The Fuel of Philosophers(illustratedphilosopher.com)

46 pointsby comeagain5 anni fa23 comments

https://www.illustratedphilosopher.com/episodes/the-fuel-of-philosophers

23 comments

> Correlation isn’t causation, of course: there may be some other common factor at play making coffee-drinkers healthier.

Is it worth reading past this?

There may be some other factor at play, making…?

How do you recognize the first part and then say the second part?

It could just as well be “healthier people who don’t succumb to negative side effects of substance whatever have more bandwidth to think deeply about things.”

I’m not positing that it is, just that when you have a “correlation” like this, you can posit all kinds of scenarios that lead to it (e.g. firemen start fires).

So I admit, I didn’t read the rest of the article. Because it name drops some buzz wordy things and then messes with them. Why even lead in with this? Just say the point.

So I’m asking fello more patient HNers, does it go better? Just an author trying to warm to the real pony and I should persevere?

johnsillings5 anni fa

Yeah, read it! It'll take you less time than it took to write this comment ;)

Plus, the article's not just about the health benefits of coffee, it's about Arabica production potentially getting wiped out and some fun facts about famous philosophers and coffee.

Lovely little piece, if you ask me.

Borrible5 anni fa

Yes, but how did it Plato, Aristoteles and the other brains back then?

And, why is Nietzsche talking bullshit in Ecce Homo?

'Nothing should be eaten between meals, coffee should be given up — coffee makes one gloomy.'

Hm, something really dark and deep is brewing up here...

You never drink the same cup of coffee twice. But also, after drinking it, you're not the same as before.

nanna5 anni fa

Sartre's productivity was fuelled by regular injections of amphetames into his thigh, i heard from a French philosopher who knew him.

aiscapehumanity5 anni fa

One downside of coffee is the potential for sleep cycle disruption. At least in our modern sleep hygienics

dsizzle5 anni fa

Not just philosophers -- the quote that comes to mind for me is “a mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems.”

Turing_Machine5 anni fa

Musicians, too.

  Father sir, but do not be so harsh! 
  If I couldn't, three times a day, 
  be allowed to drink my little cup of coffee, 
  in my anguish I will turn into 
  a shriveled-up roast goat.

  Ah! How sweet coffee tastes, 
  more delicious than a thousand kisses, 
  milder than muscatel wine. 
  Coffee, I have to have coffee, 
  and, if someone wants to pamper me, 
  ah, then bring me coffee as a gift!

-- from the Coffee Cantata, by Johann Sebastian Bach

dsizzle5 anni fa

Ha. Now that you mention this, it's kind of surprising there aren't that many references to coffee in modern music (at least nothing this rhapsodic comes to mind anyway).

Maybe the stronger stuff is more inspiring in the pop era? https://open.spotify.com/track/6G3NoUqDpqD3Rgfel2pD6s

loevborg5 anni fa

    C-A-F-F-E-E, trink nicht so viel Kaffee!
    Nicht für Kinder ist der Türkentrank,
    Schwächt die Nerven, macht dich blass und krank,
    Sei doch kein Muselmann, der ihn nicht lassen kann.

https://www.thelocal.de/20140516/enjoying-coffee-the-german-...

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-a-f-f-e-e

oatmale5 anni fa

Morning has broken

Mr. Coffee has spoken

The familiar wake-up call

Sings to my ears

I wake up with a shrug

To the floor with a thud

Where in this hellhole is my coffee mug?

I can now face the day

On legal speed (The American way)

I'm sketching

I'm seizing

I'm spazing

I'm shaking

I can not stop spilling on my brand new shirt

I-I-I'm wored

I'm so inspired

I drank the entire pot

So off to work

Here I come to save the day

On legal speed (The American way)

Drinking coffee

I drink coffee

Drinking coffee everyday

https://open.spotify.com/track/4zDXcKIWCKWpPzeyOWhM6y?si=wJX...

sndman5 anni fa

Commonly sung in UU services:

Coffee, Coffee, Coffee Sung to the tune of “Holy, Holy, Holy” ------------------------------------------------- Coffee, Coffee, Coffee, Praise the strength of coffee. Early in the morn we rise with thoughts of only thee. Served fresh or reheated, Dark by thee defeated, Brewed black by perk or drip or instantly.

Though all else we scoff we Come to church for coffee; If we’re late to congregate, we come in time for thee. Coffee our one ritual, Drinking it habitual, Brewed black by perk or drip instantly.

Coffee the communion Of our Uni-Union, Symbol of our sacred ground, our one necessity. Feel the holy power At our coffee hour, Brewed black by perk or drip or instantly.

quantified5 anni fa

The Royal Academy in London was started in a coffeehouse. I’d love to know how much of the Enlightenment and the advances of the modern world relate to coffee.

sidpatil5 anni fa

Rényi was the one who stated that.

According to Wikipedia, he was a colleague of Erdős, and Erdős was known for his coffee habit and later amphetamine use.

dsizzle5 anni fa

Yeah, I initially heard it as attributed to Erdős, so the part about it being falsely ascribed to him checks out!

marginalia_nu5 anni fa

The leaky jar of Gorgias.

apocalypstyx5 anni fa

This seems to me a milder version of the trope of the artist doing drugs to 'expand their mind' beyond what the normies can handle. Which reminds me of a supposed story about a Buddhist monk who supposedly dropped acid in a club in LA and stated: 'this is what meditation is like.' These days I find myself more so interested in the people whose minds seem to attain those 'out there' states without any external aid.

coldtea5 anni fa

>These days I find myself more so interested in the people whose minds seem to attain those 'out there' states without any external aid.

Another classic trope.

apocalypstyx5 anni fa

I didn't claim it was new and revolutionary, rather just the likely result of a cynicism toward notions of conferred insight (or insight at all, really.)

tivmas_hidden5 anni fa

Not a Buddhist monk, but as a dedicated meditator I can confirm this is true. At least the sensory clarity and ego destroying aspects of acid. The visual hallucinations of fractals are not something I’ve experienced in meditation.

inter_netuser5 anni fa

whats wrong with external aids? ome kind of rustic fetish?

Dalai Lama himself is encouraging research into neuroscience to make meditation easier/work faster.

amelius5 anni fa

We still have Jolt Cola.

Gatsky5 anni fa

I wonder to what extent coffee is an association rather than an actual antecedant of productivity. This is more evident with nicotine for example, where the addicted user will tell you all sorts of hogwash about how great smoking is, how they have the best converstaions with people when smoking, how they love the sound the plastic wrap makes when it comes off the packet, how they wrote their novel while chainsmoking etc. In reality they come to associate relief of their nicotine cravings with whatever they are doing at the time.

Nicotine and caffeine probably do have some cognitive benefits (my understanding is that the effect for nicotine is there but minimal), but they are likely to be quite exaggerated. There is also quite a lot of variation in caffeine metabolism, and this no doubt has an impact on the perception of its effects. Some people down 6 cups of coffee a day and are fine, whereas I would be incarcerated for amphetamine abuse if I had that much.

Vivtek5 anni fa

Rust really only affects sungrown arabica. We've got some rust on our own (shadegrown) trees, but if they're healthy and happy and not too hot, they stay ahead of the fungus pretty handily.

If you're just after caffeine, though, robusta has more caffeine than arabica.

The downside is that robusta needs pollinators and arabica doesn't - so you're damned either way as the century wears on. You'll probably need to learn to like excelsa.