Good article in general, except for the title. I know many people and see many people online who understand these truths.<p>The hard part is creating a viable alternative culture that can make collective choices about technology use.<p>It’s also worth noting that the Amish rely on the ‘English’ I.e. American legal system and military for their defense. Their way of life doesn’t stand alone outside of American society.
I am always a little conflicted about articles that portray the Amish as this wise group of people. I lived close to Amish country for a while and there were lots of stories about child and spousal abuse. They seem to live to some degree outside the regular legal system so you hear less but it seems to be a pretty oppressive group.
I think this articles attributes intent and wisdom where it is not due and as such should be at best considered a romanticization of their culture.<p>Even tough it seems they understand the choice they are making regarding some technology and even tough in many case with hindsight it appears that they made some judicious choices for their society wellbeing, I argue they do not have the tools to make those choices in an unbiased manner as those tought experiments are also technological byproducts.<p>Their stance regarding modern medicine, tolerating it when someone is truly ill, seems particularly hypocritical if not disingenuous.
I made the same observation about chasidic Jews. On first glance, their engagement with technology may seem backwards (eg, still on feature phones?) but as time goes on we're seeing those choices pan out right (eg - people who go on tech detoxes, etc - something you never need to do when you're chasidic or amish.)<p>I would say the thing that's missing from "our" society is a compass. What is it that we want to be, what do we value the most, etc? You begin by knowing those answers, and <i>then</i> you can evaluate whether technology helps or hurts you.<p>For example -- almost everyone says "we value family." But the chasidim and the amish express that by living close to their family, while "a typical American" moves far away from home and then has to rely on FaceTime and WhatsApp. The reason we have this problem is because we value something else above family (or community) -- that may be novelty, work opportunities, etc. But mainly, I think it's because we've become quite a bit untethered.<p>Society has moved pretty far away from religious and traditional values in the past few decades, and hasn't replaced them with anything (certainly not anything better.) So while a chasid or amish person can look at TikToc and say "that's just going to take me away from my family/spiritual work and therefore I don't want that" - we in secular society are confused about our trade-offs.
I feel like I have to drop "Technopoly" here, because that's promoting similar concepts. Postman calls out our bias towards adopting new technologies without any reluctance, and without consideration of the hazards of deploying it. He also espouses the view that once a technology is adopted it will self-proliferate up to the point where it becomes wholly outmoded, which at least as far as I can tell appears to be true. So there's this natural blindspot for technology where mankind seemingly sees only upsides, judges it fit for use. Eventually an overarching technic emerges where it's not mankind that is using the technology, but rather technology is using mankind. Like most of Postman, it's a very compelling criticism, and despite its age the points he made are remain salient.
My thoughts at:<p>- 30% through the article: "Ok, maybe I'm Amish."<p>- 60% through the article: "Ok, I'm definitely Amish."<p>- 100% through the article: "So what other media can I consume on the interwebz?"
The problem is we've stopped asking ourselves what it is that we value. What are our goals? If it's maximum pleasure we could just create a VR world with heroin, a catheter, and a bedpan. Go on a soma holiday whenever we wanted. But we don't want maximum pleasure, only our hindbrain does, and we are letting ourselves be led around by it for the profit of others.
> Any idea that technology is an unmitigated good begins to be questioned.<p>I think that's where we as the more "common" society may have gone off course: no technology (chair, toothbrush, etc to be cheeky/comprehensive on my use of the word technology) lives in a world where it's an absolutely perfect good. Anything can be abused, and when we've though about adjusting or rethinking big internet-based technologies, including social media services, it seems we're not putting enough responsibility on the operators of these services.<p>To me, that _doesn't_ mean we expect them to be perfect either with the ability to be responsible actors, but there needs to be some agreed upon standards that we can evaluate performance of their ability to act responsibly. It can just be left up to them, which is currently the state at a high-level.
Also see this 2009 article, "Amish Hackers" [1].<p>[1] <a href="https://kk.org/thetechnium/amish-hackers-a/" rel="nofollow">https://kk.org/thetechnium/amish-hackers-a/</a>
It's not just the Amish. Many communities have decided they wish to live at ~1850. It has always made me curious why, what do they know?<p>If you look deeply in many religions they are the same. Buddhist monks aren't excluded from tech but they certainly dont own any themselves. Why? Because it's something to consider and create desires. Just as they shave their head not because of aesthetics but because now you never have to worry about your hair looking bad.<p>When you eliminate the unnecessary from your life, you certainly live a happier life.
I live outside of Pennsylvania Dutch country and two weeks ago driving in that area I was shocked to see many horse and buggy drivers distracted by their iPhones.
Interesting article, but since the way of life of the Amish is so polarizing, I'm afraid this distracts from the question, whether society as a whole and its members ought to embrace all technology or whether it's sensible to evaluate and discuss its merits and perhaps regulate its use. This is of course done everywhere to some extent, but perhaps we ("the English") would be better of doing it more?
> But they carefully consider how each [technology] will change their culture before embracing it. And the best clue as to what will happen comes from watching their neighbors.<p>This knowledge is not unknown in the English world. This is how most large, conservative financial organizations manage technology. They don’t dive into new technology without some very careful consideration.
An interesting read about the subject is the small 'utopian' book Erewhon by Samuel Butler, published in 1872.
It considers the implications of the industrial revolution on society, and thus how it shapes the industrial society and its future. The relationship with the religious power structure is quite enlightening.
Highly recommend this and other videos by Peter Santenello. He goes into Amish communities and just talks with people. Fascinating insight into the same topics of this article.<p><a href="https://youtu.be/EgY1SVXiBrU" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/EgY1SVXiBrU</a><p>His journey into orthodox jewish neighborhood in NY is great too.
One small past thread:<p><i>The Amish understand a life-changing truth about technology the rest of us don’t</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17106823" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17106823</a> - May 2018 (6 comments)
I can relate. Even though I own a smart phone, I've turned off all notifications and sounds that can distract me except for incoming calls. Never used Facebook. Don't want a car.
This is happening in a lot more religions. Younger Catholics are becoming more traditional. We're even adopting our own garb. At my traditional parish, men come dressed in suits and many women veil (as is traditional when in church). Similar attitudes regarding television and video games. Many even hold to the old catholic beliefs on usury (not very popular amongst most other conservatives). It's a good reminder to be out of this world. Most social life is through the parish. It's pretty nice. Would love to meet the amish in the middle.