[karamanolev]

I think the parent had this key part - "risk - whether it be to limb, financial, social, mental, or whatever else". Going by your example of art, it carries some of the other types of risks - mental (not being appreciated), financial (not making enough for a decent life), societal (getting too engulfed and being lonely). I'm not saying the parent was well backed by data and statistics, I just think there's some truth to it - interesting things are frequently interesting, because you can also fail at them. If you can't fail, the reward is much smaller / non-existent.

[ijpoijpoihpiuoh]

Doing art (or anything else) as a profession certainly has those risks, but art as an activity in general does not have any significant excess risks associated with it. (I would not consider "getting engulfed" as an excess risk since that can happen with anything.)

You may be right that there is some truth to what the top poster said. I did not mean to imply I thought it was absolutely and categorically untrue. I just think it's broadly untrue. "Things that are unrisky are unfun" is a not a generally true statement, for most people. It could certainly be true for some people. But, I suspect most people who say such things are rationalizing their choice of activity, exactly as the linked article suggests.