4 ms·

So, what you're saying is that you find it hurts your productivity to read productivity articles, so you try not to put yourself into the position where you hav

So, what you're saying is that you find it hurts your productivity to read productivity articles, so you try not to put yourself into the position where you have to read them? On a more serious note, I feel like "maximizing" "productivity" on things you are passionate about is largely wasted effort (unless the thing you are passionate about is "maximizing" "productivity")...

StavrosK 9y ago
> So, what you're saying is that you find it hurts your productivity to read productivity articles, so you try not to put yourself into the position where you have to read them? No, it hurts my happiness to read productivity articles, so I skip them.
- ravitation 9y ago
  Yeah, but what is happiness other than a way to increase your productivity?
  - Bjartr 9y ago
    Happiness is an end unto itself. An end that productivity can, but doesn't always, serve. At least that's how I go about my life.
    - ravitation 9y ago
      It's a joke. The fact that so many see it as something else is interesting on multiple levels.
      - derefr 9y ago
        Neurologically, it might actually be justified—there's a recent hypothesis that we're wired to "decrease uncertainty" more than any other terminal preference, i.e. that "being productive" (in the sense of doing things to ensure that a situation will resolve a particular way) is an end unto itself, that we pursue regardless of whether it makes us happy. (I like this hypothesis because it neatly explains why the experiences of happiness, of contentment, and of motivation, are all effectively orthogonal, and many people can have one of the three while never having the other two. It also explains why people tend to feel relief when a negative event they've been attempting to prevent finally happens anyway.) As well, there is a reason that Buddhism's viewpoints on dukkha and nirvana needed to be invented/discovered and taught (and that people struggle to learn them.) The idea that there is a happiness that exists as a state of *being8, that does not involve "doing", is not, seemingly, an instinctual belief among human beings—or even one that's very easy to convince people of.
- naveen99 9y ago
  go read it. you will be happier. i could tell you didn't read it, because if you did you'd realized you are more similar than you think.
mmcnl 9y ago
No that's not what he was saying.

StavrosK 9y ago

> So, what you're saying is that you find it hurts your productivity to read productivity articles, so you try not to put yourself into the position where you have to read them? No, it hurts my happiness to read productivity articles, so I skip them.

ravitation 9y ago
Yeah, but what is happiness other than a way to increase your productivity?
- Bjartr 9y ago
  Happiness is an end unto itself. An end that productivity can, but doesn't always, serve. At least that's how I go about my life.
  - ravitation 9y ago
    It's a joke. The fact that so many see it as something else is interesting on multiple levels.
    - derefr 9y ago
      Neurologically, it might actually be justified—there's a recent hypothesis that we're wired to "decrease uncertainty" more than any other terminal preference, i.e. that "being productive" (in the sense of doing things to ensure that a situation will resolve a particular way) is an end unto itself, that we pursue regardless of whether it makes us happy. (I like this hypothesis because it neatly explains why the experiences of happiness, of contentment, and of motivation, are all effectively orthogonal, and many people can have one of the three while never having the other two. It also explains why people tend to feel relief when a negative event they've been attempting to prevent finally happens anyway.) As well, there is a reason that Buddhism's viewpoints on dukkha and nirvana needed to be invented/discovered and taught (and that people struggle to learn them.) The idea that there is a happiness that exists as a state of *being8, that does not involve "doing", is not, seemingly, an instinctual belief among human beings—or even one that's very easy to convince people of.
naveen99 9y ago
go read it. you will be happier. i could tell you didn't read it, because if you did you'd realized you are more similar than you think.

mmcnl 9y ago

No that's not what he was saying.