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Please don't let gaming consume your life

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Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#51

Post by detst »

jsprinkles wrote: post #42
jonursenbach wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is him having a heart attack in any way related to him playing video games all weekend?

It isn't. We can infer from the rest of the post that the person in question was unhealthy, but OP took an unnecessary shot at gaming. One can argue an unhealthy focus on anything can kill you in the same way, and gaming wasn't a symptom. Frankly, this entire thread is about as bad as mass media blaming video games when a kid shoots up his school.

> infer from the rest of the post that the person in question was unhealthy

And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming.

> One can argue an unhealthy focus on anything can kill you in the same way

And in this case that thing was gaming. It's a cautionary tale, not an indictment on all gaming.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#52

Post by jmduke »

dekz wrote: post #40
boredguy8 wrote: post #8

There are more subtle ways of gaming ruining your life, as well: slowly losing the drive to do anything more than what's necessary to pay the cable bill, rent, and the gaming subscription. Slowly the only friends you have are people you know from your guild. When the only source & output of creativity and energy are all wrapped up in playing a video game. I've also seen people similarly consumed by pornography, alcoh…

How does this compare with what can be considered a 'gym' addiction. Is it ok when it is exercise? What is too much? What about work, startups? I rock climb at least 6 hours a week, it's not bizarre to hear someone dying from rock climbing though.

Psychological addiction is never healthy for the mind, no matter what the stimulus is.

That being said, spending an exorbitant amount of time devoted to exercise is generally better than spending an exorbitant amount of time devoted to passivity.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#53

Post by jsprinkles »

detst wrote: post #51
jsprinkles wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't. We can infer from the rest of the post that the person in question was unhealthy, but OP took an unnecessary shot at gaming. One can argue an unhealthy focus on anything can kill you in the same way, and gaming wasn't a symptom. Frankly, this entire thread is about as bad as mass media blaming video games when a kid shoots up his school.

> infer from the rest of the post that the person in question was unhealthy And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming. > One can argue an unhealthy focus on anything can kill you in the same way And in this case that thing was gaming. It's a cautionary tale, not an indictment on all gaming.

> And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming.

Very much, emphatically, not. I know someone into World of Warcraft who spends ~40 hours a week playing, and just ran Bay 2 Breakers. Gaming and being unhealthy are very definitely unrelated, and any attempt to paint them as being related is FUD.

If someone is out of shape because they "spend too much time hacking", are you going to blame hacker culture next? Gaming is an easy target. Admit it.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#54

Post by humbledrone »

dekz wrote: post #40
boredguy8 wrote: post #8

There are more subtle ways of gaming ruining your life, as well: slowly losing the drive to do anything more than what's necessary to pay the cable bill, rent, and the gaming subscription. Slowly the only friends you have are people you know from your guild. When the only source & output of creativity and energy are all wrapped up in playing a video game. I've also seen people similarly consumed by pornography, alcoh…

How does this compare with what can be considered a 'gym' addiction. Is it ok when it is exercise? What is too much? What about work, startups? I rock climb at least 6 hours a week, it's not bizarre to hear someone dying from rock climbing though.

Someone recently tried to convince me, a frequent climber, that the health effects of getting exercise from climbing were outweighed by the risks involved. I did a bunch of research on the subject, and it is very clear that the benefits of exercise massively outweigh the risks of even a dangerous activity like climbing.

It's hard to find statistics for indoor climbing, but for outdoor climbing there is a death for every 320,000 outings. If you go on two outings a week, your chance of dying is around 0.03% per year [1].

Getting the proper amount of exercise (compared to being sedentary), though, can decrease the total risk of year-over-year mortality by a factor of up to 4.5 times [2]. The overall risk of death for e.g. a middle-aged man is something like 0.2% [3], so any significant reduction to this factor compares very favorably with the risk of death from climbing.

So, basically, if your options are either a) be sedentary or b) get adequate exercise by rock climbing, it is better for your health to choose b. This comparison looks even better if you're doing only gym climbing (which is much safer than outdoor climbing).

[1] http://www.allclimbing.com/archive/2009/01/data-on-climbing-...

[2] http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/107/1/e2.full

[3] http://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#55

Post by leoedin »

dekz wrote: post #40
boredguy8 wrote: post #8

There are more subtle ways of gaming ruining your life, as well: slowly losing the drive to do anything more than what's necessary to pay the cable bill, rent, and the gaming subscription. Slowly the only friends you have are people you know from your guild. When the only source & output of creativity and energy are all wrapped up in playing a video game. I've also seen people similarly consumed by pornography, alcoh…

How does this compare with what can be considered a 'gym' addiction. Is it ok when it is exercise? What is too much? What about work, startups? I rock climb at least 6 hours a week, it's not bizarre to hear someone dying from rock climbing though.

When people die from rock climbing, it's because they were careless or because they were pushing the envelope in some way. Rock climbing gyms are very safe - you're unlikely to die there.

Anyway, 6 hours a week at the climbing wall is hardly an addiction. That's more like a hobby.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#56

Post by detst »

jsprinkles wrote: post #53
detst wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> infer from the rest of the post that the person in question was unhealthy And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming. > One can argue an unhealthy focus on anything can kill you in the same way And in this case that thing was gaming. It's a cautionary tale, not an indictment on all gaming.

> And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming. Very much, emphatically, not. I know someone into World of Warcraft who spends ~40 hours a week playing, and just ran Bay 2 Breakers. Gaming and being unhealthy are very definitely unrelated, and any attempt to paint them as being related is FUD. If someone is out of shape because they "spend too much time hacking", a…

Very much, emphatically, yes:

> Work offered to pay for a gym membership. Friends coaxed him to exercise and eat better.

Instead he was gaming.

> If someone is out of shape because they "spend too much time hacking", are you going to blame hacker culture next?

Yes, in part. BTW, I'm not "blaming" gaming.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#57

Post by vm »

At what point is it wrong to engineer a product to be addictive?

Tobacco companies are evil for doing this. But when it comes to things like fast food, gambling and games, I hear things like "everyone knows those are bad for you" so you should "be responsible"

Like all things, not everyone submits to urges. But I bet most gamers don't know there are sophisticated teams fine-tuning the gaming experience to maximize time played (or whichever metric). Some people are outmatched by those teams.

I had been thinking about this earlier today when I saw this quote from Bing Gordon: "World of Warcraft has 0% churn from levels 35-40" [1]. Those guys at Blizzard are good.

[1] https://twitter.com/ericries/statuses/204601761560932352 - I put faith in Eric Ries for the accuracy of this statement

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#58

Post by jsprinkles »

detst wrote: post #56
jsprinkles wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And we can also infer that he was unhealthy, in larger part, due to spending too much time gaming. Very much, emphatically, not. I know someone into World of Warcraft who spends ~40 hours a week playing, and just ran Bay 2 Breakers. Gaming and being unhealthy are very definitely unrelated, and any attempt to paint them as being related is FUD. If someone is out of shape because they "spend too much time hacking", a…

Very much, emphatically, yes: > Work offered to pay for a gym membership. Friends coaxed him to exercise and eat better. Instead he was gaming. > If someone is out of shape because they "spend too much time hacking", are you going to blame hacker culture next? Yes, in part. BTW, I'm not "blaming" gaming.

Here's a thought, oh, I don't know: it was his fault, not gaming's. Radical concept, personal accountability. It's almost like the choices we make in life shape who we are, or something else absolutely crazy like that.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#59

Post by leoedin »

humbledrone wrote: post #54
dekz wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does this compare with what can be considered a 'gym' addiction. Is it ok when it is exercise? What is too much? What about work, startups? I rock climb at least 6 hours a week, it's not bizarre to hear someone dying from rock climbing though.

Someone recently tried to convince me, a frequent climber, that the health effects of getting exercise from climbing were outweighed by the risks involved. I did a bunch of research on the subject, and it is very clear that the benefits of exercise massively outweigh the risks of even a dangerous activity like climbing. It's hard to find statistics for indoor climbing, but for outdoor climbing there is a death for ev…

It's worth noting that those deaths aren't simply evenly distributed either. Of the friends I've known that have had potentially life threatening climbing injuries (fortunately nobody's died yet), they were either doing "expedition" level stuff or were simply stupid (free soloing). There are of course exceptions. Pay attention to what you're doing and don't be an idiot and 95% of climbing injuries will pass you by.

Re: Please don't let gaming consume your life

#60

Post by swah »

dekz wrote: post #40
boredguy8 wrote: post #8

There are more subtle ways of gaming ruining your life, as well: slowly losing the drive to do anything more than what's necessary to pay the cable bill, rent, and the gaming subscription. Slowly the only friends you have are people you know from your guild. When the only source & output of creativity and energy are all wrapped up in playing a video game. I've also seen people similarly consumed by pornography, alcoh…

How does this compare with what can be considered a 'gym' addiction. Is it ok when it is exercise? What is too much? What about work, startups? I rock climb at least 6 hours a week, it's not bizarre to hear someone dying from rock climbing though.

I thought exercising 1 hour per day was the general recommendation.
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