.

If you are only a passive participant in the media you consume, guess which you are going to see more of??

Take an active role in the media you consume and not only will you get better quality content, you will have a much better understanding of the world we live in.

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