Philosophy Now Forum

Greta wrote:

FlashDangerpants wrote:I am doubting that friendship can be analytically reduced to a ledger of transactional costs and benefits without losing something essential the phenomenon in the process.

The "something essential" is trust.

I still think that liking people might be involved somehow.

FlashDangerpants wrote:

Greta wrote:

FlashDangerpants wrote:I am doubting that friendship can be analytically reduced to a ledger of transactional costs and benefits without losing something essential the phenomenon in the process.

The "something essential" is trust.

I still think that liking people might be involved somehow.

Yes, "running a ledger" in a relationship not only erodes trust but also affection.

In a relationship in which everything is metered with quid pro quo, is a business relationship and is can only be about money. It is doomed to failure.
I once had a partner that, after the "honeymoon period" was over, began to demand that cooking had to be done on alternate nights. And the person not cooking had to do the washing up.
Not only was that the case but she used to moan if I waited till the morning to do the dishes. The monotony of this arrangement was punishing.
I ended up getting really pissed off that she seems to make too many things dirty when she cooked, whilst I tended to use fewer pot and pans, and always made better food, compared to her disastrous tasteless rubbish.
Once she had controlled the cooking and washing, she then moved onto control of the sex, which was also meted out in instalments and measured against good deeds I had manage to perform. Unless I managed to keep her happy, sex was off. This was a great shame as the sex had started off really well, until we started to live together.

Needless to say, the relationship did not last.

Relationships need to be based on giving, and understanding the needs of your partner.

Obvious Leo wrote:

duszek wrote:I heard that in Africa people do not suffer from depression because they are too busy trying to make ends meet.

There was no such thing as depression in Japan either until the pharmaceutical companies realised what a lucrative market it was. There isn't even a word for depression in the Japanese language and yet the Japanese are now the highest per capita consumers of anti-depressant drugs in the world. Who would ever have thought that misery could be such an easily marketable commodity?

"There's a sucker born every minute"....P.T. Barnum.

Not only Japan, but the pharma boys did the same thing in India. They call it "exporting the category". First you tell them they need something they never needed then you give them the solution.

There was a massive scandal a few years ago in India, when Nestle's promoted Formula milk as a better product than mother's milk. Babies were dying because of the lack of clean water with which to make up the formula milk. Of course Nestles denied any culpability for their aggressive advertising campaign for years, before the outcry reached the ears of concerned people in the west who started to boycott Nestles products.

Hobbes' Choice wrote: First you tell them they need something they never needed then you give them the solution.

This is the great truth of our times, Hobbes, and it applies to all cultures across all product ranges. If somebody had told you twenty years ago that having a mobile phone would become an indispensable accessory to modern living you would probably have laughed at the idea. However the plutocracy has very nearly made it so and only a small number of stalwarts like me are fruitlessly trying to hold back the tide. One more nail in the coffin of our personal freedom is the assumption that we must always be available to talk to any **** when it suits THEM. Pig's arse.

Hobbes' Choice wrote:In a relationship in which everything is metered with quid pro quo, is a business relationship and is can only be about money. It is doomed to failure. /...Relationships need to be based on giving, and understanding the needs of your partner.

I agree H.C. I also like the idea of caring more about the friend/partner than some sort of "goal" or "principle". People are more important... much of the time. Like, when somebody feels more comfortable doing something a certain way, it's not ultimately helpful to try to "improve" on it UNLESS a significant problem could occur from their approach. A lot of methods work just fine! And a person's feelings and energy are more important than stuff and ideas... and more important than someone being "right/better". It means a lot to feel appreciated and free... without needing to pay or compete... especially with those you become close to.

Obvious Leo wrote:If somebody had told you twenty years ago that having a mobile phone would become an indispensable accessory to modern living you would probably have laughed at the idea. However the plutocracy has very nearly made it so and only a small number of stalwarts like me are fruitlessly trying to hold back the tide. One more nail in the coffin of our personal freedom is the assumption that we must always be available to talk to any **** when it suits THEM.

I don't own a cell phone either, Leo. I refuse to become addicted to something ringing in my pocket. I have watched how people cannot LEAVE IT ALONE. They must see who is calling! And sometimes they must text back or even answer, while right in the middle of a conversation with someone right in front of them. It's too weird. I nicely told one friend that I wouldn't go to lunch with her anymore if she couldn't leave her phone alone during our time together. I'm not going to sit there and watch her be obsessed with it, when our time together is so rare and limited. I think the cell phone can easily become just one more distraction from THE PRESENT MOMENT AT HAND. Perhaps one more way to avoid the panic that might set in when all the noise stops... and someone has to really be with themselves in the quiet... or connect more meaningfully with someone else.

And how about the way so many people take "selfie" photos all the time... instead (it seems) of embracing what's really going on around them and who they are with... they want to get a photo to look back on as some sort of proof of who they are or what they've experienced... but it's just a flat image. That's how it seems to me, anyway. I have many photos from my party days, when we would try to catch EACH OTHER in compromising and memorable situations. Those were fun to look back on once in awhile, but life is in the current moment, and I don't feel a need to take photos of MYSELF to somehow demonstrate that. Like one male friend who kept sending me selfies of himself -- and I quietly wondered "who does that"? I guess it's a generational thing -- and I hope that humankind isn't becoming too robotically detached (if it's not too late) from the vibrancy of being in the moment!

Lacewing. I actually do own a cell phone for business reasons but only three people on the planet know the number. I need it for accessing my voice-mail and for making phone calls when I'm away from home but the last thing I need is arseholes ringing me up all day long. I've never taken a photograph with a phone and may the big G strike me dead if the urge ever comes upon me to do so.

Obvious Leo wrote:

Hobbes' Choice wrote: First you tell them they need something they never needed then you give them the solution.

This is the great truth of our times, Hobbes, and it applies to all cultures across all product ranges. If somebody had told you twenty years ago that having a mobile phone would become an indispensable accessory to modern living you would probably have laughed at the idea. However the plutocracy has very nearly made it so and only a small number of stalwarts like me are fruitlessly trying to hold back the tide. One more nail in the coffin of our personal freedom is the assumption that we must always be available to talk to any **** when it suits THEM. Pig's arse.

I resisted the mobile for quite a long time. In the early noughties I suddenly realised that my social life disappeared because I was not instantly contactable like everyone else so would miss invites to go out on the town.
Rather than make fixed arrangements where to meet, people would just waltz out into town and text saying where they had ended up.
I no longer have that sort of social life- I don't miss it. The phone I have now is simple, has large keys, and a snap shut display. My monthly sub is £7.50 and I never go over the limits.
But having a phone is expected of me by my partner (just in case).

But phones are only half of it. I have a laptop, a Big Mac, and a MacBookPro, a PC, and a Kindle. My TV is attached to a I Tbyte harddrive, a Blueray (with Netflix), and a FireStick.

30 years ago I was happy with 5 channels and a VCR.

Lacewing wrote:

Hobbes' Choice wrote:In a relationship in which everything is metered with quid pro quo, is a business relationship and is can only be about money. It is doomed to failure. /...Relationships need to be based on giving, and understanding the needs of your partner.

I agree H.C. I also like the idea of caring more about the friend/partner than some sort of "goal" or "principle". People are more important... much of the time. Like, when somebody feels more comfortable doing something a certain way, it's not ultimately helpful to try to "improve" on it UNLESS a significant problem could occur from their approach. A lot of methods work just fine! And a person's feelings and energy are more important than stuff and ideas... and more important than someone being "right/better". It means a lot to feel appreciated and free... without needing to pay or compete... especially with those you become close to.

I can take a lot of experience to arrive at that position: where you know you have to let go and let live. If you can both do that for each other whilst helping out where needed, and giving your time as you can, then you shall have ahappy recipe for success.

I have social life although I have not had a mobile phone so far (does it not cause cancer ?)
In Germany we have a tradition called "Stammtisch": at a certain time once a week people show up in a certain restaurant and have a beer or a juice and more if they want.
Seeing certain people once a week and not more can be just enough.

I have only an old-fahioned telephone at home and my buddy who has a flat rate calls me every day at a certain time and we exchange readings in English and in German and also chess moves and private news.

It´s not so bad for me if someone needs to make a phone call in my presence, I can observe something interesting perhaps, a tone of voice or a tension in the body, which I might use in my fiction writing and read at my next literary circle. I can also use the break for watching people at other tables or for thinking something over.

The advantages of real life experiences are huge. Yesterday I had a long talk with an elderly Orthodox Jew from Israel who told me lots of interesting views about life and politics and I also observed him talking to a young man from India sitting next to me who was a convinced Marxist.

The world is full of interesting people, I can tell you.

Obvious Leo wrote:

duszek wrote:I heard that in Africa people do not suffer from depression because they are too busy trying to make ends meet.

There was no such thing as depression in Japan either until the pharmaceutical companies realised what a lucrative market it was. There isn't even a word for depression in the Japanese language and yet the Japanese are now the highest per capita consumers of anti-depressant drugs in the world. Who would ever have thought that misery could be such an easily marketable commodity?

"There's a sucker born every minute"....P.T. Barnum.

But how about the state of "melancholy" which goes back to Aristotle ?

In case of big love none of the two needs to deserve sex in any way. Because both want it and cannot get enough of it.

It is only when the deal is not good for both partners to the same extent that one party asks for some sort of compensations to make the deal fair.

Cooking and washing up is a common reason for a row.

The two have to find a good deal: one party does the cooking and washing up and the other party ... brings a lot of money home ? repairs the roof ? acts as a taxi driver ? acts as a psychotherapist ?

The two partners need to find a fair deal that works for them.
Fair is what they themselves honestly think is fair, one cannot tell in advance in a general way what should be regarded as fair, neither a third party nor a religious authority nor a holy book.

Obvious Leo wrote:"There's a sucker born every minute"....P.T. Barnum.

... and two born to take his money.

Although it wasn't Barnum but David Hannum.

Hobbes' Choice wrote: 30 years ago I was happy with 5 channels and a VCR.

I know I'm probably a Luddite throwback but we used to have tellies with only two knobs on it. Once I managed to figure out what these two knobs did I could make my telly do whatever I wanted it to do. Now my telly has about 50 buttons on a gadget I can never find and even when I manage to find it I can never get it to make the telly do what I want it to do. I know the red one at the top is OFF, so that's usually the one I go for, but my life has never been the same since my tech-savvy kids pissed off.

Arising_uk wrote:

Obvious Leo wrote:"There's a sucker born every minute"....P.T. Barnum.

... and two born to take his money.

Although it wasn't Barnum but David Hannum.

Thanks for reminding me of this. I've mis-attributed this quote before and now I've done it again. Brain rot gets us all in the end.