Your argument ignores the fact that choosing a reasonably challenging life isn't independent from the actual degree of easiness you can access at a given point in time. That's why I put those examples in the last section. The guy with the morning routine is choosing a challenge, but that challenge is associated with the digital age.
Your argument ignores the fact that choosing a reasonably challenging life isn't independent from the actual degree of easiness you can access at a given point in time. That's why I put those examples in the last section. The guy with the morning routine is choosing a challenge, but that challenge is associated with the digital age.
It also ignores the fact that many people don't know a minimum degree of challenge is fundamental for a fulfilling life. People don't go on TikTok and spend hours and hours in there because they want but because, in the beginning, they don't know just how detrimental that addiction is going to be. And then they can't get out.
Except for that I agree with you. Technology doesn't erase challenges by itself. It's the culture and the customs around it that do - the existence of "nothingatall" doesn't force you to take it.
Culture is a sort of technology, or a set of technologies (institutions, etc) that afford certain practices, which in turn proscribe acceptable and unacceptable challenges.
Avoiding "content" addiction is certainly one of the big challenges right now and those that succeed will also hopefully succeed in changing the economic forces that created it.
Challenges can be out of favour or hidden - but that just creates a new challenge of countering that. Fundamentally no challenge can be erased, take hunger, it may seem trivial, but certainly not universally or permanently erased.
Not knowing that you need challenge for a fulfilling life is a problem - a challenge brought on by our culture dominated by advertising, that teaches that fulfillment must come from external sources so it can be bought. But requiring certain "hard" challenges for a fulfilling life is just as nonsensical. Advertising culture says the ultimate challenge is getting enough money but any culture that ranks challenges by some sort of worthiness or utility is making the same mistake.
Yeah, agreed. I never said we need certain hard challenges (e.g. to be really hungry from time to time). Just some. Of course, the last section is a philosophical experiment. That's the idea, to see what could happen (that, to some degree, I think it's happening in the West)
OK, we agree that we need challenges, but I read "some things shouldn't be easy" as prescriptive for what challenges are "hard"/valuable. "What you do isn't as valuable as what I do" (e.g. "real" art versus "AI art") may have some subjective reality in the current cultural context or for the individual (better to feed yourself than feed the addiction) but my guess is that attitude is counter to living a meaningful life or letting others lead theirs.
It just feels like "you didn't work as hard as I did" instead of "we all face the challenges of our times".
Your argument ignores the fact that choosing a reasonably challenging life isn't independent from the actual degree of easiness you can access at a given point in time. That's why I put those examples in the last section. The guy with the morning routine is choosing a challenge, but that challenge is associated with the digital age.
It also ignores the fact that many people don't know a minimum degree of challenge is fundamental for a fulfilling life. People don't go on TikTok and spend hours and hours in there because they want but because, in the beginning, they don't know just how detrimental that addiction is going to be. And then they can't get out.
Except for that I agree with you. Technology doesn't erase challenges by itself. It's the culture and the customs around it that do - the existence of "nothingatall" doesn't force you to take it.
Culture is a sort of technology, or a set of technologies (institutions, etc) that afford certain practices, which in turn proscribe acceptable and unacceptable challenges.
Avoiding "content" addiction is certainly one of the big challenges right now and those that succeed will also hopefully succeed in changing the economic forces that created it.
Challenges can be out of favour or hidden - but that just creates a new challenge of countering that. Fundamentally no challenge can be erased, take hunger, it may seem trivial, but certainly not universally or permanently erased.
Not knowing that you need challenge for a fulfilling life is a problem - a challenge brought on by our culture dominated by advertising, that teaches that fulfillment must come from external sources so it can be bought. But requiring certain "hard" challenges for a fulfilling life is just as nonsensical. Advertising culture says the ultimate challenge is getting enough money but any culture that ranks challenges by some sort of worthiness or utility is making the same mistake.
Yeah, agreed. I never said we need certain hard challenges (e.g. to be really hungry from time to time). Just some. Of course, the last section is a philosophical experiment. That's the idea, to see what could happen (that, to some degree, I think it's happening in the West)
OK, we agree that we need challenges, but I read "some things shouldn't be easy" as prescriptive for what challenges are "hard"/valuable. "What you do isn't as valuable as what I do" (e.g. "real" art versus "AI art") may have some subjective reality in the current cultural context or for the individual (better to feed yourself than feed the addiction) but my guess is that attitude is counter to living a meaningful life or letting others lead theirs.
It just feels like "you didn't work as hard as I did" instead of "we all face the challenges of our times".