Norman makes a really interesting argument that I see throughout daily life of how a positive mood is really a partnership of the aesthetics vis a vis the usability of the product. I mean, whenever I upgrade my own technology, I see a lot of benefits from the upgrade and with that, I can see how it does influence my thinking. As an example, with my previous Xiaomi phone, I found a lot of workarounds for say installing apps that aren’t available in my region or even some hidden features that made my use of the device much more intuitive.
However I’d like to extend his argument by saying that brand loyalty does also play a factor in our thinking. I upgraded to a Google Pixel phone and I think I mostly got sold on it, because of the abudance of features and the whole Google brand. I mean, I’m enjoying the phone don’t get me wrong, but when I encunter a minor issue, it doesn’t really appaul me, more so I’m patient but particularly because I strongly side with Google as the brand value of it. So there’s definitely an argument to made there that if you are loyal and trust a brand, then your thinking is based off it.
With regards to Hamilton, I think it’s really interesting that there was a time where people thought that humans didn’t need support or help because NASA just assumed that astronauts are equipped with a higher degree of knowledge. Nowadays, we constantly make mistakes (I mean even writing this I almost forgot to save my work 😭) and I couldn’t imagine living with technology without error checks. And I think some people do get offended or at least frustrated with error check screens as they’re so constant and everywhere. But man, imagine if we didn’t have them. What kind of society would we live in?