Values

Ethics

Value

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, November 27 2024

“I know my worth.” “All humans have value.” “What is this property value?” “Of what value are you to me?” One of the biggest challenges with language is that the same word can mean several different things, and several different words can mean approximately the same thing. As such, the word “value” is used a lot when discussing relationships,...

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Meaning

On Value, Worth, Self-Esteem, and Objective Standards

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, March 27 2024

There is a major equivocation/conflation of the words “value” and “worth” going on, and wherever there is a confusion around meaning with regards to life, you know I’ll be here covering it. Let me give you some background on what is going on: millennia ago, humans were not too much more civilized than animals, and so we did have very much a...

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Growth

What Sports Can Tell You about Meaning

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, November 22 2023

Sports are one of the most popular activities for human connection. Millions—or even billions—will watch the most famous games in the world, such as the Super Bowl or World Cup. Yet, when you break it down, people are literally just watching a bunch of people run around a field trying to get a ball across a line or in a net. If there were...

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Meaning

Scarcity and Meaning

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, April 26 2023

Most of us know that basic economics states that as supply falls for a good and demand stays high, the price will rise. This is because scarcity is what causes us to need to economize in the first place; if everything was unlimited, then we wouldn’t need to worry about production and consumption because everything would always be available. But...

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Ethics

Trade-Offs

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, February 22 2023

Note: Contentious topics are used for illustrative purposes only; I am not advocating for you to take any specific ethical position. "There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs," is a famous saying about economics and economic policy. It acknowledges the reality that there are benefits and drawbacks to anything in life. Small creatures are...

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Meaning

What Do You Value?

Nathanael Garrett Novosel, December 23 2021

In The Meaning of Life, there are two points where we run into the issue of values: growth and ethics.  In the Growth chapter, we talk about identifying growth areas that matter to you.  Obviously, you can do 100 finger curls today and 101 finger curls tomorrow and you’ll have “grown” in your ability to do that, but not many people would say that t...

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