Escaping the Algorithmic Siege: Why Mud is Worth a Hundred Tutoring Classes
Hello everyone. Today, let us not discuss markets or data; let us discuss something that has been making me increasingly restless lately. Have you noticed that your child is growing increasingly apathetic toward the real world?
Take them out to dinner, and their eyes are glued to their phone, oblivious to the food getting cold. Ask them for a favor, and they say “just a minute,” which stretches into two hours. It snows outside, they glance up for a second, mutter “oh,” and look back down. You ask if they are happy, and they say “fine.” You ask what they like, they ponder for ages and say, “playing games.”
You feel an indescribable unease in your heart. This unease, I believe, warrants a serious discussion.
I am the financial veteran from the Finsages AI Era Educational Transformation channel.
Having audited corporate financial statements in the banking sector for thirty years, I have witnessed every conceivable asset bubble.
The most dangerous type of bubble is not the wildly obvious surge, but a very quiet, highly comfortable inflation. On the balance sheet, everything appears normal, and cash flow looks attractive. But upon rigorous deconstruction, you discover the entire valuation rests on an increasingly hollow expectation.
There is no real business support, no authentic customer relationships, no actual product friction. It is all expectation, narrative, and imagination of the future.
In calm waters, this type of asset can hold up for a long time. But the moment it encounters a genuine external shock, the speed of its collapse catches everyone off guard.
Because it has never undergone a real-world stress test.
A child living in a world constructed by algorithms follows this exact same logic.
What is an algorithm?
It is a system custom-designed exclusively for you, engineered to never disappoint you.
You like something, it feeds it to you. You grow bored, it switches. You feel down, it pushes a joke. You skip a video halfway, it instantly logs the signal and queues up something more gripping next time.
Its singular objective is retention.
In this system, there is no waiting, no boredom, no frustration, no misunderstanding. There is none of that defeat you feel when you spend ages explaining something to someone, and they still do not understand you. Everything is seamless, everything is optimized for you, everything is under your control.
In financial terms, this experience is called a frictionless asset.
Sounds wonderful, right? No friction, no wear and tear, pure net yield.
But after thirty years in risk management, I will tell you: a frictionless environment is one of the most dangerous red flags.
The real world is never frictionless. Authentic interpersonal relationships have friction; real work has friction; raw nature has friction; even genuine love has friction. That friction is not an obstacle; it is the ultimate proof of authenticity.
A child who has never experienced real-world friction possesses a tolerance for reality akin to a bubble asset that exists only on paper — they cannot withstand any genuine storm.
Over twenty years ago, I went down to the grassroots level for a post-lending inspection, visiting an agricultural cooperative in a rural county.
It was winter. The soil in the fields had just been turned; it was wet, and stepping on it meant sinking in. My guide was a farmer in his forties named Old Zhang. He had contracted fifty acres of village land and taken out a loan for a new seeder.
As we walked along the ridge, he squatted down, grabbed a handful of soil, squeezed it, and said, “The soil isn’t right this year. It’s too tight. We have to loosen it again, otherwise the roots won’t penetrate, and the seedlings will lack vigor.”
At the time, I didn’t think much of it, just that this man understood his land.
Later, that loan was repaid flawlessly; Old Zhang never missed a payment. When I was writing off the archives and saw his name, I suddenly remembered that handful of soil.
That man’s understanding of the dirt in his hands could never be replicated by any data model. It was tactile knowledge ground out over twenty years, season by season.
I have pondered ever since: what is the absolute best thing we can give our children?
It is not the elite school district, not the best tutoring classes, not the most advanced devices. It is the capacity to establish a profoundly deep, tactile, and authentic understanding of something real.
There is an ancient philosophical concept advocating for the achievement of equilibrium and harmony.[1] Equilibrium means the inner mind is centered and unbiased; harmony means resonating in coordination with the external world. “Achieving” implies proactive cultivation, not waiting for it to happen organically.
Applied today, I believe this is a highly precise diagnosis.
What the algorithmic world does to a child is systematically destroy their equilibrium and harmony. It keeps their emotions perpetually suspended at artificially stimulated highs, never allowing them to settle and find a quiet center. It makes their relationship with the external world increasingly unidirectional and manipulative. It ceases to be coordinated resonance and becomes “I swipe what I want, and you don’t matter.”
Nature, however, is one of the few remaining places in human society that can still provide a genuine experience of equilibrium and harmony.
Not because nature is beautiful; beauty is not the point. It is because nature does not care about you.
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You climb a mountain, and the mountain will not lessen its incline just because you are in a bad mood. You go to the beach, and the waves will not pause for you to take a photo. You sit on the grass, and the insects will not disappear simply because you dislike them.
For a child spoiled by algorithms, this indifference is a tremendously precious shock.
They discover for the first time that things in this world are not designed for them, do not exist to please them, and operate by their own rhythms and rules. You either adapt or you leave; you cannot force it to conform to your will.
This discovery is a vital psychological reality calibration for a child.
Let us use a financial concept to explain this: hard currency reserves.
Every global economy must hold a certain percentage of gold or foreign exchange reserves. Not for daily use, but because if the domestic currency collapses and credit implodes, you must hold an authentic asset whose value no one can deny.
A child’s psychological assets operate identically.
The sense of achievement accumulated in the virtual world — the followers, the gaming ranks, the likes — are all domestic currency assets. They are highly useful circulating within the system, but their value is entirely fiat, granted by the system. If the system crashes, they are worth absolutely nothing.
Real experiences are the child’s gold reserves.
The sense of achievement when lighting a fire for the first time, eyes tearing from smoke, but finally getting it to burn. The contrast of being drenched in the rain, feeling the bone-chilling cold in soaked clothes, and then feeling the warmth of hot water. Seeing a dead bird for the first time, picking it up, not knowing what to do, and standing there in long contemplation.
These experiences cannot be optimized, accelerated, or replaced by algorithms. Their intrinsic value lies precisely in their irreplaceability.
This is the hard currency in a child’s psychological world. No matter how the virtual world fluctuates, these authentic experiences will remain at their emotional bedrock, serving as an anchor to secure their capacity to perceive real life.
How does empathy grow?
It is not taught. It does not grow by simply telling a child, “You must care about others.”
Empathy is a cognitive capacity that requires a massive foundation of authentic, friction-filled interpersonal and natural experiences.
You must watch an insect slowly die to truly comprehend fragility. You must get lost in the mountains to truly comprehend fear. You must sit bored on the grass for two hours with nothing happening to comprehend stillness, and to understand what might lie behind another person’s silence.
Algorithms cannot give you this. What algorithms provide is a highly refined emotional concentrate, stripped of all ineffective ingredients. Your emotions are repeatedly yanked back and forth, but your actual emotional capacity is atrophying.
It is like a child who only consumes highly processed foods; their palate becomes increasingly dull, losing all perception of authentic ingredients. You give them a bowl of plain white rice, and they think it is tasteless. But that rice is actually deeply fragrant; it is simply that their sensory system has been ruined by overstimulation.
Returning the child to the soil, to the wind and rain, to those un-designed, clumsy, and raw scenes, is a restoration of their sensory system, not a deprivation.
I know many parents will say, “I understand the logic, but my child refuses to go; the moment we step outside, they complain about being tired.”
Yes, they will.
Because the real world has friction, discomfort, and uncertainty. For a child domesticated by algorithms, this sensation is initially intensely uncomfortable.
But you must remember one thing: discomfort is a signal of growth, not a signal to retreat.
When you go to the gym for the first time and your muscles ache, you do not conclude that exercising is wrong. When you learn to swim and swallow a few mouthfuls of water, you do not conclude you shouldn’t learn.
The child’s initial discomfort in the real world follows the exact same logic. That is proof that they are undergoing a stress test; it is the process of their psychological assets appreciating in value.
Initially, you do not need to take them far away or to spectacular wilderness. A vegetable patch, a muddy path, a rainy day, a walk without phones — that is enough.
The destination is not the point. The point is that during the time disconnected from the algorithm, they learn to coexist with themselves and the real world in the absence of external stimulation.
This capacity is called inner equilibrium, and it is the unavoidable foundational trait for anyone who wishes to truly thrive in the AI era.
The ancient philosopher Zhuangzi observed that heaven and earth possess profound beauty but remain silent.[2]
The beauty of the universe is not performing for you; it does not exist to farm your likes. It simply is. Silent, wordless, waiting for you to step inside and perceive it with your authentic five senses.
What a child learns in the algorithmic world is to be fed. What they learn in nature is to proactively perceive.
In a future where AI penetration accelerates, the gap between these two capabilities will only widen exponentially.
Being fed cultivates dependency. Proactive perception cultivates a human being who is truly alive.
I am the financial veteran from Finsages. In this era of multiplying screens and vanishing soil, I am willing to be the fellow traveler who reminds you to occasionally take your child outside to step in the wet mud.
Follow me(https://finsages.org). The world is vast and magnificent; I will see you at the top.
[1] This concept draws from the classic Confucian text, The Doctrine of the Mean (中庸 — Zhongyong): “致中和” (Achieving equilibrium and harmony). It parallels the Aristotelian golden mean or Stoic emotional regulation, emphasizing that true psychological resilience requires a proactively cultivated, balanced center that resonates authentically with the friction of the real world.
[2] This philosophical insight originates from the Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi (庄子): “天地有大美而不言” (Heaven and earth have great beauty but do not speak). It aligns with Spinoza’s view of nature or the Western Romantic concept of the sublime, illustrating that true reality is indifferent to human validation and must be engaged with on its own terms.
