Our efforts, in part, define us • Hacker News Board

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#111

Post by fellowniusmonk » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:03 PM UTC

aeon_ai wrote: post #83

At some point -- sometimes early, often too late -- we realize we're going to die. Our time is finite. We have only so many days to do anything, let alone something that matters. Meaning is found in how and why we spend that time. When we're fooled into believing money matters more than time, we trade far too much of the latter for the former. Worse, we can mistake the monetary value of our time for its actual value,…

Meaning can be found yes.

But just remember, we are the only observed entities that _create_ meaning, complex, rich, nuanced meaning. We are the meaning generators of the universe.

If the universe has a random forest walk to create meaning, to try new cool stuff, to hold a mirror to and understand itself.

We are it.

We don't know and ex ante can't predict which human(s) might reverse entropy, alter the topology of the universe, prevent an asteroid from wiping us out, escape the bounds of this reality.

None of those things may ever happen, but as far as I know they haven't been strictly ruled out yet.

It's early days yet.

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#112

Post by pixl97 » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:05 PM UTC

swat535 wrote: post #100

aeon_ai wrote: post #83

At some point -- sometimes early, often too late -- we realize we're going to die. Our time is finite. We have only so many days to do anything, let alone something that matters. Meaning is found in how and why we spend that time. When we're fooled into believing money matters more than time, we trade far too much of the latter for the former. Worse, we can mistake the monetary value of our time for its actual value,…

While you make good points, I wanted to quickly counter this narrative with the fact that majority of people are chasing money because it provides them the basic necessities. Money gives you food, shelter, healthcare and relationships; all of which are required for happiness. I think we need make the distinction between a startup founder missing his daughter's birthday because he is at the office chasing money and th…

If this is really the end state of humanity then we should stop all automation and reel things back 10 thousand years or so. This is, modern people can imagine the end of the world before they can imagine a world without money based capitalism.

Go back far enough in history and money disappears. We had barter and trade and happiness still existed without money.

Go back further and trade becomes les important and violence/cooperation to achieve what one wants becomes greater.

Trying to shove money in a post labor world won't make sense and will just lead to war/genocide if we don't find a way to transition.

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#113

Post by diordiderot » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:08 PM UTC

aeon_ai wrote: post #83

At some point -- sometimes early, often too late -- we realize we're going to die. Our time is finite. We have only so many days to do anything, let alone something that matters. Meaning is found in how and why we spend that time. When we're fooled into believing money matters more than time, we trade far too much of the latter for the former. Worse, we can mistake the monetary value of our time for its actual value,…

I've realised far too early. The death of my college age sibling has me constantly scanning and checking for life threatening illnesses. Sometimes the odd ache or a pain sends me into a days long spiral. The fear extends to my spouse and children.

Financially, I'm completely free, very comfortable, want for nothing, but still don't feel any sense of achievement.

I need help

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#114

Post by gsf_emergency_2 » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:08 PM UTC

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #111

aeon_ai wrote: post #83

At some point -- sometimes early, often too late -- we realize we're going to die. Our time is finite. We have only so many days to do anything, let alone something that matters. Meaning is found in how and why we spend that time. When we're fooled into believing money matters more than time, we trade far too much of the latter for the former. Worse, we can mistake the monetary value of our time for its actual value,…

Meaning can be found yes. But just remember, we are the only observed entities that _create_ meaning, complex, rich, nuanced meaning. We are the meaning generators of the universe. If the universe has a random forest walk to create meaning, to try new cool stuff, to hold a mirror to and understand itself. We are it. We don't know and ex ante can't predict which human(s) might reverse entropy, alter the topology of th…

Sorry to repeat but I felt a bit of Eureka

If I were to put myself in Archimedes' shoes (when he basically discovered calculus) motivation comes from "this is nuts but it could work" and meaning comes from "yep that works!"

https://youtu.be/h0gPomI3h8o

(That was long ago, but I'm sure it also happens today)

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#115

Post by diordiderot » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:11 PM UTC

pixl97 wrote: post #112

swat535 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While you make good points, I wanted to quickly counter this narrative with the fact that majority of people are chasing money because it provides them the basic necessities. Money gives you food, shelter, healthcare and relationships; all of which are required for happiness. I think we need make the distinction between a startup founder missing his daughter's birthday because he is at the office chasing money and th…

If this is really the end state of humanity then we should stop all automation and reel things back 10 thousand years or so. This is, modern people can imagine the end of the world before they can imagine a world without money based capitalism. Go back far enough in history and money disappears. We had barter and trade and happiness still existed without money. Go back further and trade becomes les important and viol…

Post labour is still resource constrained.

How do you efficiently allocate resources? Especially when you have a wide spectrum of preferences.

I think if you spent long enough thinking about that problem you'd just end up inventing money. You'd have to call it something else so it sounded rebelliously anti-capitalist though

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#116

Post by skydhash » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

card_zero wrote: post #110

skydhash wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I started on computers because I wanted to do stuff (photo manipulation and 3d modelling) and then I was fascinated by how to get the computers to do stuff (games and scripts). But just like you, I want things to be done correctly and efficiently . Coding for me is more reading than typing, because any time I'm not exactly clear on the code I want to write, it's because there's some aspects of the problem or the tool…

Neither LLMs nor popular search engines return "I don't know" often enough. They will waste your time with bad approximations to an answer instead. But as you say, "the thing you're asking for might not exist" is useful information, and lets you make faster progress with your guessing, so this compulsion to always supply an answer just slows down the process of getting to a good one.

I use my history as mich as I use a search engine at this point. For work stuff, I just bookmark docs. I also use specialized sites for some search sessions (reddit, hn, npmjs, oreilly,…)

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#117

Post by yomismoaqui » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:13 PM UTC

bsenftner wrote: post #81

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the frustrating part of software engineering too; the coding itself is the "boring" part, but for me and many others it's also the most fun and gratifying part, the thing you really want to be doing. Something to grow out of I suppose, but still. The AI vendors want to sell to upper management that that part is what's slowing their company down or costing a lot of money, but I don't think it's that. And in a…

"Software engineering" is a communications problem, and software engineering degrees do not even teach or approach teaching communications. That's a huge disconnect. I still can't understand why the larger industry does not see what our entire industry does is a communications and translation problem/solution/service. So much of what people try to do breaks down at the basic communications level, yet nobody seems to…

That reminds me of a phrase that I read some years ago:

"A typical Google engineer could describe their job as ‘taking protocol buffers and turning them into other protocol buffers’."

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#118

Post by dvcoolarun » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:17 PM UTC

I’m hearing this argument from a lot of people. I think it’s more of a feeling that anyone can contribute, and now it’s a matter of taste and stamina—who persists and who fizzles out.

Probably also tied to changes in neuroplasticity, I guess. Humans are generally good at adopting new behaviors.

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#119

Post by tofuahdude » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:20 PM UTC

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #107

bsenftner wrote: post #9

Maybe this is a neurodivergent thing, but I have, as long as I can remember, always had the following progression in my mind: "What are you doing? No, that's this situation's name, what is this really?" and I'd continue a few times seeking the "larger problem, the more basic problem being solved" that whatever I was doing "really is". That "basic problem" was "communicating" far more frequently than I expected, and t…

Culture has created this odd myth that if something is semantic it doesn't matter. That communication is just another soft skill. Humans make meaning, we are the only source of complex, long term, meaning generation we have ever observed. We emit meaning the way a star emits photons. Sure, a lot of natural processes would still exist if we weren't around. But in this universe, perhaps the only one that exists, we are…

I really like the way you said we emit meaning.

It is kind of funny, that we seek meaning and/or purpose in everything - our lives, our actions, our thoughts - but there is a nice change in perspective in considering it as something that we produce rather than find.

Re: Our efforts, in part, define us

#120

Post by fellowniusmonk » Wed, Oct 01, 2025, 3:26 PM UTC

gsf_emergency_2 wrote: post #114

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meaning can be found yes. But just remember, we are the only observed entities that _create_ meaning, complex, rich, nuanced meaning. We are the meaning generators of the universe. If the universe has a random forest walk to create meaning, to try new cool stuff, to hold a mirror to and understand itself. We are it. We don't know and ex ante can't predict which human(s) might reverse entropy, alter the topology of th…

Sorry to repeat but I felt a bit of Eureka If I were to put myself in Archimedes' shoes (when he basically discovered calculus) motivation comes from "this is nuts but it could work" and meaning comes from "yep that works!" https://youtu.be/h0gPomI3h8o (That was long ago, but I'm sure it also happens today)

Information is physical and part of the physical entropic universe, Landauer showed that.

When we imagine something in our brain we are physically testing or creating something even if ephemeral, these thoughts you make have meaning and are real just with low distribution.

They can be very complex thoughts, you can invent worlds and objects and play around with them in your mind for relatively low cost, this is the root of humanities power, the ability to create meaning, to create arbitrary coherence (even if it's just internal coherence)

You can distribute this meaning to others, as a written or spoken word.

You can investigate if your thought has correspondence to something that exists in the exterior world. This can be science and discovery.

But you can also create something that you know doesn't exist and then work to have it realized in the external world.

What's the casual path from Gene Rondenberry to the iPod? Hard to compute.

We create meaning. It's what we do.

The funny thing is this, we keep talking about people's search for meaning, but if we look at the observable facts, to speak poetically, if the universe was sentient (and I don't personally believe it is) it would be looking to us to see what meaning we create and new shit we discover and why it works the way it does.