[steve1977]

But those 40 people were likely more or less consistent and known to you and you also had direct or implied trust built up with them.

That's fundamentally different from an anonymous mass of people in a city. I've seen and heard much more than 40 people (many of them different every day) before I even reach the office in the morning.

[watwut]

> you also had direct or implied trust built up with them

This part is definitely not true. By all I read about the history, the abusive or hostile "I cant escape" situation was simple fact of life. They get less prevalent when you can leave easily, more prevalent when you are dependent.

> But those 40 people were likely more or less consistent

Not necessarily, people started to organize into larger groups basically whenever they could.

[datsci_est_2015]

Two extremes, equally unnatural, was simply my point.

Either you have to trick your mind that the people who are going about the same rituals with you shoulder-to-shoulder are part of the same tribe as you: using the same bus, coffee shop, elevator.

Or you have to trick your mind that being completely alone and going hours, sometimes days, without opening your mouth to communicate with someone or exercise the part of your brain that reads facial cues or even smell the hormones of another human (good or bad) is also somehow okay.

Having done both (2 major metros, as well as suburban and WFH life), I’ve found the former to be easier for me, personally. I also find suburban and rural people to be generally more misanthropic than urban people, which of course has some selection bias. Exurban people seem to be the most misanthropic, by far (shout out Dallas-Fort Worth).

But the point is, being surrounded by people day-in and day-out doesn’t seem to me to make people misanthropic on aggregate - otherwise cities would be an even worse place to exist. It’s the humans that make it bearable.