The modern world

in #psychology6 years ago (edited)

Try to describe a world lacking any useful human possessions! People have created, in accordance with their needs and needs, a huge variety of things without which we can not exist. It is this real world that is at the heart of our everyday life. Our holiness and dependence on the world of cultural goods are so great that we often do not even notice them or take them as an obvious fact. The world of everyday objects of use is an unobtrusive but at the same time an irrevocable part of our existence, whose importance we only appreciate when we deprive ourselves of the subject. We realize the usefulness of the cup only when we are left without it, we dream of a table if we eat on the floor. Objects embody the human spirit. Aristotle still sees in the form of the objects not just the external visible contours of a thing but their non-ideal purpose, their meaning. For him without active form, natural matter would remain only a dead matter. A model of this form of formation is precisely human activity. The marble would remain only a simple piece of stone without the sculptor's interference, the clay only a dirt table. Objects embody human thoughts and spirit, and the computer not only embodies the spirit but also tries to replace it. Like human actions and cultural objects, they are only meaningful as far as they make sense to us. In this spiritual world, the world of human subjects is similar to text, a book on the pages of which we can read the intentions of the needs and even the spiritual values of people from different historical times. Archaeologists are often able to sue for the longest time without writing only on preserved objects and cannons.

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The user

People have always been consumers but within the needs of existence. In the last decades of the past century the thirst for consuming new and new goods services and goods is insatiable. Consumption is becoming a necessity in need. Reasons
-Travel of material and spiritual goods due to the very rapid development of technology and all-round services.

  • The role of advertising means of mass communication and information.
  • The natural pursuit of man towards diversity and pleasure from the new-
  • Promoting consumption by those in power so as not to focus people's attention on other important issues and the need for social change.
    -Treasuring large producers to profit by creating new goods and services and provoking the need for them.

Ancient philosophers, Cynics, demonstrated their contempt for luxury. In their view, excessive consumption makes man a slave to the needs. That's why too many things do not make the person happy. Cygnus Diogenes consciously walked dressed in rags and walked barefoot, lived in a barrel and demonstrated disregard for the objects.
The Epicureans erected as a principle of happiness, in a reasonable measure of pleasure. Excessive pleasure leads to suffering, overeating and drooling lead to a painful condition. The Stoics also believed that the spirit and the freedom of the personality were writhing as if we did not surrender to the external seduction. For them worthy and confident is a man who is not tempted, living in temptation. They trained their students to intellectual immobility and hardness by gathering them around a grueling table. After that, they removed the treats and ate only bread and water.
The ascetic. We see the importance of the ascetic morality of religious people. Asceticism as a practice is an effort to raise the value of the spiritual above the needs of the flesh. Ascetes made an effort to suppress their bodily needs in the name of spiritual salvation. They are perceived as people of the discipline and firmness of the spirit.

Modern consumer mania

Philosophers find that early and mature capitalism are societies of production, and modern, late modern capitalism, a society of consumption. We strive for ever more modern subjects and access to new services. New phones, computers, TVs, cars. Which we constantly change with new ones. Today's consumer does not seem to use it to live, but lives to use. In his obsession with consumption, the modern consumer looks like a traveler who wanders around the world, but nowhere does he feel in his place and continues to look for him. The pleasure is not achieved by the acquisition of a new item, but in the pursuit of the next one.

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Nice post. Very interesting! I would like to add something to it.

The rise of the smartphone and the emergence of consumerism are more a result of our dependency relationship to material things and social appreciation, than vice versa. Philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau already described this relationship in the eighteenth century, in his ‘A Discourse on Inequality’.

At the moment when people are forced to form social communities due to circumstances, is goes wrong. In order to survive, people, through the idea of private property, exclude others from the use of what would belong to him or her. There arises struggles for both tangible and intangible goods.

This creates a comparison culture. What do I have I compared to others? That question leads to both admiration and jealousy: the other has something I do not have. The struggle for ownership and appreciation is the result. In fact, you are therefore no longer free: because of the dependence on the other person's appreciation for what you have, you no longer have a complete handle on your own happiness.

In past centuries, material possessions and social appreciation have had different forms of expression. But the obsession with showing off what you have is not a new phenomenon. Like I mentioned before, the smartphone is rather a means that responds to the relationship we already have to things. We post on social media to gain prestige or appreciation from others. 'See me sitting at this beautiful place' or 'see me having a nice time here'. The more likes, the greater the rating. To maintain that, we must continue to feed the image that we create from ourselves.

According to Rousseau, at that moment it is no longer about the intrinsic value of the event itself, but the respect that we get from others. Shooting a nice Instagram picture or making a vlog does not happen because we like to do that, but because we aim for someone else's adoration.

Great Article..............

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