And poker players do all 8.

If they're dying from malaria but lack the ability, as a people, to make a ****ing malaria net, they lack agency.

"We must help them" is the tacitly accepted altruism-obligation that prosperous people from higher IQ nations claim exists towards lower IQ, less prosperous nations "because morality". It's bull****.



Standard: Zero foresight and your reference for why is the past.
You're like one of those dudes buying $500,000 houses in Las Vegas in 2005, saying that everyone knows that real estate always goes up and there's no evidence anything will change.

If you don't instantly understand what happens to the earth (and to civil stability in many reasons) when there are literally billions of Africans, I cannot explain it to you, however if you live long to experience it, my guess is that your reasoning for why it's happening is because of 'oppression' or maybe 'colonialism'.

Then the question has to be asked, what do you mean by "useful"? Do you mean "useful" in traditional economic terms? Because if you do, the obvious counter-argument is that our economy facilitates a global military empire that is cancerous and destructive and results in the death and poverty of billions of people. Even absent the cog-in-the-wheel argument, how many jobs in our economy are not only useless, but counterproductive? If you work for the TSA, and your job is to waste taxpayer money, grope people at checkpoints, waste the time of travelers, and violate privacy, is that better than playing poker for a living? Is that more "useful"? I'd say no.

If you mean "useful" as in "useful" to society, like donating your time in soup kitchens or doing something truly beneficial to your fellow man, I'm sure very few people would disagree.

Unfortunately all too many times people who ask this question are talking about the former, rather than the latter.

useful is something that has a longterm value. ok, whats value then?

For me value has something to do with happiness, which is not only something you do to lift the spirits or to forget your problems, but finding to totaly inner freedom.

I think you cannot archieve this by just spending a ****load of money or by haveing enough games, good food, drugs and women to entertain you.

Not saying that these things are bad (not all drugs are created equal), but i think the connection to other beings you get by doing something that will spread and has a longterm effect, like art or certain knowledge or simply sustainable help is much more deeper than just some fun for a limited amount of time.

It might very well be that this deep happiness can just be experienced with other beings, not alone. I might be wrong here, but i cant remember being happy in the way described with just myself at least.

So doing something you are not paid for just to get this connection i described might be worth a try.