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Phys.org reports:
The idea of a life lived modestly is gaining traction. Ten years ago, Samantha Weinberg, a mother of two young children, spent a year not shopping. Her aim was to reduce her environmental impact. The next year, Mark Boyle, founder of the online Freeconomy community, embarked on a life without money in order to sever his connection with it. Since then, others have joined this "Not Spending" movement.
Frugality has its limitations. Not everyone is able-bodied enough to cycle, and if we all started foraging for wild food it would deprive non-human species of nutrients and disrupt local ecosystems. While minimalism has found new converts, especially in Japan, this extreme approach is unlikely to go mainstream.
Perhaps a more realistic hope is for a steady rise in the number of people who discover that pursuing non-material riches brings greater happiness than the getting and spending of money. In fact, significant numbers of "voluntary simplifiers" have been choosing and enjoying lives of material simplicity for decades.
Have Soylentils found greater happiness through simplification?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday April 08 2017, @04:21AM (3 children)
More Henry, with thoughts on games:
[9] The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @01:51PM (2 children)
Aristarchus - desparate to be relevant.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday April 08 2017, @06:39PM (1 child)
At least it is a quiet desperation. And not at all deplorable. Thoreau's "Walden" is in fact the source of the "simplicity" movement, Thoreau wrote "Simplify, simplify." in "Walden". So maybe not relevant at your level of familiarity with American Literature, my dear curmudgeonly AC.
(Score: 2, Informative) by anubi on Sunday April 09 2017, @07:50AM
"Walden" was one of the books my high school teachers pointed out to me.
I believe my teachers knew full good and well where things were heading, and wanted us to be aware of it, and that alternatives existed.
Another teacher pointed Stanley Milgram's "Obedience to Authority" book out to us, when she saw how frustrated we students were at the "system" during the 60's.
We had some nice classroom discussions over that.
Sorry for the late post, but I am still visiting this forum trying to undo the damage one moderator did.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]