Re:The Diderot Effect: Shopping One's Way to Financial Misery
by cultofquack on Monday June 20, 2016 @05:43AM
(#11937041)
For context, the exerpt is from the book The Screwtape Letters. A demon named Screwtape mentors an inexperienced demon in how to torment humans (and drag them down to Hell): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Screwtape_Letters
The book is in the public domain.
Re:The Diderot Effect: Shopping One's Way to Financial Misery
by jimmywanger on Monday June 20, 2016 @10:21AM
(#11938191)
Thanks for mentioning it! I couldn't figure out how to shoehorn the book description into my comment.
Another point which I think is interesting from the original article is social status signaling. Every city does it slightly differently.
For instance, in the Bay Area, you signal social status by talking about the hot startups you founded, the companies you worked for, and the open source projects you contribute to.
In LA, you signal by the kind of car you drive, the famous people you know, and the kind of clothes you wear (I know, I'm generalizing).
People who move from one area to the other have a harder time making friends, getting jobs, and getting dates cause the signals they send off are all wrong from what others are expecting.
Re:The Diderot Effect: Shopping One's Way to Financial Misery
by neomormon on Monday June 20, 2016 @06:00AM
(#11937092)
Interesting aside: The book is dedicated to his best friend J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien convinced Lewis to become a Christian: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._R._R._Tolkien
Once one gets something nice, you're trying to maintain parity between that part of your life, compared to the other parts of your life, and you're willing to spend moeny to do so.
From C.S. Lewis:
"The man who truly and disinterestedly enjoys any one thing in the world, for its own sake, and without caring two pence what other people say about it, is by that very fact forearmed against some of our subtlest modes of attack. You should always try to make the patient abandon the people or food or books he really likes in favor of the “best” people, the “right” food, the “important” books. I have known a human defended from strong temptations to social ambition by a still stronger taste for tripe and onions."
If you really like something, with a strong sense of self, you stop caring about how all your stuff matches together.