
What Life Asks of Us - robg
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/opinion/27brooks.html?hp
======
DanielBMarkham
I'm not a big Brooks fan. We get on the rhetorical boat in this article
thinking we're headed for deep water, a la Viktor Frankl, who saw people
grapple with what life expected from them in a deeply personal and horrifying
way in the Nazi death camps. Instead, Brooks takes us on a lightweight fun-
filled harbor tour, telling us that working at the seafood house is its own
reward. Lecturing us that traditions deserve to be respected and that personal
desires minimized.

What _life_ wants out of you is a deeply individualistic thing. Life is not
the same as Baseball. It's not the same as reporting, or college. College
might expect you to study and get good grades. Life expects you to continue to
learn and grow. Life is anything but an institution. E-gad, man. Drop the
poetry book and take a look around.

I don't know what he's smoking, but whatever it is, I'll pass. It sounds like
the prelude to a call to arms to support tradition. This philosophy of the
group or the tradition being greater than the individual is strangely
narcissistic -- I'm very important because I'm part of a very important
institution. Whatever it is, it's not American in origin. At least I hope not.

As a former service member, I'm deeply aware of tradition and the higher value
of culture and civilization above the individual. But that only exists in the
context of supporting the individual's right to reject, to reinvent, to be
stubborn, ugly, and ornery. Without that, institutions become machines to eat
people and their lives.

Thanks for the ride, David, but next time I'll stay home.

~~~
yters
True, but, as GK Chesterton says, tradition is just democracy extended
temporally.

------
yan
The article argues the general conservative view of life, I believe. The
valuing of customs and culture over the new. I can't say I agree with it, but
I definitely understand it. There was a great TED talk on understanding the
divide and each viewpoint:
[http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_mor...](http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html)

~~~
TooMuchNick
Has anyone ever examined how TED became so damn watchable? You could learn
more by watching their free online videos than by watching the presentations
of a dozen other conferences.

~~~
gojomo
Though the artistry of live presentation is part of the best TED talks, I
still wish they had transcripts.

------
ellyagg
The comments here are disappointingly one-sided. Nowhere did Brooks suggest
that he wanted to return to the good ol' days with all its warts. Incremental
evolution of systems is a known good strategy. There's no reason whatever to
believe that that doesn't apply to institutions, too. If you find yourself
unable to see how tradition can transmit useful information through a society
made up of people of _varying critical thinking abilities_ , you may be
letting your politics unreasonably bias your analysis.

Considering what value traditions and institutions may serve can be an
intellectual exercise. It doesn't mean you suddenly want to rescind female
voting and return to slavery. It seems impossible to have interesting
discussions with about 99.5% of the population, because they show not even the
remotest ability to avoid emotional reactions to words.

~~~
alexandros
_"Incremental evolution of systems is a known good strategy."_

Not always. Evolution keeps multiple branches around and sometimes discards
the most prominent one. There is something to be said for admitting failure
and starting from scratch rather than continiously patching a non-working
solution.

~~~
anamax
>> "Incremental evolution of systems is a known good strategy." > >Not always.

That's why he wrote "good" instead of "optimum".

Besides, keeping around several branches and discarding one, even the current
"most prominent", is incremental. (The system in question consists of all
branches.) FWIW, evolution is almost entirely incremental.

Note that advocates of the new often overstate the failings of the old, which
frequently did handle many cases. Sometimes those cases are no longer
important, other times they're less important than new cases, but even when
both are true, a given new system may not be better.

Advocates of the new also tend to forget that the fact that there are possible
new systems that are better than the status quo does not imply that the new
system being pushed is better.

New can be more fun. That's both an advantage and a disadvantage.

------
eli
I think I'm with Wonkette on this one:

 _David Brooks comes from a magical time when people could have a single
profession or employer for their entire working life, and might feel like
their personal sense of self-worth was related to how well they did their
jobs. (This was long before the invention of men’s room attendants, debt
collectors, and fryolater de-greasers.)_

[http://wonkette.com/405797/david-brooks-explains-why-we-
shou...](http://wonkette.com/405797/david-brooks-explains-why-we-should-honor-
the-sacred-rites-and-rituals-of-our-crappy-jobs)

~~~
yan
This also reminds me of a Robert Heinlein quote I recently read:

 _A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a
hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a
wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act
alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a
computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization
is for insects._

~~~
yters
Can't we do both? In a way, I prefer specialization. Then I don't have to
think so much about what I'm doing, and can spend more time thinking about
more interesting things.

It's interesting how now we think being a fulfilled person means being able to
do a bunch of stuff. That just seems exhausting to me. People aren't really so
interested in the skills, anyways. It just makes them look cool to others,
which is what they really care about. Then the process becomes self
perpetuating. It's a very roundabout and unsuccessful way of making good
friends.

~~~
jerf
"Can't we do both?"

Yes. If I may interpret Heinlein, he wasn't saying that you need to be an
_expert_ in each of those things... he was saying you should be _able_ to do
it.

You still can be an expert in some things too, as long as it's not at the
expense of those things.

(I'm not saying I agree; I don't entirely disagree or agree. I'm just trying
to explain what he was saying, as best as someone else can divine his
opinions.)

~~~
yters
Yeah, I think that's a good reading.

------
ixnu
Would Sandberg have been so dedicated to the institution had he not made
millions in it? Maybe. But baseball is far too respected given its spotted
history of cheats and over-paid egomaniacs.

Important and meaningful institutions like teaching and medicine are filled
with individuals who will not be getting a bailout or make millions like
baseball players or bankers. Most true adherents to vaulted institutions are
individualist chiefly educated in the "liberal" studies that Brooks pans.

In fact, JP Morgan (a liberal individualist), is seen as the savior of US 19th
century banking after a crisis that is eerily similar to today's. Brooks'
claim that "there is another, older way of living" rings hollow because
educated liberals did not destroy even older institutions like the Magna Carta
or the Enlightenment over the last eight years.

A nation in crisis should ask where have all the liberal individuals gone and
not lament the status of institutional group think.

~~~
robg
I suspect that that if we could measure great teachers and great doctors to
the extent that we measure great ballplayers, there would be orders of
magnitude improvement in their salaries as well. Baseball is a market economy
like any other.

If I had the skills to play professional baseball, I certainly would. The
problem though isn't that the money isn't good in the minors. You can make
100k/year in AAA. It's that their careers are so short and their skills are
highly in demand. Unless you make it to the big leagues and stick for more
than six years, you still need to find another profession.

~~~
ixnu
Orders of magnitude? Are you arguing that the only thing standing between the
best 2nd grade teacher in Harlem and millions is an efficient means of
measuring talent?

Major League Baseball is certainly not a market economy like any other - it is
a federally-protected monopoly, or American Institution if you like.

~~~
GavinB
If we could the quality of teachers with the precision that we measure
baseball players, then yes, the best teachers could make millions teaching the
children of the super-rich. Additionally, colleges would pay a premium to have
the top teachers if they were measured by a universally acknowledged standard.
You have to remember that there would only be a few hundred of them.

I also expect that if you could educate a child with the best teachers, you
would reliably get very effective adults.

History is littered with geniuses whose students went on to make
groundbreaking discoveries as well.

------
lgriffith
You were not supposed to analyze the words deeply. The words were shaped to
elicit the emotions of safety, security, and familiarity that presumed to
exist in the "good old days". On the surface it might feel good. Yet to live
it as we approach the singularity of almost vertical rate of change, its all
but impossible.

I agree with Heinlein: "Specialization is for insects." Humans are not
indistinguishable and interchangeable hive creatures. We are
competitive/cooperative individuals each with unique and changing combinations
of capacities, skills, interests, drives, and dreams.

------
rjprins
"New generations don’t invent institutional practices. These practices are
passed down and evolve."

This is simply incorrect. Institutions are made by people and can be changed
by them. As said in the article institutions can be very important the lives
of people, so people should think about them very critically and improve them
continuously. Don't accept the status quo!

~~~
jimbokun
Institutions "can be changed" is the same as saying that institutions
"evolve."

Seems the disagreement is on the semantics of "invent institutional
practices." How different does a practice need to be to be considered newly
invented, rather than an evolution of an old one?

------
h34t
This view is not only ignorant, I think it is dangerous.

We should only trust institutions that are capable of meeting the real
challenges we face _today_. But neither the problems of hosting 6->9 billion
people on earth nor figuring out how to capitalize on the vast knowledge we've
gained over just the past 100 years were anticipated by existing institutions.

We don't have longstanding traditions around the roles of 'internet
entrepreneur' or the 'genetic programmer'. Why? Because they're not old
enough; they haven't been around long enough for a halo of rich meaning and
culture to form around them. The real economic value (let alone
environmental/social value) of modern roles have not had time to become
embedded in longstanding tradition.

If we make decisions based on tradition, we blind ourselves to everything that
is made possible by the unique place in history we find ourselves in. I think
it's a dangerous time to do so. You cannot live as though nuclear warheads
have not been invented, just because it feels good to respect old
institutions. You cannot live as though there are 500 million people on the
planet, when there are 6 billion, just because it feels good to follow in the
footsteps of your forefathers.

Human culture does a fantastic job of making people feel important by building
rich traditions around important roles in society. For 99% of human history
that was probably very useful; most of the time it made sense to adapt to
existing institutions, because they were likely to be around for the rest of
your life. But that's no longer true.

I think "life" asks us to wake up and smell the coffee. Neither the problems
we face today nor the tools that may solve them are embedded in tradition and
institution. The slower we are to adapt, the longer we remain stuck on old
habits, the more harm we'll cause by pouring energy into systems designed to
solve yesterday's problems.

------
jwesley
His argument could be completely reversed and make the same amount of sense.
Could probably even use the same quotes.

------
gills
I feel sorry for David Brooks, because he may never experience life.

He may never experience that moment when one knows he or she truly exists,
that there is no blue pill, no "way we are supposed to act", and that life is
not about climbing the ladders constructed by those who have come before us.

------
Ardit20
"They impede personal exploration. They enforce conformity."

I believe there is a battle going on which is not referred to as a battle, but
has been going on since the dawn of civilisation I think. The battle is
between those who are pro-choice and those who are anti-choice. This guy seems
to be anti-choice, he does not seem to want us to think, he seems to want us
to be sheep, to accept what we re told without question, to be, well, peasants
in the 13hundred and obey the modern priests and all their mights or be
condemned to hell.

I did not know who the pro choice fighters were until I was acquitted with
TED. Those guys seem to be all about empowerment, creativity, being open
minded to different perceptions, etc. But even amongst the scientists there
are many anti choice, but not so many as the politics lobby to which seems the
newspapers belong also.

Life directed by institutions, by national patriotism, by religious devotion,
by obsession with any one thing I believe is stagnation.

