> I think we probably at some point will realize that food like we ate in the past are way better than it is today and the type of heavily processed food we eat today is unhealthy.
That point is here, right now. Michael Pollan and much of the food blog-o-sphere has been writing about this for years. The article is tone deaf to say the least.
Yes of course there is a lot of talk about it but it's hard to actually prove anything since studies on food are extremely hard due to the many variables that exist.
Another example is the extreme use of vegetable oils that was supposed to be healthy but as it turns out it seems like it is quite the reverse. Even if it is proven to be unhealthy it will continue to be in everything because it's cheap and makes products last longer.
I don't know how it is in other countries, but at least in my country of origin (Sweden) they have pushed a lot of oat milk for example but pretty much all milk derivatives have vegetable oil in them and a lot of it too. Then they make adverts suggesting it to be the more healthy option.
> At the best of times these routines of habit are just an escape from the stress...
No, not an escape. Amongst the many benefits, exercise, meditation, etc are a means (but not the only means) to quiet the mind and give a pause to thought. They force you to focus on the present moment and not to dwell in the past or future. Humans are incredible prediction machines but generally not all too accurate. Too much time spent thinking about the past and future without balance of the present creates needless suffering. None of this is new and has been known for millennia.
> None of this is new and has been known for millennia.
This is a lie. It has not been taught for centuries to quiet or attempt to repress your thoughts. What a terrible thing to propagate. There are different kinds of meditation. The problem is, you already know exactly what you're doing with the style you're practicing. Talk to a good therapist instead and they'll tell you to sit with your feelings, not attempt to quiet them. For a very important reason.
Who ever mentioned anything about repressing thoughts? Quieting the mind does not mean repressing feelings. Observe the thoughts when they arise, but do not judge. This is nothing new.
And just by a vague guess, chances are I have far more experience with meditation and meditators than you do. Now are you going to open your mind, doubt your thoughts, and confirm, or are you content to simply quiet them and move onto the next victim?
I think that is debatable, at least from the Western standpoint. Much of Western society and its economics produce tremendous amounts of depression and anxiety (rooted mostly in fear).
Be careful for what you wish. As OP alludes, much of your income is taken up by housing, childcare, healthcare, retirement funding, etc. Just about everything is "out of pocket". In terms of safety nets or other societal benefits (e.g. family leave, vacation time, etc) that Europeans take for granted, the US has none to very little. As a result, Americans work non-stop and more than half the country is stressed out on a daily basis [0]. It's really not a sustainable way to live IMO.
Thanks for the warning. I wish I could change perspectives with a few people who've worked on both sides. Thanks to your comment, I feel this should be obligatory.
> My autoimmune disease is likely caused by modern technical advances
I'm absolutely certain that my autoimmune disease manifested itself later in life due to chronic stress at work (a modern advancement so to speak). While not the cause, it was certainly the catalyst. Now that the proverbial Pandora's box of autoimmune diseases has been opened inside of me, there's no closing it back up and I can only manage it to some degree.
> There's very limited research done on on fixing it and lots done on treating the symptoms. Each commercial I see advertising a new medication to treat the symptoms is like a slap in the face.
Yup, exactly this. You have to take things into your own hands and figure out what works for you in terms of management. Not many doctors are going to take the time to sit down with you to figure out the root cause(s).
> If managing a server becomes just another bullet point in a developer job, this is exactly what we get.
Yup...the same management are the ones that laid off the DBAs, system admins, network engineers, etc because "the cloud" hand waves all this stuff away now.
I work for a large cloud provider and it’s even worse than you imagine because this same thing has happened to us. I don’t work on cloud, but we use cloud internally for our other products and devs on those teams are expected to manage all of this themselves with little guidance. We have no dedicated ops or infra person on my team. Everyone is just considered a generic software engineer. This wasn’t always the case until the recent push for devs to own all parts of the stack.
I generally agree with you, but for me I'm not necessarily trying to optimize for an ultra long life span but instead am trying to optimize for going out peacefully. I don't want my end years to be in some miserable, decrepit state in which I am unable to do much. In the end, all we can hope for is a peaceful exit.
That point is here, right now. Michael Pollan and much of the food blog-o-sphere has been writing about this for years. The article is tone deaf to say the least.