Nature versus nurture

Many industrialised societies today suffer from a poverty of desire – for excellence, quality and craftsmanship. Their citizenry value cheap-and-plenty seemingly over every other considerations.

Can you desire what you don’t know?
Is it still poverty if you don’t know what you are missing?
So how do we passed down our desires in a given society? If parents and teachers don’t know or have forgotten how to tell quality from mediocrity, how can they then teach the next generation?

How do we benchmark what is good to desire or not? Is it through mainstream advertising? The media?
Keeping up with the Joneses is well and good. What is the Joneses aspired to mediocrity?

Can we, as a society, really forget the good stuff that quickly? Are we such mindless slaves to the endless (and wasteful) cycles of fashion?

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