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Will facial expressions become extinct due to modern technology?

Here's a philosophical question for TSR that cropped up the other day as I witness a bloke on the phone smiling as he spoke to a faceless entity elsewhere in the world.

So, facial expressions are designed by nature to convey our emotions to others. Agree? Disagree?

In which case as we move more and more away from face to face communication will our facial expressions be used less and less? Until at which point they finally die out?

What do you think TSR?

Reply 1

Steve82

But did you learn these expressions through face to face communication and then apply them to these activities? If so we would become less and less used to smiling

Reply 2

AperfectBalance

While people will be on phones more and more especially at younger ages it is not like people do not talk face to face, for as long as school exists as we know it and people still go out on the streets facial expressions will exist, change possibly. but I think it is silly to say that they will just go away

Reply 3

Trinculo

Nah, facial expressions get used more with tech. More photos get taken in a hour now than in hundreds of years in the past. Something like 10% of all photos ever taken were taken in the last year. People tend to make expressions in those photos

Reply 4

Steve82

Original post by Trinculo

Is there not a difference between a posed expression in a photo, which is forced and a natural expression during face to face communication?

Reply 5

Trinculo

Original post by kalclash

Is there not a difference between a posed expression in a photo, which is forced and a natural expression during face to face communication?

I don't think so.

Also, babies smile and so do animals - so I don't think it's a learned thing

Reply 6

Steve82

Original post by AperfectBalance

Schools are integrating more and more technology into the classroom, reducing the amount of face to face interaction. Playgrounds are now full of kids using mobile devices instead of interacting.

Would it not actually be silly to assume that technology won't actually continue to become a more prominent method of communicating for the young? Musing the point whether it would get to a point to somewhat or totally mute our effectiveness to display genuine facial expressions.

Reply 7

Steve82

Original post by Trinculo

I don't think so.

Also, babies smile and so do animals - so I don't think it's a learned thing

Babies simply mimic their parents. It's actually becoming more coming for babies to reach for a phone than smile. I have seen it first hand.

Reply 8

Serine Soul

Original post by kalclash

Babies simply mimic their parents. It's actually becoming more coming for babies to reach for a phone than smile. I have seen it first hand.

My baby brother reaches his hands into our pockets to bring out our phones already (9 months)

I don't think facial expressions will go away as we will continue to interact with people face to face

Reply 9

Steve82

Original post by Serine Soul

My baby brother reaches his hands into our pockets to bring out our phones already (9 months)

I don't think facial expressions will go away as we will continue to interact with people face to face

I agree they won't go away, but they might become less and less natural to us as we move away from face to face communication from such an early age...

Reply 10

aabdelwahab1

I suppose facial expressions are embedded in the human nature and may not die out. Think about blind people, they use facial expressions without seeing anyone else doing them. I really like this question though...

Reply 11

Steve82

Original post by Dom2375

durr hburr technology is bad fire is scary and thomas edison was a witch

Who alluded to technology being bad? Who even alluded to us having a lessened ability to display natural facial expressions bad?

Maybe it's for the better. Maybe it's not. That's the idea of a healthy debates. Thomas Edison would not have looked favourably on troll comments. He would have encouraged discussion, because discussion leads to innovation.

Reply 12

username1661963

I actually think the opposite. Things like reality TV and memes (which all depend on technology) rely on drama and over exaggerated emotions to get viewers/ laughs.

"Drama" usually comes with over exaggerated facial expressions when people are arguing or laughing or it comes across as boring.

Posted from TSR Mobile

Reply 13

username2763536

Only if a lack of facial expressions somehow causes you to leave more offspring than someone with them.And even then evolution acts over hundreds of thousands of years not centuries.So no facial expressions wont die out anytime soon.Stupid question.