Staying Curious in The Algorithm Age: End The Echo, Part 2
Why we must resist the algorithm’s persistent plan to narrow our perspective.
This is Part 2 of a two-part series. Read Part 1: The Value Of Disagreement.
Few moments in life are as memorable as experiencing something for the first time. A flavor you had never tasted before. A sound you had never heard before. A feeling you had never felt before. It’s often in those moments that we grow. Our hearts expand to new people, our minds enhance to new places, and our hands extend to new endeavors. But those moments are rare. And they seem to be getting rarer. When was the last time that you experienced something completely new?
Growing up in the 90’s came with a particular promise of a better future world. I was taught that technology would give everyone access to everything that human knowledge had to offer. The entire planet would be fed with full perspective on every issue, and eventually, our ideologies were supposedly going to morph into one synchronized worldview. We would all be able to learn everything, see everything, hear everything, and never disagree again. The word “globalization” was uttered often and everywhere, by scientists, preacher and teachers. The idea itself was irresistible! The world, united. I believed in it. I looked forward to it. It seemed simple, good and certain. But then came the algorithms.
I first crossed paths with personalized algorithms sitting at my college library. In the early 2000’s, online music services were just emerging, and Pandora found success with a promise of familiarity over newness. The service delivered an endless playlist of songs just like the ones we already like. It converted your favorite genres and albums into arrangements and equations and based on that information, it recommended similar sounding songs for you to “discover”. If you were to walk around my school’s library 10–15 years ago, you’d be guaranteed to see Pandora gracing laptop screens on every other table. I gave in to the peer pressure and subscribed. From then on, studying was always accompanied by a chill instrumental Pandora playlist. All I did was suggest a single song and Pandora scored most of my college memories. We never had to listen to something drastically new again. Just more of the same, with a different label. No more risks.
With time, others followed suit. The algorithm spread.
Social media sites and data analysts discovered that we love to read news that we already agree with. We gave a thumbs up to the headlines that sounded true and we unfriended anyone with a different view than ours. Problem solved. The world we saw through our screens was now as we wanted it to be.
Netflix reads your watch list like a code of do’s and don’ts. Now our screens are filled with Rom-Coms that repeat the same joke-to-love-triangle ratio or superhero series with nearly identical plot lines. At least we don’t have to accidentally watch anything that wasn’t fine-tuned for our very specific demographic.
Like those shoes? Try this jacket! Like this site? Try this one just like it! Liked that restaurant? Here are 10 other comfort-food gastropubs around you with the same tasting candied-bacon mac & cheese!
Instead of bridges, we built walls and formed tribes exclusive to similar-thinking people. Everyone believes that everyone thinks just like them because we’ve unfriended everyone that doesn’t. The virtual world we’re left with preaches perfectly to our personal choir of likes and dislikes. Everywhere we turn, we hear shouts of “Amen!” and stroll on assuming that no reasonable person would ever evoke an opposing ideology. And then, when someone does the unthinkable and disagrees with us, we panic.
This wasn’t how it was meant to be. These walls are not our friends.
We were made for the new. We need the foreign. We need the out-worldly. We need something more. But we continually give in to the comfortable. The familiar seems painless. And yet, it’s eroding our wisdom.
The algorithm isn’t a newcomer. Others in the past have faced it and found ways to overcome it. In one of his many captivating stories collected in Mushrooms on the Moor, Frank W. Boreham warns of giving in to the repeated and familiar recommendations of the algorithm. In his early 1900’s world, the algorithm wasn’t an scrolling app. Instead, it was masked as a harmless and friendly bookseller. After all, the bookseller knows what you like. He wants nothing more than to keep you happy and loyal. So, naturally, the bookseller will guide you to more of the same. It may sound like the right thing to do, but following his voice is the first step to greatly limiting ourselves. Boreham explains that “if a book appeals to me at first sight it is probably because I know a good deal about the subject with which it deals. But, as against that, see how many subjects there are of which I know nothing at all! And just look at all these books that have no attraction for me! And tell me this: Why do they not appeal to me? Only one answer is possible. They do not appeal to me because I am so grossly, wofully, culpably ignorant of the subjects whereof they treat.”
It’s always been this way. We’d rather become experts in the fields we grew up in than students of distant lands. And instead of advancement, this mindset halts progress of cultures and peoples. Some generations break new ground only to be followed by another that barely leaves their own backyard.
The first few pages of Genesis tell this story too. God created man and woman and invited them to “eat of every tree in the garden”. Imagine the abundance of flavors. The infinite amount of colors. The endless possibilities of combinations of pure and perfect fruits. But the enemy of our souls sold a different tale: why resist the taste of the forbidden fruit? Why feed on all that God created for you when you can limit your palate to one flavor? We bit into the stale lie. We believed that the answer to our cravings was in one singular experience. We traded a full garden for lonely tree.
Boreham proposes an aggressive counter-attack. He challenges us to rise up and fight the algorithm.
“The bookseller must be circumvented, defeated, and crushed at any cost. He is too clever at trapping us in his narrow little cell. If a man wants to feel that the world is wide, and a good place to live in, he must be for ever and for ever sampling infinity. He must shun the books that he dearly wants to buy, and buy the books he would do anything to shun.”
His algorithm was a bookseller. Ours are millions of lines of code. But our battle is all the same. So go on, raise your fists and fight the code! Next time you read a breaking news story, visit three other news sites from opposing spectrum and you will gain perspective beyond a singular spin. When one of your neighbors plops a political sign in his yard supporting a candidate you can’t stand, invite them over for a BBQ and get to know them. Visit history museums of different cultures. Taste food you vowed never to eat. Listen to spiritual music from different ethnic groups. Submit yourself to the unknown and venture into the mystery.
Perhaps, the simplest and most human way of push back against the wave of sameness is through friendships. Last week, my friend Cory Knuth shared some very important and beautifully developed thoughts on “The Value of Disagreement”. Reflecting on his words reminded me of how deeply grateful I am for his voice in my life. Cory is my anti-bookseller. I say “look at point of view A”, he says “check out point of view B”. Sure, we still laugh and easily agree on most of life and art. But many of our conversations are exhausting in the best way, like a great rewarding workout. Building memories with someone I care for and can still disagree with allows my understanding of life to outgrow my own small mind.
Obviously, we must still make room for limits and boundaries. There is abundant joy in dedicating all of our romance to one person, all of our faith to one Savior, and all of our devotion to one love. What we must not forget is that those limiting choices are the rare exception. And when we do make them, they do not lock us down; they free us to experience all that was made for us. Dedicating our love exclusively to our spouse is what creates a life together with endless moments of newness. The sameness that is associated with marriage is in reality much more common in repeated shallow encounters between strangers. Following Love’s voice above all else does not limit us to one tree. It’s in saying yes to every distracting whisper that we find ourselves cast away from the garden.
True life is restoring the full spectrum. When John the Apostle saw a vision of a New Earth, he saw a “great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages”. The future is multicolored and the Good News is the re-planting of the garden.
We should get used to the new and fresh. Your fondest friend, your greatest calling, and your most memorable experience may be waiting for you on the other side of the algorithm. Crack the code. Build more bridges. Live fully.
Hebert “H” Cabral
Learning to be. In love with my wife, our three children, and our Savior. Serving End Prejudice as a leader and communicator.