4 ms·

The Cooperites of New Zealand have an even more secluded lifestyle, very religious, they seem to put on a lot of skits, plays, singing, things like dunk tanks f

by wincy 5y ago

The Cooperites of New Zealand have an even more secluded lifestyle, very religious, they seem to put on a lot of skits, plays, singing, things like dunk tanks for fun. There’s a lot of working and time for seriousness but they definitely seemed to have a good sense of humor and find time for fun. Plus working communally you’re always around other people socializing. I think our modern lifestyle is astoundingly isolated compared to pre industrial people, even hunter gatherer cultures have hunting parties rather than a lone wolf hunter.

agumonkey 5y ago
That's partly what I assume. I think our social side came from survival in harsh condition. Falsely comfy society remove the need to live together, while subjecting us to a strange chaos. Some war veteran said they preferred the battlefield because even with the threat of death, the life in those times were closer, more intense. Now that's an extreme case but it's telling. And even about art/leisure.. you don't need much to go deep. Singing, playing drums, dancing doesn't require anything modern. People had pigments or crude material to craft but still it's something.
- mlyle 5y ago
  This debate -- noble, enlightened savages vs. modern culture -- comes up again and again on the internet. To me it seems to miss the point. Modern life is not something that was intentionally designed. We're talking about the emergent output of different complicated systems, with wonderful things and horrific things enabled by both. Undoubtedly we've sacrificed some of the best aspects of the past for dubious gains. Undoubtedly we're better off in deep, fundamental ways. Meaningful self-actualization is harder than ever, because finding meaning is hard and we've studied the problem enough that fooling ourselves has gotten harder. One of the problems with an increasingly global culture and economic system is the erosion of diversity. If we had drastically different systems and experiences, we could try and marry the best aspects from each. Instead, we get some semi-stable equilibrium that emerged by happenchance and the only path out towards something different seems to be by some kind of central planning or massive movement-- both of which have tended to make things worse in practice because of unintended consequences and institutional inertia.
  - agumonkey 5y ago
    How I see the last 200 years of progress was that past life was indeed harsh and chaotic (how do you handle potential deadly diseases popping anywhere without biological models.. not easy). Ensuring more food, more time for the mass was an obvious unstoppable benefit, but to a certain extent. > One of the problems with an increasingly global culture and economic system is the erosion of diversity. If we had drastically different systems and experiences, we could try and marry the best aspects from each. Instead, we get some semi-stable equilibrium that emerged by happenchance and the only path out towards something different seems to be by some kind of central planning or massive movement-- both of which have tended to make things worse in practice because of unintended consequences and institutional inertia. I'm not sure I fully get your paragraph (you write conceptually dense ideas) but I kinda see a globalized homogenization of cultures which seems impoverished.
    - mlyle 5y ago
      > I'm not sure I fully get your paragraph (you write conceptually dense ideas) but I kinda see a globalized homogenization Yes--- . The problem is that there are massive economies of scale and interconnection driven by trade and global markets. In turn, the large scale of the marketplace doesn't leave much room for labor or capital to not be allocated "optimally". In turn, the amount of ability any given entity (individual people, businesses, or even nation-states) have to experiment with significantly different systems is very limited. For experiments on the smaller scale, there's a big chance they are not applicable to broader groups. And experiments on the larger scale (revolutions, massive policy changes, etc) tend to have unintended consequences and a massive body count. We're in a stable-ish equilibrium, but it's completely unlikely we're near any kind of global optimum on material wealth, or quality of life, or any other given chosen axis. > of cultures which seems impoverished. This is an interesting one, too. There was a certain threshold of wealth reached just before industrialization which allowed a massive growth in cultural expression and we have wonderful things from many cultures that emerged then... that then, with global media and global trade we've been able to enrich further-- we've played off of and learned and enjoyed the riches (culinary, musical, artistic, literary, ....) thereof. But in so doing we've strip-mined this heritage and permanently weakened the nation-scale incubators of new ideas.

by wincy 5y ago

agumonkey 5y ago

That's partly what I assume. I think our social side came from survival in harsh condition. Falsely comfy society remove the need to live together, while subjecting us to a strange chaos. Some war veteran said they preferred the battlefield because even with the threat of death, the life in those times were closer, more intense. Now that's an extreme case but it's telling. And even about art/leisure.. you don't need much to go deep. Singing, playing drums, dancing doesn't require anything modern. People had pigments or crude material to craft but still it's something.

mlyle 5y ago
This debate -- noble, enlightened savages vs. modern culture -- comes up again and again on the internet. To me it seems to miss the point. Modern life is not something that was intentionally designed. We're talking about the emergent output of different complicated systems, with wonderful things and horrific things enabled by both. Undoubtedly we've sacrificed some of the best aspects of the past for dubious gains. Undoubtedly we're better off in deep, fundamental ways. Meaningful self-actualization is harder than ever, because finding meaning is hard and we've studied the problem enough that fooling ourselves has gotten harder. One of the problems with an increasingly global culture and economic system is the erosion of diversity. If we had drastically different systems and experiences, we could try and marry the best aspects from each. Instead, we get some semi-stable equilibrium that emerged by happenchance and the only path out towards something different seems to be by some kind of central planning or massive movement-- both of which have tended to make things worse in practice because of unintended consequences and institutional inertia.
- agumonkey 5y ago
  How I see the last 200 years of progress was that past life was indeed harsh and chaotic (how do you handle potential deadly diseases popping anywhere without biological models.. not easy). Ensuring more food, more time for the mass was an obvious unstoppable benefit, but to a certain extent. > One of the problems with an increasingly global culture and economic system is the erosion of diversity. If we had drastically different systems and experiences, we could try and marry the best aspects from each. Instead, we get some semi-stable equilibrium that emerged by happenchance and the only path out towards something different seems to be by some kind of central planning or massive movement-- both of which have tended to make things worse in practice because of unintended consequences and institutional inertia. I'm not sure I fully get your paragraph (you write conceptually dense ideas) but I kinda see a globalized homogenization of cultures which seems impoverished.
  - mlyle 5y ago
    > I'm not sure I fully get your paragraph (you write conceptually dense ideas) but I kinda see a globalized homogenization Yes--- . The problem is that there are massive economies of scale and interconnection driven by trade and global markets. In turn, the large scale of the marketplace doesn't leave much room for labor or capital to not be allocated "optimally". In turn, the amount of ability any given entity (individual people, businesses, or even nation-states) have to experiment with significantly different systems is very limited. For experiments on the smaller scale, there's a big chance they are not applicable to broader groups. And experiments on the larger scale (revolutions, massive policy changes, etc) tend to have unintended consequences and a massive body count. We're in a stable-ish equilibrium, but it's completely unlikely we're near any kind of global optimum on material wealth, or quality of life, or any other given chosen axis. > of cultures which seems impoverished. This is an interesting one, too. There was a certain threshold of wealth reached just before industrialization which allowed a massive growth in cultural expression and we have wonderful things from many cultures that emerged then... that then, with global media and global trade we've been able to enrich further-- we've played off of and learned and enjoyed the riches (culinary, musical, artistic, literary, ....) thereof. But in so doing we've strip-mined this heritage and permanently weakened the nation-scale incubators of new ideas.