This isnt an example of “defeating the purpose”. This is something that might be considered pointless, like making your bed when you’ll just sleep in it again later.

Defeating the purpose would be writing the password to your computer on a sticky note and putting it where anyone can see it.

Your example is not defeating the purpose, it’s futility. Defeating the purpose would be to vacuum first and then dust after. An “undoing” must occur.

I think the words you’re looking for is “sisyphean”.

Reforming capitalism. You only delay the inevitable transition to end stage capitalism, you can never prevent it.

Defeating the purpose would be more like washing your disposable cutlery that you’re just about to throw out. Cleaning the house is important.

The purpose is allergies and a night’s sleep without coughing and sneezing. If you don’t have sinus problems before, you may develop them later in life from excessive exposure to dirt and dust.

Why bother to breathe when you’ll just have to breathe again in a few seconds?

Dusting and cleaning does not defeat the purpose. You’re making the mistake of thinking that cleanliness is boolean… true or false. It’s not that it’ll just get dusty again, it’s that it will get more dusty, and then even more dusty, and then dustier still, and there is actually no real practical limit to how filthy a place can get. Cleaning resets the progress to a point where you can live again.

Now, there is a related cleaning story that could be called defeating the purpose that stuck in my mind. It’s a bit Luddite in nature, but does have a point. It’s a micro-story from inside the book “Mrs Frisby and the Rats of Nimh”:

The story was about a woman in a small town who bought a vacuum cleaner. Her name was Mrs. Jones, and up until then she, like all of her neighbors, had kept her house spotlessly clean by using a broom and a mop.

But the vacuum cleaner did it faster and better, and soon Mrs. Jones was the envy of all the other housewives in town—so they bought vacuum cleaners, too.

The vacuum cleaner business was so brisk, in fact, that the company that made them opened a branch factory in the town. The factory used a lot of electricity, of course, and so did the women with their vacuum cleaners, so the local electric power company had to put up a big new plant to keep them all running.

In its furnaces the power plant burned coal, and out of its chimneys black smoke poured day and night, blanketing the town with soot and making all the floors dirtier than ever.

Still, by working twice as hard and twice as long, the women of the town were able to keep their floors almost as clean as they had been before Mrs. Jones every bought a vacuum cleaner in the first place.

That’s an example of defeating the purpose, where the thing you do actually makes it worse. A similar “defeating the purpose” is when a bunch of companies lowers wages to save money, making it so that people can no longer afford their products, meaning that they earn less money after all.

A health insurer being permitted to vertically integrate a pharmacy chain to get around profit margin caps.

Why bother doing anything if you’re going to end up dead anyway.

Wiping my ass after pooping

There’s always going to be more dust but more than zero isn’t as big a problem as more than a layer.

For me, the answer is vacations. Not in the sense of “time off work” but in the sense of “travel somewhere special during your time off work”. There is nothing less relaxing than being pressured to spend your free time correctly.

I used to not want to make my bed because I was going to sleep in it again and get it messy anyway.

My dad started telling me to not wipe my ass because I’m going to shit again anyway.

My job.

It’s what David Graeber - Bullshit jobs defines as “duct tapers” and “box tickers”

For example, you’re cleaning a room, your home or your apartment. And you find it defeating the purpose to dust things and wipe them down because, dust comes back anyways and eventually. It might not be as bad as it was or as bad as it could be, but you’ll always end up with dust and cleaning dust is just a grand waste of effort and time.

It doesn’t defeat the purpose if you have allergies. Also dusting prevents allergies by eliminating potential particulates etc. you can develop them anytime. I have dust everywhere in my house. I don’t have a duster, but I have to constantly rewind certain things on shelves that I use. Not decorations though.

Many things will just keep getting dirty making you clean them over and over. The carpets, the dishes, your car-- it is all maintenance.

Dust isn’t as important, though. But if someone in your house has asthma or allergies, it would be. I only wipe down dust on an as needed basis.