Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Addicted to Distraction

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 138 posts

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#81

Post by karmacondon »

ThomPete wrote: post #6

I haven't really gotten my thoughts clear on this so excuse me for the probably unclear formulation. I recently realized that one of the unfortunate consequences of this is the way many in my generation (I'm 41) brings up our kids. Instead of teaching them one thing in depth we are forcing them through a million different subjects way before they even turn 10. It's not unusual in my circles that kids are both playing…

Another view on this is that being exposed to different concepts and ways of thinking increases perspective and creativity. All of the things you mentioned as examples (football, playing piano and learning a language) all use very different modes of thought and activate different parts of the brain. It seems like the majority of people would really benefit from that diversity of experience.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#82

Post by danellis »

ForHackernews wrote: post #30
eterm wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those gmail permissions: Batched Inbox would like to: + View and manage your mail Sorry, but any solution which involves giving a third party access to all mail is not a solution.

> Using Gmail Complaining about > any solution which involves giving a third party access to all mail

Ah, but Google isn't a third party; it's practically an extension of the first party!

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#83

Post by ams6110 »

pilatesfordogs wrote: post #60
ThomPete wrote: post #6

I haven't really gotten my thoughts clear on this so excuse me for the probably unclear formulation. I recently realized that one of the unfortunate consequences of this is the way many in my generation (I'm 41) brings up our kids. Instead of teaching them one thing in depth we are forcing them through a million different subjects way before they even turn 10. It's not unusual in my circles that kids are both playing…

If you meet a professional athlete you'll understand firsthand what drawbacks there are to spending your first 2 decades super specialising.

I don't understand the general social disparagement of professional athletes. They have been through a filter the likes of which most of the rest of us have never experienced. Their skills and abilities are evaluated ruthlessly at every level -- if they come up short, they are out. The ones who make it are the best of the best at what they do. For each of them there are thousands of little league, high school and college athletes who did not. The people who make it through are the ones who are not only naturally gifted physically, but absolutely passionate about playing their sport. You have to be in order to put in the work needed to reach this elite level.

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#84

Post by jacinda »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #32
such_a_casual wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't you say the same about a lot of "drug addiction" as well?

Drug addiction has a strong chemical dependence compoment, but I wouldn't be surprised if depression was what led people to get addicted in the first place.

The Rat Park studies strongly suggest that this is true. Rats studied in conditions where they have every reason to be happy did not suffer from drug addiction, even when drugs were made available to them. Rats kept in cages isolated from each other (rats are very social creatures) became seriously addicted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park

http://www.brucekalexander.com/articles-speeches/rat-park/14...

http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/rat-park/

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#85

Post by LifeQuestioner »

scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

Please do post!

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#86

Post by karmacondon »

scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

Out of curiosity, what did you use to extract the text content of the page? Was it based around html, or did you actually compare the topical content?

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#87

Post by sotojuan »

ThomPete wrote: post #6

I haven't really gotten my thoughts clear on this so excuse me for the probably unclear formulation. I recently realized that one of the unfortunate consequences of this is the way many in my generation (I'm 41) brings up our kids. Instead of teaching them one thing in depth we are forcing them through a million different subjects way before they even turn 10. It's not unusual in my circles that kids are both playing…

> I believe this is fundamentally the wrong approach as it only teaches kids to skate over a subject rather than master one in full.

Reminds me of this Rich Hickey piece:

https://gist.github.com/prakhar1989/1b0a2c9849b2e1e912fb

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#88

Post by [deleted] »

g_delgado14 wrote: post #39
scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

Yeah I'd like to check it out!

[deleted]

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#89

Post by henriquemaia »

scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

If critical mass is what you need to github it, please do. I am also interested.

Thanks!

Re: Addicted to Distraction

#90

Post by RightWingRabble »

scep12 wrote: post #33

I recently wrote a chrome extension that helps me curb my "compulsion loop." It's pretty simple; each time the browser loads a website that has potentially distracting content (think: twitter, FB, reddit, hacker news, rotoworld, etc) that I tend to over-visit in search of new tidbits, the extension keeps track of my visit and the text content of the page. The next time I visit, I do a text comparison that checks how…

> When I see the browser redirect away while trying to load reddit.com, my rational side takes over and reminds me that I should be done with tidbit-seeking.

I've tried something similar, except when I see the browser redirect away while trying to load reddit.com, my hacker mindset kicks in and I try to find ways to bypass it. Finding ways to bypass the limitations is far more distracting (and interesting) to me than the site itself.

My motivation systems are screwy and hard to work around. I wish I could say I found a less radical solution than "disable wifi in the bios while I'm working", but I'd be lying.

Post reply on HN