this post was submitted on 04 Jan 2026
397 points (95.4% liked)

Showerthoughts

39054 readers
631 users here now

A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

When I was young and starting out with computers, programming, BBS' and later the early internet, technology was something that expanded my mind, helped me to research, learn new skills, and meet people and have interesting conversations. Something decentralized that put power into the hands of the little guy who could start his own business venture with his PC or expand his skillset.

Where we are now with AI, the opposite seems to be happening. We are asking AI to do things for us rather than learning how to do things ourselves. We are losing our research skills. Many people are talking to AI's about their problems instead of other people. And they will take away our jobs and centralize all power into a handful of billionaire sociopaths with robot armies to carry out whatever nefarious deeds they want to do.

I hope we somehow make it through this part of history with some semblance of freedom and autonomy intact, but I'm having a hard time seeing how.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] zombiebot@piefed.social 105 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (4 children)

Librarian here, can confirm.

I started my Master's in Library and Information Science in 2010. We were told not to worry about the internet making us obsolete because we would be needed to teach information literacy.

Information literacy turned out to be something people didn't want. They wanted to be told what to think, not taught skills to think for themselves.

It's been the single greatest and most expensive disappointment of my life.

[–] Gonzako@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago (1 children)

How does one go about learning information literacy?

[–] TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

classes in philosophy, literature, politics, and digital media. typically.

you know, those evil humanities that are destroying society... because they don't produce 'value'.

[–] whotookkarl@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 3 days ago

Rhetoric is a big one too, not just to use but to be able to identify when it's being used to manipulate you

[–] Strider@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

They wanted to be told what to think, not taught skills to think for themselves.

This must be one of the wisest statements I ever read on the internet.

[–] the_q@lemmy.zip 25 points 4 days ago

Needing a masters for $18/hr sucks too.

[–] jimmy90@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

if people don't want to use computers to expand their mind, empower themselves and others then, obviously they won't get those benefits

you can still use computers to do those things