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It's not what the world needs right now

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Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#151

Post by jack_riminton »

dentemple wrote: post #15
thorum wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone probably said the same thing to Van Gogh during his life.

Nearly everyone said the same thing to Van Gogh during his life. He was only recognized for his artwork after his death.

Well that was entirely my point, Van Gogh took a completely new approach to colour, use of light, painting en plein air etc.

People never appreciated him but at least Van Gogh could say he’s doing something groundbreaking and new.

Whereas the artist in question here, I can’t imagine they’ve ever legitimately thought that of their own art, it’s just not that groundbreaking or good.

Maybe they just realise that they’re unemployable elsewhere so they may as well carry on

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#152

Post by strken »

swatcoder wrote: post #33
crawfordcomeaux wrote: post #18

Imagine writing something with such honesty & the people reading don't stop to reflect on how this is just one facet of how the systems they prop up push people into operating to survive. They just judge the person, as though they live in a vacuum.

Honesty is not what the author is going for here. This is genre autofiction following a throughline of slumming, marginal artists that carries back through punk, beat, flapper, and la boheme writers. It's entertainment, not true confession or activism, and it delights in getting under the skin of squares who can't tell. No need to push back on the people reactively criticizing the character or writer -- that's the po…

I really enjoyed it and it didn't get under my skin in the slightest, but the gloating about squares and true hackers on HN is annoying the hell out of me. I don't think the work delights in getting under the skin of squares, I think you delight in being cooler than the largely fictional squares you believe are being gotten at.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#155

Post by cess11 »

atoav wrote: post #150
cess11 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life isn't stable, if it was it wouldn't have managed to stick around for this long. Hundreds of millions of people are impoverished, are they unable to make art? I'm also not sure what your suggestion is. Should aspiring artists create corporations and live from the labour of other people, to create something you'd consider freedom for themselves while intruding on the freedom of others? Or do you consider it freedo…

I am not sure what you mean, the history of art is a history of rich/powerful people giving poor/lower ranking people money for doing said art. Artists have never been truly free in that sense — thst was my point. Sure the art scene in parts has become entrepreneurial, but quite frankly most commercial art is either tasteless shit for tasteless customers, the works of old artists who are two decades away from dying o…

"I am not sure what you mean, the history of art is a history of rich/powerful people giving poor/lower ranking people money for doing said art. Artists have never been truly free in that sense — thst was my point."

To me the history of art is quite a bit broader than european elites wanting to protect their investments and tax evasion schemes, basically 'haussing' the value of what their predecessors commissioned from painters.

Among other things, there's what might be called 'folk art'. Songs and music that narrate more or less mythical history, a practice predating european urban elites with their mecenate style of commissioned paintings. 'Street art'. Drawing a dick on a random brick wall is a very old tradition.

Personally I'm not sure I believe in commercial art. That would be an expression and possibly an exploitation of economic relations, and not an expression or invention of humanity. In part my suspicion against the idea that relative wealth and convenience would be good for art stems from this, it implies a disconnect from most of contemporary and historic human life.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#156

Post by beardedetim »

anal_reactor wrote: post #124
labrador wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My life is special to me too, but I don't feel like the main character anymore. My family appreciates my move out of self-absorption towards giving them the attention they deserve from me.

I really don't know what to think. Sure, there's 8 billion people on Earth, the chances that I am the main character are tiny. But at the same time whenever I try treating people the same way I treat myself, I quickly get into misunderstandings and disappointments, and navigating the world with an assumption that most people are NPCs while just a handful are actual sentient beings has proven way more practical.

What if you try to treat people the way they want to be treated instead of how you want to be treated?

I think the "golden rule" has been often misinterpreted as " treat people how you want to be treated" which leads to this misunderstanding that you called out. If we change it to being empathetic towards them and treating them how they want to be treated, the NPCs seem to become fully fledged characters.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#157

Post by FooBarBizBazz »

labrador wrote: post #75

I used to be similarly lost in the drama of my own life, hanging on to things that I felt made me special. It's an ego trap in my opinion, as there are millions of people around us who have extrodinary lives that we never hear about. The word "sonder" applies: Sonder is defined as the profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passing by on the street, has a life as complex and vivid as your own…

> Sonder is defined as the profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passing by on the street, has a life as complex and vivid as your own.

That's all? I always kind of assumed they had more going on. Hoped it, for their sakes.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#158

Post by [deleted] »

labrador wrote: post #128
anal_reactor wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't know what to think. Sure, there's 8 billion people on Earth, the chances that I am the main character are tiny. But at the same time whenever I try treating people the same way I treat myself, I quickly get into misunderstandings and disappointments, and navigating the world with an assumption that most people are NPCs while just a handful are actual sentient beings has proven way more practical.

I know what you mean. Since I've been using ChatGPT4 and now Claude Opus to answer questions I think of while day dreaming, I find myself drifting further away from ordinary people. I don't know how to describe it yet. Maybe people who don't agument their thinking seem more like an NPC and say NPC like things? I don't want to get to far out there, like in Kurt Vonnegut's "Breakfast of Champions." The protagonist want…

[deleted]

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#159

Post by _nalply »

labrador wrote: post #75

I used to be similarly lost in the drama of my own life, hanging on to things that I felt made me special. It's an ego trap in my opinion, as there are millions of people around us who have extrodinary lives that we never hear about. The word "sonder" applies: Sonder is defined as the profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passing by on the street, has a life as complex and vivid as your own…

"sonder" is a German word stem with the meaning of special, set apart, different.

One form is "besonders" which can be translated as particular, peculiar, unique.

In English maybe well known is "Sonderkommando" which can be translated as special troop.

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