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The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

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Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#431

Post by purplethinking »

twostoned wrote: post #395
arca_vorago wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It cracks me up because that's what I used to say about solitaire. You mean you built a $4,000 computer and are now playing solitaire on it? The real problem is see is more about the ecosystem though. The user controlled their pc (to a certain extent), but the user has so little control over mobile devices that they get fed what advertisers and companies want them to see. It really feels like corporations and governm…

I agree with this. Mobile to me seems boring but I grew up in an age, and with a cohort, who was much more into messing about with computers and seeing what we could do with them. Mobile seems so restricted and I'm always amazed by how effectively distracted by phones people generally are. The games and apps to me seem utterly boring in comparison to hacking about on some open source project, making games, or working…

About your friend, I feel some sympathy. I feel I have a huge disadvantage growing up starting with Windows (early 90s). Graphical UIs are great for usability but they hamper understanding of the underlying systems. Even though I loved computers, it took me way too long to get into programming as a result. Part of that is also that I had no mentor around to guide me.

I tend to hate configuring things and getting other people's software working the first time, but once things are set up I love programming and algorithmic work.

I can only imagine how opaque these small black rectangles are to the younger generations. Without a mentor, preferably a programmer mom or dad, I don't think kids would even know where to start. Sure, you can find all this stuff online, but the problem is that you can't learn much by just playing around anymore.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#432

Post by manmal »

bello wrote: post #417

To provide a slightly different perspective: I recently came across a great blogpost/newsletter: http://mailchi.mp/ribbonfarm/how-to-ride-your-brain-bicycle It argues that the main reason we don't achieve our goals is not external factors, or the lack of an effective productivity system; it's a commitment failure . We have subconscious second thoughts whether our goals are actually important to us, we lack a sense of…

Exactly. And once the fear of consequences of missing a deadline kicks in, we gain a purpose - avoidance of the negative consequences. So we procrastinate until it’s almost too late.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#433

Post by ehnto »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #409
ehnto wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a very generous view. Many people are just scrolling aimlessly through a feed and not engaging at all. The addictive nature of the feed keeps them scrolling even when they can realistically gain nothing of value by continuing. That is the core of the issue. I know what a rich and enjoyable online experience is like as for the better part of my life I spent most of it online. Facebook and instagram and other f…

Yeah, this view I presented is a tad optimistic, but I see people in this (and similar) thread getting applauded for doing what's essentially a "proof from fundamental attribution error" - "people in front of a smartphone are zombies, therefore smartphone bad (but when I can be seen stuck in front of the screen, it is something important )" - and I'm trying to make a counterpoint. That, and people forgetting how bori…

That's definitely a fair counterpoint, I've had to laugh at myself a number of times (right now, for example) when I'm making criticisms of devices while on a device myself.

I'm also a pretty bias because when I did start giving up my phone for long periods, my experience was excellent. Whereas my experience with social media sites and the death of all my previously favourite online communities has been a real bummer. There used to be a HN style community for every one of my interests. Now everyone is isolated in their own Facebook silos and there are fewer collections of random internet strangers, like forums, BBs and chatrooms would provide.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#434

Post by factoring_ta »

IpV8 wrote: post #67
agumonkey wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stopped believing in progress personally. Progress doesn't help you in many important part of life. We're spending too much time on science, and often to fix economic / political errors of the past.

Interesting. Personally, I enjoy living in a world where my friends have overcome cancer, where I can spend < 1 hour a day focusing in food, and I am able to travel halfway around the world to experience machu picchu and be back by then next monday. At what point do you think we stopped productively progressing? Have you considered joining an Amish community?

Interesting 3 examples.

Curing cancer is obviously positive progress. No-one who has cancer would prefer 19th century medicine.

Spending less than 1 hour a day focusing on food seems less clear-cut. It's really good not to starve or think you might starve, and we are really lucky that we don't have to spend most of the day meeting our basic nutritional needs. There also seems to be a risk that we put not enough thought into taking care of and fulfilling our biological needs, because we can. We can't escape food, sex, exercise and other meatspace needs, and attempts to do so often become pathological. If we have to eat, shouldn't we be taking our time and trying to enjoy the full rich experience of doing so?

Similarly, visiting Machu Picchu and being back by Monday seems like a double-edged sword. Maybe it would be worth spending more time in Peru. Does the short stay really allow time to absorb the history of the Incas and how it fits into the present-day culture of people living in the area? In the 19th century, the vast majority of the people living in the United States couldn't visit Europe. But those who did went on a tour for several months to a year, visiting many countries and cities and staying long enough to learn a bit about the language and lifestyle. Were they missing out by not being able to go in a day, take photos in the right places, and get back a few days later?

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#435

Post by xlii »

While I understand the concerns (and fact that we need to protect to some degree minds of the youth) I do think it's a bit scare mongering.

Being unhumble, I think that us - rather intelligent crowd - can't really relate to people who are going to waste their time doing low-effort activities and find it way too terrifying that they do this. The only thing that shifts is what people spend their time on. Now it's smartphone, decade ago it was computers, another decade it was television and prior to that reading low-value romance/detective/horror fiction.

That's just how it is and it's always going to be low-value and maybe even damaging activities, but there is nothing we can do about it. The only thing we can do is measure it better, because smartphone is much better in gathering the data, than - for example - books are ;)

On the other hand I have 45 minutes of my phone screentime in last 24h so it might be, that I'm not seeing the issue, because I can't see the problem firsthand.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#436

Post by jjjensen90 »

Diederich wrote: post #194
lettergram wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My wife and I are going to have a son in a couple weeks. We literally were discussing today. We came to the conclusion we don't want them to have a cell phone until they are fairly old. We plan on actually installing a landline instead. We subscribe to the theory that, to some extent, we need to struggle to grow. So, I've actually convinced her to pretty much let our son (and additional children) get free access to a…

As I posted elsewhere, our teenage son has a flip phone. He always has, and he always will, until he can buy and sustain something more fancy himself. As far as desktop, he runs whatever the latest version of Ubuntu LTS. He does not have administrative access to it. I wrote a small program that watches the title of whatever the current/foreground window is and compares that title to a configured list of regular expre…

How old is your son approximately? Purely out of curiosity, what are you most afraid of him doing that makes you install spyware? Are you worried about time wasting or porn or social media or what?

I have friends who had parents that installed NetNanny etc on their computers and their recollections of their parents behavior around their use of technology are now mostly bitter and they ended up becoming obsessed with accessing unfiltered internet (which they invariably did at a friend's house or some such).

My parents didn't know what a regex was so when I was a teenager with a computer and an (extremely slow dial-up) internet connection we had to have conversations and build trust rather than involve blacklists and non-admin Linux accounts.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#437

Post by MaxfordAndSons »

DamnInteresting wrote: post #159
nakedrobot2 wrote: post #4

I am terrified about giving smartphones to my kids. France's new rule (no smartphones in schools - no exceptions) is genius, and I applaud them for that. What is a supercomputer in your pocket, with access to a significant portion of the sum total of human knowledge, good for, for most people? Playing fucking candy crush. We wish that we, humans, were better, but we are not. So what can we do about it? I have no idea…

> I am terrified about giving smartphones to my kids. Hey smartphone makers, if you're listening: Let me set an alternate PIN that unlocks the phone in a limited access mode, or "kid mode." Only pre-approved apps are available. Only pre-approved contacts can be called/texted. In-game purchases require the more secure PIN. Maybe when the phone is in this mode I can track its location easily, and make it emit a noise.…

Pretty sure GP was talking about giving their children their own smartphones.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#438

Post by TeMPOraL »

tbrownaw wrote: post #423
TeMPOraL wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea of a fully private social media profile actually scares my half-sister Not commenting on the motivations of your half-sister, but the very concept of a "fully private social media profile" makes zero sense, since social media is what you engage in to share stuff with lots of people. Compare with "fully private blog".

Compare with "fully private blog". It's called a diary or a journal.

Touché.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#439

Post by TeMPOraL »

donkeyd wrote: post #428
TeMPOraL wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea of a fully private social media profile actually scares my half-sister Not commenting on the motivations of your half-sister, but the very concept of a "fully private social media profile" makes zero sense, since social media is what you engage in to share stuff with lots of people. Compare with "fully private blog".

Fully private wasn't really the right description. What I meant was only accepting people she actually knows. In stead of anybody who sends her a friend request. She has a couple thousand 'friends' now.

I see what you mean now, thanks for the clarification.

Re: The growing body of evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds

#440

Post by andrewgleave »

A mode which progressively throttles performance until it becomes unusable with controls to vary the throttle rate and the expiry time would be useful.

Parents could give their kids the device which (deepening on settings or detection of compulsive use) would actively restrict their screen time.

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