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Study finds memory decline surge in young people

onepercentrule.substack.com

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Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#181

Post by lrvick »

dpark wrote: post #155
lrvick wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an active social life, spent years as a sysadmin, co-run two tech companies, have a family, all without a phone. This is not some crazy sci-fi lifestyle experiment I am running for the first time. I just live mostly like all industrialized humans did before 2009.

This is still not an answer to the comment chain. The real answer is “if you want to live this way, you give up a bunch of conveniences and have to deal with it.” It’s less convenient with schools, with childcare, with work, and everything else that assumes always online. > No one gets to decide your lifestyle but you. Make them adapt. Make them adapt is some nonsense. You’ve made multiple comments that through sheer…

Everything I "give up" gives me so much more back.

Now on the outside looking in, it feels like everyone criticizing me for not letting robots lift weights for me at the gym, because everyone else does it that way. I choose what to think about most of the time instead of letting a pocket rectangle decide for me. Plenty of evidence suggests this is good for our brains. Everyone else seems as absurd to me as I probably seem to them. If anything I feel like I am having to constantly accommodate phone addicts that have incredibly short attention spans.

Few in my social or professional life can keep up with my productivity, which I largely attribute to having the ability to focus and think without distraction for hours at a time which most people struggle to do these days without reaching for a phone. I can never even get through a meal with most friends without them checking social media several times.

With more than a few world firsts in engineering under my belt in the years since I gave up my phone, people tend to accept my "unusual" lifestyle choice of not being reachable every second of every day.

Not everyone aligns, and that is fine, just as not every restaurant provides vegan options.

Sometimes I have to go to a different restaurant that has paper menus and accepts cash, or a different clinic because I lack a Google or Apple account, but their loss of business and not a big deal for me given all the major privacy and productivity gains I get.

There are -always- alternatives and I have never been unable to accomplish a goal or do something I wanted to do because of not having a smartphone.

By all means give me a gotcha. I have heard them all and navigated around them without too much trouble.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#182

Post by lrvick »

dpark wrote: post #153
lrvick wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Smoking is dropping like a brick as a result of science, education, and social pressure. Just takes a while.

I was perhaps ambiguous. I am not saying societal change is not possible. I’m saying you, personally, will not change your local community as you imagine by simply telling other parents no. Nowhere in your comment is there any indication you are running some sort of community initiative or anything else that might lead to actual change. Campaigning for a spot on the school board to advocate for banning cell phones in…

> Telling parents who ask about FaceTime between friends that tablets are evil seems as effective as telling random smokers on the street that it’s going to kill them.

I would just simply say it is against our lifestyle and suggest alternatives just as a vegan family might suggest alternatives to a BBQ birthday party.

Facetime is not going to happen as my kids will never be be allowed Google or Apple accounts or smartphones, so friends parents will need to explore those alternatives if their kid wants to talk to my kid.

That is how change happens. One social graph node at a time.

Also I did in fact found a security, privacy, and digital sovereignty advocacy community called #! which has been operating for more than 20 years now, and has mentored hundreds of people looking to make healthier technology choices.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#183

Post by lrvick »

crims0n wrote: post #75
lrvick wrote: post #64

Since giving up my cell phone entirely over 5 years ago, my productivity, memory, and overall happiness are at the highest levels they have ever been, in my late 30s. I no longer apologize to anyone for this lifestyle choice anymore since the benefits are something everyone deserves, but almost all opt out of today for made up reasons. I take photos with a pocket mirrorless, and take notes with a notebook. I tell tim…

I love the sentiment, but some of us need to be reachable for work. I wonder if PagerDuty could be rigged up to work with actual pagers?

I co-run two tech companies and am reachable during office hours which are mostly spent at my desk, and when I am not working I am not reachable by work, and I trust my team.

If you modify your preferred lifestyle in any way for work during personal time, you are still working.

If a company wants you to be reachable 24/7 then they need to give you a pager and a salary based on a 168 hour work week, not a 40 hour work week.

Just because everyone else lets themselves be exploited does not mean you need to. Make the ~40 hours count and work circles around everyone else, then disconnect.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#184

Post by jazzcomputer »

tonis2 wrote: post #5

Its the low quality food, my memory improved a lot, after I stopped eating sugar and most refined foods. Theres even some research that Alzheimer starts from bad bacteria in the gut, that loves sugar.

As someone who has eaten way too much sugary food I think my gut-brain coupling may have had enough of this. A few weeks ago I had a sugar binge one night and the cognitive effects were impossible to ignore the next day. Fortunately after 2-3 days I was back to normal but of my sample size of one, and in my condition (which is pre-diabetic) I observed a clear link.

It was a good experience as it's prompted me to get more serious about cutting back sugar, implemented as long term, achievable habit change.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#185

Post by binary132 »

walterbell wrote: post #136
Infinitesimus wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean this turn of speech makes it easier to identify hunan (carbon) or machine (silicon) content. Took me a bit to figure it out too

Thanks, human :)

Uh oh. Did I just get filtered?! Don’t put me in the recycling vats!

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#186

Post by krackers »

boxerab wrote: post #122
marifjeren wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that differentially affect young people?

That is a good point. Injection rates were higher with older population. I would say that younger immune systems are more robust, potentially leading to exaggerated inflammatory responses to spike protein, which could heighten neuro-inflammation and cognitive impacts.

Possibly same reason why youngest people had highest rates of myocarditis

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#187

Post by dpark »

lrvick wrote: post #182
dpark wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was perhaps ambiguous. I am not saying societal change is not possible. I’m saying you, personally, will not change your local community as you imagine by simply telling other parents no. Nowhere in your comment is there any indication you are running some sort of community initiative or anything else that might lead to actual change. Campaigning for a spot on the school board to advocate for banning cell phones in…

> Telling parents who ask about FaceTime between friends that tablets are evil seems as effective as telling random smokers on the street that it’s going to kill them. I would just simply say it is against our lifestyle and suggest alternatives just as a vegan family might suggest alternatives to a BBQ birthday party. Facetime is not going to happen as my kids will never be be allowed Google or Apple accounts or smar…

You should of course do what you feel is best for your children.

> Also I did in fact found a security, privacy, and digital sovereignty advocacy community called #! which has been operating for more than 20 years now, and has mentored hundreds of people looking to make healthier technology choices.

That’s awesome. I think we do need better choices (not just abstinence from the tech).

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#188

Post by d_tr »

lrvick wrote: post #64

Since giving up my cell phone entirely over 5 years ago, my productivity, memory, and overall happiness are at the highest levels they have ever been, in my late 30s. I no longer apologize to anyone for this lifestyle choice anymore since the benefits are something everyone deserves, but almost all opt out of today for made up reasons. I take photos with a pocket mirrorless, and take notes with a notebook. I tell tim…

Get a flip phone. Being reachable and able to reach is good, and you'll still get all the other benefits.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#189

Post by kibwen »

doublerebel wrote: post #171
Thorrez wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about using your phone for navigation?

It’s easy to save map regions that work offline. GPS is passive and doesn’t need an internet connection to function.

Yes, it's worth noting that your GPS is still active even in airplane mode.

Re: Study finds memory decline surge in young people

#190

Post by testing22321 »

dpark wrote: post #155
lrvick wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an active social life, spent years as a sysadmin, co-run two tech companies, have a family, all without a phone. This is not some crazy sci-fi lifestyle experiment I am running for the first time. I just live mostly like all industrialized humans did before 2009.

This is still not an answer to the comment chain. The real answer is “if you want to live this way, you give up a bunch of conveniences and have to deal with it.” It’s less convenient with schools, with childcare, with work, and everything else that assumes always online. > No one gets to decide your lifestyle but you. Make them adapt. Make them adapt is some nonsense. You’ve made multiple comments that through sheer…

For context I also have no phone.

> The real answer is “if you want to live this way, you give up a bunch of conveniences and have to deal with it.” It’s less convenient with schools, with childcare, with work, and everything else that assumes always online

Without a doubt, there are times where having a phone would be more convenient.

But I don’t want a more convenient life. I want a richer, happier, more rewarding and more fulfilling life. A phone won’t get me those things, and based on how often people tell me they wish they could throw away their phone and how much happier they’d be without it, I’m pretty sure a phone would make my life worse.

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