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Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

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Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#11

Post by epaga »

calmdown13 wrote: post #7
leoossa wrote: post #6

https://www.stickk.com/ The very same idea with more developed solution, already community and more features (Just for people who looked for such things like me ago)

Yeah I was a bit gutted when I found Stickk after spending a bunch of time building Kommit. It's super similar and I felt a bit silly for not doing the research beforehand. However, considering Stickk has existed for something like 14 years, it doesn't feel particularly mature. I don’t want to be too disparaging (and I’m obviously biased) but I found their website quite clunky and the apps don’t receive great reviews…

Another similar site is beeminder - pretty cool concept! There is more than enough room for similar sites.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#12

Post by darrenf »

leoossa wrote: post #6

https://www.stickk.com/ The very same idea with more developed solution, already community and more features (Just for people who looked for such things like me ago)

Beeminder[0] is another. I particularly like that they keep a list of competitors in this space[1] - active, up and coming, dormant or dead. OP, perhaps you could think about asking Beeminder to add you to their list :)

[0] https://www.beeminder.com/overview

[1] https://blog.beeminder.com/competitors/

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#13

Post by calmdown13 »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

Hmm I'm not sure that that model is completely without merit. Of course we are responsible for all of our actions, however, we often act against our better judgement.

In Jeff Hawkins' Thousand Brains Theory he describes that the neocortex is responsible for most of our cognition, but that it has to kind of bargain with the more instinctual "old brain" to get us to perform actions.

It's quite possible he's wrong, it's still just a theory, but it kind of lines up with that model you describe.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#14

Post by johnchristopher »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

OT:

> I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul

> I keep seeing hints of this strange

Strange to you.

I wish this way of framing questions would stop.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#15

Post by marginalia_nu »

johnchristopher wrote: post #14
marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

OT: > I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul > I keep seeing hints of this strange Strange to you. I wish this way of framing questions would stop.

I call strange what is strange to me, as my experience is the only experience I have of the world.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#16

Post by smugglerFlynn »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

In psychology, different mental models exist that help to arrange your knowledge about yourself in a meaningful way. You may be interested in reading about Internal Family Systems[1], inner child therapy[2] and subpersonality[3] concept in general. These mental models are widely used in modern therapy.

At least some of these models are grounded in the way your brain is structured (e.g. limbic system vs prefrontal cortex), and research into the way child’s brain develops over the years. Others provide handy frameworks to structure therapy sessions. What you choose to do with that knowledge (e.g. disowning your actions, or becoming more responsible for them) seems to be of little relevance to the models themselves.

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Model 2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_child 2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpersonality

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#17

Post by blowski »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

My brain is dominated by one set of hormones and nervous impulses right now. Later today - perhaps when I’m more hungry, tired, horny, whatever - those hormones and nervous impulses will change.

Another way of phrasing this. My computer is running a game smoothly, everything is good. Then I run off battery and open a Bitcoin miner in the background. Nothing about the game or computer hardware changed, but the performance of the game tanked.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#18

Post by marginalia_nu »

calmdown13 wrote: post #13
marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

Hmm I'm not sure that that model is completely without merit. Of course we are responsible for all of our actions, however, we often act against our better judgement. In Jeff Hawkins' Thousand Brains Theory he describes that the neocortex is responsible for most of our cognition, but that it has to kind of bargain with the more instinctual "old brain" to get us to perform actions. It's quite possible he's wrong, it's…

> Of course we are responsible for all of our actions, however, we often act against our better judgement.

Isn't this just a matter of confusion about what is in our best interest?

When we act against our best interest, it's often because we fail to accurately gauge the outcome of our actions. We may postpone going to the dentist because it seems like a bad idea, or have a bunch of cake because it seems like a good idea; but with the clarity of looking at these things in the past, it's evident that we got it wrong. We should have gone to the dentist and ignored the siren call of cake.

For whatever reason, it seems like a lot of people are just not doing this. They keep looking to the promises from the future, but completely ignore what they know from the past; so they keep repeating the same short sighted mistakes over and over and over again.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#19

Post by marginalia_nu »

blowski wrote: post #17
marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I keep seeing hints of this strange model of the soul, I don't quite understand it, but it's like people are describing themselves as being multiple people. There's the them that wants things, and the them that does things, as separate entities. The "wanter" is only briefly able to wrest control over what the "doer" does, mostly the "doer" has its own will which is not what the "wanter" wants, but something else. Sur…

My brain is dominated by one set of hormones and nervous impulses right now. Later today - perhaps when I’m more hungry, tired, horny, whatever - those hormones and nervous impulses will change. Another way of phrasing this. My computer is running a game smoothly, everything is good. Then I run off battery and open a Bitcoin miner in the background. Nothing about the game or computer hardware changed, but the perform…

> My brain is dominated by one set of hormones and nervous impulses right now. Later today - perhaps when I’m more hungry, tired, horny, whatever - those hormones and nervous impulses will change.

This may be true, but it's about as useful as saying our behaviors and moods are controlled by the alignment of the stars. Neurochemistry just isn't something we experience directly, and as a model of phenomenology it isn't particularly informative, this is essentially a corollary of the hard problem of consciousness.

Re: Show HN: Kommit – Web app to help you follow through with NY's resolutions

#20

Post by calmdown13 »

darrenf wrote: post #12
leoossa wrote: post #6

https://www.stickk.com/ The very same idea with more developed solution, already community and more features (Just for people who looked for such things like me ago)

Beeminder[0] is another. I particularly like that they keep a list of competitors in this space[1] - active, up and coming, dormant or dead. OP, perhaps you could think about asking Beeminder to add you to their list :) [0] https://www.beeminder.com/overview [1] https://blog.beeminder.com/competitors/

Yeah Beeminder is cool, probably the best of the competing solutions that I found.

One way I hope Kommit can add value, is that it doesn't require your commitment to be digital and there doesn't need to be an API integration (Beeminder is primarily based on API integrations). If you can prove your commitment with an image, video or text, your good to go. The downside is that nothing is automatic.

Update: You can manually enter data into Beeminder, therefore it can also handle non-digital commitments. However, as far as I am aware, the manually entered data is not verified (e.g. by having it checked by a reviewer) hence I didn't feel like it was their focus.

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