Chapter 1: Why do we have to work? (part 5 of 6)

A discussion of Chapter 1 of my book "Hunting, Gathering, & Videogames" - http://www.amazon.com/Hunting-Gathering-Videogames-Allen-Gates/dp/1601450443/...

A chapter-by-chapter summary of "Hunting, Gathering, & Videogames" (and thus an overview of the entire video series):

PART I: WHY DO WE HAVE TO WORK?

Chapter One
*Hunting, Gathering, & Videogames* gives a historical overview of why we've always had to "go to work," tracing the common link between the workday of the prehistoric hunter and gatherer, the first millennium B.C. farmer, the first century A.D. pottery-maker, the nineteenth century assembly line worker, and today's videogame programmer.

Chapter Two
*Surgery & Dental Floss* spells out the complications of bartering, and explains why communities with multiple goods and services always end up using some form of money (be it beads or dollar bills) to solve their trading problems.

Chapter Three
*Penguins & Peacocks* is about why the changes in our workday--the transition from hunting and gathering to the ages of agriculture, industry, and information--took place, even though some aspects of these changes were for the worse. It looks at the parallel between the history of our workday and the way evolution works in nature: how change is driven by the demands of the immediate environment, not by concerns for future repercussions.

PART II: WORK, WEALTH, & HAPPINESS

Chapter Four
*Emperors & Emptiness* gives an overview of three drawbacks of our modern work system: the alienation, the perception of deprivation that can come from being in a society overflowing with goods and services, and the way our increased number of career options has opened up a large window for failure--particularly when we tie our occupation to our identity.

Chapter Five
*More vs. Enough* offers an alternative to the unattainable American financial goal of "more is better" by outlining a flexible but precise definition of how much income is "enough."

Chapter Six
*Measuring Success* contrasts our culture's guideline for happiness--the wealth, status, and identity we derive from our careers--with a guideline that instead aims for a balance of our physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual dimensions.

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[ToddAllenGates]

3 of 3:

> A lot of products don't help our survival needs at all (such as advertising or banking)

Neither do iPods, but I'm glad we have them! And I'm happy to trade my hours of labor for one---it's very efficient really . . . because whether you have to trade a day's worth or a week's worth of labor for your iPod, they're still things that most people could *never* make on their own, even if they took a year.

[ToddAllenGates]

2 of 3:

> so why can't we be parasites, if we can get away with it?

For those who are very successful and accumulate enough money to live off the interest, I don't think they're necessarily being parasites. And if they can pass on their wealth to their children, I guess one *could* argue that the kids are parasites, but should the gov't step in and take that money away? That kind of "cure" might be worse than the disease.

[ToddAllenGates]

1 of 3:

> The teenage hunter-gatherer would probably have beat up some other, weaker hunter-gatherer, and made him do the work for him. There's so much inequality in our world, injustice we can't fight against,

Yes, that's human nature! As I discuss in my "Roots of Morality" video (on my ToddAllenGates channel), it seems natural selection has left us with a complex mix of traits: care & compassion, but also greed & cruelty.

[SuperiorSavior]

The teenage hunter-gatherer would probably have beat up some other, weaker hunter-gatherer, and made him do the work for him. There's so much inequaliuty in our world, injustice we can't fight against, so why can't we be parasites, if we can get away with it? A lot of products don't help our survival needs at all (such as advertising or banking) they just circulate money around among the wealthy. It's not in a lot of people's economic interests to do what helps increase group survival interests

[RyunSharp]

subscribed.

[stevebritgimp]

Yes, so little explanation of the realities of the world - not to be harsh, but to be helpful. It seems you are kept in a bubble of ignorance through childhood and through schooling. I remember thinking that at the end of school you drifted into work and that was it. I remember thinking the learning process stopped at that point, where really it only properly begins at that point. I really wish my education had been more practical and helpful.