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And that's not nothing

dilbert.com

44 pointskingsidharth11 comments

I used to think that the lack of contentment we seem to feel with our current lifestyles (which qualify as opulent luxury by the standard of any king of days gone by) was a great tragedy.

I no longer believe this. The dissatisfaction we experience is a drive to accomplish more and drive the continued betterment of our race; the acquisitions and "keeping up with the Joneses" drive our productivity. There are perverse incentives, of course, to maximize our pay while minimizing our work. But at some point, to buy a $10,000 72" Plasma LED HDMI Gigajoule Laser TV, one must have done (or at least been around for) $10,000 worth of work.

Now, maybe Dilbert's dissatisfaction with his lot in life doesn't drive his productivity. Geeks are wont to build cool stuff for the sake of building cool stuff. Maybe I'm overanalyzing something that we should just laugh at. But as They Might Be Giants sang, "No one in the world ever gets what they want, and that is beautiful. Everybody dies frustrated and sad, and that is beautiful." Beautiful not because tragic sadness is good in and of itself, but because by striving to overcome our endless frustration, we guarantee our progeny a better quality of life.

>we guarantee our progeny a better quality of life

>the dissatisfaction we experience is a drive to accomplish more

These statements seem to conflict somewhat. Having a good quality of life doesn't seem consistent with being dissatisfied.

As for Dilbert: if success could only come at the price of others' happiness then 'success' would only taste bitter to the thoughtful individual.

The answer, it seems to me, is to enjoy where we are now as much as possible, including enjoying the process of trying to make the world slightly better.

> at some point, to buy a $10,000 72" Plasma LED HDMI Gigajoule Laser TV, one must have done (or at least been around for) $10,000 worth of work.

Or convinced a bank that at some point, we will have done $10,000 plus interest worth of work.

Bit of a stretch to suggest any $10k of work is a step towards 'the continued betterment of our race.' Certain efforts will help certain entities. Many people's work worsens our 'human condition,' see the opportunity cost of weapons dev or plasma-gigajoule-laser tv research (: But I suppose that's subjective.

Note that there's a http://www.dilbert.com/fast, too.

It may sound crazy, but there's people who get married with an ugly woman/man to feel better in the couple and be perceived by others as the coolest. In this case, the reference group is the spouse.

Do you have evidence for this assertion, or do you just suspect this every time you see someone who appears to have married out of their league?

Positional thinking carries a risk. We can look down and feel better, but there is always someone above who will make us feel worse.

Get the biggest house in a lower-income neighborhood, constant self-esteem boost.

My dad actually did this when he wanted to build a second home. He found a little lake whose lots seemed undervalued that had mostly crappy houses and built the nicest house around. Made him a happy camper.

Reference group: humanity.

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