this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2024

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SMBC [2011-10-28] (www.smbc-comics.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 4 months ago (4 children)

Huh, I seem to be getting something way different from this comic than most people here...

I'm seing knowledge being transferred, and as the number of sources and amount of information increases, it gets harder to figure out how everything interconnects and how it all fits together. But as you get older, you get more experience and start to see how things fit together and the world makes more sense. In the end the jumbled information you've received through your life makes more sense to you, and you transfer the new sum of information on to someone.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 months ago (1 children)

As a beginner, you learn and memorize the basics.
As an intermediate, you experiment, inject fresh energy into sketching and exploring outside the basic parameters.
As a master, you have returned to basics but with a unique perspective, your added experience to the narrative.

It's quite beautiful.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Exactly... I find it quite interesting how some perceive the theme of the comic as depressing while others find it beautiful.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

The story goes that after Wittgenstein published his monumental theoretical treatise on theory - the Tractatus Philosophicus - he became a gardener, or elementary school teacher, maybe both, I can't remember.

But the point of the story, as I interpret it, is that the road of intellectual labor leads back to simplicity, and that is a comforting thought, also very Japanese, Zen-like.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago

Perfectly valid interpretation :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

That was my take as well.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I feel like the more experiences I get, and the more experiences I learn of from other people, the less the world makes sense. The more I sit alone stuck in the echo chamber of my skull’s interior, the more experiences I can easily discount and ignore.

I don’t think anything about the world is simple or easy to understand, and I get worried when I start thinking that I have life boiled down to a few simple rules

[–] [email protected] 28 points 4 months ago

(づᴗ _ᴗ)づ 𖦹

[–] [email protected] 25 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I'm getting old and I'm getting swirlyer every day.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Do you enjoy it?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Indeed! New thoughts and ideas all the time.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

In the show Boston Legal, the character Denny has dementia, which progresses across the seasons. In one episode he starts taking medication that start helping him think straight, but it also takes away some of the kookiness that he and his friend enjoy. It also seemingly made him a bit more aggressive. In the end, he decided to stop taking the meds and he says he kind of missed his fog.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 4 months ago

Hits a bit too close to home

[–] [email protected] 20 points 4 months ago

Heart breaking

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago

We are the music makers. We are the dreamers of the dreams.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

Holy shit

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

What I take from this is that as people age and get more isolated into their niche, they forget the nuance they learned to get there

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

Getting Quino vibes from this one.

[+] [email protected] -11 points 4 months ago (2 children)

"The result of having an open mind is having a closed mind, so don't bother opening your mind at all"

-this comic, apparently

[–] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago

To me it's not end of the story that's the point of this, but the idea that when you are more social and engaged with different ideas your mind is more creative and energized and flexible. And there are other times, especially as you age, where you are more isolated and your mind slows and gets trained into rote thoughts. They may or may not be the same ones you started with, and they may be well earned and refined thoughts from a lifetime of experience, but stripped of the complex context they arose in, they are still just a simplistic starting point for the next round.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

I don't think that's the point it's making, that the old person has a closed mind. Just that they seem to have ideas and values which seem e.g. morally ancient or something similar, but by the time you reach their age your values and world view will have changed to probably be very similar. I don't see any values being placed on what they are thinking.