161–170 of 278 posts
We could start by not calling it “idleness” when we paint pictures, learn physics or read philosophy...
There's a reason why these activities are often funded by patronage in the old days (nobles and kings etc).
>we also need to challenge the cultural ethic that teaches us to value ourselves in proportion to our capacity for “economically productive” labour. Human beings are more than just workers. We need to learn how to value idleness. I think much more than valueing idleness it's also a massive indictement of the system we live in. The number of people who I've talked to who legitimately don't know what to do without work…
I have a different perspective. I see work as the way we contribute to society, how we help others with things that are important for them . In return, other people work on things that benefit me . This is how we can live in wealth and peace unimaginable to most of history. This is a fantastic historic achievement, and I want to keep it going. I do agree that we are much more than just workers, of course. But that fe…
“If any action of yours, then, does not have direct or indirect relation to the social end, it pulls your life apart and destroys its unity.”
That said, keeping yourself mentally healthy is just as important, to the social end.
Some of the highest goods (as in, virtuous or wholesome things) are those that are sometimes described by workaholics, or parents of over achievers, as "useless" or "wastes of time". Art, music, sport, leisure, time with family- all these things (and more) put us in touch with the greater things in life. We collectively live out the human experience in a way that crashes through barriers of language, and in my opinio…
what counts as virtuous etc, is just a set of beliefs you have. The person who "treating their work as an end" is not less happy, in the same way that a worker ant is happy doing what they were born to do (work themselves to death). Assigning your value judgement on someone else's life decisions just another way to be on a high horse. Who's to say that the workaholics are wrong to live the way they do?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why do you associate those things specifically with urban life? Cinemas, televised sports, and listening to music are pretty broadly-enjoyed things. I don’t think they’re particularly “passive” either, but they’re certainly not uniquely urban. When I think of unique opportunities in urban environments, I’m thinking more along the lines of nightlife, live sports, music, and theatre, boutique shopping, art galleries, e…
Yeah, I think Russell got this one wrong and Vonnegut got it right. Consuming-all, creating-none became normal because of mass media. Its availability drove down the social value of playing on an unremarkable, very-local sports team, or playing the piano unremarkably, or singing, or being pretty good at telling a story (but not as good as the radio), and so on. Know what you see references to all the time in previous…
That said, I think there's also room for a new kind of very-local active-not-passive activity to spring up. We already see the beginning of this with mass tourism and the rise of mass-amateur photography thanks to digital cameras and cell phones.
Does anyone really think their picture of the Grand Canyon taken on their iPhone is better than the thousands of professional photos already taken of it? Yet people (me included!) continue to take pictures.
I'm not really sure exactly what form it will take but that kind of "sure but I haven't personally experienced it" take feels like it might re-open the doors that were slammed shut by the kind of mass media effect you describe.
Compound that with a kind of long-tail niche of hyperlocal activities and there's more scope for hope in the future. Sure things like theater and music have been are a lost cause. But maybe birdwatching in a nearby national park? Or groups that handle beach cleanup or beach erosion?
Maybe we're just in the middle of a (long) transition toward those kind of things.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good grief, people. If you're wearing a mask while on a bike (distant from people) you're doing it wrong.
In some jurisdictions it's mandatory to wear a mask when out in public. A lot of the definitions are wishy washy (medically approved, for example), is a national forest a "public space"? technically, yes...
Can confirm that not one soul has hassled any of us for riding our bikes in the woods with our masks off.
Were it not for bicycle motocross, I think I would have jumped in front of a bus by now. Seeing my friends in the woods is one of the only things keeping me sane.
I cannot recommend cycling highly enough; not just as a pandemic activity, but as a way of life.
I'm a huge fan of sloth. I frequently take many months off between jobs, sometimes a year or more. I refuse to work more than 40 hours a week except for genuine emergencies (things like outages; being behind schedule never counts), and I'm close to drawing the line at four days a week. I always take at least three weeks off a year, and that's in a bad year. I take "mental health days" often and with no guilt. If you…
I could not agree more. I'm pretty early in my software career after a few years as a military officer, and if that job taught me one thing, it's that NOTHING at work is as important as you think it is. Looking back on those times, even in a job where lives are sometimes on the line, I can't believe how seriously I took some things and how much more fun I could have had. It's a disappointing lesson to have to learn i…
The guy with the moustache is a blue collar worker and the other one is white collar worker (actually in Tech/IT)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> what actually happened[1]: half the workforce gets laid off. The article says as much: > In a sane world, Russell thought, the factory would simply halve working hours, maintaining the same wages but greatly increasing the time that the workers could devote to the joys of leisure. But, as Russell observed, this rarely happens. Instead, the factory owner will opt to keep half the workers on the same hours and lay of…
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All that needs to be done is to properly mandate maximum work hours (no overtime even if the worker is willing).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
i still remember the time (early in my career) i was summoned to jury duty and tried to register an "undue hardship" with the judge because i had a project deadline coming up. i genuinely thought it was that important, but looking back it was really not a big deal at all (and the judge knew it) :)
One level of enlightenment is when you understand things can be done later at your convenience. Another level of enlightenment is when you understand somethings don't have to be done at all.
I'm a huge fan of sloth. I frequently take many months off between jobs, sometimes a year or more. I refuse to work more than 40 hours a week except for genuine emergencies (things like outages; being behind schedule never counts), and I'm close to drawing the line at four days a week. I always take at least three weeks off a year, and that's in a bad year. I take "mental health days" often and with no guilt. If you…
I could not agree more. I'm pretty early in my software career after a few years as a military officer, and if that job taught me one thing, it's that NOTHING at work is as important as you think it is. Looking back on those times, even in a job where lives are sometimes on the line, I can't believe how seriously I took some things and how much more fun I could have had. It's a disappointing lesson to have to learn i…
I'm a huge fan of sloth. I frequently take many months off between jobs, sometimes a year or more. I refuse to work more than 40 hours a week except for genuine emergencies (things like outages; being behind schedule never counts), and I'm close to drawing the line at four days a week. I always take at least three weeks off a year, and that's in a bad year. I take "mental health days" often and with no guilt. If you…