HCI (Human-Classics Interactions)

Norbert Wiener made an analogy in the 1940s that people seemingly understood the world with the latest technology that they had at the time. For example, mechanical clocks trail-blazed technology in the 17th and 18th centuries. Thus, people saw the world in terms of springs and gears, that René Descartes, one of the most well-known philosophers, even alluded to organisms as biological clocks. Combustion engines were the hottest topic in the 19th century, so people were obsessed with understanding the world with these engines, such as explaining that humans are nothing more than automated combustion engines. Then, in the 20th century, you guessed it, computers took place, and we started explaining complex concepts with “computers”.

These HCIs (Human Clock-Combustions-Computer-You-Name-It Interactions) are fundamentally the paradigm of how you convert and flow energy and information. If you squint, energy = information = entropy, so one could say these are some paradigms of how humans harvest entropies.

Humans fundamentally try to optimize these entropy flows. Keeping the old way of flowing naturally is evidence of abundance and thus escalates its level to luxuriousness because of not only its inefficiency but also its tedious housekeeping. It, at one point, becomes a form of art. That is why I think mechanical watches are still appreciated as classics, and soon, we will see the same with combustion engines; they will eventually escalate to classic cars. (just like that old man who spends 3 hours daily polishing his 1940 Chevy).

In that same vein, I feel like our current way of computing, desktops and smartphones, will both be forms of art one day. Maybe at that point, we will wire our brains to the Matrix and think, why would people spend a myriad of hours and dollars on Duolingo when you can “install a language pack.”

But yet again, we are living in a soon-to-be “classic” way. So don’t grieve about what we recently lost—handwritten letters, arcades, or payphones—cherish what will soon-to-be classics. Your 2050 grandchildren will be flabbergasted when they hear you slam on plastic buttons and screens to text a thought to your friends.

Written 100% by a human, with Norbert Wiener’s analogy from the book “The Dream Machine”.