E29: Build Sandcastles out of Bullsh*t

Uh Okay, so the first point in my diary this week I've just written, Algorithms are running my life. Here's the context on this. Diary entry. I've been a absolutely obsessed with Brexit for the last maybe three months. I think I've learned more about British politics in the last three months than I've learnt in the last ten years, right? For me it's become more sort of obsessive and more interesting than Netflix is. I just think the whole thing's fascinating.

It's also tragic and it's also a mess, but I also find it fascinating. Anyway. Every single day I will go home after work and I'll watch Brexit videos. And I've been doing that for many months now. And what I what I've noticed as one might expect because of the presence of algorithms in our lives, is I'm now being served more and more and more and more Brexit videos. So if I opened up my phone right now or went to YouTube, all I would see is Brexit videos, because that's what I've been watching. And it made me think about that in a sort of wider context. The algorithms that are across all of the major social platforms are designed to show us more of the same. And we become

Little people in this massive echo chamber of information being re fed our own thoughts or being refed ideas that we've sought out. But in the same way, I've talked before in this podcast and on my social media channels about the importance of who you follow, because they also are feeding you information nonstop twenty four seven. And there are a number of famous studies, uh specifically my favorite is by a guy called Tim Casser, that prove the stuff you're being fed by algorithms and the people you choose to follow are impacting your happiness, your mental health, your the amount of knowledge you have, your perspective on the world, your optimism and even your values. In that study with Tim Cassa, where he um he conducts this study on these little kids and a toy and an advert.

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