141–150 of 203 posts
I can’t imagine ever affording such a nice apartment.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, OK but this is clearly romanticizing away the fact that you are deeply dependent on these services. See how long you can just sit and enjoy the stars when your indoor plumbing and refrigeration goes away, and more importantly when your neighbors go away, not to mention the billions of little moving parts that must operate flawlessly for something like the global supply chain that brings you those shorts you wea…
Fair enough, but I do think there are diminishing returns beyond the basics, and there’s a hierarchy. We are very fortunate to have clean water and sewage. There are terrible stories in Victorian England of like workers popping in water systems and killing hundreds of people. Electricity powers a ton of basics and maybe you think you could do without heating and air conditioning until a heat wave passes over Europe a…
I can eat better than a king, every day.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We need a Netflix Chaos Monkey tool for modern life. Each week one modern convenience stops working for a day: indoor plumbing, air conditioning, electricity, wifi, automobile, air travel etc. after one day without, you will again appreciate those things for the next few years
I don’t know if I’m just weird, but my reaction is usually the opposite. When the power goes out, and you’re forced to sit and talk to people or just enjoy the quiet of the night. I think about how much we’ve lost in the modern rat race. One of the things that sits with me is that for all we’ve been given, most of us have lost the ability to just sit out in a field and enjoy the stars (light pollution, starlink, etc)
Depends on what essentials need power. Furnace? Sewerage lift pump? Water pump?
Wonderful, and even misses a lot of things! Glass windows that let light in but not cold and rain. Smokeless cooking. Mattresses that don't need to be fluffed up. We're accustomed to so, so many things. Toilets!
This is an interesting premise, and I would like to read the article, but the weird scrolling makes that almost impossible; the pictures overlay the text to such an extent that I can only read a couple of lines at a time. I wish there were some browser feature that would force sites to use normal scrolling.
This is so ironically on point. I recall reading a shampoo bottle in the bathroom maybe 25 years ago because there was nothing else to read. Meanwhile now you are correctly complaining about how weird the scrolling feels like.
Just want to notice that the author is a part of the effective altruist cult. > I am an associate program officer in the Abundance and Growth Fund at Coefficient Giving, where I lead our grantmaking on Innovation Policy. In this role, I aim to identify and support efforts to safely accelerate scientific progress and innovation. I am motivated by the broader goals of improving scientific research, funding, institution…
And so… what? Make a point or leave it be, rather than making vague innuendo about how we should disapprove of them.
A disclosure should be required next to anything they're working on.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> affordable That's the crux, isn't it? You aren't just dependent, you are dependent on a system that relentlessly stalks you with increased demands. You are tasked with keeping ahead of a pack of hunters who want to take you down -- and not only will your companions leave you for dead the moment that happens, the group will punish any suggestion that we might want to do something about this on a systemic level becau…
Today’s ways of living - no matter how challenging or disillusioning or alienating they may be - are largely preferable to literally being hunted and having your livelihood threatened by predators, compared to the figurative hunters and predators you’re describing. It ain’t perfect - and we’ll work to improve it - but it’s way better than the way it used to be for so many people. Civilization aint all bad.
1. Those who are happy with what they have,
2. Those who are never happy and always want more.
But this is an oversimplification. Many people belong to a third group:
3. Those who understand we have nice things today, but aren't happy with how we got them and whether we'll be able to have them tomorrow.
Sadly I think the "you should be happy" people tend to bunch together groups 2 and 3. You can see this false dichotomy all over the place.