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

We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

lostbookofsales.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 161 posts

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#131

Post by Balgair »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #7

It is interesting how manufactured distraction-free sessions like yoga, meditation, paid retreats, have emerged to fill the demand for idle time. We’re forgetting how to unplug unless it’s a product or service that we can buy. The distraction issue is the number one issue holding back most of the young people in the mentorship group I’m part of. They’re so glued to their phones to check minute-by-minute updates about…

One (hopelessly futile) tactic may be focusing on the ROI of various reading material. Internet comments take ~5 minutes to write, 30s to read (6x ROI). Blog posts are ~4 hours to write, 10m to read (24x). Magazine articles are ~3 months to write, 30m to read (960x). Books are ~5 years to write, 8h to read (1300x). Obviously, reading books is one of the best sources of reading. But it also works with video and audio material. Movies are better than YT vlogs which are better than ticktocks. Albums are better than singles which are better than soundcloud covers. I know that teenagers are never going to listen to this advice (I sure wouldn't have), but there is that fleeting chance!

(Also, the ROI stuff is a rough guide, read/view/listen to whatever you'd like, I'm not your dad!)

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#132

Post by spookthesunset »

p0d wrote: post #112
warent wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bitcoin is especially distracting right now, as they’re all nervously watching the real-time changes of their $1000 portfolios to see if they need to be sad about losing money because it’s crashing or sad about not investing more money because it’s going up. Great way to articulate this! This very experience is relatable although in my case with normal stocks, and something very interesting happened. I sold some st…

I sold my $1000 in bitcoin as it was proving a distraction. I was constantly checking it's value. I also came to the conclusion I don't believe in bitcoin. I was just hoping to make money which doesn't resonate with my values. I am good for money. I am thinking of turning my attention to micro loans to get my mind off the topic of myself. It took a long walk to break the bitcoin distraction and start to see sense. I…

Stuff like that is exactly why I just invest in boring market-wife index funds.

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#133

Post by agumonkey »

hedberg10 wrote: post #92
warent wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bitcoin is especially distracting right now, as they’re all nervously watching the real-time changes of their $1000 portfolios to see if they need to be sad about losing money because it’s crashing or sad about not investing more money because it’s going up. Great way to articulate this! This very experience is relatable although in my case with normal stocks, and something very interesting happened. I sold some st…

Notice how your mood changed by just thinking differently. This can be done with anything. Its not the event(e) that makes us feel, its the callback(us).

Yeah one can go full panic attack over the wrong interpretation. This alleged reality vanishes as fast as it came, although the potential mistakes it triggered can last long.

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#134

Post by agumonkey »

dilawar wrote: post #95
ta988 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mind sharing that one?

I think he meant this one. Grerk also had something similar but can't locate the reference. https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com//mobile/view/1...

Very nice, do you know where to read about maya ? (fun fact Alias Maya was one of my favorite software ever, yet it's the first time I get interested in the philosophical concept behind the name thanks to you)

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#135

Post by callamdelaney »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #7

It is interesting how manufactured distraction-free sessions like yoga, meditation, paid retreats, have emerged to fill the demand for idle time. We’re forgetting how to unplug unless it’s a product or service that we can buy. The distraction issue is the number one issue holding back most of the young people in the mentorship group I’m part of. They’re so glued to their phones to check minute-by-minute updates about…

There is a lot of talk about investments / trading on this thread so I thought I'd drop some of my thoughts and experiences here.

1) You can be right and still lose significant amounts of money. I've lost many thousands myself on something that I was eventually right about, timing is key - and it doesn't do to dwell on any decision - whether because you lost or could have made more. Sure, if I'd just invested my pocket money in bitcoin when I first mined it in 2012 I'd be retired already - but I didn't - shit happens.

2) If you are attaching emotion to your positions you're doing it wrong. This is a huge point, not one I've personally mastered - which is why I don't play with stocks anymore.

3) The whole cycle of emotions surrounding markets is explained brilliantly by George Soros in 'The Alchemy of Finance'. This is an excellent read. It's interesting and illuminating that Soros was a student of Philosophy and not strictly mathematics or business.

In my own experience there are two layers to markets - what actually is and what people think is or will be; usually the latter is much more powerful in terms of short term positions. One of Soros's points is that the two interact and influence the other eventually.

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#136

Post by atleta »

I keep remembering that episode from The Outer Limits (the 90s series). I think the title was "The stream". It was set in the future, where everybody had an implant that they could use to access 'the stream' to get access to all the world's knowledge and information. (I.e. the internet, but back then even dialup internet was an uncommon thing for most people to have.)

The story was that there was a single guy who could not have the implant and he was, of course, and outcast. And then there was a virus that started to spread through the stream and people started to show strange symptoms. Well, maybe not that strange: they started to consume more and more information. First the infected just started to look up and quote seemingly irrelevant pieces of information. You know, like the things you'd see on Quora (or during a random trip to Wikipedia) and then they would spend more and more time fetching more knowledge and have more and more information hunger.

I'd say it's not unlike what we see around ourselves the past few years.

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#137

Post by coffeefirst »

saiya-jin wrote: post #111
coffeefirst wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The food analogy is really good. Like food, hyper-distraction affects different people differently, I've watched really bad habits affect real peoples lives in bad ways, and many people who grow up in a culture where that's normal may never break those habits. Also like food, I'm spending way more time in front of screens in order to cope with the pandemic. Is it okay? Eh, not really, but I think it's okay to accept…

> it's okay to accept the necessity of overindulgence given the circumstances Yes and no. To be honest I am not very happy with all the articles/folks advocating that people should en masse self-medicate during covid with gaming/hours on internet. Its like unless you sit in front of computer/phone there is literally nothing to do at home, just slowly go crazy. I wish governments did recognize this since early pandemi…

Yeah, I've thought about that, but at least for the people I know personally, they're all bored to death with these stopgap habits and the second it's safe to hang them up and go back to parties, music, and weddings, it's going to be a second roaring 20's.

(But agreed on the "don't take a walk" style lockdowns. And I'm honestly surprised the backlash to them isn't stronger.)

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#138

Post by mybrid »

What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it. --Herbert Simon, economist

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#139

Post by hikarudo »

dilawar wrote: post #95
ta988 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mind sharing that one?

I think he meant this one. Grerk also had something similar but can't locate the reference. https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com//mobile/view/1...

I like how this story is told in Buddhist contexts:

http://www.1netcentral.com/articles/the-snake-rope-essential...

Re: We live in an age of distractions, dealing with constant mental stimulus

#140

Post by iamsanteri »

nicbou wrote: post #130
iamsanteri wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi Pascalo, I have exactly the same feeling when going on a bike tour. We just did a 5-day, 250km bike ride along the Danube river here in south-Germany and it was one of the most incredible experiences I've had. On the saddle I feel free and my mind is resting. High-five!!

I've done the same route, with the same results! When you get to your stop, you're usually too tired to check your social media.

Now how awesome is that, a fellow human riding the ”donauradweg” here on Hacker News. Love it.
Post reply on HN