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Comment by throwupper247 | Hacker News Reader

Selling something that people want isn't equal to providing value. Let me be pessimistic: coffee doesn't provide a positive value, because it's a drug that get's people addicted however little and subliminal. Maybe that is a value to society in general, but it isn't to the individual. The car definitely is an economic nessecity in some parts. I don't know what refridgerator oligarchy you are refering to and it specifically doesn't matter. I'm sure the term oligarchy relates negatively to democratic societies.

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I love coffee. It is one of the great pleasures of life, like chocolate and strawberries. It provides positive value to me.

Hedonism is your ultimate phylosophical truth, is it? Strawberries are hardly as heavily industrialised as coffee, calling your relationship with a hot bevarage a romantic one is doubtful. I am as pessimistic as your logic is flawed. There are few things in live the brain is prewired to feel a need for. Coffee supplis the illusion of fullfilling two or three enssential ones of these, hunger and thirst and sleep, but it doesn't actually provide the associated value.

Hedonism is as true as any other. Plenty of people, even if they are not familiar with philosophical terms and wouldn't self describe as such, are living according to hedonistic values. Plenty of people are living according to all sorts of different codes. Any system that defines value in a way that doesn't allow for these people, for example by saying that coffee doesn't have value, is a faulty one.

Economically, if a person is willing to spend $5 on coffee then coffee is worth $5 to them. Trying to attach solid philosophical reasoning behind that may be a fun thought experiment but it's hardly the solved one your responses seem to imply that you think it is.

No, hedonism is not true. It's a deceptive misconception of what values are a good guideline for a sustainable life. I was getting at the common notion that hedonists don't want to work, because it's no fun, which is obviously incompatible.

>any system that defines value in a way that doesn't allow for these people

wat

Hedonism defines pleasure as the primary and most intrinsic good so any system allowing it is just hedonism. WTF? How would any system acommodate competing theories? Fun thought experiment, sure.

>Economically

Usually it would go the other way, if coffee is worth something to me, I will be willing to pay that. You mess up simple logic, get your head straight.

I hate to continue on a tangent, but coffee is delicious and smells amazing and you'd have to be The Grinch to not enjoy the atmosphere in a good cafe. If you want some tangible benefits just throw in some sugar and cream.

It's disgustingly bitter, so much most can only bare it with milk and sugar.

Your subjective evidence is not convincing, even less as I was implying coffee had an addictive and hence behavioral conditioning effect, part of which comes from advertisement like yours, so stop it, will ya.

> disgustingly bitter

I take mine black. I admit it is an acquired taste, but oh what a glorious taste it is! Maybe you just had some bad coffee.

Coffee supplis the illusion of fullfilling two or three enssential ones of these, hunger and thirst and sleep, but it doesn't actually provide the associated value.

You know, for many, that's a completely irrelevant factor in their appreciation for coffee.

And by the way, I'm pretty sure it does quench thirst, seeing as it's 99% water.

No, I don't know.

If 99% water solution just has to satisfy thirst, then a 1% zyankali solution doesn't kill, is it? It's a bad comparison, because I really don't know what else coffee brew consists of exactly, but you probably don't either, so ... that pretty much wraps it up.

>"Selling something that people want isn't equal to providing value. Let me be pessimistic: coffee doesn't provide a positive value, because it's a drug that get's people addicted however little and subliminal. Maybe that is a value to society in general, but it isn't to the individual."

If you don't think someone selling you coffee that you want is providing value, then perhaps you should try make your own. Once you have to "spend" time to physically make/get yourself the good/product that you wanted, you'll quickly learn what "value" a seller provides. Technically, not the seller as much as the actual producer, but the seller provides value as well. And in most examples represents the entire supply chain.

That's just sad how much you are missing my point, all the while defending the coffee that your text kind of reads like you had too much before reading.

>"Selling something that people want isn't equal to providing value."

This is the point I was addressing.

>"Let me be pessimistic: coffee doesn't provide a positive value, because it's a drug that get's people addicted however little and subliminal."

Oh, so now it's "positive value". This is something you are imposing on the person based on your own personal opinion about value and coffee.

>"Maybe that is a value to society in general, but it isn't to the individual."

No, it's a value to the individual that chose it. You, being external to the hypothetical individual we are discussing, don't get to make decisions for said individual.

>"That's just sad how much you are missing my point, all the while defending the coffee that your text kind of reads like you had too much before reading."

My comment had nothing to do with advocating coffee.

>My comment had nothing to do with advocating coffee

My comment did. You can't just reply to the whole comment without considering that part.

No, your comment had to do with redefining value based on whether you think something is good for someone. Like coffee.

I was trying to tell you that there is a difference between what someone thinks about something's value and the actual value of that thing. It's called subjectivity and objectivity and I feel like your first comment in this thread sounds like you imply that there was no objectivity. The absolut is a special case of relativity: coffee is absolutely disgusting, even if it subjectively seems to taste relatively fine to some, they all agree that it was disgusting at first, hence it's called an aquired taste.

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