Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943) • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#101

Post by shrimp_emoji » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:47 PM UTC

sonnyblarney wrote: post #31

ballenf wrote: post #9

There's a fundamental conflict between conceptual Utopia/Heaven and the law of supply and demand. All literary conceptions of a utopia rely on abundance of some good that is scarce in the author's time. Usually ignoring that its ubiquity makes it tend toward zero value. Here's my stab at Utopia, but it requires a belief that Knowledge is infinite: Utopia is a state of unhindered, continual learning at your own chosen…

"Utopia is a state of unhindered, continual learning at your own chosen pace." That's a very specific view of Utopia that I suggest most regular folk would not agree with, moreover, it's a bit odds with metaphysical kind of utopias from antiquity. Knowledge is ultimately still material, not necessarily enlightening. It's part of the dualist 'trap' that keeps us focused on what's right in front of our noses, 'playing…

>That's a very specific view of Utopia that I suggest most regular folk would not agree with

The pain of learning and remembering and the zero-sum nature of forgetting make me disagree with it, but you can call all of those "hindrances". If I could swell my processing speed and memory capacity to absurd levels and become one of many god-like intelligences, able of satisfying all of my curiosities with any and all facets of reality with no particularly strenuous effort before, as a last resort, exercising my power to mutate my mind to the point where I put myself in ceaseless ecstasy for its own sake (in these dimensions or the others[0]), that has to qualify as the definition of paradise.

Let's hope we crack the conservation of energy sometime. : p

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sublimed

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#102

Post by otakucode » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:50 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #22

hexomancer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it alzheimer’s?

No, although that is an interesting thought: selectively forgetting things so you can relearn them later.

It would be helpful, if still dealing with a human brain, to forget things in order to remain sane. Simulated brains which have the ability to forget removed end up acting pretty much exactly like schizophrenics brains.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#103

Post by stcredzero » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:53 PM UTC

otakucode wrote: post #92

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans can't really tell the difference between real and simulated risk. Online games are incredibly compelling for the people who play them, but they're a lot less risky than taking part in a real war and risking real blood and real body parts. I don't see why we couldn't sublimate games like economics in the same way. The experience of winning would be almost identical, but simulations wouldn't have to be zero sum…

Err, I think going much further down that line of reasoning, you will discover something unpleasant: The winning, for some, isn't as important as someone else losing.

Is it really that someone else has to lose? Some people are toxic like that. Others are only that way because they've been antagonized. However, if they are or they aren't, in either case there has to be something at stake.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#104

Post by DannyB2 » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:53 PM UTC

Just an opinion here.

The article says a number of things about the Christian Heaven. But fails to recognize the premise is that people who go there are changed. On the inside. There is peace, on the outside, because there is peace in the heart, on the inside. There is contentment, because it is on the inside. There isn't a lust for power and control over other people's lives. Nor any shortage of resources. And the biggest thing described as great about Heaven is being in God's presence. Not material things or power.

The problem with all other utopias is that they seem to imagine something that people create without a change on the inside. People have tried to create ideal kingdoms for millennia. The problem is that its seeds of destruction are on our insides. It is us that is the problem.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#105

Post by empath75 » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:56 PM UTC

apo wrote: post #6

I'm always amazed at how readable and relevant Orwell remains. This essay is a good example. It would seem that human beings are not able to describe, nor perhaps to imagine, happiness except in terms of contrast. ... I wonder if this also works in reverse: humans are incapable of describing or imagining unhappiness except in terms of contrast. This reminds me of a line that goes something like: revolutions happen no…

> revolutions happen not because of poverty but through the process of a society becoming poorer.

I don't think it's the case that most of them start because the society as a whole had become poorer, but because some particular segment has, while others accumulate wealth. It's not really worth having a revolution if there's nothing of value to seize. A lot of revolutions started as tax revolts by the wealthy, in fact -- the french revolution and english civil war come to mind. It was only after central authority collapsed that events outpaced the initial instigators.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#106

Post by otakucode » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 6:57 PM UTC

beaner wrote: post #28

saagarjha wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you? Do you have no worries in the world?

Many do not. There is a theory of something called the Power Process, which states that for people to be happy, they need goals which require effort, and need to achieve at least some of those goals. The lack of meaningful goals which require effort in the first world may be responsible for much of the depression, suicide, and other issues that plague us today. I found this Medium post which quotes the relevant parts…

What lack of meaningful goals? I find it very hard to believe that any human being is ever in a position where they find it hard to see meaningful goals to strive for. The lack of ability to achieve any of those goals, however, I could easily see being a problem. You can't really achieve anything that requires concentrated effort if you've got to work 40 hours a week so that you can eat.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#107

Post by cafard » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 7:02 PM UTC

I guess the question is, "Which socialists?"

Nancy Mitford professed herself a socialist, yet wrote frivolous social comedy about the English and French upper classes. Kingsley Amis at one point was a communist, and wrote very funny novels.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#108

Post by jmawesome » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 7:11 PM UTC

DannyB2 wrote: post #104

Just an opinion here. The article says a number of things about the Christian Heaven. But fails to recognize the premise is that people who go there are changed. On the inside. There is peace, on the outside, because there is peace in the heart, on the inside. There is contentment, because it is on the inside. There isn't a lust for power and control over other people's lives. Nor any shortage of resources. And the b…

The idea of peace in the heart in Christian Heaven is an idea entirely absent in the New Testament. Peace, in the NT, is always interpersonal--and it's this very thing that causes conceptions of heaven to fail.

To describe it as peaceful, as tranquil is not the point. To describe it as peaceful, where all have been reconciled and relationships have been restored starts to capture an essence of what the purpose is.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#109

Post by CalChris » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 7:11 PM UTC

Interesting that Orwell adopts Eliot as an English writer. He was from Saint Louis and educated at Harvard.

Re: Why Socialists Don't Believe in Fun (1943)

#110

Post by kazen44 » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 7:15 PM UTC

e12e wrote: post #98

beat wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But millions less than there were even a few decades ago. The world is making progress toward peace, health, safety, and a decent standard of living at an extraordinary pace right now. This is not to say everything is hunky-dory. But it is to say that this is no longer World War II. edit: Where do you think all the Syrian and Lebanese restaurants in America came from? Refugees from the collapse of the Ottoman empire…

I certainly hope Syria will rise again - but I'd say it's a big difference between being well educated, functioning civil society bombed into the stone age - and being poor. Norway followed a similar path as Sweden - being quite well on its way even before we stole (negotiated for) most of the oil rights in the north sea. And like most countries after ww2 - while the devestation was great, the rebuild was rather quic…

> And like most countries after ww2 - while the devestation was great, the rebuild was rather quick. Once there was peace. And one important part of peace, was liberation and independence.

independence didn't happen for a majority of countries that fought in world war 2 however. Either they got locked behind the iron curtain after being litteraly level to the ground (poland), or had to fight a bloody long war for independance (vietnam, indonesia, most of africa).

your comment is only really relevant for western europe in that sense.