Something that occurred to me that I could make more explicit here.
The first two thirds of this (go out into the wilderness, build a place for your tribe, embodied play), is something I think is really valuable. But one thing it doesn’t do is be something uniquely rationalist.
Instead, if you just did the first two thirds, you’d have a holiday that’s basically about tapping into… raw humanity, or something. Retreat as much as possible to the “Before Times” – before we were connected to and dependent on a global grid. As much as possible, experience flourishing that is only dependent on you and your tribe and the macroscopic physical world. Tap into what being human meant before all that.
And I think this is real good to have access to. It’s good to be reminded that you’re embodied.
This is a human holiday. It’s not especiallya rationalist one.
And I think reasonable people can disagree on whether you want a human holiday or a rationalist one (even if you’re super into having some kind of rationalist culture). It’s good to be reminded that underneath all your confident ideologies and religions and economic doctrines… you’re just… people.
But I think there’s something differently valuable (which I personally prefer) about a holiday that, instead of saying “remember that you are a human”, you have a holiday that helps build an explicit rationalist identity that includes being embodied, physical strength, the outdoors, and certain primal-ness.
And the calculating-the-sun/building-a-stonehenge-esque-thing part of the holiday here is meant to do that last part. In private conversation, one person mentioned it didn’t quite accomplish that goal for them, but they understood where I was coming from with the overall goal.
Something that occurred to me that I could make more explicit here.
The first two thirds of this (go out into the wilderness, build a place for your tribe, embodied play), is something I think is really valuable. But one thing it doesn’t do is be something uniquely rationalist.
Instead, if you just did the first two thirds, you’d have a holiday that’s basically about tapping into… raw humanity, or something. Retreat as much as possible to the “Before Times” – before we were connected to and dependent on a global grid. As much as possible, experience flourishing that is only dependent on you and your tribe and the macroscopic physical world. Tap into what being human meant before all that.
And I think this is real good to have access to. It’s good to be reminded that you’re embodied.
This is a human holiday. It’s not especially a rationalist one.
And I think reasonable people can disagree on whether you want a human holiday or a rationalist one (even if you’re super into having some kind of rationalist culture). It’s good to be reminded that underneath all your confident ideologies and religions and economic doctrines… you’re just… people.
But I think there’s something differently valuable (which I personally prefer) about a holiday that, instead of saying “remember that you are a human”, you have a holiday that helps build an explicit rationalist identity that includes being embodied, physical strength, the outdoors, and certain primal-ness.
And the calculating-the-sun/building-a-stonehenge-esque-thing part of the holiday here is meant to do that last part. In private conversation, one person mentioned it didn’t quite accomplish that goal for them, but they understood where I was coming from with the overall goal.