"Humans live in automatic ways, maintaining routine relationships with each other while knowing almost nothing about those other humans they deal with on a daily basis; summary knowledge about others is sufficient to work and behave. They greet each other and ask "how are you doing", but they no longer listen to the answer; they only want to know if "everything is all right" in order to be able to carry on distractedly with their epidermal relationships. And if, by chance, someone says that they are not well (that they are very ill, or in debt), the person they are talking to will remain silent, as if the other had broken a sacred rule of conviviality; after a few minutes they will say: "But other than that, things are all right, aren't they?" Humans found this relaxed, indifferent, summary, and self-centered way of "leading life" when they realized that living life, really living it and not just "leading it," would entail a huge expense in terms of suffering, loneliness, reflection, and connection with the world."