4 ms·

It's not extremes. Modern society is designed so that we don't have to do any of those things (in extreme or even in between), we just throw money (that we gene

by spurgu 6y ago

It's not extremes. Modern society is designed so that we don't have to do any of those things (in extreme or even in between), we just throw money (that we generated doing one specific job) at our problems.

anonymou2 6y ago
Then when that job is no longer needed by society you are really, really lost.
- Spivak 6y ago
  I mean that's already true. The kinds of skills that people talk about in these threads are typically very domestic. Even if you had all of them you still probably have a few skills that can bring in money if you're lucky.
  - spurgu 6y ago
    > I mean that's already true. Exactly. That's why it makes a lot of sense to study/learn things outside your area of expertise, and/or if you want to lean on the more extreme side, study/learn basic survival skills (that everyone used to know before the agricultural revolution).
TeMPOraL 6y ago
It's a strong point. Personally, I find it both hard to argue against and at the same time extremely dehumanizing. Related to this is the phenomenon of turning everything into service. Why would you own things and accept responsibility for maintaining them, if you could just throw money at the service provider and have the thing be present when it's needed? Of course the thing will be extremely limited in what you can do with it, subject to Terms&Conditions, but why would you want to do anything non-standard with stuff? There's always another service you can throw money at to solve the same problem. What's the end-game here? That we specialize into sub-species of humans, forever stuck in one role, with zero autonomy? No longer building wealth, we'll only be allocating the flow of money - from what Society gives us in reward for our work, straight to Services of said Society? Will we become specialized cells of the meta-multicellular organism Society becomes? I can see how we're on the path towards that reality, and I absolutely hate it.
- arvinsim 6y ago
  "Specialization is for insects"
- vikramkr 6y ago
  No the ideal end game is that we specialize into whatever role we want with full autonomy without having to worry about things we don't want to worry about. I dont want to have to know how to build a house or do construction work. Once upon a time, I would have had to know how to make a shelter. Now, because that's become a service, I can focus my energy on things I enjoy. But if I wanted to, I could focus my energy on construction. But I dont want to - instead I specialize in ields im good at and build a competitive advantage to generate wealth. We are a species are wealthier than ever (well, maybe we were wealthier a few months ago) and have accomplished more and more because of specialization. We were stuck in the role of "generalist survivor" for a couple million years, never really advancing, until specialization happened.
  - ywei3410 6y ago
    Correction: You _have_ to specialize in the fields that you are good at; not what you want to be good at because you can't compete in the other fields. A couple of million years without advancing is hyperbole to the extreme; specialization which you are touting has only existed for 100-150 years or so (see Foucault, Frankfurt school etc...).
    - vikramkr 6y ago
      Specialization and division of labor is literally a defining aspect of civilization. Did you forget a couple zeros? The industrial revolution alone was starting around 1760, which is 260 years ago, and evidence for the existence of civilization extends quite a bit further back than that...
      - ywei3410 6y ago
        No; I don’t agree with that at all — the idea of extreme specialization for greater prosperity is from the foundations of Capitalism. /The Wealth Of Nations/ was only published in 1776. The Industrial revolution certainly introduced part of the idea of the modern workforce; see /Discipline and Punish/ [1] for a good overview of the evolution of attitudes, but extreme specialization of /worker skills/ was an alien idea. The existence of cottage industries prior to the Industrial revolution is illustrative of this fact. /Collaboration/ has been a hallmark of civilization; but it is revisionist to say that we have always specialized to this extreme or seen it as a necessary goal. For example, the blacksmith of feudal society didn’t only make spoons, nor the farmer a single crop. If we want to critique previous civilizations; we even need to be wary of the fact that such systems were determined primarily through morality, such as /Plato’s Republic/ or /Confucianism/ rather than any ideal of prosperity. The farmer was a farmer because that was his/her place not because they were better or worse at it. Even if I’m being charitable and equate division-of-labour to specialization; which, I think is a /huge/ leap — it does not counter the original point which is there is little autonomy in what you choose to do for a living in the logical conclusion of a system where you must specialize to compete. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discipline_and_Punish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discipline_and_Punish
Vrondi 6y ago
Amazing to see someone celebrating helplessness for the masses.
- Spivak 6y ago
  I don't think this is a resolvable conflict in general; one person's division of labor is someone else's helplessness. I think it's crazy that some people don't cook. Like every house and apartment comes with a kitchen, what do you mean you don't use it? "It's so much cheaper" I say ignoring the fact that I'm a cooking and baking enthusiast and so I'm not counting the fact that if I valued my time at any reasonable rate it's really not. It's the same thing in the woodworking community -- "you'll save so much money, anything you see in the store I can make half as good, for twice the price!"
  - bobthepanda 6y ago
    > Like every house and apartment comes with a kitchen, what do you mean you don't use it? Traditionally in urban areas most people actually purchased food instead of making it, because most people did not have kitchens. You can kind of still see that today; many old New York tenements have been converted into apartments with "kitchens", but really this usually describes something about the size of an airplane bathroom with a stove, a fridge and 1 counter.
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  Is giving the people the freedom to do what they want and not focus on the pedantry of things they're not interested in "celebrating helplessness", or is it getting work for the sake of work out of the way?
- spurgu 6y ago
  Not sure if you're directing this comment at me, but I'm surely not celebrating it, merely observing it as a fact.
michaelmrose 6y ago
50% of the population of the US and 95% of the world would be unhealthy or poor if they all adopt that philosophy about food. Sounds like your bubble not modern society.

by spurgu 6y ago

anonymou2 6y ago

Then when that job is no longer needed by society you are really, really lost.

Spivak 6y ago
I mean that's already true. The kinds of skills that people talk about in these threads are typically very domestic. Even if you had all of them you still probably have a few skills that can bring in money if you're lucky.
- spurgu 6y ago
  > I mean that's already true. Exactly. That's why it makes a lot of sense to study/learn things outside your area of expertise, and/or if you want to lean on the more extreme side, study/learn basic survival skills (that everyone used to know before the agricultural revolution).

TeMPOraL 6y ago

It's a strong point. Personally, I find it both hard to argue against and at the same time extremely dehumanizing. Related to this is the phenomenon of turning everything into service. Why would you own things and accept responsibility for maintaining them, if you could just throw money at the service provider and have the thing be present when it's needed? Of course the thing will be extremely limited in what you can do with it, subject to Terms&Conditions, but why would you want to do anything non-standard with stuff? There's always another service you can throw money at to solve the same problem. What's the end-game here? That we specialize into sub-species of humans, forever stuck in one role, with zero autonomy? No longer building wealth, we'll only be allocating the flow of money - from what Society gives us in reward for our work, straight to Services of said Society? Will we become specialized cells of the meta-multicellular organism Society becomes? I can see how we're on the path towards that reality, and I absolutely hate it.

arvinsim 6y ago
"Specialization is for insects"
vikramkr 6y ago
No the ideal end game is that we specialize into whatever role we want with full autonomy without having to worry about things we don't want to worry about. I dont want to have to know how to build a house or do construction work. Once upon a time, I would have had to know how to make a shelter. Now, because that's become a service, I can focus my energy on things I enjoy. But if I wanted to, I could focus my energy on construction. But I dont want to - instead I specialize in ields im good at and build a competitive advantage to generate wealth. We are a species are wealthier than ever (well, maybe we were wealthier a few months ago) and have accomplished more and more because of specialization. We were stuck in the role of "generalist survivor" for a couple million years, never really advancing, until specialization happened.
- ywei3410 6y ago
  Correction: You _have_ to specialize in the fields that you are good at; not what you want to be good at because you can't compete in the other fields. A couple of million years without advancing is hyperbole to the extreme; specialization which you are touting has only existed for 100-150 years or so (see Foucault, Frankfurt school etc...).
  - vikramkr 6y ago
    Specialization and division of labor is literally a defining aspect of civilization. Did you forget a couple zeros? The industrial revolution alone was starting around 1760, which is 260 years ago, and evidence for the existence of civilization extends quite a bit further back than that...
    - ywei3410 6y ago
      No; I don’t agree with that at all — the idea of extreme specialization for greater prosperity is from the foundations of Capitalism. /The Wealth Of Nations/ was only published in 1776. The Industrial revolution certainly introduced part of the idea of the modern workforce; see /Discipline and Punish/ [1] for a good overview of the evolution of attitudes, but extreme specialization of /worker skills/ was an alien idea. The existence of cottage industries prior to the Industrial revolution is illustrative of this fact. /Collaboration/ has been a hallmark of civilization; but it is revisionist to say that we have always specialized to this extreme or seen it as a necessary goal. For example, the blacksmith of feudal society didn’t only make spoons, nor the farmer a single crop. If we want to critique previous civilizations; we even need to be wary of the fact that such systems were determined primarily through morality, such as /Plato’s Republic/ or /Confucianism/ rather than any ideal of prosperity. The farmer was a farmer because that was his/her place not because they were better or worse at it. Even if I’m being charitable and equate division-of-labour to specialization; which, I think is a /huge/ leap — it does not counter the original point which is there is little autonomy in what you choose to do for a living in the logical conclusion of a system where you must specialize to compete. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discipline_and_Punish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discipline_and_Punish

Vrondi 6y ago

Amazing to see someone celebrating helplessness for the masses.

Spivak 6y ago
I don't think this is a resolvable conflict in general; one person's division of labor is someone else's helplessness. I think it's crazy that some people don't cook. Like every house and apartment comes with a kitchen, what do you mean you don't use it? "It's so much cheaper" I say ignoring the fact that I'm a cooking and baking enthusiast and so I'm not counting the fact that if I valued my time at any reasonable rate it's really not. It's the same thing in the woodworking community -- "you'll save so much money, anything you see in the store I can make half as good, for twice the price!"
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  > Like every house and apartment comes with a kitchen, what do you mean you don't use it? Traditionally in urban areas most people actually purchased food instead of making it, because most people did not have kitchens. You can kind of still see that today; many old New York tenements have been converted into apartments with "kitchens", but really this usually describes something about the size of an airplane bathroom with a stove, a fridge and 1 counter.
bobthepanda 6y ago
Is giving the people the freedom to do what they want and not focus on the pedantry of things they're not interested in "celebrating helplessness", or is it getting work for the sake of work out of the way?
spurgu 6y ago
Not sure if you're directing this comment at me, but I'm surely not celebrating it, merely observing it as a fact.

michaelmrose 6y ago

50% of the population of the US and 95% of the world would be unhealthy or poor if they all adopt that philosophy about food. Sounds like your bubble not modern society.