The Scariest Story

The scariest stories are not the ones of fictional worlds that intentionally blur lines with reality to provide a fright; they are the ones experienced by others that we choose to ignore because they are so horrific and unsettling that we cannot bear to give them our attention. Our present is so fragile that we evade our fears by refusing to acknowledge their existence on our shared planet. That is privilege. In a previous piece, I discussed how luxurious it is for us to consider different possibilities for ourselves before we are forced to live them. This is not true for all of us. Nonetheless, there will be a time in everyone’s lives when they reflect on all the people they’ve been. While the truth about ghosts remains debatable, it is undeniable that each of us will be many people in our lifetime, with each of our past selves becoming a ghost. But it is our own ghosts and our collective overlooks that can become what haunts us.

Nothing haunts like the shadow of the past in the future. When reality appears eerily familiar to something we’ve already experienced, the collective will become increasingly more frightened by the possibility of past events resurfacing. Yet these events play out elsewhere, and we pay them no attention. Fear only grows because the possibility of its manifestation becomes real. While fear is a feeling, a temporary state of being, it can be paralyzing to the powerless. It is when we reach the heights of these temporary states that we must continue to move through them, so as not to become immobilized. When we are ignorant of the wars, of the infiltration of technology into personal lives, and of the human suffering around the world, we stand on the side of fear, making us immobile in our efforts.

How Did We Get Here?

Despite the ways that fear creeps into our lives, it is not distinctly human. What is, however, is the adoption of the idea that we no longer need each other to survive. And that is the scary headlining story humankind is deciding whether or not to tell today.  The natural world cannot be replaced, nor can it be replicated through artificial means. In many ways, the present technologies we see are born from a place of loneliness, as if it would be better to replace humankind with an artificial version as opposed to improving the conditions for all. However, technology behaves as an amplifier in society. Meaning, it will amplify the state in which it was created from, in this case, loneliness.

A Harvard report on loneliness from May 2024 suggests, “21% of adults in the U.S. feel lonely, with many respondents feeling disconnected from friends, family, and/or the world,” (Batanova, 2024). The report went further to address what Americans believe is contributing to loneliness and found that technology was leading the answer, with 73% of respondents thinking that was the contribution, followed by families not spending time together, people working too much or being too busy or exhausted, and people struggling with mental health challenges that are hurting their relationships (Batanova).

While loneliness grows more prevalent, so do AI technologies in the workforce and in our daily lives. According to Reuters, “60% of workers today are employed in occupations that did not exist in 1940, or 74 percent if we consider just the professional category, which added the most workers during the past eight decades. However, recent academic research suggests we may have reached an inflection point in the U.S., whereby technology is now destroying more jobs than it is creating,” (Stephen, 2025). This comes at a time when many people are feeling disconnected from the work they do, with recent data from MetLife showing that, “employees are quietly cracking, exhibiting heightened feelings of disconnection and undervalued at work. According to the company’s latest research, just over half (53%) of employees report feeling valued, a 10% decrease compared to last year, and employee engagement has dropped to 66%, down 6% from 2024" (MetLife, 2025).

Disconnection from work and the replacement of humans by technology only serve to exacerbate either issue. The growing disconnection from work and people leaves humans without connection. Yet, we are a social species that is reliant on connection for well-being. In fact, one of the world’s longest studies on adult life, the Harvard Study of Adult Development, where the findings have been put together in a book titled The Good Life: Lessons from the World’s Longest Scientific Study of Happiness, has revealed and emphasized the importance of connection. Authors of the book state, “Contrary to what many people think, it’s not career achievement, or exercise, or a healthy diet, one thing continuously demonstrates its broad and enduring importance: Good relationships” (Suttie, 2023), they also go on to give reasoning behind loneliness and disconnect in society, attributing it a culture that “pushes us toward going it alone and overachieving at the expense of our relationships” (Suttie, 2023).

Despite these findings, human-to-human interaction remains on the decline, and 1 in 4 young adults believe AI partners could serve as a replacement for real-life romance (Wang and Toscano). It is difficult not to overlay the rise of technology since 2003 with data from a study titled, US trends in social isolation, social engagement, and companionship-nationally and by age, sex, race/ethnicity, family income, and work hours, 2003-2020, published by the NIH in 2022. Here are some figures from the study:

Figure 1: Annual Daily Average in Minutes are in blue trendlines. Joinpoint lines are black with red-bordered square points indicating years at which the slope the trendline changes significantly.

Figure 2: US social connectedness trends, annual daily average in Minutes, 2003–2020. Men (blue), Women (red).

Figure 3: US social connectedness trends, annual daily average in Minutes, 2003–2020. 15-24 years (blue), 25-34 years (red), 35-44 years (yellow), 45-54 years (green), 55-64 years (orange), 65+ years (purple).

To provide context in the technology space, the iPod was released in 2001, and the iPhone in 2007. Following, Myspace was started in 2003, Facebook in 2004, YouTube in 2005, Twitter in 2006, and Instagram in 2010. Here is a graph depicting the rise of social media usage from 2004 to 2018:

Now, since it seems obvious, it doesn’t feel necessary to delve in-depth into how the rise of social media and social isolation have gone hand in hand. However, it is worth mentioning since media and entertainment continue to occupy a large portion of an individual’s day, with an overall average of 6 hours a day spent on media and entertainment activities across generations, as reported by Deloitte’s recent Digital Media Trends report.

Constant usage of technologies in our work and personal lives is replacing human connection. This fuels the idea that we, social creatures, no longer need one another. That we can replace real human interaction with parasocial relationships and human-machine interactions, and expect to carry on as a species. Loneliness itself is reported to be “more dangerous than smoking, Alzheimer’s disease, other dementia, and adversely affects the immune and cardio-vascular system. It is a generally accepted opinion that loneliness results in a decline of well-being and has an adverse effect on physical health,” (Tiwari, 2013). Loneliness is a disease, and it’s coming for us all unless we collectively make the choice to put down our phones and become chronically offline.

“Loneliness is increasing worldwide and needs to be handled as a disease, not just as a situation or a symptom of disease or a mere social concept” (Tiwari, 2013).

The Future is Built Together

Collectively, we are building ghost towns for the future. We continue to innovate without designing for human activity, but rather, for human-machine interactions. The last study I referred to was ringing the alarm bells that loneliness was becoming a problem, and that was from 2013. Now, “more than half of U.S. adults (1 in 2 adults) are considered lonely, which is fairly consistent with pre-pandemic research that showed 61% of adults experiencing loneliness in 2019 after a seven-percentage point increase from 2018” (Cigna, 2024). Instead of creating public policy that creates access to transportation, public parks, and community-based organizations, the government has invested $500 billion to fund infrastructure for AI (Holland). Further, “the International Energy Agency (IEA) projects that data centers’ electricity consumption in 2026 will be double that of 2022-1,000 terawatt-hours, roughly equivalent to Japan’s current total consumption,” (Berreby, 2024). Not only does the rise of AI have major implications for human connection, but it also has implications for the environment. The future is born out of the present, and the actions we take now will determine what our future looks like.

We are standing at a decision point in the story of humanity. One that has already been filled with dark twists, horrid affairs, and lighter times. In many ways, we have chosen to ease our suffering. However, this ease was distributed justly, and suffering remains present in many parts of the world, and it remains within our own communities. The stories we tell ourselves about the present are a choice and remain deeply rooted in our own unique perspectives that have been shaped by our experiences. However, the future for humanity and our planet does not rely on individualism. It cannot rely on individualism. It depends on collectivism. The future depends on the steps we take now to decrease or eliminate our time spent in alternative worlds that an algorithm feeds us to keep us there. It depends on us, collectively, choosing to make actual changes to our daily lives that lead to increased human connection and strengthen humanity.

Our present is the constant union of our past and future, and while our present can choose the future or reinforce the past, the shape of our own existence is molded through choice. So too is the shape of the collective future. Every piece of us that ceases to exist in our present remains as a ghost of our past. Whether these pieces serve to haunt us is dependent upon previous action and the placement of present energy. We have the power to choose which parts of us evolve and which remain unchanged. Nonetheless, nothing truly departs us. Like the garbage that collects in the ocean, our past selves linger in our consciousness. Likewise, we collectively determine which parts of the present will become ghost towns as we move through time and space together.

The stories I find most frightening are those that we have chosen to tell. However, advancement comes with the expense of the loss of the way things were, and we have a choice to make. The progress of the future lies within the evolution of the present. Just as a person must determine for themselves whether they will evolve or repeat, the collective must do so as well. As we move towards the future, we determine the stories that will be told, and humankind can only be told together, albeit through different perspectives; it is a collective responsibility to shape the fate of humanity. When we let distance grow between us and our neighbors, we stand no chance of telling the story together. Spending time on technology separates and divides as our worldview becomes distorted by the stories we allow others to tell, and the stories that sell will always be those that illicit fear.

So, when we have the opportunity to tell a different story, even if it’s through a small act, we should. The future is now. Exchange human-machine interaction for human interaction. Order your food in person, not from an app. Consult with a friend, not a chatbot. When we don’t choose human connection, we risk our physical spaces becoming ghost towns. In these towns, we will be haunted by the choices we didn’t make. Now is the time to take action. Now is the time to tell a better, less frightening, story of humanity.

References:

Batanova, Milena. “Making Caring Common.” Making Caring Common, 3 Oct. 2024, mcc.gse.harvard.edu/reports/loneliness-in-america-2024.

Berreby, David. “As Use of A.I. Soars, so Does the Energy and Water It Requires.” Yale E360, Yale School of the Environment, 6 Feb. 2024, e360.yale.edu/features/artificial-intelligence-climate-energy-emissions.

Deloitte. “2025 Digital Media Trends: Social Platforms Are Becoming a Dominant Force in Media and Entertainment.” Deloitte Insights, Deloitte, 24 Mar. 2025, www.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/industry/technology/digital-media-trends-consumption-habits-survey/2025.html.

Hillyer, Madeleine. “How Has Technology Changed - and Changed Us - in the Past 20 Years?” World Economic Forum, 18 Nov. 2020, www.weforum.org/stories/2020/11/heres-how-technology-has-changed-and-changed-us-over-the-past-20-years/.

Holland, Steve. “Trump Announces Private-Sector $500 Billion Investment in AI Infrastructure.” Reuters, 21 Jan. 2025, www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/trump-announce-private-sector-ai-infrastructure-investment-cbs-reports-2025-01-21/.

Jen, Stephen. “AI Will Replace Most Humans, but Then What?” Reuters, 19 Aug. 2025, www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/ai-will-replace-most-humans-then-what-2025-08-19/.

Kannan, Viji Diane, and Peter J. Veazie. “US Trends in Social Isolation, Social Engagement, and Companionship ⎯ Nationally and by Age, Sex, Race/Ethnicity, Family Income, and Work Hours, 2003–2020.” SSM - Population Health, vol. 21, no. 21, Mar. 2023, p. 101331, pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9811250/, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2022.101331.

“New MetLife Data Finds Half of Employees Report Feeling Disconnected, Undervalued at Work.” MetLife, 2025, www.metlife.com/about-us/newsroom/2025/september/new-metlife-data-finds-half-of-employees-report-feeling-disconnected-undervalued-at-work/. Accessed 26 Oct. 2025.

Suttie, Jill. “What the Longest Happiness Study Reveals about Finding Fulfillment.” Greater Good, 6 Feb. 2023, greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/what_the_longest_happiness_study_reveals_about_finding_fulfillment.

“The Loneliness Epidemic Persists: A Post-Pandemic Look at the State of Loneliness among U.S. Adults.” The Cigna Group Newsroom, 2024, newsroom.thecignagroup.com/all-stories?item=446.

Tiwari, Sarvada Chandra. “Loneliness: A Disease?” Indian Journal of Psychiatry, vol. 55, no. 4, 2013, pp. 320–322, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3890922/, https://doi.org/10.4103/0019-5545.120536.

Wang, Wendy, and Michael Toscano. “Artificial Intelligence and Relationships: 1 in 4 Young Adults Believe AI Partners Could Replace Real-Life Romance.” Institute for Family Studies, 2024, ifstudies.org/blog/artificial-intelligence-and-relationships-1-in-4-young-adults-believe-ai-partners-could-replace-real-life-romance.