Really? I read it nodding, thinking of how many of my friends/family/cow-orkers, and if I'm being honest with myself - me a lot of the time, could be described perfectly as "simply focusing on superficial day-to-day aspects of life."

1/4 of middle aged women in this country are on antidepressants. Is that 'existential' depression or some kind I don't know about, I don't know, but that's a pretty sad stat.

Day-to-day life isn't superficial to everyone.

I assure you: everyone else is having the same Special Snowflake Thoughts as you.

Probably something about being special, yes. But it's not the same thing. The OP is referring to a kind of critical thinking.

If you don't believe in qualitative differences in thought, then we might as well just abandon education as a whole.