Perhaps even telling stories is an attribute of being human itself?

Yea, I don't understand why more people aren't seeing this.

It's grotesque to me.

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"I play. I have a soccer ball under my bed right now and I play when I'm alone, with the soccer ball. It's beautiful. I'm fifty-eight—but I'm very athletic, I can run rings around anyone my age. And I play a lot of soccer and badminton with my crew, they're all in their thirties. Yes, I play a lot"

😂

I hate this. This is nightmare material

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This reminds be of the book Mount Dragon by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. It's mostly about a virus, but does lead to a scene where two old men end up fucking themselves over by fighting over the virus and exposing themselves. With their remaining time they program themselves as characters into the facilities digital tools, which then get gifted to the world as a major step forward in tech.

Within, the old men programed in have philosophical debates and remain friends.

This is beautiful.

Funnily enough I was just at a Zizek talk this evening here in NYC, and came across this as we were leaving. I imagine if I'd seen it during the q&a he'd have had some interesting insight about it.

"Hallucinations of a slab of silicon" perhaps, but could there be value derived from such a fake conversation? Maybe this site demonstrates that a fake conversation could potentially have more credibility than a conversation between two "real voices".

Edit: After listening to the two fantasizing about repopulating the earth together, I sort of take that back.

I went about 10 minutes; laughed a lot and moved on.

Is it by its very nature meaningless? Or is it the will of the universe made audible?

This is amazing :o

I didn't think the phrase needed explanation. Measuring your happiness by your wealth and consumption of goods is obviously a very popular choice, but some people try to pursue happiness other ways.

Good point.

I always thought of stoicism's bread and butter as identifying the dichotomy of control. I would think a stoic striving for those achevments would deem them as controllable. Not to be confused with probable.

Wonderful! I've been looking for a new podcast.

On a serious note though, I wonder how long you could listen to the infinite conversation.

This is avery good podcast on David McRaney's work how people hold opinions and change their mihttps://www.econtalk.org/david-mcraney-on-how-minds-change/#audio-highlights.

In short, we form strong beliefs and look for data to support them -- motivated reasoning.

New information alone rarely causes anyone to change their mind.

A different approach based on trust, respect and mutual exploration that McRaney calls "street epistemology" involves getting people to examine their own assumptions and develop hypothetical counter arguments. Because these arguments are self generated, they are the best shot at actual self-examination and real movement on strong beliefs.

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I feel ya.

I don’t know if I’m good at this interaction issue. But I try and it’s important to me to make that effort. I want to live my values best I can. So I’m always trying to learn and get better. I think if anything I’m better in person as words can anodyne and I would think most lack the connection and ability to transcend past a more difficult arena. In person we humanize each other and often show magnitudes higher level of normal human decency and respect.

I bring up the intelligence thing for two reasons. We get the often over used Dunning Kruger type effect. Let’s just refere to it as it’s colloquial understanding. While I also get those people that I know are prob smarter than me often dealing with the imposter syndrome. If I know something they don’t they attack it and feel threatened by me just the same as the anti-intellectual bunch. They’ll try to out think something from an angle they don’t know enough about. And often they get by because of this superior knowledge. Both groups to me just need to put the effort in and more than anything become a bit more emotionally self aware. Maybe that’s truly where I excel with my skill bundle. Introspection coupled with a passion to learn and share my thoughts when the time arises.

In perspective approach… I like to go back to thinking if only on the marginal gains … just as most things are slightly pushed in one direction or another.

I interact with people from all over the world and tend to open up people that have never had an American talk to them about their culture in a way that shows respect, curiosity and a decent general understanding often of something important to their culture. I think if you find something to relate with any perosn on this earth then your either not trying hard enough or you don’t care from a place of ignorance. I see my self as an ambassador of that cosmopolitan principle and I thrive with variety of this sort. So I try to tread all sorts of lines. Wether I’m in deep convo with an Uber driver from Afghanistan for 45 minutes Non stop and we both wish the drive was longer or showing by example to a fishing boat captain that people from California aren’t all terrible evil no good people that are antithetical to the way they see life… Then I’ve done my small part. So I if I can just crack that shell a touch. Even put a slight consideration of doubt on a previously narrowly conceived doubt. Well then, I feel accomplished. Shoot for the 10% change on a view and be happy with anything.

Sometimes it does just coming down to having a real person in front of you and not allowing them to get stuck in the caricature in their head. I started seeing this problem become common in the last 6 - 8 year or so. Even people I knew would think “oh your one of those,” then we would talk and I’d take down all the straw men in the field and even if the steel man wasn’t visible to them, at least many of the cartoon representation in this metaphysical mind of theirs doesn’t have as much clutter, so it allowed the cowardly lion to come out with more confidence. It’s only threw having these tough discussions in which we get to test our own ideas against other on the safer battlefield of words. So when I can politely disagree and we can still shack hands at the end of the night even if the we don’t agree on anything… showing my conviction and morale has an effect on them. It’s this hyper siloed echo chambering off in ones specialized in-group that we lose faith in others as scapegoating and disgust arises quite similar to the grand history atrocities that we should never forget

Ehh… Maybe it’s been too long… I’m not so optimistic currently in general with the climate of our culture. Political violence is becoming a troll. Eventually the politicans will embody more of the trolls characteristic. It’s all reminds me of Black mirror episodes... Or maybe what the hebrews call… Gollum’s or generally known as homunculi.

But I digress before I open too big of a can of worms here.

And when I ask what would you do? I’m just honestly curious and open to take tips and suggestions.

I suggest you listen on Spotify or Apple Podcast “Stoicism On Fire”. Everything in this articule is debunked. That Ryan guy use Stoicism in a mean to achieve fame and money. And it’s not what’s Stoicism is about

Smart philosophers, not cutting edge scientist trying do something impossible until possible. Different times, different kinds. Apples and pears. Stoicism logic is not meant for when you are trying to break through in your scientific field. Stoicism is not to hold down science. Stoicism is to keep your emotional outbursts in check and be a bit more sane, reasonable and calm. And I mean by stoicism the practical parts of stoicism. Not the fringe religious type stuff.

then why was stoicism founded by driven and smart people if it doesn’t apply to them

Don’t you think that anyone can achieve something they thought to be impossible because they actually put their mind to it and didn’t go “oh well it’s too hard/ not in my control bether just deal with it”

Bro, stoicism is a simple tool for the everyday person to not lose their sanity. The extremely driven, smart, daring, somewhat crazy pioneers are too busy to think about stoicism. They are the extreme minority. They will do what they do best. Stoicism will most likely not resonate with them.

To tie your happiness to material possessions, is so not stoicism. Virtue is the thing they want.