I know all of these exact behaviours, I used to incredibly afraid of flying, but I never wanted it to prevent me from traveling. So all of the counting, listening to changes, obsessively watching the little plane on the map as we progress to finally be done with the terror tube. Being a data person, I decided that it was a "good idea" to consult the NTSB accident and incident reports (https://www.ntsb.gov/Pages/AviationQuery.aspx) which sort of helped, because there you see the majority of incidents are your garden variety "whoops!" on the tarmac between vehicles, severe turbulence that injures someone who doesn't pay attention to the seatbelt sign, or some problem with the APU. (not life threatening) Then one day, my fear just stopped. I don't know how, I was doing a lot of flying at the time, so maybe that was it, but now I don't have that gut twisting dread whilst flying. (Save for a few lingering tics)
But to your point about AI and emotional manipulation, I think this is a very real thing that needs to be explored further. I suspect there's some very smart AI Ethics people that are on it, but not getting the attention that it needs.
On flying thing, I'm glad it to hear it got better. That's the strange thing about it to me - it seems like it just kinda turns on one day, and then, sometimes, turns off. Brains are weird, I guess.
On AI, I feel like I'm slowly becoming a bit of a doomer about it. I don't think we're to this point yet (or even that close to it, for that matter), but it feels like something people need to start thinking about regulating. We've got controlled substances; we've got bans on certain types of guns (very few, but, different conversation). It's a a suggestion that'll probably set a lot of people off, but feels like regulations on legal technologies will at some point become necessary.
On the flying anxiety part. For me, visiting a cognitive behavior therapist helped a lot. More specifically - understanding distinction between rumination and "productive" thought. And now, when I sense the begining of a "negative loop" ("counting down the long minutes until we land"; "remind myself the wings are still upright"; "I monitor for changes in pressure or speed, listen for new engine pitches or hisses in the ventilation, and try to detect hidden connotations in announcements") I'm trying to shift me focus onto something more "productive" (listen to podcasts or music; read a book; watch a movie; sleep).
On the "are we in charge of the AI, or is the AI in charge of us?". As with anxiety, the goal is not try to control anxiety (the more I tried, the more it took control of me), but accept it and let it be (it usually goes away in 20 minutes without additional negative food, as our brain not designed to stay in this state for too long without substantial reason).
On the flying stuff, sometimes that works for me, sometimes it doesn't. But mostly I end up just kind of blank, staring out the window, kind of full of static. Which is maybe an improvement? I'm not actually sure.
On the AI piece, to be clear, I'm not anxious about that, at least not in the emotional sense. It's more I think AI tools that push on our emotions could have a create a bunch of really weird consequences. Like, I could see kids losing the ability to talk about how they feel about things because they start leaning on AIs to autocomplete that for them. If we can't function without spellcheck, or pilots can't fly without autopilot, or we can't think without google, or can't write without a thesaurus, it seems not unreasonable that we'd struggle to communicate without an AI telling us what we think.
I also developed a bad flight anxiety on a single flight after college that lasted for probably 15 years. Oh man—“the heart-stopping announcement that flight attendants will need to discontinue their service for a few minutes.” The worst for me are trans-Atlantic and trans-pacific flights. Though amazingly, something about 2 years of constant pandemic anxiety seems to have cured me. We’ll find out—I’m reading this post as I wait to board a flight!!
Yeah, the weird thing for me was that it all just happened at once. It's gotten better in moments (and the pandemic helped, for some reason), but it's still there. Which is apparently pretty normal, strange as it is.
(And I haven't read about any planes disappearing a la Lost, so hope you made it and on an easy flight)
I know all of these exact behaviours, I used to incredibly afraid of flying, but I never wanted it to prevent me from traveling. So all of the counting, listening to changes, obsessively watching the little plane on the map as we progress to finally be done with the terror tube. Being a data person, I decided that it was a "good idea" to consult the NTSB accident and incident reports (https://www.ntsb.gov/Pages/AviationQuery.aspx) which sort of helped, because there you see the majority of incidents are your garden variety "whoops!" on the tarmac between vehicles, severe turbulence that injures someone who doesn't pay attention to the seatbelt sign, or some problem with the APU. (not life threatening) Then one day, my fear just stopped. I don't know how, I was doing a lot of flying at the time, so maybe that was it, but now I don't have that gut twisting dread whilst flying. (Save for a few lingering tics)
But to your point about AI and emotional manipulation, I think this is a very real thing that needs to be explored further. I suspect there's some very smart AI Ethics people that are on it, but not getting the attention that it needs.
On flying thing, I'm glad it to hear it got better. That's the strange thing about it to me - it seems like it just kinda turns on one day, and then, sometimes, turns off. Brains are weird, I guess.
On AI, I feel like I'm slowly becoming a bit of a doomer about it. I don't think we're to this point yet (or even that close to it, for that matter), but it feels like something people need to start thinking about regulating. We've got controlled substances; we've got bans on certain types of guns (very few, but, different conversation). It's a a suggestion that'll probably set a lot of people off, but feels like regulations on legal technologies will at some point become necessary.
On the flying anxiety part. For me, visiting a cognitive behavior therapist helped a lot. More specifically - understanding distinction between rumination and "productive" thought. And now, when I sense the begining of a "negative loop" ("counting down the long minutes until we land"; "remind myself the wings are still upright"; "I monitor for changes in pressure or speed, listen for new engine pitches or hisses in the ventilation, and try to detect hidden connotations in announcements") I'm trying to shift me focus onto something more "productive" (listen to podcasts or music; read a book; watch a movie; sleep).
On the "are we in charge of the AI, or is the AI in charge of us?". As with anxiety, the goal is not try to control anxiety (the more I tried, the more it took control of me), but accept it and let it be (it usually goes away in 20 minutes without additional negative food, as our brain not designed to stay in this state for too long without substantial reason).
On the flying stuff, sometimes that works for me, sometimes it doesn't. But mostly I end up just kind of blank, staring out the window, kind of full of static. Which is maybe an improvement? I'm not actually sure.
On the AI piece, to be clear, I'm not anxious about that, at least not in the emotional sense. It's more I think AI tools that push on our emotions could have a create a bunch of really weird consequences. Like, I could see kids losing the ability to talk about how they feel about things because they start leaning on AIs to autocomplete that for them. If we can't function without spellcheck, or pilots can't fly without autopilot, or we can't think without google, or can't write without a thesaurus, it seems not unreasonable that we'd struggle to communicate without an AI telling us what we think.
I also developed a bad flight anxiety on a single flight after college that lasted for probably 15 years. Oh man—“the heart-stopping announcement that flight attendants will need to discontinue their service for a few minutes.” The worst for me are trans-Atlantic and trans-pacific flights. Though amazingly, something about 2 years of constant pandemic anxiety seems to have cured me. We’ll find out—I’m reading this post as I wait to board a flight!!
Yeah, the weird thing for me was that it all just happened at once. It's gotten better in moments (and the pandemic helped, for some reason), but it's still there. Which is apparently pretty normal, strange as it is.
(And I haven't read about any planes disappearing a la Lost, so hope you made it and on an easy flight)