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What should I do with my life?

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Re: What should I do with my life?

#31

Post by Psyonic »

Jun8 wrote: post #5

Almost all of the people I interviewed found their calling ! after great difficulty ...the catfish farmer used to be an investment banker, the truck driver had been an entertainment lawyer, a chef had been an academic, and the police officer was a Harvard MBA. Hmm, I think there might be some inherent bias here. These people were so interesting because Bronson chose the interesting ones (he says he selected 70 out of…

Ya, seriously. I'm pretty sure most farmers, truck drivers, and police officers didn't start in lucrative careers first.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#32

Post by caffeine »

nopassrecover wrote: post #14
fnid2 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ways to do these things have been around for decades, but it's not in the interest of the producers of homes and employers to do them. Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies…

I agree with everything you say but question "it simply takes too long to evaluate intelligence". It's not like we are house flies with a day to find a mate. I think maybe the problem is intelligence (and other characteristics) are often hard to evaluate. Added to this, the intelligent meek geek isn't getting the girl because he isn't bold, but cognitive dissonance convinces him that there must be something wrong wit…

We share common ancestors with houseflies who have a day to find a mate. We were at one point small furry proto-mammals who mated almost exclusively by smell and aggressiveness.

It no longer takes too long to evaluate intelligence. But when our mate evaluation systems were being designed, there were fewer available dimensions to optimize over. A woman's opinion of a man's smell still correlates strongly with both her menstrual phase and their mutual genetic suitability.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#33

Post by euroclydon »

lionhearted wrote: post #25
euroclydon wrote: post #2

I think it's evil the amount of energy and resources that go into creating unnecessary desires in people in order to cultivate a consumer class. It's time to reap the benefits of our technological advancements, by working shorter weeks, finding less expensive ways to build shelter (houses), and becoming more proficient in local food generation.

> It's time to reap the benefits of our technological advancements, by working shorter weeks, finding less expensive ways to build shelter (houses), and becoming more proficient in local food generation. There's nothing stopping you from doing all those things right now. It'll take a little creativity, but they've all been done already in various places so you've got a blueprint on how to do it. For my part, I'm more…

Yeah, I'm certainly not going to be calling my congressman and asking for France-style work week legislation, and I am a staunch proponent of freedom, including the freedom to be stupid and be separated from your money because of that stupidity.

I'm with ya all the way brother, just hoping to inspire people to reap the benefits of technology, and not get caught unwittingly in a rat race.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#34

Post by Psyonic »

goatforce5 wrote: post #4

Oooh. Po Bronson is probably my favourite author. There's something about his writing style that pushes my buttons. It's probably worth nothing that he used to do a lot of writing for Wired magazine (eg http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/6.12/hotmale.html ) and his second novel, The First $20m Is Always The Hardest, was about a startup ( http://pobronson.com/index_first_20_million.htm ). His site has lots of excerpts…

Not really related at all to this discussion, and not technically the first line (though its on the first page), but this line from Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer was the most captivating book starter for me ever: "I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive."

How could you not keep reading after that?

Re: What should I do with my life?

#35

Post by Psyonic »

gaius wrote: post #9
tome wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I upvoted you, but your penultimate sentence is not true. Advertisers employ the most sophisticated psychological techniques that remain legal.

I don't deny it, but no-one points a gun at your head and says "eat these Pringles".

Don't underestimate persuasion techniques. If they can convince an entire group of people to simultaneously commit suicide, they can probably convince them to eat Pringles.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#36

Post by domokun »

fnid2 wrote: post #11
euroclydon wrote: post #2

I think it's evil the amount of energy and resources that go into creating unnecessary desires in people in order to cultivate a consumer class. It's time to reap the benefits of our technological advancements, by working shorter weeks, finding less expensive ways to build shelter (houses), and becoming more proficient in local food generation.

Ways to do these things have been around for decades, but it's not in the interest of the producers of homes and employers to do them. Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies…

I don't think evolution has a whole lot to do with this. Evolution takes place on a much longer time frame, so we're mostly talking about cultural norms here. Furthermore, whatever "trait" leads to accumulating sports cars and mcmansions is not heritable.

There's something called the Matching Hypothesis in sociology that basically says people end up pairing with those on the same "level" (in whichever way that person's culture defines status). i.e. an 8 takes home an 8-ish from the bar, or rich guy gets supermodel. But most everyone ends up matching up with some one else, and flashy-guy isn't improving his gene pool by mating with brain-dead hottie, so I don't think nature is the culprit here.

(However, less educated (for simplicity, let's equate that to less intelligent) people do have a higher birth rate. So the world is getting dumber, but for different reasons! :) )

@euro, we need to work on changing cultural norms (more education, more sustainability, less consumerism) like you suggest in order to better the world.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#38

Post by jaytee_clone »

fnid2 wrote: post #11
euroclydon wrote: post #2

I think it's evil the amount of energy and resources that go into creating unnecessary desires in people in order to cultivate a consumer class. It's time to reap the benefits of our technological advancements, by working shorter weeks, finding less expensive ways to build shelter (houses), and becoming more proficient in local food generation.

Ways to do these things have been around for decades, but it's not in the interest of the producers of homes and employers to do them. Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies…

The world will continue getting dumber... until we re-program our genes so that we won't perceive excess as attractive... We can also improve a few other human limitations such as keeping meaningful relationships with more than 150 people.

It's hard but it will happen eventually, or our species will die out before we get there, who knows.

Re: What should I do with my life?

#39

Post by jaytee_clone »

hugh3 wrote: post #26
fnid2 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ways to do these things have been around for decades, but it's not in the interest of the producers of homes and employers to do them. Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies…

Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies did. Or else it didn't catch on because people didn't like living in them. I assume you're talking about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/…

"Personally I'd work hard to live in a big fancy house and drive a cool fast car even if there were no women in the world, because I just like 'em."

Why yes, isn't that a great design? You don't even need to rationalize about what attracts a mate, you just like to do it by default, and most women just happen to be attracted to that by default also.

Certainly your chance of reproducing and passing down these default settings will be much greater than someone who has to rationalize about attractions, don't you think?

Re: What should I do with my life?

#40

Post by giantfuzzypanda »

uspatentpending wrote: post #29
fnid2 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ways to do these things have been around for decades, but it's not in the interest of the producers of homes and employers to do them. Look into some of the inventions by R. Buckminster Fuller. He invented a house that cost thousands, easily transported, made of aluminum, and sturdy, but it never caught on. Probably because he didn't spend time marketing it, but the mobile home and large home manufacturing companies…

tl;dr -- Evolutionary forces are far more complex and do not always select for strength over intelligence. Evolution != bigger && stronger. If this were true, why aren't there still brontosaurus-sized creatures on land? The truth is evolution selects the best adaptation for the specific ecosystem. Depending on the ecosystem, this could mean all sorts of adaptations, including more advanced intelligence and less advan…

> The truth is evolution selects the best adaptation for the specific ecosystem.

Evolution is completely random.

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