Why do we keep seeking TOTL: explained by math!

Discussion in 'General Audio Discussion' started by earnmyturns, Aug 5, 2022.

  1. earnmyturns

    earnmyturns Smartest friend

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  2. Pancakes

    Pancakes Friend

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    I hope AIs are programmed to be happy all the time. A greedy computer is the last thing I want to compete with.
     
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  3. daduy

    daduy Acquaintance

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    Hah, I thought it's simply addiction, we are craving for the eargasm, and after a while the same gears don't deliver anymore because we are used to it, so we need higher dose.
     
  4. earnmyturns

    earnmyturns Smartest friend

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    Yes, but why would we be wired that way? That's what the paper explains: in some circumstances it leads to faster learning.
     
  5. Biodegraded

    Biodegraded Friend

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    The older i get the more I find myself annoyed by academics' redundancies. Why "relative comparisons"?
     
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  6. Beefy

    Beefy Friend

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    As opposed to absolute comparisons...?

    Percent/fold change, versus the absolute magnitude of a change.
     
  7. Biodegraded

    Biodegraded Friend

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    In the context of the abstract and authors' summary, "comparisons" would've done just fine.

    Edit: now I'm doing it: "the context of" was unneccessary.
     
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  8. earnmyturns

    earnmyturns Smartest friend

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    Well, you don't know how reviewer #2 asked them to write their claims :D
     
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  9. Biodegraded

    Biodegraded Friend

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  10. Boops

    Boops Friend

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    LOL. Every time someone makes one of these Downfall meme vids I watch the whole thing.
     
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  11. Tchoupitoulas

    Tchoupitoulas Friend

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    From the concluding remarks: "Paradoxically, people in modern societies are hardly more satisfied than previous generations."

    Thanks to my time-machine (which does, in fact, bring me a great deal of satisfaction), I can go back and ask medieval peasants how satisfied they were.

    Codswallop.
     
  12. Pancakes

    Pancakes Friend

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    Given that they weren't committing suicide regularly and in large quantities, probably not too bad. There are always the "lords" and then the rest. Since happiness is relative, as long as the "rest" aren't too much better off, all is good.
     
  13. roshambo123

    roshambo123 Friend

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    "Hedonic treadmill." Bottom line: you can't get off.

    There's studies that suggest people are hard pressed to change their baseline happiness. In House MD, someone asks Wilson how House was before his chronic pain and he says "basically the same." Whether you win the lotto or your fave doggo gets smooshed by a Prius, with enough time you drift back to how happy you were before, usually.

    As to "Why are we wired to become unhappy with circumstances that are relatively good?"

    A few things:

    1) Overcompensation
    Nature adores efficiency so psychology deals with this by giving us fears and desires that are disproportionately scaled to reality. The point? People with excessive levels of motivation tend to do more and gain a competitive advantage. This plays into the second point which is:

    2) Shooting par means you lose
    In nature, anything that gives you a 1% survival advantage probably gets passed down through generations. Thus, it is constructive to fear bears when you probably will never encounter one, or to desire and accumulate way more grain than you can ever eat. Because one day, your neighbor who doesn't fear bears gets eaten by one, and the other neighbor who felt "I can rest, we don't need that much grain" dies of starvation when a frost comes earlier than expected. In the long game, only too much is enough, as such:

    3) You're not designed to be happy
    Cue Richard Dawkins. Your brain was not designed to be happy with audio gear, it is an instrument designed by your selfish genes to make sure you live long enough to procreate and ensure your offspring make it to puberty. The music is just there for you to woo potential partners. Everyone is doing that with their gear, right?

    “One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity
    that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well.
    This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither
    sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night
    filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights
    is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy”
    - Camus
     
    Last edited: Aug 5, 2022
  14. daduy

    daduy Acquaintance

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    Wow too much, I just want to buy moar dac,amp,cans without over analysing my own psyche
     
  15. rhythmdevils

    rhythmdevils MOT: rhythmdevils audio

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    Better is better. Come on it’s that simple. I appreciate beauty.
     
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  16. roshambo123

    roshambo123 Friend

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    And yet, Leonardo DiCaprio still isn't married.

    Wonder how he ranks his girlfriends and if he considers each one an upgrade? Endless looking for better tends to end up a pursuit of just more. Which reminds me, getting back to the original topic, someone actually came up with an optimal stopping algorithm for choosing a life partner. Wonder if we could apply that to audio gear? :p

    But it's the David Foster Wallace thing. Best to worship a god because worshipping most anything else eats you alive.
     
    Last edited: Aug 6, 2022
  17. ColtMrFire

    ColtMrFire Writes better fan fics than you

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    Probably doesn't like the divorce statistics.
     
  18. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    I'm sure they yearned for the latest in scythes and adzes. Stuff that would give them that edge.

    A friend of mine (one of those people that others asked stuff before there was google, because he'd know: usually did too) told me that medieval peasants may have been 'serfs,' but they put in fewer working hours and had more free time than employees of the current age.
     
  19. Pancakes

    Pancakes Friend

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    I bet they spent a lot of time frolicking in meadows and whatnot. We get to argue with customer service.
     
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  20. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    Hmmm... I guess there was a downside to that. No contraception and high infant/mother mortality.

    But hey, we get covid.
     

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