> I'm simply incapable of doing things I've set out to do. Simple things. Everything is difficult.
“Independent discharges of dopamine neurons (tonic or pacemaker firing) determine the motivation to respond to such cues. As a result of habitual intake of addictive drugs, dopamine receptors expressed in the brain are decreased, thereby reducing interest in activities not already stamped in by habitual rewards.”
I'd like to add a couple more ideas, because what you're describing in your article is spot on, and I believe can be generalized past your own experience.
> Another angle that makes this ever more distressing is that my memory is very, very fallible ... I can confidently say that I've done nothing I said I would do there.”
Herbert Simon says: “In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention”.
As an information-addict myself, I've been meditating a lot about this topic. During the past two years I've been researching it from a psychological perspective (And for that, I'm grateful to @ericd for this HN comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24581016). I'll throw in some resources that I've came across during this journey, in case anyone finds them useful:
It should also be mentioned that the most addictive and dopaminergic drugs most people in the Anglosphere consume daily are the wide variety of pre-made pre-cooked fast food meals which are engineered for maximum palatability. These days this goes for just about everything that isn't bought in the grocery store in its purest form. Just about every product on the shelves these days is contaminated with engineered ingredients to get you a stronger feeling of reward so you come back for more.
“Talk to me about taste, and if this stuff tastes better, don’t run around trying to sell stuff that doesn’t taste good.” - Stephen Sanger, head of General Mills
You can search the web using that quote to begin your descent into the rabbit hole.
The food you eat does not just affect your body weight. It also affects your mental state.
Are you very familiar with ADHD? It's very much the same effect, except instead of substance abuse/addiction as the cause, it's a natural chronic deficit in stimulation.
I've read The Molecule of More and didn't consider it all too great of a read.
There were some correlations that didn't sit well with me - one, off the top of my head, was an implication that MDMA consumption could make me politically conservative.
I personally would recommend just Huberman as he covers Dopamine to a great extent.
“Independent discharges of dopamine neurons (tonic or pacemaker firing) determine the motivation to respond to such cues. As a result of habitual intake of addictive drugs, dopamine receptors expressed in the brain are decreased, thereby reducing interest in activities not already stamped in by habitual rewards.”
From: Dopamine and Addiction | Annual Review of Psychology — https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-psych-...
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Edit:
I'd like to add a couple more ideas, because what you're describing in your article is spot on, and I believe can be generalized past your own experience.
> Another angle that makes this ever more distressing is that my memory is very, very fallible ... I can confidently say that I've done nothing I said I would do there.”
Herbert Simon says: “In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention”.
As an information-addict myself, I've been meditating a lot about this topic. During the past two years I've been researching it from a psychological perspective (And for that, I'm grateful to @ericd for this HN comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24581016). I'll throw in some resources that I've came across during this journey, in case anyone finds them useful:
- Dr Gabor Mate: Addiction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-APGWvYupU
- Dr. Anna Lembke: Understanding & Treating Addiction | Huberman Lab Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3JLaF_4Tz8
- The book “The Molecule of More” by by Daniel Z. Lieberman and Michael E. Long.
- The book “The Shallows” by Nicholas Carr.