> One theory I have for this is that younger people are taught by teachers, when they are at an impressionable age, to revere the smartphone as the pinnacle of human achievement.

Probably over-analyzing this, but I can see why this might happen:

1. There's an ulterior motive of getting them to treat it safely, as it's one of the more-expensive and breakable things they might be carrying around, and they become obstreperous if it is unavailable.

2. It's probably the most immediate and tangible candidate. They probably aren't going to be around MRI scanners or cryo-cooled qubits or whatever.

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AnthonyMouse 5 days ago | parent [-]

They're also designed to be mistaken for sorcery. If you used a PC in the 90s then you have some idea how it works because the inner workings used to be more exposed, error messages had actual contents that could imply something about how you might, yourself, address the problem, etc. Even the bubble-headed marketing people had to learn how to use AS/400 to do their jobs. You can see how a modern phone is the same device only now LCDs place the CRTs and it uses a radio instead of physical wires for internet access etc. You may not be able to easily disassemble the phone but you know roughly what's in it.

Whereas if you've never used a PC, a phone is a black box. You tap the screen and it mysteriously does things. You're discouraged from trying to figure out how or make any changes to it yourself.

And if it's magic you better be careful because who knows what'll happen.

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Terr_ 4 days ago | parent [-]

> And if it's magic you better be careful because who knows what'll happen.

In terms of risk-taking (rather than knowledge) IMO the opposite has happened: Older generations had to worry about voiding the warranty because you held down the two buttons at the same time that the manual clearly told you never to do on page 37.

In contrast, younger folks have grown up with cheaper devices with much-improved idiot-proofing. That makes the strategy of "try shit until it seems to work" a lot more viable.

Meanwhile, older folks look on, seeing confident action and misinterpreting it as competent understanding, woefully concluding that "Unlike myself, kids these days just know computers."

	▲	AnthonyMouse 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		> In terms of risk-taking (rather than knowledge) IMO the opposite has happened: Older generations had to worry about voiding the warranty because you held down the two buttons at the same time that the manual clearly told you never to do on page 37. That was never really a thing though. To begin with, warranties are generally pretty worthless because they cover exactly the things that don't usually happen. Power switch doesn't work one day out of the box? Covered, but unlikely to happen and probably not hard to fix yourself anyway. Dropped it and broke it? Not covered. Device is three years old and the battery is flat? Warranty is already expired. If you haven't needed a warranty in the first month you probably won't need it at all. > In contrast, younger folks have grown up with cheaper devices with much-improved idiot-proofing. That makes the strategy of "try shit until it seems to work" a lot more viable. Except that the idiot-proofing is that if something is broken, you get a message that says "an error occurred" and there's no way to fix it because the brokenness is in an app you can't modify or is running on a server you don't control. Meanwhile mashing buttons at random is more dangerous than ever because your whole life is in that device and it will readily transfer real money or send private files to people you don't want to have them or give attackers access to your accounts on various services.