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All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

theguardian.com

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Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#241

Post by mobilemidget »

hilbert42 wrote: post #235

"Modern humans spend virtually no time on "inward-directed thought", and not solely because we're too busy: in one US survey, 95% of adults said they'd found time for a leisure activity in the previous 24 hours, but 83% said they'd spent zero time just thinking." I think Pascal was correct because at least those people I know well enough to discuss such matters with tell me they don't spend much time thinking or cont…

I always find this percentages puzzling. I reckon people busy thinking are too busy, or simply never get requested to fill in surveys about how they spend their idle CPU brain time.

Thinking is the last remaining freedom, as long as you don't say all the things you think of out loud. :)

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#242

Post by froh »

birdsbirdsbirds wrote: post #236

Where can I apply for that room? For virtually everybody, that quiet room is not a given, but has to be acquired and maintained. How can you sit in that room and give yourself to silence if you know deep down that the silence is a temporary illusion? You have to leave that room and either defend your wealth or acquire the means to be able to return. Additionally, the experiment doesn't measure what it wants to measur…

Sitting in silence allows your brain to change, such that back outside you are more resourceful.

If you accept that premise, the a journey begins how to guide the time in silence such that your life quality "in noise" actually benefits well from investing into silence.

Notice that this has absolutely nothing to do with finance, material wealth, neither as precondition nor as outcome.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#243

Post by decuran »

nprateem wrote: post #227
ck425 wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any idea what scientifically is actually happening?

No idea. Biology isn't my area. Some kind of resonance in the central nervous system perhaps, accompanied by a quietening of some parts of the brain?

More than likely something is going on from the changes to the active neural circuitry. Usually the "Default Mode Network" is active. When this is quieted down, which is similar to what happens when you're on LSD, it's possible that very unusual states of mind and body (the "currents" mentioned, which I've experienced as well) can arise.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#244

Post by hilbert42 »

mobilemidget wrote: post #241
hilbert42 wrote: post #235

"Modern humans spend virtually no time on "inward-directed thought", and not solely because we're too busy: in one US survey, 95% of adults said they'd found time for a leisure activity in the previous 24 hours, but 83% said they'd spent zero time just thinking." I think Pascal was correct because at least those people I know well enough to discuss such matters with tell me they don't spend much time thinking or cont…

I always find this percentages puzzling. I reckon people busy thinking are too busy, or simply never get requested to fill in surveys about how they spend their idle CPU brain time. Thinking is the last remaining freedom, as long as you don't say all the things you think of out loud. :)

"Thinking is the last remaining freedom, as long as you don't say all the things you think of out loud."

Absolutely, right on both accounts. (Occasionally swearing under my breath sometimes gives the game away.)

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#245

Post by MaxBarraclough »

gambiting wrote: post #237
wpietri wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How helpful to have a person who knows nothing about my situation police my behaviors because of a vague congruence and an apparent desire to score internet points. No, for the purposes of what I'm doing, HN was not included in that. From my perspective, HN isn't really designed for addiction in the same way. No personalized, UAM-optimized algorithmic feed, no infinite river of small content bites, no rich mechanisms…

"From my perspective, HN isn't really designed for addiction in the same way." I mean, it's fine that you feel this way, and you are probably correct - it wasn't designed for it. But I suspect for a lot of us , me included, it serves that exact purpose. I post so that strangers on the internet read it and give me likes. I compulsively check my comments section on my account to see how many upvotes my comments have. E…

> clearly upvote/downvote system didn't happen by an accident, it's there for a reason

It encourages and prominently displays good quality comments, and discourages and buries poor quality comments. It's not a perfect system as a lot of people vote based on whether they happen to agree rather than based on a comment's quality, but it's much better than nothing.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#246

Post by gambiting »

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #245
gambiting wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"From my perspective, HN isn't really designed for addiction in the same way." I mean, it's fine that you feel this way, and you are probably correct - it wasn't designed for it. But I suspect for a lot of us , me included, it serves that exact purpose. I post so that strangers on the internet read it and give me likes. I compulsively check my comments section on my account to see how many upvotes my comments have. E…

> clearly upvote/downvote system didn't happen by an accident, it's there for a reason It encourages and prominently displays good quality comments, and discourages and buries poor quality comments. It's not a perfect system as a lot of people vote based on whether they happen to agree rather than based on a comment's quality, but it's much better than nothing.

The same effect would be achieved without showing the numbers though. That's where the addiction comes in.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#247

Post by hfx »

gambiting wrote: post #237
wpietri wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How helpful to have a person who knows nothing about my situation police my behaviors because of a vague congruence and an apparent desire to score internet points. No, for the purposes of what I'm doing, HN was not included in that. From my perspective, HN isn't really designed for addiction in the same way. No personalized, UAM-optimized algorithmic feed, no infinite river of small content bites, no rich mechanisms…

"From my perspective, HN isn't really designed for addiction in the same way." I mean, it's fine that you feel this way, and you are probably correct - it wasn't designed for it. But I suspect for a lot of us , me included, it serves that exact purpose. I post so that strangers on the internet read it and give me likes. I compulsively check my comments section on my account to see how many upvotes my comments have. E…

> otherwise, why are you replying to strangers that you are unlikely to ever meet or speak to again?

The act of writing out your thoughts gives them added clarity. This holds for long(er)-form comment-based sites such as HN and Reddit, not so much for FB and Twitter.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#248

Post by ivanhoe »

I don't think it's anything human specific, any caged animal needs something to occupy its attention and stimulate the senses otherwise it will suffer the huge stress and with time start developing health issues - whether it's a mammal or bird or even a fish. It seems much more like an underlying neurological limitation of some kind, than just some high-level philosophical/existentialistic issue specific to us humans.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#249

Post by chordalkeyboard »

hilbert42 wrote: post #235

"Modern humans spend virtually no time on "inward-directed thought", and not solely because we're too busy: in one US survey, 95% of adults said they'd found time for a leisure activity in the previous 24 hours, but 83% said they'd spent zero time just thinking." I think Pascal was correct because at least those people I know well enough to discuss such matters with tell me they don't spend much time thinking or cont…

The modern world is also set up in such a way* to preclude such activity because we are surrounded by stimuli and activity that distracts people and gives them things to do and think about. I noticed this when I became more interested in quiet contemplation. Its not easy for everyone to allocate uninterrupted time for such activity.

* the modern world emergently selects for these interruptions, I'm not suggesting an anti-mindfulness conspiracy. Its why Buddha is sometimes depicted with lions and tigers. The legend is that when a meditating practitioner is near to enlightenment, he or she will hallucinate ferocious beasts and those are illusions that come about as he nears enlightenment in order to distract him or her.

Re: All problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone (2014)

#250

Post by raziel2p »

INTPenis wrote: post #238
XorNot wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither has Facebook, reddit or any other social media I use. That doesn't seem like a meaningful distinction.

Their whole model is built around getting people's attention by making them addicted to notifications. If you disable the notifications, that's good for you. But you're a small exceptional minority. HN afaik has no such feature at all.

How did you know that XorNot replied to your previous comment?

Notifications, addictive design and gamification are really bad practices that we should try to avoid - but the underlying drug of social media is that someone noticed and reacted to your content, and HN provides that just like Facebook or Twitter.

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