Not sure of the quote you have in mind, but the idea of equality causing status anxiety goes back to Tocqueville.
297 karma · joined September 20, 2012
> “First: Survival is the primary need of civilization. Second: Civilization continuously grows and expands, but the total matter in the universe remains constant. One more thing: To derive a basic picture of cosmic sociology from these two axioms, you need two other important concepts: chains of suspicion and the technological explosion.”
1. you can never know the intentions of other entities, and they cannot know yours (chain of suspicion)
2. technology level grows unpredictably (technological explosion)
3. the goal of civilization is survival
4. resources are finite but growth is infinite
As soon as you identify another entity in the forest, even if they cannot annihilate you at present and signal peace, both could change without warning. Therefore, the only rational move is to eradicate the other immediately. (Especially if you believe the other will deduce the same.)
Elimination in the book is basically sending a nuke, not a costly invasion force.
not sure it actually is true, but that's the argument in the book
It's a silly story: I recently wrote a program to create my diet from the week based on local grocery store nutrition labels and prices for a couple hundred items, subject to constraints for calories, macronutrients (supporting my goals in the gym) and micronutrients (hit all RDIs for vitamins and minerals plus some speculative stuff). Meat is never included in the generated output because it's too expensive relative to what it offers from a nutrient perspective. All of my daily needs can be met for cheap and with minimal prep on a diet consisting basically of rice, beans, eggs, soy milk, oat milk, pea protein, Brussel sprouts, carrots, and apple juice, which works out to <$15/day for ~3000 calories; <$10/day if I remove some personalized constraints which adds lentils and substitutes cow milk in place of plant milks. Prior to my program, I was spending $20+/day buying groceries mindlessly or on takeout.
I've basically become a vegetarian out of sheer frugality and laziness (I don't like cooking and I don't like solving a puzzle to hit my macros each day). I imagine many people could be convinced to be weekday vegetarians from this angle, but it did take me several months to work through nutrition science books/videos to arrive at this point. (Shout out RP Strength.)
The other issue with my diet is that it is not optimized for taste or variety. I don't mind this (condiments go a long way and I'm pretty focused on my fitness goals), but I think I'm an outlier in this respect.
Anyway, all this to say I see an economic angle for hope, except that all messaging to the public on nutrition science is awful and confusing which leads to consumption decisions not based in any logical framework, and I doubt that behavior will change anytime soon unless we go through another economic shock.
Can you give an example? I feel like there is a really key insight here but I'm having trouble parsing it.
Tobin did a really wonderful interview in 2008 that made me really appreciate electronic music more when I read it regarding how drum and bass is truly avant garde given its manipulative use of samples rather than simply looping beats or lifting long samples because they need a saxophone somewhere: [2]
> Rusty: It seems like now, your more recent music has been more synthetic, more digital and less samples? Is that correct? Or are you just tweaking the samples so much?
> Amon Tobin: It's really just about manipulation now. Like I said, back in the early nineties, it was interesting just to take samples as they were and see what you could do with them. And now, the technology has advanced so much more and there's a lot more room for maneuvers between synthesizers and synthetic processes applied to recorded material and sampled material. So there's much more of a hybrid going on now as far as I'm concerned and so my music is maybe now a little bit less easy to define in terms of is it sampled best or is it synthesized or is it just, you know, I guess, electronic, really.
> ...
> Rusty: I know. I was going back through some of my older CD's from that period, which I hadn't listened to in a while, and I was like "That was really good." I mean, it's super stylistic, so you tend to burn out if you hear a little too much of it.
> Amon Tobin: Well, the interesting thing about drum and bass is that it was, to me it felt like it was a genuinely forward-thinking type of music. People were really trying to do new things. They weren't trying to be nostalgic or relive some golden era of music in the seventies. It was all about 'Let's try and make something truly futuristic and do things with production that had never been possible before.' And that spirit still remains, as small as the genre is. It's influenced a lot of other types of music which are much more in the forefront now. So, you know, I think it's normal. These things go in cycles. Things become, you know, they become very much in the spotlight.
A very modernist take, pushing boundaries for its own sake. Contrast with pop music which is exactly the opposite, being rearrangements of standards.
Somehow I find his music is perfect for working with code. It feels like it really meshes with my mind in a way I've never found with other artists.
Also was sad to see he recently retired from live shows, but am glad I got to see him live several times several times in San Franciso. He shows were always mind-blowing and it's such a pleasure to see a master at work. Plus I respected how humble he was; his talent is far far beyond artists who are more financially successful, and he avoids the spotlight. I wish there was more available about how his mind works, because it must be very unique.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_General_Theory_of_Employme...
Can you expand on this. Do you think think engineering schools select for ADHD? Just curious, haven't heard this before.
- Special case of the above: They allow people who have want to trade huge amounts of a commodity a way to efficiently do so (no need to talk with multiple people; can do the trade all in one place).
- By making trading more efficient, society can get a better idea of the "true" price of things. Extremely important because prices guide investment. For example, if you're a farmer, and you're thinking about what crops to plant or a research lab thinking about where to focus your research. Having an efficient market with accurate prices ensures the economy grows at max speed.
Because of cocaethylene? Can't find anything online that makes it clear what the danger is.
The redeeming factor of the film for me was its visual style, which was innovative for its time, and defined the cyberpunk aesthetic that we are familiar with today. The dark dystopian ecumenopolis, neon lights, giant ads, flying cars, etc.
Also worth pointing out that there were several different versions of the film, and some of them have a worse ending than others.
I've found myself in a similar point in life (currently 29). When I was young, everyone encouraged me to learn, and I think I get intrinsic pleasure from it, so like you I've done an enormous amount of reading on a variety of topics.
# Ways being extremely curious can be bad that nobody tells you about
Not long ago, I started to feel discouraged because it didn't seem like the rules I was following in my life were actually making my life better. I think this was for a few reasons:
- For a long time I was reading articles on HN, Twitter, and elsewhere, so my attention was being extremely divided. When I became aware of this, I killed all my newsfeeds and just started reading books. Obviously I'm still here on HN, but I'm happy to say I read a fraction of what I used to.
- I prioritize learning something interesting over doing things that would make my life better, so I struggle with taking care of myself (e.g. cooking, household chores). I often wonder if I'm actually using learning as a distraction from anxiety.
- I started to realize most of the things I learn I don't really understand. This seems to be for a few reasons. 1) Reality has a surprising amount of detail, 2) a lot of authors honestly aren't that good, 3) I'm not always criticizing what I'm reading to see if it makes sense, sometimes just suspending disbelief with the hope that it'll all come together in time. But, if you don't actually understand things, you can't really do much with them. I've been aiming to instead of generically learn, learn with the aim of building tangible skills, because I think that would make me happier.
- I prioritize learning over reflecting on the higher-order reason for learning things in the first place. This is mostly because trying to figure out a high-level system to organize what I actually want to do with my life hasn't really seemed to get me anywhere, so I've resigned myself to looking at all the things I'm interested in learning, sticking with it for a few months, and then reevaluating. Not a system I'd recommend but it sort of works. I think I need to study philosophy; self-reflection for hours in coffee shops doesn't seem to actually lead to anything but disorganized, loosely associated vagaries.
- An extreme emphasis on reading can cause you to miss a huge part of your life, which is your conscious, subjective experience of things, who/what that spontaneous process that is "you" really is, and how to express it. For the longest time, I dismissed this as being useless to discuss or learn about because I felt if something couldn't be expressed in words, it was bullshit and it wasn't worth spending time on. The objective is nice and rational, but the subjective is still something you can gain knowledge of, and some people who are really in touch with art/fashion/film/interior design/music are shaping our emotional responses in ways that you just don't even notice if you limit yourself to books. A friend encouraged me to pick up an art to help develop this type of self-awareness better, and it's been a struggle, but one I'm grateful for.
# Explorers
Still, I think pleasure from learning is a valuable trait. One thing I've been reflecting on is Bartle's Taxonomy of Player Types [1], which would probably categorize us both as Explorers:
> Explorers, dubbed "Spades" (♠) for their tendency to dig around, are players who prefer discovering areas, and immerse themselves in the game world. They are often annoyed by time-restricted missions as that does not allow them to traverse at their own pace. They enjoy finding glitches or a hidden easter egg.
This model seems interesting to me for a few reasons:
- My friend, an Achiever type, and I, started playing an MMO game back in 2020 and we ended up completely dominating the in-game economy. I think this was because he was extremely pragmatic about moving us toward our goals, and I was able to really think hard about what we really needed to do in order to multiply our wealth.
- I've been reflecting on my career as a software engineer, and I think it wears me out because tech culture is so results oriented, which doesn't suit how I like to do things. I really don't care about making money or velocity, I just want to understand things and let my skills compound.
- I think this interest in deeply understanding how a system works and then being able to build new things with those principles was really valuable in being able to build/see the future in the game. I think it would work well in the real world as well. I've been looking for a word for this idea at a broader level, and I think it's essentially "critical thinking", something I don't think I ever properly learned in college. If I could do this in more parts of my life, I think I could do amazing things. I've been thinking of learning to write as a way to get better at this. But I agree, I don't really want to start a blog- I hate the attention economy and all it entails. I think all great writing is essentially criticism, but so is all great art and all great products, so I'd rather push in that direction after developing the ability to critically write/think.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bartle_taxonomy_of_player_type...
I wrote this quickly, so apologize if it feels half-baked, but hope it stirs some thoughts. Am hoping others will have more to say on some of these points because honestly it's been an existential struggle for me trying to understand what to do with life. SWE hasn't really felt like my true calling lately.
I think it helped that I stayed in hostels. Basically, all of the fun I had came from meeting people at breakfast or at bars, and then doing things with those people. The people you meet at hostels are open to meeting people and, being travelers themselves, are usually coming from somewhere interesting, with an open mind, and with nothing to do. I had a lot of great conversations with people I wouldn't have normally ever met, learned a lot about their cultures, and learned to get really comfortable meeting and befriending people.
The other thing I consciously tried to do was be open to everything. If someone invited me to go do something I hadn't done before, I'd say yes unless I had a good reason not to. That led me to a lot of interesting places!
The experience for me, as an American in Mexico, I would also say genuinely did make me rethink how I understood Mexico and Mexican culture in the US. I would be very excited to go see firsthand a lot of the countries that have influenced me in some way, because it really seems different when you see it directly rather than just on TV.
I think it also helped that Mexico was very cheap and I had no responsibilities back at home. I showed up with no plans to do anything at all, and no expectations. Some of the days especially at first were relatively boring. But it felt okay, as part of the goal was challenging myself to enjoy life even when I really wasn't doing anything.
Have you considered traveling in ways besides simply sightseeing? I think the travel industry pushes one idea of travel onto us, but it's not the only way. Many of the people I met were lifelong travelers, who worked in their home countries until they saved up enough to travel for six months, and then they would go and try to make their money last as long as they could while still enjoying themselves before repeating the process.
And I agree the logistics of travel are terrible. But, it wasn't actually too bad on my trip here. It was easy enough to book a flight to Mexico. And once I was there, I basically booked space at hostels for 1-3 days at a time, and then just extended my stay one day at a time if I wasn't bored yet. Unlike the hundreds of hotels in big cities, there are usually 3-10 hostels in any given area of Mexico so the choice was always easy, and since they're so cheap ($15-25/night) and have good availability I never really worried about booking them.
All of this said, I think I could probably have traveled even more adventurously. And actually that's a good summary of the mindset I think you should consider: be adventurous. Try to challenge yourself by eating foods you normally wouldn't eat, going places you wouldn't normally go, talking to people you wouldn't normally talk to. I think you'll get a lot more from travel that way.
- The move toward storing data in the cloud to storing in on my local computer, especially for a note-taking style app is really important. - Love the mini command line at the top that is autocompleted when I press a button.
Bugs:
- Getting an error for a file I have named "C++.md". It prevents me from opening an entire directory of Markdown.
- Also tried opening a folder from IA Writer, and get the error: "bangle can't open this folder because it contains system files". Not sure what that means.
I also suggest a way to edit a markdown file as soon as I open the app even if it's not local as a little demo.
Link to press release for study: https://www.newcastle.edu.au/newsroom/featured/plastic-inges...
> The literature was interrogated for several counts of microplastics in staples such as water, shellfish, fish, salt, beer, honey and sugar. This project did not take into account other possible direct ingestion sources such as the honey, fish, sugar (for which data was collated) or rice, pasta, bread, milk, utensils, cutlery, toothpaste, toothbrushes, food packaging and a multitude of other sources that would only add to the amount consumed. As such, there is confidence that based on the literature reviewed and subsequent analysis performed that up to 5 g/week of microplastic particles is potentially ingested by humans. Having said that, it should be stressed that the amount of the microplastics ingested by an individual will depend on a combination of parameters that is highly variable not only pertaining to the characteristics of the microplastics but also to each’s age, size, geographic location, demographics of the location, nature of development and life-style options.
> This study is being reviewed for publication; the full methodology and supplementary data will be available upon acceptance.
I believe the published paper is "Estimation of the mass of microplastics ingested – A pivotal first step towards human health risk assessment" (2020): https://sci-hub.do/10.1016/j.jhazmat.2020.124004 (Same authors.)
Table 6 in the study has the "5g of plastic/week" number quoted by the article. That number is the "global average rate of microplastics ingested" ("GARMI"). GARMI is calculated as:
GARMI = Average Number of Microplastics Ingested (ANMP) x Average Mass of Individual Microplastic Particle (AMIMP)
ANIMP can be calculated in different ways. It seems the average mass of microplastic particles found in drinking water was higher than the average mass of microplastic particles found in different foods. The study says 90% of ingested plastic particles come from drinking water, so it seems reasonable to use the AMIMP of water particles rather than food particles.
ANMP_drinking_water = 91994 ("the amount of water consumed per person was assumed to be 0.6 L/day" "The figures assumed are well below the World Health Organisation's guidelines of 3 to 4 L/person/day". 0.6 L/day comes from minimum 0.45 L/day of tap water + 0.15 L/day of bottled water. 91,994 is calculated as average of min (9029 particles) and max (174,959). If you only drank tap water, this number would be 42,298.)
AMIMP_aquatic = 2.8g / 1000
ANMP_drinking_water * AMIMP_aquatic = 257g
257 / 52 ~= 5g
Challenging those variables would be where to start. But assuming they're right, probably makes sense to focus on filtering plastics from drinking water.
Some price comparison:
- 30 400mg guaifenesin tablets cost $10.50 ($0.35 each) at a Walgreens in San Francisco
- 200 400mg guaifenesin tablets cost $8.50 ($0.04 each) on Amazon (CostCo Kirkland brand)