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> You don’t need to fix everything, just make the world better by being in it.

I wish more people would follow this advice. I've made it a habit to try to make the world an infinitesimally better place every day. It doesn't always work out, but the effort is a huge boon to my mental health and maybe I succeed and the world is a better place.

This is a demanding thing to achieve. The road to hel is paved with good intentions.

Philospy spends a lot of literature on how to tell if what you are doing is making the world any better?

History, current history is filled with examples of "making it better" and doing enormous damage.

Is your intent when you do the action what is important? Or is it how your action is received in the moment? Or what a spectator might conclude. Or is it the eventual consequences of your action that is important? Or none of the above.

Your intent is selfish. I want to be a person who makes the world a better place. Do you do so in a vacuum? You do the act, and then never ever speak about it to anyone. Or is the real goal the adoration of those you "tell"? (Innocently and self deprecating of course)

If you were (or are) an evangelical Chrisitan, sharing the word of God, and saving souls would be the greatest good you could ever accomplish. "Today I shared the Word with 5 people. "

Those 5 people may have found a person rambling about God to be unwelcome. Annoying. Rude.

Or maybe one was in a deep crisis, and he was moved and accepted Christ and his life took meaning from it. His life got better and afterwards he kept a good job, got married, had wonderful kids.

Or a person who was rambled at has terrible trauma from childhood from being sexually abused by a Catholic priest and this forceable reminder brings him over the edge, and he kills himself 20 minutes later in a public toilet.

Maybe one is a woman who was viciously demonized by protesters for having an abortion two weeks ago. This most unwelcome vocal assault by another right-wing misogynist is what finally drives her to take a stand and gets involved in politics, changes her major to political science and many years Later she is a senator who casts a deciding vote in something she think is wonderful

Did this evangelical guy make the world better?

Perfect is the enemy of good here I think :)

I generally work on a smaller scale and usually in regards to the people around me. Did I help? Inspire creativity? Say something kind? Say something that needed to be said? Learn something?

It doesn’t take much. Did you make someone else’s existence better?

You can still do big things, but don’t forgot the small ones. They matter too.

This is a more radical practice than most being presented here I think. Optimizing things is a cultural norm and value for most people likely reading this.

I see a lot of my peers focus on optimizing their "good output" on some scale or metric, but ignore or even devalue this one. This one that, in my experience, also has a lot more daily challenges of difficult virtues like forgiveness and humility.

My xmas gift to one of the other teams in the company was improving one of their alerts, so that it fires when there is an observable problem with the monitored thing, instead of firing pretty much constantly. Makes the alert more useful and saves them from alert fatigue.

The intent of "make the world a bit better every day" is colloquially understood to refer to things like picking up more than just your garbage, making choices that add less tragedy to the commons, and generally being nice to people even if they're not nice to you.

Deliberately taking "make the world a bit better every day" off to some demeaning tangent tearing down others by wild scenarios designed to discourage does not "make the world a bit better every day".

"...2000 years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change..." Yeah, Douglas Adams got that bit right.

I pick up trash in my neighborhood. It makes the neighborhood cleaner and more enjoyable for all. You might be overthinking this.

>You’ll never find me reading a book I don’t like

Some of the best books I've ever read I didn't like at first. Love in Time of Cholera was an absolute slog for the first 89 pages, I didn't actually get through those pages the first time I tried to read it. It's one of my all time favourite books. First 30 pages of Dune were similar. Found the same with another book by Dostoevsky.

Which Dostoevsky book?

I’m at that stage with The Brothers Karamazov right now. I have no idea what people see in it. Book 1 chapter 5.

The first 100-200 pages were a slog for me too. But pushing through was completely worth it, it's a masterpiece IMO

Dostoevsky is one of those authors for me whom I just really cannot stand when reading the book, but there are always quotes from them and critical interpretations of them that I find absolutely amazing. Hemingway is the same, except for The Old Man and The Sea.

Get up to the Grand Inquisitor story. You can stop after that, that's the peak for me, it went downhill from there.

It wasn't really fun to read. But like all russian novels, it's very long, devoid of adventure, full of characters you forget constantly. You read them to experience the russian soul, not to have fun. The best Dostoievsky for me is "The Player", one of the shortest and one whose lessons I constantly quote, especially around a horse race or a casino lol.

If you want enjoyable classics, Alexandre Dumas or Theophile Gautier are my go to but Im French so maybe the anglo world has some authors too as brilliant as Dumas but I doubt it. The best russian classic is Master and Margherita, it's a bit less slow than average but Boulgakov is special (a bit their Kafka).

This was a strange one for me. Profoundly boring, yet oddly captivating. I wanted to stop reading it the whole way through, but I just couldn't.

Notes from the underground. It's actually a two part novella. First part was very difficult to get through (I think it took me three tries), and then the second part was amazing. Couldn't have had the second part without the first though.

That is one of my favorite books. Why do you think the first part was difficult to get through for you?

Yeah. In the last three years I picked up Joyce's Ulysses, which I sputtered out on 35 years ago, and Pynchon's Mason & Dixon, which I sputtered out on 15 years ago. I now believe that Ulysses is the best book I've ever read, and Mason & Dixon is very good.

So much process. People think there's a formula, not well known, that greatly raises the chance for "success" however defined, for everything. Nope. IMHO the key to "anti-mimetic"[0] living is to cultivate your inner bullshit detector. My friends have a fully functioning one; people who turned out to be false do not; I have no idea how to nurture one for anyone else. There is no process, other than get as broad non-digital experiences as you can and use those to learn to think for yourself. I have no idea how you can do that, because apparently no-one who is not my friend appears to think doing this is sane.

[0] This Rene Girard stuff, fueled by lavish attention from Peter Thiel and his acolytes, is bullshit. Think not? Well a while ago, I thought it might have some validity, but then I read the review by Joshua Landy in my previous HN comment:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21955489#21956253

The child comments are interesting too. A moral of the story is that my bullshit detector initially failed me, but eventually, with more experience, I got it straightened out.

> I have no idea how to nurture one for anyone else.

The bullshit detector is usually intuition and, very rarely, is what's called 'wisdom'. Intuition is what I'd describe as "the right feeling" - ability to "hear" truth, in a sense. Wisdom is "the right knowledge" - ability to see the truth. Intuition is related to emotions, and can be improved by straigthening up one's emotions. An uncontrolled storm of emotions obscurates intuition, and hatred burns it. That's why, I think, a known occult aphorism says: "a moment of hatred erases eons of achievements". Wisdom is similarly related to thoughts and words, and so straightening up what one says and thinks, allows the wisdom to show up. The " all seeing eye" is the typical symbol of wisdom. Afaik, only few top scientists had it, and they attributed their ability to see truth to luck and lots of read books.

I believe that most people out there give in to emotions, those gradually turn into something more sinister - hatred fueled by vanity, that burns their intuition to the ground and from that moment they're unable to feel what's right and what's wrong.

> The bullshit detector is usually intuition and, very rarely, is what's called 'wisdom'. Intuition is what I'd describe as "the right feeling" - ability to "hear" truth, in a sense.

Careful there. In many domains our intuitions are notoriously unreliable, given they're informed by our culture, upbringing, past experiences, genes, etc.

Intuition isnt some sort of gut feeling, or advanced pattern matching. Intuition is more like "soul's ear" that cannot be wrong. But very few people have it and tend to confuse their biases and ignorance with intuition.

The best bullshit detector is to simply keep running through the implications of whatever is being suggested. If you see something marked 80% off look for a similar item that’s five times as expensive. I think the core issue is people have a lot of false and conflicting ideas floating around so they get used to cognitive dissonance.

Many groups have a vast vested interest in convincing people of obvious falsehoods. The phrase used is “Diamonds are forever” rather than the more honest “Diamonds are flammable.” Simply repeat it often enough and it’s the falsehood which sticks around like a lesser form of brainwashing.

Diamond being "forever" is a fairly weak example of something that's repeated without any truth because virtually the only way someone can lose one is through loss or theft. Repeating "diamonds are flammable" would start people farther from the truth. You yourself may have fallen prey to the overcorrecting anti-diamond meme - do they decay in any meaningful way, or are they just overpriced?

> do they decay in any meaningful way, or are they just overpriced.

The flammable thing is relevant because gold, platinum, or silver can be recovered after a fire, but Diamonds can’t be. It’s a real risk. Large ones regularly get chipped and their all susceptible to a range of chemicals including some acids etc.

Add it all up and nationwide Diamonds get destroyed on a very regular basis.

PS: And yes as you referenced they do decay at standard temperatures and pressures but reasonably slowly. Still diamonds last 1,000 years if well preserved just don’t have the same ring, paper can do the same. The simple fact the average stone is more stable feels like a slap in the face.

I think that might have more to do with their brittleness and their coefficient of thermal expansion than it does their flammability, but thanks for pointing out a danger I hadn't considered.

> If you see something marked 80% off look for a similar item that’s five times as expensive

When Facebook was first getting popular it triggered my bullshit detector.

I smelled bullshit because the underlying mechanism was social coercion to join, followed by social comparison to make everyone miserable.

It wasn't bullshit because it was bogus, it was bullshit because it stank.

My friends all have similar bullshit detectors for the spammy, the scammy and the coercive. If I knew how teach it, I'd be surprised if anybody who didn't already have it would even want to learn it.

The same work through the implications rule shows how anti-social Facebook is.

Sitting alone in your room looking through old photo albums isn’t social, but somehow going through other peoples photos is? Calling Facebook a social network is such a bold faced lie I am somewhat shocked anyone can say it with a strait face let alone honestly believe it. But it gets worse, calling clicking a like button on a news article “social” is such double think you almost wonder if these people are speaking the same language.

Sure. That doesn’t work for me. Tried it. After some time in therapy, I had to unlearn the compulsion to finish books, movies, or tv shows that I don’t enjoy.

If I’m reading for enjoyment, there’s plenty I can read. If I’m reading to learn, that’s why I’m here on HN. I have the next batch of acoup.blog and a 1890s textbook on ship handling on my eink tablet. Should keep me busy for the next month. :)

Taking the book example further, I’ve often found that doing something I don’t like in the moment can more than make up for it in long term happiness or skills gained. Skiing is a good example for me. I hated skiing, hated learning it, hated driving out to the mountain to do it. After putting in a lot of work, now I absolutely enjoy it and look forward to it seasonally and treasure all the memories I have created.

> Saying the truth no matter what the cost is extremely dangerous advice to follow literally.

And there’s the risk that you could be wrong… and / or just do more damage than good.

another way to think about it is if you reach a point where telling the truth no matter the cost, then maybe the path you've followed is sub-optimal.

but yes, this doesn't help you if you find yourself in that position.

Often times people don't want to hear the truth. A classic example in my own life was the gender wage gap in the late 2000s and early 2010s, especially with the Obama (forget the year) state of the union with the "all things equal" comment. A complete misunderstanding of the data by the majority of the population, and filled with highly charged emotions.

Sometimes it's dangerous to be right.

How you say what you perceive as the truth matters a lot. For example, saying “I believe this to be true” has a different effect then saying “ this is the truth.”

Providing the reasoning behind conclusions can also help- “I believe that unlimited migration is harmful to those poorest of those already here and that the rule of law is incredibly important, so I’m opposed to extending a path to citizenship” or “all human beings deserve the same dignity and from a practical standpoint an undocumented immigrant that has been working, paying taxes, and staying out of trouble is more worthy of citizenship than many who gained it simply at birth, so I support a pathway to citizenship.”

Both statements may still be problematic depending on the circumstances (where depending on the circumstances, the best option may be to say nothing) but they are far better than saying “illegal immigrations wrong” or “giving people a pathway to citizenship is the right thing to do.”

This is true in a logical sense, but also very impractical to actually apply.

You end up being drawn into super long winded discussions about minor details.

If that's what you actually want, that's fine. But a lot of the time you just want to resolve a deadlock.

> Pick battles you can win

Don't forget to pick some battles to make sure you still know how to battle. And pick some where you will lose so you can grow.

I’m not advising caution. I’m advising prudence. Choose where it’s worth putting your energy. This is the “fight we’re you need to fight” bit I mentioned.

Me arguing with my father about politics during thanksgiving is generally fruitless. Taking some time the next day discussing our assumptions and benefits that are behind our different beliefs? Generally a better approach and we can easily agree or disagree on single points. I may not “win” but both of us will know more about each other and have more respect for each other. (Or less. At least we didn’t yell and drag relatives in.)

> The really important thing here (that’s hinted at towards the end) is moderation.

Indeed. Arabs have this concept of al-Wasattiyah borrowed from Islam, which means middle / balanced / avoid extremes / compromise / weaken: "Al-Wasatiyyah... means excellence, rightfully balanced, just and fair in all aspects... Balance without any excessiveness in human life."

https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/a...

> Pick battles you can win. Know when saying the truth matters and when it doesn’t.

Great rules to live by. My own little corollary: learn which rules can be bent and which ones to disregard completely. They're not all created - or enforced - equally.

Win build on each other like compound interest. So does confidence. The two are almost inextricably linked.

> Saying the truth no matter what the cost is extremely dangerous advice to follow literally.

An example I use is someone knocks on your door and asks if you know where Maria is. You do, and you’re sheltering her. If you tell the truth, the person at the door will kill Maria. If you lie and say “I haven’t seen Maria”, the person will leave and continue looking elsewhere.

In this case, telling a lie is the moral thing, and telling the truth would be evil.

A common anecdote from Kant. Im not Kantian but I think (feel) that he is somewhat right that the lie IS wrong. I think the key is that no one can be perfect, and sometimes you have to make a decision between two things that are wrong. In this case lying is much less wrong than not.

This suggest a sort of morality that contains the axiom "lying is always wrong", which then demands torturous philosophical gymnastics in order to justify one's actions in circumstances when lying is obviously right. To say that lying is sometimes right does not diminish the merit of truthfulness, rather it is an acknowledgement that communication is a means to an end, and not the end itself.

This is why I reject the categorical imperative. The claim kant makes is that you still lie because it's more unethical to normalize a society of people being given up to murderers than it is to normalize a society of (white?)-liars.

I claim that this has degenerated into utilitarianism. This is also word for word what scopenhaur (a huge fan of kant) has to say about Kant's categorical imperative in his critique of Kant's ideas...

Someone who is unable to lie is classified by psychiatrists as "cognitively impaired".

I mean, you can truthfully say "even if I knew, I wouldn't tell you".

This invites much more opportunity for speculation on the person hunting a vulnerable person that you’re trying to protect. This is precisely what someone would say if they were avoiding lying but are trying to cover for a vulnerable person.

It's also the sort of thing that someone would say who wants waste the time of an evil government to delay them from carrying out their plans.

An evil government would just drag them out of their house.

If everyone on the street did it it would cause significant problems for the government.

Why would you try to waste the time of someone who has murderous intent? I think you might have lost the plot a little bit.

By wasting their time, they can't spend as much time murdering other people. Maybe you know your next door neighbor is running an underground railroad, and you want to distract from that.

Alas the first part "even if I knew" when you know that you do know, is not truthful..

And if you were not sheltering Maria, you could truthfully say "no", and would probably do so. The discrepancy in behavior is as good as a "yes'.

Just fix your mind on another Maria who isn't here, and tell the truth about her.

That’s what lying is.

Just don’t dob in the other Maria

Sounds like the buddha's middle path (that's a half serious remark). Those books also add that it's important to keep your thoughts, emotions, words and actions aligned, but like you say, nowhere those books say that you should express your opinion unprompted on every corner, and silence is a good answer when truth would only make things worse.