“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” -- Blaise Pascal
According to Pascal, we fear the silence of existence, we dread boredom and instead choose aimless distraction, and we can’t help but run from the problems of our emotions into the false comforts of the mind.
The issue at the root, essentially, is that we never learn the art of solitude.
...
our aversion to solitude is really an aversion to boredom.At its core, it’s not necessarily that we are addicted to a TV set because there is something uniquely satisfying about it, just like we are not addicted to most stimulants because the benefits outweigh the downsides. Rather, what we are really addicted to is a state of not-being-bored.
Deep thoughts by Blaise Pascal. Was he right? Are we addicted to not-being-bored? Is boredom good for us?
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday November 28 2018, @10:16AM
Yes, extroverts are a bizarre bunch, and I would expect them to have a hard time seeing any value in solitude. One might try explaining "hell is other people" or "I look forward to social gatherings like you look forward to a calculus exam" but they still won't get it.
However, I would say that boredom and solitude are separate things. When I was a kid, boredom was the bane of my existance. When you have limited knowledge, responsibility, freedom, or resources, it's hard to know what you should be doing. Doing the first thing that popped into my head was generally a recipe for trouble.