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This will sound moralistic, and I don't mean it that way, but I think this relates to our general lack of clear values as a society. With religion absent in man

This will sound moralistic, and I don't mean it that way, but I think this relates to our general lack of clear values as a society. With religion absent in many people's lives, not much has stepped in to take up the slack and say "what really matters is being a good person" or "what really matters is wisdom" or "what really matters is family". So we're left with the messages we ARE getting, which are from a combination of advertising (what really matters is having a lot of money/nice things), Hollywood (what really matters is being good at shit) and the news cycle (which focuses on careers and especially major careers). "Mom gets home from work and has a fun late afternoon with her kids, spending no money and getting nothing much done" isn't a story we ever see upheld as a great, positive way to spend our time. So we pursue the things we do see people praising and talking about - promotions, money, milestones, important-ness.

pcurve 11y ago
it doesn't sound moralistic. I think you make great points and they're entirely plausible for many people.
update 11y ago
> What our modern society needs are some new myths, legends, stories and rituals that we can all identify with in our more cosmopolitan world. Without such identification we could end up like a rudderless ship in the ocean, not knowing who we are, or where we are going. Isn’t that something that our leaders, whether in business or politics, should be concerned with? Bill Moyers on Joseph Campbell (http://blog.iese.edu/leggett/2012/02/27/the-power-of-myth-by-joseph-campbell/ http://blog.iese.edu/leggett/2012/02/27/the-power-of-myth-by...)
- amelius 11y ago
  The problem is that the myths that sell aren't the ones we should identify with.
- eli_gottlieb 11y ago
  Maybe what our modern society needs is to orient its moral compass around reality rather than myths.
nostrademons 11y ago
Nah, it's that folks who get their values from other folks are the only ones who bother to tell other folks how well they're doing at achieving their externally-gifted values. If your goal is to make a lot of money but you decided that was just your goal, why bother to tell anyone you've achieved it? (Indeed, it can be very counterproductive to tell other people.) If your goal is to be a good husband & father, then what does it matter what anyone besides your wife & kids think of you? As a result, external discourse is filled with people crowing about how well they achieved this or that milestone, all of which is desirable only because other people think it's desirable. But then, the only people who care are the ones looking to others for their values. There are plenty of people whose values are plenty clear, arrived at through some deep reflection about what they personally want. But then, since it's what they personally want, why would anyone else care?
- jacquesm 11y ago
  > As a result, external discourse is filled with people crowing about how well they achieved this or that milestone, all of which is desirable only because other people think it's desirable. That's spot on and I wouldn't mind it if that was related to acts of creation.
- burgessaccount 11y ago
  Interesting thoughts. To me, it has always seemed like, if I had something figured out, that had made me happy, i would WANT to share it, if it could help others. When people find a diet or an exercise regimen that works for them, they love to talk about it. I don't think it purely comes down to boasting. I agree that people with deeper wisdom will often be less eager to boast or force their values on others. But I also think there are some people who, in the spirit of helpfulness, are sharing positive values - they just don't have the megaphone that movies, ads, and pundits have.
  - nostrademons 11y ago
    That works great until you realize that other people often have different value systems. What you're super proud of may be deeply offensive to another person. Just think about how saying "I'm a Googler, and proud of the work I do" might go over for a CS student vs. how it goes ever for the journalist who's struggling to make a living because Google has commoditized the news business. In practice, what usually happens is people end up self-organizing into small communities of like-minded people. Within the community, values are very homogenous, and people can feel safe that they have a good pulse on what will be offensive vs. what won't be. But when one community meets another, they're often shocked at how barbaric the rest of humanity can be. (Just look at the Trump vs. Sanders melee that played out in Chicago last night.) And the more differentiated and more nuanced someone's views are, the less they fit into any one community. There are plenty of people whose personal relationships are entirely personal because they're at the point where no one group is going to give them that feeling of belonging.
rodgerd 11y ago
> With religion absent in many people's lives, not much has stepped in to take up the slack Given the obsession with hard (in fact over-) work in the English-speaking world and European north tends to be commonly treated as an artifact of the "Protestant work ethic" this seems pretty off-base.
- tluyben2 11y ago
  That is probably one of the reason but not conciously for most in north EU. So religion is absent in their lives just some of the habits instilled by centuries of teachings die hard.
- ahmedk92 11y ago
  Islam's view on work is balanced. Simply it's a mean to live financially independent, not a life purpose. This idea can be seen in the commitment to the five must-be-on-time prayers during the day. No work should cause the prayers to be postponed. Ironically, through the last century, there is a "modern" Islamic speech that preaches "hard work ethics" (the western way) among other western values. It will be funny if the west starts to morally rethink their life style, while the Islamic world is about to complete the low-morale modernization process.
  - cbeach 11y ago
    That "balance" doesn't seem to be contributing much to the economies of Muslim-majority countries, and their living standards, though, does it? Except for those nations sitting on abundant oil reserves, the Muslim world is chaotic, unproductive and has terrible human rights / freedom of expression.
    - sshumaker 11y ago
      You have to be very careful to tease out correlation from causation here. In the Middle Ages the Islamic world was significantly ahead of the West in these regards. For a bunch of historical reasons (ineffectiveness of Ottoman Empire for several hundred years, World War I) most of the Islamic world is indeed behind first-world countries. But that's also like blaming Christianity for the problems in Central America or Central Africa. Religion is only a small factor.
jrcii 11y ago
>This will sound moralistic, and I don't mean it that way It's truly sad that the culture of people in computing reading this forum, which reflects the nation and west as a whole, is so disconnected from God that you feel the need to disclaim the profession of morality or religion.
- Aeolos 11y ago
  > It's truly sad No, actually it's one of the few truly hopeful and uplifting things. Why would that be sad?
- mirimir 11y ago
  No, what's truly sad is that I'm too old to have any shot at being a god. So it goes.
- ionised 11y ago
  On the contrary, I find it uplifting to witness people so disconnected from God.
nether 11y ago
OTOH the US has been driven by the Protestant work ethic for centuries. Many religions praise hard work and not just savoring the fruits of life, so an inverse correlation between faith and devotion to labor seems unlikely.
ArkyBeagle 11y ago
Doesn't sound moralistic at all. It sounds like an appeal to analysis of sources of information. I don't see how you can go wrong. We went from Eisenhower to Kennedy in a few years. I think this, and the fact that people move too much are largely the whole story. See also Peter Whybrow for more on this.
- ianamartin 11y ago
  >>>the fact that people move to much ??? I'm really curious about what you mean by this. Would you please elaborate?
  - burgessaccount 11y ago
    I don't want to speak for ArkyBeagle but I think, when young adults move, they often move for work - so you show up in a city where what you're there to do is work, the people you know are through work, you don't have the balanced social structure of family, friends, and work, so you don't end up spending healthy time relaxing with family and friends, you just... work. That's my guess.
    - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
      That is better than I could have summarized it. I would say that for children, it may be even harder. Then again, I moved a child from what seemed a very good but isolated (for her) situation and she developed much more of a network after the move.
  - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
    I am echoing Peter Whybrow from the BookTV presentation of his book "The Well-Tuned Brain". Moving disrupts your (organic, on the ground) social network.
thenomad 11y ago
I see that sort of message a great deal in the "Lifestyle design" communities. A lot of the nomad-entrepreneur / lifestyle-design / ISV / four-hour-work-week culture values time with family, for example, very highly, and is actively working toward prioritising that over work. It's one of the reasons I like that culture. It's also one of the reasons I like HN, because there's a significant minority of those folk here. Interestingly, this ties into your comment further down the thread: "To me, it has always seemed like, if I had something figured out, that had made me happy, i would WANT to share it, if it could help others." A lot of people in the above communities do exactly that - but they tend to subsequently get decried as con artists, snake oil salesmen, or whatever, by people who believe they're selling an impossible dream. Of course, there are also some genuine snake-oil salesmen out there. But I've generally found the population is lower than is commonly assumed.

pcurve 11y ago

it doesn't sound moralistic. I think you make great points and they're entirely plausible for many people.

update 11y ago

> What our modern society needs are some new myths, legends, stories and rituals that we can all identify with in our more cosmopolitan world. Without such identification we could end up like a rudderless ship in the ocean, not knowing who we are, or where we are going. Isn’t that something that our leaders, whether in business or politics, should be concerned with? Bill Moyers on Joseph Campbell (http://blog.iese.edu/leggett/2012/02/27/the-power-of-myth-by-joseph-campbell/ http://blog.iese.edu/leggett/2012/02/27/the-power-of-myth-by...)

amelius 11y ago
The problem is that the myths that sell aren't the ones we should identify with.
eli_gottlieb 11y ago
Maybe what our modern society needs is to orient its moral compass around reality rather than myths.

nostrademons 11y ago

Nah, it's that folks who get their values from other folks are the only ones who bother to tell other folks how well they're doing at achieving their externally-gifted values. If your goal is to make a lot of money but you decided that was just your goal, why bother to tell anyone you've achieved it? (Indeed, it can be very counterproductive to tell other people.) If your goal is to be a good husband & father, then what does it matter what anyone besides your wife & kids think of you? As a result, external discourse is filled with people crowing about how well they achieved this or that milestone, all of which is desirable only because other people think it's desirable. But then, the only people who care are the ones looking to others for their values. There are plenty of people whose values are plenty clear, arrived at through some deep reflection about what they personally want. But then, since it's what they personally want, why would anyone else care?

jacquesm 11y ago
> As a result, external discourse is filled with people crowing about how well they achieved this or that milestone, all of which is desirable only because other people think it's desirable. That's spot on and I wouldn't mind it if that was related to acts of creation.
burgessaccount 11y ago
Interesting thoughts. To me, it has always seemed like, if I had something figured out, that had made me happy, i would WANT to share it, if it could help others. When people find a diet or an exercise regimen that works for them, they love to talk about it. I don't think it purely comes down to boasting. I agree that people with deeper wisdom will often be less eager to boast or force their values on others. But I also think there are some people who, in the spirit of helpfulness, are sharing positive values - they just don't have the megaphone that movies, ads, and pundits have.
- nostrademons 11y ago
  That works great until you realize that other people often have different value systems. What you're super proud of may be deeply offensive to another person. Just think about how saying "I'm a Googler, and proud of the work I do" might go over for a CS student vs. how it goes ever for the journalist who's struggling to make a living because Google has commoditized the news business. In practice, what usually happens is people end up self-organizing into small communities of like-minded people. Within the community, values are very homogenous, and people can feel safe that they have a good pulse on what will be offensive vs. what won't be. But when one community meets another, they're often shocked at how barbaric the rest of humanity can be. (Just look at the Trump vs. Sanders melee that played out in Chicago last night.) And the more differentiated and more nuanced someone's views are, the less they fit into any one community. There are plenty of people whose personal relationships are entirely personal because they're at the point where no one group is going to give them that feeling of belonging.

rodgerd 11y ago

> With religion absent in many people's lives, not much has stepped in to take up the slack Given the obsession with hard (in fact over-) work in the English-speaking world and European north tends to be commonly treated as an artifact of the "Protestant work ethic" this seems pretty off-base.

tluyben2 11y ago
That is probably one of the reason but not conciously for most in north EU. So religion is absent in their lives just some of the habits instilled by centuries of teachings die hard.
ahmedk92 11y ago
Islam's view on work is balanced. Simply it's a mean to live financially independent, not a life purpose. This idea can be seen in the commitment to the five must-be-on-time prayers during the day. No work should cause the prayers to be postponed. Ironically, through the last century, there is a "modern" Islamic speech that preaches "hard work ethics" (the western way) among other western values. It will be funny if the west starts to morally rethink their life style, while the Islamic world is about to complete the low-morale modernization process.
- cbeach 11y ago
  That "balance" doesn't seem to be contributing much to the economies of Muslim-majority countries, and their living standards, though, does it? Except for those nations sitting on abundant oil reserves, the Muslim world is chaotic, unproductive and has terrible human rights / freedom of expression.
  - sshumaker 11y ago
    You have to be very careful to tease out correlation from causation here. In the Middle Ages the Islamic world was significantly ahead of the West in these regards. For a bunch of historical reasons (ineffectiveness of Ottoman Empire for several hundred years, World War I) most of the Islamic world is indeed behind first-world countries. But that's also like blaming Christianity for the problems in Central America or Central Africa. Religion is only a small factor.

jrcii 11y ago

>This will sound moralistic, and I don't mean it that way It's truly sad that the culture of people in computing reading this forum, which reflects the nation and west as a whole, is so disconnected from God that you feel the need to disclaim the profession of morality or religion.

Aeolos 11y ago
> It's truly sad No, actually it's one of the few truly hopeful and uplifting things. Why would that be sad?
mirimir 11y ago
No, what's truly sad is that I'm too old to have any shot at being a god. So it goes.
ionised 11y ago
On the contrary, I find it uplifting to witness people so disconnected from God.

nether 11y ago

OTOH the US has been driven by the Protestant work ethic for centuries. Many religions praise hard work and not just savoring the fruits of life, so an inverse correlation between faith and devotion to labor seems unlikely.

ArkyBeagle 11y ago

Doesn't sound moralistic at all. It sounds like an appeal to analysis of sources of information. I don't see how you can go wrong. We went from Eisenhower to Kennedy in a few years. I think this, and the fact that people move too much are largely the whole story. See also Peter Whybrow for more on this.

ianamartin 11y ago
>>>the fact that people move to much ??? I'm really curious about what you mean by this. Would you please elaborate?
- burgessaccount 11y ago
  I don't want to speak for ArkyBeagle but I think, when young adults move, they often move for work - so you show up in a city where what you're there to do is work, the people you know are through work, you don't have the balanced social structure of family, friends, and work, so you don't end up spending healthy time relaxing with family and friends, you just... work. That's my guess.
  - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
    That is better than I could have summarized it. I would say that for children, it may be even harder. Then again, I moved a child from what seemed a very good but isolated (for her) situation and she developed much more of a network after the move.
- ArkyBeagle 11y ago
  I am echoing Peter Whybrow from the BookTV presentation of his book "The Well-Tuned Brain". Moving disrupts your (organic, on the ground) social network.

thenomad 11y ago

I see that sort of message a great deal in the "Lifestyle design" communities. A lot of the nomad-entrepreneur / lifestyle-design / ISV / four-hour-work-week culture values time with family, for example, very highly, and is actively working toward prioritising that over work. It's one of the reasons I like that culture. It's also one of the reasons I like HN, because there's a significant minority of those folk here. Interestingly, this ties into your comment further down the thread: "To me, it has always seemed like, if I had something figured out, that had made me happy, i would WANT to share it, if it could help others." A lot of people in the above communities do exactly that - but they tend to subsequently get decried as con artists, snake oil salesmen, or whatever, by people who believe they're selling an impossible dream. Of course, there are also some genuine snake-oil salesmen out there. But I've generally found the population is lower than is commonly assumed.