4 ms·

I could also write my own novels and produce my own TV shows but they wouldn't be as good as what an Orwell or Sorkin could produce.

jahewson 7y ago
Do the things you do have to be world-class all-time greats in order to be worth doing?
- mlthoughts2018 7y ago
  If they are accessible, then yes, and I don’t see why that would be controversial. Normally enjoyment of the art making process for amateurs is just that, enjoyment of the process. If I want to enjoy literature, I’ll read the work of professional writers. If I want to enjoy the task of writing, I’ll write myself. For most people, art making as a hobby is occasional, simply by the time & resource limits of regular jobs, family obligations, etc. While consuming art is much more accessible. Some other things can be closer to a gray middle area. For me, that is cooking. I expect myself to be able to make really world class food even in my crappy apartment kitchen with limited time and a normal grocery budget. So when I can’t do that, due to time constraints generally, I won’t whip together something quick just ‘cause.. I’d rather simply transfer the grocery budget to restaurant budget and eat better made things. Thankfully, since most of the very best food is found at cheap or medium end restaurants, and not too much at five star expensive places, this is fairly easy without changing my budget. But compromising to make a mediocre thing myself, either purely for the sake of cooking or to allegedly save money, is not interesting or useful to me. I could imagine people feel that way about a lot of things.
  - decasia 7y ago
    I think you said it better than I did!
  - shi314 7y ago
    I personally would have a not so great food with room for improvement everyday rather than to eat similar delicious food every day. Improvement makes a mundane thing not-so-mudane while no improvement makes a not-so-mudane thing look mudane. Anyways, different people have different preference.
  - imtringued 7y ago
    >If they are accessible, then yes, and I don’t see why that would be controversial. The simple answer is that it completely ignores how the world works. Things don't decide to be world class. They are labeled world class after they have existed and were compared with other things that are not world class. If you decide to remove the non world class things from the ranking (because they were not worth doing) you will realize that the number of non world class things has increased.
- braythwayt 7y ago
  Nope, not at all. You and only you decide if a thing is worth doing. If you want to learn Mandarin, so what? You will probably never be a best-selling or critically acclaimed author of Mandarin books. You are unlikely to be the next star in a Mandarin-singing boy-or girl-band. You will not be a TV host reading the news in Mandarin. What of it? Does learning even a little Mandarin give you pleasure? Do it! It’s insane to judge everything in your life by whether you are going to be in the top one tenth of one percentile. That is a recipe for constant stress an unhappiness, for forever judging yourself by impossible standards and coming up short.
decasia 7y ago
Sure. And the pleasure you would get out of this would depend in part on your skill in the relevant medium. But I think there's a significant difference: with music, as you play it, you are also experiencing ("consuming") it. And that's what also brings a lot of the pleasure to it. With writing and videography, meanwhile, the act of production is usually a lot more decoupled from the experience of consumption. I happen to think that producing writing and producing video are also fun activities in their own right. But they don't fit into social life in the way that playing someone a song does.
- braythwayt 7y ago
  +1000 I perform Bach terribly. But I consume Bach wonderfully when I play. I call it “Listening to the music with my hands.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfENUjqz4bs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfENUjqz4bs I have experienced this with many other physical activities. To ride a twisting descent engages your brain more deeply than to look at the same road or trail. To climb a boulder engages your brain more deeply than to look at the line. Climbers pantomime the moves before climbing just as aerobatic pilots pantomime their routine before flying. Physical motion engages the brain a certain way that simply thinking, listening, or watching does not. The pleasure of listening to music with your hands begins when you first make a single satisfying note happen. It is not necessary to be able to play what you would like to hear.
- eslaught 7y ago
  I think it's harder to get to this point with e.g. writing, but it is possible. There have been more than a couple times I've thought to myself (while writing), "wow, this is actually what I had imagined in my head." Which is not to say that anyone else would be impressed with it. But there is definitely a certain satisfaction (and even in the moment, not just afterwards when you read it) in being able to tell your story instead of endlessly reading others' stories. I'm not sure it's enough to keep me going by itself (honestly, I still like to think someone else may be able to enjoy it, eventually, even if this is probably unrealistic). But it's definitely a factor.
- maroonblazer 7y ago
  I play music too and derive a lot of pleasure from it, both as a performer and a consumer. However you seemed to be claiming that DIY-ing music was a viable alternative to consuming professionally produced music. Depending on one's aesthetic standards this is most likely not the case.
pessimizer 7y ago
I don't mean to flatter you, but there's no evidence of that.
Can_Not 7y ago
Obviously that's because you'd have to be doing it after spending your primary energy in your current 40-60hr job and plus you don't have money to hire professional editors and screenwriters. I guess we'll never know if you lacked the talent or not.

jahewson 7y ago

Do the things you do have to be world-class all-time greats in order to be worth doing?

mlthoughts2018 7y ago
If they are accessible, then yes, and I don’t see why that would be controversial. Normally enjoyment of the art making process for amateurs is just that, enjoyment of the process. If I want to enjoy literature, I’ll read the work of professional writers. If I want to enjoy the task of writing, I’ll write myself. For most people, art making as a hobby is occasional, simply by the time & resource limits of regular jobs, family obligations, etc. While consuming art is much more accessible. Some other things can be closer to a gray middle area. For me, that is cooking. I expect myself to be able to make really world class food even in my crappy apartment kitchen with limited time and a normal grocery budget. So when I can’t do that, due to time constraints generally, I won’t whip together something quick just ‘cause.. I’d rather simply transfer the grocery budget to restaurant budget and eat better made things. Thankfully, since most of the very best food is found at cheap or medium end restaurants, and not too much at five star expensive places, this is fairly easy without changing my budget. But compromising to make a mediocre thing myself, either purely for the sake of cooking or to allegedly save money, is not interesting or useful to me. I could imagine people feel that way about a lot of things.
- decasia 7y ago
  I think you said it better than I did!
- shi314 7y ago
  I personally would have a not so great food with room for improvement everyday rather than to eat similar delicious food every day. Improvement makes a mundane thing not-so-mudane while no improvement makes a not-so-mudane thing look mudane. Anyways, different people have different preference.
- imtringued 7y ago
  >If they are accessible, then yes, and I don’t see why that would be controversial. The simple answer is that it completely ignores how the world works. Things don't decide to be world class. They are labeled world class after they have existed and were compared with other things that are not world class. If you decide to remove the non world class things from the ranking (because they were not worth doing) you will realize that the number of non world class things has increased.
braythwayt 7y ago
Nope, not at all. You and only you decide if a thing is worth doing. If you want to learn Mandarin, so what? You will probably never be a best-selling or critically acclaimed author of Mandarin books. You are unlikely to be the next star in a Mandarin-singing boy-or girl-band. You will not be a TV host reading the news in Mandarin. What of it? Does learning even a little Mandarin give you pleasure? Do it! It’s insane to judge everything in your life by whether you are going to be in the top one tenth of one percentile. That is a recipe for constant stress an unhappiness, for forever judging yourself by impossible standards and coming up short.

decasia 7y ago

Sure. And the pleasure you would get out of this would depend in part on your skill in the relevant medium. But I think there's a significant difference: with music, as you play it, you are also experiencing ("consuming") it. And that's what also brings a lot of the pleasure to it. With writing and videography, meanwhile, the act of production is usually a lot more decoupled from the experience of consumption. I happen to think that producing writing and producing video are also fun activities in their own right. But they don't fit into social life in the way that playing someone a song does.

braythwayt 7y ago
+1000 I perform Bach terribly. But I consume Bach wonderfully when I play. I call it “Listening to the music with my hands.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfENUjqz4bs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfENUjqz4bs I have experienced this with many other physical activities. To ride a twisting descent engages your brain more deeply than to look at the same road or trail. To climb a boulder engages your brain more deeply than to look at the line. Climbers pantomime the moves before climbing just as aerobatic pilots pantomime their routine before flying. Physical motion engages the brain a certain way that simply thinking, listening, or watching does not. The pleasure of listening to music with your hands begins when you first make a single satisfying note happen. It is not necessary to be able to play what you would like to hear.
eslaught 7y ago
I think it's harder to get to this point with e.g. writing, but it is possible. There have been more than a couple times I've thought to myself (while writing), "wow, this is actually what I had imagined in my head." Which is not to say that anyone else would be impressed with it. But there is definitely a certain satisfaction (and even in the moment, not just afterwards when you read it) in being able to tell your story instead of endlessly reading others' stories. I'm not sure it's enough to keep me going by itself (honestly, I still like to think someone else may be able to enjoy it, eventually, even if this is probably unrealistic). But it's definitely a factor.
maroonblazer 7y ago
I play music too and derive a lot of pleasure from it, both as a performer and a consumer. However you seemed to be claiming that DIY-ing music was a viable alternative to consuming professionally produced music. Depending on one's aesthetic standards this is most likely not the case.

pessimizer 7y ago

I don't mean to flatter you, but there's no evidence of that.

Can_Not 7y ago

Obviously that's because you'd have to be doing it after spending your primary energy in your current 40-60hr job and plus you don't have money to hire professional editors and screenwriters. I guess we'll never know if you lacked the talent or not.