My dream Retirement watch

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kcowan
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by kcowan »

SQRT wrote:I often use the phrase "more money than brains" as for me it captures the sense that that expenditure isn't "smart". But in reality I suspect many people on this site have "more money than brains" in the sense that their spot on the wealth (or income) distribution is higher than their spot on the intelligence distribution. I know it is for me.
Maybe not just for watches but for sure there is evidence of enjoyment of the finer things that only money can buy in many threads here. :thumbsup:
For the fun of it...Keith
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Koogie »

kcowan wrote:Maybe not just for watches but for sure there is evidence of enjoyment of the finer things that only money can buy in many threads here. :thumbsup:
Don't forget that is demographically related as well as financial. This forum skews old. That's not a bad thing but it does influence threads for luxury items and household expenditures. I gotta admit at my age (41.989) I cannot relate to this watch thing. I'd call them superfluous at best. But then there are people 15 years younger than me that would scoff at my SUV or my 2K mountain bike. C'est la vie.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by SQRT »

Koogie wrote:
kcowan wrote:Maybe not just for watches but for sure there is evidence of enjoyment of the finer things that only money can buy in many threads here. :thumbsup:
Don't forget that is demographically related as well as financial. This forum skews old. That's not a bad thing but it does influence threads for luxury items and household expenditures. I gotta admit at my age (41.989) I cannot relate to this watch thing. I'd call them superfluous at best. But then there are people 15 years younger than me that would scoff at my SUV or my 2K mountain bike. C'est la vie.
Agree. But I was thinking more along the lines of how does your place on the wealth distribution compare to your place on the intelligence distribution. Corollary, is it better to be rich or smart? Does either make you happier?
Just random thoughts for an old(64.83) guy with apparently too much time on his hands.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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SQRT wrote:
Koogie wrote:
kcowan wrote:Maybe not just for watches but for sure there is evidence of enjoyment of the finer things that only money can buy in many threads here. :thumbsup:
Don't forget that is demographically related as well as financial. This forum skews old. That's not a bad thing but it does influence threads for luxury items and household expenditures. I gotta admit at my age (41.989) I cannot relate to this watch thing. I'd call them superfluous at best. But then there are people 15 years younger than me that would scoff at my SUV or my 2K mountain bike. C'est la vie.
Agree. But I was thinking more along the lines of how does your place on the wealth distribution compare to your place on the intelligence distribution. Corollary, is it better to be rich or smart? Does either make you happier?
Just random thoughts for an old(64.83) guy with apparently too much time on his hands.
Well, from what I can infer I am probably about average on the wealth distribution scale on this forum but I am an outlier on the wealth distribution scale for my age group. In fact it is a bit of a problem in the sense that I find it hard to relate to the financial problems of my demographic and suffer somewhat socially as a result. Still, there are much worse problems to have.

As to the intelligence scale. Well, my mother always told me that I was cunning and crafty, not smart. And I have a memory like an elephant. And the ears to match.

Which is best ? I know dumb people who are miserable. And a few very smart people who are miserable. I don't think either is desirable.
As the saying goes: "I've been poor and I've been rich. Rich is better"
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by kcowan »

I have a couple of friends who are off-scale on the IQ curve. Neither of them are happy. They get frustrated by things I just let go.

I have some friends high on the wealth distribution scale who are always struggling to spend their way to happiness. It never works.

I would guess that the wealth distribution of the core group here is between $1 mil and $5 mil with the disparity coming from real estate holdings and choice of places to live. But mostly with a common commitment to spend wisely and invest wisely. And a desire to share experiences so that others may benefit.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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kcowan wrote:I have some friends high on the wealth distribution scale who are always struggling to spend their way to happiness. It never works.
Me too. The trouble with the super-rich is that they think everything can be solved with money. But no matter how much is spent on things, they are never absolutely perfect. So the super-rich always manage to be dissatisfied. They will send back meals that are not quite the right temperature. They'll return goods that have minute imperfections. They'll abuse waiters and waitresses who don't come up to their expectations. (Which is not a good idea, because waiters and waitresses have ways of getting their own back... :thumbsup: )

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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Flaccidsteele »

Wallace wrote:The trouble with the super-rich is that they think everything can be solved with money. But no matter how much is spent on things, they are never absolutely perfect. So the super-rich always manage to be dissatisfied.
The irony is that running faster on the hedonic treadmill in hopes of increased status and wealth actually increases the odds of being unhappy.

Society has known this for generations. We just ignore or rationalize it away.

Just like the idea of death.

We, as individuals, focus on experiencing happiness. Which is fleeting. By chasing it. And failing. Rinse and repeat.

Instead, we should focus on being happy. Which is a type of existence.
Human beings mistakenly identify with their desiring selves. Acting from this moral-psychological site we are ensnared in cycles of wanting, temporary satisfaction, often disappointment, and typically, endless craving. The more attached to the results of our actions we are, the more we fuel our motivation for particular outcomes and achievements, the farther we keep ourselves from true happiness.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by SQRT »

Wallace wrote:
kcowan wrote:I have some friends high on the wealth distribution scale who are always struggling to spend their way to happiness. It never works.
Me too. The trouble with the super-rich is that they think everything can be solved with money. But no matter how much is spent on things, they are never absolutely perfect. So the super-rich always manage to be dissatisfied. They will send back meals that are not quite the right temperature. They'll return goods that have minute imperfections. They'll abuse waiters and waitresses who don't come up to their expectations. (Which is not a good idea, because waiters and waitresses have ways of getting their own back... :thumbsup: )

"I'm glad I'm a beta" - Brave New World
Well, I think your characterization of the "super rich" is quite sweeping and a gross generalization. Not sure what you would consider as super rich but surely you can't really mean all of them? I know quite a few pretty rich people and none of them generally act this way?
I was just thinking of the saying " more money than brains" and how it describes wastefulness, when in reality if you look at it literally it could actually describe a lot of us here. Can't really do too much about the brains part, but I think the money part is more within your control.
Do you think being intelligent is any more likely to make you happy than being wealthy? Keith doesn't seem to think so and I would tend to agree. Is the secret to being happy to be dumb and poor? Doubt that. What do you think the correlation is between intelligence and wealth? Probably slightly positive? If being smart doesn't increase your chances of being happy why would anyone want to be smart?
Again, just an old guy thinking.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Wallace »

SQRT wrote:Well, I think your characterization of the "super rich" is quite sweeping and a gross generalization. Not sure what you would consider as super rich but surely you can't really mean all of them?
Perhaps. There is a golf and curling club in our town where the subscription for a year is about the same as I splurged on my dream retirement watch. On the occasions when I played as a guest I was consistently shocked at the way members treated staff, and at their constant complaints over trivial issues. And they were completely oblivious of their behaviour. They are probably at the low end of the "super-rich", but I doubt that it gets better as they acquire more money."
I was just thinking of the saying " more money than brains" and how it describes wastefulness, when in reality if you look at it literally it could actually describe a lot of us here..... <SNIP>..
Do you think being intelligent is any more likely to make you happy thn being wealthy? Keith doesn't seem to think so and I would tend to agree. Is the secret to being happy to be dumb and poor?
(Bear with me here - long-winded explanation coming up) - There's a reason the caduceus has two snakes on it. The story is that Hippocrates, father of medicine, was in his garden and saw two snakes trying to devour each other. Neither was winning. He placed his staff between them and as they climbed up the staff he froze them in a permanent embrace. One he called knowledge, and the other he called wisdom. They are on the medical caduceus to remind us that one should not have dominion over the other.

Knowledge is a function of the left side of the brain. Wisdom is from the right. You can just as easily call them "intelligence" and "common-sense". We all know people who are highly intelligent, yet have no common-sense. They tend to do poorly in society. Similarly we know people who have an opinion on everything, but it is seldom based on fact.

So - I'm eventually getting to the point - the answer to your question is that one factor determining the secret of happiness, whether you are rich or poor, depends on the "right" balance of intelligence and common-sense. If one of those snakes devours the other, you are almost certain to be unhappy.

Of course, that's only my uneducated opinion........ :)
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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Wallace wrote:(Bear with me here - long-winded explanation coming up) - There's a reason the caduceus has two snakes on it.
Thank you for the story!
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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One golf/curling club is a pretty small sample don't you think?
Wisdom vs intelligence is another issue. Hard to define wisdom and I suspect is to a large extent, in the eyes of the beholder. Do you think wisdom is positively correlated with happiness?
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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Wallace wrote:Perhaps. There is a golf and curling club in our town where the subscription for a year is about the same as I splurged on my dream retirement watch. On the occasions when I played as a guest I was consistently shocked at the way members treated staff, and at their constant complaints over trivial issues. And they were completely oblivious of their behaviour. They are probably at the low end of the "super-rich", but I doubt that it gets better as they acquire more money."
Money doesn't buy class.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Flaccidsteele »

Wallace wrote:Knowledge is a function of the left side of the brain. Wisdom is from the right. You can just as easily call them "intelligence" and "common-sense". We all know people who are highly intelligent, yet have no common-sense. They tend to do poorly in society. Similarly we know people who have an opinion on everything, but it is seldom based on fact.
Aside from enjoying the post, I just wanted to mention an update to the "left-brain/right-brain" thing (perhaps it should go into the science thread?)
Popular culture would have you believe that logical, methodical and analytical people are left-brain dominant, while the creative and artistic types are right-brain dominant. Trouble is, science never really supported this notion.

Now, scientists at the University of Utah have debunked the myth with an analysis of more than 1,000 brains. They found no evidence that people preferentially use their left or right brain. All of the study participants — and no doubt the scientists — were using their entire brain equally, throughout the course of the experiment.

Left Brain vs. Right: It's a Myth, Research Finds
From self-help and business success books to job applications and smartphone apps, the theory that the different halves of the human brain govern different skills and personality traits is a popular one. No doubt at some point in your life you've been schooled on "left-brained" and "right-brained" thinking – that people who use the right side of their brains most are more creative, spontaneous and subjective, while those who tap the left side more are more logical, detail-oriented and analytical.

Too bad it's not true.

Despite what you've been told, you aren't 'left-brained' or 'right-brained'
And for anybody who cares, the study itself can be found here:
Lateralized brain regions subserve functions such as language and visuospatial processing. It has been conjectured that individuals may be left-brain dominant or right-brain dominant based on personality and cognitive style, but neuroimaging data has not provided clear evidence whether such phenotypic differences in the strength of left-dominant or right-dominant networks exist. We evaluated whether strongly lateralized connections covaried within the same individuals. Data were analyzed from publicly available resting state scans for 1011 individuals between the ages of 7 and 29. For each subject, functional lateralization was measured for each pair of 7266 regions covering the gray matter at 5-mm resolution as a difference in correlation before and after inverting images across the midsagittal plane. The difference in gray matter density between homotopic coordinates was used as a regressor to reduce the effect of structural asymmetries on functional lateralization. Nine left- and 11 right-lateralized hubs were identified as peaks in the degree map from the graph of significantly lateralized connections. The left-lateralized hubs included regions from the default mode network (medial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, and temporoparietal junction) and language regions (e.g., Broca Area and Wernicke Area), whereas the right-lateralized hubs included regions from the attention control network (e.g., lateral intraparietal sulcus, anterior insula, area MT, and frontal eye fields). Left- and right-lateralized hubs formed two separable networks of mutually lateralized regions. Connections involving only left- or only right-lateralized hubs showed positive correlation across subjects, but only for connections sharing a node. Lateralization of brain connections appears to be a local rather than global property of brain networks, and our data are not consistent with a whole-brain phenotype of greater “left-brained” or greater “right-brained” network strength across individuals. Small increases in lateralization with age were seen, but no differences in gender were observed.
An Evaluation of the Left-Brain vs. Right-Brain Hypothesis with Resting State Functional Connectivity Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by SQRT »

Koogie wrote:
Wallace wrote:Perhaps. There is a golf and curling club in our town where the subscription for a year is about the same as I splurged on my dream retirement watch. On the occasions when I played as a guest I was consistently shocked at the way members treated staff, and at their constant complaints over trivial issues. And they were completely oblivious of their behaviour. They are probably at the low end of the "super-rich", but I doubt that it gets better as they acquire more money."
Money doesn't buy class.
No one said it did. Being poor doesn't either.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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SQRT wrote:
Koogie wrote:
Wallace wrote:Perhaps. There is a golf and curling club in our town where the subscription for a year is about the same as I splurged on my dream retirement watch. On the occasions when I played as a guest I was consistently shocked at the way members treated staff, and at their constant complaints over trivial issues. And they were completely oblivious of their behaviour. They are probably at the low end of the "super-rich", but I doubt that it gets better as they acquire more money."
Money doesn't buy class.
No one said it did. Being poor doesn't either.
But it should. These rich boors that Wallace encountered have put themselves into a position above the club staff by virtue of their membership in this lofty establishment. With increased privilege should come increased responsibility and better behaviour (or class). Not entitlement.

I bet a few of those rich boors had nice watches on too.. ! :twisted:
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by ockham »

Koogie wrote:
Money doesn't buy class.
"There's only two things that money can't buy,
And that's true love and home-grown tomatoes."

-- lyric from an old folkie tune that runs through my head from time to time.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by SQRT »

Koogie wrote:
SQRT wrote:
Koogie wrote:
Money doesn't buy class.
No one said it did. Being poor doesn't either.
But it should. These rich boors that Wallace encountered have put themselves into a position above the club staff by virtue of their membership in this lofty establishment. With increased privilege should come increased responsibility and better behaviour (or class). Not entitlement.

I bet a few of those rich boors had nice watches on too.. ! :twisted:
A little hostility here? Look I've seen boorish behaviour in lots of places. Trying to tie it to wealth seems dubious to me. Why not say it was golfers, or middle aged white guys, or anybody else you have a gripe against and can be identified at that club. It's only a club not some kind of "saintly society". People sometimes tend to observe the behaviour they expect. I wonder if the host also displayed this behaviour and if so why would Wallace have accompanied him in the first place? But that is really neither here nor there.

As I said before, sweeping general statements extrapolating poor behaviour to a larger group is not very helpful, fair, or enlightened.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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SQRT wrote: A little hostility here? Look I've seen boorish behaviour in lots of places. Trying to tie it to wealth seems dubious to me. Why not say it was golfers, or middle aged white guys, or anybody else you have a gripe against and can be identified at that club. It's only a club not some kind of "saintly society". People sometimes tend to observe the behaviour they expect. I wonder if the host also displayed this behaviour and if so why would Wallace have accompanied him in the first place? But that is really neither here nor there.

As I said before, sweeping general statements extrapolating poor behaviour to a larger group is not very helpful, fair, or enlightened.
No hostility, disappointment. And not generalized, specific to the boors in question. You expect people of means to be better educated and that includes knowing their manners. They have the time and capacity to lead by example. Not have a belittling attitude to those of lesser means who are in effect their employees.

Maybe you are being overly defensive ? I have nothing against the rich (or bankers ! :wink: ). I could by some measures be included in the "rich" (or middle aged white guys) I do take care in how I choose to treat people though and that includes especially not mistreating the "help"
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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SQRT wrote:One golf/curling club is a pretty small sample don't you think?
Wisdom vs intelligence is another issue. Hard to define wisdom and I suspect is to a large extent, in the eyes of the beholder. Do you think wisdom is positively correlated with happiness?
Depends if wisdom contains knowing one's self. In my view, absolute wealth levels have little to do with poor behaviour it really all stems from unfortunate souls still stuck on the hamster wheel of status projection. Saddest part about that game is people play it not only against their friends and neighbours but against themselves:

What was awesome a short time ago is no longer good enough but the next big thing will change everything.
What was awesome a short time ago is no longer good enough but the next big thing will change everything.
What was awesome a short time ago is no longer good enough but the next big thing will change everything.....x infinity

IMO, once a person truly resolves the status game for what it is (a consumerist value system designed to get you to part with all your money) in their own mind, their shot at getting off and staying off the hedonic treadmill and remaining happy is almost certain.
Show me the incentive and I will show you the outcome

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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by SQRT »

Koogie wrote:
SQRT wrote: Look I've seen boorish behaviour in lots of places. Trying to tie it to wealth seems dubious to me.

As I said before, sweeping general statements extrapolating poor behaviour to a larger group is not very helpful, fair, or enlightened.

Maybe you are being overly defensive ? I have nothing against the rich (or bankers ! :wink: ). "
Yes, maybe a little defensive. Ironically, private clubs are pretty good at dealing with employee abuse. A member (or sponsor) can be warned about poor behaviour and asked to apologize. Restaurants are usually too concerned about profits to do much about it and don't have the leverage that a private club has.
We can agree there is no excuse for this kind of behaviour. My personal experience at private clubs has been comparable to establishments open to the public. Really no better or worse.
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Flaccidsteele »

Some of these look pretty nice.

What stood out for me were the Uhrenfabrik Junghans Max Bill and the Orient Dress Watch 45.

Everyone would love to enjoy deep pockets when it comes to purchasing watches, but the reality is that finding a good watch that is also a really good value takes some work. Fortunately, the aBlogtoWatch team has compiled this list of 10 affordable watches that get a nod from snobs so that you can mingle with the elite timepiece collectors of the world and not feel as though your choice of watch is being immediately dismissed.
Top 10 Affordable Watches That Get A Nod From Snobs
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

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Flaccidsteele wrote:Some of these look pretty nice.

What stood out for me were the Uhrenfabrik Junghans Max Bill and the Orient Dress Watch 45.

Everyone would love to enjoy deep pockets when it comes to purchasing watches, but the reality is that finding a good watch that is also a really good value takes some work. Fortunately, the aBlogtoWatch team has compiled this list of 10 affordable watches that get a nod from snobs so that you can mingle with the elite timepiece collectors of the world and not feel as though your choice of watch is being immediately dismissed.
Top 10 Affordable Watches That Get A Nod From Snobs
I have an Orient watch. It's pretty good, IMO. This one is similar to mine:

Image
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by buny1p »

Wow what a strange topic, I retired 12 years ago and after being a clock slave for 30 years I was glad to put my watch in the drawer. I only take a watch on overseas trips to keep track of timezone changes so I don't miss flights. I have never noticed anyone elses watch,nor would I know if it cost $20 or 20000 .
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by Flaccidsteele »

buny1p wrote:Wow what a strange topic, I retired 12 years ago and after being a clock slave for 30 years I was glad to put my watch in the drawer. I only take a watch on overseas trips to keep track of timezone changes so I don't miss flights. I have never noticed anyone elses watch,nor would I know if it cost $20 or 20000 .
Translation: "I'm not the target market for watchmakers" ;)
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Re: My dream Retirement watch

Post by flywaysuzy »

My retirement gift to myself has four legs and is bay in color. :wink: She comes home next week and I am super excited to have the time to spend riding, fixing fences and shovelling manure. I have a watch somewhere- probably sitting under a pile of books waiting to get a new battery, poor thing!
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