When I was stranded in my desert. My inner self found it's way to substack. Something inside of me was putting up one hell of a fight. I was contending with a heavyweight called the human condition. I even did some writing on word press. It was the only way I could hold myself accountable. If I wrote in a journal it just wasn't the same. I had to know that other people where out there. I had to make myself believe that their were real consequences. Though I was aware of the real danger I was putting myself in by the way I was living. I guess what I am trying to say. Writing knowing that others would see it. Made me want to be better at having conversations and talking about things with out all the run on sentences. You're writings always came threw to my email at just the right moments when I needed to think a different way or stop thinking all together. Today I am out of the madness and have a bank account and a good credit score. I know the world will never be perfect and everything will happen the way it does for reasons unknown. Like a move I can watch over and over. Pacific Rim. When the colonel tells Raleigh. Where do you want to die. On a wall or in a Yeager. No matter what's going on around me today I'm in my Yeager and it's been a pleasure knowing that I'm not alone. Thanks for all you do!
I've long yabbered about 21st Century Survival Skills: Coding, soldering, woodworking, metalworking, electric systems, plumbing, concrete, gardening, cooking, baking. Just make stuff. When I was in my 20s, Make Magazine was first published. I started building stuff. I asked friends with skills show me how to get started. I've built furniture, plumbed sinks, wired switches and even built some kooky stuff like airpowered soda bottle rocket launchers. Just start and be a noob. Mess up some lumber, go "oh shit" and start over. Buy a guitar and learn three chords and annoy your friends. Void some warranties by cracking open devices. Last year when our clothes dryer broke I disassembled it and made friends with the local parts guy who helped me learn a ton (full disclosure: it was DOA).
You say "domestication" and I say "progress". We have more free time to do whatever we want now than any other time in human history. Back in the days when you have to build your own house, tend your own farm, there was no such thing as free time.
There's a strange urge to look back at history with rose colored glasses. The reality is that you have more agency over your life now, even if you disagree with how people spend it. But that is their choice and they are not doing it blindly, it is their preferred path.
We're not all naive sheep being led around. We are adults making choices for ourselves. They might just be different choices than you would make.
Not all 'progress' is better simply because it's new. We get lots of things wrong all the time.
We agree it's great to have modern industrial farming and someone to build your house for you. I said these things! But there's an obvious tradeoff in continuing to outsource more and more of your life and even thinking to others, the state or technology. It's really nice to be able to cook for yourself with ingredients you selected, or make simple repairs without needing to call a contractor. I don't think that's contentious.
There's timeless ideas here about humanity - it's not looking back with rose colored glasses it's deciding more consciously what we want to have control over. Look around at depression/anxiety/obesity levels it is obvious many people are definitely being led around poorly here. Modernity's #1 hubris (not saying you are guilty of this, I think collectively we are) is believing we are always right about ways of living, when we have 1,000s of years of collective wisdom we shrug off.
You're projecting your own preference into everyone else again. Not everyone wants to cook. Many people live better lives on various medicines you see as domesticating. A lot of people prefer modern life, and not just because it's new.
You can't assume you are seeing the world clearly and everyone else is not. You have a set of preferences that you are welcome to, but you cannot judge everyone else's choices through them. We're not children, we are adults just like you.
Yes, I absolutely think there are some better ways to live than others. Consent morality is a dead end. We don't need to impose this of course through sword and state but we should take a moral stance on a bunch of stuff that the current culture does not.
That's a fancy way of saying that you think you are smarter than everyone else. DHH has made a career of that, so he's not a good reference. We can disagree, but it's important you know how your argument sounds.
We are not all idiots, and our choices are our own. The fact that anyone cares about anyone else's choices is the real problem.
The collective wisdom of 1,000s of years of humanity is smarter than any of us, which is kind of the point of maintaining some of our natural ways of living, or just keep the spirit of remaining independent even during the acceleration of technology, culture and society. I think we're all somewhat nihilistic to care so little, and I mentioned someone in the tech industry since that's been the sector to move fast and break things with very little regard to what it impacts. So - I'm happy to see people in it maybe think a bit differently.
The collective wisdom of 1,000s years isnt in what we did, it's in what we do. We developed science, and medicine to create those drugs. We build economies and technologies so we didn't have to do things ourselves.
You can't make a claim to a higher truth that doesn't exist. Most of human history we did things because we had no choice. Now we do and many of us choose differently.
I will continue to "fight the machine";) Thanks for the motivation.
Don't let them fully tame you friend
When I was stranded in my desert. My inner self found it's way to substack. Something inside of me was putting up one hell of a fight. I was contending with a heavyweight called the human condition. I even did some writing on word press. It was the only way I could hold myself accountable. If I wrote in a journal it just wasn't the same. I had to know that other people where out there. I had to make myself believe that their were real consequences. Though I was aware of the real danger I was putting myself in by the way I was living. I guess what I am trying to say. Writing knowing that others would see it. Made me want to be better at having conversations and talking about things with out all the run on sentences. You're writings always came threw to my email at just the right moments when I needed to think a different way or stop thinking all together. Today I am out of the madness and have a bank account and a good credit score. I know the world will never be perfect and everything will happen the way it does for reasons unknown. Like a move I can watch over and over. Pacific Rim. When the colonel tells Raleigh. Where do you want to die. On a wall or in a Yeager. No matter what's going on around me today I'm in my Yeager and it's been a pleasure knowing that I'm not alone. Thanks for all you do!
I've long yabbered about 21st Century Survival Skills: Coding, soldering, woodworking, metalworking, electric systems, plumbing, concrete, gardening, cooking, baking. Just make stuff. When I was in my 20s, Make Magazine was first published. I started building stuff. I asked friends with skills show me how to get started. I've built furniture, plumbed sinks, wired switches and even built some kooky stuff like airpowered soda bottle rocket launchers. Just start and be a noob. Mess up some lumber, go "oh shit" and start over. Buy a guitar and learn three chords and annoy your friends. Void some warranties by cracking open devices. Last year when our clothes dryer broke I disassembled it and made friends with the local parts guy who helped me learn a ton (full disclosure: it was DOA).
You say "domestication" and I say "progress". We have more free time to do whatever we want now than any other time in human history. Back in the days when you have to build your own house, tend your own farm, there was no such thing as free time.
There's a strange urge to look back at history with rose colored glasses. The reality is that you have more agency over your life now, even if you disagree with how people spend it. But that is their choice and they are not doing it blindly, it is their preferred path.
We're not all naive sheep being led around. We are adults making choices for ourselves. They might just be different choices than you would make.
Not all 'progress' is better simply because it's new. We get lots of things wrong all the time.
We agree it's great to have modern industrial farming and someone to build your house for you. I said these things! But there's an obvious tradeoff in continuing to outsource more and more of your life and even thinking to others, the state or technology. It's really nice to be able to cook for yourself with ingredients you selected, or make simple repairs without needing to call a contractor. I don't think that's contentious.
There's timeless ideas here about humanity - it's not looking back with rose colored glasses it's deciding more consciously what we want to have control over. Look around at depression/anxiety/obesity levels it is obvious many people are definitely being led around poorly here. Modernity's #1 hubris (not saying you are guilty of this, I think collectively we are) is believing we are always right about ways of living, when we have 1,000s of years of collective wisdom we shrug off.
You're projecting your own preference into everyone else again. Not everyone wants to cook. Many people live better lives on various medicines you see as domesticating. A lot of people prefer modern life, and not just because it's new.
You can't assume you are seeing the world clearly and everyone else is not. You have a set of preferences that you are welcome to, but you cannot judge everyone else's choices through them. We're not children, we are adults just like you.
Yes, I absolutely think there are some better ways to live than others. Consent morality is a dead end. We don't need to impose this of course through sword and state but we should take a moral stance on a bunch of stuff that the current culture does not.
DHH shares eloquently how this applies to parenthood here, could say similar stuff about many areas: https://world.hey.com/dhh/the-parental-dead-end-of-consent-morality-e4e8a8ee
I do think a bunch of us especially in tech are seeing things a bit clearer here tbh. We can respectfully disagree and that's cool too.
That's a fancy way of saying that you think you are smarter than everyone else. DHH has made a career of that, so he's not a good reference. We can disagree, but it's important you know how your argument sounds.
We are not all idiots, and our choices are our own. The fact that anyone cares about anyone else's choices is the real problem.
The collective wisdom of 1,000s of years of humanity is smarter than any of us, which is kind of the point of maintaining some of our natural ways of living, or just keep the spirit of remaining independent even during the acceleration of technology, culture and society. I think we're all somewhat nihilistic to care so little, and I mentioned someone in the tech industry since that's been the sector to move fast and break things with very little regard to what it impacts. So - I'm happy to see people in it maybe think a bit differently.
The collective wisdom of 1,000s years isnt in what we did, it's in what we do. We developed science, and medicine to create those drugs. We build economies and technologies so we didn't have to do things ourselves.
You can't make a claim to a higher truth that doesn't exist. Most of human history we did things because we had no choice. Now we do and many of us choose differently.