[HN Gopher] You can't optimize for rest (2021) ___________________________________________________________________ You can't optimize for rest (2021) Author : headalgorithm Score : 41 points Date : 2023-06-01 10:19 UTC (12 hours ago) (HTM) web link (theconvivialsociety.substack.com) (TXT) w3m dump (theconvivialsociety.substack.com) | commandlinefan wrote: | I got about halfway through, wondering, "how is he going to tie | all of this into HTTP-based API calls?" before I realized he was | talking about actual rest. | dboreham wrote: | Same thought. Although also tutting at the lack of | capitalization. | drooby wrote: | Interesting read. Though I can't see how the general claim is | true, "you can't optimize for rest".. | | Surely, you can. Many people do. It's called FIRE. | ok_dad wrote: | I think a better title might have been "Society can't optimize | for rest". FIRE is a myth, only a small percentage of people | will ever have the ability and means to do it. A few can | optimize for their own rest, on the backs of the rest of us who | cannot and will have to work until close to death. | | I think the only way you optimize society for rest on the whole | would be to determine how much and what kind of time off humans | need at the maxima, and then figure out how to schedule humans | for the work that cannot be automated based on that. Suppose a | human needs to have a month of time off per 6 months of 20 hour | a week work, then we should assume no human can work for more | than 20 hours a week 10 months a year, minus some other safety | margin. I don't think there is ever going to be a day where | society is able to optimize for rest to the extent that it's | really needed, the pendulum will never swing as far as it needs | to. | UncleOxidant wrote: | > FIRE is a myth, only a small percentage of people will ever | have the ability and means to do it | | And many of the early proponents of FIRE have been going back | to work. Recently, Financial Samurai posted that he was going | to return to work for various reasons (one being he's going | to have to save up to pay for his kid's education). | nathants wrote: | fire may be a myth, but rest is occasional remote work, | heloc, section 121, and moving every 2 years. usa only. | ymmv. housing go brrr. | jgauth wrote: | Can you describe more what you mean? Are you suggesting | one could live by selling their home and purchasing a new | one every 2 years, and doing something with credit | secured by the home(s)? How does that relate to rest? | alfalfasprout wrote: | Yeah and it's at the expense of QOL for the younger years of | your life. | truculent wrote: | No. They are optimising for financial independence. They may | use that to rest, but they may use it for travel, community | projects, time with family. Not necessarily restful activities. | drooby wrote: | > They are optimising for financial independence. | | And WHY exactly would someone do that? So that they don't | _have to_ work. Optimizing for rest does not mean resting | 100% of the time. That will also lead to depression. IMO, | optimizing for rest means having the freedom to work or rest | as much as you need to be happy. Financial freedom provides | that because one can choose to work or rest whenever they | desire. | | Perhaps this is a dispute over the definition of rest. | majormajor wrote: | Even for shallow definitions of "rest" vs the deeper dive the | article attempts I think that's only so true. Work or financial | need are not the only sources of unrest in live. | | If you have a partner, is that more or less restful? | | If you have children, is that more or less restful? | | Is living in a city more or less restful than on a farm? | | I think the answers to these questions oscillate frequently | over the course of one's life in the modern world. | basicallybones wrote: | Optimizing for anxiety minimization and joy/meaning maximization | is a pretty good alternative. I think it is a good way to be an | admirable, productive person without burning yourself out to | please others. | whateveracct wrote: | I've recently given up on setting deadlines, shooting for | milestones, etc in my hobby programming. I now just do whatever | is interesting or fun. | | I used to oscillate between highs of productivity and | unpleasant lows of anxiety about not making progress. I just | started my mindset switch (in progress) so we will see if I'm a | generally more pleasant guy this way! | atleastoptimal wrote: | I maximize for my enemies' pain | commandlinefan wrote: | I assume you're joking... but it's hard to miss how much of | corporate life becomes a game of chicken where managers try | to find how hard they can push workers before the workers | push back - or, to what extent workers will sacrifice rest | and their own well-being for continued employment. Of course, | the manager has a manager who's pushing them, too. | kbenson wrote: | There are likely many points in a work environment where | the local minima and maxima of work output and employee | happiness meet. The important thing is to remember that | those are balanced in the small, and that a wider | perspective may yield a better outcome on both measurements | if you care to search for it. | glitchc wrote: | Does it maximize your pain too? | antognini wrote: | It's easy to do if you are your own worst enemy. | hangsi wrote: | "Irrelevant!" | senko wrote: | This is touched upon near the end: | | > the remedies to which we often turn may themselves be | counterproductive because their function is not to alter the | larger system which has yielded a state of chronic exhaustion | but rather _to keep us functioning within it_ ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2023-06-01 23:00 UTC)