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Coffee Is Hard

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Re: Coffee Is Hard

#71

Post by DantesKite »

godot wrote: post #6

As a geek and a fan of 80s-90s PC games (not just Sierra but also LucasArts adventure games and so on), this was a super entertaining read on its own; but I also enjoyed some of these insights about life in general from it: > Living is mostly a series of repetitive and unrelated tasks. It makes sense that the most tedious things to code are the tedious things that just have to be done. There are no life lessons or gy…

It's interesting how all the tedious tasks listed are a product of modernity. Vacuuming, driving to work, flossing, doing dishes, etc.

I wonder how repetitive life feels for humans who still have to hunt for their food.

Not to say that we should shift back to a hunter-gatherer society, but I wonder how much of the mundaneness of life is something we brought on ourselves and not actually an implicit part of existence.

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#73

Post by maxwindiff »

DantesKite wrote: post #71
godot wrote: post #6

As a geek and a fan of 80s-90s PC games (not just Sierra but also LucasArts adventure games and so on), this was a super entertaining read on its own; but I also enjoyed some of these insights about life in general from it: > Living is mostly a series of repetitive and unrelated tasks. It makes sense that the most tedious things to code are the tedious things that just have to be done. There are no life lessons or gy…

It's interesting how all the tedious tasks listed are a product of modernity. Vacuuming, driving to work, flossing, doing dishes, etc. I wonder how repetitive life feels for humans who still have to hunt for their food. Not to say that we should shift back to a hunter-gatherer society, but I wonder how much of the mundaneness of life is something we brought on ourselves and not actually an implicit part of existence.

They have their version of mundane tasks.

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#74

Post by knzhou »

DantesKite wrote: post #71
godot wrote: post #6

As a geek and a fan of 80s-90s PC games (not just Sierra but also LucasArts adventure games and so on), this was a super entertaining read on its own; but I also enjoyed some of these insights about life in general from it: > Living is mostly a series of repetitive and unrelated tasks. It makes sense that the most tedious things to code are the tedious things that just have to be done. There are no life lessons or gy…

It's interesting how all the tedious tasks listed are a product of modernity. Vacuuming, driving to work, flossing, doing dishes, etc. I wonder how repetitive life feels for humans who still have to hunt for their food. Not to say that we should shift back to a hunter-gatherer society, but I wonder how much of the mundaneness of life is something we brought on ourselves and not actually an implicit part of existence.

That's a totally backwards take. Most of these things are modern labor-saving devices that replaced even worse drudgery. Sweeping takes longer than vacuuming. Washing dishes by hand takes longer than a dishwasher -- especially if you don't have unlimited running water, or dish detergent, or if you need to start a fire to get hot water. Ancient Romans didn't have to deal with rush hour traffic, but research says their commutes were just as long as ours.

To put it another way: we used to required half of all human beings to attend to household tasks. That setup wasn't put into place because of malice, it was there by necessity. Managing a household used to take as much effort and thought as running a small business does today. Modernity has saved us from that.

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#75

Post by ergothus »

> Most treasured memories are agonies that won’t get out of the mind and have to get turned into a character-building story to maintain sanity,

My world is changed by how obvious yet insightful this is.

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#76

Post by [deleted] »

pololee wrote: post #70

> I like Git commit messages. Used well, I think they’re one of the most powerful tools available to document a codebase over its lifetime. 1000000% agree!

[deleted]

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#77

Post by pololee »

sulZ wrote: post #72
pololee wrote: post #70

> I like Git commit messages. Used well, I think they’re one of the most powerful tools available to document a codebase over its lifetime. 1000000% agree!

I think that you may have replied to the wrong thread[0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21289827

Oo. Thx.

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#78

Post by bipson »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #64
ghostly_s wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is you learn to appreciate the substance of everyday life and it ceases to feel tedious. Perhaps mundanity would have been a better word. This idea, by the way, is called "mindfulness" and is the essence of Buddhism.

I think English translation of Buddhism could use some more distinct words, because "mindfulness" is also a part of "insight meditation", and - as far as I understand - these concepts are rather different from each other.

Mind to explain how these concepts are rather different?

Re: Coffee Is Hard

#80

Post by jotm »

DantesKite wrote: post #71
godot wrote: post #6

As a geek and a fan of 80s-90s PC games (not just Sierra but also LucasArts adventure games and so on), this was a super entertaining read on its own; but I also enjoyed some of these insights about life in general from it: > Living is mostly a series of repetitive and unrelated tasks. It makes sense that the most tedious things to code are the tedious things that just have to be done. There are no life lessons or gy…

It's interesting how all the tedious tasks listed are a product of modernity. Vacuuming, driving to work, flossing, doing dishes, etc. I wonder how repetitive life feels for humans who still have to hunt for their food. Not to say that we should shift back to a hunter-gatherer society, but I wonder how much of the mundaneness of life is something we brought on ourselves and not actually an implicit part of existence.

I'd imagine, if it was really early hunter gatherers, it would go more like "hungry, caught prey, ate, happy!". Way more impulsive responses. Throw in some "starving, I wish food was more stable, even if tedious". Anything after agriculture would include tedious tasks like tending to the crops and cleaning.
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