4 ms·

It turns out humanity's real soul (at least most of it) is always looking for gimmicks to waste their time - be it compulsive little "games", the gadget of the

• daeken 14y ago
  People have always had their ways to escape; prayer, sewing, radio, books, TV. That doesn't mean we're in any less capable position to do amazing things. Do I think we take our information-rich world for granted? Yes. Does that make us lazy or in any way bad? No.
  • herval 14y ago
    I'm not implying people from the past where any more productive or interested in challenge than today's (they were not). The main difference, though, is that a larger number of people leave in stable/confortable enough lives today than in the past - thus the number of people doing nothing but indulging themselves is proportionally larger...
    • bermanoid 14y ago
      You say that as if it's a bad thing. To me, "the number of people doing nothing but indulging themselves is proportionally larger" sounds like a good thing, a clear indicator that we've come a long way - we're so well off now that you don't actually have to do anything useful in order to survive. That's awesome, to the extent that it's true. Our goal should be a day when nobody has to work, and everything that we want done happens anyways. We're still pretty far from that, but I think motion in that direction is a positive indicator, not a negative one.
      • herval 14y ago
        That's a very dreadful prospect of a future... And yes, I think it's a pretty bad thing. On a related note, the book "Childhood's End" covers this topic quite well from my point of view. In the end, no one had to move a finger for anything. And it was damn boring and counter-evolutionary...