Pretty sure being in a long term relationship means you’ve moved on from small talk a long time ago.
I don’t want to talk with my wife about the weather, we have more important shit to worry about unless we’re literally having to dodge a tornado.
Small talk is for strangers.
Yup. And if we don’t have anything more important to talk about, we’ll just cuddle. Silence is absolutely fine with people you’re comfortable with.
Huh.
Wife and I talk ALL the time about anything and everything, be it the weather, how weather works, of free will exists, the kids, if kids exists, you name it…
Maybe you’re both extroverts?
We’re both introverts, so we’re totally comfortable just sitting next to each other reading different books, or cuddling on a cold winter night. Sometimes we talk about random stuff, but quite often we’re exhausted from dealing with other people but still want that proximity.
I always took it as an early red flag that the person is way too intense and stressful to be around if every conversation has to be a do or die dynamic.
It’s not that it has to be that exciting. Just don’t talk endlessly about shit that doesn’t matter. You bought a new kind of mustard, I don’t need a 20 minute explanation on why. To me, someone who can’t exist without noise, or making noise is a red flag. That being said, early on in the relationship is different because you’re still trying to get to know them.
Yup. If my SO and I don’t have anything more urgent to say, we generally talk about upcoming plans, like next year’s vacations, shopping lists, etc. We almost never talk about the weather unless we’re planning to be out in it.
Been together >10 years, small talk is pretty rare and largely reserved for entertaining guests.
As a person who doesn’t really like to talk to most people and believe silence is fine… Let us have this do or die conversation.
Then return back to where you came from.
I dont know how to make small talk so i just learned to make really good goat noises
You need to change your name to just_an_average_goat
I’d like to be your friend.
how do people who “hate small talk” plan on being in sustained meaningful relationships
That’s the neat part–I don’t!
Actually I have this kind of conversations. I don’t care so much about monkey problems
Talking philosophy is small talk.
Person: Hey you having a good morning?
Me: Depends… What does it mean to be a good person?
If my partner can’t handle silence, then there’s something seriously wrong. We usually have something to do and if we don’t we just cuddle up. There’s no need for constant noise.
Yeah, that’s pretty much how it looks like for me
I’ve seen women like that on dating apps. Claim to hate small talk, include in their bio that if you just open with “hi” they’ll unmatch you, and then when you put some thought into actually writing a response, ask a leading question about their interests or what they wrote in their profile, they unmatch you anyway.
#thisiswhyyouresingle
Did you see that ludicrous display last night?
What was Wenger thinking sending Walcott on that early?
Remind me never to get into a sustained meaningful relationship then.
My interest in talking has more to do with who I’m talking to and less to do with the subject of conversation
Same! It isn’t so much the small talk, but being stuck making small talk with a stranger or coworker/distant relation or whatever that you have no interest in speaking to.
This is why I hate getting haircuts. I don’t have any personal relationship with the person cutting my hair. Maybe we’ll find a common interest, but if I could just wear earbuds the whole time and not seem like an asshole, I would. But instead I just shave my head when my hair gets long enough to annoy me.
Which… is pretty much the definition of small talk. If I’m making small talk, it’s because I don’t want you to feel awkward with the silence, which means I don’t know you well enough to know what you prefer.
Wife and I have a longstanding argument over whether free-will exists.
I say it does and she has no choice but to say otherwise.
and she has no choice
I am forced to see what you did there :D
Consider this, free will can still be pre-planned. We can choose what we want to do, so what if it was pre planned? I still chose it.
I like to change definitions to secure my position also
what definition did I change?
The meaning of free will.
The meaning of free will is exactly what people are discussing when they talk about whether or not it exists. What does and what doesn’t count as free will is what’s up for discussion.
I think free will as a concept is kinda stupid I’ve yet to talk to anyone who can actually give it a solid definition that isn’t something like “it means we can do what we want”
Either your decision is based on your personality, meaning it’s not free it’s a set calculation based on genetics and accumulated experience or it’s completely random meaning it’s not will at all
Free will as a philosophical concept has less to do with “I can do what I want” and more to do with “I have control over my actions/thoughts.” This gets into all sorts of interesting corners, such as:
- if God exists and is all-knowing, can God know what you’re about to do? If God does, is it really your choice, or just something God planned long ago?
- if God doesn’t exist, then we’re all products of everything that came before. Assuming that’s the case, a sufficiently powerful computer with a sufficiently large amount of data could determine what you’re about to do. If that’s the case, is it really your choice, or are you just a really complex automaton where the inputs (your life experiences and current situation) exactly determine your actions?
- in either of the above cases, if you’re unaware that another observer knows what you’ll do, do you retain free will? Does free will disappear the moment you learn of this observer? Can knowing about the observer change your actions in an unpredictable way, or can actions always be predicted?
And so on. There are some interesting discussions there at the edges, like at what point AI gains free will. That can have very real moral implications (i.e. when does AI get personhood?), so it’s not just idle chat.
If you just start talking to some random person about it, then you’re unlikely to get a high-quality conversation; because most of the stuff people will say about it is inane or obvious or obviously wrong, etc. But there are definitely interesting discussions and thoughts that can be had about it. I’ve had countless garbage conversations about, and a handful of good ones. Probably my favoutite take is from Daniel Dennett’s book “Freedom Evolves”. He is very careful to build up a strong picture of what is it that we’re talking about and what the ‘obvious’ problems are, before then carefully and systematically showing those things aren’t really problems with what we were talking about anyway. Before reading that book, I was hard line in the camp of “obviously free will doesn’t exist; that’s a scientific fact”; but after reading it… well, I’d now say “it depends exactly what you mean, but probably the free will you’re talking about does exist.”.
Can your free will be restricted in any way? Someone in prison has less agency than you or I, if that means his free will is restricted then we have more free will than he does. Therefore it exists.
Why do we need to bother executing it then? Choice has no value if agency to exercise it is revoked at any stage.
Not executing it would also be predetermined. The only thing you can do is pretend to choose.
that thought affects your brain, and therefore the future! :D
if we don’t, then the predetermined outcome won’t happen!
How is it a choice if there is no other options?
/woosh
It’s really not much of a whoosh when some people hold that position legitimately
When I get my ballot with an uncontested seat, I can still choose whether to check the box. Even though it doesn’t impact the outcome at all, I still have the choice on whether to check the box. Even if I am completely restrained and my movements are forced, I still have the choice of whether to accept or resist that action, even if it’s just a mental protest.
So I don’t think there’s ever a case where there are no other options, but there are plenty of situations where there are no other good options (e.g. cake or death), but that doesn’t restrict your free will, it just restricts your options.
Free will exists because I can change my mind about liking or wanting something.
I want to rebuke you but you name is even more triggering. There is no linear chaos, you need non-linearities or discontinuities for chaos.
Glad I could be of use.
The concept behind linear chaos is that the chaos is bound at one point. The theoretical cone of influence can only move in one direction and widen at a set rate. Kind of a mashup of chaos over time.
I’m able to make smalltalk. I just don’t enjoy it, so I avoid it when I can.
And my wife and I don’t engage in smalltalk. We talk about what we actually care about. Seems to have worked fine for the past 24 years.
Pretty much.
I don’t wake up and ask my wife, “How’s the weather?” Or “Did you see that game last night?”
We talk about real shit. Like yesterday, we had a long conversation about what we would do with a tamed bear.
Like yesterday, we had a long conversation about what we would do with a tamed bear.
Well don’t hold us in suspense!
We’d have to reorganize the living room and we’d name her Halle Beary.
Sounds good. As long as Halle gets lots of bear pets.
Yes. Non-verbal communication and silence work too.
Can confirm, I hold our evenings together laying in bed next to each other reading different books or whatever in high esteem. We’re not disfunctional, we’re just introverted, though we like each other’s company.
In my perspective (a lonely person generally accustomed with my loneliness), small talk doesn’t seem to be the problem. The problem is the lack of people’s interest in deep topics, such as the aforementioned nature of reality: people either don’t have the needed patience, time, or both. People are so busy running through the survival game of the mundane existence that deep topics are left for their afterlives (if there’s one), when human ideologies and need for survival cease to exist. Small talk is like “sorry I got no time to think about the ultimate question of life, universe and everything else, gotta go to my modern slavery where I’m not paid to think but to obey, bye!”. Deep inside, seems like a fear of becoming lonely as those that, just like me, likes to think about the depths of the reality and breaking paradigms (for example, “shouldn’t we discuss how existence is so fleetingly finite in the grand scheme of cosmos and how futile is to accumulate wealth and goods?” is a granted source of loneliness).
The problem is the lack of people’s interest in deep topics,
I’m not sure about that. I think small talk serves occasions where you might want to keep it polite as deeper topics tend to become emotionally loaded disputes.
For example, going to a bubble tea shop. Usually, you don’t want to discuss the meaning of life with the shop keeper, but it may be a nice gesture to talk a bit about the small things in life. Small talk is a good way to share a pleasant conversation and appreciate each other.
Furthermore, small talk can serve as an opener to deeper topics if the occasion arises and everyone seems to be in the mood for such deeper topics.Anyway, my wife and I are friends with the shop keeper now and we’ve talked about the weather, religions, vacations and how to raise children.
There’s someone out there that would love talking about that stuff with you if you haven’t already found them just so you know! ❤️
Everyone’s got a person with a similar wave length as long as they don’t settle before then!
Met a few people like that, can literally talk to them for hours without getting bored
So far all of those people are either dudes or taken though lol
That doesn’t mean they will ever meet though… 😅
Not the OP, but I seem to share at least some form of his experience and I actually think this “song” does a really good job of summarizing how I feel about it.
I am as sure there is someone out there for me as I am of anything else I have a high degree of confidence in. On the matter of whether we will ever meet or not though, that I can’t say. Maybe the world is too large and time is too great. In the grand scheme of things we will find out soon enough.
Well if they settle before then, they’ll for sure never meet.
Of course, though unfortunately the decision is not a binary one. If a person spends their whole life searching and not finding, it could be that putting the same amount of time and energy into something else would have resulted in a more fulfilling life. There are shades of gray with this too since it’s not one or the other. Like most things it’s all about balance.
Well said
