Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

derekthompson.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

911–920 of 1001 posts

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#911

Post by kelnos »

xyzelement wrote: post #197
wat10000 wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt it's quite that simple, but this does seem likely to be a big factor. I say this as an atheist myself. Religion does seem to give people a purpose and a community that's difficult to find elsewhere, and that translates to happiness. Sometimes I wish I could do it, but I can't. While a fall in religiosity may be part of the cause, I don't think a return to religion is the answer. We need to find ways to replic…

I think this is a common reaction that I used to agree with but no longer. I think religion tends to capture something essential about reality that atheism excluded by definition. There's a reason no atheist society has historically arisen and thrived in the way that you are suggesting. If it was possible why hasn't it happened. The idea of atheism is ancient - why has it not worked?

Because atheism isn't a club like an organized religion is. You don't need to join a specific community or church or organization in order to be an atheist. You just stop believing in religion, and there you are.

We don't need a "society"; having one would be counter-productive, and would even probably be more like a religion.

> I think religion tends to capture something essential about reality

I think you have this backwards; religion tends to capture people who want to believe that reality is something other than it is.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#912

Post by alex43578 »

testing22321 wrote: post #735
asdfman123 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I agree. I think we're deep into a spiritual crisis, a crisis of meaning . A lot of people are blind to the trend because those aren't easy things to measure. But if you're single, isolated, on dating apps -- or maybe caught in an unfulfilling marriage commuting from the suburbs to a job you resent -- there often doesn't seem much point to your own existence. Everything has been stripped of its meaning. The spi…

> Everything has been stripped of its meaning. A friend j got the epic ski pass, so he skied at 43 resorts this winter with his wife and kid all across the US. From Baltimore to Tahoe through about 25 states. I thought it would be awesome, he said it was shit. Because one corporation owns all of it, they’re all identical. Same signs, same food, same rules. No adventure, nothing new at each resort . Giant monoculture.…

Are you skiing for the signs or for the mountains, the views, and the experience?

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#913

Post by sph »

hunterpayne wrote: post #706
sph wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, because the world was just great before 2016. The orange idiot is just the culmination of decades of decline, not a random blip in American history.

I agree but like most tragedies, it wasn't the event, it was the reaction. Trump did very little in his 1st term (especially in comparison to now), yet extremist/politically addicted people lost their minds constantly. It was their radicalization and increased extremism that caused most of the harm. And as most of their real life social circle pulled back from their extremism they got deeper into their social media b…

Trump might've been "subdued" in his 1st term, but social media was already at its breaking point even before he sat in the White House the first time. Remember the cesspool that was /r/TheDonald for example, the 4chan psyop factory, the pepe the frog memes, Steve Bannon, etc.

Trump is a product of the idiocy of the American electorate. He's also a product of the forces that have worked for many, many years to have a guy like him run the country. Trump is what you eventually get after the Reagans, the Nixons, the George Wallaces have sown the seeds.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#914

Post by kelnos »

hunterpayne wrote: post #742
riversflow wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean we have academia, which is essentially secular study. Moreover Atheist don't need to go to church together to indoctrinate their beliefs, that happens every day when no miracles happen and the world continues to be kill or be killed anywhere animal intelligence has not overcome that reality in some small pocket. Atheist also tend to understand that their is no forgiveness and they have to sit with their action…

"I mean we have academia, which is essentially secular study." It should be, but is it? If this is the case, why has the reproducibility of papers fallen off by so much? In the past, this wasn't the case but it also wasn't the case that society was so secular. In fact, secularism and inability to publish reproducible papers is positively correlated. While I'm not a believer, it does seem to me that somehow without re…

> secularism and inability to publish reproducible papers is positively correlated.

It's annoying that I need to say this, but: correlation is not causation.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#915

Post by kelnos »

9rx wrote: post #406
benjaminends wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to be snide, but did you read the article? The article explicitly removes decline in religion as an explanation for this particular bout of unhappiness. Is everyone in this comment chain arguing from a perspective of, "I disagree with author's assessment" or "I read the headline and I'm offering my own conjecture"?

> The article explicitly removes decline in religion as an explanation for this particular bout of unhappiness. It tried to, at least, but I'm not sure it succeeded. The growing secularization up to 2020 follows the long-term trend towards unhappiness and peak secularization and peak unhappiness line up too. Happiness has even started to improve in line with the growing return to religiosity that has occurred most re…

> The growing secularization up to 2020 follows the long-term trend towards unhappiness and peak secularization and peak unhappiness line up too.

Are we looking at the same graphs? That's not what I saw.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#916

Post by kelnos »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #229
wat10000 wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A reaction to that very same secularization. Religious nutjobs feel threatened and this is their answer.

I think this is def part of it. Trump was not doing well in 2016 at all until the final debate when he cornered Clinton into a (legitimate) strong defense of her pro-choice position. All the "moderate" Christians who couldn't stomach Trump before suddenly had no choice. Essentially all Christian denominations + Mormons think abortion is murder. How can a candidate win a majority in a society where a plurality identif…

I don't think that had anything to do with it. A majority of Americans support some level of access to abortion, and only a small minority believes it should be banned.

The real problem was that Hillary Clinton was just not a particularly good candidate, but she was pushed hard by the establishment because it was "her turn". The last-minute hand-wringing about "her emails" is what probably put the final nail in the coffin.

> They're willing to tolerate Trump on a whole pile of things as long as they feel he's accomplishing their "moral" goals -- and so far he mostly is.

If that's the case, then these people are not particularly moral at all. I guess that's why you used scare quotes?

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#917

Post by alex43578 »

rstuart4133 wrote: post #590

Impressive article. He gathered a lot of data interesting in its own right, tested a lot of theories, focused on facts over assertions; and it did it in a way that was a pleasure to read. The conclusion was somewhat underwhelming: it's a least two things hitting at once: inflation and COVID, possibly with social media thrown in. I dunno if he's right, but I'd probably add two more factors: the latest round of the ong…

I really don’t think Americans broadly are concerned with the Ukraine war on a day to day basis.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#918

Post by kelnos »

pelasaco wrote: post #316
eBombzor wrote: post #72

I do feel this trend in my life. I have a job which I'm grateful for but nothing feels satisfying anymore, and I feel like it is much harder to connect to people or form deep relationships, especially in this field, unless you already have a clique in your workplace. On top of that, AI is generally a demotivating entity to the majority of people. Despite all the hype of Altman and whonots, I feel like people just don…

> I do feel this trend in my life. I have a job which I'm grateful for but nothing feels satisfying anymore, and I feel like it is much harder to connect to people or form deep relationships, especially in this field, unless you already have a clique in your workplace. do you have kids? Family? That is the ancient receipt for a great and happy life.

[dead]

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#919

Post by spicymaki »

nvch wrote: post #621
HerbManic wrote: post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is Taoist/Buddhist translator Red Pine (Bill Porter) who once said something along the line of; if the Taoists and traditional Buddhists where in charge, we wouldnt have built the world like we have today. It would be angled towards happiness and satisfaction rather than growth of the machine. Taken at an absolutists stance you could easily push that argument down (are you against ALL of modernity?!). But the over…

In this case, we might not have an advanced civilization with modern medicine and technology. Herbs for healing, candles for lighting, letters for communication. (Perhaps I wouldn't be alive without modern medicine. I suppose it's not easy to be dead and happy.) Don't get me wrong, I love Taoism and Buddhism. But, from what I understand, they are not very pro-civilization and pro-progress.

Buddhism was never intended to be the way you organized societies. It was a monastic tradition where you practiced outside of society with the support of people who had to live in the real world and do the dirty work of progress and civilization.

The goal of Buddhism is not happiness anyway it is the total cessation of suffering. If Buddhists are scoring high on happiness surveys they are doing it wrong.

Re: If America's so rich, how'd it get so sad?

#920

Post by alex43578 »

bean469 wrote: post #895
partiallypro wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America is very very rich, the average person is much wealthier than the average European. 76% of Americans do not live paycheck to paycheck. That is a self reported stat and not reliable. It's a media sensationalist headline grabber which virtually every economist ignores. People don't like saying America is rich because it defies their beliefs, but the actual stats don't lie. Every American I know that has moved to…

> 76% of Americans do not live paycheck to paycheck. That is a self reported stat and not reliable. Do you have any sources for this? The reason why I personally don't believe your claim is because every single US citizen I know lives paycheck-to-paycheck, quite literally

Per the Federal Reserve, the average 35 to 44 year old has over $141,000 in retirement savings. That’s just incompatible with the idea that everyone is living paycheck to paycheck in the full sense of the phrase. Every dollar is not being spent: plenty is being saved for retirement, spent on unnecessary things, etc.

Are most of these people allocating every dollar that comes in each month to bills, living expenses, and savings? Sure, but that doesn’t mean they have no money left in the paycheck.

Post reply on HN