5 ms·

Anything in moderation.

rTX5CMRXIfFG 4y ago
Platitude, not useful advice. In reality, all it takes for too many people to spiral into bad habits is to have just a little taste.
- eyelidlessness 4y ago
  Okay, bad habits in moderation, everything else in excess.
- eikenberry 4y ago
  How many is too many? I don't think adiction disorder it that common.
- yomkippur 4y ago
  People have been consuming alcohol for a very long time. What you are describing is addiction and its part of our society. If not alcohol, its something else. Hell, some people get addicted to work. Again, everything in moderation is a sound advice. If you can't drink or have reasons not to, don't. But you won' t get invited to parties if you started saying out loud what you write on HN.
lapinot 4y ago
Yeah, this kind of study is for me quite at the pinnacle of the western problem with science and medicine where mental health and subtle social well-being is just pushed under the rug. Do we get the same publicity towards antibiotics, which are also like not without their big drawbacks? Or any kind of "science" stamped drugs and treatment really. Humans have been consuming what we call bad bad drugs now since i believe earlier than writing, even other animals are doing it. Maybe you know, practice and evolution, has determined it had positive effects. And perhaps (wow big idea) over-consumption of alcohol is a symptom and not an isolated problem. Oh yeah, this was financed by the B&M Gates foundation, explains some stuff about the pov. I'm not doubting the "internal" quality of this research, this is probably top notch statistics and data quality, but the philosophical ground and world view behind the institutions that produced it is so heavy at the same time.
- lbrito 4y ago
  I agree that this kind of article can be myopic (or used for myopic conclusions), but for the life of me I can't understand the hate Bill Gates and his foundation gets.
  - lapinot 4y ago
    Well because it's the money and globalization talking. In the middle of all the conspiracy shit you find online, there is also a ton of subtle and well-documented journalistic work explaining how sure they've helped poor kids in africa (who's against that?), but at the same time they're really bad at making the people they help self-sufficient and independent from global powers (which are the reason for their problems in the first place). They are giving stuff, but they are never really giving away the real thing. Why would they actually? They were cynical and capitalistic enough to actually make a shitton of money by exploiting people in the first place for a big part of their career (Bill Gates). By now we understand pretty much how they think about society and about what's good and bad. They are still somehow advancing the agenda of globalization. If you don't understand this, you ought to read about leftist critics of western humanitarian orgs. edit: see eg https://mondediplo.com/2022/07/11africa https://mondediplo.com/2022/07/11africa (sorry it's paywalled i'm looking into capturing it somewhere)
    - darawk 4y ago
      What is the "real thing" and how would one give it away?
      - lapinot 4y ago
        The real thing is materialistic independence and you give it away by educating skilled workers giving away IP and financing locally operated factories and other infrastructures. But global power have institutional safeguards against this because then they'll push themselves into a bad corner negotiating for resources they need themselves.
        4y ago

Platitude, not useful advice. In reality, all it takes for too many people to spiral into bad habits is to have just a little taste.

eyelidlessness 4y ago
Okay, bad habits in moderation, everything else in excess.
eikenberry 4y ago
How many is too many? I don't think adiction disorder it that common.
yomkippur 4y ago
People have been consuming alcohol for a very long time. What you are describing is addiction and its part of our society. If not alcohol, its something else. Hell, some people get addicted to work. Again, everything in moderation is a sound advice. If you can't drink or have reasons not to, don't. But you won' t get invited to parties if you started saying out loud what you write on HN.

lapinot 4y ago

Yeah, this kind of study is for me quite at the pinnacle of the western problem with science and medicine where mental health and subtle social well-being is just pushed under the rug. Do we get the same publicity towards antibiotics, which are also like not without their big drawbacks? Or any kind of "science" stamped drugs and treatment really. Humans have been consuming what we call bad bad drugs now since i believe earlier than writing, even other animals are doing it. Maybe you know, practice and evolution, has determined it had positive effects. And perhaps (wow big idea) over-consumption of alcohol is a symptom and not an isolated problem. Oh yeah, this was financed by the B&M Gates foundation, explains some stuff about the pov. I'm not doubting the "internal" quality of this research, this is probably top notch statistics and data quality, but the philosophical ground and world view behind the institutions that produced it is so heavy at the same time.

lbrito 4y ago
I agree that this kind of article can be myopic (or used for myopic conclusions), but for the life of me I can't understand the hate Bill Gates and his foundation gets.
- lapinot 4y ago
  Well because it's the money and globalization talking. In the middle of all the conspiracy shit you find online, there is also a ton of subtle and well-documented journalistic work explaining how sure they've helped poor kids in africa (who's against that?), but at the same time they're really bad at making the people they help self-sufficient and independent from global powers (which are the reason for their problems in the first place). They are giving stuff, but they are never really giving away the real thing. Why would they actually? They were cynical and capitalistic enough to actually make a shitton of money by exploiting people in the first place for a big part of their career (Bill Gates). By now we understand pretty much how they think about society and about what's good and bad. They are still somehow advancing the agenda of globalization. If you don't understand this, you ought to read about leftist critics of western humanitarian orgs. edit: see eg https://mondediplo.com/2022/07/11africa https://mondediplo.com/2022/07/11africa (sorry it's paywalled i'm looking into capturing it somewhere)
  - darawk 4y ago
    What is the "real thing" and how would one give it away?
    - lapinot 4y ago
      The real thing is materialistic independence and you give it away by educating skilled workers giving away IP and financing locally operated factories and other infrastructures. But global power have institutional safeguards against this because then they'll push themselves into a bad corner negotiating for resources they need themselves.
      - 4y ago