The phrase "We have never been more connected to one another in human history than we are right now, yet we are more alone than ever" keeps repeating itself, resonating in the soul of every person.
DFW is a phase. Like yeah, if you're young it's a touching phrase, but what goes after it? The only way that has substance is to become a philosopher and understand our nature. We are made out of the same nanomachinery as ants are. And ants are connected like you wouldn't believe but they're only one of a handful eusocial species on Earth. If that's not our future, it's certainly a future that's laid before us.
Bla bla bla, everything's fine, just accept your new corporate technocratic billionaire overlords and their algorithmic software which is now starting to completely dominate every aspect of our lives. When legitimate businesses start operating the same as scammer organizations, then it's not a scam, is it? Come on, normalize it like everyone else. It's just regular business now, and if you question that you'll just get told, "Aaah, whatever, business is business and it's always been like this, stop being a miserable hater!" In fact, anything you notice change to the detriment of society, everyone will just be conditioned to tell you it's always been like that and in fact everything before the 2000s was worse. It's not gaslighting if everyone believes it.
Nonsense that sounds profound. How could anyone know how lonely people were or weren’t in the past. It’s only relatively recently that a legion of narcissists make sure that anyone who will listen know how they’re feeling on any given day.
the irony of watching a clip recap served by addicting algorithm of a movie summarising about DFW's thesis about how pointlessly addictive media is and will be.
Excellent point. And I wish I could agree that it’s pointlessly addictive, but I don’t believe it’s pointless. I think it’s quite deliberate. And if we can’t turn off the screens, then we’ll have to change what’s on them. I’m glad I found your excellent point on my screen.
Carrey really went off the deep end with that beard and his arrogant, condescension. "I needed color'' he brags when he shows off his dreadful ''art.'' He's a great comedian, but a lousy painter and a pompous ass when pontificating and spouting his philosophy.
Jim can dedicate his life to painting, traveling, yoga retreats, because money, while perhaps not a solution, more importantly is no longer a problem. He has access to the world’s most talented and successful people because of his own fame. He’s not speaking to an overworked case worker if he’s depressed. A medical student at a learning hospital isn’t mending his bones if he’s hurt. No, fame/money, in an of themselves, don’t make you happy. But they are the wheels on a vehicle that can take you where you want/need to go. With money, you can go anywhere, be anywhere, and with fame, you will be surrounded by people, some of whom will take a genuine interest in who you are. The pool of quality people who can potentially love you, and the experiences you can have with those people, are pretty spectacular for a person like Jim. Glib summations about money and fame not making you happy change none of that deeper reality.
The last dying thought of Christopher McCandless will resonate with me forever. Happiness only real when shared. You can have everything in the world, but if you aren't surrounded by those who love and support you, it might as well be a dream.
DFW was the canary in the coal mine. His crushing premonition about what I consider humankinds relation to Earth as a mere resource, is now slowly coming to haunt us all.
If I can just achieve X, Y and Z then it’ll all be okay. This is what I thought going to law school and becoming a lawyer would do for me. It wasn’t until I achieved those things that I realized they in fact did not make it all okay. I was still empty and even lonelier than when I had initially begun. Without purpose and connection to something and someone or some idea in the physical, our souls will always feel alone and sad. No amount of achievement or goal progression can change that. It could even be likely that goal progression itself is just a form of distraction masquerading as purpose in order to occupy us away from the uncomfortable truth that we have not found our true meaning for being here, and we may never will.
Wow. One of the best RUclips comments I’ve seen - especially paired to a video from a masterpiece film. You are absolutely correct. Even goals towards ‘purpose’ could be almost a side quest of sorts. Maybe what we need as humans is seriously just community. Just because we’re advanced and have ‘jobs’ or ‘careers’ .. so what. Maybe 2 million years before any of this is what taught us what we really need. To be useful, to be present, and to repeat. Maybe we have truly gone too far in our search.
Stanley Kubrick: "I suppose it comes down to a rather awesome awareness of mortality. Our ability, unlike the other animals, to conceptualize our own end creates tremendous psychic strains within us; whether we like to admit it or not, in each man’s chest a tiny ferret of fear at this ultimate knowledge gnaws away at his ego and his sense of purpose. We’re fortunate, in a way, that our body, and the fulfillment of its needs and functions, plays such an imperative role in our lives; this physical shell creates a buffer between us and the mind-paralyzing realization that only a few years of existence separate birth from death. If man really sat back and thought about his impending termination, and his terrifying insignificance and aloneness in the cosmos, he would surely go mad, or succumb to a numbing sense of futility. Why, he might ask himself, should he bother to write a great symphony, or strive to make a living, or even to love another, when he is no more than a momentary microbe on a dust mote whirling through the unimaginable immensity of space? Those of us who are forced by their own sensibilities to view their lives in this perspective - who recognize that there is no purpose they can comprehend and that amidst a countless myriad of stars their existence goes unknown and unchronicled - can fall prey all too easily to the ultimate anomie….But even for those who lack the sensitivity to more than vaguely comprehend their transience and their triviality, this inchoate awareness robs life of meaning and purpose; it’s why ‘the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,’ why so many of us find our lives as absent of meaning as our deaths. The world’s religions, for all their parochialism, did supply a kind of consolation for this great ache; but as clergymen now pronounce the death of God and, to quote Arnold again, ‘the sea of faith’ recedes around the world with a ‘melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,’ man has no crutch left on which to lean-and no hope, however irrational, to give purpose to his existence. This shattering recognition of our mortality is at the root of far more mental illness than I suspect even psychiatrists are aware." Question: If life is so purposeless, do you feel it’s worth living? Kubrick: "The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning. Children, of course, begin life with an untarnished sense of wonder, a capacity to experience total joy at something as simple as the greenness of a leaf; but as they grow older, the awareness of death and decay begins to impinge on their consciousness and subtly erode their joie de vivre, their idealism - and their assumption of immortality. As a child matures, he sees death and pain everywhere about him, and begins to lose faith in the ultimate goodness of man. But, if he’s reasonably strong - and lucky - he can emerge from this twilight of the soul into a rebirth of life’s elan. Both because of and in spite of his awareness of the meaninglessness of life, he can forge a fresh sense of purpose and affirmation. He may not recapture the same pure sense of wonder he was born with, but he can shape something far more enduring and sustaining. The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent; but if we can come to terms with this indifference and accept the challenges of life within the boundaries of death - however mutable man may be able to make them - our existence as a species can have genuine meaning and fulfillment. However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light."@@darkman619112
@@John12050 Thank you for this quote, it seems to me Kubrick appeals to the ideals of Camus. rebel against nihilism and bring light to the universe in whatever means you can, if you can.
The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster. A good short story. Could read it in an hour. If you ever wanna read something that touches this subject but still want a story. 1 of the first. 1 of the best.
This is the only story that I have ever read (so far, anyway) that has made me feel a real, tangible fear and dread. Other stories can express to me that I should be feeling a certain way; some even succeed in evoking them. But genuine horror? The Machine Stops, and this short story alone, almost two years later, still occassionally haunts my mind's eye in a way that no other has since.
"Sitting alone. Looking at images on a screen. Given to us by people who do not love us." I'm a radiologist and this reminded me of a bad night on-call when the ER gets busy. 😬
This hits a lot harder when you're older and realize how misled you were at times , how you wasted time and potential for true happiness and chose to follow paths that only lead to emptiness. It's so awful to be aware of how isolated we've become, and yet feel powerless to do anything about it. Personally, I feel enough peace in my choices to stay hopeful for the next day, week, etc. , but I've seen more and more men these days that seem lost and hopeless.
Thank you. This just affirmed my decision to leap. Not off a high rise (or a cliff, as I've been thinking about) but out of this fucking job and into LIFE.
What he's saying is so relevant now. Look at how far we've come with technology, spurred on further by the epidemic. Now there's AI and stuff which are alternatives to interacting with people.
The key is when he says: "...and it's fine, in low doses. But, if it's the basic main staple of your diet, you're gonna die." We let ourselves lose control, we become willing zombies, we wait in lines around the block, before the store even opens, we can't wait, so eager, to sell our souls. Until we change this, until we can learn to consistently override the reptile brain, further the downward spiral we go. Why are we so willing, so eager, to sell our souls?
Thanks for sharing in the description. I’m about to start med school and have been realizing how the prestige/accolades/accomplishments from pursuing this path often don’t add any real value or meaning to life. Which is so interesting because of how much weight people give this stuff when talking about it: parents, friends, professors etc. In reality so what. Seems to me that what’s really important are the connections you make (classmates, colleagues, lovers, mentors, friends, patients) and the intrinsic value and purpose that this career can offer to your life. Very nice edit helps really put things in perspective.
The music is "The Big Ship" by Brian Eno!!! DFW has spoken about how much this song meant to him, I assume that's why they put it in the background of this pivotal scene.
Just to clarify, first they play Max Richter's "On the Nature of Daylight" and then they use "The Big Ship" at the end, since it was DFW's favorite song.
@@TheGoldenCapstone It matters to him because he doesn't have anything to be proud of besides things he happened to be born with. Racism absolves him of ever having to do anything wonderful for himself, all he has to do is merely exist as a member of a group he had no control over being born into and then spout garbage about people who are in other groups that they too had no control over being born into. Racism and antisemitism are diseases of the mind. Swamp-Donkey is ill.
went to IMDb and the only Sean associated with this movie was an art assistant, Sean Mouton. he hung those mirrors so damn well. better than anyone that year
Loneliness is a good thing, you cannot convince me otherwise. After 35 years (yep) of living with my shitty parents due to my massive anxieties that lead to insane depression, a life crippling drinking problem that made me a severe alcoholic for 20 years, a string of horrible horrible jobs with no goals, little pay and always on the verge of being fired no matter how good I did, I hated everything. I hated my terrible parents, hated my life, drank NON-STOP, attempted suicide twice, god damn it. I finally landed a good job with great job security and it allowed me to move out and live on my own. Almost instantly I stopped drinking, started focusing more on me and what I wanted to be… and that was simply being away from people. I love it. I am far happier now at 37 than at any other time in my life.
Rarely anyone deeply connects anymore, choosing screen time and texting over human connection and verbal exchanging of emotional place, placement, and shared emotional space. Flashy and colorful machines blinking, dinging, and constantly whirling have lured our spirits to the brink of annihilation. With each interview I can see the weight of the understanding of an oncoming dreaded reality that he shouldered. And that very few others understood, or couldn’t help, properly share in, or begin to help him make peace with the gravity of knowledge concerning what would befall us all. He is stardust now for sure, moving beyond light speed becoming, planets, stars, nebulae …as he should be. Look up and catch a glimpse of him everywhere.
Finite Jest at a mere 4:39 clock time. I dig it. I also like the idea that David Siegel does mainly comedy, but he also did this. And that the writer wrote Celebrity Death Match episodes. Absurdity is the antidote to the horror guys like DFW press up against.
Imagine the world was a Rorschach Test. Amidst all the pain, there is beauty. Some see it naturally, others struggle to find it, others still, are not bothered whether they see it or not. If you are struggling to find it, yours is the greatest journey of all. Don't give up.
Give up. You can't eat beauty. You can't pay your bills with it. You can screw, kiss and hug someone beautiful, but not actual beauty. It doesn't cure headaches. It doesn't cook food. Beauty is intangible. Maybe you know when you see it. Great. But, as an organism, you cannot live on just sunshine. Life wants to kill you. So. You gotta appreciate and respect the ugly even moreso.
I think I like DFW because writing is his center and he allows people to visit him. I think that is why he felt unstable -- aside from living his life the way he wanted to until his end. The saying Everything Good Must Come to an End meant his pleasures were being scrutinized in the name of his craft. He was brave and incredibly (you may not notice it) insecure. If he had everything he could ever want and need I don't think I would be here admiring him. I wish he was still around so I could see exactly what got to him.
Self absorption. A huge problem in modern times. In "Nothern Exposure" there's a big warning to Joel about this. It's a "capital sin" that can ruin your life. The solution has been said here in the comments: find someone you care, a homeless, a woman, a young boy with cancer in a hospital, whoever needs help and you like and you care. Then life is more important than you and your thoughts.
The problem though is this becomes a breeding ground for codependency. You become reliant on the need to please that person and if that person changes you are left with nothing. It will soon turn to resentment because you are reliant on a feeling from those people but all feelings are temporary.
I don't know, DFW was a very smart guy but sometimes I think he projected a lot of his internal strife on the only thing a person truly fears: change. I think the world has always been a very bleak and hostile place and only through tribal institutions like religion or societal traditions do people ever convince themselves that true good or true meaning can exist. In the information age, we are all experiencing the erasure of tribal institutions and thus feel like we're caught up in a great collapse of meaning and connectivity. However, all that meaning and connectivity really only came from ingrained lies and selfish appeal and now the internet has revealed to us what a human soul really is: an uncaring narcissist. We want and even need to believe that our lives have meaning but no other person ever truly knows us or even care about us, after all can we ever truly care about anything that isn't somehow connected to ourselves? If this grand isolating technology-based society ever crumbles, we will tumble back into full-blown tribalism as we always have to justify the selfish violent struggle that is at the center of life's meaning, but until then we must sit lonely in the eye of the storm and contemplate the meaningless and lonely truth that is all around us.
Yes, agreed. But remember when you meet one person, and see "the whole universe in their eyes" like George Carlin said, and you see how that person isn't an uncaring narcissist, but a friend. It is the society, its institutions of reward and failure, pitting us in competition, and more and more so in the modern age: deceit as a form of victory, which causes the selfishness. So let us all try to find a real friend, maybe two! So we can be less lonely even in the eye of the storm...
@@oddseatapes6211 I disagree, I think the connection we feel from others is part of our instinctual social reflex that kicks in when we see a person we deem "similar to us". We think this person may fit into our mental "tribe" and that perhaps we can help each other with our shared struggles which we typically assume someone like us has. Once we see that the other person actually doesn't care about our struggle and it was all an illusion as they prioritize their own needs over yours, conflict results and the tribe splits apart.
Become the best version of yourself and give that person to the world. I am going to watch this movie tonight. I love thinking about the deeper meaning of it all and why we are here .
What he's describing is what Aldus Huxley described in Brave New World, which he would have been very aware of as a philosopher. I wonder if he really thought this, he was very aware of so much, too much.
Huxley became more optimistic, particularly because of psychedelic drugs. If you haven't already, read The Island (1963), Heaven and Hell (1956) and Doors of Perception (1954), and finally Moksha (1977). Huxley spent the last 15 years of his life devoted only to the psychedelic experience and even took LSD on his deathbed
I disagree. A lot of his characters have characteristics that overlap, and there's certainly times when he's been typecast, but he manages to inject humanity into most of his work(not BvS). He's great in this and squid and the whale.
I think he played him accurately - with a wall around himself where even he himself was shut out. But this music is not in the film right.. is it the music of “face of the angel” or “la grande bellezza”?
Placing your entire happiness on someone else isn’t very healthy, for them or you. Sure, we can all think less about ourselves. But don’t save someone else as a way to avoid your own problems and act out to nurture someone in the way that you feel you should be where there is no reciprocation. There’s plenty of people to take advantage of that. Keep an open heart, a sharp mind and take care of yourself
@@UrSturdyWingOf course you have to REALLY be interested in the well beeing of the other, not in order to achieve something for your self. Thats the paradoxon. To he happy, you have to give up the desire to be happy.
@@jakobrhein8684making other people happy won’t bring me any more peace than making myself happy because happiness isn’t the problem. It’s an ever present nagging surplus of negativity, not an absense of positivity or meaning. I have had wonderful moments of true happiness and still they’ve felt pointless because they’re being experienced by me, and me is accutrly aware the whole time of how much I despise myself. It’s like painting a beautiful flower in a tiny corner of a painting you hate. It feels nice to look at the flower but you’re never unaware that it’s on a canvas you despise. And you’re the canvas.
Welp, that hit hard especially that im writing a pretty complicated essay taking the position that the integration of LLM's in education should be done, but that its gonna be deeply transformative. Its up to us to educate people critically about them, thats why it should be integrated, se we dont sink deeper in meaninglessness.
Extraordinary people like David Foster Wallace get lost on us in modern day society. I believe we may have little to no structure as to how to deal with extraordinary intelligence anymore which is why mid level inventions get commercialized and become the mainstream.
Knowing that he killed himself really puts things into perspective. Jaysus. Who knew that we need community, love, and dare I say religion to keep us together. If you’re under 35, you haven’t hit the point where you’ve lived enough to see how down people can get and how empty people feel just wanting more stuff. I remember having an argument with my dad about god. I told him I don’t think we need god and he looked at me like, you’re so unaware of how good you have it, cuz when basic needs are met, you can think of everything else, and essentially make problems for yourself that you would never have had. You’re too fortunate.” In other words. We’re all too fortunate. It’s really sad. Cuz so many kill themselves as they want more than what material whatever can give them.
@@ssgdhgsdfff8887 depends on how you live your life. Most are brought up to see religion as stupid, I know I did. Science can explain everything they say. When your children are born or your life falls apart, something happens to you that you can’t explain (I’ve had both happen) and the feeling is unexplainable. The tiny feeling that there is something else to life than getting drunk/high/ and getting more money to buy more stuff. It’s a feeling of something more, it makes you feel small, like you’re part of something greater. There’s a very emotional video from Jordan Peterson at one of his lectures, someone asks him why he shouldn’t commit suicide and he answers it in a way that hints at that feeling that was unexplainable. He’s the first person to get anywhere close to making it tangible. I was told not to listen to him, cuz he said bad things about x group, but if you listen to him, it’s really not about the group. If you have problems in the future, he is a great person to listen to. He’s helped me a ton. His lectures on the Bible are fascinating and his view on god is very interesting. He’s one of the only people who say you’re not stupid for asking questions about god. That’s very refreshing.
It's not about wanting more stuff, it's about filling a human shaped hole with stuff. People don't kill themselves because of not having a TV or phone, they kill themselves because without distraction they find themselves so unbelievably alone. The irony is, you father lived a better and more fulfilling life and couldn't see how much had been eroded, we live less now than ever before and it is killing us.
"What Ι am about to say does not concern the ordinary man of our day. On the contrary, Ι have in mind the man who finds himself involved in today's world, even at its most problematic and paroxysmal points; yet he does not belong inwardly to such a world, nor will he give in to it. He feels himself, in essence, as belonging to a different race from that of the overwhelming majority of his contemporaries. The natural place for such a man, the land in which he would not be a stranger, is the world in Tradition. Ι use the word tradition in a special sense, which Ι have defined elsewhere. It differs from the common usage, but is close to the meaning given to it by Rene Guenon in his analysis of the crisis of the modern world. In this particular meaning, a civilization or a society is "traditional" when it is ruled by principles that transcend what is merely human and individual, and when all its sectors are formed and ordered from above, and directed to what is above. Beyond the variety of historical forms, there has existed an essentially identical and constant world of Tradition. Ι have sought elsewhere to define its values and main categories, which are the basis for any civilization, society, or ordering of existence that calls itself normal in a higher sense, and is endowed with real significance. Everything that has come to predominate in the modern world is the exact antithesis of any traditional type of civilization. Moreover, the circumstances make it increasingly unlikely that anyone, starting from the values of Tradition (even assuming that one could still identify and adopt them), could take actions or reactions of a certain efficacy that would provoke any real change in the current state of affairs. After the last worldwide upheavals, there seems to be no starting point either for nations or for the vast majority of individuals-nothing in the institutions and general state of society, nor in the predominant ideas, interests, and energies of this epoch. Nevertheless, a few men exist who are, so to speak, still on their feet among the ruins and the dissolution, and who belong, more or less consciously, to that other world. Α little group seems willing to fight on, even in lost positions. So long as it does not yield, does not compromise itself by giving in to the seductions that would condition any success it might have, its testimony is valid. For others, it is a matter of completely isolating themselves, which demands an inner character as well as privileged material conditions, which grow scarcer day by day. ΑΙΙ the same, this is the second possible solution. Ι would add that there are a very few in the intellectual field who can still affirm "traditional" values beyond any immediate goal, so as to perform a "holding action." This is certainly useful to prevent current reality from shutting off every horizon, not only materially but also ideally, and stifling any measures different from its own. Thanks to them, distances may be maintained-other possible dimensions, other meanings of life, indicated to those able to detach themselves from looking only to the here and now. But this does not resolve the practical, personal problem-apart from the case of the man who is blessed with the opportunity for material isolation of those who cannot or will not burn their bridges with current life, and who must therefore decide how to conduct their existence, even on the level of the most elementary reactions and human relations. This is precisely the type of man that the present book has in mind. To him applies the saying of a great precursor: "The desert encroaches. Woe to him whose desert is within!" He can in truth find no further support from without. There no longer exist the organizations and institutions that, in a traditional civilization and society, would have allowed him to realize himself wholly, to order his own existence in a clear and unambiguous way, and to defend and apply creatively in his own environment the principal values that he recognizes within himself. Thus there is no question of suggesting to him lines of action that, adequate and normative in any regular, traditional civilization, can no longer be so in an abnormal one-in an environment that is utterly different socially, psychically, intellectually, and materially; in a climate of general dissolution; in a system ruled by scarcely restrained disorder, and anyway lacking any legitimacy from above." - Julius Evola, Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for Aristocrats of the Soul
@@rexnemorensis8154of course you had to quote a fascist. "Traditionally", we used to hang fascists upside down, now it's the pastime of bored teenagers on the internet.
@@sbef Actually you're wrong. Evola was a traditionalist which is further right than fascism. He was critical of fascism and even wrote a critique of fascism from the right, viewing it as still a fundamentally merchant-class ideology, but one that still upheld the virtues of class and warrior ethics such as courage, sacrifice, filial piety, honour, justice, and loyalty to nation-state. These are superior values to those of bourgeois, liberal societies, such as production, consumption, toxic individualism, as well as the delusional concepts such as liberty, equality and democracy born out of the French revolution which favour. Traditionalists understand that where there is equality there cannot be freedom: what exists is not pure freedom, but rather the many individual, domesticated, and mechanized freedoms, in a state of reciprocal limitation. He saw fascism as a bulwark against the regressive, plebeian influences of communism, socialism and liberalism which out of envy reduce all institutions and individuals to the same base condition, and favours the advancement of the most gluttonous, manipulative and even psychopathic individuals. The modern democratic politician is a self-serving seducer, sophist and manipulator whilst also a worshiper of the people, or simultaneously a pimp and a whore, which is something people instinctively perceive.
Technology and materialism are killing us. It is a deeply unsatisfactory culture to live in for anyone wishing to experience true community or a rational balance of instinct and service to the larger good. There is no "larger good." There is only the bottom line.
I read in the description that you went to medical school and that this is what you dreamed of doing but it left you feeling no better than before. Remind me an awful lot of what I've experienced. How are you holding up? Did you continue your medical studies?
so I'm a doctor now. and I have a different relationship with it these days. when I help people its good, although i feel a lot of pressure a lot of the time to do more, almost like there is some spectre observing and judging me the whole time. I still struggle with everything now that I did then, but. I don't know. I guess as more time goes on I respect more and more the struggle DFW had just... finding the right goal posts to have and to not flog yourself into getting there. I'm in therapy and take my meds regularly. I'm doing better most days. I'm happy
@@frontlinebreakthrough5723 I am a PhD in a highly technical field near the top of my industry and I just want you to know I struggle with the same thing. I'm in a position any of my former students would envy and dreamed of, starry eyed, as they came to me for advice during office hours. In the end, after publications, patents, and big job titles it made me no happier. In fact I felt emptier than when I embarked on this journey. The only thing that brought me any peace and happiness was finding God and taking care of my wife and family and framing my achievement to those two ends. I don't even care about the money anymore. This isn't to say some people won't find meaning in achievement, it is to say that it won't fix what's inside of you. It's just a distraction that lets you kick the existential can further down the road. I beg of all of you that read this to try and understand how valuable it is to be truly content in your station in life, it's something I may never have.
You're alone because it's easier. You yearn for others because it seems like the answer. But it isn't. Other people are an enclosed immeasurable abstraction of processes You might as well be asking for the ocean. To be together and retain your identity with the ocean is two conflicting states of being You are alone be cause you are conscious. Bron from unconscious and refusing to accept your role as mediator betwen unconscious and the unknown Its not a picnic Its much more than a stupid pleasurablw thing. If you could even imagine that would be worth having. We are all connected by language and routine and even in it's most mundane. Within the details are hilarious and boundlessly beautiful aspects Wallace's suicide was related to catanonia and a phenomenon of dementia that people don't have a mind to simulate He was so opposed to unconsciousness and play due to his pressures to be composed and retain his stature as leader and noblemen that he couldn't slip into silly goose mode, and he talked about being stuck in fearing what he looked like and wanting an image that he could trust or agree to, so as not to feel guilty where it goes. But one thing is for sure He didn't love himself He ruled over himself and demanded constant vigilant effort and gigantic modes of course corrections to steer himself and America away from an unvirtious life of hedonic slavery. And yet because he took it so seriously he was killed by himself for being a hypocrite who couldn't reconcile the truth was that was just a shape of water and he didn't have anyone he loved or loved him enough to let him be who he needed to be to transform into to live and be a real example of living. And it was possible. Instead he just oscified in latter years in the country like people who seek seclusion do. And diminished results surrounded by people you can't relate to dwindle the effect of your coping mechanisms In the words of Leonard Cohen "Love is the only engine of survival" Wallace was too dedicated to novelty to speak in tired cliches with conviction And he resorted to medication thinking it would solve that dilemma. If had just left America and lived anywhere where he wasn't known and he had to learn another language he would have been happier and I personally believe it would of cured his "spiritual crisis"
I am actually having trouble trying to listen to what's being said because I can't stop thinking about how he's so blatantly fake smoking. They are both bad smokers but Jessie is just the worst smoker I think i've ever seen. I literally have to pretend that his character doesn't smoke and is trying to impress the other one by pretending to smoke.
IJ is ky favorite book. Its notoriously unreadable so people always ask me why. Well, its because of the shit being said in this video. Especially the dirst minute and a half. Make no mistake, entertainment is reaching lethal levels of addictiveness, and he saw it coming all along. That boy _knew_
Happiness is a kind of wisdom and Wallace didn't have it. *The problem with loneliness, and isolation was Wallace's problem, not mine, not yours, his. And he extrapolated outward from himself, saying everyone will have this issue and it will be pervasive. It is not. HE had emotional and mental issues and that's the way he perceived things.
The movie these clips are from is based on the book "Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace". The book they were on tour for is Wallace's novel "Infinite Jest". I have read both and would highly recommend both.
Yep, keep in mind these conversations took place in 1996. So the part about leaping from a skyscraper because the alternative is awful basically foreshadowed 9/11 also. He was too good for this world..
Even now, as I live in western Europe, I don't harbor the illusion that if I just made the big effort and wasted my life cultivating great social relationships, that it would 'solve' my life and fill me with happiness. On the contrary, a happy-go-lucky social life is often as superficial as a soap opera in the face of the work and the sacrifices and the sufferings involved in having few but deep friendships. I think many series and films offer us an amazing understanding of human life, an amazing experience. I'd gladly spend my life alone in a room watching cinema and documentaries and listening to good music, than be back to my childhood life being so poor I could not afford a bus ticket to the next village, and for human company I'd have idiotic traditional villagers. All of us forcing one-another in tight social and gender roles, all of us watching one-another for mistakes, so gossip could be at the same time the great social entertainer and the whip that kept us in line with toxic traditional beliefs.
I like how you only exist in that specific dualistic realm Villagers Or Movies There's literally billions of people who agree with you stop bro please stop this mindset
@@dffgffffffdddddddddd literally my coming to age was moving from a 300 people Balkan village to Scandinavia to study film, and afterwards occupy myself with film and now teaching film ha ha ha good observation. but yes, my youth was marked by watching Dune and Star Trek.
Most people aren't lonely. They just want a partner, they usually have family etc. you never know real loneliness when you have no friends, partner or family and you used to think you used to be lonely.
the movie is called The End Of The Tour, and it’s based on the book David Lipsky's memoir Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself based on the conversation he had with David Foster Wallace
The phrase "We have never been more connected to one another in human history than we are right now, yet we are more alone than ever" keeps repeating itself, resonating in the soul of every person.
DFW is a phase. Like yeah, if you're young it's a touching phrase, but what goes after it? The only way that has substance is to become a philosopher and understand our nature. We are made out of the same nanomachinery as ants are. And ants are connected like you wouldn't believe but they're only one of a handful eusocial species on Earth. If that's not our future, it's certainly a future that's laid before us.
Bla bla bla, everything's fine, just accept your new corporate technocratic billionaire overlords and their algorithmic software which is now starting to completely dominate every aspect of our lives. When legitimate businesses start operating the same as scammer organizations, then it's not a scam, is it? Come on, normalize it like everyone else. It's just regular business now, and if you question that you'll just get told, "Aaah, whatever, business is business and it's always been like this, stop being a miserable hater!" In fact, anything you notice change to the detriment of society, everyone will just be conditioned to tell you it's always been like that and in fact everything before the 2000s was worse. It's not gaslighting if everyone believes it.
Damn
Nonsense that sounds profound. How could anyone know how lonely people were or weren’t in the past. It’s only relatively recently that a legion of narcissists make sure that anyone who will listen know how they’re feeling on any given day.
@@Wanderlust073 We are lucky to have those articulate narcissists.
You can recognyze a really lonely man easily by how much he can talk, when he start to talk.
Damn, true. I'm a fuggin chatterbox.
this sentence is genius.
Perhaps by how much he can talk about himself.
That's why most schizophrenic people are lonely. People don't wanna hear their shit.
this hit really hard.
Name of the movie: The End of The Tour
the irony of watching a clip recap served by addicting algorithm of a movie summarising about DFW's thesis about how pointlessly addictive media is and will be.
Dude, for real. He's appreciating the irony, from heaven. The first minute and a half of this video are absolutely prophetic
Ha
Bravo, brilliant comment. I am now putting my phone down for the rest of the day. Thanks
Excellent point. And I wish I could agree that it’s pointlessly addictive, but I don’t believe it’s pointless. I think it’s quite deliberate. And if we can’t turn off the screens, then we’ll have to change what’s on them. I’m glad I found your excellent point on my screen.
infinite jest.. oh just love what you love.
"I hope everybody could get rich and famous and have everything they ever dreamed of, so they will know that it's not the answer." -Jim Carrey
@@LLUN-i5uyeah I feel like give us two a go I bet one of us makes it work lol😂
Okay Jim give your wealth to me so I can find out.
@@LLUN-i5uYou should read up on how poor he was before he made it
Carrey really went off the deep end with that beard and his arrogant, condescension. "I needed color'' he brags when he shows off his dreadful ''art.'' He's a great comedian, but a lousy painter and a pompous ass when pontificating and spouting his philosophy.
Jim can dedicate his life to painting, traveling, yoga retreats, because money, while perhaps not a solution, more importantly is no longer a problem.
He has access to the world’s most talented and successful people because of his own fame. He’s not speaking to an overworked case worker if he’s depressed. A medical student at a learning hospital isn’t mending his bones if he’s hurt.
No, fame/money, in an of themselves, don’t make you happy. But they are the wheels on a vehicle that can take you where you want/need to go.
With money, you can go anywhere, be anywhere, and with fame, you will be surrounded by people, some of whom will take a genuine interest in who you are.
The pool of quality people who can potentially love you, and the experiences you can have with those people, are pretty spectacular for a person like Jim.
Glib summations about money and fame not making you happy change none of that deeper reality.
The last dying thought of Christopher McCandless will resonate with me forever. Happiness only real when shared. You can have everything in the world, but if you aren't surrounded by those who love and support you, it might as well be a dream.
I think that the problem can be having those people there but not being able to take them in, never feeling like it’s enough
Being alone while surrounded by people..look around theyre everywhere..water water everywhere without a drop to drink
That was just a quote underlined in a book
how do you know that's what he was thinking about when he died? He died alone, no one was there to record what he was thinking
It's a Lord Byron quote
DFW was the canary in the coal mine. His crushing premonition about what I consider humankinds relation to Earth as a mere resource, is now slowly coming to haunt us all.
sharply observed.
Lol people have been telling you for over a century
💯
Been telling you too bleu, yet you still can't stop yerself from being a prick
Western culture's relation to Earth**
One of my absolute favorite movies of all time. Truly deserves a lot more credit.
If I can just achieve X, Y and Z then it’ll all be okay. This is what I thought going to law school and becoming a lawyer would do for me. It wasn’t until I achieved those things that I realized they in fact did not make it all okay. I was still empty and even lonelier than when I had initially begun. Without purpose and connection to something and someone or some idea in the physical, our souls will always feel alone and sad. No amount of achievement or goal progression can change that. It could even be likely that goal progression itself is just a form of distraction masquerading as purpose in order to occupy us away from the uncomfortable truth that we have not found our true meaning for being here, and we may never will.
Maybe because there isn't really a reason. Not that i know tho.
Then what? There is no true meaning for us being here; I mean like, what else do we live for then? Pets, Family, Money? Idk anymore.
Wow. One of the best RUclips comments I’ve seen - especially paired to a video from a masterpiece film. You are absolutely correct. Even goals towards ‘purpose’ could be almost a side quest of sorts. Maybe what we need as humans is seriously just community. Just because we’re advanced and have ‘jobs’ or ‘careers’ .. so what. Maybe 2 million years before any of this is what taught us what we really need. To be useful, to be present, and to repeat. Maybe we have truly gone too far in our search.
Stanley Kubrick: "I suppose it comes down to a rather awesome awareness of mortality. Our ability, unlike the other animals, to conceptualize our own end creates tremendous psychic strains within us; whether we like to admit it or not, in each man’s chest a tiny ferret of fear at this ultimate knowledge gnaws away at his ego and his sense of purpose. We’re fortunate, in a way, that our body, and the fulfillment of its needs and functions, plays such an imperative role in our lives; this physical shell creates a buffer between us and the mind-paralyzing realization that only a few years of existence separate birth from death. If man really sat back and thought about his impending termination, and his terrifying insignificance and aloneness in the cosmos, he would surely go mad, or succumb to a numbing sense of futility. Why, he might ask himself, should he bother to write a great symphony, or strive to make a living, or even to love another, when he is no more than a momentary microbe on a dust mote whirling through the unimaginable immensity of space?
Those of us who are forced by their own sensibilities to view their lives in this perspective - who recognize that there is no purpose they can comprehend and that amidst a countless myriad of stars their existence goes unknown and unchronicled - can fall prey all too easily to the ultimate anomie….But even for those who lack the sensitivity to more than vaguely comprehend their transience and their triviality, this inchoate awareness robs life of meaning and purpose; it’s why ‘the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,’ why so many of us find our lives as absent of meaning as our deaths.
The world’s religions, for all their parochialism, did supply a kind of consolation for this great ache; but as clergymen now pronounce the death of God and, to quote Arnold again, ‘the sea of faith’ recedes around the world with a ‘melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,’ man has no crutch left on which to lean-and no hope, however irrational, to give purpose to his existence. This shattering recognition of our mortality is at the root of far more mental illness than I suspect even psychiatrists are aware."
Question: If life is so purposeless, do you feel it’s worth living?
Kubrick: "The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning. Children, of course, begin life with an untarnished sense of wonder, a capacity to experience total joy at something as simple as the greenness of a leaf; but as they grow older, the awareness of death and decay begins to impinge on their consciousness and subtly erode their joie de vivre, their idealism - and their assumption of immortality. As a child matures, he sees death and pain everywhere about him, and begins to lose faith in the ultimate goodness of man.
But, if he’s reasonably strong - and lucky - he can emerge from this twilight of the soul into a rebirth of life’s elan. Both because of and in spite of his awareness of the meaninglessness of life, he can forge a fresh sense of purpose and affirmation. He may not recapture the same pure sense of wonder he was born with, but he can shape something far more enduring and sustaining. The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent; but if we can come to terms with this indifference and accept the challenges of life within the boundaries of death - however mutable man may be able to make them - our existence as a species can have genuine meaning and fulfillment.
However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light."@@darkman619112
@@John12050 Thank you for this quote, it seems to me Kubrick appeals to the ideals of Camus. rebel against nihilism and bring light to the universe in whatever means you can, if you can.
The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster. A good short story. Could read it in an hour. If you ever wanna read something that touches this subject but still want a story. 1 of the first. 1 of the best.
This is the only story that I have ever read (so far, anyway) that has made me feel a real, tangible fear and dread. Other stories can express to me that I should be feeling a certain way; some even succeed in evoking them. But genuine horror? The Machine Stops, and this short story alone, almost two years later, still occassionally haunts my mind's eye in a way that no other has since.
"Sitting alone. Looking at images on a screen. Given to us by people who do not love us." I'm a radiologist and this reminded me of a bad night on-call when the ER gets busy. 😬
As someone that relies on your image reading skills, I love you ❤
This hits a lot harder when you're older and realize how misled you were at times , how you wasted time and potential for true happiness and chose to follow paths that only lead to emptiness. It's so awful to be aware of how isolated we've become, and yet feel powerless to do anything about it. Personally, I feel enough peace in my choices to stay hopeful for the next day, week, etc. , but I've seen more and more men these days that seem lost and hopeless.
but what happens when everyone becomes jealous and they all betray you. what is the point?
This is the click of the night. One of those life changing clicks.
A moment also to appreciate the incredible acting. He sounds exactly like DFW. Really moving selection of scenes/dialogues
Thank you. This just affirmed my decision to leap. Not off a high rise (or a cliff, as I've been thinking about) but out of this fucking job and into LIFE.
One of my all-time favorite movies, and one that obviously becomes only more relevant with each passing year. Great montage of great scenes!
Thank you so much
What he's saying is so relevant now. Look at how far we've come with technology, spurred on further by the epidemic. Now there's AI and stuff which are alternatives to interacting with people.
spurred on by lockdowns imported by politicians from totalitarian China.
He also predicted that VR porn was eventually gonna be a thing and it was going to destroy our minds. And he said this stuff in 1995.
The key is when he says: "...and it's fine, in low doses. But, if it's the basic main staple of your diet, you're gonna die." We let ourselves lose control, we become willing zombies, we wait in lines around the block, before the store even opens, we can't wait, so eager, to sell our souls.
Until we change this, until we can learn to consistently override the reptile brain, further the downward spiral we go.
Why are we so willing, so eager, to sell our souls?
Thanks for sharing in the description. I’m about to start med school and have been realizing how the prestige/accolades/accomplishments from pursuing this path often don’t add any real value or meaning to life. Which is so interesting because of how much weight people give this stuff when talking about it: parents, friends, professors etc. In reality so what. Seems to me that what’s really important are the connections you make (classmates, colleagues, lovers, mentors, friends, patients) and the intrinsic value and purpose that this career can offer to your life. Very nice edit helps really put things in perspective.
The arrival score underneath is a great touch
The music is "The Big Ship" by Brian Eno!!! DFW has spoken about how much this song meant to him, I assume that's why they put it in the background of this pivotal scene.
Just to clarify, first they play Max Richter's "On the Nature of Daylight" and then they use "The Big Ship" at the end, since it was DFW's favorite song.
@@cybermaruoh wow! I didn’t even realize arrival had any music that wasn’t original score
This is a brilliant movie. Thanks for reminding me of it, I'm going to show it to my kid.
Dude.. allowing a Jew to play DFW is a gd travesty. No wonder his family was against it. This is garbage.
@@-Swamp_Donkey- it's impossible to tell if you're trolling here - you're not actually that bigoted and stupid are you?
@@-Swamp_Donkey- ? Why does that matter?
@@TheGoldenCapstone It matters to him because he doesn't have anything to be proud of besides things he happened to be born with. Racism absolves him of ever having to do anything wonderful for himself, all he has to do is merely exist as a member of a group he had no control over being born into and then spout garbage about people who are in other groups that they too had no control over being born into. Racism and antisemitism are diseases of the mind. Swamp-Donkey is ill.
@@-Swamp_Donkey-yo wtf 😂😂
First 10 secs I thought it was a docu. Sean deserved an Oscar for this.
Sean who?
That’s Jason Segel?
@@matthew9090ligma
went to IMDb and the only Sean associated with this movie was an art assistant, Sean Mouton. he hung those mirrors so damn well. better than anyone that year
Loneliness is a good thing, you cannot convince me otherwise. After 35 years (yep) of living with my shitty parents due to my massive anxieties that lead to insane depression, a life crippling drinking problem that made me a severe alcoholic for 20 years, a string of horrible horrible jobs with no goals, little pay and always on the verge of being fired no matter how good I did, I hated everything. I hated my terrible parents, hated my life, drank NON-STOP, attempted suicide twice, god damn it.
I finally landed a good job with great job security and it allowed me to move out and live on my own. Almost instantly I stopped drinking, started focusing more on me and what I wanted to be… and that was simply being away from people. I love it. I am far happier now at 37 than at any other time in my life.
Be cautious not to confuse being alone with loneliness.
damn he nailed the cadence
He sure did! I honestly thought it was him! Never saw the movie was thinking I’m watching his clip😅
Rarely anyone deeply connects anymore, choosing screen time and texting over human connection and verbal exchanging of emotional place, placement, and shared emotional space. Flashy and colorful machines blinking, dinging, and constantly whirling have lured our spirits to the brink of annihilation.
With each interview I can see the weight of the understanding of an oncoming dreaded reality that he shouldered. And that very few others understood, or couldn’t help, properly share in, or begin to help him make peace with the gravity of knowledge concerning what would befall us all.
He is stardust now for sure, moving beyond light speed becoming, planets, stars, nebulae …as he should be. Look up and catch a glimpse of him everywhere.
He's spot on
painful irony that this is youtube youre watching lmao
Finite Jest at a mere 4:39 clock time. I dig it. I also like the idea that David Siegel does mainly comedy, but he also did this. And that the writer wrote Celebrity Death Match episodes. Absurdity is the antidote to the horror guys like DFW press up against.
Who the hell is David Siegel?
Imagine the world was a Rorschach Test. Amidst all the pain, there is beauty. Some see it naturally, others struggle to find it, others still, are not bothered whether they see it or not. If you are struggling to find it, yours is the greatest journey of all. Don't give up.
That's... really beautiful put honestly. I never thought of life that way
Its also a rorschach test in that there is no inherent beauty, if you see it its because you've convinced yourself of it
Damn, dude. That is well said!
Give up.
You can't eat beauty.
You can't pay your bills with it.
You can screw, kiss and hug someone beautiful, but not actual beauty.
It doesn't cure headaches.
It doesn't cook food.
Beauty is intangible. Maybe you know when you see it. Great. But, as an organism, you cannot live on just sunshine. Life wants to kill you. So. You gotta appreciate and respect the ugly even moreso.
contrast is necessary
I think I like DFW because writing is his center and he allows people to visit him. I think that is why he felt unstable -- aside from living his life the way he wanted to until his end. The saying Everything Good Must Come to an End meant his pleasures were being scrutinized in the name of his craft. He was brave and incredibly (you may not notice it) insecure. If he had everything he could ever want and need I don't think I would be here admiring him. I wish he was still around so I could see exactly what got to him.
“he allows people to visit him.” is a lovely way of putting it.
Self absorption. A huge problem in modern times. In "Nothern Exposure" there's a big warning to Joel about this. It's a "capital sin" that can ruin your life. The solution has been said here in the comments: find someone you care, a homeless, a woman, a young boy with cancer in a hospital, whoever needs help and you like and you care. Then life is more important than you and your thoughts.
The problem though is this becomes a breeding ground for codependency. You become reliant on the need to please that person and if that person changes you are left with nothing. It will soon turn to resentment because you are reliant on a feeling from those people but all feelings are temporary.
nothing is more important than me cause if I die nothing matters anymore
@@agapon2023that’s a more honest answer than people are willing to give.
I really, really appreciate your description above
Fucking hell, he nailed it.
Wait, holy shit, that WASNT DFW?!
@@firemantimmy5367
Jason Segel
I connected really strongly when the Brian Eno music piece from his early works started. Of course I should explore this in more depth.
Bro, this is Max Richter - In the nature of daylight.
@@dominikkurowski3145 Bro, this is Brian Eno - The Big Ship
@@xalpol12how can you get the two mixed up? This isn't The Big Ship...
@@Q-BOT bruh watch it till the end
@@xalpol12bruuuuh im so dumb. Thank you for pointing it out, I understand why people say its The Big Ship😂 Sorry youtubelets!
Thank you for taking these incredibly poignant pieces of this movie/book.
🙏
We all will die in a very meaningful way❤
my god how did i find this is incredible
my first watch of this was a drama, but now it's horror.
Thank you. This helped me.
@@alexandercoco2576 I’m so happy ♥️
I don't know, DFW was a very smart guy but sometimes I think he projected a lot of his internal strife on the only thing a person truly fears: change. I think the world has always been a very bleak and hostile place and only through tribal institutions like religion or societal traditions do people ever convince themselves that true good or true meaning can exist. In the information age, we are all experiencing the erasure of tribal institutions and thus feel like we're caught up in a great collapse of meaning and connectivity. However, all that meaning and connectivity really only came from ingrained lies and selfish appeal and now the internet has revealed to us what a human soul really is: an uncaring narcissist. We want and even need to believe that our lives have meaning but no other person ever truly knows us or even care about us, after all can we ever truly care about anything that isn't somehow connected to ourselves? If this grand isolating technology-based society ever crumbles, we will tumble back into full-blown tribalism as we always have to justify the selfish violent struggle that is at the center of life's meaning, but until then we must sit lonely in the eye of the storm and contemplate the meaningless and lonely truth that is all around us.
Yes, agreed. But remember when you meet one person, and see "the whole universe in their eyes" like George Carlin said, and you see how that person isn't an uncaring narcissist, but a friend. It is the society, its institutions of reward and failure, pitting us in competition, and more and more so in the modern age: deceit as a form of victory, which causes the selfishness. So let us all try to find a real friend, maybe two! So we can be less lonely even in the eye of the storm...
@@oddseatapes6211 I disagree, I think the connection we feel from others is part of our instinctual social reflex that kicks in when we see a person we deem "similar to us". We think this person may fit into our mental "tribe" and that perhaps we can help each other with our shared struggles which we typically assume someone like us has. Once we see that the other person actually doesn't care about our struggle and it was all an illusion as they prioritize their own needs over yours, conflict results and the tribe splits apart.
Become the best version of yourself and give that person to the world.
I am going to watch this movie tonight. I love thinking about the deeper meaning of it all and why we are here .
What he's describing is what Aldus Huxley described in Brave New World, which he would have been very aware of as a philosopher. I wonder if he really thought this, he was very aware of so much, too much.
I think most u.s. high school kids have to read BNW...at least we used to
Sadly Huxley's book is not a warning it's a recommendation. He's gloating.
Huxley became more optimistic, particularly because of psychedelic drugs. If you haven't already, read The Island (1963), Heaven and Hell (1956) and Doors of Perception (1954), and finally Moksha (1977). Huxley spent the last 15 years of his life devoted only to the psychedelic experience and even took LSD on his deathbed
Brilliant performance
Loneliness is the curse of the intelligent and empathic.
This is PROFOUND.
@@Mark-v7y8t
I know.
I know.
And why is that?
@@claudiamanta1943 You need to be much more specific than "And why is that?"
thank you for this.
Lots of sadness and lots of truth.
Jesse eisenberg plays the exact same character in every movie.
Clearly you haven’t watched Sasquatch Sunset yet lol 😆
@@djofortunato5799 and nearly nobody has, it was a limited release for one week before going to streaming just yesterday lol
I don't agree, in this movie he's playing the fakest smoker on planet earth. I've never seen him play that before.
He sucks
I disagree. A lot of his characters have characteristics that overlap, and there's certainly times when he's been typecast, but he manages to inject humanity into most of his work(not BvS). He's great in this and squid and the whale.
I think he played him accurately - with a wall around himself where even he himself was shut out.
But this music is not in the film right.. is it the music of “face of the angel” or “la grande bellezza”?
It’s not, it’s On the Nature of Daylight by Max Ritcher
brian eno - the big ship
Nice Max Richter music in the background…❤
It doesn't even look like Jason Segel, man he did this one well.
The cure to this is so simple. Quit focusing on yourself and make someone else's life cool. Simple as that.
Placing your entire happiness on someone else isn’t very healthy, for them or you. Sure, we can all think less about ourselves. But don’t save someone else as a way to avoid your own problems and act out to nurture someone in the way that you feel you should be where there is no reciprocation. There’s plenty of people to take advantage of that. Keep an open heart, a sharp mind and take care of yourself
@@UrSturdyWingOf course you have to REALLY be interested in the well beeing of the other, not in order to achieve something for your self. Thats the paradoxon. To he happy, you have to give up the desire to be happy.
No.
Can Go wrong too
@@jakobrhein8684making other people happy won’t bring me any more peace than making myself happy because happiness isn’t the problem. It’s an ever present nagging surplus of negativity, not an absense of positivity or meaning. I have had wonderful moments of true happiness and still they’ve felt pointless because they’re being experienced by me, and me is accutrly aware the whole time of how much I despise myself. It’s like painting a beautiful flower in a tiny corner of a painting you hate. It feels nice to look at the flower but you’re never unaware that it’s on a canvas you despise. And you’re the canvas.
Ugh... This hits hard today
Welp, that hit hard especially that im writing a pretty complicated essay taking the position that the integration of LLM's in education should be done, but that its gonna be deeply transformative. Its up to us to educate people critically about them, thats why it should be integrated, se we dont sink deeper in meaninglessness.
So that we no longer need human interaction? And that humans no longer have jobs, at least not the ones that require thinking.
Extraordinary people like David Foster Wallace get lost on us in modern day society. I believe we may have little to no structure as to how to deal with extraordinary intelligence anymore which is why mid level inventions get commercialized and become the mainstream.
Knowing that he killed himself really puts things into perspective. Jaysus. Who knew that we need community, love, and dare I say religion to keep us together. If you’re under 35, you haven’t hit the point where you’ve lived enough to see how down people can get and how empty people feel just wanting more stuff. I remember having an argument with my dad about god. I told him I don’t think we need god and he looked at me like, you’re so unaware of how good you have it, cuz when basic needs are met, you can think of everything else, and essentially make problems for yourself that you would never have had. You’re too fortunate.” In other words. We’re all too fortunate. It’s really sad. Cuz so many kill themselves as they want more than what material whatever can give them.
@@ssgdhgsdfff8887 depends on how you live your life. Most are brought up to see religion as stupid, I know I did. Science can explain everything they say. When your children are born or your life falls apart, something happens to you that you can’t explain (I’ve had both happen) and the feeling is unexplainable. The tiny feeling that there is something else to life than getting drunk/high/ and getting more money to buy more stuff. It’s a feeling of something more, it makes you feel small, like you’re part of something greater. There’s a very emotional video from Jordan Peterson at one of his lectures, someone asks him why he shouldn’t commit suicide and he answers it in a way that hints at that feeling that was unexplainable. He’s the first person to get anywhere close to making it tangible. I was told not to listen to him, cuz he said bad things about x group, but if you listen to him, it’s really not about the group. If you have problems in the future, he is a great person to listen to. He’s helped me a ton. His lectures on the Bible are fascinating and his view on god is very interesting. He’s one of the only people who say you’re not stupid for asking questions about god. That’s very refreshing.
@@ssgdhgsdfff8887maybe, but you'll get stronger and conquer whatever comes your way - hopefully.
It's not about wanting more stuff, it's about filling a human shaped hole with stuff.
People don't kill themselves because of not having a TV or phone, they kill themselves because without distraction they find themselves so unbelievably alone.
The irony is, you father lived a better and more fulfilling life and couldn't see how much had been eroded, we live less now than ever before and it is killing us.
If some people lived a life as shitty as some do, they’d want to believe in a religion too.
It’s not a chemical imbalance
It’s a yearning to live a life worth living
Absolutely! I'm desperate for it right now. I've had it, but my two most important sources of deep love both died while we were together.
I love this.
It's not loneliness if it's intentional.
I'm alone on purpose and I am making peace with it.
Some other alternatives for a way to live.
Hold on. You are loved 🫂
Correction: a screenwriter's rendition of DFW talking about loneliness.
I believe the script for this movie is heavily based on actual recorded conversations between him and a journalist. Much of it is direct quotes
He knew what the disease is but not the cure.
Many great mi da have been looking for the cure for centuries while getting infected.
"What Ι am about to say does not concern the ordinary man of our day. On the contrary, Ι have in mind the man who finds himself involved in today's world, even at its most problematic and paroxysmal points; yet he does not belong inwardly to such a world, nor will he give in to it. He feels himself, in
essence, as belonging to a different race from that of the overwhelming majority of his contemporaries.
The natural place for such a man, the land in which he would not be a stranger, is the world in Tradition. Ι use the word tradition in a special sense, which Ι have defined elsewhere. It differs from the common
usage, but is close to the meaning given to it by Rene Guenon in his analysis of the crisis of the modern world. In this particular meaning, a civilization or a society is "traditional" when it is ruled by principles
that transcend what is merely human and individual, and when all its sectors are formed and ordered from above, and directed to what is above. Beyond the variety of historical forms, there has existed an
essentially identical and constant world of Tradition. Ι have sought elsewhere to define its values and main categories, which are the basis for any civilization, society, or ordering of existence that calls itself normal in a higher sense, and is endowed with real significance.
Everything that has come to predominate in the modern world is the exact antithesis of any traditional type of civilization. Moreover, the circumstances make it increasingly unlikely that anyone, starting from
the values of Tradition (even assuming that one could still identify and adopt them), could take actions or reactions of a certain efficacy that would provoke any real change in the current state of affairs. After the
last worldwide upheavals, there seems to be no starting point either for nations or for the vast majority of individuals-nothing in the institutions and general state of society, nor in the predominant ideas, interests,
and energies of this epoch.
Nevertheless, a few men exist who are, so to speak, still on their feet among the ruins and the dissolution, and who belong, more or less consciously, to that other world. Α little group seems willing to fight on,
even in lost positions. So long as it does not yield, does not compromise itself by giving in to the seductions that would condition any success it might have, its testimony is valid. For others, it is a matter of completely isolating themselves, which demands an inner character as well as privileged material conditions, which grow scarcer day by day. ΑΙΙ the same, this is the second possible solution. Ι would add that there are a very few in the intellectual field who can still affirm "traditional" values beyond
any immediate goal, so as to perform a "holding action." This is certainly useful to prevent current reality from shutting off every horizon, not only materially but also ideally, and stifling any measures different
from its own. Thanks to them, distances may be maintained-other possible dimensions, other meanings of life, indicated to those able to detach themselves from looking only to the here and now.
But this does not resolve the practical, personal problem-apart from the case of the man who is blessed with the opportunity for material isolation of those who cannot or will not burn their bridges with current
life, and who must therefore decide how to conduct their existence, even on the level of the most elementary reactions and human relations. This is precisely the type of man that the present book has in mind. To him applies the saying of a great precursor: "The desert encroaches. Woe to him whose desert is within!" He can in truth find no further support from without. There no longer exist the organizations and institutions that, in a traditional civilization and society, would have allowed him to realize himself wholly, to order his own existence in a clear and unambiguous way, and to defend and apply creatively in his own environment the principal values that he recognizes within himself. Thus there is no question of suggesting to him lines of action that, adequate and normative in any regular, traditional civilization, can no longer be so in an abnormal one-in an environment that is utterly different socially, psychically, intellectually, and materially; in a climate of general dissolution; in a system ruled by scarcely restrained disorder, and anyway lacking any legitimacy from above." - Julius Evola, Ride the Tiger: A Survival Manual for Aristocrats of the Soul
@@rexnemorensis8154of course you had to quote a fascist. "Traditionally", we used to hang fascists upside down, now it's the pastime of bored teenagers on the internet.
@@sbef Actually you're wrong. Evola was a traditionalist which is further right than fascism. He was critical of fascism and even wrote a critique of fascism from the right, viewing it as still a fundamentally merchant-class ideology, but one that still upheld the virtues of class and warrior ethics such as courage, sacrifice, filial piety, honour, justice, and loyalty to nation-state. These are superior values to those of bourgeois, liberal societies, such as production, consumption, toxic individualism, as well as the delusional concepts such as liberty, equality and democracy born out of the French revolution which favour. Traditionalists understand that where there is equality there cannot be freedom: what exists is not pure freedom, but rather the many individual,
domesticated, and mechanized freedoms, in a state of reciprocal limitation. He saw fascism as a bulwark against the regressive, plebeian influences of communism, socialism and liberalism which out of envy reduce all institutions and individuals to the same base condition, and favours the advancement of the most gluttonous, manipulative and even psychopathic individuals. The modern democratic politician is a self-serving seducer, sophist and manipulator whilst also a worshiper of the people, or simultaneously a pimp and a whore, which is something people instinctively perceive.
@@rexnemorensis8154 🤓
Technology and materialism are killing us. It is a deeply unsatisfactory culture to live in for anyone wishing to experience true community or a rational balance of instinct and service to the larger good. There is no "larger good." There is only the bottom line.
I read in the description that you went to medical school and that this is what you dreamed of doing but it left you feeling no better than before. Remind me an awful lot of what I've experienced. How are you holding up? Did you continue your medical studies?
so I'm a doctor now. and I have a different relationship with it these days. when I help people its good, although i feel a lot of pressure a lot of the time to do more, almost like there is some spectre observing and judging me the whole time. I still struggle with everything now that I did then, but. I don't know. I guess as more time goes on I respect more and more the struggle DFW had just... finding the right goal posts to have and to not flog yourself into getting there. I'm in therapy and take my meds regularly. I'm doing better most days. I'm happy
@@frontlinebreakthrough5723 I am a PhD in a highly technical field near the top of my industry and I just want you to know I struggle with the same thing. I'm in a position any of my former students would envy and dreamed of, starry eyed, as they came to me for advice during office hours. In the end, after publications, patents, and big job titles it made me no happier. In fact I felt emptier than when I embarked on this journey. The only thing that brought me any peace and happiness was finding God and taking care of my wife and family and framing my achievement to those two ends. I don't even care about the money anymore. This isn't to say some people won't find meaning in achievement, it is to say that it won't fix what's inside of you. It's just a distraction that lets you kick the existential can further down the road. I beg of all of you that read this to try and understand how valuable it is to be truly content in your station in life, it's something I may never have.
In my mid 30s and Ive thought about this alot lately
same
What is the song at the end?
good words
What is the name of this movie?
The End of The Tour
E.T.
I'm convinced that DFW was a victim of CPTSD. RIP -- I relate to your pain and emptiness.
was this all said by DFW was this based on an interview?
@@eli7527 it was based on the book that David lipsky wrote- he wrote it based on the 3 day interview he had with Wallace.
What’s this film called?
It’s called the End of the Tour
The Shawshank Redemption.@@frontlinebreakthrough5723
@@frontlinebreakthrough5723you should definitely credit that in the description my dude
1:05 funny how he tells that to Mark zuckerberg
Even the candy haha😅
I can't! Why isnt the movie titel anywheere to be found? :(
I saw someone commented that it’s a movie called The End of the Tour.
that's right, thanks!
@@401chel
2nd song?
Though I love Jason, I really don't think he was the right choice to play David Foster Wallace.
You're alone because it's easier.
You yearn for others because it seems like the answer.
But it isn't.
Other people are an enclosed immeasurable abstraction of processes
You might as well be asking for the ocean.
To be together and retain your identity with the ocean is two conflicting states of being
You are alone be cause you are conscious.
Bron from unconscious and refusing to accept your role as mediator betwen unconscious and the unknown
Its not a picnic
Its much more than a stupid pleasurablw thing.
If you could even imagine that would be worth having.
We are all connected by language and routine and even in it's most mundane. Within the details are hilarious and boundlessly beautiful aspects
Wallace's suicide was related to catanonia and a phenomenon of dementia that people don't have a mind to simulate
He was so opposed to unconsciousness and play due to his pressures to be composed and retain his stature as leader and noblemen that he couldn't slip into silly goose mode, and he talked about being stuck in fearing what he looked like and wanting an image that he could trust or agree to, so as not to feel guilty where it goes.
But one thing is for sure
He didn't love himself
He ruled over himself and demanded constant vigilant effort and gigantic modes of course corrections to steer himself and America away from an unvirtious life of hedonic slavery.
And yet because he took it so seriously he was killed by himself for being a hypocrite who couldn't reconcile the truth was that was just a shape of water and he didn't have anyone he loved or loved him enough to let him be who he needed to be to transform into to live and be a real example of living.
And it was possible.
Instead he just oscified in latter years in the country like people who seek seclusion do. And diminished results surrounded by people you can't relate to dwindle the effect of your coping mechanisms
In the words of Leonard Cohen
"Love is the only engine of survival"
Wallace was too dedicated to novelty to speak in tired cliches with conviction
And he resorted to medication thinking it would solve that dilemma.
If had just left America and lived anywhere where he wasn't known and he had to learn another language he would have been happier and I personally believe it would of cured his "spiritual crisis"
I honestly thought this was a deleted scene from the social network 😂
While i sit here alone in my room watchin this, the prophecy was fulfilled.
thats not david foster wallace thats jason segel
Jessie Eisenberg so obviously doesn't smoke, lol.
Dude has the range of Jessie Eisenberg
I am actually having trouble trying to listen to what's being said because I can't stop thinking about how he's so blatantly fake smoking. They are both bad smokers but Jessie is just the worst smoker I think i've ever seen. I literally have to pretend that his character doesn't smoke and is trying to impress the other one by pretending to smoke.
the truth is like poetry....and most of us hate poetry.
IJ is ky favorite book. Its notoriously unreadable so people always ask me why. Well, its because of the shit being said in this video. Especially the dirst minute and a half. Make no mistake, entertainment is reaching lethal levels of addictiveness, and he saw it coming all along. That boy _knew_
whats the music you added form it escapes me
The nature of daylight by max richter ☺️
Segal was genius in this.
Why am i wearing a hulk hogan durag
such good casting
Happiness is a kind of wisdom and Wallace didn't have it. *The problem with loneliness, and isolation was Wallace's problem, not mine, not yours, his.
And he extrapolated outward from himself, saying everyone will have this issue and it will be pervasive.
It is not.
HE had emotional and mental issues and that's the way he perceived things.
More or less how I think all day - all year, since 2019
anyone know what book theyre referring?
The movie these clips are from is based on the book "Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace". The book they were on tour for is Wallace's novel "Infinite Jest". I have read both and would highly recommend both.
This is edited from the original
It's uncanny how DFW predicted so presciently exactly where we are.
Yep, keep in mind these conversations took place in 1996. So the part about leaping from a skyscraper because the alternative is awful basically foreshadowed 9/11 also. He was too good for this world..
Even now, as I live in western Europe, I don't harbor the illusion that if I just made the big effort and wasted my life cultivating great social relationships, that it would 'solve' my life and fill me with happiness. On the contrary, a happy-go-lucky social life is often as superficial as a soap opera in the face of the work and the sacrifices and the sufferings involved in having few but deep friendships.
I think many series and films offer us an amazing understanding of human life, an amazing experience. I'd gladly spend my life alone in a room watching cinema and documentaries and listening to good music, than be back to my childhood life being so poor I could not afford a bus ticket to the next village, and for human company I'd have idiotic traditional villagers. All of us forcing one-another in tight social and gender roles, all of us watching one-another for mistakes, so gossip could be at the same time the great social entertainer and the whip that kept us in line with toxic traditional beliefs.
I like how you only exist in that specific dualistic realm
Villagers
Or
Movies
There's literally billions of people who agree with you stop bro please stop this mindset
@@dffgffffffdddddddddd literally my coming to age was moving from a 300 people Balkan village to Scandinavia to study film, and afterwards occupy myself with film and now teaching film ha ha ha good observation. but yes, my youth was marked by watching Dune and Star Trek.
he doesnt talk as calmly as dvf and also he wasn't runnint around the place with that bandana on
Most people aren't lonely. They just want a partner, they usually have family etc. you never know real loneliness when you have no friends, partner or family and you used to think you used to be lonely.
I hear you
Or when your long term partners who are devoted to you both die way too young.
David Cross looks more like David Wallace
Jason should have gotten at least a nomination for this
i think i died in a meaningful way cause of images on a screen. most of my adult life has been watching videos on the internet and i feel braindead
What movie or show is this?
the movie is called The End Of The Tour, and it’s based on the book David Lipsky's memoir Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself based on the conversation he had with David Foster Wallace
“Deuce Bigelow: Male Gigolo”
@@MichaelWaisJr ty
@@raavaolinorman6518 Anytime. It’s a movie about the history and phenomenon of boobs. How boobs were created, how they got here, why boobs, etc..
what movie is this?
The end of the tour
Wait they made a movie out of his stuff?
End of the Tour
Best scene in Arrival hands down.
😅
did he wear the scarf the whole movie
I just really did not like Eisenberg in this movie