Thin Desires Are Eating Your Life. “A thick desire is one that changes you in the process of pursuing it. A thin desire is one that doesn’t.”
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Comments 3
"The business model of most consumer technology is to identify some thick desire, find the part of it that produces a neurological reward, and then deliver that reward without the rest of the package."
Gonna be thinking about this one for a while.
https://bsky.app/profile/kottke.org/post/3mb5atkftcw2w
What a superb article. Thank you for sharing!
I think I’ll be using this languaging for a while, thanks for pointing us to it! It brings to mind that we’re most fulfilled when our desires meet our own idiosyncrasies, not the fulfillment of others’ narratives or expectations. I was reminded of this the hard way a couple months ago when we pivoted from our usual family vacation style of low-dopamine, forest bathing/beach combing to the wildly expensive (for us), social currency of Legoland. I’d say it was a thin desire on my part to avoid depriving my kids of what culturally is relevant; it takes commitment and the courage to live your values with thick desires!
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