Re:The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology ...
by concordDance on Sunday October 22, 2023 @01:09AM
(#37972989)
Does she find that task enjoyable and fulfilling? If not, it's bullshit.
And if bet money on it NOT being enjoyable and fulfilling. Humans almost universally hate being cogs doing the same repetitive trivial action over and over.
Re:The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology ...
by oldsecondhand on Sunday October 22, 2023 @05:37AM
(#37974026)
Do janitors find their job enjoyable and fulfilling? Probably not. Their job is still important for the functioning of society, so I wouldn't call it bullshit.
Re:The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology ...
by JohnFen on Sunday October 22, 2023 @12:42PM
(#37976905)
I was a janitor for a long time in my younger years, and I actually did find it enjoyable and fulfilling. Just sayin'.
Re:The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology ...
by ethbr1 on Monday October 23, 2023 @07:55AM
(#37984418)
What did you enjoy about it? Curious!
Re:The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology ...
by JohnFen on Monday October 23, 2023 @09:46AM
(#37985552)
I enjoyed that what I did made a real impact on people, I enjoyed the sense of satisfaction from making a space nice again, and I enjoyed that it wasn't intellectually demanding, which gave me plenty of time every workday to think about hard programming problems.
There's a real sense of accomplishment in it, and it's nice that people can immediately see and enjoy the results of your hard work. There's also something about doing manual labor that is satisfying.
And I enjoyed being "invisible" around people who used the spaces I cleaned. You usually don't exist, so people tend to continue to speak to each other as if nobody else is listening. I learned a lot about people that way.
There are mega-efficient factory farms in Nebraska that are immensely productive per-human involved, but that doesn't mean what hobby farmers in Connecticut or subsistence farmers in Africa are doing is bullshit.
I think "bullshit jobs" are less of a thing than people believe. It's just that people devalue assembly-line or cog-in-machine work, even when they're the ones doing it - especially in the US where we grow up wanting to be a unique success story like an entertainment celebrity or rich entrepreneur and so that kind of work is antithetical to our idea of a successful person. Fact of the matter is, machines needs cogs, and we don't have an infinite capacity to replace human cogs with automated ones.