Gunnar_Zarncke comments on General-Purpose Questions Thread - Less Wrong

4 Post author: Sable 19 June 2016 07:29AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (30)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: Elo 20 June 2016 12:31:18AM -2 points [-]

I have been believing this for a very long time. I recently went looking for the source of this advice, I couldn't find any - do you have any idea where the source is?

(reason: I have gotten anecdata about how people take advantage of public transport and then shifted to live closer to work and lost their "daily reading hour". AKA this advice had a negative impact on them. Some of the papers I started reading specifically mention bad health, and being overweight leading to other health problems but the happiness discrepancies usually disappear once you correct for health. Another point mentioned was lower back pain while driving and sitting in traffic. which - for someone who rides a bicycle to work, isn't the same problem. I would be keen to update this advice to something more accurate and more specific than "live close to work".)

Comment author: Gunnar_Zarncke 20 June 2016 05:57:00AM 1 point [-]

Indeed there are not studies linked to in the repository post.

Independend of that I'd read the advice more as the avoidance of useless time. Useless in the really useless sense of time where you can't read, think, talk or anything because you are busy looking for the next connection, switch trains, hurrying along and such. "daily reading hour" sounds like quite productive use of time but is only possible if there are longer stretches of uninterrupted commute.