The Rise and Consequences of Optimization

The podcast episode explores the concept of optimization and its impact on various aspects of our lives. Coco Crum, a writer and applied mathematician, discusses the origins of optimization, tracing it from philosophers and physicists to tech giants and lifestyle gurus. She highlights the dangers of a single-minded pursuit of optimization and the loss that comes with it. Crum explains that optimization involves setting constraints, defining objective functions, and searching for the best outcome within those constraints. She uses the example of making lemonade to demonstrate how different parameters and constraints can lead to different definitions of what constitutes the best lemonade. She also addresses the idea of changing the objective function as an alternative to excessive optimization. She points out that optimization has become so ingrained in our way of thinking that even slowing down is seen as something to be done optimally. Crum explores how optimization has become a dominant philosophy in society, drawing parallels between it and religion. She discusses the positive aspects of optimization, such as technological advancements and increased efficiency, but also highlights the negative consequences, such as the loss of specificity, a disconnect from scale and human connection, and the fragile nature of optimized systems.