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> "Making music" they never release. Picking up little "pass the time" jobs. And these are people that aren't living "leanFIRE" > It seems like such a nihilist

> "Making music" they never release. Picking up little "pass the time" jobs. And these are people that aren't living "leanFIRE" > It seems like such a nihilistic way to live. You're just floating along the stream of life. Things worked out for you, but you have no further passion or inclination to improve the world? No problems you could set yourself to solving? You seem to assume or take for granted that releasing music for an external purpose, improving the world, solving problems, etc have inherent value. I would 100% disagree with that. I don't think there's any greater objective value to raising orphans than there is to playing video games for the rest of your life. If somebody wants to make music and never release it, then they should have the freedom to do so. Your comment is on par with criticizing people for living meaninglessly just for not having children, when not everybody values or enjoys having children. > complete leisure time 100% of the time or picking up arbitrary hobbies. I'm at the opposite end: I'm surprised how many people care about solving problems or things like that. I couldn't care less. If I were to win the lottery or something, I'd immediately erase my identity and go live in a castle/farm in a forest somewhere, making music I'll never release etc until I die, etc

munificent 6y ago
I think it's important to separate out the moral and psychological components here. I agree with you that if your bills are paid and you're harming no one, then you have no moral obligation to do anything more than sit on your butt and play videogames. It's your life. At the same time, humans are a social species. We have evolved brains and intrinsic motivation reward systems that only give us the real deep kinds of life-satisfaction emotions if we are putting real effort into something that we find to be meaningful in ways that help our perceived family or tribe. There are of course outliers who can spend indefinite days just binge-watching TV happy as a clam. But most of us are wired like border collies. If we don't have a herd to take care of some real reason to get out of bed in the morning, we go crazy.
- silicon2401 6y ago
  oddly, I somewhat agree with your position but in a reversed way. > There are of course outliers who can spend indefinite days just binge-watching TV happy as a clam. But most of us are wired like border collies. If we don't have a herd to take care of some real reason to get out of bed in the morning, we go crazy. I don't think these are outliers, I think these are a surprising majority. It's the classic bread and circuses or Soma concept: as long as people are fed a steady supply of moderate entertainment and material enjoyment, they are content to idle. And I would go further and say that you somewhat contradict your earlier position, which to me came across as being interested in solving problems and improving the world, not just your family/tribe. I would also point out that binge-watching TV is different from creating music, never to produce it. Kafka created amazing works that he specifically wanted destroyed. So from my perspective it's unclear if you look down on anything that isn't sacrifice for someone else's gain (external reward), created for sharing with others (external reward), or engaging with others (external reward). I'm not sure where you get your data that most humans are like border collies, but at least based on your comments it seems like you really value socially-based activities, so you may be overlooking the many others who don't need social interaction or external reward/response to find meaning and fulfillment.
  - munificent 6y ago
    > I don't think these are outliers, I think these are a surprising majority. It's the classic bread and circuses or Soma concept: as long as people are fed a steady supply of moderate entertainment and material enjoyment, they are content to idle. This is a typical cynical take, but not borne out by reality at all. Yes, people enjoy leisure, but look at how they really live and you'll observe that they enjoy it in the context of a larger meaningful framework. While there are many bullshit jobs, most people still work surprisingly hard at them in large part because they have at least some coworkers they care about and want to support. Even the most jaded employee does so to earn a paycheck that most use to take care of their families and loved ones. Related: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mS3uDqQL4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mS3uDqQL4 You're right that given the opportunity, many people will just idle and consume media. But if you notice, most of them aren't actually enjoying it much. It's a way to survive, but not to thrive. > And I would go further and say that you somewhat contradict your earlier position, which to me came across as being interested in solving problems and improving the world, not just your family/tribe. I said "perceived tribe", which for some includes the entire world. > it's unclear if you look down on anything Again, I'm making no moral claims. I'm not looking up or down at anyone. I'm just saying that if you observe humans as a species it is clear that most of them need meaningful social connections and effortful tasks that support those connections in order to thrive. Imagine you were an alien species building a human zoo. If you gave each person their own cell with unlimited videogames and movies, they would wither and die. Give them community and something meaningful to struggle for to benefit that community and they won't even know they're in a zoo. > so you may be overlooking the many others who don't need social interaction or external reward/response to find meaning and fulfillment. I am fairly introverted and as a software engineer, I obviously know lots and lots of other introverts. I many think the emotional experience of introverts in today's society is "I want more solitude". But that doesn't mean their optimal state is hermitage. (True hermits are vanishingly rare in the human species, less common than many severe mental illnesses.) That emotional response needs to be understood in the context of their lives. Everyone needs solitude to process their experiences, autonomous time to feel that they are the agents of their life, and time away from the draining experience of being surrounded by people we think of as "others" and need to raise some level of defenses of wear masks around. If you live in an urban area as a lowly employee of a giant corporation and spend all your down time consuming media instead of actually just sitting with your thoughts, then you get little of those. But that doesn't mean most people want an unbounded quantity of solitude anymore that wearing a cast for the rest of your life is somehow healthier than taking it off once the bone has knitted. What we need is balance, and while everyone has a different prefered quantity of solitude, there are very very few whose ideal is "no social interaction at all".
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
tasuki 6y ago
So, castle or farm? You can't just handwave this question away so easily! Would you hire people to take care of the castle or farm for you? I hear both are quite a lot of work! How exactly would you be spending your time, apart from making music?
- yladiz 6y ago
  I'm not that commenter, but if I won the lottery, like the big one, I'd buy a castle, gild one toilet, and Instagram the shit out of it, pun intended. Then I will never have to work again because I'll become an Influencer.
  - cercatrova 6y ago
    *Gild, geld means to castrate an animal.
    - yladiz 6y ago
      Thank you
- silicon2401 6y ago
  excellent question, by f-you money I mean serious f-you money (we're daydreaming, after all), so my vision is a literal stone castle as well as a nice farm. ideally these would be maintainable just by myself so maybe a modest fort-like castle and tiny homestead farm. not necessarily a disney castle and hundreds of acres of corn. aside from the farm likely taking up all my time (for however long i'm able to sustain that), pursue all my interests: exercise, language, reading, writing, watching movies/tv, taking photos, making films, lifting weights, kayaking, hiking, rock climbing, cooking/baking, biking, playing video games, drawing, spending time with loved ones, studying, the list is endless.
  - kozak 6y ago
    But who will be cleaning toilets in the castle?

munificent 6y ago

I think it's important to separate out the moral and psychological components here. I agree with you that if your bills are paid and you're harming no one, then you have no moral obligation to do anything more than sit on your butt and play videogames. It's your life. At the same time, humans are a social species. We have evolved brains and intrinsic motivation reward systems that only give us the real deep kinds of life-satisfaction emotions if we are putting real effort into something that we find to be meaningful in ways that help our perceived family or tribe. There are of course outliers who can spend indefinite days just binge-watching TV happy as a clam. But most of us are wired like border collies. If we don't have a herd to take care of some real reason to get out of bed in the morning, we go crazy.

silicon2401 6y ago
oddly, I somewhat agree with your position but in a reversed way. > There are of course outliers who can spend indefinite days just binge-watching TV happy as a clam. But most of us are wired like border collies. If we don't have a herd to take care of some real reason to get out of bed in the morning, we go crazy. I don't think these are outliers, I think these are a surprising majority. It's the classic bread and circuses or Soma concept: as long as people are fed a steady supply of moderate entertainment and material enjoyment, they are content to idle. And I would go further and say that you somewhat contradict your earlier position, which to me came across as being interested in solving problems and improving the world, not just your family/tribe. I would also point out that binge-watching TV is different from creating music, never to produce it. Kafka created amazing works that he specifically wanted destroyed. So from my perspective it's unclear if you look down on anything that isn't sacrifice for someone else's gain (external reward), created for sharing with others (external reward), or engaging with others (external reward). I'm not sure where you get your data that most humans are like border collies, but at least based on your comments it seems like you really value socially-based activities, so you may be overlooking the many others who don't need social interaction or external reward/response to find meaning and fulfillment.
- munificent 6y ago
  > I don't think these are outliers, I think these are a surprising majority. It's the classic bread and circuses or Soma concept: as long as people are fed a steady supply of moderate entertainment and material enjoyment, they are content to idle. This is a typical cynical take, but not borne out by reality at all. Yes, people enjoy leisure, but look at how they really live and you'll observe that they enjoy it in the context of a larger meaningful framework. While there are many bullshit jobs, most people still work surprisingly hard at them in large part because they have at least some coworkers they care about and want to support. Even the most jaded employee does so to earn a paycheck that most use to take care of their families and loved ones. Related: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mS3uDqQL4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mS3uDqQL4 You're right that given the opportunity, many people will just idle and consume media. But if you notice, most of them aren't actually enjoying it much. It's a way to survive, but not to thrive. > And I would go further and say that you somewhat contradict your earlier position, which to me came across as being interested in solving problems and improving the world, not just your family/tribe. I said "perceived tribe", which for some includes the entire world. > it's unclear if you look down on anything Again, I'm making no moral claims. I'm not looking up or down at anyone. I'm just saying that if you observe humans as a species it is clear that most of them need meaningful social connections and effortful tasks that support those connections in order to thrive. Imagine you were an alien species building a human zoo. If you gave each person their own cell with unlimited videogames and movies, they would wither and die. Give them community and something meaningful to struggle for to benefit that community and they won't even know they're in a zoo. > so you may be overlooking the many others who don't need social interaction or external reward/response to find meaning and fulfillment. I am fairly introverted and as a software engineer, I obviously know lots and lots of other introverts. I many think the emotional experience of introverts in today's society is "I want more solitude". But that doesn't mean their optimal state is hermitage. (True hermits are vanishingly rare in the human species, less common than many severe mental illnesses.) That emotional response needs to be understood in the context of their lives. Everyone needs solitude to process their experiences, autonomous time to feel that they are the agents of their life, and time away from the draining experience of being surrounded by people we think of as "others" and need to raise some level of defenses of wear masks around. If you live in an urban area as a lowly employee of a giant corporation and spend all your down time consuming media instead of actually just sitting with your thoughts, then you get little of those. But that doesn't mean most people want an unbounded quantity of solitude anymore that wearing a cast for the rest of your life is somehow healthier than taking it off once the bone has knitted. What we need is balance, and while everyone has a different prefered quantity of solitude, there are very very few whose ideal is "no social interaction at all".
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

tasuki 6y ago

So, castle or farm? You can't just handwave this question away so easily! Would you hire people to take care of the castle or farm for you? I hear both are quite a lot of work! How exactly would you be spending your time, apart from making music?

yladiz 6y ago
I'm not that commenter, but if I won the lottery, like the big one, I'd buy a castle, gild one toilet, and Instagram the shit out of it, pun intended. Then I will never have to work again because I'll become an Influencer.
- cercatrova 6y ago
  *Gild, geld means to castrate an animal.
  - yladiz 6y ago
    Thank you
silicon2401 6y ago
excellent question, by f-you money I mean serious f-you money (we're daydreaming, after all), so my vision is a literal stone castle as well as a nice farm. ideally these would be maintainable just by myself so maybe a modest fort-like castle and tiny homestead farm. not necessarily a disney castle and hundreds of acres of corn. aside from the farm likely taking up all my time (for however long i'm able to sustain that), pursue all my interests: exercise, language, reading, writing, watching movies/tv, taking photos, making films, lifting weights, kayaking, hiking, rock climbing, cooking/baking, biking, playing video games, drawing, spending time with loved ones, studying, the list is endless.
- kozak 6y ago
  But who will be cleaning toilets in the castle?