4 ms·
You feel that becoming a particular type of engineer you aspire to is meaningful, but once you get there you’ll realize you’re still yourself and you didn’t asc
by 300bps 4y ago
You feel that becoming a particular type of engineer you aspire to is meaningful, but once you get there you’ll realize you’re still yourself and you didn’t ascend to some higher level of being.
This viewpoint sounds to me like it’s coming from someone who is depressed.
I’ve had a long career with a lot of accomplishments and I wouldn’t trade any of it for anything. Yeah someday the sun will consume the inner planets and we’ll all be gone but I don’t think about that. I’m having an absolute blast with life doing whatever I want to do.
Some of the happiest times I’ve had were a direct result of working my butt off conceiving a goal, coming up with a plan, executing that plan and then enjoying the rewards of that goal.
I don’t envy the generation today. In 1982 when I turned on my first computer it did nothing but say, “READY.” If I wanted to play a game I had to type the BASIC or Assembly source code in from a magazine. That’s literally how I learned to program. Sure I played games but most of my time was productive - literally producing instead of consuming.
If I grew up today, what a difference it would be. Infinite distractions. My life would be totally different. I’ve said this many times - the 20th century was about humanity learning to live in a world with infinite sugar, fat and salt. The 21st century will be about humanity learning to live in a world of infinite information.
Will you consume the mental equivalent of broccoli or Pepsi? In the long run I’ve found it makes a tremendous difference in one’s level of happiness.
- metadat 4y agoHard disagree, I am not depressed at all and side with the parent comment's perspective. Everything is pointless. This also doesn't invalidate your enjoyment of your career and other accomplishments. They're good things [for you and those you touched], yet still ultimately pointless, merely tangential randomness to everyone outside of your little bubble. The Earth is a tiny, insignificant blue dot in the vastness of space which is the Universe. It appears to be rare but there is no evidence it is important or otherwise significant. It's eventual demise (in a very long time) is the likely outcome, just like what we observe with other planetary bodies.
- 300bps 4y agoI am not depressed at all and side with the parent comments perspective. Everything is pointless. Context matters and you seem to have ignored all of it and misunderstood what I was saying. We can agree that everything is ultimately pointless - as I said myself in the comment you’re responding to, one day the sun will engulf the inner planets before becoming a red dwarf. What I find unsettling though is the context in which “life is pointless” was brought up. It was essentially, “don’t feel bad about not accomplishing anything because life is pointless and accomplishing anything will not fulfill you anyway.” Do you agree with that sentiment? I don’t.
- metadat 4y agoAh, thanks for clarifying 300bps, and I sincerely apologize for misinterpreting and misunderstanding you. It was not intentional. I agree with you 100%, that is a self-defeating nihilist sentiment.
- fnordpiglet 4y agoOh I have had a great career and enjoyed it tremendously and still enjoy it. But I’ve had clear goals that were hard to achieve that I feel proud of achieving, but I had some other attachment in the “quest” that I thought would make me more like the folks I respected. It wasn’t until I became one of them that I realized they were never different than me, they had just worked hard like I had. If anything that’s humbling but it also cleared my mind of a lot of motivations that were based on a falsehood I told myself. I hear the same falsehoods in a lot of the engineers who look up to me now and I want to shake them and say “it’s not true.” But I’ve never gotten any of them to actually hear me.