Welcome to the Surreal World

Technology is advancing at a pace that often outstrips human comprehension, adaptation, and regulation.

> “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.” > — Dr. Ian Malcolm, Jurassic Park (1993)

This will be a brief overview as I have work to attend to, and perhaps you do too. So let me pose a question: Have you ever reflected on just how drastically different life is today compared to two decades ago?

To illustrate, here’s a random compilation of items we now rely on that were nonexistent when I finished college: smartphones, blogs, virtual assistants (like Siri and Alexa), streaming television, Spotify, Slack, Salesforce, high-definition video, non-T9 texting, Google Maps, generative AI, 4G, 5G, food delivery apps, peer-to-peer banking, blockchain technology, cryptocurrency, social media platforms, TikTok, the creator economy, the gig economy, and multimedia journalism.

In our lifetimes, we used to engage with the world through direct interactions; now, we often find ourselves staring at screens and clicking away. For those of us in white-collar jobs in the Global North, this shift has fundamentally altered how we live our daily lives. We may not fully grasp the magnitude of this transformation or its implications.

Thus begins the saga of seven billion strangers, born to live and die on this planet, while every action they take is documented, exploring what unfolds when people stop being authentic and begin to exist in a surreal manner.

The Great Inversion

For millennia, human existence was primarily challenging, yet it held a certain logic. We inhabited a tangible world. Occasionally, we would create less "natural" things, but our lives remained grounded in physical experiences. We traversed our environment on foot, by bike, car, ship, or airplane, collecting and utilizing resources. We performed tangible work, either producing or selling real goods and services, or leading teams that did so.

Even a few years post-broadband internet, the fundamentals of life remained largely unchanged. Our real-world experiences informed our interactions in the digital realm.

However, over the past decade or so, the digital sphere began to eclipse the physical one. We now dedicate more time to consuming experiences through screens, connecting with others via messaging, and fulfilling our needs through smartphones, tablets, computers, and a multitude of applications.

From my desk, I can now learn virtually anything (via Wikipedia), enjoy any song (on Spotify), order food from any store (through Amazon Fresh or Doordash), watch any video (on YouTube), read news and various interpretations (on Reddit and Twitter), connect with acquaintances for "free" (using Facebook or WhatsApp), and manage my business (using Slack or Outlook) as well as my work (with Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides).

We can learn skills like dancing, cooking, building, repairing, and gardening. We receive real-time directions anywhere and can purchase travel tickets to any destination on the planet. On pleasant days, I open my window to enjoy the breeze, occasionally feeling hungry, thirsty, or tired. That’s how I remind myself of my physical existence.

Not long ago, all of this would have seemed like a scene from a sci-fi movie, and this list is just the tip of the iceberg. While it may sound appealing, it appears to come at a very steep cost.

Metamodernity

A significant shift since The Great Inversion— a term I’m coining here—is humanity’s newfound ability to comprehend itself on a large scale, learning from the past and present across the globe with unprecedented ease and speed. We now have direct access to vast amounts of information, which is reshaping our cognitive processes.

Metamodernity refers to our capacity, or lack thereof, to embrace multiple post-modern realities simultaneously. In 2019, philosopher Lene Rachel Anderson published Metamodernity: Meaning and Hope in a Complex World, arguing that:

> “Metamodernity provides us with a framework for understanding ourselves and our societies in a much more complex way. It contains both indigenous, premodern, modern, and postmodern cultural elements and thus provides social norms and a moral fabric for intimacy, spirituality, religion, science, and self-exploration, all at the same time.”

This sounds promising, and one could argue that the equity, justice, and liberation movements that have gained momentum on social media since around 2010 reflect a kind of metamodern narrative pluralism. We have never before had such a comprehensive understanding of human nature, history, progress, imbalance, and flourishing—especially at this scale. We’re addressing various societal issues more rapidly thanks to the digital age, which is undoubtedly a positive development.

We've dramatically reduced the time needed to learn, understand, create, adapt, and respond to information. However, this is only beneficial if all actors in the information chain are well-intentioned or if the technologies enabling this progress function positively. Unfortunately, that's often not the case. The ease with which individuals can deceive, manipulate, harm, and traumatize others has escalated—this is a troubling reality.

Megamodernity

The term megamodernity was introduced by Adrian Parr in a 2004 essay, which many may not be familiar with. He defines it as “the unbounded movement of capital, and the diasporic age where some have the freedom to move as they choose,” suggesting a widespread Americanization and homogenization of the world driven by capitalist expansion and exploitation. This phenomenon is indeed unfolding.

What Parr likely didn’t foresee was the extent to which not only money and people are on the move, but also information and, importantly, emotions. Global TikTok trends with millions of participants can emerge and dissipate within weeks. Twitter experiences a turnover of “main characters” every few hours. Collectively, we are exposed to more multimedia content than any previous generation—often hundreds of thousands of times more.

As a species, we produce over 2.5 quintillion bytes of new data daily. If each byte were converted into a US dollar, it could grant everyone on Earth a balloon payment of $312,500,000—an amount surpassing that of all but a select few individuals globally. Much of this data is fleeting or inconsequential, yet it creates an overwhelming data trail—what we encounter is literally beyond our capacity to process. We consume the equivalent of a lifetime's worth of information every single day.

A revised definition of megamodernity extends beyond the movement of capital and people; it encompasses the limitless excess of information—both beneficial and detrimental—that we encounter in this post-Inversion era. We now learn, feel, read, watch, create, and listen to an overwhelming amount of content at astonishing speed, leaving us unable to fully comprehend or process it. It’s akin to viewing 16 movies daily or reading countless newspapers. The mental and emotional fatigue from this constant consumption is inflicting harm on our minds, relationships, societies, and economies, effects we have yet to fully quantify or understand.

The convergence of metamodernity (improved information management) and megamodernity (an overflow of information that exceeds our capacity) presents us with a unique digital conundrum: we possess greater awareness of historical realities, yet we struggle to engage with them effectively. Our extensive screen time may enhance productivity and knowledge, but these advantages vanish once we disconnect from our devices, eroding our ability to navigate the physical world. Regardless of our digital activities, we must still govern, experience life, forge connections, and evolve within the tangible world.

The Price of Surreality

We still lack a comprehensive understanding of the effects screens have on us. Broadly, technology appears to diminish the authenticity of relationships, amplify misinformation, and harm the mental and physical health of youth through excessive social media use. Sedentary and isolated lifestyles, made possible by screens, negatively impact numerous aspects of personal and societal wellbeing.

The abrupt transition from physical to digital-first living—exacerbated by the global COVID-19 pandemic—has fundamentally altered what it means to be human, alive, conscious, healthy, social, productive, or a citizen. We are uncertain if we are biologically equipped to adapt to the new reality we’ve created, and the initial signs are concerning. Rates of depression and anxiety have surged; moreover, mainstream music sounds homogenized and overproduced.

The current landscape feels volatile because it operates on a scale that is complex and immense. This would be manageable if our aspirations, empathy, and cognitive resources could evolve accordingly, but they cannot. We lack a thoughtful or empathetic framework for regulating the transformative technologies that simplify our lives while complicating our sense of vitality. It’s imperative that we address this gap before those with malicious intent exploit it.

In conclusion, while discussions of modernities, narrative pluralism, and vast quantities of data may come across as alarmist or overly dramatic, I’ll summarize our current tech-driven surplus of information, outrage, and awareness with a simple analogy: “It’s like witnessing a car crash—you simply can’t look away.”

Yet in this scenario, every car is crashing at once. We are unable to avert our gaze; far too much of our existence hinges on our fixation with that glowing rectangle, continuously clicking and observing. Meanwhile, we remain passive, witnessing the chaos unfold around us, unable to take action or halt the impending crashes, fully aware of their approach and the fact that even more are on the horizon—too fast, yet never fast enough.

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