Post number #951540, ID: c3131f
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I saw an earlier thread about how this is a particularly fast moving era and I agree. Picture yourself in the 1970s: There is no 24 hr news, You've read all the books in your house,youve got no video games,youve got no money for records or movies, there's nothing good on TV, the comic book store is miles away...
What do you do exactly? You laze around, unstimulated, wondering why the hell time is moving so slow.
Post number #951542, ID: c3131f
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.... Of course, that problem would be solved by the Internet. You can get all the news you want, all the games you want, all the music you want, all the movies and TV...
There's not enough time in the day to get through it all, and you wonder why time is moving so quickly.
Post number #951543, ID: c3131f
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There's this concept I read about. 'Erudite Boredom'. Back to that 1970s example; no news no books no movies etc.You can't just 'pull up something new' as is constantly possible today. This is the world where entertainment costs money and investment, apart from being sparse. (I think Ive heard people say that stations would 'sign off' at night and stop delivering content? Imagine if the Internet did that.)
Post number #951544, ID: c3131f
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There's this concept I read about. 'Erudite Boredom'. Back to that 1970s example; no news no books no movies etc.You can't just 'pull up something new' as is constantly possible today. This is the world where entertainment costs money and investment, apart from being sparse. (I think Ive heard people say that stations would 'sign off' at night and stop delivering content? Imagine if the Internet did that.)
Post number #951547, ID: c3131f
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So youve got absolutely nothing to do. This leads to periods of major boredom, where you have nothing for company except your thoughts. What happens here? Do you just stare at the wall? Of course not!You create.
Youve probably heard an older person talking about how back in the day they 'made their own fun'. That was totally true. Faced with a total lack of outside stimulation they made their own; poems in their heads, doodles in notebooks, graffiti on city walls;myriad creativity
Post number #951549, ID: c3131f
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I saw a documentary about these brothers;The Crumbs, who grew up in the 40s and 50s, a much less stimulating time than now. They occupied themselves with drawing comics;totally obsessively, they even kept a monthly schedule like the real ones. For them, especially middle kid Robert, Comics were an entertainment, and a confessional. It was the site of their fantasies; They weren't alone with a book that had everything they wanted in it; they wrote and drew that book themselves.
Post number #951554, ID: c3131f
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Back to the '70s. No TV no movies etc. You find yourself drowning in tedium. The music sucks and there are no good clubs. What do you do?
Well if 'Erudite Boredom' strikes, after weeks and months of this; you make your own music, and play it wherever. This isnt a world that has a place for every little niche, so you make your own.
This is how punk started. Many quotes fly around about how 'there was no place for young people, and nothing to do.' at the time.
Post number #951555, ID: c3131f
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I'm not just idly speculating,(Though I MAY be ranting, just a bit), I've experienced Erudite Boredom myself. I used to go to a boardingschool where computers were allowed only an hour a day.A lot of my free time was spent totally unstimulated.I had a lot of time to just think; me and my thoughts alone I got highly creative. For me writing and art became my entertainment.I couldn't read manga so I drew my own. I read all the books I had so I wrote my own stories.I 'made my own fun'
Post number #951556, ID: c3131f
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What I'm saying is that boredom is good. Profound boredom even leads to creativity. If things are so fast today it's because boredom has been eradicated.
Those moments that once found you staring at a spot on the ceiling are now replaced by pulling out your phone to watch a quick, stimulating video.
Imagine how many long afternoons in the 70s were spent staring at ceilings, vs todays short evenings of always checking your phone for something to entertain you.
Post number #951557, ID: 7a2e71
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consider the following >never lived in the pre-internet era >speculates on what it must have been
Post number #951560, ID: 7a2e71
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>Back to that 1970s example; no news no books no movies etc.You can't just 'pull up something new' as is constantly possible today. every town over the population of 5-10k had a virtually unlimited supply of books through local libraries and inter-library exchanges this is still true but why bother when libgen exists you running out of your own books is a skill issue >I think Ive heard people say that stations would 'sign off' at night at like 3 in the morning when everyone is z
Post number #951561, ID: 7a2e71
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plus, in places that were not the ass end of the earth (i.e. corporately developed suburbia with 0 planning for actual humans) you had a lot of shit going on basically all the time precisely because you had no shutins there was no dearth of entertainment or things to do your single outliers do not sociology make
Post number #951562, ID: 7a2e71
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also on the face of it this thread is some real "the past was better!" bullshit no it wasn't you never even lived in it you might as well dream of the 1300s buddy. the present is all you get. maybe the future if you live into it
Post number #951589, ID: c3131f
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>you might as well dream of the 1300s
Obviously people were dying of AIDS or whatever back then, but again, I think it was a superior intellectual environment,in certain ways, due to lack of constant stimulation.
Think about an artist from back then. He was likely to get apprenticed to a master at around 7 years old. Once he was apprenticed art was to become his life.
Post number #951590, ID: c3131f
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This is the 1300s; No TV, No Radio, No movies, No comics, No recorded music; you would have to go to church to hear it; or learn how to play yourself.
There are ways of distracting yourself,but many of those are considered a sin by the church, like drinking, or cavorting with prostitutes, so the artist might not do any of those.
Post number #951591, ID: c3131f
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Without any 'entertainment' as we recognize it, I venture that pursuing mastery in art would be how he kept himself occupied. Doing studies, doing sketches, developing techniques,reading up on art history...
I don't think it's any coincidence that many artists back then achieved mastery rather young
Post number #951592, ID: c3131f
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>no it wasn't >you never even lived in it
I doubt you are any more fit to judge.
In any case, I guess I must be confusing people with all of this past talk.
I don't think the past was greatly superior. What I'm saying is that I think it produced a more conducive intellectual and creative environment due to less stimulation the farther you go back.
Post number #951593, ID: c3131f
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We don't have to go so far back for this.
Think about today. Why do they tell you to keep your phone off during class? Why do you have to turn off the music when you want to really focus?
Why do monks lock themselves away in monasteries and spend all day meditating? Because reducing stimulation improves mental clarity. Because it is healthy, at least once in awhile, to be totally alone with your thoughts, or totally focused on one act
Post number #951594, ID: c3131f
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When you are doing a single activity, without any outside stimulation. (Let's say drawing.) That activity itself becomes your mode of stimulation. The Disney animator Richard Williams has always reccomended drawing while 'unplugged', (i.e, not listening to any music), because it improves focus and leads to 'smarter drawing', since the animator has all his attention focused on the task of animation itself, to the exclusion of all else.
Post number #951596, ID: c3131f
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When you lack stimulation entirely, your mind fills in. I have heard of people who sat staring at bare walls all day, and soon enough they started slightly hallucinating-- their mind was trying to stimulate them.
There is an anime YouTuber called Gigguk. He describes the time he spent as a monk. He says he had nothing to stimulate him all day, so he had a lot of time with his thoughts. He says that during this period he came up with some of his most popular video ideas.
Post number #951597, ID: c3131f
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>He says that during this period he came up with some of his most popular video ideas
'Anime in eight minutes' was one he mentioned. He gets millions of views on those videos.
Post number #951601, ID: c3131f
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>you never lived it
By the way, did you read that bit about me at boarding school? It wasn't 'the past', but in certain ways I think it was close. No Phone,No Computers,No TV,No music.
It was just me and my books. And when I finished those it was me and my head.
Like I said; I became hugely productive and creative as a way to entertain myself. I drew reams of manga, I wrote dozens of stories. Some friends wrote songs in the music room. Some had exercise as their occupation.
Post number #951604, ID: c3131f
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I managed to find that article I read. Apparently 'Erudite Boredom' was just some bullshit I cooked up, but otherwise it illustrates my point. https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/social-media-profound-boredom/
Post number #951608, ID: c3131f
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"Citing influential 20th century German philosopher Martin Heidegger, they note that there are likely two types of boredom: superficial and profound.
When superficially bored, “We are held in limbo by a situation that restricts us from doing what we want to be doing, while simultaneously being left empty insofar as the situation does not satisfy us.” Think of being stuck in a useless work meeting or trapped inside on a rainy day."
Post number #951610, ID: c3131f
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When repeatedly exposed to superficial boredom, we can reach profound boredom, defined as “a deep state of indifference towards oneself and to the world” leading to “an existential discomfort in which people struggle with their sense of self.”
Post number #951612, ID: c3131f
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Modern society tees us up for superficial boredom, the study’s authors say. When we are always connected technologically, previously segmented social, work, and home lives blend together, bringing constant disruption and leaving little time to focus on a single activity.
Post number #951613, ID: c3131f
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"At the same time, the pace of life is accelerating, imparting a “sense of busyness and rush amidst compressed time, and the corresponding desire to escape these feelings,” the authors add. This confluence of factors leaves time for brief bouts of boredom, ones that are now swiftly assuaged through social media or other internet pursuits, thus preventing us from reaching profound boredom."
Post number #951615, ID: c3131f
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"As painful as profound boredom can be, it can also lead to reassessment of one’s life and spur action to remedy the ultimate causes of one’s boredom. As part of their research, the authors interviewed 15 subjects aged 20 to 60 in England and Ireland about the experience of lockdown during the COVID pandemic. Invariably, they spoke of boredom and being in limbo, and mentioned frequently turning to social media to pass the time, an act which many said left them feeling empty."
Post number #951616, ID: c3131f
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Co-author Timothy Hill, an associate professor of management marketing, business, and society at the University of Bath, is grateful that the pandemic’s gradual ebbing is reducing boredom overall (along with all the malaise and death), but thinks that we also should still allow more profound boredom into our lives by resisting the siren songs of social media.
Post number #951617, ID: c3131f
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"This research has given us a window to understand how the ‘always-on,’ 24/7 culture and devices that promise an abundance of information and entertainment may be fixing our superficial boredom but are actually preventing us from finding more meaningful things. Those who engage in ‘digital detoxes’ may well be on the right path,” he said in a statement."
Post number #951621, ID: a6d57f
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Piss
Post number #951623, ID: 1e8935
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poopoo
Post number #951628, ID: 2f1e60
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>>951589 >He was likely to get apprenticed to a master at around 7 years old. Once he was apprenticed art was to become his life. Until he died at the ripe ol' age of 27. :3
Post number #951637, ID: f99178
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mmm yummy more schizo posting to fill up my tummy
Post number #951638, ID: c3131f
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>mmm yummy more schizo posting to fill up my tummy
Is this what people call uncommon perspectives these days?
Post number #951639, ID: f99178
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keep it coming g/u/rl this shit fills me up like you wouldn't believe
Post number #951664, ID: 87e11d
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>>951540 tell how worth is reading all that.
Post number #951694, ID: c3131f
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>>87e11d What's your favorite book?
Post number #951702, ID: 8165b6
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I agree with this sentiment quite a bit, and I think there’s a lot of interesting discussion that could happen around what the impacts of being constantly distracted *really* are and what we might do about it; so I think it’s a shame to see everyone reductively taking this as a generic “DAE think the past was better???” post. It’s possible to try and look for things we may have lost on our way without saying that we need to return to candle lighting and dying of turning 35.
Post number #951705, ID: 58e3ed
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on your mom moving fast
Post number #951751, ID: 595811
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>>951638 no m8, but you are in anon board here, not your personal blog or news article. Keep your points short and interesting, maybe shorter than 3 posts, unless someone asks you to elaborate more.
People are clearly not interested responding to your wall of text and you keep posting them, hence the scizo title that gurls gave you.
Post number #951765, ID: 7d0523
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>bro you don't understand, If I was in the 1970s I'd be so efficient reading all the encyclopedias and all books. I would basically invent club penguin and al-qaeda by 75.
OP has actually engaged with the topic in an interesting way and it's too long for your zoomer brains. Your on /u/ not Twitter learn to read. Nibba is citing heidgger I would die for OP in this normally one burg cell board.
Post number #951786, ID: 875963
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still kicking around op? let me try to start it up with a take. "People are not living in the present but like to look at the past like a king looks at their naive population, it's so simple"
Total number of posts: 44,
last modified on:
Tue Jan 1 00:00:00 1681644701
| I saw an earlier thread about how this is a particularly fast moving era and I agree.
Picture yourself in the 1970s: There is no 24 hr news, You've read all the books in your house,youve got no video games,youve got no money for records or movies, there's nothing good on TV, the comic book store is miles away...
What do you do exactly? You laze around, unstimulated, wondering why the hell time is moving so slow.