The world is a software program

We all walk through the same world. But sometimes I wonder if we’re actually watching the same movie.

When you look at a traffic light, you see a red light: “I need to stop.” That’s the interface. That’s what everyone sees. When I look at that same traffic light, I see a logic loop. I see a system of timing, sensors in the road surface, and a central server deciding when traffic should flow and when it should come to a halt.

You experience the world, I see how the world is programmed.

Why I see this (and how my dyslexia helped)

Back in school, I was the boy who got stuck on textbooks. To me, words were unmanageable blocks of text. I constantly had to devise workarounds to understand what was written. That was frustrating, but it was also a form of training. Because I couldn’t follow the “normal” path of text and language, I learned to look at the structure behind the words.

I learned to spot patterns. I learned that a sentence isn’t just a collection of letters, but a logical building block. When I started programming later on, it felt like coming home. Finally, there was a language that actually made sense. Since then, I’ve viewed everything in life as a system built on rules, just like a computer program.

The “shades of gray” in society

Imagine society is a beautifully designed app. Most people are delighted by the lovely colors, the user-friendly buttons, and the pleasing layout. But I see the errors in the code.

Take the traffic jam example: You’re stuck in traffic, annoyed by the congestion. You see a line of cars. I see an inefficient algorithm. I see the whole system grinding to a halt because we all want to be in the same place at the same time, whereas a simple tweak to the logic, such as staggering times, would make the entire process run more smoothly.

Take social dramas, for instance: you see two people arguing and feel the emotion. I see a ‘loop’ they can’t break out of. I see two people talking past each other, stuck in an action-reaction pattern because their internal ‘software’ isn’t compatible.

The burden of transparency

There is a downside to all this. Once you see how the world’s source code works, you can’t unsee it. It’s like knowing the secret behind a magic trick: the magic is gone, but you see exactly how it’s done.
That can feel lonely at times. You want to warn people, “Watch out, this system is about to crash!”, but those around you are too busy admiring the beautiful interface. They don’t realize that what they call “bad luck” or “coincidence” is actually the predictable outcome of a poorly written program.

Look behind the controls

I’m not writing this because I think I’m better than everyone else. Quite the opposite. I’m writing this because I believe everyone benefits from a little insight into the “source code.”

You don’t have to be a programmer to see that the world isn’t made up of random coincidences. The next time something frustrates you, whether at work, in traffic, or in your relationships, try looking past the controls. Instead of asking, “What is happening here?”, ask yourself, “What is the logic causing this result?”

If we all spent a little less time looking at the interface and a little more time looking at the logic governing our lives, the world would seem a lot less mysterious. And perhaps, just perhaps, we can then improve the code a little bit together.