You are not running out of time • Hacker News Board

Re: You are not running out of time

#41

Post by astrofinch » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 1:10 AM UTC

john_b wrote: post #11

reasonattlm wrote: post #2

Beg to differ. I'd say that if you're not feeling pressed, that you have too little time left, then you don't have anywhere near an adequate view of the plausible future. A golden age lies ahead, of glittering marvels to make all that has come so far pale to insignificance. But unless we step up to the plate and master biotechnology a lot faster and better than is presently managed, all of us reading this now will mi…

I think you missed the author's point. The article wasn't about gaining more (or infinite) time. It was about maximizing your joy in life by living in such a way that you can be proud of your accomplishments without being overwhelmed by the need to continually out-do yourself or others. How long you live is completely irrelevant to that point. And if you are not enjoying your life because you're feeling so pressed an…

If reasonattlm is right, it may be worthwhile for me to work my tail off and sacrifice peace of mind in the short term in order to live forever in the long term. So what he says is somewhat relevant.

Re: You are not running out of time

#42

Post by astrofinch » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 1:13 AM UTC

donaq wrote: post #40

I doubt Bill Gates agrees. You do not get to be the richest man in the world (without being the monarch of an oil-rich country) without a strong streak of competitiveness.

Your comment reminded me of this awesome story about Bill Gates.

http://www.borrett.id.au/computing/petals-bg.htm

Re: You are not running out of time

#43

Post by minikomi » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 1:42 AM UTC

equalarrow wrote: post #18

This essay is definitely something to keep in mind, albeit it's probably easier in theory than practice. I'm probably a little older than most of the Y crowd. I've worked at a few very successful startups - pre and post dot com. For one of them, which changed the travel industry, I was literally one of the first people to put down code and my own stab at defining their architecture - I was there before there were any…

Perhaps being creative in the teaching field would be the best way to combine all your skills and knowledge, and be the most rewarding to you. Sounds like you have a lot to offer!

Re: You are not running out of time

#44

Post by tectonic » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 1:49 AM UTC

reasonattlm wrote: post #2

Beg to differ. I'd say that if you're not feeling pressed, that you have too little time left, then you don't have anywhere near an adequate view of the plausible future. A golden age lies ahead, of glittering marvels to make all that has come so far pale to insignificance. But unless we step up to the plate and master biotechnology a lot faster and better than is presently managed, all of us reading this now will mi…

Hey reasonattlm, I just read through your comment history and it looks like every single comment is about life extension. While I sorely hope that your optimism turns out to be warranted, I also hope that you're living and enjoying your life today, on the off-chance that it's not.

Re: You are not running out of time

#45

Post by robryan » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 1:57 AM UTC

reasonattlm wrote: post #2

Beg to differ. I'd say that if you're not feeling pressed, that you have too little time left, then you don't have anywhere near an adequate view of the plausible future. A golden age lies ahead, of glittering marvels to make all that has come so far pale to insignificance. But unless we step up to the plate and master biotechnology a lot faster and better than is presently managed, all of us reading this now will mi…

While living longer certainly benefits the individual I don't think it's a sure thing that would benefit society as a whole. Certainly it's a debate that would have to go hand in hand with any major breakthroughs in the area.

Re: You are not running out of time

#46

Post by tejaswiy » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 2:08 AM UTC

kiba wrote: post #32

Jach wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I can agree with the author's point I think it was poorly expressed (your summary is better) and the way he suggests embodying the point seems contradictory to making an effort against Death. Though I think if people did have a certain expectation to live billions of years we wouldn't have very many hurried people around, though that's just my own speculation. > Not to mention the disappointment you might feel…

They would also take great effort to find black swans and long shot. Living a really long life can make you ambitious. If you're an old 75 years old, than you might be predisposed to the short term. The young don't know they have it, and the old don't care. If you're going to live on the average lifespan of a 100,000 thousand years and improving, than 50 years is no problem to be wasting your time on big projects. Yo…

Wow. This reads like a Neal Stephenson novel.

Re: You are not running out of time

#47

Post by impendia » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 2:09 AM UTC

I recommend reading about Buddhism for anyone who was inspired by this post, as I was. Anything by Pema Chodron is a good place to start. For HN'ers in the Bay, the SF Zen Center cheerfully welcomes walkins.

Re: You are not running out of time

#48

Post by dasil003 » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 2:19 AM UTC

tectonic wrote: post #44

reasonattlm wrote: post #2

Beg to differ. I'd say that if you're not feeling pressed, that you have too little time left, then you don't have anywhere near an adequate view of the plausible future. A golden age lies ahead, of glittering marvels to make all that has come so far pale to insignificance. But unless we step up to the plate and master biotechnology a lot faster and better than is presently managed, all of us reading this now will mi…

Hey reasonattlm, I just read through your comment history and it looks like every single comment is about life extension. While I sorely hope that your optimism turns out to be warranted, I also hope that you're living and enjoying your life today, on the off-chance that it's not.

I hope his optimism is unwarranted. While I certainly would have a hard time turning down the opportunity to live longer, I don't think greatly extending peoples lives will be good for the individuals, society or the planet. Life and death is a beautiful cycle; not something to be defeated due an overwhelming fear of death.

Re: You are not running out of time

#49

Post by grellas » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 2:20 AM UTC

In a sense, each of us lives our life in Titanic style, setting forth in the confident assumption that we are unsinkable and placing an unduly high value on our capacity to meet any challenge, panicking (or at least feeling a sense of stoic distress) at the mid-point as it first truly hits us that we are about to slam into the iceberg of inevitable aging and decline, sweating it out over a seemingly interminable period as our vessel creaks and groans its way toward destruction, and finally salvaging what we can from the wreckage and setting it off in a few lifeboats intending to keep hope alive for the next generation of humanity. In the process, we hope to do something more meaningful than spend time rearranging deck chairs as we decide upon our life's focus.

This is not intended as a grim metaphor on life. In fact, I am a supreme optimist about the beauty of living and about having hopes of doing great things and doing one's best to achieve them. But what are those things when the reality is that one's individual life is finite? That is the challenge faced by every human being who has ever lived.

This piece attempts to answer it by saying, in effect, be careful to set your goals on things that ultimately matter. Whether the author, at age 30, has enough perspective to answer this question well is something we can all ponder. But we all need to try, and this piece is a thoughtful attempt to do so.

Re: You are not running out of time

#50

Post by epenner » Tue, Jul 19, 2011, 2:37 AM UTC

It's hard not to compare with your peers, colleagues, and classmates. I was a year into my first job as a developer before being laid off and am now planning my next steps. At 23 this sounds fairly ridiculous but the feeling of running out of time weighs heavily on my mind. Here's what I'm struggling through.

1. Following the steps of alumnus a tried and true path seems to be going back to grad school for a masters degree, studying something that requires advanced mathematics (i.e. graphics programming) and then getting that job at Google. But what if is not cracked up to what I imagine it to be? When I graduated I was head over heels about working full time as a developer. However the actual experience of working with a very large & complex legacy C++ codebase was more frustrating and painful than I could have possibly imagined. Velocity and skills development was slow (it was not uncommon to spend several days investigating a single bug) and most of my time was spent slogging through very complicated and undocumented code, trying to figure out the intent of the original authors. Not having other jobs to compare it to, could be much the same. In any case if I don't upgrade my arsenal or credentials I feel like I will always doomed to work at second-rate dev shops where employees are ever susceptible to unpleasantries like mediocre salaries/advancement and layoffs. Companies here cannot just cannot compete with tech giants.

2. Find another job. I have a 2-3 month window to quickly find another job as there seems to be some stigma associated with unemployment. The city I live in is a technological wasteland and opportunities for pure software development are relatively limited, so realistically my next employer is likely to be an Oil and Gas company. While that certainly pay the bills it kind of limits your career to other oil and gas companies.

3. Forget about societal pressures and do my own thing. I have enough savings to take a year off, develop my skills, fill in gaps in my knowledge and work on toy projects. Unfortunately this means having to explain a gap year where I might have very little to show for it. The skills I develop will probably not be directly applicable to a job.

Like many I aspire to become the best I can be and like to think of myself as somewhat respectable but at the end of the day I'm just an average developer. I guess the point is if you aren't a genius/wizard you have to deal with your inadequacies and "running out of time" is always in the back of your mind.