4 ms·

I read In Praise of Idleness when I was 13-14 because an older person recommended it to me. Although the essay was written in the 1935, he convinced me this was

by wenc 2y ago

I read In Praise of Idleness when I was 13-14 because an older person recommended it to me. Although the essay was written in the 1935, he convinced me this was the future, and that it foretold what European life was going to be. And indeed, modern Western Europe lives this way -- where leisure is accorded importance, hard work is not the highest virtue, and citizens were free to create culture and invent new ideas. As evidence, he pointed to all the discoveries made by medieval monks and people with idle time to play with ideas, as opposed to the proletariat who worked but did not have the luxury to think higher thoughts. Idleness was thus the pre-condition for great ideas. In a sense, this is the vision of UBI -- where basic needs were met, and people were free to self-actualize. This is also the happy version of tenure in academia -- where you didn't have to worry about "publish or perish" but instead you get to work on really important ideas without showing results for years (multi year grants or being in a place like the IAS helps). Google in some ways used to operate like this before the current pivot -- many googlers lived a life of "resting and vesting" while wandering about for years looking for a big idea with little pressure to deliver anything. I definitely found this vision attractive, but as I grew older, I realized that it was not entirely tenable in it purest form. Yes, the best ideas certain came from having time to wander and work on different things (you get more creative working on multiple decorrelated ideas at the same time rather than one big idea), but in my experience, complete idleness without pressure to deliver anything does not work. I don't know if I believe the premise of In Praise of Idleness any more. We no longer live in a simple world. In a complex world, great ideas come from incrementalism, and keeping busy and making progress seems to be necessary in many domains in order get to the big idea because all the low hanging fruit have been plucked.

t43562 2y ago
Keep yourself busy on one thing if you want to. If you don't then why are you doing it?
advael 2y ago
I think Russel, like many scientists, feels the need to dangle "the next big idea" as a tantalizing reason to allow more idleness. I do think that in an important sense, he is right and you are wrong, that "pressure to deliver" is not as necessary as you think, and that the world has not changed so much since his time so as for him to have once been right but now be wrong However, I think this takes for granted the primacy of "big ideas" as the sole organizing principle we should arrange the world to efficiently produce, by force if necessary. I think the real argument for UBI is that self-determination is a core value, that the negotiations we make to better society neither need nor should involve a gun to the head of every person not born into wealth. I also think that overvaluing efficiency, expediency, and generally speaking impatience is pushing our species off a cliff
- naveen99 2y ago
  It turns out universal basic literacy (reading and math) and universal basic effort (2 hours of walking or equivalent anctivity) are even more important.
  - advael 2y ago
    I agree with you that both of these things, and more, are important to encourage in society. In fact, I'd even say that literacy has more components than that, like for example understanding the importance of precision in language, like knowing that "effort" is an overly vague and connotationally loaded choice of words when describing the universal benefits of regular exercise. However, I'm not really sure why any this is relevant in the context of this discussion
  - N_Lens 2y ago
    [dead]
bee_rider 2y ago
I do wonder if the problem is not enough, or too much idleness. Isaac Newton is regarded as a genius, but he worked on really basic stuff like calculus and Newtonian mechanics. Of course it was harder, when he and his competitors were inventing it. Sure, we handle more complex stuff now. But modern highschool material used to be really complex. Eventually theory, frameworks, language, and pedagogy, develop around a field that make it look deceptively simple. That’s still incrementalism but incrementation comes from the next generation that grew up in an environment where our discoveries are table stakes. Is it possible that you no longer live in a simple world, because you’ve become an expert, and moved on from ingesting the refined model from the previous generation, to either applying the current unrefined model to the hardest problems it can handle, or to building the model for the next generation?
- galdosdi 2y ago
  To your point, I took a History of Math class in college, and one week we had to actually do calculus the way Leibniz and Newton would have done it. Some exercise that was easy in our modern notation was actually very painful using period accurate tools. I forget the details, but remember the feeling.
DenisM 2y ago
Low-hanging fruit depletion is a problem, but there are ways of dealing with it: - A larger number of people searching for the next Newtonian apple all over the place. - A smaller number of larger groups that pursue a narrow area with intense focus. That’s more like “work” though. - New areas. Especially software. Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple were created by tinkerers with the privilege of free time. This process did not yet stop. To your other point, not every idle person will pursue new knowledge. And that's ok. A larger number of idle people will contain a larger number of tinkerers.
user_7832 2y ago
Re: your last paragraph I would say there's a mid-point somewhere between overworked 60-hour-a-week employees burning out and folks doing absolutely nothing productive. The nature and environment of work is important too, if you're tilling a farm there's an upper limit on your output, but with the internet anyone can be made to feel inadequate for not "hustling"/"grinding" enough.
- eszed 2y ago
  Russell's proposed mid-point is 20 (or maybe 24?) hours of work in a week. That seems sensible to me!
jimsimmons 2y ago
It comes down to honesty. Are you idle because you want to be idle or are you just being lazy and not going after the opportunity right before you? Are you not pursuing the low-hanging fruit out of principle or is your ego holding you back from doing humbler things? If you can be honest with such questions then the duality goes away and everything boils down to doing the right thing
- t43562 2y ago
  This is not about idleness or laziness at all. It's about working for the man versus doing what you want to do.
  - jimsimmons 2y ago
    Right, how do you know what you want to do is not sleeping 15 hrs a day versus getting inspired by some idea
    - hackable_sand 2y ago
      You can do both at the same time.
    - t43562 2y ago
      Why shouldn't you sleep more if you want to? Why should you feel under pressure to not sleep because you have to add 0s to some billionaire's account - that's exactly what my daily work is about BTW.
      - mantas 2y ago
        Who will pay for food on your table and roof above your head? Billionaires pay little tax so that’s not the answer.
    - immibis 2y ago
      If you're actually tired enough to sleep for 15 hours a day then you need it and you'll be much more productive in the remaining 9 hours if you do it. If this condition persists more than say a couple of weeks (if you have some severe sleep debt) then see a doctor. If you mean lying in bed awake but not really doing anything, then (a) thinking is doing something, (ii) if you're not thinking and just moping then there's a reason why you are depressed and it's not simply that you are just lazy. Right now, the political climate is a big one for a lot of people. And (3) maybe you just haven't stumbled on the right inspiration yet. It's random. Give it time. Go and do some stuff that seems kinda interesting, in the meantime. I've been in a similar state for several months; I've done some stuff but nothing that exciting. Attending FOSDEM for the first time this year inspired me to join a hackerspace, and to read the code of some open source projects to learn how they work. Some days I stay in bed most of the day or just graze YouTube whether in bed or not (and I hate that after the fact). Some days I want to do something so I do it.
apples_oranges 2y ago
Maybe low hanging fruit only hang low in hindsight. There’s a kind of control-certainty associated with some things, we got this, and there are some things where we at least know what we need to work on. Other things are more vague. So we now have more of the first category (in some areas) and this makes the apples appear to be lower than they were and most likely still are.
mycologos 2y ago
Another complication is that boredom was easier to come by in 1932. There are far more things competing with far more sophistication for our attention today. Boredom is underrated!
hyperthesis 2y ago
"[A]ll the low hanging fruit have been plucked" from these trees. In a complex, highly multi-dimensional space, yes, there's always a hill to incrementally climb. There are other hills. Incrementalism gets you necessary data; but not necessarily insight. EDIT Of course, following up an idea is work.
- ip26 2y ago
  Climbing this hill is the only way you’ll discover the far more tantalizing peak, hidden in the clouds above it.
deepsun 2y ago
My friend professional musician says that it's a common myth that muse comes to artists randomly. He says the best inspiration comes from invoices, and deadlines definitely help.
- willsoon 2y ago
  That's true. Ideas comes from total idleness or come from being under total pression. Maybe ideas just... comes.
ip26 2y ago
It might be a low hanging fruit problem, but just look to all the great ideas that took the tireless efforts of tens of thousands of people to bring to life. Few modern marvels are the product of an solitary, idle daydreamer. To connect with modern dialogue, we’re talking about the “idea guy”.
nextaccountic 2y ago
> Google in some ways used to operate like this before the current pivot -- many googlers lived a life of "resting and vesting" while wandering about for years looking for a big idea with little pressure to deliver anything. I think Valve works like this too (not sure if they stopped)
flyingspaceship 2y ago
I think most niches right now are vulnerable to someone with passion to come in and completely change everything. The only exception being limited items like GPUs and oil. Online dating for example is a complete hellscape and there's room for about a thousand passionate individuals to come in at various angles to try to improve it.

by wenc 2y ago

t43562 2y ago

Keep yourself busy on one thing if you want to. If you don't then why are you doing it?

advael 2y ago

I think Russel, like many scientists, feels the need to dangle "the next big idea" as a tantalizing reason to allow more idleness. I do think that in an important sense, he is right and you are wrong, that "pressure to deliver" is not as necessary as you think, and that the world has not changed so much since his time so as for him to have once been right but now be wrong However, I think this takes for granted the primacy of "big ideas" as the sole organizing principle we should arrange the world to efficiently produce, by force if necessary. I think the real argument for UBI is that self-determination is a core value, that the negotiations we make to better society neither need nor should involve a gun to the head of every person not born into wealth. I also think that overvaluing efficiency, expediency, and generally speaking impatience is pushing our species off a cliff

naveen99 2y ago
It turns out universal basic literacy (reading and math) and universal basic effort (2 hours of walking or equivalent anctivity) are even more important.
- advael 2y ago
  I agree with you that both of these things, and more, are important to encourage in society. In fact, I'd even say that literacy has more components than that, like for example understanding the importance of precision in language, like knowing that "effort" is an overly vague and connotationally loaded choice of words when describing the universal benefits of regular exercise. However, I'm not really sure why any this is relevant in the context of this discussion
- N_Lens 2y ago
  [dead]

bee_rider 2y ago

I do wonder if the problem is not enough, or too much idleness. Isaac Newton is regarded as a genius, but he worked on really basic stuff like calculus and Newtonian mechanics. Of course it was harder, when he and his competitors were inventing it. Sure, we handle more complex stuff now. But modern highschool material used to be really complex. Eventually theory, frameworks, language, and pedagogy, develop around a field that make it look deceptively simple. That’s still incrementalism but incrementation comes from the next generation that grew up in an environment where our discoveries are table stakes. Is it possible that you no longer live in a simple world, because you’ve become an expert, and moved on from ingesting the refined model from the previous generation, to either applying the current unrefined model to the hardest problems it can handle, or to building the model for the next generation?

galdosdi 2y ago
To your point, I took a History of Math class in college, and one week we had to actually do calculus the way Leibniz and Newton would have done it. Some exercise that was easy in our modern notation was actually very painful using period accurate tools. I forget the details, but remember the feeling.

DenisM 2y ago

Low-hanging fruit depletion is a problem, but there are ways of dealing with it: - A larger number of people searching for the next Newtonian apple all over the place. - A smaller number of larger groups that pursue a narrow area with intense focus. That’s more like “work” though. - New areas. Especially software. Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple were created by tinkerers with the privilege of free time. This process did not yet stop. To your other point, not every idle person will pursue new knowledge. And that's ok. A larger number of idle people will contain a larger number of tinkerers.

user_7832 2y ago

Re: your last paragraph I would say there's a mid-point somewhere between overworked 60-hour-a-week employees burning out and folks doing absolutely nothing productive. The nature and environment of work is important too, if you're tilling a farm there's an upper limit on your output, but with the internet anyone can be made to feel inadequate for not "hustling"/"grinding" enough.

eszed 2y ago
Russell's proposed mid-point is 20 (or maybe 24?) hours of work in a week. That seems sensible to me!

jimsimmons 2y ago

It comes down to honesty. Are you idle because you want to be idle or are you just being lazy and not going after the opportunity right before you? Are you not pursuing the low-hanging fruit out of principle or is your ego holding you back from doing humbler things? If you can be honest with such questions then the duality goes away and everything boils down to doing the right thing

t43562 2y ago
This is not about idleness or laziness at all. It's about working for the man versus doing what you want to do.
- jimsimmons 2y ago
  Right, how do you know what you want to do is not sleeping 15 hrs a day versus getting inspired by some idea
  - hackable_sand 2y ago
    You can do both at the same time.
  - t43562 2y ago
    Why shouldn't you sleep more if you want to? Why should you feel under pressure to not sleep because you have to add 0s to some billionaire's account - that's exactly what my daily work is about BTW.
    - mantas 2y ago
      Who will pay for food on your table and roof above your head? Billionaires pay little tax so that’s not the answer.
  - immibis 2y ago
    If you're actually tired enough to sleep for 15 hours a day then you need it and you'll be much more productive in the remaining 9 hours if you do it. If this condition persists more than say a couple of weeks (if you have some severe sleep debt) then see a doctor. If you mean lying in bed awake but not really doing anything, then (a) thinking is doing something, (ii) if you're not thinking and just moping then there's a reason why you are depressed and it's not simply that you are just lazy. Right now, the political climate is a big one for a lot of people. And (3) maybe you just haven't stumbled on the right inspiration yet. It's random. Give it time. Go and do some stuff that seems kinda interesting, in the meantime. I've been in a similar state for several months; I've done some stuff but nothing that exciting. Attending FOSDEM for the first time this year inspired me to join a hackerspace, and to read the code of some open source projects to learn how they work. Some days I stay in bed most of the day or just graze YouTube whether in bed or not (and I hate that after the fact). Some days I want to do something so I do it.

apples_oranges 2y ago

Maybe low hanging fruit only hang low in hindsight. There’s a kind of control-certainty associated with some things, we got this, and there are some things where we at least know what we need to work on. Other things are more vague. So we now have more of the first category (in some areas) and this makes the apples appear to be lower than they were and most likely still are.

mycologos 2y ago

Another complication is that boredom was easier to come by in 1932. There are far more things competing with far more sophistication for our attention today. Boredom is underrated!

hyperthesis 2y ago

"[A]ll the low hanging fruit have been plucked" from these trees. In a complex, highly multi-dimensional space, yes, there's always a hill to incrementally climb. There are other hills. Incrementalism gets you necessary data; but not necessarily insight. EDIT Of course, following up an idea is work.

ip26 2y ago
Climbing this hill is the only way you’ll discover the far more tantalizing peak, hidden in the clouds above it.

deepsun 2y ago

My friend professional musician says that it's a common myth that muse comes to artists randomly. He says the best inspiration comes from invoices, and deadlines definitely help.

willsoon 2y ago
That's true. Ideas comes from total idleness or come from being under total pression. Maybe ideas just... comes.

ip26 2y ago

It might be a low hanging fruit problem, but just look to all the great ideas that took the tireless efforts of tens of thousands of people to bring to life. Few modern marvels are the product of an solitary, idle daydreamer. To connect with modern dialogue, we’re talking about the “idea guy”.

nextaccountic 2y ago

> Google in some ways used to operate like this before the current pivot -- many googlers lived a life of "resting and vesting" while wandering about for years looking for a big idea with little pressure to deliver anything. I think Valve works like this too (not sure if they stopped)

flyingspaceship 2y ago

I think most niches right now are vulnerable to someone with passion to come in and completely change everything. The only exception being limited items like GPUs and oil. Online dating for example is a complete hellscape and there's room for about a thousand passionate individuals to come in at various angles to try to improve it.