In another related thread I posted: Cut away branches that suck energy but don't bear fruit.
For me this is my bullshit filter.
Life is Short
361–370 of 452 posts
Re: Life is Short
#362Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am following a similar strategy (almost identical) but it is not as rosy as described here. You may lose friends because they may think you don't care enough about them since you don't call them frequently anymore (and emails do not work for everyone). You are unreachable through the modern messengers because you refuse to waste time on a gazillion of them. Other people update their friends through Facebook. If you…
"our modern world makes money by distracting us" I'm not getting involved in the overall discussion, just wanted to highlight this gem. This is so true. In a conversation about Netflix's announcement of worldwide availability the other day I put it this way - so much of the economy is based on cultivating and indulging in mindlessness. If you cultivate mindfulness you see how pointless and wasteful so much of people'…
This is a deeply ugly and patronising thought.
Re: Life is Short
#363I love this essay, and I love the mindset of being aware that your life is limited and your time should not be wasted. I find it is avery enabling realization. A personal favorite quote of mine:
"Think of your many years of procrastination; how the gods have repeatedly
granted you further periods of grace, of which you have taken no advantage.
It is time now to realize the nature of the universe to which you belong,
and of that controlling Power whose offspring you are; and to understand
that your time has a limit set to it. Use it, then, to advance your
enlightenment; or it will be gone, and never in your power again."
Marcus Aurelius (Meditations 2:4)Re: Life is Short
#364Earlier quoted context omitted.
Commenters stating that the essay blames poverty on the poor really are reading something into the essay that wasn't there (at least for me). The topic of economic desparity has become such a hot and emotional one that it seems impossible to have an honest conversation about what it really looks like, what are the causes and effects, etc. It seems very important to me that we drop the tribalism and fighting so that w…
> Commenters stating that the essay blames poverty on the poor really are reading something into the essay that wasn't there (at least for me). He did call those who disagree with Zuckerberg's letter envious losers, so how can you read something like the Inequality essay without that colouring it? https://medium.com/@girlziplocked/paul-graham-is-still-askin...
I skimmed the linked article and searched it for "envious losers" but didn't find the phrase you mention. It did have a nasty tone, and seemed more like a personal attack and attempt to incite anger than a reasoned response to the ideas presented.
Re: Life is Short
#365It is funny how one of the top comment is a very long debate about how this article is good or not, completely missing the point. The sooner you realize life is short, the more you will make smart use of your time. The same goes for faith: the sooner you realize there is no life after death, the more you will make smart use of your time. Your brain runs out of electricity and fluids, and poof you go.
I disagree on the point about life after death. I don't think that having faith that there's something after necessarily leads to valuing your time less now . Especially when you don't know what's in store for you next - a good existence or a bad one. With that kind of uncertainty, I'd certainly value the time I have now - at least I know what it's like now. There are also two ways of thinking about what's "smart". F…
For the faithful, racking up merit, studying etc are indeed noble pursuits no matter what.
But I was more speaking about all the time spent in churches, praying etc in the mislead hope of having eternal life.
Re: Life is Short
#366The original (or is it?) 'Ars Longa' is a nice, short read. Worth a pause:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ars_longa,_vita_brevis#Transla...
Re: Life is Short
#367Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unpacking the whole context and philosophical debate (e.g. between libertarians and Marxists) requires a book-length argument. (But to briefly answer your question, no. “People ought to be entitled to what they create” is not a universally accepted principle.) So folks responding to Graham are mostly not going to do the topic justice. (Side note: In a similar but less defensible way, Paul Graham’s summary of Joseph S…
> “People ought to be entitled to what they create” is not a universally accepted principle Yes, in the society and economy we are discussing this is a universally accepted principle. Bob is a farmer. He has the same amount of land as his neighbor, but he works twice as hard, and grows twice the number of crops to sell in a year. He has twice the income. No one would reasonably claim that he's entitled to none of wha…
None of those PG communicates with believe that all income inequality is bad.
This is exactly one of the main problem with the essay. He argues against a position only very very few people really have. But it goes further than that.
PG is right claiming that you can't stop how technology creates inequality. But he is wrong if he believe that this wealth is created purely from risk taking and hard work. Of course those who are wealthy mostly work hard, but so does everyone else.
But the real issue of course is that if we can't stop technology to keep pushing wealth for some into extremes and for others to keep stalling then the wealth created is mostly due to luck and access to the right people and some timing. Not unlike a Powerball ticket but just of being born into the right context.
And so if PG wanted to show he actually understood the issue. Instead of arguing against some straw man he could have spent some time on using his otherwise amazing ability, to think out of the box, to put forward some thoughts on how society could deal with this. Then he would have at least shown some understanding of the people he was talking about.
Instead he basically says. It's going to continue like this, but don't worry it's better than the alternatives and it's going to be good again.
Why would anyone who doesn't stand to benefit from this ever accept such a position?
I just don't see PG's thoughts as well developed here as they are in other areas and no amount of historical context is going to change that.
Re: Life is Short
#368If you can't see past the link to the other essays here please try to isolate this one for a bit, especially if you're young and you don't have kids yet. This essay is rich in realizations that come with age, and in some sense I would have potentially gotten a lot of mileage out of it when I was 20 or so (but then I would probably have lacked the background to fully comprehend it), and even more when I was a young fi…
I'm a new father, and it's striking how things that previously seemed broad and philosophical get pressingly real as you become a parent. Parenthood is full of great joys but also intense logistical realities: your time gets heavily scheduled for care and play. And when you see a child developing new abilities every week, your 5x/week decision on when to head home from the office becomes a very clear trade-off between working more and collecting a unique experience with the most compelling person you've ever met.
For people who aren't yet parents, it compares a bit to the way your thinking about money matures when you get your first job. Suddenly a shirt equals two hours of labor instead of some abstract quantity of a theoretically finite resource. This triggers in many of us a quest to figure out income, so we can get the things we want. But even the affluent among us can't just throw more time at all the things they'd want to do.
Re: Life is Short
#369If you can't see past the link to the other essays here please try to isolate this one for a bit, especially if you're young and you don't have kids yet. This essay is rich in realizations that come with age, and in some sense I would have potentially gotten a lot of mileage out of it when I was 20 or so (but then I would probably have lacked the background to fully comprehend it), and even more when I was a young fi…
I have two kids, I have had two melanomas so far. I understand what it means when people say life is to short.
But is life is too short to use your wealth and power to help solve the problem you acknowledge there is? That sounds like a weird idea. Most of PGs essays aren't controversial they are more informative. Why is life too short for that?
If anything PG is a thinker and a good one at it. He doesn't get everything right (who does) but he is a smart enough thinker to be able to develop his thinking.
You can read his essay in three ways.
1) Life is too short, I don't like writing essays about things that interest me anymore.
2) Life is too short, I just want to kick back and enjoy my family and the money I have.
3) Life is too short.
No matter how you turn it around I fail to see why he would give up writing something that he surely enjoys doing. Especially when you have the power to actually get people to take you serious. (Perhaps thats the problem?)
So why should life be too short for that? Only PG knows. But I think he is proving that either some of the "conspiracy theorists" in this thread are not wrong, or some of his critiques of his last couple of essays are not wrong either.
Re: Life is Short
#370A lot of these points sound similar to the famous resolutions of the young Jonathan Edwards. I try to make a habit of reading them at least once a year for many of the points Paul mentions in this article.
http://edwards.yale.edu/archive?path=aHR0cDovL2Vkd2FyZHMueWF...
a few examples: "6. Resolved, to live with all my might, while I do live."
"9. Resolved, to think much on all occasions of my own dying, and of the common circumstances which attend death."
"52. I frequently hear persons in old age say how they would live, if they were to live their lives over again: resolved, that I will live just so as I can think I shall wish I had done, supposing I live to old age"