tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post8055539976243669315..comments2024-03-29T04:06:37.402-07:00Comments on Had Enough Therapy?: In Love with MediocrityStuart Schneidermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12784043736879991769noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-78864133691268150802016-07-15T12:52:15.954-07:002016-07-15T12:52:15.954-07:00Let's make sure that the doctors(esp neuro-sur...Let's make sure that the doctors(esp neuro-surgeons) working on Congressmen are very diverse. <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-42869358643628545142016-07-15T12:32:36.285-07:002016-07-15T12:32:36.285-07:00Stuart: For reasons that escape me, he does not ut...Stuart: For reasons that escape me, he does not utter the magic word here. We live in a culture of celebrity, a culture where people get obscenely rich by being mediocre and shameless.<br /><br />I wonder if celebrity isn't the culprit, but a consequence. And what we have isn't a culture of celebrity but a culture of status, and yes money (the ultimate bean-counting) is the primary measure of status, along with public relations is the field of psychology that enables that status.<br /><br />I remember in my 20s, pretending to be a philosopher I told myself "Out modern problem isn't that we make too many mistakes, but that we mass produce too many of those mistakes."<br /><br />I wonder about words like mediocrity and I admit I don't clearly know what it means. Like if excellence is about spending 100 million years of stored sunlight from fossil fuels in 100 years is a sign of success, we might be lying to ourselves. But now the consequence of that mediocre thinking is coming due, whether by the consequences in climate change, or environmental destruction, or simple depletion of one time resources our descendants will have to do without.<br /><br />So if modern success is based on a lie, then we can ask if the path back to excellence isn't by just doing more and more and more and more, but finding out how to do more with less, and need to do less, working with natural systems and cycles rather than in domination over it, just because we can for a while. At least that's the approach that conservatives like Wendell Berry propose.<br /><br />Thomas Edison's diligence might not be the only path to avoid the lures of celebrity culture, but its a good reminder of what that delusional world is missing:<br />"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work."<br /><br />We're all seduced by the promises of our modern consumer culture, built on the lie that 7-9 billion people can someday live like Americans, forever, and have no negative consequences to the natural world around us upon which we and our hopeful descendants depend.<br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-62407497438166530912016-07-15T11:27:54.305-07:002016-07-15T11:27:54.305-07:00Stuart, I'm with you 100%: it's the cultur...Stuart, I'm with you 100%: it's the culture of celebrity. All day. What I think we have to look at is celebrity's meteoric rise with the proliferation of the Glowing Box (television, computers, tablets, and especially smartphones). The Glowing Box is celebrity's delivery/distribution system. It's instant gratification. The jini cannot be put back in the bottle. So let's consider celebrity as a condition. Where do we go from there? I say we need to build a culture of responsibility. Contribution and meritocracy will build from there, and it's connected to your "Don't Just Feel: Do Something" post today... INITIATIVE! But Dalrymple is correct: we are in love with ourselves. The Glowing Box is the best distribution system for anomie ever devised. We will have to work with it in some way in order to produce a better future. Otherwise, we'll eventually all have holodecks at home and live the Star Trek lifestyle.Ignatius Acton Chesterton OCDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18222603717128565302noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-59882563980334412612016-07-15T08:36:52.554-07:002016-07-15T08:36:52.554-07:00The comments on Dalrymple's article were, well...The comments on Dalrymple's article were, well, pretty mediocre, but this one caught my eye:<br />Ultrawhite97 • 6 days ago<br />"This article reminds me of the "Peter Principle". It is actually very common...just look around at your place of employment, and you'll see all kinds of examples: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...<br /><br />I'm sure it happens with politicians all the time. I used to feel bad for these people, but I don't anymore. I think that it is perfectly fine for one to be mediocre, <b>as long as they are aware that they are;).</b>"<br /><br />That last sentence is, ultimately, the source of Dalrymple's complaint (and I agree with him on that). It's only in Lake Woebegon that all of the children are above average.AesopFanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08136804368672830018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-31150390455027940552016-07-15T08:31:32.828-07:002016-07-15T08:31:32.828-07:00Isaac Asimov wrote several brilliant short stories...Isaac Asimov wrote several brilliant short stories on the theme of mediocrity, of the "If this goes on" sub-genre. The world eventually devolved into having the majority of the people (because, by definition, most of us ARE mediocre)completely supported by the productive (that is, not mediocre) minority.<br />They were good for a laugh and a shake of the head in the 1970s; today, we see them on the way to fulfillment.AesopFanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08136804368672830018noreply@blogger.com