I work on programming projects I find fun. What makes it recreation is that it's something I want to work on, I don't have others imposing deadlines or requirements.

A mechanic can enjoy working on his own project car in the off time.

Both of these things are productive in a way that playing games isn't, but they're still recreational. It's not spending your life chasing dimes. It's looking at the different recreational things you could be doing, and choosing the ones that also intersect with being productive and have a side-effect of helping you professionally.

Games and play -- of the "unproductive" kind -- are a fundamental and valuable human activity. Not everything has to produce something beyond mental well-being. Plus, of course, children learn by playing.

We can keep learning by playing as we get older, we just change the scope. You have to tend to your curiosity to keep it fit and capable.

Sure. You don't have to convince me of this! I'm already a believer :)

Nobody said your hobbies must be productive. But some people prefer it to be, and I don't think it's right to shame those people as if they're just chasing dimes or denying part of what it is to be human.

Productive is all relative anyway. Children learning by playing is productive, the productive part is the learning that is a byproduct. Working on a project car is fun in itself. It doesn't become less fun if the person doing it is a professional mechanic. Would you tell a person who plays games professionally in an e-sports league that they must do something else for fun?

I think it is a sign of good life when you find a way to get paid for doing what you enjoy. And if you enjoy it, then it is still fun when you do it outside of work. The productive benefits of it do not make it less fun.

I agree with both of you, to a degree. Playing a single player video game is unlikely to help you build relationships with others. And yet never stopping to enjoy life in all its variation leads to a pretty empty life, too.

> Playing a single player video game is unlikely to help you build relationships with others

I disagree. I have fond memories of discussing Zelda on the playground as a kid. Similarly, online communities are formed around basically every notable single player game. It's still a shared experience, even if it's not shared at the same moment.

Your father got a child, so he's clearly not obsessing enough about work.