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Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

themarginalian.org

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Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#81

Post by martopix »

asta123 wrote: post #79

Alain’s School of Life has been excellent for me. Mostly introducing me to well known philosophers, psychologists and summary of their ideas. It fascinated me that challenges analysed by thinkers a century or more ago apply to me today. There I discovered stuff like - 19th century idea how modern man would not need religion and would find meaning in education, art, chosen profession - and here we are none the wiser;…

If this makes you feel better, I studied philosophy in high school (rather common in Italy), and it was 100% history of philosophy. We spent inane amounts of time on presocratic debates on whether water, air, or apeiron was the fundamental element of nature, then another year on the middle ages, and when things got relevant for modern life (Freud, Nietzsche) we stopped, and never got to the existentialists, Popper and contemporaries.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#82

Post by jacquesm »

Swenrekcah wrote: post #78
jacquesm wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How many of us write programs, support infrastructure, design gadgets … for what? What is important ? Our job… buying gadgets… traveling.. This isn't limited to STEM and computers. It goes for almost everybody.

True but STEM still usually lends itself to less social interaction than many other jobs such as education, nursing, arts, etc.

Education and nursing are the outliers, most jobs don't do much in terms of interaction and with wfh becoming the norm for office jobs this is dropping rapidly. The arts are not really a profession, they are a calling more than a means to sustain yourself.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#83

Post by noufalibrahim »

switchbak wrote: post #5
PotatoPancakes wrote: post #2

Alain de Botton's School of life is... honestly weird. It's really confident and tries to give good advice; but so much of that advice is quite bad, and the channel might overall do more harm than good (for more people than fewer). YouTuber Big Joel has done two breakdowns of it that are worth watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlkJJygIoVU and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VZ30qL7j3Q .

I'm a few minutes into Big Joel's takedown and ... it's pretty unimpressive. He's moreso complaining that psychology isn't a hard science, and that it's hard to make objectively proven statements about things like attachment theory as it relates early childhood development to later relationships. Well, yes, and this is more or less where we're at with Psychology (as I understand it, I'm definitely a lay person): it's…

I used to watch Alain's videos for a while (back when marginalian was brain pickings).

I think his project is more or less the same Sam Harris' - to extract useful (for some definition) ideas out of traditional religious or other moral systems and to secularise them for modern consumption as part of a project to improve humanity. My background and experience with this kind of thing makes me think that it's a doomed project and slick videos on YouTube is a poor way of teaching these things.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#84

Post by guiriduro »

roody15 wrote: post #29

I am a bit older and have worked in IT now for almost 2 decades. (44 years old) I honestly think the general premise here holds true and perhaps applies to many of us here in computed related occupations. It seems many of us focused on STEM STEM STEM or COMPUTERS COMPUTERS COMPUTERS in education but perhaps are emotionally infantile to an extent. How many of us write programs, support infrastructure, design gadgets ……

> How many of us work countless hours for companies whose missions we don’t perhaps even agree with…

And there you have Marxist Alienation in a nutshell, and a new thematic thread to read though, if you're interested.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#85

Post by Swenrekcah »

jacquesm wrote: post #82
Swenrekcah wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True but STEM still usually lends itself to less social interaction than many other jobs such as education, nursing, arts, etc.

Education and nursing are the outliers, most jobs don't do much in terms of interaction and with wfh becoming the norm for office jobs this is dropping rapidly. The arts are not really a profession, they are a calling more than a means to sustain yourself.

That depends on how you classify arts. I meant it as a catch all for the entire entertainment industry. Related to that are other “creatives” such as advertising. Then a good chunk of people are either politicians, political operatives or lawyers, those are all heavily people oriented jobs.

Edit: Forgot sports and the entire industry around that.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#86

Post by jacquesm »

Swenrekcah wrote: post #85
jacquesm wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Education and nursing are the outliers, most jobs don't do much in terms of interaction and with wfh becoming the norm for office jobs this is dropping rapidly. The arts are not really a profession, they are a calling more than a means to sustain yourself.

That depends on how you classify arts. I meant it as a catch all for the entire entertainment industry. Related to that are other “creatives” such as advertising. Then a good chunk of people are either politicians, political operatives or lawyers, those are all heavily people oriented jobs. Edit: Forgot sports and the entire industry around that.

Ah good point. To me arts = artists, not entertainers, but you are totally right they should probably be included. When I think art I think paintings, statues, not movies or books but that's a shortcoming on my end.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#87

Post by simjnd »

barrysteve wrote: post #64

I find it really hard to say anything at all about Alain's work. It's such a nothing burger. In the work of his I've encountered, he regularly quotes old philosophers without adding anything new, and trying to apply the knowledge of old in new ways. Reading old philosophers and engaging with their work directly, produces the effect of transforming it into your own understanding, you don't need a middleman to re-apply…

I really enjoy Alain's work, but your comment made me think it might be because I'm really unfamiliar with old philosophers. Would you mind pointing me to the ones you're referring to and whose work is approachable for a newcomer?

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#88

Post by amelius »

yakak wrote: post #70
amelius wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, beside bringing in some money, having spent your life as a programmer will not make you a better person than if you had spent your career solving crossword puzzles.

I guess it depends what you mean by better person. How would being a plumber or electrician make you a better person? Given jobs in a "healthy" economic system, I don't think anyone should do anything if their only goal is to show they improved society through their work. What do we know about the nuns that would have filled mother Teresa roles if she had not displaced them? When you are done working for income, if y…

> I guess it depends what you mean by better person. How would being a plumber or electrician make you a better person?

I don't know about those professions. But the job of manager or marketing/salesperson at least gives you interpersonal skills.

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#89

Post by rigelbm »

phs318u wrote: post #48
roody15 wrote: post #29

I am a bit older and have worked in IT now for almost 2 decades. (44 years old) I honestly think the general premise here holds true and perhaps applies to many of us here in computed related occupations. It seems many of us focused on STEM STEM STEM or COMPUTERS COMPUTERS COMPUTERS in education but perhaps are emotionally infantile to an extent. How many of us write programs, support infrastructure, design gadgets ……

I used to worry about being "successful" until I had an epiphany triggered by my father's death. Do you want to know what success is? Visualise the day of your funeral. Who is there? Are they sad, devastated, in tears? Are they looking at their watch or relieved you're finally gone? What does it say on your headstone? "Here lies roody15. Beloved father, husband, son. Forever in our hearts" Or will it say, "Here lies…

That sounds a lot like a "immortality project", as described by Becker in The Denial of Death [1].

[1] https://ernestbecker.org/about-becker/beckers-synthesis/#:~:....

Re: Alain de Botton on existential maturity and what emotional intelligence means

#90

Post by mensetmanusman »

Our family is outside the norm in practicing millennia old religious traditions that include daily practice of gratitude and forgiveness. I have found it to be amazingly useful for passing down ‘emotional intelligence’ and existential maturity to the next generation (and also keeping everything in life in perspective).

This essay seems to suggest that the secular world lacks these practices for passing down EI, because many of the premises were foreign to my lived experience.

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